John Kerry

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I start by thanking Senator Landrieu and Senator Allen for their leadership on this effort and for all those descendants of families who have been absolutely extraordinary in the way in which they relived their pain, brought it to the public view, kind of laid their hearts out on the table in a very real and emotional way--that has been a wonderful part of this process--and the way in which the book Jimmy Allen put together has helped to unleash a pain that was never lost, never forgotten by anybody, but never quite had a place to play itself out--until this public effort that is being made by the Senate. There is no small irony, I suspect, in the fact that the Senate is here sort of making good on what the Senate failed to do. I personally am struck by even, at this significant moment, the undeniable and inescapable reality that there are not 100 Senators as cosponsors. Maybe by the end of the evening there will be, but as we stand here with this resolution passed by voice vote, there are not. Moreover, all the people in the Senate and the press understand how we work here. It is critical that we take the step we are taking and have taken, but at the same time wouldn't it have been just that much more extraordinary and significant if we were having a recorded vote with all 100 Senators recording their votes? We are not. So even today, as we take this gigantic step, we are also saying to America that there is a journey still to travel. I don't want to diminish one iota--and I don't mean to because I believe what is happening here today is so significant, but at the same time, it has to give all of us a kind of kick in the rear end to get us out there to do that which is necessary, which gives fuller meaning to the words that are going to be expressed here and have been expressed here--most important, to give fuller meaning to the emotions that have been laid bare for all of America to understand better by the families who have come here to share this with us. I also join not just in thanking Mr. Cameron and Ms. Johnson, and others, but Janet Langhart, who is here with our former colleague and the former Secretary of Defense, Bill Cohen. We certainly appreciate her commitment to this effort and the meaning of this to her and to all of the families who have come here together. It is pretty incredible to think about it. Lynchings really replaced slavery. They came in the aftermath of slavery, around the 1880s. Between the 1880s and 1968--I have to pause when I think about that because I was already a young officer in the military. I had left college. I remember the early part of the 1960s devoted to the civil rights movement, the Mississippi voter registration drive. We were still recording lynchings during that period of time, but I did not know it, not in the sense that we know it today. I thought I knew history pretty well, but I will tell you, until I saw this array of photographs which then sparked my curiosity to read more about it, I had always thought, like most Americans, that a lynching was just slinging a rope over a branch of a tree and that was it. The story is so much more gruesome than that, so much more dark and horrendous as a moment in American history that it is really hard to believe it happened at all in our country, which is another reason it is so important that we are taking this step to remember. We have seen revisionism in almost every part of history, including the Holocaust. So it is good we are taking this step today, and it is good we have these photographs now brought together as a compilation of history, and it is good that the Senate is taking this effort tonight. It is extraordinary to think that 99 percent of the perpetrators of lynchings escaped any reach of the law whatsoever. It is incredible to think that almost 5,000 people are recorded as incidents, and how many are not recorded? How many went without the local authorities in each of those communities--who were already complicitous in what happened, standing by, permissive, turning away from basic human rights--how many of those incidents were not recorded? A lot of us have read a lot about World War II and the Holocaust and other moments of history where there is a knock on the door and life changes. But you have to stop and really think what it was like in all but four States in our country, not just for African Americans but for new people, for folks who had come here from other places to live the American dream. In some cases, they were not knocks, they were just angry mobs screaming and yelling with torches and running rampant through a household, dragging out people screaming. In other cases, there was a pretext, more polite, but it was never polite in what it ended up as. Lynchings were not just lynchings; they were organized torture. They were incidents of kinds of torture that defied imagination, about which you do not even want to talk, the kinds of things that any decent society ought to stand up against. People were literally tortured for sport in front of people, and crowds would cheer--bedlam. Children were brought to be spectators. Some of these photographs show kids standing there with their eyes wide open and adults standing beside them, who were supposed to be more responsible, glued to the horror they were witnessing. In the first half of the last century alone, in the 20th century, over 200 antilynching bills were introduced in the Congress--200. Three times, the House of Representatives passed antilynching legislation. Seven Presidents asked for this legislation to be passed. The Senate said no. So it is important that we are here today to apologize. Some people wonder what the effect of an apology is. We can understand that question being asked. This is sort of a day of reckoning for us as a country, it is a moment for the conscience of our country to be listened to by everybody. It is an embarrassingly and unforgivably late moment in coming, but we are addressing a stain on our history, and we are working to heal wounds across generations. I believe that is important. Some people might try to diminish that, but the very lack of unity I mentioned earlier, in fact, goes to show why this apology is so important and why we all have to keep moving in this direction. No words, obviously, are going to undo the horror of those 5,000 Americans losing their lives. No apology is going to just wipe away the memories of Mr. Cameron and others, though they have shown a greater graciousness of understanding than others even at this moment. The fact is that this resolution can be one more step in the effort for all of us to try to get over the divide that still exists between races and as a result of Jim Crow in this country, but only if we face the truth. It is the Bible that reminds us that it is the truth that sets us free. And so it is that we have to embrace it, commit ourselves to putting our hearts and our actions where our words have now preceded us. This should be an important step forward, but, frankly, it will only do that if we do not stop here. The truth is that it is not enough to face the horror of lynchings if we then just walk out of here and consciously turn away from legally separate and unequal schools in America. It is not enough to decry decades of refusing to use the force of law against lynchings if today we refuse to use the force of law to tear down the barriers that prevent people from voting, barriers in the economy, divisions in the health care system that works for too few of those who are in the minority in America. It is only by reconciling the past that we have to understand where we have to go in the future and get there. I remind my colleagues to remember the words of Julian Bond when he dedicated that beautiful, simple memorial in Montgomery, AL, to those who gave their lives for civil rights. He said it was erected as much to remember the dead as it was for those young people who cannot remember the period when the sacrifices began, with its small cruelties and monstrous injustices, its petty indignities and its death dealing in inequities. There are many too young to remember that from that seeming hopelessness, there arose a mighty movement, simple in its tactics, overwhelming in its impact. That is why we have to remember the period of the lynchings. That is why this resolution is important--for the young people who do not know what it means to wake up in the middle of the night to hear that knock, for young people to need to commit to help our country complete the journey in order to guarantee we make it all that it promises to be and can be. We will never erase what Mr. Cameron or Mr. Wright and too many others went through, but we certainly can honor the legacy of these civil rights heroes and the martyrs who came before us by doing right by them and by the country. I hope this resolution will help us do that. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY. What is the status of the time? Is it under control, or is it just open?

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, what is the current time on both sides?

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, will the quorum be tallied to both sides?

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

Mr. KERRY. How much does the majority have remaining?

Mr. KERRY. Fifty?

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

Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I will use at this moment. Obviously, I will not use all of it.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, what is the parliamentary situation?

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

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I am not sure how much of that time I will use. I have made a significant amount of argument, as others have, in the Foreign Relations Committee during the time leading up to this debate on the floor. I listened to Senator Biden's comments and I listened to Senator Biden's colloquy with Senator Sarbanes. They raised critical points, as have others, such as Senator Dodd and Senator Voinovich, and others on the floor. I am not sure it serves any great purpose to rehash all of those arguments, but I will say in summary that what brings a lot of us to this point of questioning the nomination of John Bolton is not personal and it is not political in the sense that it is sort of an automatic reflex reaction to a nomination of the President, or to divisions between the parties. I think people can sense from the bipartisan concerns that have been expressed, as well as the record that has been set forward, that these are really deeply felt and very legitimate concerns about a position that is one of the most important foreign policy positions for our country. Obviously, the President has the right to make a choice. We all understand that. Subsequent to the President making that choice, an enormous amount of information has come forward, not from traditional sources, not from people who might have been disposed to oppose this nomination, but from people who have worked with Mr. Bolton, from people who are ideologically in the same place as he is, who are members of the same administration. The picture they have painted is clearly one that ought to raise concern for any Member of the Senate about a position that requires special credibility, special stature, and special ability to be able to carry the message of our country in one of the most important fora in the world, in a very complicated world. On several occasions, a number of Senators have talked about this issue of credibility, and it cannot be overlooked. One cannot gloss by it. We are in the midst of delicate, critical negotiations with Iran. Nobody knows where that will go in these next months. The potential for critical intelligence analysis to be put before the United Nations in order to persuade the world of potentially dangerous steps requires a voice that has no questions attached to it, where people will not have to ask whether that person speaks for the administration or for themselves. The history of Secretary Colin Powell, whom we all admire but who was sent to the United Nations with information that was inaccurate and made a speech which he now personally wishes were otherwise, raises even further the question of credibility. In addition, we will have to deal with Syria itself where important issues have been raised with respect to Mr. Bolton's attitude toward Syria, his willingness to stretch information with respect to Syria. Obviously, North Korea looms huge on the diplomatic and security horizon. All of this fits within a context of information that the Foreign Relations Committee has requested a number of times. Two weeks ago, the Foreign Relations Committee, in a historical moment, voted to send John Bolton's nomination without recommendation. I voted no at that time for the reasons that I stated, and I believe we have yet to complete the task of building the complete record to be able to have the full Senate make a judgment on this nomination. Over the last 24 years, the Foreign Relations Committee has sent hundreds of nominations to the floor with favorable recommendations. Only twice did the committee report a nomination unfavorably, and only once did it report a nomination without recommendation. So obviously we come with serious reservations within the committee, and the Senate ought to want a full record to be put in front of it before it votes on this nomination. The power of advice and consent has been talked about a lot in the last weeks. Obviously, we have a constitutional responsibility not just to advise but also to consent, and nowhere is it suggested in the Constitution that we ought to consent automatically. So over the last week, both Democrats and Republicans on the committee have worked hard together to jointly interview more than 30 individuals with information relevant to this nomination. We also requested numerous documents from the State Department, USAID, and the CIA. This indepth level of investigation was necessary because concerns were raised by individuals in Government and in the private sector about the nomination. Again, I repeat, we did not seek out these people. They came to us. Most of those who