Jay Rockefeller

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, it is a reasonable amount which covers $853 million in ``automatic'' costs such as inflation and wage increases. It also allows for new initiatives, such as the need to address the dramatic increase in deadly hepatitis C, particularly among veterans who served in Vietnam; emergency care; and the rising long- term care needs of World War II veterans. The Conference Report on the Budget Resolution includes this number. And in an April 30, 1999, letter to the Appropriations Committee, 51 Senators are on record supporting it. Even with the economic prosperity our country has recently begun to experience, if we approve the proposed huge tax cuts, or fail to adjust the budget caps, there simply will not be money left to increase the veterans' health care budget to what it needs to be. I can assure my colleagues that further cuts will seriously jeopardize the quality of VA health care. Earlier this week, I spoke about the erosion of VA's programs to help veterans with special needs. Resource shortfalls have imperiled services for the spinal-cord injured, for blind veterans, for veterans in need of prosthetics, and for veterans in need of mental health care. Health care professionals within VA are overworked. Reductions-in-force have also become a reality for them. In my own state, we are already seeing lapses in the availability of health care. For example, at the Beckley VA Medical Center, approximately 400 new veterans are waiting to be seen in primary care. Approximately 500 veterans already in the system are on a waiting list for hearing evaluations. And the caseload in pharmacy has increased over 41 percent in the last year, with no increase in staffing, causing many veterans to wait two hours or longer to have a prescription filled. At the Martinsburg VA Medical Center, veterans are waiting six months for a urology appointment. In the PTSD program, the number of beds have increased by 14 while the number of staff have been reduced, making one-on-one counseling very difficult. At the Clarksburg VA Medical Center, current staffing has not kept pace with the demand for inpatient care, and veterans are too often referred to private hospitals because no beds are available at the VA. In outpatient care at Clarksburg, the waiting times for an appointment in optometry and dermatology are approximately four months, and in urology, veterans are waiting seven months for an appointment. There has been a recent proposal to close both the inpatient and outpatient surgical programs at the Huntington VA Medical Center and to refer veterans to a VAMC in Kentucky, over 130 miles away. I can assure my colleagues that if these things are happening in the VA medical centers in my state of West Virginia--and trust me, they are--then you can be sure that they are occurring in the VA medical centers in your states, as well. Staff at each of our VA medical centers have been stretched to the limit, and without additional funding, staffing will only get worse. The erosion of services and the huge reductions in staff have already put the veterans' health care system in serious jeopardy, and I cannot allow it to continue. In summary, there is no doubt that we are at a precipice, and the fate of veterans and their families, as well as millions of other Americans, are threatened by this rush to enact hugely bloated tax giveaways. Mr. President, I am pleased that a majority of the Senate recognized that the size of this tax bill would have jeopardized veterans' health care. As we proceed to conference, I now hope they will come to the same conclusion about other critical domestic programs and rethink this tax cut. alternative fuel vehicles

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I filed a motion to protect veterans' health care because veterans are apt to be hurt by the tax reduction bill before us. I was joined in this effort by Senators Mikulski, Bryan, Daschle, Harkin, and Bingaman. Senator Mikulski, as vice chair of VA Appropriations Subcommittee, and my other cosponsors all understand what is at stake here. I did not proceed in offering this motion, however, because Senator Wellstone offered a similar motion. The issue raised by my amendment still applies to this tax bill. It is very simple: approval of this $800 billion tax reduction bill leaves no ability to meet our obligations to veterans. If we spend all of the federal surplus on tax giveaways, there will be nothing left to fund veterans' health care. In my view, the Senate Finance Committee needed to rethink this tax bill and reserve $8.5 billion over 5 years to appropriately fund VA health care. This is simple math. My motion instructed the Finance Committee to provide for slightly more than 1 percent of the tax cut included in the bill before us. I want to repeat that--it would have set aside about 1 percent of the tax cut included in the bill for veterans. The amount included in the motion--$8.5 billion over 5 years--has been fully justified by the Committee on Veterans' Affairs in its Views and Estimates letter to the Committee on the Budget. I ask unanimous consent that a copy of this letter be printed in the Record.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 and its impact on providers and beneficiaries' access to health care services. Congress has a responsibility to address problems with the BBA for providers, especially those in rural areas. I believe it is important that we keep one thought in mind during the course of this debate--we debated all these changes to help our seniors. They are, and should remain, at the forefront of these discussions. The BBA made the most significant modifications to Medicare in the history of the program. It signified a change in policy designed to pay more reasonable prices and increase overall efficiency. There is no doubt that these were needed reforms enacted to protect and preserve the program for future generations. However, in light of the magnitude of the changes, we need to make some adjustments to compensate for unforeseen consequences. It is clear that in rural areas like West Virginia, the impact of the BBA on beneficiaries and providers is much more dramatic than in many other parts of the country. Medicare payments make up a larger proportion of rural hospitals' revenues and rural hospitals have lower hospital margins in general. Thus, West Virginia hospitals, like many other rural hospitals, have little to fall back on when federal Medicare payments are cut. Since rural hospitals are often local safety net providers with low, and sometimes negative, margins, payment reductions may mean financial jeopardy for rural hospitals and consequently, reduced access to care for rural beneficiaries. It is not yet clear whether Medicare payment rates will take into account the severity or complexity of patients' illnesses. Under the current law, caring for the chronically ill or those with complex medical conditions can push these health care facilities closer to the brink of bankruptcy. Rural facilities are especially concerned because they do not treat a large enough volume of patents to counterbalance the costs of a few very sick ones. We cannot afford to lose providers without endangering the well-being of our citizens. Therefore, it is imperative that we take action to make sure that the problems we're facing today do not become a crisis that we'll have to face in the near future. I would like to note that this body has voted on one facet of this issue earlier this year. The Senate budget resolution included an amendment, which was passed by voice-vote, that directed attention to the impact of the BBA on hospital care. Specifically, the amendment expressed the sense of the Senate that we should consider the extent to which the BBA has had adverse effects on access to hospital care and provided additional budget authority to address the unintended consequences. Today, I am offering an amendment with my colleagues from Massachusetts and Maryland, Senators Kerry and Mikulski, that takes the next step in providing for the additional needs of our health care delivery system, especially in rural areas. The ``Medicare Quality Assurance and Continued Access'' amendment would amend a small portion of the tax cut for a comprehensive package of assistance to Medicare providers. Mr. President, I am not advocating that we undo the BBA. However, we must address the inequities that resulted from its enactment, particularly when it comes to making certain our seniors get the care they need. We have commitment to those who came before us and sacrificed so much to make this nation what it is today. Today, we have the opportunity to honor that commitment, and I urge my colleagues to do so by supporting changes to the Balanced Budget Act.