Ron Wyden

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, after the Senate's unfortunate debate about the tragic case of the late Terri Schiavo, I thought the Senate was unlikely to debate this matter any time soon. Unfortunately, it seems there may be another discussion of this matter. In spite of the fact that the American people made it very clear that the Government ought to stay out of these tragic end-of-life matters, new legislation, S. 3788, has been introduced which would, in effect, throw Oregon's Death with Dignity Act into the trash can. As a result of the introduction of this legislation and my concern that the last thing we need is more Government stepping into these very difficult end-of-life decisions, I am announcing this afternoon that I am placing a hold on S. 3788 which would overturn Oregon's unique Death with Dignity Act and would, in my view, do great damage to the cause of pain management all across our country. In the past, the Senate has looked at this only in the context of what some describe as assisted suicide. Obviously, there are differences of opinion on this issue. The people in my State have been debating this for well over a decade and twice have made it clear that they believe these decisions ought to be left to the individual and to families trying to cope with these difficult circumstances. They have sent a strong message that death is an intensely personal and private matter and that the Government ought to leave our citizens alone. The Government ought not attempt to override or preempt the individual and family values, religious beliefs, and wishes. What has been debated in Oregon is not all that different from what was faced in the Senate when there was a discussion about the case of the late Terri Schiavo. I objected on the floor at that time to consideration of the original Schiavo legislation, which was an extraordinary overreach of Federal power, and today I put a hold on S. 3788 which would overturn my State's law. These are very difficult issues, and many of us are torn with respect to how to handle them. I, for example, opposed physician aid in dying both as an Oregon voter and as a Senator. When my State originally considered the Death with Dignity Act, I worried a great deal about the adequacy of the ballot measure safeguards to protect particularly the poor and the vulnerable. Now we have 8 years of experience with this legislation and, thankfully, my fears with respect to how the vulnerable would fare under this legislation have not been realized, and the realities are that the safeguards in the law have worked quite well in preventing potential abuses. Had Oregon acted hastily or without thorough examination and debate, I might not be in a position to defend my State's law. But no one can accuse my State of acting precipitously in approving this matter. We have endured several ballot initiatives, court challenges, and, most recently, a challenge that was heard by the U.S. Supreme Court. Each time, the will of a majority of Oregonians prevailed. It is that will of my State's voters which S. 3788 would overturn. During the 8 years the law has been in effect in my home State of Oregon, the opponents of the law have combed through the statute looking for potential pitfalls. The law still stands because the notion of opponents that there would be abuses and a stampede to Oregon have not been borne out. In fact, and this obviously could not ever be proved, my sense is that there are probably fewer assisted suicides in my home State, the only State with a statute, than there are in other parts of the country. That is because the real effect of Oregon's Death with Dignity Act has been to generate a significant increase in the use of hospice and to generate a significant increase in the number of people who spend their last days at home with family dealing with these issues on their own. So we have not seen this tidal wave of assisted suicides in my home State, but what we have seen as a result of all of the focus on end-of-life care is a significant increase in folks spending their last days through the compassionate services of hospice programs and help with their families at home. The reality is there is no constitutional issue at stake in this discussion with respect to State rights. Historically, defining medical practice has been a matter left to the States. What is so ironic is that some who come to the floor of the Senate to talk about State rights are essentially saying they only believe in State rights if they think the State is right. This is a matter which Oregonians have decided for themselves. It has historically been an issue which has been left to the States. In my home State, there was a vigorous discussion around dinner tables and at the ballot box, and our State has spoken clearly with respect to where we stand on this difficult issue. I do not believe that a Senator from another State should seek to overturn another State's law based on his personal beliefs. We are just a couple of months from Election Day in which local, State, and Federal elections will be held. Many States will have numerous ballot measures covering every issue imaginable. Voters need to know they can debate even the most emotionally wrenching issues through the ballot process and have their election results respected. The proposed legislation I have put a hold on, S. 3788, sends voters the message that if Congress doesn't like the conclusion your State comes to through a ballot measure, your vote really doesn't matter. I intend to make sure that the votes of the people of my State, on a matter that has historically been left to them, will count. You can be opposed to physician aid in dying and be opposed to this legislation as well. The reason I conclude that, is because I believe this proposal will be a huge setback to the cause of pain management in every corner of the country, not just in my home State. Like efforts before it, S. 3788 seeks to undermine my State's law by amending the Controlled Substances Act in order to say that drugs which fall under the Controlled Substances Act cannot be used in physician aid in dying. The Controlled Substances Act, of course, is legislation Congress passed to go after drug kingpins and to make sure that those with access to drugs, including doctors and pharmacists and others, do not distribute them illegally. The penalties in the Controlled Substances Act are substantial. However, the bottom line is the Controlled Substances Act was not meant to throw the will of the people of my State or any other in the trash can with respect to a medical practice involving end-of-life care. Like past efforts, the legislation I have put a hold on purports to create a safe harbor to protect physicians and others. Sadly, such a safe harbor is meaningless because of the realities patients, families, doctors, pharmacies, and others face when they are trying compassionately to assist a dying patient in that patient's last days. Medicine and the use of controlled substances, particularly in the case of the dying, is an art, not an exact science. It is not as if you can prove scientifically and medically that a dose of a drug in so many milligrams can always relieve pain and half a milligram more is going to result in death. People are different. Each of these medical tragedies is different. The dying often can withstand doses of controlled substances that would kill a healthy person. There are many examples that make it clear that interpretations after the fact by law enforcement give physicians great concern with respect to how these drugs are used. Second-guessing will deter physicians, even physicians who are opposed to assisted suicide, from moving into treating pain aggressively. During the previous congressional effort to throw out my State's law, the New England Journal of Medicine editorialized against that attempt out of the very same concern I have reflected today about the impact on pain management. The New England Journal of Medicine said: Many doctors are concerned about the scrutiny they invite when they prescribe or administer controlled substances and they are hypersensitive to drug-seeking behavior in patients. Patients as well as doctors often have exaggerated fears of addiction and the side effects of narcotics. Congress would make this bad situation worse. That is what independent medical authorities said the last time there was an effort to pass legislation like the new bill, S. 3788, and it holds true as well today. I have appreciated Senator Smith's leadership, my colleague from Oregon on the other side of the aisle, who joins me with respect to the concern about pain management. He and I have introduced the Conquering Pain Act to help provide families, patients, and health professionals with assistance so that no patient would be left in excruciating pain waiting for a doctor's office to open up. The reality is, as we saw during the debate involving the late Terri Schiavo, Americans have dramatically differing views on this issue, and those views are passionately held. But there can be efforts, successful efforts, to bring both sides together on this issue. I mentioned the Conquering Pain Act Senator Smith and I have sponsored. I also believe there should be changes in the Medicare hospice benefit to extend opportunities for end-of-life care there. Right now, the Medicare law almost forces someone to give up hope for the prospect of recovery in order to get the hospice benefit, and I believe that is unfortunate. I am almost finished with my remarks. I see my good friend from the State of Kentucky here. I would ask unanimous consent at this time--and see what is convenient for my colleague from Kentucky--for 5 additional minutes to wrap up my remarks, and if that is convenient with the Senator from Kentucky, I would make that unanimous consent request.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak in morning business until 2:20 p.m.