came to us have worked with Mr. Bolton and continue to work in Government. They came to us at great risk to themselves. That risk has to be measured by our colleagues in the Senate. Everybody knows how this place works. We know the difficulty of a person coming out of the same place of business in politics and saying something that is critical of somebody they worked with. The fact is that we owe those people who took those risks a serious and complete effort in the consideration of this nomination, not a perfunctory effort, not one that seeks to find a way around a legitimate request for information. The fact is that this administration's cooperation in the Foreign Relation Committee's effort to do due diligence on the Bolton nomination has been sporadic at best and far from complete. In the 22 years I have served on the committee, I have seen efforts on both sides of the aisle that have been far more extensive and far lengthier for less important positions or for the similar position. Initially, the administration's response was to refuse access to documents or individuals to be interviewed until just a few days before the committee's first business meeting to consider the Bolton nomination on April 19. Chairman Lugar had to personally intervene in order to persuade the administration to comply with earlier requests that were made repeatedly by Senator Biden on behalf of all of the Democrats on the committee. The State Department finally responded but, again, not fully. It did not provide all of the documents requested, and those that were provided were suddenly deemed to be classified, even though many were unclassified e-mails. After the committee decided on April 19 to further investigate allegations and concerns about this nomination, the administration continued to drag its feet on the Democratic request for information. On April 29, Senator Biden sent a letter specifying nine different categories of documents relating to the issues of concern that needed to be investigated thoroughly. Some of these requests involved additional information related to specific cases the committee had been reviewing. Four of them were requests for drafts of speeches or testimony. These four requests were designed to ascertain whether Mr. Bolton sought to stretch the intelligence to support his policy views. A lot has been spoken on the Senate floor about that effort to stretch, and I would associate myself with the concerns that have been expressed by other Senators about that effort. There is nothing more serious at this moment in time. The State Department refused to respond fully to Senator Biden's request. Instead, it responded to a letter by Chairman Lugar on May 4 suggesting that it needed to provide documents in only five of the nine categories. Well, it is not up to the administration to decide which categories are appropriate for the proper advice and consent of a Senate committee or of the Senate itself. So in an effort to move the process along and get further cooperation from the administration, Senator Biden narrowed the Democratic request down to two areas: Information related to the clearance of Mr. Bolton's September 2003 testimony on Syria before the House International Relations Committee and information related to National Security Agency intercepts and the identity of U.S. persons on those intercepts. Over a period of 4 years, Mr. Bolton requested the identity of U.S. persons on intercepts 10 times. Senator Dodd originally asked for these intercepts in a question for the record on April 11. The Department responded by saying that the committee needed to get these from the National Security Agency. So Chairman Lugar supported the Democratic request for the NSA intercepts but asked the Intelligence Committee to request them and find a means of sharing them with the Foreign Relations Committee. The Intelligence Committee finally did get the intercepts, but the chairman and ranking member of that committee were not allowed to see the key information; that is, the names of the U.S. persons, which is an essential part of the evaluation of the committee. No one--no one on the Foreign Relations Committee, not Chairman Lugar or Senator Biden-- has been given access to these intercepts. In response to letters from Senator Biden regarding the intercepts, the Director of National Intelligence, Ambassador Negroponte, referred Senator Biden back to the Intelligence Committee. What the Senate has to decide is whether it is going to stand up for the rights of a committee, for the rights of an appropriate set of inquiries to be answered so we can fulfill our constitutional responsibilities. Senators can be for Mr. Bolton, Senators can have already made up their minds, Senators can have decided that they know how they are going to vote and they do not need more information, but they ought to respect the fact that both the chairman and the ranking member made a request and that request has not yet been fulfilled. The information we are seeking relating to the Syria testimony will shed further light on whether Mr. Bolton tried to press the envelope on intelligence and whether he told the committee the truth when he said he was not personally involved in the preparation of the Syria testimony. The question of whether Mr. Bolton told the committee the truth is important because there are already several other instances where it is in doubt, where in fact there is clear evidence that he didn't tell the truth, specifically with respect to the efforts to fire the two analysts of intelligence. Stretching intelligence and credibility are two of the key areas of concern with respect to the Bolton nomination, two of the key areas of inquiry that the committee is seeking. This is a proper and a critical request. Having access to the NSA intercepts will tell us whether Mr. Bolton did anything improper after receiving the identities of U.S. persons involved. The fact they do not want anybody to see it seems to suggest the exact opposite. Senator Roberts, the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, indicated in his letter to Senators Lugar and Biden that on at least one occasion Mr. Bolton shared the identity information of a U.S. person with another individual in the State Department without authorization from NSA. Did he do this more than once? Why did he request these intercepts? What was he trying to find out? What was he going to do, or did he do with the information? We can only speculate without proper access to those intercepts and without knowing the identities of the persons on them. The State Department has told the committee that the request for information about the Syria testimony is not ``specifically tied to the issues being deliberated by the committee.'' But for the executive branch of Government, which has already been slow-walking this provision of information, to tell a Senate committee how to exercise the advice and consent power of the Senate is not only unacceptable, it is unconstitutional. The Foreign Relations Committee has the prerogative to determine, and has laid out for our colleagues to judge, the legitimacy of the basis of this request. I think it passes muster. For the chairman and ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee to be denied access to NSA intercepts and information which Mr. Bolton was able to see is unacceptable on its face. An Assistant Secretary of State and staff are permitted to see this, but the chairman and ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee are not? Is the Senate prepared to ratify that as a standard by which we will have our inquiries pursued with respect to any nomination on either side at any time? The Foreign Relations Committee has spent an enormous amount of time and energy related to this nomination. Grudgingly, cherry-picking document requests, we have proceeded along with the administration actually denying other requests entirely. The information we continue to seek is relevant to this nomination and to the critical concerns that many of us have about the nominee and his use of intelligence. We should have access. Since the administration has refused to provide it, the only choice we have is to deny the vote on this nomination until there is full compliance. That is not a filibuster. That is not an effort to not have a vote. Give us the information. We are prepared to have a vote immediately and let the chips fall where they may. But it is vital that the rights of the committee and the rights of the Senate, the rights of the advice and consent process, be upheld. Let me just say again this should not be anything except a measurement on the merits. During her confirmation hearing in 1981, to be U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Jeane Kirkpatrick described her vision of the job. She said: I do not think that one should ever seek confrontation. What I have every intention and hope of doing is to operate in a low key, quiet, persuasive, and consensus-building way. I think a principal objective should be to try to communicate effectively with the representatives of as many nations as possible to broaden a bit the areas of mutual understanding. We should try to extend a bit the frontiers of reason and cooperation, and I think we should work to that end, and we should work to establish the patterns of consultation and trust. No one would ever accuse Jeane Kirkpatrick of being soft or shying away from her views. She is a staunch conservative who speaks her mind. But she understood and respected the value of diplomacy and negotiation; of listening to and respecting others' views; of working the system; of seeing the big picture and, most importantly, of establishing credibility and trust. She herself has said of this nominee that he is ``no diplomat.'' We should make the judgment in the end of whether this is the right person. I have heard colleagues argue how important it is to have a straight-talking, tough person at the U.N. This is not about the U.N. per se, obviously. It is about our interests and how we are going to best advance those interests. But those of us who spent a long time trying to reform the U.N. and working with it, and have had some success in some measure with respect to that effort, in a bipartisan effort going back to the time we worked with Nancy Kassebaum and Larry Pressler and Jesse Helms, all of us understood you need to establish those patterns of consultation and trust and speak with credibility. I regret that this process has proven that this nominee does not meet the Jeane Kirkpatrick standard or test, and therefore all of us ought to raise serious questions about the nomination. I think my time is about up, so I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, Memorial Day is a day of mixed emotions: sorrow for the families whose sons and daughters have given their lives for our country, coupled with universal pride in the great Americans who for generations and particularly today teach us the full meaning of service and sacrifice. The courage and bravery of our young men and women fighting overseas continues to inspire all of us, and indeed inspire the free world and those yearning for freedom. America's fallen soldiers shouldered a responsibility greater than any of us will ever know. Their families, their units, and their nation depended on them, and they answered the call of duty with selflessness and devotion. Our soldiers did not shirk from this responsibility, and all the uncertainty, danger and honor that came with it. Their families remember them as special sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, and cherished friends. Their Nation remembers them as special citizens. Grown men will touch their names etched on granite walls and will today weep for fallen comrades who gave their lives so that others can live. In this time of war, and in memory of our fallen heroes, we must be mindful to do everything in our power to keep our troops safe as they keep us safe. We must do better to take care of their families, who sacrifice in ways too many to count. While we can never repay our Nation's debt to families who have made the ultimate sacrifice, we must always remember the legacy of their fallen sons and daughters: a safer and freer world. On this Memorial Day, I believe it appropriate to take a small step in that direction by recognizing in the record those exceptional individuals from Massachusetts who this year gave their lives, and earned the eternal gratitude of the American people: Arredondo, Alexander S., Lance Corporal, USMC, 25-Aug-2004--Randolph, MA; Connolly, David, S., Major, USA, 6-Apr-2005--Boston, MA; Cunningham, Darren J., Staff Sergeant, USA, 30-Sep-2004--Groton, MA; Depew, Cory R., Private, USA, 04-Jan-2005--Haverhill, MA; Desiato, Travis R., Lance Corporal, USMC, 15-Nov-2004--Bedford, MA; Farrar Jr., Andrew K., Sergeant, USMC, 28-Jan-2005--Weymouth, MA; Fontecchio, Elia P., Gunnery Sergeant, USMC, 04-Aug-2004--Milford, MA; Fuller, Travis J., 1st Lieutenant, USMC, 26-Jan-2005--Granville, MA; Gavriel, Dimitrios, Lance Corporal, USMC, 18-Nov-2004--Haverhill, MA; Johnson, Markus J., Private, USA, 1st Class, 01-Jun-2004--Springfield, MA; Lusk, Joe F. II, Captain, USA, 21-Jan-2005--Framingham, MA; Moore, James M., Colonel, USA, 29-November-2004--Peabody, MA; Oliveira, Brian, Corporal, USMC, 25-Oct-2004--Raynham, MA; Ouellette, Brian J., Petty Officer, 1st Class, USN, 29-May-2004--Needham, MA; Palacios, Gabriel T., Specialist, USA, 21-Jan-2004--Lynn, MA; Schamberg, Kurt D., Sergeant, USA, 20-May- 2005--Melrose, MA; Sullivan, Christopher J., Captain, USA, 18-Jan- 2005--Princeton, MA; Vangyzen IV, John J., Lance Corporal, USMC, 05- Jul-2004--Bristol, MA; and Zabierek, Andrew J., Lance Corporal, USMC, 21-May-2004--Chelmsford, MA.