Rand Paul

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I think most Americans remember where they were on 9/11/2001. I was doing eye surgery in Bowling Green, KY. When I came out of surgery, I walked into the patient's room and on the television set were the planes crashing into the buildings. My first thought was horror. My second thought was concern for my father who was in Washington and is a Congressman and lives near the Pentagon. As I thought about this, it struck me as so bizarre and hard to believe. But I know exactly where I was and remember it vividly today. I think Lucky Penny remembers where she was. Lucky Penny was one of the first female F 16 pilots. She was here in Washington at one of the bases, and she was asked to scramble her F 16. After the first two planes crashed, she was asked to intercept United Flight 93, which was coming in from Pennsylvania and thought to be headed toward the White House. She was asked to scramble a fighter jet with no armaments. They didn't have time to load the armaments and at that time we were not prepared and did not have jets already prearmed. Her mission was to take down the plane however she could, which probably meant ramming her jet into the commercial airliner and bringing it down. Can you imagine being given this task? She took it upon herself and quickly scrambled her jet. The jet had to be scrambled in such a fast fashion that there were still things attached to it. People were trying to dismantle and pull out the gas hose and all the appendages to the plane as she was taxiing down the runway. I think she will never forget where she was on 9/11. When SEAL Team 6 infiltrated bin Laden's compound, I think Americans were proud of SEAL Team 6 and proud of our military and proud of what they did to finally get this mass murderer. What happened in the weeks leading up to that attack and the attack on the compound by SEAL Team 6 was a doctor in Pakistan who helped us. His name is Dr. Shakil Afridi. He is about the same age as I, and I have a lot of sympathy for him and for his bravery. Doctors are not soldiers. We are taught to heal and to help, but he thought it was important enough and that bin Laden was a bad enough person that he would help America get bin Laden. He set up a vaccination clinic, and they did DNA testing to try to prove that bin Laden was in the compound. He risked his life to get this mass murderer. As a consequence though, Pakistan has not treated him very well. The Pakistan Government has put him in prison for 33 years. I find it incredibly insulting that this is coming from an ostensible ally. I find it troubling that this man who is a hero and should be praised and congratulated and rewarded has been sentenced to prison for 33 years. He has been in prison for the last year without trial and probably being tortured. He has lost a significant amount of weight and now he is told he will go to prison for the rest of his life for helping America to catch the mass murderer bin Laden. What I find particularly troubling is that the United States continues to fund and give money to Pakistan. Over $1 billion of U.S. taxpayer money is sent to Pakistan. It troubles me that we are sending $1 billion to a country that imprisons the gentleman, the physician, who was brave enough to help us get bin Laden. It makes no sense. Recently, a committee proposed reducing our foreign aid--the $1 billion--by $33 million. It is 3 percent. I think they will laugh at us and keep doing what they are doing. They only understand negotiation from strength. So what I am proposing, and what I will insist upon in the next few days, is a vote on ending aid to Pakistan unless they free Dr. Afridi. I think that is the very least they can do. I am also asking the U.S. Government to grant him emergency citizenship and to help his family get over here from Pakistan and to provide them safe passage. I think it is the least we can do. We shouldn't reward bad behavior. That is what we have done with foreign aid for so many years. It is one thing to talk about aiding or assisting your allies, but it is another to aid and assist the people who persistently persecute their own people--people who continue with human rights abuses. In Pakistan there is a woman named Asia Bibi. She has been accused of saying something about the prophet. She said she didn't do it. It is gossip. She is set to be executed in Pakistan. I think Americans should be outraged that 1 billion of your taxpayer dollars is being sent to Pakistan, a country that is imprisoning the guy who helped us get bin Laden, that is imprisoning a Christian for saying she said some sort of religious blasphemy, and the accusation is basically gossip. I think we should be insulted, not to mention the fact that I don't think it works. Look at the examples throughout the