Angus King

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, as usual, my senior colleague from Maine has outlined this issue exceptionally well and covered the important points. I wish to add and amplify a few. The first thing I would say is that I yield to no person in this body in terms of their commitment to the environment, their commitment to ending our dependence upon fossil fuel, and our facing of the challenge of climate change. This biomass discussion is a way of helping with that problem rather than hindering it. The important term in all of this discussion is the word ``fossil.'' The issue we are facing now with climate change and with increased CO2 in the atmosphere is because we are releasing CO2. We are releasing carbon that has been trapped in the Earth's crust for millions of years, and we are adding to the carbon budget of the atmosphere. Biomass is carbon that is already here. It is already in the environment. It is in the trees. It is simply being circulated, and there is no net addition of carbon to the atmosphere because of the use of biomass. I have been in the renewable energy business now for more than 30 years and have worked in hydro, biomass, energy conservation on a large scale and wind power. So I have some background in this. A biomass plant typically burns fuel that would not otherwise enter into the economic stream of timber. It is often bark, mill waste, ends of logs, branches--the kind of thing that otherwise lies on the forest floor, dies and decays and releases carbon. There is no net addition of carbon. To be intellectually honest, you have to say that burning it releases that carbon so much sooner than it would otherwise be released, but in the overall term we are talking about a renewable resource. In New England and I suspect around the country--I know in Maine-- there are substantially more trees in the forest today than there were 150 years ago because of the number of farms that have been returned to their natural state of forestry. That has given us an opportunity to develop an energy source that is a lot more safe and supportive of the environment than the other fossil fuel elements we have seen that have contributed to the CO2 problem in this country. I think this is a commonsense amendment. It basically tries to get the Federal Government on the same page on this issue consistently across the agencies. It makes the point that as long as we are talking about sustainable management, we are talking about what amounts to a continuous renewable resource. We are not adding to the carbon burden of the atmosphere, and therefore I think this is a commonsense amendment that will not set back our efforts with regard to climate change but will actually advance them. I am happy to support this amendment, to support my colleague from Maine. I think this is the kind of commonsense amendment that actually belongs. It is a very important part of this bill. It strengthens it considerably, in my view. I want to again thank my senior colleague for bringing this bill forward.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. That is absolutely correct. That I will touch on in a moment. That potentially changes the relationship with utilities and with the grid system. This is a good thing. This provides competition. Our whole system is based upon competition. Everybody here talks about the power of the market. That is what we are talking about here. It strengthens the grid by making it more resilient because power is going in two directions. We had a huge ice storm in Maine in 1998. The power went off. Everybody lost their power--600,000 people. The people who had generators in their homes could make their own power, but those were very few people. Now we are talking about a grid that is not wholly dependent upon a central powerplant but power goes in both directions. I am on the Intelligence and Armed Services Committees. This is a national security issue. One of the great vulnerabilities of this country is a cyber attack on critical infrastructure. To the extent this infrastructure is self-healing and distributed, it is less subject to a catastrophic attack. It saves money because it saves money on distribution and powerplants if people are making their own investments and you don't not need the level of transmission and distribution wires. Of course it could substantially reduce our dependency upon fossil fuels. There are two possible reactions to this from the utility companies. One is to adopt, adjust, and reinvent themselves, as companies have done. I remember New England Tel. New England Tel is now Verizon. If they were still focused exclusively on landlines with the old black telephones, they would be long gone. Instead, they reinvented themselves because of a change of technology, and now they are one of the Nation's leading wireless providers. AT&T used to be Ma Bell. Now it is a leading wireless provider because they adapted, and they changed their whole business model based upon new economic realities. That is one option. There are utilities in the country that are adopting that option; that are finding new business models, relationships with their customers, in order to participate in this system and be counselors and energy providers and consultants to their customers in this new world. On the other hand, they can fight, resist, and try to delay. That is what we are talking about here today. That is what has happened in Nevada, imposing high fixed fees that ostensibly are to recover the costs, but everybody knows the real purpose is to strangle this industry in its infancy. I think those companies should think about the examples of Packard, Kodak, and Polaroid that failed to adapt, that failed to take account of new technological realities and ultimately failed. I don't think that is the future these companies want. This amendment is not a Federal takeover of State utility regulations. It provides guidance. It uses the term ``take into account.'' All it says is that if you are going to change a net metering regime, or if you are going to impose fees, they have to be based upon data and analysis, not arbitrary fees that are designed to strangle the industry. It is not a mandate for net metering or any other kind of payment. Again, what we are trying to do is to make sure that the benefits to the grid from a home installation--whether it is demand, response, storage, whatever--are measured as well as the cost. The issue is very simple. It is fair compensation to the customer for the energy they produce or save and fair compensation to the utility for maintaining the grid. I know there are costs to the utility for maintaining the grid, and they have to be fairly compensated. But the question is fair. What is the right number? An arbitrary exorbitant fee that essentially makes the development of solar or storage unfeasible is not the right number. The Democratic leader mentioned storage, and this is really an essential part of the discussion. As storage technology improves, this is where the utilities are most exposed. In my view, utilities are in a race with battery technology in order to determine who is going to provide the backup to the solar, wind, and demand response facilities in the house. Who is going to provide the backup? If the utilities insist upon high, unreasonable fees, eventually--and I think ``eventually'' is within 5 years; it is not 10 years, 20 years or 30 years--people are going to say: I am going to do my own storage, my own backup in my basement, and cut the wires. Then the utility has lost the customer all together, and I don't think that makes any sense. The real point is that change is coming anyway. The only question is whether it happens fairly, deliberately, and expeditiously and is fair to the customers as well as the utilities or whether it goes through a long series of individual fights State by State.