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, today I rise in support of the Reach Out and Read program. Reach Out and Read is a program that promotes early literacy by educating doctors and parents about the importance of reading aloud. Reach Out and Read facilitates reading by giving books to children at pediatric check-ups from six months to five years of age, with a special focus on children growing up in poverty. Children who are exposed to reading in their first years of life learn to love books at an early age--a love that often stays with them throughout their teenage and adult lives. They are also more likely to escape the many problems associated with illiteracy and reading difficulty, including school absenteeism and dropout, juvenile delinquency, substance abuse, and teenage pregnancy. Reach Out and Read is active in more than 2,300 hospitals and health care centers in 50 States, the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico. Two million children participate annually and 3.2 million new, developmentally appropriate books are given to family members. There are 123 Reach Out and Read clinical locations in my State of Massachusetts. More than 116,000 children participate in Reach Out and Read and more than 200,000 books are distributed annually. Reach Out and Read is unique. Funded both by both the Federal Government and private donations, it is a program with documented results. In 1998, the National Research Council released the much- acclaimed report, ``Preventing Reading Difficulties n Young Children'' which specifically cites Reach Out and Read as a program that effectively encourages young children to read. It is supported by the Department of Pediatrics at the Boston University School of Medicine and is endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics. We should all continue to support this very special program.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I thank the Chair, and I thank the distinguished Senator from West Virginia for his extraordinary analysis and understanding of the Constitution which he has constantly been the keeper of in the Senate. We are in a remarkable moment of confrontation. This is a great institution, or at least it always has been, and it is looked up to by people all over the world. Caught up as we are now in this moment of partisan ideological division of a raw reach for power, the Congress itself is daily dropping in its regard by the American people. Rather than reaching across the aisle to grapple with the real crises that face our Nation, the Republican leadership keeps moving unilaterally to change the way this institution has worked, and not for the better. Those of us who have had the privilege of being here for some period of time--I have been here for 22 years; Senator Byrd has been here almost 50; Senator Kennedy, Senator Stevens, and others have also served for a significant period of time--but brief as my stay has been, I find myself now I think No. 18 in seniority, which means 82 Senators have come and gone during the time I have been here. I have had a chance to know many of them going back to the time of Barry Goldwater, John Stennis, Russell Long, and others. Never in that whole period of time I have served have I ever seen this institution behaving the way it does today. Colleagues who came to do the same good as colleagues on the other side of the aisle, locked out of conference committees, hearings that do not take place when they ought to; oversight that does not occur as it used to. This institution is being damaged daily by the partisanship, the bitter ideological divide that is preventing good people on both sides of the aisle from doing good business for the American people; from finding real solutions to the real problems of real concern to average families all across our country, who cannot pay their health care bills, who are losing jobs abroad, who worry about the twin deficits of the budget of our country and of our trade; who see extraordinary threats to community as kids do not get the education they ought to. All this time we have been spending weeks, if not months, caught up discussing a nuclear option, discussing a few judges out of the two hundred, 208 or so, who have been nominated and approved by this President. The Senate is now watching this struggle take place, countless hours consumed by an effort to change the rules by breaking the rules. If my colleagues want to change the rules, use the rules to change the rules. Do not subvert the system. Do not play a cute parliamentary game that has been untouched over 200 years. This is a stunning moment. The problem is that words spoken in this Chamber do not even fully convey the importance of this moment. This is, in fact, one of those times the Founding Fathers and countless other statesmen of history have warned us against. Henry Clay said: The arts of power and its minions are the same in all countries and in all ages. It marks its victim, denounces it and excites the public odium and the public hatred to conceal its own abuses and encroachments. James Madison said: Where the whole power of one department is exercised by the same hands which possess the whole power of another department, the fundamental principles of a free constitution are subverted. . . . The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny. What we are going to see if this happens is the judiciary of the United States entirely put into the hands of the Presidency, period. The advice and consent will be wiped out, barring displays of courage that we have not seen recently, because people will come, as they did in our committee most recently, to say, well, we just had an election and the President won and the President has the right to his appointments, that is it, end of issue. Gone, the divisions; gone, the test; gone, the judgment we were supposed to apply as a separate and coequal branch of Government. That is what the Founding Fathers wrote. They did not give the President the ability to have whoever that President wants. That is what is written into the Constitution, that every single one of us went to the well of this body and raised our hands and swore to uphold. We did not swear to uphold the majority leader. We did not swear to uphold the President. We did not swear to uphold our party. We swore to uphold the Constitution of the United States, and that is our duty. Lord Acton said it maybe best: All power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Thomas Jefferson said: I hope our wisdom will grow with our power and teach us that the less we use our power the greater it will be. If my colleagues want to use the power of ending a filibuster, just have the filibuster for week after week and let people stand up and make their arguments. If the arguments have no currency, believe me, between the press, public opinion, the bloggers, and C-SPAN, this country will rise up and they will get their 60 votes if they deserve them. That is an up-or-down vote of its own kind. If it were compelling enough, as it was with the Civil Rights Act, or compelling enough as it has been in other great confrontations in this body, we have always found our way to make it happen. We have always done it without the rules. We are a Nation that has listened to some remarkable men and women in remarkable debates about how we as a Nation are different in balancing power and protecting the people and the institutions that we set up to protect the people. We are not here as an institution to protect an ideology. We are not here as an institution to protect a party. We are here to protect collectively the Government of the United States of America that is made up of those brilliant words that were fought over so diligently and remarkably in Philadelphia and which have served us so well all of these years. Now all of a sudden in 2005, feeling the flush of victory in an election that was close, controlling two branches of Government, elected officials, people who serve at the grace of that Constitution for a brief period of time, at the sufferance of the people who vote for us, those people are choosing to serve the moment, not to serve history, not to serve precedent, not to serve common sense, not to serve even the real interests of the American people, but to serve a narrowly defined, elected, official, leadership-determined, ideological purpose. I believe the real interests of Americans are best served by remembering that the greatest strength and the greatest virtue of our democracy is not that it gives power to the majority, which is easy to exercise, easy to understand, easy to abuse; the great virtue of the American system of Government and of our democracy is the protection it provides to the minority. That is what is special about America. That is what makes us different from everybody else. That is what lives are being lost for, to tell people in Iraq and Afghanistan, this is what you ought to embrace--the full measure of democracy, not some limited tricky little measure where, in the flush of victory, you change the rules. What would we say about this if it was another country that we had helped to be the country they are, embracing our democracy, but they started to play those kinds of games and there was suddenly an abuse of rules that had been set up that everybody understood were there to make the democracy work effectively? It is precisely the protection of the minority that makes our democracy so respected and so awesome to people all over this planet. This is a dangerous time for our democracy. What is at stake here is something far greater than the confirmation of a few judges. Let there be no doubt that line was drawn clearly here this morning because the deputy leader offered to have four judges confirmed. We could have confirmed four judges right here, today, this morning. No, no, no. This is a division. This is a moment of confrontation being sought by the leadership on the other side of the aisle. What is at stake is something far greater than any of the individual judges. It is defined by the refusal to accept the offer to do those judges today. We could have gotten the President's percentage up from 95 to whatever, 98 percent. But, no, we do not want that. That will change the focus. No matter how much time is spent on the life story of Priscilla Owen, we all know the choice of this particular judgeship and of just staying on this judgeship and not trying to have other judgeships represents, in fact, a choice. It is a smokescreen for what this fight is really all about. It is not about these few judges. We could have confirmed those judges. But the Republican leadership is fundamentally determined to deny the minority the right to hold the Executive accountable for such judgments as we might make about the lifetime appointment of those judges. I heard both sides out here. Some Members of our side did call for up-or-down votes when that was the argument that best served them. But, guess what, when they didn't get it, they didn't call for a change in the rules, and they did not try to break the rules to change the rules. They used their best argument, but they respected the institution. That is not what is happening today. So we can forget about who said what when. The real fight is about the Senate. The real fight is about the Constitution. The real fight is about who we are and what kind of country we are going to be and how we behave and what kind of example we set to young kids in school today who read the history books and dream someday of being a Senator and perhaps joining the world's greatest deliberative body. This is about George Bush and Karl Rove and the Republican leadership and their quest for absolute control over who goes to the Supreme Court and to the judgeships across this country. This is about carrying, beyond this branch of Government, power into another branch of Government that is supposed to be separate. This is about the gratification of immediate ideological goals and the pursuit of power, regardless of the long-term consequences to the Senate, the Congress, or the Constitution of the country. To get what they want, the leadership has acquiesced to outside forces. Not even the precedents and history and quality of this institution are guiding them. It is an outside hand. As John Danforth, with whom many of us had the privilege of serving here, a greatly respected former Republican Senator--he was George Bush's choice as a special envoy to Darfur. He was George Bush's choice to go to the United Nations. He is, above all, as all of us know, a man of enormous faith, a respected minister, and a leader in his church. Here is what he wrote a few weeks ago: The problem is not with people or churches that are politically active. It is with a party that has gone so far in adopting a sectarian agenda that it has become the political extension of a religious movement. So spoke Senator John Danforth, Republican. Yet, despite Senator Danforth's warning, most of my colleagues stay right on script in this fight for history, this fight for principle, and this fight for rights. On script, they allow our cherished principles to be abused and glossed over as the debate sort of develops or drops down into a competition of hollow sound bites. But script and sound bite are not what should dictate what happens here, not in the Senate. Conscience and principle ought to dictate what happens here. There have to be Senators prepared to stand up and do their duty as U.S. Senators, not Senators of their party. My distinguished colleague, Senator Voinovich, recently showed courage in the Foreign Relations Committee when he suddenly stopped the proceedings of the committee and he said: I am not comfortable with what is happening here. My conscience tells me we ought to stop and take a better look. Guess what happened. He was vilified on talk radio and in certain partisan circles for having gone off script. Senator Chafee of Rhode Island, 4 years here, stands up and says: Wow, that is the first time in 4 years I have ever seen anybody do that. What? The first time in 4 years a Senator saw another Senator stop and think for himself and exercise conscience and go off script? What kind of statement is that about what has happened here? It is not controversial, my friends. It is a sad statement about the Senate, and it underscores what is happening here now. Independence and conscience and principle are really what is at stake here, the independence of the Senate, the independence of the judiciary from an administration that is just hell-bent for leather determined to get its way. Heavens knows what leverage will be exerted in these next hours as we see so much on the table, with military bases closing and other issues--who knows? Independence of the Senate, a special institution in our