Amy Klobuchar

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise to commend the House for bringing today before the House a step that will bring our Nation closer to achieving long overdue fairness for people suffering from mental illness and chemical dependency. We are now one step closer as the House considers this important mental health parity bill today, one step closer to realizing the dream of my friend, the late Senator Paul Wellstone, who championed equality for those with mental health needs, until his untimely death in 2002. If this law passes, as it should, we can thank the persistence of leaders such as Representatives Jim Ramstad and Patrick Kennedy; we can thank Senators Pete Domenici and Ted Kennedy; and we can thank the Wellstone sons, particularly David, who continues to carry the torch lit by his father. While Federal law may not alleviate the stigma that surrounds mental illness, it can bring us closer to ending insurance discrimination and easing the unfair financial burden borne by patients and their families. Most health care plans currently have barriers to mental health and chemical dependency treatment. Individuals seeking treatment for these health problems face higher copayments and higher deductibles, as well as arbitrary limits on the number of office visits or inpatient days covered. These people pay the same premiums as everybody else, but when they get sick, their insurance doesn't cover them. The House and Senate proposals build upon the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996 by mandating that if an insurer offers mental health and chemical dependency coverage, the treatment limitations can be no more restrictive than for medical benefits. Minnesota is proud to have one of the strongest mental health parity laws in the country. But this law only goes so far. Federal action will expand mental health parity protections to those covered by self- insured plans--117 million people--and move us toward real equity for those needing vital services. It is appropriate that this legislation in the House is named in honor of Paul Wellstone--an inspiring figure whose ceaseless motion and tireless pursuit of a better world was brought to a stop only by that tragic plane crash. Many in this body, including myself, counted Paul as a friend. We all know Paul was a crusader and a man with many passions. But anybody who ever met or talked with him quickly found out that he had a special place in his heart for helping those with mental illness. This deep and abiding concern was shaped by the suffering of his own brother. Paul's brother Steven suffered from mental illness. As a young child, Paul watched his brother's traumatic dissent into mental illness. As a freshman in college, he suffered a severe mental breakdown and spent the next 2 years in mental hospitals. Eventually, he recovered and graduated from college with honors. But it took his immigrant parents years to pay off the hospital bills. Writing about this, Paul recalled the years that his brother was hospitalized. For 2 years, he said, the house always seemed dark, even when the lights were on. It was such a sad home. Decades later, Paul knew there were far too many sad homes in our great Nation--too many families devastated by the physical and financial consequences of mental illness. Paul knew that we can and should do better. For years, he fought to allocate funding for better care, better services, and better representation for the mentally ill, and for years he fought for mental health parity and insurance coverage. For Paul, this was always a matter of civil rights, of justice, and of basic human decency. Of course, on this issue, as with every other issue, Paul and Sheila, his wife, worked together. We should all care about securing mental health and chemical dependency treatment equity for the same reasons that Paul did. We should care because of the suffering and stigma that individuals and families endure due to mental illness and addiction. We should care because it is cruel when people with mental health or addiction problems receive lesser care than those with physical health problems. We should care because of the enormous financial cost of these diseases for our society and because the economic research shows how cost effective good treatment can be. I saw this firsthand as a county prosecutor. I cannot tell you the number of violent crime cases I remember where the right treatment could have prevented a horrible crime, and the later costs of imprisonment, or maybe the right medication would have stopped someone from spiraling downward to a point where they committed a crime. This is not to excuse the crime, and it doesn't mean that we didn't prosecute them aggressively and that they didn't go to prison; it just means if we can prevent the crimes with appropriate treatment and medication, then we must do it. Untreated mental illness and substance abuse adds an enormous burden to the criminal justice system every day. That is why we created a mental health court in Hennepin County, where I prosecuted, which has had many successes, as well as a drug court. But it would be better to prevent people from getting into the system in the first place. That is why this legislation is so important. Finally, we should care because we know that people who are suffering need help. Mr. President, 54 million Americans suffer from mental illness or substance abuse. Almost 15 million suffer from depression. Over 2 million suffer from schizophrenic disorders. Over 20 million Americans need treatment for alcohol or drug abuse. These numbers are staggering, but ultimately what convinces anyone of the importance of this issue is when we see how real people close to us suffer, whether it is a son or a daughter, a mother or father, or, as in Paul's case, a brother or a sister, a neighbor or a coworker. Patrick Kennedy and Jim Ramstad have been brave enough to talk about their own struggles, and that really adds some moral compass to their leadership in the House. I have seen it in my own family with my dad, who suffers from alcoholism, a larger-than-life dad who could climb the highest mountains, whom also I have seen plunge to the lowest valleys with his battle of alcoholism. My dad finally got the treatment he needed, and I have never seen him so happy as in the past 10 years. Other families need to be, as my dad puts it, ``pursued by grace.'' This legislation offers crucial support for people in need. Several months ago, our Senate unanimously voted in support of mental health parity. The House is now passing its own legislation. I will say that the House bill is stronger, and I prefer the House bill over the Senate version, but I trust these two bills will be reconciled and signed into law, and I hope my Senate colleagues involved in the conference committee will get us and bring us back the strongest bill possible. This will be a victory for millions of Americans living with mental illness who face unfair discrimination in their access to affordable health care treatment. Again, I thank my colleagues, Senator Kennedy and Senator Domenici, for their leadership on this issue. I thank Patrick Kennedy and Jim Ramstad for their continued leadership. But in the end, I am here today with respect to Paul Wellstone, who led this fight for so many years. I know he is looking down on us today and looking down at the House of Representatives that is passing this bill with his name in his honor. I yield the floor.

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

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I wish to address one point related to the amendment that the Presiding Officer and I have, amendment No. 4105, which is coming up for a vote shortly. I received an e-mail communication from the Consumer Product Safety Commission which pledged Chairman Nord's support for our amendment. I am pleased she is supporting our amendment which basically bans industry from financing travel when it involves industries the Consumer Product Safety Commission regulates. They also clarified in the amendment that there were, in fact, I think 29 instead of 30 trips that were taken in the last 7 years but also that Chairman Nord herself took only 3 of these trips and that the rest of the trips were her predecessor who went on trips to places such as China. I would point out that one of the trips she took, which they call mundane in this e-mail, was to New York that was financed by the toy industry itself. As my colleagues know, we are now dealing with these toxic toys. Another one she took which wasn't mentioned in her e- mail, but I am getting out of the Washington Post article, was $2,000 in travel from the Defense Research Institute to attend its meetings in New Orleans on product litigation trends. Her predecessor had attended the same group's meeting in Barcelona. My point is to clarify the record. We are pleased to have Chairman Nord's support for our amendment. But I would note the issue that doesn't seem to be grappled with in this e-mail is the consumers who have to deal with this--the families with whom Senator Pryor and I met, including the mother of the little boy who swallowed the Aqua Dot that morphed into the date rape drug--they were not able to finance the travel. They were not able to spend 2 days with the head of the Consumer Product Safety Commission to make their case. That is why I believe it is very important, as we look at the ethical accountability issues related to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, that this amendment pass. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. I move to reconsider the vote, and I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 4094

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, as a member of the Commerce Committee, I appreciate the leadership of Senator Pryor on this bill and the work all of us did, as well as Senator Durbin and Senator Nelson. I believe this is landmark legislation. I have been to this floor many times to talk about this bill, how important it is to have that Federal mandatory lead standard, as well as the recall provision our office was instrumental in writing. I think it is a very good bill. There is one change that I think would make it even better. This is an amendment Senator Menendez and I have. The Consumer Product Safety Commission Reform Act is not just about increasing staffing, funding, and oversight of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, it is also about making the Commission more accountable to the public. The Commission must make consumer safety an absolute priority. But it must also perform its duty outside the influence of the people whom it is supposed to regulate, outside the influence of the manufacturers, the retailers, the lobbyists, and the lawyers. In November 2007, however, an appalling picture of the CPSC came to light. What you have to understand is when we found out about this travel, hundreds of trips and thousands of dollars of travel that had been paid for by the industry that this Commission was supposed to regulate, we were in the midst of this bill, we were in the midst of looking at recalls, now up to 29 million toys that have been recalled. We were in the midst of finding out about kids who went into a coma from swallowing an Aqua Dot that turned out was laced with the date rape drug. That is what we were doing when we found out that for years the head of the Consumer Product Safety Commission had been traveling on the consumer dime, on the dime of the industries they are supposed to be regulating. Through an article in the Washington Post, we learned that thousands of dollars' worth of travel had been taken by the current Consumer Product Safety Commission Chairwoman Nord and her predecessor, Hal Stratton. Since 2002, Chairwoman Nord and former Chairman Stratton took 30 trips--30 trips--on the trade associations', manufacturers', lobbyists' or lawyers' dime, totaling nearly $60,000. So that is 30 trips totalling nearly $60,000. In one particularly egregious instance, the Consumer Product Safety Commission Chairman accepted $11,000 from the fireworks industry for a 10-day trip to China. The claim was the industry had no pending regulatory requests but had a safety standard proposal before the Commission. Now, you try to tell this to the moms whom we were with yesterday, of those kids who were swallowing toys, one that was laced with lead and one had morphed into the date rape drug. You tell them they had the proposals before them--and they were not pending regulatory requests but they were proposals pending--they would see through this. This kind of abusive Government practice must end. With this amendment, the amendment that Senator Menendez and I have offered, no Commissioner or employee of the Consumer Product Safety Commission can accept payment or reimbursement for travel or lodging from any entity with interests in their regulations. So it simply means people and the companies the Consumer Product Safety Commission is regulating cannot pay for their trips to China or their trips to Florida or to California. It is that simple. Now, what is interesting about this is that many agencies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Federal Trade Commission, have similar rules restricting industry-sponsored travel. CPSC doesn't have that rule. As the Senate considers this sweeping reform in consumer product safety, we believe we should be free of any appearance of impropriety or undo influence of regulated industries on the CPSC. Senator Menendez has a bill, a very good bill--and I am a cosponsor; many people are cosponsors--that extends this to all agencies. And I hope very much the Senate will consider this bill very soon. I am so pleased we are working together on this amendment, which is focused on the Consumer Product Safety Commission. Leaving the Commission vulnerable to charges of impropriety is simply unacceptable, especially at a time when the public has completely lost faith in the CPSC's ability to regulate the industries they are supposed to be watching. Ethics is at the core of government and democracy. Without ethical leaders, our entire system fails. Ethics is woven into the very fabric of how government works, and ethics reform goes to the very heart of our democracy, to the public trust and respect that is essential to the health of our Constitution. Like you, Mr. President, I came to Washington to bring ethical government back to the city, and I am so proud that shortly after we joined the Senate, the most sweeping ethics reform legislation since Watergate passed the Senate and became law. But as seen by the actions of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, our job does not stop with one law. We must be resolute that ethical government is not optional, it is not voluntary, and it is not limited to elected officials. With this amendment, we will send a signal to the Commission that their priority is keeping consumers safe. Their priority is not going on trips financed by the people they are supposed to regulate. Their priority is looking out for those two kids who almost died from those toys, or the family of little Jarnell Brown, that is still watching what is happening here today--this little 4-year-old boy who died when he swallowed a charm that was 99 percent lead. That is their job, not going on trips paid for by the fireworks industry. It is my hope that my colleagues will support a travel ban amendment to the Consumer Product Safety Reform Act of 2008. I am very pleased to be sponsoring this amendment with my colleague from New Jersey, Senator Menendez. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I will divide my time with Senator Menendez. We feel strongly about this amendment. This is an amendment that basically says the Chairman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission and other employees cannot finance their travel from the industry they are regulating. This was a major scandal this fall, right in the middle of the time that we found out that 29 million toys had been recalled, that employees of the CPSC were taking travel paid for by the industry they are supposed to regulate. It is not consistent with what SEC and other agencies do. We believe this amendment is very important. We heard from the chairman of the Commission that she doesn't oppose this amendment. Thank you. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I wish to recognize the Minneapolis Emergency Communications Center, which is being honored today as the Nation's Outstanding Call Center. Too often, the exceptional work and service that 9-1-1 call centers and workers perform every day across America goes unrecognized. Before I came to Washington, I served as the chief prosecutor for Hennepin County, Minnesota's largest county, for 8 years. During that time, I saw firsthand the critical contributions 9-1-1 call centers make to public safety on a daily basis--helping to save lives and bring criminals to justice--and gained an unending appreciation for their work. Today, I wish to thank all 9-1-1 operators for all they do to keep our communities safe--for coordinating the response to each and every emergency, and for doing it all with composure and compassion, and never with complaint. But today is a special honor for the Minneapolis Emergency Communications Center, now recognized as the Outstanding Call Center of 2007 for its response to the tragic I-35W bridge collapse in August of 2007. I would like to congratulate and thank director John Dejung, deputy director Heather Hunt, and each of the 77 call center agents involved in the response. In the minutes and hours following the bridge collapse, the response of Minnesota's fire fighters, police, and other emergency personnel was extraordinary. One of the most enduring images of the response is that of brave young firefighter Shanna Hansen who, with a rope tied around her waist, kept diving down into the depths of the Mississippi to search for any survivors. What wasn't seen was how the Minneapolis Emergency Communications Center directed the response. Under the most difficult of circumstance, center personnel produced the very best of results and no doubt saved lives. The entire Nation saw Minnesota's finest on display in those first few hours after the collapse, and it was made possible by the 9- 1-1 responders we are honoring today and their colleagues in Minneapolis. So it is with great pride that I congratulate the Minneapolis Emergency Communications Center for this well-deserved award of Outstanding Call Center of 2007.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I am proud to be a member of the Commerce Committee that passed this legislation through the committee under the leadership of Chairman Inouye, Senator Stevens, and the Consumer Subcommittee Chairman Pryor. I am also glad this legislation includes the bill I introduced that finally put a mandatory ban on lead in children's toys. This legislation has been called by the Wall Street Journal as ``the most significant consumer-safety legislation in a generation.'' That comes from the Wall Street Journal. But what this is about is not all the details of all the toys, which I am going to talk about in a minute, and the 29 million toys that have been recalled and what this has meant to our economy, but what this is about are these little children. Senator Pryor and I just left an event where two children, their families, their mothers, were there to talk about what had happened to them. The first was this little boy named Jacob. His family is from Arkansas. The mom painted this picture for us. Look at this little boy. She painted this picture that I will never forget, of her standing in the kitchen one day and all of a sudden they see their little boy and he is practically limp. Just like that he went from being a happy little boy playing. What happened is he had swallowed one of these Aqua Dots toys, one of these toys you put in water and it expands to an animal or whatever it is. He had swallowed it. So he is getting more and more limp, and finally the ambulance comes and they end up in the hospital. Within an hour, he is completely unconscious. They have no idea what is wrong. Unconscious. They thought maybe he had swallowed a little toy, maybe something that you would think would be in his stomach creating some indigestion or something such as that, but the hospital tries everything they can think of. They thought maybe he had accidentally gotten into their medicine cabinet and they didn't know it and took some medicine and something happened. So they gave him drugs to try to reverse it, but he wouldn't wake up. It was a complete puzzle because they didn't know how this could have happened. Nothing they tried worked. Finally, 6 hours later--and the doctor said if he hadn't been there, he wouldn't have believed it--with all these tubes connected and everyone thinking they are going to lose him, he wakes up and he is fine. And they think: How could this happen? What is wrong? And they simply don't know. So they call the company that manufactures these Aqua Dots and they try to write them. The mom gets home the next day and gets on the Internet with bloggers trying to figure out what could be wrong. She writes letters to the company, trying to get information. Well, finally, they tested him some more and they tested these Aqua Dots some more. And what did they find? They found that the Aqua Dots contained a chemical that was really the date rape drug. The date rape drug, as a prosecutor, I can tell you that we handled those cases where women have been slipped one of those drugs in their drink; they are suddenly completely out of it and do not know what happens. You know the crimes that have occurred as a result there. But here is this little boy swallowing a dot, a dot that had the date rape drug in it manufactured in China. And that mother stood here with Senator Pryor and me and told this moving story and said: This cannot happen to other parents. She said: The Senators in this body, why do they not think if this happened to their kid or their grandkid where they suddenly swallow a little toy and are out like that. It is like swallowing a gumball, out like that for 6 hours thinking they are going to die. Then there was another mother who came from Oregon. She told the story of her son, whom we see now years later, Colton. When he was very little, he swallowed a charm they had gotten from some one of those little vending machines that you put your money into. He swallowed it. And all of a sudden she said he started acting completely lethargic, not at all like the little toddler he was. And they brought him into the hospital and they found out that charm was 39 percent lead, 39 percent lead. Now, their story, unlike the story of little Jacob, did not end there, because he has that lead permanently in his system. And today, years and years later when they go to the doctor, he is still tested for elevated lead levels. And, in fact, even a few days after he got home, after they had gotten the charm out of his stomach, he bit his cheek and his cheek swelled up to the size of a golf ball because of the lead that was in his system. That is what we are talking about--moms getting little charms that their kids swallow, which used to be maybe if you swallowed a penny, having this kind of health effect. We all know what lead can mean. I certainly know in Minnesota where we had a little boy whose mom was not with us today. The mom was not there because her heart is broken. Her little 4-year-old boy died when he swallowed a charm that turned out to be 99 percent lead. And he did not die from choking, he did not die because it blocked his airway, he died because that lead seeped into his system day after day. And when he died, he was tested at three times the normal lead level. In 2007, nearly 29 million toys and pieces of children's jewelry were recalled because they were found to be dangerous and, in some cases, deadly for children. As a mom and a former prosecutor and now as a Senator, I find it totally unacceptable that these toxic toys are in our stores and on our shores. As my 12-year-old daughter said when she found out that the Barbies were being recalled, she said: This is getting serious. The provision of the Consumer Product Safety Commission Reform Act that I authored addresses some of the most serious discoveries of this past year. And that is the lead that has been surfacing in these toys. The toy that little Jarnell Brown swallowed that led to his death was made in China. It was 99 percent lead. The toy that little Colton swallowed that nearly led to his death and has led to elevated lead levels in his bloodstream for many years was 39 percent lead. These deaths, these injuries have been made so much more tragic by the fact that they could have been prevented. These little boys should never have been given these toys in the first place. It should not take a child's death or severe injury or a child swallowing an Aqua Dot with a date rape drug to alert us that there is a problem in this country. Parents should have the right to expect that these toys are tested and that these problems are found before these toys get to the toy box. For 30 years, we have been aware of the dangers poised by lead. We all know about it from the lead paint standard. But what is ironic to me is we have a Federal standard for lead paint, we have a standard, but we have never had a standard for lead in toys or jewelry; never had a standard for those little pieces of jewelry that will end up in kids' stomachs, or how about teenage girls who are sitting in class and chewing on a charm that they may have around their neck--never had a standard; it has all been voluntary. It is not just these cheap trinkets that are being discovered to contain hazardous levels of lead. Last summer the CPSC recalled 1.5 million Thomas & Friends trains, including the Thomas the Train caboose, the Thomas the Train rail car, the box car, after they were discovered to be coated with poisonous lead paint. A lot of those parents had bought these toys because they were wood, they thought they would be better for their children. Many of these products reaching retail for between $10 and $20 apiece were on the market for almost 3 years before they were discovered to be defective, putting hundreds and thousands of toddlers at serious risk for lead ingestion and brain damage. What is even worse is what happened after the initial recall. This shows you how out of hand things have been because there have been no set standards and no good regulations coming from the Consumer Product Safety Commission. After more than 3 months passed, RC2, which is the company that makes Thomas the Train sets, realized that their first recall was incomplete. They had asked for a recall and then they found hundreds of thousands of additional products, many of which had been sold in the same packaging with trains that had already been recalled, were coated with lead paint and also needed to be recalled. Clearly, the RC2 Corporation that manufactured Thomas & Friends trains was embarrassed by its safety record. It apologized to its customers, saying it would make every effort to ensure that this would not happen again. To help encourage customer loyalty, which you can understand in a competitive market, and to get them to return those recalled toys, RC2 said: Okay, parents, we are so sorry this happened. We are going to give a bonus gift for your trouble. Well, the bonus gift backfired in a big way because it was discovered that 2,000 of these bonus gift trains that they had given to parents for them sending back the recalled products contained lead levels four times higher than legally allowed, leaving parents of toddlers across the Nation to deal with a double recall. All of these toys are manufactured in China. The burden should not fall on parents or kids to tell if a toy train is coated with lead paint or if a toy has been assembled so shoddily that it will come apart in a toddler's mouth. How would a parent ever think an Aqua Dot would contain the date rape drug? I think it is shocking for most parents when they realize we never have had a mandatory ban on lead in children's products, all we have had is this voluntary guideline. It is shocking that until this legislation is passed, the Consumer Product Safety Commission cannot actually enforce a lead ban in children's toys. In response to a series of letters I wrote to Chairwoman Nord in August about the danger of lead in children's products, the chairwoman responded on September 11. In that letter, Chairwoman Nord acknowledged that: The CPSC does not have the authority to ban lead in all children's products without considering exposures and risk on a product by product basis. Now, that is really going to help the family of Colton to find that out, that our powerful Federal agency, with which we thought we had solved all these consumer product issues back in the 1970s, that this a safe country, does not have that authority. Chairwoman Nord went on to say that: Were the CPSC to attempt banning lead in all children's products, it would likely take several years and millions of dollars in staff and other resources. This response makes it clear that Congress cannot wait for the CPSC to act to ban lead from all children's products. We have been waiting for years. These parents have been waiting for years and years. This mother who spoke with us today wrote all these letters. She has been trying to lobby by herself on behalf of her son to make sure this did not happen again. And what she told me this morning was her heart broke 2 years after her son had this horrible experience when she heard about the case of Jarnell Brown who had died. She felt her efforts were in vain. Well, this Congress has a duty to make sure they were not in vain. Parents should not have to wait years for the CPSC to take action we already know is appropriate. The medical evidence is clear and overwhelming, lead poisons kids and there must be a Federal ban. To talk a little bit more about the specifics, this legislation effectively bans lead in all children's products by classifying lead as a banned hazardous substance under the Federal Hazardous Substance Act. The bill sets a ceiling for a trace level of allowable lead at .03 percent of the total weight of a part of a children's product or 300 parts per million. To put that in some perspective, California has standards right now of .04 for children's toys and .02 for jewelry. The voluntary ban that is not even mandatory right now that the Consumer Product Safety Commission uses is at .06. We have worked with pediatricians, we have worked with consumer experts. We set this at a very smart standard of .03 percent of trace levels. That ceiling would take effect in 1 year, allowing retailers and manufacturers to comply; 2 years later the legislation would then further drop the amount of allowable lead in children's products to .01 percent of the total weight of a part or 100 parts per million. Now, if the CPSC finds you can actually go below the threshold, which a lot of pediatricians have argued we can do in this country, that we can even get down to zero lead, that would be great. What this law says is you do not have to be stuck up there at .01, which is of course a small amount of trace lead. You can, in fact, do a rulemaking and go lower for certain products or for all products. This legislation gives the CPSC the power to lower levels even further as science and technology allow. The legislation before us today also sets an even lower threshold for paint. Under this bill, the allowable lead level for paint would drop immediately to 90 parts per million. This lowered threshold is critical because science has shown that as children put products in their mouths, it is the painted coatings which are most easily accessible to kids. Every parent of a toddler knows that to be true. They can see, if any parent looks in their toy box, all the little teeth marks, and they know they put them in their mouth. Under current law, the Consumer Product Safety Commission has adopted this voluntary guideline of .06 percent. It is voluntary. That is part of the reason it takes so long, that is part of the reason we have had this huge delay. This puts in a mandatory guideline at .03 going down to .01. This legislation changes what is a bad system, a broken system, and gives the CPSC the tools it needs immediately to go after the bad actors who used lead or lead-based paint in their products. To me the focus is simple: We need to get these toxic toys out of our kids' hands, not just voluntarily, not just as a guideline but with the force of law. Millions of toys were being pulled from these shelves, 29 million last year. Right in the middle of Halloween, they were pulling the little funny teeth that you put in your mouth, Aqua Dots, Thomas the Train, Sponge Bob Square Pants, Barbie dolls, you name it. It gives the force of law to pull these toys from the shelves. As if the appalling number of recalls this year is not bad enough, these recalls illuminated other problems with pulling toys from the store shelves, the daycare center floor or the drawer under the kid's bed. This I actually heard from my friends. Because once these recalls happen, every parent runs to the kid's room and says: Okay, I have got to find the toy that has been recalled. Now, how are you going to tell the difference between the brunette Barbie doll, the blonde one, the one that had this outfit on. This is practical when you are a mother. How are you going to tell the difference between this caboose or this box car? So they are looking at these toys trying to figure it out, putting them up to the Web site. Because, guess what, there is no batch number on these toys. I have to tell you, most parents, when they get their kid a toy, do not keep the packaging. My mother-in-law may be an exception to that, but most parents do not keep the packaging. So what this legislation does is it says: The batch number will be on the toys whenever practical. They are not going to go on a pick-up stick, but whenever practical, the batch number will be on the toys so when there is a recall, the parent is going to be able to figure out which toy it is, and also the batch number is going to be on the packaging. Why do we need this? Because we do know that large retailers such as Toys ``R'' Us and Target, the