Habeas Corpus

Floor Speech

HABEAS CORPUS -- (Senate - June 12, 2008)

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Colorado for his statement on oil shale. I wish to tell him a little story that goes back many years. When I first was involved in political life, in 1966 as a college student I worked for a Senator from Illinois named Paul Douglas who used to give speeches about oil shale, saying there is a great untapped natural and national resource of oil shale in the Rockies, in Colorado, and in other areas. Yours is the first comment I can remember on the floor of the Senate in all of those years relating to this issue again. I am glad the Senator from Colorado not only brought it up but put it in perspective in terms of our national energy needs and the impact of oil shale exploration and production in the Senator's State. I think he has every right to be careful in what he does.

I hear many colleagues, particularly from the Republican side of the aisle and from the White House, suggesting the reason we have our gasoline prices today and high crude oil prices is because we are not drilling for oil in ANWR, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. I, for instance, personally think that is an oversimplification, that that one potential source of oil could in no way solve our problems in terms of what it could produce.

I might call the attention of my friend and colleague from Colorado to some information that was given to me today. I hope the Senator from Colorado is aware there are 44 million offshore acres, off the shores of the United States of America, that have been leased by oil companies--44 million. Of those, only 10.5 million have been put into production. One-fourth of all of the leased offshore acreage oil companies currently hold--land that the Federal Government has a right to--is being actually explored and utilized. Of the 47.5 million onshore acres under lease for oil and gas production, only 13 million are in production; again, about a fourth. So three-fourths of all of the land offshore and on shore owned by the Federal Government and the taxpayers, leased by oil companies for the potential production of oil and gas, is actually in production. Only one-fourth. Combined, oil and gas companies hold leases to 68 million acres of Federal land in waters they are not producing any oil and gas on--68 million. That is compared to 1.5 million acres in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

So those who come to the floor and say: ``You know the problem here? We are just not opening up enough area for oil and gas exploration,'' ignore the obvious. Oil and gas companies spend money to obtain them and then sit on them and then come back to us when we complain America needs a national energy policy and say the real problem is the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. ``If we could just have a crack at those 1.5 million acres,'' after they have taken 68 million acres, put them under lease, and are not utilizing them.

I might add that Congressman Rahm Emanuel from my State of Illinois and Congressman Dodd are working on legislation that would say to these oil and gas companies: If you are going to lease this land and not use it, the cost of the annual lease is going to keep going up. Let someone else lease it who might use it. I think that is reasonable. They are suggesting that money from the leases should be dedicated to wind and solar energy--energy-efficient buildings; LIHEAP--which I know would be a good idea for the Senator who is now presiding who is from New England; weatherization assistance, and a number of other areas.

I thank the Senator from Colorado for his thoughtful reflection on what we are facing here.

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, will the Senator from Illinois yield for a question?

Mr. DURBIN. I am happy to yield.

Mr. SALAZAR. Through the Chair, I ask my friend from Illinois whether it is true that we have already opened huge amounts of offshore resources as well as onshore resources for the potential development of oil and gas and that ultimately, if we are going to get our Nation to have the kind of energy independence and national security that has been talked about now for 30 or 40 years, we need to, yes, develop those potential resources and those 75 percent of those offshore and onshore lands the Senator spoke about, but also to look at a whole new agenda of clean energy that will help us get to our national security, our environmental security, and create an economic opportunity here at home?

Mr. DURBIN. I would respond to the Senator from Colorado and tell him, yes, of course. He has anticipated the reason I came to the floor: to discuss what happened this week in the Senate or, to be more accurate, what didn't happen this week in the Senate. Because on Tuesday, we offered to the Senate, both sides, Democrats and Republicans, an opportunity to debate what the Senator from Colorado suggested, whether we will invest as a nation in energy and job creation. The Senator from

Colorado knows what happened as well as I do. The Republicans refused to join us to bring to the floor to debate the bill that would create tax incentives for investments in energy efficiency, renewable, sustainable energy that will not lead to global warming and will not lead to pollution. The frustration that I and other Members on the Democratic side feel comes from the fact that we have tried repeatedly to bring these measures to the floor and we have been stopped time and time again.

