Trent Lott

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. I am glad to yield.

Mr. LOTT. Absolutely.

Mr. LOTT. That certainly is reasonable.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on passage of the resolution.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I think the way to adjust this is we had hoped we could go ahead and get a vote notwithstanding the receipt of the papers from the House. But that is not going to be possible. I think the way to be fair to everybody is to ask unanimous consent that the period for morning business be extended until 10:30 under the same provisions as earlier agreed to. The Senator would then be able to get time in his own right.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, we would alternate back and forth, and other Senators certainly would be able to speak. The time limit under the earlier agreement was the time would be equally divided between now and 10:30.

Mr. LOTT. The only one I know of who seems to be anxious to speak on that side is the Senator from Louisiana. I ask unanimous consent that after Senator Specter speaks that the Senator from Louisiana be recognized.

Mr. LOTT. Not more than 15 minutes. I yield the floor.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business on Sunday, it stand in recess until 5 p.m. on Monday, October 30; that following the routine convening requests, there be 2 hours for debate on the continuing resolution to be equally divided in the usual form. I further ask unanimous consent that a vote occur on the passage of the continuing resolution, if the resolution contains funding for 1 day, if received from the House, at 7 p.m. on Monday, and that paragraph 4 of rule XII be waived. Finally, I ask unanimous consent that the vote scheduled to occur at 7 p.m. on Sunday now begin at 6:45 p.m., assuming the papers have been received from the House of Representatives.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, for the information of all Senators, we will convene at 4 p.m. on Sunday with up to 2 hours 45 minutes equally divided for morning business. Under the previous order, there will be a vote occurring on the continuing resolution at 6:45 p.m., assuming the papers have been received from the House, and earlier, if possible, or a little later, if it is necessary. But I believe around 6:45 we will be able to vote. On Monday, the Senate will convene at 5 p.m. with 2 hours for debate on the continuing resolution. A vote on the continuing resolution will occur at approximately 7 p.m. on Monday, again assuming the papers have been received from the House.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate stand in recess under the previous order.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it recess until the hour of 4 p.m. on Sunday, October 29. I further ask unanimous consent that on Sunday, immediately following the prayer, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate proceed to a period for morning business until 6:45 p.m., with Senators speaking for up to 10 minutes each, with the time equally divided in the usual form.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. All right.

