Supporting poultry industry is vital to region’s economy

As America emerges from the worst recession in decades, we must continue to work to create jobs and grow businesses. On the Delmarva Peninsula, agriculture presents an opportunity to do both.

Agriculture is a pillar of the Delmarva economy, and 80 percent of this industry is poultry-related. In Delaware, poultry is a $3.2 billion industry, employing more than 13,000 people.

Sussex County, the birthplace of that industry, leads the U.S. in broiler production, producing more than 200 million birds annually. Despite this heritage, chickens can be raised and processed almost anywhere. It’s imperative for us to implement policies to keep this vital industry thriving on Delmarva and to support farmers in being good environmental stewards.

As part of this effort, we held a summit in January in Delmar to explore ways to grow our region’s poultry economy. Participants included Delaware’s congressional delegation and Maryland Sens. Barbara Mikulski and Ben Cardin; poultry industry leaders; growers and trade associations; scientists; and state and local officials. The growers had a simple question for us: “Do you want us here?” We write today in part to answer: “Yes, we do!” We’re dedicated to fighting for poultry’s future on the peninsula.

To win that fight, we have focused on four critical areas: exports, employment, energy and the environment. Fortunately, exports have grown 90 percent during the past five years. One in five chickens grown in America is exported. Additionally, Congress and President Barack Obama approved free trade agreements last October with South Korea, Panama and Colombia, leveling the playing field for American workers, farmers and businesses disadvantaged by unfair tariffs and trade practices. Lower tariffs will help Delmarva’s poultry companies sell more products overseas, generating an additional $10 million or more per year in export revenue. We’re also working to reduce trade barriers in China, Russia and India while improving access for U.S. poultry products in promising markets like countries in Africa. Vigilant oversight of abusive trade practices by competitors is critical to further expanding our poultry industry, and we commend the administration’s focus on export promotion and trade enforcement.

A skilled and reliable workforce is also essential to poultry businesses. Without an adequate workforce, Delmarva companies will be more likely to move to other states. We must ensure that employees possess skills to succeed while companies identify how to make this often difficult work more appealing.

Rising corn prices, which have increased 75 percent since June 2010 as demands for food and corn-based ethanol have increased, present another major challenge for the industry. Thankfully, companies like DuPont are developing technologies to help us to feed and fuel ourselves. These innovations will dramatically improve corn yields and increase the efficiency of corn as a feedstock for poultry. Additionally, as we transition from a biofuels supply that relies on corn-based ethanol to one that predominately consists of advanced and cellulosic biofuels not made from kernels of corn, we will further reduce demands on corn. Government can help bring next-generation biofuels to market by ensuring our tax policies and research dollars — along with government purchasing power and regulations — support these efforts.

While we’re advancing agriculture’s capacity, we must be mindful of this industry’s impact on our environment. Chicken litter disposal impacts regional land, air and water quality. Fortunately, much of the industry embraces its responsibility as an environmental steward. Through our Nutrient Management Commission, established in 1999, Delaware is a national leader in employing shared responsibility to develop and implement best practices to ensure the use of poultry litter as fertilizer is appropriate and safe.

Like many American industries, poultry has struggled recently due to challenges including the economic downturn, rising feed costs, increasing labor costs and anti-American trade practices. Despite this adversity, the industry endures and is poised to rebound stronger than ever.

The answer to the question of whether the poultry industry is welcome in Delmarva is a resounding “absolutely!” We will continue to work to address the challenges facing producers and seize opportunities to grow Delmarva’s poultry industry. Agriculture is more than a pillar of our state’s past, present and future economy. It’s a way of life we must nurture so it can help feed millions in America and around the world.

This op-ed appeared in The Wilmington News Journal

Support the Future of American Innovation

Innovation has long been the spark that powers entrepreneurship and job creation in this country, and behind nearly every innovation are two of my favorite words: research and development. After all, it’s through R&D that ideas become innovations, that innovations become products and that products transform industries.

Over the past three decades, the research and development tax credit has helped tens of thousands of successful American companies create jobs by incentivizing investment in innovation. There is little doubt that it has strengthened our economy and deserves to be made permanent. But with America’s global manufacturing competitiveness at stake, it’s time Congress shows the same type of support for entrepreneurs and young companies.