I say to my colleague and friend from Colorado, through the Renewable Energy and Job Creation Act, we can create incentives we know will work. In my home State of Illinois, and probably in the State of Colorado, we are finding wind turbines being built in massive numbers to generate clean electric power. Near Bloomington, IL, an area I never would have dreamed of as a wind resource area, 240 wind turbines are being built. They will generate enough electricity there to provide all the needs of the two cities of Bloomington and Normal, IL, without pollution, using nature as a source.

Why did this recently happen? Because we created, over the last couple of years, incentives for businesses to do it. Now when we come this week to the floor of the Senate and say to our Republican colleagues: Let's not stop this now; this is a move in the right direction for green energy sources, what did they say? ``We don't want to even debate it.'' They stopped us again.

This week in the Senate--

Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, would the Senator from Illinois yield for a question?

Mr. DURBIN. I am happy to yield.

Mr. SALAZAR. Through the Chair, I ask of my friend from Illinois how important the extension of these energy tax credits is for renewable energy, given the fact that this is not pie-in-the-sky kind of technology we are talking about. As I understand, in my State--and I know there are already three solar powerplants that are functioning--there is a plan in the State of Arizona to put together a 400 or 500-megawatt powerplant that will be powered by the Sun, a 200-megawatt powerplant in the State of California, a whole host of ways in which the Sun can become harnessed for our energy needs.

The same thing is true with respect to wind. As my good friend from Illinois talked about, what is happening in Illinois is happening across America, including in my own home State of Colorado where we have gone from almost no wind production 3 years ago to 1,000 megawatts, and there are three or four coal-fired powerplants in my State.

So how important, I ask my friend from Illinois, would the extension of these tax credits be until 2015, 2016--however we end up finally reaching that number--to continue investing in harnessing the power of the Sun, the power of wind, the power of biofuels?

Mr. DURBIN. I say in response, through the Chair to the Senator from Colorado, if we don't extend these Federal renewable energy tax credits, America could lose 76,000 jobs in the wind industry, 40,000 jobs in the solar industry. The bill the Republicans refuse to allow us to bring to the floor to even debate provides $8.8 billion for research and development investment. This year alone, over 27,000 U.S. businesses would use this tax credit to benefit companies in computers and electronics, chemical manufacturing, information services, and scientific R&D services. The list goes on and on. The Renewable Energy and Job Creation Act, which they would not allow us to bring to the floor to debate this week, includes $18 billion in incentives for clean electricity, alternative transportation fuels, carbon sequestration, and energy efficiency.

I say to my friend from Colorado through the Chair that this is nothing new. So far, during this session of Congress, the Republicans have engaged in 76 filibusters as of today. The record in the Senate for any 2-year period of time was 57 filibusters. A filibuster is every Senator's right to stop any bill, any nomination, for an indefinite period of time, and that filibuster can only be broken if 60 Senators vote to break it. It is called a cloture motion. We tried three times this week to break Republican filibusters, first on a bill dealing with the price of gasoline to try to bring it down and make it more affordable. The Republicans filibustered it. When we had our vote, we couldn't find 60 votes because they wouldn't cross the aisle to join the Democrats in breaking the filibuster and debating specific ways of bringing down the price of gasoline.

We followed that with a measure to deal with, as I have said here, tax incentives for the right energy decisions for our future. The Republicans initiated another filibuster. We called it for a vote. We failed to come up with 60 votes again because we only had nine Republican Senators who would cross--well, I think the number was seven Republican Senators who would cross the aisle and join us. We needed more. Out of 49, we needed about 10 or 15. We didn't get those. So that bill to create incentives for businesses and individuals to make the right energy decisions was defeated by another Republican filibuster.

