Joseph Lieberman

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, before I begin my remarks, I must pay tribute to Senator Byrd. We are on different sides of the discussion on the Iraq war, but he is an extraordinary public servant who remains as full of not just passion, which is evident, but brainpower at a mature age, shall I say, as he was when he was a lot younger. It is a privilege to serve with him and to have listened to him.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. The war Iran is fighting against American troops and our allies in Iraq is an undeclared war, but it is, nonetheless, a real war in which real Americans and Iraqis are being murdered by Iranian agents. We cannot close our eyes to that outrageous reality. This amendment exposes that behavior and demands justice. As we speak, the President of Iran is in the United States. There is no better time than that for us to stand together, united as Americans, regardless of our position on Iraq or our party affiliation, and send a crystal clear message to Mahmud Ahmadi-Nejad and the fanatical terrorists and tyrants who now run the great country of Iran and oppress its people that their campaign of terror against our troops in Iraq must end and we will stand united as Americans against it. Ahmadi- Nejad should not be given any American platform to speak from until he acts to stop his government's killing of Americans. They have been shouting for almost three decades ``death to America.'' He leads those chants of tens of thousands in Iran today. But they have done more than shout; they have acted to bring that death to Americans in the marine barracks in Beirut, Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, and today in Iraq. Giving this evil and fanatical man a platform at a great American university is an insult to the hundreds of Americans whose blood he and his extremist allies in Iran have on their hands. He deserves no audience, no respect, no opportunity to explain away his hateful words and murderous actions. He and the ruling clique in Iran deserve the punishment, and more, this amendment Senator Kyl and I are introducing would impose on them as the terrorists they are. I urge my colleagues to support the amendment. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to speak against the amendment introduced by Senators Levin and Reed, my friends. I actually say that with full meaning. I have great respect for the Senators from Michigan and Rhode Island. I even like them. But in this case, I am in deep disagreement about the amendment they have offered. This is the most recent iteration of a series of amendments Senators Levin and Reed have put in. It changes slightly from earlier versions, but the strategy is essentially the same, and in doing so, it ignores, I say respectfully, all the changes that have occurred in Iraq on the ground in the months that have gone by since the first Levin-Reed amendment was introduced. It also ignores the clearly stated counsel of the National Intelligence Estimate, of the head of the independent Commission to evaluate Iraqi security forces, GEN Jim Jones, and it ignores much of the testimony General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, who live on the ground, gave to Congress and the American people last week. I rise to oppose it because I think it does not reflect the successes we have had, and if it ever passed, it would take us from this strategy which is bringing success to a strategy which would bring us to failure. It orders a change of a strategy that is working and puts us on a course to a strategy that I believe will fail disastrously. But at least everyone would have to acknowledge that we do not know how it will work as compared to the Petraeus strategy that is now working. This amendment, as has been said, would first order the beginning of a reduction of U.S. forces in Iraq not later than 90 days from its enactment. Well, the interesting thing to say is that General Petraeus and President Bush announced last week that a withdrawal of American forces will begin this month. It will reach over 5,000 by the end of this year, by Christmastime. Quite remarkable. Unexpected. Not predicted. But why is it happening? It is happening because the surge strategy, combined with the improvement in the performance of the Iraqi security forces, has allowed our commander on the ground to recommend to the Commander in Chief, who has accepted the recommendation, that we can reduce some of our troop presence in Iraq without compromising the mission and the security of Iraq. But General Petraeus said very clearly that he is not for congressionally-mandated deadlines, including this one; that as a general principle of war, not just to support his own position, he feels--and I could not agree with him more--that withdrawals of American troops in battle ought to be made on the basis of what is happening on the battlefield and at the recommendation of the commanders on the battlefield. Then the Levin-Reed amendment represents essentially a transition of U.S. forces to a limited presence, undefined number, to carry out the following missions: to protect the U.S. and coalition personnel and infrastructure, training, equipping, providing logistical support to the Iraqi security forces, and engaging in targeted counterterrorism operations against al-Qaida, al-Qaida affiliated groups, and other international terrorist organizations. As I will make clear in a moment, I am particularly troubled that that does not include the groups Iran is training, equipping, and then sending back into Iraq which have killed hundreds of American soldiers and thousands of Iraqi soldiers and civilians. In ordering a withdrawal within 90 days, in ordering a transition from a strategy that is working to a strategy that I believe will fail, as I said at the outset, this amendment ignores the best evidence and judgment we have based on what is happening on the ground. The National Intelligence Estimate commented quite clearly about what would happen if we limited the mission our solders in Iraq were allowed to undertake prematurely. It warned us in no uncertain terms that: Changing the mission of coalition forces from a primarily counterinsurgency and stabilization role [which is the current Petraeus strategy] to a primary combat support role for Iraqi forces and counterterrorism operations [which is the strategy that would be imposed by this amendment] would erode the security gains achieved so far. Not ``might'' but ``would'' erode the security gains achieved thus far. General Jones made very clear in testimony he gave just 2 weeks ago that: Deadlines can work against us. I think a deadline of this magnitude would be against our national interests. General Petraeus warned us last week that: We need to ensure that we do not surrender a gain for which we fought very, very hard by being locked into a timetable. Likewise, we heard from General Petraeus, who bluntly told us: While one may argue that the best way to speed the process in Iraq is to change the mission from one that emphasizes population security, counterterrorism and transition, to one that is strictly focused on transition and counterterrorism, making that change now would, in our view, be premature. That is diplomatic language chosen by a military man speaking to Congress last week: ``would be premature.'' Look, as our mission in Iraq succeeds and hopefully continues to succeed as it is now both in terms of stabilizing the country, reducing victims of sectarian violence, chasing al-Qaida, and, most significantly, improving the capacity of the Iraqi security forces, we will transition our mission because the Iraqis and the environment will allow us to do that, and there will be transition to something, I would guess, quite like the goal of this amendment. But if you force this by congressional action before the commanders on the ground tell us it can be safely implemented, it will be more than General Petraeus's diplomatic term, ``premature,'' and probably more than the NIE's direct term, ``would erode the security gains achieved so far.'' I think it would begin to unwind Iraq and lead to a victory for al-Qaida and Iranian-backed terrorists. I think it is particularly unjustified for Congress to take up this amendment now, the moment we are seeing evidence of real progress in Iraq. I know some of the supporters of the amendment suggest that by withdrawing forces, we would force the Iraqi Government to achieve the political progress we all want. There is no military solution, only a political solution that will ultimately end this. That is true. But let me say this: That misses one powerful reality in Iraq today. We are now not just fighting to give Iraqis the stability to reach political reconciliation and the ability to self-govern, we are fighting al-Qaida and Iranian-backed terrorists. That requires a military solution. So to say the goal here is just to make sure the Iraqi leadership reaches some accommodations with one another--that is not the end of it. You can have that happen, and if we pulled out prematurely, al-Qaida and Iran could blow the whole thing apart, and it would be a devastating loss for Iraq, for the region, and for the security of the people of the United States. But listen to what Ambassador Crocker said about this idea to Congress last week: An approach that says we are going to start pulling troops out regardless of the objective conditions on the ground and what might happen in consequence of that could actually push the Iraqis in the wrong direction, to make them less likely to compromise, rather than more likely. It would make them far more focused on building the walls, stacking the ammunition, and getting ready for a big nasty fight without us around, than it would push them toward compromise and accommodation with the people who would be on the other side of that fight. That is Ambassador Crocker, who lives with those people every day, the leaders, the political leaders of Iraq, and he is saying: Watch out, a premature withdrawal by the U.S. forces would do exactly the opposite. It would not encourage the Iraqis to political reconciliation; it would basically lead them to hunker down for a civil war they fear would be following. You know what, from this distance, although I have been there six or seven times now, it seems like common sense and human nature that if we pull out too soon, they are not going to wake up and suddenly make difficult political agreements; they are going to get ready for civil war. This amendment is based on a premise that disregards exactly what our Ambassador, a nonpolitical career person, an expert on the Middle East, is telling us would happen. I would also point out, as I mentioned briefly at the beginning, that the amendment, I fear, would leave our troops unable, even in their reduced mission role, to respond to and go after Iranian operatives and Iranian-backed militias, the so-called special groups that are in the midst of fighting a vicious proxy war against American troops and Iraqis in Iraq. General Petraeus testified last week that: These elements have assassinated and kidnapped Iraqi governmental leaders, killed and wounded our soldiers with advanced explosive devices provided by Iran, and indiscriminately rocketed civilians in the international zone and