provided us with the witness of nature and the testimony of sacred scriptures to lead us toward certainty you protect us from dangers and empower us to run and not grow weary strengthen our lawmakers for today's work lead them through these new and troubled times to the road that fulfils your plans bless them with productivity and progress for your glory lord help them to learn how to better serve you by serving others build this chamber with your presence and our senators with supernatural power to design and do your will enable them to live out their lives in the spirit of against the morning business or other senators the objections were last friday there was a one p m filing deadline for first degree amendments to the bill and today we should have a good idea of which amends we offered require roll call vote senate to the senate vote the around five thirty and there could be more than one roll call vote will be x on this bill tomorrow morning for member should be prepared to cast the number of votes part of the senate recessing for the caucus luncheons on tuesday this president i've had my staff check with the managers of the builder staffs and there could be from anywhere from one to five votes tonight it's up to the managers of this bill and some senators will be advised that at sometimes one time i w during these last nine months of this added more structure to the iraq debate now senator from virginia i say that because today i received a call from the one director  office of management and budget mr nussle who said i'm going to send you the rest of the supplemental appropriation bill for the war in iraq i said thank you very much mr president one we're now being asked to appropriate another two hundred billion dollars for two thousand and eight for the war in iraq another two hundred billion dollars that's two hundred billion dollars on top of four hundred fifty billion dollars in the defense appropriation bill one six hundred fifty billion dollars one none of it paid for higher war in iraq has been paid for with borrowed money or borrowing money from china india saudi arabia mexico to finance this war japan when we sent a bipartisan bill and i mean bipartisan children's health bill to the president it was paid for it was bipartisan as presently have some of the most conservative members of the united states senate supporting the children's health initiative senator grassley from iowa senator hatch from utah with the leaders two of the leaders and moving this forward a bill to provide for health care for kids it was so important that this bill passed ten years ago on a bipartisan basis children's health why did it pass because we found that there were children who did not qualify for medicaid the poorest of the poor get medicaid and mispresent we found there were a number of children whose parents didn't make much money hundred percent of poverty two hundred percent of poverty and therefore we passed a bill for these children who had fallen through the cracks that they would be able to have some health insurance not to cover all children now but it covered a lot of the children that needed help and by the time ten years gone by six and a half million children were covered and so this bipartisan buy camera piece the legislation passed here would provide for another four point four million children total two million children would qualify for this program ninety two percent of the children or on this program on the president vetoed it ninety two percent of them were two hundred percent about poverty how much is that mr president it's kind of debatable how much it is but about thirty five thousand dollars parents with two children how would the pay for health insurance average cost of health insurance for a family for is fifteen hundred dollars a month eighteen thousand dollars a year for health insurance for their children when they only make thirty five thousand dollars a year half of their income would go for health insurance no money left for groceries also they have paid taxes no fuel costs place to live so that's this group of people that congress decided to help what did the president's people do came back and said it's a socialized medicine program i don't know what that was supposed to mean because the program is private insurance the states issue the amount of money they hand to help to health insurance companies and the kids who are covered are privately insured then the program the so far off base on this he also and his people said one of the congressman nevada agreed with the present he couldn't support this because it helped illegal aliens is present that is factually baseless meaning not one percent of that statement is correct in fact the legislation that was vetoed by the president at child who was an immigrant would have to have been legally in the united states for five years before they qualified that therefore the program would not even cover illegal immigrants and i said been here five years and it was totally paid for not like the iraq war it was to all paid for the program mr president is going that is but one to be eliminated because the president's hard heartedness is going to in a state nevada far more than one hundred thousand children would just be eliminated from the program i'm going to present a first elective job i had in the state of that it was for us county hospital and indigent hospital frankly and one of the problems that we had was children that were uninsured it's still that way it's still that way this is a program that would allow children that were sick or injured to go to a hospital that hospital the one that i was there now the university medical center and the children's bills would be paid for by an insurance company you have if not those children who have no insurance come to the facility and who pays for that you do i do everybody in this room pays what because their health insurance cost more money because of indigent care taxes raised to take care of them to get health care insurance premiums are raised to take care of all this it effects the song it's a very poor quality of care the president had the audacity to say not long ago everybody has insurance in effect they just go to an emergency room if they're sick the most in adequate care is administered it emergency rooms because it's not set up to be the family physician every dime of the money for the children's health mission was paid for it's no wonder mr president that the american people are frustrated we've been fighting for america's priorities while the president continues investing only has failed war strategy and wants us to come up with another two hundred billion dollars and just i off on it that's what he said today gave a press statement they said those people won't sign off on this bill immediately are not for the troops in iraq isn't this getting to be a little old going on pretty soon will be a protein the sixth year of this this war has cost the american people three quarters of a trillion dollars money borrowed from other countries this is so even as our as his own pentagon leadership are now on record saying that our ground forces are stretched dangerously thin because the current brac strategy general casey told congress very recently and this is a quote the army is out of balance and the current demand for our forces exceeds the stain of all supply we are consumed with meaning the demands of the current fight and are unable to provide ready forces as rapidly as necessary for other potential contingencies mr president this is the man that is in charge of the army's secretary the army takes care of the army commander of the army i don't know the title i've lost it momentarily but he's the guy this in charge i mean he certainly should know iraq war is leaving us less secure and prepared to find effective work here or respond to the unexpected and the unexpected can come at any time that's a world we live in a president bush  expect congress to rubber stamp this latest supplemental request we won't do that mr president in the coming weeks we'll hold it up to live a day and fight the changes strategy and redeployment of troops it's long overdue foreign