Tom Harkin

Mr. HARKIN

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I have an amendment at the desk.

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

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, that was simply the House bill that came over and was at the desk. On behalf of Senator Chambliss, myself, and others, I offer the substitute amendment as the Senate-passed bill. That is what is now pending at the desk. Today begins the deliberation and amendments on the 2007 Food and Energy Security Act, otherwise known as the farm bill. I intend to take some time to lay out basically the farm bill and the different titles, some of the things we did in committee, approaches that were done in the past, and what we are looking at in this farm bill. So I will take some time this afternoon to do that. As I understand it, under the previous order, there will be no amendments in order today.

Mr. HARKIN. It will be opening statements on the bill itself, and we will proceed to amendments tomorrow at whatever time the Senate convenes. Mr. President, on behalf of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, I am pleased to bring to the floor the Food and Energy Security Act of 2007, which enjoys broad bipartisan support among all our committee members. In fact, we reported it out by voice vote without a negative vote among the Senators who were present. We had a quorum present. I thank our ranking member, the senior Senator from Georgia, Saxby Chambliss, for his leadership and partnership in producing the bill, along with the chairman and ranking member of the Finance Committee, Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley, as well as chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Conrad. We generally refer to this legislation as the farm bill. But that title doesn't do justice to the range and scope of the bill. Yes, the bill helps farmers and ranchers who produce an abundance of food and fiber and are contributing ever more to our Nation's energy security. The bill also helps conserve and protect the environment on tens of millions of acres of farmland, ranchland, and wetlands. It is the most important legislation to allow millions of low-income American families put food on the table. It is the single most important legislation for boosting economic growth in jobs and improving the quality of life in rural communities across our Nation. We have faced a huge challenge in writing this legislation this year. When we wrote the last farm bill in 2002, we had about $73 billion of new money over 10 years to invest. But for this bill, this year, we barely had any funding above baseline. Fortunately, we have had some help from the Finance Committee in obtaining additional funds. We have also reexamined all of the spending in our baseline to come up with budget offsets. We have combined these funds and produced what I believe is a forward-looking bill to make historic investments in energy, conservation, nutrition, rural development, and promoting better diets and health for all Americans. It also maintains a strong safety net for America's farm producers. The bill looks to the future and creates new opportunities in agriculture and rural communities. Yet I emphasize that this bill complies with the strict pay-as-you-go budget rules we adopted earlier this year. This legislation continues a strong system of farm income protection. It is a truism that we have heard many times but ``no farms, no food.'' Our Nation needs programs that will help farm and ranch families survive the inevitable downturns in markets, disasters, and crop failures. We need these programs so that the cycles of markets and weather do not force out of agriculture people who are so vital to grow food, fiber and, increasingly, energy for our Nation. You will notice I referred to cycles in agriculture. That is why I have long been a strong supporter of what is commonly called countercyclical income protection programs for our farmers and ranchers. That is a type of program that pays adequately when farm income falls. Yet it is careful with taxpayers' dollars when farm income is good. Because a countercyclical program is good common sense, I have never been a fan of direct or, as they came to be known in the mid-1990s, freedom-to-farm payments that were enacted in the 1996 farm bill. Since the freedom-to-farm payments or the direct payments are not countercyclical, what we have found is that they help too little when times are bad for farmers, but they are very hard to justify--direct payments to farmers--when we may be having record prices and high incomes. How can you justify giving sort of ``free money'' when times are good? So, in my view, a very positive feature of the bill is that we continue the countercyclical income protection system we reinstated in the 2002 bill. We allow farmers at their option to choose a new program, called ``average crop revenue,'' modeled after legislation introduced by Senators Durbin and Brown. This new choice for farmers will make farm income protection stronger and more flexible. It will allow farmers better to manage their farm's risk in today's uncertain and evolving farm economy. Our legislation also includes other improvements in countercyclical income protection. It is reinstituting a higher payment rate in the Milk Income Loss Contract program, or the MILC program, and adjusting certain target prices and loans. I will explain why I stress the countercyclical elements in this legislation. The farm programs are supposed to be about income protection, helping farm and ranch families survive cycles of hard times--the ravages of wind and weather, pestilence--and to stay in business. The farm programs are not supposed to be just about USDA commodity program payments and trying to maximize those payments regardless of income. Now, it is true that for over 70 years Federal price and income supports have been the dominant feature of U.S. food and agriculture policy. Yet it is a mistake to suggest that farm program payments are somehow the most important contributor to the past success of American agriculture or to its success in the future. A lot of times, people say these farm programs in the past have been a great success. Look what they have done to help us become the leader in the world in terms of agricultural production. Well, they have been helpful but not the most important. The most vital elements in the success of American agriculture has been the skill, the dedication, and the hard work of the men and women and families on farms and ranches across the Nation, and also all of the people who develop and supply technology and other production requirements, such as all the new hybrids that have come in in the last 30 to 40 years that increased production exponentially; and, of course, the highly productive land and climate with which our Nation has been so blessed. Thanks to those factors, agricultural productivity--get this--rose some 116 percent from 1960 to 2004, while in other U.S. industries it rose 13 percent. So there has been a 116-percent increase in productivity of agriculture and only 13 percent in the rest of the American economy. So while this legislation we have today is vitally important, let us not forget the true sources of America's agricultural strength and abundance. For those reasons, I strongly believe that, in addition to a solid countercyclical farm income protection system, we must also make investments to help U.S. agriculture succeed in the future, as I will explain in a moment. One area in the bill where we are reaching out to help agricultural producers is in initiatives for growers of what we call specialty crops--fruits, vegetables, tree nuts, other horticultural or floricultural crops. Past farm bills focused heavily on a few crops that have come to be known as storable commodities, most notably cotton, rice, corn, soybeans, and wheat, which are, of course, vitally important. However, according to USDA, specialty crops now account for roughly 50 percent of the total value of U.S. crop production. In this bill before us, we include a dramatic increase in our assistance to specialty crop producers but not in the form of subsidies or payments. They have not asked for those. This legislation will help our Nation's specialty crop growers address the very diverse challenges they face in today's complex and global marketplace. The programs within this bill will help America's specialty crop producers gain access to overseas markets where they can promote and sell their products. It will also strengthen our national prevention and surveillance system for invasive pests and diseases, which will help protect the stability and health of fruits and vegetables in this country. And, of course, we increase research on specialty crops to prevent the spread of plant-based viruses. For instance, the Clean Plant Network, for which we include $20 million over the life of the bill, will be a tremendous help to our orchard and nursery industries. The Clean Plant Network establishes a national system of diagnostic and research facilities to help ensure that our orchards and nurseries have the safest plant materials possible to grow the fruits and vegetables we need. We also provide a significant amount of money in this bill to address the trade-related challenges of U.S. specialty crop producers. The current trade deficit for specialty crops in the United States is roughly $2.7 billion. In other words, we import $2.7 billion more in fruits and vegetables, horticulture, items such as that, than we export. The Market Access Program at USDA provides funding to nonprofit agricultural trade associations and agriculture cooperatives to help promote U.S. agricultural products overseas--in other words, to try to get that balance of payments more in line. The bill invests an additional $94 million in the Market Access Program, which brings the program up to almost $240 million a year. Again, this program has been tremendously popular among specialty crop producers who receive nearly 50 percent of the MAP funding. The bill also makes crucial investments in the prevention of invasive pests and diseases. A total of $200 million in new funding is provided for a pest and disease program at USDA to enter into cooperative agreements with State departments of agriculture that conduct early plant pest detection and surveillance activities. To some, the farm bill may seem an abstraction, removed from the pulse of everyday life, but this is not the case. The farm bill touches the lives of millions of Americans every single day, and nowhere is this more evident than in the nutrition title of the farm bill. In the nutrition sections of this bill, we strengthen America's commitment to fighting hunger and promoting sound health and nutrition. By strengthening food assistance to low-income Americans, the bill that is before us will help millions of Americans who currently live daily in the shadow of hunger. Because of the assistance this bill provides, millions of Americans will put food on their tables, will be better able to afford childcare so they can enter the workforce, will be able to save modest sums for retirement or for the education of their children, and because of this bill, millions of low-income children in schools throughout America will be introduced--some perhaps for the first time--to fresh