John McCain

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I would say to my friend from South Carolina that we have received some disturbing news today; that is, the President of Afghanistan, President Karzai, has made a decision to release 65 of the 88 detainees at Parwan prison in Afghanistan. The Senator from South Carolina and I have known the President of Afghanistan for many years. We have had many meetings with the President of Afghanistan, and I believe we had established a rather cordial relationship over these last 13 years. Many of my colleagues may not know that the Senator from South Carolina, in his capacity as a Colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, a lawyer, has spent a great deal of his active-duty time in Afghanistan on Active Duty primarily focusing on the whole issue of detainees, how they are tried, how they are incarcerated, and steps for release and detention. In other words, there is no one that I know who has more indepth knowledge of this issue than the Senator from South Carolina. I don't believe anybody has ever worked as hard as he has on this issue, and there have been significant accomplishments as a result of his and other wonderful Americans' work. I think facts are stubborn things; and I would ask my friend from South Carolina, isn't it true the release of these detainees poses a direct threat to the lives of our service men and women who are serving in Afghanistan? Is it true that 25 of these individuals are linked to the production and/or emplacement of IEDs; that 33 tested positive for explosive residue when processed after capture; that 40 percent are associated with direct attacks, killing or wounding 57 Afghan citizens and allied forces; that 30 percent are associated with direct attacks, killing or wounding 60 U.S. or coalition force members; that 32 were captured after the ANSF assumed responsibility? So isn't it clear, I ask my colleague, after all these years of work trying to get this whole system of detainees and trials and incarceration, that we are now seeing--sadly--this result of individuals who can be traced to attacks on or directly responsible for the deaths of brave Americans?

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator from South Carolina, and I hope my colleagues will understand the in-depth knowledge which he has about this issue. No one understands it as well or has been more involved, to the point of being involved with each of the individual cases. Before I respond to the question, I think it important for our colleagues to understand some of these specific cases. I am not going to submit for the record all 65 because it is long. But let me just mention a couple of examples of people who are about to be released into Afghanistan while our men and women are still there in harm's way. Habibulla Abdul Hady is a Taliban member, emplaced IEDs used in attacks against ANSF and ISAF forces in Kandahar province which took American lives, and was biometrically matched to an IED incident in Daman, Kandahar, where pressure plate IEDs and components which took American lives were seized by coalition forces. Nek Mohammad facilitated rocket attacks against our forces in Kandahar province, is an IED expert, and transferred money to Al Qaeda. The list goes on. Akhtar Mohammad is a suspected Taliban commander who conducts attacks, provides lethal aid and supports Taliban leaders in operations against ANSF and ISAF in Nangarhar and Kunar province. He acted as a trusted courier for the former Ghaziabad Taliban shadow governor. The list goes on and on. These are not random arrests. These are not misdemeanors. These are serious, hard-core professional terrorists who have already committed these acts, and that is what is so disappointing about it. Again, I say to my friend from South Carolina, we have been there often, and being around these brave young Americans who are serving and sacrificed has probably been the best part of our lives. Some of them have had three, four, five, six tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq. It seems to me that we owe them at least the security of not releasing these trained killers--they are not amateurs--into the fight again. We already know that the ones we released voluntarily--I think it was 27 or 30 percent--reentered the fight. I say to my friend in response: Isn't it almost totally predictable that these hard-core individuals will quickly reenter the fight? They are talented, professional, trained zealots, and it would obviously put American lives in danger. Finally, in answer to my colleague's question, again, I am saddened because President Karzai, my friend from South Carolina, Senator Lieberman, and I have developed a relationship over many years of cooperation and assistance. There are reasons for some of his behavior. It has been terribly mishandled by this administration. We still don't know the number of troops they want to leave behind. Having said all of that, and the sadness I feel, I think it has been replaced a bit by anger because this kind of action cannot be excused when we have an obligation to do everything we can to protect the lives of the young men and women who are serving. To let this go without a response is an abrogation of our responsibility to these young men and women. I still have hopes for the agreement. I would point out to my colleagues that it was first raised a couple of years ago by Senator Graham when he and I were over there. The overwhelming majority of Afghans support this agreement. But when we have people such as this running around, it is not just Americans and our allies who are in danger but the lives of the Afghan people, whom President Karzai was elected to represent, are in danger. I ask my colleague again how many times he has been through this drill with President Karzai where they were about to release these people and we managed to pull them back from the brink? Apparently they have finally stepped over the line.

Mr. McCAIN. I will emphasize one point that my friend from South Carolina has already made. We are not giving up on Afghanistan. We believe that we can't afford to see the movie that we saw in Iraq in which the total withdrawal of American forces caused the chaos and the situation in Iraq today. In the second battle of Fallujah, 96 soldiers and marines were killed and 600 were wounded. Today the black flags of al-Qaida fly over the city of Fallujah. There is no greater metaphor for the failure of this administration in Iraq. We are saying that we will make a new deal with Karzai's successor. We will provide the economic assistance and we will provide the follow- on force. But right now we cannot stand by without responding to this act which directly puts the lives of Americans and Afghans in danger. These are professional killers. They are terrorists. They are good at their work, and we cannot expose our allies, our friends, and our men and women to this kind of danger without a response. I will finally say again that no one understands this issue better than Colonel Graham. Colonel Graham has been through every single one of these cases. He has fought this battle many times before, and if anybody has any question about the severity and the consequences of the act being taken today by President Karzai, I suggest they talk with him since he has all the information. I thank my colleague for his many years of service in Afghanistan and Iraq on behalf of the men and women who are serving and have served with him.

Mr. McCAIN. I want to also recognize that the Senator has a son in the Navy as well.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, today marks the last voyage of the Ex-USS Forrestal, the world's first supercarrier. On this occasion, I believe it is fitting to recognize the ship and all who sailed on her in service to a grateful nation. Launched almost 60 years ago in Newport News, VA, she was named after former Navy Secretary and first Secretary of Defense James Forrestal. Forrestal represented American ingenuity and shipbuilding excellence, integrating operational needs, and engineering insight that created the first steam catapult, angled flight deck, and use of optical landing systems. During her 38 years of active service, Forrestal and its attached air wings were involved in missions around the globe. At the beginning of her sea life, she was sent to the eastern Mediterranean during the Suez and Lebanon Crises and over the course of her service life was involved in dozens of NATO operations, overseas deployments, patrol missions, and strategic port visits around the Atlantic and Sixth Fleets. She was ``home'' to thousands of the Nation's finest sailors and aviators this country has ever known. Forrestal's contributions to the war effort in Vietnam are well documented. Unfortunately, so is the terrible fire that engulfed the flight deck on July 29, 1967, killing 134 shipmates, injuring 161 more, and destroying more than 20 aircraft. I will never forget when that Zuni rocket hit my A-4 Skyhawk after it was accidentally fired from across the flight deck, rupturing the fuel tank and setting that horrific, costly fire. I will always remember and honor my brave comrades who died in the Forrestal fire. Although the ship is being towed to Brownsville, TX, to be physically dismembered, her legacy, the bonds forged, and memories created among shipmates will live forever. I bid her a final ``fair winds and following seas.''