elsewhere. So even in the reduced mission, it does provide for allowing our troops to go after al-Qaida but not the Iranian-backed operatives. And as Senator McCain I think quite compellingly pointed out on the floor earlier today, what are our troops supposed to do when they see someone walking along with an IED? Go up to them and say: Excuse me, sir, are you a member of a sectarian militia or are you al-Qaida? If you are sectarian militia, go ahead. If you are al-Qaida, I am sorry, I am going to have to capture you. That is not going to work. I am sure my colleagues, including the sponsors of this amendment, agree that the United States has a vital national interest in preventing the dominance of Iraq by the fanatical anti-American regime in Tehran, and yet this amendment would give our forces, as I read it, no authority to deal with that critical mission after the transition period is over. I just want to say that at the end of last year, after too many months, too many months of a strategy that was not working in Iraq, President Bush, as the Commander in Chief, finally said: I have to change the strategy. He called in a lot of people to ask how should he change it in response to the reality on the ground, which is that what we were doing was not working, was not succeeding. He met General Petraeus, a man who had been in Iraq before, had disagreed with the prevailing strategy, and instead of being honored, he was sent out to Fort Leavenworth, where he did some great work. It is a great place. But he really should have been raised up to continue the fight in Iraq. President Bush brought him back to Iraq, accepted his ideas for a new strategy of counterinsurgency, of stabilizing Iraq. He gave him the 30,000-plus troops, and it has worked. Remarkable. We all know Iraq has not reached the goals we want it to reach, but assassinations are down, deaths from sectarian violence are down. American and Iraqi forces are in control of most of Baghdad now, not the militias. Most significantly, al-Qaida is on the run. I heard bin Laden and Zawahiri put out other tapes today. I wonder whether these tapes are a sign not of confidence but of insecurity by al-Qaida's leaders. I am beginning to wonder whether they are worried about the fact that they are essentially being chased out of an Arab country, Iraq, particularly painful for them, chased out of an enormous Sunni Arab province, because they are all Sunni Muslims, and that they are on the verge of what could be a humiliating defeat, if we continue to move this strategy forward against them. As we all know in our own lives, sometimes the people who bark the loudest are the ones who are the most insecure. I am beginning to wonder whether bin Laden and Zawahiri, who masterminded the attack against us on 9/11, are now, on what has become the central battlefield of the war with Islamist extremism, al-Qaida, whether they are badly losing that war. What I am saying is, after a long time President Bush looked at the facts, changed the strategy, and the new strategy is working. This amendment, respectfully to its sponsors, does not regard the facts, does not look at the facts, does not accept the changes that have occurred in our strategy and the success it is bringing and basically continues as if nothing had changed. In doing so, if adopted, it would do a disservice to our forces in Iraq who are succeeding, to the cause of freedom in Iraq and throughout the Muslim world, and to the cause of security of every American threatened by al-Qaida who we know is working, plotting, and intends to strike us again, and the fanatics who, unfortunately, control the Government of a great country, Iran, who lead thousands and tens of thousands on any occasion they can in chants to ``death to America.'' That is what is on the line. That is what would be jeopardized if this amendment were passed. That is why I respectfully ask my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the Levin-Reed amendment. I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to respectfully speak against the amendment offered by my colleague from Virginia. Let me put this in context, as I see it. One week ago, the commander of our military forces in Iraq and our top diplomat in Baghdad returned to Washington to address the Members of this Congress. What General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker offered us last week was not hype or hyperbole but the facts. They offered us the facts. What we heard from them was reality--hard evidence of the progress we have at last begun to achieve over the past 8 months--progress against al-Qaida, progress against sectarian violence, progress in standing up the Iraqi Army, progress that all but the most stubborn of ideological or partisan opponents now acknowledge is happening. What we also heard from General Petraeus last week was a plan for the transition of our mission in Iraq which he has developed, together with our military commanders on the ground, that builds on facts on the ground, not on opinions over here, that builds on the successes our troops have achieved on the ground which will allow tens of thousands of American troops to begin to return home from Iraq starting this month. So the question now before the Senate is not whether to start bringing some of our troops home. Everyone agrees with that point. Beginning this month, some of our troops will be coming home. The question before the Senate now is whether we are going to listen to the recommendations of our commanders and diplomats in Iraq, or instead whether we will reject them and try to derail the plan they have carefully developed and implemented and that is working. The question is whether we build on the success of the surge and the strategy of success led by General Petraeus, or instead whether we impose a congressional formula for retreat and failure. I believe the choice is clear because we have too much at stake for our national security, our national values, and most particularly, of course, freedom is on the line and the outcome in Iraq. Are the victors going to be the Iraqis with our support and the hope of freedom and a better future for them or are the victors going to be al-Qaida and Iran and Iranian-backed terrorists? That is the choice. It is in that context that I believe the Webb amendment is a step in precisely the wrong direction. That is its effect. The sponsors of the amendment say they are trying to relieve the burden on our men and women in uniform. I, of course, take them at their word. They have an honorable goal that all of us in this Chamber share. It is not, however, what the real-world consequences of this amendment will be. On the contrary, Secretary of Defense Bob Gates has warned us in the most explicit terms that this amendment, if enacted, would have precisely the opposite effect that its sponsors say they desire. It would create less security, more pressure on more soldiers and their families than exists now. As many of my colleagues know, Secretary Gates is a man who chooses his words carefully. He is a former member of the Iraq Study Group. He is a strong believer in the need for bipartisan consensus and cooperation when it comes to America's national security, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan. He does not practice the politics of polarization or partisan spin. So when he tells us this amendment would do more harm than good, so much harm, in fact, that he, as Secretary of Defense, would feel obliged to recommend to the President that if this amendment is adopted, the President veto the entire underlying Department of Defense authorization bill, well, then, when Bob Gates, Secretary of Defense, says that, I think we have a responsibility to listen and to listen to his words very carefully. The reason for Secretary Gates' opposition to this amendment is not political, it is practical. As he explained in a letter to Senator Graham of South Carolina earlier this week, the Webb amendment ``would significantly increase the risk to our servicemembers''--significantly increase, not decrease, the risk to our servicemembers--and ``lead to a return to unpredictable tour lengths and home state periods and home station periods.'' Exactly the opposite of the intention of the amendment. By injecting rigid inflexibility into the military planning process, this amendment would force the Pentagon to elevate one policy--the amount of time individual members of the military spend at home--above all other considerations, above the safety and security of those same soldiers and their colleagues when they are deployed abroad, above the impact of implementing that policy would have on our prospects for success in Iraq and all that means to our country and, I add, to our soldiers. Secretary Gates also described a range of grim consequences that would result if this amendment is adopted. To begin with, it would likely force the Pentagon to extend the deployments of units that are already in Iraq and Afghanistan beyond their scheduled rotations. So some of those units which are now scheduled to be there for 15 months might have to be extended beyond that because of the provision in this amendment that says you have to have an equal amount of time at home as deployed. Why? Because there aren't enough capable units to replace them that meet the inflexible requirements imposed by this amendment. Far from relieving the burden on our brave troops in battle deployed overseas, this amendment would actually add to their burdens and keep our soldiers away from their families, certainly a goodly number of them, for even longer. It would also mean more frequent and broader callups of our National Guard and Reserve units, pulling forces into the fight that would otherwise be able to remain at home. In other cases, this amendment will require the Pentagon to deploy units trained for one mission to go fight another mission, not because it makes military sense to do so but because they are the only ones left that meet this amendment's inflexible dwell-time rule. In plain English, we are going to be forced by this amendment to send less- capable units into combat. In addition to imposing greater dangers thereby on our individual service men and women, this amendment would also have other baneful effects on our national security. At a time when our military is stretched and performing brilliantly, it would further shrink the pool of units and personnel available to respond to events, crises, not just in Iraq and Afghanistan but around the world. In doing so, this amendment--and again I quote Secretary Gates--``would dramatically limit the Nation's ability to respond to other national security needs while we remain engaged in Iraq or Afghanistan.'' Is that what any one of us desire? Is that what the men and women who serve us in uniform desire? No. All of us recognize the extraordinary services our troops are giving our country and the burden that places on their family in this time of war. All of us want to do something to help relieve the burden they bear. But the answer is not to impose a legislative straitjacket on our men and women in uniform. The answer is not to impose an inflexible one-size-fits-all rule that will endanger their safety and hobble our military's ability to respond to worldwide threats. The answer is not, in our frustration, to