last 30, 40 years of the different dictators we have given money to. We gave over $60 billion to Mubarak, the military dictator of Egypt. He stole a lot of it. He was one of the richest men in the world. He had some of the largest palaces in the world. His kids were enriched also at our expense. Look at Mobutu in Congo. He was given billions of dollars and entertained by American leaders. At one time he had seven of the largest palaces in the world, mansions in the United States, mansions in Paris that were all paid for with our money. What did his people have? His people didn't have running water or electricity. Even if we believe in the humanitarian nature of giving money to these countries, it is not going to them. We are making rich autocrats richer in Third World countries, and it is not going to the people of the country. It is stolen and skimmed off the top. Look at Mugabe. Mugabe in Zimbabwe tortures his opposition, has confiscated land, has basically run his country into the ground, and we have given him billions of dollars. We can't buy better behavior and we shouldn't reward autocrats. Let's not reward folks who torture their people. For goodness' sake, we should not send $1 billion to Pakistan when they are imprisoning a hero who helped us get bin Laden. My amendment will call for an immediate halt to all aid to Pakistan now. I am asking President Obama not to send one penny to Pakistan until Dr. Afridi is freed. I am asking that no more money goes there in the future until Dr. Afridi is freed. I think this is the least we can do. I plan on demanding a vote in the Senate, and I hope the American people will pay attention to how their representatives vote. They are voting to send money we don't even have. We are $1 trillion in debt. We borrow the money from China and send it to Pakistan. It makes no sense. Our infrastructure is crumbling. We have had two bridges collapse in Kentucky this year. We are struggling for money to pay for our own infrastructure, and we are sending $1 billion to a country that imprisons Christians for their beliefs. It has to come to an end. It is going to come to an end one way or another. What I ask is that the Senate step up and support ending this money being sent to Pakistan and, at the very least, not send any more until Dr. Afridi is freed. I thank the Chair. I yield back my time and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that privileges of the floor be granted to Benedikt Springer from Senator Merkley's staff.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. My amendment is to rein in the FDA. I believe they have gotten overzealous in their duties. They do have important duties, but I think they have gotten overblown. My amendment has three parts. First, it attempts to stop the FDA's overzealous regulation of vitamins, foods, and supplements by codifying the first amendment prohibition on prior restraint. What this means is the first amendment says we cannot restrain speech before it happens. This amendment also helps to make explicit that commercial speech is speech and should be protected. Under current rules, the FDA prevents even the manufacturer of prune juice from saying that prune juice relieves constipation. I think that is an FDA that has gotten a little bit out of hand. I think that vitamin supplement manufacturers and distributors should be allowed to give us information and that the buyers should be allowed to review that information in making decisions about the product and that this speech should not be restricted. Second, my amendment says the FDA doesn't need to be carrying weapons. I don't need to see bureaucrats carrying automatic weapons. If there are police officers necessary in the operation of their duties, I would rather have the FBI. The FDA does not need to be sending armed agents to the Amish farms to arrest a farmer for selling milk from the cow. Third, my amendment fixes what needs to be fixed in a lot of regulatory crimes. We need to add in the component of mens rea. Mens rea means that when a person commits a crime and they put that person in jail, they have to prove that person had a guilty mind and had intent to commit a crime. So we add two words. If they are going to accuse a person of a crime, it has to be knowing and willful. These are very simple words, but they change the burden of the government. If the government is going to accuse a person of the crime, they need to know this. If Congress is going to criminalize conduct at a Federal level, as it does in the FDA Act, then the least we can do is add in the mens rea requirement. Thank you. I urge support for my amendment.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask that the reading of the amendment be waived.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to call up my amendment No. 2143.