Government, a place where things purposefully slow down, where they find their balance--that is what the Senate was created for. It is surprising and disturbing that members of the Republican leadership know what is at stake, but they have actually worked with the Republican administration to spreads things that aren't true. I don't know what happened to truth around here. I don't know what happened to truth in the discussion of great issues before this country. But the truth is, in the end, none of the constitutional issues that have been put forward--and today's Republican leadership--none of them stand up. They do not stand scrutiny. They are hollow, tortured, poll- tested statements. The whole argument about the Constitution and up-or- down votes or ``unprecedented''--the word ``unprecedented'' has been used. They sound good, but they are not true, and we know it. Yet Senators continue to fall in line, turning out the script, turning out the phases that have to be repeated. It is not a true representation of the Constitution, of history, or the rights of Senators. Personally, I believe there would be a lot more outrage in the Nation and in the media if the value of truth had not been so diminished over the last years. We have a budget that comes trillions of dollars short of counting every dollar we plan to spend, but, oh no, there is no accountability. We have a budget that doesn't even count the interest on the debt. Find me an accountant in a business in America who doesn't put the interest on the debt that they owe in the accounting, and they would be fired. We do not do it. No accountability. We have had a Medicare actuary who was forced at risk of losing his job to lie about what the costs would be of a prescription drug bill and lie to the Congress. No accountability. We have had falsified numbers in Iraq, on everything from the cost of the war to the number of troops that have been trained to the slam dunk on intelligence--no accountability. We have an administration that continues to want to fund fake newscasts paid for by the American people, without disclaimer, and mislead people across America. In fact, the administration's willingness to consistently abandon the truth I think has done great damage to the American people's willingness to believe anything any of us say. They are less willing to listen. They are less willing to trust or take anything said seriously. Now we find ourselves in a struggle between a great political tradition in the United States that seeks to find the common ground, do the common good, and we have a new ethic on any given issue, where any means justifies the ends of victory no matter what. It is a new view that says, if you don't like the facts, just change them. If you can't win by playing by the rules, just rewrite them. Witness what happened with Tom DeLay. The new view says if you can't win a debate on the strength of your arguments, then go ahead and demonize your opponents regardless of whether it is true. The new view says it is okay to ignore the overwhelming public interest as long as you can get away with it. This time the Republican leadership has gone the farthest to get away with it, hoping to convince Americans that by breaking the Senate rules, they are actually acting to defend the Constitution, honor the words of our Founding Fathers, and avert a judicial crisis. This debate is not fueled by an effort to protect the Constitution. It is fueled by ideology. It is not fueled by a shortage of judges on the bench because, as the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee has made clear, we have the best record of appointing them and the lowest vacancies in years. The facts have been repeatedly cleared up, again and again, and repeatedly they are brushed aside with the old adage that if you throw enough mud and you repeat something that is not true enough, enough people may come to believe it. Over 95 percent of all judges already approved. I have been here since 1985 and I have probably voted for a thousand judges. I have not counted them all. For Ronald Reagan, for George Herbert Walker Bush, for President George Bush. What have we got? Ten who have not been confirmed? The Bush administration and their allies in Congress hope to get away with this by selling words to the public on a ``team'' the public would never buy if there was a referee who put real facts in front of the American people. Unfortunately, words with great meaning--Constitution, Founding Fathers, history, precedent--all of these are being twisted and cheated of their full meaning and of their full import in the process. In the end, the American people are being underestimated by this administration. They may work their will here; I don't know yet. We do not know. Certainly they have a lot of cards to play. But in the end, Americans value the Constitution, and over time this will be felt. In the end, Americans understand that the strength of our democracy is best judged by the enduring strength of our minority and its ability to be heard. And Americans cherish the ability of the minority to be heard. When Americans first heard the term ``nuclear option,'' they kind of recoiled--appropriately. They were confident that dismantling the filibuster and silencing the minority would have as catastrophic an effect on our democracy as a nuclear blast would on our security. But the majority's action was not to back off and to say, okay, we will play by the rules. The majority's reaction was to change the slogan. So in an act of transparent hypocrisy, the minority changed the slogan from ``nuclear option'' to ``constitutional option.'' George Orwell would be pleased. They embarked on a series of hollow arguments based on mythical constitutional provisions confident that if you just say it, somebody will believe it. You can change the slogan, but you cannot change the fact that diminishing the rights of the minority diminishes the spirit and the substance of our Constitution and the foundation of our Government. Argument after argument put forward by the Bush Republican leadership is just plain false. False. I have heard it argued that our Constitution mandates specific protocol of voting for judges. No. They have used their new catchphrase, up-or-down votes, hundreds of times in recent days. But those words do not appear once in our Constitution. They are not even subliminally in the Constitution in the advice and consent and separateness of power given to the Senate and the right of the Senate to make its own rules. No one should be fooled. Those phrases do not mean constitutional. They do not mean democratic. They do not mean fair. They are phrases that are code for dissent-proof, minority-proof, and filibuster-proof. There is nothing in our Constitution or our history to suggest that the nominee of any President is so special as to be excused from the scrutiny of the minority or granted immunity from the tools of democracy that protect that minority. I didn't win, but I can guarantee this: Had I been President, I would not have contemplated supporting or sending a request to change what I have viewed as something of value in the entire time I have been here in the Senate. Never would have occurred to me. It would have occurred to me to send people up here who could win the support of people on both sides. It would have occurred to me to bring the members of the Judiciary Committee together and sit them down and work together to come to a common understanding of what sort of standard we ought to apply and let the American people share that standard. There is nothing in our Constitution or in history to suggest the President ought to be granted immunity from the tools of democracy. And that is what will happen. My colleagues are well aware that the power of advice and consent is granted to the Senate and the Constitution says absolutely nothing about how the Senate will proceed to provide advice and consent. And the words advice and consent are there in their duality because advice is one thing and consent is another. You can withhold your consent or you can give your consent. You can say yes, or you can say nothing if you do not vote. And if you do not vote, you have withheld your consent. It didn't take long before the new Congress exercised its constitutional powers in 1795. Senators who were friends and colleagues of the Founders themselves, who surely knew their intent, turned around and defeated George Washington's nomination of George Rutledge to be the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. In 1968, Republican Senator Robert Griffin captured the spirit of that event when he said: That action in 1795 said to the President then in office and to future presidents, don't expect the Senate to be a rubber stamp. We have an independent and coequal responsibility in the appointing process and we intend to exercise that responsibility as those who drafted the Constitution so clearly intended. The Constitution did not mandate a rubberstamp for George Washington and the Constitution doesn't mandate a rubberstamp for George Bush today. In 1795, the rejection of Washington's nominee was heralded as the Constitution working, not failing. There is no doubt that an active, coequal partnership was intended. That resounding rejection of George Washington, our revolutionary leader, helped to seal the death of the monarchy in this country. The genius of empowering the Senate and the minority was that by limiting the executive, the Senate legitimized the executive. So when I hear my colleagues come to the Senate arguing that the Constitution mandates the will of the majority always trumps the minority, I don't hear the wisdom of our Founding Fathers. I don't see or hear a respect for what happened in 1795. I don't hear the same blind activism that characterizes the judges they intend to enforce on the Federal bench. The actions of some Senators, in fact, today come closer to rewriting the Constitution than defending it. Another argument we have heard is that the filibuster itself is unconstitutional. That has been made. That argument is deeply flawed. The Constitution in Article I, section 5 granted each house the power to ``determine the rules of its proceedings.'' That is the Constitution of the United States. Every Senator went down there, raised his or her hand, and swore to defend the Constitution. And the Constitution says we have the power to determine our rules and we have a rule by which we determine the rules, and the current rule says you have to have a supermajority to change the rules. But, no, in the flush of victory, in a moment of ideological excess, people are going to come in and change the rule by breaking the rule of the Senate that the Constitution itself enshrines. Shame. That is a disgrace to the oath and a disgrace to the history and a disgrace to what this institution stands for and to the quality of our democracy that we export at the lives of young Americans abroad. It is wrong, fundamentally wrong. Over the past 200 years, our predecessors in the Senate have taken the role of ``consent'' very seriously. They have created time-tested rules to assure the rights of the minorities and to balance the power of government. With a hold, a so-called hold, a single Senator can delay a Presidential nominee. A single committee chairman can block a nomination by simply refusing to hold hearings. I saw Senator Helms do that any number of times. I tried to get a hearing. We tried to get the possibility of a Governor of the United States of America, the Governor of Massachusetts, Bill Weld, nominated to be the Ambassador to go to Mexico. Senator Helms: no hearing. Wouldn't hear of it. It could not happen. Nomination killed. What is this game that is being played back and forth about who said what, when? We all know how this place has worked all these years. These rules were not created by the Democratic Party when George Bush was elected President. The filibuster was used as early as 1790 by Senators from Virginia and South Carolina who filibustered against a bill to locate the first Congress in Philadelphia. That was a filibuster of one because in 1790, as Senator Byrd has pointed out, you needed unanimous consent to end the debate. They did change that rule, but they changed that rule by using the rules of the Senate, not by breaking them. Think about it. Those legislators and friends and even the Founders themselves permitted a filibuster of one. Knowing that, today's activist arguments buckle under the weight of history. The unfortunate truth is that some Senators have now fashioned themselves as activist legal scholars using a false reading of the Constitution to paint their opponents as obstructionists while pursuing their political agenda at the expense of our democracy. I think some of my colleagues forget that the Senate was designed specifically to be the moderating check on a President. And guess what. We have done unbelievably well as a nation these 200 years. We are the envy of people all across this planet. There is not one of us whose heart does not fill with pride, who is not astounded at what we can do and have done, and what we can achieve in America, and the stories of individual Senators in this Chamber who have risen from adverse circumstances, and nothing, to be able to represent people in their States. It is a stunning story. It is a story based on that respect for the law and based on the mutual respect that has always guided this great institution. I think some of my colleagues have lost track of that. My colleagues also forget, as they demonize the filibuster, it has been a force for the good. Farmers don't forget that. There are a lot of farmers in the Midwest in our country. They don't forget when Senators from rural States used the filibuster to force Congress to respond to a crisis that left thousands of farmers on the brink of bankruptcy in 1985. The big oil companies don't forget it. That don't forget when Senators used the filibuster to defeat massive tax giveaways that they were lobbying for in 1981. And I don't forget it, when, 10 years ago, I came to the floor and filibustered to prevent a bill that would have gutted public health and safety and consumer and environmental protections. That bill never passed, and we know the country is better