Frank Lautenberg

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. With all due respect, I thought the Senator from Illinois had suggested that she was wrapped up with her commentary, and in consideration of accepting that condition, it was my understanding we were going to provide Senator Conrad with time to address his amendment before the vote takes place.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. The Senator from Illinois has a question?

Mr. LAUTENBERG. It has not. How much time remains on the side of the proponents?

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Has the unanimous consent order been propounded that would give Senator Conrad an opportunity to discuss his amendment before the vote takes place?

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I do not know, before I relinquish the floor, what the expectation is for Senator Conrad, who has a vote coming up. What is the order of business, please?

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I thank the Senator from Illinois. I do want to say something about this important piece of legislation. Mr. President, I stand to support the amendment presented by the distinguished Senator from Illinois. Senator Moseley-Braun's amendment is a critical issue in terms of how we deal with the educational requirements of our young people. The Senator from Illinois has had a long record--certainly since she has been here, and I understand before she arrived to the U.S. Senate-- of interest and involvement in children, particularly focused on education in the early years. I am delighted to join with her and others here who are supporting an investment in bringing our school facilities up to date, making sure that the place in which children are expected to learn invites the process of learning and doesn't distract them, because it is either too cold, too hot, or too dangerous, or because of water leaking through the roof, or perhaps asbestos in the building, or insufficient facilities to attend to the children's needs. The condition is so outrageous that the GAO says that there are more than 14 million children attending schools that are in need of extensive repair or replacement. Several million attend schools with safety code violations, and, as I mentioned, leaky roofs are in schools that house 12 million students. The GAO found the problem of crumbling schools transcends demographic and geographic boundaries. Roughly one-third of urban rural and suburban schools report that at least one building is in need of extensive repair, or to be completely replaced. Furthermore, the GAO reports that most schools are not prepared to incorporate modern technology in the classroom. Forty-six percent of schools lack adequate electrical wiring to support the full-scale use of technology. More than a third of the schools lack the requisite electrical power. And 56 percent of schools have insufficient phone lines for modems. When we talk about percentages of 56 percent here and 12 percent there, it kind of escapes into an amorphous condition that prevents us from really analyzing what the effects of these inadequate facilities represent. It takes a real toll on students, on children. I came out of the computer business. I arrived here some years ago from the city of Paterson, NJ, where my company was founded and where I was born. We had a population, I would say, of somewhere around 150,000 people with a commensurate number of students. I have been back there many times. I have a fondness of that place of my birth. I know a lot of the people who live in the town. One of my schoolmates was a fellow named Larry Doby, who was just admitted to the Baseball Hall of Fame. I visit the city regularly. Until recently, I used to go to the same barbershop every couple of weeks since I was a college student. I return there and very often bring people around my old neighborhood to kind of give them a sense of what kind of beginning and opportunity I had. They were amazed at the dilapidated condition of the facility. I met children there and told them I lived in the building. They asked me what floor. I said, ``The second floor.'' The number of the building was 310 Hamilton Avenue. They asked me, ``What floor?'' I lived on the second floor. ``Yes. What apartment?'' I said, ``In the back apartment.'' They said, ``You lived there?'' ``Yes. I lived there.'' So it established a particular attachment. I was called on by the board of education at Paterson a year or two ago to see if I could get them some help so they could get the schools wired in preparation for connection into the Internet. They couldn't raise the money within the city. People wanted it; they couldn't afford to pay the taxes necessary. The city was in arrearages all over the place. I arranged for some people I knew in my old company to pay for the facility to be wired. We went down there, and we stood with the people from the telephone company and pulled wire. What a pitiful