fruits and vegetables that science tells us are critical to sound health and prevention of diet-related chronic diseases. The current USDA nutrition assistance programs need to be modernized and strengthened. Nowhere is that more evident than in the persistence of the term ``Food Stamp Program.'' We have all heard of food stamps, even though food stamps, the paper coupons, have long since gone by the wayside. So we renamed it the ``Food and Nutrition Program.'' It is no longer the ``Food Stamp Program,'' it is the ``Food and Nutrition Program.'' We update it in a number of important ways. We made some progress in the 2002 farm bill, but the economic challenges of low-income Americans, in many respects, multiplied in recent years. Since 1999, the number of Americans experiencing food insecurity has increased from 31 million to 35 million. Similarly, between 2000 and 2006, median household income in the United States, adjusted for inflation, actually decreased. Over the same period, the number and percentage of American children living in poverty increased. So USDA food assistance has not kept up with inflation or changes in the real world. For example, because of budget cuts enacted in the mid-1990s, the purchasing power of USDA food benefits has continued to erode with each passing year. Similarly, despite growing recognition that low-income Americans require the same incentives to save for their future as others, current rules all but force low-income Americans to spend down their meager savings to rock bottom before they are eligible to receive food assistance during times of insecurity. These punitive rules on family assets have not been meaningfully addressed since the late 1970s. Let's take the case of a single mother who is working and has a couple of kids. She may be working at a low- income job, but she has put away a little bit of money for a rainy day. She loses her job. Something happens, and she is temporarily unemployed and needs to have food assistance for herself and her children. Right now, she has over $2,000 in savings. She is ineligible for any food assistance. That $2,000 was set in the 1970s and has barely been increased since. If it had kept up with inflation, that would be about $6,000 now. That is one of the items we address in this bill. Finally, as more and more low-income women have entered the workforce in recent years, Congress has often spoken of the need to support families during this transition from welfare to work, but our actions have not suited and matched our rhetoric. For example, despite the fact that childcare is critical to successful participation of women in the workforce, when calculating income for a household to qualify for food assistance and to set benefit levels, no more than $175 per child per month can be counted as childcare costs despite the fact that the average monthly cost of childcare in 2006 was well over $600. So I am proud to say this bill addresses all of these issues. It stops the erosion and even increases food assistance for most recipient families. It reforms the asset rules by increasing the asset limit modestly. I wish we could have done more. We just didn't have the money for it, but we did increase it. We also adjusted for inflation. We exempt tax-deferred retirement accounts and education savings accounts from the asset limit. We take that off the table. It promotes work by allowing the full deduction of childcare costs. They get to deduct that cost. There is no more $175 limit. Whatever your childcare costs, you get to deduct it. I again thank the administration. In their farm bill they proposed earlier this year, this is also one of the key features of the administration's policy, to take away that limit on the childcare deduction. Fighting hunger and food insecurity is the central mission of the farm bill's nutrition title, but it is not the only mission. In this title, we also seek to address poor health and nutrition among America's children. Much has been said and written about the sad state of nutrition among our kids, manifested in rising rates of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and a national epidemic of childhood obesity. In this bill, we act to improve child nutrition with a major expansion of the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program for schools. I was able to initiate this program in the 2002 farm bill. I have always believed that one of the reasons kids don't eat fresh fruits and vegetables is because they simply don't have the opportunity to do so. I figured, let's give them an opportunity and see what happens. So we began by providing fresh fruits and vegetables--free, I might add--free fresh fruits and vegetables to 100 schools in four States and one Indian reservation. We wanted to test it: What would happen if we gave free fresh fruits and vegetables to kids at school-- not in the lunchroom, but when they get the growlies at 9 o'clock in the morning or in the afternoon when they get a little tired or antsy, kids need something to eat. What if they had fresh fruits and vegetables available at those times? What happened is the kids, the teachers, the principals, the parents all loved this program. Not one of the schools that has participated in this program--and it is all voluntary, no one is forced into it--not one school that has participated in this program has asked to drop out. In fact, every school that has participated has begged to stay in it. By 2005, because other States were clamoring to get into the program, and other schools, we expanded to 10 States and two more Indian reservations. That is how successful it has been. In those States in which we do have the program, the schools that are not getting the free fresh fruits and vegetables are lining up saying: We want it also. We have seen the positive effects it has had. Kids no longer are eating junk food. Kids are no longer sneaking candy and cookies. They are no longer going to vending machines to get some sugary snack. They are eating fresh fruits and vegetables. In this bill, we make a quantum leap forward for this program. The bill provides $1 billion--that is right, $1 billion--over 5 years to expand the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program to reach nearly 4.5 million children nationwide, with a special focus on high-poverty school districts. I wish to emphasize that point. I have been to some of these schools where they have the free fresh fruit and vegetables program. I can remember being in one school where some of the fourth-grade kids had never had a fresh apple in their entire lifetime--fourth grade; fresh bananas, they never had such a thing. I remember I was at a class one time, and they had fresh pears. The kids didn't even know what they were--kiwi fruit, strawberries. I remember I went to a school in Iowa once--and our schools let out in the summer after the first crop of strawberries is harvested. The principal told me that by 10 a.m. in the morning, there wasn't a strawberry left in school. Kids eat these fresh fruits. I have actually seen with my own eyes kids eat fresh broccoli. That may come as a surprise to some people, a shock, that kids actually eat fresh broccoli. I have actually seen kids eat fresh spinach. Because of the popularity of the program, because it has grown, some of the marketers are now packaging fruits and vegetables just for this program, so the kids get a little plastic package, they rip it open, and they have enough in there for a little snack. As I said, it has taken off. It is providing better health, better nutrition for kids. They study better. They behave better. There was some reticence when we started this program. Teachers said: Oh my gosh, kids will be throwing peels on the floor, apple cores at each other, making a mess of everything. This has not happened. In fact, teachers are now some of the strongest supporters of this program. So when you go into these schools, you can see these kids eating these foods, ripping open a package and getting little baby spinach leaves, and they have a little tin of ranch dip, they dip it and eat it. I always said I didn't like broccoli until I had fresh broccoli. Who likes cooked broccoli and cooked spinach? It is not good for you. It may be good for you, but fresh is very good. I emphasize this point because we are expanding this program. I have a goal I have stated, and as long as I am here, I am going to keep fighting for that goal; that is, to make sure this program is available to every elementary school in America within 10 years. I think it will do more to prevent childhood obesity, provide better health, plus when kids start eating these fruits and vegetables--and we have some anecdotal evidence of kids who are eating fresh fruits and vegetables, and they go home and ask their parents: Can we have some of this at home or they go to the store with their parents, when they go shopping, and say: I had this in school, I really liked this fruit or I like these vegetables, can we have this at home? It is going to do a lot for helping get at this problem of childhood obesity and some of the chronic diseases, such as diabetes, among younger kids. Now, I wish to talk a little bit about the energy title, another very important and kind of a new area for agriculture. The energy title will help farmers in rural communities across the country join in a major transition in which our agricultural sector supplies clean biofuels and renewable energy for all of America. It gives farmers a chance to add biomass crops to their farming operations, with Federal support to protect against the financial risks associated with the transition. It supports rural communities with the development of biorefineries for the production of biofuels and bioproducts. It helps farmers and ranchers and rural small businesses that want to improve their own energy systems through grants and loan guarantees for energy efficiency improvements and renewable energy systems. It emphasizes a particular opportunity--help for farmers and communities to install livestock manure to energy facilities that address environmental and odor problems, while utilizing a valuable energy resource. It will make investments in research that will complement and enhance rural energy production opportunities. Members of the Senate are well aware of the disastrous consequences of America's dependence on foreign oil. No less an authority than Alan Greenspan has said the war in Iraq is about oil. At the same time, with oil prices relentlessly approaching $100 a barrel, our dependence on foreign oil is a threat to both our national security and the health of our economy. The bigger picture is that new oil discoveries around the world are steadily declining at the same time that global oil consumption is rising. I have a chart to indicate that. These are the billion barrels of oil per year in discoveries, and we can see in the 1930s, the 1950s, a huge increase, the 1960s, the 1970s a little bump up there with Alaska, and then we keep coming down. We can see that global oil discoveries are rapidly, rapidly, rapidly declining. At the same time, we superimposed on that this red line showing consumption. So as the oil discoveries are going down, look at our consumption. It keeps going up and up and up. Well, the Petroleum Council's report delivered to the Department of Energy this past summer