Paul Wellstone

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I want to take a few moments to take the floor. I do not know quite how to do this. I may not do it very well. I do not know whether my words will accomplish anything. But sometimes, you know, you just feel like you should speak on the floor of the Senate. That is what comes with the honor of being a U.S. Senator. Mr. President, on the front page of the Washington Post today--this just needs to be recognized on the floor of the Senate--there is a headline, ``For Ousted Bosnians, a Trail of Tears.'' Under that headline, ``Serbs Force Thousands of Muslims in Harrowing Journey.'' Then there is a picture of older men, women, and children, a Bosnian woman wheeling what I gather would be, Mr. President, her elderly father in a wheelbarrow. And the first paragraph reads, ``Bedraggled, hungry and scared, thousands of Bosnian Muslims flooded into a swelling makeshift refugee camp with little food, water or medicine today after a harrowing journey into Muslim-held territory from the fallen town of Srebrenica, now occupied by Bosnian Serbs reveling in their victory.'' Mr. President, another article in the Washington Post is headlined, ``Serbs Start Expelling Muslim Civilians From Seized U.N. Conclave,'' with pictures of women and children herded into refugee camps. Mr. President, these pictures send chills down my spine. I am the son of a Jewish immigrant born in Odessa in the Ukraine who lived in Siberia in Russia. I am an American Jew, and these pictures send chills down my spine, along with the reports that the Serbs are taking all young men, boys 16 years of age, away from their families. I do not know where they are taking them to. But they are taking them away to find out whether they are guilty of ``war crimes.'' Mr. President, I do not know exactly what it is the international community should do. But I am convinced the international community has to do something. Mr. President, it is as if the world has not learned anything in the last half a century. We really are talking about genocide of people. I will not talk about the position a number of Senators took several years ago in calling for action. I took such a position. Normally, I do not talk about intervention, international military intervention, but several years ago several of us came to the floor and said it had to happen. That is beside the point. Mr. President, I was thinking about this this morning, and I was talking to my wife, Sheila. We have been debating the regulatory reform bill, and it is extremely important. I have been involved in the debate about the rescissions bill. All of us care about our work, and all of us give everything we have, whether we agree or disagree. The Presiding Officer and I, who are good friends, are good examples; we do not agree on all issues. But I am trying to figure out, for God sake, what in the world is the world going to do? What is the civilized international community going to do? We see people just expelled, expunged, young men taken away from families to see whether they are ``guilty of war crimes.'' Elderly and children, 1-year-olds put on trains--to go where? What is going to happen to these people? Sometimes, in the history of humankind, silence is betrayal. I do not think we can be silent about it. I wish to God I knew exactly what the international community could do. The fact that there are no good choices does not mean we still should not choose some course of action. I do not mean any easy fix, Mr. President. I do not mean something where we essentially turn our gaze away from the rape and torture and murder of innocent people. So, Mr. President, I just wanted to take a few minutes to speak to these pictures. If my father, Leon, was alive--he is no longer alive-- he would say that there exists on the part of humankind an enormous capacity for good but also, unfortunately, an enormous capacity for evil. It is that parallelism that makes it all so complicated. I assume that next week in this Chamber we will be talking about what is now happening in the former Yugoslavia. I do not know what the focus of the debate will be. I know there are several resolutions, but I think it has to be more than resolutions and amendments. The international community cannot turn its gaze away from this. This is genocide. We should have learned some lessons over the last half a century. I do not think we can go about our normal business just because it is long distance, somewhere away. These are all of God's children. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, the issue of female genital mutilation [FGM] was first brought before the Senate last September when Senator Reid introduced a sense-of-the-Senate resolution condemning this cruel ritual practice and commending the Government of Egypt for taking quick action against two men who performed this deed on a 10-year-old girl in front of CNN television cameras. Last October, Senators Reid and Moseley-Braun and I introduced a bill entitled Federal Prohibition of Female Genital Mutilation Act of 1994. At that time we committed ourselves to working on this issue until legislation passes that bans the practice of female genital mutilation in the United States. The bill we are introducing today would accomplish this goal by making it illegal to perform the procedures of FGM on girls younger than 18. In addition, this legislation proscribes the following measures as necessary to the eradication of this procedure: compiling data on the number of females in the U.S. who have been subjected to FGM, identifying communities in the United States in which it is practiced, designing and implementing outreach activities to inform people of its physical and psychological effects, and developing recommendations for educating students in medical schools on treating women and girls who have undergone mutilations. I am proud to be a cosponsor of an act that addresses an issue so crucial to the mental and physical health of women and girls. The ritual practice of female genital mutilation currently affects an estimated 80 million women in over 30 countries. Although FGM is most widespread in parts of Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East, immigrants from practicing groups have brought the custom to wherever they have settled, including the American cities of New York, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, and Washington, DC. This tradition is sometimes euphemistically referred to as ``female circumcision,'' a dangerously misleading label which encourages us to think of the procedure as nothing more significant than the culturally required removal of a piece of skin. A closer examination of the issue makes it clear that female genital mutilation is in fact the ritual torture of [[Page S 9912]] young girls. In her Washington Post article, Judy Mann describes female genital mutilation as ``the ritualized removal of the clitoris and labia in girls--from newborns to late adolescents. In its most extreme form, a girl's external sexual organs are scraped away entirely and the vulva is sewn together with catgut, leaving a hole the size of a pencil for urine and menses to pass through. Her legs are bound together for several weeks while a permanent scar forms.'' In the countries and cultures of its origin, FGM is most commonly performed with crude instruments such as dull razor blades, glass, and kitchen knives while the girl is tied or held down by other women. In most cases, anesthesia is not used. Afterwards, herb mixtures, cow dung, or ashes are often rubbed on the wound to stop the bleeding. Aside from the obvious emotional and physical trauma which are caused by this procedure, it has been estimated that 15 percent of all circumcised females die as a result of the ritual. The long term effects dealt with by American doctors who treat mutilated women and girls are listed by the New England Journal of Medicine as including chronic pelvic infections, infertility, chronic urinary tract infections, dermoid cysts (which may grow to the size of a grapefruit), and chronic anxiety or depression. Although female genital mutilation has sometimes been viewed as a purely cultural phenomena, it is clear that no ethical justification can be made for this inhumane practice in any country. The unacceptable nature of FGM by international human rights standards was underscored by the World Health Organization on May 12, 1993, when it adopted a resolution which highlighted the importance of eliminating harmful traditional practices affecting the health of women, children and adolescents. This resolution explicitly cited female genital mutilation as a practice which restricts ``the attainment of the goals of health, development, and human rights for all members of society.'' In 1993, the Vienna Declaration of the World Conference on Human Rights also held that FGM is an international human rights violation. Additionally, FGM has already been banned in many Western nations. In 1982, Sweden passed a law making all forms of female circumcision illegal, and the United Kingdom passed a similar law in 1985. France, the Netherlands, Canada, and Belgium have each set a precedent for the illegality of female circumcision by holding that it violates laws prohibiting bodily mutilation and child abuse. Action has been taken to enforce the statutes banning this practice in all the countries I've just mentioned. However, due to complex cultural factors, dealing with this issue in the United States require more than making the ritual practice of FGM illegal. Immigrant parents in the United States who import a circumciser from their home country or find an American doctor willing to perform the procedure claim to do so out of a desire to do the best thing for their daughters. In the societies and cultures that practice it, FGM is said to be