Jon Kyl

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Madam President, it is my intention in a moment to ask unanimous consent to speak on a different subject. Perhaps Senator Levin would like to comment briefly. I know he has a more lengthy statement he would like to make at a later time.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. In that event, Mr. President, I would like to conclude with some remarks in opposition to the nominee. With all due respect to Senator Levin--he knows I have the utmost respect for him--I believe Madelyn Creedon is not qualified for this very important position, one of the most important positions in our Government. She has never held the kind of positions, as her predecessors have, that would qualify her to head this particular agency. The Deputy Administrator for Defense Programs has the direct authority over the Directors of the three National Laboratories, the head of the Nevada Test Site, and the heads of the four nuclear weapons production facilities. This is the person who is in charge of our nuclear weapons production facilities, as well as the nuclear weapons laboratories and programs. While Ms. Creedon has worked as Senator Levin's counsel, before that and in between working for Senator Levin, she has also served as general counsel on the Base Closure Commission. She also served for a little over a year as an assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Energy. And she was counsel for special litigation at the Department of Energy from 1980 to 1990. She has never had the kind of educational background or administrative background that would qualify her for this position. The Deputy Administrator will be called upon to manage numerous large and very technically complex projects that are expanding the limits of America's scientific knowledge. Experience in managing large organizations and a technical background are highly desirable. The previous holder of this position, for example, Dr. Victor Reis, has a Ph.D. in physics and previously headed the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency--or DARPA, as we know it--and also served as Director of Defense Research and Engineering at the Department of Defense. We have known for a long time that our nuclear weapons program has had great problems. With the appointment now of General Gordon to head the security side of this program, as Senator Domenici has just talked about, I think it is important that we have somebody really well qualified as the Deputy Administrator. I do not believe it is accurate to say that Ms. Creedon is his nominee. I think it is accurate to say he has no objection to her nomination. But as was pointed out, her nomination was made prior to the time he took his position. While I am certain that her nomination will be confirmed here today, I think for those of us who believe very strongly in national security, a strong nuclear weapons program, and a future that will ensure that our weapons are safe and reliable, it requires us to vote ``no'' on a nomination which is clearly inferior. There are 50 people who could readily be identified who have far superior qualifications to serve in this highly technical, very important post. For that reason, again, with all due deference to Senator Levin, and with deference to the nominee, I will be voting ``no'' and urging my colleagues to do the same. I thank the Chair.

Mr. KYL

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

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Madam President, tomorrow the Senate is expected to vote on a motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to the consideration of the House-passed Death Tax Elimination Act, H.R. 8. I want to take a few minutes today to explain a key element of that legislation, one that wasn't discussed much during the House debate but which I think is critical to Senators understanding actually how the legislation works. The bill which passed the House on June 9 by a vote of 279-136-- incidentally, 65 House Democrats joined Republicans in very bipartisan support for the bill--ultimately repeals the Federal estate tax. But the change in policy is really more substantial than just that. The details are very important because they offer a way for both sides of the aisle to bridge past differences with respect to the estate tax, specifically with respect to how transfers at death are taxed. Although it is true that H.R. 8, the bill that passed the House, would repeal the estate tax at the end of a 10-year phaseout period, the appreciation and inherited assets would not go untaxed. That is a very important point, Madam President. This is a departure from previous estate tax repeal proposals. Under H.R. 8, a tax would still be imposed, but it would be imposed when the inherited property is sold; that is, after the income is actually realized, rather than at the artificial moment of death. The House bill, therefore, removes death from the calculation of the imposition of the tax. Earnings from an asset would be taxed the same whether the asset were earned or inherited. The plan broadens the capital gains tax base by using the decedent's basis in the property to calculate the tax. That differs from current law where the basis can be stepped up to the fair market value at the time of death. In exchange for the broader tax base, a lower tax rate would apply. The capital gains tax rate would be the general rate that would apply. I also note that a limited step-up in basis would be preserved to assure that small estates bear no new tax liability as a result of these changes. What we have done is to ensure that nobody who would escape paying the estate tax would ever have to pay a capital gains tax on that amount of money, so everybody would be treated the same in terms of avoiding liability from any tax; and only those who choose to sell an asset at a later point in time, after the property is inherited, would pay a tax. They would pay a capital gains tax--a much lower rate than the estate tax--and they would have the benefit of an exemption even more generous from the estate tax today. Here is how the bill would actually work. The estate tax would essentially be replaced by a capital gains tax. That tax would be imposed on the gain or the increase in value of the inherited property relative to its original basis or cost, plus any cost of improvements. As with the estate tax, as I said, there would be an amount of property exempt from taxation. In the case of the new capital gains tax, the exemption would be $1.3 million of gain. That is, the decedent's basis would be exempt, whatever that amount of money is, plus $1.3 million. That exemption would be divided among all of the heirs. Now, $1.3 million is the amount that can be currently shielded from the estate tax by family-owned businesses or farms. So we have provided a basic exemption here that is the same as the most generous exemption under today's law. In addition to that, we provide an additional exemption. A surviving spouse will be entitled to $3 million more, in addition to the exemption I just mentioned; that means the decedent's basis--his cost of the property--plus $3 million for the property transferred by the decedent to him or her. For married couples, there is an additional $1.3 million in exempt gains that can be added for the second spouse, for a total exemption of $5.6 million above the decedent's basis in the property, $1.3 million for the first spouse, plus $1.3 million for the second spouse, plus $3 million for spousal transfers. In each case, the exempt amount is added to the basis. It, of course, cannot exceed the fair market value of the property at the time of death. That is the way these exemptions add up. They provide a significant exemption from the payment of any capital gains tax even when the property was inherited and later sold. Why is this change important? For one thing, it removes death as the trigger for the tax. That is the object that most of us want to achieve--to take death out of the equation. It is an artificial event. People are certainly not making plans based upon death. I don't think anybody can justify death being a taxable event. Ordinarily, we see taxable events as the earning of income, the gain of profit from an investment, the sale of property, and the result of income from that. Those are taxable kinds of events. Death is purely an artificial event which should not be a trigger for any payment of tax. In fact, we all appreciate that it creates a great hardship on families at the very time of death. For example, frequently the owner of the business--the person who started the business--has to figure out at that very difficult time in their life how to pay the estate tax. Frequently, the only way to do that is actually to sell the business, sell the farm, or sell the assets in order to acquire enough liquid assets to pay the estate tax. It takes death out of the equation. That is the first object of this. I think it is the most important. But a tax would be imposed on the beneficiaries of an estate just as it would have been imposed if someone had realized a capital gain during his or her lifetime. The beneficiaries of an estate would not only inherit assets but they would also inherit the decedent's tax basis on that property. The trigger for the tax is, therefore, the sale of the assets and the realization of income. That is the appropriate time to levy a tax--not when someone dies. Advocates of the death tax often note that it serves as a backstop for the income tax by imposing taxes at death on income that previously escaped taxation. They are referring to capital gains that have never been realized. It is theoretically possible for that to be the case, although it is ordinarily true that you have spent ordinary income to acquire an asset and you have already paid income taxes on that ordinary income. But for someone who may have come into property in some other way, there could theoretically be unrealized gains that would escape taxation, except for the proposal that we have. It is true that under current law those gains, but for the estate tax, would go untaxed forever because of the step-up basis. In other words, under current law, you acquire the market value as of the date of death, and that is the value of the property. So if you later dispose of it, there is very little gain if you dispose of it quickly. But of course you have to pay a 55-percent or lower percent death tax on that property. The House-passed bill addresses this concern of unrealized gains never being taxed head on. It not only eliminates the death tax but also the step-up basis. So unrealized gains will ultimately be taxed if and when the inherited property is sold off. Therefore, nothing escapes taxation. This concept, I must confess, was one which I heard Senator Moynihan talking about when I first presented the death tax repeal to the Finance Committee. There was some concern. While we all appreciate that it is not good tax policy to impose a tax at the time of death, there has to be some way to recapture a tax on these unrealized gains. This is the proposal that does that. Therefore, it is not only eminently fair but it conforms the tax policy for everyone--people who acquire a decedents' estate or people who simply earn money--and it doesn't contain this bad element of taxing at the time of death. Instead, when you make the economic decision to sell property you have inherited--if you make that decision--you know what the tax consequences are. You know how much income you are going to receive. You can figure out how much tax you are going to pay. If you decide to go ahead and sell at that point, then you pay a capital gains tax using the original basis. But it is your decision based upon your timing and your economic circumstance and not because of a fortuitous event of death. It is interesting; President Clinton's fiscal year 2001 budget, on page 109 of the analytical perspectives, scores the existing step-up basis in capital gains and death at $28.2 billion in fiscal year 2001, and a total of $152.96 billion over 5 years. So elimination of the step-up basis as proposed in H.R. 8 can, therefore, be expected to recoup a portion of the revenue lost from the death tax repeal. That reduces the cost of the death tax repeal substantially. To say it another way, when you eliminate the death tax altogether, you are eliminating all of that revenue. But if you come back and collect a capital gains tax using the original basis on any of the inherited assets that are later sold, the Federal Government is at least going to recoup some of that revenue. Will it be 40 percent? Will it be 30 percent? I don't know. But it is interesting that the President's own people score the step- up basis of capital gains at death at over $28 billion in fiscal year 2001. That is roughly the amount of the estate tax that is going to be collected. So if you assume that all of the property would be immediately sold, then the Government theoretically would recoup all of that money. That won't happen. Obviously, people will wait a while to sell assets. But the point is that it illustrates the Government is not going to