Jay Rockefeller

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I want people to understand that the Federal aviation reauthorization process is moving slowly but steadily. We take several steps forward but none backward. Yesterday we approved 14 amendments. There was a tremendous amount of work done by the staff to work those out. We have another large group we hope to be able to do this afternoon. So large chunks of the bill are actually getting done. Then, we have a number of controversial amendments, or potentially controversial, and we are in the process of getting those locked down so the Presiding Officer can pronounce a unanimous consent agreement with 2 minutes equally divided. I yield the floor to the Senator from Texas.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Environment and Public Works be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 17, 2010, at 10:30 a.m., in room 406 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

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 I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now resume consideration of the DeMint amendment No. 3454, and that at 6 p.m. the Senate proceed to vote in relation to the amendment, with the time until then divided and controlled between Senators Inouye and DeMint or their designees; and that upon disposition of amendment No. 3454, the Senate then proceed to vote in relation to the following amendments with 2 minutes of debate prior to each vote equally divided and controlled in the usual form; and that after the first vote in this sequence, the remaining votes be limited to 10 minutes each; and that no amendment be in order to any of the amendments in this order, prior to a vote in relation thereto; and that in the case where there is a modification, the amendment be so modified with the changes at the desk. The amendments are Feingold amendment No. 3470, as modified; Vitter amendment No. 3458, as modified; Lieberman amendment No. 3456.

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

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that it be in order for the Senate to consider en bloc the amendments listed here--I will read them in a moment--and that the amendments be considered and agreed to; that in the case where an amendment is modified, the amendment, as modified, be considered and agreed to; and the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table en bloc; and that no amendments be in order to the amendments considered in this agreement.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I compliment the Senator from New Jersey who is complimented far too little for doing so many good things but did a lot of them on the floor this afternoon. I appreciate what he said which is not related to aviation, about the school bond. It makes an enormous difference. It has been changed a bit to make it more effective at the State level. I appreciate the fact that he said that. And the points he made with respect to some of the amendments to the aviation bill seemed to make a lot of sense. The last one may cause some discussion, but I know the Senator and I know what is in his heart. He always speaks the truth.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. You could join the Commerce Committee. You are right up there in the leadership. I respect everything the Senator from New Jersey does. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I move to table the amendment and hope it is defeated.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I would say to the good Senator from the State of Arizona that we have a number of amendments that are already more or less agreed to. More amendments are coming in, including several that he has mentioned. We want a chance to look at those to see whether those are--I heard one amendment, for example, that sounded pretty easy to do. The earmark amendment, I actually--I am not dissing this, but I just cannot resist but point something out; that is, on earmarks, this would ban earmarks for the foreseeable future. Let me redefine that. In the last 71 years, the Congress of the United States has not had a budget deficit in only 13 years. So you can see for the foreseeable future it is sort of a large matter. Nevertheless, we welcome the chance to look at that and work on it. I yield the floor.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I rise to get back to something called the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill. It is the bill we are on. I do not hesitate to say my daughter was one of the cofounders of a charter school, very successful, in Washington, DC, but I would also say to her, as I would to proponents of this legislation which is being discussed--vouchers--that in the Federal aviation bill, we are talking about 500 million Americans who fly every year. Not to diminish them nor my daughter's incredible work--1,300 students--that figure is going to rise very shortly to over 1 billion, and therefore what we do in the Federal aviation bill, which is the pending business, is incredibly important. Senator Byron Dorgan has discussed safety issues and other aspects of the legislation and he is the chairman of the Subcommittee on Aviation Operations, Safety, and Security, which I was for 10 years before I became chairman of the full committee, so I care passionately about the Federal Aviation Administration bill. I recognize it is not the most colorful, gallant legislation in the history of the world but, believe me, it affects every single American. It used to be that only 16 percent of Americans fly. Now everybody flies. There is no way to describe how frustrated passengers are, and they have every right to be. This Federal aviation bill, incidentally, has been extended or laid over 11 different times. Eleven different times we have not been able to get to it, until this day. So I am glad we had the previous discussion and we are going to get to a number of amendments and vote on them before 6 o'clock this evening, after I announce some agreements that have been already been reached. So progress is being made, and I just wish to see it continue being made. You have to figure that some passengers--not many cases but in some cases--have been kept waiting 9 hours on a tarmac. I can't even begin to do the body math of 9 hours, but I don't choose to because it is not pleasant. How does one eat? How does one keep sanity? Presumably, the engines are running. If they are, there is air. If they are not, there is no air. So it is extremely stuffy. You are without food, you are without water, you are without facilities and, most important, you are without any information to know where you are. This is all absolutely unacceptable. In one little section of the bill, I want to say a couple of the things we do to fix that. This bill requires that air carriers in coordination with airports develop contingency plans to make certain they are prepared for these kinds of delays which will happen and which do happen. As more and more people fly, they will happen more frequently. It is a fact of life. Under our bill, passengers have to have access to water, they have to have access to food, to restroom facilities, and to medical attention. They cannot remain on the tarmac for over 3 hours. I think that is stretching it. There is one little caveat which I sort of accept--at least it is in the bill--that if a pilot in his or her judgment believes that within the next 30 minutes or less they will take off, they do not have to go back to the terminal to disgorge their passengers so they can get caught up on water, facilities, medical attention, all the rest of it. These are such commonsense protections, but they affect so many people and children. I have five grandchildren. I am trying to think what my five grandchildren would be acting like after 3 hours on a plane that has not gone anywhere. I am trying to imagine that from various points of view and none of them comes out very favorably, not one of them. The air carriers will also have to post on their Web site which of their flights as a matter of their record tend to be delayed, tend to be canceled, tend to be on time, or diverted. That is a matter of record. It is not doing every one, but those which are likely to do that. That is on the Web site so when the passenger purchases tickets they get that, and that information has to be updated on a monthly basis and it has to be provided to customers before they purchase a ticket, Web site or no Web site. That is an advance in keeping passengers happier. Any air carrier selling a ticket must disclose the actual air carrier. Why do I say that? Because, as Senator Dorgan has said a number of times, oft you do not know what you are flying on. There is a United up here, and a Colgan down here, and you don't know what you are flying on so you do not know who to hold accountable. We think accountability matters so you are told before you get the ticket what plane you are going to be flying on--who owns that plane, who flies that plane. So you do not, as I routinely--in West Virginia, this Senator--they are all propeller flights with one or two exceptions. Senator Dorgan has also pointed out that 50 percent of all our aviation in America--and we do fly half the people in the world. We are half the world's air traffic, right in North America. So we have to know whether they are a regional carrier and we have to know the information about them before people buy their ticket. Passengers have been overlooked. They have been dismissed by the aviation system for so many years because we could get away with it and everybody was prospering. But along this time people were suffering, grievously sometimes. I think a lot of people--in fact, I think of a couple of my sisters and some people in my office, who, just when they are in an airplane, they change. They get white-knuckled. It is a cylinder, and people react in different ways to that. So we need to give passengers all the comfort, the information, and the transparency they can possibly have. I just make that short statement. It is one aspect of our very long and comprehensive FAA authorization bill which has been waiting now for 3 years to reauthorization, and which we wish to do.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I now ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each, with the following Senators recognized to speak as follows: Senator Merkley for up to 5 minutes, Senator Sanders for up to 15 minutes, and Senator Kaufman for up to 20 minutes; and that if there are any Republican speakers, they would be included in an alternating fashion.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Then I would further inquire: I don't see any possibility of the House changing a bill, which would have to come back over to the Senate, because it would be highly unlikely the Senate would be able to pass that bill. So I don't think that will be the process. I think what the House will do--and they said they haven't done it; therefore they can't do it--well, they said that about the Senate bill in the Senate, too, and we did, and it was very close for reasons that it got no votes from your side. But that is not the point. The point is, reconciliation on 16 percent of the GDP, if they pass it--and this is all in the full time of working out the process on the House side the Senate bill, which is what they want to try to do, and then the reconciliation is not done on their side, it is done on our side, in which we put in a few things to--whatever will be attractive to Republicans as well as some things which will help with liberals on the Democratic side in the House because they are more liberal than we are. That, I would say to my good friend from Utah, is not reconciliation, but it is put that way for months now. I am on the floor and I have this microphone and you are being kind enough to be patient with me, but it isn't reconciliation. The Senator from South Dakota said it is 16 percent of the gross domestic product. It isn't. It is probably about 5 percent, 6 percent.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank the Senator.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Madam President, I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the list that I will send to the desk shortly be the only first-degree amendments in order to H.R. 1586 other than any pending amendments; that the first-degree amendments be subject to second-degree amendments which are relevant to the amendment to which offered; that managers' amendments be in order if they have been cleared by the managers and leaders and, if offered, they be considered and agreed to and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; further, that upon disposition of all amendments, the substitute amendment, as amended, if amended, be agreed to and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; the bill, as amended, be read a third time and the Senate proceed to vote on the passage of the bill; that upon passage, the title amendment, which is at the desk, be considered and agreed to and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