an integral part of the socialization of girls into acceptable womanhood. Often, the mutilations are perceived by a girl's parents as her passport to social acceptance or the required physical marking of her marriageability. In spite of its obvious cruelty therefore, FGM is a part of cultural identity. Clearly, female genital mutilation must be dealt with in a manner which takes into account its complex causes and meanings. Because of the complexity of this issue and the lack of available information regarding FGM in the United States, this bill includes a provision ensuring that research be carried out to determine the number of females in the U.S. who have undergone mutilations. This research would also document the types of physical and psychological damage dealth with by American medical professionals who treat mutilated women. The bill also requires that we investigate approaches such as the one used in Great Britain where child protection networks are used to identify at risk girls and trained professionals are assigned to work with their families. Finally, the legislation would ensure that medical students are educated in how to treat women and girls who have undergone FGM. In 1994, the New England Journal of Medicine reported that pregnant women who have undergone infibulation--in which the labia majora are stitched to cover the urethra and entrance to the vagina--are at serious risk, as are their unborn babies, if treated by physicians who have not been trained in dealing with infibulated women. In fact, untreated infibulated women have double the risk of maternal death and several times increased risk of stillbirth when compared with women who have not undergone mutilation. The education of medical students regarding FGM is especially essential as under this bill it would be considered illegal to discriminate or deny medical services to any woman who has undergone FGM procedures. Passage of a bill banning FGM would have helped Lydia Oluloro who fought her deportation and that of her two daughters on the grounds that her sister had threatened to kidnap the girls and have the mutilations performed on them if they were forced to return to their native Nigeria. Passage of this bill would also send a clear message to American medical professionals, some of whom reportedly have been offered as much as $3,000 to perform mutilations on young girls. It would see to it that the names of Western doctors who mutilate girls would no longer be passed around in immigrant communities. It would help in prosecuting cases resembling the one faced by the Atlanta district attorney in 1986 in which an African-born nurse was charged with child abuse after botching a clitoridectomy on her 3-year-old niece, and it would ensure that immigrants are educated as they enter the country regarding the operations's illegality and its dangers. Female genital mutilation is the world's most widespread form of torture, yet no other mass dilation of humanity has received so comparatively little journalistic or governmental attention. We in the United States should make it clear that it is a serious crime if it occurs here. I urge my colleagues to support this legislation as an essential tool in the struggle against the perpetuation of this heinous practice.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am pleased to join Senators Kennedy and Kassebaum, as well as many of my colleagues on the Labor and Human Resources Committee, in introducing the Health Insurance Reform Act of 1995. The reforms included in this legislation would make it illegal for insurers to drop people when they become sick and to discriminate against individuals with preexisting conditions. While I wish that we were doing much more in Congress to ensure that all Americans have access to affordable, comprehensive health insurance coverage, I view the insurance reforms contained in this legislation as a serious step in the right direction. There is no excuse for not doing what we can to make coverage more accessible--especially for people with preexisting conditions and disabilities. It is a disgrace that our private insurance system continues to discriminate against precisely the individuals who most need coverage. All working Americans face a growing threat from the uncertainties created by the health insurance system. Even people with good health insurance coverage cannot count on protection if they lose or change jobs, especially if someone in their family has a preexisting condition. Our current health care system allows insurers to collect premiums for years and then suddenly refuse to renew coverage if individuals or employees get sick. It also allows insurers to routinely deny coverage to different types of businesses from auto dealers to restaurants. The GAO has estimated that as many as 25 million Americans could potentially benefit from the insurance reforms included in this bipartisan bill. Most of the people