Dale Bumpers

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. I was wondering if my colleague would take a moment to reiterate and confirm what is my understanding of the conference committee's actions concerning the Department of Agriculture's fresh poultry labeling rule. I understand that, by including the Senate- passed bill provision in the conference report, the conferees intended to prevent the final rule which was promulgated on August 25, 1995, from taking effect, and also to prevent USDA from using any funds to implement or enforce this regulation as promulgated. Is that my colleague's understanding as well?

Mr. BUMPERS. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. BUMPERS. I appreciate the clarification.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from Mississippi for his generous comments and his leadership for making possible the presentation of the conference agreement for the fiscal year 1996 appropriations bill for the Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, and related agencies. This has been a very difficult year, but we have been able to reach an agreement with the House which has resulted in this conference report and I urge my colleagues to support it. This conference report contains $63.2 billion in new budget authority which is $630.5 million below the bill passed by the Senate earlier this year and nearly $5.8 billion below the amount contained in the appropriations bill for fiscal year 1995. I must point out to my colleagues that these reductions have not been taken lightly nor will they be lightly received. For far too long, this subcommittee has seen a dwindling of resources available to us to make the increasingly difficult choices of budget priorities. The programs under the jurisdiction of this subcommittee are often overlooked or misunderstood in their importance to our Nation as a whole and to the specific groups these programs are designed to serve. They do deserve our attention and they deserve our support. I only wish the allocation provided this subcommittee would have allowed us to do more. The programs funded by this bill are programs that touch upon the lives of nearly every American. These programs range from school lunch and nutrition education for our Nation's children to promoting and enriching the research capacity on the land grant campuses across the country. These programs will enhance soil and water conservation, as well as promote the export of U.S. products, and provide humanitarian assistance in areas of deprivation. Included in this bill are programs designed to provide housing to the poor, a better business climate for companies seeking to locate in rural areas, and better habitat for our Nation's wildlife. The funding included in this bill will protect the capacity of our Nation to produce an abundant and safe food supply for our people an many around the world. This conference report contains more than $700 million for the Agricultural Research Service and $850 million for activities of the Cooperative State Research and Extension Services. This combined investment of more than $1.5 billion in research and extension will be an important contribution to improve the quality and efficiencies of our Nation's productive capacity and make us more competitive in world markets. Also provided is nearly $545 million for the Food Safety and Inspection Service. This amount is slightly above the amount provided by the House, but somewhat below the Senate figure. The Government's role in food safety is at a critical juncture as we move away from the organoleptic method toward a more effective microbiological inspection system based on sound science. The importance of the work of this agency must not be underestimated and I am concerned that higher levels of funding may be necessary during the transition of moving toward the updated system. Everyone has a stake in this challenge, including the producer, the processor, the marketer, and ultimately the consumer whose reliance on the integrity of this agency's mission must be without question. In the area of conservation, this conference report provides $630 million for the Natural Resource Conservation Service's Conservation Operation account to provide technical assistance and guidance to improve water quality, check soil erosion, and better protect our natural resource base. One hundred million dollars is provided to provide watershed and flood prevention services and $77 million is included to enroll an additional 100,000 acres in the Wetlands Reserve Program. One of the areas in which the Senate was at strong disagreement with the House was that of rural development. To a large extent, the conference agreement more closely resembles the more acceptable funding levels contained in the Senate provisions. The section 502 rural housing program level was maintained at the Senate figure of $2.7 billion, an increase of $450 million above the House level. The water and wastewater programs provided through the Rural Utilities Assistance Program are included with nearly $500 million in new budget authority, an amount more than $50 million higher than that proposed by the House. Also, additional funds may be available for these programs if carryover funds in the WIC Program exceed $100 million. I do not know if carryover funds in WIC will exceed this amount. WIC is an extremely important program as well, and I hope that the WIC Program will be able to expand in a manner to utilize all available