for it. Some Senators come to the floor with a practical argument about our courts. They claim that because we have not rubberstamped each and every one of George Bush's nominees, the Nation faces a crisis because of a shortage of judges on the bench. It is not true. How can you keep coming to the floor of the Senate saying things that are just plain not true? Over 95 percent of the President's nominees have been confirmed. Our courts today have the lowest vacancy rate they have had in years. Enough of that argument. What is threatened is a delicately balanced system that for 214 years successfully prevented the Executive from usurping power that was granted in good faith by the American people. And that threat manifests itself in this nuclear option that threatens the character, the core of this institution. The integrity of this Senate is threatened when the majority attempts to change the rules by breaking the rules. The balance of power is threatened when the power of advice and consent is gutted. It will be gone. Whatever nominees they want will be confirmed, unless you happen to find a few people who will stand up to the pressure exerted on their States' need or their reelection need or the other needs that the Founding Fathers wanted to protect Senators against. Our democracy is threatened when we set the dangerous precedent that minority rights will be silenced at the convenience of the majority. I believe our courts and the justice this rule is meant to deliver are threatened, in the end, by some of these judges who have been nominated. As I said, that is not what this is fundamentally, in the end, about. It is about getting everything you want when you want it. I will wrap up in a moment, Mr. President. Some of my colleagues have argued that Democrats filibuster these judges because we simply dislike them or disagree on ideology or policy. Well, there may be some disagreement on things they have said or the way they have approached their courts. We saw what Attorney General Gonzales has said about Priscilla Owen, that her dissent in In re Jane Doe was an ``unconscionable act of judicial activism.'' But the point is, we have confirmed countless judges with whom we disagree on countless issues. If we have confirmed over 200 judges of the President of the United States, you know we do not agree with them on many of the issues that they brought to the bench, but they brought a fundamental fairness or they brought a record that we did not believe ought to be disputed. I think we have shown our good faith on the approach to the confirmation of judges. We have confirmed countless judges because we believed they were impartial and responsible arbiters of the law. It is an activist judge, it is a judge with a particular--many of the arguments have been made; I am not going to go through them now--but those arguments have been eloquently made with specificity as to these few judges. It is judges who want to rewrite our laws from the bench whom we believe are unqualified for a lifetime appointment. And we stand against them, Mr. President, not as a threat to the Constitution, but in defense of the Constitution. We have also been accused of unprecedented acts with respect to these nominations. Well, I am not going to go back into all that history. A lot of my colleagues have talked about it in the last days. But you just cannot come out here with a straight face, on either side--both sides have engaged in delaying some nominees--many of them were not even allowed out of the committee when President Clinton was in. Waited years; never got out. That does not make it all right, but it is the way it works as we fight this process of finding people who meet the consensus of the Senate. Did you hear the minority then hide behind a mythical constitutional value? No. Did you hear the minority stand up and assert a constitutional violation or the rules of the Senate ought to be changed? No. The majority leader himself has voted to filibuster a nominee. It does not matter whether it is 1, 2, or 10 filibusters, a filibuster is a filibuster. President Johnson's nominee to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Abe Fortas, was defeated with a filibuster. Tennessee Republican Howard Baker articulated the minority's position saying: The majority is not always right all of the time. And it is clear and predictable that the people of America, in their compassionate wisdom, require the protection of the rights of the minority as well as the implementation of the will of the majority. Throughout our history, Presidents and majorities have always had to govern a nation where minority rights are protected. Until this day, Presidents of the majority have respected that tradition. They were humbled by it. They were inspired by it, by the lessons of history that colleagues seem to have forgotten today. In 1937, President Roosevelt attempted to court pack and assert his influence. His own party said no. Thomas Jefferson once attempted to impeach a Supreme Court Justice who disagreed with his political agenda. His own party said no. When my colleagues complain of lack of precedent, remember those precedents. They were fair, and they were just. They respected the Constitution and they defended the judiciary. Our predecessors stood up to their own party leaders because they valued the real strength of our democracy more than the short-term success of a political agenda of the moment. And the question for all of us here is: Are we going to live up to that test? Recent predecessors of Senate Republicans have repeatedly urged respect for this--their own party Members, Members of the Republican Party, people of extraordinary respect and even reverence. Former Republican Majority Leader Howard Baker said, destroying the right to the filibuster: would topple one of the pillars of American democracy, the protection of minority rights from majority rule. Former Senator Chuck Mathias said: The Senate is not a parliamentary speedway, nor should it be. Former Republican Senator Bill Armstrong said: Having served in the majority and in the minority, I know it's worthwhile to have the minority empowered. As a conservative, I think there is a value to having a constraint on the majority. My colleagues should defend their judges, but do it without tearing down the Constitution and our Founding Fathers, or destroying the rules and character of this great institution. Defend your judges without ceding dangerous and corruptive levels of power to the executive branch of Government. Defend your judges without erasing 214 years of wisdom and sacrifice that raised this Nation from tyranny and chaos and spread freedom across the globe. Our Founding Fathers would shudder to see how easily forces from outside of the mainstream now seem to effortlessly push people toward conduct the American people don't want for their elected leaders, abusing power, inserting the Government into our private lives, injecting religion into debates on public policy, jumping through hoops to ingratiate themselves to their party base, while step by step and day by day real problems that keep American families up at night fall by the wayside in Washington. Congress and our democracy itself are being tested this week and next and will be tested in this vote. We each have to ask ourselves individually, as a matter of conscience, what are we prepared to do? I have attended the Senate prayer breakfast with colleagues here. I know this is a place of great faith and a place of real concern. I ask my colleagues to look into their souls and ask themselves, is this the right thing to be doing for the long-term interests of our Nation? For those in this Chamber who have reservations about the choices their leadership has made and worry about the possible repercussions on our Constitution and democracy, stop over the weekend and look at history and find the courage to do what is right. History has always remembered and found a place for those who are courageous, and it will remember the courageous few who live up to their responsibility now and speak truth to power when the Senate is tested, so that power doesn't go unchecked. The Senate and the country need Senators of courage who are prepared to make their mark on history by standing with past profiles in courage and defending not party, not partisanship, but defending principle, defending the Constitution, and defending democracy itself. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations bill for fiscal year 2005 is a vital piece of legislation. It provides $75.9 billion for the Department of Defense, nearly $4 billion for the Department of State, and billions more for military construction and other national priorities. It will come as no surprise to anyone that Congress will pass this bill with an overwhelming majority. Instead, we should be asking what took so long. The administration continues to play games with the funding of the war on terror and the war in Iraq. These aren't inside-the-beltway issues. Every day the administration resists bringing forward an accurate and reasonable accounting of our future needs in Iraq, it complicates the way the Department of Defense conducts business. In recent weeks, the Pentagon has been forced to shuffle $1.1 billion to cover Army shortfalls while the Department of Defense waits for the President to sign the supplemental into law. That $1.1 billion came out of Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Army National Guard personnel accounts. That is a dangerous way to conduct business. As we pass this legislation, I urge the President to heed the advice of so many Senators who believe that he must better reflect the costs of war in his regular defense budgets and simply be straight with the American people about the ongoing costs of operations in Iraq and elsewhere. Our troops shouldn't have to wait for the gear and equipment they need to do their jobs well, to win the peace in Iraq, to bring the terrorists to justice in Afghanistan and around the world, and to come home. This bill takes some important steps toward the Military Family Bill of Rights which we have talked about for many months. It increases to $400,000 the life insurance coverage available to service members, and raises the death gratuity to $100,000 for those who die in combat and in combat-related incidents, including training. It also extends to 1 year the length of time widows and children of military personnel may remain in military housing. Together, these provisions are important affirmations of the Congress' support for the men and women of the American military and their families. I thank the House-Senate conferees for including those provisions. I regret that the House-Senate Conferees struck a provision that the Senate added to pay an equal death gratuity to the survivors of all service members killed while on active duty, regardless of the circumstances. This policy was supported by 75 Senators in a floor vote. It was supported by the House in its version of the legislation. And it is supported by the uniformed leadership of the military. It is clear that the civilian leadership at the Pentagon, led by Secretary Rumsfeld, opposed it. While they have succeeded in striking the provision from this supplemental legislation, I will continue to work with my colleagues, many of whom have worked on this issue for some time, for its enactment. While I support this bill overall, I have serious concerns about the attachment of the REAL ID Act to the conference report. This legislation creates new hurdles for legitimate asylum seekers, allows the government to waive environmental laws to build physical barriers on the border, and forces an unfunded mandate on the States. This legislation did not have so much as a hearing in the U.S. Senate. Such legislation should be considered in committee and before the full Senate, rather than being attached to an emergency spending bill. It is my hope that the Senate will work to amend the most damaging provisions of the REAL ID Act as soon as possible. I am pleased that the conference report includes the ``Save our Small and Seasonal Businesses Act'' which makes changes to the H-2B visa program. This provision will provide great relief to many small businesses in Massachusetts that count on foreign workers to keep their seasonal businesses open. Mr. President, I would also like to thank the conferees for addressing potentially damaging anti-small business language in this bill which would have allowed small business subcontracts at the Department of Energy to be counted as prime contracts and capped all small business contracting goals at 23 percent. Section 6023 had strong bipartisan opposition from members of the Small Business Committees and from other members concerned about protecting small business federal contracting. The compromise language included in Section 6022 of the final version of this bill lays out a process for the Small Business Administration and the Department of Energy to expand small business contracting. The compromise requires the Small Business Administration and the Department of Energy to develop a Memorandum of Understanding, MOU, on a methodology for measuring the achievement of awarding prime contracts and subcontracts to small businesses. It is my understanding that MOU will in no way count the subcontracts awarded by DOE's management and operations contractors towards DOE's prime contracting goal. Section 6022 also requires DOE and SBA to conduct a joint study of changes at DOE that would encourage greater opportunities for small business contracting, and it includes temporary relief for local small firms that are facing undue burdens as a result of contracts being broken out from large, bundled management and operations contracts. Mr. President, the Department of Energy has the worst small business utilization record of all Federal agencies. This compromise is an opportunity to address the growing challenges facing small firms as a result of contract bundling, the need for greater diligence by the administration in its effort to meet the 23 percent government-wide minimum goal for small business contracting, and the need for greater management and oversight by the Department of Energy of the contracting dollars being awarded by the Agency. I hope the administration will use this opportunity to improve small business contracting at the DOE and will draw on the conclusions of the ongoing studies being released by the GAO to address the current shortfalls in small business prime contracting and subcontracting oversight. As the ranking member of the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, I am committed to working with the other committees of jurisdiction, including the Energy Committee, to ensure that DOE and SBA do not undermine the intent of Section 6022 by using this compromise language to prevent small businesses from receiving their fair share of DOE prime contracts.