Ken Salazar

Mr. SALAZAR

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, before my friend from Ohio leaves the floor, I want to tell him, through the Chair, that he has his finger on the right issue. There are so many of us here in this Chamber on both sides of the aisle who recognize that the fiscal house of America is in a disastrous condition, and how we move forward when we get a new President in 2009 is going to be very important in terms of how we address the fiscal reality and fiscal challenges we face. I think the recklessness we have seen with respect to this mountain of debt, which my good friend from Ohio has pointed out is now nearing the $10 trillion mark, is something we have a moral obligation to address. I know among colleagues on both sides, including Senator Conrad and Senator Gregg, there have been conversations about how we might be able to develop a process to try to get our fiscal house back in order. And I appreciate the leadership of my friend from Ohio on this issue. Mr. President, I come to the floor to talk about an issue which has been talked about here quite a bit over the last several days. It has to do with what people think is an easy solution that will deal with the gas price and energy crisis we face here in America. I have heard several of my colleagues come to the floor saying we have a panacea here--just develop the oil shale of the West, just develop 2 trillion barrels of oil that are locked up in the shale of the United States of America, 80 percent of which is in Colorado, and somehow we are going to wave a magic wand and that magic wand will automatically start creating these billions and trillions of barrels of oil that all of a sudden will bring about this abrupt decline in the price of gasoline and the price of oil. There is a lot of hot air in those statements that are being made because the reality of it is that oil shale development in Colorado is still a long way away. That is because the research and development program, which we approved in this Congress, in the Senate, in the 2005 Energy Policy Act, contemplated that we would enter into a research and development phase to determine whether oil shale could be commercially developed. Why is that so important? It is important, first of all, because for 100 years people have been looking at the possibility of developing the oil that is locked up in the shales of mostly Colorado and some in Utah and some in Wyoming, and they haven't been successful. We have had the largest economic bust of the West and in western Colorado in 1980s, as major companies tried to develop oil shale and found out, after investing billions of dollars, that they simply could not under those technologies. It is easy to understand why. It is because when you look at where the kerogen is, which is the oil substance, it is locked up in the rock. It is shale. There is a reason why they call it oil shale. It is not kerogen. It is shale. It is rock. So when my friends come to the floor on the other side and say: Hey, here is a panacea to deal with the high gas prices of today, I would ask them all, with all due respect, to simply look at the reality of oil shale and its potential and also to look at its limitations. Chevron, which is one of the largest oil companies in the world and a company that has been interested in looking at the possibility of oil shale development, in submitting its own comments to the Department of Interior's Bureau of Land Management, as they moved forward with their programmatic environmental impact statement on commercial oil shale development a few months ago, said: Chevron believes that a full scale commercial leasing program should not proceed at this time without clear demonstration of commercial technologies. That was a statement by Chevron on March 20, 2008. Yet there are myths being spread across the country. There are people who are talking to newspaper editorial boards and all around the country saying that all we have to do in America is go to Colorado, go to the western slope, go get the trillion barrels of oil locked up in that rock and, hey, we will solve all of our gas problems in America. That is simply not true. I want to first go through what I think are some myths with respect to oil shale development, myths that have been propagated by some who, frankly, have the financial interest and concerns of only the oil companies, not the interests of the environment and of developing real solutions to the energy problems we face. Myth No. 1 is that we on this side, including myself and other Democratic colleagues, are in fact stopping oil shale from being developed. Nothing could be further from the truth. In 2005, under legislation that we offered out of the Energy Committee in a bipartisan way, with the leadership of Senator Domenici and Senator Bingaman, we included oil shale provisions which I helped to write. Those oil shale provisions created an orderly process for us to move forward with oil shale development. That legislation, which came out of committee and which came out of this Chamber, included sponsors: Senators Hatch, Allard, myself, Domenici, and Bingaman. What that legislation asked the Secretary of Interior to do--in fact, it did not ask; it directed the Secretary of Interior--was to enter into a research, development, and demonstration program on oil shale. Since that time, not so long ago, 2005--we can still remember that, just a few years ago--six of these leases have already been issued. Five of them are in Colorado. Three of them have been issued to one company, the Shell Exploration and Production Company. Under the provisions of the law that we included in that legislation, it is also important to remember that with the 160-acre research and development lease, these companies also have the right to convert those research and development leases to 5,000 acres. That is 5,000 acres of our public lands for R&D lease. That is 5 times 5, 25,000 acres that can convert over into full-scale commercial development, if they should so wish. So we have a program that is already underway. Now, the Bureau of Land Management has decided to move forward with a commercial oil shale leasing program under provisions that were stuck in, in the dark of night, in the conference committee over in the House of Representatives that seem to direct the Bureau of Land Management to move forward with a commercial oil shale leasing program. I do not believe, nor do many of the leaders in my State of Colorado, including our Governor of Colorado, that this is the way we ought to move. Governor Freudenthal in Wyoming does not believe this is the way we should move forward on the possibility of oil shale development. They support the legislation I have introduced on how we move forward with oil shale development. It is very simple legislation. I introduced this legislation that would clarify the process for us to look at how we move forward with oil shale development. Let me simply walk through what the five steps would be. First, the BLM would have 1 year to complete an environmental review of a commercial oil shale leasing program. That is a good amount of time for the BLM to look at completing the environmental review of something which is going to be so impactful to the Western Slope and to the State of Colorado. Second of all, because we believe in making sure the States are providing us input on these Federal lands, which is so important to us in the West--it is so important to us in the West in large part because a third of my State is owned by the Federal Government. The Federal Government is the largest landlord we have in our State. So it has always been important for us to make sure the States and local governments are having input into the development of the resources that are on those Federal lands. My legislation would allow the Governors of the affected States to have 90 days--90 days is not a lot of time--to comment on a commercial oil shale leasing program. Third, the legislation would give the BLM a year to develop a commercial leasing program and to propose the regulations to accompany it--all, I think, very reasonable pieces of the legislation. Fourth, the Department of the Interior and the National Academy of Sciences would prepare reports to Congress on the technology and the proposed plan for oil shale development. Finally, oil shale development would have to comply with our already existing environmental laws--a very simple, straightforward process for us to look at how we can develop oil shale. There are people out there who are saying we in Colorado oppose oil shale development or that Democrats have opposed it. That is simply not the case. We did not oppose it in 2005, and we do not oppose it today. We simply say we want to move forward in a thoughtful and responsible way as we look at the possibility of developing oil shale. So myth No. 1--that we are opposed to oil shale--is simply false. It is a myth. It is not true. Secondly, there is another myth out there that says the current moratorium which is in place as a result of legislation which the Congress adopted last year on commercial leasing regulations is somehow preventing energy companies from developing oil shale, that we are somehow preventing the oil companies from developing oil shale today. Again, that is a myth. It is not true. The reality is, the BLM has clearly stated that the current moratorium on issuing commercial leasing regulations will have no effect--no effect--on U.S. energy supply or on when commercial oil shale production could begin. I have here a part of a transcript of a hearing we had in the Energy Committee not too long ago, where we had the Assistant Secretary of the