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

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Kansas for his very cogent remarks. Kansas probably is the airplane center of the country, if not the world. The point he makes is that it is bipartisan and that we have been working on it a long time. Anybody can come down and offer extraneous amendments. We don't preclude that in our system. It is possible under the Senate rules. It is also possible under the Senate rules to make extraneous amendments unacceptable and unactionable. I think what we want to do is try to avoid some of those processes. I know the leaders on both sides are trying to figure out a way to deal with this problem of extraneous amendments. If it has to do with aviation, we are all for it. If people simply want to talk about subjects they care about but not offer amendments, that is fine. If people want to offer aviation amendments, please come forward. Those are important. This is a 3- to 4-year effort we have been on, trying to do an aviation bill. The Presiding Officer certainly understands the consequences of aviation delays and all the rest of it. It is something we have to do as a country and we cannot dally. This is not the Senate acting in its finest tradition. We have a chance to change that, and I hope the Members will cooperate in that effort. I thank the Chair and note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Ad Hoc Subcommittee on State, Local, and Private Sector Preparedness and Integration of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 11, 2010, at 11 a.m. to conduct a hearing entitled, ``New Border War: Corruption of U.S. Officials by Drug Cartels.''

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Select Committee on Intelligence be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 11, 2010, at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on March 11, 2010, at 10 a.m. in SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct an executive business meeting.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Armed services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 11, 2010, at 9 a.m.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 11, at 10 a.m., in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 11, 2010, at 10 a.m., in room 253 of the Russell Senate Office Building.