have a total loss of revenue as a result of the repeal of the estate tax. There will be revenue coming in from the capital gains tax that replaces it. I think whatever revenue losses are associated with repeal, of course, also needs to be put in perspective. This is the point that is most important to me. The President's budget, on page 2, estimates that revenues for 2001 will amount to over $2 trillion, rising to $2.92 trillion--almost $3 trillion--by the year 2010, the year that the death tax repeal would actually be implemented. In other words, by 2010, the Federal Government will collect an additional $840 billion in just that 1 year. Surely, with an $840 billion surplus in just that tenth year that the estate tax is repealed, we can afford to eliminate this unfair tax and still satisfy pressing national needs with the additional $840 billion. It is pretty clear when you put that in perspective that no one should vote against estate tax repeal on the basis that the Federal Government can't afford it. Clearly, it can afford it. One final point: I call Senators' attention to a letter that should be reaching their offices from the National Association of Women Business Owners, or NAWBO as it is sometimes called. The organization is writing in very strong support of death tax elimination. They write that women business owners in the country employ one out of every four workers. By the way, about half of the small businesses in the country are women owned. So this is a very important point to the National Association of Women Business Owners. It is one of the groups that very strongly supported us when we had the White House conference, and repeal of the death tax was No. 4 on the list of legislative items. In any event, here is what they write with respect to the point that one out of over four workers, or about 27 million workers in the United States, are employed by women business owners: When a woman-owned business has to be sold to pay the death tax, jobs are lost. This was written by president Barbara Stanbridge and vice president for public policy, Sheila Brooks. They say, ``on average, 39 jobs per business, or 11,000 jobs, have already been lost due to the planning and payment of the death tax.'' It is not only the payments that will suffer, but it is also the planning. The payments that go to the lawyers, estate planners, and insurance also increases expenses and results in job loss. NAWBO projects on average 103 jobs per business--or a total of 28,000 jobs--will be lost as a result of the tax over the next 5 years. Ms. Stanbridge and Ms. Brooks note that women businesses are just starting to grow. Many are first-generation businesses, and they have just begun to realize that, due to the death tax, their business will not be passed on to the next generation--at least not without a 55- percent estate tax and perhaps a 55-percent gift tax during life. Most of the businesses can't afford to pay the tax. As I said before, they are sold off frequently to big corporations that are not subject to the death tax. Let me make this point. I was asked by a reporter today what the original theory of death tax was. The reporter said it doesn't seem to make any sense. It doesn't make sense. But the original theory was they would prevent the accumulation of wealth. It was put in at a time when it was kind of the progressive or populist time, and there was a feeling that we should prevent the accumulation of wealth. Let me give you a story of a friend of mine in Phoenix, AZ. He came to Arizona from New York and built a printing business. Eventually, he employed about 200 people. He was a very successful entrepreneur. A lot of people depended on Jerry Wisotsky, a pillar of the community, who contributed huge sums of money to all kinds of causes. He was a very rough and gruff guy on the exterior. On the interior, he had a heart of gold. He could not turn down any request for a charity in town. He was very generous. All of his family were. When he died, the family found that everything had been plowed back into the business--the latest of printing equipment and so on. He had no hard cash to pay the huge estate tax. They had to sell the business. To whom did they sell it? It was some big conglomerate--a big German company, I think. But it was a big corporation. So much for the death tax preventing the accumulation of wealth. It took a whole bunch of wealth from one family in Phoenix, AZ, and transferred it to a big international corporation. It doesn't prevent the accumulation of wealth. It concentrates wealth in the big companies that end up being able to afford to buy the business--frequently at bargain basement prices. It is unfair. It is not good for communities. I made the point about contributions of this one family. As I said, that family used to contribute to every charity in Arizona. They are still very generous, but they don't have the assets they used to have when Jerry owned the business. This argument that charities are going to suffer if we repeal the estate tax I know to be wrong. I am waiting for the first executive director of some big charity organization in the community to come back to me and lobby against the repeal of the estate tax on the grounds that it will hurt contributions to charity. I will immediately call every member of that person's board of directors and say: Do you know what your hired person is lobbying for back here? They are lobbying to pay 55 percent of the estate tax to the U.S. Government because it might be an incentive to contribute more to their charity. I think these folks will turn tail and go home. The reality is people who are big hearted will make big contributions, as the Wisotsky family, and they can do it if they have an income stream coming, rather than if they have to sell the business to somebody else. I talked about the women-owned businesses. Minority-owned businesses are in the same position, which is why we have strong support from various minority business organizations. However, the point of repeal of the estate tax is it is in keeping with the American dream. The American dream is to work hard, be successful, and give your children a greater opportunity than you had. That is the American dream. The estate tax works counter to the American dream, the ability to pass on something to your children and grandchildren after you have worked very hard during your lifetime to save that money. That is another point. The death tax penalizes savers. We talk about tax policy and trying to promote savings and investment. The estate tax is exactly contrary to that. On the one hand, the Federal Government seeks to encourage people to save through IRAs, Roth IRAs, 401(k)'s, education savings accounts, and lower tax rates on capital gains. Yet on the other hand, it penalizes savers upon their death with death tax rates as high as 55 percent. Consider two couples with similar lifetime earnings. One spends lavishly during their lifetime and leaves only a small estate. That couple is not subject to the death tax. The second couple who foregoes lavish spending and sets money aside for family, for the future, for contingencies in the future--as the Government policy seeks to have them do--gets hit with a substantial tax on death degree. That is not right. It is not good tax policy or good national economic policy. It is particularly not fair because there is a better way: Tax the gains when they are realized; don't tax at death. That is what the Death Tax Elimination Act is all about. I urge Senators to take a very close look at this when we have this issue of the cloture vote. Think very carefully about not allowing us to proceed. There is some notion that politically some people will want to use the death tax repeal legislation to offer all kinds of nongermane amendments to make whatever other points they may want to make. Everybody around here knows the Senate schedule is very tight. Everybody knows the death tax repeal is extremely popular around the country. A very high percentage, 70 to 80 percent of the American people, support its repeal. It passed the House of Representatives. If everyone had been there, it would be a veto- proof vote. I believe it will be a veto-proof vote. It is pretty clear the death tax repeal is going to pass. It will be successful if it comes to a vote. I don't know whether some people plan to play political games and use this vehicle to score political points on totally unrelated matters. I urge those Members to think very carefully about that strategy. If we are not able to get the clean version of the House bill, H.R. 8, to a vote, I will be standing on the floor pointing fingers at those people who have prevented the Senate from doing that. I think that is very fair. It is very appropriate. The House of Representatives overwhelmingly repealed the death tax. The American people want it repealed. We will have an opportunity to consider it in the Senate. Those Senators who stand in the way of this, playing parliamentary games, using amendment tactics with amendments that are not germane to the estate tax, we are going to be on the floor pointing out the results of their efforts. If they stop this with those tactics, they will have to accept the consequences of their actions. It is fine with me to have people try to amend the bill. I don't think they will be successful. This bill, written by Chairman Bill Archer and Representative Dunn and others in the House of Representatives, including members of the minority, is very well put together. It reduces rates for the first 10 years and has a repeal at the end of the 10-year period. By then it is all gone. That should give everybody time to adjust to the fact that it is going to be repealed, however it will be repealed. I hope my colleagues will not decide to try to derail the opportunity to repeal the death tax through a strategy either of denying cloture-- in other words, the ability to bring the bill to a final vote on the floor of the Senate--or alternatively, to require the majority leader to agree to nongermane amendments, which obviously would sink the ship. It is my understanding from talking to the majority leader today that he does not yet have an agreement to permit bringing the bill to the floor with a limited number of germane amendments, with a clear vote before the end of this week. If that can't be accomplished, we will have to move for cloture and we will have a cloture vote. I believe we will get cloture. When we do, then only germane amendments are allowed. There will be a vote by the end of the week. Members can't say they are for repeal of the death tax and then engage in tactics which prevent the Senate from ever getting to that vote. Let me make a couple of other points. This is a very bipartisan approach both in terms of outside groups and the strong support we have had both in the House and in the Senate from Members on both side of the aisle. That is why I do not make a blanket action over who might use dilatory tactics. Many members of the minority are cosponsors of this legislation. When I originally developed this concept, Senator Bob Kerrey of Nebraska was very supportive and immediately became a cosponsor of what is now known as the Kyl-Kerrey bill. We have 29 cosponsors. Frankly, we could have more. Nine are members of the minority party. The rest are members of the majority party. Let me single out these members of the minority party who have been willing to support us. I am sure there will be more, but cosponsors include Senators Bob Kerrey, John Breaux, Chuck Robb, Blanche Lincoln, Ron Wyden, Mary Landrieu, Max Cleland, Evan Bayh, and Patty Murray. These are all Senators who I think have studied this and realize there is a tax on the unrealized gains incorporated in this bill, so it becomes a very fair bill just taking death out of the equation. I particularly thank those Senators for putting aside any partisanship in recognizing the importance of this repeal. For those who are not totally familiar with the overall essence of the bill, let me describe the key elements of it. As amended, H.R. 8 would, first, in the year 2001 convert the unified credit to a true exemption and repeal the so-called 5-percent bubble and expand the availability of qualified conservation easements. It would also repeal rates in excess of 53 percent in that first year. Between 2002 and 2009 it would phase down the estate tax rates by 1 percent to 2 percent each year. Third, in 2010 it would implement the Kyl-Kerrey language eliminating the death tax and implementing a carryover-basis regime, as I discussed earlier. Over the Fourth of July, I had occasion to attend some ceremonies and hear our Founding Fathers quoted. Of course Benjamin Franklin is always one of the most fun to quote, but he is one who, some 200 years ago, said: Nothing in this world is certain but death and taxes. It should come as no surprise that after 200 years the Federal Government would find a way to put those two inevitabilities together to create a death tax which is not only confiscatory but also offensive to the American sense of fairness and also harmful to small business and to the economy. It was also harmful to the environment, and