minute there is a recall, they have been very good about stopping all sales; they do it through their computer system. Well, some of the smaller mom-and-pop retailers do not have that capability, not to mention eBay and those kinds of things. So we want to make sure the batch number, in this legislation, requires it not only be on a toy but also on the packaging. This legislation, though, does a lot more than ban lead in children's toys and to help parents identify recalled toys. It brings consumers the protection that has been lacking for almost two decades. As we all know, the CPSC's last authorization expired in 1992, and its statutes have not been updated since 1990. Not surprisingly, the marketplace for consumer practices has changed significantly in the last 16 years. And we have seen through recall after recall how ill-equipped the Consumer Product Safety Commission is to protect consumers. Today, the Commission is a shadow of its former self, although the number of imports has tripled, tripled in recent years. So what you have seen is a tripling of imports, products coming in, and then what have you seen with the staff? Well, have you seen quite a drop in the staff. The CPSC staff has dropped by almost half, falling from a high in 1980 of 978 people who worked there. Okay. Well here we go, 978 people. And what do we see in 2007? Well, we have 393 today. You wonder how are these date drugs getting into our system, getting on to our shores. You don't have the staff adequate to monitor these toys. So while you have seen a tripling of imports coming from China and other places, you have seen an enormous decrease in the staff that regulates them. In fact, much has been made of a guy named Bob who is the only official toy inspector at the CPSC. He is retired. He was out in a back room testing toys by dropping them to the ground. He had all these toys on his desk. That is what we are dealing with, while we have seen a tripling of imports and toys and jewelry that have tested to be 99 percent lead. What have we seen now with the recalls? We have actually seen a huge increase in the number of recalls. As you know, part of it is because finally you have had the businesses, once this hit the streets and was all over newspaper headlines, saying: We finally better start testing these products more frequently, which was a good thing. But we have seen in 1980, 681,300 recalls. In 2007, we have seen 28,773,640 recalls, all toys that either were in parents' homes or were sitting there on the toy shelf ready to be bought. Let's look at a comparison so you can see why. It doesn't take a rocket scientist. Probably my 12-year-old daughter would see what is going on. When you look at this comparison, in 1980, you had only 681,000 toys recalled. Then you go up to 2007, where you had 28 million recalled. Look at the staff comparisons. When you have 681,000 toys recalled, the staff is up here at 1,000. When you have 28 million toys being recalled, you have a staff that is half of what it used to be. So there is a graphic depiction of what we are dealing with. What does this legislation do? It puts 50 more staff at U.S. ports of entry in the next 2 years to inspect toys and products coming into the country. Not only does this bill give the CPSC the necessary funding and staff, it also gives the commission the ability to enforce violations of consumer product safety bills. We have seen too many headlines this year to sit around and think about this problem and say: It is just going to solve itself. The market will take over. The market has been broken. The CPSC has been broken. This is the time that Government comes in, which is reasonable, and works with business, as we have done. I am proud of the work Toys R Us has done with us, as well as Target, which has always been helpful in working with us. They know it has had an effect on their bottom line. Here is what this bill does. We can beef up this agency that has been languishing for years. We can put sensible, responsible rules in place that make it easier for them to do the job. This is not just numbers on a chart. This is about a little kid that just in the last year, in the year 2007 in the United States, could swallow just a little toy, which kids have done for centuries, and end up in a coma, unconscious from a date rape drug. This bill is about numbers. This bill is about our economy. But more than that, this bill is about these kids. I urge my colleagues to support it. I thank Senator Pryor and the other members of our committee for their leadership. I see Senator Durbin from Illinois. I thank him for his great leadership on this bill. It is the most significant consumer safety legislation in our generation, as the Wall Street Journal has said. We have an opportunity, and we must work swiftly. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, the Consumer Product Safety Commission Reform Act of 2007 represents some of the most sweeping reforms we have seen in consumer product safety laws in 16 years. In fact, the Wall Street Journal called it ``the most significant consumer safety legislation in a generation.'' I am proud to be a member of the Commerce Committee that passed this legislation under the leadership of Chairman Inouye, Senator Stevens, and Consumer Subcommittee Chairman Pryor, and with the help of Senator Bill Nelson and Senator Durbin. I thank all the Senators for their help on this bill. I am pleased this legislation contains two key bills that I drafted. The first bans lead in children's toys, and the second makes it easier for parents to identify toys once they have been recalled. This bill is not just a matter of implementing consumer safety laws and regulations, it is a matter of protecting consumers from harmful products. This bill is a matter of saving the lives of children. We have seen children who have died from lead paint or choking on toys. It means saving lives like that of a little boy named Jarnelle from Minnesota, who died after swallowing a charm that was 100 percent lead. That is how I got interested in this bill. This bill is a matter of helping parents to understand toy recall procedures and making it easier to identify toys that are not safe. It is a matter of keeping consumers informed about whether products are safe and where the products are from. It is getting serious about consumer safety. This is a good bill, a comprehensive bill, and a necessary bill. With the bipartisan help of our Senate colleagues, we can pass a meaningful consumer safety bill that gives the Consumer Product Safety Commission the tools to do their job and also sets clear and unequivocal standards for consumer products in this country. It is clear that the current system we have in place is broken. It is broken for the most vulnerable consumers: the children in this country. It needs to be fixed. In 2007, nearly 29 million toys and pieces of children's jewelry were recalled--29 million. They were recalled because they were found to be dangerous and, in some cases, deadly for children. As a mother and as a former prosecutor and now as a Senator, I find it totally unacceptable that toxic toys are on our shores and in our stores. When I first got involved in this issue last June, my 12-year- old daughter was not that excited because it involved things such as SpongeBob SquarePants. But when the Barbies started to be recalled, she came into the kitchen and said: Mom, this is getting serious. As we all know, the Consumer Product Safety Commission's last authorization expired in 1992, and its statutes have not been updated since 1990. Not surprisingly, the marketplace has changed greatly in 16 years, and this summer we saw firsthand how ill-equipped the Commission is to deal with the increased number of imports coming into this country from other countries that clearly do not have the same safety standards as our country. Today, the Commission is a shadow of its former self, although the number of imports has tripled--tripled--in recent years. As the number of recalls is increasing by the millions, the number of Commission staff and inspectors at the Consumer Product Safety Commission has dropped by more than half. So you see a tripling of the imports while you see the Commission staff being cut in half. At the same time, you see an enormous increase in the number of recalls. Let's look first at the number of staff. Well, it dropped by more than half, falling from a high in 1980 of 978 to 393 today. At the same time, the number of total recalls in 1980 was 681,300. In 2007, the number of toy recalls alone was over 28 million. So you go from 680,000 to 28 million at the same time you cut your staff in half. In total, the Consumer Product Safety Commission has only about 100 field investigators and compliance personnel nationwide. This legislation we are proposing today more than doubles the Consumer Product Safety Commission's budget authorization by the year 2015. We now know that this past year the Commission had only one official toy inspector--pictures of his office have been shown in newspapers around this country--one toy inspector to ensure the safety of $22 billion worth of toys. His name is Bob, and he just retired. This bill provides some needed help to increase the CPSC inspection, research, and regulation staff. It puts 50 more staff at U.S. ports of entry in the next 2 years to inspect toys and products coming into the country. Not only does the bill give necessary funding and staff to the Safety Commission, but it gives the Commission the ability, by giving them more tools, to enforce the laws. I think it is shocking for most parents when they realize we never had a mandatory ban on lead. We never had a Federal mandatory ban on lead. Instead, we have a voluntary guideline for lead. It is this voluntary guideline that is clearly not being followed as it should which led us to the sad situation we are in now. To me, the focus is simple: We need to get these toxic toys out of our children's hands--not just voluntarily, not just as a guideline, but with the force of law. As millions of toys are being pulled from store shelves for fear of lead contamination, it is time to make crystal clear that lead has no place in children's products. This bill finally gives the Consumer Product Safety Commission the enforcement mechanisms it needs to do its job. On top of these critical improvements to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, this bill finally sets standards for lead in children's toys and establishes requirements for recalls and the labeling of toys. As I mentioned at the outset, this past year we saw a record number of recalls of children's toys, totaling 29 million pieces of children's jewelry, toys that were choking hazards or contained deadly amounts of lead paint. This is about little kids swallowing jewelry, but it is also about teenagers chewing on jewelry while they are sitting in class--teenage girls not realizing the jewelry is full of lead. For months now, news of recalled toys has dominated our headlines-- and for parents, this news has been pretty scary. In November 2007, more than 4 million children's craft toys called Aqua Dots were recalled because they morphed into a dangerous, dangerous date rape drug. Now, I had cases as a prosecutor involving that date rape drug. It is nothing to fool around with. Just to think that you have 4 million children with products, when these kids accidentally put them in their mouth because they are these little Aqua Dots that suddenly became a date rape drug and put these kids into a coma. At least two children slipped into comas after swallowing this dangerous toy. Another 9 million toys were recalled last year for containing toxic levels of lead. The lead levels in these toys can lead to developmental delays, brain damage, and even death if swallowed. As if the appalling number of recalls this past year is not bad enough, these recalls have illuminated other problems with pulling toys from the store shelves, the daycare center floor, or the drawer under a child's bed. Except for my mother-in-law, I have to say I do not know a lot of mothers and grandmothers who keep the packaging that comes with toys. So what happens is, if you get rid of the packaging and there is a recall, you do not really know if the toy is one that should be recalled. It is very hard to tell one Thomas the Train Set from another, one SpongeBob from another, one Barbie doll from another. That is what parents have been struggling with. So what this bill does--instead of making parents sort through the red caboose and the green car and the blond Barbie and the brunette Barbie--what it does is it puts a requirement in place that says the date stamp, the recall stamp, has to be on the packaging because sometimes you might be selling the toys on the Internet or it might be in a small mom-and-pop grocery store that will not allow for the computer systems we have in our bigger stores, but it also requires that the date stamp be on the actual toys whenever practical. It is not going to go on a pick-up stick, but it sure can go on a Thomas the Train Set. This legislation also requires, as I said, that it be on the packaging. Again, it is for small retailers and people selling things on eBay. Big major outlets, such as Target, are able to, once they find out that a batch number is on the toy, close down their register so these toys cannot be sold. However, if you are selling on eBay, you want to have that number on the packaging. So that is why our legislation requires that the batch number be not only on the packaging but also the toy itself. The other piece of this bill I drafted addresses some of the most deadly discoveries of this past year. As more and more toys are coming in from other countries such as China with lower safety standards, we are seeing deadly amounts of lead surfacing in children's toys. The people in my State know this well. Two years ago, a 4-year-old boy named Jarnelle Brown went with his mom to buy a pair of tennis shoes. He got this pair of tennis shoes, and with the tennis shoes came a little charm. She did not buy this charm. She did not ask for this charm. It was given free with a pair of tennis shoes. So they bring the shoes home with the charm, and this little boy is playing with it. He swallowed the charm. He did not die from swallowing the charm. He did not die from choking on the charm. He died as the lead in this charm seeped into his system one day after one day. His airway was not blocked. He just swallowed that lead charm, and it went into his stomach. Over a period of days, the lead in this charm went into his system and it went into his bloodstream. Over a period of days, he died. When they tested him, his lead level was three times the accepted level. When they tested that charm, that charm from China was 99 percent lead--a little free charm given to a mom with a pair of shoes. This little boy's death is made so much more tragic by the fact that it could have been prevented. He should have never been given that charm in the first place. It shouldn't take a child's death to alert us to this problem, but now we know it for a fact, and we cannot now sit here and do nothing. Parents should have the right to expect that toys are tested and that problems are found before they reach their toy box. The legislation I originally introduced to address this problem, the lead ban, is what is included in this bill and we are considering on the floor today. It basically says any lead in any children's products shall be treated as a hazardous substance. It sets a ceiling for trace levels of lead and empowers the Consumer Product Safety Commission to lower the ceiling even further through rulemaking as science and technology evolve. This was reached after many discussions with toy manufacturers and retailers to get a sense that there sometimes are trace levels of lead. That is why we included this in here, to be practical, but allowing as science develops for the Consumer Product Safety Commission to go below that trace level. We see similar trace levels in some State legislation throughout the country. Some of it is different for jewelry than it is for toys, but we have yet to see a mandatory threshold for trace levels of lead in the Federal Government. For 30 years we have been aware of the dangers posed to children by lead. The science is clear. It is an undisputed fact that lead poisons children. It shouldn't have taken us this long to take lead out of their hands and out of their mouths. It is the Consumer Product Safety Commission's job to do that. In recent months, it has become all too obvious that this commission needs much reform and that reform is long overdue. We have seen too many headlines this year to sit around and think this problem is going to solve itself. As a Senator, I feel it is very important to take this step to protect the safety of our children. When I think about that little 4-year-old boy's parents back in Minnesota and I think about all of those other kids who have been hurt by these toys--they have no control over these toys. They don't know where they came from. At this moment I say that the time has come to get this bill passed. I thank the retailers from Minnesota, including Target as well as Toys 'R Us. Their CEO testified before the Appropriations Committee and was very positive about moving forward and understood the need to beef up the tools the CPSC has, as well as increasing the resources for that agency. We can beef up this agency that has been languishing for years and that is a shadow of its former self. We can put the rules in place that make it easier for them to do their job. We cannot sit around bemoaning the results anymore; we have to act. We have our opportunity. Our opportunity is this bill. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Yes.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to discuss the state of our economy, the budget cuts proposed by this administration, and yes, the war in Iraq and the need to set our priorities straight in this country. Like my colleague from South Carolina, I wish to thank our troops. Like the Presiding Officer, I visited Iraq and saw firsthand the bravery of these troops everywhere I went. Of course, I was very focused on Minnesota troops. They would come up to me in cafeteria lines and airport tarmacs and never complain about a thing. They didn't complain about the heat or their equipment or their long tours of duties. Many of our Minnesota National Guard extended over and over and over again. They really only asked me to do one thing, and that was when I got home, that I call their moms and dads, their husbands and their wives, and tell them they were OK. When I got home, I talked to their families. I think I called over 50 moms and dads, husbands and wives. I heard a little bit different story. I heard stories of families waiting and waiting and waiting, with anxiety over jobs that might be lost or never gotten back. One of the moms I talked to when I went back in March--I left a message for her. A few months later, I called her again when her son had been killed. I met her. I have to tell my colleagues, these troops, as my friend from South Carolina said, have done their duty. They deposed an evil dictator. They guaranteed free elections in Iraq. Now it is time for us to do our duty for them. We all know there can be no purely military solution in Iraq. This has been agreed to by so many military commanders and experts and Members of this body on both sides that it is not really worth arguing about anymore. We all recognize that true stability in Iraq will only come through political and economic compromises between Iraq's main ethnic groups and that only the Iraqis themselves can reach these agreements. Given this, I believe our strategy should be focused on transitioning to Iraqi authority and bringing in other countries and that we cannot keep doing this alone. I was listening to my friend from South Carolina speak so eloquently, and one of the things that struck me that he said was that this was priceless, and he meant this in the best of all ways. He said it was priceless. I just can't say this war has been priceless. After 4 years, 5 years, over 3,600 American soldiers have been killed. Over 25,000 have been wounded. We have been in this war now longer than World War II. Almost $450 billion--$450 billion has been spent. We cannot wait until next year to change our strategy. The President is intent on leaving the current situation for the next administration to resolve. Unfortunately, our soldiers in the field don't have the luxury of simply running up the clock on this administration. We owe it to them to begin bringing our combat troops home. I think we all know we can't do this overnight. We know we are going to have troops remaining to guard our embassies and to train police and to act as special forces, but I do believe that if we want to push this Government to get its act together, the Iraqi Government, we have to send a clear message that we are not staying there indefinitely. So we owe it to our troops, but we also owe it to the people of this country. We can no longer continue to give the President the blank checks he keeps asking for. We must ensure the safety and the well-being of our troops in the field, but funding must be conditioned on a plan for responsible redeployment of U.S. combat forces from Iraq. Now, why is this so important to our own country and to our own future and to our own children? Well, as I said, the war in Iraq has already cost over $490 billion directly, and by some estimates it has cost the American people almost $1.5 trillion when factoring in all of the costs. For each month that passes, we spend another $12 billion on the war, and we cannot separate the President's spending in Iraq from the economic and the budgetary problems we face. One of the things that has always really bothered me on behalf of the people whom I represent is that this administration never really adequately calculated the repercussions of this war. I think the troops in the field--and I will say one thing. Despite the clear disagreements on strategy for this war, there has been bipartisan agreement that our troops need to be treated with the kind of respect they deserve. When they signed up for war, there wasn't a waiting line. When they come home and need medical care and they need mental health care, they need to get their education benefits, they shouldn't be waiting. It is this Democratic Congress that took on this issue and looked at the facts. Why are all of these men and women coming up to me out in Minnesota and saying they couldn't get health care? Look at the facts. The Pentagon underestimated the number of troops coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan by four times the amount--four times more returning troops needed health care than they estimated. We put billions of dollars into that. We are willing to rise to the occasion and say we are not going to make the same mistake we made after Vietnam. We are going to treat our troops with the respect they deserve when they come home. But again, when the administration made its plans for this war--a war I did not support from the beginning--when they made their plans, they did not anticipate the enormous costs.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, the administration did not anticipate the cost for our troops. The war has already cost over $490 billion, $1.5 trillion when you factor in all costs, $12 billion a month. They did not anticipate what was going on with this economy. They did not respond the way they were supposed to to the mortgage crisis. They did not anticipate. They listened to their friends in the special interest groups, and look where we are now. Look where we are now. Two weeks ago we passed a short-term stimulus package that will help change the economic direction of this country by putting money in the hands of American families, including our seniors and our veterans. This action was a start. But today we must begin focusing on the long- term policies to spur economic growth long after the rebate checks are spent. We have to get this economy on the right track, and it means making a reckoning for that money that is spent in Iraq, to start bringing home some of our combat troops, to start being more responsible about this budget. Today we announced our next step, which is to look at this mortgage crisis, really the crisis that I say fundamentally puts us where we are right now. Mr. President, 8.8 million families across the United States are underwater. They owe more to lenders than they have equity in their home, giving them limited or no options for refinancing. The Foreclosure Prevention Act, which I am going to talk about later, and I hope will come to the floor this week, signifies a major step in the right direction, curbing the disastrous effect the foreclosure crisis has had on our families and our economy. The time to act is now. We also need long-term economic policies that will encourage sustainable economic growth in every corner of this country. From the impact of the mortgage crisis and the value of homes, to the skyrocketing cost of oil that fuels cars, trucks, and heats homes, to rising prices in the grocery stores, the middle class is being squeezed from every side. Back in January, I traveled around my State. I visited towns all the way from Worthington up to Halleck, MN. You haven't been anywhere, Mr. President, unless you visited Embarrass, MN, in the middle of January. It is always one of the coldest places in our country. We were all over our State. People are concerned. They are Minnesotans so they try to be optimistic, especially when it is January. They try to look to the future. They look at the potential with this energy revolution. But they would come out to cafes, come out to college campuses and talk about how it is getting harder and harder for them to send their kids to college, to afford health care, and to fill their cars up with gas. To give a sense of what we are looking at in our State--and our State has always had a diverse economy; we are eighth in the country for Fortune 500 companies--the unemployment rate for Minnesota recently jumped to 4.9 percent, up from 4.4 percent the month before. Our State has lost 23,000 jobs in the last 6 months alone. Home heating prices for Minnesota families have also risen by 14.1 percent per household in the past year alone. On the foreclosure front, the statistics in Minnesota are equally devastating. At the end of 2007, over 50,000 families in Minnesota were delinquent on their home payments. It is estimated that 30,000 will lose their homes in the next several years if something is not done. What are these families like? They are like the Gray family in Minnesota with whom I met. They are both teaching. They were all excited to buy their new house. They got a mortgage approved, a standard mortgage. It turned out the home values were much higher, and they were not able to afford a home. So they went to someone they thought they could trust and got one of these adjustable rate mortgages. They were told a lower rate at the beginning, $1,500, and it might go up a few hundred dollars. By 2008, it was up to $3,300 a month from $1,500 a month. We know that is not the rate of inflation. We know it is not the right thing to happen. I use that as one example of what we are seeing across this country and why this administration has its priorities messed up and why people such as the Grays, good people who are just trying to have a home for their family, have found themselves in the middle of this mess. It is where Wall Street has hit Main Street. It is where the Bush administration's priorities to spend $12 billion a month have hit people like the Grays right in their homes. The cost of foreclosures is not limited to these families. If something is not done, Minnesotans will lose an estimated $1.6 billion in declining home values. That is because the chickens have come home to roost. When it comes to this mortgage crisis, it is not just one family, one foreclosure. It affects real estate values on an entire street, an entire neighborhood, an entire community. We need an economy that creates stable middle-class jobs. We need infrastructure investments so we don't have bridges falling, as we did in our State, right in the middle of America. We need energy investments that will reduce our dependency on foreign oil and create good ``green collar'' jobs in the growing clean alternative energy sector of our economy. The people we serve are asking for a new direction, a government that spends their money wisely, that represents their values, that works for American families. America wants a Washington that is going to offer new priorities and new solutions. Last year, our Congress succeeded in a downpayment on change. It was a beginning. We were hampered by procedural rules and all these filibusters, but we moved this country. There is so much more to do. We moved, first of all, to a more responsible budget process. We gave working Americans an increase in the minimum wage. We provided greater financial aid to help their kids go to college. And we passed a new energy bill that raises fuel efficiency standards for the first time since I was in junior high. But there is much more that needs to be done. Senator Dorgan and I heard about it at an economic hearing we had in my State just last week where we met with a panel of economists and experts on energy policy and what was going on in our economy in Minnesota. One economist described our current condition as ``serious, unstable, and declining.'' In our State, families sense their stability is slipping, with 67 percent of middle-class Americans having an increased sense of anxiety about their futures. Tom Stinson, Minnesota's chief economist, discussed the frightening unemployment statistics. We haven't added any new jobs over the past year, and we are not alone. States that have historically had lower unemployment rates are now creeping toward the national average. Unfortunately, when we look at this problem we are facing, and we know there are solutions, we know there is a way to get this economy back on track and be fiscally responsible, but President Bush's new budget proposal falls far short of what America needs to address our economic downturn and invest in meaningful recovery effort. This new budget request does not offer new priorities or now solutions. Instead, this budget continues a familiar pattern of misplaced priorities. It continues a 7-year pattern of fiscal irresponsibility: borrowing money and leaving an ever-larger debt to our children and grandchildren. Look at this, the wall of debt we have seen and how quickly it has risen from 2001 to 2013. This administration took a $200 billion surplus and turned it into a $300 billion budget deficit. Do you know what it means to middle-class families? When I talk to people in our States about what all these millions and billions and trillions mean, it means that 1 out of 12 Federal tax dollars goes to pay interest on that debt. That money is not going to the United States. Most of that money is going to companies in foreign countries. That is what is happening to this country. I was listening before to my colleague from Oklahoma talking about how we have to be willing to make these sacrifices and pay for things. I find this so ironic because it is people on our side of the aisle who have been willing to talk about rolling back some of the Bush tax cuts on people making over $200,000. Think how that money can go to pay off this debt, to go into infrastructure investment we have been talking about, to move this economy in the right direction. It is people over on our side of the aisle who have been talking about oil giveaways and putting them into renewable energies so we can start investing in farmers and workers in the Midwest instead of oil cartels in the Mideast. How about the debate we had on the middle-class tax issue, on AMT tax relief? We were willing to talk about how we wanted to pay for it. We wanted to pay for it off those hedge fund operators, but they wouldn't go for it. It is this Congress that put the pay-as-you-go back. When I talk to people in my State, they understand we need to have a short-term stimulus package, why we need it, and why economists believed it was a good idea. But when we go forward in the long term, we cannot keep going the way we are going with this wall of debt. We are not going to end up where we want to go. We are going to be right back where we were before we put the stimulus in place, and we need to make bold changes in this country. In just 7 years, this administration took that budget surplus, $158 billion--think of that money--and made it into a $400 billion deficit. So when we talk about this war in Iraq and when my esteemed colleague from South Carolina talks about it being priceless, it is not priceless. It is $12 billion a month. Meanwhile, this new budget continues to neglect crucial investments that are needed to strengthen our economy and our Nation for the long term. It does not make the investments we need in our Nation's transportation infrastructure. It does not make the investments we need in developing renewable energy sources to move us toward greater energy independence and security. It does not make the investments we need to support the basic medical and scientific research that has always been a key driver of our country's innovation and growth. I come from Minnesota, a State where we believe in science. We brought the world everything from the Post-It note to the pacemaker, and we believe this investment pays off not only in the health of our citizens but also for jobs and looking to the future and not letting other countries such as India, China, and other countries go ahead of us because we have failed in this country to have an investment strategy and put those Government policies in place that drives that investment. Here are a few examples from my State of where the President's budget goes wrong. Americans are struggling to lower home heating costs in any way they can. Nationwide, the average household is expected to pay 11 percent more for heating this winter compared to last year. Families who rely on home heating oil are facing record prices, 30 to 50 percent above last winter. So what does the administration do in its budget? It cuts this funding. It ends the