Department of the Interior, Secretary Allred, come before our committee and testify about the potential of oil shale. It debunks the myths that somehow we are going to wave this magic wand and all of a sudden, this year or next year or the following year, we are going to have all this oil flowing from oil shale in the West. I asked Secretary Allred: When I look at your chart on oil shale development on public lands, you have at some point on that chart this little brown dot that says ``project completion: phase 3-- commercial.'' When do you think that will happen? What year? Assistant Secretary Allred responded: Senator, it's hard to predict that because . . . I asked him the question: 2011? Secretary Allred's response: Oh no, I think, I think . . . I then asked Secretary Allred: 2016? Secretary Allred responded: Probably in the latter half of, say, 2015 and beyond. ``2015 and beyond.'' So that is what the Assistant Secretary of the Interior, responsible for this program, is actually saying, that we would be ready possibly to move forward with commercial development of oil shale in the year 2015--7 years from now. Why, therefore, is there such a rush to move forward headlong today and to complete the development of commercial oil shale regulations before the end of the Bush administration? Why is that the case? I do not understand it because it is not going to produce any oil that will help us deal with the energy crisis we face in the Nation today or tomorrow or the next year. So we have to keep asking those questions. There is another part of the myth with respect to oil shale, and that is that we need to understand that even companies such as Chevron and others do not know what kind of technology ultimately is going to be viable for us in the development of oil shale. Even Jill Davis from Royal Dutch Shell Corporation, in the Rocky Mountain News, is quoted as saying: The thing is we have to determine whether it works on a commercial scale. So there are lots of myths. Myth No. 3 is that the BLM is prepared--I hear some of my colleagues come to the floor and writing letters and making statements in the media--that the BLM is prepared to issue commercial oil shale leasing regulations because the BLM knows the nature and the needs of the development of oil shale, including water and power requirements. Nothing could be further from the truth. BLM has clearly stated it does not know how much water would be required to implement and carry out a commercial oil shale leasing program. So how can we move forward with a commercial oil shale leasing program when we do not know how much water would be required to develop this oil shale? In a hearing, again with Assistant Secretary Allred, I asked the following question: Let me ask you about water availability. Under the Colorado River Compact, as described, there is a significant share of water of the Colorado River between all of the seven States-- Upper Basin, Lower Basin--we have a share of water within Colorado that we are entitled under the compacts to consume for Colorado water users. Do you know, today, how much of that water consumption under those compacts would be required to be able to implement a commercial oil shale leasing program? Secretary Allred's response: Senator, we do not. And that's part of the . . . that's part of the purpose of the R&D leases--to try to determine that. So how can we move forward headlong with a commercial oil shale leasing program when we have no idea how much water is going to be consumed in the development of these so-called half a trillion or a trillion barrels of oil? We do not know because we do not know how much water is going to be required based on whatever technology ultimately might be chosen. Another myth is that the BLM, Department of the Interior, is absolutely ready to move forward with a commercial oil shale leasing program because they know what they are doing with respect to the power requirements. They do not know what the power requirements are going to be. Producing 100,000 barrels per day of oil shale will require approximately 1.2 gigawatts of dedicated electric generating capacity. The question is, where is that electricity going to come from? Where is that power going to come from? What will its impact be? None of those questions have been answered. Yet the Bureau of Land Management is insistent on completing this commercial oil shale leasing program as fast as they can. I think, again, they are wrong. There is another myth out there that says without commercial leasing--I hear some of my colleagues say this--without commercial leasing regulations from the Bureau of Land Management, investors may decide to stop risking their capital on oil shale and instead focus on other projects with more certain returns. That is not true. The reality is the commercial leasing moratorium is giving BLM, investors, energy companies, scientists, Congress, and local communities the time they need to get more information about oil shale development and to allow the technologies to mature before any full-scale operation begins on public land. Again, as Chevron commented in the Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement: Chevron believes that a full scale commercial leasing program should not proceed at this time without clear demonstration of commercial technologies. So there are a lot of myths with respect to oil shale development. Mr. President, I have several more minutes to go, and I see the assistant majority leader has come to the floor, so I will yield to him if he would so choose. Mr. President, I will continue. Myth No. 5. Somehow or another, those purveyors and artists of wanting to move forward with oil shale development with all speed ahead are saying this is somehow supported by the State and local governments it affects. Well, more than half--probably 75 percent--of all the oil shale resources are located in my State of Colorado. The Governor of the State of Colorado, Bill Ritter, says let's go slow and be thoughtful about oil shale development because we know the kind of impact it can have on the vast Western Slope of the State of Colorado. But it is not just the Governor of the State of Colorado who says that, it is also the Governor of Wyoming, Governor Freudenthal, as well. Within my State of Colorado, there is a whole host of local governments that are very concerned about the Department of the Interior and the BLM moving forward, rushing headlong, moving recklessly to develop oil shale on the Western Slope without knowing yet what they are doing. Joining in stating those concerns are the City of Rifle, the town of Silt, the Pitkin County Board of County Commissioners, the Routt County Board of County Commissioners, the San Miguel County Board of Commissioners, the Front Range Water Users Council, the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District, the Colorado Springs Utilities, Aurora Water, the Board of Water Works of Pueblo-- and the list goes on and on. Even the newspapers in Colorado are saying this. This is an editorial that was written in the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel is the newspaper that covers the 20 counties of the Western Slope of Colorado. This is what the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel said: There is no need to accelerate leasing of federal land for commercial oil shale production. The notion that the one-year moratorium on commercial leasing approved by Congress last year is somehow a barrier to commercial development is nonsense. If anything, that moratorium should be extended. The real barriers to commercial oil shale production are technological, environmental and financial. The Denver Post, the State's largest statewide newspaper, said the following: Given that oil from shale isn't just around the corner, and given the vital questions of water and energy, shale development deserves the most careful--and lengthy, if necessary--study possible. Developing oil shale has been a dream since the early 20th century. But careful planning is needed to make sure the dream doesn't turn into a nightmare. In conclusion, what I want to say is I think Chevron is correct today, that it is a mistake for the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Land Management to want to push forward to complete the implementation of the Bush-Cheney agenda with respect to oil and gas and oil shale development. They want to rush head long to get this done before the end of the administration when we know that there are so many technological barriers and so much we do not yet know about how we are going to develop oil shale. So Chevron is correct when it says we are not ready to move forward with a full-scale oil shale program. Let me conclude by simply saying this: For me, as a longtime farmer and rancher and as a person who has spent my life fighting to protect the beauty of Colorado, fighting for the land and water of that State, it is important for me always, as a Senator, to remember that the planet we have and the great State of Colorado I have is something I need to protect for my children and for my grandchildren and great- grandchildren for generations to come. It would be a mistake for us, in my view, for the State of Colorado or the United States of America to move forward with a program that is going to create significant problems to that legacy we are attempting to give to our children and to our grandchildren. I hope we could work together in a bipartisan basis to look at the possibility of the development of the oil shale resource but to do it in a thoughtful and deliberate way so we don't destroy the environment along the way. Mr. President, I thank the Chair and I yield the floor.