this is so because what happens is families find, in order to pay the tax, they have to sell land they would like to keep in the family for its environmental value. But they find they have to sell it to generate income. Inevitably what happens is the property is developed. That development is the reason why there are conservation groups who have also joined us in opposition to the estate tax and in favor of its repeal. There is another point I want to mention. Opponents of our legislation say this only affects a few people. First of all, it is not true; it affects a lot of people. It is true in the end only a few people have to end up paying. But a lot of people have spent a lot of money preparing various tax shelters to escape the payment of the estate tax. Who benefits, of course, are the lawyers and the estate tax planners and the insurance companies. I have nothing against any of those folks, but I don't think we need to create tax policy just to create jobs for lawyers. I am a lawyer. I know I always had plenty to do without having to get into this. So I don't think any of those folks would have real grounds for suggesting that in order to keep them in business we have to keep the estate tax. So it is not just the people who pay, it is also the people who have to try to avoid paying. There is another thing. The Chair is well aware of this because she and I share the same concern about this problem, as a result of which I understand either tomorrow or Wednesday there is going to be a hearing before the Aging Committee, talking about senior citizens who end up getting bilked or scammed because of people who come to them and say to avoid the death tax they have to give them a bunch of money to set up some kind of trust to save their assets. Most of these people are people who would not have to pay the tax; their estates are just not big enough to be taxed. They fall within the exemption. But they are afraid. They have heard about this death tax and they are susceptible to these scams which take large amounts of money from them under the guise of estate planning which is not necessary for them. So you not only have the people who have to pay the tax, you not only have the people who have to pay not to pay the tax, but you also have people who get scammed into paying some of these unscrupulous folks, setting up trusts they do not need because they would never be subject to the tax. You also find--again I go back to the example I cited before--when businesses are sold, frequently jobs are lost, and those jobs are also affected, as I pointed out, by the reduced income from the businesses that have to prepare not to pay the tax. So it is just not true the tax only affects a limited number of people. In fact, I believe it was 3 years ago that we had the latest statistics for the amount of money spent to avoid paying the estate tax. It was almost exactly the same as the amount of tax paid in that particular year. In effect, it is a double taxation and a very inefficient tax when you have to pay that much money to avoid paying the tax. Edward McCaffrey--I don't think he would mind me putting this label on him--who is a liberal, a professor of law at the University of Southern California, put it this way. Polls and practices show that we like sin taxes, such as on alcohol and cigarettes. . . . The estate tax is an anti-sin, or virtue tax. It is a tax on work and savings without consumption, on thrift, on long-term savings. He is exactly right. We may all be for sin taxes. But one of the reasons why the bulk of Americans, whether they will ever have to pay the tax or not, oppose the estate tax is they realize it is contrary to everything we believe in America. It is not a tax on sin; it is a tax on virtue--saving something for your kids when you die. Let me also cite economists Henry Aaron and Alicia Munnell, making the very same point. Writing in a 1992 study, they said that death taxes: [H]ave failed to achieve their intended purposes. They raise little revenue. They impose large excess burdens. They are unfair. As I noted, opinion polls constantly show between 70 percent and 80 percent of Americans favor repeal of the death tax. When Californians had the chance to weigh in with a ballot proposition, they voted 2 to 1 to repeal their State's death tax. I think that is a very important point because that vote was very recent. The legislatures of six other States have enacted legislation since 1997 that would either eliminate or significantly reduce the burden of their States' death taxes. In fact, the minority leader was here a moment ago. I note on the ballot in the home State of the distinguished minority leader, South Dakota, there will be a proposition this fall for the elimination of the death tax. If you talk to the men and women who run small businesses around the country, if you talk to people who join in meetings, gatherings that I talk to all the time, you will find very strong support for repeal of the tax. Remember, it is a tax that is imposed on a family business when it is least able to afford the payment, on the death of the person with the greatest practical and institutional knowledge of that business' operations. That is the reason why so many businesses cannot make it to the second generation or the third. I mentioned before the women- and minority-owned businesses. Instead of passing hard-earned and successful businesses on to the next generation, many of these families have had to sell their companies in order to pay the death tax. That certainly stops the upward mobility that is so important to some of these groups. It is why death tax repeal is supported by groups such as the National Association of Women Business Owners, the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the National Black Chamber of Commerce, the National Indian Business Association, and the National Association of Neighborhoods. This is a very wide spectrum of organizations representing a very broad spectrum of the American community. I cannot think of a policy that has come to the Senate in recent times that has a more broad appeal to it than the repeal of this very unfortunate and unfair tax. I mentioned before the argument about concentration of wealth. I just want to go back to that for a moment. There is a February 2000 study by the National Association of Women Business Owners, the Independent Women's Forum and the Center for the Study of Taxation combined. It found the death tax costs female entrepreneurs nearly $60,000 on death tax planning, obviously money they could use to put back into their businesses. They report that 39 jobs were lost per business due to the costs of death tax planning during the last 5 years. Think about that. Women business owners report that the cost of death tax planning will create 103 new jobs per business in the next 5 years. Think about that statistic. Most of the businesses we think about are much smaller than that to begin with, but we know small businesses can grow to 200 or 300 employees if they are successful. These numbers are staggering when you stop to think about the amount of job loss that results, just from the costs of planning to avoid the estate tax. It is an incredible statistic. There is a June 1999 survey of the impact of the death tax on family business employment levels in upstate New York which found that the average spending for death tax planning was as much as $125,000 per company. Think of that. For the 365 businesses surveyed, the total number of jobs lost already as a result of the cost of death tax planning was over 5,100 jobs. The average estimated number of jobs these businesses would lose over the next 5 years if they actually had to pay the death tax exceeds 80 per business, with the numbers of jobs at risk at a minimum of 15,000 jobs. This is just among something like 300 companies in upstate New York. These are staggering statistics. If you expand that to the rest of the country, it is impossible to argue that the estate tax is not my problem, that it is just for a few rich folks. It affects everybody in this country. What it suggests to me is that although it is paid by only a small number of individual taxpayers, it has a disproportionately large negative impact on the economy. As someone said, it is the tax with the longest shadow of any on the books. The adverse consequences are compounded over time, too. A December 1998 report by the Joint Economic Committee concluded that the existence of a death tax in this century has reduced the stock of capital in the economy by nearly half a trillion dollars. Think about what a half of a trillion dollars of capital stock infused into the economy in the future could mean. These surpluses that are projected now would be expanded even more significantly because the growth in capital would obviously provide a lot more return on investment. It is really staggering when one stops to think about the impact of this one tax and how pernicious it is, all the way from the individual minority-owned business to the economy of the United States losing half a trillion dollars in capital stock. Just think, by repealing the death tax and putting those resources to better use, the joint committee estimates that as many as 240,000 jobs could be created just over a period of 7 years. Americans would have an additional $24.4 billion in disposable personal income over that period of time. If we said to the American people: We have a great deal for you; how would you like another $25 billion in the next 7 years and all we have to do is repeal this tax that does not bring in revenues to the United States proportionate to the cost that it imposes on the economy, I think they would say that is a very good deal. It seems to me almost all of the arguments for those who used to favor the tax have been pretty well laid to the side, and the only question now is how we are going to get this to a vote in the Senate and how we are then going to be able to send it to the President. I mentioned the cost to the environment a moment ago. Maybe those who have in mind offering amendments would like to consider this for just a moment: An increasing number of families who own environmentally sensitive lands, as I said before, have had to sell property for development to raise the money to pay the death tax, which destroys natural habitats as a result. With that in mind, Michael Bean of The Nature Conservancy observed that the death tax is highly regressive in the sense that it encourages the destruction of ecologically important land. So maybe folks who were planning to speak in opposition to this would like to take that into consideration. Because it tends to encourage development and sprawl, a lot of environmental organizations have endorsed its repeal. Among those organizations: The Izaak Walton League, the Wildlife Society, Quail Unlimited, the Wildlife Management Institute, and the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies. Incidentally, pending repeal in 2010, as I noted before, H.R. 8 expands the availability of qualified conservation easements, which is something I am sure all of these conservation organizations support. For all of these reasons, it is going to be very hard to explain why we would not support repeal of this tax. It overwhelmingly passed in the House of Representatives. The repeal portion of the death tax recaptures taxes on unrealized gains, something that had been a problem for some Members of the other side of the aisle. I understand why, and I was happy to include that compromise in this legislation, and Representative Archer did the same. In the meantime, it enhances conservation easements, reduces rates. I really cannot think of a good argument against this. And yet constituents may ask: Why can't you get it to a vote? Why do you need to worry about this? The reason is, frankly, because of the rules of the Senate, any Senator has the ability to raise nongermane matters until we have had a cloture motion voted on and approved. There are those who would like to take advantage of this opportunity to raise their favorite issue in that way. If enough people do that with these nongermane riders which we have all heard so much about, it can sink the ship that otherwise would carry the legislative business to the President for his signature. I hope that will not happen. I hope very much we can reach an agreement to quickly take up and consider any amendments and then vote for the repeal of the estate tax, vote for the House-passed bill, H.R. 8. I hope we can do that tomorrow at the very latest. If we cannot, then obviously we are going to have to file cloture and have that vote on Thursday. I encourage all of my colleagues to look at this legislation very carefully because there is some misinformation about it. I know I talked for some time today, but hopefully I have been able to answer some of the questions that have been raised in my remarks. I stand ready to work with Senators who want to understand better exactly what we are trying to do here, what the effect of it will be, and what the many organizations are that support this legislation because they are significant. I certainly hope they will make their