Mike Johanns

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I rise for a few minutes to talk about S. 3217, the financial regulatory reform bill. I focus, if I could, my comments today on why the cloture vote on financial reform is such an important key vote. My colleagues from the other side have talked about this vote, and it is often referred to as a procedural vote to begin debate. Almost in the same sentence, I think both sides of the aisle recognize that notwithstanding the good work that has been done by Chairman Dodd and Ranking Member Shelby, there is still much to be done on this bill, and there are still some significant flaws within the bill. The argument goes on to say: Don't worry, these problems can be worked out on the Senate floor. We will have a robust debate, and we will have floor amendments. So get the bill to the floor--the argument goes--and the promises made to fix it will then happen. But that is where the logic goes into the ditch. Once this bill does get to the floor of the Senate, we all recognize it is going to be very difficult to change it. Look at the health care bill to see how difficult it was to make changes. Let me make that comparison because I think it is a fair comparison. During the health care debate, let me remind my colleagues, there were 488 amendments that were filed. Of those 488 amendments, only 28 received a vote--28 out of 488. Of those 28 amendments, only 11 amendments passed. This being said, only 2 percent of all the health care amendments filed actually got passed. If we look at the partisan nature of this bill, it even becomes more blatant. If we look at the Republican amendments, we come to the conclusion that there was a serious problem. Only one Republican amendment passed. So the death knell of the amendment depended upon whether it had an ``R'' or a ``D'' behind the name. The notion that we will be able to fix a bill--and again, everybody is acknowledging it is a flawed bill--on the Senate floor is pure folly. History is our greatest teacher. Instead, I respectfully suggest that what we need to do is get serious about reaching a bipartisan compromise. I have said publicly, and I will say on the Senate floor every opportunity I get, that with a sufficient amount of work, this bill can get 70 or 80 votes. We have worked on this issue on the Banking Committee for months and months, trying to understand what went wrong and how best to fix it. The American people want Members of the Senate to work together on the bill. They wonder what on Earth has come of Congress when they see us holding the exact same cloture vote on the exact same legislation day after day. They ask a simple question: Why can't you just sit down and work through these differences of opinion? I am mindful of the fact that this is probably clever messaging--a clever messaging ploy by Washington's standards. But by Nebraskan standards, we are tired of Washington cleverness and the partisan rhetoric that goes with it. I can tell you that people want a bill that will end too big to fail and protect our economy from financial meltdown. What they don't want is a bill written so broadly that it impacts businesses in segments of our economy that play no part in the economic collapse. I want these same things. I still believe we can accomplish this. My hope is that we can quit making this an issue of political gamesmanship and talking points and start working toward a solution. I have consistently stated that the issue of regulatory reform isn't a partisan exercise. The issue just doesn't cut on ``R'' or ``D'' lines. We can get a broad, bipartisan bill if we stop the attacks and focus on trying to solve the differences that still exist on this bill--important policy differences. Stop the daily cloture votes. I understand the political theater of that, but it doesn't lend itself to solving problems. What we need is a bipartisan effort, where people sit down and work through these differences of opinion. With that, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, today I wish to recognize an outstanding young Nebraskan for her spirit of community service and for her dedication to making a difference in the lives of others. Jordan Somer is currently a junior at Central High School in Omaha, NE. At Central High School, she is a member of the school's dance team and is involved in student clubs. Jordan's vision was to create a pageant for girls and women with disabilities. In 2007, she founded the Miss Amazing Pageant. Now in its fourth year, the annual pageant encourages girls and women with disabilities to develop their public speaking skills and to build a positive self- image. The Miss Amazing Pageant not only provides girls and women with disabilities with opportunities to shine, but also makes a clear difference in the community. Each participant in the Miss Amazing Pageant is asked to donate four cans of food. This food is then given to people in need. Jordan's pageant also gives back the money raised through ticket sales and silent auctions. Since 2007, Jordan's pageant has generously donated $15,000 to various community organizations. I am pleased to recognize Jordan as a winner of the National Youth Service Award for Global Youth Service Day. It was a special honor for me to nominate someone so deserving of this award. Her service and leadership through the Miss Amazing Pageant has made a difference in the lives of individuals with disabilities and in Nebraska communities. I want to express my personal congratulations to Jordan on her National Youth Service Award. I commend her for the worthy example she is setting for other young people and wish her all the best in her future endeavors.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, let me start my comments today by thanking the senior Senator from Illinois. It has been an honor to join with him on this important resolution. I rise today to pay my respects to the people of Poland, to acknowledge the great work of their President, President Lech Kaczynski, to acknowledge the death of his wife and 94 other Poles who died in the plane crash in western Russia this last Saturday, April 10. They were traveling to Katyn, Russia for a memorial service to mark the 70th anniversary of the Soviet killing of more than 20,000 Polish officers in 1940. Among the Polish leaders killed in the plane crash last Saturday were dozens of members of Parliament, revolutionary heroes from 1989, senior military commanders, and the president of the national bank. This is a terrible, heartbreaking loss, not just for Poland but for its close friend and ally, the United States. The tight bond that has been forged between Poland and this country has been one of the most welcome results of the end of the Cold War. Since the fall of communism, in which the Polish Solidarity movement played a major role, Poland has led the way in building a pro-United States free market democracy. Poland's access to NATO in 1999 has led to invaluable Polish contributions to peace and stability around our world. Polish soldiers have fought side by side with Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, including in key coalition leadership positions. We have suffered together when our troops took casualties, and today we grieve together. The foundation of our close partnership was laid by many Polish immigrants to America. Today, over 9 million Americans of Polish descent reside in the United States, including the State of Nebraska. I am very proud to be one of them. My grandparents immigrated here from Poland many decades ago. The Polish are an important part of this great country and have been since the earliest days of our Nation when they helped settle Jamestown, VA. I am very pleased to introduce this resolution along with the senior Senator from Illinois. The senior Senator may not know this, but he represents some of my relatives in Chicago, and represents them well. I joined with him and all of our colleagues in a moment of silence, as we have done today. I want to pay our respects to the Poles, both in this part of the country and across this great Nation, as well as in Poland. I also acknowledge the great contributions they have made to our country. I yield the floor.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I wish to pay tribute to a great Nebraskan and great American. Last week, we lost a visionary figure who, through years of service, made lasting contributions to our society: former University of Nebraska chancellor and later U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Clifford Hardin. I was deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Cliff Hardin. His lifetime of service both in government and academia provides a shining example of the impact one person can have. As chancellor of the University of Nebraska, Cliff was the steady hand that guided the University through a turbulent era. He was appointed to the position in 1954 at the age of 38--the youngest university president in the country at the time. His tenure at Nebraska lasted 15 years. In reading the many tributes to Cliff over the last week, I was touched by one particular story that showed his true colors. Upon learning that a rival university had plans to place Nebraska's Black football players in one hotel and the White players in a separate hotel, he refused to let the team even board the plane to go to the game. It wasn't long until the other school changed course and offered the same accommodations for all players. As Secretary of Agriculture, Cliff was a results-oriented advocate for farmers and ranchers in my home State of Nebraska and across the country. He put a premium on bipartisanship, and his distinguished record of accomplishments set a wonderful example for me during my time as Secretary of Agriculture. As Congress works this year to reauthorize child nutrition programs, his impact is still felt. It was then-Secretary Hardin who established the Food and Nutrition Service within the Department of Agriculture to administer nutrition programs. I extend my deepest condolences to the entire Hardin family. Cliff leaves behind a legacy of service and leadership. He will be missed but not forgotten.