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, since June of 2013, there have been steady and persistent unauthorized disclosures of apparently classified information regarding the activities and practices of the National Security Agency, NSA. These disclosures have caused grave damage to the United States. They have harmed our relations with friends and allies and harmed our ability to combat threats to the United States. They have also undermined public support for U.S. intelligence programs by casting doubt on the candor of key officials, the permissibility of the NSA's activities, the efficacy of the government's oversight, and whether legitimate privacy interests are properly taken into account in connection with important surveillance activities. Last month, the President proposed some changes to how our Nation conducts certain intelligence collection activities. But the President's proposals left many crucial questions unanswered. Now is the time for Congress to improve how it executes its constitutional oversight duties--to examine certain intelligence collection activities and practices and ensure that we are fulfilling our obligation to protect both the security of our Nation and the freedom of our citizens. The vital issues at stake here are complex, broad, and cut across many areas of jurisdiction of established congressional committees, including national security, intelligence, technology, commerce, foreign affairs, and privacy. For these reasons, today I am introducing legislation calling for the establishment of a Senate Select Committee to investigate how these leaks occurred and to make findings and recommendations for legislation to address these issues which are vital to American national security.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I would like to make remarks about the farm bill conference agreement that is before us. Of course, across the Nation Americans are demanding that Washington restore their faith in government. Last year we saw a Congress crippled by government shutdowns and debt-ceiling standoffs. We nearly failed to pass a Defense authorization bill. While many of my colleagues have high hopes this year for returning to the practice of moving legislation through the regular order and perhaps working under a more open amendment process, I am profoundly disappointed that one of the first pieces of legislation we will send to the President this year is a $1.5 trillion farm bill. It is a mind- boggling sum of money that is spent on farm subsidies, duplicative nutrition and development assistance programs, and special-interest pet projects. Taxpayer groups such as Citizens Against Government Waste blasted this farm bill as a ``Dung Deal.'' Last week, the Wall Street Journal called it ``A Bipartisan Taxpayer Raid,'' writing: It's no accident that Congress dropped this porker under the cover of the State of the Union hoopla. Handouts to agribusiness and millionaires, continued trade protectionism for the sugar industry--it's all still there. How are we supposed to restore the confidence of the American people with this monstrosity? A few weeks ago we crammed down their throats a $1.1 trillion Omnibus appropriations bill loaded with wasteful spending. Tomorrow we will wash the omnibus down with another trillion dollars. The only policy that gets bipartisan traction in Congress is Washington's desire to hand out taxpayer money like it is candy. We have heard about some of the ``savings'' generated by this farm bill. It is true there are noteworthy cuts to several outdated Depression-era farm subsidies such as the Direct Payments Program and the Countercyclical Program. We also close loopholes in our Food Stamp Programs and conservation programs, which generated about $16 billion in savings, according to the Congressional Budget Office, and I applaud the conferees for their efforts. But, unfortunately, just about every subsidy eliminated under the farm bill is simply reinvented into a new and many times more expensive program. For example, we have a new thing called Agriculture Risk Coverage Program, which locks in today's record-high crop prices and guarantees farmers up to an 86-percent return on their crop. Depending on market conditions, ARC--agriculture risk coverage--could cost taxpayers between $3 billion to $14 billion each year--far more expensive than the $5 billion saved by the elimination of the Direct Payments Program. The bill also maintains the $95 billion federally backed crop insurance program which subsidizes crop insurance premiums. We then pile on a new $20 billion program called Supplemental Coverage Option that subsidizes crop insurance deductibles. The bill also strips out an amendment offered by my colleagues Senator Durbin and Senator Coburn which would have prevented crop insurance subsidies from going to individuals with a gross income greater than $750,000 a year. That amendment was adopted by 59 votes in the Senate's farm bill earlier last year. And guess what. Surprise. It is absent from the conference agreement. Millionaire farmers can rejoice that their crop insurance subsidies are safe. That is millionaire farmers, farmers with a gross income greater than $750,000 a year. So the next time I hear the managers of this bill talk about the small farmer, I guess they are talking about millionaires as well. But it is all part of farm bill politics. In order to pass a farm bill, Congress must find a way to appease every special interest of every commodity association from asparagus farmers to wheat growers. If you cut somebody's subsidy, you give them a grant. If you kill their grant, then you subsidize their crop insurance. Let's look at several handouts that special interests have reaped in this year's farm bill. The bill provides $7 million in grants for the marketing of sheep. Now some who may be viewing this at home will maybe think I am making it up that we are spending $7 million of their tax dollars for the marketing of sheep. It also adds a thing called--and I am not sure I pronounce it right-- ``japonica rice.'' Japonica rice is a sushi ingredient grown primarily in California, and it is added to the list of products that can receive farm subsidies. The bill provides $100 million to promote the maple syrup industry. I repeat: $100 million to promote the maple syrup industry. It says American tax dollars will go to--and I quote from the bill--``promote research and education for maple syrup production . . . promoting sustainability in the maple syrup industry . . . and market promotion for maple syrup.'' So, my fellow citizens, the next time you see an advertisement for maple syrup, you may want to watch it because it is your tax dollars that paid for it. It places a 15-cent fee on harvesting Christmas trees. Not even Christmas is left out of this one--a 15-cent fee on harvesting Christmas trees. That money then is earmarked for promoting the orchard industry. There is $12 million for a ``wool research and promotion'' program. There are a lot of needy areas of America today, but I had no idea that wool research and promotion was worthy of $12 million of our tax dollars. I think this next one is probably my favorite--or unfavorite: $5 million for a study to--again, I am quoting from the bill--``evaluate the impact of allowing schools to offer dried fruits and vegetables to children.'' I know that is a tough decision for schools to make, as to whether they should offer dried fruits and vegetables to children. Do we need $5 million to help them evaluate that? There is $25 million for a new grant program to ``teach children about gardening, nutrition, cooking''--and get this--``and where food comes from.'' I am sure all over America children are asking: Where does food come from? This may sound like a well-intentioned initiative, but this grant program is a lot like 18 other food and nutrition programs that the Government Accountability Office declared duplicative in a report issued 2 years ago. The Federal Government's duplication of nutrition programs has cost $62.5 million annually in previous years. So here is a new grant program under the label of ``nutrition education.'' The energy title of this bill doles out about $881 million in energy programs. Most Americans do not realize that the farm bill has become as much about energy subsidies as about farm subsidies. There is funding for ethanol research, biorefinery installations, and a sugar- to-ethanol program where the Federal Government purchases surplus sugar and sells it at a loss to ethanol producers. American taxpayers will spend $5 million on the Biodiesel Fuel Education Program. Now, if there is anything that is needed in America, it is a good, vigorous biodiesel fuel education program. We are going to spend $5 million on it. It is to spread the gospel on the benefits of biodiesel. I have no objection to the use of biodiesel. In fact, I think I prefer it much more as an alternative compared to corn ethanol. But here we have $5 million to educate consumers on the benefits of biodiesel. Hidden in this bill is a tax on heating oil. Just yesterday, the Washington Times talked about the farm bill's National Oilheat Research Alliance Program in an article entitled ``Congress seeks to jack up fees on home heating oil in midst of frigid winter.'' The article reads: Congress' mammoth farm bill restores the imposition of an extra fee on home heating oil, hitting consumers in the cold- weather states just as utility costs are spiking. The fee-- two-tenths of a cent on every gallon sold--was tacked onto the end of the 959-page bill, which is winding its way through Capitol Hill. The fee would last for nearly 20 years and would siphon the money to develop equipment that is cheaper, more efficient and safer, and to encourage consumers to update their equipment. The heating oil fee was backed by Northeast lawmakers who said it would fund important research to benefit consumers. The bill prohibits oil companies from passing the fees on to consumers, but taxpayer advocates said that's a sham and that the money has to come from consumers. To say they can't pass on the cost, said Diane Katz, research fellow in regulatory policy at the Heritage Foundation, ``It's kind of silly because of course the costs are going to get passed on. Money is fungible.'' So here we have a special oil tax on consumers where the revenue is earmarked back to the heating oil industry, about $15 million a year according to the GAO. Why is the Federal Government in the business of collecting funds for heating oil research on behalf of the heating oil industry? The bill reauthorizes USDA loan subsidies for peanut growers and allows them to use their peanuts as collateral. If a peanut grower forfeits on their USDA loan, the Federal Government takes ownership of the peanuts and taxpayers bear the cost of storing the peanuts. The infamous sugar program is housed in this farm bill. This is probably the most ongoing scandal in the history of all of the farm bills and of all of the egregious aspects of it. Like the peanut program, USDA gives sugar growers, primarily in Florida, Louisiana, and Michigan, hundreds of millions of dollars in loans each year. If a sugar grower misses their profit margins, they get to keep the loan and transfer their excess sugar to the Federal Government as collateral. Over the past year, sugar subsidies and forfeitures have cost the taxpayers $258 million, while over 640,000 tons of sugar was handed over to the USDA. You know something. If you really look at it, there are a few families that control the sugar industry in Florida. Those families, God bless them, have given generous contributions to both Democratic and Republican parties. So the taxpayers have paid $258 million and over 640,000 tons of sugar was handed over to the USDA. Combined with import tariffs and marketing controls, the USDA Sugar Program costs consumers over $3 billion every year, one of the most obscene Federal farm subsidies ever conceived. This farm bill, advertised as full of reforms, does nothing. Another bizarre handout in this farm bill that I have been involved in now for many years is the creation of a catfish office. Again, I assure my colleagues, I am not making this up--a catfish office inside the U.S. Department of Agriculture at a cost of $15 million a year. The USDA will hire inspectors to visually inspect catfish in seafood facilities--only catfish and not shrimp, not a cod, not a tilapia, but only a catfish. We are going to have a special office called-- appropriately--the catfish office, to inspect visually catfish in seafood facilities--and only catfish. Senator Shaheen and I and 11 other Senators have sponsored legislation to kill this catfish program. I have been opposing it for years. In 2012, our legislation was adopted in the Senate by voice vote. I assure the distinguished manager of the bill that is the last time that on this issue I will accept a voice vote. The distinguished chairperson assured me that with a voice vote this amendment of ours would remain in the legislation, and obviously that has not been the case. So next time the distinguished manager, if it ever comes up again, assures me that an amendment of mine will be adopted in the final legislation, I will have to have better authentication than just taking her word. Last year, the House Agriculture Committee passed a bipartisan amendment to repeal it in the farm bill. Despite all this opposition, the unpopular catfish office resiliently survived conference. We do not need a new USDA catfish inspection program. The Food and Drug Administration already tests catfish, along with all other seafood. But certain farm bill conferees are insisting on creating a catfish office because catfish farmers in Southern States do not want to compete against foreign catfish importers, particularly those from Vietnam. Its true purpose is trade protectionism at the taxpayer's expense. Under this farm bill, there will be a virtual ban on catfish imports for several years while foreign inspectors switch from FDA's inspection procedures to USDA's catfish procedures. The Government Accountability Office investigated the proposed catfish office. In four different reports--four different reports--they called it ``duplicative'' and ``wasteful'' and warned that it fragments our food safety system by splitting FDA's ability to inspect seafood. In fact, one GAO report was simply titled, ``Responsibility for Inspecting Catfish Should Not Be Assigned to USDA.'' It called on Congress to eliminate the catfish office. Both the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the FDA have questioned the scientific value of the proposed catfish office. Several years ago, USDA studied the idea and concluded that there is substantial uncertainty regarding the actual effectiveness of a USDA catfish inspection program. Even the President's budget proposed to zero it out. American consumers should also be concerned about the trade implications of this program. Some nations, including Vietnam, have threatened WTO retaliation against American agricultural exports, like beef and soybeans. Trade experts warn that this catfish gimmick is the kind of protectionism that harms our efforts to win concessions under trade agreement negotiations like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which could reduce the tariffs on American products sold to Asian trading partners. Again, Senator Shaheen and I tried to eliminate the catfish office in the Senate's farm bill, but the managers blocked the vote on our amendment. The House Agriculture Committee did the right thing and passed the farm bill amendment to eliminate it. Unfortunately, when this bill went to conference, several Senate conferees blocked the vote in conference to repeal it--actually blocked a vote in conference and actually rewrote the law to increase it. It seems that catfish is one bottom feeder with friends in high places. At the end of the day, this farm bill will be hailed by its supporters as reform-minded. Let me assure the American public that this is hardly reform. It was managed under a closed amendment process and will prove to be more wasteful and costly than any farm bill we have ever seen. For these reasons, I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this bill. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the Wall Street Journal Editorial appropriately entitled, ``A Bipartisan Taxpayer Raid.''

