The Senate is convened.

• Propounded a UC to call up and confirm nominations in Executive Session. (without objection)
• Today --
  • We will have morning business.
  • We will have no role call votes today.

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "the final cost of the plan is unclear, but the potential consequences of inaction are no. this proposal was designed to contain a spreading in prices and urgent action is needed. that's why republicans are are resistant -- have resisted the impulse to add permanent tax relief and other aid to families an business that's we believe is critical to the long-term health of our nation's economy and we ask our colleagues across the aisle to show similar restraint so whatever action we take can be done quickly and in time to make a real difference."
• Spoke in honor of a soldier who passed in Afghanistan.

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "we will not let haste abandon good judgment in the process. the bush administration's called on congress to rubber-stamp its bill and legislation without serious debate or efforts to improve it. we can't let that happen"
  • SUMMARY "democrats believe that there should be protection for the taxpayers who are footing the bill for this legislation. that begins with more oversight, more transparency, more accountability and more controls to prevent conflicts of interest. democrats believe that there should be limits on compensation for executives of companies who benefit from this legislation so that the american people don't see their tax dollars spent on exorbitant corporate pay and even golden parachutes"
  • SUMMARY "democratic and republican presidents who serve before president bush all understood that demanding accountability from the financial sector is not somehow anticapitalist. just the opposite. it maintains balance, protects taxpayers and keeps our economy running smoothly. but the greed-fueled bush-cheney administration thought they knew better. they put cronies and ideologues in charge of our most critical regulatory agencies, people who disdain government oversight of any kind and systematically put wall street ahead of main street"
• Spoke on the Package of Held Bills.
  • SUMMARY ". we all know the senate is not used for speed. that's the way the founding fathers have set this up. but what has happened is really ridiculous. senate rules give rights to the minorities, as they should. even individual senators. the senate rules sometimes make things move slowly and don't allow the majority to run roughshod over the minority, and i agree with that. these rules promote bipartisanship. they promote a deliberate process. they promote policies with broad support throughout the country."
  • SUMMARY "because otherwise one senator is saying, i know best, and that's what's happened here, i know better than the committee, i know better than the congress, i know better than the senate, i know better than the broad bipartisan rules. senate rules are about centerrism. not egocenterrism. it used to be if one senator was trying abuse the ruled, his or her congress would set them straight"
  • SUMMARY "now i'm being asked to wait until 6:30 or 7:00 until he shows up. holding up the entire senate, holding up the passage of these bills, mr. president. these bills aren't just naming of courthouses. these are bills dealing with the christopher reeves paralysis, stroke victims, setting up a registry for lou gehrig's disease."
  • SUMMARY "but in all cases, the spending decisions are made through the budget and appropriations. not through the authorizing process. unfortunately, pecky things like facts -- pesky things like the facts and truth are not an obstacle. if you repeat a lie enough, the old play book, then gullible people believe it but facts are facts and truth is truth."
• Propounded a UC to call up and pass Calendar #894, the package of held bills. (Kyl objected on behalf of Coburn)
  • SUMMARY "you cannot blame senator coburn alone because there has been complicit with these people on this side of the aisle, allowing him to do this. it is shameful. there is no other way to say it. everyone knows this does not cost a single penny."
• Propounded a UC to call up and pass all health related measure in the package of held bills (Kyl objected on behalf of Coburn)

• Responded.
  • SUMMARY "some of these bills, there are eight of them that senator coburn has said let's just pass them right now. we don't have to go through the whole rigmarole of filing cloture and 30 hours of debate and all of the things that the majority leader talked about. one or two is on the list that he just mentioned. there are eight in total. so i would just note that it boils down to a take it or leave it, either all 35 or none, whereas senator coburn's view is that some of those bills could be passed without the necessity of filing cloture."

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "we must act with resolve, but we cannot be a rubber stamp for the administration's proposal. this proposal gives sweeping authority to those who were asleep at the switch in the first place. remember the fed? remember the maestro at the fed and who points down interest rates? and now have helped create the housing bubble?"
  • SUMMARY "are there better so let me be clear, i do believe that we need to act promptly but with safeguards. we need to act with resolve, but we need to have regulation and even retribution. if we have stabilization, which i believe we must do, we must also have reform. "
  • SUMMARY "i'm tired of creating or seeing this laxity where what emerges when we deregulate is the emergence of sharks and whales. either way, the minnows get swallowed up. well, i think we don't want our economy to sink, and i think it is time to swim."