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I am proud to rise tonight and follow, first of all, Senator Sessions. He has come to the floor many times on this issue and talked about the crisis that is building in our Nation relative to the spending and the debt. He always speaks with such eloquence. I also want to say thank you to my colleague, Senator Coburn, for giving me an opportunity to come down tonight and offer a few thoughts in the time that we have. I appreciate it immensely. Senator Coburn puts himself in a very difficult situation by standing on principle because, of course, he makes himself a target of somebody who wants to say he is not caring about the people who are out there and looking for work. I know him and very much that is the opposite. But here is the point. Here is what we are facing in this Nation. We are literally getting to a stage in our history where the cascading amount of debt is like a huge snowball that now is gaining enormous momentum as it comes down the mountain. It is just growing bigger and bigger. I am going to head back home to Nebraska tomorrow. I am going to have an opportunity to get across the State. I have some--we call them community coffees but townhall meetings. I am going to talk to the people of Nebraska. I will guarantee that one of the first things on their agenda will be to raise concern about the spending and the debt they see going on here in Washington. Let me, if I might, take a moment and talk about the ethic of the State that I come from because I think it is enormously important in terms of what we are doing. I might add, I have had an opportunity as county commissioner, as city council member, a mayor, and a Governor to represent this great State. In my job as mayor of Lincoln, I was a strong mayor, so I was the guy responsible for the budget. Here is how we did it. There was only so much money that was available, and what we would do is we would put a list down, page after page, of very important priorities for the community. At some point on this list there would be a line drawn and my budget director would say to me: Mayor, if you want to go below that line and fund some of these other important priorities, you are going to have to look above that line and figure out what you can live without because it is at this line that we have to quit spending. Otherwise, our bond rating will be in jeopardy. Otherwise, the economic stability of this community will be in jeopardy. You know what. We made some very hard choices. We had some things we would have loved to have done, but we began to realize we just couldn't fit them into the budget. Then I had the good fortune of becoming the Governor of the State of Nebraska, and it didn't change anything. The Nebraska Constitution says we can only borrow $50,000. Maybe at some point in our State's history that was a handsome sum of money, but in effect what the constitution says is we cannot borrow money. While other Governors were balancing budgets by issuing bonds and debt, we did not have that alternative. I had really three choices: raise taxes, which I did not like and opposed, cut spending, or do both. And I cut spending. You could look at many places in that budget and say, well, Mike, why did you choose this versus that? And you could have a great debate about why this priority versus that priority. But in the end, what we were doing was trying to choose the priorities for our State without borrowing money, without putting our State in debt, while maintaining economic stability. I want to share that our State has fared as well as any State in the country during this very tough economic time. Our unemployment rate is about 4\1/2\ percent. We value our businesses, we create jobs, and we do not spend money we do not have. I came out here a year ago--a little more than a year ago--to join the Senate. I am as proud today as I was then to be here on the Senate floor. But here is what I will tell you: I am worried about where we are headed with this budget. You see, this $9 billion is very manageable. We want to provide unemployment insurance to the people who need it. We all do. We want to help these people. But we have a multitrillion-dollar budget here, and in effect what we are saying to the American people is that we cannot find $9 billion to offset the cost of that. We can do better than that because, if that is what we are acknowledging, that we cannot find $9 billion to offset the cost of that important priority, then, my goodness, how will we ever deal with a budget deficit that is over $1 trillion annually--annually--as far as the eye can see. I see I am running out of time, but I want to end with this thought. I had a wonderful group of schoolkids from Nebraska in today, from Superior, NE. I have been to Superior many times. It is a great community. And these kids are great kids. As I was talking about the various things that had happened here, I said something to them that I hope made the point of the need to take responsible action on this budget. I said this year I will celebrate my 60th birthday. God will not keep me on this Earth long enough to pay the debt that has been incurred. It is no consolation to Nebraskans that I go home and say to them: I have been here over a year, and I figured out who is at fault, because, you know what, they are not caring about who is at fault. They are saying: Mike, we elected you to go back there and lend your voice to try to fix these problems. It will be of no consolation for me to go home and say, well, it was the Democrats or it was the Republicans. It will be no consolation. The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Cantwell.) The Senator has used the time that has been yielded to him.

Mr. JOHANNS. I said to those kids: I will not be on Earth long enough to pay this debt. I said to them: That means that will fall to you. Do you know what I am saying to those kids? I am saying that the quality of their lives will be impacted by the fact that we could not take responsible action to deal with this debt. I would like to say to them: You will not have any more wars. But they will have their own wars to fight. They will have their own pandemics to deal with. They will have their own recessions they have to somehow fund and finance. And they will have their own challenges they will have to deal with. You know what. If we do not start coming to grips with this debt, they will not have the resources to manage their way through those challenges. You see, tonight is not about unemployment insurance. We want to help those people. Tonight is about making the statement that we have to take control of this because it is taking control of the future of those young people. I yield the floor and the remainder of my time to Senator Coburn.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business, and I would also like to lock in, if you will, that Senator Landrieu will follow me.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. I rise today to discuss the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal Identification System. Over the past several years, USDA has administered a system called the National Animal Identification System, NAIS. The ultimate goal of the system was to keep track of animal movements so that we could trace back animals in the event of a disease outbreak. The first step under animal ID was to register farms where animals are housed, also known as premises, and that registration was to occur in a database. After registering a premise, a producer could identify individual animals or groups of animals that moved to or from a premise, each given an individual ID number. This system worked for those who wanted to use it. But no one was forced to participate. In other words, it was a voluntary system. If producers wanted to participate in the program so they could keep track of an animal's movements or because a trading partner might be more inclined to buy their product, or for any reason that worked well with their operation, then it was there for them. It was at their disposal. But as long as NAIS was in existence, it was a voluntary program. Now, recently, on February 5, 2010, USDA announced it was doing away with that and developing a new framework for animal disease traceability in the United States. It caught my attention as a former Secretary of Agriculture. The Obama administration completed a series of listening sessions held by USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service--we refer to them as APHIS--and those were done just last year. Having held farm bill forums across the country as the Secretary of Agriculture, I applaud any effort to hear directly from farmers and ranchers. I applaud USDA for seeking input on NAIS. I was very appreciative that, at my request, one of those animal ID listening sessions was, in fact, held in my own home State of Nebraska. But I must admit, after the listening sessions I was very surprised at the new framework that the USDA has developed. USDA says the new program is not a mandatory program except for animals that travel to a different State from where they were born. Think about that. With that little caveat, that basically means the program is a mandatory program for a whole lot of livestock in the United States. You see, anybody who has any farm background or agricultural experience will tell you that the vast majority of animals in this country move to a different State in their lifetime. It is just simply a fact. Additionally, the program is mandatory not only for premise registration but for the actual tracking of the animal. Here is the real kicker. State governments will be tasked with keeping track of the livestock under the new system. It is almost like this administration realized how much opposition there was to a mandatory system--and, believe me, there is--and decided to hand the hot potato to the States. But in doing that, they said, thou shalt do it but keep the headache off our desks. States are genuinely and rightfully concerned about this new program potentially being dumped on them. I am already hearing from officials and producers in my home State, and they are enormously concerned by this proposal. Some groups are even urging the Nebraska Department of Agriculture, which would be tasked with administering the program, to refuse to participate. And, believe me, this is not the last State that will weigh in on this very controversial proposal. Later this week, there is a meeting of State departments of agriculture, State veterinarians, and other interested parties to further examine this issue. That is why I am on the Senate floor. I am going to be very anxious to hear their input and to hear the outcome of that meeting because there is great concern in farm country for this proposal. My