intelligence surveillance act is so important it's been good for this country for many many decades but we need to update that and that's what this is all about we all agree that it's important to improve the temporary surveillance law the president signed in august enacting new legislation that provides strong intelligence tools to fight terrorism while protecting the privacy of law abiding citizens there is no contradiction between security and liberty we can fight terrorism without compromising our liberty and the values and bedded in our constitution last thursday center rockefeller and his intelligence committee on a bipartisan basis senator bonn took a step toward improving the flawed surveillance law that the president signed in august i really do appreciate the hard work of chairman rockefeller vice chairman bond and the members the committee in seeking to address the complex issues at stake in the coming days other senators will have a chance to examine in great detail the work of the intelligence i believe that the administration's chosen again to stone stonewall congress and adding information and documents needed for congress to properly consider this legislation remember the intelligence committee said we are not going to deal with immunity until we look at those documents they were able to look at the documents with no perks no and nothing preconceived they had the opportunity to look at those with no i've talked to senator rockefeller and there was no agreement between the administration  as to what would happen if they looked at those documents here is why i'm so disturbed the white house said on the one thousand to the covert through their advocate dana question was asked i'm wondering if in general terms you can describe these dots those documents perhaps lay out who else in congress you mean allowed to see them he meaning the president here's what dana perino said the senate intelligence committee had showed a willingness to want to include in their legislation retroactive liability protection for companies that were alleged to have helped the united states in the days after nine eleven because they were willing to do that we were going to show them some of the documents that they were out they asked to see this president jay rockefeller told me within the past hour that that was not that was no preconceived agreement at all they want to see the documents find out what they should do legislatively she goes on to say but to the extent of anyone else being able to see the documents i think we'll wait and see who else is willing to include that provision in the bill that's present i want the record to be very clear that the judiciary committee is should be able to see those documents how else can they make a judgment as to what they should do legislatively and they should not have to make some deal with the white house that will let you look at these but you will write the legislation for you that is wrong and i think that we it's very clear that the house committees of jurisdiction also should see those documents it's absolutely wrong for the white house to say and i repeat we'll let you look at these but will only let you look at that if you will agree to sign this that white house press secretary on friday said the key documents would be held out to congressional committees as a prize for anyone willing to commit to a specific legislative plan that's indefensible and insult to the american people to congress s committees to do their business as they must do and they must do so immediately we believe this legislation move forward quickly i'd like to do it before thanksgiving i know the judicial committee has a lot of work to do but i think it's important we do this why do i want to do that mr president this legislation that came out of the intelligence committee is good it strengthens our national security it provides the intelligence community the tools it needs to go after foreign terrorists and other threats to america to american serious security does this mean th judicial committee cannot improve the legislation i'm confident perhaps they can is the intelligence committee's work that know all do all know that's all we had joint referral but it's a good piece of legislation it gives better protection for american increases or all of florence foreign intelligence surveillance court to it us court approval to target u s persons overseas three explicitly prohibits targeting any person reasonable believed to be in the united states it eliminates ambiguous language on warrantless domestic searches five it states the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance interception domestic communications authorized by the act it also requires the head of elements of the intelligence the acting under the new authority to conduct nearly audits and intelligence collection thirdly it requires inspectors general of the department justice and tell community to review the use of the new authority with respect to references to u s person's identity and communications it grants limited immunity from liability from potential liability any kelly communication company that may have assisted the government in the aftermath of september eleventh that's why mispresent itself vitally important that you should committee and the respective house committees see what the intelligence committee saw without any preconceived arrangements by the white house five it s procedure so that the federal courts can review an attorney general certification to determine whether an electronic communication service provider acted in accordance with specific orders certifications and direct the script prescribed by statute and finally it sets a secure sunset allo congress to evaluate how the new authorities are being carried out should any of this be changed that's what we have joint refer old to have that judicial committee take a look at this they have a document jitters the intelligence committee is working very very hard and to come up with what should be the final legislation comes here to the floor and finally the house passes legislation we work it out in conference we want to move forward on this it's important we do it we have knowledge that i think it's so wrong that the white house is saying you can do this but only as we tell you how it should be written otherwise we're not going to show you any of the documents that are simply defenseless behalf of the white house thank you must present for your patience the previous order the leadership time is reserved for the previous order though now be a period for the transaction of morning business until three p m with senators permitted to speak there and for up to and within talked at length about the legacy he left i spoke of knowing jim for forty years how i had my family of lifelong democrats that voted for him for attorney general decade ago it noted that he was a person who still believed that a federal judge could make a difference and i think cases of extreme necessity were basic rights of being infringe should make a difference in the rest of our political structure bogs down this appreciation for the rule of judicial independence is something we must admire and remember we work together when he was attorney general when i was state's attorney and i particularly remember one very difficult and tragic murder case where we were able to forge an unprecedented use of a grand jury to bring about justice whe i look like that would not have been possible we talked about that as recently as a couple years ago but then with jim the two of us could pick up a conversation where we left off six months before when we last seen each always identified with everybody cashier at the bank guy at the market the man working at the dump that was who he was kind generous to people who needed a helping hand brothers and today and what was wrong was a brilliant caring funny man and appreciative of people he was a very wise man in the pentagon papers case he was dissenting so he ended up on the wrong side of the court of appeals at the supreme court and up agreeing with him his daughter betsy oakes said i think everyone who loved byard my father want to