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

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, today I am offering an amendment to the FDA. I am troubled by images of armed FDA agents raiding Amish farms and preventing them from selling milk directly from the cow. I think we have bigger problems in our country without sending armed FDA agents onto peaceful farmers' land and telling them they can't sell milk directly from the cow. My amendment has three parts. First, it attempts to stop the FDA's overzealous regulation of vitamins, food, and supplements by codifying the first amendment prohibition on prior restraint. What do I mean by that? The first amendment says we can't prevent speech--even commercial speech--in advance of the speech. We can't tell Cheerios they can't say that there is a health benefit to their Cheerios. Under our current FDA laws, the FDA says that if someone wants to market prune juice, they can't say it cures constipation. They can't make a health claim about a food supplement or about a vitamin. They can do it about a pharmaceutical, but they are not allowed to do it about a health supplement. I think this should change. There have been several court cases that show this goes against not only the spirit but the letter of the law of the first amendment. So this amendment would change that. This amendment would stop the FDA from censoring claims about curative, mitigative, or preventive effects of dietary supplements. It would also stop the FDA from prohibiting distribution of scientific articles and publications regarding the role of nutrients in protecting against disease. Despite four court orders condemning the practice as a violation of the first amendment, the FDA continues to suppress consumers' rights to be informed and to make informed choices by denying them this particular information. It is time for Congress to put an end to FDA censorship. Second, my amendment would disarm the FDA. Now, some of you might be surprised the FDA is armed. Well, you shouldn't be. We have nearly 40 Federal agencies that are armed. I am not against having police. I am not against the Army, the military, or the FBI. But I think bureaucrats don't need to be carrying weapons, and I think what we ought to do is if there is a need for an armed policeman to be there, the FBI--who are trained to do this-- should do it. But I don't think it is a good idea to be arming bureaucrats to go on the farms, with arms, to stop people from selling milk from a cow. I think we have too many armed Federal agencies and that we need to put an end to this. Criminal law is increasingly used as a tool of our government bureaucracy to punish and control honest businessmen who are simply attempting to make a living. Historically, the criminal law was intended to punish only the most horrible offenses that everyone agreed were inherently wrong or evil--offenses like murder, rape, theft, arson. But now we have basically federalized thousands of activities and called them crimes. If bureaucrats need to involve the police, let's have them use the FBI. But I see no reason to have the FDA carrying weapons. Today, the criminal law is used to punish behavior such as even fishing without a permit, packaging a product incorrectly, or shipping something with an improper label. Simply said, the Federal Government has gone too far. The plain language of our Constitution specifies a very few Federal crimes. In fact, the Constitution originally only had four Federal crimes, and now we have thousands of Federal crimes. We have moved beyond the original intent of the Constitution. We don't even know or have a complete list of all the Federal crimes. It is estimated there are over 4,000, but no one has an exact number. Finally, my amendment will require adequate mens rea protection. In other words, when there is a crime, we are supposed to prove the intent. People have to have intended to harm someone. It can't be an honest mistake, where a business man or woman has broken a regulation and didn't intend to harm anyone. If we want to convict someone of a crime and put them in a jail, it should have a mens rea requirement. This is something we have had for hundreds of years that comes out of our common law tradition. This amendment would fix this problem by strengthening the mens rea component of each of the prohibited acts in the FDA Act by including the words ``knowing'' and ``willful'' before we address and accuse someone of a crime. I think this would give protection to folks who are guilty of inadvertently breaking a regulation and would keep from overflowing our jails. We have plenty of violent criminals without putting people in for honest breaches of regulations. If Congress is going to criminalize conduct at the Federal level, as it does with the FDA Act, then the least it can do is have an adequate mens rea requirement. My amendment will attempt to do this. It is not that we will not have rules