hope is that conference participants can get some answers to some basic questions. Consider this: Let's say a Nebraska farmer buys a Nebraska calf with no tracking number and puts it out in a Nebraska pasture. So that is in state. That is pretty clear. No need to comply. Sometime later, after that calf has gained some weight, it is then taken to the auction barn, the sale barn. At this point, in the sale barn, there are multiple buyers from all over the country typically. There could be buyers from Nebraska and Kansas, Iowa, and other States. They are all in the arena to bid on their calves. But apparently only buyers from Nebraska could make bids even though other buyers from other States might offer more money. Let's say by chance a Nebraska feedlot is the highest bidder and buys the calf, still in state, can feed that calf out--still no need to comply with the animal ID program. But now, some months later, the steer is ready to go to the packing plant, but the plant is on the other side of the river in another State, and they will pay more than a plant instate for that animal. Wait a second. Can the feedlot owner sell to the Iowa meat processor? Apparently not because the two owners prior to him chose to not participate in the program. The bottom line: Many livestock auctions attract bidders from in state and States all over the country. So one can assume all animals sold through an auction barn will be required to have animal ID. For those who have been to these sales, can you imagine literally the auctioneer stopping the sale and saying: These animals are not registered; only Nebraska purchasers can buy the animals. If they were not ID'd, auctioneers would literally have to stop the bidding and announce where the potential seller resides for each animal without a tracking number. Then many of the buyers must sit on the sidelines, visit the bathroom, go to the vending machine, anything but bid on their calf. Can you imagine. It just doesn't make any sense. What will be the viability of the cattle operations in this country for that sale barn? What about the rancher who sells some of his cattle in state and some of it goes to facilities in other States? Will that person be required to tag some of the animals in the feedlot but not others? He or she is going to spend more time trying to figure out how to comply with the USDA program than he or she will spend ranching. Producers are basically going to be forced to fully participate in the program. I think the USDA knows it. If a potential buyer is from another State, there can be no deal unless the animal has the tracking number. This looks like a backdoor mandate that is being packaged as something else. Worse yet, the package is being delivered and dropped on the doorstep of our States. Let's face facts. This so-called new animal ID plan is a mandatory system, when it was promoted as a voluntary one. In my judgment, to be blunt, this is a wolf in sheep's clothing, but America's farmers and ranchers are not going to be fooled. They know better than anyone that the vast majority of agricultural commerce occurs across State lines and even country to country. They deserve better. Let me be clear. I did not come here to be critical of the fact that USDA is considering new approaches. In fact, I acknowledge that when I was the Secretary, I called a timeout to fully understand the complexities of the animal ID and to hear from producers. I openly said: I am considering making this a mandatory program. I thought a mandatory approach might be necessary, and we listened and studied it very closely. Then we went to the countryside. We listened to farmers and ranchers. What we heard overwhelmingly is: Mike, do not make this a mandatory program. We realized that producers already comply with a laundry list of Federal regulations. In this administration, it grows by the day. They take numerous steps to ensure the safety of their animals. That is their livelihood. Mandating an animal identification system would have been one more costly burden dictated on the rancher by the Federal Government. I appeal to my friend Secretary Vilsack. We were Governors together. I know where you are coming from. I went down that road too. I can tell you, Mr. Secretary, it is a dead end. On one hand, USDA has acknowledged the broad and deep opposition in the countryside when the administration seemed to say: We are going to go forward anyway. Our producers themselves have spent years trying to understand what NAIS is about. There is no repackaging that will convince them another Federal mandate is a good idea. Does this administration think States will embrace this hot potato with all the costs and the unanswered questions that go with it? I don't see it. The old NAIS system was not perfect. We always acknowledged that. This is hugely complicated. But calling it voluntary and then leaving producers no real choice is far from perfect, and, most importantly, it is not a solution. I urge the USDA to reconsider. I yield the floor.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I rise to offer a resolution supporting increased access for U.S. beef and beef products to the country of Japan. Let me step back and set the stage for this resolution. On December 23, 2003, one cow was discovered in the United States with BSE, the disease sometimes referred to in a kind of slang way as ``mad cow disease.'' Even though that animal was actually born in Canada, the reaction of our trading partners around the world was swift and devastating. Almost immediately, Japan and other countries closed their markets to U.S. beef. Virtually with the snap of a finger, we lost over 90 percent of our export market. It just disappeared. At the time, Japan was the largest export market for U.S. beef. It had a value to our producers of $1.4 billion. We began work to address BSE in this country dating all the way back to 1988, when the Department of Agriculture established a BSE committee to make recommendations on appropriate regulatory controls. Our government has developed and implemented a multilayered system of interlocking safeguards to ensure the safety of American beef. After the 2003 BSE discovery, we added even more safeguards. These efforts by our government, in coordination with U.S. cattle producers, have paid off. A 2006 study by USDA found that BSE was virtually nonexistent among the 40 million adult cattle in our country. Again in 2007, the World Organization for Animal Health, the internationally recognized standard-setting body, also known as OIE, classified the United States as a ``controlled risk'' country for BSE. This classification simply means that because of the expansive system of safeguards that are in place, U.S. beef is safe for export and for consumption. Interestingly enough, that is the identical classification the OIE gave to Japan just last year. So as Japan asked their trading partners to treat them fairly under OIE standards, we are asking them to reopen their market for our beef. Seven years have passed. We have proven, time and again, the effectiveness of our safety system. The Japanese still restrict most U.S. beef products. Japan's actions are not consistent with fair trading practices, nor with the U.S. treatment of Japan's imports. That is why I agreed to meet last week with the Japanese Ambassador to discuss this matter. I asked the Ambassador: What would happen if the United States said it doesn't want any more car parts from Japan until they can assure us that there are absolutely no defects? That is essentially what it has done to our beef industry. If we in the United States said we would never do anything in response to the current Toyota situation that they have not already done to us, that would not be a good deal for Japan when it comes to exports. Their treatment of our beef has cost our Nation's beef industry billions of dollars and has been economically devastating to States such as mine, the State of Nebraska. If we treated their products the same way, it would be equally as devastating to Japan because we are a major importer of Japanese goods. Over the last 6 years, the United States has purchased, on average, over $132 billion in Japanese goods annually. In 2009 alone, even in the midst of a global economic downturn, the United States purchased $95.9 billion of products from Japan. Cars led the way. We purchased $31.5 billion in vehicles and parts. Beyond that, we bought $19.5 billion in nuclear reactors, machinery, and parts. Just over $15 billion worth of electronics we bought from Japan, another $5 billion in optic, photo, medical or surgical instruments, and dozens and dozens of other products that add up to another $25 billion. I wish to make something clear. I am not advocating that the United States close its borders to Japan's products. Japan is a valued friend. But what I do say I say directly and with the resolution: Sanctions on our beef do not represent the act of a friend nor that of a fair trading partner. There is simply no scientific justification for their restrictions, none whatsoever, a point my friends from Japan cannot deny. Quite honestly, Japan's standard of accepting only beef from cattle aged 20 months and younger was pulled out of thin air. It is nothing more than an economic sanction. I have been dealing with this issue for nearly 7 years, first as the Governor of Nebraska, then as our Agriculture Secretary, and now as a Senator. My confirmation hearing before this body to become Secretary of Agriculture was dominated by one topic: Opening Japan's borders to our beef. I come forward to offer this sense-of-the-Senate resolution. The resolution does not say we want to keep Japanese products out of the United States. It is in the interest of neither the United States nor Japan to arbitrarily restrict market access for friends and close partners. We are both with Japan. Trade between the United States and Japan should be conducted with mutual respect and based on sound science, something we haven't seen from Japan in this area in the last 7 years. My resolution does say that both Japan and the United States should comply with science-based standards. It also states the Obama administration should insist on increased access for U.S. beef and beef products to Japan. Very simply, it is time for fair treatment from our friends in Japan. I will continue to press this issue. I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting a resolution that basically says trade should be fair.