The last thing we considered was related to another program. It had nothing to do with energy but a lot to do with health care. We wanted to make certain the Medicare Program continued to reimburse the doctors and medical professionals who provide critical care for 40 million elderly and disabled Americans. The Bush administration wants to cut their compensation by 10 percent or more. I think it is unfair. These men and women are not being paid as much as others, and they are providing critical health services to a lot of needy people. The Bush administration, which is no fan of Medicare or Social Security, wanted to cut their reimbursement. Well, they will cut that reimbursement and fewer doctors will participate in the program and seniors will have a more difficult time getting their care.

So we started to bring to the floor a measure that would restore the pay for doctors helping patients under Medicare and we also provided some incentives in there for better practices to reduce overall costs to the Medicare Program. We paid for it by looking at the Medicare Advantage Program. The Medicare Advantage Program allows private insurance companies to offer Medicare benefits. The Republicans have always favored that, saying that creates a competitive atmosphere. Medicare competes against private health insurance when it comes to basic Medicare coverage. As a footnote, it is ironic that they would welcome this kind of competition from Medicare, but fought us tooth and nail when we tried to bring the same competition when it came to prescription drugs. Nevertheless, we said this Medicare Advantage Program costs too much money for the services provided. We have had expert testimony that it is about 13 percent more expensive for private health insurance companies to offer the same benefits as the Medicare Program. We took savings from that program and paid for the increase in pay for doctors under Medicare.

We didn't add to the deficit. I suppose that is why the Republicans, by and large, have turned on us. They don't want to pay for the actions they bring to the floor. They don't want to offset the costs of programs or tax cuts by actually balancing the books. They want to continue to add to our deficit.

The vote came up today, and nine Republicans crossed the aisle to vote for us. Overwhelmingly, they represented Republican Senators who are afraid they are going to lose in the election in November. They came over to join us and vote for our position. The Republican leadership was careful not to let too many come over. So at the end of the day, we were unable to bring this Medicare bill to the floor for debate.

So here we are at the end of a full week of the U.S. Senate, in Washington, DC, in our capital, on Capitol Hill, and we are beset by a world about us in turmoil, with the war in Iraq; we have a nation that is torn by energy prices, gasoline prices, and diesel prices; we have Americans concerned about their health care, and when we try three different times to bring to the floor of the Senate measures that address these challenges, each and every time the Republicans answered with a filibuster and stopped us from acting.

The sad reality is that the GOP, the Grand Old Party, has become a ``Graveyard of Progress.'' I am afraid that is what GOP stands for these days. They cannot face the possibility of change. They are frightened by it, determined to stop it. They have stopped it with 76 filibusters, which is a recordbreaking number of filibusters in the Senate.

Well, we could not come up with 60 votes to turn that around; there are not enough Democratic Senators. The final word will be in the hands of the voters in November, on November 4. They can decide whether they want change in Washington, change in the Senate, or more of the same. They are going to have that opportunity in a series of elections. I hope those who follow this debate and believe this Government, working in a constructive bipartisan way, can achieve good things, will remember that when they go to the polls in November.

Let me say as well, Mr. President, that I have watched this Presidential campaign carefully because my colleague from Illinois, Senator Obama, is now, as they say, the ``presumptive Democratic nominee'' for the Presidential nomination. A long campaign awaits us, almost 5 months. Senator McCain is a substantial and formidable opponent in this election campaign. But make no mistake, the voters are going to have a clear choice in this election about who will represent them in the White House for the next 4 years.

We are also initiating the first national dialog on health care reform in 15 years. For 7 1/2 years, the Bush administration has summarily ignored the major problems facing America. When President Bush gets up in the morning and looks out the window of the White House, all he sees is Iraq. For 7 1/2 years, that has been the focus of his attention and the centerpiece of his energy. I will tell you, there are many other things this President ignored at the peril of our great Nation. His economic policies have brought to us a sorry state.

