I would certainly be willing on the first amendment to sit down with the Senator to see if there is an unemployment extension that can be agreed to. I think it is something we need to do. I think there is a willingness on our side to have…

My understanding is that third amendment is not a tax-related amendment and would be appropriate to be offered, for example, if you wanted to, on the homeland security bill or another piece of legislation that is coming through. So there…

The second amendment is highly controversial and would be an amendment that would surely sink any possibility of this legislation being passed.

Reclaiming my time, I will read to you the provisions of this legislation on what the money is expended for. No. 1, it talks about $2.6 billion of this legislation is a nonitemized or charitable deduction. It is not for religious…

this year, we did not wait passively for September to arrive; we began preparing weeks ago to greet this month with offerings of memorial in hand. At services across the Commonwealth and in remembrances around the country, last fall's…

I rise briefly to express my disappointment and dismay at what is going on in the neighboring State to Pennsylvania--New Jersey. What we are seeing play out in New Jersey is not something that, as an elected official, I find particularly…

yes, the House does have a budget, but the Senate does not. The Senate's top line number is higher than the House's. That is why we go through the budget process, so that we can have agreement between the two bodies on the top line number…

one quick comment about being stalled. I suggest that in defense of my colleagues in the House--and I try to be a defender of them in the Senate--I suspect one of the reasons is that we don't have a budget. It is very hard to mark up…

I rise to talk about a plan that is being discussed here in the Halls of the Senate and a very important plan in this time of economic recovery when we are looking at the 1-year anniversary a week ago of September 11 and the tragedy that…

The American public is demanding health care insurance. The Patients' Bill of Rights dramatically increased the cost of health insurance. If we are interested in what the American public is demanding, it is lower health insurance bills…

I, too, like Senator Specter, am very proud tonight to praise the nomination of Brooks Smith to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals and to congratulate the President on an excellent nominee. I certainly urge all of my colleagues on both…

it is a proud moment for me to speak on behalf of Joy Flowers Conti. I had the privilege of practicing with her as a lawyer in Pittsburgh. She is an outstanding litigator and outstanding person in the community, and I am very grateful that…

I congratulate Kit Conner from outside of Harrisburg, PA, for filling the vacancy in the Middle District. Judge Conner is one of six members from Pennsylvania who are on the Executive Calendar in the Senate. Including him, there are five…

Mr. President I am pleased to introduce legislation along with my colleague Senator Specter to establish a one dollar silver coin that will benefit the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, PA. As the first national center of its…

So it would come in here under the Dorgan amendment, reimportation, not being reviewed by the FDA before it came here? Only if we found out the terrorist attack was successful through this scheme would we then find out that we have a…

That is important because another provision of the Canadian system is that the price may not increase more than the consumer price index. They fix prices even after they have set them in place. The prices of drugs are going up. The…

I must respectfully disagree with my colleague's assertion on that point, for it is factually incorrect, although a commonly cited myth. According to recent findings by NDC Health, a health care information company, the pharmaceutical…

I have a question. Listening to your comments, are you suggesting that a product made in Iraq or Yemen or Iran or some other country that may have terrorists in their country, they could actually send a drug through Canada into the United…

Should the American public, through its pricing system, free market pricing system of drugs, continue to subsidize the rest of the world in pharmaceutical research? If the answer is no, we need to state that. If the answer is, no, we don't…

Let me explain to you exactly how that process works. It is not a free market. They cannot set their prices. They have to negotiate with a board, and it is called the Patented Medicines Price Review Board. That board sets the prices in…

We are creating a loophole that allows any foreign country to go through Canada to import drugs into the United States. And the Canadian Government doesn't even inspect it and does not even open it. It can come right in here.

That is why we have Customs inspectors and FDA inspectors, who do, in fact, monitor things coming into this country for purposes that are fundamentally different. When you are talking about pharmaceutical products, that is a fundamentally…

Not to mention all the hundreds or thousands of compounds that were even tried to be researched, and they ended up where they decided: No, we are not even producing a drug that could be sought for approval.

There are enormous implications if we allow the Canadian Government to deny and basically say to the company: Either take it at this price or we will go ahead and manufacture it ourselves. By the way, once they license it in Canada, the…

I know we can work together in a bipartisan way to manufacture as many appropriations bills as possible between now and the August break. I know the Appropriations Committee has begun to churn out these bills in marathon sessions. That is…