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, will the Senator from Illinois yield for a question?

Mr. SALAZAR. Through the Chair, I ask my friend from Illinois whether it is true that we have already opened huge amounts of offshore resources as well as onshore resources for the potential development of oil and gas and that ultimately, if we are going to get our Nation to have the kind of energy independence and national security that has been talked about now for 30 or 40 years, we need to, yes, develop those potential resources and those 75 percent of those offshore and onshore lands the Senator spoke about, but also to look at a whole new agenda of clean energy that will help us get to our national security, our environmental security, and create an economic opportunity here at home?

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, would the Senator from Illinois yield for a question?

Mr. SALAZAR. Through the Chair, I ask of my friend from Illinois how important the extension of these energy tax credits is for renewable energy, given the fact that this is not pie-in-the-sky kind of technology we are talking about. As I understand, in my State--and I know there are already three solar powerplants that are functioning-- there is a plan in the State of Arizona to put together a 400 or 500- megawatt powerplant that will be powered by the Sun, a 200-megawatt powerplant in the State of California, a whole host of ways in which the Sun can become harnessed for our energy needs. The same thing is true with respect to wind. As my good friend from Illinois talked about, what is happening in Illinois is happening across America, including in my own home State of Colorado where we have gone from almost no wind production 3 years ago to 1,000 megawatts, and there are three or four coal-fired powerplants in my State. So how important, I ask my friend from Illinois, would the extension of these tax credits be until 2015, 2016--however we end up finally reaching that number--to continue investing in harnessing the power of the Sun, the power of wind, the power of biofuels?