Last Friday, we had the terrible announcement about a dramatic increase in the price of crude oil, an increase in the price of gasoline, a substantial increase in unemployment, and a 350-point loss in the Dow Jones, in the stock market. It was a sad and gloomy Friday across America from an economic viewpoint. But even those large numbers--the big numbers that come to us at the lead of any newscast and on the front page of the paper don't tell the true and complete story.

The Senator from Vermont invited his constituents to talk about challenges they face as families all across his State. He has told me and our colleagues--and has spoken on the floor about it--that he was overwhelmed by the response. Ordinary people in Vermont--and I am sure those in Illinois are having a tough time--are struggling to pay for gasoline, for the increased cost of food. They understand utility bills are going to be challenging this summer to cool their homes, as we face a brutal summer in most parts of the country. They are scared to death, I know, in New England--because I visited there--of dramatic increases in the cost of home heating oil this winter. Those realities are translating into economic insecurity for some of the hardest working families in America.

If you just could consider what has happened under the Bush administration to the middle of the middle class in America. These are folks who are working hard every day, trying to raise families, are playing by the rules, and they are falling further and further behind. These are the ones, many times, who are losing their homes because of subprime mortgages and deceptions which led them to an indebtedness they could not handle, and now they face the loss of their home, one of their major assets, if not their only asset. They have transferred their debt onto credit cards as often as they can, but they reach a breaking point.

A friend of mine is on the risk committee for a major bank in this country. He told me that the balances on credit cards are going down because people realize they cannot pay any more and they cannot buy things they need. But the default on credit cards is going up, leading to even more bankruptcies. That is the reality.

President Bush doesn't understand that reality. His economic policies, which are supported by John McCain, are really based on one basic principle: cut tax rates for the wealthiest people in America. They continue to believe that if wealthy people have more money, somehow this will translate into a better quality of life for those working families and middle-class families who are struggling to survive. Well, 7 1/2 years of that thinking led us to this point. These people, faced with the Bush economic policies, are struggling to get by.

The President doesn't understand the energy picture. Every 6 months, he makes a trip to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and is seen holding hands with the sheiks of Saudi Arabia, begging them to release more oil into the United States and bring prices down. But they give him a pat on the back and send him off with the very curt answer of ``no.'' They tell him time and again that they are not going to release more oil. They have plenty of customers around the world and they don't need the United States. That is the reality and totality of the Bush energy policy.

This President has yet to call in the CEOs of the major oil companies. In this country, these companies are reporting recordbreaking profits at the expense of families, businesses, farmers, and truckers. This President has yet to call them in and hold them accountable for what I consider to be pure greed when it comes to profit-taking. He won't call them in because, apparently, he believes that is the natural course of events, that some who are in a virtual monopoly position, providing energy and oil to this country, ought to have whatever profits they can reap at whatever cost to America's families and our future. I think the President is wrong.

There is another issue, the issue of health care. We know that under this President, more people have lost health insurance than ever in our history. People who had health insurance lost it because they lost a job or they could no longer afford it. Now they are completely vulnerable to any illness or diagnosis that could bring them down tomorrow and virtually destroy all of the savings they have. The status quo in health care in America isn't satisfactory. The American people know that. Despite President Bush's inaction, they want change.

Premiums for health insurance have been rising more than twice as fast as employees' wages, while this administration has been in power. The number of uninsured Americans has been increasing by more than a million people a year under President Bush. Each year, the United States spends about twice as much for health care per person as other developed nations. The closest nation in spending for health care to the United States per person, per capita, annually, is Luxembourg, which spends less than half of what we do. We spend about $7,000 per year on health care per person. The United States, despite all the money being spent, continues to score poorly on measures of the public's health, such as life expectancy and infant mortality.

The challenge for this country and for the American people is making quality health coverage available and affordable for all Americans. We must take steps to improve quality and make our health care system more efficient so that we can get the greatest value for every health care dollar we spend. We have to put our health care ideas on the table and start the real debate about change.

My colleagues on the other side of the aisle have put forward some ideas on health care reform. I applaud them for acknowledging the need to change, but I am concerned with the direction in which they want to take us.