Mr. JOHANNS

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

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. If my colleagues will permit, let me offer a few closing thoughts. I so appreciate the opportunity to be on the floor with them. It was not that long ago that our President of the United States actually was a Member of this body. He was a Member of the Senate. It just seems, from time to time, we are asked to comment on the 60-vote rule. He was asked to comment on that. Here is what he said. ``Removing the 60-vote threshold would change the character of the Senate forever.'' He went on to say having majoritarian absolute power on either side was ``not what the Founders intended.'' The thing about reconciliation is this: It limits debate, it is a very abbreviated process, and it just comes in and says you are only going to get 20 hours of debate. Very limited. The second thing is it only takes a majority vote. From time to time this issue pops up. But you do not have to study the history of this great Nation very long to understand what our Founders were doing. The House is a majority body. Now, States such as Kansas and Nebraska do not fare very well in that. We do not have a lot of Members. We are never going to have as many Members as California, New York, or New Jersey. So literally on every vote you could find yourself losing. Our Founders understood that. They came up with an idea for a very unique body, a body that would be an equalizer. Every State got two. Every State got two Members. But the important thing about this body was this: that as issues were passed on the House side by majority vote, over on this side it was anticipated that something more would be required to cause the Members to come together and try to work through the Nation's difficult problems. Initially there was no way to stop debate. Then about 1915 it was decided that a two-thirds vote would stop debate. Then, in the mid- 1970s that was changed to 60 votes. That 60 votes is an important limitation on the power of the Federal Government to impose its will upon the people. I will wrap up my comments today by saying this: The will of the people here is very clear. They do not want this bill. They see this as a massive government takeover of their lives. They have spoken very clearly and eloquently in our townhall meetings, in elections that have occurred, and they have said: We want you to go back and work through your differences and come up with a bipartisan approach. Yet if reconciliation is used, you will not only change the character of this body, you will change how our government operates. If you can pass this bill through a reconciliation process, you can do anything, and you end up with literally a system that is vastly different than was ever intended and a system, in my judgment, that is not good for the future of our great Nation. With that, let me wrap up and say again to my colleagues, I appreciate the opportunity to be on the Senate floor with you today. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Burris.) The clerk will call the roll.

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I rise to speak to the Senate health care bill and to talk a little bit about some of the issues related to that bill, in terms of financing and scoring and, to be very candid, about some of the accounting gimmicks that try to hold this bill together. I will be joined by Senator Wicker and Senator Barrasso in this colloquy. Let me get started. If you start to study the bill, and for many of us who have served in other capacities--myself as Governor and as a mayor--the first thing you want to do is ask yourself: Does it work? Is the financing of this bill such that it makes sense? Is it an honest portrayal of the income you expect and the expenses you expect? Certainly, that is where I start and, I suggest, many of my colleagues start. The one thing about this health care bill that struck me immediately and struck others is, first of all, there are 10 years of tax increases. They total over $\1/2\ trillion--a massive amount of tax increases. The second thing you see is, there are 10 years of Medicare cuts, again about $\1/2\ trillion total. You do those things and some other things and it pays for 6 years of spending because even though some of the issues relative to this health care bill kick in initially, the vast majority of it does not kick in for 3 or 4 years. When you put that all back together, you begin to realize what you have is a health care bill that costs about $2.5 trillion over a 10- year score. Then you start working through a whole bunch of other issues. You have a Senate bill that takes $52 billion in higher Social Security taxes and revenues and counts them as offsets. That would be money normally reserved for the Social Security trust fund. You look at the CLASS Act. One Member of this body--a Member who is very respected for what he has done relative to budgeting--called this a Ponzi scheme. The CLASS Act was initially opposed by our friends on the other side or by leading Democrats. But it is back alive. It is included in the Senate bill. It is another Federal entitlement that is going to create an insolvency problem very quickly. It takes money from premiums that are supposed to go for benefits and uses them as offsets and pay-fors. CMS experts have looked at this, and they reached a conclusion that is reliable. They said the CLASS Act faces ``a significant risk of failure,'' and then said, and may lead to ``an insurance death spiral.'' Our friends on the other side claim the bill will simultaneously extend the solvency of Medicare and then magically decrease the deficit. But the reality of that, again, comes from CMS actuaries who say: Well, wait a second here, that is double-counting. You can't use the same dollar twice. You can't count it twice. CMS concludes that the Medicare cuts in the legislation cannot be simultaneously used to finance other Federal outlays, such as coverage expansions under this bill or to extend the trust fund. So when you cut all the way through this and see what is happening here, it doesn't hold together. This is a financial plan that is built upon sand, and you can almost guarantee it is going to collapse. So let me, if I might, ask my colleague, Senator Wicker, what he thinks of all of this. Can he offer some thoughts as to where this bill is headed and the financial mechanisms of this bill?

Mr. JOHANNS. This is exactly what I am hearing at home in Nebraska, Mr. President. As a former Governor, as the Senator from Wyoming points out, you deal with these programs every day. You are trying to figure out how to fashion a State budget that deals with Medicaid. I said a few weeks ago that I don't know whom the folks who wrote this bill were talking to because if you look at the expansion of health care to people in this bill, really what they are doing is expanding Medicaid by about 15 to 18 million individuals. The Senator from Wyoming hit the nail on the head. You already have serious access problems with Medicaid. What do I mean by that? As the doctor, Senator Barrasso, said, doctors cannot practice on the Medicaid reimbursement. They would literally go broke. Our little hospitals in all of our States, our critical access hospitals, would say: We cannot keep our doors open on Medicaid reimbursement. They can't do it on Medicaid or Medicare reimbursement. So what is the solution? Well, the solution certainly isn't adding 15 to 18 million more people who will walk into a hospital or a doctor's office and who will hear: Sorry, we don't take Medicaid patients because we can't afford to do that. The other thing I want to mention, if I might--and then I am going to ask Senator Wicker to comment on some of these questions also--because this is a very important point, is that all of a sudden we are starting to hear a lot of discussion from the White House on down about how we have to get a handle on cost. And I think they have communicated that well because, quite honestly, the American people get it. They understand that if you don't have an impact on cost, you are not going to get anywhere with health care reform. My colleagues will remember that we sent a letter to the CMS Actuary--this is an actuary employed by the Federal Government--and we said: Take a look at this bill and tell us what you think in these respects, and one of the respects was health care costs. Let me quote from that report: Overall health expenditures under this bill would increase by an estimated total of $222 billion. Compared to what? Compared to doing nothing. If we did nothing, we would have a better impact on health care costs than this bill is going to have. After spending $2.5 trillion, after cutting $\1/2\ trillion out of Medicare, after raising taxes over $\1/2\ trillion, the CMS Actuary says to us: After you have done all those things, the overall health expenditures under this bill would increase by an estimated total of $222 billion versus doing nothing. I ask Senator Wicker, is that the kind of health care reform he is hearing the people back home want?