Small and startup businesses are driving our nation’s economic recovery and creating jobs by taking risks to turn their ideas into marketable products. Over the past few decades, firms that were younger than five years old were responsible for the overwhelming majority of new jobs in this country.

There are plenty of federal programs designed to help traditional small businesses — retail stores, service providers, restaurants and others — grow from employing one person to employing 10 people, but how do we help the “gazelle” companies reach their potential and grow from employing five people to employing 50? Or 500? Or 5,000? 

For these innovators to grow and create jobs, we have to support them in their critical early stages.

This summer, I hosted a series of roundtables with business owners in Delaware, and after listening to the owners of young, innovative companies describe their struggle to capitalize on their ideas, it was clear that finding a way to help them was an economic imperative.

The tax code is a powerful tool in the government’s toolbox, but tax credits can’t help emerging companies that don’t yet have tax liabilities. That takes the R&D tax credit off the table for countless promising startups and small businesses. 

For the past few months, I’ve been working with experts and business leaders on an idea to create a new small-business “innovation credit” that would help those young companies. The idea has evolved since April when I introduced it in my first bill as a Senator, the Job Creation Through Innovation Act. The innovation credit would make the R&D tax credit tradable so that certain startups that aren’t yet profitable could sell their tax credit to a larger company. 

Take, for example, Elcriton — a small but growing Delaware company that has patented strains of bacteria designed to consume duckweed (common pond scum) and produce biobutanol. It has tremendous potential for job creation. The company is run by two Ph.D.s who put all the money they could raise into early R&D but need more capital to continue to grow the company. 

Elcriton might qualify for the R&D tax credit if it was already an established company, but because it hasn’t yet turned a profit (like the overwhelming majority of high-tech startups), it’s out of luck.

Enter the tradable credit.

Fortunately, Delaware is also home to many great, well-established companies, and because those companies turn a profit and pay taxes, they could actually use a tax credit. So Elcriton sells its tradable credit to one of those larger, established companies (in Delaware or anywhere else in the country). The bigger company gets the tax credit, and the newer company gets the infusion of cash it needs to sustain its innovation. 

It creates a win-win situation that will help create the next generation of American manufacturing jobs without focusing on a particular industry.

We can’t let tough economic times slow down the power of American ingenuity, especially when history has taught us that now is exactly the time we need to be investing in our innovators. More than half of our Fortune 500 companies were launched during a recession or bear market, so a small business founded this year could become the next General Electric or DuPont if it gets the support it needs.

Congress needs to confront this challenge with the same type of creativity and ingenuity that entrepreneurs bring to their own companies. We can build the next generation of American manufacturing by investing in American innovators today.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) is a member of the Budget Committee.

Partisan Paralysis in Washington Must Stop

My first few days in Washington as Delaware’s junior senator were largely split between the classroom and the cloakroom.

I would routinely go from orientation sessions with other new Senators straight to votes on the floor, living the contrast between the way we believe things ought to be and the way things are.

The post-election lame duck session reinforced the tension of that push and pull, laying the groundwork for the 112th Congress — which started Wednesday — that I and many of my colleagues worry will grind to an unproductive standstill right out of the gate.

While there were some remarkable achievements in the concluding weeks of the 111th Congress — healthcare for 9/11 first responders, the New START treaty, and the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell among them — not enough was done to address the most important issue facing Americans today: getting people back to work.

There can be no higher priority for the Senate than finding ways to stimulate job creation in the United States. With unemployment at 9.8 percent and the federal deficit set to eclipse $14 trillion, it is critical that this new Congress focus on job creation, rein-in expenditures, and widen the tax base — getting people off of unemployment and into the workforce.

The contentious debate over the extension of President Bush’s tax cuts during the lame duck session resulted in a package that did not go nearly far enough to address job creation but reflected — at least in part — a necessarily pragmatic approach to the immediate challenges Americans face.

The Sunday before the vote on that package, I was volunteering at a community event in North Wilmington. A friend came and sat down next to me.