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I have several points to make. The other side has talked constantly about we are going to fix the system. We cannot do prescription drugs until we fix the system. It is a question totally of priorities. I will put a little dose of reality into this. No matter what my colleagues on either side of the aisle might think, we are not going to reform Medicare this year on a systemic basis. If it happens the way the majority party wants, it is going to be vetoed by the President. It is not going to happen. The question before the Senate on this amendment is, Do we want to take the tens of millions of Americans who have no prescription drugs and give them the benefit of prescription drugs now through voting for the Kennedy amendment, of which I am proud to be a cosponsor, or do we want to say, oh, let's wait and fix the system, and then when we fix the system, which may be 3, 4, 5, 6 years from now, we will do prescription drugs because that is sort of neat and orderly? The world does not work like that. The real world of the Congress and the White House does not work like that. We are either going to do tax cuts as they want to do it over there, or we are going to do prescription drugs and maybe some modest tax cuts as we want to do it over here. That is the choice that needs to be made. The distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator Roth, talked about catastrophic health care. He said beware of that experience. My reaction is the opposite. Remember that experience as the reason not to back off from making a hard choice. That was one of the best bills on health care this Congress ever passed. The Senate did not back off on catastrophic health insurance. Three times they tried to repeal it in the Senate, and 3 times we had 73 votes to defeat repeal because catastrophic health insurance was a good thing for seniors. We did not get the message out to seniors. That was our fault. But do not say beware of catastrophic health insurance. The House backed off. We did not. It was good legislation. We are here to do the right thing. The right thing is to pick between the priorities. Do we want to wait 4, 5, 6, 8 years to fix Medicare until we get a bipartisan consensus? People talk about a bipartisan consensus for Medicare reform. It is not here. They talk about the Breaux-Thomas commission, the Medicare Commission. Everybody talks about the bipartisan thing. It was not bipartisan. There were two Democrats who voted for it, yes, but it was not bipartisan. There is not a bipartisan consensus on the floor of the Senate today of what to do about Medicare, and there will not be one until we have some more iterations which I cannot yet explain because I am unable to. Are we going to stand quietly by while the average senior in West Virginia has a gross income, from all sources, of $10,600 a year, and from which you then are to subtract $2,000, virtually all on prescription drugs or on medical out-of-pocket expenses, leaving that senior with $8,600 a year to live all of life? Are we going to let that person hang until the Senate, in its ultimate wisdom, comes to a sense of what is Medicare reform, and are we going to agree on it? My priority is to do prescription drugs now. Pass the Kennedy amendment. Do it now. They talk about having a $90 billion reserve. The Senator from Tennessee said we have fixed the problem. I am very sorry to say that that reserve talks about ``may be spent for,'' so it might be prescription drugs, it might be disasters, it might be a whole series of things, but there is no Medicare prescription drug benefit that is in their plan. In fact, if I could put it more boldly, under the Republican tax plan, there is no money for Medicare reform. There is no money for prescription drugs. It does not exist. I will hear arguments, and numbers will be thrown back and forth, but that is the fact. It does not exist. That is the reason for the Kennedy amendment--to make us pick a priority: Tax cuts, for the most part for people who do not need them or, in a very small measure, in a very small amount of money, prescription drugs for people who desperately need them, who do not in the form of a cliche but in the form of real life, have to pick each week whether they are going to eat, have heat in their homes, or have prescription drugs. I say to the Presiding Officer, I say to my colleagues, try to live on $8,600 a year, as our seniors do in West Virginia. You could not do it. Prescription drugs are the reason the money gets so scarce for them. We can solve that problem by passing the Kennedy amendment. I think we have an absolute moral obligation to do so. To wait for Medicare reform to be fully formed is a hoax upon those people. They do not know that we do not have a consensus on how to reform Medicare. They do know that they are hurting. They do know that they do not have prescription drugs. And they do know that some of them take up to 12 drugs a day, and they cost, and it is coming out of their pockets. Medicare has no prescription drug benefits. These seniors are not on Medicaid; they are on Medicare. So they have nothing. So the money has to come out of their pocket. That is wrong in America. So the question is the priority. Are we for giving those people prescription drugs--a modest amount of money--or are we for simply going ahead with the $792 billion tax cut and then saying, well, we will just wait until Medicare is reformed someday, and then perhaps we will consider prescription drugs? I think the choice is clear. I thank the Presiding Officer.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, Once again, I am joining Senator Shelby and other colleagues to introduce legislation intended to strengthen the manufactured housing industry. Manufactured housing provides a major source of affordable housing for American families, including seniors. This industry represents almost thirty percent of new single-family homes sold in the United States. In my state of West Virginia, manufactured housing represents over 60 percent of new homes. Manufactured housing should play a strong role to increase the availability of affordable housing. This issue will be especially important to seniors who, according to a national survey, forty-five percent of households living in manufactured homes are headed by a person over 50 years old. Manufactured housing is affordable housing, and it is the fastest growing type of housing nationally. The average cost of a new manufactured home without land in 1997 was $38,400, and even with land and installation fees this cost is well below the typical costs of a newly constructed site-built home. But this industry faces challenges. Unlike other housing, manufactured housing is regulated by the 1974 National Manufactured Housing Construction and Safety Standards Act by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, (HUD). Because of reform in HUD management, the federal officials overseeing manufactured housing have declined from 34 staff members at its peak to less than a dozen professional staff now. This decline in staff has occurred at the same time that the industry has grown. Unfortunately, due to a lack of staff, HUD cannot keep pace with the need to update the code on a consistent basis and timely manner. In fact, between 1989 and 1996, a consensus committee made 140 suggestions to HUD about changes for the federal codes on manufactured housing, and 80 of these provisions are still pending in the Department. For example, the 1999 National Electrical Code has new, state-of-the-art standards but given staffing shortage, how long will it take to update the electrical standards? Shouldn't we address the staffing shortage, and get action on the lingering recommendations? In 1990, Congress established a National Commission on Manufactured Housing, and pushed the commission to forge consensus on key issues for this important industry, unfortunately that effort collapsed in 1994. This legislation is a new effort to address the challenges facing the industry. Introduction of the bill is just a first step. We all understand that the legislative process is designed to seek consensus and improve legislation. I believe that we must work hard to forge consensus among the industry and the consumers. This will be a challenge, but the potential rewards can be great for both sides. The industry can win and prosper with a more effective, streamlined regulatory process that keeps pace with improvements and standards. Consumers will win if safety standards and regulations are adopted more efficiently. Also, if the industry uses new standards to provide better housing, manufactured housing could be designed to meet a wider variety of needs including modules for assisted living. The current system of regulations and oversight is not working for the industry, nor is it working as well as it should for consumers, according to a survey by seniors. But when there are problems and concerns, all groups need to work together on a strategy for change. This legislation is intended to promote reform that will help both the industry and the consumers of manufactured housing. My hope is that all sides will work together to forge consensus about reform. We should use this as an opportunity to come together and develop a new, improved strategy for manufactured housing. Affordable housing is a major issue for families and communities. Manufactured housing is playing a key role in affordable housing, but more could and should be done. To achieve success, we need to develop a bipartisan, consensus approach. We need to help the industry and assure consumers that safety and standards will be retained and improved, not weakened. This is worth our combined effort to provide more affordable housing.