condition. Can you imagine that you have to depend on someone's goodness, or some company's willingness to step forward so a school can be affixed to the Internet so the kids can learn that there is something besides pens and pencils and pads that are going to be required in the lives that they expect and hope to lead one day? It is pretty discouraging if kids don't know what it is that the outside world holds for them. I once visited a school in Newark earlier in my days in the Senate. It caused me to write a piece of legislation called ``computers in schools'' to try to make sure that there was a computer available in classrooms with a reasonable population-to-computer ratio so that the children there would have a chance to learn the applications. One of the things that we saw in a visit to a school in a very poor neighborhood with high crime in a broken-down neighborhood was that one child I was introduced to was sitting at a computer terminal. They told me that he was in about the third or fourth grade. They told me that this child had such a bad deportment record that they were looking for a way perhaps to expel him from the school. Then they brought in a couple of computers. This child couldn't keep up academically. His behavior, as I say, was bad. They sat him in front of a computer. They taught him a couple of basic exercises that children learn. He was so proficient in such a short time that he began to outdistance the other children. I tell you this story only because to me it established the fact that children have to be given a chance to learn and develop based on their own ability, based on their own capacity to learn, and not be restricted to staying with a class where perhaps there is some maladjustment to it. So I fully support this amendment. Broken-down schools have a negative effect on the ability of students to learn. They see this grim surrounding, and they begin to believe that is the way the world around them exists and will exist for them. Academic research has proven that there is a direct correlation between the condition of school facilities and student achievement. Georgetown researchers found that test scores of students assigned to schools in poor condition can be expected to fall 11 percentage points below the test scores of students in buildings in adequate condition. Unfortunately, many local educational agencies have difficulty securing financing for school facility improvements. The proposal called for in this amendment would really help. The zero interest school modernization bond and the Federal income tax credits to purchase those bonds in lieu of interest payments would be an important step toward rebuilding and modernizing our Nation's schools. Mr. President, I say to those who criticize test scores, who intimate that our children are inadequate to the task that they are assigned to, I ask those people to look to where the problem is. It is not simply looking at students' surroundings. We should provide facilities through our Government. Why is it that we encourage this feeling of being forlorn, or outside of the mainstream? It is because the condition of the facility says that these children are not worth the effort that it takes to have them in a better learning condition. Mr. President, if we want our kids to learn, if we want our children to be competitive in the years ahead, if we expect them to be leaders in the true sense of the word, where we are not just making speeches but we want to do something about it, then this is an excellent opportunity to register our support. Again, my commendation goes to the distinguished Senator from Illinois for her leadership on this issue.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, before we call the roll, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Washington be able to send up two amendments.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Yes. I want to point out that the pending amendment is not germane, and I raise a point of order that the amendment violates section 305(b)(2) of the Congressional Budget Act.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Eighteen. So we would be looking at prospectively 25 hours or more. So I say to all of our colleagues on both sides, get them in here and let us try to get action done on them. If a rollcall vote can be dispensed with, it will make a huge difference in what time we conclude our business for this week, reminding everyone, all those whose memory is bad and can't recall, the fact that the recess begins for 2 weeks, in case anybody has forgotten, and should we want to hang in through Friday or whatever or however long, I understand we are going to get this done.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. That is extra time. So if we have 29 or 30 votes, and even if we were able by some stretch of the imagination to reduce that to 15 minutes, you are talking about more than 7 hours added to the-- how much time do we have remaining, may I ask?