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the federal budget should be a reflection of American values. It should be an honest document, it should be responsible, and it should create opportunity. This budget fails that test. It is dishonest because it ignores significant funding obligations. It is irresponsible because it greatly increases our national debt and ignores pressing needs. And it fails to invest in our future and create opportunity for all Americans. Using an accounting trick that would land a CPA in jail, this budget ignores billions of dollars that the Nation must spend in the coming years. It excludes the cost of ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, which may amount to almost $400 billion over the next 10 years. It excludes the cost of the President's Social Security privatization plan, which would cost more than $750 billion over the next 10 years. It excludes the $600 billion it will cost to repeal the alternative minimum tax over the next ten years. It even excludes the interest on the debt. And yet, the Republican leadership continues to mislead the American people by telling them that this budget will cut the deficit by half. The budget significantly increases our national debt. If you include the expenditures that the budget omits, the operating deficit in 2006 will be $579 billion and rise to $595 billion in 2009. Thus, the budget will add close to $600 billion a year to our national debt, debt that is increasingly financed by foreign countries and businesses. In fact, foreign holdings of our debt have increased 92 percent since this President came into office. By doing so, this President is ceding financial control to foreign interests, and that undermines America's fiscal and economic stability. The budget calls for substantial new tax cuts while significantly cutting essential domestic programs. The reconciliation instructions call for a $70 billion tax cut, which will likely lead to a 2-year extension of the capital gains and dividends tax cuts enacted in 2003 and slated to expire in 2008. In 2005, slightly more than half of these tax cuts will benefit household with incomes over $1 million, only 0.2 percent of all households. These tax cuts come at the expense of working Americans. Over the next 5 years, over $121 billion will be cut from education, veterans health care, environmental protection, housing, and other important programs. This budget fails to fully fund No Child Left Behind. It fails to help our troops by insuring that all members of the National Guard and Reserves have health insurance. It fails to help military families meet the inevitable expenses when a loved one is deployed. And, it sets in motion a backdoor legislative process to auction the Arctic Refuge to oil companies, while failing to adequately fund investments in domestic, reliable and renewable energy. This budget also hurts manufacturers and small businesses by eliminating the bipartisan Snowe-Kerry amendment which restored $78 million to the Small Business Administration, an agency whose budget is a mere 3/100ths of a percent of the total budget, yet which has been cut the most of any agency since this President took office. This budget makes the wrong choices for Americans. It hides the real costs of this administration's priorities. It significantly increases our national debt, debt held by foreign entities and passed on to our children. It provides tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans while cutting those programs most needed by working families. I do not agree with these choices, and I do not support this budget.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, this week, the Nation celebrates National Small Business Week. It is a time when all of us join together, without any partisanship at all, to celebrate the hard work of millions of American entrepreneurs. At the Small Business Administration Expo last night at the Smithsonian, we recognized countless Americans who have had the courage to put everything they have on the line in order to turn an idea into a business. We celebrated the business people of the year from all of the 50 States in the country. Today, these Americans, I think all of us recognize, are much more than small business owners. They are employers, community leaders, and they are the people who give life to the American dream. Our small business owners not only remind us of the opportunities that America provides to those who are willing to work for it, but they remind us how much opportunity small business itself provides to all Americans. They drive our economy, compromising over 99 percent of all firms and over half of our GDP. Two-thirds of all new American jobs are created by small businesses, and a majority of Americans depend on their small business employer for health insurance. Our small businesses are responsible for countless inventions and innovations that have elevated the standards of living in our country and for people around the world. The entrepreneurial spirit I am talking about is alive and well in our country, though it faces a number of particular challenges: rising health care costs, imports, a reduction in the numbers of people going into innovative jobs and pursuing careers in the sciences and in research and development. Nevertheless, three out of four adults in America have considered starting a small business. With the advent of the Internet, those numbers are rapidly going up. I know my colleagues are familiar with the Small Business Administration in a lot of different ways. We all understand how it is charged with defending small business interests in the country. It helps small businesses tackle issues ranging from initial development issues and startup issues and access to capital to Federal contracting and trade assistance. Those efforts are working relatively well. Businesses such as Staples, Intel, Nike, America Online, Eskimo Joe's, Callaway Golf, FedEx, Hewlett-Packard, Jenny Craig, Ben and Jerry's, Winnebago, Sun Microsystems, Outback Steakhouse--you don't think of them as small businesses in need of Federal assistance. But the fact is every one of those businesses, and many more that have become household names in America, got their initial startup with Federal assistance, with venture capital or loans from the SBA, which they could not have gotten otherwise and couldn't get from traditional sources. Their owners have proven that sometimes outstanding business ideas deserve a chance, even when traditional lenders or venture capitalists won't take that chance. So we can ask the question, how many of these businesses may not have made it without help from the SBA? How many jobs would have been lost? How much tax revenue would have been lost to communities and the country? The benefits of small business expansion are numerous: a stronger economy, higher paying jobs, better prospects for women and minorities, innovation, cutting-edge products, increased opportunities for countless Americans. What is unique about the SBA investments is they pay for themselves and they pay for the SBA budget many times over with the tax revenues to the country. So supporting our small business is a win-win proposition for Americans. We can afford it. The people want it. Our economy needs it. That is why it is very hard to understand why this administration does not provide the full measure of support to the SBA and to those businesses. The SBA budget has been cut by over one-third since 2001-- the largest reduction of any Federal agency, despite the fact that it is one of the few Federal agencies that completely pays for itself. Those cuts would have been far greater if Congress had not intervened. I am pleased to say, on a bipartisan basis with Senators on both sides of the aisle, we joined together to intervene. The chairwoman of the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, Senator Snowe, and I have worked with Members of both sides in order to provide the funding that was necessary and to prevent further cuts from taking place. Time and again we have received unanimous support in the Senate to rebuff proposed administration cuts that would have gone further. That is because supporting small businesses is not a partisan issue, and it never should be. We should not have to fight so hard to provide support for something that so obviously benefits all of us. The administration loves to claim the pro-business mantle, but if they were candid with the American people, they would clarify that most of that support, as we see in the Energy bill or the tax bill, means big business, not small business. If you look at the tax cuts, the administration claims the tax cuts primarily benefit small businesses, but in reality, only the biggest small businesses get the majority of those cuts. More than half of small business owners received less than $500 in tax cuts, and almost a quarter of those businesses got no tax cuts at all. If you look at energy policy, you can see that while American families and small businesses have struggled with gas prices, oil companies earned record profits in the fourth quarter of 2004. Exxon- Mobil was up 218 percent. Conoco-Phillips was up 145 percent. Shell was up 51 percent. ChevronTexaco was up 39 percent. BP was up 35 percent. Show me the small business in America, except the rare small business, that saw that kind of growth in the fourth quarter of last year. You can also look at this disparity at what is happening with respect to Federal contracts right now. Congress set the goal of the Federal government awarding at least 23 percent of its contracting dollars to small businesses. So what did the administration do? They allowed $2 billion worth of contracts to be reported as going to small businesses when, in fact, they went to some of the largest businesses in the country. The money went to Raytheon, in my State, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics, and Hewlett-Packard. Even the State of Texas was treated as a small business. An administration concerned with small business ought to be outraged by these facts, and it ought to do something about it. This administration has facilitated the distortion of that Federal agency contracting goal of 23 percent and, in fact, allowed a process to go forward that has undermined our ability to help the small businesses that need it. In addition, the administration has refused requests for an audit. They have not taken substantive steps to reform the contracting process. They have not prosecuted anyone for misrepresenting their organization as a small business. And now the administration is supporting efforts to make it easier for the Energy Department to shift money away from small businesses. A bipartisan Senate has repeatedly stood up to the administration and called them to account for being too willing to ignore the challenges that face small businesses. It is time to again join forces to assure that this new challenge to small businesses, which is the diversion of federal contracts and the distortion of the standards that apply to what is a small business and what is a large business, ought to be appropriately adjusted. Small businesses are also particularly hard hit by health care. Most small business owners want to do right by their employees. They try hard to do that, but too many of them just cannot afford to offer health care anymore. Premiums are rising faster than inflation or wages, with double-digit increases in each in the last 4 years. Since 2000, the premiums for family coverage have gone up 59 percent compared with inflation increases of nearly 10 percent and wage growth of over 12 percent. Some small businesses have reported premium increases of as much as 70 percent in one year. As a result, 5 percent fewer small businesses offered health benefits to their workers in 2004 than in 2001. By contrast, 99 percent of the businesses with 200 or more employees offer their workers health insurance. Of 45 million uninsured Americans, almost two-thirds are small business owners, their employees and their families. So I think all of us understand that in a nation founded on equity and equality of opportunity, it is important for us to address the question of health care costs. We need a plan that gives small business access to the range of plan choices and consumer product protections that are offered through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program. And we need to give these small businesses affordable options through refundable tax credits and Federal reinsurance plans that will reduce premiums for everyone. Small businesses and entrepreneurs are America's single greatest economic resource. There is not a big business in America that did not begin in someone's garage, someone's attic, someone's basement, where people did not work out of a car for a period of time in an effort to try to grow that business. Time and again small businesses, not large corporations, have pulled our economy out of trouble by creating the jobs and the products of the future. For many entrepreneurs, the SBA is their only chance to earn their fair share of the American dream. As we celebrate small businesses and entrepreneurship this week, we all have a responsibility to defend that dream. We need to ensure that the SBA is adequately funded. We need to ensure legislation never shortchanges small businesses, and we need to provide a real plan for small business health care. The doors of opportunity must be open to everyone.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent I be permitted to speak as in morning business for a period not to exceed 15 minutes.