Mr. SALAZAR

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about the pain that $4-a-gallon gas is inflicting across the country. For the last 8 years, our energy policy has been stuck in the past. Today, we suffer from that neglect. Our national security is compromised by our alarming overdependence on foreign oil. Our economy is held hostage to other countries that control the oil reserves. Every day--every day--most Americans, most of the 300 million Americans are feeling the real pain of high gas prices and diesel prices resulting from these failed policies. Americans know the past all too well. Since 2001, the price of oil has risen more than 400 percent. The cost of a gallon of gas from Colorado is up almost 300 percent. Oh, yes, we all remember those dear old days in 2001, when in Colorado we were paying $1.08 a gallon in the beginning of the Bush administration. Yet today we are at $4 a gallon in Colorado. U.S. expenditures during that same time period on foreign oil that we are importing into our country have more than tripled; a family's transportation costs have more than doubled. Projections show gas may reach $5 a gallon this summer. But the numbers do not even begin to tell the real story of how our dependence on foreign oil is hurting the American people. They do not tell the story of the farmer in Kit Carson County, on the Eastern Plains of Colorado, who is worried, worried that he will not be able to afford the diesel needed to harvest the wheat at the end of the summer. They do not tell the story of the trucker in Elizabeth, CO, whose weekly income has fallen $700 in this economy and can barely afford to fill his truck because fuel costs are higher than they have ever been. They do not tell the story of how fuel prices have pushed several airlines into bankruptcy and led United Airlines to cut over 1,000 jobs in recent days. In rural communities, in particular, gas prices are taking a huge bite out of the family budget. This map shows the average proportion of a family's income that is going for filling the tanks in counties across the country. You can see which parts of the country are the hardest hit. Those are the rural counties, where upward of 16 percent of the entire budget is going for gasoline. So you see in the broad swath of what is rural America, this yellow area. Down here is my San Luis Valley, where 16 percent of the family budget essentially is going to fill the tanks of gasoline for those families. Across the country we are paying almost $5 billion more every day for oil than we did 5 years ago. These moneys are going to the Middle East, to Russia, and to Venezuela. They are not moneys that are staying in America to make us strong. Revenues for oil-producing states and oil companies, primarily oil companies controlled by foreign governments, will reach $2 trillion this year, $2 trillion. So while American farmers and ranchers are facing $10,000-a-month fuel bills, Saudi Arabia is using its oil riches to build four new cities in the desert; the Sudanese are building new skyscrapers and five-star luxury hotels; and Russia, Russia is using its oil windfall to increase its Federal budget tenfold. Over the last 8 years, we have not only become more dependent on foreign oil, today we import an increasing amount of oil from those foreign countries. Thanks to the failed energy policies of the past, we are at the mercy of OPEC and the oil-producing nations of the world. We need to move forward with a new ethic and new imperative of energy independence. We must succeed in a sustained policy that is not a stop- and-start policy on energy independence but one that will succeed in addressing the cause that I believe most of the Members of this Senate believe in; that is, to end our addiction on the importation of foreign oil. How are we going to do this? First, we must continue to develop our domestic oil and gas resources. You heard my friends on the other side of the aisle say we are not doing enough, that we have not drilled enough in the United States of America. Yet when you look at the 2005 Energy Policy Act which I helped craft, along with Senator Domenici and Senator Bingaman, that legislation took sensible steps, in my view, to stimulate new exploration and energy development and opened the door to a whole host of items on a portfolio toward energy independence. In 2006, we worked together, again, Democrats and Republicans, to open an additional 8 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico for energy development. Those areas contained 5.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 1.26 billion barrels of recoverable oil. We were then asking that we produce more oil from our own resources in America. Colorado is a proud contributor to our Nation's energy supply, and we are working to do more. So it is false when people say we are not doing things in America to produce for our energy supply. We have more than 34,000 active gas wells in my State right now. We have almost 5 million acres of land under lease. We are producing 1.2 trillion cubic feet of natural gas each year, up sixfold from 14 years ago. Over the coming years, we will contribute even more to our Nation's energy supply. The BLM estimates that over the next 20 years we could have 17,000 more gas wells in 3 of our western counties alone. Let me say, are we against energy development in America? You tell me that the construction, the drilling of 17,000 wells in 3 of my counties in the State of Colorado is not contributing to the American supply of oil and natural gas that we need in America? We are doing a lot already here. But for those on the other side who accuse us of doing nothing, they are wrong. I have also introduced legislation to open additional areas in the State to oil and gas development, including the Roan Plateau in western Colorado. But we want to do it the right way. Let's not kid ourselves. Expanding domestic oil and gas production will not lower gas prices or kick our addiction to foreign oil. Americans consume 25 percent of the world's produced oil, but we hold less than 1.7 percent of the world's proven oil reserves. This chart shows us a little slice of the pie that is 1.7 percent. One of my colleagues earlier said it is 3 percent of the world reserves. These are the figures from the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA tells us we control 1.7 percent of the global proven reserves of oil. Yet we are consuming 25 percent of those reserves. So what my colleagues on the other side are saying is that we are going to take this little slice of the pie and somehow magically address the huge oil security problems we are facing today. That is not accurate. We need to be honest with ourselves and the American people about our energy future. We simply cannot drill our way to energy independence. If we threw open the doors of America's most treasured landscapes to drilling, it would still just be a drop in the bucket. According to the Energy Information Administration, drilling the Arctic Wildlife Refuge would, at peak production, which would be somewhere between 2018 and 2030, reduce the cost of gasoline by less than 4 cents per gallon. We need to be honest with ourselves and the American people about our energy future. We simply cannot drill our way to energy independence. Some dream that oil shale will save the day. Oil shale deposits in Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah amount to somewhere between 500 billion and 1.1 trillion barrels of oil. That is more than double the proven reserves of oil in Saudi Arabia. The trouble is, the oil is locked up in rock and, even after $10 billion of research and development, nobody has figured out an economical way to get it out. If the technology were ripe, companies like Shell would already be developing oil shale today on their own lands. Shell and other companies already own nearly 200,000 acres of prime oil shale reserves in Utah and Colorado. Nobody, not the Federal Government, not the Congress, not the State, is stopping them from developing these tracts. But they are not ready, and that's what they have all told us in testimony. They are still struggling to overcome technological and economic barriers. We can help companies such as Shell overcome these barriers through research and development incentives like the ones I helped put in the 2005 Energy Policy Act, but even under the most optimistic estimates, the technology won't be ready for commercialization until 2015. So let's be honest about oil shale. Let's not pretend there is a magic wand that we can wave that will unlock the mystery of oil shale. Let's be honest about our energy future. Let's be honest with the American people. Responsibly expanding our domestic production is only one part of the solution. As I have said repeatedly over the last 4 years, we also need to be improving our energy efficiency, investing in technologies, and developing our clean energy economy. We have taken several steps in the right direction. At the end of 2007, Congress passed legislation to increase fuel efficiency standards in cars and light trucks by over 40 percent by 2020. This will save over 1.1 million barrels of oil a day. The bill we passed, the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, also helps spur the rapid development and deployment of advanced biofuels, such as cellulosic ethanol. The bill quintupled the existing renewable fuels standard to 36 billion gallons by 2022, 21 billion of which must be from advanced biofuels, such as cellulosic ethanol. That is more than enough to offset our oil imports from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Libya combined. I was also proud of the work we did in the farm bill to spur cellulosic biofuel production, which has the potential to dramatically reduce carbon pollution. The farm bill includes a provision I sponsored that provides a $1.01 per gallon tax credit for the production of cellulosic biofuels. It is the first incentive for cellulosic biofuels of its kind. Why is this so important? Because cellulosic biofuels have the potential to displace 3 billion barrels of oil annually, equivalent to 60 percent of our country's yearly consumption of oil in the transportation sector, without affecting our need for food, feed or fiber, 3 billion barrels of oil a year. Dramatically increasing our biofuels production can and will help us get control of gas prices and reduce our dependence on foreign oil. In fact, if it weren't for current ethanol production, gas prices would be even higher than they are today. Merrill Lynch estimates that gas prices would be 15 percent higher if it weren't for our ethanol production. Do not make biofuels the scapegoat. In addition, studies are showing that, as a result of our renewable fuels standard enacted in 2005, U.S. oil imports recently declined for the first time in a quarter century. Unfortunately, there are some who just cannot accept the fact that biofuels can and should be a larger part of our energy future. They're finding any excuse to advocate yesterday's energy policies and step back into the past. These renewable energy opponents claim, for one, that biofuels production, in particular corn ethanol production, is to blame for high food prices. This is absurd. There are three factors that are driving food prices up, and ethanol production is not one of them. First, food prices are rising because global demand for grains, particularly from China and India, is rising. Second, the global food supply is down because of drought conditions in several areas of critical agricultural production. Still, U.S. producers are doing everything they can to boost supplies. Not counting corn used for ethanol production, we produced 17 percent more corn food product and exported 23 percent more food product overall in 2007 than in 2006. Third, rising oil prices are making it more expensive to produce food. Petroleum costs are embedded in every part of the global food supply chain. Recent studies by USDA reveal that for every dollar we spend on food, only 20 cents is the cost of the food product itself. The other 80 cents or so are the costs of labor, energy, transportation, and other factors. The best economic minds agree that ethanol production is having little, if any, effect on food prices. Ed Lazear, chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisors, recently reported that ethanol production accounts for less than 3 percent of the increase in global food prices. Those who claim that biofuels production is driving up food costs are flat-out wrong. Let's not forget where today's high gas prices are hurting most, it is in America's rural communities. Farmers, ranchers, small business owners, families in small towns, they know the true cost of our addiction to foreign oil. They feel it every day. They also know that the solution is not far away. They know that the solution lies in our farms and fields, in the promise of cellulosic ethanol and in the ingenuity of the American worker. Our rural communities know we can grow our way to energy independence if we continue to pass and implement policies that stimulate our clean energy economy. So let's not let them down. Let's not turn the clock back to the failed energy policies of the last 8 years. Let's not pretend that the 1.7 percent of the world's oil reserves that we possess will meet our energy needs. Let's be honest with the American people. Let's build our clean energy economy. Let's pass the tax extenders that Senator Baucus, I, and others have developed that will stimulate renewable energy development. Let's give these growing industries the tax certainty that they and their investors need to move forward with projects that are creating good-paying jobs across the country. Let's get after the speculation in the oil market. And let's get to work on breaking our addiction to foreign oil. I will conclude by making a few additional comments. We have heard from the other side of the aisle that oil shale somehow is magically going to develop as part of the solution for our energy independence and deal with gas prices today. The truth of the matter is, we supported the oil shale provisions in 2005 and have been moving forward in the development of oil shale in Colorado in a responsible way. Yet we know that even after the investment of billions of dollars, the technology is some 6 to 7, maybe 8 years away before it can be even commercially developed, if it is proven it can be done. Yet there is this accusation that is coming from the other side of the aisle that somehow the development of oil shale is going to deal with the immediate crisis we face today. That is simply a false charge. We need to move forward and attempt to look at the development of oil shale in an environmentally responsible way. Another point, before I conclude, is we need to continue to grow our way to energy independence. I am a proud sponsor, with Senator Grassley, of the 25-by-25 resolution. I think America's farmers and ranchers can help us move forward so we can produce 25 percent of our energy from renewable energy. I am hopeful this energy crisis does not create an opportunity for us to take a step back on the investments we are making in biofuels. Biofuels are a significant way in which we will move forward to energy independence. I believe strongly there are parts of our energy agenda that Republicans and Democrats can come together on, but I am hopeful the stalling tactics that keep us from moving forward to crafting an energy bill will end so we can deliver on solutions to the American people. I yield the floor.