Mr. McCAIN. I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate as in morning business.

Mr. McCAIN. I attended, as did all of my colleagues, the President's State of the Union Message the night before last. Obviously, as always, the President delivers an excellent speech. I must say that in the years I have attended the President's State of the Union Message, I have never seen a message on national security and foreign policy as disconnected from reality as the President's speech. Obviously it had minor importance by the amount of time that was taken in the speech, but what was most interesting was the President portrayed a Middle East, in particular, that has little relation to the reality today and the ongoing tragedies, deaths, and sacrifice because of a failure of American leadership. In interesting polling data today, a Pew Research poll indicates: More Now See Failure than Success in Iraq, Afghanistan Little Partisan Gap in Views of Whether U.S. Has Reached Goals. It continues: After more than a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the public does not think the United States has achieved its goals in either country. About half of Americans (52%) say the U.S. has mostly failed to achieve its goals in Afghanistan while 38% say it has mostly succeeded. Opinions about the U.S. war in Iraq are virtually the same; 52 percent say the United States has mostly failed in reaching its goals there while 38 percent say it has mostly succeeded. Continuing: In both cases, evaluations of the wars have turned more negative in recent years. In November 2011, as the U.S. was completing its military withdrawal from Iraq, a majority (56%) thought the U.S. had achieved its goals there. So the American people, despite the rhetoric from the administration--some of it incredibly bizarre--have figured out that after many years of sacrifice, expenditure of American blood and treasure, we are looking at and staring failure in the face. I will quote from the President's speech the night before last. On Iraq, the President said: When I took office, nearly 180,000 troops were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, all our troops are out of Iraq. Yes, that is a correct statement. But what the President didn't go on to say was that Iraq is now collapsing under the weight of sectarian violence that now has exceeded that of 2008, one of the most dangerous years of the war. What the President didn't say was that there is sectarian violence, Sunni and Shia, initiated largely by President Maliki, which is causing attacks throughout Iraq--bomb detonations, IEDs, attacks on various institutions. President Maliki has driven his own vice president out of the country. The list goes on and on. I say to my colleagues, there is no greater example of our failure in Iraq than Fallujah today. In the second battle of Fallujah, in 2007, the United States of America lost 96 marines and soldiers killed, over 600 wounded. Today, vehicles are driving through the streets of Fallujah flying Al-Qaeda flags. Al-Qaeda is now in charge in Fallujah. I wonder what we tell families of those brave soldiers and marines who were killed and wounded in the first and second battle of Fallujah. Because in the words of General Petraeus, who was the architect of the surge--which most of my colleagues, including the President of the United States, said would fail, when actually there were many of us who knew that it would and did succeed: We won the war but lost the peace. We lost the peace because the United States of America did not leave a residual force behind, thereby allowing the situation to deteriorate to where it is today with Al-Qaeda now in charge of the city of Fallujah, Ramadi--the Syria-Iraq border now being the headquarters and staging areas of Al-Qaeda in both Syria and Iraq. Their black flags now fly over cities where brave Americans, marines and soldiers, sacrificed their lives and their well-being. Gen. James Conway, who commanded the marines in the first battle of Fallujah in April 2004, commenting on failures of the administration's policies in Iraq stated: ``In some ways, the al-Qaeda grand strategy is vindicated.'' He deplored U.S. policies, appeared weak and confused in the wake of how hard we fought to get those cities back in the first place. What did the President of the United States say? Did he mention Fallujah? Of course not. He said: When I took office, nearly 180,000 troops were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, all our troops are out of Iraq. Yes, the troops are out of Iraq and the place is going to hell in a hand basket. Don't think that these people, Al-Qaeda and Al Nusra, are not intent on pursuing their goals of radical Islam right to the United States of America. This should concern every one of my colleagues and every American citizen. Yesterday there was a hearing in the Senate Intelligence Committee: Al Qaida faction in Syria contemplating U.S. attack, intelligence officials warn. Senate hears Nusra Front has ``aspirations for attacks on the homeland'' amid concern over civil war's terrorism implications. Intelligence officials have claimed that a faction linked to al-Qaida in Syria has a desire to launch a domestic attack on the US, an assertion that underscored the growing importance of the Syrian civil war to global terrorism. The Nusra Front, one of the jihadist factions in Syria, that aligns itself with al-Qaida, ``does have aspirations for attack on the homeland,'' James Clapper, the US director of national intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday, yesterday. We know that with Al Nusra, Al-Qaeda, and other radical Islamist organizations, which, by the way, are attracting young men from all over the world, including Europe, is now one that is contemplating attacks on the United States of America. I want to again mention General Conway, who commanded the marines during the first battle of Fallujah in 2004. At the Heritage Foundation he said: ``We fought and died taking those cities,'' Conway said Wednesday at the Heritage Foundation. Conway became the Marine Corps commandant before retiring as a four-star general. A blunt-talking general who rarely seeks the spotlight, Conway described his reaction to recent events in stark terms during his brief remarks. It causes Iraqi and U.S. policies to look a little weak and confused in the wake of how hard we fought to get those cities back in the first place. Continuing: ``In some ways, the al-Qaeda grand strategy is vindicated,'' Conway said, referring to the organization's desire to wait out American forces. Why did they wait out American forces? They waited out American forces because as soon as President Obama took office he announced we were leaving. He didn't announce a strategy for success. He didn't say we have to reach certain goals before we leave. He told everybody we were leaving. It is very clear, when we look at electoral history, that his vote against the resolution concerning military action in Iraq was one of the factors that led him to the Presidency. But for him to stand before the American people and say: When I took office, nearly 180,000 Americans were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, all our troops are out of Iraq. This is, at best, a very incomplete depiction of what has happened since all of those troops are out of Iraq. Finally, General Conway said: Those who lost people, those wounded, I think, are now stripped of a coping mechanism, Conway said. ``If you have a young Marine or soldier sitting with his legs missing, he could at least previously say, `Well what we did was the right thing. Iraq is better for it, and we won.' '' I'm not sure that same individual sitting in that chair is thinking those things these days. That's truly sad. I have talked to and heard from so many of these brave young Americans who feel exactly as General Conway described. They don't know and they don't understand after the enormous sacrifices that they made that somehow now black Al-Qaeda flags are flying over Fallujah. On Afghanistan, the President said: More than 60,000 of our troops have already come home from Afghanistan. With Afghan forces now in the lead for their own security, our troops have moved to a support role. . . . After 2014, we will support a unified Afghanistan as it takes responsibility for its own future. If the Afghan government signs a security agreement that we have negotiated, a small force of Americans could remain in Afghanistan with NATO allies to carry out two narrow missions: training and assisting Afghan forces, and counterterrorism operations to pursue any remnants of Al Qaeda. For while our relationship with Afghanistan will change, one thing will not: our resolve that terrorists do not launch attacks against our country. On the one hand, the President said there would be two narrow missions and yet our goal is still that terrorists don't launch attacks against our country. Again, he failed to put forward a true proposal for our strategy in Afghanistan and once again avoided offering any specifics on troop numbers. Why did we not leave a troop presence behind in Iraq? Because they would never give a troop number. Anybody who tells you the problem was not getting it through the Iraqi Parliament is not telling you the truth. Senator Graham, Senator Lieberman, and I were in Erbil when President Barzani said: I will go to Baghdad. When we met with Allawi, he said: I will sit with Maliki. We went to Maliki and Maliki said: I will agree to have a force of troops in my country. How many? We could not give him an answer nor would the administration give him an answer. In the words and testimony of our Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the number cascaded down to 3,500, and that would have been a force that spent its time defending itself. Therefore, we did not leave a troop force behind in Iraq, and I have just described the consequences. The same thing is happening in Afghanistan. The President will not say the force level he wants left behind in Afghanistan. Why is it he will not? I