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I am here in the hopes of convincing my colleagues to oppose the $792 billion tax cut, which is based on a premise of a projected surplus of $996 billion. We have just heard a speech which basically attacked everything President Clinton has done and stayed away from the tax cut debate itself, and that is shaping up as somewhat of a pattern. I am also here in the hopes of convincing my colleagues that the only prudent fiscal course, the only way you can strike a blow for our constituents and for our country and for our place in this world, is by taking advantage of this, what I consider to be almost certainly a once-in-a-lifetime chance to take the projected surplus and use whatever actually accrues from that to pay down the national debt. It is very odd to me that the Republican Party and Democratic Party almost seem to have switched. The Democratic Party appears to be the party of fiscal responsibility. The Republican Party wants to be the party of political expediency. That is a political statement on my part. I apologize for that, but I have to make note of my understanding of what has happened in the last several years. I think we should take this money to take down the debt. I think we should use it to save for Medicare and Social Security's future. I think we should position ourselves to be able, as Alan Greenspan has suggested, if we see the surplus coming in the future years in the way that we want, to then do a meaningful tax cut--once we have put our fiscal house in order. Remember all the talk about getting our fiscal house in order? That is all we talked about in 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993. That was the talk--most of it from the other side. We are almost there. Now we have come to the point where we can actually get over the hump, position America well for the future, and my colleagues, at least some of them, want to blow all of this investment of effort and discipline we have made with a huge tax cut spending spree which the American people are not asking for, nor is American business asking for. First and foremost, let's recognize the $996 billion surplus only exists--and I hope my colleagues will pay attention to this--only exists if you assume that Congress will cut $775 billion in real dollars over the next 10 years from programs that the American people want and need. Does that mean we are adding on new programs? No. That is programs that already exist, that are already under the budget caps and already below expenditure levels of where they ought to be. So that surplus exists only if we cut an additional $775 billion from programs, which I will discuss in a minute. That $775 billion in cuts is itself almost equal to the size of the Republican-proposed tax cut. That should tell you something about the tradeoff here, whether the tax cut numbers really add up. Deep, deep cuts would be required in seniors programs, education, transportation, veterans--just about every area of the Government--an average of over 30 percent if we are to enact a $792 billion tax cut the American people are not asking for. By deep cuts I mean the kinds of cuts in programs that provide health care to veterans. People talk about veterans and then run away from their obligations to them. Or child nutrition--we all talk about children. They will have to be cut by more than 40 percent in real terms if the Republican tax cut is enacted. This assumption is ludicrous. It is ludicrous. It is a sham that a massive tax cut of either $792 billion or, the so-called more moderate approach, the $500 billion--they are both shams. They both have the same results. They both cause us to reverse course on fiscal discipline and responsibility, not just to the American people today but to future generations. We should all have the courage to admit that now, before the Senate makes a mistake of historic proportions, we are subsuming our responsibility to the social fabric of America as we cast our votes. That kind of debilitating discretionary cuts cannot happen in an integrated and united America. The American people will not stand for it. I believe the projected $996 billion will not materialize. That is my personal view. I do not believe it will happen. But the tax cuts will kick in and they will be there. I believe once again we will get into the situation of spiraling deficits that we have tried so hard-- going back to the structural impediment talks with Japan, and then the discipline the folks on this side of the aisle exercised in 1993--that all of us have tried to exercise. Fiscal responsibility--corporate America has done it. Now Government is in the process of doing it. We have eliminated the deficits. We have a chance to eliminate the debt, something that has never even been contemplated before. Now we are going to blow it on a Republican tax cut which the people do not ask for. Well-respected economists estimate that there would be probably cumulative deficits of maybe $821 billion in the non-Social Security budget over the next 10 years if the Senate Finance Committee's tax packets were enacted. It is a lot less than what is projected. That should be reason enough to rethink a vote for this tax cut package, or any tax cut package of such gigantic proportions. Let me take a minute or two to outline what I think would happen to our economy if a massive tax cut were enacted. Let us consider what would happen if we actually voted to reduce taxes by $792 billion. Forget the inequity of distribution. I can go into that, but I will not now. Forget the cruel, gross, greedy inequity of that distribution of taxes. No. 1, if you vote for a $500 billion or $792 billion tax cut, which would undoubtedly further stimulate spending, it is inconceivable to me or any rational person in this Chamber that the Federal Reserve would do anything other than raise interest rates. I listened to Alan Greenspan this morning as Republicans tried to pin him into corners, yet he kept coming back to the point that this is not the time to do it. Do not do it now. There will be consequences if you do it now. Do not make the tax cuts now. This is not the time. The Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan, clearly says that. It is not the time for massive tax cuts. If you credit him, as I think most of us do, with being a part, along with the fundamental force of the private sector, of our booming economy, then you should consider what he has to say. One listens closely to every word he has to say because he has not missed one yet. Greenspan said just this week: The first priority in my judgment should be getting the debt down, letting the surpluses run, and to, as has been suggested here--[I am quoting Greenspan; this is all him]-- put in contingency plans so that in the event that all of this is happening, you could move forward later, at a later date, with tax cuts. No. 2, let's examine what an increase of tax reductions would do, let's say, with a 1-percent increase in the interest rates by the Federal Reserve. In West Virginia it would mean the average home mortgage holder with an adjustable rate mortgage of $60,000 would pay $456 more every year for that mortgage. The average student loan payment, based upon $11,800 owed, which is typical, would cost the average student $70 more a year. Add those up, and an average person in West Virginia will have to pay $615 more per year in increased costs due to higher interest rates. I encourage any Member to do the math for the people they represent. That is the increase they will have to pay. Then you say: But there is a tax reduction out there in the land. In West Virginia, the Republican tax rate reduction proposal will give the average West Virginia family a tax cut of approximately $118 per year versus the $615 more they will have to pay just on college, car, and home. That is a tax cut? If they have to pay more money, that is not a tax cut. But you say: We have the proposed marriage penalty relief. Maybe that is 100 bucks. Maybe that is a little bit more than 100 bucks, but still that is an enormous tax increase on the burden of average families in West Virginia. I am taking the average family median income of $30,500. As far as I figure, it does not add up to the cost of what they will have to pay in higher interest rates that are sure to accompany a huge tax cut. Moreover, many of the people we represent benefit from the programs that will have to be cut. I go back to the 40-percent cut in programs that are now in effect and helping people; not new programs, not new spending, but programs in effect and already underfunded and staying that way through the year 2002. Families with children in Head Start programs will have significant cuts. We all benefit from a range of basic Government services. The air transportation system is grossly underfunded. We all benefit from that. Not all of us, but more and more of the American people are flying. We benefit from what goes on at NIH in biomedical research. Cures for cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and many other things are on their way. Or the assistance that is provided directly to the States--all of these things will be cut under the Republican tax plan. Not just cut, they have already cut, but they will be cut much more. The NIH increase this year is minute. It will go down substantially. Do people really want to do this? Are my colleagues truly willing to sacrifice those benefits for the American people for a tax cut that disproportionately benefits those who are doing best in our country already? Three, the Treasury Department just provided us with an analysis of who benefits from the Republican tax cut when it is fully phased in. I point out on the marriage penalty tax cut, there will be no relief for any West Virginians or anybody from any of our States for the first 5 years because it does not kick in. All we do in West Virginia is pay more taxes under a Republican tax cut because of what it inevitably does through the Federal Reserve System. If my colleagues vote for the Republican tax cut, if they are of such a mind to vote for the Republican tax cut, please understand that Americans in the highest income brackets will get 67 percent of the benefit of this bill. Can anyone call that a middle-income tax cut with a straight face? If one divides up the quintiles--America divided into five different income categories--it is gross, it is embarrassing to see what happens in the distributional tables of who benefits from the Republican tax cut. How much is there for those in the lower