Chuck Grassley

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today I rise to acknowledge women in Iowa who are taking a stand against heart disease and stroke. Many people assume that cardiovascular disease is a man's disease. The truth is, it has claimed more lives of women since 1984. Nationwide, 8 million women are living with heart disease. Thirteen percent of women age 45 and over have had a heart attack. As a survivor of breast cancer, my wife Barbara knows the fears of many women. Heart disease, just like cancer, is scary and real. It is up to women around the world to educate their friends, mothers, and sisters about the disease. Women in Iowa are doing it this week. I commend every woman in Iowa for being an advocate for a very good cause. The campaign to educate all women about the major risk factors of heart disease and about heart-healthy behavior will positively impact the lives of many families. Women in Iowa should not underestimate their personal risk, and they should know what they can do to beat the disease. In Congress, I have worked to increase funding for the National Institutes of Health. The NIH is one of the world's foremost medical research centers, and the Federal focal point for medical research in the United States. I am keenly aware of the overall benefits of biomedical research to the health care system, and to those with heart disease. In fact, the NIH has set out to develop a national public awareness and outreach campaign to convey the message that heart disease is the number one killer of American women and that it can be successfully prevented and treated. Six years ago, we set out to double the funding for the NIH. We followed through with our promise. As a result, the NIH now funds nearly 10,000 more research grants and can support the training of over 1,500 more scientists each year. This is good news for women everywhere. The increase in funding is a step in the right direction, but we can't give up. It will take all of us to stop the leading cause of death in our state.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I urge adoption of the Levin-Coleman modified amendment.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I ask the Senator from South Carolina be recognized.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I promised the Senator from South Carolina we would have a little colloquy on an issue he was concerned about. Could we do that right now?

Mr. GRASSLEY. I am happy to confirm the understanding of the distinguished Senator from Louisiana. The provision was adopted to provide needed clarifications in order to eliminate the uncertainties that have arisen regarding the proper application of the income forecast method. I believe the disputes that have arisen regarding the mechanics of the income forecast formula are extremely unproductive and an inefficient use of both taxpayer and limited tax administration resources. By adopting these clarifications, I believe the committee intended to end any disputes and prevent any further waste of both taxpayer and Government resources in resolving these disputes. Any existing disputes should be resolved expeditiously in a manner consistent with the clarifications included in the bill.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I move to lay the motions on the table en bloc. The motions to lay on the table en bloc were agreed to.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I ask unanimous consent Senators Hatch and Pryor be added as cosponsors to the Hutchison amendment.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Yes.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I can comment very positively about the motivation behind the amendment, and the good policy of giving equity to people who are called away from jobs and away from family to go to a far-off land to defend America in a war against terrorism and doing it in a way that has never been done for guardsmen and reservists to this extent, I think going back to the Korean war. What we are doing now has not been done for a long period of time. The Senator from Louisiana needs to be complimented on her efforts to recognize that and, particularly, to recognize that through employers who show very patriotic fervor in cooperating in this whole program. I can say that very positively about the amendment of the Senator from Louisiana. She is asking me to predict what might happen in conference. It is very difficult to do that. I have a reputation for defending the position of the Senate and working as best I can to work through this. Obviously, I cannot make any promises to the Senator from Louisiana.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Texas, Mrs. Hutchison, have 2 minutes for an amendment that she wants to offer.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senators from Pennsylvania, the senior and the junior Senators, have 5 minutes apiece to discuss something very personal to their State.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following the disposition of the Hollings amendment, the next amendments to be offered are the following in the order provided: Senator Kyl, No. 3127, 60 minutes equally divided; Senator Landrieu, 60 minutes equally divided; Senator Levin, 20 minutes equally divided; further, that there be no second-degree amendments in order to the amendments prior to the vote.