want to point out that President Karzai of Afghanistan is a paranoid individual, and he has been incredibly unhelpful. It has been terribly disappointing to me--and I have known him for 14 years--that he is behaving as he is. But President Karzai's paranoia is somewhat understandable when he does not know whether the United States will remain, he doesn't know whether he can count on the United States, and he knows he has to stay in the neighborhood and accommodate for the likelihood now that the United States leaves completely. So his paranoia, to some degree, is much more understandable. On our last trip to Afghanistan in early January, we saw firsthand the progress that has been made by American and Afghan forces, and such progress is a true testament to the positive impact our troops have had and the long-term benefits of our partnership with the Afghan people. The Afghan people, though, and military will need our continued support. If we pull out, if we see the Iraq movie again, we will see the same thing happen in Afghanistan that is now happening in Iraq, and it doesn't take a lot of smarts to know that. So now we turn to Syria. In Syria ``we will support the opposition that rejects the agenda of terrorist networks.'' What does that mean? Despite promise after promise, the administration has refused to provide aid to the moderate opposition forces in Syria who are committed. It was 2 years ago when the President of the United States said: It is not a matter of whether Bashar al-Assad will leave office, it is a matter of when. It was over 2 years ago, at the Senate Armed Services Committee, when Secretary of Defense Panetta and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in answer to my question: Sir, it is inevitable, it is inevitable that Bashar al-Assad will leave office. Does anybody believe that now? Our failure to help the Free Syrian Army over time was negated and overwhelmed by the presence of 5,000 Hezbollah sent in by the Iranians, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, planeload after planeload of weapons that now land at the Damascus Airport from Russia, while they are loaded onto Russian-built helicopters, and barrel bombs, which are explosives packed with all kinds of nuts and bolts and other metals, are dropped out of those helicopters on men, women, and children. But not to worry--not to worry--because the chemical weapons are leaving, apparently, according to the President, because he said: American diplomacy, backed by the threat of force, is why Syria's chemical weapons are being eliminated, and we will continue to work with the international community to usher in the future the Syrian people deserve, a future free of a dictator, terror, and fear. The chemical weapons he is hailing as a success--how much has been accomplished? The Syrian Government has delivered less than 5 percent of its deadliest chemical weapons agents to international authorities so far. This is a quote from an L.A. Times story: Syria unlikely to meet deadline on its deadliest chemical agents. President Bashar Assad's government has delivered less than 5 percent of its deadliest chemical weapons agents. The deadline is next week. So even this claim about chemical weapons being removed does not bear scrutiny. But far, far, far more important--far more important, I say-- is that if we got rid of the chemical weapons Bashar al-Assad had, that would not change the equation on the ground. I am sure a Syrian mother cannot differentiate very well if her child is killed by a chemical weapon, a barrel bomb or is starved to death, as 120,000 men, women, and children have met that fate. It is unbelievable. Now we are watching a charade take place in Geneva, and that of course has turned into a farce. Anybody who believes that Bashar al-Assad is going to willingly leave office, when he is winning the battle on the ground, obviously has no idea of the nature of Bashar Assad. Again, the slaughter goes on, and one of the huge aspects of this happens to be the fact that it is no longer a civil war. I would remind my colleagues this conflict began because in homes there were some children who wrote some anti-Assad graffiti on the wall. They were rounded up by Assad's police and were tortured and beaten, and that began an Arab spring in Syria. That spread throughout the country and now has spread throughout the region. As I just said, the Iraq-Syria border is now Al Qaeda. It is now controlled by them. The Iranians are all in, with 5,000 Hezbollah; Lebanon is destabilized; Jordan is overwhelmed by refugees; Turkey is even under strain; 100,000-some refugees are even in Kurdistan. It has turned into a regional conflict and one which, sooner or later, will finally erupt into a major conflict which is going to affect the United States of America. The President of the United States may want to leave the Middle East alone, but I can assure my colleagues the Middle East will not leave America alone. Look at the statement made just today by our Director of National Intelligence who said that al-Nusra, an affiliate of Al Qaeda, is planning attacks on the United States of America. The President said: Finally, let's remember that our leadership is defined not just by our defense against threats but by the enormous opportunities to do good and promote understandings around the globe, and no one is better positioned to take advantage of those opportunities than America. I couldn't agree more. But when the United States is viewed by the world, particularly the Middle East, as weak, withdrawing, no longer involved or trying to disengage, then I am not sure we can have the effects the President outlined in his State of the Union speech. I think it is very clear that a seminal moment, as far as the entire Middle East is concerned, was when the President of the United States said that because Bashar Assad had crossed the red line in the use of chemical weapons--there was indisputable evidence that 1,400 men, women, and children had been killed in chemical weapons attacks--we were going to have to enact strikes against Bashar Assad in Syria. A few days later, our Secretary of State, in one of the more incredible statements I have ever heard--said: Yeah, but the strike will be ``unbelievably small.'' I am not making that up. He said the strike would be ``unbelievably small.'' That must have really frightened the Syrians when they heard that any military strikes would be ``unbelievably small.'' The President of the United States then, without informing our allies--specifically the Saudis--according to published reports, took a 45-minute walk with his Chief of Staff and then decided he would go to the Congress of the United States for permission or for ratification of any attack he might make, and, obviously, that wasn't going to happen. I say to my colleagues, I travel a lot in the Middle East. I can tell you--and I would even name names but not on the record--that at that moment our allies lost confidence, they lost belief in the United States. We are now watching countries in the region openly stating--for example, the Saudi Arabians refusing a seat on the National Security Council of the United Nations--and this is published everywhere--they no longer believe in the United States of America. By the way, one of the other aspects of this, and there are many, is a Washington Post story of this morning: Europeans are flocking to the war in Syria. What happens when they come home? The story is about a couple of people who went from England. The distress among security officials is pervasive in European capitals and in Washington. U.S. Intelligence Chief James R. Clapper, Jr. told a congressional panel Wednesday that the Syrian war had attracted about 7,000 foreign fighters from as many as 50 nations and that at least one of the main jihadist groups in Syria aspires to carry out an attack in the United States. But Europe is a far closer and more accessible target. The International Center for the Study of Radicalization estimated last month that nearly 2,000 Western Europeans had traveled to Syria to fight and that the number was rising fast. Continuing to quote from the article: French officials say 700 came from France. French Interior Minister Manuel Valls asserted this month that returning fighters represent ``the biggest threat the country faces in the coming years.'' The anxiety has been especially acute in Britain, where memories are still fresh of the July 2005 transit bombings. These attacks, which claimed 52 lives, were carried out by homegrown radicals, at least two of whom had received training in Pakistan. ``The penny hasn't dropped. But Syria is a game-changer,'' Richard Walton, who leads counterterrorism efforts at Scotland Yard, told the Evening Standard newspaper. ``We are seeing it every day. You have hundreds of people going to Syria, and if they don't get killed they get radicalized.'' So we are in a situation of failed leadership over the last 5 years and the chickens, unfortunately, are beginning to come home to roost. When the President of the United States, in his address to the Nation, describes things in the Middle East as he did, I think it is very, very, very unfortunate because that does not comport with the actual facts on the ground. I say to my colleagues, the American people no longer believe our mission in Iraq and Afghanistan was the right thing to do. I can tell my constituents that in 2008 things were very different. The surge had worked. We were gradually withdrawing from Syria. We had the Taliban in Afghanistan largely under control. In Syria, Bashar Assad was losing. Now the terrain throughout the Middle East is dramatically different. As much as I regret to say, it is my obligation to tell my constituents my view; that is, we have very, very difficult times ahead. I do not like to predict that bad things are going to happen, but right now I don't see how they can be avoided. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to engage in a colloquy with my colleagues, Senator Graham, Senator Ayotte, and Senator Roberts.