feelings known during the course of the next few days, too, because it is important for our colleagues to understand the depth and breadth of support for repeal of the estate tax. I conclude by thanking Senator Levin, again, for allowing me to take this time and to urge my colleagues to support H.R. 8, to agree to a time agreement that will enable us to take it up in a timely fashion, to get it disposed of with germane amendments as quickly as possible so we can have a vote on repeal sometime this week. That is something the American people would feel very proud we accomplished. Everyone can go back to their constituencies and brag about it. It is not partisan; it is bipartisan. Republicans cannot brag they did it all alone because many Democrats in the House made it possible with a veto-proof margin. Without the support of our Democratic colleagues in the Senate, I know we would not have gotten this far today. I am very hopeful people on both sides of the aisle will see not just the fairness of it but the political benefit in responding to our constituents, which is, after all, what we are supposed to be doing around here. We know they would like to see repeal, and I think it is time for us to show them we can get something done here; we can do this and not hide behind all of the usual parliamentary maneuvers that are so common in the Senate. I am very hopeful we will be able to finish this bill by the end of this week, send it on to the President, and go back to our constituents and say we did something very important for them: We repealed the death tax. I thank the Chair, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, today the Senate is voting on final passage of the FY2001 Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education appropriations bill, H.R. 4577. This measure includes funding for many good and worthwhile programs: medical research conducted by the National Institutes of Health, a drug-demand reduction initiative, efforts to combat bioterrorism, Pell Grants, Impact Aid, and services for older Americans, to name a few. The amount of funding allocated to this bill is very generous: $97.8 billion in discretionary appropriations, or about 12 percent over last year's level. There are very substantial increases provided for particular programs. For example, there is a 12 percent increase for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, a 13 percent increase for the Ricky Ray Hemophilia Relief Fund, a 15 percent increase for the National Institutes of Health, a 19 percent increase for Head Start, and a 13 percent increase for education. I believe the OSHA increase, for one, is something that can and should be cut back in conference. If we want to maintain the other large increases, though, we need to find other programs, of lesser priority, to cut in order to moderate the total cost of the bill. My concern is, as we get to conference, there will be pressure to increase spending even more. We are going to hear a lot, for example, about the need for more funding for the Social Services Block Grant program. If the amount in the bill for SSBG is going to be increased, we are going to have to find somewhere else to cut. I hope proponents of these increases will keep that in mind as we proceed to conference. The sky is not the limit here. I am going to support this bill today to get it to conference, but I am not inclined to support a dollar more in the conference report. We have got to do a better job of prioritizing, or we will soon find Congress once again raiding the Social Security surpluses to pay for other government programs. We just put a stop to that two years ago. We have to honor our commitment to preserve Social Security surpluses for Social Security. The question is on the engrossment of the amendments and third reading of the bill. The amendments were ordered to be engrossed, and the bill to be read a third time. The bill was read a third time.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I introduce a bill today to facilitate the construction of a secondary port of entry in Yuma County. I introduce this measure in collaboration with Representative Ed Pastor, who has taken the lead on this issue in the House of Representatives and has seen his bill H.R. 3023, through to passage just this week by a vote of 404 to 1. The identical bill I introduce today will convey to the Greater Yuma Port Authority an area of land currently controlled by the Bureau of Reclamation for the purpose of constructing a commercial port of entry on approximately 330 acres of land just east of the city of San Luis. Anyone who has ever been to the U.S. port of entry in San Luis, Arizona, knows that traffic congestion there causes such bad delays that oftentimes individuals attempting to conduct cross-border trade there, bring goods across the border, or simply visit relatives and friends, are discouraged from crossing the border or are faced with spending two to four hours to cross. The port of entry at San Luis has become one of the busiest ports-of-crossing in the nation. After months of negotiation, all of the local principals involved in this effort, from the city of Yuma to Yuma County, the city of San Luis and Somerton and the Cocopah Indian Nation, and the Bureau of Reclamation, now fully support this effort. The bill will facilitate the construction of an additional commercial port of entry just east of San Luis, to be conveyed to the Greater Yuma Port Authority (YMPO) for fair market value. Mr. President, this legislation will make a difference to the people of Arizona, particularly to the people of Yuma and surrounding areas. It will help increase cross-border trade in the area, and will help to spur economic development for an Arizona region in need. I urge expeditious consideration of this legislation.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I introduce a bill today to facilitate the construction of a secondary port of entry in Yuma County. I introduce this measure in collaboration with Representative Ed Pastor, who has taken the lead on this issue in the House of Representatives and has seen his bill H.R. 3023, through to passage just this week by a vote of 404 to 1. The identical bill I introduce today will convey to the Greater Yuma Port Authority an area of land currently controlled by the Bureau of Reclamation for the purpose of constructing a commercial port of entry on approximately 330 acres of land just east of the city of San Luis. Anyone who has ever been to the U.S. port of entry in San Luis, Arizona, knows that traffic congestion there causes such bad delays that oftentimes individuals attempting to conduct cross-border trade there, bring goods across the border, or simply visit relatives and friends, are discouraged from crossing the border or are faced with spending two to four hours to cross. The port of entry at San Luis has become one of the busiest ports-of-crossing in the nation. After months of negotiation, all of the local principals involved in this effort, from the city of Yuma to Yuma County, the city of San Luis and Somerton and the Cocopah Indian Nation, and the Bureau of Reclamation, now fully support this effort. The bill will facilitate the construction of an additional commercial port of entry just east of San Luis, to be conveyed to the Greater Yuma Port Authority (YMPO) for fair market value. Mr. President, this legislation will make a difference to the people of Arizona, particularly to the people of Yuma and surrounding areas. It will help increase cross-border trade in the area, and will help to spur economic development for an Arizona region in need. I urge expeditious consideration of this legislation.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, the Senate is today considering the conference report to accompany the FY2001 military construction appropriations bill, H.R. 4425. The bill includes funding for military facilities and infrastructure, including base improvements, operation and training facilities, barracks and family housing, and environmental compliance. Attached to the military construction bill is a supplemental spending package for FY2000 that includes funding for anti-drug efforts, including in Colombia, funds to replenish defense accounts that have been drawn down by the Clinton administration to pay for military operations in Kosovo and Bosnia, and funds for disaster assistance, wildland firefighting activities, and administrative expenses associated with repeal of the Social Security earnings limitation earlier this year. I am pleased that the total cost of the supplemental package was reduced from the original $13 billion proposed by the House to about $11 billion. I want to commend the Majority Leader, Senator Lott, and the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Senator Stevens, for working to limit the cost of the supplemental package. I think we could have gone further, though. The bill includes about $600 million for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program. I question the need to include that money here. There is $7 million for peanut assessments. There is language in the bill that lifts the firewall that would prevent defense funds from being diverted to certain domestic programs. These are things I would omit from the bill, if I could. The fact is, though, that the bulk of the supplemental spending is urgently needed, even though some provisions of questionable merit have been included. More than half of the supplemental--$6.5 billion--is required to replenish defense operations and maintenance accounts that President Clinton has tapped to cover the cost of unauthorized military missions around the globe, including in Bosnia and Kosovo. Because O&M accounts have been seriously depleted, we find that we are now on the brink of serious readiness problems in our military if we do not replenish these accounts, and do so quickly. Mr. President, the firefighting money in this bill--$350 million-- like the defense money--is an urgent matter. The Los Alamos, New Mexico, fires have dominated the news, but wildfires this year have consumed more than 25,000 acres in Arizona, as well. Nationwide, over one million acres have burned this year, and we still have several months remaining in our fire season. The money in this bill will reimburse the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service for costs incurred in connection with firefighting efforts on the Grand Canyon rim and elsewhere around the country. The firefighting funds have to be allocated. The bill allots $1.3 billion for counternarcotics activities, including Plan Colombia. That is a start, but we are likely going to have to do even more to help gain control of drug production and distribution from Colombia. There are several items of particular importance to the state of Arizona that I would like to highlight at this point. First and foremost is language to prevent the Secretary of the Interior from moving forward with a unilateral reallocation of Central Arizona Project (CAP) water. This language is defensive in nature--that is, it is intended only to counter a threat by the Interior Secretary to reallocate CAP water by the end of the calendar year contrary to the terms of Indian water settlements now being negotiated. Water is a precious and scarce resource, and the allocation of CAP water is one of the most important decisions affecting the future of my state. Arizona simply cannot allow the Secretary to reallocate its water merely because he is about to leave office. The bill includes a $12 million one-time appropriation to be split equally between Arizona, Texas, California, and New Mexico to help cover the overwhelming costs associated with processing criminal illegal immigrants and the significant number of border-related drug cases. It also includes a one-time, $2 million appropriation for Arizona to assist Cochise County and other affected jurisdictions along the U.S.- Mexican border that are incurring significant costs for local law enforcement and criminal justice processing because of record-breaking levels of illegal immigration and smuggling of drugs and people into the state. Dr. Tanis Salant, a professor at the University of Arizona, is close to completing a study on unreimbursed costs that occur as a result of increased illegal immigration in the area. He estimates that Arizona's border counties collectively spend $15.5 million to bring criminal illegal aliens to justice. Cochise County spends 33 percent of its overall local criminal justice budget to process criminal illegal immigrants. This does not even include incarceration costs, which are also severe. Finally, the bill funds important military construction projects in the state: $2.265 million to improve the readiness center at the Army National Guard's Papago Military Reservation; $1.598 million for the readiness center at the Guard's Yuma installation; and $3.35 million for the child-development center at Fort Huachuca. These were projects that were not identified in the President's budget, but which are important priorities in the state. As I said early on, there are some things in this bill that I do not support. There is questionable need for some of the military construction projects that are funded. The LIHEAP money should not be included here. Peanut assessments. The breaching of the defense firewall. But it seems to me that the good in the bill outweighs the bad. Mr. President, I will vote for this bill. We have no choice but to replenish our defense accounts and pay for emergency items, like firefighting and disaster relief.