John Warner

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to consideration of S. 1079, Senator Murkowski's bill to extend the Temporary Extended Unemployment Compensation Act of 2002; provided further the Senate proceed to its consideration, the bill be read a third time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that S. 1040 be star printed with the changes that are at the desk.

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. I ask unanimous consent the concurrent resolution be agreed to, and the preamble be agreed to, and the motion to reconsider be laid on the table, with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Judiciary Committee be discharged from further consideration of S. Con. Res. 44, and that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the amendment to the preamble be agreed to, the preamble, as amended, be agreed to, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements regarding this matter be printed in the Record.

Mr. WARNER. There is an amendment at the desk.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Judiciary Committee be discharged from further action on S. Res. 100 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, before our distinguished colleague departs the floor, I appreciate his thoughtful comments, but I guarantee him-- Senator Levin and I have been doing this now for 25 years, but we are no stronger than the members we have on the committee. When the Senator from Georgia joined us, our strength increased. I intend to get that work product out of him 100 percent. I thank him for joining us, and for all he does on this committee and for the men and women in the Armed Forces.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I thank the Members of the Senate who participated in the progress today. We have had good colloquies and strong statements. We have two pending amendments. I hope the respective leaders tomorrow can establish a time for voting on those amendments. Senator Levin and myself are going to be right here from roughly 10 a.m. on. I am hopeful that other amendments can be brought forward. We are anxious--and it is a bipartisan desire--to move this bill at its earliest time because we have important legislative measures that must be addressed this week prior to the recess that is scheduled. One more of great significance is action on the debt limit. I am quite sure we are not going to leave town until that is in place. Amendment No. 697

Mr. WARNER. I ask our distinguished colleague, the distinguished leader on the other side of the aisle, the cost implications.

Mr. WARNER. I say to my distinguished friend and colleague, there are a number of provisions that will be addressed as we proceed to this bill to try to improve the compensation benefits for the Reserve and Guard. I generally recognize the need to do so, but I must say to my good friend, the regulars are beginning to say, well, what is the distinction between a Regular and a Guard and Reserves man? A Regular, the clearest distinction is he or she is subject to 365 days of service to country and probably moving from base to base every third year. Also, they do not have the benefit of both Reserve and Guard pay. As someone said, and I hope the distinguished leader will not take this the wrong way, maybe everybody will leave the Regular Forces and join the Guard and Reserve because there is a little more flexibility and a little more pay and benefits. We have to watch as we move along in this direction to not get out of balance what has been in balance for many years. I recognize that the Guard and Reserve are pulling heavily on the oars these days and they have the inconvenience of being called up at times as they have experienced in Afghanistan and the Iraqi operations and having to leave their families rather abruptly and depart their businesses, employers confronted with getting replacements in some instances but allowing them to return to their positions, which I think is the proper thing to do. We have not had any hearings. We do not know what the ramifications are. I say to my distinguished colleague, at the moment I will have to indicate my intention to oppose.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I thank the Senator for his work on the committee. We value very much his contributions. He is very fair and open-minded in the manner in which he makes decisions.

Mr. WARNER. Could you give the date of the publication?

Mr. WARNER. If I could ask a further question? I should examine this report. It is timely. But I am advised there is a provision in the report indicating that 80 percent to 90 percent of the Guard and Reserve have private sector health insurance. Are you familiar with that?

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I will do that. I value the wisdom and initiative of our distinguished leader. So I will do that.

Mr. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Madam President, I thank our colleague on this point. But bear in mind that there are some in the House bill. We will have to deal with them in conference. To the extent we can have any interlocking on this bill with those provisions of the House bill, which the Senator's committee and our committee and the Senate as a whole feels should be incorporated into the bill, it would be helpful to do that. I think in general the Secretary of Defense is on the right track in the sense that when you stop to think, today's military is so different than it was 2 or 3 years or even a decade ago. As I mentioned earlier, before the Senator from Maine joined us on the floor, the total force today is not only the uniformed men and women of the Armed Forces, they are very much part of the civilian force. There are thousands of civilians over in the Iraqi situation and in Afghanistan right now taking risks commensurate with those of uniformed personnel and performing services to give infrastructure to the military to do their missions. The Secretary of Defense has to have some flexibility in how he assigns and reassigns civilian personnel. I hope we could achieve some measure commensurate with what the wisdom of the Congress enabled the Secretary of Homeland Defense to have. It seems to me that is sort of the bar at which we ought to look. Might I inquire, does the Senator share views similar to the Senator from Virginia?

Mr. WARNER. I will have one more word, but I yield--not necessarily yield--to my colleague from Michigan if he wishes to reply to the Senator from Maine.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I thank both my colleagues. But before we conclude this very valuable and important colloquy, I ask the Senator from Maine, who speaks with such conviction if we are going try to do something on this bill or is the thought that it is just not achievable? Because we have an issue with the House right now. And the question is, are we going to address that issue in part-- maybe not all, but in part--in such a way that we can do constructive advancements in this field to assist the Secretary and the administration in this enormous Department with a diversity of responsibilities? Can we conclude we are going to give it a try, and that would move it along pretty quickly? Because hopefully this bill will be voted on early this week.

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

Mr. WARNER. It is my understanding that the Senate, at the hour of 5 o'clock, will proceed to a rollcall vote and that the vote will be held open for the period of 1 hour, until 6 o'clock; is that correct?

Mr. WARNER. My distinguished colleague, the ranking member, and I hope Members could come up to see either of us, if we are here--and if we are not here, both staffs will be here--and indicate the possibility that they may have amendments that will be forthcoming and the time, say tomorrow, that would be convenient for them to bring up those amendments. Tonight we will be addressing some amendments after 6 o'clock. We will resume with amendments in the morning. We have gotten excellent cooperation from those desiring to offer amendments. But by midday tomorrow, we should, at our respective caucuses, be able to give the Senate some idea during the caucuses of the progress of this bill and the likelihood of when final passage could be achieved. Am I not correct on that, I ask my colleague?

Mr. WARNER. In any event, Mr. President, there have been some rumors to that effect.

Mr. WARNER. There is nothing in the Record as to post-6 o'clock as to further votes tonight. That is the case until we hear from the majority leader; is that correct?

Mr. WARNER. I yield the floor.

Mr. WARNER. I thank our distinguished assistant leader.