She told me that most people didn’t realize it, but that her husband was laid off a year before and was still constantly searching for work. They had two young children and a mortgage, and they were hanging on by just a thread — and that thread was fraying. Unemployment insurance was the only thing preventing them from losing their home. She hated the idea of extending tax breaks for millionaires, but for her it was much more pragmatic than a political debate — for her, it was about keeping her family together.

My vote came down to an assessment of risk. I trusted the advice of the economists who lined up to say that letting the tax cuts expire on the middle class (and failing to extend unemployment insurance) would have a negative impact on our economy and would destroy thousands of American families — including that of my friend in Wilmington.

It was too great a risk NOT to act.

The final version of the deal President Obama and Vice President negotiated did have some very positive measures. Measures like the 13-month extension of unemployment insurance, extension of the research and development tax credit, and others that will help create jobs.

To say it comes at a high cost, though, is an understatement. The nearly $1 trillion in additional debt our nation will have to take on to pay for this will have to be addressed by this Congress, as will how we got here.

Too much legislation was left for dead because a week of floor time was needed to overcome the threat of a Republican filibuster, resulting in a troubling number of bills passed by the House with bipartisan support left unconsidered by the Senate.

This partisan political paralysis has to stop.

The tension between the way things ought to be and the way things are is never clearer than on those days when I commute to and from Washington.

When I’m back here in Delaware I get to meet with lots of folks who are working hard to grow their businesses and put more of their neighbors back to work. Far from the rhetoric of the policy debates that dominate the national news, these are the people on the front line of our state’s steady efforts to rebuild our workforce.

By putting job creation front and center, the new Congress can make real strides toward restoring our economy and making the way things are the way they ought to be.

This op-ed appeared in The Wilmington News Journal.

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Government can lay groundwork for innovation

There is no doubt that America is in a jobs crisis, and while there should be no higher priority for Congress than creating and finding jobs for our neighbors who are currently out of work, we must also make sure we’re cultivating the ideas that will power the American economy a year, a decade, and a generation from now.

Innovation is an economic imperative.

For decades, manufacturing jobs have been a reliable path to the middle class for millions of hard-working American families, but that path is not nearly as wide as it was just ten years ago. Since then, our nation has lost more than three million manufacturing jobs. As plants shut down, communities are flooded with skilled workers forced to take lower paying, unskilled jobs — oftentimes two or three of them — just to make ends meet.

The reality is that we’re not going to be able to reopen all the plants that have closed and get those workers back on the assembly lines making the same products. Instead, we can pursue a new manufacturing agenda — one that will help entrepreneurs to create innovative businesses that will open new plants and hire American workers for skilled and sustainable jobs.

While labor-driven commodity manufacturing may have moved to the developing world, we can still remain a world leader in innovative and high-performance manufacturing — as we are today in industries ranging from aircraft to pharmaceuticals.

The innovations of today will be built in the factories of tomorrow.

Finding ways to make things better, quicker, and more efficiently is just part of who we are as Americans, but research and discovery take patience and investment. While Congress does not directly create jobs, it can help create an environment that supports inventive companies so they remain competitive.

Supporting American innovation calls for a long-term strategy that includes educating a workforce for the demands of a cutting-edge economy, directing investment to advanced research, and providing targeted tax credits to the companies that are on the verge of the next groundbreaking product, service, and processes.

If innovation is the engine that drives our economy, then investment is the fuel that powers the engine. Now isn’t the time to be starving the engine.

The government has played a critical role in fostering innovation throughout our nation’s history. Nearly every component of the iPad, for example — one of the most transformative consumer products in a generation — can be traced back to federally funded research. Tiny microchips, accelerometers, the global positioning system, and scratch-resistant glass are all available to Apple today because forward-looking legislators recognized that federal investments in research could eventually have significant impacts on our economy.

Federal investment in research at the University of Delaware is currently supporting an investigation of disease pathways; the development of newer, stronger magnets; and advanced work in chemistry, biological sciences, marine biosciences, and materials science and engineering. It is even helping develop and build a massive neutrino telescope at the South Pole. Any one of them could result in breakthroughs that facilitate the development of new technologies and products to power the new economy.