Mr. KING. Mr. President, the Democratic leader has just outlined the issue that is before us today. I want to put it into some context. The first thing I want to say is that what we are talking about today is the most fundamental of American economic principles--free-market competition. Free-market competition is what we are talking about here. Now, as the Democratic leader outlined, for 135 years, our electrical system worked basically in the same way that it works today. It has worked because of central powerplants, wires, distribution and transmission systems, and homes. Homes and businesses and offices were the passive receptors of electricity. The utilities have done a wonderful job. I have worked with them over the years. They have done a complex job where the power has to be there when the switch is thrown. They have done a terrific job of serving the American public, but what the American public wants is not necessarily electricity itself, it wants what electricity can do. A friend of mine once said, for example, that in this country every year, 5 million people buy quarter-inch drills, but nobody wants quarter-inch drills. What they want are holes. What the American people want are microwaves and televisions and computers and electricity and hot water in their homes. How that power comes is really not what they are concerned with, but they do want options. A revolution has occurred. Without a doubt this system served us well for 130 years, but a revolution has occurred in the last 25 years. This chart dramatically shows what has happened. This is the price of a watt of solar energy. In the 1970s it was $76. Today it is 36 cents. This is revolutionary. This is disruptive. This is change. What this has enabled is for us to now tap into that very large, fully permitted nuclear fusion device in the sky that delivers power wirelessly to every city, town, village and hamlet on Earth. That is what we are talking about. Why is this important? For a number of reasons. If you combine the cheaper solar power with smart appliances that can use their power only when it is the most efficacious for the grid--smart meters that many of our grids now have, demand response that allows customers to diminish their demand at times of high demand on the grid, and new storage technologies, if you add all of those together, it is an entirely new world of electricity development. This is where we are today. We still have central powerplants. We still have wires, but we have homes and businesses making their own electricity and storing their own electricity from that big nuclear fusion plant up in the sky. This is a good development. No. 1, it empowers consumers. It empowers families.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, today I wish to commemorate the 150th anniversary of Norway Savings Bank, a mutual savings bank based in southern Maine. This community bank has a long and proud history of serving the people of Maine, and I am proud to add my voice to those in our grateful State in recognizing this milestone. Norway Savings Bank will celebrate its anniversary by hosting events on February 5, 2016, at each of their 24 locations across western and southern Maine. When Norway Savings Bank was incorporated in 1866, Norway was a small but growing town with a third of the population settled today. A century and a half later, Norway has become a bustling mill town, as well as a popular tourist destination. And since it opened its original building on Main Street in Norway in 1894, Norway Savings Bank has proven itself to be an exemplary community bank. As a mutual savings bank, Norway Savings Bank is first and foremost accountable to its depositors and the community. At Norway Savings Bank, customers not only find high-quality service, but also an engaged and warm environment. Its dedicated employees have continued the tradition of providing customers with prompt and personalized solutions, regardless of the financial challenge. The bank's great customer service and hard work even has people ``from away'' taking notice: DepositAccounts.com named them one of the top 200 healthiest banks in 2014. Norway Savings Bank's investment in its employees is also commendable. The bank consistently prioritizes the well-being of its staff and is consistently recognized as a top employer in the State of Maine. The bank was named one of the Best Banks to Work For in America in 2013 by the American Bankers Association, and branches of the company have been awarded Best Places to Work in Maine by the Society for Human Resource Management's, SHRM, Maine State Council. Finally, bank leadership and employees prove that they understand the true meaning of ``relationship banking'' by devoting countless hours of their valuable time, as well as their resources, to the betterment of Maine by regularly supporting important community initiatives and issues. Between 2012 and 2014, Norway Savings Bank employees volunteered 27,788 hours of their time to different organizations in the community. The bank's core business model of putting community first remains true today even as Norway, ME, and the broader financial depository industry have changed dramatically. I am proud to join the people of Norway, ME, and communities across western and southern Maine in thanking Norway Savings Bank for their commitment to the people of Maine and continued work on behalf of our great State. This milestone is a testament to their hard work over the past 150 years, and I wish them many more years of success.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, today I wish to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Weld, ME, a small town set along Webb Lake in Franklin County. The town, with 419 inhabitants, has a long and proud history dating back to the 19th century, and I am pleased to join the people of Weld in celebrating their bicentennial and recognizing the town's cherished place in the State of Maine. The yearlong bicentennial celebration will kick off with an event on Saturday, February 6, at the newly renovated townhall. First settled in 1800, Weld was incorporated in 1816 and named for its proprietor Benjamin Weld, of the well-known Boston family. Incidentally, the year of Weld's incorporation also marked the notorious Year Without A Summer in New England, with 6 inches of snow blanketing the land in June. Widespread crop failures and other hardships pushed many westward, but the town of Weld prevailed, establishing itself as the small but strong community it remains today. Nestled in a valley created by Mount Blue and the Tumbledown Mountains, Weld has long been noted for its striking natural beauty. The area is rich with wildlife and home to many fish species, loons, moose, and even the occasional bald eagle. At the core of Weld's identity is Webb Lake, where many go to enjoy Maine's beloved outdoor traditions. The historic Kawanhee Inn, a rustic log inn that dates back to the 1920's, has gained wide recognition for staying true to its origins and character. Along with Mount Blue State Park, Camp Kawanhee for Boys, and family cottages with deep historical roots, the inn attracts many visitors to Weld. In the summer months, the town's population swells to the thousands as people from Maine and all around the country flock to Weld to enjoy fishing, boating, hiking, and a respite from fast-paced lifestyles. When the temperatures drop and campers and summer residents pack up to leave, there remains a close-knit and engaged year-round population. The Congregational Church, Masonic Lodge, and the Weld Historical Society are bolstered by active community involvement. Additionally, the Webb Lake Association is a nonprofit organization that spearheads conservation efforts and raises awareness about water pollutants in the lake. The Webb Lake Association is but one example of the townspeople's commitment to preserving the area's unsurpassed beauty. I commend all that the people of Weld have done to make their town such a special place to live and experience nature. Their shared love for their hometown has made them one of Maine's most cohesive and dedicated communities. This has been especially illustrated by the members of the Weld Bicentennial Committee, whose efforts have made this special celebration possible, and I am proud to recognize this milestone.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Madam President, I believe the Senator from Wisconsin wants to make a comment before I do.

Mr. KING. Madam President, I rise to join my colleagues, including the Senator from Wisconsin, to discuss what we are going to be voting on tomorrow. First, I should say I have no major problem with the budget deal, with the omnibus. The process isn't exactly what it should have been. We didn't consider our 12 appropriations bills on the floor. However, the appropriations process did go through the committee process, and it was a result of bicameral and bipartisan negotiations. My problem is with the tax extenders part of the package. First, it is a double standard. For all of this year--and we struggled in the Armed Services Committee and through the appropriations process-- everything that had to be increased in spending for whatever purpose had to be paid for. That was the standard. Everything has to be paid for. We had to find offsets. Then all of a sudden, we are considering a $680 billion hole in the deficit that doesn't have to be paid for. It is like we are all concerned about the debt, except when we aren't. Frankly, as someone who has been here for a fairly short time, I find this puzzling. The rule ought to apply both ways, because tax expenditures, by the way, are what they are. Republican and Democratic economists concede that the deductions, loopholes, and changes in the Tax Code are called tax expenditures. That is what they are, because otherwise they would be revenues to the government. These are real dollars, and this is what has happened since the Tax Reform Act of 1986, when tax expenditures represented about 5 percent of GDP. Here we are today, and then the package we are talking about. We are going up into this area. This is almost 8 percent of GDP. This is a huge outlay that is like new mandatory spending. It happens automatically. It doesn't have to be reviewed every year. There is no assessment of whether these expenditures are effective or not, and some of them obviously are. I have no problem with many of the items that are in here--mortgage interest deduction, health care interest deduction. But some of them deserve consideration, just as our budgets deserve consideration. This is on automatic pilot. This is a kind of new mandatory spending. The other piece is that we are deepening the debt hole. This is the percent of GDP of spending, and these are revenues. This is the deficit. This is the debt. That is what is killing us in the long run. There is a tremendous interest rate risk here--as the Senator from Virginia pointed out. We are now at historically low interest levels. In living memory, I don't know a time when interest rates have been as low as they are. For every point that interest rates go up with an $18 trillion debt, the cost to the Treasury is $180 billion. The math isn't that complicated. If interest rates go up to 5 percent, just interest payments on this $18 trillion debt will be $900 billion a year. So 90 percent of our current total discretionary budget would go to interest payments. It would swamp the defense budget. It would swamp the discretionary budget. Yet we are tiptoeing along the edge of this precipice. If interest rates go up with an $18 trillion debt, we are in real financial trouble. The second problem with this huge debt is it gives us no room for slack. It gives us no room for an emergency, for a recession, for hostilities, for a major terrorist attack and its effect on our economy. We have no cushion because we have used the cushion up. We continue to use it up, even when the economy improves. This $18 trillion some day is going to have to be paid back. Finally, these aren't really tax cuts. Tax cuts are when you lower taxes and lower expenditures or raise other taxes so it is revenue neutral. If you cut taxes in a time of deficit, which means you have to simply borrow the difference of what the revenues would have been, that is not a tax cut. That is a tax shift. We are simply shifting the taxes from ourselves to our children. This bill should be called the ``tax your grandchildren act'' because we are cutting our own taxes, but we are borrowing the money that otherwise would be collected and our kids are going to have to pay it back at some point with interest. That is unethical. That isn't right. If 5-year-olds knew what was going on and could vote, we would be dead ducks, because that is who is bearing the burden of these policies. What do we have to do to solve this? In some ways, it is simple and in other ways it is hard. Conceptually it is simple. We have to bring expenditures and revenues into balance. That means looking at the whole course of Federal revenues and also Federal investments, and we also have to make investments to make our economy grow. The best solution to this deficit problem is a growing economy. But ultimately for me, this is an issue of ethical stewardship. Tom Brokaw wrote the famous book ``The Greatest Generation.'' They fought World War II, sacrificed, built the Interstate Highway System, and built the economy that we are running on today--the greatest generation. I shudder to think what would be the case if Tom Brokaw wrote a book about our generation, which is borrowing and is not keeping our infrastructure up, is not adequately providing for the common defense, and is shifting the cost from us to our children. That is not stewardship; that is intergenerational theft. That is what we are engaged in here. We are going to have one vote tomorrow. I intend to vote for the bill because I believe in the budget section, but I am very uncomfortable with the tax extender section. I don't have policy problems with many of those tax extenders. I do have a fundamental problem if they are not paid for. I don't think it is honest for us to go home and say that we cut your taxes when our grandchildren are going to have to pay those bills with interest. That is the point that I think needs to be made about this, not that we are going to be able to stop this train that is going to be coming through here in the next 24 hours, but that we really need to talk next year about serious tax reform, about trying to balance revenues and expenditures and putting this country on a financial path, on a fiscal path that is sustainable and responsible. I yield the floor.