Mr. SALAZAR. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. SALAZAR. Madam President, I come to the Senate floor this afternoon to speak about the Medicare package we will be voting on cloture on, the legislation that Senator Reid filed for cloture yesterday. We will be doing that vote sometime tomorrow. Before I make my comments about that particular piece of legislation, I want to make a few comments in general about the importance of the health care agenda and the health care challenge that faces America. For all of us who are in elected office in all of our States, we hear about the pain the people of America are feeling from a number of different perspectives. We hear loudly and clearly that people in our States are very concerned about what is happening with the runaway prices of oil and the high cost of gas and diesel and the farmers and ranchers and the businesspeople and consumers in general, just concern about that cornerstone of our economy which is causing so much pain to the people of America today. We also hear about another cornerstone of concern, and that is what is happening with the housing crisis, the housing crisis which, in many ways, has ignited the economic instability we face in America today, where people are losing their homes, record foreclosures are occurring, and people want to know what it is we are doing in Washington to address the dream of home ownership for America. In my State, it is projected that in the year ahead and in 2009 there will be about 50,000 homes that will go into foreclosure. There will be about a third of the housing stock that will have a decline of anywhere from 12 to 15 percent in value over the next several years. Those two cornerstones of our economy--energy and housing--are trembling a little bit today. It is important for all of us in the Congress to do what we can to try to stabilize our energy policy and energy prices and also to deal with the challenges we face in the housing crisis. There is another cornerstone in our economy which is something we need to address. We will do small pieces of it here, but it has to do with health care. Health care today is a huge challenge and problem for America. In the Presidential debates, one of the hot topics will be how will the next leader of the greatest democracy in the world help us address the huge challenges we face in health care. One thinks about the fact that there are 47 million Americans who do not have health insurance today. One thinks about my State of Colorado with a population of under 5 million people. Today there are 850,000 Coloradans who don't have health insurance, and of those 850,000, 180,000 are children, children without health insurance in our State. As I look at the issue of health care in general, one of the cornerstones that face our country in terms of the economic and real human pain we are facing, I am proud of the fact that there are people in the Senate who are trying to figure out a way forward already. First, Senator Baucus, chairman of the Finance Committee, has decided this is an issue we need to learn a lot more about. So we have a series of hearings on what is happening with health care, what is happening with health care in other places around the world. Next Monday we will be having a health care summit to try to further our understanding on how we can deal with this incredibly difficult issue. Then in the mix of all that dialog, my good friend from Oregon, Senator Wyden, who just happens to be on the floor--totally by coincidence--has offered for all of us to take a look at the Healthy Americans Act. The Healthy Americans Act is important because it is the only piece of legislation that has come to the Senate in a manner that is a comprehensive health care reform package, but also, importantly, it has the kind of bipartisan support which, at the end of the day, will be required in order for us to fix the very complex health care problems and challenges we face today. I applaud him and both my Democratic and Republican colleagues who have joined him in that effort. It is the only significant bipartisan piece of legislation that has been considered in Washington for a long time. But the issue of health care and health care reform is not going to go away this year. It is an issue I expect will loom large on our plates right after the January 2009 inauguration. Many of us will be working to try to find the right solution that fits the American population. I very much look forward to working with my colleagues on that on a bipartisan basis and to working with my good friend, Senator Wyden, on that agenda as well. I wanted to speak about a ticking health care emergency that, if unaddressed, will affect millions of doctors and patients across the country before the end of the month. In 19 days from today, Medicare reimbursement rates are scheduled to drop 10 percent, based on an outdated formula that we desperately need to fix. A 10-percent cut to Medicare reimbursement rates will force tens of thousands of doctors into the red, tens of thousands of doctors across America in every one of our States. Millions and millions of Medicare patients will find that their doctor simply cannot afford to treat them. Every single Member of this body has heard loudly and clearly about the devastating effects these cuts will have on patients and on doctors. Here are just a few things I have heard over the last several days. This is from Dr. Mike Wasserman, a Colorado physician who is in a group practice that focuses solely on Medicare patients. He said: A 10 percent cut is untenable. I would have to seriously consider immediately closing our practice if this were to actually stick. Other comments that I have received in my office from others: Many primary care physicians will not only stop taking new Medicare patients but will consider reducing their current Medicare load. That means more patients being cared for by higher cost specialists. Conceivably, this could actually lead to greater Medicare expenditures. Finally: This cut will have a devastating impact on health care across the board as most commercial insurers and TRICARE tie their rates to Medicare. Let's keep these realities in mind as we try to forge ahead in the next 19 days, and hopefully sooner, to try to fix the Medicare issue which faces us today. The June 30 Medicare cuts will affect military health care plans through TRICARE. We will have the rug pulled out from under the feet of TRICARE if we don't fix this problem. For me and for the soldiers in Colorado at Fort Carson, for the airmen at Schriever, Peterson, and Buckley Air Force Bases, and for our Guard and Reserves, I know they will find that fewer doctors will see them, their spouses, and children. It will be more difficult for returning servicemembers from Iraq and Afghanistan to get treatment for PTSD and for wounds they have incurred on the battlefield on our behalf. As the largest purchaser of health services, Medicare rates also serve as a starting point for private insurers. This means the impact of a cut will eventually be felt by middle-class families as well. We cannot let this happen. We cannot let Medicare reimbursement rates fall on June 30. That is why I am pleased that Senator Baucus and a bipartisan group of Senators on the Finance Committee have introduced a bill that would correct this problem. I strongly support this bill, the Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act. I thank the leadership of Majority Leader Reid for giving us the time to bring this matter to full debate and conclusion, hopefully, on the Senate floor. We have to get this bill done. We have no choice. In addition to saving doctors and patients from the June 30 Medicare cuts, the bill makes several fiscally responsible improvements to Medicare and Medicaid, including, first, the bill improves critical programs to ensure seniors and individuals with disabilities on a restricted income can afford the health care prescriptions they need to stay healthy. Second, the bill extends and expands rural health programs. Third, the bill expands coverage of preventive services which are so needed in health care. Fourth, the bill reduces coinsurance for mental health services. Fifth, the bill addresses overpayments and unscrupulous marketing tactics in the Medicare Advantage Program. Finally, the bill will protect the long-term solvency of the Medicare Program. Curiously, the Medicare bill introduced today by Senator Grassley, my good friend and the ranking member on the Finance Committee, mirrors many of these provisions. While the differences may not be in number, the differences, nonetheless, in my view, require us to move forward with the version of the bill Senator Baucus has introduced.