who would be helped by this legislation are people who change jobs and currently face preexisting conditions or waiting periods with their new health coverage. Many States, including Minnesota, have already enacted standards for insurance carriers, but because ERISA preemption prevents States from regulating self-funded health plans, only Federal standards can apply to all health plans. More and more employers in Minnesota have been choosing to offer self-funded plans to employees. Such plans now enroll about 1.5 million people, up from 890,000 in 1992, and about 50 percent of all privately insured residents. Current estimates also show that more than 400,000 Minnesotans--including 91,000 children--are uninsured. I am under no delusions that these insurance reforms will fix our broken health care system. They will not result in universal coverage-- or anywhere near it--and they will not solve the problem of rising costs. After all, only comprehensive reform will make health care affordable for many of the uninsured who simply cannot afford the high cost of coverage. While I am committed to fighting for comprehensive reforms that would include everyone and enable working families to afford health care coverage as good as Members of Congress have, I recognize that this may not happen this year. At the very least, however, we should act on reforms that would address some of the most egregious inequities in our current system, as well as those that would allow States to expand access and contain costs.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I will not take but a couple of minutes. I have from my office watched the Senator from California, the Senator from Washington, and the Senator from Massachusetts out on the floor, and I really have been moved by what you have said. My wife, Sheila, is not here today. But her mom passed away from breast cancer, and we feel very, very strongly about these issues. The Senator talks about having an up-or-down vote and we will be here for as long as it takes. If I could just ask my colleagues, why do you feel so strongly about this? Let us just forget all the statistics, all the charts, all the numbers. Why do you feel so strongly about this?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I would be pleased to, if I could read one more time the definition of ``filibuster.'' Maybe my colleague could further explain what the filibuster is, although I----

Mr. WELLSTONE. That is correct. I just want to make it clear that when I see a piece of literature coming out on a rescissions bill titled ``The Cost of Delay: The Filibuster * * *,'' I just wanted to read for some of my colleagues who make these accusations the definition of ``filibuster.'' It seems to me when Senators are going to be engaged in these kinds of attacks, we ought to be clear what a filibuster is. So, I read the definition of ``filibuster.'' And I will do it one more time. Dictionary definition: ``The use of obstructionist tactics such as the making of prolonged speeches or the introduction of irrelevant material for the purpose of delaying legislative action.'' Our proposed amendments are not irrelevant. They are directly relevant to this bill. We have offsets. We have agreed to amendments. We have agreed to time limits on those amendments. That is in no way, shape or form a filibuster. I do not want to interrupt the flow of discussion about this bill, but I must say that if this goes on, I am going to have to come out here and start reading definitions of democracy and other such terms that are important to the way we conduct our business. But, Mr. President, before I yield the floor, let me just make it clear one more time. I did this morning, and I want to say it one more time. Senator Moseley-Braun and I have been very clear. We were clear Friday; we are clear now. The bill comes over, changes are made, changes are made late Thursday night, changes that are made that we think make this rescissions bill not the bill that was passed out of the Senate. We think it could use improvement. We think the people in the country do not know about some of these changes. We are not at all sure that some people's priorities are to cut low-income home energy assistance, summer jobs training, job training for dislocated workers, or counseling programs for seniors when it comes to consumer protection on health policies that they purchase. Therefore, we wanted the opportunity and desired the opportunity and made it clear to have some discussion. I do not know why my colleagues are afraid of some limited discussion about this so people in the country know what is in it. But it certainly is not a filibuster. We are ready to proceed as soon as there is no longer any delay, and I certainly hope the majority leader will be willing to let us go forward. I yield the floor. Mr. GLENN addressed the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Would the Senator yield?