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "address the issues that were in play and the policies that were in play that allowed this massive financial crisis to emerge. and they also are interested, as the senior senator from maryland pointed out, in preventing those who have contributed to the problem and benefitting from it to unjustly enrich themselves as we sort these things out. we are seeing in this proposal the possibility of a huge transfer of power to the executive branch. and not simply to the executive branch, but to one official in the executive branch with very few strings attached. the individual whose career i respect still is in a situation where he spent that career in the markets. we are going to empower this individual and the department of the treasury to get directly involved in the stock market in a discretionary way that has very little precedent in our history, and at the same time there are potential conflicts of ! interest that are unavoidable and need to be examined."
  • SUMMARY "the administration is asking for an unprecedented rescue, and that rescue cannot come without a fixing of the system. equally importantly, there should be guarantees in any legislation voted out of here that address the issue of executive compensation."

• On the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "i mentioned earlier that executive compensation in our country is wildly out of control in terms of our own history and in terms of what's going on in the rest of the world. i do not believe it is punitive or unreasonable to ask for a fair measure when tax dollars are being used to help bail these companies out."
  • SUMMARY "i would say to the senator from illinois, when we use the word punitive, there are so many people in this country teaching school or out driving a truck somewhere who will have to pay more taxes for this who don't have the benefit of owning stock, they will have to pay a penalty for the misfeasance that has brought us to this situation and if the administration and secretary paulson and others truly want to solve this problem, and i think they do, then they ought to be able to yield on this point."
  • SUMMARY "we want to make sure that there is no conflict of interest. the decisions are made by those who nothing, no skin in the game, no investment in the decision, and there has to be at least subject to some review, there's no one in this country, thank goodness, above the law, and, yet, in the proposal given to us by the treasury department, there is no judicial or administrative review of decisions being made"

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "we must act with resolve, but we cannot be a rubber stamp for the administration's proposal. this proposal gives sweeping authority to those who were asleep at the switch in the first place. remember the fed? remember the maestro at the fed and who points down interest rates? and now have helped create the housing bubble?"
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "are there better so let me be clear, i do believe that we need to act promptly but with safeguards. we need to act with resolve, but we need to have regulation and even retribution. if we have stabilization, which i believe we must do, we must also have reform. "
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "i'm tired of creating or seeing this laxity where what emerges when we deregulate is the emergence of sharks and whales. either way, the minnows get swallowed up. well, i think we don't want our economy to sink, and i think it is time to swim."

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "address the issues that were in play and the policies that were in play that allowed this massive financial crisis to emerge. and they also are interested, as the senior senator from maryland pointed out, in preventing those who have contributed to the problem and benefitting from it to unjustly enrich themselves as we sort these things out. we are seeing in this proposal the possibility of a huge transfer of power to the executive branch. and not simply to the executive branch, but to one official in the executive branch with very few strings attached. the individual whose career i respect still is in a situation where he spent that career in the markets. we are going to empower this individual and the department of the treasury to get directly involved in the stock market in a discretionary way that has very little precedent in! our history, and at the same time there are potential conflicts of interest that are unavoidable and need to be examined."
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "the administration is asking for an unprecedented rescue, and that rescue cannot come without a fixing of the system. equally importantly, there should be guarantees in any legislation voted out of here that address the issue of executive compensation."

• On the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "i mentioned earlier that executive compensation in our country is wildly out of control in terms of our own history and in terms of what's going on in the rest of the world. i do not believe it is punitive or unreasonable to ask for a fair measure when tax dollars are being used to help bail these companies out."
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "i would say to the senator from illinois, when we use the word punitive, there are so many people in this country teaching school or out driving a truck somewhere who will have to pay more taxes for this who don't have the benefit of owning stock, they will have to pay a penalty for the misfeasance that has brought us to this situation and if the administration and secretary paulson and others truly want to solve this problem, and i think they do, then they ought to be able to yield on this point."
  • SUMMARY SUMMARY "we want to make sure that there is no conflict of interest. the decisions are made by those who nothing, no skin in the game, no investment in the decision, and there has to be at least subject to some review, there's no one in this country, thank goodness, above the law, and, yet, in the proposal given to us by the treasury department, there is no judicial or administrative review of decisions being made"