Mr. KERRY. What is the pending business?

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

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, this morning, Americans braced themselves for another week of devastating news about the gas pump. This morning, Americans learned again of the record increases in the price of oil in America. When they turn on the news tonight, they are not going to learn of anything that has been done by this Congress or the administration in the past months or even past years. They are not going to see Washington taking the necessary steps to end our dependency on foreign oil. Instead, people will see President Bush meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, a stark reminder of our dangerous dependence on foreign oil and how much that dependence threatens our economy as well as our national security. The President offers strong words against nations that sponsor terror, but for those in control of 65 percent of the world's oil supply, those words are compromised from the get-go. That is wrong, but it is fundamentally what happens when the administration is committed to an energy future that is dependent on oil, oil, and more oil, at all costs, even if that cost is our national security. The fact is, we are more dependent on foreign oil today than ever before. Despite the sharp rhetoric of the 1970s and the initial effort to try to be less dependent on oil, it has consistently increased. This dependence slows our economy, harms our environment, dilutes our national security, and it burdens Americans with the high gas prices they face today. Sadly, the President's energy bill, which we are going to soon debate in the Senate, fundamentally ignores these problems, and it does nothing to lower gas prices. In the last days, the administration has conceded ``changes to production, consumption, imports and prices are negligible under the plan submitted to the Congress.'' Frankly, Washington has danced around this statement for a year now. But last week, President Bush himself acknowledged the truth. He said: [The] energy bill wouldn't change the price at the pump today. I know that and you know that. So if we all know that, why pass this Energy bill along in its current form when real solutions are staring us in the face? Americans are paying an average of $2.28 a gallon at the pump. That is up 6 cents in the last week, over 50 percent in the last year, and up a staggering 56 percent since 2001. The President's so-called energy plan does nothing to reduce our dependency on foreign oil. The President's own economists found oil imports will actually increase 85 percent by 2025 under a proposal such as the one we see in the Congress. Less than 5 percent of the incentives in this bill are devoted to developing alternative sources of energy. That is 5 percent for the future, 95 percent for the status quo. In 2002, when the Senate passed an energy bill with a bipartisan vote of 88 to 11, the bill provided for a balanced tax package: 50 percent of the benefits to oil and gas and 50 percent to renewables. By abandoning that balanced, forward-looking approach, this bill sells out our Nation's dream of an energy independent future. Why are we taking the time in the Senate and the House to discuss an energy bill that does not take the steps available to begin to free us from our dependency? The failure to aggressively address the dependency will condemn a generation of Americans to higher gas prices, and the problem will only get worse. The era when the United States, Japan, and Europe comprised the bulk of the world's demand for oil is long over. Oil consumption from developing Asian nations is going to more than double in the next 25 years, from 15 million to 32 million barrels a day. Chinese consumption will grow from 5 million to nearly 13 million per day. India's consumption will rise from 2 to more than 5 million barrels per day. The escalating demand for foreign oil is simply unsustainable. Every American who has taken an economics class, who owns a small business, or who balances the family checkbook understands that when demand for the product goes up and supply of that product is limited, prices are going to go through the roof. If you do not own your own product, that is great, but if you do, you are in trouble. Obviously, we do not. The fact is that the United States only has 3 percent of the world's oil reserves. So no matter what happens, we are going to remain dependent if fossil fuel and oil are going to remain the staple of our transportation, heating, and other product sources in the United States. In reality, international demand for oil is going up, and prices are going up as that demand goes up. There is little we can do to stop it unless we change the fundamentals on which we are currently producing and providing for the various oil needs of our Nation. We cannot drill our way out of this problem under any scenario whatever. Whether we drill in Alaska or even the oil in the deep water of the gulf, we cannot drill our way out of it. America needs to move forward in the technology race. We need to invent our way out of it. The spectacle of an American President literally reduced to asking--some would describe it as begging--another country to open the spigots and try to provide some momentary relief is really its own statement about where we find ourselves today. The fact is, what we ought to be doing is accelerating research and development in our country. Today's meeting with the Saudis really underscores what is wrong with the energy policy of our country. The danger of maintaining our dependence on foreign oil is so obvious that Americans cannot help but question the actions of this administration. The actions do not meet their words. The President has said the right things. Last week, he said: With oil at more than $50 a barrel . . . energy companies do not need taxpayer funded incentives. So he said the right thing. But the facts tell a different story. The Energy bill provides 95 percent of the tax benefits to oil and gas companies, with over $8 billion directly going to the oil and gas companies of the country. Only 5 percent--less than even in the bill we passed 2 years ago in the Senate, or 3 years ago--is going to go to those things that would actually provide Americans with relief. At a time when oil and gas prices are at historic highs, our energy policy ought to be aimed at investing in new and renewable sources of energy, not lining the pockets of the special interests. On energy, the administration has not been leveling with the American people. I think the President and Congress continue to miss an extraordinary opportunity. Most public policy forces us to make difficult tradeoffs: foreign versus domestic, urban versus rural, consumer versus business. But energy policy does not require us to do that. Other than the big oil companies, everyone benefits from reducing our dependence on foreign oil. Energy policy provides us with a unique opportunity to address a huge group of challenges all at the same time. If we lead the world in investing in new energy technologies, we create thousands of high-paying jobs right here in America. If we learn to tap clean energy sources, we preserve a clean environment for our families and future generations. We reduce mercury and acid rain. If we remove the burden of high gas prices, American consumers will have more cash in their pockets to spend on consumption products or on savings or on college or other things. That will all give our economy the boost it needs. Most importantly, if we end our dependence on foreign oil, we strengthen our national security. The Energy bill before the Congress accomplishes none of these goals. In fact, it weakens all of them. Let me focus on one of those things that it weakens, our national security. Increased American energy dependence further entangles our Nation in unstable regions of the world and forces us even to compromise our values. In exchange for oil, we transfer wealth to people who have done us harm and would do us harm in the future. This is, obviously, as bad for our troops and for those serving abroad as it is for people who experience the high gas prices here. We risk being drawn into dangerous conflicts because of our dependency in a particular region. We also see an already overburdened military that has to bear the consequence of that. In recent years, U.S. forces have had to help protect the Cano Limon pipeline in Colombia. Our military had to train indigenous forces to protect the pipeline in Georgia. We plan to spend $100 million on a special network of police officers and special forces units to guard oil facilities around the Caspian Sea and to continue to search for bases in Africa so we can protect all of the facilities there. Our Navy patrolled tanker routes in the Indian Ocean, South China Sea, and the Western Pacific. The reality is, we have to protect oil because that is what protects our way of life today. This is a serious issue, with real consequences, because of the unstable nature of conflict-ridden, oil-producing areas which challenge our security. In the spring of 2004, insurgents attacked an Iraqi oil platform. There was violence against oil workers in Nigeria. The result was to press global oil output and record-high gasoline prices. We were helpless to stop it. I do not think any American wants to be helpless where national security is concerned. Our dependence on foreign oil creates just the sort of alliances that George Washington warned against in 1796. These alliances with foreign suppliers leave us more vulnerable, and they can crumble the foundations of our economic and national security. The most dangerous aspect of this is that we are not alone in this dependency. I mentioned it earlier: International demand for oil is rising at an alarming rate. Another word for ``demand'' is ``competition.'' Another word for ``competition'' is ``race.'' At this rate, the great powers of the world may resume the race to secure the remaining energy reserves. That is an alarming scenario, but it is exactly the course we find ourselves on. With strong leadership, we can avoid it. But we cannot do it without a balanced energy plan that ends our dependence on foreign oil. If anyone needs an example of how energy dependence can shortchange national security, look no further than the war on terror itself. If we assume oil miraculously drops back to $30 a barrel--no one assumes that, but if you did--over the next 25 years, the United States will send over 3 trillion American dollars out of the country, much of it to regimes that do not share our values, and even, in many cases, our goals. It is bad enough to think that those $3 trillion are not going to go directly into the American economy, that they are going to go to other countries. It is worse to consider the impact on our volatile relationship with regimes such as the House of Saud, fragile as it finds itself increasingly today. Our dependence on Saudi oil is a bad bargain for the war on terror. In the past, Hamas received almost half of its funding from Saudi Arabia. We know al-Qaida has relied on prominent Saudi Arabians for financing, and Saudi Arabia sponsors clerics who still, after all the rhetoric, promote the ideology of terror. We all know what is going to happen today. The President is going to ask Prince Abdullah to raise production. But we have to be honest with the American people and acknowledge it is a short-term fix at best, and it is one that carries its risks. In the year 2000, Governor Bush said he would ``jawbone OPEC'' to ``open the spigots.'' But 5 years later, either he has not jawboned enough or it is not important. It is time the administration learned the only long-term solution to America's energy crisis and to our security itself is to end our dependence on foreign oil. National security is the most inexcusable casualty of our energy policy. But again, it is not the only one. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan has said: Markets for oil and natural gas have been subject to a degree of strain over the past year not experienced for a generation. I might say, respectfully, it may not have been experienced for a generation, but it was entirely predictable that this would come around again, particularly when you look at the development rates of China, India, and other Asian and South Asian countries. As the chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers said: High energy prices are now a drag on our economy. That is the Republican administration speaking for itself. This administration's energy policy works for Saudi Arabia, it works for the countries that get those trillions of dollars, it works for big oil and gas companies--all of which have record profits. I think one of the top companies had a 213-percent increase in profits, others 146 percent, others in the double digits. Show me the American family whose income went up commensurately. Show me most American businesses that are struggling with health care costs and now have increased costs of transportation. The American trucking industry has billions of dollars, perhaps $20 billion paid out because of the rise in the cost of fuel. So everyone is losing: consumers, small businesses, the environment, our troops, our security--everyone but the oil and gas companies. We need an energy policy that works for America and works for the 21st century. We have successfully moved from different sources of fuel in our history. We went from wood to coal. We went from coal to oil. We went from oil to a mix of oil and gas and coal and nuclear and hydroelectric, and now we are talking about wind power and other sources. We have the capacity to have various kinds of additives and even biodiesel and other forms, but we are not moving rapidly to secure the marketplace for those alternatives. It is time now for America to make its next transition in fuel, to move to a mix of solar and wind and biomass and fuel cells and clean coal and other wonders of American ingenuity. We have huge reserves of coal. But despite all the rhetoric, the administration hasn't even adequately funded the clean coal technology program. We need to tap America's strength. The new president of MIT wrote a couple of articles the other day pointing out how America is slipping backwards in technology. All you have to do is pick up any of the analyses on competitiveness in technology in America today. America is producing fewer engineers, fewer scientists. Fewer kids in college are going into science and the physical sciences. Less money is being put into the R&D to move us into that competitive edge. That competitive edge is what built the economy of the 1990s. It is what helped us to be able to create the high value-added jobs so we moved to an unemployment rate that was the lowest in the modern history of our Nation, and we paid down debt. We invested in the long-term future of our country. We have seen a complete reversal of that in the last 4\1/2\ years. I hope this Congress will do what it ought to do, not start pitting people against each other according to definitions of faith, but come here with faith in America and American ingenuity and understand that we need to tap America's strength. We need to tap our markets, our capacity for invention, innovation, and our values. That is the way we will control our own destiny. We need to embrace and foster a revolution toward an energy world that benefits our environment, our economy and, most importantly, our security. The President's energy plan will bring us more of the same--the status quo, a more dangerous future of energy dependence and high prices. It is time we came together with a real energy policy that works for the American people and puts Americans back in charge of their future and liberates our children from the stranglehold of fossil fuel. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I rise today to honor America's single greatest economic resource: our small businesses. Small businesses drive our economy, making up 99 percent of all firms, and today marks the first day of the annual National Small Business Week celebration. This week, we honor the firms that are working year round to provide goods and services to us all. Every day, small businesses and entrepreneurs are making innovations, creating new jobs, and pushing our economy forward. In fact, more than 50 percent of our Nation's GDP and more than two-thirds of all new jobs in our economy are attributable to small businesses. From the high-tech startup and the small manufacturer to the family-owned bookstore and the lemonade stand run by the little girl down the street, small businesses and entrepreneurs are an exciting part of our communities. And the opportunities they create represent the American Dream. Given the importance of small businesses to our economy, it is only logical that there would be a Federal agency dedicated to promoting and protecting their interests. The Small Business Administration, which I am sure my colleagues are well aware of, serves as an indispensable small business advocate and resource within the Federal Government. With offices and strategic resource partners across the country, the SBA is able to serve entrepreneurs at the local level by providing training, mentorship, and valuable resources and at the national level by encouraging agencies to extend contracts to small businesses and to develop small-business friendly regulations. The SBA offers a number of programs designed to help small businesses overcome obstacles to success. I am proud to support these programs, which tackle issues ranging from entrepreneurial development and access to capital to Federal contracting and trade assistance. Without these SBA resources, thousands of small businesses would not have grown, survived tough times, or even been created. Once small businesses such as Staples, Intel, Nike, America Online, Black Enterprise Magazine, Eskimo Joe's, Callaway Golf, FedEx, Hewlett- Packard, Jenny Craig, Gymboree, Ben & Jerry's, Winnebago, Sun Microsystems, and Outback Steakhouse all received assistance through at least one of the SBA's programs. These businesses started out small but are now household names. They prove that their owners had excellent business ideas even though traditional lenders or venture capitalists would not take a chance on them. The SBA gave these once small businesses an opportunity to grow, helping them to get their foot in the door and eventually bring new products to markets across the country and the world. The long-term gains that our economy experiences from helping these companies are too numerous to list entirely, but they include thousands of jobs, a stronger economy, increased opportunities and millions in additional tax revenue, which has paid for the SBA's budget many times over. While helping them grow is a part of SBA's mission, many small businesses are not looking to become large corporations, and these too need SBA's assistance and support. Every small business is important. Our neighborhoods could not function and would not be the same without the local dry cleaner, the corner market, the day care provider, the hardware store, the car mechanic, the restaurant, and countless other small businesses. Whether family-owned or a franchise, an S Corp or a sole-proprietor, fast-growing or home-based, all small businesses contribute greatly to our economy. And for decades, the SBA has been there to help. According to SBA Administrator Hector Barreto's recent testimony before the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, the SBA backed a record $21.3 billion in loans and related financing to small businesses last year. Of that money, nearly one-third of it went to businesses owned by women or minorities. The SBA's major technical assistance programs reached a record number of clients last year, and the procurement assistance programs aided more than 37,000 small businesses. These impressive figures demonstrate that the entrepreneurial sector of our economy is alive and flourishing, in part because of the SBA. It is up to us, in the Federal Government, to ensure that this entrepreneurial spirit continues to thrive. This week, in honor of National Small Business Week, the SBA is hosting SBA Expo '05, which serves to highlight the year's greatest achievers and small business advocates. I am proud to join Senator Snowe and several other members of Congress as an honorary cochair of this event, where the SBA will also honor the National Small Business Person of the Year and State winners, including Massachusetts' own Fred Curtis, Jr. of Curtis Tractor Cab. Mr. Curtis has worked tirelessly to expand his company, growing from 21 employees in 1988 to 221 employees last year. Demonstrating the value that a small investment can give, Curtis Tractor Cab has grown more than 700 percent since receiving an SBA 504 loan from the Worcester Business Development Corp. I thank Mr. Curtis for his important contributions to the Worcester area. I know I speak for the small business community in Massachusetts when I say we are very proud to have an entrepreneur like Mr. Curtis representing our State with this award. I also commend all of the SBA award winners this week. Their contributions to their States, communities, and our national economy are immense. In addition, I specifically congratulate Steven Stultz, the National 2005 Financial Services Champion of the Year. Much of what the SBA does involves access to capital, and Mr. Stultz has been a ubiquitous leader for the greater lending community. He is an active member of the National Association of Development Companies--NADCO-- sits on the Board of Directors for CDC Small Business Finance, and is in his second year of a 3-year term as chairman of the National Association of Government Guaranteed Lenders--NAGGL. Mr. Stultz's dedication and leadership have propelled the 7(a) and 504 loan programs into powerful economic development tools. He has worked closely with Congress, particularly with the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, to make necessary and thoughtful changes to the SBA's several loan program. I am thankful and supportive of his tireless advocacy and work to make access to capital easier for small businesses nationwide. As a tribute to the SBA and the 25 million small businesses in the Nation, Senator Olympia J. Snowe and I support S. Res 120, to honor their impact on our Nation and our economy. As the resolution indicates, the SBA has assisted more than 20 million entrepreneurs throughout its history. However, despite the agency's noble mission, its assistance to small businesses is being threatened by this administration, which has cut funding to the SBA by 36 percent since 2001--more than any other Federal agency. One can only imagine how much more the SBA could have done for small businesses this year with just the same funding it received in 2001. We may never know the true cost these cuts have had on the future growth of our economy. How many Intels were passed up for funding, how many rural businesses weren't able to get management assistance, and how many jobs weren't created? Small businesses give entrepreneurs the opportunity to pursue their passion, they give parents the opportunity to stay at home with kids while supplementing the household income, they give people the opportunity to be their own bosses, they empower women and minorities, and they spark innovation. Small businesses are vital to the success of our country and our economy, and we must do everything in our power to ensure our small businesses and entrepreneurs have the greatest resources in the world.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. I ask unanimous consent--I will not speak that long--to proceed for such time as I may consume.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the successes of the intelligence community are never really known to the American public. But the spectacular failures of the last few years have been apparent to us all. Blue- ribbon panels, presidential commissions, and common sense have all told us that the intelligence community needs reform. In recent months, with action by Congress and the administration, we've begun to see progress. With the vote on John Negroponte's nomination today, we will take an important step in giving life to the structural reforms we've debated for so many months. John Negroponte faces a daunting challenge as the country's first Director of National Intelligence. It will be his responsibility to make intelligence reform a reality, to break-down the barriers between intelligence agencies, and to restore the credibility of the American intelligence community. There once was a time where the word of the President of the United States was enough to reassure world leaders. After the intelligence failures of the last few years, that is no longer true. In his confirmation hearings, Mr. Negroponte identified ways to improve the intelligence process--formalizing lessons-learned exercises across the community; utilizing ``Team B'' analyses to avoid self- reinforcing analysis premised on faulty assumptions; improving inter- agency and community-wide cooperation; and removing barriers between foreign and domestic intelligence. He must also be able to work effectively with Secretary Rumsfeld and the Department of Defense--and its 80 percent of the intelligence budget--to really reform the community. Many of us in Congress will support his efforts, and I urge President Bush to be steadfast in this regard as well. But Mr. Negroponte's most immediate and urgent task will be to speak truth to power. When the intelligence does not support the policy goals or ambitions of the administration, Mr. Negroponte must never flinch, never waiver, never compromise one iota of his integrity or the integrity of the intelligence. He must also be willing to push analysts to challenge assumptions, consider alternatives, and follow the evidence wherever it may lead them. And when they do, he must back them with the full authority of his office. Today we face many threats, the dangerous legacy of the Cold War in vast nuclear arsenals, the spread of weapons of mass destruction, the spread of terrorism, lingering disputes in various regions of the world, and new forces, like globalization, all crying out for leadership by the United States. The decisions policy makers make are influenced by many factors. But on issues of war and peace, on protecting this country, on determining our long-term national security needs and the direction of our foreign policy, there is no substitute for intelligence that is accurate, timely, and trusted. Mr. Negroponte will shape the role of Director of National Intelligence in fundamental ways. He will be judged on whether or not America is safer at the end of his tenure than when he starts. For the sake of us all, I hope he succeeds.