Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Hurricane Recovery, 2006--Conference Report

EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT FOR DEFENSE, THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR, AND HURRICANE RECOVERY, 2006--CONFERENCE REPORT

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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would like to commend my colleague from the State of Washington for her statement. I believe that she has outlined several things that should be taken into serious consideration by this administration. A special envoy would be I think a dramatic and important step forward in changing the battlefield in Iraq to a more constructive environment. I also think the idea of the United Nations appointing a high commissioner for this purpose will also be extremely helpful. I associate myself with her remarks, and I thank her for her observations on this war in Iraq.

The President visited Iraq yesterday. It was a surprise visit. I am sure it did a great deal to help the morale of our soldiers to know that our President would take this dangerous journey to be there with them, even if it was for a brief period of time. I am looking forward to the President's report to the American people today on what he found and what he proposes. We are all hopeful that this war will come to an end soon, that American troops will come home, and that at some point very, very soon, we truly will have our mission accomplished.

This morning's newspaper informs us that we have lost 2,493 of our best and bravest young men and women serving this United States in Iraq. I asked a member of my staff to check when we lost 2,000 soldiers, and the date was October 25 of last year. It appears that in a very short period of time, we will pass the 2,500 mark. At the time that we recorded the 2,000th military death in Iraq, I asked, along with other Senators, for a moment of silence on the floor of the U.S. Senate to acknowledge their great contribution to our country and in respect for their memory. When the time comes that 2,500 have given their lives, I will make that same unanimous consent request. Since there are no Republican Senators on the floor at this moment, I won't make it at this time, but I want the majority to know that I think, on a bipartisan basis, Senators from both parties should come to the floor when we have recorded the 2,500th death in Iraq and observe a moment of silence in memory of our fallen warriors and in prayer for their families whose lives will never be the same because of their loss.

At that time too we should reflect on those who have gone to serve and have returned broken in body and some in spirit. Over 2,000 have come back from Iraq with serious head injuries. Many of them are struggling now to regain the basic faculties and strengths which they need to lead a normal life.

Another 15,000 or 16,000 soldiers have returned who have lost an arm or leg or other grievous injury. They, too, are struggling with their families and with the help of the Veterans Administration to get back to a position where their lives can return to normal.

We know we are not spending enough money at the Veterans Administration. We promised these men and women, if you swear an oath to the United States, if you wear our uniform and our colors, if you will march behind the flag for America's security and interests, we will stand with you. When you come home, we will be there. If you need help in a hospital, we will provide it. If you need help paying for your education or your future, we will help you.

We are not keeping our promise. In too many cases across America, the Veterans Administration is not adequately staffed, not adequately prepared to meet the returning veterans' needs.

I have seen it in my State. Post-traumatic stress disorder is a serious problem. Men and women who are in combat are under extreme stress. They are involved in actions which can leave a lasting imprint on their minds. They are separated from their families, some for long and repeated periods of time, and some come back needing a helping hand. They need to sit down with a friendly counselor, a professional who can bring them back through some of the terrible experiences they have had.

I have met with these soldiers, these Marines and others. They are brave enough to stand up and say, I need help, and we need to help them so that their lives will be restored to normal. Unfortunately, the bill we are now considering, the supplemental appropriations bill, doesn't include an adequate amount for our Veterans Administration. We tried to add it in the conference committee. There was a motion made by the Senator from Washington, PATTY MURRAY, to put more funds into the Veterans Administration so we would not shortchange our soldiers. It was defeated.

We have been through this before. It was only last year we went through the same debate, and finally, after several months, the Bush administration came in and said: I guess we just don't have enough money for the veterans. And we added some. Why do we go through that every year? We know these veterans are returning and they need our help and we need to have the professionals there to give them that helping hand.

It is unfortunate that this supplemental appropriations bill is the way we fund this war. This is at least the fourth time we have had such a bill. These bills are supposed to be for unforeseen emergencies--hurricanes, earthquakes, things that occur that God has wrought and we have to deal with but not for things that we can ordinarily anticipate; that is what our budget is for.

The administration every single year takes the cost of the war and puts it in an emergency bill, saying: We were surprised; we still have a war going on.

We should not be surprised. We know that we have been in Iraq now for over 3 years and that we are likely to be there for some time to come. Putting this in a supplemental appropriations bill allows the administration to say it is not part of the ordinary budget; therefore, it is not part of the budget, not part of the budget deficit. That is not true.

This $90-billion-plus bill is added to the debt of this Nation, and we should be honest with the American people about it. This bill is not an honest portrayal of the true cost of this war.

I am also really disappointed; when there are natural disasters across America, one of the first victims is usually an American farmer. These are people trying to make a living growing our food and fiber, and changes in the weather, whether it is a drought or a flood, can make all the difference in the world in their success. I cannot tell you how many times in my congressional career I have been asked to come to the rescue of farmers across the United States in virtually every State in the Union, and I have done it because I know my agricultural community is vulnerable as well and a time may come when they need help.

This is such a time. Last year we had a drought in the State of Illinois, a terrible drought that cost us dramatically when it came to our corn crop and other production. I sat down with the Secretary of Agriculture and said, Why don't you help our farmers? We always help farmers in these situations.

He said: I looked at the statistics and, on average, the farmers in Illinois are just fine.

On average? Farmers don't farm on average. They farm their acreage. On average you may have one prosperous farmer near one who was wiped out in the drought. On average both of them did just fine, but we know the reality. The reality is that one farmer and his family are suffering.