Mr. GRASSLEY. The Senator is correct. It is my intent to urge my colleagues to minimize this penalty in the final bill that is sent to the President for his signature. income forecast method provision

Mr. GRASSLEY. I do appreciate the importance of this issue. If we do not see substantial progress toward adoption of a market-based currency valuation system, I would support Senate hearings at the appropriate time.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I would like to thank the Senator from Pennsylvania for his commitment to the Section 29 extension to new coke facilities. Although I am supportive of the provision, the most appropriate time to address it is during the conference. I look forward to working with Senator Santorum and the two Senators from Ohio to include this amendment in the conference report. privacy

Mr. GRASSLEY. I would be pleased to engage in a colloquy with the Senator from Oregon.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, now that this bill has finally passed the Senate, I take the opportunity to thank several people. First and foremost, I thank Senator Baucus. I am very certain we would not be here without his good work and his cooperation. In fact, as I have said so many times in speeches, this whole effort started when Senator Baucus was chairman of the committee in the last Congress. He held hearings and started this process going. He has not only cooperated and put in good work during this Congress, but it all started under his leadership. I also need to thank all the other members of the Finance Committee for their time and energy in making this bill a reality. I thank my staff on the Finance Committee: Mark Prater, chief tax counsel, and the other tax counsels, Ed McClellan, Elizabeth Paris, Dean Zerbe, Christy Mistr, and John O'Neill as well as John's predecessor, Diann Howland. These individuals, along with Adam Freed, the staff assistant for the tax team, have been real workhorses for the committee, keeping the lights burning long into the night to make this bill possible. For the record, as evidence of the work effort, this bill was introduced on the day Hurricane Isabel blew into town. Because of hard work, the markup of the bill occurred in a calm environment. I also thank the trade staff, particularly Everett Eissenstat, chief Trade Counsel, and his team of David Johanson, Stephen Schaefer, Daniel Shepherdson, and Zach Paulsen. I also thank Carrie Clark who recently left our trade staff. Thanks also needs to be paid to our administrative staff, including Carla Martin, Amber Williams, Geoff Burrell, and Mark Blair. From my personal staff, I thank Sherry Kuntz and Leah Shimp. Also helpful were our Finance Committee press team of Jill Kozeny and Jill Gerber, known around the committee as the ``Jills.'' Lastly, on my side, I thank Kolan Davis and Ted Totman, the Committee's staff director and deputy staff director for riding herd on all this work. In addition, this bipartisan bill would not have been possible without close work and cooperation at the staff level. I appreciate and thank the minority staff for their good work. I particularly note Russ Sullivan, Democratic Staff Director, as well as Pat Heck, Democratic Chief Tax Counsel, Matt Stokes, Matt Jones, Matt Genasci, Judy Miller, Jon Selib, Liz Leibschutz, Matt Stanton, Dawn Levy, and Anita Horn Rizek. In addition, I thank Tim Punke and his trade team, along with John Angell, Bill Dauster, and Mike Evans, former Deputy Staff Director, for their time and energy. I extend my thanks also to George Yin and his staff at the Joint Committee on Taxation for providing their extensive knowledge and guidance to this effort. I particularly point out the good work of Ray Beeman, David Noren, and Brian Meighan. Brian recently left Joint Tax for the private sector. I also thank Acting Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy, Gregory Jenner, and his staff for their assistance on the so-called SILOs tax shelter provision of this bill. I thank the majority leader, Senator Bill Frist, and his leadership staff for all their assistance. The majority leader backed me and Senator Baucus all the way on this bill. We would not have the result today but for the majority leader's patience, determination, and dedication. It was tough going at times, but he and I knew we would get the right result. From Senator Frist's staff, I thank Lee Rawls, Eric Ueland, Rohit Kumar, and Libby Jarvis. I also thank our Senate leadership team and their staffs, especially our able whip, Senator McConnell. Finally, my thanks go to Jim Fransen, Mark Mathiesen, Mark McGunagle, and their capable staff at Legislative Counsel for taking our ideas and drafting them into statutory language. I would like to tell them all to go home and get a good night's rest because the bill has been a very long time working its way through the Senate. Now, I urge our friends in the other body to pass a companion bill. Hopefully, when that bill passes the House, our friends in the Senate Democratic leadership will not resist our efforts to go to conference. Every month of delay is another month where the Euro tax ratchets up another percentage point on our products going to Europe. I