states that: It is a hard truth that the global supply of oil and natural gas from the conventional sources relied upon historically is unlikely to meet the projected 50- to 60- percent growth in demand over the next 25 years. Well, our country needs energy. We need energy to grow and to produce. We need energy for the new kinds of manufacturing we are going to have in this country, for transportation. It is an urgent national priority to accelerate our transition from oil to homegrown, farm-based renewable sources of fuel and electrical power. If we reach our full potential in producing renewable biofuels using feedstocks from our farms and forests, we can replace as much as 30 percent of our transportation fuels by 2030--by 2030. Right now, current ethanol production is about 7 billion gallons annually. I believe we are headed toward a production of 60 billion gallons of biofuels, requiring 50 to 100 million acres of crop lands dedicated to biomass crops by the year 2030. These charts show the sharp upward trajectory of biofuels over the past 5 years and with the contributions we are making in this bill. So here is what we have done in biofuels. It doesn't go back very far. If you go back to about the late 1980s, early 1990s--millions of gallons. Not very much. But look at the sharp curve up as we came up in the late 1990s into 2000 and 2005. Then let us look at the projections. Here we are at 2005, and here is 2030 at 60 billion gallons per year. So that is the trajectory. That is the trajectory we are basically on and a lot of us are committed to. Senator Lugar and I have a bill in that basically--and others have cosponsored it--to mandate we reach that level by 2030. Well, the energy title in this bill allocates $1.1 billion over 5 years for new investments in farm-based energy. It is imperative we accelerate the transition of biofuels produced from cellulosic feedstocks, in addition to grains and oilseeds, if we want to get to that 60 billion gallons per year. And here, in addition to speeding up the development and evaluation of conversion technologies, we also confront a classic chicken-and-egg dilemma. Entrepreneurs would not build cellulosic biorefineries in the absence of reliable feedstock. Producers would not grow the cellulosic feedstocks unless and until there are biorefineries to produce them. Well, in this bill we address this dilemma very aggressively. On the supply side, we allocate $130 million over 5 years to the biomass crop transition program. We know it takes a few years to get crops, such as switchgrass or miscanthus or soft pine or fast-growing poplars or whatever it might be, to get them started and established, so farmers are going to need financial assistance during the transition. That is what we provide in the Senate bill. On the other side, on the demand side, we allocate $300 million to support grants and loans for biorefinery pilot plants, loan guarantees for commercial biorefineries, and support for repowering existing corn ethanol plants and other facilities so they can process cellulosic ethanol. In addition, we continue the CCC Bioenergy Program with $245 million to support feedstock purchases for advanced biofuels production. We continue the section 9006 program of grants and loan guarantees that we put in the 2002 farm bill. This is for farmers and ranchers to purchase renewable energy systems or energy efficiency systems for their own farm or ranch. The budget for this is $230 million, double what we put in the farm bill in 2002. We are including about $140 million for biomass research, including biomass crop experiments. A large part of the future of biofuels lies in the use of cellulosic feedstocks. Cellulosic fuels, biofuels, can be produced just about everywhere in the United States. This will expand biofuels production beyond our major corn-producing regions and to places closer to where the fuels are blended and consumed. I will make this prediction. If we can preserve the Senate energy provisions in conference--maybe get some additional funding for them, which we will try to do--I predict that within 5 years, by the end of the life of this farm bill, we are going to see cellulosic biofuel refineries sprouting up akin to mushrooms all over this country. That will help restore our energy security and our national security. It is good for the environment and good for farmers and the rural economy. Now, let me talk a little bit about another important part of this farm bill, and that is the conservation title. Agriculture and forest lands account for 69 percent of all the land in the United States. That means farmers, ranchers, and forest landowners are the first line of defense for our environment. They are America's first conservationists. The conservation title of this bill gives them the tools they need for voluntary efforts to conserve oil, to protect water and air quality, to increase wildlife habitat on their land, and maintain and improve our Nation's natural resources for future generations. The conservation programs are similar to a toolkit to address conservation needs, from the basic function of providing technical assistance on how best to, for instance, protect the waterway from erosion and runoff, to paying for easements, to protect wetlands and grasslands or working farmland that is under the threat of development, to cost-share incentive payments and enhancement payments to help farmers build and adopt new conservation practices. This bill looks to the future in preserving our natural resources by allocating $4 billion in new budget authority for the conservation title. This is extraordinarily important to the future of farming in the United States. I am pleased we were able to accomplish so much with relatively limited funding. For example, the Wetlands Reserve Program had no baseline to continue to enroll wetlands after this year, so we had to put in new money for that. The Grassland Reserve Program was also out of funds to enroll new land. We had to put new money in for that. The Conservation Security Program's funding had been cut by billions, almost $4 billion over the last 5 years, to pay for agricultural disasters and budget reconciliation. We needed to restore sufficient funding to allow the program to enroll more acres nationwide, and I am pleased to say we have successfully resolved all of these funding challenges. In addition to maintaining or expanding existing programs, we addressed some new needs in this bill. For example, here in the mid- Atlantic area, where Washington, DC, is located, we devote $165 million to improving conservation to help clean up the Chesapeake Bay. This is money that will be used for upland treatment so all that runoff would not be going into the Chesapeake Bay. In the Southeast, in order to provide better wildlife habitat, we provide funding to improve the management of trees planted on Conservation Reserve Program acres. I am pleased to join with the committee's ranking member, Senator Chambliss, who was the basic mover behind this. The conservation title also establishes new incentives for producers to allow voluntary public access to their land for hunting, fishing, and other wildlife-related activities. Senator Conrad has been a leader on this issue. I am pleased to have cosponsored his legislation, and we have included it in this bill. The conservation title also makes important policy changes. We have worked to streamline the process to acquire conservation easements in the Wetland Reserve Program, the Farmland Protection Program, and the Grassland Reserve Program. That process has been paper heavy since the beginning. In this bill, we have addressed that to cut down on the paperwork. In this bill, we make significant improvements in the Conservation Security Program, which was created in the 2002 farm bill to reward farmers and ranchers for good conservation practices on working lands. Now, this was new in the 2002 farm bill. In the past, most conservation programs were lands that were taken out of production, in one way or the other--wetlands, grasslands, the CRP and others. But as we saw more and more land coming into production, a lot of it for ethanol production, more and more marginal lands started coming in and we had to do something about that. In this bill, the program was renamed the Conservation Stewardship Program to reflect the goal of the program to promote the long-term benefits to our Nation by adopting and maintaining good conservation practices. We have yet to realize the full potential of the Conservation Stewardship Program because of tight restrictions on funding that excluded many producers. Regulations only allowed certain farms and acres to be enrolled in certain designated watersheds every year. In addition, the process resulted in some kinds of crops and production techniques being largely excluded from the program, such as organics, for example. Well, the new Conservation Stewardship Program will eliminate these shortcomings. It will grow rapidly, at a pace of more than 13 million acres a year, which, with the 15 million already enrolled, will total 80 million acres in 5 years. Acres will be allocated to States based not on watersheds but simply on each State's share of the national eligible acres. Within each State, enrollment will be accomplished through a ranking process that will prioritize producers who are already doing good conservation and who are willing to do even more. Again, I emphasize that this program we started in 2002 is going to grow rapidly, as I said 80 million acres, and the idea behind it basically is to reward farmers for being good conservationists--those farmers who practice good tillage methods, conservation tillage, who put buffer strips along rivers and streams; those who apply the right amount of fertilizer, not excessive amounts of fertilizer that can run off into our rivers and streams, polluting the Chesapeake Bay and other places. So again, the idea is to reward good stewardship of our land, and I think it is a good investment. I think it is one that will be broadly supported by the American people. As I said, these kinds of conservation programs are more important than ever. The rising demand for commodities is bringing millions of acres into production. A lot of land that was in the Conservation Reserve Program is now coming out. We can't force people into the Conservation Reserve Program, and we don't have enough money to bid everything back into it. So if that land is going to be planted for some kind of crop production, then we better help ensure it is done in a conserving manner. So we provide the incentives in the Conservation Stewardship Program to make sure they get the technical assistance, the cost-share, and the payments to prevent erosion and runoff. As we look to the future, we have to look at these conservation programs not only as a boost to the environment and cleaning up our environment but as a WTO, a World Trade Organization-compliant, non- trade distorting way of assisting farmers and ranchers. I got the idea for this Conservation Security Program--now renamed Conservation Stewardship Program--traveling through Europe in the late 1990s and looking at their farms and being amazed at the countryside. Then I looked at how much money European countries were giving to help their farmers--a lot more than we were--for conservation. I had to figure this