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

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, the plight of countless rural communities in Oregon and across the country may take a turn for the worse due to the impending expiration of the county payments legislation. For this reason, I am putting a hold on the following two Bush nominees to express my continuing dissatisfaction with the administration's lack of attention to the needs of people in more than 700 rural counties in over 40 States: John Ray Correll, Director of the Office of Surface Mining, Interior Department and Mark Myers, Director of the U.S. Geological Services, Interior Department. In addition, I would also object to any unanimous consent allowing Mr. Correll, Mr. Myers, and Mr. Bernhardt to remain on the calendar. Instead, I request that these three nominations be returned to the White House during the congressional August recess. Rule 31 paragraph 6 of the Senate Rules provides that when the Senate will be in recess for more than 30 days, any nomination in committee or on the Senate Calendar must be returned to the White House unless the Senate, by unanimous consent, allows a nominee to remain on the calendar. To date, the administration has proposed only one solution to funding county payments, and it is one that many of us find unacceptable. The county payments law, which provides a stable revenue source for education, roads and other county services in rural areas, is due to expire at the end of this year. In early 2005, I cosponsored a bipartisan bill, S. 267, to reauthorize county payments for another 7 years. In February, the administration proposed reauthorizing the law for only 5 years while cutting funding by 60 percent and funding that reduced portion with a controversial Federal land sale scheme. Senator Baucus and I have proposed a sensible, alternative funding source for county payments. Our legislation fully funds county payments by ensuring that a portion of Federal taxes are withheld from payments by the Federal government to government contractors. The Federal Government currently does not withhold taxes when it pays government contractors. In May, the Republican-led Congress approved a major tax bill that uses our funding provision to instead provide tax cuts for the most fortunate Americans, leaving rural counties with fewer options and growing fiscal concerns. As I have said before, I will hold these nominees and every nominee coming after them, if necessary, until the administration steps to the plate and delivers some leadership in finding a way to fund county payments.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, the reason Senator Kyl and I feel so strongly about this, this is a program that is out of control. The fact is that even the sponsor of this program, our distinguished former colleague, Senator Johnston of Louisiana, said this program is not operating as Senator Johnston intended. A brief bit of history is relevant. This program began in the 1990s, when the price of oil was under $20 a barrel. The point of the program, as devised by Senator Johnston, nobody could really argue with. We needed to produce energy, and with the economic situation in that part of the country, folks were hurting. They devised this program. But no one can make a case for a program that began when oil was $19 a barrel, when the price of it is now over $70 a barrel. We have a situation where the companies are charging record prices. They are making record profits. We certainly do not need record subsidies, particularly at a time when we have a program that even the sponsor of the original effort says is not working. This is the biggest subsidy in the energy area. This is one of the biggest boondoggles we have seen operated by the Federal Government. The fact of the matter is, there have been mistakes made under both Democratic and Republican administrations. As I outlined for the Senate several months ago, the initial mistakes were made by those in the Clinton administration which did not lock in the appropriate price thresholds. When former Secretary Norton came into office, she sweetened up the subsidies administratively, and Congress went still further with respect to this program in the Energy bill. The Government Accountability Office has estimated that at a minimum the Federal Government and the taxpayers are going to be out $20 billion. There is litigation underway that could mean the taxpayers would be out in the vicinity of $80 billion. It is time to draw a line in the sand and ensure that this effort to roll back these subsidies becomes law. If the oil industry can keep the Senate from voting on royalties, the legislation the House adopted after Senator Kyl and I came to the Senate and discussed it, almost certainly is going to disappear. The negotiations now underway with oil companies, in my view, are going to be dragged out until the last legislative vehicle has left town. Then the companies can walk away from the table and return to feeding at the expense of the taxpayers. Senator Kyl and I have worked very closely with Chairman Domenici. As always, he has been very fair and very straightforward with us. With this approach, we have a chance to get a permanent solution to this giveaway of taxpayer money. We will not interrupt the approach that Chairman Domenici has advocated. We hope it will work. It essentially involves negotiations on a voluntary basis. As I have indicated in the Senate before, while I hope that works, put me down as skeptical because it is fairly implausible that the oil companies will simply walk away from billions and billions of dollars at the negotiating table. If it does work, all the better. If it doesn't work, however, Senator Kyl and I believe it is finally time for the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, to lock in a permanent solution. Colleagues, the President, to his credit, has said, ``You don't need subsidies for the oil industry when the price of oil is over $55 a barrel.'' The President made that statement, and I appreciate him making it. Second, this is an opportunity for the Senate to go back through these various programs, save taxpayers some money, and to do it in a bipartisan way. Even though the President said we do not need incentives with the price of oil over $55 barrel, we did see the Secretary of the Interior and the Congress continue to sweeten this royalty relief program, even as the price of oil climbed far above the point mentioned by the President at which the oil industry no longer needs subsidies. We are now faced with the prospect that if we are going to get a permanent solution, now is the time for the Congress to step up. I, also, point out, given the fact that the Senate has voted in the last few days to start a new program, a program that will involve additional dollars going out to the oil industry, at a minimum, let us say we are going to fix the old program that is out of control before a new program is started. That is common sense. For the Senate to talk about creating a new program, allowing even more taxpayer money to be given away--and in that case, for 50 years or more--common sense says the Senate should step up before the end of this session and move to permanently fix the old program that is out of control. The Senate ought to have an opportunity to debate and vote on a permanent solution to ending these oil royalty giveaways. The House has voted to do it. They voted, in a bipartisan way, for the very thing that I spoke at length about in the Senate and that Senator Kyl and I have been trying to change for many months. I also point out, if we can get the savings by fixing the old program, you can talk about a responsible way for funding new efforts, such as the effort approved by the Senate this week. I am sure our citizens who now face the highest gas prices ever will be interested to know when the Senate is going to have a chance to vote on the question of, at this time of record prices and record profits, whether we should continue to give away record amounts of taxpayer subsidies that the President of the United States has indicated are not necessary. If the Senate ducks this issue, I think it will be very difficult to explain to the American people how Congress can be proposing to allow additional billions of dollars of royalty money to go out before it fixes the current out-of- control program. I have said for some time the Senate should not be forced into a false choice of either aiding the Gulf States or standing up for the public interest in the face of outrageous taxpayer rip-offs. We can and should do both. Given what the Senate did earlier this week on the new program, it is, in my view, essential to protect taxpayers to accept the bipartisan amendment that Senator Kyl and I offer this afternoon to reform the Oil Royalty Program. Mr. President, I urge colleagues to support the bipartisan Kyl-Wyden amendment. I would also note--I see Senator Stevens on the Senate floor--that we have a number of sponsors of this bipartisan proposal, including Senator DeWine, Senator Lieberman, Senator Cantwell, Senator Feinstein, and Senator Salazar.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, first of all, I thank the distinguished Senator from Arizona for working with me on this issue for many months now. Colleagues know that I stood in this spot for almost 5 hours a few months ago to try to put together a bipartisan effort to save taxpayers billions of dollars. I believe we have done that. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the official score that Senator Kyl and I have now received from the Congressional Budget Office, which the Congressional Budget Office has now officially informed us that over the next 10 years, the taxpayers will save $9 billion

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, several weeks ago I came to the Senate to announce I will do everything in my power to block this Senate from considering the major overhaul of the telecommunications legislation until that legislation includes specific provisions to ensure that there is no discrimination on the Internet. A discrimination-free Internet essentially is what the net neutrality debate is all about. Certainly colleagues have been hearing a great deal about this subject as those who oppose net neutrality have spent millions and millions of dollars trying to convince the American people and the Congress that somehow discrimination on the net is a good thing. They have made a big point of trying to say that net neutrality is a very complicated issue, it is one involving technical issues of communications law, and it ought to be something left to lawyers and lobbyists to sort out in Washington, DC. That is not good enough for me and I don't think it is good enough for the American people. In fact, more than 500 organizations with views all across the political spectrum have come together to support net neutrality and a discrimination-free Internet. This is the fourth time I have come to the Senate to outline examples of what will happen if discrimination is allowed on the Internet and also to respond to some of the most directly asked questions about what net neutrality is all about. Today I begin my discussion with a new development just reported by the Reuters News Service. Reuters News Service reported this week that the profits of the AT&T company were up by 35 percent, bolstered ``by strong growth in wireless and high speed Internet services.'' I am of the view this is excellent news. I want to see American companies be profitable. I believe in markets. I believe in wealth creation. When our companies do well, of course, they pay taxes. They pay taxes to the American Government and that can be used for health care, education, and other services our citizens have such a great interest in. It is free enterprise that makes markets work. When