at the Federal level, but the rules ought to be reasonable. We ought to allow people to market vitamins. There is no earthly reason why someone who markets prune juice can't advertise that it helps with constipation. We have gone too far. We have abrogated the first amendment. What we need to do is tell the FDA the courts have ruled that the first amendment does apply to commercial speech, and the FDA has been overstepping their bounds. I hope this amendment will pass. I will ask for the yeas and nays at the appropriate time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam President, we are currently borrowing $50,000 a second. We borrow $4 billion a day, and we are borrowing over $1 trillion every year. The situation has gotten out of control, and I think the situation of our deficit and our country threatens our country. In fact, I think it is the No. 1 threat to our national security, and our security as a nation is this overwhelming burden of debt. Many economists have said this burden of debt is actually causing us to lose 1 million jobs a year. It crowds out private investment because we have to take care of financing this enormous debt. Amidst all of this, we have rules in place. There is a Budget Act that we have had in place since the 1970s that requires that this body put forward a budget. The problem is we have no budget and have had no budget for 3 years. Now, one would say: How can this be when we have a law that says the majority party has to have a budget, and yet we have no budget? They are in defiance of the law. Then if you were to come to us and say you want money spent on X item, we can't even do anything about it because there are no appropriations bills. If we don't have a budget, we don't have appropriations bills, and we can't alter up or down the appropriations bills because we don't have a budget to go by. In fact, every bit of spending we do here is in defiance of our own rules because we are supposed to compare the spending bills to the budget, and we have no budget. Many of us have been promoting something new--this would be a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution--because we don't seem to be doing a very good job balancing the budget. When you have less money coming in, you spend less money. Every American family has to do this. Why can't Washington simply spend what comes in? It shouldn't be that complicated. But they aren't obeying their own rules, so I think we need stronger rules. That would be an amendment to the Constitution that says we must balance the budget. We had a vote on it. Forty-seven of us on our side of the aisle voted for it, and no one on the other side voted for it. Our balanced budget amendment to the Constitution would require that the budget balance within 5 years. In that vein, our office has put together a budget that does balance in 5 years, and it actually, over a 10-year period, would reduce the deficit by $2 trillion. Ours is the only budget that will balance in 5 years and begin paying down the debt over 10 years. Right now, Congress has an approval rating of 11 percent. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that we aren't doing our job. We aren't passing a budget, much less a balanced budget amendment. If people vote for our budget, we would balance in 5 years and begin paying down the debt. I think the stock market would be ecstatic to hear this. How do you do this? In order to balance the budget, we have to tackle entitlement reform. Currently, Social Security is $6.2 trillion short of money. The taxes people pay into Social Security are less than what we pay out. Social Security is essentially insolvent. You ask: Well, how come my check keeps coming? Your check will always keep coming. As the bankruptcy grows deeper and deeper, your checks will come--they won't buy anything. You are already seeing this at the pump. Gasoline prices have doubled. Is it because gas is more precious? No. It is because the value of the dollar is shrinking. The value of the dollar is shrinking because we print all this new money to pay for this massive debt. It is unsustainable, and one way or another it is going to come to a head. Will it come to a head through the destruction of our currency paying for this debt? I don't know, but we certainly need a budget. Ours will be a budget that balances in 5 years. People say: Why don't you compromise with the other side? We will, but they have to have a budget. If ours balances in 5 years and the other side will promote one that balances in 10, compromise would be 7\1/2\. But if the other side doesn't have a budget or if the other side has a budget--the President put forward a budget, and we will vote on that too. His never balances. So we have infinity for their side, and we have 5 years on our side. How do we get halfway from infinity to 5 years? If we are going to compromise, they have to come to the table. We have to engage in a debate. Entitlements are 65 percent of the budget. They call it mandatory spending, and nobody wants to do anything about it. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid is 65 percent of the budget. If we don't tackle entitlement reform, we can't fix it. We have a proposal on the table. Social Security reform, we fix Social Security. The way we fix it is we gradually let the age of eligibility rise to 70 over about 20 years, and we means-test the benefits--not on the current people but on the next wave. My generation will have to wait longer. Why? Is it because we want to change things? No. It is because we are living longer. We all have a longer life expectancy, and then we had smaller families. This isn't anybody's fault. It is not the Democrats' fault and it is not the Republicans' fault. We just had a bunch of large families born after World War II. They are all retiring, and each subsequent generation had less children. It is a demographic fact. Combine that with the fact that we are living longer, and we have to make changes. But we have a proposal on the table. We will fix Social Security. How do we compromise if the other side will not come up with a proposal? Social Security is $6 trillion in the hole. Medicare is $35 to $40 trillion in the hole. We have a solution. We will give every senior citizen in the country the same health care plan I have. The same health care plan that every Senator and Congressman has, we are willing to give it to them. Do you know whose idea this was? Senator John Kerry from Massachusetts, a Democrat. We have taken his idea and put it forward, but we can't get anybody on that side to talk to us. They have given up. It is an election year. They are not going to do anything this year. They didn't do anything last year. So we haven't done anything to fix entitlements. We have done nothing to fix Social Security, nothing to fix Medicare. How do you compromise with a side that has no proposition, that won't put anything forward? But we have a 5-year plan that balances in 5 years, and we fix Social Security. We save Social Security in perpetuity--which, I laughingly say, is a long time. We also fix Medicare. We save Medicare. Medicare is facing a $35 to $40 trillion deficit, and we are willing to save it. But the other side has to come to the table, and nobody is showing up to debate these issues. No one is proposing any budget on the other side. No one is proposing any entitlement reform. In our budget we save Social Security, we save Medicare, and we go one step further. We have tax reform that would help the country and would make it fair. Some on the other side say, well, let's get rid of all those loopholes for special interests. We do it. We do a flat tax: 17 percent for all businesses, 17 percent for all personal. You get to deduct your kids and your house, and that is it. No other deductions. No other special interest exemptions. No other special credits for any special business or special enterprise. A flat 17 percent for everybody. We would see a boom in this country like we have never seen if we would do it. What would compromise be? Maybe the other side wants 25 percent, and I want 17 percent, and we go in the middle and we do 22 percent. That would be compromise. But how do we compromise with the other side when there is no budget? There is no entitlement reform proposed from the other side. There is no tax reform proposed from the other side. How do we compromise if there is no other side? If the other side has decided not to show up this year--if this year is going to be a waste of time and everybody is going to just run for office, maybe we shouldn't be paid this year. Maybe you shouldn't pay your Congressman, maybe you shouldn't pay your Senator this year if we are not going to have proposals from both sides. This means we should be talking about entitlement reform, talking about tax reform, talking about budgets, and there would be give-and- take. The only way to get give-and-take in our country is people need to show up for the debate. We need to do our job. Why is there not a committee in Washington, not any committee--why is there not any committee meeting every day on how to fix Social Security? Nobody is talking about it. Why is there no committee discussing Medicare reform meeting every day, Republicans and Democrats, talking, figuring out a way out of this? There is no such committee. Why is there not a committee on tax reform, discussing how we could make our Tax Code simpler and make it easier for people to figure out and make the rates lower so we could spur the economy? Every time we have lowered tax rates, unemployment is cut in half. When we had an upper rate of 90 percent and Kennedy lowered it to 70 percent, unemployment was cut in half. When Reagan lowered the top rate from 70 percent to 50 percent, unemployment was cut in half. When Reagan lowered it again from 50 to 28, unemployment was cut in half. But we as a country have to