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I bring to the attention of my colleagues the front page of the Washington Post this morning: ``Hill balks at shifting CIA role in drone war.'' Congress has moved to block President Obama's plan to shift control of the U.S. drone campaign from the CIA to the Defense Department, inserting a secret provision in the massive government spending bill introduced this week that would preserve the spy agency's role in lethal counterterrorism operations, U.S. officials said. The measure, included in a classified annex to the $1.1 trillion federal budget plan, would restrict the use of any funding to transfer unmanned aircraft or the authority to carry out drone strikes from the CIA to the Pentagon. . . . '' The Appropriations Committee is supposed to appropriate. The Appropriations Committee has no business making this decision. How many of my colleagues knew that this provision was in this mammoth appropriations bill? I bet a handful. The job of the Armed Services Committee and the job of the Intelligence Committee is to authorize these things. There was no hearing in the Armed Services Committee, there was no hearing in the Intelligence Committee on this issue. Instead, a major policy decision that has to do with the ability to defend this Nation against the forces of violent Islamic extremism is now being decided in a secret annex of a mammoth appropriations bill. It is not the first time I say that the appropriators have authorized. The appropriators have gotten into the business of the authorizing committees in a way that is a violation of every procedure and process this Senate is supposed to be pursuing. I believe Senator Levin, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, will be as outraged as I am. I believe the chairperson of the Intelligence Committee will be as angry as I am. This is a fundamental function of government that has to do with national security and it is hidden in a provision, in a secret provision of the mammoth appropriations bill. I say to the distinguished chairperson and ranking member, that is not their business. Some of us have been speaking out for more than a year about the terrorist attack of September 11, 2012, which took the lives of four American public servants in Benghazi, Libya, including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens. We have spoken out because of the many questions that still remain unanswered to this day. We have spoken out and will continue to speak out despite efforts of partisans and proxies of the administration to sweep all of this under the rug. The latest snow job came in December, from the New York Times, that ever-reliable surrogate of the Obama administration, which published a long report challenging some key facts about the Benghazi attack. But as Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan used to say, everyone is entitled to their own opinions but not to their own facts. The facts are stubborn. In reality, what the Times report does is propagate myths. Let's review some of the facts. The Times claims the following: Months of investigation . . . centered on interviews with Libyans in Benghazi who had direct knowledge of the attack there and its context, turned up no evidence that Al Qaeda or other international terrorist groups had any role in the assault. The Times goes on to claim: Benghazi was not infiltrated by Al-Qaeda. . . . Here are the facts. Al Qaeda-affiliated groups were present in Benghazi, and they were involved in the attack of September 11, 2012. The New York Times itself reported on October 12: American officials said [the attack] included participants from Ansar al-Shariah, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, and the Muhammad Jamal network, a militant group in Egypt. All of these groups are affiliated with Al Qaeda. The New York Times claims: Republican arguments appear to conflate purely local extremist organizations, like Ansar al-Shariah with Al Qaeda's international terrorist network. Again, here are the facts. In an interview yesterday with CNN, the Senator from California acknowledged correctly that Ansar al-Shariah, which played a major role in the attack, is linked to Al Qaeda. We are drawing on the work of our Intelligence Committee which yesterday released its report on the Benghazi attack and its aftermath. In that report you will find numerous references by the intelligence community before the attack that make clear the nature of the Al Qaeda threat in Benghazi. The claims that Al Qaeda had not infiltrated Benghazi rests on the same rhetorical sleight-of-hand that holds that while groups may align themselves with Al Qaeda, may seek and receive direction from Al Qaeda, may share similar terrorist goals of Al Qaeda, and may even call themselves part of Al Qaeda, but if they are not sitting along the Pakistan-Afghan border or are not part of so-called core Al Qaeda or Al Qaeda senior leadership, then somehow they are not Al Qaeda. This is the same bizarre language and logic that may have led then- Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice to claim just days after the attack that ``we have decimated Al Qaeda,'' this despite the fact that Al Qaeda-affiliated groups are proliferating and gaining traction all across the Middle East and North Africa, including in Benghazi. The fact is that the attack against our diplomatic facility in Benghazi on September 11 was carried out in part by Al Qaeda-affiliated terrorists who had a safe haven in parts of eastern Libya. As the Senate Intelligence Committee report finds, the Intelligence Committee provided ample strategic warning about the negative security trends in Benghazi and the likelihood they would further deteriorate. This was the opposite of an intelligence failure; this was clear as day. Despite these clear warning signs, the State Department was unprepared. Our diplomatic facility in Benghazi was insecure and had already been attacked multiple times. Our military was not postured and ready to respond to contingencies in a part of Libya where attacks against westerners and western interests had already occurred and where the threat of more attacks was growing. The false narrative the New York Times is furthering just so happens to align with the Obama administration's account of events, but, again, facts are stubborn, and the Senate Intelligence Committee report clearly supports the conclusion that the administration knew or should have known of the terrorist threat in Benghazi during the relevant period and should have pre-positioned assets or made other preparations to better protect our people serving there. The administration and its allies will continue to try to sweep Benghazi under the rug--including the fact that we have still not received testimony and the presence of the individuals who were present and moved to Germany the day following the attack on the Embassy and the deaths of four Americans. Contrary to the President's repeated claim that the tide of war is receding and contrary to his administration's talking point that Al Qaeda has been decimated, the reality is that Al Qaeda-affiliated groups are emboldened now from central Asia to the Middle East and north Africa, all the way to west African countries such as Nigeria and Mali. Indeed, nothing brings this home more tragically than watching the black flags of Al Qaeda hoisted over the Iraq city of Fallujah. Ninety-five brave soldiers and Americans died in Fallujah, 600 were wounded, and today we see the black flags of Al Qaeda hoisted over the city of Fallujah. The problem is getting worse, and that is in large part due to this administration's disengagement from these regions. Look at Libya today. It is a country that we and our NATO allies intervened to save from the wrath of an anti-American tyrant, and it is now characterized by chaos, lawlessness, and ungoverned spaces that are exploited by those who seek to do harm to our Nation and our interests. According to the Senate Intelligence Committee's report, 15 Libyans who cooperated with our investigation into the Benghazi attack have been murdered. The administration can blame the Libyans for these problems, just as they blame the Iraqis for Iraq's problems, but they can't escape their share of the blame for failing to support these people who want and need our help to secure their countries. That is why Chris Stevens was in Benghazi. That is why he risked and ultimately gave his life. He believed it was in our interest to lead events in the world and support our friends and those who wish to be our friends in their effort to build stable, successful societies with effective democratic governments. The greatest way we can honor his sacrifice, and those of his colleagues, is by recommitting ourselves to their mission. Unless America actively supports those in the broader Middle East who wish to replace despair and extremism with hope and freedom, I fear the tide of war will eventually get us again. I note that my colleague the Senator from New Hampshire is on the floor, and I would ask her and my colleague from South Carolina, is it not true that in this Intelligence Committee report, which is very encompassing, except for one mention in the minority views, there is no individual who is held responsible? So now we have a situation where bureaucracies are responsible but individuals are not. I find that intriguing. Also, my friend from South Carolina has been trying to interview witnesses for a number of months, if not years, who were at the scene of the attack and then moved to Germany the following day. Isn't it true that we have never been able to interview those witnesses, which could have cleared up any arguments or any doubt about what the attack was all about?

Mr. McCAIN. I think a lot of people who are observers really have to view this and the actions on the part of the administration--the statement by now-National Security Adviser Susan Rice on every Sunday talk show was that this was the result of a hateful video, a spontaneous demonstration, and that Al Qaeda has been decimated. We can only view that and some of these actions in the context of the fact that it was a political campaign. There was a Presidential campaign going on, and the rhetoric time after time and rally after rally from the President of the United States and his surrogates was this: Bin Laden is dead. Al Qaeda is on the run. The tide of war is receding. All of these events that took place at the consulate in Benghazi and the death of Christopher Stevens contradicted that storyline. Still, I cannot understand why 2 weeks later the President of the United States was before the United Nations and still talking about how this was due to a spontaneous demonstration and hateful video. You can only understand that, in my view, it was in the context of a storyline that was propagated throughout the 2012 Presidential campaign.