Mr. JOHANNS. I believe the Senator is correct. Let me offer a thought, if I might. I think others--maybe I will turn to Senator Brownback next. If this were a great bill, if this were the kind of legislation you wanted to take home and go out there and champion and maybe, if you are up for election, campaign on, then you would not have to go through all these gyrations and gimmicks and somersaults and cartwheels to try to get this darn thing passed. But that is exactly what is happening. I cannot wait to get up in the morning and run down and turn on the computer and see what the latest is, because they are, over there at the House, but they finally figured out that the only way to get this terrible policy enacted is to pass the Senate bill with all its warts and moles and ugliness and special deals and whatever. They have to pass it without pulling a dotted ``i'' out or a crossed ``t.'' They may be able to say back home: Folks, I didn't support that. What I wanted was the reconciliation package that would fix all these things. All I can say is reconciliation was never designed for this. This is not what reconciliation was designed for. Reconciliation was designed to bring down the budget deficit. What is happening over in the Senate are more somersaults, more gyrations, more cartwheels to figure out how to shoehorn this terrible piece of policy into a rule for which it was never designed. Now you are going to end up this day, I guess, where we all show up and literally you have rulings on what you can do with reconciliation and what you cannot do. So no House Member can go home and say I voted for this awful piece of legislation, but we are going to be saved by reconciliation. Do you know what. Maybe you will, maybe you won't. The reason why that question cannot be answered today is because reconciliation was never designed to take control of one-sixth of the economy; it was never designed to do what folks are trying to do. Let me wrap up with this, and then I would like to hear Senator Brownback's thoughts. Enough of the somersaults, enough of the cartwheels, enough of trying to figure out how many angels fit on a pin and what size razorblade is going to divide the hair. This is craziness. This is terrible policy. Please stop now. The country is begging us to stop and start over with a thoughtful process. If there were a great bill, we would not be going through this. There would be bipartisan support such as there has been on many tough issues through the decades of our history. But, you see, this is not a good bill. This is a terrible bill. The bottom line is, they are going to try to fix it with a process that was never designed for this purpose. I would like to hear the thoughts of Senator Brownback.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I rise today to speak for about 10 minutes about the health care debate that continues to be in front of us. For much of our country, the health care debate has been a long and confusing trail. As details have emerged over the last weeks and months, constituents ask me: What is going to happen to my health care? Will I be able to continue to see the doctor I have always seen? They heard both sides argue the merits and the detriments of various pieces of legislation. Citizens are understandably skeptical and perplexed by the debate that has transpired. One of the things I suggest that is very clear, one situation that is clear as a matter of policy and conscience is that Americans are against the Federal funding of abortion, whether they support or oppose the bill. Unfortunately, the Senate-passed health care bill allows taxpayer funds to fund abortion. The current Senate language says people who receive a new government subsidy could enroll in an insurance plan that covers abortion. Nothing would stop them from doing that. Some say: Yes, but States could opt out. What I point out is that in those States that opt out, the taxpayers would still see their tax dollars funding elective abortions in other States. Additionally, the Office of Personnel Management can provide access to two multistate plans in each State, and only one of them would exclude abortions. OPM's current health care program, the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, now prohibits any plans--any plans-- that cover elective abortion. For the first time, a federally funded and managed health care plan will cover elective abortions. Those who have looked at this language have said very clearly that it is woefully inadequate. I say that. It does not apply a decades-old policy--an agreement really--that was reached many years ago that was embodied in the Hyde amendment. The Hyde language bars Federal funding for abortion except in the cases of rape and incest or where the life of the mother is at stake. The public has clearly rejected advancing the abortion agenda under the guise of health care reform. Yet as we have seen the language of the Senate bill proceed, it seems very clear my colleagues are refusing to listen. They seem bent on forcing this very unpopular bill upon us via a rather arcane process called reconciliation. The important point to be made today is this: Reconciliation will not allow us to fix the egregious abortion language. This is not the first time I have come to the floor to speak about this issue. Last November, I came here to urge pro-life Senators to vote no on cloture if they wanted any chance to address the Federal funding of abortion in the Senate bill. I said then that if the language was not fixed before the debate began, there would be no way to fix it. We would not have any leverage to fix it. I wish I were here on the floor today to say that I was wrong about that. Unfortunately, though, I was not wrong. Unfortunately, when an amendment was offered to match the Stupak language in the House bill with the Senate bill, only 45 Senators supported it. The sad reality is that this Senate, as a matter of the majority, is not a pro-life body. There are not 60 Senators who are willing to vote for that. Back in November, some of my colleagues disagreed with my assessment. There was a big debate. They said: Whoa, wait a second. We can fix this provision via an amendment, they said. But they were wrong. When the dust settled, we were left with a Senate bill that allows Federal funding of abortion. The House is now being asked to vote on the Senate bill. You see, that is going to be the pathway: vote on the Senate bill so any fix on other provisions can come through a reconciliation sidecar. According to the National Right to Life committee, the Senate bill is--and I am quoting their language--``the most pro-abortion single piece of legislation that has ever come to the House floor for a vote since Roe v. Wade.'' They go on to warn: Any House Member who votes for the Senate health bill is casting a career-defining pro-abortion vote. There is talk that Democratic leaders might try to appease pro-life House Members by promising to change the Senate bill through a separate bill or the reconciliation sidecar I mentioned. I urge pro-life supporters and pro-life House Members to think through this very carefully. Don't be fooled. Don't be lulled into thinking there are 60 votes in the Senate that will somehow rescue this situation. There are not. You do not have to take my word for it. It is in black and white in the Congressional Record. It is the same situation we faced in November. The Senate specifically rejected the amendment that would have blocked Federal funding for abortion. Nothing--nothing--has changed to suggest the Senate would have anywhere near 60 votes to support it now. It was recently reported that some in the pro-life community support adding pro-life language in the reconciliation sidecar or maybe in a separate bill with the hope and the promise that somehow the Senate will swoop in and waive the rules and keep that language there. Let me be abundantly clear. As much as I might want that to happen, it will not happen here, as demonstrated by November's vote. If the Senate rejects it again, the language in the Senate bill would become law. Current law would be reversed, and taxpayer dollars would, in fact, fund abortions. There was recently a column in the Washington Post. It issued a warning to pro-life Democrats to be wary of this strategy. I am quoting again: The only way they can ensure that the abortion language and other provisions they oppose are eliminated is to reject reconciliation entirely--and demand that the House and Senate start over with clean legislation. I come to the Senate floor again to encourage my pro-life colleagues in the House to recognize the reality in the Senate. I tell them what they know already, and that is that many innocent lives are depending on their courage. This issue should not be an issue of political gamesmanship, especially when the game is so rigged against pro-lifers. This is an issue of conscience. On this one, you are pro-life or you are not. Agreeing to a strategy that is guaranteed to fail, one that has failed already in this health care debate in November, in my judgment, is not leadership at all. It is surrendering your values. I leave the floor today, and I pray that my House colleagues will have the wisdom to understand this in their decisionmaking. I yield the floor.