decide that we do not want to punish rich people, that we do not want to go out and punish corporations. We work for these people. We want them to do better. The oil and gas industry employs 9.2 million people and pays $86 million a day in taxes. We want them to do better. Let's not punish them with more taxes and regulations. Let's make their taxes lower and their regulatory burden lower so they can drill for more oil in our country and employ more people in our country. These are the decisions we have to make as we go forward. We have a budget that can balance in 5 years. It is what our country needs. I think people would react, and the marketplace in particular would react in a tremendous fashion if we would move forward and vote for a budget. The Republicans will have four or five budgets presented. Some of them balance in 5, some of them balance in 8, some of them balance in 28. But we are at least trying. We are showing up and we are presenting budgets that would balance at some finite period of time. I tell people if it is never going to balance, it should not even be presented. If it is not going to balance in your lifetime--if you say it is going to balance in somebody else's lifetime when somebody else is going to be here in Congress--you have abdicated your responsibility. We can do better than this. The American people expect us to do better than this. The American people expect us to show up and do our job. We will today vote on these budgets. What I ask of the American people is: Look and see how your Representatives vote. Look and see how your Senators vote. Look and see whether your Senators believe in balancing the budget or if they think it doesn't matter; we will just print up more money. But realize if their answer is to print up more money, if their answer is deficits do not matter, if that is their answer, I want you to get mad and I want you to get angry and I want you to get even. Every time you go to the gas pump and pay $4 for gas I want you to know why gas prices are rising. Not because gas is more precious but because your dollar is less valuable, and that is because of the massive debt we run and the irresponsibility up here that nobody is willing to tackle it. There are some on our side willing to make the tough decisions. Is it easy to stand here and say to the people in Kentucky and the people in America that the only way to save Social Security is letting the age of eligibility rise? Do you think that is popular? Do you think I am saying that to pander and try to get votes? I am saying that is because it is the only thing that is going to save Social Security, the only thing that will save our country, is we have to make difficult decisions. I think that is what needs to happen. People need to say: Are you willing to make the tough decisions? Are you willing to stand up and say this is how we would fix Social Security; this is how we would save the system; this is how we would correct this deficit that is dragging us all down? One side is willing to do that. I am willing to do that and I hope my fellow Senators will today consider voting to balance the budget. I yield my time.

Mr. PAUL. Madam President, like the previous three Republican budgets, this budget is silent on student interest rates. Anyone who asserts otherwise for good political theatre should know that it is untrue. This budget has nothing to do with student interest rates. I think we should have a debate on a little higher plane. We are borrowing $50,000 a second. We are borrowing $4 billion a day, over $1 trillion a year. While America burns through a century of wealth, the President fiddles. The President's friends fuss and they produce no budget. This budget balances in 5 years. It saves Social Security. It saves Medicare. It reforms and simplifies the Tax Code. I urge my colleagues to act now and vote for a budget that balances. Do something to save America from this looming debt crisis. I yield the floor.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2101.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, first, we borrow billions of dollars from China, India, and Saudi Arabia. Then we loan it back to them again. Republicans rightly complain that we are sending taxpayer money to the President's major donors at Solyndra and BrightSource. Now Republicans need to be consistent and say we are not going to send Ex- Im loans to even bigger companies that are even more profitable. If it is wrong for the government to choose winners and send our money to corporations, we should say it is wrong and we should vote against this. Does anybody remember the President threatening to increase taxes on corporate jets? Ex-Im Banks are now going to increase the loans for corporate jets tenfold. My amendment will stop this charade. My amendment will stop sending taxpayer dollars overseas to countries from whom we already are borrowing money. It makes no sense, and the time is now to stop it.