carry on us the three an act of making appropriations for the departments of labor health and human services and education and so forth and for other purposes to present one of my first i want to ask consent that caitlin parton of my staff be granted for privileges for the good two days last week on it and a memo which were disposed of we now have a whole series of pending amendments right now senator specter and i have been working our staff have been working to try to get these amendments cleared and network is continuing as the leader said we would have votes today starting at five thirty we have two amendments that i will first ask consent that i will ask consent to go to these two amendments at five thirty and one following the other that would be the albert amendment number thirty three sixty nine and the thirty three thirty five as modified by thirty four forty five so would go to those two amendments in order at five thirty but i want to make it clear that if we don't reach an agreement on a whole host of other amendments are pending we could roll into a whole series of votes tonight and i want to read those off just so that people know what they are first there's the  senator vitter number thirty three twenty eight dealing with the importation of drugs from canada there is a dorgan amendment thirty three forty five relating to the nafta trade agreement that was the senator menendez amendment number thirty three forty seven providing funding for the patient navigator program an amendment funds dealing with abstinence education there's a senator roberts amendment thirty three sixty five to fund the small business child care grant program center reads amendment thirty three sixty  providing funding for trauma and emergency medical services programs there's a coburn amendment number thirty three fifty eight that would end all earmarks for every kid in america has health care and then there's the brown webb amendment number thirty three sixty one providing information to schools relating to the prevention of violent events and other crisis situation so all of those amendments are pending i mean there at the desk they're pending and can be called up and the quite frankly mr president as the chairman as before manager this bill if we don't reach agreement on him it's my intention that we could roll over into those votes tonight so again with the concurrence of my ranking member senator specter first i'd like to ask consent that that five thirty the senate proceed to vote on the on amend number thirty three sixty nine on relation to the outer demand number thirty three sixty nine and then when either one of those two amendments deserve direction without objections or so then we will proceed to vote at five thirty on those two and then we'll just have to see whether or not we can work out and get these other amendments so that we won't have any other votes tonight but if we don't then we'll just have to roll into a whole series of votes yet this evening and we have to do this if we want to finish by noon tomorrow and both leaders on both sides on on thursday made a commitment that we would finish this bill by tuesday at noon and if we're going to do that i see no other way of doing it other than having the votes tonight or getting the sides to agree on the acceptance of these amendments and quite frankly senator spec and i have agreed on a number of these amendments to get them worked out we've agreed on that but they're being held up in other places nine or stand that that's a privilege of any senator is to to the floor anybody who wants to debate in the management a lot of time to the floor promptly and we will find as the hours five thirty approaches of the senators will come in when we are just about ready to vote when there is not practices been to have a single vote on monday evenings at five thirty we have two votes lined up and we know that many senators will have other commitments which is customary for monday evening but they can't be fulfilled unless we conclude the business of the senate and least move along so that we have within striking distance the prospect of concluding the bill by noon tomorrow so again i repeat senators who have is just a list of amendments that are pending that have been offered that are pending at the desk that we could call up to vote on which we could do the c v now there's a bunch of other mammoths that senators have said they're going to offer that we have on our list but they haven't been offered yet and senator specter is absolutely right they they could senators could find themselves in a crunch where there's no time left off of these amendments by noon tomorrow so the want to get the members considered a good time there's no one on the floor naked they could get recognized right away mr president i may have misstated something earlier but in my consent requests by my maker that i ask warm called today they continue working on the labor health and education spending bill and c q reporting this morning that majority leader harry reid said that he would reach an agreement with republicans to complete the bill by midday tuesday the senate version of the measure would provide six hundred five point five billion dollars including nearly one hundred fifty billion dollars in discretionary spending for the audience of labor health and human services education and related agencies including the social security administration over in the house today they're working their way through a number of suspension bills mending many dealing with natural resources twenty two bills in all today and votes at six thirty you can follow that and on this monday afternoon the senate working on the two thousand and eight labor health and human services and education spending bill first votes expected around five thirty this afternoon several amendments expected including one cutting federal funding for abstinence education in public schools but it appears that the democrats have settled on a possible strategy for getting their spending bills the two thousand and eight spending bills to the president's desk for more we go to capitol hill for an update joining us emily pierce of roll call your story in today's edition suggests house and senate democrats have settled on a strategy for getting at least the first couple of annual spending bills to the president's desk what's their strategy well what they've decided is because the president has threatened to veto as many as eight or nine of these annual appropriations bills you know there are twelve altogether they've decided to go ahead and have him veto one very pleased and the one that they've picked is the labor health and human services education spending bill what they think that they're going to be able to do here is not only get the president to the bargaining table but also sort of continue on their successful p r strategy that following on the state children's health insurance program where they were able to sort of make a president look bad for vetoing that bill why didn't the democrats say that's sending this labor h h s bill is the thing to do why do they think that'll work to their advantage well i think they think it's going to do two things for them in contains nine billion dollars more than the president asked for for these particular programs and that's close to half of the twenty two billion that the president has asked them to shave completely from all of their discretionary domestic programs so they think well we'll send him the one with the most money but the biggest problem basically try to get him to come to the bargaining table so that we can set an overall number an overall price tag for all of the discretionary spending projects and then we could possibly move forward with the rest of our preparation strategy but also with sending them with sending him labor h h s they also get a p r message in that if assuming the president vetoes it as he is likely to do they can say how dare you veto all of these wonderful programs for hospitals and education and you know worker safety and what not the overall strategy how much of this is political gamesmanship and how much are they really trying to get