thank everyone for their cooperation in allowing us to get to this point this evening. This, of course, is not the final step in the process. The House has not passed their version of the FSC legislation. I anticipate the House will send a bill to the Senate at some point. When that happens, I hope we will be able to proceed to conference so that we are able to get a final product. I appreciate the assistance of Senator Baucus throughout this process and hope we will be able to send a bill to committee. Order Of Procedure Mr. President, following Senator Baucus's remarks, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, Senator McCain has filed a motion to strike all of the Energy tax provisions from the JOBS bill. Senator McCain has a right to his opinion, but I overwhelmingly disagree with his opinion and I urge all of my fellow Senators to vote ``No'' on this amendment. In order to secure our country's economic and national security, we need to have a balanced energy plan that protects the environment, supports the needs of our growing economy, and reduces our dependence on foreign sources of energy. Every man, woman and child in the United States is a stakeholder when it comes to developing a responsible, balanced, stable, long-term energy policy. The events of September 11 have made very clear to Americans how important it is to enhance our energy independence. We can no longer afford to allow our dangerous reliance on foreign sources of oil to continue. But ``wait'' we do, and we do it well. It has been over 10 years since we have passed energy legislation. And if we wait until we get that ``perfect'' bill, the wait will be forever. Today, we have the opportunity to correct that because we have added all of the Energy Tax provisions to this JOBS bill. Our energy tax provisions obviously are not perfect. And to those who complain about various provisions, I say, so what do we do? Do nothing? Wait for the ``perfect'' bill? These provisions may not be perfect but let me tell you what we do have. We have energy tax provisions that were crafted from inception in a bipartisan manner. From the beginning, both Democrat and Republican staffs from both Finance and Energy Committees worked side by side to craft a fair and balanced energy tax package. I may not personally believe in every one of these provisions, but the process has worked to craft an energy tax package that is good for all 50 States and all forms of energy production, both renewables and traditional oil and gas and conservation and energy efficiency. Some of the amendments pending on this bill suggest the energy tax provisions will pick winners and losers. Is that true? Am I OK with that? The answer is a definite ``yes.'' Remember, the winners we pick in this bill are all Americans, all of whom have a stake in reducing our dependence upon foreign energy. We do this by favoring domestic producers over foreign producers. It is well past time to get serious about implementing energy efficiency and conservation efforts, investing in alternative, renewable fuels and improving domestic production of traditional resources. As you know, Mr. President, I support a comprehensive energy policy consisting of conservation efforts, development of renewable and alternative energy resources, and domestic production of traditional sources of energy. And we will have an opportunity under Senator Domenici's leadership to address the energy policy issues at a later date, but for now we will only be considering the energy tax provisions. As my colleagues well know, I have long been a supporter of alternative and renewable sources of energy as a way of protecting our environment and increasing our energy independence. I strongly support the production of renewable domestic fuels, particularly ethanol and biodiesel. As domestic, renewable sources of energy, ethanol and biodiesel can increase fuel supplies, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and increase our national and economic security. As Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, I continue to work closely with the ranking member, Senator Baucus, to defend an energy tax title that strikes a good balance between conventional energy sources, alternative and renewable energy, and conservation. Among others, it includes provisions for the development of renewable sources of energy such as wind and biomass, incentives for energy efficient appliances and homes, and incentives for the production of non-conventional sources of traditional oil and gas. I believe the energy tax provisions included in the JOBS bill does a good job to address our Nation's energy security in a balanced and comprehensive way. I am also pleased that with the JOBS bill we have finally gotten to a point to address this important issue that has such a direct impact on our national and economic security. For the sake of our children and our grandchildren, we must implement conservation efforts, invest in alternative and renewable energy, and improve development and production of domestic oil and natural gas resources. And we need all of the energy tax provisions to be included in the JOBS bill. I urge you to vote ``no'' on Senator McCain's effort.