Mr. McCAIN. Regarding Iraq, we called for the resignation of the Secretary of Defense because of the failures in Iraq.

Mr. McCAIN. Another question for my colleagues: The attack went on for a period of some nine hours, as I recall. Over that period of time, with the hundreds of airplanes, aircraft that we have and the ships and other military capabilities we have in the area, in the Mediterranean, we were not able to get any real significant help. There are a number of accounts of where a team supposedly landed, were held at the airport, were not allowed to move in, and all of that. All of these are questions that have not been answered. General Ham told the Senator from South Carolina and me over the phone that he didn't have any assets that were capable of reaching Benghazi. Does he mean we don't have the capability over an 8- or 9- hour period to get some relief to an ongoing attack? Again, what was the hangup that kept people at the airport who finally did get there?

Mr. McCAIN. We still don't know what the President did that evening.

Mr. McCAIN. The fact is no one, no one to this day has been held responsible for the tragic deaths of four brave Americans--no one. The Intelligence Committee report I appreciate. The whole bureaucracy is responsible. Individuals are the ones that run bureaucracies. I am disappointed that the Intelligence Committee did not have the courage to name the names of the people responsible. I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the chairwoman. I was awaiting the arrival of my colleague from Virginia, who was going to speak first.

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator from Maryland. I hope the Presiding Officer will chastise the Senator from Virginia for being tardy. I know he is very capable of that. So I will go ahead and begin, although I had planned on the Senator from Virginia being first. He is the sponsor of the bill which I am cosponsoring. I thank the chairwoman.

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Chair. (The remarks of Mr. McCain and Mr. Kaine pertaining to the introduction of S. 1939 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

Mr. McCAIN. I thank Senate Armed Services Chairman Levin for working with me to clarify language in the consolidated appropriations bill of 2014 that directly contravenes section 2822 of the Fiscal Year 2014 National Defense Authorization Act. To date, Congress has not received sufficient cost-analysis supporting the Department of Defense's proposed movement of troops from Okinawa to Guam. For this reason, in the authorization bill, the Armed Services Committees explicitly prohibited any premature investments in Guam until the Secretary of Defense provides Congress with, among other things, a report on military resources necessary to execute the U.S. force posture strategy in the Asia-Pacific region. I also appreciate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Durbin for agreeing that the reporting requirements in section 2822 of the NDAA must be satisfied before the Department of Defense can obligate funds for investments in Guam if the report finds they are needed. In furtherance of these requirements, I fully expect the Senate Armed Services Committee will provide close and careful oversight over the use of any monies that may be appropriated for the transfer of forces covered in this section and obligated by the Department for that purpose and, specifically, hold hearings to determine the extent to which any plan to realign forces from Okinawa to Guam will sufficiently support our operational requirements in the Asia-Pacific region.