Reuters reports that AT&T has made a 35-percent profit primarily due to wireless and high-speed Internet services, the digital part of the economy, that is good news. However, there are other implications with respect to the news this week about AT&T profits. It seems to me what the news highlights this week is that AT&T can make money with an Internet that is discrimination free. They have been arguing, as part of the discussion involving telecommunications, that somehow it will not be possible for them to make the profits that are necessary for broadband and sophisticated communication services to get to all the people of this country. The news this week shows that AT&T and other companies can be profitable with an Internet that is discrimination free. They do not need to throw net neutrality into the trash can in order to do well. The events of this past week have proved that AT&T does not need to discriminate in order to make money. To continue with the discussion I have begun over the last few weeks, I also want to go to the question of ``won't consumers just get their broadband from companies that do not discriminate on the net if somehow we don't have net neutrality.'' This is an excellent question. The answer is simple. If there were a competitive market for high-speed Internet services, the market would guarantee net neutrality. Consumers would insist that the Internet remain free of discrimination and they could take their business elsewhere if they didn't happen to approve of discrimination. Unfortunately, there is not a competitive market today for high-speed Internet. Until there is, strong net neutrality protections are needed. What is the market for high-speed Internet? According to the Government Accountability Office, in 2005, about 30 million Americans had broadband service. However, most of these Americans have a choice of perhaps only two broadband providers, the local phone company and the local cable company. Some may have only one provider. Others may have no options at all. No choice, limited choice, certainly is not my view of a competitive market. A choice between two is only one step beyond a monopoly. Most experts say at least four providers are needed in a market for it to be truly competitive. Today's market is still a long way away from the kind of competitive model we need to best serve our citizens with the communications services they deserve. Many of my colleagues have stressed the possibilities of satellite, broadband over power line, or wireless as competitors to what is called DSL and cable. These offerings are not real competitors. Satellite high-speed Internet is too expensive for the consumer to be a real competitor with today's services. Both wireless and broadband over power line are new technologies, and we all hope that someday they are going to develop into competitive options to the phone and cable company offerings. They ought to be encouraged. However, they are still new, and until they become widespread and priced at a competitive level with cable, for example, the market for high-speed Internet will remain limited or will remain a duopoly. A second question I am often asked is: As a small business, what does all this Net neutrality stuff mean to me? Last week, I came to the Senate floor and explained what it means for consumers. Small businesses, of course, are just one type of consumer in the market. And no Net neutrality is going to mean the same thing for the millions of small businesses that it means for consumers: a double-barreled discrimination with less choice and a higher price. Small businesses also have a second concern: They use the Net not just as a consumer but also as a market for their business. They have Web sites. Small businesses across the country use the Net to market their products. Through Web sites such as NexTag and Yahoo Shopping, small retail shops are able to reach millions and millions of homes that they could not otherwise access. A bed and breakfast, say, in central Oregon, in Bend, OR, is able to market itself on the Net and compete with a Holiday Inn. For the small businesses, the prospect of a two-tiered discriminatory Internet, where they will have to pay priority access fees to network operators, is daunting. For a small business, the fees that the large Bells and cable companies would charge could have a chilling effect on their ability to do business online. While large businesses can afford to take on these additional costs with only a small hit to their overall profitability, many small businesses are not going to be able to pay these extra fees. This would mean they would either get stuck on the Internet slow lane or have to mark up their prices more than big businesses. Either way, without an Internet free of discrimination, these small businesses are going to be at a competitive disadvantage. In my previous discussions on the floor, in addition to trying to respond to some of the major questions people are asking about Net neutrality, I have tried to bring out several specific examples of the kind of discrimination that would be allowed under the bill that was passed by the Senate Commerce Committee recently. So today I want to outline two additional examples of what could happen to our small businesses if legislation allowing discrimination on the Net were allowed to move forward. Let's say, for the purpose of the first example, we have a family known as the Taylors. The Taylors own an inn on the Oregon coastline. Occupancy has been lower lately because a large new national chain hotel opened up down the road. George Taylor's son Mike comes up with an idea to save the inn by reaching out to new customers: They ought to start a Web site to market their inn and take reservations online. In a world with Net neutrality, the Taylor family, with that small inn, would pay to access the Net, create a Web page, and they would be off to the races, up and running, marketing their business. Under the Commerce Committee bill, in order to launch their Web page in the fast lane so they could get priority access to customers across the country and around the world, that small business would have to pay an additional fee to hundreds, if not thousands, of Internet access providers around the country. The priority access fees are a drop in the bucket to that big national chain of hotels that is hurting their business, but if the Taylor family cannot pay the extra fees, they are not going to be able to compete. A second example of how the absence of Net neutrality would hurt small business--this one involves a business owner who I am calling Jessica Myers. Ms. Myers owns a small legal placement firm with eight employees. In a world with Net neutrality, she saves money on her phone bills as a Vonage customer. She buys all her office supplies on line from another small business she found at Shopzilla, and saved thousands of dollars on new computer equipment from Buy.com. Her employees are able to navigate law firm Web pages, learning of open jobs and potential clients to market these openings to. Under the Commerce Committee bill, Jessica's business is going to see a huge increase in her costs. Vonage no longer works properly, causing her to pay extra for phone service from the local phone company. The office supply store is no longer on line because they could not afford to pay for priority access and cannot compete without it. Her computer equipment at Buy.com is now more expensive, maybe 10 percent more, because Buy.com is passing on the costs they pay the network operators for priority access. Her employees are much less effective because they now spend hours every day waiting for law firm Web sites to load that are stuck in the Internet's slow lane. Her costs go up. Her productivity and her profits go down. In each of these two new examples I have outlined of the consequences for our small businesses, the large businesses that own the Internet pipes are going to be extending their reach to the detriment of small business. According to the business plans of the big phone and cable companies, and what they have told Wall Street, what has been outlined in the Wall Street Journal newspaper, that is the direction they are heading. Without Net neutrality, neither of the small businesses in the examples I have cited is going to be able to use the Net in the way they do now, and they are going to be disadvantaged at a time when they are a big part of America's future in competing in the global marketplace. The big cable and phone companies have spent millions--more than $40 million since January of this year--to try to make the American people think that Net neutrality is, to quote one Verizon lobbyist, a ``lose- lose proposition.'' The absence of Net neutrality will be the lose-lose for consumers. Discrimination will be seen in Internet content, and we will see higher prices for consumers. That is why more than 500 groups of all political philosophies and persuasions have come together to draw a line in the sand and say: We are going to insist that the Internet remain discrimination free. At the end of the day, this issue of Net neutrality, despite what the opponents and the lobbyists want the Senate to think, isn't that complicated. Today, the way the Net works is you go with your browser where you want, when you want, and everybody is treated equally. Those who oppose Net neutrality want to change all that. They want to make it possible for phone companies and cable companies to play favorites. They will be in a position to charge some people more and some people less. They are people who want to change the way the Net works today, which is that everybody gets a fair shake. And that is, again, the point of my citing this afternoon AT&T's profits that come from wireless services. I repeat, I am glad to see AT&T do well. I believe in markets, and markets are what make our country's free enterprise system go. But AT&T is doing well with an Internet that is based on the principle of equality, Net neutrality, and no American facing discrimination on line. I see the distinguished Senator from Tennessee here, and he remembers our discussion about taxation and on-line services and on-line businesses. The Senate worked together on a bipartisan basis, and we have kept the Internet free of discrimination as it relates to taxation. I think it makes no sense at all for the Senate to say we are going to let the Internet prosper as it relates to taxation--and taxation is a big factor, obviously, in business opportunities and business sales--it makes no sense to keep the Internet free of discrimination as it relates to taxation and then to throw Net neutrality in the trash can and allow discrimination as it relates to so many other aspects of on-line business and services that are important to the American people. So this is the fourth time I have come to the floor to discuss this issue. I do not want to see consumers face the double barrel of discrimination and higher prices on line. It is my intent to keep my hold on that overhaul of the telecommunications legislation on until I see that bill has been changed, until I see it has been altered and revised to ensure the core principle of the Internet--that everybody gets a fair shake and that the Internet is free of discrimination. My hold stays until that bill is altered so we can preserve an Internet free of discrimination for all Americans in the years ahead. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that after Senator Salazar finishes his remarks, and Senators Thomas and Lautenberg finish, I may speak as in morning business. I will revise that. I ask unanimous consent that after Senator Salazar is done and Senator Thomas is done and Senator Lautenberg is done, that I may speak, unless another Republican comes to the floor, and that if another Republican comes to the floor, that I be allowed to speak after that in morning business.