Mr. LAUTENBERG. The chairman of the Budget Committee neglected to mention the fact that voting time is not included in the calculation of the remaining hours.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, we have heard about the amendment that the Senator from Georgia proposes with Senator McCain, and I want to describe why I am opposing this amendment. While it sounds good on the surface, I think there are a few things we have to talk about and highlight what kind of problems might ensue. This amendment would cut domestic programs like education, child care, law enforcement, veterans' programs, and environmental protection. It would violate current budget rules. Frankly, I view it as fiscally irresponsible. This amendment calls for $101 billion in cuts from discretionary programs for use in providing various tax breaks. I note that it is not allowed under the Budget Act. And there is good reason that the Budget Act protects against that. The Budget Act is designed to ensure that if we incur permanent obligations, like permanent tax cuts or new mandatory spending, that we pay for these obligations with permanent savings. That is what the pay-as-you-go system is all about, and it has worked well for many years. People understand very clearly that if you spend it, you have to find a way to get the money. This amendment flies in the face of these rules, and it threatens to undermine long-term fiscal discipline. The amendment says that we should make cuts in temporary spending--that is, annually appropriated discretionary programs--and use temporary cuts to fund permanent tax breaks. That is a mix and match that does not work. Mr. President, it does not take a CPA to figure out that this can create serious problems in the long term. I am not opposed to tax cuts for ordinary working Americans, but I do think we should pay for them with permanent savings. I do not think we ought to introduce gimmickry that says we are going to have permanent cuts and temporary savings. In addition, I am concerned about what it would mean to cut $101 billion from programs which support education, fight crime, support our veterans, and protect our environment. Many of these programs are critical to the well-being of our country and to millions of ordinary Americans. The question is raised, Is there waste in Government? Yes, of course, but this amendment does not target waste, it adopts the meat-ax approach to Government, and that is not what the American people want. In the most successful corporations, in the largest corporations, there is waste, but how you get rid of it is to focus on what caused it in the first place and work deliberately toward ending it. You do not simply say, ``OK, we're going to cut our expenses across the board.'' That goes through good departments; that goes through bad departments; that goes through good management, as well as bad management. That is not the way problems are solved. I think most Senators from both parties will agree that the era of big Government is over. Government has been shrinking, and it will continue to shrink. As a matter of fact, the executive branch employment is the lowest as a proportion of total civilian employment since the 1930s. Federal outlays as a percent of GDP stand at their lowest level since the Nixon administration. Nondefense discretionary spending is at its lowest percentage of GDP since the early 1960s. I think it is important to note where America stands. Total Government spending as a share of GDP is the lowest for the United States than for all G-7 countries, the most advanced countries in the world--France, Italy, Germany, Canada, the U.K., and Japan. That tells us that not only is Government spending proportionately less but that Government is in fact smaller when it comes to employment and programs realistically. Under the budget agreement reached last year, nondefense discretionary spending in 2002 will reach its lowest level in almost 40 years as a share of GDP. But the McCain-Coverdell amendment would violate the budget agreement. It would lower the discretionary spending caps even further, making draconian cuts in the investments that Americans care about most. Under this amendment, funding for the National Institutes of Health would be cut by 7.9 percent; education would take a 7.6 percent cut; child care would be hit to the tune of 7.8 percent; the environment, 8.3 percent; transportation, a 7.1 percent cut; and veterans programs, a 7.6 percent cut. And it goes on--crime fighting programs would be reduced 7.6 percent. All to support $101 billion worth of tax breaks. The kind of cuts that would be required under this amendment could have a devastating effect on our children. It would dramatically reduce funding for education, child care. It would weaken enforcement of environmental laws and undercut our efforts to reduce crime and support our veterans. I listened to the debate carefully, and I heard descriptions of an America that I really do not recognize--an America where your freedoms are limited, where your opportunities are reduced, an America where it is harder to get by. I have to ask one question: Why is it that people will die to take the chance and the risk of death to get to our shores, to sneak in our borders, to float on tubes in the Caribbean, hide in the holds of airplanes, take a chance on drowning in the hold of a boat to get here, to get to this place described as a confiscatory structure that does not permit people opportunity? Mr. President, that bell does not ring true. It may be good politics, it may sound good on the radio when people hear it, but it is not the truth about our society. This is the greatest country on the face of this Earth, and it has been since its creation. And we have been smart. We have been working hard, but we have also been darn lucky, let me tell you. We have an abundance of whatever it is. We have an abundance of oil; we have an abundance of minerals; we have an abundance of space; we have an abundance of agricultural land. Boy, are we lucky-- America the beautiful. That was not a coincidence; that is the truth. And people all around this world know it. That is why our stock market is constantly headed upward. Why? Because people say, if you have money, whether you are in countries A, B, C, D, all the way around the globe, ``Boy, I want to put my money in America, because I know it is safe here.'' We have seen country after country, the richest oil countries, they are packing their money and getting out of their own resource structure, because they know they may have oil in the ground but they do not have freedom on the streets; they do not have a secure societal structure. And we hear whispers about what Thomas Jefferson might have done. Look at this country. Look at our citizens. Life expectancy has never been better. I remember when I was a child, the man next door to us died. He was 53 years old. And I thought to myself, I said to my friend, ``Oh, he was old.'' Old? I see lots of guys over 50. I see guys in my decade running in marathons, jogging, healthy, supporting their families, enjoying life. Why are