out. How were they providing so much money to farmers--more than we were--but they didn't violate trade rules? Yet the money we were giving to farmers violated trade rules. It was simply they were making ``green payments'' to farmers-- payments to their farmers for conservation--cleaning up rivers and streams. Green payments. Green payments are under the ``green box'' of WTO, and it is WTO compliant. So we do not violate any of our agreements under WTO by providing farmers incentives for good conservation. Now, I mentioned earlier that one element has been overlooked seriously in our farm bills in the past. We put a little bit in the 2002 farm bill dealing with organics, and that was a cost-share for the organic certification. But the fact is, organics is the fastest growing sector in U.S. agriculture. The demand for organic products is so great that it far outpaces our domestic supply. Much of that $2.7 billion of products, all agricultural products coming into this country over what we send out, is organics. I have had people in the organics food business, who sell organic foods, say they can't get it locally; they cannot get it in this country, so they have to import it. Well, we don't have enough farmers getting into organic production, so imports pick up the slack. In this bill, we make it a priority to help farmers who are serious about getting into organic food production, and we help them overcome the challenges of transitioning into this industry. We include $80 million over 5 years for research into organic production and marketing. We include $5 million for price yields and overall data collection, which we don't even know about. We remove the 5-percent surcharge arbitrarily charged to organic producers who want to reduce their risk by buying crop insurance. Crop insurance had a 5- percent surcharge on it. We removed that. We make EQIP more universally available for farmers to transition into organic agriculture. Now, one of the problems in organics that we have had is for a farmer to get certified to be organic, you have to have at least 3 years of not using pesticides, that type of thing. During that 3-year period the farmer cannot sell into the organic market, and receive higher prices, yet still is bearing the costs of making the transition to organic production. So we have provided some cost-share assistance to help farmers adopt sound conservation practices that are part of the transition to organic production. If they are serious about becoming organic producers, we will provide help in pursuing that opportunity. Let's also talk about the assistance in this bill addressing global hunger and malnutrition through our food aid and development assistance programs, another part of our bill. We are very proud that over the last half century the United States has been the world's leading donor of food to hungry people. That is a source of great pride to us. U.S. programs are estimated to have helped more than 3.5 billion people over that period. I firmly believe our humanitarian activities throughout the developing world continue to be an essential component of our long- term effort to combat poverty and to build bridges of goodwill to foreign countries. It is a shocking fact that in the 21st century there is an estimated 800 million hungry people in the world, nearly half of them children. In April, the Government Accountability Office released a study on how to improve the targeting and efficiency of U.S. international food aid programs, a study that Senator Chambliss and I requested last year. I am pleased to report that the agencies involved in the delivery of U.S. food aid are on a path to adopt most of the recommendations made by the GAO. Some of the other recommendations, those that require statutory changes, are addressed in this bill. We set aside a specific amount of funding under title II food aid for nonemergency development assistance projects. The creation of this ``safe box,'' as it is called, is intended to send a strong message that it is not acceptable for USAID to use nonemergency program funding as the piggy bank to raid if regular appropriations for title II emergency programs are inadequate. It is shortsighted to withdraw assistance from hungry people struggling to break the vicious circle of poverty in order to provide food to even hungrier or more desperate people. To me, this approach is like using one family's seed corn to feed another family. In the end, both families are left hungry, and the first family's efforts to lift themselves out of poverty are hindered. So we address that in this bill. The trade title also gives USAID authority for a pilot program to conduct local or regional cash purchases of food. For the last few years, the President has requested authority to use up to 25 percent of title II funds for local or regional cash purchases, but this concept needs careful testing before we consider adopting it on a larger scale. I also want to make clear that I see local cash purchases as a complement to donation of U.S. commodities, not as a substitute. As I have already noted, the funding for this new farm bill is extremely tight, so we were limited in what we could do to increase resources for international food aid. However, the title containing food aid provides an increase for the amount that can be spent in transporting U.S. food commodities under the Food for Progress Program from the current $40 million annually to $48 million. The Food for Progress Program is aimed at improving economies and helping to build democratic institutions in developing countries and in Eastern European countries transitioning to democracy. Obviously, we would have liked to do more to increase funding for the Food for Progress Program. I also would have liked to have provided mandatory funds for the excellent McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program, which I helped to establish in law in the 2002 farm bill. The McGovern-Dole program is designed to encourage children in developing countries to go to school and stay in school by providing them free or subsidized food. It has a lot of similarities to the School Lunch Program in this country. In its brief lifetime, the program has helped 19 million kids attend and stay in school in developing countries. Think about it this way. In the United States, we provide free and reduced-price school lunches all over America and they help families a great deal. We may not think so much about the impact of that because in the overall economy of our nation food costs only about 10 percent of our disposable income on food. In some of the poorest countries, where food may consume perhaps 60 percent or more of disposable income, providing free food to children who attend school is a very big benefit to that family. That food can be the magnet that gets children out of an abusive child labor situation and into school. So it is a great program. I remember when both Senator Dole and Senator McGovern came to see me about it in the late 1990s, trying to get it into the next farm bill, which we did, and their hopes and dreams for it. I still think if we can put the money into this program and grow it, it could be one of the best things we could do to fight hunger and poverty, to end child labor and to root out some of the harsh economic conditions, anger and frustration that may even lead some to turn to terrorism. Despite limited new funding, I am proud of the work we have done on food aid and other trade issues in this bill. We also in this bill help promote farmers markets, which are expanding all over the country. I can remember barely 10 years ago in my State of Iowa you could probably count the number of farmers markets on both hands. Now they are all over. In the Washington, DC, area, and other metropolitan areas, in the last several years we have seen farmers markets springing up all over the place. People want to purchase fresh, locally grown food. However, these are very challenging enterprises. They require grassroots organizing, planning and advertising; farmers have to be recruited; there are regulatory and logistical challenges. In both the 2002 farm bill and this new farm bill, I have worked to help people overcome some of these barriers to establishing successful farmers markets. In the 2002 farm bill we added a program called the Farmers Market Promotion Program to help people develop and organize farmers markets and to enable direct producer-to-consumer market opportunities. In the legislation before us, we include $30 million for the life of the bill for these types of activities. Too often farmers can and want to expand production of foods to be sold locally, but they face difficulties finding markets. Larger retail outlets want consistent supplies and abundant quantity, which is something a small farmer just can't provide. This bill seeks to solve this problem by fostering new opportunities for farmers to band together, providing funding through the value-added product market development grant program, as well as loans through the Business and Industry Loan Program. The idea is to promote what we call aggregators, where farmers who grow produce--vegetables or fruits or whatever it might be, or maybe they want to do some free-range chickens or organic meat or something like that--can join together to tap into bigger markets. What we need are aggregators who can go out to this farmer and that farmer and that farmer and say: OK, you bring your beets here and you bring your beets and you bring your beets or you bring your carrots or you bring your eggs or whatever it is. We put them together, and then we can sell them to larger buyers. That is what we have done in this bill to promote and make it easier for farmers to get their produce to farmers markets. For rural communities, as we seek to promote new opportunities in production agriculture, we have to realize the success of our farm households is tied not only to what is produced on the farm but the strength of the surrounding economy--rural economic development. Currently, more than 80 percent of total farm household income comes from sources off the farm. I have a chart that shows that. It is amazing when you look at it. The percent of farm household income from off-farm sources 2 years ago: in the Northern Great Plains, 69.3 percent; in the Heartland, where I am from, Iowa, 66.7 percent; Mississippi Portland, 90.1 percent; Southern Seaboard, 94.9 percent; Northern Crescent, 85.2 percent. I guess we would probably be the least, in the Heartland, 66.7 percent. So even in our area, two-thirds of farming comes from off-farm income sources. Again, 9 out of 10 people who live in rural America are not farmers. So our committee has a responsibility for crafting public policies that support not only farmers but all of our citizens who live in small towns and rural communities. Rural America confronts unique challenges because of its low population density, the limited capacity of local governments and other special circumstances. In recent years we have come to appreciate that agriculture and rural development are closely intertwined. They have a common fate. We need to go forward with a policy framework that supports both our farms and our rural economy. For years many economic development leaders have been frustrated that we have failed to create a more comprehensive approach to rural economic