throw an enormous wrench into the existing, well-functioning personnel system of the U.S. military. The answer is most definitely not to make it harder for us to succeed in Iraq. I know there has been some disagreement among the supporters of this amendment about whether it is intended to be a backdoor way to accelerate the drawdown of our troops from Iraq, for which there is not adequate support in this Senate Chamber, fortunately, and thus discard the recommendations of General Petraeus and, if I may say so, put us on a course for failure instead of the course of success we are on now. My friend, the Senate majority leader, said he does not see this as a backdoor way to accelerate the drawdown. On the other hand, Congressman Murtha said that is exactly what it is supposed to do and he hopes it will do. The fact is many in this Chamber have argued honestly and openly for months that General Petraeus and his troops were failing to make meaningful progress in Iraq and that Congress should, therefore, order them to begin to withdraw. That could be done by cutting off funding or mandating a congressional deadline for withdrawal. I have argued against those recommendations, as my colleagues know. But I must say I respect the fact that those arguments by opponents of the war accept the consequences of their beliefs, and they are real and direct. Those in the Chamber who want to reject the Petraeus recommendations and his report of progress and impose on him their own schemes for the withdrawal of our troops from Iraq, I think ought to do it in the most direct way, rather than any attempt to derail this now successful war plan by indirection. The fact is, regardless of the intention of its sponsors, the Webb amendment, if enacted, will not result in a faster drawdown of U.S. troops from Iraq. The fact is the Commander in Chief and the military commander in Iraq are committed to the success of this mission. On the contrary, therefore, it would only make it harder for those troops, along with their brothers and sisters in uniform in Afghanistan, to complete their mission successfully, safely, and return home but to return home with honor to their families and their neighbors. Yesterday, a couple of Connecticut veterans from the Iraq war were in town and came to see me. At the end of a good discussion, in which they did urge me to vote against the Webb amendment, one of them said to me: Senator, we want to win in Iraq, and we know we can win. I said to them: Thanks to your bravery and skill--and now a good plan--and with the help of God, you are going to win, so long as the American people and their representatives in Congress don't lose their will. That victory will not only secure a better future for the people of Iraq and more stability and an opportunity for a course in the Middle East that is not determined by the fanatics, the haters, the suicide bombers of al-Qaida and Iranian-backed terrorism but is determined by the people themselves who pray every day and yearn every day for a better future. I will say something else. There are different ways to burden men and women in uniform. One is the stress of combat, another is to force them into a position where they fail. I have had many conversations with soldiers from Connecticut and elsewhere who have served in Iraq, and I have had the conversations in Iraq and here. I don't want to mislead my colleagues in what I am about to report. I don't get this in 100 percent of those conversations, but in an overwhelming number of those conversations, they are proud of what they are doing, they believe in their mission, they believe they are part of a battle that can help make the future of their families and our country more secure. They are proud. They are reenlisting at remarkable numbers. That is the best indicator of this attitude. If you want to burden them and their families in a way we can never quite make up for, then take us from the road of success, leading to the road of victory, and force us directly, force them directly or indirectly, to a retreat and defeat. That can break the will of an army. We don't have to do it, we must not do it, and I believe this Senate will not allow this to happen. I, therefore, urge my colleagues to vote against the Webb amendment. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to urge my colleagues to support the legislation before us today which was reported out of our committee on a 9-to-1 vote, bipartisan support. In some sense, it is unbelievable that we are here today in 2007 trying, against some odds at this moment, to give to the residents of the Capital City of the United States, the District of Columbia, the right to have a voting representative in the Congress of the United States. To me, it is unbelievable, it is palpably unjust and, in my opinion, a national embarrassment. This bill, comparable to a bill that passed the House of Representatives--bipartisan--cosponsored by Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton and Congressman Tom Davis--basically rights this grievous wrong by giving the District of Columbia, more than a half a million of our fellow Americans, a voting Member of Congress in the House of Representatives and to, frankly and directly, overcome concerns of the partisan impact of giving a House seat to the District because it tends to vote Democratic, and correcting another injustice, saying that the State of Utah, which came very close--less than 900 citizens--from having another seat in the Congress in the House as a result of the 2000 census also gets a seat. So one for the District of Columbia, one for Utah. The situation is this: The residents of the Capital City of the greatest democracy in the world do not have voting representation in Congress. And yet, they have to pay the taxes we adopt--this is taxation without representation--their budget uniquely has to be approved by the Congress, and their sons and daughters today are serving, and I add dying in disproportionate numbers, in Iraq and Afghanistan in the war on terrorism, and yet they do not have a voting representative in Congress to pass judgment on appropriations and other matters related to that war. It is time to end the injustice, to end the national embarrassment that the citizens of this great Capital City do not have voting representation in Congress. I ask all my colleagues to vote for cloture. Do not let a filibuster kill a voting rights act, as used to happen too often around here. I have been honored to join as a cosponsor of this measure my dear friend, a great Senator, Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah. I yield the remaining time we have to Senator Hatch.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to express my strong support for the legislation before us today to ensure that citizens of the District of Columbia and the State of Utah are properly represented in the U.S. House of Representatives. In the 1964 Wesberry v. Sanders case, Supreme Court Justice Hugo L. Black wrote that ``no right is more precious in a free country than that of having a voice in the election of those who make the laws under which, as good citizens, we must live.'' The bill we are considering today--S. 1257--serves this purpose. It would, for the first time, give the citizens of the District of Columbia full voting representation in the House of Representatives, while adding a fourth Congressional seat for the state of Utah, based on updated population statistics from the 2000 Census. I want to thank my good friends Senators Hatch and Bennett for greatly increasing the possibility of success this year with their support for this effort. Earlier in the year, the three of us introduced S. 1257 as a compromise that would move us beyond the partisan stalemates of the past that have denied the citizens of DC their most precious right. I must also thank DC Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton and Congressman Tom Davis, whose persistence and bipartisan cooperation has brought us to where we are today. It was they who forged the original compromise that passed the House in April by a vote of 241-177 and is now before us here in the Senate. Notwithstanding the remarkable service of Congresswoman Norton, the citizens of the District of Columbia deserve more than a non-voting delegate in the House. They deserve a representative who can vote not only in committee, as Delegate Norton now does, but also on the House floor, which she is barred from doing. The fact that District residents have been without voting representation in Congress since the District was formed more than 200 years ago is not only a national embarrassment, it is a grave injustice and at complete odds with the democratic principles on which our great nation was founded. America is the only democracy in the world that denies the citizens of its capital city this most essential right. And yet, the people of DC have been the direct target of terrorist attacks but they have no voting power over how the federal government provides homeland security. They have given their lives to protect our country in foreign wars--including the current one--but have no say in our foreign policy. They pay taxes, like every other American. In fact, they pay more: Per capita, District residents have the second-highest federal tax obligation in the country. Yet they have no voice in how high those taxes will be or how they will be spent. The District is also the only jurisdiction in the country that must seek congressional approval--through the appropriations process--before spending locally-generated tax dollars. So when Congress fails to pass appropriations bills before the beginning of the new fiscal year, the District's budget is essentially frozen. And yet DC has no say in our federal appropriations process. Giving the residents of DC voting representation in the House is not only the right and just thing to do; it has popular support. A poll conducted by the Washington Post earlier this year found that 61 percent of the nation believes it is time to end centuries of bias against the District by giving its citizens voting representation in Congress. It helps to take a look back in history to locate the original source of this inequity. In 1800, when the nation's capital was established as the District of Columbia, an apparent oversight left the area's residents without Congressional representation. Maryland and Virginia ceded land for the capital in 1788 and 1789 respectively, but it took another 11 years for Congress to establish the District. In the interim, residents continued to vote either in Maryland or Virginia, but Congress withdrew those voting rights once the District was established. Apparently by omission, Congress neglected to establish new voting rights for the citizens of the new District. Whatever the reason for this oversight, it has no relevance to reality or national principles today. To have your voice heard by your government is central to a functioning democracy and fundamental to a free society. The Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee held a hearing on the bill May 15, during which we heard compelling testimony on the need for and constitutionality of S. 1257 from legal scholars, civil rights leaders, and fellow members of Congress. The bill was reported to the full Senate on June 13 by a