Mr. LOTT

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, first, for the interest of all Senators, I know they are wondering when a vote or votes will occur. It is anticipated that there will be at least a couple, maybe three or four votes, within the next 2 or 3 hours. We are not certain exactly what time that will occur, but I will try to get it started shortly so we can get to the votes that are needed. For instance, once again we are going to need to set up a process so we can get a vote on the very important bankruptcy legislation. As a result of trying to get on the tax bill yesterday, I had to set aside an action that had been taken earlier on the bankruptcy reform, and it is my intention still to try to file cloture on that to try to get that very important legislation addressed before the Senate completes its work. Also, we would need to vote on the continuing resolution that would take us over into tomorrow. Also, we would possibly need to move to proceed to the D.C. appropriations conference report and the Commerce-State-Justice conference report. Within a few minutes we will try to get those started. Mr. President, as to what has been said last night and this morning, it has been interesting. You know, the American people understand this is a political season and that tempers get a little short, people get a little desperate in their actions, and I think that begins at the White House with the President. I have tried to communicate with the President, but it is not always easy. He was in New York City the night before last. He was playing golf yesterday afternoon. He did return the call I made to him yesterday afternoon, even though I placed the call the day before to talk about some of this. But he has written this letter threatening a veto. So much of this is complaints about procedure, complaints about ``inside baseball,'' complaints about what may not be in the bill. Let me say to the American people some very important things they need to hear. Let's not get into all the brush of the way we do business around here. Let's talk about the result. First of all, some people may be surprised to learn--some people may not even like it--but 80 percent to 90 percent of this bill has been requested by the President of the United States. He wants these things, and they have been negotiated with the administration. There have been negotiations between the House and Senate. Once again, that is procedure. But let me assure the American people there are a lot of things in here that he wanted that I don't particularly like. Let me also say there are some things that were taken out at his specific request. When you get down and analyze his complaints, it is because he doesn't think we did quite enough to suit him on this school bond construction tax credit. There are a lot of people over here who do not think that what we have done should be in this bill. But there was an effort made to accommodate a lot of different thinking. But he is not opposed to what is in here necessarily; he just wants more. On the Medicare adjustments, lots of people have had input on that. The House of Representatives had an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote on that subject. I don't know exactly what it was, but probably 300 or more for the Medicare adjustments. The Finance Committee reported it out, I believe it was 19-0. I will clarify for the record these exact votes. So there has been an awful lot of bipartisanship. But let's not get all wrapped up in that. Let's look at what is in the bill. Let's look at what is in the bill that is overwhelmingly good, that everybody is for, and we are reduced to complaining about how it got here. Once again, It's the old saying we are going to defeat the good--no, we are going to defeat the excellent because we do not like the procedure or because it is not perfect or everything that the President wants. We are a coequal branch. He should not expect, and he will not get, 100 percent of what he wants. No President will--none. But we worked with him. When you get 80 or 90 percent of what you want, then most people say that is pretty good. He sits over there or in California or New York and says: Give me everything. Let me talk to the American people about what is good about this bill. Let's not get into the politics and the procedure and all that is happening. Let us just go down the list and let's talk a little bit about what is included. Who among us is opposed to the IRA and pension reform provisions in this bill? Who thinks we should not raise IRA contributions up to $5,000 per year? Who thinks we should not increase contribution limits for 401(k)s, 403(b)s and 457 plans from $10,000 to $15,000? And, by the way, with a lot of bipartisan requests, another $5,000 I believe is available for people over 50 for these 401(k) and other plans. There are some 50 modifications in this bill with regard to IRAs and pensions. We want to encourage people to save, don't we? Who is opposed to this? By the way, unfortunately, it has limits. This is really targeted at middle-income and low-income people to encourage savings. The chairman of the Finance Committee has become the hero of the IRA proposals, the Roth IRA. Here again, we take one more small step to give people a little opportunity to save for their needs, for their children, without the Government saying: Oh, we will tell you how you may do that and we will limit it. So I think there are pretty good provisions in there. There is small business tax relief for the one group left in America that may save us, the small business men and women, those young entrepreneurs, men and women and minorities who take a chance, people who start the little restaurant, as the Senator from Nebraska did. He went out there; he found out about the restaurant business--it is tough. You have to get people hired. You have insurance costs. You have crime. You have management problems. You have food spoilage. It