brackets doing the best they can? Very little. In fact, for those in the lowest quintile, which is, in fact, close to 23 million families, they get less than one-half of 1 percent of this generous Republican tax cut bill. I suggest my colleagues should be able to answer these questions to themselves before they have to answer them to their constituents. Equally shocking is the fact that more than 45 million families in the lowest brackets get a tiny percentage from this bill. The 23 million American families right in the middle get only 10 percent of the $792 billion Republican proposal. That means, again, that three- fifths, or a little bit more, get only 15.5 percent of the total benefits in this bill. This is wrong; this is dangerous tax policy. Frankly, it is dangerous social policy which will reverberate upon those who vote for it. Fourth, the Republican tax cut will increase mandatory interest payments on the debt by $141 billion over the next ten years. Mandatory interest payments on the debt are already at about $227 billion. Doesn't that tell you in fairly clear and simple terms why we need to, in fact, pay down the debt to get rid of that obligation, to free up for the capital market this money which is now crowding out private sector investments. Five, if we spend every dime and more of our available assets in the form of yet unknown surpluses before we preserve Medicare and Social Security for the future, there will be no additional resources left to strengthen those programs that we know the American people do want, do ask for, do insist on, and do look to us to provide. Medicare is desperately in need of modernization. It is desperately in need of universal outpatient prescription benefits. Social Security needs to meet the needs of the baby boom generation. People on the other side and some on our side talk about we in Washington trying to decide what is good for the people as opposed to the people know what is good for the people. The people out there know. Those whom I represent and my colleagues represent know they are not in it for themselves. They are in it for their children and their grandchildren. It is not just what they think might be best for them. They are thinking, yes, what might be good for them, but what is good for their children and grandchildren. That is the way Americans are. That is the way we have always been. Six, and finally, for your consideration: If my colleagues cast their vote for a $792 billion tax cut predicated on those deep spending cuts, how will my colleagues be viewed in their States?

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank my Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. If my colleagues vote for this bill, will they be viewed as a leader? Will they be seen as somebody who is thinking for the long-term good? That is what people want. That is what people yearn for, is leadership. Or will they be looked at as somebody who took the easy course of voting to ``return tax dollars,'' or some part of them? Or will they be viewed as somebody who signed up to an economic plan that will limit our ability to protect Medicare and Social Security? My people point that out. Even if they do not know it, even if they are not sure of it, in their own minds, wouldn't they question whether or not you are exercising leadership responsibilities or political imperatives? When will these devastating cuts in the important domestic programs affect your constituents? Imagine--how would my colleagues respond to that? What would my colleagues say to them? How would they view you when they discover that these things happened and they happened because of a $792 billion vote that you made? What would you hear from your constituents if you agreed to $775 billion in very important discretionary cuts on programs people care about? These are not new programs but programs already reduced, programs to be further diminished by $775 billion. How would they view you then? Would they view you as a leader or as a follower of public opinion that did not exist in that regard? Here is one example which is shocking to me, I say to the senior Senator from New York. The House is now considering reclaiming $6 billion from the welfare reform money from the States--from the States, not even from us, but from the States--to make up their shortfall on the Labor-HHS budget. It is kind of ``reverse Robin Hood''--stealing from the poor to make sure we can provide tax breaks for the wealthiest of Americans. I conclude my remarks simply by urging my colleagues, in the most sincere and intense terms, in one of the most important debates--the most important debate I have been associated with in the 15 years I have been in the Senate--to weigh these considerations against the possibility that exists for this country and for our people if we actually pay down the national debt--to accomplish the impossible--to eliminate the budget deficit, to eliminate the national debt, and then to contemplate what kind of country this could be for all of our citizens. I thank the senior Senator from New York, and I thank our colleagues and yield the floor.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, Once again, I am joining Senator Shelby and other colleagues to introduce legislation intended to strengthen the manufactured housing industry. Manufactured housing provides a major source of affordable housing for American families, including seniors. This industry represents almost thirty percent of new single-family homes sold in the United States. In my state of West Virginia, manufactured housing represents over 60 percent of new homes. Manufactured housing should play a strong role to increase the availability of affordable housing. This issue will be especially important to seniors who, according to a national survey, forty-five percent of households living in manufactured homes are headed by a person over 50 years old. Manufactured housing is affordable housing, and it is the fastest growing type of housing nationally. The average cost of a new manufactured home without land in 1997 was $38,400, and even with land and installation fees this cost is well below the typical costs of a newly constructed site-built home. But this industry faces challenges. Unlike other housing, manufactured housing is regulated by the 1974 National Manufactured Housing Construction and Safety Standards Act by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, (HUD). Because of reform in HUD management, the federal officials overseeing manufactured housing have declined from 34 staff members at its peak to less than a dozen professional staff now. This decline in staff has occurred at the same time that the industry has grown. Unfortunately, due to a lack of staff, HUD cannot keep pace with the need to update the code on a consistent basis and timely manner. In fact, between 1989 and 1996, a consensus committee made 140 suggestions to HUD about changes for the federal codes on manufactured housing, and 80 of these provisions are still pending in the Department. For example, the 1999 National Electrical Code has new, state-of-the-art standards but given staffing shortage, how long will it take to update the electrical standards? Shouldn't we address the staffing shortage, and get action on the lingering recommendations? In 1990, Congress established a National Commission on Manufactured Housing, and pushed the commission to forge consensus on key issues for this important industry, unfortunately that effort collapsed in 1994. This legislation is a new effort to address the challenges facing the industry. Introduction of the bill is just a first step. We all understand that the legislative process is designed to seek consensus and improve legislation. I believe that we must work hard to forge consensus among the industry and the consumers. This will be a challenge, but the potential rewards can be great for both sides. The industry can win and prosper with a more effective, streamlined regulatory process that keeps pace with improvements and standards. Consumers will win if safety standards and regulations are adopted more efficiently. Also, if the industry uses new standards to provide better housing, manufactured housing could be designed to meet a wider variety of needs including modules for assisted living. The current system of regulations and oversight is not working for the industry, nor is it working as well as it should for consumers, according to a survey by seniors. But when there are problems and concerns, all groups need to work together on a strategy for change. This legislation is intended to promote reform that will help both the industry and the consumers of manufactured housing. My hope is that all sides will work together to forge consensus about reform. We should use this as an opportunity to come together and develop a new, improved strategy for manufactured housing. Affordable housing is a major issue for families and communities. Manufactured housing is playing a key role in affordable housing, but more could and should be done. To achieve success, we need to develop a bipartisan, consensus approach. We need to help the industry and assure consumers that safety and standards will be retained and improved, not weakened. This is worth our combined effort to provide more affordable housing.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I appreciate the courtesy of the Presiding Officer.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank the Presiding Officer. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed for less than 15 minutes.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, is the Senator from West Virginia allowed to yield himself a certain amount of time?