Mr. KING. A quick colloquy.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, today I have joined my esteemed colleague, Senator Susan Collins, in submitting a resolution designating December 12, 2015, as Wreaths Across America Day. What started as a quiet tribute to our Nation's veterans in a small town in Washington County, Maine 24 years ago, has blossomed into one of the greatest honors paid to our servicemembers coast to coast. Every December, donated balsam fir wreaths travel from Harrington, ME, to veterans' cemeteries around the country and are placed on the graves of our fallen heroes. During this season of giving, it is only fitting to recognize this wonderful tradition and the generosity of those who conceived it, and as always, to reaffirm our commitment and appreciation for those who fought to preserve our freedom. During the 1992 holiday season, Morrill and Karen Worcester of Worcester Wreath Company found themselves with a surplus of unused wreaths. Recalling a boyhood visit to Arlington National Cemetery, Morrill was inspired to use those extra wreaths to honor American servicemembers. So, aided by then-Senator Olympia Snowe and determined to celebrate our veterans and their families, the Worcesters arranged to have the wreaths placed in one of the older sections of Arlington National Cemetery. Building on the Worcester family's vision, other folks from around Maine stepped up to help out and give back. James Prout, the owner of a Maine trucking company, made sure the wreaths were safely transported to Arlington. The Maine State Society of Washington, D.C., a group of people from Maine living and working in the Nation's capital, helped organize the wreath laying ceremony at the cemetery. So it went for several years--wreaths were quietly assembled and sent to Arlington National Cemetery to honor our country's veterans. Then in 2005, a photo of the wreaths in Arlington took the internet by storm, and the tradition quickly gained widespread attention. The salient image of the snow-covered wreaths resting on the graves of the fallen transformed what was once a quiet act of kindness to a national sensation. Soon thousands of volunteers were inspired to help in Arlington or to bring the project to their hometowns throughout the country. Last year alone, Wreaths Across America and its national network of volunteers laid over 700,000 memorial wreaths at 1,000 locations including sites in all 50 States and numerous national veteran cemeteries on foreign soil. Thanks to truckers and the Patriot Guard Riders who escort the tractor trailers on their motorcycles, the wreaths travel to Arlington and beyond as part of a Veterans Honor Parade--stopping along the way to remember, honor, and teach. I am proud to stand with Senator Collins in sponsoring December 12, 2015, as Wreaths Across America Day. On this day, and every day, let us remember the brave men and women who have served our country and thank the dedicated volunteers who proudly honor their memory and sacrifice.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, at the end of the fall season, we see the culmination of youth athletics across the country. In each sport, whether it is field hockey, football, soccer, or the like, we as parents and spectators see the aggregation of hard work, sportsmanship, and perseverance come together to produce outstanding championship athletes. Today I wish to draw attention to all of the talented Maine youths who won athletic championships across the State this year. In particular, I would like to congratulate the members of the Lewiston High School Blue Devils boys' soccer team, who on the path to their undefeated regular season and recent state championship victory have demonstrated remarkable levels of teamwork and sportsmanship. The Blue Devils' achieved victory through an impressive display of talent and teamwork. Throughout their regular season the team scored a total of 114 goals, consistently demonstrated their strong defense, and earned recognition when USA Today ranked them 22nd in the country. The team's display of unity, patience, and determination in the state final against Scarborough High School was a fitting conclusion to a stunning season of hard work. During two prior seasons, the Blue Devils earned their way to the State finals but each time returned home without the win. Following their defeat last November, Lewiston High School coach Mike McGraw vowed to his team that they would return and they would win. This year, that promise was fulfilled. But the story of the Blue Devils' win is not solely one of raw athletic talent and training. This is a team with a long history and deep friendships that have spanned many years and continents. A number of the players originally hail from Somalia and have known each other and played soccer together since they were children in a refugee camp in Kenya. Others--native Mainers and immigrants alike--have bonded and shared their passion for the sport since grade school. This fraternal bond between the players and the supportiveness of the Lewiston community is a fine example of Maine citizens from diverse ethnic, religious, and experiential backgrounds coming together to achieve victory while championing Maine's spirit and America's highest ideals of inclusiveness and unity. I wish to join the city of Lewiston and the entire Maine community in congratulating the Lewiston High School boys' soccer team for their well-earned success. They demonstrated impressive athletic ability, incredible determination, loyalty to their coach and one another, and have highlighted the richness that multiculturalism brings to our communities. The Blue Devils have earned their title as champions in more ways than one.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, each November we celebrate National Adoption Awareness Month to recognize the families that choose to adopt and the organizations that support them. During this month, we honor those who welcome these children into their homes and hearts, help them to grow to their full potential, and give them a better future. Today I would like to draw attention to the importance of adoption and raise awareness about youth in foster care programs, especially in Maine. There are over 400,000 children in the foster care system, many of them waiting and hoping that the right family will come to adopt them. While many of these children are successfully returned to their birth parents and relatives, almost half are left in the system to fend for themselves. The absence of a stable family structure can be disastrous for children who are still developing psychologically and are trying to find their way in the world. This issue has very real impacts on the future of these children and our society as a whole. Young adults who age out of the foster care system before being placed with a family are at a significantly higher risk for homelessness, incarceration, and unemployment. Alternatively, children who are adopted from foster care are more likely to achieve academic success and emotional security than their counterparts who remain in foster care. Nearly 80 percent of Americans, myself included, believe that more should be done to encourage adoption; yet, each year, tens of thousands of available children remain in the system, without families. Every child deserves to grow up in a permanent, safe, and loving home. This month, as we thank all those who have opened their hearts and homes to these children, we must acknowledge that there is still much work ahead of us. I am proud of the important roles Maine citizens have played in promoting adoption awareness. Adoptive & Foster Families of Maine, Inc., AFFM, has been instrumental in helping children find the security they deserve and in providing support to the families who welcome them into their homes. Fostering or adopting a child can be an emotional process, and AFFM offers many services to all Maine adoptive families, including support groups, resource mentors, material goods, and a referral database for legal matters and mental health support. The adoption process is an emotional, transformative, and sometimes even stressful time for children and for their new families; therefore, the services provided by AFFM are an integral aspect of cultivating safe, joyful adoptions across the State. I have witnessed their hard work in action, and I am proud of all they have done for families and children across Maine. My wife, Mary, and I have been blessed with two adoptions. I know firsthand what an amazing process adoption can be. Our experience would not have been possible without the loving support of our family, friends and community. Mary and I have been so fortunate with the joy all of our children bring to our lives every day, and I am proud to celebrate National Adoption Awareness Month. I would like to recognize and thank Adoptive & Foster Families of Maine, Inc., and all others who facilitate adoptions throughout the country and make it possible for children in foster care to find their forever homes. Selfless, caring individuals and programs like AFFM help bring children one step closer to their dreams. They offer the hope of love and security to future generations, and for that, they deserve our immense gratitude.