Joseph Lieberman

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I have no objection whatsoever. We will look forward to a good, hearty debate on Senator Byrd's amendment tomorrow.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to voice my strong support for the convincing call to action against Iraq that President Bush issued yesterday at the United Nations to discuss the unique dangers created by Saddam Hussein's regime and to argue that it is imperative that the international community, led by the United States of America, mobilize now to eliminate those dangers. On September 11, 2001, a foreboding new chapter in American history began. On that day, our Government was reawakened in this new century to its oldest and most solemn responsibility: protecting the lives and liberty of the American people. As we survey the landscape of threats to our security in the years ahead, the greatest are terrorists--al-Qaida and rogue regimes such as Saddam Hussein's. Saddam hates America and Americans and is working furiously to accumulate deadly weapons of mass destruction and the missiles, planes, and unmanned aerial vehicles to use in attacking distant targets. Every day Saddam remains in power is a day of danger for the Iraqi people, for Iraq's neighbors, for the American people, and for the world. As long as Saddam remains in power, there will be no genuine security and no lasting peace in the Middle East, among the Arab nations or among the Arabs, Israelis, and Christians who live there. The threat Saddam poses has been articulated so often that some may have grown numb to the reality of his brutality. But after September 11, we must reacquaint ourselves with him because if we do not understand and act, his next victims, like Osama bin Laden's, could be innocent Americans. President Bush advanced that process with great effectiveness in his speech at the U.N. yesterday, albeit after a season long on the beating of drums of war and short on explaining why war may now be necessary. But the President did that yesterday in New York. Now we, in Congress, must go forward together with him as the Constitution's competing clauses require us to do. Each of us must decide what actions will best advance America's values and secure the future of the American people. The essential facts are known. We know of the weapons in Saddam's possession--chemical, biological, and nuclear in time. We know of his unequaled willingness to use them. We know his history, his invasions of his neighbors, his dreams of achieving hegemonic control over the Arab world, his record of anti-American rage, his willingness to terrorize, to slaughter, to suppress his own people and others. And we need not stretch to imagine nightmare scenarios in which Saddam makes common cause with the terrorists who want to kill Americans and destroy our way of life. Indeed, 2 days ago on September 11, 2002, the state-owned newspaper in Iraq showed a picture of the World Trade Center's Twin Towers in flames with the headline ``God's Punishment.'' This man--Saddam Hussein--is a menace to the people and the peace of the world. It was his brutal invasion of his peaceful neighbor, Kuwait, in August 1990 that first and finally convinced America and the world that Saddam had become a tyrant, like so many before him in world history, who had to be stopped before he did terrible damage to his people, his region, and the wider world. I was privileged in January of 1991 to join with my colleague from Virginia, Senator John Warner, in sponsoring the Senate resolution that authorized the first President Bush to go to war against Saddam. The American military fought bravely and brilliantly, in that conflict and won an extraordinary victory in rolling back Saddam's invasion of Kuwait. But we did not achieve total victory. On April 9, 1991, I came to the Senate floor and expressed my disappointment that our forces in Desert Storm had not been authorized to remove Saddam from power, while his military was in disarray. I said then: ``The United States must pursue final victory over Saddam. We must use all reasonable diplomatic, economic, and military means to achieve his removal from power. Until that end is realized, the peace and stability of the region will not have been fully accomplished.'' In 1997 and 1998, I joined with Senators Bob Kerrey, Trent Lott, and John McCain to introduce the Iraq Liberation Act, which established in law for the first time that it is U.S. policy to change the regime in Baghdad, not just contain it, and authorized specific assistance, including military training and equipment, to the Iraqi opposition in furtherance of that goal. That declaration was based on Saddam's record of barbarism before, during and after the gulf war, and his repeated violations of U.N. resolutions. On November 13, 1998, after Saddam ejected the U.N. weapons inspectors, I said, ``If we let him block the inspections and the monitoring that he agreed to as a condition of the cease-fire in the gulf war, then there is no doubt that one day soon, he will use weapons of mass destruction, carried by ballistic missiles, against Americans in the Middle East or against our allies.'' Since then, months and years have passed and the danger from Baghdad has only grown greater. International pressure--legal, diplomatic, economic, and political--has failed to change Saddam's behavior. Growing stockpiles of Iraqi weapons, toxins, and delivery systems have accumulated. So too has a growing pile of