Department of Energy Weatherization Assistance Program. The Weatherization Assistance Program increases the energy efficiency of homes occupied by low-income Americans, directly reducing their energy costs. It cut it by 100 percent. The funds appropriated in fiscal year 2008 for this program will enable upgrades for as many as 85,000 homes. With energy costs rising significantly and an economy poised on the brink of recession, the weatherization program and the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program are necessities, they are not luxuries. Another example: Nearly 6\1/2\ years after the terrorist attacks of September 11, Americans are well aware of the need for State and local governments to be prepared as possible against future threats. I heard you talking, Mr. President, earlier this afternoon about the importance of putting that money into our own homeland security. So what does the administration do with this budget? It slashes funding for State and local first responders' efforts, cutting firefighter assistance grants from $1.2 billion to $300 million, and the State Homeland Security Grant Program from over $1 billion to $200 million, and, once again, it proposes to eliminate the cost of the COPS Program. As a former prosecutor, I take this personally because I saw how that COPS Program worked, how it added police officers to our neighborhoods, how it brought down crime. Look at this: What is the comparison when we are looking at this budget as we are talking about priorities of the $12 billion a month on the war in Iraq? This is the amount the President would need to add to his budget to maintain this police program which puts police out in the neighborhoods at a 2008 level, plus inflation. Personally, I would like to do more, especially in our rural areas. I think we need meth cops out there. Just to restore it to 2008 levels plus inflation would cost $596 million. What would you do if you just roll back the tax cuts for those making over $1 million in 2009? I am not talking about people making over $250,000; I am talking about people making over $1 million. What would you bring in with that? You would bring in $51 billion. Look at the comparison. Think about how many police you could buy on the streets. Think how much you could buy to help people afford their homes. Think of the benefits. Look at what you can do for $51 billion to help our veterans. We have soldiers coming home from Iraq that just this summer in Minnesota were told: You are the longest serving unit, you Red Bulls from Minnesota, of the National Guard in Iraq. But guess what. Your paper only says 729 days. So guess what. You are not going to get your full education benefits, even though you served longer than 729 days. Obviously, we took up this matter with General Shellito, head of our National Guard, took up this matter with the Army, and it is working to fix it. Oh, well, it saved some money to write that down as 729 days. But think about $51 billion and what we could do with that. We are talking about priorities here. Fiscal responsibility is also about making sure down the line that these priorities are right. Do we want a budget that offers tax giveaways to the wealthiest or a budget that provides relief to middle-class families squeezed by rising costs for health care, housing, energy, college tuition, childcare and care for aging parents? Do we want a budget that gives lucrative special favors to the giant oil and pharmaceutical companies, or a budget that invests in our future prosperity, such as research and development on renewable energy? Do we want a budget that continues to spend $12 billion a month in Iraq or a budget that provides our veterans with the help they need; that makes sure we have the money we need to keep our troops there for the focused purpose of guarding our embassy and training police and having them there for special forces; and money for the COPS program-- that $596 million it would cost to restore that? That is about homeland security. I want to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by reversing or rolling back these tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans--people making over $200,000. I want to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by eliminating offshore tax havens for multimillionaires so people aren't hiding money in the Cayman Islands. I want an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by ending the tax breaks and giveaways that have been handed out year after year to the big oil companies. I want to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by allowing Medicare to negotiate for lower prices for prescription drugs for our seniors. The President's budget does not provide the new priorities and the new solutions America needs. Instead, it continues to take us down the wrong path. This budget is only the most recent example of an administration that is putting its head in the sand and ignoring the reality of the looming economic recession. As the housing market is crumbling, and millions of families are expected to lose their homes in the next couple of years, the administration seems to hope this problem will go away. This is why I have cosponsored the Mortgage Foreclosure Prevention Act, and I am committed to working with my Senate colleagues on a bipartisan basis to pass this bill to help keep our families in their homes and get the middle class back on their feet. Across the country, we are seeing families struggling to keep their homes. If something isn't done, over 2 million families will lose that struggle in the next 2 years. Through a pilot project conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank in Minneapolis, we have been able to track by ZIP Code all of the outstanding subprime mortgages in our State. This data is a startling reminder that we are seeing only the beginning of this crisis if we don't do anything about it. By being able to track the reset dates of all the subprime mortgages in Minnesota, the study shows thousands of mortgages resetting to higher interest rates monthly, causing more and more families to fall behind on their payments. Congress must act quickly if we are going to curb any effects of the housing crisis. In my home county, where I was chief prosecutor of Hennepin County, we have seen an 82-percent increase in sheriff sales of foreclosed homes. The problem extends to greater Minnesota. We have seen the foreclosures double in some of our urban areas. We have seen 3 out of 100 households--3 out of 100 households--that are in foreclosure. Something must be done to help these families. I have met them. These are not just statistics and numbers; these are real families living in the State of Minnesota. This is why I believe we need to pass the Foreclosure Prevention Act and why I believe we need to reprioritize what is happening in this country--$12 billion a month in Iraq, with no end in sight, and some people saying we are going to stay there for 100 years, while these families are losing their homes, while our veterans are still not getting a fair shake. This bill, the Foreclosure Prevention Act, would give $200 million to families to counsel them in ways to avoid foreclosure. I will put that chart up again showing an example of these priorities. This is for people making over $1 million a year--people making over $1 million a year. Here is our $51 billion. Think of this mortgage counseling. It is a proven way to work here. It would be only $200 million. Our State finance agencies are in a perfect position to help families refinance loans, but their hands have been tied by ceilings on the amount of State-backed mortgage bonds they can use. This bill makes it easier for them to help find families and rework their mortgages. That is what we are trying to do. It will not work for every one of these people. Some we don't want to help. They are not deserving of this. They maybe speculated on these mortgages to begin with. But many of these families I have personally met, including the family from Ohio we saw today here in the Senate. These are hard-working families who were maybe not told the truth about their mortgage or misled about their mortgage or the whole mortgage was set up to get them in trouble down the line, and the mortgage lender goes away and sells it to someone else, who sells it to someone else, who sells it to someone else, and pretty soon it doesn't just hurt that family, it hurts the entire street, and it hurts the entire neighborhood. This is about getting our priorities right. Yes, it is about the war in Iraq and an administration that refused to account for the cost, refused to have a plan to start bringing our troops home, that refuses to admit we are in financial straits--financial straits they got us into. Because we must remember, when they came in, we had $200 billion surpluses, and now we are where we are with this wall of Federal debt. The American people are tired of this. They want a fair accounting of what is going on in this country. They want a fair accounting of this war and a plan to bring our troops home. That is the best thing we can do for our troops, and that is the best thing we can do for our country. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. I thank the Chair. (The remarks of Ms. Klobuchar pertaining to the submission of S. 2642 are located in today's Record under ``Submission of Concurrent and Senate Resolutions.'')

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

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise to speak in strong support of amendment No. 4023. This is the amendment my friend, Senator Mikulski, just spoke about. It is a bipartisan amendment. Cosponsors are myself, Senator Mikulski, Senator Coleman, and many other Senators from across this country. This amendment would stop the administration from making drastic changes to its targeted case management system that would hurt those in our country who are most in need of assistance. Targeted case management benefits children in foster care, kids and adults battling mental illness, and seniors and disabled people receiving institutional care. It exists to help those individuals to navigate the complicated web of available services, to help these men, women, and children overcome bureaucratic barriers in order to achieve independence. These services include transporting people with disabilities to and from doctor's appointments as well as managing pharmacy services for individuals with severe mental illness. These essential services are now threatened by a proposed rule change from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. For 8 years, I served as the chief prosecutor and top lawyer for Minnesota's largest county, serving Minneapolis and 45 suburban communities, with a population of over 1 million people. In that role, I worked closely with our county child protection and adult protection agencies, with our hospital, which was the biggest emergency hospital in the State of Minnesota. So I saw firsthand what would happen if we did not prevent people from getting in trouble, what would happen when they would end up at the emergency room or when they would end up in the jail because they were not getting the necessary mental health care they needed. I know firsthand the vulnerability of these individuals, young and old, and the responsibility of Government to help them achieve as much independence, well-being, and dignity as possible. When Congress passed the Deficit Reduction Act in 2005, it clarified exactly what services are eligible for payment under the Targeted Case Management Program. Senator Mikulski went through those important services. Unfortunately, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has since come up with a rule that goes miles and miles beyond what Congress intended. That rule is scheduled to be implemented next month. This impending rule will have a devastating fiscal impact on States and local communities. It will endanger the well-being of vulnerable people who benefit the most from these crucial services. Our States received over $2 billion in funding for targeted case management in 2005. If this rule is put into effect, that funding will be slashed in 2008. I want to use one example; it is from a county in my State, Dakota County. Now, this is not exactly a sort of wild-eyed county; it tends to be a more conservative county in our State. But, like any other county in our State, they have needs for case management services for people who are mentally ill, seniors, young kids who need help. This county has made a practice of developing a cost-effective, community- based system of services that relies heavily on case management. Why did they do it? Well, they did it to save money. Medicaid funding has been key to developing service alternatives in homes and in less expensive settings than in institutional settings. This is the kind of innovative, cost-effective approach we want to encourage from Government. Instead, with this sudden rule change, they are being punished. Even worse, the vulnerable individuals they serve are being punished. I always believed this was a country where we wrapped our arms around the people who need the help. That is what America is about. That is what patriotism is about. But with this rule slash-and-burn of all these services, they are not wrapping their arms around these people, they are rejecting them for Dakota County, this suburban county in Minnesota. For States such as California, Colorado, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and North Dakota, pulling the plug on targeted case management will disrupt the lives of those served by these cost-effective efforts. Furthermore, in the end, it will just increase the total costs borne by State, local and Federal governments, which means all of us as taxpayers also pay more. It simply defies common sense. Our amendment will postpone the Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services' rulemaking by 1 year. We need a year to examine exactly how badly this will hurt our States and local governments, especially the children, the disabled, and the seniors who need these services most. I occupy the Senate seat once held by Hubert Humphrey. Some of my colleagues had the great privilege of serving in the Senate with him. Hubert Humphrey was someone who, of course, was never at a loss for words. Many of those words were memorable. There is one statement in particular that I believe is very appropriate for this topic. Senator Humphrey once said this: The moral test of Government is how that Government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadow of life, the needy, the sick, and the disabled. I submit that this hasty, ill-considered action to cut essential services for the most vulnerable people fails that moral test of government. I believe we can and we must do better. That is why I strongly support our bipartisan amendment, an amendment focused on saving money in the long term by keeping people in settings that actually save taxpayers money, by not slashing funds to the most vulnerable in our society. That is why we support this amendment, and we ask our colleagues to vote with us. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I am here to talk about the American Renewable Energy Act which I am introducing today, along with my colleagues, Senator Snowe from Maine and Senator Cantwell from Washington. Last week, we passed a short-term stimulus package that will help change the economic direction of this country by putting money in the hands of American families, including our seniors and veterans. Last week's action was a start, but we must begin focusing on long-term policies that will help our economy long after these rebate checks have been cashed. If we do not do that, we are going to be back exactly in the place we were before. We need long-term policies that will encourage sustainable economic growth in every corner of this country. In January, I traveled all around my State on a Main Street tour of Minnesota. We talked about the economic challenges facing the people of our State, but we also talked about the opportunities. Energy was a topic that came up everywhere. It came up when people were filling up their cars and trucks with gas, and it came up when we talked about the opportunities. I visited southwestern Minnesota, which is home to hundreds of large- scale wind turbines, helping to make Minnesota the Nation's third largest producer of wind energy. Along with ethanol, these wind-energy farms have spurred a rural economic renaissance in our part of the State. For example, in 1995, SMI & Hydraulics, Inc., began their business in Porter, MN, primarily as a welding and cylinder repair shop for local farmers and businesses. Today, SMI & Hydraulics manufactures the bases for the wind towers we sell all across this country. It just recently expanded its facility to 100,000 square feet and created over 100 new jobs, many of which are traditional manufacturing jobs. My colleagues have to understand, these places are like barns. They started out as farmers' barns and have expanded and expanded as they have been able to meet this country's rising energy needs. The success of companies such as SMI & Hydraulics is not unique to Minnesota. Renewable energy has been a bright spot in an otherwise lagging economy. Last year, the renewable electricity sector pumped more than $20 billion into the U.S. economy, generating tens of thousands of jobs in construction, transportation, and manufacturing. Throughout the country, renewable energy has led us down a path toward new jobs, lower energy bills, and enhanced economic development. That is why today I am introducing this bill, along with my friends Senator Snowe and Senator Cantwell, to help lead us further down the path to a better, cleaner, more prosperous energy future, with new opportunities for investment, innovation, and job creation. Our bill, as I said, is called the American Renewable Energy Act. There are two key elements of this legislation. First, the American Renewable Energy Act creates strong, consistent incentives for private sector investment in renewable energy resources and technology by extending tax incentives, such as the production tax credit, for 5 years. Of course, this covers wind, solar, geothermal, hydro, and other forms of renewable energy, and making sure that is in place so we can spur the kind of investment that will create jobs and allow us to be on the same path other countries around the world are on. Second, the legislation establishes a national renewable energy standard requiring that 20 percent of our energy come from renewable sources, such as wind, solar, and biofuels, by the year 2025. A national renewable energy standard will create a large market for clean sources of energy, reducing global warming pollution, and strengthening our economy. Let me briefly describe each of these elements. First, the renewable energy tax incentives. Already the industries for solar, wind, and biomass are expanding at annual rates exceeding 30 percent. But at the same time, we are no longer the world leader in two important clean energy fields. Even though all the technology was developed in our country, we rank third in wind power production behind Denmark and Spain, and we are now third in photovoltaic power installed, behind Germany and Japan. Ironically, these countries surpassed us largely by adopting technologies that had been first developed here in the United States. We came up with the right ideas, but we didn't capitalize on these incentives by having these innovations, by having the right policies in place to support their commercial development and rise and support the jobs that would have come with developing the technology. Our foreign competition was able to leapfrog over American businesses because these other countries have government-driven investment incentives, aggressive renewable energy targets, and other bold national policies. What I am proposing with my legislation is a package of tax incentives to spur investment in advanced clean technologies to serve the growing market for renewable energy sources. Specifically, in the bill Senator Snowe and Senator Cantwell and I are introducing today, we want to extend and expand the existing Federal production tax credit for renewable energy, and I want to make sure it is a long-term credit and businesses will have the clarity and certainty they need to make their own large-scale, long-term capital investments in these technologies. Currently, the production tax credit and other key energy efficiency tax incentives are set to expire at the end of this year. Our legislation will extend these tax incentives for 5 years. To pay for these incentives, the legislation will repeal several tax giveaways that currently go to the major oil companies. ExxonMobil shattered another record profit, earning $11.7 billion last quarter and totaling over $40 billion in profits in 2007. Big oil doesn't need these tax incentives, but our rural economies do. Over the years, the production tax credit has been a problem because of its short-term green light-red light nature. The cycle begins with strong investment and growth in the renewable power industry, thanks to the tax incentive, but then the investment and growth slow down as the tax incentive nears expiration and is allowed to lapse. When the incentive gets restored, the renewable power industry takes time to regain its footing, and then experiences strong growth again until the incentive nears expiration again. Up and down, up and down, up and down. It is no way to run a government policy that should be geared toward creating more jobs in our country. In fact, the American Wind Energy Association has recently noted that the slowdown in wind industry activity actually starts about 8 months before the tax credit's expiration date. These are large-scale, capital-intensive projects that often take long years to develop. But uncertainty about the future of the production tax credit discourages project development and investment. Extending the tax credit for 5 years would create a much stronger incentive and investment environment for renewable energy development. Simply put, a new economic sector is emerging. It is one that can shift the Nation's economy to clean energy production, generation, and use. But without the continued support of tax incentives to help this emerging industry compete on a level playing field, the opportunity will be lost. Over the past few years, the solar energy industry has witnessed unprecedented growth. This growth pumped over $2 billion into the U.S. economy and created 6,000 new jobs. Developing solar energy is an economic engine for our country. From 2006 to 2007, the job base in the solar energy industry grew by 103 percent. Almost all of this growth is directly attributable to the solar investment tax credits that are scheduled to expire at the end of this year. If we allow these credits to expire, those jobs will dry up. We will lose out on creating new companies and we will lose out on creating new opportunities for clean energy. I have focused on wind and solar, but there are amazing opportunities in other renewable energy fields, including hydro. There are amazing opportunities with geothermal. But we are never going to reach the full potential for jobs in this country if we keep going back and forth, up and down. We have to have a policy that is geared to the long term. I will also say that in visiting with farmers and ranchers around our State, the other thing we need to do--but we will have to focus on in another bill--is look at creating incentives for individuals and small businesses that may want to put up their own wind turbine. That is a subject for another day, but we have to do everything we can to promote this renewable energy. The second element in this legislation would provide an additional incentive for investment in renewable energy technology and resources. It would establish an aggressive, nationwide renewable electricity standard, one requiring that all electricity providers generate or purchase 20 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by the year 2025. Currently, as I show on this chart here, there are 24 States, plus the District of Columbia, that have renewable electricity standards. Together, these States account for more than half of the electricity sales in the United States. You can see what these States are doing here. All on their own, the States have risen to the occasion, and said: Well, the Federal Government isn't doing anything, so I guess we will do it on our own. California is at 20 percent, Minnesota at 27.4 percent by 2025--one of the most aggressive standards in the country. Bipartisan agreement, a Democratic legislature, and a Republican Governor reached this agreement with our utilities, including Excel Industry signing on and not opposing this agreement. We have New York at 24 percent, Wisconsin at 10 percent by 2015; 15 percent by 2015 for Montana--15 percent by 2020. Look at these States along the way, all over this country, and we are seeing these standards taking place. While Minnesota, Maine, Washington, and other States are already headed down the path toward a new clean energy economy, the Federal Government hasn't even made it to the trail yet. The Federal Government is still stuck in the fossil age. There is a famous phrase: ``the laboratories of democracy.'' That is how Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis described the special role of States in our Federal system. In this model, States are where new ideas emerge and innovative proposals are tested. But Brandeis did not mean for this to serve as an excuse for inaction by the Federal Government. Good ideas and successful innovations are supposed to emerge from the laboratory and serve as a model for national policy and action. The responsibility is on us. We know what is going on in these States around the country. The courage we are seeing in the States as they seize opportunities offered by renewable energy should be matched by courage in Washington. I think it is time for the Federal Government to follow the lead of Minnesota, Washington, Maine, and other States around the country and adopt a forward-looking renewable energy standard. There are many benefits from having a strong national standard. It would save money for American consumers, as much as $100 billion in lower electricity and natural gas bills. It would aid in the fight against climate change by preventing well over 3 billion tons of carbon dioxide from being emitted into the atmosphere by 2030. It would create jobs and increase income across the country, especially in rural areas. Each large utility-scale wind turbine that goes on line generates over $1.5 million in economic activity. Each turbine provides about $5,000 in lease payments for 20 years or more to farmers, ranchers, or other landowners. You can see from this chart the job creation with this national renewable electricity standard set at 20 percent--355,000 new jobs, nearly twice as much as generating electricity from fossil fuels; $72.6 billion in new capital investment; $16.2 billion in income to farmers, ranchers, and rural landowners; $5 billion in new local tax revenues. Then look at these consumer savings--$49 billion in lower electricity and natural gas bills; a healthier environment; reductions in global warming pollution equal to taking nearly 71 million cars off the road; less air pollution, damage to land, and less water use. These are the benefits. We pay for it by taking back some of those tax giveaways we give to those oil companies--ExxonMobil, $11.7 billion in one quarter. So are we going to give them more money or try to create 355,000 new jobs in this country? That is the choice. I believe the combination of an aggressive renewable electricity standard and a strong package of tax incentives can begin to move our Nation to a new, cleaner, and more prosperous energy path. It is long overdue. The private sector is already beginning to invest in this energy future, and they are ready to invest more. But our Government must provide the right policies and incentives so they will be prepared to make the large-scale, long-term investments that are required to make it happen. The opportunities are enormous for creating new technologies, new industries, new businesses, and new jobs, while at the same time promoting our energy independence, strengthening our national security, and protecting our global environment. This piece of legislation, cosponsored by my friends Senator Snowe and Senator Cantwell, this bipartisan piece of legislation is about leading the new economy, not following along; not doing countless rebate checks after rebate checks--which we need to do right now, but we are never going to get on the path to a new economic future unless we lead the way, and this is Washington's time to lead. This is about making America the global energy leader instead of the lagger. It is about creating a better economy for the next generation by leading a whole new industry. It is about not being complacent. It is about getting on a new energy path. I believe an aggressive renewable electricity standard, coupled with strong tax incentives, leads us down this path. I urge all of my colleagues to support the American Renewable Energy Act.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I am here to talk about the American Renewable Energy Act which I am introducing today, along with my colleagues, Senator Snowe from Maine and Senator Cantwell from Washington. Last week, we passed a short-term stimulus package that will help change the economic direction of this country by putting money in the hands of American families, including our seniors and veterans. Last week's action was a start, but we must begin focusing on long-term policies that will help our economy long after these rebate checks have been cashed. If we do not do that, we are going to be back exactly in the place we were before. We need long-term policies that will encourage sustainable economic growth in every corner of this country. In January, I traveled all around my State on a Main Street tour of Minnesota. We talked about the economic challenges facing the people of our State, but we also talked about the opportunities. Energy was a topic that came up everywhere. It came up when people were filling up their cars and trucks with gas, and it came up when we talked about the opportunities. I visited southwestern Minnesota, which is home to hundreds of large- scale wind turbines, helping to make Minnesota the Nation's third largest producer of wind energy. Along with ethanol, these wind-energy farms have spurred a rural economic renaissance in our part of the State. For example, in 1995, SMI & Hydraulics, Inc., began their business in Porter, MN, primarily as a welding and cylinder repair shop for local farmers and businesses. Today, SMI & Hydraulics manufactures the bases for the wind towers we sell all across this country. It just recently expanded its facility to 100,000 square feet and created over 100 new jobs, many of which are traditional manufacturing jobs. My colleagues have to understand, these places are like barns. They started out as farmers' barns and have expanded and expanded as they have been able to meet this country's rising energy needs. The success of companies such as SMI & Hydraulics is not unique to Minnesota. Renewable energy has been a bright spot in an otherwise lagging economy. Last year, the renewable electricity sector pumped more than $20 billion into the U.S. economy, generating tens of thousands of jobs in construction, transportation, and manufacturing. Throughout the country, renewable energy has led us down a path toward new jobs, lower energy bills, and enhanced economic development. That is why today I am introducing this bill, along with my friends Senator Snowe and Senator Cantwell, to help lead us further down the path to a better, cleaner, more prosperous energy future, with new opportunities for investment, innovation, and job creation. Our bill, as I said, is called the American Renewable Energy Act. There are two key elements of this legislation. First, the American Renewable Energy Act creates strong, consistent incentives for private sector investment in renewable energy resources and technology by extending tax incentives, such as the production tax credit, for 5 years. Of course, this covers wind, solar, geothermal, hydro, and other forms of renewable energy, and making sure that is in place so we can spur the kind of investment that will create jobs and allow us to be on the same path other countries around the world are on. Second, the legislation establishes a national renewable energy standard requiring that 20 percent of our energy come from renewable sources, such as wind, solar, and biofuels, by the year 2025. A national renewable energy standard will create a large market for clean sources of energy, reducing global warming pollution, and strengthening our economy. Let me briefly describe each of these elements. First, the renewable energy tax incentives. Already the industries for solar, wind, and biomass are expanding at annual rates exceeding 30 percent. But at the same time, we are no longer the world leader in two important clean energy fields. Even though all the technology was developed in our country, we rank third in wind power production behind Denmark and Spain, and we are now third in photovoltaic power installed, behind Germany and Japan. Ironically, these countries surpassed us largely by adopting technologies that had been first developed here in the United States. We came up with the right ideas, but we didn't capitalize on these incentives by having these innovations, by having the right policies in place to support their commercial development and rise and support the jobs that would have come with developing the technology. Our foreign competition was able to leapfrog over American businesses because these other countries have government-driven investment incentives, aggressive renewable energy targets, and other bold national policies. What I am proposing with my legislation is a package of tax incentives to spur investment in advanced clean technologies to serve the growing market for renewable energy sources. Specifically, in the bill Senator Snowe and Senator Cantwell and I are introducing today, we want to