bipartisan vote of 9-1. The primary argument against the bill that we heard at our hearing was the question of constitutionality. Opponents cite Article I, Section 2, of the Constitution which states that the House ``shall be composed of members chosen . . . by the people of the several states.'' But those words were not written in a vacuum. Just six sections later, the framers of the Constitution gave Congress authority to ``exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever'' regarding the District. Numerous legal scholars, including Judge Ken Starr and former Assistant Attorney General Viet Dinh, both of whom have testified before Congress on this issue--said this broad authority is sufficient to give District residents full House representation. Congress has repeatedly used this authority to treat the District of Columbia as a state. In 1940, the Judiciary Act of 1789 was revised to broaden the definition of diversity jurisdiction, which refers to the authority of the federal courts to hear cases where the parties are from different states, to include the District of Columbia. This revision upheld by the courts when challenged. The courts have also found that Congress has the authority to impose federal taxes on the District; to provide a jury trial to residents of the District; and to include the District in interstate commerce regulation. These are rights and responsibilities granted to states in the Constitution, yet the District Clause has allowed Congress to apply them to DC. We should also remember that Congress has granted voting rights to Americans abroad in their last state of residence regardless of whether they are citizens of that state, pay taxes in that state, or have any intent to return to that state. Clearly, the courts have supported broader interpretations of Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution. If, after listening to these arguments, you still doubt the constitutionality of this legislation, I hope I can persuade you to support it because it is the right thing to do, and we can let the courts resolve the constitutional dispute at a later date, once and for all. S. 1257 requires expedited judicial consideration of any appropriate court challenge, so any question of constitutional interpretation will be answered promptly. Finally, allow me to reassure skeptics that in no way does this bill open the door to granting the District voting representation in the Senate, as some have contended. In fact, language was added in our Committee markup explicitly stating that DC, and I quote here, ``shall not be considered a state for purposes of representation in the United States Senate.'' End of quote. It can't get any clearer than that. The vote we are about to cast will decide whether the Senate should proceed to the bill. It is a vote on whether this legislation is worthy of Senate consideration. No matter where you stand on the merits of this bill, surely you must agree that a bill on voting representation and equal rights deserves consideration by the United States Senate. The Senate has not filibustered a civil rights bill since the summer of 1964 when it spent 57 days including six Saturdays on the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Let us together assure the American public that the days of filibustering voting rights bills are over. The House has acted. It is now time for the Senate to do the same. The legislation introduced in both the House and the Senate is an expression of fairness and bipartisanship, an example of what we can do when we work across party lines as the good people of this nation have so often asked us to do. Members from both parties and both houses have finally come together to find a solution to break the stalemates of the past that have denied DC residents equal representation in the Congress of the United States. Now is the time to give the residents of the District what they so richly deserve and that is the same civic entitlement that every other federal tax-paying American citizen enjoys, no matter where he or she lives. By giving the citizens of the District of Columbia a genuine vote in the House, we will ensure not only that their voices will finally be fully heard. We will be following the imperatives of our national democratic values.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Madam President, I call up amendment No. 2691.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Madam President, this is an amendment I am pleased to offer with Senators Brownback and Kyl. It would restore the $75 million requested by the administration to support programs of democracy, rule of law, and governance in Iran. I ask unanimous consent that Senators Coleman and Graham be added as original sponsors.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. No government today poses a greater threat to the United States, indeed, to the Middle East and probably to the world, than the Islamic Republic of Iran. We are all aware of the belligerent international behavior of the Iranian regime, its efforts to develop nuclear weapons, its use of Islamist terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Taliban, to undermine moderate governments across the Middle East, its designation by the United States State Department as the No. 1 state sponsor of terror and, of course, its escalating proxy war against American troops and Iraqi civilians and military in Iraq, where the Iranian Revolutionary Guard has been training, arming, equipping, and directing terrorists who are responsible in turn for the murder of hundreds of American soldiers and the murder of thousands of Iraqi civilians and soldiers. What may, I fear, be less appreciated is that Iran's extremist terrorist behavior abroad is matched by equally extremist behavior at home. Just as the Iranian regime has been supporting the forces of repression and terror against the people of Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, and Afghanistan, it is also escalating a campaign of repression and terror against its own citizens, the people of Iran. As the New York Times reported yesterday, the Iranian Government has in recent months ``arrested prominent intellectuals, suppressed the Iranian student movement, rolled back social freedoms, purged university faculties, [and] closed newspapers.'' This assault on Iranian civil society has been well documented by the most prominent international human rights nongovernmental organizations. Amnesty International, for instance, reports that ``in recent months, the Iranian authorities have been carrying out a widespread crackdown on civil society, targeting academics, women's rights activists, students, journalists and labor organizations.'' Dissidents and democrats in Iran today are under attack by their own Government. The question before this Congress is whether we are going to stand with them in solidarity or whether we will turn away our heads. This amendment would provide $75 million in funds, the amount requested by the administration; in fact, announced by Secretary of State Rice. That announcement, I know from sources I have, was broadly heard and appreciated within the Iranian civil society dissident movement. The committee has recommended one- third of that amount of money. This $75 million would go to labor activists, women's groups, journalists, human rights advocates, and other members of Iranian civil society. It provides Congress an opportunity to demonstrate that even as we condemn the behavior of the Iranian regime, we stand with the Iranian people, a people with a proud history who truly are, in my opinion, yearning to be free. That freedom is suppressed by the fanatical regime that dominates their lives today. The alternative path before Congress, if we don't adopt this amendment, would be to cut the administration's request by two-thirds. At that level of funding, existing programs will not only be unable to expand, they will actually be cut back. In other words, at just the moment when the Iranian Government is engaged in an unprecedented rollback of the human rights and political freedoms of the Iranian people, the American Government will be rolling back its own programs to help defend those rights and freedoms. Why would we do this? The report language of the Appropriations subcommittee, I say respectfully, says that ``the Committee supports the goals of promoting democracy in Iran,'' but ``it is particularly concerned that grantees suspected of receiving U.S. assistance have been harassed and arrested by the Government of Iran for their pro-democracy activities.'' I ask unanimous consent to be given another 5 minutes.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. In other words, the argument against this amendment seems to be that we should give less to help dissidents in Iran because our help, in turn, may lead to their harassment by the totalitarian government in Tehran. I respectfully disagree with this logic. I know that we do not give less to democracy advocates in Myanmar or Zimbabwe or Belarus when they are being harassed by the regime, nor do we give less to freedom fighters behind the Iron Curtain in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary. On the contrary, it is precisely when dissidents are under attack that they need more help from the United States, not less. I am sure my colleagues would agree that if we give less money to these civil society human rights activists in Iran, the Iranian regime will not repress them any less. The repression probably, in fact, will be greater. As to the argument that those who accept this money--and I can say, speaking generally, that the money is given through third parties, international organizations, to the civil society human rights advocates in Iran--that somehow they will be harassed for receiving this money, I believe the just and right thing to do is leave that decision to those who are fighting for freedom in Iran, for us to be willing to help them if they want that help. The record is clear there. Since the State Department began making these grants 8 months ago, 90 percent of the fiscal year 2006 funds have been obligated, with the remaining funds expected to be obligated by mid-September. Perhaps there are some Iranian groups that do not want our funding, but it is clear that many others do. The need is great. It is beyond the $75 million this amendment would provide. That choice should be theirs. Our moral responsibility is to make the money available to these courageous fighters for freedom in Iran, those who want not only more freedom but a better future for themselves and their children. I want to close by saying that we know from history that dissidents can change history, because history is made not by abstract, inexorable forces but by individual human beings such as Vaclav Havel or Lech Walesa or Andrei Sakharov or Natan Sharansky. It was the bravery of these people that kindled our moral imagination to see the suffering of millions behind the Iron Curtain, and it was their leadership that inspired millions more to cast off their shackles and overthrow a cruel and dictatorial system of Communist government that many thought would endure forever. Like the Communist terrorists of eastern Europe, the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran repress their people because they are frightened of them. They know how powerful the dissidents and the democrats in their midst can become. These are the people to whom this money would go. That is the reason my colleagues and I have offered this amendment. I ask all Members of the Senate to support it, and I thank the Chair. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I speak today to congratulate the Bridgeport Public School System, which for the second year in a row has been selected as a finalist for the Broad Prize for Urban Education. The $1 million Broad Prize, the largest education prize given to school districts, is awarded each year to honor urban school districts that demonstrate the greatest overall performance and improvement in student achievement while reducing achievement gaps for poor and minority students. That Bridgeport has been nominated for this award 2 years in a row speaks volumes about the progress Bridgeport has made educating its students. The city's schools serve the highest percentage of low-income students in Connecticut, with 95 percent of its students eligible for either free or reduced-price school lunches. Yet in 2006, Bridgeport students outperformed their peers in demographically similar districts in the State in reading and math at all grade levels. In fact, Bridgeport is the only one of those school districts to improve in reading and math at all grade levels from 2003 to 2006. This improvement was seen across all subgroups of students, including low- income, African-American and Hispanic students. The city has also done a remarkable job in closing the achievement gap between White and minority students. Bridgeport has reduced achievement gaps between Hispanic students and their White peers in high school reading and math, as well as in elementary school reading, and the district has reduced achievement gaps for African-American students in high school math. In addition, Bridgeport has closed the Hispanic achievement gap faster than the State average in elementary and high school reading and high school math. This is no small feat, considering that almost 90 percent of the district's students are racial minorities. The Broad Foundation has praised the district's willingness to take a hard look at the data it collects on student performance, and using it to identify where it is succeeding and where it needs to improve. In fact, Bridgeport uses this data to put together quarterly assessments that are tightly aligned to State standards. Data from these assessments is available in real time, allowing for immediate diagnostics and subsequent adjustments. Given the proliferation of data, administrators and teachers have become more comfortable using it and district administrators have reported that school principals have been using the data to determine their schools' needs and plans. Teachers have also reported that they too analyze the data when meeting together in teams to determine their strengths and weaknesses. This results-based approach, where the main focus is on student performance, has so far been a rousing success. I would like to congratulate Superintendent John J. Ramos, Sr., and all the teachers, principals, administrators, and other school personnel of the Bridgeport public schools not just for the nomination, but for all the hard work they have done to provide a better education to their students. They have proven that it is possible to give all children a fair opportunity to receive a high-quality education. May other districts follow their example.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce, together with my colleagues Senator Mary Landrieu and Senator Norm Coleman, the All Students Can Achieve Act. This bill represents a comprehensive bipartisan proposal to strengthen and improve No Child Left Behind, NCLB. We hope that many of the ideas contained in our proposal will be considered by the HELP Committee as it tackles NCLB reauthorization, and we look forward to working with the committee to that end. Over 5 years ago, the President and Congress created a watershed moment in American education when we enacted the No Child Left Behind Act. We worked together across party lines and from both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue to address an ongoing crisis in our public schools, especially schools in minority and low-income communities, where students' reading and math achievement was far below that of peers in better off white communities. Closing these student achievement gaps may be the most important civil rights movement of our time. In No Child Left Behind we made a national commitment to reject as unacceptable a system in which low- income minority students were reading at a grade level 4 years below that of their higher-income peers. We made a national commitment to bring an end to that intolerable gap and to ensure that each and every child, regardless of race, nationality or family income, could develop his or her talents to the fullest. No Child Left Behind had the goal of bringing all minority and disadvantaged children, including children with disabilities, the attention and support they need to succeed, by holding schools and States accountable for delivering results to all of their students. With passage of NCLB, we made a good start. Progress has occurred but there is much more to be done to close the persistent gaps in student achievement. No Child Left Behind, which Congress must now reauthorize, provides a foundation, but we now must take new, bold steps to fulfill the national commitments we first made 5 years ago. So that is why today we are presenting a significant reform proposal, which we are calling the All Students Can Achieve Act, and which we ask our colleagues and the President to give serious consideration as we work to reauthorize No Child Left Behind. I want to touch briefly on some of the key features in this bill that build upon the reforms of the No Child Left Behind Act, and will attach a more detailed summary at the conclusion of my remarks. Central to our strategy for closing the achievement gap is the pathway our bill creates for getting the very best teachers, teachers who are the best at bringing real learning and real growth in achievement to their students, into the schools and classrooms where they are most needed. No one does more important work in our society today than good teachers. We must attract, train and pay them as the critical professionals that they are. In our proposal, we ask States to move to a ``teacher effectiveness'' evaluation system. This system would evaluate teacher performance based on results in the classroom. To get to this point, States must develop comprehensive data systems that can track individual student growth and performance, and link student performance to individual teachers. We require and fund the data systems, and permit development of so-called growth models for compliance with Adequate Yearly Progress, AYP. Growth models give schools credit for boosting student performance over time, even where absolute test results are not at required levels. By linking student growth to individual teachers, States can measure teacher effectiveness by determining which teachers demonstrate learning gains in the classroom. Our proposal allows those States that have developed meritorious teacher effectiveness systems to opt out of the Federal Highly Qualified Teacher requirements, and to benefit from additional flexibilities in the use of Federal funds. Further, since we want to make sure that we can get the best teachers to the students most in need, our bill requires an equitable distribution of effective teachers across all schools and ultimately, after teacher professional development, if teachers are still not effective, we assign them away from our most needy schools. Our bill includes a provision to ensure that future collective bargaining agreements allow this to happen. In fact, because we recognize that there is nobody more important than a teacher, especially the most effective teachers, our bill puts the option of merit pay on the radar screen through a discretionary grant program to support new ideas for teacher professional development, tenure, assignment and compensation policies. We also seek to enrich the quality of education by, among other things, giving schools the option to bring in experienced professionals in math, science and critical foreign languages, as members of an Adjunct Teacher Corps. We strengthen accountability by closing the existing loopholes that often prevent States and schools from truly measuring the actual achievement of minority students. Instead of allowing minority students to fall through the cracks of underachievement, this will force schools to take the steps needed to close the achievement gap for those students. Our bill gives parents the option of transferring their children in failing schools to other public schools, including schools across district lines if there is not an acceptable option within the original school district. In addition, our bill provides a two-track system for schools missing AYP. Schools missing AYP due to one or more subgroups, but less than 50 percent of the student population, would go through a more targeted attention program to address the problem areas. Finally, we call for the development of voluntary American standards and assessments. Here we seek to address the need to promote rigorous standards and assessment of student learning to ensure that all students, no matter where they are schooled, are taught the skills they need to succeed in life. We call on the National Assessment Governing Board, with an expanded membership to include more teachers and business leaders, to develop these world class standards. States may choose to adopt these standards, thereby freeing up State resources. Alternatively, states could build their own assessments and standards based on the American standards, keep their own standards and tests, or team together in regional censorial to develop standards and assessments. The Department of Education would report to Congress on the variance between the rigor of state assessments and the American standards and assessments in cases where the voluntary standards are not used. It should be apparent that nothing in our bill would interfere with State flexibility to determine teaching format and substance. In sum, No Child Left Behind is not just the name of an education law. It remains a solemn and urgent commitment that we made to America's children and parents. Because far too many children are still left behind and denied the opportunity to succeed in our society, we have renewed that commitment by offering this bill. I want to thank my colleagues and cosponsors, Senators Mary Landrieu and Norm Coleman, and their staffs for their help in shaping this bill. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill and a detailed summary be printed in the Record There being no objection the material was ordered to be printed in