The inventor of the laser wasn’t trying to invent CD players, barcode scanners or laser scalpels, but none of those would exist — nor would the jobs building and supporting them — without his work. Even GPS wasn’t invented on its own; what eventually became GPS was a series of scientific discoveries that were completely unrelated.

Investments in the research of today are investments in the jobs of tomorrow. Our nation’s economic recovery depends largely on the strength of American innovation, and at this critical moment, we simply cannot afford to starve our economy of the investment it needs.

The op-ed appeared in The News Journal.

National Guard gets its seat at the table

Last week, the Senate passed legislation to give the Chief of the National Guard Bureau a seat on the Joint Chiefs of Staff. I strongly supported the measure, and worked for much of my first year in the Senate to help build bipartisan support that reflected not only the immense respect the citizen soldiers of this nation have earned, but the extraordinary potential they have for enhancing our national security.

Though the courage of members of the National Guard is no less respected than the other branches, and the sacrifice of their families is every bit as great, passing the legislation was not about rewarding extraordinary service. Rather, it was about recognizing what we need to do for our future in order to keep our country safe. It was about bringing to bear every resource we have for the defense of this nation.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff are the top military advisers to the president and to the Secretary of Defense. They are responsible for making sure our military is prepared for every threat to our national security, but as those threats tilt toward the asymmetric, so must our military planning.

The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have begun a fundamental transformation of our military, shifting away from a posture designed to counter Soviet aggression in Europe toward a posture that confronts new threats to American lives and interests.

Writing in a report for the Center for New American Security last year, retired Gen. Gordon Sullivan described the National Guard as at a crossroads: “Down one path lies continued transformation into a 21stcentury operational force and progress on the planning, budgetary and management reforms still required to make that aspiration a reality. Down the other path lies regression to a Cold War-style strategic force meant only to be used as a last resort in the event of major war.”

There was a clear choice, and this week, the Senate made it, taking what I believe is a significant step toward strengthening our national security.

When national defense solely meant fighting our enemies abroad, the current organizational strategy made sense. But now that we are more likely to have to simultaneously defend against threats to America’s national security here on American shores, we need the National Guard to have a seat at the table. We need the National Guard’s resources and capabilities to be a first line consideration that matches its first-line mandate.

Here in Delaware, the 31st Civil Support Team is the tip of the spear of the military response to a chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear attack. Following closely behind police, fire and EMS services, our CST would diagnose the threat, inform and update the chain of command, and prepare the affected area to receive a response by larger military units.

When the Joint Chiefs sit down to plan for a biological attack on this country, they need someone at the table who fully understands the mission of units like the 31st Civil Support Team, whose members are full-time Guard, but are not active- duty military.

One area that needs more thought by the Joint Chiefs is the important role the Guard can play in cyber security — an area where most threats are decidedly asymmetric.

The Delaware Air National Guard’s 166th Network Warfare Squadron is already playing a key role in our nation’s defensive and offensive cyber capability working with U.S. Cyber Command, but its potential as a bridge between the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security, between federal and state governments, and between the public and private sectors has barely been considered outside of a few circles. Determining what unique role the Guard can play in cyber security to create a more robust, more flexible defense-in-depth is just one of the new ideas I believe the chief of the National Guard Bureau can bring to the planning process.

The men and women of the National Guard bring extraordinary capabilities to our armed forces, and because of the Senate’s actions this week, I know that our military will be better prepared for new and emerging threats to our nation.

The op-ed appeared in The Delaware State News.

In Repealing DOMA, Progress is a Great Victory

As the Senate Judiciary Committee takes up the Respect for Marriage Act today, we mark a major milestone on the path to equality for all American families. And while the Respect for Marriage Act may not become law during this Congress, take a moment to think about how far we’ve come in the 15 years since the Senate passed the Defense of Marriage Act.

It speaks volumes that 11 senators who voted for DOMA in 1996 now proudly count themselves as cosponsors of its repeal.

Progress is a great victory here, and equality advocates have a lot to be proud of today.