U.N. resolutions which Saddam has persistently defied. They testify to the repeated opportunities the international community has given him to prove he has changed and to his determination nonetheless to remain a recidivist international outlaw. As President Bush made clear yesterday, this must end. The hour of truth and decision has arrived. This is Saddam's last chance, and the United Nations' best chance to show that its declarations of international law stand for something more than the paper on which they are written. It is time for all nations, law abiding and peace loving, to make clear that, after September 11, the world will not hesitate or equivocate while a tyrant stocks his arsenal and builds alliances with terrorists. I am grateful that President Bush has effectively begun the critical work of educating the American people, the Congress, and the world about why. Our cause is just. The facts are on our side. ``Making this case'' is not a burden. It is the vital responsibility of a democracy's leaders when they have decided that our Nation's security may necessitate war. It is an extraordinary opportunity, as well, to engage our allies in meeting the greatest security threat of our generation before it is too late--not just for us but for them. An opportunity to make the consequences of repeated defiance of the United Nations painfully clear to Iraq, and to any other government that might follow in its criminal path. An opportunity to show the world's law-abiding, peace-loving Muslim majority--who share the same values we do, the same aspirations we have for our families, and, I might add, the same extremist foes-- that as we oppose tyranny and terror, we will actively support them in their fight for freedom and a better life. President Bush has acted wisely and decisively in asking the United Nations to lead this noble effort, to insist that Iraq obey its resolutions, and to be prepared to enforce them militarily if Iraq does not comply. But if Saddam does not comply, and the United Nations proves itself unwilling or unable to take decisive action, then the United States surely can and must assemble and lead an international military coalition to enforce the United Nations resolutions and liberate the Iraqi people, the Middle East and the world from Saddam Hussein. If we lead, I am confident many other nations will come to our side. For more than 11 years now, since the early spring of 1991, I have supported the use of military force to disarm Iraq and to remove Saddam Hussein from power. In fact, since the Iraq Liberation Act was passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton in 1998, that has been the law of our land. Therefore, I am fully supportive of such military action now. I know that many of my colleagues in the Senate believe thoughtfully and sincerely that it would be preferable to give support to the President in two stages, first to endorse yesterday's call for U.N action, and then to return later, if the U.N. does not act, to authorize the use of America's military power against Iraq. Other Members of the Senate are understandably concerned that a debate on the question of war against Iraq may be unnecessarily politicized if it occurs in the more heated environment of this fall's congressional elections. But the White House has made it clear it will ask for a resolution of support and authorization in the very near future. Each member of the Senate must, and I am confident will, face that reality in a spirit of non-partisanship, going where their hearts and heads take them, in deciding how best to fulfill our Constitutional responsibility to provide for the common defense in the current circumstances. For my part, I intend to work with Members of both parties in the Senate with the White House to draft a Senate resolution that will receive the broadest possible bipartisan support for the President, as Commander in Chief, as he works to protect our Nation and the world from Saddam Hussein. On October 22, 1962, as nuclear weapons were being amassed in Cuba, President, Kennedy spoke to the Nation and warned Americans of the need to act in the face of the rising threat. President Kennedy's courageous and eloquent words can guide us now. He said on that occasion. My fellow citizens, let no one doubt that this is a difficult and dangerous effort on which we have set out. No one can see precisely what course it will take or what costs or casualties will be incurred. Many months of sacrifice and self-discipline lie ahead, months in which many threats and denunciations will keep us aware of our dangers. But the greatest danger of all would be to do nothing. The path we have chosen for the present is full of hazards, as all paths are, but it is the one most consistent with our character and courage as a nation and our commitments around the world. The cost of freedom is always high, and Americans have always paid it but there is one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender or submission. Our goal is not the victory of might, but the vindication of right--not peace at the expense of freedom, but both peace and freedom, here . . . and, we hope, around the world. God willing, that goal will be achieved. I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Environment and Public Works be authorized to meet on Friday, September 13, 2002, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct an oversight hearing to receive testimony on the implementation of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. The hearing will be held in SD-406.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