Mr. WELLSTONE. I cannot think of a better colleague to do that for me. One more time before we get into these kinds of accusations and this kind of attack politics, ``The Cost of Delay: [[Page S 9778]] The Filibuster * * *.'' ``Filibuster. The use of obstructionist tactics such as the making of prolonged speeches or the introduction of irrelevant material for the purpose of delaying legislative action; an instance of the use of such tactics, especially in the United States Senate.'' Again, when Senators have amendments to a piece of legislation, very relevant, and agree to a time limit, and make it very clear that all we want is an opportunity to have a debate and discussion so people know what the priorities are of this rescission bill and some opportunities to improve it as we see it and better represent our constituents, that is hardly a filibuster. My second point, by the way, Mr. President, is there is no delay on our part. The delay is on the part of the majority leader who will not accept an eminently reasonable proposal. There is probably not a Senator in the U.S. Senate, Democrat or Republican, I say to my colleague from Utah, who does not believe that it is important for us, especially if we do not block a motion to proceed and especially if we have a time agreement, to have an opportunity to improve a piece of legislation. I would be pleased to yield to the Senator.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. President, I was on the floor earlier today trying to just present some clarity about the rescissions bill. I will not go over my remarks I made earlier, but, Mr. President, the simple point I made was that Senator Moseley-Braun and I, Friday and today, always made it clear that we had several amendments, altogether four amendments, and we agreed to 50 minutes on each amendment, to be in the evening and the stacked votes the next day, and equally divided for summary, 50 minutes equally divided. That seemed an eminently reasonable proposal, especially for a bill where there were changes from what we had done in the Senate and wanted a chance to make some changes in this piece of legislation. That was rejected by the majority leader, Mr. President, which amazed me. I mean, to argue that Senators cannot come out and have some amendments and some discussion about a peace of legislation so people know what is in there, it seems to me to go against the grain of what we are about and what representative democracy is about. Now I see something put out by the Republican Policy Committee, ``The Cost of Delay: The Filibuster * * *.'' So, Mr. President, could I just read from the dictionary about what a filibuster is? ``The Cost of Delay: The Filibuster * * *.'' Here is the definition of ``filibuster'' right out of the dictionary. ``The use of obstructionist tactics such as the making of prolonged speeches or the introduction of irrelevant material for the purpose of delaying legislative action.'' Our amendments are hardly irrelevant. They deal exactly with these cuts. We wanted to have some offsets. We agreed to a time limit on the amendments; less than an hour for each one. And now I see this accusation of the filibuster.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, just so the Senator would--I will let the Senator from Ohio respond, but just for a moment, I want the Senator from Utah to know, I was actually not referring to this piece of legislation at all.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, do I have the floor?

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am pleased to introduce the Medicare Health Care Quality Act of 1995 today to make certain that Medicare beneficiaries are protected and receive access to high-quality care when they enroll in health plans offered through the Medicare Program. I am deeply concerned about the extreme cuts in the Medicare Program that would be necessitated by the recently adopted budget resolution. A careful examination of the program clearly shows that the increasing numbers of elderly, disabled, and end-stage-renal disease patients-- changing demographics--and overall health care inflation account for most of the increased growth in spending. According to projections based on CBO numbers, the cuts contained in the Republican budget resolution will not allow the Medicare Program to even keep pace with the private sector on a per person basis. And the Medicare Program takes care of many of our society's sickest and frailest members. We have heard a lot recently about Republican proposals to restructure Medicare by giving seniors a voucher and allowing them to purchase health coverage in the private market. This legislation would ensure that plans participating in such a program would be required to meet minimum standards of performance, and that access to needed care, and quality of that care are assured. Many health plans already meet the standards I have included in this legislation, but for those that do not, this legislation will provide a critical safety net for patients. If a voucher system is created, it is likely that constraints on the amount of the voucher will force many seniors to choose managed care plans, as their most affordable alternative. Currently abut 3 million Medicare beneficiaries are enrolled in managed care plans through the Medicare Program. Most of these patients are satisfied with the care they receive. A significant fraction, however, primarily the frailest, the sick and disabled, are not satisfied, according to a recent report by the office of the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services. Serious problems identified with the program identified in this report included: Compliance with Federal enrollment standards for health screening and informing beneficiaries of their appeal rights appeared to be problematic. Perceived unmet service needs . . . led 22% of disenrollees and 7% of enrollees to seek out-of-plan care'' Some beneficiaries reported having difficulty making appointment for services in terms of the days waited for