We’re just not quite there yet on the Respect for Marriage Act. Even if we could break a Republican filibuster in the Senate, the bill certainly would not survive the House of Representatives.

That’s not a reason to be sad today — it’s a reason to redouble our efforts to show that the love and commitment shared by same-sex couples is of equal value as that shared by heterosexual couples.

This is a different country than it was in 1996 when the Defense of Marriage Act was passed, and momentum is very much on our side.

When Americans were polled on marriage equality this spring, it showed for the first time that more people favor marriage equality than oppose it.

When Senator Carl Levin (D-Mich.) signed on as a cosponsor of the Respect for Marriage Act last month, he became the 30th cosponsor of Senator Dianne Feinstein’s DOMA repeal bill.

When the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was finally implemented in September, it capped an extraordinary 18-year effort.

When 13 U.S. senators — myself among them — came together this spring to record an “It Gets Better” video urging bullied teens not to give up, they pledged to work tirelessly for equality.

There is no question that we’ll get there eventually. DOMA will be repealed. And when it is, I predict it will be by a bipartisan majority in both Houses of Congress. But DOMA is merely a symptom of the problem each of us who advocates for equality is trying to fix. We’re not just pursuing marriage equality — we’re pursuing equality.

We must protect equality in our schools and pass the Student Non-Discrimination Act.

We must protect equality in our workplaces and pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

We must protect equality in our families and pass the Uniting American Families Act.

Genuine equality is the cause to which we aspire, and to achieve it, we must focus not just on persuading our lawmakers, but persuading our neighbors. Tellingly, according to recent polling, the trait most predictive of whether a person is a supporter of same-sex marriage is whether that person has talked to a gay or lesbian person about same-sex marriage.

For those Americans who do not yet support equality, we must show them that the love same-sex parents have for their children is no less devoted than the love opposite-sex parents have for their kids. We must show them that families headed by same-sex couples do not have a negative impact on other families. In fact, they face the same challenges as every parent: arranging carpools, parent-teacher conferences, and getting their kids to eat their vegetables.

We will find our victories in each American who one day accepts that they have nothing to be afraid of from the equality movement, and that accepting people as they are is simply easier than objecting to them over whom they love.

We need to continue working to move LGBT equality into the mainstream, and we can’t do that by demonizing those who disagree with us. If we’re to have any hope of eradicating discrimination from our laws, it’s going to take persuading the millions of Americans who just aren’t quite sure yet.

The victory we celebrate today is one we should all cherish. Today we made progress, and for that, we should be proud.

This op-ed appeared in The Huffington Post.

A real bipartisan job creation plan

There is no question that America is in a jobs crisis. More than 14 million Americans are unemployed, millions more are underemployed and too many have just given up looking for work altogether.

Washington’s dysfunctional political process has not encouraged certainty among growing businesses, or confidence among the general public about the ability of policymakers to work together. Week after week, the Senate shoots down proposals from each party designed to create jobs, adding to a long line of fruitless efforts to grow the economy.

The gridlock may be rooted in the fundamental differences between our parties, but it’s been compounded by a focus on short-term political gain over the pursuit of a genuine bipartisan consensus. This has made real action on our jobs crisis nearly impossible.

But even with stark ideological differences and a divided government, there are policy proposals we can act on immediately to promote growth and get unemployed Americans back to work.

President Barack Obama and both parties in Congress this fall put forward plans for job creation, as has the president’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. Every day, members of Congress introduce legislation aimed at jump-starting the economy.

Many of these ideas are ambitious and will take time to achieve. Many are simply non-starters for one side or the other. But many are non-controversial, bipartisan and would help boost the economy right away. We should act on them now.

As freshman senators from states hit hard by the recession, we believe Congress can’t afford to spend the next year spinning its wheels — scoring political points in a debate that is more about protecting political jobs in 2012 elections than getting the jobless back to work. We should unite behind policy ideas we all agree on and that would likely be signed into law if we stop letting politics get in the way.

Today we are introducing legislation that includes some of these ideas. Our bill would extend tax relief for small businesses — to help them purchase new equipment so they can grow and create jobs. It includes modernizing and improving the research and development tax credit; encouraging hiring of returning veterans and reforming burdensome regulations.