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

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, before he leaves the floor, I want to commend the distinguished leader from Nevada. He has for a long time championed the needs of consumers. In the West, we understand the devastation gasoline prices have had on our consumers. And his case for a new energy policy, a red, white, and blue energy policy that makes us free of our dependence on foreign oil, is a case he has eloquently made, and made frequently. I want him to know how much I appreciate his leadership before he leaves the floor. I want to start the discussion about the legislation which is before us now by acknowledging the enormous pain and hurt so many citizens of our Gulf States have endured since Katrina struck their communities. Pictures of this tragedy are seared into our minds at this point. In the Senate, I sit next to the distinguished Senator from Louisiana, Senator Landrieu. She has brought passion, energy, and eloquence to the cause of securing help for those she represents so well as folks in the Gulf States try and get on their feet. My view is that the challenge for the Senate is to reconcile the need to help those folks hurting in the Gulf States with the urgent need for Congress to legislate fresh, bolder energy policies for our entire country. My understanding is the distinguished majority leader from Tennessee, Senator Frist, will not allow amendments to this legislation. If that is the case, my view is this legislation does not balance the need to help folks in the Gulf States with the urgent need to get that fresh red, white, and blue energy policy for our country's future. Does the Senate truly believe more shouldn't be done to promote renewable energy? Does the Senate truly believe more shouldn't be done to promote automobile efficiency? Does the Senate truly believe more shouldn't be done to protect consumers from exploitive practices? Does the Senate truly believe taxpayer dollars should be used to subsidize oil companies even though the President, to his credit, has said subsidies aren't needed when the price of oil is over $55 a barrel? If no amendments are allowed under this legislation, which is my understanding from the statement made by the distinguished majority leader, essentially what the Senate will be saying to the country is if we go off and drill in the gulf a bit, then the country can call it a day as far as getting a new energy policy. I don't think that is good enough. I support responsible drilling in the gulf. We obviously need more energy production. By any realistic calculus, we know oil will be part of our future and we are going to need to encourage production in a responsible way. In the Senate Committee on Finance, again, working on a bipartisan basis, the Senator from Wyoming, the distinguished Senator who sits on the Committee on Finance, Senator Thomas, has some excellent ideas in terms of encouraging production, particularly getting more oil from existing wells. We do need more oil production. But drilling alone is not the new energy policy this country needs. It is more business as usual. We have been down this road before. In the 1990s, for example, the Congress passed a royalty program that was supposed to stimulate energy production and be good for the Gulf States and for our country as a whole. What it has done is something very different than what was envisioned. In fact, the sponsor of that legislation, our respected colleague from the State of Louisiana, former Senator Johnston, has said the program, as it has developed, is nothing along the lines of what he envisioned. The Government Accountability Office has said with the royalty program created in the 1990s when oil was about $19 a barrel--it is over $70 a barrel now--that program that was created in the 1990s is going to cost taxpayers a minimum of $20 billion and possibly as much as $80 billion. That is the royalty program we have on the books now. As we start this discussion about setting up a new program, I want to make sure the Senate is up on how much money is being frittered away under the mismanaged program that is on the books today. One would think it is common sense to fix the old program before we start a new program. One would think it is common sense to take the savings generated by fixing the old program and applying those savings to paying for the new program before the Senate this afternoon. However, neither of those commonsense steps is being taken. A new program is being considered by the Senate today when Congress has not corrected the old program which even the oil companies acknowledge is not needed today, and even the sponsor, our former colleague, Senator Johnston, has indicated is not working. I have talked with Chairman Domenici about this. Chairman Domenici has indicated he wants to fix this old program, this old, mismanaged program that has wasted so much of the taxpayers' scarce resources. We all know Chairman Domenici is a straight shooter and forthright and I have appreciated his discussions with me. However, I don't think the oil companies are going to easily give up this multibillion dollar boondoggle, this sweetheart deal they have obtained. Time is not on the side of those who want to put a stop to the billions of dollars being needlessly dispensed under the 1990s program. The legislation before the Senate now is one of the last opportunities the Senate will have to permanently fix the broken royalty program that began in the 1990s. Senator Kyl and I have been working in a bipartisan way to change this. There has been action in both the other body, the House, and in the Senate, in the Senate Committee on Appropriations where the distinguished senior Senator from California, Senator Feinstein, has done an excellent job of trying to advance the cause of stopping these subsidies, but my guess is the legislation the Senate has been able to at least start in the appropriations process may not even hit the floor of this body, and even if it does, the oil companies are very well positioned to run out the clock on the effort in this session of Congress to stop the needless subsidies that were granted in the 1990s. For example, there is mediation now going on between the companies and the Government, but it is nonbinding, so the oil companies hold all the cards. The appropriations process, of course, only lasts for a year so the companies can run out the clock on that, as well. Senator Kyl and I spent a lot of time in the Senate making the case for why this was a needless expense, particularly at a time when we have so many other needs in our country. That day, despite the fact I stood in this spot for almost 5 hours, we could not even get a vote on a measure to stop these subsidies that the General Accounting Office has calculated is at least $20 billion and possibly $80 billion. Put me down as pretty skeptical that the oil companies are going to voluntarily give up these huge sums of money. As of now, in this session, one measure after another has failed in terms of potential steps that could protect the consumer. Let's review: The Federal Trade Commission, the agency that is supposed to protect the consumer and to deal with concentration and mergers in the oil industry, a big goose egg from the Federal Trade Commission. In fact, the chair, Deborah Majoras, has all but said that high prices are essentially good for the consumer because by her theory that will promote more energy production. That is a pretty astounding theory of consumer protection, but Senators can look it up. That is what she said before the Energy Committee. The agency that regulates commodities? Zip, with respect to dealing with speculative practices, practices that contribute very significantly to the cost of oil. In fact, when oil company executives came before our committee--the distinguished Senator from Alaska will recall--one oil company executive said speculative practices are a big factor in driving up the cost of oil for our consumers. We have not seen anything to reign in those speculative practices. How about stopping needless tax breaks? When the oil company executives came before the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, I went down the row and asked each one of the executives whether they needed all these tax breaks. They now have record profits, consumers have record prices, so I made the point, why in the world would you need record tax breaks? The executives, when they had to answer in broad daylight, said they did not need them. Ever since then, I have been trying to roll back some of those tax breaks. The President, to his credit, said tax breaks are not needed when the price of oil is over $55 a barrel, but we have taken only the most modest step. A tiny bit of the tax relief that the oil companies are getting has been rolled back under a proposal I made involving a drilling writeoff that the companies get. So, Federal Trade Commission, zip; anti-speculative efforts, zip; tax breaks that are needless expenditures that the oil companies say they don't need, virtually nothing. So put me down as pretty skeptical given the fact that in each of those areas the Government has ducked taking on the oil companies. Put me down as pretty skeptical that somehow these oil companies are going to come to the table and walk away and leave behind $20 to $60 billion worth of breaks in royalty relief from the 1990s. I don't think it is going to happen. I hope it does. Chairman Domenici is very sincere in his views, but given the track record in this Congress of the oil companies being able to escape any kind of effort at those various agencies I have outlined, I don't think the oil companies are going to voluntarily clean up a program in the 1990s that has been so mismanaged. My sense is it is going to be necessary to pass legislation in this Congress to force the companies to give up these needless subsidies. There is a compromise with respect to how it could be done in a bipartisan way. It is a compromise that I and the distinguished Senator from Arizona, Senator Kyl, have been talking about. We actually proposed it to the distinguished chairman of the committee, Senator Domenici. I suggested what we might do is allow the negotiations between the companies and the Government under the 1990s royalty program to proceed for a bit longer. Possibly that will work. I am skeptical, but possibly it will. But if those negotiations did not produce the savings for taxpayers and the cleansing of this old program that is so important, then we have to be tougher. After a period for negotiations, I would propose as part of a bipartisan compromise that the Senate then insist the companies get no new leases until the old program has been cleaned up. That would bring together some of the ideas advanced by the distinguished chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Senator Domenici, and some of the ideas Senator Kyl and I and others have offered on a bipartisan basis. We suggested that be done in this bill. We said: Here is an opportunity in this legislation to permanently fix the old program before you start a new one. We thought it was a chance to take two approaches Senators have been talking about and bringing them together and permanently fixing the program. I believe if the Senate does not do that, the clock is going to run down on the program, and I think, in all likelihood, the Senate, in the beginning of 2007, will be in much the same place it is today. I do not want to see that happen. I think it is time for a fresh approach with respect to how our country makes energy policy. I think we need to be much bolder and much more creative. I have advanced ideas in this area; a number of Senators have. But we have seen precious little of that kind of bold thinking. What we have seen is essentially business as usual. I hope colleagues will take a look at the analysis that has been done by the Senate Budget Committee of the impact of the legislation before us today. This is, of course, S. 3711. I asked the Democratic staff of the Senate Budget Committee to do an analysis of the impact of the bill before us today. The legislation before us now authorizes at least a 50-year commitment. The oil companies, in my view, under this legislation have been able to parlay the suffering of our citizens in the Gulf States into something that I believe could become an unaffordable gravy train. What the Budget Committee staff found is that between 2017 and 2055, the U.S. Treasury and Federal taxpayers would be out almost $20 billion beyond what is already going out the door under the broken royalty relief program from the 1990s that I have described once again on the floor of the Senate. But beyond that, all bets are off. Lost revenues after that could be as much as $12 billion to $15 billion each year. So I would ask the Senate: At a time when clearly folks in those Gulf States are hurting, and the Senate ought to step in and be of assistance to them, does it make sense to authorize a 50-year program that, particularly after the initial period, will involve additional sums, additional untold billions of dollars of revenues that could be lost? The challenge for the Senate now, it seems to me, is, first and foremost, to get some amendments to this legislation. I