scheduled appointments. . . Some beneficiaries reported they were refused referrals to specialists. . . It is clear to me, however, when I look at the managed care plans in Minnesota, that managed care plans can provide access and quality in health care, while holding down the growth of costs. In a recent editorial on July 6, 1995, in the New England Journal of Medicine, the editor-in-chief, Dr. Jerome Kassirer stated: Managed care itself is not the enemy. On the contrary, many of its effects are salutary. Patients stay in the hospital far fewer days, many surgical procedures that previously required hospitalization are now safely performed in day surgery, there is far more attention to preventive care, many medical practices have been standardized to produce better outcomes, and satisfying patients has become an explicit goal. There is, however, remarkable diversity among managed- care plans. Some, mostly older plans that were created when cost containment was an unexpected benefit rather than their central purpose, deliver high-quality care economically. Unfortunately, others cut costs by recruiting the healthiest patients, excluding the sickest, rationing care by making it inconvenient to obtain, and denying care by a variety of mechanisms. The Medicare Health Care Quality Act of 1995 defines the standards that must be met by any health plan, including managed care plans, if they are to participate as a plan for Medicare patients. The major standards would include those for: Information to be provided to enrollees on plan coverage, benefits, patient satisfaction, and quality indicators to assist consumers in making informed purchasing decisions. Utilization review activities, credentialing of health professionals, and handling of grievances by consumers and providers to assure that all are treated fairly by the health plan. Provision of adequate access to care, including specialty and emergency care without penalizing consumers. Fair marketing of health plans to Medicare beneficiaries to be certain plans cannot selectively market, and enroll only the healthiest patients. Mr. President, I have repeatedly stated that trying to restructure the Medicare Program without addressing the bigger question of overall health system reform is foolish, and likely to worsen the situation in the private sector. As Medicare cuts are put in place, providers will be forced to shift charges to private sector payers, insurance rates will rise, more people will be unable to afford coverage, and we will all end up paying more for our health care in the end. I believe that we must tackle health care reform in this Congress. Until that happens, however, and as Medicare beneficiaries continue to join private sector health plans, including managed care plans, in increasing numbers, it is critical to be certain that adequate patient protections are in place. The Medicare Health Care Quality Act of 1995 will go a long way toward doing that. I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Thank you, Mr. President. I ask unanimous consent that I be able to speak for 5 minutes as in morning business.

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

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. And I think the majority leader may be worried about that. So I am ready for the debate on these amendments, and I hope we will be able to work out some agreement. I yield the floor.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I read this morning in the paper that the majority leader has dismissed what I think was a very reasonable proposal about how to proceed on the rescissions bill. I want to be just very clear about where we are right now in the deliberations. Madam President, on Friday morning Senator Moseley-Braun and I came to the floor of the Senate to express our concerns about the most recent version of the rescissions bill that had been worked out the night before. There had been a deal struck by some parties on Thursday night, and it was coming over to the Senate from the House Friday morning around 10. It was about 120 pages long. We had not had an opportunity to examine it. There were some I think who wanted to just voice vote it. But at a minimum, we wanted an opportunity to propose several amendments and to have debate on each of them. Madam President, the position that I took then and I think Senator Moseley-Braun took as well--she certainly can speak for herself--is that when it comes to major spending bills, [[Page S 9739]] I have always said we should have recorded votes. That is critically important. We should not have voice votes on large spending bills that are this crucial. By the same token, when you have a bill with $16 billion in spending cuts, and there are changes made from what we had passed in the Senate, changes made at the last second--then clearly it is important to talk about those changes, to talk about the priorities reflected in these cuts, what kind of programs are going to be cut, how they are going to affect people in the country and what the alternatives are. So we talked some about our amendments. I focused on the Low-Income Energy Assistance Program. I will not take a long time on that right now. I spoke about that at some length on Friday. I talked about a very important Medicare Counseling program for senior citizens to make sure they do not get ripped off. And all too often that happens by insurance companies on supplementary coverage to Medicare. I talked about an important job training program for homeless vets, and other job training funds for dislocated workers. And Senator Moseley-Braun talked about school infrastructure and all the problems that go with the lack of investment in schools and lack of investment in children. As it turns out late Thursday night some of the funding we had restored in the Senate was then cut again. This was a deal that we did not think was such a good deal. What we said was that we at least ought to have the right to propose amendments, have debate and have those voted up or down. Madam President, at