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, in support of National Forest Products Week, I would like to recognize the nearly 18,000 hard-working men and women employed by the forest products industry in the great State of Maine. Maine is home to about 40 wood products and paper manufacturing facilities, which contribute over $900 million to the economy through jobs and wages and over $4 billion in industry shipments of products, making the forest products industry one of the largest manufacturing sectors in the State. Our Nation's forests are an essential element of our urban and rural landscape. Covering more than 750 million acres across America, they create opportunities for recreation and habitats for wildlife, and their products play an integral role in our daily lives. As the only renewable building material, wood requires less energy to transport, construct, and produce in comparison to alternative building materials. By increasing the use of wood products in construction, we have the opportunity to reduce greenhouse emissions and improve the environmental performance of buildings. Design and building professionals are increasingly recognizing wood's environmental attributes and helping to create strong markets for wood products. The industry continues to grow and is taking on new and innovative projects like the development of tall wood buildings. Over the past several years, a number of tall wood projects have been completed around the world, demonstrating successful applications of next generation lumber and mass timber technologies. Today, the concept is gaining traction in the U.S., with more architects opting for a sustainable solution for attaining safe, cost-effective, high- performing tall buildings. Even with the advances of digital communications, paper also continues to play a valuable role in our daily lives: from enhancing education through written communications to capturing and preserving life's most memorable moments. In my State, I continually hear from men and women for whom paper is not only a preference, but for some, a necessity. Forty-one percent of Americans over 65 years of age do not use the internet. Eliminating paper as an option for vital government communications--like the IRS tax instruction manual--impedes access to critical information every citizen has a right to receive. Thank you for the opportunity to recognize the hard-working men and women employed by the forest products industry in Maine. I ask my colleagues to join me in celebrating National Forest Products Week and reflect on the positive economic, social, and environmental impacts paper and forest products have on our everyday lives.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. I would suggest to the Senator that if you are in a fight and all you can do is defend and never punch, you are going to eventually lose that fight. I think this is an important area. The theory of deterrence, as distasteful as it might have been, the mutually assured destruction during the nuclear era did in fact prevent the use of nuclear arms for some 70 years. I think we need to be thinking about a deterrence that goes beyond simply defensive measures. I commend the chairman for raising this issue and appreciate your thoughtful consideration. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. KING. Mr. President, the United States is under attack. We are under attack--not a week ago, a month ago, September 11 or yesterday, but right at this moment. We are under attack from state actors, from terrorist nonstate actors, and from garden-variety criminals. This cyber issue is one of the most serious that we face. When I first got here, I was appointed to the Armed Services and Intelligence Committees. On those two committees over the past 3 years, at least half of our hearings have touched upon this issue and the threat that it presents to this country. The leaders of our intelligence community and our military community, in open session and in closed session, have sounded the alarm over and over and over. The most dramatic--I don't remember what the hearing was--was when one of our witnesses said: ``The next Pearl Harbor will be cyber.'' As the Senator from Missouri just pointed out, we are fortunate that we have had a number of warning shots but none have been devastating. But we have had warning shots--at Sony, at Target, at Anthem, at the Office of Personnel Management of the U.S. Government, and at the home email of the Director of the CIA. We have had large and small intrusions and cyber attacks that have been more than annoying, but, so far, they haven't been catastrophic. That is just a matter of time. That is why we have to move this bill. This bill isn't a comprehensive answer to this question, but it is at least a piece of it. It is a beginning. We are going to have to talk about other aspects of our cyber strategy, but at least we can pass this bill, which came out of the committee 14 to 1. It is bipartisan, and it has support in the House. Let's do something. I do not want to go home to Maine and try to explain to my constituents, when the natural gas system or the electric system is brought down, that we couldn't quite get around to it because of the difference of committee jurisdictions or because we had other priorities or because we were tied up on the budget. This is a priority. It is something we should be doing immediately, and I am delighted that we have moved to it. Now, as I have sat in the Intelligence Committee every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon for the past 3 years, it occurred to me several months into those debates and the discussions of this and other issues that really we in the Intelligence Committee and also we in this body really are working with and weighing and balancing two constitutional provisions. The first is the preamble of the Constitution. The most basic responsibility of any government, anywhere, anytime, is to provide for the common defense. That is why governments are formed, to provide the security, and also to insure domestic tranquility. Those two together are the basic functions of why we are here--to protect our people from harm. And that is clearly what this bill is talking about. But the other constitutional provision in the picture that we also have to weigh is the Fourth Amendment: ``The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated. . . . '' That is a fundamental premise of who we are as a people. These two provisions of the Constitution are intentioned--neither one dominates, neither one controls the other--and it is our job in this body to continuously weigh and calibrate these two provisions and their balance in light of threats and evolving technologies. When the Fourth Amendment was written, nobody had ever heard of telephones. They certainly had never heard of the Internet. They never thought about any of these things. But they said: The rights ``shall not be violated.'' It is interesting--``unreasonable searches and seizures.'' They didn't know the threats we would be facing when they said it was a fundamental premise of the U.S. Constitution that we should protect against both foreign and domestic enemies. That is what we have to do, and that is what this bill does. This bill is very carefully worked up, with a lot of discussion and negotiation, to be effective in protecting the public, while, at the same time, to be effective in protecting the public's privacy rights in respecting these two principles. We have had warning after warning after warning, and now it is time for us to act. The good news about the United States is that we are the most wired nation in the world. Technology has been a huge boon to our economy and to our people, and we are way ahead of a lot of the rest of the world in our interrelationship with technology and how we have used it to enhance our lives. That is the good news. The bad news is that we are the most wired country in the world, because that means we are the most vulnerable--asymmetric vulnerability. We are more vulnerable because we are more connected. That means we have to take great care in this country to be sure that we don't allow that vulnerability to result in a catastrophic loss for our people. Not only are we talking about national security issues, but we are talking about individual people's lives. If the electric grid went down, people's lives would and could be lost--in hospitals, at traffic intersections, across the country. If the natural gas system--the vast pipeline system that links our country in terms of energy--somehow went awry because of a cyber intrusion into the operating system, that would have devastating consequences for human lives and also, of course, for the economy of our country. Somebody could get into the routing system of a railroad, and a train carrying hazardous material would be caused to derail. These are the kinds of things that can happen and will likely happen unless we take steps to protect ourselves. Some of these attacks and intrusions are sponsored by nation-states. We know that. Some of them are sponsored by just garden-variety criminals who are trying to steal our money. Or some of them are large international criminal organizations that are trying to steal our commercial intelligence and how we build our products and how we compete. Some of them are terrorist organizations that see this as a cheap way to attack America. Why go to all the trouble to build a bomb and smuggle it into the country and all the risk that entails, when you can disrupt the country in just as great a way with a few strokes on a laptop? It is economic security, national security, economics. It has been estimated worldwide that cyber crime costs our country $445 billion a year. That is to the global economy--a half trillion dollars a year. Some 200,000 jobs in the United States could be and are being affected, and 800 million personnel records were stolen, and 40 million were Americans. The cost of cyber crime is estimated to be between 15 and 20 percent of the value created by the Internet. We always talk that we don't want any taxes on the Internet. This is a tax. This is a tax we are all