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Madam President, I rise today to speak about the same topic the last Senator spoke about. Let me, if I might, start my comments today by complimenting Senator Sessions. I look at that graph that was just up and the one thing it points out to me in very vivid detail is that spiraling cost, that straight-up cost, is only to pay the interest. It does not even start to pay down the principal. I stand here today before offering some comments about this further, thinking how much we would unleash the potential of this country if we just sent a signal that we were getting serious about our spending, our debt load, and we were intent on addressing that. That is what brings me to the floor of the Senate today. I rise today to speak against raising the debt ceiling. This is a decision that should not be taken lightly. No one in this body should take this decision lightly. It is a serious matter, enormously serious. Our country has debt, and it is important that we start to deal with these commitments and the spending that is just out of control. Ralph Waldo Emerson once said: ``Pay every debt as if God wrote the bill.'' Yet I could not support increasing the amount that the Treasury can borrow by $1.9 trillion--it is the largest increase ever contemplated--in the current environment of spending the people's money as if it meant nothing. You see, what is missing for me, to get to a point where you could raise the debt ceiling, is a commitment, a plan, a serious plan, a roadmap on how we get our spending under control. The orchestra, sadly, continues to play oblivious to our government barreling down on this entitlement-and-spending iceberg which is coming our way. There is just no doubt about it. If this increase passes, the debt limit will have increased about 35 percent in the last year. Think about that: 35 percent in the last year. We are not talking about a few million dollars or billion dollars. We are talking about trillions of dollars. Let me repeat that. Since this administration took the reins, our debt ceiling will have increased by over one-third. We as parents teach our children, we say: Money doesn't grow on trees. How many times did I tell my kids that? But it seems as if the U.S. Government has missed this sage lesson. The latest proposed increase is undoubtedly the largest increase in history, more than double the previous record of $984 billion. Since arriving here I have consistently argued for setting priorities and against wasteful spending. I would like to say again, and I have said this on the Senate floor, as my time as Governor of Nebraska went on I realized there were no easy choices in balancing the budget, but we had a constitutional mandate to balance the budget back home in Nebraska. What is more, our State constitution prohibited us from borrowing money. What did that mean? I couldn't balance the budget by issuing debt. This whole idea of the Federal Government issuing more and more debt was a foreign concept back home. When I came out here to join the President's Cabinet, I did not have to turn to the last Governor and say: I am sorry about all that debt I took on for the State. There is no debt in Nebraska. We pay our bills. Since arriving here, though, I have begun to realize this government tries to be all things to all people every day and all day. The U.S. Government simply cannot continue on that path. We believe back home that less government is better government. Many of my colleagues would probably come to the floor and stand and disagree with that. They may believe that you have to literally spend your way out of these problems, you have to spend your way to wealth. But there is nothing in our heritage that would lead me to the conclusion that is the right approach. Even if you disagree, we can have a respectful debate. I am hard pressed to find anyone, though, who would argue with the reality of the numbers. I used to tell my cabinet when I was Governor, when we were dealing with tough budget issues: Look, folks, this is not magic; it is math. And the numbers do not lie. The numbers tell us that the Nation's fiscal course is not sustainable. By the end of this year, our debt held by the public will be more than 60 percent of the gross domestic product. Think about this. Among internationally recognized economic thresholds, 60 percent is generally known as the tipping point toward an unsustainable nation. The European Union actually treats it that way. You cannot even be a member of the European Union if your debt exceeds 60 percent of your gross domestic product. Think about this. This great Nation would not be eligible to join the European Union. Looking down the road, within 10 years our publicly held debt will approach the 90-percent mark. You see, once that snowball gets going down that mountain, good luck of ever stopping the avalanche. We will not be able to catch up with this runaway debt if we do not start dealing with it now. We are, in my judgment, on the verge of a vicious cycle that requires more taxes, more debt to be taken on by American families and sent overseas to foreign creditors. If we allow our country to slip into this cycle--and we are dangerously close to it now--then that shining city on the hill former President Reagan would often speak about is more dim, if not dark. Instead of voting to increase the debt limit and simply kicking the fiscal can down the road, we need, first, to devise some concrete interventions. Unfortunately, the President's 2010 budget proposes a $1 trillion deficit, on average, for each of the next 10 years. With that vision, debt limit increases are going to be very commonplace around here. The cost of bearing such debt will swallow up our Nation's resources. It will diminish productivity. I know the temptation is great--I saw it last night in the President's speech. I say this very respectfully--the temptation is great to say, you know, folks, these are the last guy's problems. This is the problem I created. All I can say is this: What that reminds me of would be like me becoming the mayor of Lincoln--and I served two terms as mayor there--and this time of the year, you have terrible pothole problems. It would be like me saying: Those potholes there were caused by the last guy. I will fix the ones that arose during my tenure. I think what the American people are asking us to do is to start working together to solve the problems. But, unfortunately, these are not just potholes in the road of our Nation's history, these are massive problems that are going to seriously impact our children and grandchildren and bring down their quality of life. I yield the floor.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Madam President, I rise today to speak in support of a pending amendment. This amendment is called the Erasing Our National Debt Through Accountability and Responsibility Plan. I wish to start out today by saying I am very proud to be a cosponsor of what I consider to be a very commonsense amendment. The Troubled Asset Relief Program, known as TARP, was enacted in the fall of 2008 for the U.S. Treasury to buy toxic assets, primarily mortgage-backed securities. It was sold to Congress as having a sole purpose of getting bad assets out of the market. It was sold as an idea of stabilizing the economy. At the time this was sold, this was it. This is what we told people this was going to do. Supposedly, it was going to be a one-time, very narrowly focused program during a time of the worst economic crisis we had seen in decades. Lawmakers at that time were warned that if we do not act now, if we do not take this action, the failure to act is going to be devastating. Yet Washington, after it got approval of this plan, almost immediately threw out the original game plan. Money was not used to buy those troubled assets. Instead, it was given to large banks with very few strings attached. The government hoped banks would generate small business loans, and would send the money out to allow people to do auto loans and mortgage loans. That simply did not happen. There is plenty of finger-pointing going on as to why that did not happen, but the bottom line is that consumers were left to battle the credit crunch alone, and they felt abandoned in their fight. What did Washington expect when it gave away practically free money? From the get-go, the TARP rule book was simply tossed out the window. Since then, TARP has morphed in so many ways that most people cannot even remember, cannot even think about its original purpose. The American people have unquestionably lost faith in the $700- billion taxpayer-funded boondoggle. They expected it to get the economy up and lending. Now they feel duped, and I do not blame them. Instead of jump-starting lending in the economy, what this has turned into is a revolving slush fund for unrelated spending projects. It just goes on and on. Let me run through a sample of what TARP has been used to fund: No. 1, buy General Motors. Who knew that the U.S. Government would spend about $50 billion of TARP buying not only an ownership interest in General Motors but a controlling interest? Back home in Nebraska, when I have talked to Nebraska citizens about this, I say to them: If I had come out during my campaign and suggested that the President of the United