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

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I am. I yield back our time as well.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I am proud of the work our Governmental Affairs Committee has done. It was a very open process. We included provisions recommended by members of both parties. I think it is a strong proposal. Obviously, there is some disagreement with the White House about parts of it, but I repeat what I have said before, that we are in agreement on: First, the basic necessity to better organize our homeland defenses, because this disorganization which exists now is dangerous. Second, there is broad bipartisan agreement on this bill we have reported out of our committee and the White House about what I have estimated to be 90 percent of the components of the bill. We are having a series of tussles about the remaining 10 percent. The sooner we resolve them, the better. The sooner we get this bill passed and on the way to a conference committee with the House and authorize the administration to set up this new Department, the safer the American people will be. I appreciate the Senator's call for expedited action, and I hope and pray that others in the Senate heed that call.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair and, again, suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, yesterday, being obviously the first anniversary of the horrific attacks against us on September 11 of last year, we commemorated with very moving--and I thought unifying--purpose at events here in the Capitol in Washington, at the Pentagon, in New York, and Pennsylvania--and really throughout America and so many places. Our attention was riveted again on what happened to us and how urgent it is to act to prevent that horror from ever happening again. I will state again what I have said on the floor before. I am not one who believes that another September 11 type of attack against America is inevitable. It is not inevitable if we are aggressive in searching out and destroying the remaining al-Qaida terrorists, if we are wise and strong in marshaling the unique capabilities we have in America to better organize our homeland defenses. Of course, that is what this bill is about. I think the President's statement today at the United Nations is further testimony and further draws our attention to the urgency of the challenges we face. I want to say parenthetically that I thought the speech the President gave at the United Nations today was a powerful and convincing indictment of Saddam Hussein and the grave threat he poses--not just to the United States and to his neighbors in a most critical region of the world, but to the legitimacy and the authority of the United Nations in the world community, a United Nations which Saddam has outrageously and consistently defied and deceived for more than a decade. I fully support the President's call to action by the United Nations. I hope the nations of the world will take a look at the record. I think my friend from Tennessee said it was in some sense a lawyerly statement. It really was an indictment of the 16 resolutions of the United Nations that Saddam Hussein has ignored, and he has defied and thumbed his nose at every one of them. How can the United Nations be the institution we want it to be--bringing peace and resolving conflicts--if one rogue leader of one nation treats its orders and resolutions with such disrespect? This is a moment of decision for the members of the United Nations. I hope they rise to the challenge that President Bush has quite correctly put before them today. This does bring us back to where we are on this amendment and Senator Thompson's motion to strike titles 2 and 3 of this amendment which is before the Senate and which was reported out of the Governmental Affairs Committee. These were authored largely by Senator Graham of Florida, who has spoken on them. They are part of an attempt in this bill to deal not just with homeland security, but to deal with the problem of terrorism that the President spoke about so eloquently and convincingly today at the United Nations. Homeland security is just one part of the battle against terrorism. We obviously have other parts that are critically important as well-- certainly the Defense Department, certainly our intelligence community, the State Department, the Treasury, and various foreign aid and public diplomacy programs, and law enforcement agencies, a lot of which will not in any sense come under the purview of this new Department of Homeland Security. That is why it was the wisdom of the committee--I believe it was certainly the judgment of the committee--that in addition to creating the Department of Homeland Security, we would guarantee the kind of aggressive antiterrorism effort that the country needs now and in the years ahead by creating in the White House an office to combat terrorism, to coordinate not just the Homeland Security Department but the other agencies of our Government that are involved in the fight against terrorism. It is my understanding that many have spoken in support of Senator Thompson's amendment to strike these sections. Perhaps some at the White House agree that there will be an office in the White House, but they object to the confirmation requirement in our proposal that the director of that office be confirmed