paying. The users of the Internet are paying to ward off this epidemic of cyber crime. It is not only the government. Of course, it is companies, such as Sony, Target, Anthem, the industrial base, JP Morgan, Home Depot. The list goes on and on. Most importantly, it is not just the big guys. Sometimes we feel that OK, this is the large banks, the large insurance companies that have to worry about this. In the State of Maine, we have to worry about it. My staff and I in Maine have reached out to businesses large and small across the State. Every single one, with one exception, listed cyber intrusion as one of their greatest issues. The Maine Credit Union League, with $2.5 million a year, and local credit unions are having to deal with cyber intrusion. One of our Maine health care providers has experienced thousands of attempts to steal confidential data every year. Keeping the data safe is costing them more than $1 million. This is costing us real money. At one of our Maine financial institutions, 60 to 70 percent of the emails they get in the bank are phishing emails trying to compromise their secured data. One of our utilities spent over $1 million a year just on preventative costs to defend against cyber crime. This is in a State of 1.3 million people. This is real. This is real in our State. I had a forum over the August break with businesses throughout Maine--mostly small businesses and homeland security. We had 100 businesses come just to visit and sit for a day to talk about this issue. These were small businesses, and all of them were seeing these kinds of problems. One was a small business with 35 employees that did a deal overseas, and a cyber criminal in effect stole their payment. They sent a fake invoice to the customer overseas, the customer paid it, and the money went to the crook, not to my company in Maine. That is the kind of thing that is happening, and that is one of the reasons we have to take action today. No business is immune. No individual is immune. And, of course, this country is not immune. The price of inaction is just too high. This is something we must attend to. As I mentioned, this bill is not the whole answer, but it is a part of the answer. Some people say: Well, it is not broad enough. My answer is this: OK, I understand that, but let's do what we can do and then take it one step at a time. Some people say it compromises privacy. I don't believe that it does. Extraordinary measures were imported into this bill in order to protect the privacy of individuals. This is not about individual data. This is about a company voluntarily telling the government and perhaps some other companies: Here is what I am seeing as an attack. How can we collectively defend ourselves against it? That is what this bill is really all about. We have to take action, and now is the time. I thank the chair and the vice chair of the Intelligence Committee, the members of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, the members of the Judiciary Committee, and all of those who have contributed to the finalization of this important piece of legislation. There is an attitude out there that we can't get anything done around here. I think this gives us an opportunity to prove that idea wrong. We can get things done. We should get things done. This is a chance for us to protect our people, to provide for the common defense--which is our most solemn constitutional responsibility--in a way that also protects the interests of the Fourth Amendment and individual privacy rights. I hope we can move swiftly, complete the consideration of this bill this week, work out our differences with the House, and get this matter to the President. We have no place to hide if we don't get this done. This is what we are here for. Again, I thank my colleagues who worked so hard to bring us to this point. I yield the floor.

Mr. KING. I ask the Senator, would you agree that this bill represents an important part of our cyber defense but that in order to deter attacks in the long term, we must have a cyber policy that goes beyond simple defensive measures?

Mr. KING. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, today we solemnly remember a dear friend of Maine, the late Leon Gorman. Leon was president of L.L. Bean and a committed environmentalist, but more than that, he was a wonderful man and gifted leader. On September 3, 2015, Leon passed away at the age of 80. Throughout his life, he devoted endless attention and time to the betterment of Maine, and he will be greatly missed. Leon graduated cum laude from Bowdoin College before serving in the Navy for 3 years. When he stepped in to fill his grandfather's shoes as president of L.L. Bean in 1967, Leon took the company from a $4.75 million corporation to $1 billion global label. In his memoir, Leon writes that his proudest accomplishment was growing his grandfather's company from less than 100 workers into one that has employed tens of thousands of Mainers over several decades. Even with this impressive growth, Leon remained committed to the company's values and stayed true to the traditions and spirit of the State he loved. He was a true man of Maine in every way. Leon was an extremely successful businessman, but also an active philanthropist. He donated generously to the National Park Foundation and the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, as well as to numerous other environmental groups and State parks. He was also a very active Bowdoin alumnus, giving generously to the college and serving as both an overseer and trustee. During his time as chairman of L.L. Bean, Leon focused the company's charitable giving program on outdoor recreation and conservation. Not only did Leon personally donate to environmental groups, but under his leadership, L.L. Bean, Inc., has contributed millions to conservation groups and has provided funding for education, health and human services, and the arts throughout Maine. Leon will be fondly remembered for his unmatched generosity of heart, unwavering commitment to the people of our State, and his deep and abiding love for all that is Maine. Through his tireless efforts, Leon affected countless lives and contributed greatly to the betterment of Maine. He will be remembered for his firm devotion to protecting and enjoying nature and his dedication to the communities of our State. The State of Maine has lost a man of true integrity, and he will be greatly missed. I would like to join the people of Maine in remembering Leon Gorman and thanking him for his immeasurable contributions to our State and the Nation.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, on September 11, 2001, 3,000 people were brutally killed in this country. The response of our Nation was overwhelming. We changed our laws, we increased our intelligence community's capacity dramatically, we fought two wars, and we imposed vigorous inspection regimes at airports and in connection with transportation. We made huge changes in order to see that such a thing did not happen again. Why? Because we love each other. We are a compassionate people, and when American lives are threatened, we react. In that case, we reacted in an overwhelming way. In 2014, we lost one American to a potential Ebola epidemic. One life was lost. Even though it was only one life, millions of dollars were spent across the country, and our entire health system was mobilized, again, because we love each other and we want to protect each other. Over the last 10 years we have had disasters in this country that have affected our neighbors, most recently in South Carolina. Of course, the two great disasters of the last decade are Katrina and Sandy. Again, we responded. In money, $100 billion was allocated for relief from those two storms. Why? Because we love each other and we take care of each other. When we see a problem in this country, particularly a problem that threatens fellow Americans, we act. We do something. When there is a risk to our colleagues and our friends and our families, we address it. Yet we have one epidemic in this country, one disaster that we are deliberately ignoring. It is an epidemic which takes over 30,000 lives a year, 30,000 American lives a year, and that is gun-related violence. The breakdown on that 30,000 figure is over 10,000 homicides committed with guns and 20,000 suicides committed with guns. Maine is a gun-owning State. Of any State, I think my State has the second or third highest percentage of gun owners in the country. Yet we have one of the lowest levels of gun violence. Why is that? I think it is because of our deep tradition of respect and care for firearms and the idea that is passed down from generation to generation that firearms are to be treated responsibly and with respect and with an understanding of their destructive capacity. Thinking about this issue has made me reflect upon what is the proper response from what level of government. I do not think all problems in this country need to be solved by the Federal Government. I think this is one of them. I think there is an important role to be played by States and localities because they can adjust their rules and laws according to the needs in their States. The needs, responsibility, and the importance of this issue in Maine may be different than it is in New Mexico or Texas or Illinois or New York. Therefore, under the genius of our system, the principle responsibility should rest at the State and local level. However, I do think there are minimum standards the Federal Government can impose that will enable the States then to work within those standards to meet the requirements that they see are most important for their citizens. This is a true role of federalism. In our