is endless. Bless their hearts. So we do a little something for small business men and women. I do not apologize for that. My only complaint is we do not do enough. The ridiculousness of the request from the administration that we take out a provision that would have eliminated the .02 percent Federal unemployment tax surtax--it doesn't take out the FUTA tax, just the so- called surtax that was temporary, just stuck it on the small business men and women to boost this fund which I understand now has $22 billion in it. So we had a proposal to take off that little .02. That is something that will actually help the small business man and woman who is working on the margins, barely making it, a little extra they can keep that is not needed in this $22 billion trust fund. Then the tip credit. The President threatened to veto this bill over the tip credit issue. He is wrong. The Senator from Nebraska knows that was a mistake. These are people who never had another job, couldn't get another job. This is a little help for the people who are working on tips. My Lord, we are taxing tips. If you work hard and you get a bonus, you pay extra. If you work hard, you do a really good job, and you get a little extra tip, you pay a little extra. The whole concept is ridiculous. But in an effort to accommodate that, in a conversation I had with the President himself, we took out the FUTA and the tip credit. I apologize to small business men and women. I apologize to the workers out there busing those tables. That was unfortunate, but it was taken out at the specific request of the President of the United States. I wanted those taxes taken out, but he would not let us do it. So in this spirit of cooperation--there is so much rain and so many dark clouds here about how we do not have more cooperation. Next year, thank goodness, we are going to have a different President. Hopefully, we will have a better atmosphere around here. Maybe we can work together. I believe George W. Bush means that, believes it, and will reach out and try to bring us together. This is a classic case of where we tried to accommodate the President of the United States, and he writes this letter threatening his veto. He may veto it, but the American people are going to know who did what needed to be done and who vetoed it. We do have this package of small business tax relief that has been negotiated by Chairman Roth, Chairman Archer, a lot of input from Democrats in the House and Senate, and the administration. It also includes above-the-line deductions for health insurance for employees in small businesses. This is bad? What about that restaurant owner who provides insurance for his supervisory personnel, but he or she cannot provide it for all of their workers because it would just eat up all the margin of profit he has? Here you can allow the employees to deduct the cost of their health insurance. This is a good idea. This would help entry-level workers, minority workers, people who are carrying the load in this country get a little break on health insurance. But, oh, no, ``We don't really like that idea because it is above-the-line deductions''--once again, explain that to the man and woman down there working in the trenches-- ``We ought to have a credit or something.'' This is good, and it would help people in that low-income area. By the way, we have been hearing all year long that we have to have a minimum wage increase. A minimum wage increase is in here: $1 over 2 years, raising it to $6.15. It is in there. Is the President against that? Then also there is a provision in here called community renewal. This would allow rural areas, poor areas to have a chance for economic development, to have a chance to recruit a little business. The Mississippi Delta pops into my mind: poor people struggling to get a little infrastructure, improve their education, get a few jobs in the area. Enterprise zones: There are 40 of those, 40 of the new community renewals. This is a deal, by the way, asked for by the President and the Speaker. I had reservations about a lot of the provisions, but we worked through that. This was negotiated with the administration interminably for weeks and months. It is in here. Some people on my side think this is not a good idea, but I supported it. The President made a deal with the Speaker; that is, President Clinton, in case you do not quite understand, and Speaker Denny Hastert made a deal they wanted to do it and, by the way, supported by J.C. Watts passionately. This is a way we can help rural and poor communities. Let's do this; let's do this. I have been in meetings when there was an effort to kill this until J.C. Watts spoke up and everybody went silent. It is in here. Are you against that? I have tried on this floor for weeks to move the foreign sales credit fix for WTO compliance. It came out of the Finance Committee unanimously. I have asked unanimous consent to move it. For some strange reason, it has been objected to by the Democrats in the Senate. When you are in the leadership, you have to do some of these things, and Senator Reid had to object on behalf of somebody; he would not object. It has been objected to. What are we going to do here? On November 1, we will have a problem with our European allies. I do not think they are doing very good, frankly, complying with WTO, and they are not reacting to sanctions. I am not going to cry alligator tears over the Europeans and WTO, but that provision is in this bill. Is the President going to veto that? Those are four broad categories and a lot of subcompartments about which I have talked. The Senator from Louisiana, Ms. Landrieu, has been very supportive of this concept of encouraging adoption. We should encourage more adoption for people who are not only wealthy but people in the lower and middle- income area. This bill doubles the tax credit for adoption to $10,000, I believe is the number. Is that not good? No, no, that is good.