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "i have to say at outset for those of us who have been here so many years, this is an eerie resemblance to something i have seen before. we were told by this administration in october before an election that we had to give to the president of the united states the authority to invade iraq."
  • SUMMARY "why should i worry about conflict of interest? have we had any conflicts of interest with the war in iraq? let me think for a moment. does the word halliburton spring to mind? these contracts for billions of dollars that shortchanged the troops and our taxpayers."
  • SUMMARY "i'm not going to diminish the power of the entrepreneurial spirit but they can get carried away. we saw it happen with the savings and loan crisis and the subprime mortgage crisis. it has happened before and may happen again. i'm disappointed that senator mccain in the past took that position."

• Propounded a UC to call up and pass en bloc a series of measures. (without objection)
• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "this administration has been reckless in how it managed the government's finances and it has been reckless in how it managed its responsibility to ensure a strong, stable, financial system. this administration acted as if the rules don't apply anymore. loopholes here. loopholes there. don't use the regulations you have. it permitted large financial institutions to run amok, to turn the economy into a gambling hall playing with funny money and now in the 11th hour, the house managers, bernanke and paulson, have finally been asked to step in to shut the game down."
  • SUMMARY "for companies that receive assistance, there should be some kinds of limits based on dividends. key executives should have a look-back provision placed on their compensation, and there should be a prohibiting of these golden parachutes."
  • SUMMARY "we also have to make sure going forward that the appropriate financial regulations are in place, that these loopholes are closed. there should be changes in corporate governments to intrude -- to improve the independence of corporate boards and to reduce reckless behavior. there should be limits on speculative behavior."

• Spoke on Shawn Johnson.
• Spoke on drug policy.
  • SUMMARY "in 2006, there were 107 reported cases of child abuse where meth was manufactured in the presence of a minor. due to the shocking number of children that were being victimized by drugs in one form or another, i joined my colleagues in supporting a bill called the drug endangered children's act of 2005. this bipartisan legislation established a national grant program to support state drug-endangered children's programs"
  • SUMMARY "the federal penalties are doubled or if it's a repeat offense, tripled. and a mandatory minimum of at least one year must also apply. however, this penalty applies only to someone who actually sells drugs to someone under 21 years of age. the saving kids from dangerous drug act as amended in the judiciary committee would expand the circumstances under which these enhanced penalties apply to cover the entire operation. under our bill, the enhanced penalties that already exist, would already apply to anyone over 18 years of age who knowingly, or intentionally, manufactures, creates, distributes, dispenses, or possesses a schedule one or schedule two controlled substance that has been combined with a candy product"

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "mr. president, the current financial crisis facing our country should, in fact, put an end to almost any support for the extreme right-wing economic policies that president bush has been pursuing for the last eight years. an, in fact, were pursued even before that. these policies include, of course, huge tax breaks for the very rich under the guise that that money will trickle on down to ordinary people and create a prosperous nation. that certainly has not been the case. those policies include unfettered free trade"
  • SUMMARY "mr. president, when we talk about the reasons for the possible need of a bailout, we cannot minimize the greed, the ugly greed that we have seen among many of the wealthiest people in this country in the last few years. not least of all the people on wall street"
  • SUMMARY "why do i raise those issues and give those facts? i do that for a very simple reason and that is that i regard it as an outrage for anyone to suggest that the middle class of this country, whose standard of living is going down, should be forced to bail out wall street when people on wall street have made huge, huge amounts of money in recent years. and in general, as a result of bush's reckless and irresponsible economic policies, the wealthiest people have also done extraordinarily well"

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "i'd like to know why we can't slow down a little by the and think this thing through. that's the tradition of the senate, the saucer that cools. but we're hearing it's a crisis rs and you politic politicians will -- you politicians will just mess this up. we'll take care of it. but that imlicts the separation of powers to an extraordinary degree, i think, and may well be adverse in the long run. the proposal certainly was not greeted by wall street today as an indication of a solid fix."
  • SUMMARY "in a fundamental sense, the goals that i believe we should have would be, first, to protect the interest of the taxpayers before we spend in a matter of days an amount of money equal to and in excess of the war in iraq, almost one-third of our annual expenditures. so let's protect the taxpayers. how do we do that? we need to find out more about the problems. we're told there are great problems, problems, problems. and we've got to act, act, act. exactly what are those problems that require us to act so fast? and, secondly, i think our actions should be respectful of the marketplace, and let's try to do things that would restore our integrity in the marketplace"