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I yield to the majority leader.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak for 10 minutes.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I have one quick point. People say we ought to have a tax cut and we ought to give it back to the people who earned it. In other words, it is not the Government's money; it is their money. I think one thing is interesting: How much is it their money as opposed to their children's money and their children's children's money. In other words, when we talk about protecting money for future programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, we are not just talking about those who pay taxes, whether they be rich or poor, but whether or not their children and their children's children are going to have a reasonable shot at life. It is not just that we do not have money because we are living now and others are not, but we have to keep looking toward the future and our responsibility to that future; is that not right?

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank the majority leader for his courtesy.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I am very anxious to talk to my colleagues. I want to do it as much as I can in these days to come. As the previous speaker said, with whom I do not agree on policy, this is a momentous, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I have been here for 15 years. I was for 8 years before Governor of West Virginia where we faced things such as 21-percent unemployment, and things which are almost Third World in their statistical significance compared to what most of my colleagues had to deal with. Being able to look at a tax surplus or a projected surplus of a lot of money over the next number of years is a wonderful opportunity for the people of my State and for the people of my country. I have to say, though, the approach of the Finance Committee, on which I serve, voting a $792 billion tax cut is antithetical, to my thoughts, as to what is good for the country and good for the economy. I will start off by simply saying the obvious; that is, as one of the senior Members of the majority side of the Finance Committee said, 5 percent of Americans pay 95 percent of personal income taxes, and therefore the money ought to go back to them. That is an odd way of thinking. That is certainly one way of thinking. It is obviously that Senator's way of thinking. It doesn't square with sort of the sense of fairness, equity, and distribution of equal opportunity in an economic sense as in other senses that I was brought up to believe in. We have projected--and I underscore the word ``projected''--a surplus of $1 trillion over the next 10 years. The central question is: How do we most responsibly spend this? I think it is a central question of historic importance. For me there is really only one answer; that is, to pay down the national debt. It is very hard for me to put into words the feeling of how far we have come since the mid-1980s when we used to have those talks with the Japanese, the structural impediment talks in which they would tell us what they thought we should do and we would tell them what we thought they should do and we never listened to each other. We, in fact, listened to them in 1993, and on our own, in a historic vote, made an enormous beginning, later fueled by the private sector, to balance the budget deficit. I didn't think that would happen when I was in the Senate. But we proceeded to take the action. I myself was assigned the responsibility of cutting $60 billion out of Medicare, which at that time was a great deal of money, and we proceeded to do that. But never in my wildest dreams did I ever even begin to think of the possibility that we might, in fact, be able to pay down the national debt--the national debt which under the Reagan- Bush administration rose to over $4 trillion. I can't contemplate amounts of that sort. So I couldn't possibly contemplate the results of eliminating amounts of that sort. But we have a chance to do that. We have the chance to do it by the year 2014 and 2015. People talk a lot about taxes around here. To me, the greatest tax will come if we pass the Republican tax package, if we ``give'' the so- called ``middle-income worker'' that kind of tax advantage because I think it is false. In my State, where the average income is around $30,500, I think the average mainstream worker would end up losing $500 or $600 a year because interest rates would go up on car payments, on home loans, on education loans, on credit cards, and all of those things. Interest rates would go up because we know from what Greenspan said they would. They would probably go up by about 1 percent. I think the average people in the State whom I represent would end up paying much more under the Republican tax cut plan than they would if we opted to retire the debt because in that case, I think interest payments would go down, and those same people--having watched in wonderment what is or is not going on in Washington--would benefit from the results of two things: Not only lower interest rates, which would affect them up to where they are fixed, but they would also benefit from an economy. I try to contemplate this in my mind. Come the year 2010 or 2011 when the world really begins to understand that America is dead tracked on the idea of elimination of the national debt, what would happen to the national economy? My mind can't even bring that into consideration, except it is filled with scenes of incredible entrepreneurial activities by people who are willing to take risks, people who emerge from the hollows of West Virginia, from the deserts of Nevada, from all kinds of high plains of the Northwest, or the northern middle west, and start doing all kinds of things which they have never dared do before base interest rates were there to do it, where money is available, capital is available, and there is a sense of optimism in America, and what I have seen in the last 8 years becomes almost a memory in terms of the optimism and the incredible success and energy of that kind of new economy. To me, paying off the national debt does two things: One, it guarantees the economic future of the people whom I represent, who elect me to represent them; and it guarantees the economic future of the entire country for perhaps a generation or two to come because we will have done something impossible--eliminate the budget deficit, and then eliminate the national debt. How would the markets respond to that? How would human nature respond to that? I only glory to contemplate what that might mean. Second, I want to pay down the national debt because I don't want to spend money. I don't want to spend money on a whole lot of new things. I want to make sure that something called Social Security--the money for that--and something called Medicare --the money for that--is there in the meantime, until those programs run out of money in a number of years, as all of that money will be going into those trust funds, building up and guaranteeing the future of Medicare and Social Security. That is a matter not of the energy of the American economy but the depth of the American commitment, the social contract that we made both with respect to Social Security and Medicare, both of which are going to need our attention and which need more funds. They would have the funds under a system wherein one concentrated on paying down the national debt. In the Finance Committee, I originally was for a tax cut of only $250 billion. I am for that today. That was a different tax cut from anything we are considering. I worry very much about Americans not saving. I like the idea of Government matching any American who put a certain amount of money into a savings account; in other words, to encourage something which we do worse than any other people in the world, and that is to save money, putting money in the bank--not only for one's own future but for the capital markets. I want to see that. I want to see the marriage penalty tax eliminated so it does not become more expensive to get married, it becomes less expensive to get married. If we put up a bill that had no tax cut at all, I would be tempted. I don't know, in the final analysis, if I would vote for it, but I would be tempted. I believe in paying off the national debt. I think the consequences of that are enormously exciting. Not contemplating the numerical ``joust'' we play with each other over millions and trillions of dollars, the simple fact is that by the year 2014 or 2015 there would be virtually no national debt remaining--less than 1 percent. That is the single most exciting public policy event I can contemplate since I have served in the Senate. My fear is that Congress is going