Mr. LOTT. On that?

Mr. LOTT. I did not ask anybody to yield on your side. You all talked for about an hour. I will be glad to respond later because I know you care about that and you want to make sure it is available to others.

Mr. LOTT. I wanted to work on that. I told the President the other day: Mr. President, if there is something in here you don't particularly like, we can change that maybe in the next bill. Mr. President, if there is something more you want, let's add it in the next bill. This is not the be all to end all. This is not the end of the world. This is a giant step for mankind though. And he is going to veto it because he does not get every last dot and tittle that he wants? I do not think that is defensible. Let me go on down the list. For years, I have been an advocate under pressure from the Senator from Iowa, Mr. Grassley, for farm savings accounts. The chairman of the Ways and Means Committee does not like this sort of thing. He says it will never end. We have savings accounts for education, for medical expenses, now for farms. My attitude is, why not? I never met an incentive to encourage people to save for their own needs I did not like, and to encourage farmers to save a little for the bad times because, more than anybody else, they know the good times when the crops are abundant, weather is good, prices are fine; they do fine. And then rain, sleet, snow, drought, locusts--they have to deal with all of it. Allow them to save a little for the bad times. Is that a bad idea? No, that is a good idea. Deduction for computer donations to schools and libraries: Businesses and industries, big and small, are willing to give their 2- and 3-year- old computers to schools and libraries to help with programs such as Power Up. Let's power up these kids. Let's use these used computers to teach them to read and to become computer literate. The Senator from Michigan, Mr. Abraham, has been relentless in pushing for that. The amazing thing to me is, why would anybody not be for that? This is good. That is in this bill. Deduction for long-term health insurance and long-term health expenses: This is an interesting category. We have been worried legitimately about the people who are worried about the long-term needs they have with their health. We want to do something about it. We do it in this bill, but when I talked to the President: Gee, I really prefer a credit as opposed to a deduction, but if you make the deduction high enough, maybe it will be OK. When I talked to him yesterday, he said: Yes, you did go up higher. We are going to nitpick a gnat to death. Should we have long-term health insurance deductions or not? We have an opportunity here. The President is going to veto it, flitter it away. I do not understand that. I have taken a lot of unkind commentary from my colleagues on this side of the aisle about the Amtrak bonds credit. The Senator from Massachusetts knows I have tried to be helpful to Amtrak. I believe in America, if we are going to be a modern nation and lead the world, we need a national rail passenger system. I think we need it, I think we can have it, and I think it can be self-supportive. Maybe not. I think it can. I supported Amtrak reform. I stood on this floor--the Senator remembers--and helped make that happen with some opposition. There were people ready to pull the plug and say: Goodbye, adios, Amtrak. I do not think that is wise. I made a commitment, and I will keep it some day: If we have done everything we can to get Amtrak in the position of providing the service, making ends meet and paying for themselves, if we can get that done, great. If we cannot, at some point, we have to say Americans do not support a national rail passenger system and we pull the plug. I do not like tax credits, particularly. I prefer deductions. You can argue this is not good, and I have heard that argument from the Senator from Texas and others. Again, Senator Roth from Delaware has made this one of his highest priorities and so has, by the way--once again, proving the bipartisanship of this legislation--the Senator from New York, Mr. Moynihan, the ranking member on the Finance Committee. People come to me and say: How in the world could you let that in there? First of all, I am not a dictator. And secondly, how can anybody, any leadership person, tell the chairman of the Finance Committee and the ranking member of the Finance Committee that they cannot have in this bill one of their highest priorities, the Amtrak issue? So it is in here. Is that bad? No. I think it is pretty good. We repealed the diesel barge tax. We have modes of transportation other than Amtrak that are kind of having a hard time--rail and barge. We have here a 4.3-cent tax we dumped on them. We ought to take it off. We ought to take it off of the automobile gasoline also. We expanded the qualified zone academy bonds for school construction. The President says he wants this. I think we are starting down a track that is not going to be very healthy where we eventually build all schools in America with Federal funds. That is where we are headed. That is where a lot of people want us to be. I do not think that is good. I think that ought to be done at the local level. I am willing to give them an incentive through bonds, where they have to pay the principal, and they get some consideration on the interest. I am willing to do that. But what some people want, once again, is they want everything in school, in education, run from Washington. That is what really is at stake. Once we start building schools, local schools, from Federal funds, let me tell you, Mississippi will have the nicest, newest schools in all of America--all of America--because we have more poor people and greater needs probably than anybody. But I do not think we should just totally take over education. I still trust parents, teachers, administrators, and students at the local level. I do not trust bureaucrats in Washington at the Department of Education or the IRS or anywhere else. So that is some of the good stuff in this bill. Let me also point out--and I did not even get very much into the Medicare add-backs. Everything says we need them. What about hospitals? What about rural hospitals? What about home health care? What about hospice? What about managed care? What about the nursing homes? They need some help. This bill provides that. There has been a lot of bipartisan input on that. If I had my druthers, I would mix it a little differently. I would put in more for hospitals and rural hospitals, a little less for probably some other categories, but it is not just about Mississippi hospitals; it is about Massachusetts hospitals; it is about managed care facilities in New Mexico; it is about nursing homes in Kentucky. You have to try to find a blend. You also have to try to keep it from exploding totally out of control because it could be $50 billion, $60 billion, $70 billion. I think this bill is between $28 and $30 billion. It is enough to do what is needed. And it has the endorsement of many organizations. I have a list. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this list be printed in the Record, along with a letter to Congressman Thomas, signed by the executive vice president of the American Hospital Association, Rick Pollack.