development. That is why I am excited about the Rural Collaborative Investment Program in this bill, which received $135 million in funding over 5 years. This new program provides Federal support for regional collaboration. It is becoming clearer to us that no one rural town or county can go it alone. Rural areas must work together regionally to scale up investments, build competitive economic clusters, and overcome geographic disadvantages. The Rural Collaborative Investment Program awards innovation grants on a competitive basis to regions that creatively leverage these funds with other Federal, State, private, and philanthropic resources. It provides incentives for elected officials, leaders of the business community, and nonprofit organizations to come together, to jointly develop plans that work best to improve the economy in their particular area. Those who develop the best plans will receive significant resources from USDA to help implement their plans. Because of limited Federal funding, many who compete for innovation grants will not get one, but they will still come out winners because they will have gained valuable experience in collaborating across county and town boundaries, and they will have completed a plan of action tailored to their specific area. Again, this is so essential. If we look at the fact that the majority of farm household income is coming from nonfarm income, what good does it do to help our farm families if all of the small towns dry up and blow away? Already in my own State of Iowa, kids who live on farms and in small towns are riding school buses longer and longer distances as schools consolidate. Farm families cannot even buy the essentials for their families without driving long distances, because there is not enough business to support local stores. We have small towns in Iowa where churches no longer exist. We have to do something to start enhancing the economic viability of our small towns and communities. That is what we do with the Rural Collaborative Investment Program. One other key element I want to point out is the promotion of community foundations. You know, rural Americans possess hundreds of billions of dollars in assets. Much of it is in land. Good valuable land. And, quite frankly, a large share of this, I know in my area, and in the upper Midwest--I do not know so much about some other parts of the country, but I bet it holds true almost all over--a large share of the asset value is held by people who are 65 years of age and older. Well, these farmers, ranchers, businesspeople and others care deeply about their communities. They care deeply about their rural way of life. They care about the institution of the family farm. Many would be more than happy to give a generous share of their wealth back to their communities if they had a credible agency to make good use of the gift. That is exactly the role that community foundations play. They are the perfect vehicle for bringing together local financing, local brain power, local leadership, to focus on solutions tailored to a given community or group of communities. The rural development title of this bill also provides $40 million for a new microloan program championed by the Senator from Nebraska, Mr. Nelson. This initiative provides support for organizations that help people of modest means acquire the expertise to start their own businesses. It provides small loans to these new entrepreneurs. We provide $50 million in new funding for rural hospitals. Each dollar supports about $18 in direct loans, and generates even more dollars in the form of loan guarantees. This funding will help rural hospitals acquire the equipment they need to improve patient care and to computerize their records, for example. In talking about all of the needs in rural America, one of the big needs is health care, and in making sure we have rural hospitals there with primary and emergency care. We also provide $40 million for the construction of daycare centers. Again, demographics show many young families are leaving rural America. Poll after poll shows they want to stay there. But they need an off- farm job, and to get that off-farm job, they need daycare, and there simply is not much daycare to be had. Access to quality, affordable daycare is a big part of the solution. It is urgently needed. Another one of the big problems in rural America is the backlog of requests for money for good drinking water and for wastewater systems. This bill provides $135 million to reduce the backlog of these applications. One other thing that is going to help a lot with rural jobs is the introduction of broadband services to our small towns and communities; and not only to small towns and communities but to the farms themselves. I like to think the extension of broadband to our farms and rural areas is every bit as essential today as the extension of electric lines was to our farms and rural areas back in the rural electrification days of the 1920s and 1930s. The bill does that. We provide financial resources, we cut down on paperwork. We also cut down--basically we shift from financial assistance going to areas that already have broadband service. We do not need that. We need to get it into areas that do not have it. Broadband is a basic utility, both for the kids who need it for their schoolwork, and for farmers and rural business people in order to do business. I know of instances where in small communities, a small business person was growing his insurance business, but he needed access to broadband. There were, I forget exactly how many, less than 10 people who worked there. But he was going to grow his business. He knew he could, but he knew he needed broadband access. If he had broadband access, he could have stayed in that small town, maybe employed 15 to 20 people. Since he could not do it, he moved to a larger city, Des Moines, our capital. At least he stayed in Iowa, but I would have much preferred if he could have stayed in that small town and community and had broadband service. We need to extend broadband as rapidly as possible. Let me talk briefly about agricultural research, which has been so important for that 116 percent increase I talked about in agriculture productivity since 1960. The research title will increase competitive grant opportunities for basic and applied agricultural research; it will strengthen the research, extension, and education programs administered by USDA through our land grant institutions. It will achieve these objectives by restructuring the grant administering agency at USDA and transforming it into a national institute of food and agriculture. This will improve, integrate, and streamline the management of competitive and infrastructure programs, and will require a roadmap to be led by the Under Secretary for Research, Education and Economics, to refocus the research mission at USDA. As I have said, agricultural research has historically produced enormous benefits from relatively modest funding. In my experience, few people appreciate the transformational impact of breakthroughs in agricultural research. To give one example, consider the work of an Iowan, Dr. Norman Borlaug, beginning in the 1950s. His methods of high- volume crossbreeding and shuttle breeding in order to develop disease- resistant wheat varieties were soon applied to other crops around the world, fostering what was known as the ``green revolution'' which has saved upwards of a billion lives. Dr. Borlaug won the Nobel Peace Prize and recently won the Congressional Gold Medal in a very nice ceremony here in the Capitol. But many people still do not realize how his successes in agricultural research have changed the world. We are continuing to achieve great agronomic breakthroughs in agricultural research, but agricultural research is rapidly changing, and so we need to change the methodologies by which we fund and promote this research. That is what we do in this bill. With the changes included in this bill, we will elevate the visibility of competitive research programs while strengthening our infrastructure programs--such as the research, extension and education programs--in place at our land grant universities. The National Institute of Food and Agriculture will lay the groundwork for a more robust agricultural research system, which we hope will lead to increased funding in the future, funding, I might add, that has remained flat in the past 20 years in inflation-adjusted dollars. I would also highlight that in the research title we provide $80 million for specialty crops research, such as to advance breeding and mechanization, and to improve the safety--I emphasize the safety--of fruits and vegetables. We also provide $80 million for research in organic agriculture, which as I said earlier is one of the fastest growing parts of our agricultural economy. The largest obstacle to farm entry for beginning farmers and ranchers is access to two things, credit and land. Since 1990, a portion of the funding in the Farm Service Agency loan programs has been reserved for beginning farmers and ranchers. This bill expands the credit opportunities for beginning farmers by increasing the funding set- aside, and increasing the direct farm ownership and operating loan limit for the first time in over 20 years. Socially disadvantaged farmers face many of the same challenges as beginning farmers do, and so we increase opportunities for them by authorizing wider participation in Farm Service Agency loan programs. I am also proud of the fact that this is the first farm bill ever to include a livestock title dedicated to the needs of our livestock, poultry, and egg producers, and aimed at promoting animal health and expanding market opportunities. Consolidation and vertical integration of the livestock and poultry industry has dramatically reduced the number of buyers, and in some regions there are only a few left. This lack of buyers has created an acute need for market reforms and more rigorous USDA enforcement of the Packers and Stockyards Act and the Agricultural Fair Practices Act. To that end, this bill eliminates two layers of bureaucracy at USDA. It designates a special counsel, so at long last we will have a high- level official at USDA dedicated to overseeing, managing, and enforcing these two acts. The bill would limit packer ownership of livestock in order to provide stability to the marketplace for independent producers. It provides basic fairness for producers using contracts, so that companies cannot force producers to travel great distances to settle disputes; in other words, to travel clear across the country to where a packer's headquarters might be located. In addition, this bill makes arbitration voluntary, so producers are not forced into unfriendly terms, requiring mandatory arbitration, in take-it-or-leave-it contracts. Let me also mention that at the urging of Senator Durbin and others, the bill requires the creation of a Congressional Bipartisan Food Safety Commission. This commission would be responsible for reviewing the Nation's food safety system, and making recommendations on how best to modernize the current structure. Over the last year we have had outbreaks of E. coli contamination in bagged spinach, lettuce, and numerous recalls of very large quantities of meat and meat products. Over the weekend and in today's paper I read there are a million