hope the majority leader, the distinguished Senator from Tennessee, Mr. Frist, will change his mind. I hope the distinguished majority leader will allow amendments on automobile efficiency, on renewable energy, on protecting consumers from exploitive practices, and protecting taxpayers from needless subsidies. We would not be talking about hundreds of amendments. I think amendments in those four areas would provide an opportunity to strike a balance in this legislation to make sure that urgently needed help is directed to these Gulf States, that efforts are being made to get a new energy policy for our country. It does not make any sense, to me, for the Senate to say: Let's go drill a bit in the Gulf--and pretty much call it a day. But that is what the legislation in its present form essentially says. It says: At a time when the country desperately needs a new energy policy, when people are clamoring for it at townhall meetings and in chambers of commerce and in virtually every other place a Senator goes, what we are going to say is nothing doing. We are going to say a bit of drilling in the Gulf will cover it, and a bit of drilling in the Gulf can take place, even though billions of dollars are being wasted under a program--a previous program--that was directed to the Gulf States from the 1990s. I think the Senate can do better. I think the Senate can do better on a bipartisan basis. Senator Kyl and I are ready to propose what we believe could be a bipartisan initiative that would involve recommendations made by the chairman of the Energy Committee, Senator Domenici, ourselves, Senator Feinstein, and others. We think we could save a big chunk of money--billions and billions of dollars--that could be applied to the new program that is being considered by the Senate today. That is the kind of bipartisan work the Senate should focus on. I look forward to the discussion and particularly hope the distinguished majority leader, Senator Frist, will change his mind. This subject is too important to bar Senators from offering meaningful amendments and allowing the Senate to get a more balanced energy policy and securing the needs of our citizens. Madam President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. I yield the floor.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I have already announced that I will do everything I can to block Senate consideration of the major overhaul of the telecommunications laws until it contains language to ensure there cannot be discrimination on the Internet. Last week, I outlined a number of examples of the kind of discrimination that could take place unless there is language known as Net neutrality in the legislation. I am going to give additional examples this morning of what will happen if discrimination is allowed on the Net. I also intend to start laying out answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about Net neutrality. The major phone and cable companies that are now spending enormous sums trying to prevent Net neutrality so outspend the folks who share my views that I think it is important for the Senate to get a sense of what is going on. That is why it is my intent to come to the floor of the Senate again and again and again to outline what is at stake with respect to ensuring that the Internet is kept free of discrimination. Let me begin by first addressing this question of what exactly is Net neutrality. If you listen to some of the so-called experts about communications, they would suggest this is so complicated, so arcane, so difficult for anybody to understand, you ought to let the lawyers and the lobbyists sort this out. Of course, that is traditionally what has gone on in this field. You have lawyers and lobbyists being paid very handsomely to battle it out with each other, usually in Washington, DC, or in courtrooms across the country. Somehow, the typical person, the typical citizen, who has become empowered using the Internet, does not get to participate in these discussions. I will tell you, Mr. President, I do not think the American people are going to buy that any longer. The Internet, which, of course, has opened up so many doors for our citizens in terms of health care and business opportunities, education, and culture, has also ensured they get a lot of information about these communications debates that used to be reserved for lawyers and lobbyists. The people of this country--and the hundreds and hundreds of organizations that want to keep the Internet discrimination free--are no longer going to accept a notion that a handful of insiders in Washington, DC, can have these debates about the future of the communications systems they depend on, and that the people of this country will have to take what these so-called experts decide. So this is going to be a debate, in my view, that is going to be driven by the grassroots of this country, by thousands of people getting involved and coming to their legislators, and others, to talk about the future of telecommunications--why so much communication power is concentrated in so few hands. I am going to try to advance this debate here on the floor of the Senate every so often so we can make sure somebody is getting the message out about what is at stake, other than those big cable and phone companies that seem to be spending almost $150 for every $1 spent by folks who share my views. The first question I want to talk about this morning is what exactly is Net neutrality? It is not that complicated. It is a pretty straightforward proposition. What Net neutrality means is you cannot discriminate on the Internet. The people who are against Net neutrality--I call them ``the discriminators'' because that is their agenda--want to discriminate. They want to be in a position to play favorites. They want to say: We will give certain people a good deal, both in terms of service and all the considerations that go into folks making their choices on line. I do not think we should have that kind of discrimination. I think it ought to be, as it is today, possible for our citizens to go with their browser where they want to go, when they want to go, and everybody would be treated equally. That is the way it works today. I do not think there ought to be any changes. Today, somebody pays a fee to get on the Net. They go where they want, when they want. And if you want to buy something online from Harry & David--their wonderful fruit, which we know a lot about in the State of Oregon--you pay your Internet provider for the connection, Harry & David pays its Internet provider for its connection, and that is that. Once you pay your Internet access fee, no one stops you from shopping at Harry & David because you did not pay an extra fee. Without a clear policy preserving Net neutrality and ensuring there is no discrimination on the Net, the Net would be forever changed. And, in my view, it would be forever changed if discrimination is allowed on the Internet. So that is why I have indicated I am going to use every procedural tool I have as a Senator to block Senate consideration of the telecommunications overhaul until it ensures there is Net neutrality and no discrimination online. Now, a second question I am often asked is people want to know, as a consumer: How will Net neutrality affect me? For starters, keeping things the way they are, keeping Net neutrality, is not going to change anything about the Net for millions and millions of our consumers who rely on it. Net neutrality has been the way we have enjoyed the Net since day one. And it is only in the last year that there has been this new front opened up where folks say: We have to be allowed to discriminate. It has only been in the last year where the basic nondiscriminatory nature of the Internet has been under attack. So it is not going to change the world for the consumer if Net neutrality is preserved. But I will tell you, it is surely a troubling question for consumers if we do not have Net neutrality. Consumers, in my view, without Net neutrality, would immediately feel the effects. They would have fewer choices, and they would pay higher prices. And I am going to try, again, to use some examples this morning of why that is the case. Currently, consumers pay a fee for connecting to the Internet. The fee is for a certain amount of bandwidth. The more bandwidth you buy, the faster the speed with which you connect to the Internet. So with a dial-up connection at 56 kilobits per second of bandwidth, it is going to take a lot longer to get your favorite Web sites than with a high- speed connection at 6 megabits per second. That is why some folks call broadband high speed. A broader bandwidth can accommodate more bits, and they can move faster down the pipes. A growing number of our citizens want the higher speed or broadband connection to the Net. If the large phone and cable lobbies are able to stop Net neutrality, consumers would no longer have access to all the content available on the bandwidth they buy. Rather, those that provide content on the Net-- and that is everybody with a Web site, from small nonprofits and universities to large corporations--would be forced to pay the big phone and cable companies an extra fee for access to the consumer's bandwidth. If they did not pay or could not afford to pay these extra fees, their content would be waylaid, it would be off on the Internet slow lane. This would mean consumers would have fewer Web site choices. Some small businesses that depend on the Net for sales, in my view, will end up closing down. Many of the bloggers--and we know that now blogging is awfully popular; these are folks who write just to be heard--they are going to find it hard to continue without Net neutrality if they have to pay those extra fees. Nonprofits--I am not sure we will see all their Web sites. At the end of the day, without Net neutrality, consumers will be left with fewer choices. That is not all that consumers will be left with. Because the loss of Net neutrality is double-barreled discrimination, consumers would also be left with higher prices. Those companies that choose to pay fees to the larger phone and cable companies are going to pass those fees on to the consumer. The price of goods sold online is going to rise because companies will pass on the fees to consumers. And because no one can determine now how high the fees are going to go, no one can predict how high the price of goods sold online would go either. So that is a little bit of what all this means to the typical consumer. It does mean, in my view, higher prices and fewer choices for the reasons I outlined. But I thought I would continue what I started last week; that is, bringing some specific examples I think we will see on the Internet if there is an absence of Net neutrality. The first example I am going to cite this morning is somebody I am going to call Josh Nelson. Josh Nelson wants to get Internet broadband for himself and his family at home. ``Local Cable'' is the only choice for Internet access, and we will say it charges $49.99 for a 6 megabit per second connection. In a world with Net neutrality, when Josh buys his connection from ``Local Cable,'' he gets to visit any Web site he wants, when he wants, and how he wants. If he wants, for example, to download movies from the popular Vongo for $10 a month, he can do that. If he wants to search the Web using Yahoo or book a family vacation online at Travelocity, Josh can do that, too. Under the bill that has come from the Senate Commerce Committee--the bill that does not protect Net neutrality--Josh will not be able to do any of those kinds of things I have described unless content providers pay a new priority access fee on top of the $49.99 Internet access charge Josh already pays, and the fees the content providers pay to get on the Net. Unless Travelocity pays the additional priority fee, booking that vacation at Travelocity could take 20 minutes to process because they are not paying the extra fee to ``Local Cable'' for priority access. Downloading movies at Vongo could cost more as well, could cost $20 rather than $10 because Vongo is passing on the costs of paying ``Local Cable'' the priority access fee. Josh at this point--and this is as sure as night follows day in terms of what is ahead--is going to want to switch to another broadband provider, given all these extra costs he would have to eat. But he is stuck. There are no other choices for many people across the land. The second example I want to outline involves somebody I am calling Mary Smith. Mary goes on line now through a broadband connection with a local Bell company to purchase a television from her local electronics store, Barnes Electronics. In a world with net neutrality, when Mary goes to Barnes Electronics web site, the site works properly and she can purchase the new television with ease. Under the legislation that came from the Senate Commerce Committee, it is going to be a different world for Mary. When she types in the web address for Barnes Electronics, the site may not immediately load. Instead a page could load asking her if she would prefer to shop at Big Box Electronics web site which paid the local Bell to interrupt Mary's browsing. After clicking no, she is directed to Barnes Electronics web site. However, the site takes a long time