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair, and I thank the Senator from Missouri. May I say first that I regret this debate is happening at all. I regret the news coverage of this discussion. I wish this had been able to be settled among Members of both parties in both Houses and the executive branch. If not, I wish we were debating this in executive session. Why do I regret this debate is occurring? Because we are at war. We were attacked on September 11, 2001 by a brutal, inhumane enemy who killed 3,000 Americans and intends to do so again. They tell us repeatedly. This is about gathering intelligence on that enemy. I regret we are having this debate. I regret all the publicity, because I fear they will learn something indirectly about the methods of intelligence we have. But here we are. I want to explain why I will vote for the McConnell-Bond proposal. I am because we are at war. I am because it has been publicly suggested there is increased terrorist activity. We have seen the Web site of threats against the United States, suggesting even threats against the Capitol, the citadel of our democracy, by these extremist Islamist terrorists. Admiral McConnell, whom everyone says they respect--I respect him; I trust him--says to us--and I will be as vague as I need to be and want to be--he is missing for a reason a tool he needs to adequately gather intelligence on the terrorist threat. He has told us what he needs to close that gap. I think we are beyond the point of debating what might be a better way to do this. I feel that particularly because Senator Bond has added the 6-month sunset. We have a crisis. We are at war. The enemy is plotting to attack us. This proposal will allow us to gather intelligence information on that enemy we otherwise would not gather. This is not the time for striving for legislative perfection. We have the 6 months after this is adopted to work together to try to do something everyone believes is more appropriate. Concerns have been expressed about American citizens, again being as vague as we all ought to be. The fact is, we have been told authoritatively that these acts of surveillance will only touch American citizens coincidentally, and an infinitesimally small number. So you have to balance. What are your concerns about that, a program run by Admiral McConnell and an extraordinary staff at the NSA who work for us? These are our soldiers in the war against terrorism. I want to give them the power and authority they need to find out what our enemy is doing so we can stop them before they attack us. With all respect to my colleagues, I plead with everyone, let us not strive for perfection. Let us put national security first. Let us understand if this passes, as I pray it will, and the President signs it, as I know he will if it passes both Houses, we are going to have 6 months to reason together to find something better. If we leave Washington for August recess without closing this gap in our Nation's intelligence capabilities at a time of war, it will be quite simply a dereliction of duty by this Congress. It will be a failure to uphold our constitutional responsibility to provide for the common defense. I appeal to my friends on both sides of the aisle, let's do what we need to do now. Let's do what Admiral Mike McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence, tells us he needs to provide intelligence to our Government to enable our Government to protect us from terrorists. I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce, together with my colleagues Senator Mary Landrieu and Senator Norm Coleman, the All Students Can Achieve Act. This bill represents a comprehensive bipartisan proposal to strengthen and improve No Child Left Behind, NCLB. We hope that many of the ideas contained in our proposal will be considered by the HELP Committee as it tackles NCLB reauthorization, and we look forward to working with the committee to that end. Over 5 years ago, the President and Congress created a watershed moment in American education when we enacted the No Child Left Behind Act. We worked together across party lines and from both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue to address an ongoing crisis in our public schools, especially schools in minority and low-income communities, where students' reading and math achievement was far below that of peers in better off white communities. Closing these student achievement gaps may be the most important civil rights movement of our time. In No Child Left Behind we made a national commitment to reject as unacceptable a system in which low- income minority students were reading at a grade level 4 years below that of their higher-income peers. We made a national commitment to bring an end to that intolerable gap and to ensure that each and every child, regardless of race, nationality or family income, could develop his or her talents to the fullest. No Child Left Behind had the goal of bringing all minority and disadvantaged children, including children with disabilities, the attention and support they need to succeed, by holding schools and States accountable for delivering results to all of their students. With passage of NCLB, we made a good start. Progress has occurred but there is much more to be done to close the persistent gaps in student achievement. No Child Left Behind, which Congress must now reauthorize, provides a foundation, but we now must take new, bold steps to fulfill the national commitments we first made 5 years ago. So that is why today we are presenting a significant reform proposal, which we are calling the All Students Can Achieve Act, and which we ask our colleagues and the President to give serious consideration as we work to reauthorize No Child Left Behind. I want to touch briefly on some of the key features in this bill that build upon the reforms of the No Child Left Behind Act, and will attach a more detailed summary at the conclusion of my remarks. Central to our strategy for closing the achievement gap is the pathway our bill creates for getting the very best teachers, teachers who are the best at bringing real learning and real growth in achievement to their students, into the schools and classrooms where they are most needed. No one does more important work in our society today than good teachers. We must attract, train and pay them as the critical professionals that they are. In our proposal, we ask States to move to a ``teacher effectiveness'' evaluation system. This system would evaluate teacher performance based on results in the classroom. To get to this point, States must develop comprehensive data systems that can track individual student growth and performance, and link student performance to individual teachers. We require and fund the data systems, and permit development of so-called growth models for compliance with Adequate Yearly Progress, AYP. Growth models give schools credit for boosting student performance over time, even where absolute test results are not at required levels. By linking student growth to individual teachers, States can measure teacher effectiveness by determining which teachers demonstrate learning gains in the classroom. Our proposal allows those States that have developed meritorious teacher effectiveness systems to opt out of the Federal Highly Qualified Teacher requirements, and to benefit from additional flexibilities in the use of Federal funds. Further, since we want to make sure that we can get the best teachers to the students most in need, our bill requires an equitable distribution of effective teachers across all schools and ultimately, after teacher professional development, if teachers are still not effective, we assign them away from our most needy schools. Our bill includes a provision to ensure that future collective bargaining agreements allow this to happen. In fact, because we recognize that there is nobody more important than a teacher, especially the most effective teachers, our bill puts the option of merit pay on the radar screen through a discretionary grant program to support new ideas for teacher professional development, tenure, assignment and compensation policies. We also seek to enrich the quality of education by, among other things, giving schools the option to bring in experienced professionals in math, science and critical foreign languages, as members of an Adjunct Teacher Corps. We strengthen accountability by closing the existing loopholes that often prevent States and schools from truly measuring the actual achievement of minority students. Instead of allowing minority students to fall through the cracks of underachievement, this will force schools to take the steps needed to close the achievement gap for those students. Our bill gives parents the option of transferring their children in failing schools to other public schools, including schools across district lines if there is not an acceptable option within the original school district. In addition, our bill provides a two-track system for schools missing AYP. Schools missing AYP due to one or more subgroups, but less than 50 percent of the student population, would go through a more targeted attention program to address the problem areas. Finally, we call for the development of voluntary American standards and assessments. Here we seek to address the need to promote rigorous standards and assessment of student learning to ensure that all students, no matter where they are schooled, are taught the skills they need to succeed in life. We call on the National Assessment Governing Board, with an expanded membership to include more teachers and business leaders, to develop these world class standards. States may choose to adopt these standards, thereby freeing up State resources. Alternatively, states could build their own assessments and standards based on the American standards, keep their own standards and tests, or team together in regional censorial to develop standards and assessments. The Department of Education would report to Congress on the variance between the rigor of state assessments and the American standards and assessments in cases where the voluntary standards are not used. It should be apparent that nothing in our bill would interfere with State flexibility to determine teaching format and substance. In sum, No Child Left Behind is not just the name of an education law. It remains a solemn and urgent commitment that we made to America's children and parents. Because far too many children are still left behind and denied the opportunity to succeed in our society, we have renewed that commitment by offering this bill. I want to thank my colleagues and cosponsors, Senators Mary Landrieu and Norm Coleman, and their staffs for their help in shaping this bill. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill and a detailed summary be printed in the Record There being no objection the material was ordered to be printed in