some of these bills signed well this one i don't think they expect to get signed they would love for it to get signed don't get me wrong i'm sure that they would welcome the president's signature on this bill i don't think they expect it but what has happened here is it's a little bit of a game of chicken with the white house and congress  the white house has said we want to negotiate with you on these bills but you have to send them to us first and the democrats in congress have said well we don't want to send you any bills until you've started negotiating with us so order to jump start the process of actually sitting down and trying to figure out what the overall number can be you know or even just the number in this particular bill what is the president willing to give them he said he wants them to shave twenty two billion total they're saying well can't we work out something here where we get a little bit extra than what you want and it's unclear whether or not they're ever going to go there but they have to get to the bargaining table first your story mentioned earmarks being a potential snag in the democrats strategy how would that work well one of the things especially in the labor health and human services bill what you see what has typically happened over the years is that there's a large chunk of money that is set aside specifically for these targeted spending provisions for lawmakers pet projects now that doesn't necessarily mean that it's all the typical pork barrel spending some of it is for hospitals in their district some of it's for museums you know it's all within the eye of the beholder whether or not you think it's worthwhile or not but in labor and in the past there's been about almost a billion dollars set aside for earmarks now the house pledged this year to shave to cut their earmarks in half the senate hasn't done as much they have reduced they have not reduced as much what i was hearing on friday is that there was a little bit of a stalemate going on there although that's sort of typical but they do have to figure that out they have to figure out what the level of earmarks is going to be in this bill and the house in particular is worried that they don't want to send a bill to the president that has a lot of earmarks that maybe aren't don't pass muster that look like pork because then that gives the president an excuse to make fun of their overspending have you heard any reaction from republicans to this strategy not so far i mean the republicans i think are just waiting for the end game that's what they've been telling me you know they've been going after these bills on the floor of the senate because the house has already passed all their bills you know and trying to go after some of the pork provisions and some of the other things what i was told last week by republicans is look we're going to see how this plays out with the president and we're going to wait and see if the democrats try to pass a big omnibus spending package at the end of the year and that's when we going to come out guns a blazing well wrap it up with the end game if the president does veto the bill as he pledged what happens after that well i think that they hope that again that that starts them on talk if it doesn't they'll probably send him a couple of other bills that they will that they likely will find but will hope it will be politically embarrassing for him to veto such as homeland security there's the transportation spending bill which of course has a lot of money for bridges and after the minnesota bridge collapse you know that will be a big issue as well so i think that they're hoping that they won't have to get to that point but that the rip that the president will come to the table and that this will go smoothly for them if it doesn't this could be a long long year emily piers writing in roll call on the democrats strategy for the two thousand and eight spending bills thanks for joining us thank you and the senate this afternoon continuing work later today votes later today on the health and human services spending bill for fiscal year two thousand and eight you can read that bill in its entirety if you go to our website c span dot or right there in the center of the home page look under featured links and you can take a look for yourself on the spending issue the sociate a press reporting on an event we covered earlier today president bush asked congress on monday for another forty six billion dollars to fund the wars in iraq and afghanistan and finance other national security needs quote we must provide our troops with the help and support they need to get the job done bush said the figure brings to one hundred ninety six billion the total requested by the administration for operations in iraq afghanistan and elsewhere for the budget year that started october one it includes one hundred eighty nine point three billion the defense department six point nine billion for the state department and two hundred million for other agencies in to new with the a p report today congress has already provided more than four hundred fifty five billion dollars for the iraq war with stepped up military operations running about ten billion dollars a month the war has claimed the lives of more than thirty eight hundred members of the u s military and more than seventy three thousand iraqi civilians evening we're going to have a vote on my m m at the allard amendment number three three six nine i just want to take a few moments here to review with my colleagues the amendment and then understand just before we have the members i can briefly describe the amendment again mr president the office of management and budget reviews federal spending programs with a nonpartisan analysis to determine what taxpayers are receiving as far as the value of the taxpayer dollars is concerned this program is called the program assessment reading to her part is they utilize the same procedures that business executives will use frequently to determine whether their company is meeting specific goals in this particular instance the congress has directed the agencies to put in place a similar system where they set up goals objectives and then determine through that process whether the agency is enough or the program is effective or whether it's moderately effective adequate results are not demonstrated they haven't made the effort yet or the last category would be in effect well a small percentage of programs received and effective rate programs receiving this rating are not according to clarity regarding the program's purpose or goals poor management or some other significant weaknesses my amendment goes and cuts ten percent of the funding under this bill for programs label ineffective under the all in b part program and transfers the funding to an account a privilege to establish to pay down the national debt this amendment is supported and scored by the national taxpayers union and citizens against government waste we are not ending any programs or zeroing out any agencies all we're doing is taking one dollar and ten from programs that can't justify their effectiveness and using it to begin to address our over nine trillion dollars national debt i understand many people have fallen thoughts for some of these programs  but fun thoughts and good intentions don't you call good government i'm not one to make sweeping statements but i think i can say with some certainty that the vote total on this amendment will stand as a rough proxy for what percentage of the u is committed to the school discipline so i'm going to be urging my colleagues to join me in voting for this amendment i believe it's a commonsense amendment and it's a problem that we need to address we want to make sure that our taxpayer dollars are being used in a way that can be described as effect that's the ideal situation certainly those programs that are classified as ineffective you have to question even though the mission of the  there has been a mission draw now may be somewhat appealing when you get right down into the workings of the agency nothing much is happening to accomplish goals objectives which the congress had in mind the time the passed