Mr. SALAZAR. I ask unanimous consent for an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. SALAZAR. The one thing we have always agreed on is that the goal of the Medicare Program is to provide affordable, high quality health care to our Nation's seniors. The Baucus bill is the only option that does that, with nearly $4 billion in beneficiary improvements. The Baucus bill also addresses one of the biggest concerns of Medicare Advantage, the lack of reliable networks for private fee-for-service plans. By requiring private fee-for-service plans to have a written contract with providers, this bill makes sure patients have access to the providers they are promised, and doctors will get paid for the services they provide. For nearly 40 years, patients have relied on Medicare, knowing that they would not fall through the cracks. We must continue to protect the integrity of Medicare's good name by swiftly addressing inadequacies. The Baucus bill will do just that. Too much is at stake to let this bill get stuck in the politics of obstructionism. For Medicare patients, for their doctors, for parents, kids, soldiers, and servicemembers' families, we need to get this done before the June 30 deadline. I yield the floor.

Mr. SALAZAR

Mr. SALAZAR. Madam President, let me acknowledge the great work of Chairman Boxer and my good friends and colleagues, Senators Warner and Lieberman. They were two members of the Gang of 14 who brought the Senate back from the brink of disaster, now almost 2 years ago. I admire them as good friends and as people who have helped lead us out of difficult times. Senator Boxer from California is unequaled in terms of her passion for our planet and environment. I appreciate the thoughtfulness, the bipartisan approach they have taken to deal with what is truly one of the central issues of our time. I want to spend a few minutes, as we come to the end of our debate on global warming, to say how important this issue is for me. When I get up in the morning and I think of my job as a Senator, I think about the major issues we face around the world. We face issues of war and peace and how we have to deal with terrorism. We face the issue of how we deal with energy independence. Many of us here have joined in a bipartisan effort, progressives and conservatives together, an effort we describe as ``setting America free.'' We know the huge issue of health care which confounds and confronts so many people. But among those issues, which are the greatest of our time, is the reality that we are frying our planet, as many people have said. We have not developed a framework to move forward to make sure we save our planet, that we save civilization for our children and grandchildren. The world they know, the planet they will know in 2050 and 2100, when none of us are here, will be the kind of planet where we have preserved what we know as God's creation on Earth. The importance of this issue is unparalleled. It is something I believe we should be able to move forward with. I want to illustrate this in a couple of different ways. First, with respect to water, for the State of Colorado and the arid West--and I know in the State of the former Presiding Officer, Nebraska, because we share the South Platte River and its waters--we know the importance of water. Water is the lifeblood of the West. Without water, we know communities and fields will dry up and die. We have seen that happen in many cases around the West. This is a picture of a place in eastern Colorado where we have had severe drought over the last 7 years. You see what happens to what would have been a great crop of corn which a farmer planted, knowing that he would harvest this crop of corn at some point in time. But because of severe droughts we have had on the eastern plains, this field died. There are so many places in the arid West where that same story could be told. There are seven States that share the water of the Colorado River. Much of that water is born in my State of Colorado, as the mother of many rivers, including the Colorado River, and places such as Wyoming and Utah. As those seven States, with a population of 30 million people, depend on the flow of water on the Colorado River, we are seeing challenges there that we have never seen before. The flows in the Colorado River for the last several years have been at an all-time low over the last 100 years because of the record drought we are seeing on the Colorado River. Lake Mead, which is one of the controlling vessels on which we depend to regulate the flow of water on the Colorado River, will never fill again. That is what the scientists are telling us today. So as we look at the reality of water across the West, it is impressive that organizations that are not Democratic or left leaning or so-called environmental organizations are coming to me and saying: You need to do something about global warming. You and the Congress and the new President have to do something about the issue of global warming. The ski industry in Colorado, in places from Vail to Aspen to Steamboat, is saying: We are concerned about global warming because the snow that is the essence of our having the best ski programs in the entire world is in danger. The water users, the Denver Water Board, the Northern Water Conservancy District, the Southwest Water Conservancy District, are telling us we need to do something about water. I believe global warming has a lot of different consequences, if it goes unaddressed. I am hopeful this Senate will have the courage to move forward and address the reality of global warming. There is a connection here to our planetary security, but also to our national security in terms of energy. I agree there are some good things we have already done as a Senate in a bipartisan way, under the leadership of Senators Bingaman and Domenici, with passage of the 2005 act and the 2006 Energy bill and, most recently, with passage of the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act. The CAFE standards we included in that bill alone will save huge amounts of consumption of fossil fuels and will save us from emitting thousands upon thousands of tons of carbon into the atmosphere. Those are good things that we have done, but our work is far from finished. We must do more. The way of doing more is by making sure that we put a cap on carbon in the United States. Some people say: How can you do that in the United States, because you can't control China and the fact that they are building a coal-fired powerplant, one a week, or you can't control what is happening in India? But there is a reality for us as Americans: We must lead. We must have the courage to take the first steps so that then the rest of the world will be able to follow us, so we can address the issue of global warming in an effective way. I don't believe this bill is a perfect bill. I have four or five very important amendments I want to be considered. I could not vote for this bill as it is currently structured, because there are improvements that have to be made. But that is the nature of the legislative process. I would like to have the opportunity to have my colleagues join us in a debate so we could improve upon this bill and make it much better. I will cite three areas where I believe we need to make improvements on this legislation. I have others. The first is renewable energy. I do not believe the allocation tables included in the Boxer substitute are the allocation tables that are appropriately supportive of a renewable energy future. I have seen a renewable energy revolution taking place in Colorado over the last 3 years, where we are now generating over 1,000 megawatts of electric power from wind, harnessing the power of the Sun, doing things with biofuels we have never done before. I am proud of what is going on in Colorado. I would like to see those allocation tables changed so we put a much greater emphasis on renewable energy. Secondly, coal for us, in many States, including the West, is very much what oil is to Saudi Arabia. We have vast amounts of coal, not only in my State but obviously to the north in Wyoming and Montana. I believe there is a future for clean coal technologies through the methods of carbon capture and sequestration. Yet it is money that has kept us from moving forward with a demonstration of those projects. That technology shows great promise. It is my hope that we could amend this legislation to move forward with carbon capture and sequestration in a more effective way. Finally, I do not agree that there is sufficient recognition of the contribution that farmers and ranchers can make with their bioproducts. It is those products that end up consuming the very carbon dioxide we are now emitting into the atmosphere. We need to offer amendments with respect to the agricultural offsets that are included in this bill to make them a much more effective way of helping us address the carbon problem we have. Let me conclude by saying to my colleagues once again: I have the utmost and greatest respect for my leaders and my role models--John Warner, Joe Lieberman, Barbara Boxer--for the work they have done, for having brought us to this point on this legislation. If given the opportunity, and if we can have a robust debate on the floor of the Senate on global warming, we can make this bill a much better bill. We can put the United States in a position of leadership where we address the issue of carbon, we address the issue of global warming, and we save our planet and civilization. I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. SALAZAR