the end of this debate on Friday the majority leader pulled the bill from the floor, and said that it would not come back up except under a unanimous-consent agreement but certainly with no amendments. We are talking about a $16 billion spending bill, and he was insisting on no amendments. I sure think there is enough time for a few amendments. We made it very clear yesterday that we would agree to the four amendments. I have three amendments. Senator Moseley-Braun had one amendment. I think we were going to limit the debate to 1 hour on each amendment, equally divided, and we would stack votes for the next day. And I think we would have 40 minutes for summary of each amendment before votes, 10 minutes for each one. I was surprised that proposal has been turned down, because I thought it was eminently reasonable. I must say to you, Madam President, that it seems to me that there must be something more at stake here. I do not understand what the majority leader is worried about. I mean I suspect that he would have the votes to defeat these amendments, though I do not think these amendments should be defeated. Certainly, this is all about the whole question of the way the legislative process works. Madam President, I quote from a piece today in the New York Times about what is going on in the House: Draconian cuts; Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Resources yesterday did their work . . . eliminating jobs programs, programs in the Department of Energy like the Low- Income Energy Assistance, Head Start, Safe and Drug-Free Schools, assistance for the homeless, enforcement of environmental laws, job training programs for summer youth. Madam President, in our amendments these are the very priorities we want to call into question. I believe that this rescissions bill was just a glimpse of what is to come. These are truly distorted priorities. And what is especially troubling is that there are alternatives to cutting these high-priority programs. For example, we do not see rescissions in any of the wasteful spending within the Pentagon. We wanted to transfer a little money out of the travel and administrative budget of the Pentagon; over 60 percent of all the Federal Government's travel and administrative funds is in this one agency; billions and billions of dollars, to make sure people do not go cold in the winter; to make sure there is some support for dislocated workers. We wanted to at least attempt to restore funding for that, offsetting the cuts with cuts elsewhere. The dislocated worker funding is also key to many Americans. For example, we see bases being closed throughout the country. We see people losing their jobs. And we are not going to provide people the opportunity to have retraining and find other work? We are unwilling to provide a little bit of a support for elderly people by way of consumer protection when they purchase health care policies? We are not interested in any support for homeless vets when it comes to some job training or cutting that? But when it comes to subsidies for oil companies, coal companies, tobacco companies, that is not on the table. When it comes to looking at some of the waste within the Pentagon and transferring some of that funding to some of these programs, that is not on the table. Madam President, let me be very clear about it. Our proposal was eminently reasonable. We wanted to have some debate on key parts of this bill, which makes $16 billion worth of cuts in Federal spending. We agreed to some time for each amendment. It was limited time. We wanted to talk about the priorities of these cuts, and propose some alternatives. My understanding is that the majority leader has now dismissed even that. Madam President, I do not think four amendments, a total of about 4 hours, is too much time to spend in the legislative process on a $16 billion rescissions bill. I do not think democracy works well when we shut off this debate and discussion. I do not think people in the country really know what we are doing when we shut off this debate and discussion. Frankly, I think that is the issue. I am determined, given the reasonableness of our proposal, that we will have an opportunity to have these amendments considered, and we will have debate, within limits, and people will vote up or down, and people in the country will know that we are cutting funds for job training for dislocated workers, low-income energy assistance, counseling programs for older people about consumer protection to make sure they do not get ripped off when they purchase health care coverage, job training for homeless vets, and basic repair of schools for kids. That is what we are doing. And now look at what the House Appropriations Committee is doing. This rescissions bill is just a glimpse of the distorted priorities that are now being put into effect in this Congress. Americans do not want to see their fellow citizens who have been laid off because of retrenchment or because of base closures without an opportunity to have job retraining. They do not want to see low-income people going cold in cold-weather States. They do not want to see senior citizens without consumer protections. They do not want to see homeless vets without some support. They do not want to see kids without some opportunities, learning in decent schools.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the distinguished Senator from Utah. [[Page S 9734]] Amendment No. 1498 to Amendment No. 1487 (Purpose: To strengthen the agency prioritization and comparative risk analysis section of S. 343)

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I say to my colleagues, I would be more than pleased to defer to the Senator from Utah. I was hoping I would be able to speak. I have an engagement at 10. Does the Senator think I would have an opportunity to do that after he lays down the amendment?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent, deferring to the minority leader, that I have 10 minutes to speak in morning business after he lays down the amendment.