to load and she becomes so frustrated, she says: Well, I will just go shopping at Big Box and eat all those higher prices. In each of these examples, those who own the pipes extend their reach to the detriment of the American people. According to the business plans--and these have not exactly been hidden--of the big phone and cable companies and what they tell Wall Street, the kind of world I describe is what we are heading for. Without net neutrality, neither of the people in the examples I just outlined would enjoy the Internet the way they enjoy it today. One last question for purposes of this morning. I am often asked now: If we have net neutrality, does that mean we are not going to have sophisticated communications networks built in my neighborhood? Of course, we all want these sophisticated communications systems. Folks want them in Georgia, in Oregon, across the land. We all understand the value of constantly trying to upgrade our communications systems. Nobody wants policies that create disincentives to building new and improved communications networks. For years cable companies have been digging up the streets in neighborhoods across the land to build more sophisticated networks, even though net neutrality protections were in place. For all these years, when we have said we were not going to allow discrimination on the Internet, we have had the cable companies out there digging up the streets putting in these systems. So it is not as if we don't have some evidence of what you can do when the Internet is free of discrimination. We have seen these sophisticated networks built by cable companies right now. They are doing it when there is an absence of discrimination on the net. The reason I cited this is, it proves that if consumers demand it, the communications companies are going to build it because they can make a profit. The Bells, for example, would rather build a network with discrimination in it because they can make billions of dollars of extra profit. That is why they are threatening not to build networks and to try to hold hostage consumers and businesses across America. I don't think that is right. There is concrete evidence that this notion that we will not have sophisticated communications networks unless we allow discrimination on the net makes no sense at all. I have tried to make a focus of my career in public service to keeping the Internet free from discrimination. It has paid real dividends already, particularly in regard to taxation. I was a Senate sponsor of the legislation that prohibited discrimination in taxes on line. When we started, it was a very simple proposition. We would see, for example, that if you bought a newspaper on line, you paid taxes. But if you bought the snail mail version of that newspaper, you didn't pay any taxes. So Congress came together on a bipartisan basis and said: We are not going to allow discrimination and taxation with respect to the Internet. We have done it. It has made sense. For all those who claimed there were going to be dire consequences, that the States and localities wouldn't have any money, that it was going to kill the traditional retailer, the main street retailer, we haven't seen any of that. The Internet Nondiscrimination Act as it relates to taxation has made a huge difference. I worked with Senator Allen on the other side of the aisle on that. Our mutual friend, former Congressman Chris Cox, who now heads the Securities and Exchange Commission, he and I began this effort when he was serving in the other body. We have seen already, with respect to ensuring that the net is free from multiple and discriminatory taxes, why it makes sense to keep the Internet a discrimination free zone. For the life of me, I can't figure out why we want to bring discrimination back to the telecommunications world, which is what this telecommunications overhaul will do, unless net neutrality is protected. The major cable and phone companies have spent more than $40 million since January of this year to make the American people think that net neutrality is what they call a lose-lose proposition. I am here to say that the absence of net neutrality will be the lose-lose proposition. The American people will see discrimination in Internet content, higher prices for consumers, and that is why hundreds of organizations that span the political spectrum, who disagree with each other on virtually everything, have come together to say: We are going to pull out all the stops to try to protect the Internet from discrimination. I do not want to see the American consumer face the double barrel discrimination on the net of reduced choices in content, diminished services, and the additional prospect of higher prices. As a result, it is my intent to keep my hold on this major telecommunications rewrite until it ensures true net neutrality and an Internet free of discrimination.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, that is exactly the kind of scenario I envisioned, and I appreciate that from the Senator from Georgia, and renew my unanimous consent request.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I modify my request and ask unanimous consent that after Senator Obama speaks, and after a Republican has spoken after Senator Obama, that I could be recognized for up to 20 minutes at that time.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed for up to 20 minutes after the distinguished Senator from Illinois.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, often when the Senate passes something unanimously, it means that the matter is not so important. That is not the case today. The Voting Rights Act is about as important as it gets. Senators of both political parties deserve great credit for bringing this vitally needed legislation to the floor of the Senate today. I have come to salute those inside and outside the Senate for their work to bring this extraordinarily important issue before the country and before the Senate and to make an appeal to Senators and those outside the Chamber to work for more. In the past three successive elections--2000, 2002, and 2004--there were scores of accusations of voter intimidation, rigged voting machines, conflicts of interest among elected officials, and other serious electoral abuses. Many newspaper articles, State and Federal governmental investigations, private studies and scores of lawsuits have described in considerable detail the toll that election abuses now take on our democracy. As much as it is an accomplishment that the Senate will be voting to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act today, that law cannot cure many of the problems that we have seen in the last three election cycles. But there is a proven system that can reduce many of these abuses, and I hope in the days ahead the U.S. Congress will take steps to promote it. It is known as vote by mail. My State of Oregon adopted this election system back in 1998, with nearly 70 percent support of our State's voters. It has been a resounding success any way one looks at it, and it has not been seen in any way as a kind of partisan tool that advantages one particular party or one particular philosophy. What I want to do this afternoon is describe briefly how Oregon's vote by mail system works and then talk about why the Senate ought to be taking steps to promote it nationally as a way to deal with some of these problems that have swept across our land over the last three election cycles. In Oregon the system works in this way. At least 2 weeks before election day, election officials mail ballots to all registered voters. The voters mark their ballots, seal and sign those ballots, and return them by mail or by placing them in a secure drop box. Election officials count the votes using optical scanning machines that confirm the signature on the return envelope matches the signature of the voter on file. Each county also provides optional onsite voting booths for individuals who need special accommodations or prefer to vote onsite. The bottom line is that vote by mail can address many of the problems that plague this country's elections. For example, with vote by mail, there is no waiting in line in the polls for hours. All through our country over the last election we heard complaints about people having to wait in line, often for hours and hours on end. It doesn't happen with vote by mail. Each voter receives a ballot in the mail. They can complete it at home, at work, or wherever is convenient for them. And you don't have the problem of people waiting in line for hours and hours to exercise their franchise. With vote by mail, no one would get the run-around about which polling place they are supposed to vote at. The ballots are mailed to the citizen's home. If, for some reason, a voter's ballot does not arrive 2 weeks before the election as it is supposed to, the voter has enough time to correct the problem, get their ballot, and then cast it. Americans who face the toughest time getting to the polls, such as citizens with disabilities and the elderly, report that they vote more often using vote by mail. Women, younger voters, stay-at-home moms also report that they vote more often using vote by mail. Once again, it is an opportunity on a bipartisan basis to deal with a very serious problem that we have seen over the last few election cycles. Citizens wouldn't get the run-around at the polling place when they show up on election day to vote and are told: ``You really shouldn't be here; you ought to be there.'' ``We can't really tell you where you ought to be.'' ``We have all these people in line, and we will try to help you later.'' All of that is eliminated through vote by mail because folks get their ballot at their home. Third, with vote by mail there is less risk of voter intimidation. A 2003 study of voters in my home State showed that the groups that would be most vulnerable to coercion now favor vote by mail. Over the last few elections, we saw again and again our citizens saying that they feared coercion. They were concerned about intimidation in the exercise of their franchise. We have documentary proof in our home State, a specific study that I have cited, that citizens who are most vulnerable to intimidation and coercion feel more comfortable voting by mail. Next, with vote by mail, malfunctioning voting equipment is a thing of the past. Everyone heard the stories in 2004 of citizens who said they voted for one candidate only to see the electronic voting machine indicate that the voter had cast a ballot for somebody else. Irregularities such as this cannot occur in vote by mail. Each voter marks the ballot, reviews it, and submits it, the ballot is counted, and it becomes a paper record--a paper record that is used in the event of a recount. I happen to believe that we must have a paper trail for every ballot that is cast in our country. It is wrong that there is at present no such paper trail. Every time I have a community meeting, people bring up: why can this not be done? It is just common sense. My home State has led the way to ensure that through our vote-by-mail system there is a paper trail. With vote by mail, the risk of fraud is minimized. When an Oregon county receives a voter's marked ballot, the ballot is then sent to elections workers trained in signature verification who compare the signature on each ballot against the person's signature on their voter registration card. This can be done quickly and easily because each voter's registration card has been electronically scanned into the system. No ballot is processed or counted until the county is satisfied that the signature on the ballot matches the voter's signature on file. If someone tries to commit fraud, they can be convicted of a Class C felony, spend up to five years in prison, and pay $100,000 in fines. Vote by mail can help make the problems of recent elections a thing of the past. In doing so, it will make our elections fairer and help reinstill a confidence in our democracy, which frankly, has been lacking. There are a number of other reasons why I think our country ought to be doing everything possible to encourage citizens to adopt vote by mail. This approach increases election participation. For example, vote by mail helps make voter turnout in Oregon considerably higher than the average national voter turnout. Oregon experienced a record turnout of more than 70 percent in the 2004 Presidential election, compared to 58 percent nationally. Vote by mail, we find, gets more citizens involved in the issues because folks get their ballots weeks before the final day when their ballot is due, and they have the time to quiz candidates, examine issues that are important to them, and do it in a deliberate fashion that gives them more time. Next, vote by mail has produced huge savings at the local level for election costs. Vote by mail reduces those election costs by eliminating the need to transport equipment to polling stations and to hire and train poll workers. My home State has reduced its election- related costs by 30 percent since implementing vote by mail. So we have the results. We have the results to show the rest of the country why we ought to be encouraging across the land vote by mail. In a survey taken 5 years after we implemented this system, more than 8 