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Reserving the right to object, and I will not object, I wanted to ask my friend from Iowa how long he intends to speak.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair, and I have no objection.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank my friend from California for her leadership in this very important matter. We all know, if you read the public opinion polls, Congress is at an all-time low in the estimation of the American people. I am not going to comment about the political impact of that, but more broadly on the fact that this is, in our self-estimation, the greatest democracy in the world, and that means this is a government which depends on the support of those we govern--the consent of the governed. When the level of trust and respect between the people of the United States and the Members of this elected Congress is as low as it is now, our democracy is less than it should be. I don't want to say it is in jeopardy, but I will say that it is weakened by this distrust. So why does this distrust exist? I am sure everybody has their own favorite explanations. It seems to me that part of it is a pervasive partisanship here that gets in the way of us producing results, producing solutions to problems that people have--the people who are good enough to honor us by sending us here. They are frustrated because they think we too often put partisan interests ahead of public interests, ahead of their interests. Another reason for the low estimation and opinion the American people have of Congress today is the wave of scandals that has afflicted the Congress and individual Members. When one Member is accused or convicted of an ethical or legal lapse, it affects the attitude of the people toward the entire institution. These seem to have come with increasing frequency. Ultimately, no law can guarantee that an individual anywhere, including in Congress, will do the right thing and will be ethical. There are always private moments when we will all have to count on our moral compasses and our values center. But we adopt law to try to create a clarity of rules and create incentives for our society overall--and in this case, we ourselves--to guide us, encourage us, hopefully to scare us into doing the right thing. It is in that context that I rise with real enthusiasm to support the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act which is before the Senate today. This is not only the right thing to do in every substantive way, but it is the right thing to do in the larger sense that I described, of trying to rebuild the respect the American people have for this institution and for all of us who are Members of it. The focus here is on disclosure, as it ought to be. The American people will naturally view darkly what is done in the shadows. They want to know that what we do in their names here in Congress is done with their best interests at heart rather than the narrow interests of a special few whose money may appear to the public to buy those special few access. Those suspicions, in the context of public cases of ethical and legal violations, grow in the darkness. The American people must know, through disclosure and sunlight--and this bill will shine light on so much of what we do--that the only special interest being represented here in Congress is the interest of the American people who were good enough to honor us by sending us here to serve them. This sweeping legislation shines much needed light in corners and corridors of this Capitol, too long left in the dark. It should help restore the public's trust now, a trust that is in much need of restoration. I am proud to say that much of the lobbying part of this legislation came from the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, last year under the leadership of Senator Collins, this year under my chairmanship. We always have worked together on a bipartisan basis. With regard to lobbying, I wish to cite a few of the key proposals that increase disclosure. This bill will bring the Lobbying Disclosure Act into the age of the Internet by requiring electronic filings and by requiring quarterly-- rather than semiannual--reports detailing lobbying activities that lobbyists perform for specific clients. The reports are going to be right there for the public to see on the House and Senate Web sites. Second, the bill amends the Lobbying Disclosure Act to require lobbyists to file reports detailing their activities beyond lobbying directly. That includes campaign contributions, payments for events to honor Members or to entities controlled by Members, and donations to Member charities, Presidential libraries or inaugural committees. None of these contributions are currently disclosed under law. This legislation attempts to build a broader wall between what we do here in serving the public and the lobbying world. Lobbying is a constitutionally protected activity. We are not trying to stop it or curtail it. We are trying to make sure it is done in an honorable and honest way. This legislation increases from 1 to 2 years the cooling-off period before Senators can come back and lobby their colleagues. The bill also adds a provision to the Lobbying Disclosure Act prohibiting lobbyists from knowingly providing gifts or travel to Members in violation of House or Senate ethics rules, putting lobbyists on the hook for civil or criminal penalties if they violate the rules. Amendments to the Lobbying Disclosure Act will also shine a spotlight on so-called stealth coalitions by requiring greater disclosure of the identity of individual organizations that contribute to collective and focused lobbying efforts. We back all these provisions with teeth--better enforcement. We increase civil penalties under the Lobbying Disclosure Act and create new criminal penalties for knowing and corrupt failure to comply with the act. We will have annual audits. We require annual audits by the Government Accountability Office, GAO, of lobbyists' filings--that is a second tier of review--and regular reporting by the Department of Justice on actions they take against those who violate the rules. Those are the most significant parts of this legislation that came out of our committee with regard to lobbying. I do wish to compliment my friend and colleague from California, Senator Feinstein, for her work in putting together an extremely tough ethics package. I think it is a very significant accomplishment for her in the first half year of her chairmanship of the Senate Rules Committee. In particular, I am pleased the final package, for the first time, requires so-called bundled campaign contributions made by lobbyists to Federal candidates to be disclosed to the public and published on the Federal Election Commission Web site. I know Senator Feinstein has mentioned, and others will, other reforms here. I wish to say just a final word about earmarks. This was an issue that came up in my campaign for reelection last year. I was accused by one of my opponents of bringing earmarks back to Connecticut. I thought that was something good to do. I said, like so much else in life, there are good earmarks and bad earmarks. Bad earmarks can often get through if there is not adequate disclosure. If you support an earmark and it is in legislation, you ought to not only be proud to be identified with that earmark in public but, if necessary, to come to the floor and defend the earmark to make sure it has the support of your colleagues. This legislation requires that all earmarks included in bills and conference reports and their sponsors be identified on the Internet at least 48 hours before the Senate votes. Senators will be required to certify that they and their immediate family members have no financial interest in these earmarks. Dead-of-night additions to conference reports--that is, new earmarks, business that has too often been done here without public scrutiny or even the scrutiny of most Members of Congress--will now be subject to a 60-vote point of order. I will say, if a Senator from yesteryear--not so far back yesteryear, 15 years, maybe 10 years--came back and saw that we were doing this here, they would wonder where they were. But where they would be is someplace where the American people justifiably want us to be. Once the elections are over, the American people expect us to come here and do their business. That is exactly what this legislation will make much more likely. In the end, as I said at the beginning, it all comes down to the moral compass each Member of Congress has and the respect we give to the office in which it is our privilege to serve. But government in the shadows with deals cut behind closed doors invites abuse, breeds distrust, and simply must end. This bill goes a long way toward doing exactly that. I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to offer my support to not only the reauthorization of the Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, but also to the expansion of this successful program. CHIP was created a decade ago on a bipartisan basis with the support of a Democratic President and a Republican Congress. Members of both sides of the aisle came together to address the problem of uninsured children across this country. In 1997, over 22 percent uninsured low- income children were uninsured. In 2005, that percentage had decreased to less than 15 percent. It is clear that CHIP has significantly lowered the percentage of low-income children that are uninsured. Overall, CHIP has led to a one-third reduction in the percentage of low-income uninsured children in America. CHIP covers a total of 6 million children today, and research shows us that these children are doing better than those without insurance. CHIP kids are more likely to have seen a physician, and to have had a well-child visit than uninsured children. They are more likely to receive hospital care and prescription medications for their health conditions. Most importantly, CHIP kids have better health and academic outcomes, such as improved care for asthma; declines in infant mortality, childhood deaths, and low-birth weight; and improved academic performance. These facts make it clear that our bottom line should not be dollar amounts, but the health and success of our children, and it is clear that children enrolled in CHIP are healthier and doing better in the classroom. I see no greater reason than that to expand this successful program. CHIP is a national success story that we should all take pride in. Unfortunately, it is one the few success stories that we have to report in health care over the last decade. Health care costs are rising at ever increasing rates, employer sponsored coverage is decreasing, the numbers of uninsured is rising, health care quality is not where it should be given the amount we spend on health care, and patients are not involved enough in their own care. As families, businesses, and providers confront these realities, Washington is in a deadlock about how to solve one of our most daunting domestic challenges. CHIP, however, offers this Congress another opportunity to reduce the number of uninsured children in this country now. Just as importantly, we have an opportunity to also make an investment in our future by improving the health status of our Nation's children. It is imperative to our Nation's future health security to provide these children with the coverage they need to be healthy and productive for years to come. I know that members of both parties want to cover uninsured children in their States and across the country. Members of both parties want CHIP to function as efficiently as possible and to reach those most in need. Members of both parties want to provide States with flexibility to address their States' unique concerns. Now, we are all faced with a new challenge--to cover the 9 million children that remain uninsured across America, 6 million of whom are eligible for Medicaid or CHIP. This challenge brought a core group of Senators from the Finance Committee together