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, today I come to the floor to discuss the consolidated appropriations bill of 2014, upon which we will soon be voting. While I am pleased that this bill will prevent another government shutdown and hopefully signal to the American people that we can actually work together, I will not be voting for this bill due to serious concerns surrounding specific policy riders and spending provisions. I am also seriously concerned about the process whereby we are passing a 1,582 page, $1.012 trillion spending bill that we received at 8 p.m. Monday night--giving us very limited time to time to carefully review or debate and no ability to amend. Now, this is not a new occurrence in Congress. According to the Congressional Research Service, between 1977 and 2013, there were only 4 years when all appropriations were enacted on time--fiscal year 1977, fiscal year 1989, fiscal year 1995, and fiscal year 1997: ``[O]ver half of the regular appropriations bills for a fiscal year were enacted on time in only one instance (1978). In all other fiscal years, fewer than six regular appropriations acts were enacted on or before October 1. In addition, in 12 out of the 37 years during this period, none of these regular appropriations bills were enacted prior to the start of the fiscal year.'' This is unacceptable and must change. With our country facing a rapidly growing $17.3 trillion debt, which amounts to more than $54,000 per citizen, it is time for Congress to go back to the ``regular order'' and consider each one of the 12 individual appropriations bills in turn to fund the activities of our government before the end of the fiscal year, with ample time for debate and amendments, instead of ramming through a massive 1,582-page Omnibus appropriation bills like the one before us today. The American taxpayer expects more and deserves better than what we are giving them in this bill. The Omnibus includes appropriations policy riders and pork barrel projects that should raise red flags for all of my colleagues. For example, tucked away in the classified portion of this bill is a policy rider that has serious national security implications and is a prime example of the appropriators overstepping their bounds. This provision will halt the transfer of the U.S. drone counterterrorism operations from the CIA to the Department of Defense. In doing so, it summarily changes a very important policy that guides how we do certain counterterrorism operations abroad from a direction that the President has specifically prescribed. And how did most of us become aware of this major policy change? By reading this morning's Washington Post; that is how. This is outrageous, and it should not have happened. While there may be differing opinions on who should control drone counterterrorism operations, we should be able to debate these differences in the committees of jurisdiction and eventually on the Senate floor. The fact that a major national security policy decision is going to be authorized in this bill without debate or authorization is unacceptable and should not be the way we legislate on such important national security issues. The $1 trillion Omnibus also includes a wasteful provision directing the U.S. Department of Agriculture, USDA, to continue developing the duplicative Catfish Inspection Office--even though the FDA has a similar inspection office. According to the Government Accountability Office, GAO, this duplicative office will cost taxpayers roughly $15 million a year once up and running. Both the Office of Management and Budget, OMB, and GAO have recommended that Congress repeal the catfish program because it is ``wasteful and duplicative'' of FDA's seafood inspection services. The fact remains that the Catfish Office won't improve food safety. Its true purpose is to ban catfish imports for several years while USDA bureaucrats iron out their procedures with foreign inspectors. A New York Times article from November 2013 explains how this program would disrupt our trade relations with Asian countries. Some nations, including Vietnam, have threatened WTO retaliation against our agriculture exports, like beef and soybeans. During the Senate debate on the farm bill, I was joined by Senator Shaheen and 11 other Senators in offering an amendment to that bill that would have eliminated the Catfish Office, but the managers blocked a vote on our amendment. The House version of the farm bill includes an amendment to eliminate the USDA Catfish Office, but Senate conferees are, likewise, blocking a vote in conference. I urge the Senate conferees to the farm bill to drop their opposition and allow a vote in conference on this important provision. Appropriators should have not included this policy rider in the omnibus. Instead, we should move to eliminate the duplicative and wasteful USDA Catfish Office. In addition, the Omnibus bill includes $120 million in unrequested funding for Guam in direct contravention of the bicameral decisions of the Armed Services Committees. There is absolutely no justification for this. That is why the Armed Services Committees have expressly prohibited such funding in the NDAA. To date, Congress has not received sufficient cost-analysis supporting the Department of Defense's proposed movement of troops from Okinawa to Guam. For this reason, in the authorization bill passed just last month, the Armed Services Committees explicitly prohibited any premature investments in Guam until the Secretary of Defense provides Congress with the strategic plan which includes, among other things, costs associated with the movement to Guam and a report on military resources necessary to execute the U.S. force posture strategy in the Asia-Pacific region. While this language will stay in the Omnibus bill due to the inability to offer an amendment to strip it, I am thankful to Senate Armed Services Chairman Levin for working with me to clarify the language. I also appreciate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Durbin and Vice Chairman Cochran for agreeing that the reporting requirements in section 2822 of the NDAA must be satisfied before the Department of Defense can obligate funds for investments in Guam if the report finds they are needed. I fully expect the Senate Armed Services Committee will provide close and careful oversight, including hearings, over the use of any monies that may be appropriated for the transfer of forces covered in this section and obligated by the Department for that purpose. Yet another example of the abuse of the appropriations process is the continued inclusion of a misguided policy rider that prohibits the Postal Service from moving to 5-day mail delivery, which would save the Postal Service $2 billion a year. This congressional mandate was initially put in place in 1984 and is the only roadblock keeping the Postal Service from transforming the way it delivers mail, while still being able to provide universal service. The Postal Service continues to lose billions of dollars each year; however, some in Congress have decided that they know better than the Postal Service leadership and continue to prohibit the Postal Service from modernizing and transforming the way it does business. Congress must accept the fact that the Postal Service's current way of doing business is no longer viable. The American public communicates and conducts business in a completely different way than they did even 5 years ago. We must allow the Postal Service to adapt to changing times in order to have a Postal Service in the future, and this includes 5-day mail delivery to save $2 billion a year. In addition to these unacceptable policy riders, the bill also includes other examples of pork barrel spending for programs, some duplicative, such as $65 million for Pacific Coast salmon restoration for States including Nevada, a program that even President Obama has called duplicative and mocked in his 2011 State of the Union Address; $80 million in additional funding for Amtrak, which continues to operate in the red year after year; $15 million for an ``incentive program'' that directs DOD to overpay on contracts by an additional 5 percent if the contractor is a Native Hawaiian-owned company. There is language that makes it easier for the DOD to enter into no- bid contracts for studies, analysis, and unsolicited proposals. The language in the bill makes it ripe for wasteful spending and earmarks for pet projects. For example, Department of Defense may eliminate competition and use a no-bid contract for a ``product of original thinking and was submitted in confidence by one source.'' With the Department facing cuts now and into the future, this type of vague language could lead to costly wasteful spending on programs that DOD neither needs or can afford. There are $600,000 for a program at Mississippi State University to research how to grow trees faster for replanting after hurricanes. There are numerous ``Buy America'' provisions that hurt competition and innovation, drive up the costs of procurement, and further increases the taxpayer burden; $10 million for the USDA High Energy Cost Grants Program that go to subsidize electricity bills in Alaska and Hawaii; $10 million for a DOD Youth Challenge Program that was neither requested by the President nor authorized to receive funding in the fiscal year 2014 NDAA; and $3.3 million increase in the STARBASE Program. According to the Internet, this ``nice-to-have'' but not ``necessary-to-have'' program ``focuses on elementary students, primarily fifth graders. The program's goal is to motivate these students to explore Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, STEM, as they continue their education. Military volunteers apply abstract principles to real-world situations by leading tours and giving lectures on the use of STEM in different settings and careers.'' With a war going on and budget crisis at our doorstep, this is how we elect to spend our increasingly scarce defense dollars? We should leave the education of our children to our teachers and parents and not our military. There is a $7.7 million increase for the Civil Air Program, or CAP. CAP is a volunteer organization that provides aerospace education to young people, runs a junior cadet program, and assists when possible in providing emergency services. Its members are hard-working and we are grateful for their volunteerism. This year, as in the past, the Senate Armed Services Committee authorized CAP funding. However, CAP is auxiliary and thus should not be funded given the need for the military to tighten its purse strings and fund programs that are a priority to our national defense, not auxiliary. The bill also includes $375 million for Army, Navy, and Air Force ``alternative energy research'' initiatives. As I have stated in the past, this type of research has yielded such shining examples as the Department of the Navy's purchase of 450,000 gallons of alternative fuels for $12 million--over 26 dollars per gallon. There is over $460 million in funding for Defense Department to do research dealing with research for alzheimer, autism, prostate and ovarian cancer, HIV/AIDS and numerous other diseases and illnesses. While this type of research is important, it should not be funded by Department of Defense. It should, instead, be funded by the National Institutes of Health, the budget of which this bill more than doubles over last year's. We cannot continue this process where massive, unamendable, thousand- plus page spending bills totaling trillions of dollars are voted on 2 days after being made available to Members of this body. No Senator could have read and fully understood the long-term impact the policy and spending provisions this bill will have on the future of this Nation. It is a shameful way to do business. The American taxpayers are tired of Washington and our uncontrollable spending habits as well as our inability to cut wasteful, underperforming, and duplicative programs. Furthermore, our refusal to reform our broken tax system and our unsustainable mandatory programs have contributed greatly not only to the current fiscal crisis in our country, but to Americans' unfavorable opinion of the institutions of our government. We must change course and have a fair and open process to fund the Federal Government, not a closed process. For all of these reasons, I will not be voting for this appropriations bill.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I am pleased today to join my colleague, the junior Senator from Virginia, as we introduce the War Powers Consultation Act of 2014. This legislation is the final product of the National War Powers Commission, which was a bipartisan effort co-led by former Secretary of State Jim Baker and former Secretary of State Warren Christopher. The commission was set up by the Miller Center at the University of Virginia to devise a modern and workable war powers consultation mechanism for the executive and legislative branches. It included some of our Nation's most distinguished and respected thinkers and practitioners of national security policy and law. In 2008, after more than a year of hard work, the commission released the final product--an actual legislative proposal to repeal and replace the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which no American President has ever accepted as constitutional. As does my colleague, I view our introduction of this legislation today as the start of an important congressional and national debate, not the final word in that debate. We wish to pick up where the National War Powers Commission left off 6 years ago, and we do so fully understanding and hopeful that this legislation should be considered and debated and amended and improved through regular order. My colleague from Virginia has done a great job on this legislation, and I am proud to join him. I wish to expand a bit on why updating the War Powers Resolution is such a worthwhile endeavor for the Senate to consider right now. The Constitution gives the power to declare war to the Congress, but Congress has not formally declared war since June of 1942 even though our Nation has been involved in dozens of military actions of one scale or another since that time. There is a reason for this. The nature of war is changing. It is increasingly unlikely that the combat operations our Nation will be involved in will resemble those of World War II, where the standing armies and navies of nation states squared off against those of rival nation states on clearly defined fields of battle. Rather, the conflicts in which increasingly we find ourselves and for which we must prepare will be murkier, harder to reconcile with the traditional notions of warfare; they may be more limited in their objectives, their scope, and their duration; and they likely will not conclude with a formal surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship. The challenge for all of us serving in Congress is this: How do we reconcile the changing nature of war with Congress's proper role in the declaration of war? It is not exactly a new question, but it is a profound one, for unless we in Congress are prepared to cede our constitutional authority over matters of war to the executive, we need a more workable arrangement for consultation and decisionmaking between the executive and legislative branches. We have seen several manifestations of this challenge in recent years. In 2011 President Obama committed U.S. military forces to combat operations in Libya to protect civilian populations from imminent slaughter by a brutal, anti-American tyrant. I, for one, believe he was right to do so. But 6 months later, when our armed services were still involved in kinetic actions in Libya--not just supporting our NATO allies but conducting air-to-ground operations and targeted strikes from armed, unmanned aerial vehicles--the administration claimed, as other administrations would, that it had no obligations to Congress under the War Powers Resolution because our Armed Forces were not involved in combat operations. That struck many Members of Congress, including me, as