Federal Constitution we have the Second Amendment, and I respect and support it. It is a basic part of our governing document, but the Second Amendment, to me, not only imparts rights but responsibilities. Guns are dangerous instrumentalities. Anybody who has ever used one knows that, and there are responsibilities which come with the right to keep and bear arms. Justice Scalia in the Heller decision--where the Court struck down the District of Columbia's total ban essentially on handguns, saying it overreached and violated the Second Amendment--was very clear and explicit where he said: The Second Amendment, like all other amendments in the Constitution, has limits. Interestingly, specifically he mentioned in that opinion--and nobody ever accused Justice Scalia of being a liberal. Justice Scalia pointed out: Of course you can limit the ability of felons and the dangerously mentally ill to obtain handguns. The government can limit it. And also, the government can reasonably place limits on the commercial transaction, the sale and purchase of guns. We are here today because of one more in a depressingly familiar series of mass shooting incidents: Columbine, Newtown, and now Oregon. All over the country this is happening in a repetitive way. It is important to use this occasion to reflect upon the dangers we are ignoring, the epidemic we are ignoring, but I think we also have to realize that mass shootings, as horrendous as they are, are not the bulk of the crimes committed with guns and the deaths dealt by guns in this country; that those are everyday criminals, abusive spouses, and, sadly, people taking their own lives. Don't forget that those 30,000 deaths a year of our fellow citizens are not all in mass shooting situations, but they involve many other circumstances. So what is the solution? A friend of mine in Maine coined the term, which I think aptly applies--in fact, it probably applies in this case more than any other: There is no silver bullet. There may, however, be silver ``buckshot''--a multiplicity of solutions, no single solution. Nothing we do today in the way of background checks or anything else is going to solve this problem entirely. We must recognize that. So we must move in a comprehensive way--not only on the Federal level but on the State level as well--not to compromise the Second Amendment, not to take guns out of the hands of law-abiding citizens, not to make it inherently more difficult for law-abiding citizens to maintain them but to put into place commonsense solutions to deal with this epidemic of gun violence. The first, of course--and I commend my colleague from Maine for emphasizing this today; that is, we have to deal with the failures of our mental health system. In all of these mass shooting incidents, it appears that the perpetrators had some significant mental health issues. We have to deal with that. We have to have a better system that finds people in advance, before they act out their violent fantasies. We have to try to intervene and help those people before violence occurs. So mental health has to be a part of this, but it is not the whole answer because people with those kinds of proclivities, whether they are violence-prone felons or people with dangerous mental health issues, we simply have to keep guns out of their hands. That brings us to the second commonsense solution, which is background checks, which we already have. We have had them for 15 or 20 years. Some people say: Well, we are worried about background checks because it will lead to a Federal registry, and they will know who has the guns and then they will come and get them. We have had the background checks for a number of years. That hasn't happened. In the Manchin-Toomey bill that we voted on a few years ago, it was a felony for any Federal official to create a registry that would be available to the government. The simple, basic, commonsense idea of a background check is to see whether someone is a convicted felon or has demonstrated a dangerous mental illness that should disqualify them from having a firearm. That is common sense. That has been supported--is supported--by a majority of gun owners and by the vast majority of the American people. It was even supported by some of the national gun organizations as recently as 10 or 15 years ago but no longer, for reasons I don't understand. Another part of the package I think will be introduced in the next week or so is to add convicted spousal abusers to the list--which, again, is common sense. I mentioned in Maine we have a very low level of gun violence, but much of it involves spouse upon spouse. If we have a case where someone has been convicted of spousal abuse, to me, again it is common sense that they should not be able to obtain a gun. Finally, if we are going to have a system of background checks that is nationwide--that, by the way, should be efficient--in this day and age, there is no reason it has to take any kind of long period to check, but if we have such a system, then it doesn't make sense to turn a blind eye to trafficking and straw purchases, which are essentially designed to get guns into the hands of people who otherwise couldn't buy them. That is a modest package. To the express language of Justice Scalia, it doesn't violate the Second Amendment, and it will not solve the whole problem. Nothing is going to solve the whole problem. We are a human society, and humans, sadly, are often prone to violence, but it can make a difference. It can make a difference. Remember, we are talking about 30,000 people a year--30,000 people a year. The American people send us to address issues, to address problems. On September 11, Congress acted. After Sandy and Katrina, Congress acted. During the Ebola crisis, Congress and the American health system acted. Why? Because we love each other and we value each other. It seems to me this is exactly the same case. We look out across the country, and one of the problems with this issue is it is slow motion and small. Every now and then we have one of these incidents, like we did last week, where a significant number of people are killed in 1 day, but the truth is, 10,000 people a year are murdered in the United States--10,000 people a year--not necessarily in a mass shooting. But 30,000 people a year altogether, if we include suicides, is a small American town disappearing every year. If all of these deaths occurred in one town or in Iowa or Illinois or Chicago or California, we would be on this. We would find the cause. We would be at least trying to prevent it, but because it happens in slow motion in small ways across the country, in small towns and large cities, we are ignoring it. The incident in Oregon gives us an occasion to remind us once again of how serious this is and that we have an opportunity to do something about it, not by overreaching, not by violating the Second Amendment, not by impinging on the rights of law-abiding gun owners--of whom we have many in Maine--but simply by the commonsense imposition of a nationwide system to be sure that people who are felons or dangerously mentally ill can't get guns. I don't understand how anybody can object to that goal because I care about my fellow Americans, I love my fellow Americans, and I want to protect them from harm. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, today I wish to recognize the outstanding devotion of Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr., who has worked tirelessly to preserve Maine's rich heritage throughout his career. After more than four decades with the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, Earle stepped down as director on October 1, 2015. Despite his retirement and to the delight of the people of Maine, Mr. Shettleworth will continue to hold the esteemed position of Maine's State historian. Mr. Shettleworth's interest in historic preservation was sparked when he was just 13 years old, after witnessing the destruction of Portland's Union Station. Shortly after this defining event, Mr. Shettleworth became the youngest founding member of Greater Portland Landmarks and has had a distinguished career in public service ever since. Throughout his life, Earle has greatly appreciated architecture and art, which have added to his passion and devotion to preserving Maine's history. Mr. Shettleworth has served on a wide range of historical commissions and societies, including the Maine Historic Preservation Commission. During his years with the commission, Earle helped designate over 1,500 properties in Maine as historic places in the National Register, and by the time he retired, he was the longest serving State historic preservation officer in the United States. Mr. Shettleworth holds a bachelor's degree from Colby College and a master's degree from the American and New England Studies Program at Boston University. He has published dozens of articles and authored numerous books. As a reporter at the Portland Evening Express, Mr. Shettleworth authored a series of 52 articles called ``Portland Heritage,'' which explored the history of the city's notable buildings. Mr. Shettleworth has received honorary doctorates of humane letters from Bowdoin College and the Maine College of Art for his scholarship in the fields of history, historical preservation, and art history. I would like to join the Maine Historic Preservation Commission and the people of Maine in recognizing and thanking Mr. Shettleworth for his tireless work and dedication to the great State of Maine. Earle not only preserved Maine's history, but also inspired greater public interest in our State's rich heritage. The State of Maine owes Mr. Shettleworth immensely for all his hard work, and we cannot begin to thank him enough. I wish him all the best in his retirement.