It will take steps toward boosting high-skilled legal immigration, so we can attract and retain talented individuals with extraordinary capacities, to create high-paying jobs in America. It will also protect our businesses against the illegal theft of intellectual property, with strict enforcement of laws already on the books.

Our plan borrows heavily from legislation introduced by both parties and in both chambers of Congress — Republicans in the House, and Democrats in the Senate. All the provisions have garnered bipartisan support in today’s political climate, and all would help encourage job creation today.

These shorter-term policy fixes clearly won’t be a substitute for the comprehensive economic reforms we need. Nor will they save critical entitlement programs for future generations, or fundamentally make the federal government more efficient. These types of changes will only be realized after a vigorous debate over the proper role of government in our lives and in the economy.

But as we engage in this broader conversation about our long-term future, we can still act on things we agree on.

The American people, particularly the 14 million unemployed, are looking for their elected officials to set aside their agendas and act now to reverse the trend of sluggish economy growth. We can give all Americans at least a little faith that, by working together, even Washington can do some things right.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) serves on the Budget Committee. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) serves on the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee.

This op-ed appeared in POLITICO.

It’s long past time for Congress to engage on jobs

In the ten months since I began my service in the Senate, Congress has spent tragically little of that time confronting our nation’s slow economic recovery. Every time a bill that would help create jobs came up — even ones that in previous years enjoyed widespread bipartisan support — it would be blocked. Too many opportunities to help middle-class Americans were sacrificed at the altar of partisan politics.

Those politics, which nearly shutdown our government in March and nearly caused our nation to default in July, must be put aside when Congress returns to Washington next week. We have a jobs crisis in America, and it is long past time Congress shows it’s engaged in solving it.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve visited dozens of employers and convened a series of roundtable discussions with Delawareans, since I believe the best ideas for propelling our economic recovery aren’t going to come from Washington, but from those on the front lines of the economy. The conversations have been enormously productive.  

We don’t have a shortfall of good ideas, merely a lack of political will to turn those ideas into action. In fact, there are dozens of strong bills Congress can and should consider immediately to make an impact.

My legislative strategy for job creation focuses on six critical areas that join together progressive and conservative proposals and the voices of business owners and out-of-work Delawareans: 

Invest in critical infrastructure projects

Investing in our infrastructure not only strengthens our long-term global competitiveness, but creates jobs for Americans looking for work. Congress should urgently pass the BUILD Act, which would create an infrastructure bank to jump-start public infrastructure projects, and should restore the Build America Bonds program, which has proven to reduce borrowing costs for cities, counties and states to build roads, bridges, and schools.

Reform our tax code and stabilize our nation’s debt

Ours is not a tax system that encourages job growth, and our staggering national debt makes it more important than ever to prioritize how our nation spends its tax dollars. We need a corporate tax code that lowers rates, closes loopholes and raises revenues by ensuring that all corporations pay their fair share and gives small businesses the opportunity to innovate and grow. Congress should consider my Job Creation Through Innovation Act, would incentivize American inventors to manufacture their products here in America. It would also make permanent the Research and Development Tax Credit and create a new Small Business Innovation Credit. Congress should also consider a raft of reforms to our nation’s tax system as part of a balanced approach to deficit reduction and debt stabilization.

Offer greater support for America’s small businesses

This spring, Congress failed to pass long-term reauthorizations of the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs, two programs that have enjoyed strong bipartisan support for decades. This summer, it failed to reauthorize the Economic Development Administration. All three are proven job-creators and should be reconsidered promptly.

Develop and protect the next generation of American technology and ingenuity

Our nation has the greatest wealth of talent in the world, and we need to do more to protect the ideas and innovations that have long-fueled American entrepreneurship. Protecting innovators and their hard work must be one of our highest priorities. Congress should pass the America Invents Act, PROTECT IP Act, and a series of smart bills that would support investments in clean energy development.

Increase certainty by reforming government regulation

Decades of compounded bureaucracy have created a business climate in need of significant regulatory reform. Congress should support President Obama’s plan to save businesses $10 billion over the next five years through targeted reforms, and should look for additional areas where streamlining regulations and simplifying reporting requirements can lead to savings without hurting consumer protections or the environment.