pounds of ground beef being recalled from stores in this area, and I do not know what other areas of the country. We have had repeated cases of contaminated food, everything from peanut butter to seafood to hamburger. So the work of this new Congressional Bipartisan Food Safety Commission will both be timely and urgent. Our consumers are basically demanding that. In sum, I have sought to lay out the comprehensiveness of this bill. A lot of people are focused on payments to farmers. They think that is the farm bill. That is a small part of the farm bill. It is comprehensive. It addresses food safety, as I just mentioned. Food assistance to hungry people abroad, food assistance to hungry people in this country, energy, rural economic development, conservation of our nation's resources. In energy, the bill opens up new vistas for energy production in this country, biofuels, cellulosic biomass materials; all of this is covered in this bill. So this bill is a strong forward-looking bill. It will be good for farmers, good for rural communities, good for our environment and good for our nation. It will promote our citizen's health, improve our energy security, and it is fiscally responsible. The bill won strong bipartisan support in the committee, and it deserves the same bipartisan support of Senators here on the floor. As we look ahead to consideration of the bill this week, I hopefully can use the Senate's time productively. Obviously, this is the farm bill. We want to be productive. I encourage Senators, if they have amendments--and I am not encouraging a lot of amendments--to bring their amendments to the floor in a timely fashion. Hopefully, we can complete our work this week and go to conference as soon as possible. I assume the chairman of the Finance Committee, Mr. Baucus, in his opening remarks, will dwell more on the part of the substitute amendment at the desk that includes provisions of the Finance Committee package. It includes a permanent disaster assistance program, tax credits that help offset the cost of conservation programs in the bill, and other tax provisions related to agriculture and energy. I expect Senators Baucus and Grassley will discuss these provisions at greater length. However, I thank them both and the members of the Finance Committee, including the occupant of the chair, for all of their support in helping the Agriculture Committee meet its goals and at the same time stay within our budget guidelines. I know I have taken a lot of time, but for those who may be watching on monitors, people around the country watching on C-SPAN, and others who think a farm bill is only about payments to farmers, I wanted to show the comprehensiveness of this bill. It touches our lives every day in many ways, from the abundant food and fiber we enjoy to the safety of our food, to fruits and vegetables in schools, to the assistance to a family down on their luck who need some food assistance to feed their children during a time where they may be out of work for a period. It provides funding to help us meet our energy needs, to get us off of the oil pipeline to foreign countries. It saves our soil, provides for clean water and increased wildlife habitat for hunters and fishermen and everyone who enjoys the outdoors. It provides more research into improved agricultural technology and practices--how to do things better, how to be more productive, more safe. We have growing demands on the land. Yet we have to make sure our productivity keeps going up. We have seen tremendous strides in the past because of agricultural research and what we have accomplished there. I want people to know, this legislation is not only a farm bill. This is a food and energy security bill covering everything--all the food we eat and consume, all the food we produce, all the food we have in our food assistance programs, and, yes, our energy needs as well. That is what this bill is. It is comprehensive. It is a good bill. I encourage the support of all Senators for this legislation. I thank my ranking member and good friend, Senator Chambliss, first for his stewardship of this committee when he was chairman and for all of the hearings Senator Chambliss had last year all around the country. He came to my State of Iowa. We had a great hearing in Iowa. He laid the groundwork for this bill. It was a smooth transition this year, when our party took over the Senate through the election of last year. We continued that groundwork Senator Chambliss laid for this bill. People wonder why we took so long. Two reasons: One, the farm bill bills usually take a long time. I have often said this is my seventh farm bill since the time I first entered the House back in 1975. It is a very challenging bill to put all together, especially when one has the budget constraints we had. In 2002, that sailed through easily. We had $73 billion over baseline. Under the leadership of Senator Conrad and the Budget Committee, we decided this year we will not resort to deficit spending anymore. We will get out of the hole we are in. We are going to get out of the budget deficits we have had in the past. So we have a pay-go budget, and we met our obligations with this bill in that regard. It took some time to work it out. We also received help from the Finance Committee. The Finance Committee, for many reasons, had a lot of things on their plate, too, but once the Finance Committee acted, we had our funding through that action, we moved ahead aggressively to finalize the legislation and put the bill together. We had tough negotiations, but farm bills have always been tough negotiations. They have also been good negotiations. They have been done in a spirit of making sure all the pieces fit together. That is what this farm bill does--it makes many pieces of the jigsaw puzzle fit together. It may not be everything I wanted in the beginning or everything Senator Chambliss wanted in the beginning or anybody else, but that is what this is. It is kind of a grand compromise, if I may say, to put all these things together and to fit them together so the entire country benefits. I say that in the way of thanking Senator Chambliss. I see Senator Conrad in the Chamber. I thank him both in his capacity as chairman of the Budget Committee and as a senior member of the Agriculture Committee. He helped us put all these numbers together so they work. Again, I close my remarks by thanking Senator Chambliss for his stewardship when he was chairman but also for being my partner in putting this legislation together as ranking member. It would be fine with me if we could quickly vote and move this bill to conference. I think Senator Chambliss might agree with me on that. But we will have some amendments this week. I hope we can complete them in a timely fashion. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a letter dated November 5, 2007.

Mr. HARKIN. I yield the floor.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded. The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Nelson of Florida.) Without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed as in morning business.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, tomorrow with the closing of the Maytag manufacturing plant in Newton, IA, a beloved Iowa institution and an icon in the history of industrial America will be gone forever. The Maytag brand, synonymous with product quality and reliability, will still be attached to rebranded Whirlpool Corporation appliances, but do not be fooled, those products will no longer be made by loyal, skilled, experienced, Iowa workers. They will be made elsewhere. This is a heartbreaking loss to the Newton community, Newton, IA, and a loss felt by people across my State of Iowa. Maytag was founded in Newton by Fredrick Louis Maytag, in 1893, as a manufacturer of farm equipment. Fourteen years later, the company introduced its first washing machine, which it produced during seasonal downturns in the farm implement business. Newton soon became known as the washing machine capital of the world. By the time it was acquired by Whirlpool in 2006, Maytag Corporation was a $4.7 billion company with 18,000 employees worldwide. But the center of its operations, the heart of its operations, was Newton, IA, with 2,800 employees. Now, it is all gone. Thousands of good-paying jobs and the economic foundation of an entire community. For generations, Iowans eagerly went to work at Maytag, and Maytag was an integral part of the Newton community. Maytag workers helped to build a thriving local economy. The children of Maytag assembly line workers and the children of the Maytag executives all went to the same high-quality schools. When children graduated from high school or from college, many came home to Newton to work at Maytag, either on the line or as executives. Together, workers and management at Maytag built a wonderful community and a wonderful business. Now, in what seems like the blinking of an eye, Maytag is gone. Why? Well, because it is cheaper to make appliances in foreign countries that pay their workers a pittance; that lack labor standards and environmental protections. Maytag management was seduced by the lure of lower wages; sent jobs from some of their plants to Mexico. This, combined with unwise decisions by management to buy a variety of companies, significantly weakened Maytag's finances and their ability to invest in improvements to their own product lines. That made the company a takeover target. It is a personal tragedy for the workers of Maytag and elsewhere who have lost good-paying jobs, but it is something else; it is a threat to the middle-class standard of living in this country, as displaced workers are obligated to accept lower paying jobs, often without health insurance or pension benefits. According to a study by economists at Iowa State University, the average income in Jasper County, that is the home of Newton, the average income in Jasper County in 2005 was $34,400 a year, again, because of Maytag. Without the Maytag jobs, the average income will drop by nearly $5,000. Let's be clear. As I said, washing machines made elsewhere will probably still carry the Maytag brand, but I will always say that the heart and soul of Maytag was the Newton community. Richard Doak, a Des Moines Register columnist, was intervening a Maytag worker years ago when the company was hinting it might close the Newton plant. The worker stated: If that ever happens, it will be the end of Maytag, because the people of Newton are the essence of the company. We pump blue blood [said the worker, referring to the color of the Maytag logo.] Daniel Krumm, the chief executive officer who transformed Maytag into a global company said that what he called the Newton ethic, was the key to the company's success. By the Newton ethic, he meant an entire community that was loyal to the company and took great pride in making products of the highest quality. Unfortunately, some of Daniel Krumm's successors chose to betray the Newton ethic. Some of them chose to cash it in for cheaper products, and higher profits made outside the United States. This story is all too familiar to skilled workers in the manufacturing sector in this country. You might wonder why I am on the floor talking about this on this Thursday, October 25. Because tomorrow, on Friday, Maytag will shutter its last plant and cease operations in