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, today we solemnly remember Senator Beverly Daggett. A dedicated public servant, Beverly died on September 6, 2015, 3 days before her 70th birthday, after a valiant, lifelong battle with kidney disease. Bev will be remembered for her dedication to her family, community, and State. The State of Maine has lost a woman of true integrity, and she will be greatly missed. Bev was an exceptionally intelligent and hard-working woman who found countless successes in life. She began her tenure in the Maine House of Representatives in 1987 as a member of the 113th legislature. She served in the Maine House of Representatives from 1987 through 1996 and in the Maine Senate from 1997 through 2004. In the Senate, Bev rose to leadership as the Senate Democratic leader in 2000. She worked closely with members on both sides of the aisle to achieve the historic power- sharing deal that stemmed from the Senate's first ever partisan tie. In 2002, in recognition of her strong leadership, her colleagues elected Beverly Daggett to serve as the first woman President of the Maine Senate. Bev's dedication to community was obvious as she served in countless ways other than her political activities. Senator Daggett was also Kennebec County Commissioner for several terms. She served for 25 years on the Board of Crisis and Counseling, culminating in her role as board chair. She also sat on the school board and was a member of the Green Street United Methodist Church, where she was a substitute organist. Above all else, Beverly was a devoted wife, mother, and friend. I had the honor of working with Beverly during my time as the Governor of Maine and witnessed firsthand her strong leadership and commitment to the betterment of Maine. I am deeply saddened by her passing and would like to join her friends and family in reflecting on her many life accomplishments and honor her memory. Beverly will be remembered for her deep and abiding faith, her leadership, encouragement of those around her, ceaseless advocacy for those without a voice, sense of humor, and wisdom. Her firm devotion to the betterment of Maine will never be forgotten. I, along with all the people of Maine, am thankful for her immeasurable contributions to our State and the Nation.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, this month marks the 50th anniversary of the introduction of U.S. ground troops in the Vietnam war, and I would like to recognize our Vietnam era veterans who dedicated their strength and service to defend freedom and democracy across the globe. In honor of this anniversary, the Secretary of Defense coordinated various events to thank and honor all veterans of the Vietnam war. A well-deserved welcome home ceremony will be held in Presque Isle, ME, on September 26, 2015, to recognize and commemorate the lives of those who fought so bravely. For nearly 20 years, the Vietnam war occupied the American collective conscience. American involvement initially focused on assisting French forces to counter the Vietminh communist revolution. However, in 1964 the Gulf of Tonkin incident dramatically shifted American perspective, and on August 7, President Johnson drafted and Congress unanimously approved a resolution authorizing direct military intervention in Vietnam. Throughout the war, the United States deployed over 2.7 million servicemembers to Vietnam, and over 8 million Americans served in uniform during the Vietnam era. More than 58,200 Americans lost their lives and more than 150,000 were seriously wounded during the conflict. I would like to honor those brave Americans who sacrificed so much for their country. Their contributions to our Nation will never be forgotten. Maine played a crucial role in the war effort. With one of the highest percentages of veterans per capita in the nation, the Vietnam war's legacy still resonates in Maine today. Close to 48,000 people from Maine served in Vietnam, and nearly 350 Maine servicemembers were killed or went missing in action during the war. Our veterans' unwavering patriotism, courage, and resilience fully demonstrate the fortitude of American character and our Nation's commitment to democracy worldwide. On this 50th anniversary of the Vietnam war, I would like to join the Secretary of Defense in recognizing the brave Americans who served overseas, as well as those on the homefront whose unrelenting support was invaluable to those overseas. Our veterans have made countless personal sacrifices in protection of our freedoms, and I am proud to honor and thank them for their service to our great Nation.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, as the Senator from North Dakota just mentioned, we are here on the floor to talk about the importance of the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank. There are a lot of issues here that are contentious and controversial, and there are arguments to be made on both sides, but this one, frankly, puzzles me. I do not understand why the Congress has not moved with alacrity to reauthorize an agency of the Federal Government that fills a gap in the private market which is not filled by private enterprise, which has been in business for over 80 years, and which helps and assists businesses large and small across America and returns money to the Treasury. This is not a cost to the Treasury. This is not some kind of budget bill that increases our deficit. This actually will increase revenue because this agency makes a net return for the taxpayers. When General Electric last week announced the possible layoff of 500 people across the country and the moving of jobs overseas--because virtually every other industrialized country in the world has an export-import bank, an export promotion authority that is comparable to what we have, General Electric says: We are going to have to go where they provide that kind of support. One staff member of the committee in the other body, which has voted to not reauthorize this, said: Well, for General Electric, this is a drop in the bucket. Well, of those 400 or 500 jobs General Electric is talking about, 80 of them are at a General Electric plant in Bangor, ME, and 80 good jobs in Bangor, ME, is not a drop in the bucket. I would invite that staff member to come to Bangor, ME, and talk to the families of those people who are going to lose their jobs because of this ridiculous policy of not reauthorizing a governmental agency that is serving the public needs of this country, particularly in an age of expanding global trade. We are competing with the rest of the world, and we are shooting ourselves in the foot in the process. It simply makes no sense. I have visited with small businesses in Maine--as few as 35 jobs which depend upon the actions of the Export-Import Bank in order to be able to finance their receivables from foreign countries and then they can compete in the international marketplace. There is simply no reason to not move with some speed to reauthorize this agency. We are penalizing American businesses in global competition for no good reason that I can discern. If there are issues at the Bank with its management or whatever, let's fix those. Let's have hearings. Let's find what the problems are and fix them but not eliminate an agency that is doing good and returning money to the taxpayers, particularly at this moment in American and world history where international trade and world exports are so important. I hope my colleagues in both Houses, on both sides of the aisle will join with us to make a simple reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank so it can continue to do the good work it has done on behalf of businesses in Maine and North Dakota and Texas and California and New York and all over this country. This is just common sense. There are things around here that I understand we have controversies about and we can argue about, but I have not heard any argument that holds any water as to why this agency should not be continued and allowed to provide the benefits it has and does and will do for the businesses and, more importantly, the employees of those businesses all across the country. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Madam President, I rise to congratulate my colleague, my esteemed colleague, my esteemed senior colleague for this accomplishment. I think it is important to realize--we all know the logistical challenges of making every single vote. What she has done is symbolic of her service to this country and to the State of Maine. It is not just making every vote. It is symbolic of an intense, fierce commitment to this body and to this institution and to the country. I am delighted that the majority leader and the minority leader have recognized her today. I had the occasion to sit next to her at a function in Maine when the vote record came out. It comes out about quarterly or every 6 months. I looked at mine. I had it in my hand. I leaned over to her and I said: Look, I have a 98.6-percent attendance record of voting in the Senate. She leaned back and said: You will never catch me. It is true. Of course, as has been mentioned, she sits in the seat of Margaret Chase Smith, one of Maine's important leaders of the mid-20th century, one of the most important Members of this body. Every day that Margaret Chase Smith appeared on the Senate floor, she had in her lapel a red rose. So in order to recognize Senator Collins today, I wish to present her with a rose symbolic of her kinship to Senator Margaret Chase Smith. Senator Collins, what an accomplishment. Thank you on behalf of the people of Maine and the people of this country. (Applause, Senators rising.)