• Performed wrap up.
• Moved to proceed to S. 3297, the Package of Held Bills.
• Tomorrow --
  • We will convene at 10:00 AM.
  • We will recess from 12:30 PM to 2:15 PM
  • We will have one hour of morning business.
  • We will proceed to the consideration of H.R. 6049, tax extenders.
  • We will consider up three amendments.
  • We expect votes tomorrow morning.

The Senate Stands in recess until 10:00 AM tomorrow.

• Spoke on Shawn Johnson.
• Spoke on drug policy.
  • SUMMARY "in 2006, there were 107 reported cases of child abuse where meth was manufactured in the presence of a minor. due to the shocking number of children that were being victimized by drugs in one form or another, i joined my colleagues in supporting a bill called the drug endangered children's act of 2005. this bipartisan legislation established a national grant program to support state drug-endangered children's programs"
  • SUMMARY "the federal penalties are doubled or if it's a repeat offense, tripled. and a mandatory minimum of at least one year must also apply. however, this penalty applies only to someone who actually sells drugs to someone under 21 years of age. the saving kids from dangerous drug act as amended in the judiciary committee would expand the circumstances under which these enhanced penalties apply to cover the entire operation. under our bill, the enhanced penalties that already exist, would already apply to anyone over 18 years of age who knowingly, or intentionally, manufactures, creates, distributes, dispenses, or possesses a schedule one or schedule two controlled substance that has been combined with a candy product"

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "mr. president, the current financial crisis facing our country should, in fact, put an end to almost any support for the extreme right-wing economic policies that president bush has been pursuing for the last eight years. an, in fact, were pursued even before that. these policies include, of course, huge tax breaks for the very rich under the guise that that money will trickle on down to ordinary people and create a prosperous nation. that certainly has not been the case. those policies include unfettered free trade"
  • SUMMARY "mr. president, when we talk about the reasons for the possible need of a bailout, we cannot minimize the greed, the ugly greed that we have seen among many of the wealthiest people in this country in the last few years. not least of all the people on wall street"
  • SUMMARY "why do i raise those issues and give those facts? i do that for a very simple reason and that is that i regard it as an outrage for anyone to suggest that the middle class of this country, whose standard of living is going down, should be forced to bail out wall street when people on wall street have made huge, huge amounts of money in recent years. and in general, as a result of bush's reckless and irresponsible economic policies, the wealthiest people have also done extraordinarily well"

• Spoke on the economic relief package.
  • SUMMARY "i'd like to know why we can't slow down a little by the and think this thing through. that's the tradition of the senate, the saucer that cools. but we're hearing it's a crisis rs and you politic politicians will -- you politicians will just mess this up. we'll take care of it. but that imlicts the separation of powers to an extraordinary degree, i think, and may well be adverse in the long run. the proposal certainly was not greeted by wall street today as an indication of a solid fix."
  • SUMMARY "in a fundamental sense, the goals that i believe we should have would be, first, to protect the interest of the taxpayers before we spend in a matter of days an amount of money equal to and in excess of the war in iraq, almost one-third of our annual expenditures. so let's protect the taxpayers. how do we do that? we need to find out more about the problems. we're told there are great problems, problems, problems. and we've got to act, act, act. exactly what are those problems that require us to act so fast? and, secondly, i think our actions should be respectful of the marketplace, and let's try to do things that would restore our integrity in the marketplace"

• Performed wrap up.
• Moved to proceed to S. 3297, the Package of Held Bills.
• Tomorrow --
  • We will convene at 10:00 AM.
  • We will recess from 12:30 PM to 2:15 PM.
  • We will have one hour of morning business.
  • We will proceed to the consideration of H.R. 6049, tax extenders.
  • We will consider three amendments.
  • We expect votes tomorrow morning.

The Senate Stands in recess until 10:00 AM tomorrow.