Mr. LOTT. The list includes the Federation of American Hospitals, the National Association of Community Health Centers, the National Association of Long Term Hospitals, the National Association of Children's Hospitals, the National Association of Rural Health Clinics, the Mississippi Hospital Association--very important--the National Association for Home Care, the Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care, the American Cancer Society, the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, the National Kidney Foundation, the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation, the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, the American Association of Blood Banks, and so on down the line.

Mr. LOTT. I understand those associations are familiar with how this Medicare add-back provision would affect them, and they are supporting this conference report.

Mr. LOTT. I have a letter from the American Hospital Association--I believe that is correct; yes, here it is-- On behalf of 5,000 members of the American Hospital Association, I am writing to express our views regarding the ``Beneficiary Improvement and Protection Act of 2000.'' We believe this legislation will take another step forward in addressing the unintended consequences of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. Consequently, as we approach the remaining hours of the congressional session, we are urging Members to vote in favor of this legislation, and have recommended that the President not veto the legislation. That is dated October 26, 2000, signed by Rick Pollack, executive vice president of the American Hospital Association. So you do not like the mix. You think maybe there is too much going to managed care. But when you help hospitals and rural hospitals, there is a passthrough provision that adds to the managed care provision. You do have people in the Senate and from all over the country who believe the Medicare+Choice is a very important provision. They worked very hard in advancing their provisions--Democrats and Republicans. So while it is not perfect--if we took that same $30 billion and gave it to a Senator from Wyoming, and then a Senator from Pennsylvania, they would come up with a different mix--after a lot of work, this is close to being fair to everybody. And again, it is not the end of the road. There will be another opportunity to work on it further. I know the Senator from Idaho had wanted me to yield, perhaps on the adoption credit, or any comments he would like to make.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I know a lot of Senators would like to speak. I also know we need to again have some votes here in a reasonable period of time. So I will try to get an agreement on how we can get some further comments and then move to a vote. I know the Senator from California had wanted me to yield on that particular point.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I appreciate the Senator's comments on that. It is something we should work on. We have made progress. It is a shame we won't have it for the next 3 or 4 months. If the President insists on vetoing this bill, then I guess we will come back next year and have a chance to rework this whole area. I presume the tax bill next year, no matter who is elected President, will look different than this one. Maybe it would be better from my perspective, fairer overall, but provisions such as that could be worked on next year. I just hate that there are going to be adoptions that won't occur if the President vetoes this bill, that would occur if they had this additional credit. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following my remarks, the following Senators be recognized for times allotted, and that I be recognized immediately following those Senators: Senator Gramm of Texas for up to 15 minutes and Senator Wyden of Oregon for up to 15 minutes.

Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, all I am trying to do is to make sure that Senators who have been waiting to speak will have an opportunity, but also we have a vote that we need to begin pretty soon. I would rather not do that until Senators have had an opportunity. I yield to the Senator from Oregon.