extend and expand the existing Federal production tax credit for renewable energy, and I want to make sure it is a long-term credit and businesses will have the clarity and certainty they need to make their own large-scale, long-term capital investments in these technologies. Currently, the production tax credit and other key energy efficiency tax incentives are set to expire at the end of this year. Our legislation will extend these tax incentives for 5 years. To pay for these incentives, the legislation will repeal several tax giveaways that currently go to the major oil companies. ExxonMobil shattered another record profit, earning $11.7 billion last quarter and totaling over $40 billion in profits in 2007. Big oil doesn't need these tax incentives, but our rural economies do. Over the years, the production tax credit has been a problem because of its short-term green light-red light nature. The cycle begins with strong investment and growth in the renewable power industry, thanks to the tax incentive, but then the investment and growth slow down as the tax incentive nears expiration and is allowed to lapse. When the incentive gets restored, the renewable power industry takes time to regain its footing, and then experiences strong growth again until the incentive nears expiration again. Up and down, up and down, up and down. It is no way to run a government policy that should be geared toward creating more jobs in our country. In fact, the American Wind Energy Association has recently noted that the slowdown in wind industry activity actually starts about 8 months before the tax credit's expiration date. These are large-scale, capital-intensive projects that often take long years to develop. But uncertainty about the future of the production tax credit discourages project development and investment. Extending the tax credit for 5 years would create a much stronger incentive and investment environment for renewable energy development. Simply put, a new economic sector is emerging. It is one that can shift the Nation's economy to clean energy production, generation, and use. But without the continued support of tax incentives to help this emerging industry compete on a level playing field, the opportunity will be lost. Over the past few years, the solar energy industry has witnessed unprecedented growth. This growth pumped over $2 billion into the U.S. economy and created 6,000 new jobs. Developing solar energy is an economic engine for our country. From 2006 to 2007, the job base in the solar energy industry grew by 103 percent. Almost all of this growth is directly attributable to the solar investment tax credits that are scheduled to expire at the end of this year. If we allow these credits to expire, those jobs will dry up. We will lose out on creating new companies and we will lose out on creating new opportunities for clean energy. I have focused on wind and solar, but there are amazing opportunities in other renewable energy fields, including hydro. There are amazing opportunities with geothermal. But we are never going to reach the full potential for jobs in this country if we keep going back and forth, up and down. We have to have a policy that is geared to the long term. I will also say that in visiting with farmers and ranchers around our State, the other thing we need to do--but we will have to focus on in another bill--is look at creating incentives for individuals and small businesses that may want to put up their own wind turbine. That is a subject for another day, but we have to do everything we can to promote this renewable energy. The second element in this legislation would provide an additional incentive for investment in renewable energy technology and resources. It would establish an aggressive, nationwide renewable electricity standard, one requiring that all electricity providers generate or purchase 20 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by the year 2025. Currently, as I show on this chart here, there are 24 States, plus the District of Columbia, that have renewable electricity standards. Together, these States account for more than half of the electricity sales in the United States. You can see what these States are doing here. All on their own, the States have risen to the occasion, and said: Well, the Federal Government isn't doing anything, so I guess we will do it on our own. California is at 20 percent, Minnesota at 27.4 percent by 2025--one of the most aggressive standards in the country. Bipartisan agreement, a Democratic legislature, and a Republican Governor reached this agreement with our utilities, including Excel Industry signing on and not opposing this agreement. We have New York at 24 percent, Wisconsin at 10 percent by 2015; 15 percent by 2015 for Montana--15 percent by 2020. Look at these States along the way, all over this country, and we are seeing these standards taking place. While Minnesota, Maine, Washington, and other States are already headed down the path toward a new clean energy economy, the Federal Government hasn't even made it to the trail yet. The Federal Government is still stuck in the fossil age. There is a famous phrase: ``the laboratories of democracy.'' That is how Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis described the special role of States in our Federal system. In this model, States are where new ideas emerge and innovative proposals are tested. But Brandeis did not mean for this to serve as an excuse for inaction by the Federal Government. Good ideas and successful innovations are supposed to emerge from the laboratory and serve as a model for national policy and action. The responsibility is on us. We know what is going on in these States around the country. The courage we are seeing in the States as they seize opportunities offered by renewable energy should be matched by courage in Washington. I think it is time for the Federal Government to follow the lead of Minnesota, Washington, Maine, and other States around the country and adopt a forward-looking renewable energy standard. There are many benefits from having a strong national standard. It would save money for American consumers, as much as $100 billion in lower electricity and natural gas bills. It would aid in the fight against climate change by preventing well over 3 billion tons of carbon dioxide from being emitted into the atmosphere by 2030. It would create jobs and increase income across the country, especially in rural areas. Each large utility-scale wind turbine that goes on line generates over $1.5 million in economic activity. Each turbine provides about $5,000 in lease payments for 20 years or more to farmers, ranchers, or other landowners. You can see from this chart the job creation with this national renewable electricity standard set at 20 percent--355,000 new jobs, nearly twice as much as generating electricity from fossil fuels; $72.6 billion in new capital investment; $16.2 billion in income to farmers, ranchers, and rural landowners; $5 billion in new local tax revenues. Then look at these consumer savings--$49 billion in lower electricity and natural gas bills; a healthier environment; reductions in global warming pollution equal to taking nearly 71 million cars off the road; less air pollution, damage to land, and less water use. These are the benefits. We pay for it by taking back some of those tax giveaways we give to those oil companies--ExxonMobil, $11.7 billion in one quarter. So are we going to give them more money or try to create 355,000 new jobs in this country? That is the choice. I believe the combination of an aggressive renewable electricity standard and a strong package of tax incentives can begin to move our Nation to a new, cleaner, and more prosperous energy path. It is long overdue. The private sector is already beginning to invest in this energy future, and they are ready to invest more. But our Government must provide the right policies and incentives so they will be prepared to make the large-scale, long-term investments that are required to make it happen. The opportunities are enormous for creating new technologies, new industries, new businesses, and new jobs, while at the same time promoting our energy independence, strengthening our national security, and protecting our global environment. This piece of legislation, cosponsored by my friends Senator Snowe and Senator Cantwell, this bipartisan piece of legislation is about leading the new economy, not following along; not doing countless rebate checks after rebate checks--which we need to do right now, but we are never going to get on the path to a new economic future unless we lead the way, and this is Washington's time to lead. This is about making America the global energy leader instead of the lagger. It is about creating a better economy for the next generation by leading a whole new industry. It is about not being complacent. It is about getting on a new energy path. I believe an aggressive renewable electricity standard, coupled with strong tax incentives, leads us down this path. I urge all of my colleagues to support the American Renewable Energy Act.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, for 8 years, I served as the chief prosecutor for Minnesota's largest county, and we had something we said when we were working on white-collar cases. We said: Follow the money. Follow the money. Is it going where it is needed? That is what I ask today. I would say with the Senate finance package it is. I hope that as Congress works on this package, we will work to redirect the money to new priorities for America. At the same time, the urgent need for America to get our economy moving forward again is deep and it is long. I saw it last month, when I was touring around our State, visiting 47 counties, visiting solar panel factories down in southern Minnesota, up at a turkey processing plant, and I can tell you people want to move forward with this economy, but they feel our Government has not been supporting them. That is why we put together the Senate stimulus package, which is targeted, which is temporary, and which is going to be timely. I know we are all going to get this done, but I believe it is very important we not neglect the seniors, 600,000 seniors in Minnesota. I have always believed this is a country where we wrap our arms around the people who have been there for us--our seniors and disabled veterans. When these guys signed up for war, there wasn't a waiting line. Why would we put them at the end of the line when we are looking at these rebate checks? So I believe it is important we move forward with the Senate finance package, which does some very good things, as the Presiding Officer knows, for the State of Colorado, to promote energy--renewable energy, and wind and solar--and I wish to move forward with it. But I believe that long after these rebate checks are cashed, we are going to have to change it for the long term. This means rolling back those tax cuts for the wealthiest people, making over $200,000 a year, investing in our infrastructure, and moving this country in the right direction. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, today I wish to recognize a great achievement by the City of Saint Cloud, MN. St. Cloud, MN, is located on the banks of the Mississippi River, 60 miles northwest of the Twin Cities. When it was founded more than 150 years ago, it was known as the Granite City. But now it also bears the title of the Most Livable Community in the World. The LivCom Awards are the world's only competition for local communities that focuses on environmental management and the creation of livable communities. This year, they have named Saint Cloud the ``Most Livable Community in the World.'' This award is a deserved honor and recognition of the outstanding efforts being undertaken by the City of Saint Cloud to create a livable and sustainable community. The awards encourage best practice, innovation, and leadership in providing vibrant, environmentally sustainable communities that improve the quality of life for their residents and people worldwide. Among the goals of the award is to model innovative community planning and living for other communities. I hope that Saint Cloud will inspire other communities to tackle challenging environmental and energy issues facing our nation. Saint Cloud topped entrants from more than 50 countries. The residents of Saint Cloud, the Most Livable City in the World, have much to be proud of. I ask that you join me in congratulating the world's most livable community, Saint Cloud, MN.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, each year, the America's Promise Alliance names the 100 Best Communities for Young People in the Nation. Today, I am proud to honor five Minnesota towns that have achieved this tremendous designation--Landfall, Mankato, Northfield, Saint Louis Park, and Saint Paul, MN. The 100 Best Communities for Young People is an annual competition that recognizes outstanding community-wide efforts that improve the well-being of youth and inspire other localities to take action. There is apparently much to find inspiration from, as two previous award winners have now become five--a strong showing from the great State of Minnesota. Each of these five Minnesota communities demonstrated a commitment to community support of children through resources including effective education, safe gathering places, and a wide range of programming. Their commitment generates real outcomes in the form of high graduation rates and educational achievement, healthy behaviors, and civic engagement by their young population. Landfall, MN, is a small town with big plans for its young people. A town of just 700, they place a premium on expanding the horizons of young people. They provide students with ``Extra Innings,'' a tutoring and mentoring program that gives elementary through high school students one-on-one help with math, reading, and English as a second language. Mankato, MN, a three-time winner of this honor, prides itself on embracing young people to help them reach their fullest potential. Among their initiatives is the LinkCrew, which pairs high school freshmen with junior and senior year mentors to help them make a successful transition to high school. And, as the town that raised six Bessler boys, including my husband John, I know firsthand of the high- caliber young people Mankato produces. Northfield, MN, used to be a farm town, centered between corn and wheat fields. Now, anchored by two of our Nation's preeminent colleges, Carleton College and Saint Olaf College, Northfield has become an enriching place for young people. The Mayor's Youth Council allows students ages 15 to 18 to advise the mayor and city council on issues related to the young population. Saint Louis Park, MN, is also a three-time winner. They welcome youth into their process of government, inviting them to participate in decisionmaking on special neighborhood and community issues. Among other attractions, it is home to 51 parks thanks to the city's initiative to reserve a percentage of all city land for public parks. And in a special nod to its young population, the city's Web site lists the best sledding hills in its community. Saint Paul, MN, is our State's capital city and a shining example of how to engage children after school hours. Through the Second Shift and After School Initiatives, they provide positive places for children to spend their afternoons, develop new skills, and obtain academic assistance. From his theatre in downtown Saint Paul, Minnesota's native son, Garrison Keillor, refers to his fictional Minnesota town of Lake Wobegon as a place where ``all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.'' These five towns have certainly proven Keillor's words are more truth than fiction. I am proud to represent five of America's Best Communities for Young People and to congratulate them before the U.S. Senate.