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I know the minority leader wants to lay down an amendment. Might I ask the minority leader if I can have some time right after that, in morning business?

Mr. WELLSTONE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent I be able to speak for 10 minutes as in morning business.

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

Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair.

Mr. WELLSTONE

Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am very pleased to be able today to speak on behalf of the bill that the distinguished Senator from Wisconsin has introduced and that I am co-sponsoring; a bill that I believe takes a crucial step toward returning some standard of fairness to our Nation's Tax Code. Mr. President, I believe I can speak for a large majority of middle- income families in this country when I say that there are major problems with our tax system. When the American people send their checks to Washington every April 15, they want to know that their money is being used wisely and that everyone in the country is carrying his or her share of the load. They want to know that just because they don't have their own personal lobbyist up on the Hill and that there is a standard of basic economic fairness that is applied in our tax system--that the superwealthy can and should pay more than those who are struggling. But the American people are angry--they are angry at Washington because they feel in their hearts that there is no standard of fairness being applied in our tax system anymore. And do you know what Mr. President? They are right. Over the years our national Tax Code has become riddled with corporate tax breaks, loopholes, and outright giveaways, costing the Federal Government over $400 billion each year; Mr. President--talk about the gift that keeps on giving. These are tax dollars that we forego--money that has to be made up somewhere, and all too often ends up costing American families of modest means even more. These tax loopholes and corporate giveaways are like trying to fill up a bucket with water, but the bucket has hundreds of holes that let the water dribble out from every corner. You can turn on the spigot and put more and more and more water into the bucket, but until the holes are plugged you'll never keep the water where it belongs. That's what this bill does; it begins to plug some of the tax holes. This bill removes a special tax break that only a very few businesses have in this country--companies that mine lead, mercury, uranium, and asbestos. It's called the special percentage depletion allowance, and it allows mining companies to deduct 22 percent of their profits from their income each and every year for each and every mine they operate. Twenty-two percent, Mr. President. Now I know of lots of small business operators in Minnesota who would love to have that kind of special allowance for their business--but they don't have it. Those who mine these minerals have it. A twenty-two percent tax break--and for what? So miners can dig hazardous heavy metals like lead and mercury out of the ground? Do we give tax breaks to companies that take these dangerous metals out of our environment and recycle them? Why are we giving a tax break to companies that mine asbestos to encourage them to dig more out of the ground when in just a few years the use of asbestos will be banned altogether? Why give a 22-percent tax credit to a company that mines uranium and not to a company that produces ethanol, or solar panels, or geothermal power? Mr. President, this 22-percent tax deduction is not free--it costs the American public. The Joint Committee on Taxation said that eliminating this deduction for these minerals would save the Government $83 million over the next 5 years. If corporations do not pay their fair share of taxes, middle-class people have to pay more; the American public is in effect underwriting this tax dodge for these companies. That is not right, it is not fair, and it should be stopped. This bill takes a bold step, and I applaud its author, my good friend the distinguished Senator from Wisconsin for bringing it to the floor. And, I would say to the people of this country, and to my colleagues, that I see this bill as a beginning. I hope it will be the beginning of an all-out effort to reform what I and others have called [[Page S 9720]] corporate entitlements; an effort to cut back on what are spending programs by fiat, programs that, unlike regular spending programs, never come up for review in Congress or by the public at large. It is an effort to return some standard of fairness to our tax system, and rebalance the tax scales to ensure that corporations will pay more of their fair share--and the American public will no longer be forced to underwrite multinational corporations.