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

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, the ordinary middle-class family is struggling to get a home loan. Tens of thousands of homeowners have lost their homes or are struggling to make payments on their home loans. Meanwhile, Congress steadily dishes out billions of dollars in taxpayer-subsidized loans to large profitable companies. Eighty percent of these export-import loans are given to companies that are in the Fortune 500. So we are giving taxpayer loans to very profitable companies. I am a great believer in capitalism, in the jobs corporations create. I defend profit and the benefits that accrue from leaving that profit largely in the private sector. I am not one who clamors for punitive taxes. I am not someone who thinks we need to punish corporations. But at the same time, I do not want my colleagues to construe that to mean I believe we should be subsidizing profitable corporations. I don't think taxpayer-subsidized loans should go to profitable companies. President Obama has been passing out loans to his campaign donors. He has been using a campaign trough that he has set up over at the Department of Energy. Very wealthy multimillionaires and billionaires are getting loans through the Department of Energy, including Solyndra and BrightSource. People heavily involved in the President's campaign have been getting subsidized loans. Republicans have been rightly criticizing the President for these Department of Energy loans to Solyndra, BrightSource, and others. Republicans have been correct in criticizing the President for trying to pick the winners and losers in energy production. Yet now a majority of Republicans are poised to vote for their own set of subsidized export-import loans. In fact, they want to increase the export-import loans by nearly 50 percent and pick the winners and losers in the export business. The Horse traders may disdain consistency, but the American people value principled and consistent opposition to deficit spending. The American people know hypocrisy when they see it. The American people know corporate welfare when they see it. The Export-Import Bank, in fact, provided an $18 million loan to a steel mill in China. Our steel industry has been in decline for decades and we loan $18 million to our competitors? Who in their right mind would subsidize our Chinese competitors with loans? It makes no sense. Can we think of anything more insulting than loaning money to our competitors? Come to think of it, I might. We actually give foreign aid to China. We actually send China economic development assistance. Is it any wonder Congress has an 11-percent approval rating? Many Americans are trying to hang on to their homes, struggling to make the payments on their own home mortgage, while very profitable big business is being given subsidized loans by the government. It makes no sense. What gives? To add insult to injury, we are borrowing money from the same countries we are lending the money to. So we borrow money from India because we run a deficit of over $1 trillion a year--we borrow money from India-- and then we are sending it back to them in the form of taxpayer- subsidized loans. It makes no sense. Ex-Im loans, such as the loans to Solyndra and BrightSource, are simply forms of crony capitalism. With trillion-dollar annual deficits, surely we can vote to end corporate welfare. If companies are making billions of dollars in profits, can we at least end the welfare we are sending to these corporations? I urge a vote against reauthorizing the Ex-Im Bank, and I hope my Republican colleagues will see the inconsistency of criticizing the President on one hand for his crony capitalism and then turning around and doing the same thing. I support not reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank, admitting it is corporate welfare, and trying to save the taxpayers some of their hard- earned money. Thank you very much, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, this amendment doesn't change any of the postal mandates and, to tell my colleagues the truth, the system we have now is not working very well. I think we do need some innovation, so I think it would be a good idea to vote for this amendment. I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2039.

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

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, let's be frank. The Postal Service is bankrupt and only dramatic action will fix the Postal Service. The problem is labor costs. Eighty percent of the Postal Service's costs are labor. If we look at UPS, it is about 50 percent. If we look at FedEx, it is about 38 percent. Before we close one post office, before we end Saturday mail, before we ask citizens to get poorer services for higher prices, maybe we ought to look at the root of the problem. Even FDR--the biggest of the big government advocates--said this about collective bargaining: All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. So agreeing with FDR, I hope my colleagues from across the aisle will agree with their patron saint FDR and will support this amendment that would end collective bargaining. In the interest of time, I will be happy to have a voice vote.

Mr. PAUL. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, this amendment would add a technical change to the profitability plan that is already required under the bill, and it would simply ask that when they do the profitability plan, they report on whether Congress is helping or hurting. A lot of times we do things that are well intentioned that may not work out. I think they need to let us know more about whether Congress is helping or hurting the process. I urge adoption of this amendment.

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

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that amendment No. 2029 with the modifications at the desk be reported.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, this amendment would allow a pilot program for local postal autonomy. One of the complaints I heard from postmasters when they came to talk to me about this bill is that they think there is a lot of middle management in the Postal Service making unwise decisions, and if they were given more autonomy at the local level to make decisions about their post offices, they would have the ability to have cost-saving measures to try to save the post office for their local community. I think this makes sense. I think we would have more innovation and get some useful ideas from our local postmasters. I yield back the remainder of my time.