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I, too, want to comment briefly on the comments of the Senator from New Mexico. We will have a lot more to say about this in the future because this is a national crisis. For today, let me simply acknowledge that what Senator Domenici and Senator Craig have said represents a huge challenge to this Nation. According to the GAO, 38 million acres of forests in the United States are in jeopardy of either dying or burning unless they are quickly treated. We have less than 20 years to accomplish this treatment. It is not only the risk of catastrophic forest fires, including the danger to communities around which these forests are located, but also the prospect that they will die of disease or malnutrition because they are so crowded together that they are competing for the nutrients and the water which, at least in the Southwest, are so scarce. In the area of Arizona where there has been research into this--now at least half a dozen years of experience--we find that when the areas are thinned and then prescribed burning is introduced, you don't get the catastrophic fire. You do get much better tree growth, more pitch content, so that they are not subject to the beetle infestation, for example, and higher protein content so the grasses can grow on the floor. This brings in more mammals and birds into the area. And the forest returns to the park-like condition that existed at the turn of the century. There have been a lot of bad policies since then, and a century of activity which resulted in the destruction of the national forests of this country. The task is huge. We need to get started. I will be supporting the efforts of the Senator from New Mexico and others in trying to ensure that we can literally save our beautiful national forests. I thank the Senator.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, the reason I wanted to speak this afternoon is to address the issue of energy policy and gasoline prices. It seems now that we are in the finger-pointing mode trying to blame one another for what is in effect a market condition; that is, the increasing rise in the price of gasoline. My point this morning is that it should come as no surprise to any of us that gas prices have gone up. Why is this so? First of all, thanks to Senator Pete Domenici, the chairman of the Energy and Water Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee, who yesterday in response to a question on a national TV program made, I think, the most succinct statement on this, we have the basic answer. He said, ``The chickens have come home to roost.'' He said that after 7 years of the Clinton-Gore administration policy, which is in effect no policy with respect to improving our energy situation, ``The chickens have come home to roost.'' While we have enjoyed a great time of prosperity in this country, we have been doing nothing to ensure that we would be able to provide the energy resources--the oil and gas on which our economy runs--at the time when our economy is up and running, as it is now; and, therefore, we should not be surprised that the demand for this product has outstripped the supply. He is correct in that. Thanks to Senator Murkowski, who chairs the Energy and Natural Resources Committee in the Senate, we have the statistics which back up this statement. Since 1992, U.S. oil production is down 17 percent, but consumption is up 14 percent. That is the basic fact right there. Demand is up significantly but production in this country is down significantly. The reason production is down is because of the specific policies of this administration. It should come as no surprise to us that when demand is greater and supply is less, the price is going to go up. Only those who do not understand the free market would fail to appreciate this fact and point the finger at someone else. Imports, we learned from Senator Murkowski, are now at 56 percent of our total supply and growing rapidly. In fact, they are in the neighborhood of about 62 percent during some months--specifically during this period of time. By comparison, in 1973, during the time of the Arab oil embargo, we imported about 35 percent of foreign oil. Remember how we were complaining at that point about how dependent upon these OPEC supplies we were--35 percent then and up to 62 percent now. We are approaching twice as much dependency on foreign oil supplies as we had during the time of the great oil embargo of the early 1970s. At current prices, I might add, the United States spends $300 million a day on imported oil. That is over $100 billion per year on foreign oil, which, incidentally, is about one-third of our entire trade deficit. This puts into clear perspective the amount of our reliance on these foreign sources. Are the people who supply this oil from abroad our friends when it comes to the supplying of this particular product? Are they working with us to keep the prices down? No. We know, as matter of fact, in this area even that our friends are willing to take advantage of the great demand and thirst for this product in the United States. The OPEC nations, which include our friend to the south, Mexico, and other countries in this hemisphere, but most especially the countries in the Middle East led by our friend, Saudi Arabia, have restricted the supply so as to drive the cost of the product up. It is real simple. When we don't have control over the supply that our friends do, they will take advantage of us. Frankly, we can't blame them. That is part of the way the market operates. We would object that they have gathered together in the form of a monopoly or oligopoly, and they are controlling the price. But it is their ability to do that on the foreign market. We understand that. We should not be surprised by it. But we should be committed to doing something about it. For 7 years, this administration not only has not done anything about it; it has gotten us more and more deeply in the hole of reliance on foreign oil. I have a friend back home--a rancher. The Presiding Officer will probably appreciate this kind of western humor, since he likes to collect these items. He said he has an attitude. He said: When you are trying to get out of a hole, the first thing you do is stop digging. I submit that we are going to keep digging the hole deeper and deeper if we don't stop this reliance on foreign oil, and if we don't start doing something about increasing our supply here at home. It turns out that we have plenty of opportunities, which I will get to in just a moment. One other fact that I think is important to note is that 36 refineries have closed since 1992. We have had no new refineries built in this country since 1976. It is not only the fact that we have less oil being produced in the United States, but also that less oil product is being refined in this country primarily because of the stringency of environmental regulations. What has been the administration's policy? Its energy policy says that we should have a mix of energy sources. But let's look at the facts. We have the lowest production in this country since world War II. We are importing more oil than ever before. We have regulations and taxes designed basically to close the oil industry. The President himself vetoed a bill to open so-called ANWR in 1995 with 16 billion barrels of oil--that is about a 30-year supply of imports from Saudi Arabia--and has instead advocated increasing royalty rates, which, of course, would make foreign investment even more attractive to U.S. companies and cause them to not want to produce oil here in this country. I get letters from constituents who say we should close down any offshore drilling or any drilling of oil in the Alaska reserve. I think these people need to appreciate that there was an area cut out of the wilderness area in Alaska and designated specifically for the production of oil. It is a very small area. We created a vast new wilderness on the North Slope of Alaska. It is a beautiful area. I have been there. But we created a very small island in there in effect that does not have any particular environmental benefit compared to the areas around it. We said in that particular area we would explore for oil. It is in that area that we are talking about producing this 16 billion barrels of oil. I have been to that area. I suggest anybody who believes we should not pursue the exploration for oil in that area ought to visit it. I think they will see two things. First, we have found a way to drill for oil that is very environmentally safe and benign. In effect, in a very small area about the size of this Senate Chamber, up to 10 wells can be drilled at a depth of about 10,000 feet with another 10, 15, or more thousand feet of drilling horizontally to a point of oil. We have a very small area where the oil drilling is actually evident from the surface of the Earth but a very large area underneath from which the oil is taken. This is done in an extraordinarily environmentally safe way. You cannot even tell, when you are on the surface, what is being done. We can explore for and obtain oil from these sites, such as the Alaska oil, as well as offshore sites, using the same technology without environmental damage. However, the administration has precluded us from doing so. Now, we have a great deal of coal, much low sulfur. The cleanest coal in the lower 48 States was locked up when the President declared the large area of Montana a national monument and, therefore, we could not take advantage of the low-sulfur coal that is located in that area. Nuclear power is the cleanest of all, but this administration has been opposed to nuclear power. In fact, there have been no new power plants, and the President, of course, vetoed the nuclear waste disposal bill. This is essential for the further development of nuclear power. With respect to hydropower, we have a Secretary of Interior who says he was to be the first Secretary to tear down dams. We cannot produce hydropower without dams. With respect to natural gas, vast areas of coal development in both the OCS and the Rocky Mountain area have been closed to natural gas. The bottom line is this administration's policy is not conducive to the development of new sources of energy in the United States, even environmentally safe, environmentally benign sources. Instead, virtually every policy this administration has pursued has had the effect of reducing U.S. oil production and increasing our reliance upon foreign sources. All that does is enable those foreign sources to take advantage of this reliance by reducing their production and jacking up the price. American consumers are paying the result of that at the pump. I have one or two other statistics. Since the start of the Clinton- Gore administration, according to Senator Murkowski's figures, domestic oil production in the United States has fallen by 17 percent for the reasons I articulated. We can't, with that level of reduction in U.S. oil production, maintain a level which enables the U.S. to control our own destiny in terms of the price of oil. We are already spending over $100 billion per year on foreign oil, about a third of our trade deficit. As a result of these facts, I have joined with Senator Lott, our majority leader, and others, in introducing the National Energy Security Act of 2000, S. 2557, the goal of which is to roll back our dependence on foreign oil to a level below 50 percent. In conclusion, there has been a lot of finger pointing. Some say it is the result of taxes. I support, at least temporarily--in fact, I would support permanently--removing the 18.4-percent Federal gas tax. People say that is only a drop in the bucket. It is almost 20 cents on the price of a gallon of gas. That is not peanuts if you have to fill your car as much as a lot of folks do. The EPA has been changing its mind about additives. In some parts of the country that has increased the cost of a gallon of gasoline. We have fewer refineries, as I indicated. Most of all, it is ``the chickens are coming home to roost'' answer that Senator Domenici provided; namely, that we have decreased the United States oil production at the same time we are relying more and more on foreign oil. The net result of that should come as no surprise to anyone. We are going to have to pay higher prices at the gas pumps as a result. It is time that the United States had a clear strategy, a good energy policy, that promoted the development of oil resources in the United States in a safe and environmentally clean way. That can be done. I believe under a new administration which is focused on developing an energy strategy that will suit the American people, it will be done. I thank Senator Thomas for making some of his time available to talk about this important subject.

