John Warner

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Environment and Public Works be authorized to meet on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct a business meeting to consider legislation and committee resolutions. The meeting will take place in SD-406 (Hearing room).

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Finance be authorized to meet in open Executive Session during the session on June 23, 2004, to review and make recommendations on proposed legislation implementing the U.S.-Australian Free Trade Agreement.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 10 a.m., to hold a hearing on Nominations.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 3 p.m., to hold a briefing on Iraq.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Governmental Affairs be authorized to meet on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 11:30 a.m., to consider the nomination of David M. Stone to be Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security, Transportation Security Administration.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Indian Affairs be authorized to meet on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 10 a.m., in room 485 of the Russell Senate Office Building to conduct a business meeting on pending committee matters, to be followed immediately by an oversight hearing on Indian Tribal Detention Facilities.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet to conduct a hearing on Wednesday, June 23, 2004 at 10 a.m. on ``The Law of Biologic Medicine'' in the Dirksen Senate Office Building Room 226. Witness List Panel I: Dr. Lester Crawford, Acting Commissioner, Food and Drug Administration, Rockville, MD; and Mr. Daniel Troy, Associate General Counsel, Food and Drug Administration, Rockville, MD. Panel II: Mr. David Beier, Senior Vice President, Global Regulatory Affairs, Amgen, Washington, DC; Mr. William B. Schultz, Zuckerman Spaeder LLP, Washington, DC; Carole Ben-Maimon, M.D., President and Chief Operating Officer, Barr Laboratories, Bala Cynwyd, PA; and William Hancock, M.D., Bradstreet Chair of Bioanalytical Chemistry, Northeastern University, Boston, MA.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Competition, Foreign Commerce, and Infrastructure be authorized to meet on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 2 p.m. on Peer-to- Peer (P2P).

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Government Affairs' Subcommittee on Financial Management, the Budget, and International Security be authorized to meet on Wednesday, June 23, 2004, at 2:30 p.m. for a hearing entitled, ``International Smuggling Networks: Weapons of Mass Destruction Counterproliferation Initiatives.''

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Lands of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, June 23, at 2:30 p.m. The purpose of the hearing is to review the grazing programs of the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service, including permit renewals recent and proposed changes to grazing regulations and related issues. The hearing will also examine the Wild Horse and Burro Program, as it relates to grazing, and the administration's proposal for sage-grouse habitat conservation.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Production and Price Competitiveness of the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry be authorized to conduct a hearing during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, June 23, 2004. The purpose of this meeting will be to examine proposed legislation permitting the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to register Canadian pesticides. Agenda: S. 1406.

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. The pending amendment offered by the Senator increases mandatory spending if adopted and would cause the underlying bill to exceed section 302. Therefore, I once again raise the point of order against the amendment, pursuant to section 302(f) of the Congressional Budget Act. I yield back my time and ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. WARNER. That is correct. And the votes, again, for colleagues who might not have followed the majority leader and Democratic whip's comments, are to be stacked at approximately 11:30, at which time we will proceed to all votes. Will the Chair advise the Senate with regard to the next amendment in order and the time allocated to each side?

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I did not hear. I was unable to hear the Presiding Officer. Will he repeat it.

Mr. WARNER. I thank the Chair. Amendment No. 3472

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I am going to ask the Senator to yield momentarily to the managers for the purpose of a unanimous consent request, which is concurred in by the leadership, without charging the time against the debate of this amendment. Mr. President, on behalf of the leadership, I submit the following request: Currently, we are debating five votes with the understanding that at the conclusion of those votes, and possibly yielding back some time, a sequence of five votes will commence. I am now asking unanimous consent that sequence of five votes be delayed until 1:45 and that at the conclusion of the debate on the five scheduled votes, pursuant to regular order, we return to the first pending amendment at the desk, which is the Bond amendment, and proceed to debate that amendment.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I once again wish to emphasize to our colleagues, in the past the Committee of the Armed Services most particularly, and I think the Congress in general, has refrained from requiring the Department of Defense to provide detailed planning, manpower, or cost estimates for future military operations. The very nature of any military operation is such that the planners do their very best. They establish parameters. There are some great quotes, which I cannot bring to mind, but in war is the unexpected. You never can know for certain what your requirements will be. Certainly in trying to project that into the future, much less the immediate days or weeks or months ahead--force level projections and cost projections or estimates based on assumptions--conditions can change so quickly, for better or worse, rendering such estimates of very little value. So the Senator has put forth an amendment. In the course of our deliberations with the committee staff and this manager, and with the Senator and others, much of it is very useful and beneficial. There was a lot of thought given. We wanted to accept the amendment with slight modifications. We have now, for example, at 3 o'clock this afternoon the Secretary of State coming up to brief the Senate. That is consistent with how the executive branch is trying to be very forthcoming, and the Department of Defense, the Department of State, and others, in providing information in briefings about the stabilization and reconstruction efforts in Iraq over the past year, providing numerous updates in a variety of areas, at least on a weekly basis. General Abizaid has been very clear about his force requirements for the next 6 months, reducing the need for what we call a sort of quick-fix report as proposed by the amendment by the Senator from Massachusetts. The McConnell amendment requires a comprehensive, balanced report within an appropriate and feasible time period that enables the Congress to perform its oversight responsibilities. Therefore, I think this is a question of reasonableness, and that reasonableness is predicated on forthcoming estimates and forthcoming briefings by the administration on a broad range of issues that relate to the operations our military forces are courageously performing worldwide. Therefore, I strongly urge our colleagues to support the McConnell amendment. Mr. LEVIN addressed the Chair.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, how much time is remaining on our side?