legislation time before the five thirty vote the manager senator harkin and i have been on the floor continuously say shortly after three o'clock when the bill was called back to the floor for consideration and we know from practice regrettably that when you vote starch up to five o'clock or back to five forty five or ten minutes to six people wants more time and have a great deal to say and then we will be unable to accommodate all of the astronomers who want to act on the bill senator harkin outlined at the outset the two votes which will begin to five thirty sure that there is the prospect of substantial additional voting tonight if we are unable to clarify where we stand because of our target to conclude this bill by noon tomorrow which was the target established by the pending amendments where objections of the law should come to the floor now where we have the time to transact business in the absence of any other senator on the floor  well have been set aside but nonetheless it's pending to the underlying bill it is the simplest of amendments to this amendment thirty three forty five amend model modified rather by member thirty four twenty nine sponsor i'm requiring with this amendment the labor department to form a study to determine the number and the type of jobs that were lost by the north american free trade agreement that agreement was done a long while ago  but we are now in the process of about to consider additional for a trade agreements one with peru one with panama one with south korea one with colombia and as we bring it to another  group of free trade agreements so called free trade agreements the floor of the senate i'd like to remind our colleagues that there's very little information about what happened to previous trade agreements except that we know they didn't work out very well so we're going to more of the same nafta for example the free trade agreement that we did north american free trade agreement at the time that we did it we had a modest trade deficit with canada and now that's turned into a very large trade deficit with canada at the time we did a nafta agreement north american free trade we had a modest surplus very small surplus in trade with mexico now we've turned that into a very large trade deficit with mexico so we're moving in exactly the wrong direction despite that we still have folks who huff and puff here about the need to do more of the same i want there to be a study that talks about what are the types of jobs we've lost as a result of these trade agreements how many jobs have we lost in what sectors have we lost those jobs it's interesting in october fourth in the wall street journal this month the wall street journal said republicans grow skeptical on free trade it was talking about republicans but actually the skepticism among non republicans even greater it turns out that the dissatisfaction with the current trade strategy is a bipartisan dissatisfaction the poll found that fifty nine percent of polled republican voters are greedier the following statement foreign trade has been bad for the u s economy because imports from abroad have reduced demand for american made goods and cost jobs here at home and produce potentially unsafe products mr president it's not surprising that people are concerned about this free trade strategy i mean free trade is just a mantra a moniker that doesn't really mean very much i like for a dime for trade i'm for plenty of trade i come from a state that produces a lot of agricultural products and we need to find a foreign home for more than half of what we produce so i don't come to the floor of the senate saying let's not trade i just come here saying let's do trade agreements that are good for this country not bad for this country  passed nafta the north american free trade agreement and we were told by the way this is an agreement that started under george bush the first was completed by president clinton i opposed president clinton and george bush the first president bush  we were told that if we did if we completed nafta the north american free trade agreement we would have two hundred thousand new american jobs created in this country as a result two economists gary clyde have power and jeffrey shot off our shot they called the study said actually a hundred seventy thousand new jobs in a couple of years they rounded up the supporters of this trade agreement rounded up to two hundred thousand new jobs and let me tell you what has happened since that time i told you that we turned a very modest trade surplus with mexico by the billion and a half dollars into a very large trade deficit now somewhere sixty to seventy billion dollars a year but we have a little program down in the labor department the requires companies to certify jobs that are lost because the jobs went to mexico and then you get trade adjustment assistance for the workers so what we know is  four hundred twelve thousand u s jobs have been certified as lost because of nafta under just one program at the department of labor in the ten years after nafta had been approved i commissioned a study from the congressional research service and they identified the top one hundred companies that laid off u s workers as a result of nafta during that first ten to come up with that they turned to the department of labor they have this trade adjustment assistance act and it says these top one hundred companies amounted to two hundred one thousand jobs a certified were lost due to nafta and if you look at all of the companies that's four hundred twelve thousand jobs so let's look at this list just a few of the names we passed nafta have power shot all the political supporters including those here in the united states senate just come in there suspenders talking about what a wonderful deal this is going to be for the united states knowing of course no one that wears a blue suit in this chamber is going to lose their job it's going to be somebody else so let's look at what happens levi strauss fifteen thousand six hundred seventy six jobs lost due to nafta now does that mean people aren't weren't levi's know you can find some levi's go outside this door look around you'll find levis are still buying them you can find places where they're still selling them a popular american jeans except that you won't find a pair levis that was made in this country that's gone fifteen thousand six hundred seventy six well that's a big number what about just one of them what about the one person follow that person home from work one day and that person had to tell their spouse you know what i lost my job today the spouse as well what happened but i don't know i've done a good job of work for fifteen years but they told me that i've lost my job they're moving the job to mexico why because i make too much money that's why i get paid six eight ten eleven dollars an hour and that's way too much money you can hire people for much less money in mexico china indonesia bangladesh sri lanka well kraft foods kraft foods is on this list kraft foods decided they were going to move  their big newton cookies to mexico monterrey mexico somebody says to you some day you know what squad for some mexican food just go to the store and buy some some fake newton cookies it's mexican food and all those folks that made fake newton cookies in new jersey they say some of them had to his shovel fig paste with a scoop shovel that they made too much money in new jersey so is there a better scoop shovel in mexico or is there somebody that will shovel that fake paste for much less money per hour or is there some natural figured vantage in mexico probably not it's just that kraft just like levis decided well this trade agreement gives us the opportunity to move these jobs to mexico for the loan five thousand three hundred fifty two u s workers in texas alone people stop wearing underwear i don't think so people still wear under enjoyed those careers but they're gone because those jobs are moved in search of cheap labor barbie play houses that mattel had in a kentucky plant they shifted that factory to mexico the list really goes on and on you can see the list here the corporations that certified