One of their ideas is to create incentives for more people to buy health insurance in the individual insurance market. Those who support this idea talk about it in glowing terms. Think about it. They say you could choose your own health plan and keep your health plan when you change jobs. But they ignore the most important implication of that idea: You are on your own. Remember President Bush's famous ownership society, the ownership society that wants to privatize Social Security? Thank goodness that was rejected on a bipartisan basis. The model of the ownership society of President Bush and the philosophy behind this thinking is very basic: Just remember, we are all in this alone. That is their notion. It doesn't work. It doesn't work in life. It doesn't work in your family, in your community, or when it comes to health insurance. Anybody in a less-than-perfect health care situation doesn't want to be on their own. It is a place you end up when you have no option.

In most States, insurers are free to tell a person they won't cover them for a particular medical condition. To the cancer survivor, they can say: Congratulations for surviving cancer; we will cover you for everything else that might affect you but not for cancer. Or they can deny coverage altogether. Many of us in this Chamber would have trouble finding health insurance in the individual market, if it were available, and it might be too expensive. This would be a health insurance system the Republicans support that is a great idea for the young, healthy, and the wealthy but not for the rest of America. It would move our health insurance system in the wrong direction.

Those on the other side of the aisle are having trouble responding to these criticisms. They appear unwilling to require insurers to cover everybody, regardless of their health condition, or to require greater sharing of health costs between the young and the old and between the healthy and the sick. That would require Government regulation. They don't like to have the Government involved. They want the market to reach the conclusion. The market has already reached a conclusion when it comes to health care, which is that the cost of health care and coverage will increase every year, and it will cover less every year. That is what the market says, and that is what they accept.

They are caught in a dilemma because the free market insurance system, without reasonable regulation, means allowing health insurers to enroll the healthy and exclude the sick. To get out of this ideological quandary, they have proposed an idea: creating high-risk pools for everybody insurers don't want to cover. Insurers would probably like that idea, to take the people for whom it is most expensive and put them in a separate pool.

Today, high-risk pools exist on a small scale in 34 States. These State high-risk pools can serve as a life preserver for people who have nowhere else to turn in the current health insurance system, but they should not serve as a foundation of a reformed health system.

State high-risk pools have many shortcomings. They are not often able to cover everybody who can't find affordable health insurance. Premiums are way too high. In Illinois's high-risk pool, a 50-year-old woman would have to pay more than $800 a month in premiums for a policy with a $500 deductible. Benefits are often limited. With these shortcomings, I cannot understand how these high-risk pools could be the bedrock of the Republican position when it comes to health care reform.

Some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle also want to allow insurers to choose which State insurance regulations they want to live by. Proponents say this is a way to let all insurers sell insurance nationwide. But if you follow this, you know that doesn't work. Without State regulation and basic State requirements on coverage, there is no guarantee of solvency and no guarantee of coverage when you get sick.

If enacted, these changes would move our system in the wrong direction. Instead of pooling people together, those who are well and those who are sick, to spread the risk, Republicans would have us separate the healthy from those who are not healthy. Instead of helping people with chronic diseases, they are pushed over into high-risk pools with high premiums.

The whole point of expanding health coverage is to make sure you have access to quality, affordable insurance. Changes to our health insurance system that make health insurance cheaper for some but more expensive for others is hardly a solution. We need to create large purchasing pools and offer a wide range of plans. Change the rules for setting premiums so that health costs are shared more broadly between the healthy and the sick. We need to provide a tax credit to businesses that step up and say: We believe the health of our employees is as important as the money we pay them.

We are going to make a sacrifice in our profit taking so that our coverage extends to not only the owners of the company but the employees. That kind of good, responsible civic conduct should be rewarded in our Tax Code.

I am glad we are starting to discuss health care reform again. Nothing is going to happen under this President. We are going to have to just count the days until January 20, 2009, when this President leaves office and another President comes to office, and the American people will then have a real chance for real change.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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