Strengthen America’s global trade position

We need to do more to assist businesses of all sizes in creating jobs through exports. Our trade agreements must do more than just open new markets — they must lower tariffs on American products and create a level playing field for American workers. Among other steps, Congress should consider and pass the Trade Enforcement Act, U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement, and an extension of the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program. 

You can read more and weigh in on the specific proposals and bills I’m recommending in the updated version of my legislative strategy for job creation, which I released today and is on my website now at coons.senate.gov.

Locking in savings for a sustainable budget

Under our current budget process, the path of least political resistance is to keep revenues low while offering a high level of services. Balanced budgets are fundamentally against the short-term interests of politicians from both parties.

Our growing national debt is neither a Republican nor a Democratic problem but, rather, a shared, structural problem.

My experience in the private sector and after six years of tough budget balancing as a county executive taught me how difficult — and important — it is to have responsible budget processes in place.

To achieve long-term debt stabilization, we must enact a mechanism that would force Congress into a fiscal straitjacket and require savings each year. “Save As You Go,” or SAVEGO, is just that mechanism.

This approach to budgeting soberly acknowledges the gravity of our situation and uses automatic, annual processes to force difficult but necessary policy changes.

It is widely recognized that entitlement reform is radioactive for Democrats, while raising revenue is political kryptonite for Republicans. In essence, SAVEGO places both painful choices into a lead-lined vault that would automatically open any year Congress fails to achieve deficit reduction.

The mechanism is robust. SAVEGO would divide the budget into distinct categories, requiring savings in each.

First, predetermined caps on discretionary spending would be set for the next 10 years.

Second, savings targets would be enacted for entitlements and revenue. If Congress failed to meet its goals in any given year, a series of spending cuts and revenue increases would be triggered to make up the difference. Washington would be required to save hundreds of billions each year.

The consensus among economists and across several deficit study commissions is that at least $4 trillion in deficit reduction must be passed within a decade to achieve fiscal sustainability. SAVEGO is designed to guarantee we reach this goal.

In months of meetings, hearings and careful consideration of alternatives, I haven’t seen an enforcement mechanism that would help compel Congress to confront the problem better than this method.

SAVEGO closely mimics budget process reforms that helped produce balanced budgets in the 1990s. A bipartisan array of commentators, budget experts and former lawmakers — including New Mexico Sen. Pete Domenici, a Republican and former Budget Committee chairman, and Alice Rivlin, a Democrat and former White House budget director — agree SAVEGO has the potential to rein in deficits and restore fiscal sanity.

Perhaps most important, SAVEGO could lock in necessary savings without denying Congress the opportunity to make its own annual budget decisions.

To be successful, a real deficit deal will need to put everything on the table — from entitlements and revenue to domestic programs and Pentagon spending.

Our long-term deficit is too big to address simply by raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans or by slashing domestic spending — the math just doesn’t add up. Each side will have to give some cherished ideological ground as part of a compromise, and SAVEGO is the mechanism — the way to harness each party’s aversion to its own political kryptonite — to keep both sides at the table.

Americans don’t hesitate to do what is necessary when faced with threats to the security of our nation. It should be no different when confronted by such a fundamental threat to our nation’s economy.

Of course, I would prefer that Congress had spent the past six months working on the comprehensive solution to our fiscal problems we need. But with Congress so divided and real deadlines for progress bearing down on us, I urge Vice President Joe Biden’s deficit working group — with or without the participation of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) or Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) — to make SAVEGO part of the negotiations.

Both Democrats and Republicans need to seriously consider a mechanism that can pass Congress, restore confidence to our markets and get us back on track to fiscal sanity.

It is often said that “decisions come with consequences.” But it is also true that indecision can come with consequences. At a time when every family, business and community in America has had to make tough choices and sacrifices to get through the recession, it’s long past time for Congress to join them.

This op-ed appeared in POLITICO.