out of 10 Oregon voters said they preferred voting by mail to traditional voting. I am confident that the rest of our country would embrace it the very same way. What this is all about, and why I have taken time to discuss our approach, is that I think it is very much in line with both the spirit and the text of the Voting Rights Act. America needs to make sure that no eligible voter, based on color, creed or any other reason, would be disenfranchised. What we are doing in the Senate today by reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act is the right thing. It is clearly a step in the right direction for these difficult times. But I do think much more can be done to improve the election process. I intend to press at every possible opportunity for a way to encourage an approach that has empowered people in my home State in a manner that has far exceeded the expectations of even the biggest boosters. It has been totally nonpartisan. In Oregon, we were amused in the beginning of our discussion about vote by mail. At the beginning of the discussion, it seemed that a fair number of Republicans were for vote by mail, but a number of Democrats were skeptical. Then, after I won the Senate special election in 1996-- and Senator Smith and I have laughed about this often over the years-- there was an about face, and it seemed then that Democrats liked vote by mail and Republicans were a little cautious. Our State's citizens said enough of all this nonsense and overwhelmingly voted, on a bipartisan basis, to say this is just plain good government, and this is the way we want to go. I think the Oregon story can be copied across the country, and I am going to do everything I can to encourage it. The Supreme Court declared in the Reynolds v. Sims case: [i]t has been repeatedly recognized that all qualified voters have a constitutionally protected right to vote . . . and to have their vote counted. Promoting vote by mail across our land will help make this constitutional right a reality. I encourage my colleagues to look and study the approach we have used in our State, an approach that will advance the spirit of the Voting Rights Act. Support the Voting Rights Act today and work with us to build on its incredible importance in the days ahead. I yield the floor.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for Emily Katz, a legislative fellow in my office, to have floor privileges while the Senate considers the Voting Rights Act.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, Senator Snowe and I today are introducing the Medicare Prescription Drug Lifeline Act. This legislation provides a solution for those seniors falling into the coverage gap, also known as the doughnut hole of the Medicare prescription drug benefit. The doughnut hole occurs when the spending for a senior's drug expenses reaches $2,250: at the point, the senior is on their own until their spending for prescription drugs reaches a total of $5,100, where the benefit picks up again. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimated that nearly 7 million seniors will fall into the coverage gap this year. Seniors who enter this ``no man's land'' of spending face the same problems seniors faced before the drug benefit even began: they skip doses, they don't take all their medicine to make it stretch, and they are forced to choose between their food and fuel costs and their prescription drug costs. This legislation would take three steps to deal with this problem: First, the Secretary of HHS would be required to let seniors know they are approaching the coverage gap. Second, it would allow seniors, when they are notified that they are reaching the coverage gap, to switch plans to avoid the gap. Finally, the legislation requires the Government Accountability Office to examine ways in which the benefit could be redesigned to eliminate the gap without increasing Federal spending. Together, these provisions will give seniors a lifeline to coverage. Senator Snowe and I both voted for the legislation that created the Medicare prescription drug benefit. When we did so, we pledged that we would continue to work to improve the benefit. Senator Snowe and I have teamed up together on many occasions to try to reduce the cost of the prescription drug program by giving the Secretary the same power other Government officials have to bargain for better prices. Our legislation has won a majority of votes in the Senate, and we intend to continue to press for that power. The latest effort is aimed at another shortcoming in the law: finding a way to help seniors avoid falling into the coverage gap. Senator Snowe and I believe that our legislation will help seniors a straightforward way to avoid the gap. Congress needs to address both these issues and we will continue our strong commitment to seniors by working to improve the drug benefit.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I have come to the floor today to join my colleague at this time to discuss the Catastrophic Health Coverage Promotion Act that Senator Smith and I are introducing today. Mr. President, first, I want to say how much I appreciate Senator Gordon Smith. At a time when our citizens all across the land and in our home State of Oregon believe there needs to be more bipartisanship, Senator Smith doesn't just talk about it, he is consistently willing to meet me more than halfway on critical issues, and he does that with other colleagues in the Senate. As we begin our time discussing this legislation, I want to let him know how much I appreciate the chance to cooperate with him once again. As he stated, we did put the issue of catastrophic health coverage at the top of our bipartisan agenda for the Senate session. What it comes down to, Mr. President, is that Senator Smith and I believe it is a moral blot on our Nation for a country as good and rich as ours to send millions of its citizens to bed at night fearing they will be wiped out if a serious medical illness hits them. That is the reality. It is the reality for families who have no coverage at all, and it is the reality for families who have some measure of coverage, say, through an employer, but it doesn't stretch far enough. Senator Smith and I want, in a bipartisan way, to tackle both of those kinds of concerns. That is why we have put forward the legislation we introduced today. I think now is an ideal time for bipartisanship on the catastrophic health coverage issue. If you look back over the last few years, Senator Kerry, in the 2004 Presidential campaign, had an excellent proposal with respect to catastrophic coverage, and I said so in the course of that campaign. But I also said at the time that I thought our distinguished majority leader, Senator Frist, also had a good catastrophic coverage proposal. You could debate the various merits of the Kerry proposal and the Frist proposal--which approach involved a little more government, which approach involved the private sector--but at the end of the day, for the purposes of government work, they were pretty darn similar. So when Senator Smith and I sat down after the 2004 election, we said let's finally get this done. Democrats and Republicans have been talking for years about how to make sure that all our citizens have a safety net under them so that they will not get wiped out from medical illness. We settled on this approach, which we thought would give us the opportunity to try some fresh, creative ideas for protecting our citizens. Let me give an example of what happens in, for example, South Carolina, Oregon, or anywhere else in this country. If you have a small business with six people working there, and one of them gets sick, that essentially blows up the whole health premium structure for all six of the employees. What we ought to look at is something called reinsurance. Under reinsurance, that employee who gets sick could get a bit of help for their high bills through a modest role for government, and if government steps in, in that kind of instance, you have an opportunity to hold down all of the costs for the entire six-person firm. So we should have been looking at reinsurance years ago, but because Senator Smith, who chairs the Senate Aging Committee, has been examining these questions and has worked with me, now we are going to have a chance to tackle it in a way that I think is going to give us the opportunity to get the job done. We are also very concerned about people who have no coverage at all. So what happens if you have no coverage at all is folks walk into a hospital in Oregon or in South Carolina, usually they show up in the emergency room, and the hospital has to absorb those costs. What we would do is give that person who now has no coverage at all the possibility of actually buying some private coverage in the marketplace with a bit of a subsidy in order to be able to have coverage that would pick up at least a portion of those bills that the hospital is now absorbing. At the end of the day, those are the two principal kinds of instances we are facing--folks who have some coverage through a private employer, but it doesn't stretch far enough, and folks who don't have any coverage at all. Under that approach, we would like to make it possible for them to get into the private insurance market, protect them from catastrophic illness. We think we can do it with a modest subsidy coming from government. My sense is that we are now looking at health care on two tracks in our country. The first track is a track that suggests we can take steps right now in areas like catastrophic coverage to protect our citizens. There are other ideas I have advanced during this Congress. For example, Senator Snowe and I have now gotten a majority of Senators to agree with our proposal to lift the restriction so Medicare can bargain and hold down the costs. That, like the question of catastrophic coverage, is a step you can take right now. Let's protect our citizens from the catastrophic illness and let's hold down the costs of medicine. Those are practical, bipartisan approaches that can be taken today. We ought to pursue them and get them done. I also think there is another track to health care. I noticed that Senator Hatch was on the Senate floor. He and I were the authors of the legislation creating the Citizens' Health Care Working Group that is going to look at opportunities to make sure that all Americans have decent, affordable coverage. We have only been on that issue for more than 60 years--going back to the 81st Congress, in 1945, and Harry Truman. I have said let's also work on that second track that involves getting all Americans under the tent for essential and affordable health care coverage. That obviously isn't going to get done in the next 15 minutes. But if the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, as Senator Smith and I have sought to do on the catastrophic issue, and as Senator Hatch and I have sought to do on a broader approach to look at health care that works for all Americans--if we team up and look at health care on those two tracks, I think we can make a great contribution for our country. There are no costs going up in the United States like medical bills. We spent $1.7 trillion last year on health care. There are 290 million Americans--I guess we are approaching 300 million. When you divide $1.7 trillion by 290 million Americans, it comes to something like $25,000 that could be sent to every family of four in America with the amount of money now being spent on health care. So while we are spending enough money, my sense is that we are not spending it in the right places. Once again, Senator Smith has given us an opportunity to think creatively about better ways to approach the use of the health care dollars. I was pleased when Senator Smith suggested in our legislation that we also make it possible to include a focus on health care prevention. We are not doing enough with health care prevention in this country. The Medicare Program shows that pretty well. Medicare Part A, for example, will pay huge checks for senior citizens' hospital bills, but Medicare Part B pays virtually nothing for prevention to keep people well. That makes no sense. We need a sharper focus on health care prevention, and one of the things that I think is attractive about Senator Smith's leadership on this issue is that he has said even in the context of looking at catastrophic health care, let's put a sharper focus on prevention. We are going to make it possible in this legislation to do that. I note we have other colleagues on the floor. I have secured time to focus on the Voting Rights Act legislation later in the afternoon, but I am very pleased to have the opportunity to talk for a few minutes about the Catastrophic Health Coverage Promotion Act Senator Smith and I are introducing today. We have focused on a number of issues in a bipartisan fashion over our years in the Senate, but this has the potential to be the biggest as it relates to the needs of our citizens at home. We want to make sure when folks go to bed at night, they don't have to fear they are going to be wiped out financially by a serious medical illness. This legislation moves us one step closer toward the goal. We hope many colleagues on both sides of the aisle will want to support the legislation.