Mr. KING

Mr. KING. Mr. President, one of the peculiar aspects of my service in this body is that I was sworn in as a U.S. Senator 40 years to the day from the day I entered Senate service as a staff member in January of 1973. Consequently, it has given me an interesting perspective about the operation of the Senate compared then and now. I am sure that some part of my memory of working here in the early 1970s and mid-1970s is colored by the rosy view of nostalgia, looking back at one's youth and one's past; but, even correcting for that bit of nostalgia, it is my observation that in those days we spent about 80 percent of our time governing and about 20 percent of our time on politics. And there were plenty of politics. This was during the Watergate period. There was a Democratic Senate and Republican President. President Nixon resigned during the period I was here. It wasn't as if politics were not a part of our life, but the work of the government continued, and the governing, which was done by this body and the House of Representatives, continued even in an era of very intense politics in our Nation's history. A friend asked me the other day: What is the difference between then and now? I said: Well, in those days my recollection is that it was about 80 percent governing and 20 percent politics. Today it is reversed. It is 80 percent politics and 20 percent governing. I want to talk a bit about governing. Probably our most fundamental responsibility after national security is a little matter of the Federal budget. It is something that we have to do every year. It is something that is in the Constitution. It is one of our most basic responsibilities. Yet here we are, 10 legislative days away from the end of the fiscal year with no budget, no appropriations bills that have been passed in both Houses, no conference committees, and as far as I can tell, no negotiations at the highest level in order to resolve what could be an impending shutdown of the U.S. Government. In addition, we have the sequester facing us, which was designed to be stupid. It was designed to be so unacceptable to both sides of the political aisle that a solution would surely be found. I remember being asked about it when I was running for this office in 2012. People said: Well, what do you think of this sequester that might happen next year? I said it will never happen because it is so unacceptable, both on the defense side and on the domestic side. Surely, Members of Congress will come together and find a compromise solution. That happened with the Murray-Ryan arrangement 2 years ago. But here we are again, facing a potential shutdown. I don't have to enumerate the problems that creates: problems of national security, problems of the effect on the overall economy, problems of confidence and trust in the government itself. So here we are, and we are not governing when it comes to a budget. The highway fund is an even worse embarrassment. We have patched the highway fund temporarily 34 times, most recently this summer. That expires in October. I have not heard a great deal of discussion about what the resolution of the highway fund is going to be, and I will make a bold prediction. Come October, there is going to be somebody who comes to this floor and says: We are close to a solution. All we need is 2 more months. So let's extend it to January, and then we will solve the highway problem once and for all. That doesn't pass the straight-face test. Here we are. We have the budget in 10 days, the highway fund in October, and we have the tax extenders, which last year we passed and they only affected 2 weeks of the year. Yet we expect American businesses to make plans, investments, and look ahead. They don't know what the Tax Code situation is going to be until the last 2 weeks of the year, and they have gotten to the point where they expect this: Well, OK, it looks like they are going to take care of it. But that is not governing, and there is a cost to that and a cost to our economy. I have been in business, and I know that one of the most important things to a business is certainty, knowing what the rules are, knowing what the Tax Code is, knowing what the regulations are going to be. Business people can deal with regulations or tax policy. The very difficult thing, however, is uncertainty. When you have uncertainty, you have a lack of confidence; and when you have a lack of confidence, you have a lack of investment; and when you have a lack of investment, you have a lack of jobs. I don't have the econometric analysis, but in my view the uncertainty, the instability, and the unpredictability of this body and of this institution has significantly put a damper on economic growth in this country. I don't know whether it is half a point of GDP, a full point or a quarter point, but it is a lot because people don't feel they can have confidence in what the rules of the game are going to be. To pass tax extenders for 2015 in the last 2 weeks of 2015 is just embarrassing. Oh, I think I said the highway fund was embarrassing. They are both embarrassing. Then we have the Export-Import Bank, whose charter expired at the end of June. This is one I really don't understand. This is a government agency that is 70 years old or 80 years old, provides support to businesses across the country, including in my State of Maine with some very small businesses, and it fills a market niche that the private sector is not filling. It returns money to the Treasury, and it helps to create jobs in the United States. What is there not to like? For reasons that I can't discern, it tends to be something about ideology, because you don't want to have--heaven forbid there should be a government agency that works. So we better put it out of business. It is not making any more loans. Yesterday General Electric, one of our most important national companies, announced the elimination of 500 jobs, including 84 jobs in Bangor, ME, because of the lack of the support provided by the Export- Import Bank. By the way, every other industrialized nation in the world provides some level of support and encouragement for exports--except us as of June 30. For a staff member for the financial services committee in the other body, which handles this, their comment about the 500 layoffs was this: Well, 500 jobs is a drop in the bucket for GE. Eighty-four jobs is not a drop in the bucket for Bangor, ME. Those are families; those are real people. It makes a difference in our community, and it is ridiculous. If there were some policy reason for it, if there were some controversy, I could understand it. But to do it just because we don't like the idea of this agency, even though it is effective in its mission and returns money to the Treasury, just doesn't make any sense. So the budget we are not doing; the highway fund we are not doing; the tax extenders we are not doing; the Export-Import Bank we are not doing. What are we doing? We are spending another week on the issue of Iran, which we thoroughly debated and voted on last week. And I understand we may spend another 2 or 3 days on it next week for a series of amendments that can appear, to me, to be strictly designed to embarrass some Members of this body and to create fodder for 30-second ads a year from now. That is not governing. That is pure, unadulterated politics, and it is not dealing with the problems of this Nation. We debated the Iran issue thoroughly. I have never worked so hard on a single issue in my life. We all had the entire recess to work on it, to think about it, to talk to people, and to read the agreement. Before the recess, there were innumerable hearings, briefings, and classified briefings. We have now had two identical votes. Yesterday, one of my colleagues said: I feel like I am in ``Groundhog Day.'' We are voting again on exactly the same issue. Now I understand we are going to have more votes. I have never known an issue where every single Member of this body has expressed themselves on one side or the other. There is no question where anybody stands. Everybody has expressed themselves. Everybody has announced their position. One hundred Senators have announced their position. I have to say a bit about 60 votes. To argue that this issue of such momentous import should not require 60 votes, when virtually everything else we have done around here since I have been in the Senate for the past 2\1/2\ years has required 60 votes, is just preposterous. I remember standing on the floor a year ago hearing one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle talking about some obscure amendment to some bill and saying: This amendment should be subjected to the normal 60-vote requirement. And I said: Normal? When is it normal? Well, it has become normal. It was the rule for the last 2 years. Now, suddenly, it was a bulwark of democracy. I remember talking about how should we modify the filibuster rule? No, we can't do that. The 60 votes is a bulwark of democracy. That protects the minority. That is built into the essence. That is what it is all about. Now, all of a sudden, it is not so important. People say: Well, this was a procedural vote, and you had a filibuster. How dare you filibuster? Let me say, unequivocally, that the proponents of the Iran agreement are prepared to have an up-or-down vote on that agreement this afternoon as long as a 60-vote majority is part of the agreement about the vote. The only reason there was a 60-vote threshold on a filibuster motion, on a cloture motion, was so that the majority would not put that issue on the table--an up-or-down vote with a 60-vote margin. Yet everybody knew when this bill passed--when the Corker bill passed--that it was going to require 60 votes. Senator Corker is on the record on the floor talking about this: Of course, it is going to require 60 votes. And even the famous letter to the Ayatollah in the second paragraph said: Of course, agreements like this are going to be subject to a three-fifths majority. Everybody knew this was going to be 60 votes, and to express shock now reminds me of the end of ``Casablanca,'' where the inspector says: I am shocked, shocked to see gambling here. I am shocked that there should be a 60-vote requirement. But, of course, there is going to be a 60-vote requirement as there has been for every other substantive issue--and a lot of not so substantive issues--for the last 2\1/2\ years. Now we are going to start to vote, apparently, on other issues not in the Iran agreement: Bring home the hostages; recognize Israel. Those are desirable ends. I support them entirely, but that was not what this negotiation was all about. This negotiation was to keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon now. It was to roll back their nuclear program. That is what the negotiation was. It wasn't about the hostages. It wasn't about Israel. It wasn't about Iran's malign activities in the region. One of my colleagues on the floor a few minutes ago said: Iran is a malign state, a rogue state. They are going to get money from the sanctions relief. Yes, they are. But the only thing worse than a rogue State with money from the sanctions relief is a rogue State with money--as the sanctions erode--with nuclear weapons, and that is what this is all about. When President Kennedy was negotiating with the Soviet Union to get the missiles out of Cuba, at the end of the negotiation he didn't say: By the way, Castro has to go--or you, Soviet Union, have to foreswear your enmity to the West. And, by the way, we have heard Iran say ``Death to America,'' and the Soviet leadership said: ``We will bury you.'' It is the same deal, the same level of threat. But President Kennedy was focused on getting those missiles out. That was the threat, just as today the threat is to keep nuclear arms out of the hands of Iran, which we all agree is what we need to do. We have debated Iran. We have taken two identical votes. The outcomes are the same. I predict the outcome will continue to be the same, and yet every minute we now spend on an issue that has been resolved is a minute that we don't spend on issues that need resolution: the budget, the highway fund, the debt limit, the Export-Import Bank, the tax extenders. That is governing, and that is what this body should be doing. I hope my colleagues at some point in the very near future will decide that it is time to attend to those issues. And if we disagree with a policy decision that has been made, so be it. But we need to move forward and not continue to politicize an issue that, in my view, should not have been politicized in the first place. These are weighty and important issues. The Iran decision was the hardest that I have ever had to make, but I have made it. We voted. It is done. We need to move forward, and we need to move forward to meet the urgent needs of the people of this country. I yield the floor.

Mr. KING. I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate as in morning business for approximately 10 minutes.