by the Senate. And there was also objection to the budget certification authority that we give the director of the office. Senator Graham is a practical and realistic man on matters of this kind. We know there is concern in the Senate about the requirement of confirmation of the director of this office and the budget certification authority. We are consulting with our colleagues to see if they will support a proposal that would modify these titles by simply removing the Senate's authority to confirm and the budget authority given to the director and leave an office of counterterrorism. This office would be appointed by the President without confirmation by the Senate, but with a guarantee that the broader counterterrorism war that we will be fighting for years will have in the White House, close to the President, an adviser for whom that is his or her only responsibility. We think this proposal is a way that Congress, respecting the President and his authority--this President and Presidents to follow-- can guarantee as much as we can by the law that is in a quieter time further from the pain and shock of September 11, 2001; that America will not fall into a slumber and allow itself to be vulnerable once again as we were a year ago yesterday to terrorism's awful sword. I report that to my colleagues. I hope members of both parties and our friends at the White House will consider that as a good-faith possibility and see whether we can build a consensus to go forward on it. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time consumed by the quorum calls be taken equally from both sides on the time remaining.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, very briefly, I thank the Senator from Florida, Mr. Graham, for his hard work on this part of our bill. It is work that really goes back to last fall. I think he is absolutely right. I appreciate his accommodation to the fact that there may be Members of the Senate who support the basic idea of an office in the White House to coordinate our antiterrorism efforts in various agencies but are concerned about the power the current language gives the Senate to confirm the nominee to that position. Therefore, we will offer a motion to table at the time the vote on Senator Thompson's motion to strike comes up, with the intention of offering a second-degree amendment to give Members the opportunity to vote on the concept of an office of counterterrorism in the White House, to coordinate our antiterrorism efforts, without the necessity for Senate confirmation, which the President, we know, opposes. I yield the floor.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I move to table the Thompson amendment before the Senate. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. LIEBERMAN

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from North Carolina be recognized to speak for up to 10 minutes in morning business, and that immediately after his remarks, the Senator from Connecticut be recognized for the purpose of offering an amendment.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate go into morning business for up to 10 minutes, allocated to the Senator from Vermont for the purpose of introducing legislation, and that when the Senator is done, I be recognized for the purpose of offering an amendment to the pending matter.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. That is a word I would embrace. That is quite right. Our Framers did not create a monarchy. They created a Republic with a President with substantial powers--accountable to the Congress with substantial powers--and to the people we are all ultimately accountable. The Senator from West Virginia is not just a Senator but ``the Senator.'' He has had so much experience over some years here. He knows, as we have all experienced these days, that sometimes we come to a moment where we can't quite achieve--Senator Graham is at an Intelligence Committee meeting, so I am taking the liberty of speaking for him--the ideal that we aspire to because the votes have been counted and we don't have the votes. That was the clear message from the vote. It was important, nonetheless, to take a significant step forward and create the office, with a law to guarantee that there would be somebody in the White House whose sole responsibility is to coordinate our government-wide antiterrorism program. I must say that I am quite personal about this issue. I said to the Senator from Florida when we talked about introducing the second-degree amendment that we may not have the votes for this, either. I understand the Senator from West Virginia has a different point of view on what has been done. But Senator Graham feels so strongly about the importance of at least creating the office, even if we can't achieve the ideal of Senate confirmation, that he wanted to offer this amendment notwithstanding the possibility that the White House is not negotiating very much at this point. They are just wanting it their way or no way. But he wanted to give this option to the various Members of the Senate, particularly on this side of the aisle, who say, Senator Graham, Senator Lieberman, I like your idea but I don't like the idea of Senate confirmation. That is the purpose of this amendment. I know how strongly the Senator from West Virginia feels about the prerogative of the Senate. I agree with him in this case. It is just that we haven't been able to achieve what we wanted here, although we hoped we might achieve a good part of it. I thank the Senator for giving me the opportunity to respond. It is not my nature to settle for less than the ideal, but, as the Senator knows, sometimes in our democratic system we have to do it to achieve some progress. I thank the Senator.