Troop drawdown should be start of new U.S. strategy for Afghanistan

Faced with the task of charting a responsible course out of Afghanistan, President Obama will soon announce whether the conclusion of America’s decade-long war there will begin with a significant withdrawal of U.S. troops or take a modest step in the direction of an eventual drawdown.

Instead of dwelling on the precise size of that withdrawal, Delawareans should listen for a strong explanation of our nation’s long-term strategy in the region.

A substantial drawdown of forces — which I support — should not be the first step on a course of total disengagement from Afghanistan. Rather, it should mark the beginning of a new, more targeted counter-terrorism strategy that more wisely focuses our military and diplomatic resources on defending America’s security interests.

At a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing last week, the president’s nominee for ambassador to Afghanistan, Ryan Crocker, said that our objective for Afghanistan was to help build “governance that is good enough to ensure that the country doesn’t degenerate back into a safe haven for al Qaeda.”  He urged that we not repeat the mistake made after defeating the Soviets in 1989 by walking away from Afghanistan now.

I responded by agreeing that we shouldn’t abruptly abandon Afghanistan, but pressed: how long will we stay and with how many troops?

“I just don’t know the answer now,” he replied.

The global threats to America’s national security make the answers to those questions critical and urgent. Though America has never shied away from taking the steps necessary to ensure its national security, our current path in Afghanistan is unsustainable and is undermining our ability to respond to other emerging global threats.

When I visited with our field commanders and top leaders in Afghanistan in February, I was struck by the magnitude of our challenge in trying to build a nation from the ground up, given the remote, rugged terrain, the profound corruption and erratic nature of our Afghan allies, widespread illiteracy, and popular distrust of the central government. Despite these challenges, America is supporting the Karzai government as an alternative to the Taliban, funding and training an Afghan national army and police force of up to 350,000, and helping to build a national infrastructure.  A recent Foreign Relations Committee study reinforced what I’d seen on the ground months before: that our $19 billion in economic assistance to help build a “good enough” national government has thus far produced very uneven progress.

On our current course, I suspect that we will be no closer to a truly secure and stable Afghanistan five or ten years from now than we are today. Our current counterinsurgency strategy does not appear to be producing an advantage that will ensure the progress we are making can be sustained after the planned complete withdrawal of U.S. forces by the end of 2014.

The disproportionate level of resources we’ve focused on Afghanistan has limited our ability to address our complex and mounting problems with Pakistan, which is home to a range of extremist groups and the world’s fastest growing nuclear arsenal. We have made real progress in killing or capturing key al Qaeda fighters and leaders in Pakistan, yet it remains the most dangerous and challenging country in the region, hedging against the United States by supporting insurgents in Afghanistan and providing safe haven to militants. Recent testimony reinforced that our large military footprint and nation-building efforts in Afghanistan may actually be destabilizing Pakistan and pushing President Karzai’s government farther away from being a reliable ally.

A stable Pakistan is essential to U.S. interests, which is why we need a different path forward in the region — a strategy that focuses far more on intelligence, special operations, and rapidly deployable units capable of targeting and killing those most determined to do Americans harm. With intelligence estimates placing fewer than 100 al Qaeda operatives still in Afghanistan, our strategy in the region must fit in the context of America’s global national security strategy.

Growing extremism in Yemen and Somalia, as well as instability across the Middle East, including growing threats from Iran, all require additional resources and attention, while record deficits and pressing investment needs at home argue for a wiser use of our military and diplomatic resources. A counterterrorism strategy would result in a smaller and more sustainable U.S. commitment of troops and financial investment.

At home, I often hear that we are weary of war. Our troops have served bravely on multiple deployments and the cost is mounting at an alarming rate. The lack of convincing evidence that our current strategy is making America safer makes each Delaware National Guard deployment ceremony harder to justify and each flight of our fallen heroes into Dover Air Force Base harder to accept.

The number of troops coming home from Afghanistan this summer is important, but more critical is that the long-term strategy President Obama lays out is one deserving of the extraordinary sacrifice of our troops and the investment by U.S. taxpayers. It must also acknowledge that Afghanistan is just one of several dangerous threats to our national security and increase our flexibility to both prevent and respond to emerging challenges.