Mr. WYDEN. Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, how much time remains under the Smith unanimous consent request for a half hour?

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, Senator Snowe and I today are introducing the Medicare Prescription Drug Lifeline Act. This legislation provides a solution for those seniors falling into the coverage gap, also known as the doughnut hole of the Medicare prescription drug benefit. The doughnut hole occurs when the spending for a senior's drug expenses reaches $2,250: at the point, the senior is on their own until their spending for prescription drugs reaches a total of $5,100, where the benefit picks up again. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimated that nearly 7 million seniors will fall into the coverage gap this year. Seniors who enter this ``no man's land'' of spending face the same problems seniors faced before the drug benefit even began: they skip doses, they don't take all their medicine to make it stretch, and they are forced to choose between their food and fuel costs and their prescription drug costs. This legislation would take three steps to deal with this problem: First, the Secretary of HHS would be required to let seniors know they are approaching the coverage gap. Second, it would allow seniors, when they are notified that they are reaching the coverage gap, to switch plans to avoid the gap. Finally, the legislation requires the Government Accountability Office to examine ways in which the benefit could be redesigned to eliminate the gap without increasing Federal spending. Together, these provisions will give seniors a lifeline to coverage. Senator Snowe and I both voted for the legislation that created the Medicare prescription drug benefit. When we did so, we pledged that we would continue to work to improve the benefit. Senator Snowe and I have teamed up together on many occasions to try to reduce the cost of the prescription drug program by giving the Secretary the same power other Government officials have to bargain for better prices. Our legislation has won a majority of votes in the Senate, and we intend to continue to press for that power. The latest effort is aimed at another shortcoming in the law: finding a way to help seniors avoid falling into the coverage gap. Senator Snowe and I believe that our legislation will help seniors a straightforward way to avoid the gap. Congress needs to address both these issues and we will continue our strong commitment to seniors by working to improve the drug benefit.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I have come to the floor today to join my colleague at this time to discuss the Catastrophic Health Coverage Promotion Act that Senator Smith and I are introducing today. Mr. President, first, I want to say how much I appreciate Senator Gordon Smith. At a time when our citizens all across the land and in our home State of Oregon believe there needs to be more bipartisanship, Senator Smith doesn't just talk about it, he is consistently willing to meet me more than halfway on critical issues, and he does that with other colleagues in the Senate. As we begin our time discussing this legislation, I want to let him know how much I appreciate the chance to cooperate with him once again. As he stated, we did put the issue of catastrophic health coverage at the top of our bipartisan agenda for the Senate session. What it comes down to, Mr. President, is that Senator Smith and I believe it is a moral blot on our Nation for a country as good and rich as ours to send millions of its citizens to bed at night fearing they will be wiped out if a serious medical illness hits them. That is the reality. It is the reality for families who have no coverage at all, and it is the reality for families who have some measure of coverage, say, through an employer, but it doesn't stretch far enough. Senator Smith and I want, in a bipartisan way, to tackle both of those kinds of concerns. That is why we have put forward the legislation we introduced today. I think now is an ideal time for bipartisanship on the catastrophic health coverage issue. If you look back over the last few years, Senator Kerry, in the 2004 Presidential campaign, had an excellent proposal with respect to catastrophic coverage, and I said so in the course of that campaign. But I also said at the time that I thought our distinguished majority leader, Senator Frist, also had a good catastrophic coverage proposal. You could debate the various merits of the Kerry proposal and the Frist proposal--which approach involved a little more government, which approach involved the private sector--but at the end of the day, for the purposes of government work, they were pretty darn similar. So when Senator Smith and I sat down after the 2004 election, we said let's finally get this done. Democrats and Republicans have been talking for years about how to make sure that all our citizens have a safety net under them so that they will not get wiped out from medical illness. We settled on this approach, which we thought would give us the opportunity to try some fresh, creative ideas for protecting our citizens. Let me give an example of what happens in, for example, South Carolina, Oregon, or anywhere else in this country. If you have a small business with six people working there, and one of them gets sick, that essentially blows up the whole health premium structure for all six of the employees. What we ought to look at is something called reinsurance. Under reinsurance, that employee who gets sick could get a bit of help for their high bills through a modest role for government, and if government steps in, in that kind of instance, you have an opportunity to hold down all of the costs for the entire six-person firm. So we should have been looking at reinsurance years ago, but because Senator Smith, who chairs the Senate Aging Committee, has been examining these questions and has worked with me, now we are going to have a chance to tackle it in a way that I think is going to give us the opportunity to get the job done. We are also very concerned about people who have no coverage at all. So what happens if you have no coverage at all is folks walk into a hospital in Oregon or in South Carolina, usually they show up in the emergency room, and the hospital has to absorb those costs. What we would do is give that person who now has no coverage at all the possibility of actually buying some private coverage in the marketplace with a bit of a subsidy in order to be able to have coverage that would pick up at least a portion of those bills that the hospital is now absorbing. At the end of the day, those are the two principal kinds of instances we are facing--folks who have some coverage through a private employer, but it doesn't stretch far enough, and folks who don't have any coverage at all. Under that approach, we would like to make it possible for them to get into the private insurance market, protect them from catastrophic illness. We think we can do it with a modest subsidy coming from government. My sense is that we are now looking at health care on two tracks in our country. The first track is a track that suggests we can take steps right now in areas like catastrophic coverage to protect our citizens. There are other ideas I have advanced during this Congress. For example, Senator Snowe and I have now gotten a majority of Senators to agree with our proposal to lift the restriction so Medicare can bargain and hold down the costs. That, like the question of catastrophic coverage, is a step you can take right now. Let's protect our citizens from the catastrophic illness and let's hold down the costs of medicine. Those are practical, bipartisan approaches that can be taken today. We ought to pursue them and get them done. I also think there is another track to health care. I noticed that Senator Hatch was on the Senate floor. He and I were the authors of the legislation creating the Citizens' Health Care Working Group that is going to look at opportunities to make sure that all Americans have decent, affordable coverage. We have only been on that issue for more than 60 years--going back to the 81st Congress, in 1945, and Harry Truman. I have said let's also work on that second track that involves getting all Americans under the tent for essential and affordable health care coverage. That obviously isn't going to get done in the next 15 minutes. But if the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, as Senator Smith and I have sought to do on the catastrophic issue, and as Senator Hatch and I have sought to do on a broader approach to look at health care that works for all Americans--if we team up and look at health care on those two tracks, I think we can make a great contribution for our country. There are no costs going up in the United States like medical bills. We spent $1.7 trillion last year on health care. There are 290 million Americans--I guess we are approaching 300 million. When you divide $1.7 trillion by 290 million Americans, it comes to something like $25,000 that could be sent to every family of four in America with the amount of money now being spent on health care. So while we are spending enough money, my sense is that we are not spending it in the right places. Once again, Senator Smith has given us an opportunity to think creatively about better ways to approach the use of the health care dollars. I was pleased when Senator Smith suggested in our legislation that we also make it possible to include a focus on health care prevention. We are not doing enough with health care prevention in this country. The Medicare Program shows that pretty well. Medicare Part A, for example, will pay huge checks for senior citizens' hospital bills, but Medicare Part B pays virtually nothing for prevention to keep people well. That makes no sense. We need a sharper focus on health care prevention, and one of the things that I think is attractive about Senator Smith's leadership on this issue is that he has said even in the context of looking at catastrophic health care, let's put a sharper focus on prevention. We are going to make it possible in this legislation to do that. I note we have other colleagues on the floor. I have secured time to focus on the Voting Rights Act legislation later in the afternoon, but I am very pleased to have the opportunity to talk for a few minutes about the Catastrophic Health Coverage Promotion Act Senator Smith and I are introducing today. We have focused on a number of issues in a bipartisan fashion over our years in the Senate, but this has the potential to be the biggest as it relates to the needs of our citizens at home. We want to make sure when folks go to bed at night, they don't have to fear they are going to be wiped out financially by a serious medical illness. This legislation moves us one step closer toward the goal. We hope many colleagues on both sides of the aisle will want to support the legislation.

Mr. WYDEN. Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, how much time remains under the Smith unanimous consent request for a half hour?