Newton, IA. I worked as hard as I could to prevent the Whirlpool takeover of Maytag. I worked with State and local officials to prevent the closing of the plant in Newton. But in the end, regrettably, our efforts were unsuccessful. Particularly, I wish to salute the tremendous effort of the officers, the plant committee, the department of stewards of United Auto Workers Local 997. Under the outstanding leadership of Ted Johnson, the local president, they have been on the frontlines throughout the crisis of Maytag, fighting to prevent the plant closure; when that failed, doing everything possible to help the displaced workers. Tomorrow, Friday, will be a sad day in Newton, IA. But there is rebirth. Not all of the news from Newton is bad. The Newton ethic survives, and the Newton community is resilient. Two companies, Iowa Telecom and Caleris, plan to add more than 200 jobs in Newton by the end of the year. Other businesses are expanding. Community leaders are coming together to develop a strategy to rebound from the loss of Maytag. I wish them every success, and I will stand ready to continue to assist in any way I can. Another sad chapter in the continuing decline of our manufacturing base in America. Maytag. Who has not seen the ad about the Maytag repairman who has nothing to do because Maytag was such a good product? Whether it is refrigerators or washing machines, home appliances, Maytag always stood for the best in quality. It was the best in quality because it was made by dedicated workers, skilled workers who took pride in their work. They made good livings. They were middle-class families. I said it was always a joy to go to Newton. It was wonderful to see the sons and daughters of assembly line workers going to the same school as the executives' kids, all working together, going to the same churches, belonging to the same clubs, going to the same bowling alleys, having this wonderful picnic every year, where the executives and their families and the workers and their families all were enjoying their annual picnic with their kids. They took pride in the products they built. I do not think the people in some of these other countries will have that same kind of commitment. They are lower paid, they did not have the benefits. At some point, we have to take stock of what is happening to our manufacturing base in this country and what is happening to us in terms of a community and a business that can grow and evolve. I know things change, and they have to change, but still, there is no reason, there is no reason why Maytag had to leave Newton. There were some bad business decisions made. But, again, it is chasing higher profits in the short term by shipping our jobs out overseas or to Mexico or to other countries. And those short-term profits lead to long-term losses for the workers and their families and everyone else. So it is a sad day tomorrow in Newton and a sad day for all of us trying to work so hard to keep Maytag alive.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, today marks 5 years since the tragic death of our friend and colleague, Paul Wellstone of Minnesota. You know, I look around the Chamber, I see men and women of remarkable talents and abilities. But I have also had a strong sense that over the last 5 years there has sort of been a void in our midst; a very special Senator, a Member who played a unique role within this body, has been missing. It is as though we are suffering from ``phantom limb syndrome''; you know, where a person loses a limb but still feels its presence. Whenever an issue of moral urgency, an issue of conscience comes to the Senate floor, I still expect to look back over here in the back row and see Paul Wellstone over there, chopping his hands in the air, speaking with his passion, urging us to do the right thing. On that score, I remind my colleagues that one of the last major votes cast by Senator Wellstone was his vote against a resolution later used by President Bush as an authority to launch an invasion of Iraq. I remember it well because Paul and I were very close friends, and we debated this between us. I said: Paul, no, Bush is not going to use this as any kind of authorization to go to Iraq. This is only meant to give him the authority to go to the U.N., to get the U.N., which is what we want to do, is to get the U.N. inspectors back there. Well, I think Paul was a little more prescient than I was. So we did not vote the same way on that. I will forever rue the day I voted to give President Bush that authority. Quite frankly, Senator Wellstone was in the midst of a very difficult reelection campaign when he cast that vote. So I think it is a measure of his political courage that he cast that vote without thinking about any political consequences. Five years later, with our Armed Forces bogged down in a civil war in Iraq, it is painfully clear Senator Wellstone's vote was not only a courageous vote, it was the right vote. I think Paul truly was, as I have said before, kind of the soul of the Senate. I have said before that no one ever wore the title ``Senator'' better or used it less. He loved it when ordinary folks came up to him and called him Paul. Some Senators might not be so approachable. Paul Wellstone was. He took that as a sign that ordinary people knew he was one of them. He was approachable and he cared. Paul Wellstone was truly my best friend in the Senate. But he is one of those rare souls who so many saw as their best friend. He had a powerful authenticity about him that made a miner up in the Iron Range know he was as important to Paul Wellstone as the President of the United States. That was a very unique ability he had. He never had to proclaim his decency. It shone forth in great acts of political courage and small acts of human kindness. He never had to say he cared. He never had to proclaim his compassion. You just knew it was there. The hard-working folks he cared about most didn't have lobbyists of influence, but they had Paul Wellstone. He truly was their best friend. So 5 years later we remember the political science professor whose measure of truth was never in political theory but in the impact of our decisions on real people. We remember the community organizer who understood how to bring people together, rural and urban, environmentalists and labor, Republicans and Democrats and, as I have often joked, he even brought Minnesotans and Iowans together. We remember a leader, a proud Democratic Farmer Labor Party liberal who constantly reminded those of us who are Democrats that the purpose of our party is to offer hope and opportunity to all Americans, including the neediest among us. I still remember the first time I ever met Paul Wellstone. It was in 1988. I was a freshman Senator. We were in the midst of one of the deepest recessions--depressions, almost--in farm country that we had had since the Great Depression. Farmers were losing their farms all over the Midwest. Suicides were up. Families were breaking up. There were bankruptcies. It was not a very good time in farm country. I remember I went out to speak to a large group right outside of Austin, MN, at a big farm gathering. I know there were well over 1,000 farmers. It was a big gathering. I think the Minnesota Farmers Union or maybe the National Farmers Union had pulled them together. So they asked me to come speak because I had been, at that time, trying to get through a bill called the Harkin-Gephardt farm bill to respond to the crisis. So I went there to speak and, of course, as any big gathering like that on the stage, you have a lot of different speakers. I was supposed to be the final speaker. I was the Senator. So I get there. We had one farmer speak, then the head of the Farmers Union speak and then somebody else spoke and then somebody else spoke. Right before me, they had this guy, this Professor Wellstone. I had never met this guy, and I am on the stage with him. I am preparing my remarks, thinking how I am going to get the crowd up and excited, get them stimulated. And so this Wellstone guy gets up to speak. He has long curly hair. He has a T- shirt on, kind of rolled up. He was muscular, a wrestler. How can I say it? After he spoke, I didn't quite know what to do. He had everybody up. He was so enthusiastic. He had everybody pumped up. He had everybody enthused. I thought, how can I follow this? Well, I tried my best. It wasn't very good. I came back to my staff. I said: I don't know who that guy is, but don't you ever put me on after him again. That was my first introduction to Paul Wellstone. Then after that we became friends. After that, through mutual friends in Minnesota, I found out that he was thinking of running for the Senate. Of course, he had a big primary. He won it. Of course, I couldn't do much to help him because I was fighting for survival myself in 1990. I had a Congressman running against me. I was a first-term Senator. But I couldn't have been more happy, after my own reelection, than the fact that Paul Wellstone won that race in Minnesota in 1990. So we joined forces in the Senate. In 1996, running for reelection, that was a tough year. Quite frankly, both of us nearly lost. We were very close. I remember talking to him on the phone. I said: Paul, I don't know if I am going to survive. He said: Yes, we are going to survive. Then 2002 came. I remember a dinner with another colleague. I won't mention the name. It is a personal thing. But we were thinking maybe of not running again. Paul Wellstone had said he was only going to serve two terms, and he was afraid of breaking that commitment. So we discussed this over dinner. Our wives were with us. We discussed the issue of running or not. I thought, well, I have been here for a couple terms myself. I didn't know if I wanted to do it anymore. That would have been my third term, his second. Then one by one we decided we were going to run again, and we talked Paul into it. We said: Paul, you have to be here. You have to do it. And don't worry about that. Your people will understand. You have things to do. You haven't finished your job. So we all decided, yes, we would seek another term in office. Paul once said: Politics is about what we create by what we do, what we hope for, and what we dare to imagine. Paul was a hopeful man. I always remember that green was his color. He had that bus painted green. When I say ``painted green,'' I mean with a paint brush. It was an awful paint job they did on that bus of his. He climbed aboard that bus in 1990 and set out to build a better America. But Paul never meant for it to be a solo voyage. He wanted us all aboard. Though Paul is no longer with us, his journey for justice continues. Near the site of the tragic plane crash is a beautiful physical memorial for Paul and the seven others who died there: his wife Sheila, daughter Marcia, two pilots, campaign staffers Will McLaughlin, Tom Lapic, and Mary McEvoy. That is the physical monument. I would like to think there are also living memorials that Paul would have been truly passionate about. One of those is the nonpartisan, nonprofit Wellstone Action organization founded by his sons, Mark and David, which trains citizens in civic activism and grassroots, people- to-people politics, the kind of politics he loved and excelled at like no one else. I think there is one more Paul Wellstone legacy. It is not tangible, but it may be