to the department of labor that we moved our jobs these companies moved the jobs as a result of the nafta trade agreement now my feeling about trade agreements is this when you sign a trade agreement with another country it ought to be mutually beneficial to us and to them i just came from a meeting about five minutes ago on the issue of automobiles the never they do a trade as do with cafe standards better gas mileage for vehicles and i made the point at that meeting somebody is talking about we're going to have chinese cars coming into this country and we are going to see new chinese import of cars into this country why because china is wrapping up a very aggressive automobile export industry and we will very soon see small efficient cars on the streets of this country coming from china well guess what we did a trade agreement with china china a while back a bilateral agreement and here's what we agreed with with china a company with whom we have a giant trade deficit two hundred thirty billion dollars a year we said this we said china when you sell your cars in the united states we will impose a two and a half percent tariff on your cars and by the way we agree that when we sell united states cars made us cars made in the u in china you can impose a twenty five percent tariff so a country with whom we have a huge trade imbalance the biggest in human history we said to them it's ok for you to impose a tariff that's ten times higher than we would impose on bilateral automobile trade i mean it doesn't make any sense it in my judgment undermines our country's economic interests undermines our country's jobs and yet this country does that we're going to have as a group of bills on the floor colombia panama south korea among that group of bills the free trade agreements that have already been done will be south korea let me just mention automobiles in south korea last year they shipped us very close to seven hundred thousand cars and put them all on ships entered this country to be sold in america seven hundred thousand cars made in korea sent here to be sold to american customers guess what we were able to send five thousand american cars south korea why the imbalance seven hundred thousand this way five thousand that way because that's the way south korea wants it ninety nine percent of the cars on the streets of south korea are made in south korea and that's the way they wanted it on our cars sold there they want those jobs in south korea they want to make cars there and sell them here why would our country allow that to be the case and this agreement that's going to be brought to the floor of the senate the trade agreement to south korea does not address that issue so i'm just you know i could couldn't have spoken to a great length about trade and a wide range of issues but at some point we need to reconcile what we're doing with these agreements and we need to stop this bad habit of negotiating bad agreements for this country i don't know who negotiates this but the person that said to china it's ok for you to impose a ten times higher tariff on us cars impose on chinese cars that person obviously doesn't understand who he or she is working for threatened from time to time to suggest those trade negotiators to go out and negotiate in secret presumably on behalf of our country should begin to wear jerseys  were in the olympics you know u s a s ok generally they could look down and try to remember who they work for these trade agreements i think undermine this country's basic economic strength that people say well it's fine if these migrate it's not fine a country without a strong vibrant manufacturing base is not destined to long be a world economic power and we have to understand that not talking about protectionism or building walls i'm talking about trade and plenty of it but trade in circumstances where the rules are fair and where this country insists on fair rules mr president i know my colleague senator harkin is here and perhaps about to make a presentation and find out what happened what happened with jobs how many we lose what kind wherefrom but apparently even this is controversial why because maybe we will learn something maybe we will learn  one way trade agreements are not in this country's interests and that we ought to be smart shrewd and tough negotiators standing up for our country's economic interests standing up for our jobs one final point we lifted this country in a century we lifted this country to standards expanded to middle class we said you've got to have a safe workplace yet you've got to have child labor laws minimum wages the right to organize a whole series of rules that lifted america up and now we're saying you know what let's compete with others and allow them to diminish standards i'm not very interested in doing that i know that the people that made healthy bicycles couldn't compete for twenty and thirty cents an hour they made eleven dollars an hour in ohio they all lost their jobs because they couldn't compete with people who would make bicycles for twenty or thirty cents an hour so every house has bicycles now made in china none are made in ohio i know you can't compete with that but i don't think that ought to be the standard of competition because i think by its nature it diminishes economic opportunity in this country mr president i am going to ask that if we can clear this amendment we have a vote on this amendment and i appreciate the work the chairman of this subcommittee has done i support his bill and i'm pleased to speak in favor of the bill american workers and american jobs i can assure you will have my support and a member that we don't have a clear yet and we may have to have a vote on it but if that is so than perhaps it could be one of the votes we have tonight if we don't get an agreement on  it sounds simple you just cut funds for programs that the bush administration included are in effect of using what's called the program assessment rating tools called part p a r t then you use the savings to reduce the de well we're all for making sure the taxpayer dollars are spent well and responsibly but let's take a look at what this amendment really means first we have to have some background on part the program assessment rating tools it's intended to help assess the management and performance of individual programs so it's not just a question of whether the program works but also evaluates whether congress has designed the program in a clear manner and whether federal agencies do a good job managing the program so programs evaluated under part fall into one of five categories they were effective moderately effective adequate ineffective or results not determine the last category means or not enough information about it to make a decision as a senator from colorado senator allard would only cut funding for programs that are rated ineffective and then take that money and apply it to the deficit as i said it sounds good why should you ever what is part how is it used this is what the president's own budget documents say about part part ratings do not result in automatic decisions about funding clearly overtime funding should be targeted to programs that can prove the achieve measurable results in some cases a part rating of ineffective or results not demonstrated may suggest that greater funding is necessary to overcome identified shortcomings while a funding decrease may be proposed for a program or a that effective if it is not a priority or if completed this mission this is the president's budget i say read it it says sometimes if you have any effective rating maybe you ought to have greater funding for it to overcome some shortcomings whereas if you have an effective program that may be getting funded maybe it should be done away with because either it is not a priority or if completed its mission in other words the memmott offered by the senator from colorado senator allard is counter to the idea behind creating the park process it was not intended as a club on a quote an effective program or it was designed to assess the impact of programs identify steps could be taken to improve them and that's not my only problem with