funds. However, if the carryover in this account continues to grow as it has in the past, I can think of no better use of these funds than to provide safe water and sanitary conditions to households which, in many cases, may be WIC recipient households as well. In the area of nutrition, nearly $8 million in child nutrition programs is provided, $27.6 billion for the Food Stamp Program, and more than $3.7 billion for the WIC Program, an increase of $260 million above last year's level. The amount included in the conference report for domestic food programs exceeds that of all other programs combined, as it has in recent years. The conference report provides $39.8 billion in domestic food programs which is 63 percent of the total amount provided in this Act. The conference report also provides $125 million for the Foreign Agricultural Service to promote the export of U.S. commodities including an increase for the foreign market development program. The market promotion program is included at the fiscal year 1995 level but with an amendment similar to the Senate provision prohibiting the allocation of Federal funds to large companies for branded advertising. During these times of fiscal constraint when funding is being reduced for rural housing, water and sewer programs, and many other services crucial for human welfare, it is incredible that we have been providing Federal grants to companies--many of which have advertising budgets of their own totalling millions of dollars--to advertise their products. The conference agreement contains a limitation on this program that is a first step in bringing some sanity to this program and helping restore taxpayer confidence in our ability to manage their hard earned tax dollars. Mr. President, there are many other important items contained in this conference report that I will not take time to mention here. As I stated earlier, the programs in this act are vitally important to all Americans and I only wish our allocation had been more generous in order for us to provide greater assistance in areas that will otherwise suffer this coming year. I understand there has been some concern that savings were achieved from limitations on mandatory programs and, as former chairman of an authorizing committee, I empathize with those that may feel we should not have realized those savings. I can only respond by restating that this has been a most difficult year and savings from mandatory programs were only achieved when absolutely necessary and in areas where it was understood to cause the least harm. I honestly hope that the allocation process for fiscal year 1997 will not result in [[Page S 15099]] the same pressures on our subcommittee as we have seen again this year. I must also honestly admit that I do not hold out much hope that such improvement is likely. In closing, I want to say again what a pleasure it has been to work with my good friend and colleague from Mississippi, Senator Cochran. He has, once again, proved that he has an excellent knowledge of the programs held under the jurisdiction of this subcommittee and that he is extremely fair and thoughtful in the deliberations culminating in the presentation of this conference report. Mr. President, let me say that this has been a very difficult, difficult year for all of us in trying to start honestly toward a balanced budget by the year 2002. It has been especially difficult for some of us who are totally committed to the viability of America's agricultural system. I had been out of town and I read a 2-week old Newsweek magazine last night. The article referred to the anger of the middle class. The article contained interviews of several people who expressed their views about Congress, with the usual statements: ``Those clowns will never balance the budget.'' ``The place is totally controlled by lobbyists.'' ``I've lost faith in our country and our Government.'' In all honesty, I relate and understand their anger and hostility. But I also want to say that I wish I could visit personally with each one of those people who made those remarks about what is going on here. I would like to point out to them that this budget in this agriculture bill is almost $6 billion--$6 billion--less than last year. The presiding Senator at this very moment, the chairman of the Interior Subcommittee on Appropriations, has just gone through the same kind of cuts in his subcommittee, and they are painful and they alienate still more people who lose some of their benefits, because it has been a draconian time here. So I want to just say this bill, in my opinion, protects the things that really must be protected. It cuts where we feel we can afford to cut and, at the same time, provide, as best we can, for a viable agricultural economy in the country. Mr. President, let me close by saying, despite the trauma of trying to craft a bill with these terrible, really, big cuts, it has been made much easier by working with my good friend, Senator Cochran, from Mississippi, whose knowledge of agricultural programs and, particularly, those programs in the agricultural appropriations bill, is legendary. He has been as careful as he could be about the interests of various Senators, but he has also been very realistic with them in telling them the so-called good old days are gone. You cannot accommodate all the requests here, all the interests. And considering the amount of money we had to spend, he has done an absolutely superb job. Let me make one other comment because it goes without saying that I have always been unalterably opposed to the idea of term limitations. I listened to some of that debate last night. I felt like I was virtually the only one in the country that is opposed to term limits. The American people may favor term limits, but when you do, you lose the institutional memory, the unbelievable knowledge of people like Senator Cochran in areas like this. When you lose that, and the integrity and dedication of people like that, you lose something that takes a long time to rebuild. So it was an honor for me, as ranking member on this committee, to work with him. I think we have come up with a bill that does everything we could possibly do within the limits and the amount of money we had. I strongly recommend passage of this bill.