there conversations about, maybe Social Security ought to be raised? I am not endorsing it; I am simply mentioning it. Why? Because we know that people who are 65 are today almost prime-of-lifers. And, boy, I come from New Jersey, and I want to tell you, when I look at New Jersey's economic structure, we are called ``the medicine chest of the country,'' because we have these pharmaceuticals. I used to read the sports pages actively. Now I read about the new inventions or the new patents actively--what is going to save your hair, what is going to save your heart, what is going to save your lungs. That is the kind of society we are. What is this gloom, this despair, that hangs over us? ``Well, they're taking away our rights. They're confiscating our property.'' Life has never been better on the whole for the people in the world than in this country, America, these days. People get in an airplane today that is jammed. It is jammed with ordinary working people. No more of the formality. You do not have to wear a suit and a tie to get in an airplane, as was the custom years ago because it was restricted to an elite few. It is available for everybody. Air traffic today is almost mass transit, because we have made it available. People go on vacations to places that nobody even heard of when I was a child. It is available. Children are healthy. Look at them. Look at the young people who surround the President's table there, bright, 15 years old. They know what is going on in the world. They have learned. They love the opportunity to be here and to associate with these great Senators, I think. This is a country where we devote our energy to young people. We want our kids to have appropriate nutrition. We want them to have proper education. Do we succeed in every program? Heck, no. We do not. But we try. We try. And it is a subject of debate here. Right or wrong, it does not matter. It is a free society, as free as any place in the world. I know lots of places where if you talk about things we talk about here--criticism of the President, criticism of this institution, criticism of that institution--you go off with your hands in handcuffs. This is a great society. It does not need any apologies from anybody about whether or not taxes--yes, maybe taxes are a little onerous at times, but the question is, compared to what? We can talk about what tax rates used to be, the amount of income kept in years and decades gone by, ``dreamsville,'' but today you may pay a little bit more, but you have a lot more left because you are earning more. That is what this society is about. Entrepreneurships, opportunities, Mr. President. I have been really lucky in my lifetime. Best of all, my luck is four children and five grandchildren, with number six on the way. That is the best luck I have ever had. But in addition to that, I was able, with a couple of other guys who, like me, came from working-class parents--my father worked in the silk mills of Paterson. Paterson is an industrial city that has fallen by the wayside, one of America's poorest cities trying to fight back. A lot of dilapidation; a lot of problems; but a lot of spirit. Three of us started a business that started an industry that created more jobs than the computer hardware business. More people are employed in the software service side of the computer industry by far than those in the hardware business, than the IBMs or the RCAs or the Honeywells or the companies that used to be in the computer business. Today, there are more people employed in the service companies like ADP--the company I helped found--by far than companies that made hardware. I am considered a pioneer. I am in something called the Hall of Fame for Information Processing, a little place in Texas, that has some plaques in there because we were innovators. The company I started-- without a dime literally; the three of us came from poverty, not middle-class; poverty--our company today employs 30,000 people across the world and has one of the best records of growth in its stock of any company in America. If you invested $300 in ADP in 1961, it is worth $1.4 million today. What does it mean? It means that entrepreneurship is alive and well in this country of ours. Look at Intel, look at Microsoft, look at America Online. Look at these companies. You will see success after success after success. There is no shortage of opportunity in America, none at all. The shortage may be in the mentality that fails to see the goodness that we have in this country of ours. Talk of the gloom and the confiscation of property and taxes and how debilitating it is to pay your way--my gosh, if people want to join a club, they look at the dues and they say, ``Well, is it worth it or not? What's it worth to belong to the country club called America?'' It is worth everything. People are willing again to fight and to die for the opportunity to be here. Look at how many illegals we have in this country now. Under all kinds of threats--you get shot at the border, you get stopped, you get jailed--they still pour over because they want to be in America. That is where the opportunity is. That is where the freedom is at its fullest. When I hear talk about how we are losing opportunity, we are losing the chance to succeed, it is summarized in one word that means a lot in America. It is called ``baloney''--and I'm not talking about meat. There is plenty of opportunity here. And we have problems. One of the problems is our violence rate--10,000 people, roughly, murdered by handguns, people afraid to walk down the street. One of the people on my staff, 2 days ago, was walking home, living just about on Capitol Hill, a gun was put in her face, took her handbag. Thank the Lord that is all that happened. Those are the problems that we have. Those are problems we ought to work on. I don't understand why we want to take money away from safety and fighting crime and put it into tax breaks for people who don't need it, especially those at the top. Look at the top incomes in this country. It boggles the mind. I never knew that people could amass the kind of fortunes that we have seen. We have our weaknesses, but, boy, have we got our strengths. I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment. Don't play with the system this way--shoot-from-the-hip tax breaks that are permanent, cuts in other programs where the revenue flow is just temporary. This adopts a meat-ax approach to domestic needs while making sure that these tax breaks are there. It violates the Budget Act. We note that. I hope our colleagues will reject this amendment and in that rejection say no, we are not going to play those kinds of games. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. (for Mr. Torricelli, for himself and Mr. Jeffords) proposed an amendment to the concurrent resolution (S. Con. Res. 86) setting forth the congressional budget for the United States Government for fiscal years 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003 and revising the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 1998; as follows: On page 53, after line 22, add the following:

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, while we have a minute, I must once again apologize to the pages, who work so hard, for keeping them out of school tomorrow by working them past 10 o'clock. I am sorry, really.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 2203

Mr. LAUTENBERG. We yield back time. We have no objection.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Amendment No. 2275 (Purpose: To express the sense of the Congress regarding a permanent extension of income averaging for farmers)

Mr. LAUTENBERG. We yield back all time as well. THE PRESIDING OFFICER. If there be no further debate, the question is on agreeing to the amendment.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. We have no comment. We yield any time that we have in response.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I move to waive the point of order, and I ask for the yeas and nays on my motion.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I yield back my time.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, there is no additional spending that is provided for by virtue of the Superfund tax. These are not entitlements. We are talking now about direct appropriations. If the funds aren't there obviously out of this fund, out of this reserve fund, if money doesn't come in, it can't be spent. There were programs developed by the Environment and Public Works Committee. I assume the Senator is aware that we have finished a Superfund reauthorization bill out of the committee. I didn't support it. But it is due to come to the floor sometime after our recess. The committee has mandatory spending authority for minimum allocation for ISTEA, the orphans' share funding for Superfund, and funding for landowner incentives under the proposed Endangered Species Act. Under current law the committee has mandatory spending authority for the Wallop-Breaux Sports Fishery Act and other legislation. So this isn't a casual proposal. It is going to be paid for by taxes that accrue to the Superfund reserve fund. It will be used for environmental purposes. That is what we are talking about. It is fairly simple. We offer the amendment, and we are ready to have it processed and hope that our colleagues will vote for it.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Yes. We should note that the Senator from New Mexico is a cosponsor of that amendment, and please note that carefully.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Between the proponents and the opponents?