the most powerful legacy of all. That is our memory of his passion, his convictions, and his incredible capacity for bringing people together to accomplish important things. Before closing, I must mention one of those important things he fought so hard for and was so passionate about that still remains unaccomplished. He fought hard all the time I knew him to end the neglect and denial surrounding issues of mental health, access to mental health services. Over 41 million persons suffer from a moderate or serious mental disorder each year. Less than half receive the treatment they need, and 80 to 90 percent of all mental disorders are treatable by therapy and medication. Paul fought very passionately for the Mental Health Parity Act to end the absurd practice of treating mental and physical illnesses as two different kinds of things under health insurance. In late 2001, the Senate passed the Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act, sponsored by Paul Wellstone and Senator Domenici of New Mexico-- that was when I happened to be chairman. We had a brief interim where we had the Senate, at that time, 2001-2002--as an amendment to the 2002 Labor-Health and Human Services-Education appropriations bill. It passed the Senate. Then we went to conference. In conference it was argued that this was not the right place for it, that it should be on an authorization bill, not on an appropriations bill. I don't have the words right here, but I have them, when people committed that we would take care of mental health parity the next year on an authorization bill. So it was dropped in conference. Then 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and we still don't have mental health parity. The Senate passed it. A strong majority of Members in the other body supported a similar bill entitled the Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007. But we still don't have it done. I can't think of a better living legacy to Senator Paul Wellstone than for this Congress, the 110th Congress, to pass the strongest possible mental health parity bill and send it to the President to become law. I hope we can get that job done before we go home whenever that may be. In closing, for those of us who had the privilege of serving with Paul Wellstone, his spirit is still very much with us. He still inspires us. He still calls us to conscience. He still makes us smile when we think of his puckish humor. He was the finest of men. We miss him greatly.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, if the Senator from Massachusetts will withhold for a second, I have two modifications I send to the desk, a modification of amendment No. 3351, a Smith amendment, and amendment No. 3376. I have two modifications I send to the desk.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I call up amendments No. 3351, as modified; 3376, as modified; 3397, by Senator Lautenberg; 3401, by Senator Cardin; amendment No. 3430, by Senator Feingold; amendment No. 3436, by Senator Hatch; amendment No. 3418, by Senator Lieberman; and amendment No. 3388, by Senator DeMint. These have all been agreed to. I ask for their immediate consideration en bloc.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, before we start, I send a modification to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration on amendment No. 3443 for Senator Hatch.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, the amendment has been agreed to on both sides.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, since no one is here to speak in opposition, I yield back all time.

Mr. HARKIN. I thank my friend from Illinois for his leadership on this issue. I have worked hard in this bill to make prevention a priority. Doula programs provide the help and support that families need to create a safe environment for new infants, particularly when mothers have nutritional challenges. Everything we learn from the National Institutes of Health reminds us that this early stage of development is so key to our health and well-being. And I want to applaud my friend Senator Durbin for bringing this proven model to me last year. We worked hard to include funding and I agree with him that expert technical assistance will be an important component to this initiative. I look forward to working with Senator Durbin and Senator Specter to monitor the implementation of this program and the outcomes it provides. public access

Mr. HARKIN. I thank the Senator from Vermont for his support of this important program and share his commitment to our Nation's low income seniors. I want to assure him that I am committed to funding the program at the highest level possible and will work with the House to do so within our existing budgetary constraints. I thank the Senator from Vermont.

Mr. HARKIN. Respite care programs recognize the vitally important work that families do when a loved one is struck with illness or disability. I have long been a supporter of home and community-based services to keep people with disabilities in their homes and respite care is an important part of that effort. For that reason, I will work with my colleague, Senator Specter, to obtain funding for the Lifespan Respite Care Act in conference. Health Information Technology Network Development

Mr. HARKIN. Section 102 of Public Law 109-415 lists States by name that have sufficiently reliable and accurate names-based reporting of living non-AIDS cases of HIV. The State of Connecticut is not listed among those States. However, it is my understanding that the Health Resources and Services Administration, HRSA, has administered the program as if Connecticut were on that list. Is that true?

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, we have had a very productive 5 days of debate on the fiscal year 2008 appropriations bill for Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and related agencies. I would like to again thank the ranking member, Senator Arlen Specter, for his leadership and partnership in helping to shape this bipartisanship bill. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the subcommittee staff for the long hours and hard work they put into it. On the Democratic side, I thank Ellen Murray, Lisa Bernhardt, Teri Curtin, Erik Tatemi, Adrienne Hallet, and Mark Laisch. On the Republican side, I thank Bettilou Taylor, Sudip Parikh, and Jeff Kratz. These staff members set a very high standard of professionalism, excellence, and integrity, and we are very fortunate to have people of this caliber in public service. Mr. President, we are just minutes away from the vote on final passage of the bill. I want to emphasize that this is an overwhelmingly bipartisan bill that meets the priorities of members on both sides of the aisle. Senator Arlen Specter and I produced a bill that passed in committee with the support of 14 of 15 Democrats and 12 of 14 Republicans. This bill funds the most essential, life-supporting and lifesaving services for millions of people in this country. It reflects the values and priorities of the American people. As I have said before, it is regrettable that, even before we brought this bill to the floor last week, President Bush threatened to veto it because it included a provision to expand embryonic stem cell research, and because it includes $11 billion in funding above what he requested. We have done our very best to accommodate the President, and to produce a bill that he can sign. To that end, we removed the stem cell provision from the bill before bringing it to the floor. This is a core priority for me, for Senator Specter, and for many other Senators. But we took it out of the bill in order to meet the President halfway. I remain hopeful that, in turn, he will meet us halfway, and join us in this spirit of bipartisan compromise. I am an optimist, and I hold out hope that, if the President examines the substance of this bill, he will see that the additional funding above his budget request goes to essential programs and services that have been shortchanged in recent years. President Kennedy said that ``to govern is to choose.'' The President has made his choices. But, under the Constitution, Congress also gets to choose. And, in this bill, we have made the right choices. Let me cite just a few examples: The President is requesting that we cut the National Institutes of Health--research into cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's and other diseases--by $279 million. In this bill, we increase funding for NIH by $1 billion. The President requests that we reduce the Head Start program by $100 million, which would cut tens of thousands of children from the Head Start roles. This bill increases funding for Head Start by a modest $200 million. Despite predictions of record energy prices this winter, Mr. Bush requests that we cut the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program for poor people by $379 million. In this bill, we maintain LIHEAP funding at last year's level. Mr. Bush requests that we eliminate the community services block grant, the safety net that includes job training, housing, and emergency food assistance. In this bill, we increase the community service block grant by a modest $40 million. In each of these program areas, the bill includes modest, reasonable increases in order to keep pace with inflation or to prevent significant cuts in essential services. This remains a bare-bones, no- frills bill that conforms to a very conservative budget allocation. For 5 years, Congress has appropriated countless billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars for schools, job programs, hospitals, and human services in Iraq. Democrats and Republicans on the committee agree that it's time to look after those same needs in this country. And that is exactly what we do in this bill. As I said, we tried hard to accommodate the President's concerns. There has been so much division and partisanship in Washington in recent months. This bill offers a great opportunity for Congress and the President to show the American people that we can resolve our differences with compromise and bipartisan goodwill. We have met the President halfway--in my opinion, more than halfway. Now it is time for him to respond in kind, and to rescind his veto threat. It is important that we send a strong, bipartisan message to the American people that, at a time when we are spending enormous sums on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we will not neglect or shortchange essential, lifesaving, and life-supporting programs and services here at home. I urge my colleagues to vote yes on this important bill. And I urge the President to join us in supporting this bipartisan bill. I know Senators are eager to vote and go home. I just want to thank all of the Senators for their many kindnesses and their courtesies in bringing this bill to a close. It was 5 days, but it was 5 days of good debate and good amendments. We have a strong bipartisan bill. I hope we will pass it with a strong bipartisan vote, go to conference, and get it to the President's desk as soon as possible.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. HARKIN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. HARKIN. If there is no one else to speak, I yield back the remaining time.

Mr. HARKIN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 3404 to Amendment No. 3325