this misguided amendment i'm concerned about the important programs americans need that would be undermined by his amendment make no mistake about it a vote for senator allen's amendment is a vote against the programs you see listed on this second vote for senator allen's amendment says that we should unto the fiscal mess created by the bush administration's policy of caskets for millionaires and the war in iraq by reducing funding for programs that help some students prepare for college provide for unemployed low income seniors with income retrain workers who lose their jobs due to foreign trade here are some of the programs that will lose ten percent of the funding in the bill were adopted the trio upward bound program funded at three hundred fifteen million dollars in the senate bill there are nine hundred sites throughout the country including i might add eight sites and over seven hundred students in the state of colorado i say to the lifespan of the chair so again and here's what here's what the bush budget had to say about this program  from the bush budget quote the program received any effective part rating when assessed in two thousand and two in part because the program evaluation showed that the program did not overall increase the proportion of participants who enrolled in college however the program was found to have a positive impact for higher risk students for whom the evaluation findings reveal that upward bound increased four year college enrollment rates in response to this finding the department of education established a priority for the two thousand and six top of titian that required projects to ensure that at least thirty percent of participants were higher risk students given the improved targeting continued funding is worn in other words better watch myself i'm saying nice things about the administration basically what they did is they actually implemented the part program correctly they looked at it they said ok got an ineffective rating why well because they said overall it didn't it didn't show that it increased four year college participation but when they looked at the subset of the higher risk tunes they said boy it really increase college participation so here's what we'll do  we'll require project to ensure that at least thirty percent of the participants are a higher risk dude that's how you use this tool you don't use it as a club to get rid of it i say to my friends from colorado of the president's own budget says that the program is a worthwhile look at the perkins career and technical education state branch funded it one point two billion that's last year's level we didn't increase it  just last year congress reauthorize and strengthen the program in the senate it passed by unanimous consent and in the house of representatives they're just one vote against and here's what the bush incorporates several important changes that strengthen the program's accountability provision and provide opportunities to improve program performance and then there's the community service employment for older americans we have funded at the last year's level this provides part time community service opportunities paid minimum wage for unemployed low income persons the health professions programs all this is interesting we put in three hundred fifty seven million this year the our demand would cut up by thirty five point seven million this is the category that includes almost all health training in america nurse training programs training in primary care medicine dentistry programs all of these would would take a cut and then there's trade adjustment assistance eight hundred eighty seven eight hundred eighty eight point seven million in this bill last year's level same thing that the president requested again this provide income support and retraining services to workers who lose their jobs due to foreign trade approx one hundred twenty thousand workers are eligible each year but only about eighty thousand actually receive services so again if we adopted the adult amendment for the trio program at an average cost of five thousand dollars a student we would cut sixty three hundred students out of the trio program for the trade adjustment assistance at about twelve thousand dollars per person that means a loss of services to seven thousand four hundred workers who've lost their jobs and want to get retrained for the perkins program i'm sorry for the community service employment program five thousand nine hundred thirty two dollars for older worker a modest amount every year to an older person means a loss of support for eight thousand one hundred forty two low income seniors so the outer amendment on its face you look at it you say well he's cutting ten percent of those programs rated ineffective so you want to think what you got why would i support an ineffective program no one wants to support and effective programs but again i refer again to the first chart here if i can show that first chart and i repeat again you have to understand what part is that's the program assessment rating tool and how  and i will read again from the president's own budget part ratings do not result in automatic decisions about funding well the out of the memo would be an automatic decision about cutting ten percent clearly over time funding should be targeted to programs that can prove the achieve measurable results i say to my friend from colorado it says in some cases a part rating of any effective or results not demonstrated may suggest that greater funding is necessary greater funding is necessary in order to overcome identified shortcomings while a funding decrease may be proposed for a program or a that effective if it is not a priority or if completed its mission so there may be effective programs that are rated as effective the probably out of the cut and i'm sure the administration and o m b are probably doing that because they've either completed its mission or it is not a priority on the other hand there on his budget which present he'll deploy she isn't the one fist senator from colorado mr president pushed appreciate the comments that the senator from iowa we're making and you know i was elected to this by i don't think you were either to make easy votes i mean this is this can be a difficult vote but there are programs on there that i support i support whole heartedly but i want to be effective how can i go back to my taxpayers back in the state of colorado and say well you're spending billions of dollars on this program but it's ineffective i mean it's not measuring up to the standards in which most businesses would be expected to measure up for performance or maybe other agencies are doing to measure  i don't know how else to get the attention of the bureaucracy except to deal with them where they pay attention and that is their pocketbook their budget and i think that when we have an effective program we're not doing our jobs as senators if we don't figure out a way and how to bring accountability to the program now this is a modest attempt to try and bring some accountability don't eliminate any program we do a reduction on a few programs  now in business in the business world they use the same process that onan be put in place here this is not a partisan process you know you refer to the president bush's actions or whether it may be a democrat president three years from now he's going to be dealing with the same problem that this president is dealing with that he has programs out there this simply are not measuring up and so let me get back to to what the standard business world does aig look at a program and say well look we're spending a certain amount of money on that and then it's not performing because it's not performing we've either got to redo the program which is an option that the congress can look at or we eliminate that altogether or we create some other kind of modification that's going to make it accountable to the top stockholders of that company well the stock holders in this case the taxpayers of this country they're the ones that are putting money into these programs and they're the ones who would expect i think the program to do what it says what