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, responding to the Senator from West Virginia, I need to say that I wouldn't describe it as running up a white flag. Senator Graham, who has constructed this section of the bill which I have supported, felt in the exercise of practicality but also because he feels so strongly about the importance of at least putting in law a requirement--again, exercising the power of Congress. There are some in the Chamber who believe Congress should never tell the President what to do about anything, and if the President wants to create an adviser on counterterrorism he should have the right to do that or not do that.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. The Senator from West Virginia is correct. It is a Lieberman-Graham amendment, and I think it is Senator Thompson's intention to move to table it.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Responding to the Senator from West Virginia, this amendment, which is suggested by Senator Graham, who was the originator and implementer of the idea of a separate White House office on antiterrorism, would leave the Secretary of Homeland Security unchanged. The Secretary would be nominated by the President and confirmed by and accountable to the Senate, and the new office on antiterrorism that would be created in the White House in our original proposal was subject to Senate confirmation, as well. We heard from many colleagues, particularly on our side of the aisle, who thought that since we were creating a Department of Homeland Security with a confirmable Secretary, it was a mistake to require confirmation of an office in the White House. Senator Graham has responded to that and, as a result, offered this second-degree amendment to create the Director, who would be appointed by the President, without confirmation by the Senate.

Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank my friend and colleague from Florida, Mr. Graham, for not only his eloquent statement and his spirit of accommodation that leads him to offer this second-degree amendment, but also for the work he has put into this idea. It is an excellent idea--I have said this before and I will say it again briefly--the pending amendment, which is to say the underlying amendment that came out of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, is our best effort to respond to the terrible events of September 11 and to protect the American people from anything like that ever happening again. That is done, first, with the creation of a Department of Homeland Security, and second, with, in the White House, this National Office for Combating Terrorism--one focused on homeland defenses and the other serving as an adviser to the President, coordinating all our antiterrorism activity which goes well beyond homeland security to defense, law enforcement, foreign policy, foreign aid, economic policy, et cetera. Senator Graham has worked hard on this issue, and I think presented a very good proposal. It was, as the last vote indicates, not the will of the Senate to accept it in its current form. Many of our colleagues indicated to Senator Graham and me that they might be able to support this office if there were no Senate confirmation. Senator Graham has agreed by this amendment to remove that requirement. What would be left then would be quite similar to what the National Security Adviser has been doing for some period of time since that statute was created, a statute which coordinates advice to the President in a particular subject area. In this case, that subject area is terrorism, which according to most experts outside and inside the Congress, will likely be the dominant threat to our security in the next period of our history. So the best proposal, which we had hoped would be accepted, would be to provide for Senate confirmation. The Senate has expressed its will there, and I think Senator Graham has now offered the next best idea. I am privileged to be a cosponsor of this amendment with him, and I do so with some sincerity, particularly because of the other section of this legislation which does create a Secretary of Homeland Security who, of course, is subject to Senate confirmation and is accountable to the Senate. So the concerns I had, the Senator had, and so many others had about the previous Office of Homeland Security being occupied by an individual not subject to Senate confirmation, and therefore not accountable to the Congress, has now been overcome with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security; that no matter what its shape, which I think we all agree will be created by the end of this session, now allows us to take a step forward, not as large as the committee proposal would have taken but nonetheless a significant step forward in creating the office and thereby giving this President and future Presidents one individual within the White House whose direct function is to coordinate the entire antiterrorism effort of the United States of America. I support the amendment before the Senate.

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

Mr. LIEBERMAN. I yield now to the Senator from Florida, my cosponsor on this amendment.

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