to figure this out but that Congress is going to figure it out too late, after it has already done the damage. I regret our failure so far to seize this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to pay off the national debt. I regret it for my State. My State is the oldest State, so to speak, in terms of population. It has actually surpassed Florida. That would naturally bias me in terms of Social Security and Medicare. If I were from another State, I would feel the same way, I believe. Social Security has lifted two-thirds of Americans out of poverty. Does one turn one's back on this? People voted for the $792 billion tax cut. But $2 trillion of the surplus already belongs to Social Security. That is not on the table. Of the $1 trillion remaining, that can only happen if we do draconian domestic cuts. I don't mean adding new programs. I mean taking tremendous numbers of billions of dollars in every single area for years and years and taking away from what we are already doing. I care passionately about veterans' health care as I have watched the veterans' health care system deteriorate in a variety of ways across this country. We are not talking about increasing veterans' health care costs. We are talking about tremendous cuts in those we already have. Many Members have discussed the fact that a young mind is formed by the time it is 3 years old, the importance of Head Start, the importance of the Older Americans Act, the importance of low-income- housing heating, housing, enterprise zones, law enforcement, the military. All of these receive enormous budget reductions that would sustain themselves over a number of years. Over half a trillion cut from present spending in fiscal year 1999; the same on through fiscal year 2002 and beyond that. CBO doesn't even choose to figure what happens after 5 years. They say they have never done it before so why should they do it now. I think that is an amazing way of thinking. That is what they say. If we spend $792 billion on a bunch of tax breaks now before we even know that the money is for real and that it will absolutely be there, I cannot in conscience, for the people I represent, believe that Medicare and Social Security will be anything under the great strain of reducing benefits. I cannot bear to have that happen. I don't think anybody should tell you otherwise. I understand it is very easy to talk about a $792 billion tax cut. It is wonderful to sit in the Finance Committee and have people say we ought to do this or that about ethanol and this or that regarding helping different people, different groups. Sometimes people voting for the bill got all kinds of things implanted in the bill. That was nice. I am sure they were good things. How does that compare to the real possibility of setting America virtually free economically, establishing our economic dominance for all time by retiring the national debt? Think how the markets would respond to that. Think how capital overseas would flow into our markets, further enabling us to go out and build an even stronger America, close the digital divide, to give everybody an equal opportunity--not guaranteeing that everybody succeeds but guaranteeing everybody has at least a chance to succeed. I cannot allow NIH, Head Start, or education programs to take the tremendous reductions from their current level of funding by the Federal Government that would be required under the Republican tax cut. It is phenomenal to me that people have not focused on this consequence of that $792 billion tax cut, a tax cut basically for the rich who already have it, who have already gained by the system, who have already gained through the last 8 years by the stock market increase. What about the people who are working hard and who would receive a $188 tax increase compared to a $700 or $800 tax increase for people who are very wealthy? I ask my colleagues to think about fairness. I ask my colleagues to think about the consequences of a $792 billion tax cut, and I ask my colleagues above all and finally to think about the absolutely extraordinary power of what would happen in this country if we actually reduced the national deficit to virtually zero--deficit and then debt. We can do both. Therefore, we shouldn't do the Republican tax cut. I yield the floor.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I had not expected to talk this afternoon. But I am here. The Senator from West Virginia is here. I am the ranking Democrat on the Veterans' Committee. I am overwhelmed with the sense of urgency, and almost despair, about the condition of health care for veterans in our country. Because of caps, the veterans health care budget, which is really the most important part of the veterans operation--benefits are important but what they really care about is, is health care going to be there if they need it?--has been flat-lined for the next 5 years. By flat-lined, I mean there is no increase. Even though there are more expenses, there is more requirement for their services, there is no more money. The Veterans' Administration is the largest health care system in the country. The only difference from any other health care system is that it is entirely a Government health care system. Therefore, the Government determines what it can spend and what it cannot spend. Unlike the private health care systems, it cannot spend a dime over what it is appropriated. So the Balanced Budget Act of 1997, which capped all discretionary programs--which said they could not increase-- obviously, therefore, included the veterans health care budget. I cannot tell you the damage that is being done to our veterans across this country. We talk about veterans, and we talk about them in very florid terms because they deserve that. Those who use the veterans hospitals, who have been in combat, who have sacrificed for their country--America kind of entered into a compact and said that these people will be treated with a special respect, special honor, and special care, and that they will get the health care they need under all conditions and at any time. The Republican tax cut, along with any other that might be suggested, including the one that is being talked about at $500 billion, would make a mockery of that commitment to the American veteran. I want people to understand that very clearly. I will talk specifically about some particular types of needs, such as spinal cord injuries, injuries resulting in blindness or amputations, posttraumatic stress disorder. Beginning in October of last year, I asked my committee staff to undertake an oversight project to determine if the Veterans' Administration is, in fact, maintaining their ability to care for veterans with these kinds of special needs. PTSD, posttraumatic stress disorder, we always associated with the Vietnam war. We have discovered it is not just that war; it is the gulf war, it is the Korean war, it is the Second World War, and it even goes back to the First World War. It is an enormous problem and a special need. This oversight project, which I asked my staff to do, reviewed 57 specialized programs housed in 22 places around the country. I say at the outset that the VA specialized services are staffed with incredibly dedicated workers, people who could be working for higher pay in private situations, private hospitals. They are trying to do more, and they are trying to do it with increasingly less. They are often frustrated in their desire to provide the high-quality services that they went to the Veterans' Administration to provide in the first place. I salute them. I will mention three of the findings in this oversight effort, and then that is all I will do. First, the Veterans' Administration is not maintaining capacity in a number of specialized programs and is barely maintaining capacity in a number of others. Despite resource money shortfalls, field personnel have been able--but just barely--to maintain the level of services in Veterans' Administration prosthetics, blind rehabilitation, and spinal cord injury programs. Staffing and funding reductions have been replete. The VA's mental health programs are no longer strong. For example, my staff found that veterans are waiting an average of 5 and a half months to enter posttraumatic stress disorder programs. This is completely unacceptable for a veteran. Secondly, the VA is not providing the same level of services in all of its facilities. There is wide variation. Staff found this variation from site to site in capacity in how services are provided. The availability of services to veterans seems to depend on where they reside, not what they have done but where they reside. In my view, all veterans are entitled to the same quality of service regardless of whether they live in West Chester County or in Berkeley, WV. It