Mr. SALAZAR. Addressed the Chair.

Mr. SALAZAR. Madam President, given the lateness of the hour and the hard work of all our staff today, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be waived.

Mr. SALAZAR. Madam President, parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. SALAZAR. Madam President, would it be in order for this Senator from Colorado to ask a question of the Senator from Tennessee?

Mr. SALAZAR

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

Mr. SALAZAR

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 5 minutes.

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

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 20 minutes.

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I rise today with the hope that this Chamber will soon find consensus in our efforts to find a new course and a new direction in Iraq. I am more convinced than ever that we must change our mission in Iraq from one of combat to one of support. We must place the responsibility for Iraq's future and for the security of its citizens in the hands of the Government of the Iraqi people. Until we change our mission and we take our military out of their streets, Iraqi politicians will not take the necessary, courageous, and final steps toward a political reconciliation that can achieve a lasting peace for Iraq and for the region. Our military is performing admirably in difficult circumstances. They have been tasked with calming streets that are wrought with sectarian conflict, with unraveling thousand-year-old webs of Sunni, Kurd, and Shia rivalries, with understanding the mixture of motives behind car bombings, suicide bombings, roadside bombings, and mass executions. They have been told that if they do this and slow the downward spiral of civil war, the Shiite-dominated Government will press for national reconciliation and a more stable, secure future for Iraq. Our troops have done their job. The Iraqi Government has not done its part. The Maliki government in Iraq has failed to capitalize on the opportunities for success our soldiers have provided, and the administration has failed to implement a political or a diplomatic strategy that is worthy of their sacrifice on the battlefield. ``There is no military solution . . . to the insurgency [in] Iraq.'' That is a quote from General Petraeus. It is a quote General Petraeus made to the world and to Members of this body many months ago. He was right then, and he is right today. I believe the overwhelming majority of Senators have the same goals with respect to our future policy in Iraq. In my view, we share four key principles and ambitions. First and foremost, every Senator in this Chamber wants a stable Iraq that can protect its citizens without dependence on American combat troops. Regardless of one's position on the merits or demerits of the invasion, we must now help Iraq stand as a sovereign nation. We must root out the terror cells that have set up shop since the invasion. And we must guard against a failed state. We must also find a way to help the 2 million Iraqis who fled across the border to Jordan, to Syria, and to Iran, as well as the nearly 2 million internally displaced persons who have fled the violence of their neighborhoods. It is the largest refugee crisis in the world today. Second, we generally agree that our military mission in Iraq must transition at some point from one of combat to one of support. We must have the ultimate goal of bringing our troops home. We may disagree about the number or the timing of troop drawdowns, but we all know we cannot sustain 15 to 20 brigade combat teams in Iraq indefinitely. It will take courage and conviction to shift our mission and to bring our troops home, but if Iraq is truly to stand on its own, we must take the decisive action so we can begin that transition. The third point on which I believe we can, by and large, agree is that this war has been poorly managed. The administration made a series of disastrous mistakes and gross miscalculations after the invasion. Failing to plan for a postwar Iraq, disbanding the Iraqi Army, purging Baathist technocrats from the Government, staffing the Coalition Provisional Authority with neophytes, sending our troops into harm's way without body armor or armored vehicles--these blunders have cost America dearly. They have eroded this administration's credibility, and they have cost us in lives and treasure. Fourth, I believe there is a widely shared view in this Chamber that the United States should focus its military and diplomatic efforts on the most pressing threats to national security. Senators on both sides of the aisle agree that our top national security priorities should be to capture the men who were behind the attacks of September 11, to break up the terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, and to confront the nuclear threats that we see, especially from Iran. Sustaining 140,000 troops in Iraq limits our ability to prosecute the war on terror where terrorist training camps are actually located. Our top intelligence analysts have concluded that al-Qaida has regrouped-- has regrouped stronger than ever--on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. While it is true that al-Qaida in Iraq is a franchise, al-Qaida's main headquarters are elsewhere and not in Iraq. Furthermore, prolonged commitments in Iraq limit our strategic flexibility should we need to respond to threats elsewhere around the world. We must evaluate whether putting all of our eggs in one basket in Iraq is the best strategy to protect America against threats and future attacks. On these four points, I believe we should be able to find consensus in this Chamber. Our goal of stability in Iraq, our desire to start bringing our troops home, our shared frustration with the management of this war, and our concern that escalation in Iraq is weakening our defenses against terrorist threats and nuclear proliferation--these four points of agreement lead to the conclusion that we must find a new way forward in Iraq. The wise heads of the Iraq Study Group laid the groundwork many months ago for a comprehensive strategy on how we would move forward in Iraq. We commissioned out of this Congress our finest and most experienced foreign policy experts, led by former Secretary of State James Baker and former Congressman Lee Hamilton, to provide us an objective and bipartisan set of recommendations on how we should proceed forward in this intractable war. I have reviewed this report multiple times, the report of the Iraq Study Group. That report was released at the end of 2006. It is a small book, but it contains great wisdom of our top diplomats, military commanders, and statesmen from around our country and, indeed, around the world. The report of the Iraq Study Group laid out a political, diplomatic, and military strategy for how we create the conditions to end this war. Its core military recommendation is simple: It is time to transition our troops from a mission of combat to a mission of training, equipping, advising, and support of the Iraq military. Iraq must take responsibility for its own security, and it must be forced to take the political steps necessary toward that reconciliation. Unlike the President's policy, the Iraq Study Group's prescriptions couple a military strategy with a robust and effective diplomatic and political strategy. The group recommended making our economic and military support contingent upon the Iraq Government devising and achieving specific benchmarks. While the Iraqis have made some progress in achieving these benchmarks, much remains to be done, and most of these benchmarks have not been met. Finally, the report makes it very clear we need a diplomatic offensive to help change the equation in the Middle East. Under this diplomatic push, we would reach out to potential partners in the region, engaging those partners in the region as we strive to have a stake in creating long-lasting peace and stability in Iraq. I wish to spend a few minutes now speaking about the Iraq war provisions in the supplemental which is later on in the day formally before the Senate. The bill before us contains many of the propositions that would change our Iraq policy in ways that are consistent with the Iraq Study Group's core recommendations. First and foremost, the bill expresses the sense of the Senate that our troops' mission should change from combat operations to counterterrorism, training and supporting Iraqi forces, and force protection. It would set a reasonable goal--not a deadline, a reasonable goal--of June 2009 to complete this transition. This goal is some 15 months past the date of March of 2008, which the Iraq Study Group originally proposed as its target date for the completion of this transition. This bill would require the Iraq Government to stand up to its own responsibilities in important ways. It would be required to match any funds we spend for training of Iraqi security forces or for reconstruction. This legislation would ensure that the U.S. military pays the same price at the pump as Iraqi civilians are paying today, by requiring the Iraq Government to provide the same kind of support for the fuel costs we are using to protect Iraq today. We are spending $12 billion of America's taxpayer dollars each month in Iraq. We are spending $12 billion of American taxpayer dollars each month in Iraq. After more than 5 years of this war, in my view, it is time for the Iraq Government to share this financial burden. We also need to recognize that this administration's policies have stretched our military to the breaking point. Our troops are away from their families too long, they do not get enough time to train, and readiness is suffering. Under this legislation, the President would have to certify that troops are fully trained and equipped before they are deployed to Iraq. It would place a time limit on combat deployments and ensure that our troops have sufficient dwell time between tours. Finally, the bill would ban permanent U.S. bases on Iraqi soil and require that any mutual defense agreements with Iraq must be approved by this Congress and by this Senate. It is not enough to simply endorse a set of military tactics and hope for the best, which is what the President of the United States has done. The solution in Iraq, our military commanders tell us, is one which is not a military solution but one which combines all those elements that were set forth in the Iraq Study Group. Henry Kissinger once said America needs to rid itself of ``the illusion that there are military answers to our security, and that policy ends where strategy begins.'' We would be wise to heed Kissinger's advice in this age of turmoil. There are no easy answers in Iraq, no easy exits, no certainty of success. To stay on the President's path of more of the same is simply to embrace a policy that is not working--the same dogmatic leadership that led us into war, the same dogmatic leadership that failed to make a postinvasion plan, the same dogmatic leadership that chases the hope of a mission accomplished without regard to learning the lessons of the failures of the past. To charge a new path--to build a political, diplomatic, and military strategy in Iraq--is to embrace the role of a statesman. For it is a statesman, Kissinger used to say, who takes responsibility for all the favorable results if everything goes as planned but also for all the undesirable results if they do not. To serve as statesmen is our role. This is our role as Senators. It is up to the wise heads of this body to take the long view in Iraq, to be realistic about our options, and to consider all our national security interests--from terrorism to nuclear threats--when pursuing our goals of stability and peace in the Middle East. Thank you. I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. SALAZAR