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I simply say to my colleague from Michigan, how well you, and having been privileged to serve these many years together, recognize that the Balkan situation was one that had a measure of predictability that in no way parallels the complexity of the mission we are carrying out in the Central Command AOR. There are stark differences between those military operations. So, Mr. President, at this time I urge colleagues to vote for the McConnell amendment, which we think is very reasonable. It could be viewed as a reinforcing of the Senator's desire to get the information we share with him in many respects--important to the Senate. I yield back the time and ask the Chair to move to the next amendment.

Mr. WARNER. That is correct.

Mr. WARNER. By arrangement of the managers, there will be side-to- side votes. The McConnell amendment first, followed by the Kennedy underlying.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I must say I am fortunate to serve on the Armed Services Committee with Senator Reed and Senator Levin. Throughout the many years we have served together, we have had our honest differences of opinion. I don't mind sharing them. I enjoy our debates. It is constructive for the Senate. There is a process by which we go about it. At some point, there has to be finality reached with regard to issues. I say, most respectfully, to my good friend from Rhode Island, the Senate has voted not once but twice, basically on the same issue raised by this amendment. I am reminded of Winston Churchill, one time in the depths of World War II, the early part of it in the Battle of Britain, when he went back to his old prep school and gave the famous speech saying, ``Never, never, never give in.'' Well, at some point, the Senate has to get on with its business. I think we have more than adequately debated the issues raised by this amendment. Nevertheless, I will take the time of my colleagues to carefully review it. The Senate has already spoken on every single issue raised by this amendment. First, the testing. The Senate adopted the Warner amendment to require ballistic missile defense testing in 2005. That is the first Reed amendment. It rejected the testing approach which the Reed amendment puts before the Senate once again, an approach, I remind my colleagues, that the Pentagon's own chief testing official described as premature and not helpful to the program. If the Reed amendment is adopted, it is just another prohibition in the program, possibly a gap in the production line, and all of those things end up in costly bills for the American taxpayers and disruption. We all know what happens when you break down and develop a system whereby you cannot predict with certainty as to how and when the units would be completed on production lines. It comes down again to, Do you want to deploy a missile defense system or don't you? If you do, I suggest most respectfully to colleagues, let's accept the judgments that you have rendered and get on and not come back and back again and again on these same issues. The Senate already rejected the Boxer amendment which would have halted the development. Do we want to halt production of missile interceptors for an extended period of time, a path that would increase costs, technical risks, and leave us vulnerable again to this threat where America stands defenseless to protect itself from an accidental or an intentional firing of a ballistic missile on to our territorial 50 States? That is the issue. The Senate yesterday, after very thorough and, I thought, one of the better debates on this bill, presented by my distinguished colleague, the ranking member, Mr. Levin, rejected the Levin amendment which would have done basically the same thing as the Reed amendment. It would have resulted in a disjointed, disrupted program. I suggest the Senate should not now adopt an amendment that would fence 2005 funds for additional missile defense interceptors until a testing requirement is completed, when it has already imposed a realistic testing requirement in 2005, explicitly rejected the kind of testing proposed in this amendment, and explicitly rejected the delays, costs, and disruptions that would result from withholding the funding needed to proceed with the testing and fielding of missile defense interceptors. I most respectfully urge my colleagues to sustain the decisions that have been debated and voted on within the past few days by this Chamber. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, we grant 1 additional minute over and above the time.

Mr. WARNER. I will accommodate the Senator from Rhode Island.

Mr. WARNER. I thank the indulgence of the Presiding Officer. The time remaining on this side is?