I urged this administration to do their best to help when it came to this disaster assistance. Over 6,000 producers nationwide wrote to my office and the offices of Senators PRYOR, LINCOLN, DORGAN, SALAZAR, DAYTON, and JOHNSON urging this disaster assistance. Major farm organizations supported us. This drought we faced last year was the worst in over a century. At least 10 counties in Illinois sustained a 20 percent loss in corn yield. The value of the Illinois corn crop was down $1.1 billion. The Illinois Department of Agriculture estimates that drought of 2005 lowered yields and resulted in a $443 million loss to producers.

Now the farmers, coming back in the field, face extraordinarily high energy prices because America does not have an energy policy. There has been no leadership in Washington. The cost of fertilizer, the cost of diesel fuel, the cost of gasoline has gone up dramatically, up to $25 an acre for farmers over the last several years right out of the bottom line.

What we asked for in this bill was to give the farmers a helping hand as we have for the farmers in the Gulf Coast States. I see my colleague and friend, the Senator from Louisiana. The farmers in that State we have helped, as we should, and Mississippi and Alabama, as we should. But I think, when it comes to this national challenge, that we should have stepped forward to help farmers across the board. This bill does not do that, and I am disappointed.

There is another element in this bill which I think needs to be addressed.

Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. GRAHAM). There are 5 minutes and 48 seconds remaining.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, that element relates to what is known as the deeming resolution. That is Senate talk for the budget resolution, which is kind of the broad outline of how we will spend money this year. Instead of passing the budget resolution as we ordinarily do, at the last minute in this conference committee the Republican leadership in the House and Senate plugged this resolution into this spending bill. It has been done before but not very often. It is an unusual approach. What it means is the overall spending limitations for the whole budget are now plugged into this special appropriations bill.

There is nothing sinister or wrong about that on its face, until you look at the resolution itself. What they put in as the resolution is President Bush's budget. Let me tell you that budget, sadly, is some $16 billion below the budget resolution that the Senate approved on a bipartisan basis.

Let me give an example of what the President's budget will cut. These are choices that have been made and will be made in the weeks ahead. One of the areas that troubles me most is President Bush's proposal to cut funding at the National Institutes of Health. That is the agency of our Government that does research on medical diseases and challenges: Lou Gehrig's disease, autism, heart disease, stroke, cancer, diabetes--the list goes on and on. President Bush's budget cut $1 billion from the National Institutes of Health since 2003 and continues to cut funding there.

There was a bipartisan commitment in Congress that we would dramatically increase medical research, believing that most families in America would applaud that expenditure of their tax dollars, and I think they would. Now, if we are going to follow the President's budget, we will be cutting back on medical research. Any family that faces a serious medical illness understands that research is the one lifeline you cling to. You pray for the best outcome, you hope for the best doctor, but you are also counting on the National Institutes of Health and other medical research to be looking for that cure.

Why would we cut back on it? And we do.

This President's budget also low-balls the spending for the Veterans Administration. As I said before, last year they were proven wrong. It means that instead of acknowledging the obvious, when we promise our soldiers we will be with them when they come home we try to shortchange it and then catch up with them later. It is no way to run a government. It is no way to keep your promise to the men and women in uniform who served our country so well.

There is one another particular issue as well that the President's budget threatens about which I am concerned. We passed the budget resolution and the Senate recognized that the global AIDS epidemic was a major priority. Our budget included a bipartisan amendment to increase funding for the global fund to fight AIDS, TB and malaria by $566 million. On average, $100 million contributed to the global fund will mean 630,000 people around the world will have chemically treated nets around their beds to avoid malaria, one of the No. 1 killers of children in the developing world; 150,000 treatments for malaria for each $100 million to the global fund; 80,000 treatments for tuberculosis; 370,000 people with HIV tests; 11,000 people with AIDS treatment.

This resolution strips $16 billion out of the budget that we just passed, and that means there will be less money to fight these global epidemics.

Why should we care? We should care, not just because of basic values that many of us hold that they are our neighbors, they are our brothers and sisters, but also because if disease is rampant in the world it will visit the United States. If the avian flu becomes an epidemic moving from animals to humans in some part of the world, we will have 21 days before it spreads around the world.

A century ago many of these diseases didn't survive the voyage on the trip from the old world where now they survive the 8, 10, and 12-hour airplane trips and come into cities and towns and counties all around the world, including the United States, so our efforts on public health around the world are not only for the right reason, they are also to protect us.

As this President's budget cuts back on spending, threatens the spending for the global fund, unfortunately, people will die as a result of it and, unfortunately, we will live in a more vulnerable world.

Budgets are about choices and usually hard choices, but the Senate made those choices in March. Unfortunately, the bill before us from this conference committee reverses that decision and makes threatening cuts in the National Institutes of Health in the areas of veterans care and in global AIDS, to mention just a few.

This President's budget had the deepest cuts in education of any President in the last several years at a time when we need schools to be the very best for the 21st century to create the opportunity that our people and our children certainly deserve.

Members of the Senate are faced with a quandary. Here is a bill that funds the war. Even those of us who voted against the war believe we have to provide the resources so our soldiers have the equipment and training and supplies they need to come home safely with their mission accomplished, and I voted for every penny the President has asked for that purpose. But within this is a budget resolution with which I do not agree. If you could split your vote on this, I certainly would, voting for the money for the soldiers but voting against this budget resolution which will force us to make cuts in critical areas of importance for America's future.

I yield the floor.

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