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, last month I traveled to dozens of communities throughout my State. I actually visited 47 counties in Minnesota in January, from towns on our southern border with Iowa to towns way up on our northern border with Canada. I saw a lot of great entrepreneurial activity out there. I got to see ethanol plants. I was with Senator Conrad in North Dakota for his entrepreneurial forum. I got to jump on solar panels to show that hail doesn't hurt solar panels in Starbuck, MN. What I heard from people throughout our State--and I think what we are hearing from people throughout America--is that Washington must provide a new direction to address the Nation's priorities and solve our economic challenges. They know what is happening. There has been a doubling of foreclosure rates in rural Minnesota. We have seen rising energy prices, as my colleagues can imagine when it is so cold. I was in International Falls, where it gets to be 10 below zero. In International Falls, it is pretty cold. In Embarrass, MN, it can get pretty cold. There are also skyrocketing health costs. I heard about that not just from individual families and workers but from small businesses that are having trouble keeping their employees on health care plans or big businesses that are having trouble competing internationally because of the costs of health care. What people told me out there is they need new solutions and new priorities from Washington. What I want to talk about today is, first of all, the President's budget and how it doesn't give us new solutions, it doesn't give us new priorities, and then our own stimulus package that is so important to push through this Congress and not to be obstructed. The President's budget continues a familiar pattern of misplaced priorities. It continues a 7-year pattern of fiscal irresponsibility, borrowing money and then leaving an ever-larger debt to our children. In just 7 years, this administration took a budget surplus of $158 billion and turned it into what will soon be a budget deficit of something like $300 billion, $400 billion. It is quite an accomplishment. Meanwhile, this new budget continues to neglect critical investments that are needed to strengthen our economy and our Nation in a very difficult time. It does not make the investments we need in our Nation's transportation infrastructure. It does not make the investments we need in developing renewable energy sources to move us toward greater independence and security. It does not make the investments we need to get new technology to solve our climate change problem--what I call building a bridge to the 21st century. It doesn't do that. It doesn't make the investment we need in the basic medical and scientific research that has always been a key driver of our country's innovation and growth. It doesn't include a shift in these priorities, and it also doesn't include how we are going to pay for it. When I went around our State in January, people were willing to talk about reform. They are willing to talk about rolling back some of these Bush tax cuts on the wealthiest people--people making over $200,000, $250,000 a year--so we can actually pay for some of the investments we need in our State. People out in rural Minnesota said: Fine by me. Roll back those tax cuts on people making over $200,000 a year. That is not me. Meanwhile, I have a road that I can't even go on because it has so many potholes and that has a shoulder that is going downhill where four people were killed in the last few months. I am happy if you can put some money into infrastructure. Here are a few examples in Minnesota of how the President got the budget wrong. I think people are well aware of our tragic bridge collapse. That was only six blocks from my house, when a bridge just fell down in the middle of a summer day in the middle of America. It was a tragic wake-up call that the Nation's bridges are deteriorating faster than we can repair or replace them. So what does the administration do in its budget? It reduces funding for the Federal highway construction fund. Minnesota is home to premier medical institutions such as the Mayo Clinic and the University of Minnesota that conduct breakthrough research on lifesaving cures. Many of the researchers at these institutions depend on Federal funding. So what does this administration do in its budget? What was I going to tell the people in our State, when I met with them at the Mall of America, who are trying to find a cure for children's diabetes, for the parents who met with me as we see autism on the rise and we are trying to find a cure or the people on the Alzheimer's ward? What does the President say to them? Well, for the sixth year in a row, it freezes funding for the National Institutes of Health, the Nation's leading medical research agency that provides essential funding to doctors and scientists. The budget also cuts health care services. For example, the administration is calling for an 86-percent cut in funding for rural health programs, including rural health outreach grants and the Rural Hospital Flexibility Grant Program. I can tell my colleagues what I heard when I was up in Brickstown, MN. I was up there. They have a hospital. They have one surgeon--one surgeon. You have to go miles and miles and miles to find another hospital. You can see towns miles and miles away, it is so flat up there. But they have this one hospital that is so important to their area. The surgeon is reaching retirement age. He might even want to retire now, but he can't because they can't find another surgeon to go up there. If they don't find another surgeon, they are not going to be able to have babies born in that hospital because they don't have a doctor who can do a C-section. Much of my State is rural despite the thriving metropolitan area we have in the Twin Cities and thriving places such as Moorhead and Rochester and Duluth, and we have these rural hospitals and health care providers that depend on this Federal funding to provide services for the rural residents of my State. It is not just a nicety; it is a necessity. In Minnesota, we are on the leading edge of the renewable energy revolution that promises to transform our economy and lead us toward greater energy security and independence. So what does the administration do in this budget? It cuts funding for solar energy research, hydropower, and industrial energy efficiency. It also cuts Department of Agriculture programs that are important for developing new farm-based energy sources such as biomass and cellulosic ethanol. Now, we heard the President at the State of the Union talking about moving to this new energy era. Well, put the money where the mouth is. It is not there. How are we going to stop spending $200,000 a minute on foreign oil if we are cutting the possibility of research into things such as cellulosic ethanol which, if done right with prairie grass, which puts carbon back into our soil, will allow the prairie grass to be grown on marginal farmland? This is the direction we need to go but not if we are going to cut funding. We have seen these wind turbines in our State where people are so excited they have wind turbines everywhere, wind turbine manufacturing, but every time the wind tax credit goes away, the investment stops about 8 months earlier because it is like a game of red light-green light: They don't know what is happening. So this is what the administration does. This budget would shut down the U.S. Department of Agriculture's North Central Soil Conservation Research Lab in Morris, MN. That was one of the places I visited in January. This lab, on the University of Minnesota campus, is at the forefront of research and development to promote homegrown renewable energy. This is our energy future, but you would hardly know it from looking at the President's budget. Finally, as I mentioned, it has been a little cold in Minnesota. It did get up to 10 degrees below zero one day, but it was down to 20 degrees below zero in Embarrass about a week ago. Nationwide, the average household is expected to pay 11 percent more for heating this winter compared to last year. Families who rely on home heating oil are facing record prices 30 to 50 percent above last winter. What does the administration do in its budget? It cuts in half the emergency funding for the low-income heating assistance program. This is a program which enjoys bipartisan support. It provides much needed help to seniors and families who are struggling with ever-rising heating costs. Maybe the President thinks we are going to have so much global warming that we don't need this heating, I don't know. While these prices are going up and you are in the middle of winter, you shouldn't cut the heating program. I hope the next President see things differently. I believe deeply in the importance of fiscal responsibility. I support the pay-as-you-go rule for budgeting. My husband and I keep our financial house in order, and we think the Government should too. If you want to talk about fiscal responsibility, you don't have it in this budget. There is no willingness to talk about doing things differently. Do we want a budget that offers tax giveaways to the wealthy or one that provides relief to middle-class families who are squeezed by the rising costs of housing, energy, health care, and tuition? You know what happened on the AMT debate. We voted to pay for it by taking money away from the hedge fund operators, but the other side would not do it. Do we want to give lucrative favors to the rich and the corporations, or do we want to invest in our future prosperity, in things such as research and development and renewable energy? Instead of investing in the oil cartels in the Mideast, we need to invest in the farmers and workers of the Midwest--maybe a few in Vermont, as well, Mr. President. Do we want a budget that continues to send tens of billions of dollars to Iraq--I think it is $12 billion a month--or do we want a budget that provides our local and State law enforcement with the resources they need to protect public safety here at home? I want to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by rolling back the tax cuts for the wealthiest people making over $200,000 or $250,000 a year. I would like to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by eliminating offshore tax havens for multimillionaires. I would like to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by ending the tax breaks and royalties that have been handed out year after year to the big oil companies. I would like to see an administration that aims for fiscal responsibility by allowing Medicare to negotiate lower prescription drug prices for seniors. Exactly what we predicted would happen has; you are seeing the prices go up, not down. They just had a re-up period for Medicare Part D. Seniors in my State are trying to figure out all these call-in lines and are trying to save a little money, and they are caught in the doughnut hole. This could have been done better. It wasn't done in a fiscally responsible way. The President's budget doesn't provide the new priorities and new solutions America needs. Instead, it continues to take us down the wrong path for the future. Even as we must plan and invest for the long term, I am also concerned that we have our priorities right in the short term. At this time, the urgent priority for America is to get our economy moving forward again and not let it weaken further. That is why we have put together an economic stimulus package that would respond promptly and responsibly. It would get this economy moving with tax rebates that are fair to the middle class, carefully targeted, and fiscally responsible. But tonight we find out that we are not going to be able to vote on that tomorrow. I do commend Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley for their swift work in getting this comprehensive, simple, and effective measure to the floor. A short-term stimulus package needs to be targeted for the people who need it most. Although economists are wary to declare that we are officially in a recession, many middle-class American families have been feeling the effects of an economic slowdown for months. From the impact of the mortgage crisis on the value of homes in their neighborhoods, to the skyrocketing costs of the oil that fuels their cars and heats their homes, to the rising prices in the grocery store, the middle class is feeling economic pressure from each and every side. When I went across my State on our Main Street tour in January, no matter where I went--all 47 counties--the economy was the first on the list of what the people in my State wanted to talk about. From city hall, to the cafe stops, to the turkey-processing places, to the little solar panel company, that is all they wanted to talk about--the economy. The message was loud and clear. I heard a lot from the middle- class families. Even before we began to experience this economic slowdown, the families were finding it harder to get by. To give you a sense of what we have in our State, in Minnesota, the unemployment rate recently jumped to 4.9 percent, up from 4.4 percent the month before. Our State lost 23,000 jobs in the last 6 months alone. Over 50,000 Minnesota families lost their homes to foreclosure in the past 3 months. Home heating prices for Minnesota families have risen by 14.1 percent per household in the past year alone. In order to get communities along Main Streets in Minnesota and across our country booming again, we need both short- and long-term solutions. While everybody agrees the rebate checks will be a part of whatever targeted and effective stimulus package Congress ends up sending to the President, I am here today to voice my strong support for several additional provisions that are in our Senate proposal. These proposals would do much to help improve the middle-class lives behind those statistics I just talked about. These are real people all over our State. These proposals are a proven stimulus for our economy. They deserve a full debate and proper consideration in our Chamber. First, we need to expand our rebate effort in order to ensure that certain deserving groups are not left out. As I said, part of creating a targeted stimulus for the economy is through helping those who need it most. I was sorry to see that the House proposal fell short. It is crucial to this package that the 20 million American seniors who worked all their lives, paid taxes, and contributed to our society in countless ways will get rebate checks. That is the first point. We need to include the seniors. In the past week, I have heard from hundreds of Minnesota seniors who told me that the Senate proposal to include Social Security recipients is the only fair way to stimulate the economy. I agree, and I support the Senate effort to include seniors. It is also crucial that we include disabled veterans in this package. These men and women have served our country both here and abroad. They signed up to serve; there wasn't a waiting line. When they come up and people are getting rebates, there should not be a waiting line. Go to the end of the line--you disabled veterans, who served our country, are at the end of the line; you don't get a rebate check. That is not right. Second, I firmly believe we should include an extension of the clean energy tax incentives in any stimulus package. We can do that in another package, but we have to do it. These benefits certainly meet the definition of what we need for a short-term stimulus package. If you look at the data, we have seen a revolution going on across the country in wind and solar and other forms of renewable energy. This has been like a game of red light-green light. You can go through the lights, and then it lapses for 6 months. It goes on again, and then it lapses. The proven statistic is that every time it lapses, the investors stop investing. That is not what we want. Our country came up with all of the technology for wind and solar, and now we are falling behind the rest of the world in developing it because we don't have the investment tax credits in place. Third, I believe the stimulus package should also include additional funding for LIHEAP. Working families in Minnesota and across the Nation should not have to choose between paying home heating bills and putting food on the table. Increasing LIHEAP funding to keep pace with the skyrocketing price of oil is essential to this stimulus package. I see the stimulus package as a first step, and it is crucial to support it. But long after those rebate checks are spent, we are going to need a long-term economic strategy in response to the problem or we are going to be back where we started in the first place. We need an economy that creates good, stable middle-class jobs. We need infrastructure investment so we don't have bridges falling down in the middle of America. We need energy investment. That will reduce our dependence on foreign oil and create good jobs in the green-collar energy sector. In the Senate, we have our stimulus package, and it is a good one. The people we serve are asking for a new direction and priority. That means being fiscally responsible, being willing to roll back some of the tax cuts for the wealthiest, closing down loopholes, negotiating for lower prescription drug prices, and taking the oil giveaways and putting them into renewables. Those are new priorities for this country. Last year, we made a downpayment on change in this country. We moved toward a more responsible budget process. We gave working Americans an increase in the minimum wage. Today, we can continue that progress and continue that change with a system that is fair for all Americans. That means getting the stimulus package done, including these necessary changes with seniors and disabled veterans and the LIHEAP funding, and then looking at the long term and making sure in this package--or in another one--we get the tax cuts in place for clean energy and do something about fiscal responsibility. And we are willing to talk about change and really do it. This is our moment. The American people have spoken. At least they spoke to me in Crookston and Worthington and Starbuck. I think if the people who live in those towns were standing here, they would tell the Senate what we need to do. So let's get it done. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding the provisions of rule XXII, Senators have until 4 p.m. Monday, January 28, to file second-degree amendments.