Stimulus Package Report

Floor Speech

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Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I wish to acknowledge the remarks of my colleague from Connecticut and thank him for his efforts to focus on the housing issues that face this Nation right now. As he has mentioned, if we are not able to get to the root cause, which is the housing debacle and the failures we have seen, all our good efforts may not be successful.

I thank him for his efforts in that regard. I know we will continue working on this issue together with the administration. It is essential we focus on the housing piece.

Later this afternoon or this evening, we are going to be voting on the conference report to accompany the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. I was one of those 37 Senators who voted against this bill earlier this week. I would like to take a few minutes this afternoon to speak to some of the reasons why I was unable and why I will be unwilling to support the conference report when it comes before us later.

My principal concern in voting against the Senate measure at the time was the scope of the spending. It is not just the scope of what we have in front of us with this particular bill, this package of $790 billion. There was an article in the Washington Post on Wednesday that had a chart that outlined all of what we have been spending in the past year.

The header is: ``It Adds Up.'' ``The Federal Government has committed at least $7.8 trillion in loans, investments, in guarantees since the beginning of 2008.'' The funding coming from the Federal Reserve is at $3.8 trillion; from the FDIC, $1.22 trillion; from the Treasury, this includes the TARP moneys we authorized back in October, $771 billion; the joint programs that include the guarantees of Bank of America and Citigroup, $419 billion; and then in the ``Other'' category, it includes not only the programs Fannie and Freddie at $200 billion, but then at the bottom we have the Senate bill for the current stimulus package at that time coming in at $838 billion.

It is almost inconceivable what we are talking about in terms of the outlays we are putting forward.

The cost of this stimulus package before us, as everyone in America knows, is $790 billion, but when we account for the interest, which we need to do--that is part of the bill--the cost increases to more than $1 trillion; it is about $1.2 trillion. So add this in to the outline of what I have laid out, and the cost to America is considerable.

Where do we get this money? From where do we get it? We don't just tell the Treasury to turn the printing presses on full bore: let's go, let's print the money. No, we have to borrow. We sell Treasury bills. We sell debt. Who buys it? People such as the Chinese and others from outside this country.

It is not just cranking up the presses and printing more money. We will be paying for this legislation. My children will be paying for it. We have a responsibility to make sure what we spend is spent wisely.

The focus of this stimulus, of course, is the job creation. Even if it actually creates the 4 million jobs the White House once promised, then those jobs, if you piece it all out--do the math--these jobs come at a cost of about $300,000 apiece. What we are seeing now is probably not 4 million jobs. Even the most optimistic economists are now estimating what we are looking at would create or save less than 2.5 million jobs.

I noted the comments of the Senator from Connecticut about the need to fix housing first, and I strongly agree with that approach. But this afternoon, I wish to speak to another issue.

As the ranking member of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, I wish to spend some time on another aspect of the bill. This is an area where millions of new jobs are promised, and that is in the area of energy. There is absolutely no doubt we must facilitate the development of renewable resources, increase our energy efficiency, and pursue the many innovative solutions to the challenges we face when it comes to how we consume, how we use, and how we create energy.

I am not satisfied with the energy provisions that are contained in this measure. I am not satisfied that they are timely, that they are targeted, and that they are temporary. By adopting this conference report, we are missing out on some significant opportunities that could revive our economy and improve our energy security at little or, hopefully, no cost to our taxpayers.

When it comes to criticisms, there is plenty of room to be critical. One of my first criticisms this afternoon is not necessarily the items that are included in the stimulus but perhaps some of the items that were left out. Simply put, this package makes no effort to increase domestic production of our traditional resources, such as oil and natural gas. What we have done is focused on the new technologies, to the total exclusion of those tried-and-true technologies. I think this creates this false dilemma. It says clean energy is the only viable option for energy development and job creation when, in fact, it might not be the most effective option at this time when we are trying to pursue jobs and get the country strong again.

Consider the benefits that could be brought about by greater production of oil and gas in this country. One recent study outlines that the full development of domestic oil and gas resources could generate up to $1.7 trillion in revenues for the Federal Government and create as many as 161,000 new jobs by 2030.

The revenues from the production could be used to provide a tremendous downpayment on the long-term strength and security of our Nation. Instead, as a result of what we will be doing today, American taxpayers are ultimately going to be paying $1.2 trillion because of the decisions we are making.

Setting aside my concerns about the priorities, it is very uncertain the funds that are provided by this bill can be spent in a rational and cost-effective way. Perhaps the best example of this is within the Department of Energy. It is set to receive roughly $45 billion in the conference report we are looking at now. DOE's total budget for fiscal year 2008 was $24 billion. Assuming the Department receives similar funding through fiscal year 2009 appropriations--and we are going to be debating that after this recess break--DOE will receive almost triple its historic level of funding in less than 3 months. What we have is an unprecedented level of spending within the Department.

CBO is concerned about how we spend this out as well. They determined the Department would only be able to spend 24 percent of its funding before the 2-year deadline. The Energy Department, along with so many of the other departments we are dealing with, simply does not have the time to gear up and properly spend, with a level of accountability, so much money over such a short period.

The question then needs to be asked: Will this level of funding become the new baseline for the Department? If it does, we will have significantly expanded Federal spending at a time of unprecedented Federal deficits. If it does not become part of the baseline, then that crashing sound we will hear is going to be the gears that are grinding back down as funding returns to normal. I suggest such wild swings in funding are disruptive and one of the most ineffective ways to spend our taxpayers' dollars.

The stimulus, by giving Government agencies completely unprecedented amounts of money for sometimes nonexistent programs, also sets up near perfect conditions for waste, fraud, and abuse. This is exactly what the American taxpayers do not want to see. For example, $3.2 billion is provided for block grant programs for energy efficiency. The conference report provides $400 million for a competitive grant system that does not currently exist and for which there is no administrative process.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has used 10 minutes.

Ms. MURKOWSKI. I ask unanimous consent for an additional 1 minute.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, making matters worse, it provides an additional $3.1 billion to State energy programs but imposes conditions on receiving funds that are currently met by only a handful of States.

Another example I wish to leave you with is the smart grid. We agree this is very important. There is $4.5 billion for the smart grid. This was authorized at $100 million in the 2007 Energy bill. It has received zero funding to date. Is it possible to expect we can ramp up to $4.5 billion in 2 years in a rational way? We don't even have the standards in place for the interoperability framework.

I don't think the American taxpayer is concerned so much about how much we spend, so long as we do it responsibly and with accountability.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.

Ms. MURKOWSKI. My concern is we have not done this with this stimulus package.

I yield the floor.

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