around these common goals, which they used as a foundation for reauthorizing and expanding this successful program to move towards covering all of the 9 million uninsured children that remain in this Nation. Both sides worked tirelessly together and compromised so that the legislation we are now considering could be brought to the Senate floor and so that we could move towards bringing health security to more of America's uninsured children. If enacted, this legislation would provide coverage to over 3 million more children, again reducing the number of uninsured children by one-third. States would receive new funding for reaching out to eligible children and enrolling them. States will also receive funding based on their spending projections, thereby reducing the likelihood of budget shortfalls as we have seen increasingly in recent years. States will receive incentives to lower the rates of uninsured children in their State. Lastly, States will continue to have the flexibility to design programs that meet their unique needs. In Connecticut, children up to 300 percent of the Federal poverty level are eligible for CHIP and this legislation would allow my State to continue to build on its success and enroll even more children into this successful program. This legislation also establishes a new framework for improving quality, which should be a priority as we consider ways of containing health care costs, by creating a quality initiative to develop, implement, collect measurement data on quality of care. I know there are some in the Senate that are opposed to this legislation and to the expansion of this program. This week they have spoken extensively on their proposals for health care reform and their willingness to move forward on that larger issue. However, while we wait to reform the health care system in this partisan environment, children in this country are living without access to health care. We have a moral obligation to care for these children and give them the best chance to succeed in school, and at life, by keeping them healthy. There are others that say the program should be expanded even more significantly. While I agree with this latter sentiment, the nature of the work of this body is bipartisan. To progress, we each may have to give something up to our colleagues. I urge them to continue on this course and support this legislation. The legislation before this Senate body is the product of months of bipartisan negotiation, compromise, and a shared vision and goal across both parties. CHIP reauthorization should be an example to all in this Chamber of what can be accomplished when we put partisanship aside and focus on what we have in common. Most of all, I urge the President to not veto CHIP reauthorization if a bill were to reach his desk. It would signal a colossal missed opportunity to provide health security to those that are most vulnerable in our Nation.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank my friend, the Senator from New Mexico, for the enormous contribution his efforts have made to move the climate change debate forward. He has taken the time to study and consider many of the nuts-and-bolts issues that are critical to developing a balanced approach, and we all are better informed for his efforts. Like my friend, I stand here today very optimistic that we can forge bipartisan legislation. It is my honor to chair a subcommittee on climate change in the Environment and Public Works Committee and to have Senator Warner as my ranking member. Senator Boxer has shown great leadership and commitment to moving climate legislation through our full committee, and I look forward to working with her and all members of our committee to report out a strong bill in the fall. Senator Warner and I have reached agreement on the salient aspects of our climate proposal. I agree with Senator Bingaman's description of the necessary design elements and believe that he and others will find that the legislation we are working on in our committee embraces these same principles. Much of the debate recently has centered on what level of U.S. emissions reductions are necessary to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gas emissions by midcentury to avoid catastrophic consequences. I believe that it is ultimately our moral responsibility to curb our emissions to avoid these consequences for those who follow us here on Earth. I also agree that we must ensure that our efforts to address climate change are consistent with our commitment to strengthening the U.S. economy and our economic competitiveness. I note that some labor unions support the Low Carbon Economy Act, and while I also recognize that we are proposing approaches to cost- containment that overlap in part and differ in part, I am optimistic that we may be able to find a common way forward that will protect the environment and the economy. It is my personal belief that reducing climate pollution will ultimately provide a benefit to the U.S. economy; however Senator Warner and I recognize that there remain many in this body who are deeply concerned about economic impacts from climate regulation. For these reasons, like Senators Bingaman and Specter, I am convinced that we must have robust cost-control measures in place in order to forge the bipartisan consensus needed for timely and aggressive action. The world is looking toward the United States for leadership on climate change. Only with bipartisan leadership and quick action will we be able assume this leadership role. I appreciate my colleagues joining me today in this colloquy and pledge that I will work closely with them to ensure that the bill we report out of the Environment and Public Works Committee enjoys the broadest level of bipartisan support possible.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I am committed to working with you and suggest that we bring our key staff together early in the recess to move this discussion forward. I think we all agree that these issues must be resolved and we can only benefit from a serious effort to try and resolve them together.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I am the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. I apologize to my colleagues for any misunderstanding. We had a very busy agenda, important matters that we needed to get done today. I did make a request that the vote be held open. It was the wisdom of the Chair not to do so. I particularly express my regret to my colleagues, for some of whom this was the first rollcall that they have missed. Anyway, for myself, had I been here I would have voted in the negative. It would not have altered the result.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to state my support for the legislation Senators Klobuchar, Alexander, and I are introducing today to create a regional Presidential primary system effective in 2012. The goal of this legislation is to transform what has become a tired, arbitrary, and exclusive presidential primary system that simply does not give enough voters the opportunity to weigh the ideas of candidates and choose the one they think would best represent their future. Given the significance of choosing the most powerful officeholder in the world, our Presidential selection process must be a fair and deliberate one that tests the strength of the ideas and character of all the candidates and exposes them to the maximum number of voters. Instead, what we have now is a confusing process that, with each passing Presidential election season, becomes more and more compressed, forcing States to move their primaries up earlier in the calendar year in order to give their citizens a chance to participate, and granting disproportionate influence to the early States. Where 50 States once scattered their primaries throughout the first half of the election year--from January through June--this year, we have a system in which 39 caucuses or primaries will be held in January and February alone, up from 19 in 2004, with enough delegates at stake potentially to decide the nominee. Almost half the States of the Union will be excluded from that process. There is another insidious effect of this increasingly condensed schedule: The more compressed the primary schedule is the more reliant candidates become on large campaign donations and the people who give them. The fundraising primary this year has already eliminated candidates who simply could not raise sufficient funds quickly enough to be competitive in the first 2 months of the Presidential year. This is no way for the world's greatest democracy to choose its President. Our legislation offers a commonsense alternative that would transform the primary season into what it should be: a contest between candidates who take their cases to the broadest possible slice of the electorate. I was honored to cosponsor proposals to bring reason to the Presidential primary system twice in the past--in 1996 and 1999--with former Senator Slade Gorton. What we are introducing today is very similar in that it calls for a regional, rotating primary system that divides the 50 States into four regions that would take turns holding primaries in the months of March, April, May, and June of the Presidential election year. Specifically, the bill would asign all States to one of four regions--corresponding roughly to the Northeast, South, Midwest, and Western regions of the country. A lottery would determine which region goes first, and the regions would rotate in subsequent election years. Each State within a region must hold its primary or caucus during the period assigned to that region. New Hampshire and Iowa would be permitted to continue holding the first primary and caucus, respectively, before any of the regional primaries would take place. I personally would have preferred to omit this provision in the bill. If we are going to change to a regional system, there should be no exceptions, and I am concerned that these two States will continue to have a disproportionate impact on the outcome of the nominating process. But Iowa and New Hampshire hold iconic status in the Presidential primary system and so they remain the first caucus and primary States in this bill. The new system would take effect for the 2012 Presidential election. By creating a series of regional primaries, we will make it more likely that all areas of the country have input into the nominee selection process, and that the candidates and their treasuries will not be stretched so thin by primaries all over the country on the same day. By spreading out the primaries over a 4-month period, we would provide the electorate with a better opportunity to evaluate the candidates over time. And with our bill, we hope that voters--not just financial contributors--will have the lion's share of influence over who the parties' nominees will be. The guiding principle of our democracy is that every citizen has the opportunity to choose his or her leaders. But the sad truth is this principle no longer bears a resemblance to the reality of an increasingly squashed and arbitrary primary system. We need to change our presidential primary system to make it more reasonable, more inclusive, and better structured so that it properly reflects the significance it holds--not only every 4 years but as a founding principle of our great Nation.