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I wish to spend a few minutes speaking about the farm bill. We will be considering an override of the President's veto hopefully later on this afternoon. As I understand, a few hours ago, the President went ahead and vetoed this bill which we worked on so hard in this Chamber for the last 2\1/ 2\ years, under the great leadership of Senator Harkin, Senator Chambliss, Senator Baucus, and Senator Grassley, along with Senator Conrad and so many of my colleagues on the Agriculture Committee as well as the Senate Finance Committee. Hopefully, we can override the President's veto quickly because what is at stake is the security of America in so many different ways. From what my colleagues tell me, this is the best farm bill we have written in the Congress in the last several decades. For me, there are significant portions of this bill which open whole new opportunities for America, and I wish to spend a few minutes talking about what I think some of those opportunities are. First and foremost, we need to remind the Nation this is a bill about feeding the hungry. It is a bill about nutrition. Nearly 70 percent of the money under this legislation will go to feed the most vulnerable people in America, including providing healthy food--fruits and vegetables--for the young people of America. For my State alone, what this will mean--I come from a small State of some 5 million people--is that about $45 million a year in fruits and vegetables will go to help our young kids who are in school so they can learn healthy eating habits and so they can be in an environment where they can truly learn. So nutrition is a very big part of this legislation. It is why hunger advocates, the faith community, schools, and so many others have been beating the drum so loudly for us to get this bill completed. Second is rural development. Rural development is a huge issue for much of this country. Today across America there are some 1,700 counties, and more than half the counties of America are designated as rural. About 800 of those counties lost population in the last few years. It is part of the America that is withering on the vine. Many of the provisions of this farm bill, including rural development sections of this farm bill, will help this part of America, which seems to be left out, to be put into a position of being second class. This farm bill invests heavily in rural America through the rural development programs that are included in this legislation. Third is conservation. Through the leadership of Senator Harkin and his vision for what we do with conservation, the $3 billion-plus that is added for conservation in this farm bill will help us make sure the conservation ethic we have pursued in this country is something we can preserve for a long time to come. Fourth, title IX of this farm bill is the energy title. In that title of the farm bill, we continue a policy which has been a bipartisan policy of this Congress to try to get rid of our dependence on foreign oil and to try to harness the power of the wind, the power of cellulosic ethanol, the power of hydroelectricity, the power of geothermal, and so many other renewable energy resources. Rural America stands ready to grasp the reins of responsibility and opportunity to help us achieve energy independence in a real way. So the energy section of this bill is a very important part of it, and so many people have been a part of this and have worked on this legislation. Finally, I would say this is work which has involved the administration now for 2\1/2\ years. It baffles me that this President would turn his back on the people of America by vetoing this farm bill, knowing his administration has been helping us craft this bill. The excuse I have heard, which has been out there in public, is this farm bill raises taxes. This farm bill doesn't raise any taxes at all. Unlike the fiscal recklessness we have seen over the last 7 years with this administration, what we have done is we have paid for this bill. This bill is 100 percent paid for, and it is paid for without a tax increase. It is paid for with the reforms we have included in this farm bill. So I am hopeful when this legislation does get over here to the floor for the consideration of the override of the President's veto, we will have a near acclamation of a vote against the President's veto of the farm bill. I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SALAZAR

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

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, what is the pending business?