States would literally over a weekend have the ability to buy General Motors without any kind of congressional approval, no one--no one--would have believed me. Yet that is exactly what happened. No. 2, there is a plan called cash for caulkers. We all know about that plan. No. 3, the House passed a second stimulus--$150 billion in TARP to fund more unrelated spending. Let me give a few examples: $800 million for Amtrak; $65 million for housing vouchers; $500 million for summer youth employment; $300 million for a college work study program. No. 4, the doc fix--$\1/4\ trillion in TARP that will never be paid back, an immediate loss to the taxpayers. No. 5, off-budget highway funding. I could go on and on. The list just does not end. The projects being funded out of this now new slush fund do not seem to have an ending point. Some of these projects might be quite meritorious. One might look at them and say: Gosh, in the normal budgetary process, I would want to be a part of voting for those projects. I might support some of them in the normal budgeting process but not through some no accountability slush fund. TARP has spiraled out of control, and it needs to end today-- immediately. TARP was never intended to finance a wide array of spending programs where the taxpayer literally was going to be the loser. We must find a way to pay for government spending, not try to disguise it in TARP. I am asking my colleagues to adopt the Thune amendment and end the no-accountability TARP slush fund. This amendment would immediately stop the Treasury Department from spending more from the TARP funds. It would repeal the administration's ill-advised extension of TARP through October 2010. It would require TARP repayments to reduce our national debt. There would be no clever statutory interpretations to get around the debt reduction requirement. A payment comes in, the debt ceiling goes down. No more reckless spending. No more Russian roulette with taxpayers' money. Not only is this common sense, but it is good fiscal sense, and it is the right thing to do. One thing is absolutely obvious: Taxpayers are asking us to work together to get deficit spending under control, to find solutions to problems that trouble this great Nation. This amendment, in my judgment, is absolutely the first step, a good start to get a handle on out-of-control spending, to start restoring faith with the American people. If TARP is ended, we show the American people that we are listening and that Congress is, in fact, serious about protecting taxpayers' money. Madam President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Thank you. I yield to the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. JOHANNS. Madam President, I appreciate the courtesy extended by the Senator from Oklahoma. I ask unanimous consent that the pending substitute amendment be modified to delete the following special carve-outs: eliminating or reducing the Medicaid unfunded mandate on Nebraska, Vermont, Massachusetts; exempting certain health insurance companies in Nebraska and Michigan from taxes and fees; providing automatic Medicare coverage for anyone in Libby, MT; earmarking $100 million for a health care facility, reportedly, in Connecticut; giving special treatment to Hawaii's disproportionate share of hospitals; boosting reimbursement rates for certain hospitals in Michigan and Connecticut; and mandating special treatment for hospitals in frontier States such as Montana, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Wyoming.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. If I may jump in here, probably like every Senator here, I read the newspapers back home every morning as I start my day. There was an editorial in the Lincoln Journal Star on December 21 that speaks to this issue of special deals. I thought it was excellent. The Lincoln Journal Star has covered me for a long time. Sometimes I agree with them, sometimes I do not. Sometimes they agree with me, sometimes they do not. But I have always respected the work they do. Here is what they said in their editorial: Since when has Nebraska become synonymous for cynical ``what's in it for me''-type politics? The term ``Cornhusker kickback'' is already a favorite of television's talking heads. They go on to say: That's how the rest of the country sees [this] deal. The editorial continues: Under its provisions, the federal government would pay all additional Medicaid costs for Nebraska ``in perpetuity.'' The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the deal may be worth $100 million over 10 years. They go on to say I think in very powerful language: The deal is the embodiment of what is wrong in Washington. Instead of thoughtful, careful work on real problems, Washington lawmakers cobble together special deals, dubious financial accounting and experimentation on a grandiose scale. They devote a paragraph to the many special deals cut, and the Senator's chart illustrates one.

Mr. JOHANNS. If I may finish, I say to Senator McCain, and then you can ask me. They say this: It's time to push the reset button on health care reform. The effort has gone awry.

Mr. JOHANNS. It doesn't go over. It just simply doesn't. In every way possible, over the last 4 or 5 days, I have been asked: Do you support this special deal for Nebraska? I don't. I think it is wrong. I could read through all the special deals because we have all got the list--it is Florida, Louisiana, and Montana, and on and on and on. But I came to the floor this morning and I asked unanimous consent that all the special deals be taken out, and I listed a long list of them. Of course, there was an objection to that request for unanimous consent. Why? Why would we want to try to pass legislation with all of this? It makes no sense to me. But let me take a step back. We all remember a few months ago there was a big story that Nevada was going to get a special Medicaid deal. It was right about that time that we took a few days off. I went back home, and I did townhall meetings, as I have done for years and years and years. But we really invested time and effort, and we identified six principles of health care which are on my Web site for people to look at. I literally had a PowerPoint presentation. I did four townhall meetings--Carnie, Grand Island, Lexington, and Lincoln. I put up these principles. One of the principles was no carve-out. No backroom deals. No special deals. I presented that to the people who were at those townhall meetings. I did tons of interviews. I explained why I felt the way I did. People were so irate at the possibility that Nevada was going to get this special deal. Since then, I think that has fallen by the wayside, but all these other things have come along. That is why I read the Lincoln Journal Star editorial. This is an editorial page that sometimes likes what I am doing and sometimes it does not. Over the years, they have not hesitated to take me to task. They looked at this and they said: Since when has Nebraska become synonymous for cynical ``what's in it for me''-type politics? They said it is time to hit the reset button. We are not getting this right at all. We simply aren't getting it right. They talked about the issues of cost containment, they talked about the Actuary's report, which I had spent a little time talking to them about, and other folks around the State. After looking at all of that, they just said: Look, this isn't going the way it needs to go for the American people. Here is what I would say to all of my colleagues in the Senate. I love my State. I love the people there. They are such honest, decent people. In many parts of our State, people believe you seal a contract not by putting things in writing but by shaking hands and giving your word. They don't want this kind of attention. They don't want to be on the evening news every night with the talking heads talking about the ``cornhusker kickback'' or whatever the latest terminology is. They just want to be treated fairly. They asked me to come here and represent them as fervently as I can, to try to do all I can to get fair treatment for them. But not a single person at any townhall I have ever had stood up and said: Mike, I disagree with that principle. I want you to go back there and give me a special deal or get our State a special deal. So I appreciate Senator McCain asking me the question. I feel very strongly about this. I wish the other side would consider my request for a unanimous consent agreement that just says: Time out, everybody. Let's pull out the special deals, whether it is Nebraska or Montana or whatever. It doesn't matter to me. Let's pull those out and let's take a step back and let's work for what Senator Risch talks about and the rest of us have talked about. We can get 80 votes on a health care reform bill. I guarantee you. But not on this bill.