Judd Gregg

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. GREGG. I understand now we go to Senator Nelson's amendment. I understand he needs about 10 minutes. I would suggest that Senator Nelson have until 5 of 8. We are going to wrap up at 8. And then I have the 5 minutes from 7:55 to 8 o'clock to respond to the amendment.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, first, I appreciate the Senator from Florida being concise in presenting this amendment. I thank him for that and for sticking with the time as was represented. It was appropriate and generous of him. The amendment, obviously, has an impact on the deficit. It would expand it. As a practical matter, it really has to be put in the context of the overall Medicare adjustments in this bill and in other bills because under the new drug program, seniors will actually see a significant discount. They will save about $5 on their prescription drugs over what was expected. The Part B premium increase which will occur as a result of this bill will be $1.60. It seems more than reasonable to have structured an agreement where we will essentially allow patients to see doctors because we will be giving them the opportunity to see doctors because the doctors will actually participate in the system, whereas they might well opt out if we cut their pay by 4.3 percent. Under this bill, of course, we avoid that because the Finance Committee has put together a package which allows us to basically hold doctors harmless. It is reasonable that seniors--we are not talking about low-income seniors here because their entire Part B premium is picked up by the Government. We are talking about middle and high income. Not to pick anybody specific, but Bill Gates's father, who is probably doing very well, or my mother, for example, has a right to the Part B premium and, therefore, is subsidized by working Americans, people who are in day-to-day jobs, to the tune of 75 percent. It is reasonable that we ask seniors to participate in the Part B premium, as they get the benefit of it, to the extent of 25 percent. This bill simply continues that process while making sure seniors will have access to doctors by basically supporting the initiatives of holding doctors harmless from a pay cut. The underlying bill has some very positive spending initiatives, and one of them happens to be giving more access to more patients who are under Medicare. So I believe we should be supporting this amendment rather than offering amendments which will essentially undermine this effort.

Mr. GREGG. I appreciate that the Senator will not yield. I was going to ask the Senator for a copy of the amendment. Out of courtesy from this side of the aisle, I decided to let her go forward. I appreciate she won't yield to us to find out what her amendment is about. Mrs. LINCOLN addressed the Chair.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask for the floor.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, at this point I yield time from our side to the chairman of the Committee of Finance. Mrs. LINCOLN addressed the Chair.

Mr. GREGG. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, at this time I think we can reach unanimous consent on what at least the next three amendments will be. I ask unanimous consent that the next three people to be recognized for amendments will be Senator Lincoln, Senator Inhofe, and Senator Nelson. The next amendment after Senator Nelson we expect to be offered by Senator Lott. The other side has not had a chance to review that amendment yet, so we reserve on Senator Lott. I further ask unanimous consent that tomorrow morning we will begin with an amendment from Senator Cantwell, followed by an amendment by Senator Grassley.

Mr. GREGG. I yield the floor.

Mr. GREGG. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, we actually now return to the deficit reduction bill, which some of my colleagues may have forgotten. But just to remind them, this bill saves $39 billion off the deficit, and is the first major attempt in 8 years to try to accomplish savings through the process of reducing the rate of growth of our entitlement accounts. In that context, we have a number of amendments, and we are glad Members have been coming forward with them. We cannot formally agree right now on what the sequence will be, but to outline what we think the sequence will be, it will be Senator Lincoln going now--we can be sure of that--followed by Senator Inhofe, followed by Senator Nelson, followed by Senator Lott this evening. And tomorrow morning, the first two amendments will be Senator Cantwell, dealing with ANWR, and then an amendment by Senator Grassley, dealing with agriculture programs. That is the game plan. Now, the understanding is that at 8 o'clock tonight we will complete our business today relative to the Deficit Reduction Act, and we will reconvene tomorrow, I believe, at 9 o'clock. Or is it 8:30? I am not sure. In any event, we will formalize that understanding in a few minutes, hopefully, after both sides have had a chance to review those amendments which I outlined. I now yield to the Senator from North Dakota to yield such time as he may.

Mr. GREGG. We are giving your side 12 minutes, and I am getting 5 minutes. It does not sound to me that you are getting frozen out.

Mr. GREGG. I don't think the agreement reflected two amendments; it reflected one amendment. Let us take a look at it while the amendment of Senator Inhofe is going forward and see if we can work it out.

Mr. GREGG. We will have a response, I presume. That is another 20 minutes.

Mr. GREGG. I ask unanimous consent that be the order of business.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, under the unanimous consent agreement, the understanding was that we move on to the Inhofe amendment and to the Nelson amendment. And although it wasn't agreed to, I believe it can now be agreed to that the amendment in order after the Nelson amendment will be the Lott amendment, except if we end up going into tomorrow, the first two amendments will be Senator Cantwell's amendment followed by Senator Grassley's amendment. If Senator Lott's amendment or Senator Nelson's amendment do not come up tonight, we follow those two amendments. Is that correct?

Mr. GREGG. I will yield to the Senator from Mississippi such time as he may use off the amendment.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at a time to be determined by the majority leader, in consultation with the Democratic leader, the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of the conference report to accompany H.R. 2744, the Agriculture appropriations bill. I further ask unanimous consent that there be 2 hours of debate equally divided between the majority and minority and that upon the use or yielding back of time, the Senate proceed to vote on the adoption of the conference report, all without intervening action or debate.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask that the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order, following the remarks of the Senator from Florida and the Senator from Oregon.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. I believe my unanimous consent request was for 20 minutes for the Senator from Oregon, and I will add to that that the Senator from Florida be given 2 minutes.

Mr. GREGG. I ask unanimous consent that there be a period for morning business with Senators permitted to speak up to 10 minutes each, with Senator Wyden permitted to speak up to 20 minutes.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, November 2. I further ask that following the prayer and the pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved, and the Senate resume consideration of S. 1932, as under the previous order.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, it is my understanding that at this point the Senator from North Dakota is yielding time to the Senator from Maryland, and it will be taken from the time of the Senator from North Dakota. After the Senator from Maryland makes his statement, I will reclaim the floor.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Tomorrow, the Senate will continue its work on the deficit reduction bill, and under the time agreement, all time will expire at 6 p.m. tomorrow evening. I remind my colleagues to work with the bill managers if they plan to offer amendments. We will complete this bill this week. We will work through Thursday and Friday, if necessary, to finish this important measure. I encourage Senators to be judicious in offering amendments so that we can avoid a multiday vote-arama that will spill into Friday's session. I remind Senators that we will need to dispose of the Agriculture appropriations conference report this week as well, and we will be slotting in debate time for that probably tomorrow evening.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Foreign Relations Committee be discharged from further consideration of S. Con. Res. 56 and that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.