Mr. KYL

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

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to speak on Republican time at this point, and should a member of the other party wish to later utilize minutes remaining on their time that they be permitted to do so.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, today the Senate will be in a period of morning business until 3 p.m. Following morning business, the Senate will resume consideration of the Labor, Health and Human Services appropriations bill. Senator McCain's amendment regarding protection of children using the Internet is the pending amendment, and it is hoped that all debate on that amendment can be completed by midday tomorrow. It is hoped that those Senators who have amendments will come to the floor as soon as possible to offer and debate their amendment. Votes may occur early tomorrow morning and Senators should adjust their schedules accordingly. I thank my colleagues for their attention. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, one of the reasons we have time today is to discuss the breach of security at the National Laboratories. I want to address that subject for a moment this afternoon. We are all aware of what happened in the last couple of weeks regarding the lost computer disks at the Los Alamos National Lab, and the news that those disks have now been found. But the questions remain about what happened to them during the time they were gone--whether or not they were copied and whether or not in any event our National Laboratories are, in fact, secure. Let me go back in time to about a year ago when we were debating the Defense authorization bill of last year. One of the portions of that bill was an amendment that I offered, along with Senators Domenici and Murkowski, to create a new semiautonomous agency at the Department of Energy, the Department of Energy Reorganization Act. That was in response to the recommendation of one of the President's own commissions, a group called the President's Forward Intelligence Advisory Board, or the so-called PFIAB Act. Former Senator Rudman chaired the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and made some recommendations concerning the creation of this semiautonomous agency in response to the effect of the theft of some of our most sensitive nuclear secrets from the Los Alamos Lab a few years ago. We discovered that the Chinese Government had possession of what were, in effect, the blueprints for some of our Nation's most sophisticated nuclear weapons ever built. We didn't know how those blueprints were obtained by the Chinese Government, but we believe they had to have been obtained from the Los Alamos nuclear lab. We determined that we needed to make some changes in security practices at the laboratory. It was believed that a scientist there by the name of Wen Ho Lee had taken charge of these documents and had somehow gotten them to someone representing the Chinese Government--a matter that has not yet been proven. We wanted to get to the bottom of it, and to make sure there would never again be a security breach at our National Laboratories. By way of background, these National Laboratories, two of them-- Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos--are technically run by the University of California at Berkeley. But they do their weapons work under the auspices of the Department of Energy. The PFIAB reports found that the culture of the laboratories to promote good science and develop all of these new technologies relating to nuclear weapons was such that it would be very difficult to reform from within, for either the Department of Energy or the laboratories themselves to put into place the security measures necessary to protect these secrets. As a result, the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board recommended the creation of an autonomous agency, totally separate and apart from the Department of Energy, under which this work is done, or, at a minimum, the creation of a semiautonomous agency within the Department of Energy for this weapons work to be done. Some called it a stovepipe; in other words, an organization within the Department of Energy that was totally enclosed, that would be run by an Under Secretary, and would be very much focused on security at the labs. The Secretary of Energy, Bill Richardson, didn't like this idea. He wanted to remain in charge. On the debate just about a year ago, my colleagues on both the Democrat and Republican sides of the aisle concluded that the President's own Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board was correct, that we should create a semiautonomous agency and take that out of the Secretary's direct control. The Secretary was so much opposed, he tried to get the President to veto the bill over that, because we passed it in the Senate and the House of Representatives passed it. It became part of the Defense authorization bill for last year. The President signed the bill, and it became the law. The Secretary continued to fight it, maintaining he should maintain the jurisdiction over this nuclear weapons program, that he could do the job. As a result, the President did not send up the name of this Under Secretary to head this new, semiautonomous agency, and Secretary Richardson did not implement the new law. He did virtually nothing to see that the new law was put into place. He kept maintaining that he was in charge and that so long as there was not an Under Secretary, he would still personally be in charge. In fact, he testified last October before the Congress that he would remain in charge until a new person was put in charge. He specifically said: The buck stops with me. He said: The President has asked me to remain in charge until there is a new Under Secretary, and the President will hold me accountable, and I intend to be held accountable. Senator Fitzgerald asked him a specific question as he said: The buck stops with me. Senator Fitzgerald asked the Secretary: If, God forbid, there should be a security breach at one of the laboratories, you would assume full responsibility, is that correct? And Secretary Richardson said: Yes, I will assume full responsibility. Now, that was then and this is now. We know there was not an Under Secretary appointed, that Secretary Richardson continued to maintain control over the situation, to take the responsibility for it, to assure the American people that our weapons labs were safe and secure. In fact, he said last year: I can assure the American people that our nuclear laboratories are safe and secure. Because he was in charge. But what we now know is this past April and May, or presumably during that period, sometime in April, at the Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory, two hard drive disks containing some very sensitive information relating to both U.S. and other countries' nuclear weapons were taken from the vault, from a portion of Division X of the nuclear program at Los Alamos. They were missing. They were missing for several weeks. They were believed to have been found in the last few days behind a copy machine in Division X. But the FBI has not yet disclosed its findings with respect to how the disks were removed, how they were returned, and what might have happened to them in the interim. The Secretary said he believes an employee was trying to cover up the fact that he had the disks and that there is no evidence they have been copied. The fact is there is no evidence either way. It is very difficult for the FBI to determine whether or not these hard drive disks were, in fact, copied. We may know more about that in the next several days. Whether they were, whether someone also has that sensitive information or not, there was still a significant security breach and lapse at the laboratories, revealing that they are still not safe and secure; there are still problems. We have to figure out what to do about it. What would happen if that information had been obtained by someone else? In addition to telling that person or country a lot about our nuclear weapons and how they work, it would have provided an opportunity for them to understand how we intended to dismantle or disable a nuclear weapon because these disks were in the possession of the team we have put in charge of disarming a terrorist nuclear weapon. There is a special kit prepared, and these disks are part of that kit. If we find that there is a nuclear device somewhere in the country, these experts will immediately take that kit to the site and begin to try to dismantle the weapon. The hard drives contain information which is helpful to them in determining how to dismantle the weapon. Obviously, if you have that, you have some ideas about how to prevent the dismantling and how to boobytrap it if you are a terrorist. It is an important piece of information. What happened from the time Secretary Richardson maintained he was in charge until now? Finally, last month, the President sent up the name of Gen. John Gordon to become the Under Secretary and head up this agency. But the Senate still hadn't confirmed General Gordon until last month. Why? Because Democrats were still trying to change the underlying law, at Secretary Richardson's request. A member of the Senate minority had held up the confirmation vote on General Gordon for several weeks, almost a month, trying to get us to make changes in the law that were acceptable to Secretary Richardson. It wasn't until the embarrassment of last week that they finally agreed to have a vote. Of course, when we took the vote, his confirmation was approved 97-0. Presumably, he is on the job as of today. I have a great deal of confidence in General Gordon, if Secretary Richardson will allow him to do his job. That remains the question. I summarize in the following way: It is clear we still have problems at our national labs. It is clear that General Gordon and his new semiautonomous agency needs to be allowed to get to the bottom of the situation and to put into place protections that will prevent further security breaches at our national labs. I believe Secretary Richardson should step down from his position for two reasons. First, it was his choice to maintain personal responsibility over this for the last year. We afforded him the opportunity to put somebody else in charge. At one point I said to him: Mr. Secretary, cooperate with us. Let's get an Under Secretary nominated and put into place and let that expert run this semiautonomous agency and give him the responsibility for this. Secretary Richardson, in effect, said: No, I will remain personally responsible because I want to do it my way. Because he wanted to take personal responsibility, contrary to the law that had been then signed by the President, and because he said he would accept full responsibility, it seems to me we should now take him at his word and allow him to assume full responsibility by taking the blame, rather than passing it on to other people. The second reason he should step down is that I don't have confidence in him allowing General Gordon to do the job even now. He has ``dual- hatted'' several employees in the Department of Energy, asking that current people be allowed to fill positions we created under this new law, positions we intended to be part of this separate, semiautonomous agency, not employees of the Department of Energy who would wear two hats--their regular Department of Energy hat and fulfill the responsibilities under this new law. We don't think you can do both. Secretary Richardson didn't want to have separate employees. He wants to use his own employees under his control, and therefore he has been dual-hatting these employees. To this day, I don't know whether he will allow separate employees to be hired, whether he will allow General Gordon to bring his own team, or allow him to do the job as he sees fit, or whether Secretary Richardson will continue to maintain the fixation for personal control of the situation. I have no confidence in that. I call for him to step down and allow General Gordon to do the job. That is what the law provides. That is why the President signed the law. I think the American people want to know that our nuclear weapons laboratories will be secure. This is the only way they will be secure. Finally, I heard a colleague on television yesterday say, back in his day, President Bush issued a regulation which changed some of the security procedures at the laboratories, as if somehow that had something to do with what has recently occurred. The point is this: If Secretary Richardson was in charge, then he had the full authority to change anything he didn't like, including any directives President Bush may have put into place. But Secretary Richardson's bent is to blame other people rather than accept the responsibility himself. So if he thought there was something wrong with the way President Bush did it, he could have corrected it since. Remember, he was in charge. My purpose here is not just to point the finger at Secretary Richardson for political purposes but to say that until he steps aside, I don't have any confidence the situation is going to get any better because he has had a year now to correct the situation, and all he has found time to do is to criticize others when he himself had accepted the responsibility. I am hoping, A, that the FBI will in the next few days get to the bottom of it, tell us exactly what occurred, and hopefully be able to assure us that no secrets have gone to an unauthorized party; B, that the people responsible for the breach in security will be found and will be properly punished; and, C, that General Gordon will be allowed to do his job, as Senator Rudman's commission, the President's advisory commission, and the Congress hoped when we passed the legislation creating his position and this new semiautonomous agency. The American people deserve to know that our most important nuclear secrets can be kept safe and secure. Especially with the terrorist threat that confronts this country, we need to know we can disarm a terrorist nuclear weapon if we should ever be faced with that particular kind of threat. We need to know our ability to do it has not been compromised. For that reason, I hope that the Secretary will step down, that General Gordon will be able to do his job, and that from now on our nuclear laboratories can operate in a way that protects the vital information they have been able to develop over these many years. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, today the Senate will be in a period of morning business until 3 p.m. with Senators Durbin and Thomas in control of the time. Following morning business, the Senate will resume consideration of the Department of Defense authorization bill. By previous consent, at 3 p.m. Senators Hatch and Kennedy will be recognized to offer their amendments regarding hate crimes. Those amendments will be debated simultaneously during today's session. When the Senate convenes on Tuesday, Senator Dodd will offer his amendment to the Defense authorization bill regarding a Cuba commission. Those votes, along with the vote on the Murray amendment regarding abortions, are scheduled to occur in a stacked series on Tuesday at 3:15 p.m. I thank my colleagues for their attention.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent Martha McSally, a fellow in my office, be granted floor privileges during the Defense authorization bill, S. 2549.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. No later than December 2001. It could be, therefore, submitted prior to that date. It all depends upon when the QDR would be submitted. But it does have to be at the same time. If I could just make one other point, I am advised by staff that the last quadrennial review did not include a review of the nuclear posture. So the last Nuclear Posture Review was in fact in 1994.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I believe the question of the Senator from Michigan through the Senator from Nebraska to the Senator from Virginia is whether he agreed with me. My interpretation is simply the language of the amendment which says that the Nuclear Posture Review shall be submitted concurrently with the quadrennial review, which is due in December----

Mr. KYL. That is exactly my understanding, too. That is precisely the way I think it reads.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, as a cosponsor of the Warner amendment, maybe I can offer a little solace to my colleague from Nebraska, which I think is consistent with the intent of the chairman of the Armed Services Committee. First of all, as the Senator from Colorado pointed out, the primary point of the Warner amendment is to ensure that two specific studies are done; that this cannot be done just on the certification of the President. That is the primary distinction between this amendment and the amendment from the Senator from Nebraska. With respect to those two studies, one of them is the quadrennial review. That is the review that Congress now requires of the President every 4 years. It is a very long set of requirements that take all of the defense needs of the country into account in a coordinated, structured way. It is in that context that I believe, incidentally, Governor Bush would probably want to have this review done. I can't speak for Governor Bush. But I am certain after having talked to him that he has in mind approaching our defense structure generally in a somewhat different way than the past administration has. He has some different strategies in mind. My guess is that he would want the nuclear review to be done consistent with the quadrennial review so that the Nuclear Posture Review would be coordinated with the quadrennial review. That is precisely what the Warner amendment calls for. It says: The secretary of defense shall submit to Congress in unclassified and classified forms as necessary a report on the result of the Nuclear Posture Review concurrently with the Quadrennial Defense Review due in December of 2001. The Senator from Nebraska is quite correct. That report would be accelerated some. As a practical matter, however, it is not going to be accelerated to the point that would occur in the year 2000, and as a result it would, in fact, occur during the next administration--not this administration, the way the amendment is written, at least as I read it. While it does not tie the Nuclear Posture Review to a specific date, it does say that it should be submitted concurrently with the QDR, whenever that happens to be submitted. I think that is the answer to the Senator's question. I think this is a very reasonable approach. I hope the Senator will support the amendment for that reason. I again go back to primarily the point that was made, and that is that we have two different approaches. One relies on just the certification of the President that he thinks this is a good thing to do. The other specifically requires him to do the Nuclear Posture Review and the quadrennial review and to submit those two concurrently. Then the President can, if need be, bring the force structure down. I would like to make one other point, if I could. If the Senator from Nebraska wishes to interrupt me, that is fine. The second point I want to make is this: There is a tendency to speak in just sort of hypothetical terms about numbers: Well, 6,000 is a lot or 3,000 seems more reasonable. What everyone really needs to understand is that we are talking about one of the most complex sets of interrelated considerations that exist in our defense strategic posture. The Senator from Nebraska, as the vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee until very recently, appreciates this point as well as anyone. I know that. Among the things that have to be considered, for example, in bringing the number of warheads down, are two things: First, though we all talk in terms of warheads, the Senator from Nebraska knows and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee knows that isn't what we really count. We count delivery systems. Those delivery systems include ICBMs, missiles on submarines, and bombers, which are the three legs of the triad that deliver the warheads. Here is just one consideration that goes into this equation. The United States has a need to project its conventional forces. We are the superpower of the world. We try to keep peace in parts of the world when other nations cannot do so because among other things, we have the reach to get to those places. We recently involved those forces in Kosovo, and before that we did it in the gulf war. In both cases we used our bomber forces. Some of these bomber forces, such as the B-2 bomber, clearly count in terms of strategic warheads. If we were to bring the strategic warheads down too far, the result of that would be to take out of service bombers which we need not just for strategic purposes but for conventional purposes as well. That is why this gets to be a pretty complicated matter and why it shouldn't be done quickly. It certainly shouldn't be done merely for political reasons. I am not suggesting that any President would do that. That is why clearly a Nuclear Posture Review is critical to any proposal that the President would make in this regard or any decision he would announce. Because you are talking about the interrelationship between conventional and strategic forces, you should tie this to the QDR as well. That is why the Warner amendment very wisely says the Nuclear Posture Review, and the quadrennial review should be submitted concurrently, and that when they are, the President could make a decision to reduce our warheads below that called for by this agreement. One more point in response to a point that the Senator from Massachusetts made earlier. The inference of his remarks was now that START II has been ratified by both the United States and Russia, there is no reason why we can't bring these warhead numbers down. But that is not true. START II has not been ratified unconditionally by the Duma. The Duma in Russia ratified START II with conditions, and until those conditions are satisfied, Russia will not submit its articles of ratification. They will not become effective. Until they are deposited with the appropriate international body, and I believe it is Geneva, Switzerland, the Duma ratification of START II is not effective. It is conditional upon two things that the U.S. won't approve: the so-called multilateralization agreement and another agreement which limits the way in which our tactical missile defenses could be arrayed. We are at a stalemate in terms of START II. That is why it is inaccurate to argue that since both countries have now ratified START II, the President might as well bring the numbers down. That is not true. There may be good reason to bring those numbers down irrespective of START II, but it is not an argument that because both countries have ratified START II, now the President should bring the warhead numbers down. In point of fact, START II has not yet been legally ratified by Russia. The bottom line is I agree with President Bush. I take it, to some extent based upon what I know of Senator Kerrey's comments, that we ought to make a determination which makes sense for America. The world is different now than it used to be. The President ought to, upon proper review, determine the size of our nuclear strategic forces. Where I think perhaps we may have a disagreement, although perhaps he now is convinced, is that rather than simply saying the President can have that authority and can exercise it irrespective of what the Congress did last year in passing the law that said no, rather than taking that approach, it makes much more sense to ensure that the President makes this decision with the calm, cool reflection of the quadrennial review and the strategic nuclear posture review having been done. When those two things are done and submitted concurrently, it will be an appropriate time for the President then to make this decision.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I rise today with my colleague, Senator Domenici, to introduce the Navajo Nation Trust Land Leasing Act of 2000, a bill to establish a streamlined process for the Navajo Nation to lease trust lands without having to obtain the approval of the Secretary of the Interior. This new authority would apply to individual leases, except leases for exploration, development, or extraction of any mineral resources. Mr. President, the current leasing process simply does not work very well. It can be cumbersome, and, because of the need to obtain approval from both the Nation and the Interior Department, the process can be lengthy. That can discourage many businesses from even considering locating the Navajo Reservation. The fact is, there is no longer a need for the Secretary to be involved in routine leasing decisions that can and should be made by the Nation itself. The changes proposed in this bill are intended to speed up the process for issuing leases by at least 50 percent, create predictable procedures for leasing trust land, and create incentives for businesses to open and operate in the Navajo Nation. It would help improve the management of tribal property, and promote economic development within the 100 Chapters of the Navajo Nation. The need to create jobs and diversify the Reservation economy are clear. A December 1998 report by the Navajo Nation Division of Economic Development reported that the unemployment rate for the Nation was 43.3 percent, up 15.5 percent from 1990. An estimated 56 percent of Navajo families live below the poverty level, with a per capita annual income of just $5,759. The lack of employment opportunities, low industrialization, slow development, insufficient infrastructure, weak economy, and difficulty in obtaining homesites and housing are causing many Navajo people to relocate to urban areas. The Navajo Nation is looking for ways to reform its regulations to make it easier to attract and retain new businesses, and to create jobs that will improve the standard of living of Navajo people. The reforms in the Navajo National Trust Land Leasing Act will give the Nation some of the tools it needs to succeed in that regard. Mr. President, the bill incorporates suggestions made by both the Navajo Nation and the Department of the Interior. There is one provision, though, that I will ask the Nation and the Department to review and provide further input. That is paragraph three of the proposed new Section 415(e) of title 25 of the U.S. Code. As introduced, the bill gives the Secretary of the Interior the authority to approve or disapprove the Navajo Nation regulations under which the tribe will subsequently consider and approve leases of trust land. The Nation understandably wants to ensure that the Secretary acts promptly on the regulations once they are submitted. We do not intend that the Secretary should be able to veto the regulations through inaction. One way to address that concern is through the imposition of some time limit for Secretarial review--maybe 30 days. Another way might be to establish criteria in the law for the Secretary to use in reviewing the Nation's regulations. That approach would give the Secretary some guidance as to how the regulations should be assessed. It would also give the Navajo Nation some assurance that objective criteria will guide the Secretary's action. If the regulations meet the criteria, the Secretary's ability to disapprove them would be limited. As I said, I will be asking both the Interior Department and the Nation for their further recommendations about these various approaches. The bill language on Secretarial approval or disapproval should, therefore, be considered open to change. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks, and I look forward to early action on the legislation:

Mr. KYL

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

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I want to follow my colleague's remarks with some thoughts of my own concerning the appearance that the Senate is not getting anything done these days, and talk a little bit about the reasons why. Anybody watching the Senate proceedings over the course of the last couple of weeks would probably wonder what we were accomplishing and would have some reason to criticize the Senate for not getting a lot of business done. What is the reason for that? I think it is very important, and that is why I wanted to come to the Senate floor to talk about it because I am becoming very frustrated at the tactics of many people on the other side of the aisle, the Democratic minority, in attempting to preclude the Senate from doing its business, the people's business. We have important legislative initiatives that the majority leader has tried to bring before the Senate repeatedly, and repeatedly he has been thwarted by the minority which seems intent on bringing the Senate to an absolute stop, to a standstill, to prevent it from doing any business unless the majority accedes to the minority's request that they be permitted to offer amendments which are nongermane, irrelevant, to the subject matter of the Senate. When people reflect on the organizations to which they belong and their understanding of things as basic as Robert's Rules of Order, they appreciate that almost any organization has to have certain rules under which to live. In the House of Representatives, as the Presiding Officer is well aware, both of us having come from the House of Representatives, there are pretty strict sets of rules to apply. There are 435 people in the House, and if they all did what they wanted to do, they would never get anything done. We pretty much have to talk about things that are germane and relevant to the pending business, and if we do not, someone can make an objection that this is out of order, and everybody knows under Robert's Rules, one can say: Mr. Chairman, that's out of order; that's not relevant to the subject we are supposed to be discussing. In the Senate, the rules are much more liberal. Members generally work together on things and do not enforce the rules as strictly as they are enforced in the House. Nevertheless, the Senate has essentially always had rules respecting germaneness and relevancy, and until very recently, we could make an objection that a proposed amendment, for example, on an appropriations bill was not germane or was irrelevant, and in order to continue to debate that amendment, the proponent would have to get 60 Senators to agree to do that, to overrule the ruling of the Chair that the amendment is not germane or irrelevant. I know this is all somewhat procedure and it may make some eyes glaze over, but it is an important foundation for my point. We decided if we were going to do the business of the people, we had to ensure we could get on with it and not have a lot of riders on these appropriations bills and, therefore, we would begin enforcing rule XVI, which says if a Senator is going to debate something, it needs to be relevant or germane to these bills. That is the basic issue that has members of the minority upset. How dare you gag us, they say. Gag them? Nobody is being gagged. We are simply going to enforce the rules that say if you are going to propose an amendment, it needs to be relevant or germane. Everybody in the country understands that--the organizations to which they belong. Why wouldn't the minority want that? Because they want to accomplish two objectives apparently: One is to prevent the majority from accomplishing anything this year so they can call us a do-nothing Congress; in other words, create a self-fulfilling prophecy. By preventing us from doing anything, they will criticize the majority leader for not doing anything. The other objective apparently is to be able to debate their agenda, things such as gun control and the minimum wage, maybe prescription drugs, and so on, on their timetable. So whatever bill we bring up, they try to attach to it an irrelevant or nongermane amendment relating, for example, to gun control. We have had lots of gun control debates. I remember 2 weeks last year when the majority leader finally said: OK, we will have the debate; it will be on the juvenile justice bill. We voted on lots of amendments, including some the minority really liked. We had that debate; we had those votes; but that was not enough. It appears we have to talk about these things all of the time because that is what is going to be politically popular in this fall's elections. That is wrong. To tie up the people's business, to tie up the Senate for political gain is wrong. If any of the members of the minority are engaging in this procedure for that purpose, they clearly ought not to. We have accomplished a lot this year, notwithstanding these tactics. I note things such as repeal of the Social Security earnings test, something Republicans wanted to do for a long time, and the Presiding Officer and I have been working on for a long time; the budget resolution, which maintains a balanced budget--we got that done; bills such as the African-Caribbean free trade bill; financial services modernization; the FAA reauthorization--a lot of different pieces of legislation that are good, that help maintain a part of our economy or ensure we are going to have a balanced budget, for example. There are many other pieces of legislation we want to pass. We want to pass the marriage tax penalty relief bill to do away with the marriage penalty in the IRS Code. The minority will not let us bring it for a vote. They say they are for it, but they are not going to let us vote on it. It is the same thing with the reauthorization of the education bill. This is a bill that needs to be reauthorized because it deals with all of the rules under which the Federal money goes to the States to support primary and secondary education. The minority will not let us vote on it. Appropriations bills: We have to pass 13 appropriations bills to keep the Government running. People get mighty upset when the Government cannot continue to operate. Who is stopping us from acting on these appropriations bills? The Democrats in the Senate will not let the majority bring these appropriations bills up, except one. We can bring up the legislative branch appropriations bill, the bill that provides the money to run the Congress. They will let us bring that one up but none of the others. We have a very important agricultural supplemental appropriations bill to help out farmers in this country. Democrats will not let us bring it up. When I say they will not let us bring it up, people say how can they stop you? Under the rules of the Senate, one Member can object to any piece of legislation being brought up for its consideration or being voted on, and in order to override that person's objection, you have to get 60 Members of this body to agree to override that and proceed to a vote or proceed to consideration of a bill. That is called invoking cloture. There are 55 Republicans and there are 45 Democrats. On these procedural matters, the Democratic Members tend to vote in a block, the net result of which is we can never get 60 votes to proceed with business. Because of the party loyalty and the partisanship that has gotten involved in our legislative agenda, we are not able to move matters forward because there is an objection to proceeding. That is why I say members of the minority preclude us from moving forward and doing the people's business. We wanted to pass a very important amendment to me, and I note to the Senator from California, Mrs. Feinstein, who is on the floor now--the crime victims' rights constitutional amendment. Frankly, parliamentary tactics were used and threatened to make it clear that we would be debating that bill for weeks, something that obviously we did not have time to do if we were going to do the other important business of the Senate. Senator Feinstein and I had to pull that bill down. Since I am being critical of members of the Democratic minority, let me say that there have been some Members, such as Senator Feinstein, who have worked very closely with me and others to try to move some of these important bills forward. We all get caught up in our own partisan battles here. That is to be expected. It is a political year, after all. It seems to me we can and ought to agree there are some things so important that we ought to get together as Democrats and Republicans and move the legislation forward. One of them clearly is the education bill. Another is the repeal of the marriage tax penalty. Another is the appropriations bills. For the life of me, I do not see why there have to be objections to bringing forward appropriations bills, and I do not subscribe to the notion that it is wrong for us to bring those bills forward if members of the minority cannot seek amendments which are nongermane or irrelevant. We all know what Robert's Rules provide. Those are not the rules of the Senate, but we all understand why we have to have rules such as that, and that is to keep the process moving along so that we can do the important business we have to do. I am very frustrated today, Mr. President. It is obvious because I do not ordinarily come to the floor, and I do not like to criticize in a partisan way. But people have to understand today or tomorrow we are probably going to begin the Memorial Day recess, which means there will be another 12 or 13 days of nonaction in the Senate, the net result of which will be we are way behind getting our business done, especially the appropriations bills to run the Government. The danger is that there are not very many opportunities for us to get these bills done before the Senate has to adjourn for an election this year, and we will end up, instead of focusing on each of the appropriations bills, in turn having to put it all into one giant appropriations bill. What happens when we do that? Every Member comes back to the Senate months later and says: I didn't know they put that in the bill. Nobody has a chance to read these giant omnibus bills. So we vote on bills we haven't even had an opportunity to read. Staff gets all kinds of things inserted. People on the inside get all kinds of things inserted in the legislation. We find out weeks later about the mistakes we have made. It is impossible to have a good, informed vote on a bill. The other danger, of course, is that it is easier; that instead of resolving disputes and prioritizing spending, by offsetting this spending with this savings--for example, in those last days to put together these giant omnibus appropriations bill--you don't make those hard decisions; you just add more money. So you resolve the dispute by saying: we are taking care of you, and we are taking care of you. And pretty soon we have busted the budget. Most importantly, we may make the mistake of spending Social Security surplus money. This past year, we did not spend a dime of Social Security surplus money. The previous year, we saved most of that Social Security surplus from being spent. Republicans, this year, are committed not to spending any of the Social Security surplus. But, unfortunately, I will make this prediction: If we get into this giant omnibus appropriations process at the end because we could not do our business during the weeks we have now to do that business, we are going to end up spending Social Security surplus money. I will never vote for such a bill. I think, therefore, we ought to be very careful about getting ourselves into that box. Mr. President, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to this issue. I hope people with goodwill can work it out, so when we come back from our recess, we can begin to get the people's business done and get it done on time. It is important for the future of this country.