should make no difference. They all have suffered the rigors of combat. They have all earned it. We promised it to them. We are not delivering it to them. Third, and finally, competing pressures on Veterans' Administration managers make it virtually impossible for them to maintain their specialized medical program. Hospital administrators particularly are being buffeted by competing demands because from central headquarters comes the lack of money, from the veterans comes the demand for services, which used to be there and which now aren't, and they are, therefore, caught in the middle. In many cases, they are suffering across-the-board cuts and have been for a number of years. I can tell Senators that under neither Democratic nor Republican administrations has the veterans' health care program been adequately funded and funded up to the cost-of-living increase and the so-called inflationary aspect, which reflects what actually true health care represents. We are robbing Peter to pay Paul in many of our veterans' hospitals and to maintain other services on which a higher priority is placed. Mental health services, I come back to it. Why is it in this country that we will not put down mental health as a disease? Why is it we do not consider it as a medical condition? Why is it that we put it off in the category of human behavior as opposed to something that has a cause in something, such as posttraumatic stress disorder. For veterans, to blindside mental health, to push mental health to the side is beyond comprehension and beyond humanity. In summary, it is imperative that we all understand what the budget crunch has meant to each VA health service. I say all of this because, again, of the $792 billion tax cut. If that takes place, everything I have talked about not only continues to be true but grows somewhere between 15 and 30 percent worse, not if we are to increase programs, but taking already that we are funding below where programs ought to be, where we have shortchanged veterans' health care services for years, and now we are going to cut billions and billions of more dollars out of that over these next years. That is absolutely intolerable. I ask unanimous consent to print a copy of the summary of the committee minority staff report in the Record at this point.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank the Chair.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I recognize my time is up. I hope my colleagues will support me in objecting to the reinstatement of Senate rule XVI. I thank the Presiding Officer.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank the Presiding Officer, as well as I thank my esteemed friend from Nevada. Mr. President, I came a bit earlier than was anticipated. I look forward to expressing what are some strongly held views on my part. In a formal sense, I rise today to object to the reinstatement of Senate rule XVI. That is my purpose in being here. Up until 1995, it prohibited legislating on appropriations bills. That is the reason I formally rise. The Republican majority, in fact, is responsible for overturning the rule which was designed to keep legislative matters unrelated to appropriations bills from bogging down the appropriations process. The Republicans themselves were responsible for overturning the longstanding Senate precedent by rejecting the ruling of the Chair, something that was given little notice and was little commented upon but is now of increasing monumental proportions. I cannot support returning to the previous order because I respect the Senate. It seems to me anybody who has a sense of what the Senate was designed for and what the Senate is, what the Senate should be, what the American people expect the Senate to be, will vote as I will vote because to do otherwise is to diminish this body, which I think has been diminished substantially in the last 5 or 6 years in any event, in terms of its impact on American debate, its impact on discussion, its impact on the intellectual activity of the Senate, and, in fact, its impact on American society as a whole. I happen to represent steelworkers, farmers, airport managers, veterans, rural people, patients, doctors, nurses, just as the Presiding Officer does. This Senator may have a few more steelworkers in his State than the Senator from Kansas does in his State; otherwise, we represent more or less the same people. I do not think these people ought to have their business pushed aside, their concerns, their worries, what they care about pushed aside in order to make the Senate's bill or the Senate's way of working more manageable, more efficient, more to the liking of the leadership, more House-like, more limiting, less substantial, less interesting, less of scope, less of dignity, less of the power of the tradition of the Senate. (Mr. THOMAS assumed the Chair.)

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I believe the majority is interested in controlling debate. I have wanted to say this a long time, and I have not found the place to do it properly, but I find so today. I believe the majority-- not the Presiding Officer who has changed since I began my remarks, who is an entirely different kind of person--the people who run the majority, who speak for the majority, who lead the Senate on behalf of the majority, are interested in controlling debate, minimizing debate in making the Senate more like the House from whence they came and in trivializing the Senate. Those are harsh words, but they come from a disturbed and unhappy Senator--not disturbed in a psychological sense, I point out to the Presiding Officer, but disturbed in the sense of not feeling good about the work I am able to do as opposed to the way it used to be a number of years ago when I first came to the Senate. I wish I could tell my colleagues I believe the Senate is functioning in a way that means legislative business can occur on authorizing legislation, but I cannot. I wish the Senate would return to a more efficient appropriations process that does not deal with extraneous legislative matters, but under the Senate's current leadership, Members of the majority party have effectively gagged--there is no other word for it--the minority from raising policy matters on the Senate floor. Every Tuesday, members of both parties have caucuses. Those caucuses, in the case of the Democrats, used to deal broadly with issues and with functions and divisions of responsibility and debate within the caucus. Now, for the most part, they are taken up with, how can we make ourselves heard? How is it that we can, by some manipulation or clever method, try to work our way through a loophole which allows us to bring up an amendment, to speak on behalf of our constituencies? In every single caucus there is a question of how the majority is diminishing the minority, not in a way which would just be satisfying in the sense of a Republican making a Democrat feel less important or making a Democrat's role less important in the Senate, but in the sense of diminishing honest and open and real debate. That is what I came to the Senate for in 1985--honest and real debate. I did not expect to win everything. I did not expect to lose everything. But I did expect to be able to debate, to be able to make my views known, as one can in a committee. All committees are run relatively fairly. The Finance Committee, the Commerce Committee, which I sit on, are run fairly by their majority leadership. This place is not; the floor of the Senate is not. We are gagged, as in the Patients' Bill of Rights doctors were gagged. We are not allowed to express our views. I resent that enormously, I say to the Presiding Officer. It takes a lot away from being a Senator. I know no longer the greatness of the difference between being a Member of the House and being a Member of the Senate. There is, of course, a difference. I stand here and speak, and I speak as I choose to speak, and nobody is stopping me, but that is because we have this arrangement for this day. For most of the rest of the time, morning business has been closed off--or had been--quorum calls were not honored, to be able to interrupt them, as this one was honored. It is a different body. It is a distressing situation. All of us, on both sides, all 100 of us, are diminished by the way this Senate is run. Let me give an example of a piece of legislation, and it is not even the first one on the minds of most, but it is a big one in terms of this Senator: This legislative body's failure with respect to the FAA and the airport improvement reauthorization bill, which is, for the fourth time in less than a year, on the brink of expiring. Last fall we threw a 6-month extension into the omnibus appropriations bill. When that expired on March 31, we did a 2-month