it was set up to do and this is a program that's been in place for ten years it's not a new program the agencies have had plenty of time to respond and react to this particular effort and i would i would credit those agencies or programs that are listed as ineffective for at least having tried to comply with the law there's another group there that i didn't address and that's those the results have not been demonstrated they're just sort of sum in their nose at the congress and senate we're not going to bother to set up any goals and objectives for our program we're just going to go ahead and let it run on automatic now in some cases they have a legitimate reason for not doing that but i do think that the congress needs to look at those programs are in effect the make some judgment now is the senator from iowa has a better suggestion on how we might bring accountability does agencies i'd be glad to hear what it is i think that this little reduction in their budget will send a message to them that you've got to get your act in order and then hopefully as we go down the through the years they'll begin to understand that you know it's the congress that controls the purse strings and that you need to get your act in order we need to have accountability to the program and i think this is a common sense a mammoth being raided by citizens against government waste the national taxpayers union supporting it and i've sat down with groups of how it is that we can bring effective efficient government forward you know we don't want programs out there that make all these grandiose claims but then don't deliver they waste taxpayers dollars in the process so listen to my friend from colorado but is maybe maybe the right amendment would be to go after the program assessment rating tools because as it says some of the programs that are rated ineffective actually may need more money give i will give the senator one example a couple years ago a school that i'm i know very well here in washington d c called gallaudet university it is the university for the deaf here in ameri premier college in the world as a matter of fact they got an ineffective rating well that got me pretty upset so i started looking at it finding out why it was ineffective now if we had to cut their funding by ten percent they never would have become effective because we've got them in and the committees did its job and that's what the committee function is for if there is something this in effective that's why we have committees call them up ask them what's happening there and make them explain why it's gotten ineffective why got demonstrated not results and then let the committee do its work that's what we did in dollar debt we could've had a ten percent cut on dollar debt you know what would happen i say to my friends they never would have become effective they needed the money they just needed some better guidance and some better direction that's what the committee structure does that's why we have the executive branch overseeing these things so i say to my friend that's the better way to approach it than this kind of sledgehammer club approach i say to measure everything what the heck i every sledgehammer response it's a mild little push to try and improve your program and i agree with you there are some of those programs that can be improved if we just increase appropriations and maybe that's what we need to do but maybe to get their attention to kind of get things to move the right direction maybe we need to start out with a reduction in spending so i think this is a commonsense program we can maybe argue about this i've never been in the committees where they've talked about this in this way and i think it needs to be talked more to committees about that's why i'm introduced an ame that my friend from florida that's why we have the appropriations committee and yes we do call them up and we do look into these matters but it's not this kind of heavy handed approach is going to cut programs that actually do and have taken steps like the upward i ask unanimous consent that in the vote sequence previously agreed to that the door going to mammoth number thirty three thirty five as modified be removed from the agreement and the menendez amendment number thirty three forty seven be substituted and that the amendment be modified with the text of amendment number thirty four twenty eight and that the senate then vote in relation to the menendez amendment number thirty three forty seven as modified following the disposition of the aldred amendment reconsider be laid upon the table and block member number thirty three three three five as modified number thirty three thirty one amendment number thirty four nineteen amendment thirty four thirty four and budget it's a nonpartisan process that was set up by the congress more than ten years ago i think it's time that the congress expects some accountability in that program itself so you can look on the expect more dot gov which lists the agencies that are performing which ones are not some of these pro some of these that some these programs are my favorite programs and i voted for countability so that when we're supporting a program that actually does what it says it's going to do that all the money just doesn't go to  bureaucracy and none of it gets to the beneficiaries and so we're trying to bring some accountability this process that's the reason for my m m and my hope is that the congress will the senate will vote for this and a strong number so that we can send a message to the agencies that they need to begin to get their act in order those that are rated and effective and that we need to do more in the committee process to refer to this rating and let's bring him put him on the on the record in our committee meetings to hold them accountable for their programs thank you m president you know the floor said this is a heavy handed club approach already we know that sometimes programs are rated ineffective as the president's own budget says actually need more funding some of those that are rated effective probably ought to have their funding cut but the senate in colorado says we're just going to across the board we're going to cut all these programs that are rated ineffective as i pointed out a couple of years ago gallaudet college here in washington d c probably the finest university for the deaf in the world probably it is somehow got an ineffective rating well they went back and they changed things now it got an effective rate had they been cut ten percent they never would have been able to get effective again so this is not the proper way to do things this is a this is something for the as i said for committees to handle and for the executive branch to handle i think yes i know the i know the intention is well i know the semicolon but i know his intention is well meaning but it's just missed directed  misguided because the program assessment rating tool is not the kind of instrument that i think the senator is in visioning went with this amendment so with that mr president i yield back whatever time i have i move to table the baucus mr by mr bennett mr biden mr bang him and mr bond mrs boxer mr kennedy mr kerry lieberman mrs lincoln mr lott mr lugar mr martinez mr mccain mrs mrs murray mr nelson of florida mr nelson of nebraska mr obama mr pryor mr reed of rhode island mr reid of nevada mr roberts mr rockefeller mr salazar mr sanders mr schumer mr sessions mr shelby mr smith ms snow mr spect mr sanders mr sanders mr tester mr tester mr brownback mr brownback now mr alexander mr alexander mr menendez no mr martinez no mr sessions mr sessions no mr weidner mr wyden i mr mcconnell mr mcconnell now mr bennett mr bennett  mr stevens  this is boxer mrs boxer  mr warner mr warner kno are there any senators in the chamber who have not voted or who wish to change their vote without objection the majority leader is right now we have one vote the fall right now the manager has been working to finish this piece of legislation as quickly as possible that staff has worked through a number of amendments today in fact a significant number of amendments and we are on a glide path to finish this