fundamentally at odds with reality, and unfortunately it pushed more Members of Congress into opposition against the mission itself. More recently, we saw the opposite problem manifested with regard to Syria. Perhaps due to the backlash in Congress that the administration's handling of the Libya conflict engendered, President Obama decided to seek congressional authorization for limited airstrikes against the Assad regime after it slaughtered more than 1,400 of its own citizens with chemical weapons last August. An operation that likely would have lasted a few days and thus been fully consistent with the President's authority under the existing War Powers Resolution had he decided to act decisively and take limited military action instead devolved into a stinging legislative repudiation of executive action. The tragic result was that the Assad regime was spared any meaningful consequences for its use of a weapon of mass destruction against innocent men, women, and children, and, as with Libya, the forces that want to turn America away from the world were not checked but empowered. Some of us may see the problem in these two instances as a failure of Presidential leadership, and I would agree, but I also believe the examples of Libya and Syria represent the broader problem we as a nation face: What is the proper war power authority of the executive and legislative branches when it comes to limited conflicts, which are increasingly the kinds of conflicts with which we are faced? It is essential for the Congress and the President to work together to define a new war powers consultative agreement that reflects the nature of conflict in the 21st century and is in line with our Constitution. Our Nation does not have 535 commanders in chief. We have one--the President--and that role as established by our Constitution must be respected. Our Nation is poorly served when Members of Congress try to micromanage the Commander in Chief in matters of war. At the same time, now more than ever, we need to create a broader and more durable national consensus on foreign policy and national security, especially when it comes to matters of war and armed conflict. We need to find ways to make internationalist policies more politically sustainable. After the September 11 attack, we embarked on an expansive foreign policy. Spending on defense and foreign assistance went up, and energy shifted to the executive. Now things are changing. Americans want to pull back from the world. Our foreign assistance and defense budgets are declining. The desire to curb Presidential power across the board is growing, and the political momentum is shifting toward the Congress. America has gone through this kind of political rebalancing before, and much of the time we have gotten it wrong. That is how we got isolationism and disarmament after World War I, that is how we got a hollow army after Vietnam, and that is how we weakened our national security after the Cold War in the misplaced hope of cashing in on a peace dividend. We can't afford to repeat these mistakes. A new war powers resolution--one that is recognized as both constitutional and workable in practice--can be an important contribution to this effort. It can more effectively invest in the Congress the critical decisions that impact our national security. It can help build a more durable consensus in favor of the kinds of policies we need to sustain our global leadership and protect our Nation. In short, the legislation we are introducing today can restore a better balance to the way national security decisionmaking should work in a great democracy such as ours. Let me say again. Neither the Senator from Virginia nor I believe the legislation we are introducing today answers all of the monumental and difficult questions surrounding the issue of war powers. We believe this is a matter of transcendent importance to our Nation, and we as a deliberative body of our government should debate this issue, and we look forward to that debate. This legislation should be seen as a way of starting that discussion both here in the Congress and across our Nation. We owe that to ourselves and our constituents. Most of all, we owe that to the brave men and women who serve our Nation in uniform and are called to risk their lives in harm's way for the sake of our Nation's national defense. Before I yield to my tardy colleague from Virginia, I wish to mention again another reason why I think this legislation should be the beginning of a serious debate which we should bring to some conclusion. The fact is that no President of the United States has recognized the constitutionality of the War Powers Act. That is a problem in itself. That is a perversion, frankly, of the Constitution of the United States of America. That is one reason, but the most important reason is that I believe we are living in incredibly dangerous times. When we look across the Middle East, when we look at Asia and the rise in the tensions in that part of the world and we look at the conflicts that are becoming regional--and whose fault they are is a subject for another debate and discussion, but the fact is that we are in the path of some kind of conflict in which--whether the United States of America wants to or not--we may have to be involved in some ways. We still have vital national security interests in the Middle East. It is evolving into a chaotic situation, and one can look from the Mediterranean all the way to the Strait of Hormuz, the Gulf of Aqaba, and throughout the region. So I believe the likelihood of us being involved in some way or another in some conflict is greater than it has been since the end of the Cold War, and I believe the American people deserve legislation and a clear definition of the responsibilities of the Congress of the United States and that of the President of the United States. Again, I thank my colleague from Virginia, whose idea this is, who took a great proposal that was developed at the University of Virginia and was kind enough to involve me in this effort. I thank him for it. I thank him for his very hard work on it, despite the fact that, as the Chair will recognize, he was late for this discussion. I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I am pleased today to join my colleague, the junior Senator from Virginia, as we introduce the War Powers Consultation Act of 2014. This legislation is the final product of the National War Powers Commission, which was a bipartisan effort co-led by former Secretary of State Jim Baker and former Secretary of State Warren Christopher. The commission was set up by the Miller Center at the University of Virginia to devise a modern and workable war powers consultation mechanism for the executive and legislative branches. It included some of our Nation's most distinguished and respected thinkers and practitioners of national security policy and law. In 2008, after more than a year of hard work, the commission released the final product--an actual legislative proposal to repeal and replace the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which no American President has ever accepted as constitutional. As does my colleague, I view our introduction of this legislation today as the start of an important congressional and national debate, not the final word in that debate. We wish to pick up where the National War Powers Commission left off 6 years ago, and we do so fully understanding and hopeful that this legislation should be considered and debated and amended and improved through regular order. My colleague from Virginia has done a great job on this legislation, and I am proud to join him. I wish to expand a bit on why updating the War Powers Resolution is such a worthwhile endeavor for the Senate to consider right now. The Constitution gives the power to declare war to the Congress, but Congress has not formally declared war since June of 1942 even though our Nation has been involved in dozens of military actions of one scale or another since that time. There is a reason for this. The nature of war is changing. It is increasingly unlikely that the combat operations our Nation will be involved in will resemble those of World War II, where the standing armies and navies of nation states squared off against those of rival nation states on clearly defined fields of battle. Rather, the conflicts in which increasingly we find ourselves and for which we must prepare will be murkier, harder to reconcile with the traditional notions of warfare; they may be more limited in their objectives, their scope, and their duration; and they likely will not conclude with a formal surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship. The challenge for all of us serving in Congress is this: How do we reconcile the changing nature of war with Congress's proper role in the declaration of war? It is not exactly a new question, but it is a profound one, for unless we in Congress are prepared to cede our constitutional authority over matters of war to the executive, we need a more workable arrangement for consultation and decisionmaking between the executive and legislative branches. We have seen several manifestations of this challenge in recent years. In 2011 President Obama committed U.S. military forces to combat operations in Libya to protect civilian populations from imminent slaughter by a brutal, anti-American tyrant. I, for one, believe he was right to do so. But 6 months later, when our armed services were still involved in kinetic actions in Libya--not just supporting our NATO allies but conducting air-to-ground operations and targeted strikes from armed, unmanned aerial vehicles--the administration claimed, as other administrations would, that it had no obligations to Congress under the War Powers Resolution because our Armed Forces were not involved in combat operations. That struck many Members of Congress, including me, as fundamentally at odds with reality, and unfortunately it pushed more Members of Congress into opposition against the mission itself. More recently, we saw the opposite problem manifested with regard to Syria. Perhaps due to the backlash in Congress that the administration's handling of the Libya conflict engendered, President Obama decided to seek congressional authorization for limited airstrikes against the Assad regime after it slaughtered more than 1,400 of its own citizens with chemical weapons last August. An operation that likely would have lasted a few days and thus been fully consistent with the President's authority under the existing War Powers Resolution had he decided to act decisively and take limited military action instead devolved into a stinging legislative repudiation of executive action. The tragic result was that the Assad regime was spared any meaningful consequences for its use of a weapon of mass destruction against innocent men, women, and children, and, as with Libya, the forces that want to turn America away from the world were not checked but empowered. Some of us may see the problem in these two instances as a failure of Presidential leadership, and I would agree, but I also believe the examples of Libya and Syria represent the broader problem we as a nation face: What is the proper war power authority of the executive and legislative branches when it comes to limited conflicts, which are increasingly the kinds of conflicts with which we are faced? It is essential for the Congress and the President to work together to define a new war powers consultative agreement that reflects the nature of conflict in the 21st century and is in line with our Constitution. Our Nation does not have 535 commanders in chief. We have one--the President--and that role as established by our Constitution must be respected. Our Nation is poorly served when Members of Congress try to micromanage the Commander in Chief in matters of war. At the same time, now more than ever, we need to create a broader and more durable national consensus on foreign policy and national security, especially when it comes to matters of war and armed conflict. We need to find ways to make internationalist policies more politically sustainable. After the September 11 attack, we embarked on an expansive foreign policy. Spending on defense and foreign assistance went up, and energy shifted to the executive. Now things are changing. Americans want to pull back from the world. Our foreign assistance and defense budgets are declining. The desire to curb Presidential power across the board is growing, and the political momentum is shifting toward the Congress. America has gone through this kind of political rebalancing before, and much of the time we have gotten it wrong. That is how we got isolationism and disarmament after World War I, that is how we got a hollow army after Vietnam, and that is how we weakened our national security after the Cold War in the misplaced hope of cashing in on a peace dividend. We can't afford to repeat these mistakes. A new war powers resolution--one that is recognized as both constitutional and workable in practice--can be an important contribution to this effort. It can more effectively invest in the Congress the critical decisions that impact our national security. It can help build a more durable consensus in favor of the kinds of policies we need to sustain our global leadership and protect our Nation. In short, the legislation we are introducing today can restore a better balance to the way national security decisionmaking should work in a great democracy such as ours. Let me say again. Neither the Senator from Virginia nor I believe the legislation we are introducing today answers all of the monumental and difficult questions surrounding the issue of war powers. We believe this is a matter of transcendent importance to our Nation, and we as a deliberative body of our government should debate this issue, and we look forward to that debate. This legislation should be seen as a way of starting that discussion both here in the Congress and across our Nation. We owe that to ourselves and our constituents. Most of all, we owe that to the brave men and women who serve our Nation in uniform and are called to risk their lives in harm's way for the sake of our Nation's national defense. Before I yield to my tardy colleague from Virginia, I wish to mention again another reason why I think this legislation should be the beginning of a serious debate which we should bring to some conclusion. The fact is that no President of the United States has recognized the constitutionality of the War Powers Act. That is a problem in itself. That is a perversion, frankly, of the Constitution of the United States of America. That is one reason, but the most important reason is that I believe we are living in incredibly dangerous times. When we look across the Middle East, when we look at Asia and the rise in the tensions in that part of the world and we look at the conflicts that are becoming regional--and whose fault they are is a subject for another debate and discussion, but the fact is that we are in the path of some kind of conflict in which--whether the United States of America wants to or not--we may have to be involved in some ways. We still have vital national security interests in the Middle East. It is evolving into a chaotic situation, and one can look from the Mediterranean all the way to the Strait of Hormuz, the Gulf of Aqaba, and throughout the region. So I believe the likelihood of us being involved in some way or another in some conflict is greater than it has been since the end of the Cold War, and I believe the American people deserve legislation and a clear definition of the responsibilities of the Congress of the United States and that of the President of the United States. Again, I thank my colleague from Virginia, whose idea this is, who took a great proposal that was developed at the University of Virginia and was kind enough to involve me in this effort. I thank him for it. I thank him for his very hard work on it, despite the fact that, as the Chair will recognize, he was late for this discussion. I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.