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, let me start my comments today by complimenting the Senator from Texas. I thought he did an excellent job of shining the light on something that is now gathering a lot of attention because the managers' amendment is out and we can read the words and we can start to understand the special deals that were cut to get the votes to make this happen. I applaud the Senator for standing here so courageously. My State, the great State of Nebraska, has been pulled into the debate. I want to start out today by saying here on this Senate floor that I am enormously proud of my State, probably like all Senators in reference to their State. I am enormously proud of the people of Nebraska. I have gotten to know them well. I was their Governor. On a more localized basis, I was also the mayor of Lincoln. I date my time in public service back to the time when I was Lancaster County commissioner and a city council member in Lincoln. These are good, decent, honorable people who are always looking to try to figure out the right way of doing things. I stand here today to acknowledge that and to tell all Nebraskans how proud I am to be here today. But I rise today to share with my colleagues the reactions of Nebraskans to the special deal that got cut for Nebraska that came to light over the weekend as the managers' amendment was released and analyzed. Less than 24 hours after the announcement of the special carve-out for Nebraska, with virtually no warning, no preparation to speak of, 2,000 people gathered in Omaha, NE, Nebraskans who, in one voice, cried foul. Nebraskans are frustrated and angry that our beloved State has been thrust into the same pot with all of the other special deals that get cut here. In fact, they are outraged that a backroom deal for our State might have been what puts this bill across the finish line. You see, I fundamentally believe that if this health care bill is so good, it should stand on its own merits. There should be no special deals, no carve-outs for anyone in this health care bill--not for States, not for insurance companies, and not for individual Senators. I stand here today and I find it is enormously ironic that advocates for this bill, who worked overtime to vilify insurance companies, in the last hours of putting this bill together struck a special deal with two insurance companies in Omaha, NE, that they would be carved out of their responsibility in this bill to pay taxes. I find it painful to even acknowledge that happened. I said at the beginning of this debate that changes of this magnitude, affecting one-sixth of our economy, must be fair and they must be believed to be fair by the people. The special deal for Nevada was wrong. I said that. In fact, one of the six reform principles I publicly outlined and took out to townhall meetings I stand by today. It simply said: No special deals. The special deal for Nevada was wrong, as is the carve-out for Louisiana. And the same applies for the backroom deal that was struck for my State, the great State of Nebraska. All of the special deals should be removed from this legislation. If this bill cannot pass without the carve-outs and the special deals, what further evidence could we possibly need to draw the conclusion that this is enormously bad policy? If you literally had to sit down in the last hours of negotiations and strike a special deal, do we need any other argument about how bad the policy of this bill is for my State and the citizens of Nebraska? Our Governor said it well: Nebraskans don't want a special deal. You see, I went around the State for months doing townhalls and listening to Nebraskans. They do not want a special deal. No Nebraskan came up to me and said: Mike, give me a special deal. You see, their request is simple: They want to be able to see the doctor of their choice and to keep the current plan they have. They want our job creators, our small businesses, to get our economy moving and create jobs in our communities from large to small, free of the $\1/2\ trillion in taxes and fees this bill will keep on our employers. The managers' amendment does nothing to change the core problems with this bill. The nearly $500 billion in Medicare cuts will be devastating to Nebraska. No special deal with an insurance company is going to make Nebraskans feel better about that. No special deal to make the State budget look better is going to make Nebraskans feel any better about the Medicare cuts and the impacts on our hospitals, our nursing homes, our home health care industry, and our hospice industry. Nationally, Governors--Republicans and Democrats--have stepped forward to say they cannot afford the unfunded mandates that come from Washington and drive their budgets into the red. The special deal struck on abortion is enormously tragic and insufficient. It breaks my heart. This is a far cry from the 30 years of policy by this U.S. Government. You see, when this is done and over, what we will be reporting to our citizens is that taxpayer funds will fund abortions if this bill passes. You see, no watered-down accounting gimmick will convince the pro-life community in my State otherwise. In fact, they have publicly said they feel betrayed. I will wrap up with this. This bad deal is not sealed. There is time for truly pro-life Senators to stand tall and say no. There is still time for principled Senators to reject the carve-outs and to cast aside the bad backroom deals. There is still time for Senators to listen to the people and reject reckless Federal policy. Fair treatment is not too much to ask of Washington. I know in my State, that is what they are asking for. I will firmly stand behind any Senator who has the courage to stop this train wreck. I will be the first to lead the applause. I am confident that the standing ovation for that courageous Senator will extend all the way back to Nebraska and it will be deafening. I yield the floor.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. I do have some things I wish to add to this debate. I have gone across the State. I have talked to hospital administrators and I always ask them the same question: If you had to keep your hospital open on Medicaid reimbursement, could you do that? With no exceptions whatsoever, from the largest to the smallest hospitals, they say, Mike, we would go broke because the Medicaid reimbursement is so bad. No question about it, that is bad news for the hospitals. But ask any Governor. It doesn't matter if they are a Democrat or a Republican--and the senior Senator from Tennessee is so right, nothing would irritate Governors more, nothing would get us in a more bipartisan furor than the politicians in Washington passing something, taking all the credit for it, and then sending the bill to the State taxpayers. I will give a speech on this to nail this down in the next couple of days. The States have very limited options. They can raise taxes or they can cut very valuable programs such as education, K-12 education, higher education, and already States are struggling. In Nebraska we had a special session where our Governor and our legislature stood up and said, We have to cut spending, and they cut over $300 million. Can you imagine if I were to call up later on in a couple of weeks from now and say, I know you did your very best at that special session, but we sent you another bill for millions and millions of dollars over the next 10 years that you have to deal with? The final point I wish to make is, do my colleagues realize what we are doing to the people we will be putting on Medicaid? Already 35 to 40 percent of the physicians won't take Medicaid. Why? Because the reimbursement rates are so incredibly pitiful. So if you are at 133 percent of poverty, we basically lock you into Medicaid. It is like giving somebody a driver's license but then saying, there is no way you can ever get a car to drive, because, look, here is the problem: They can't get medical care no matter if they have that Medicaid card. What it will do to our health care system is literally bring it to its knees, because we are going to have this massive rush of people who have the Medicaid card in hand and we don't have the capacity to deal with that. The doctors, the hospitals are all going to be in trouble because of this. It is the wrong policy for a whole host of reasons.

Mr. JOHANNS

Mr. JOHANNS. They are saying that, and that is what is happening because they are losing money. They are definitely losing money on Medicaid and they are losing money on Medicare. So what the Reid bill does is it says: Mr. Alexander, you sell whatever--cars. Let's use that as the analogy--and I know you are losing $100 on every car. But let's just give you twice as many to sell. Well, you are going to lose twice as much money. That is their solution to the health care crisis in this country. But what this actuary points out, what the Mayo Clinic points out, and what so many analysts now have pointed out is that this bill is going to put hospitals under and it is going to put nursing homes under. Here is another point that gets lost in this complex debate. That nursing home or that hospital may be the only major employer in that community. When you lose that, you not only lose your medical care, but you lose those jobs. I have said on the floor before that this bill is a job killer. It is a job killer. There is no way of getting around it. Those jobs will disappear in that small town, that rural area, and even in the big cities. I hope our friends on the other side study this very carefully. This is a roundhouse blow to the Reid plan--to the Reid-Obama plan. This, in my judgment, proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this is going to crush health care in our country.