extension--embarrassing--until May 31; then a 65-day extension-- embarrassing--through August 6. And now we are close to August 6, and we may have to--and probably will--have to do yet another extension. All of these short-term extensions may make us feel better temporarily, but they are not solutions. They do not obviate the need to take up and debate and pass an authorization bill. But we cannot debate it. We cannot debate anything on this floor except what it is the majority wants to debate. Then they fill up every tree, preclude every amendment, and we are all diminished, and the public process is diminished at the same time. So in the current Senate environment, which I deplore, regret--I like the people who lead the Senate on the majority side, but I do not respect the way they lead this Senate. I think all of us suffer from the way they lead this Senate; that is, to make the Senate more like the House--puppets. So in this current Senate environment, I am not willing to give up a single avenue for getting my work done. I will not support giving the majority one more way to cut off debate on important policy issues-- such as aviation or the future of our Nation's steel industry, restoring money to Medicare providers who have been too deeply cut. We hear more about this than any other subject when we go home. Have we discussed it? No. Research and development, lots and lots of other things. So the arcane rules of the Senate may not be at the forefront of the concerns of everyday Americans, but the rules of this Senate guide the way our democracy works or fails to work. They guide the way the people trust their Government, and they also guide the way people within the Government trust the Government within the framework of which they work as best as they can. The legislative process is honorable. It is time honored. I fear that we are dangerously close to the Senate losing its reputation and role as a great deliberative body.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. I thank the Presiding Officer. I point out to my friend from New Hampshire that he did, indeed, have the floor. The parliamentary process seems to be working. He has mentioned those aspects on which he disagrees with China five or six times apiece now since I have been on the floor in only the last 10 minutes. I don't think he should be that concerned about not being able to debate. There were those of us on the other side of the aisle who were trying to debate something called the Patients' Bill of Rights for several weeks, and we were denied that. Well, this is a tough body. One does the best they can. I think terminating normal trade relations with China would be an enormous mistake. I have often said one of the greatest speeches I have ever heard on the floor was given by Senator Jack Danforth. It was the last one he ever gave on the floor. It was a number of years ago when he retired. He talked about the fact that every Senator wants to be a Secretary of State, and every Senator thinks that he or she is a Secretary of State. Every Senator thinks that he or she ought to act as Secretary of State, and that about half of us try to. There is an endless opportunity because you can bring up other countries and bring up all the things you don't like about them. The Senator from New Hampshire doesn't approve of different of their social policies, so he brings them up. He has a chance to speak about them. None of this, in my judgment, has to do with the self-interest of the United States of America. What is foreign policy? What is trade policy? It is meant to be the self-interest of the United States of America. The Senator, as he concluded his argument, actually said that China was taking over, implying that they had taken over the Panama Canal. That came as a surprise to me because I read the news fairly diligently and haven't heard that. What I do know is this: China has been through 5,000 years of history, and I have studied it quite carefully. They have never had a single day of stability that they could count on. In fact, even under Confucian philosophy, the people always have, in the so-called five relationships, the right to overthrow the emperor any time they want, and they frequently have. They are, as the Senator from Washington indicated, one-fifth of the world's population. They are an absolute key. The very worst thing I can imagine us doing at this time would be to terminate normal trade relations. If the Senator from New Hampshire, as he says, believes that the Chinese are not treating the Taiwanese well, if you want the Taiwanese- Chinese relationship, the PRC-Taiwanese relationship, it is not a zero- sum game. The best relationship between the PRC and Taiwan is always going to be under those conditions wherein the United States and the PRC have the most normal, natural, and efficient relationship. That means we will disagree on many things, but we will also do a number of things, which we have been doing for years: For example, trading, exchanging students, learning more about each other. Americans have always had a kind of love/hate relationship with China. It is part of the mysticism, the mystery of our intangible history of the past centuries with them. We have never really understood China very well. We don't understand China very well today. But one thing I know, if we terminate normal trade relations, it is going to give the upper hand to the very people in the People's Liberation Army, some of the younger turks there who are the people that, in fact, in 1996 led the move to point missiles at Taiwan and who are probably right now doing everything they can to destabilize Zhu Rhongi and President Jiang Xemin, who are trying to reform China, to stabilize China, to deregulate China, to make China into a more modern economy with, all the time, 120 or 140 million people that are completely homeless wandering around the country. I strongly advise my colleagues to vote against what is quite an outrageous resolution, which has no place whatsoever on the floor. I yield the floor.

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask that we take a moment today to recognize the enlisted men and women of the West Virginia Air National Guard. Earlier this year, Major General Paul A. Weaver, Jr., the director of the Air National Guard, declared 1999, ``The Year of the Enlisted Force'' in an effort to promote enlisted pride. In a March 18th proclamation, Governor Cecil H. Underwood, Governor of the great State of West Virginia, made this designation effective. The Air National Guard is made up of about 95,000 people, nearly 88 percent of whom comprise the enlisted corps. About 65,000 are traditional part-time members and about 30,000 are either full-time technicians or members of the Active Guard. They average about 12.7 years of satisfactory service and perform 170 different specialty jobs. These enlisted men and women are America's friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers. They are educators, bank tellers, repair technicians, and builders. At the same time, they serve our nation as the enlisted force of the Air National Guard and they bring their diverse skills to the job. The enlisted men and women bring maturity and experience to the force and provide a much needed sense of stability and commitment. There are two units of the Air National Guard in West Virginia. The 130th Airlift Wing in Charleston, West Virginia, and the 167th Airlift Wing in Martinsburg, West Virginia. These two units supported missions during the Korean conflict and in Vietnam. Both units were stationed in the Persian Gulf throughout the Gulf War. Recently these brave men and women have performed peacekeeping missions in support of the United Nations and NATO in Eastern Europe. In fact, many of them are there as we speak. The men and women of the West Virginia Air National Guard have won many awards. Some of the most prestigious include Air National Guard Distinguished Flying Unit Awards, four Air Force Outstanding Unit Awards, and four Spaatz trophies. It is important that we all take note of the accomplishments of these outstanding enlisted men and women who make up the backbone of the Air National Guard. They bring an incredible amount of dedication to their work as they perform jobs which are crucial to military operations. They deserve our deepest gratitude as they continue to serve our country. My sincere congratulations go to the enlisted men and women of the 130th Airlift Wing in Charleston, West Virginia, and the 167th Airlift Wing in Martinsburg, West Virginia. I share in your pride and I proudly recognize 1999, as ``The Year of the Enlisted Force.''

Mr. ROCKEFELLER

Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Under the Democratic bill, she would get pediatric care, and she should.