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following proclamation be inserted in the Record. The proclamation was signed by Gov. Jim Guy Tucker and designates October 21-29, 1995, as World Population Awareness Week in the State of Arkansas. This proclamation is part of a worldwide effort to implement recommendations of the International Conference on Population and Development, held in Cairo last year. It is clear that we are facing a population crisis. We now live in a world of 5.7 billion people, a population that grew by nearly 100 million last year, the largest annual increase ever recorded. Unemployment in many developing countries is as high as 30 percent, and to accommodate their growing populations, the nations of the world will have to produce 500 million new jobs by the yearly 2000. The world's resources cannot accommodate continuing growth at the current rate. More than 1.7 billion people, nearly one-third of the world population, lack an adequate supply of drinking water, and 26 billions tons of arable topsoil vanish from the world's croplands every year. At least 65 countries that depend on subsistence farming may be unable to feed their populations by the year 2000. Time is a luxury we do not enjoy. Action is required now to ensure a reasonable quality of life and a stable and secure world for a child born today. I applaud the action of Governor Tucker and other officials of government and private organizations who are working to increase awareness of this problem and encourage the actions necessary to resolve it.

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, this is really a very gratifying time for me to speak on this subject because it goes back to the time of my first year in the Senate, 1975. I was put on the space committee by the Democratic steering committee. I did not request to be put on that committee and I did not want to be on it. We did not have much of anything to do. And so after I had been here for a few months, I went to the chairman of the committee, Ted Moss, who was the senior Senator from Utah at the time, and I said, ``Ted, I don't mind telling you I'm bored around here. I have been Governor, and there is a lot of action in the Governor's office. There is none here for a freshman with no clout.'' I said I had been reading a theory that has been publicized by two chemists at the University of California-Irvine, named Rowland and Molina. ``They have this theory they say they have worked out in a lab that shows''--and at that time this was how simple the idea was to me-- ``that the hair sprays we use on our hair in the bathroom in the morning over a period of about 15 years waft their way into the stratosphere and they destroy a three-celled molecule called ozone, and that the ozone layer is what protects us from the ultraviolet rays of the Sun. It seems like an intriguing theory to me, very possibly true, and I would like to be able to chair just some ad hoc hearings and have people come in from around the country to testify for or against the Rowland and Molina theory.'' Senator Moss said that was fine, I could do that, but I needed to get a Republican colleague to help me. So I recruited my good friend from New Mexico, Senator Domenici, who had not been here much longer than I had. I asked him: ``Will you join me and we will hold hearings. We will get some atmospheric scientists from around the country to come in and testify.'' He said he would be glad to. So we did. We held nine hearings. We had Dr. Elroy from Harvard, who was considered the premier atmospheric scientist in America. We had Dr. Robert Otten, who was the author of the greenhouse theory. And then finally we had Dr. Sherwood Rowland, who, along with Dr. Mario Molina, developed the theory of ozone depletion. You can imagine how much publicity it got. Senators do not go to a hearing unless there are a lot of television cameras with their red lights on, and there were no television cameras interested in ozone depletion. So we were pretty lonely holding these hearings. And when it was over, I suggested that we offer a bill or an amendment in this Chamber at the earliest possible time to ban or to phase-out the production of what we call CFC's, chlorofluorocarbons, at the earliest possible time. Senator Domenici did not think the hearings were conclusive enough to do that, and I could understand that because there were a lot of people in the country who were very reticent about accepting this theory. Well, I heard that my colleague, Senator Packwood, who was on the Environment and Public Works Committee at the time, had an interest in it, so I went to see Senator Packwood. I told him about the hearings. I said I thought he and I ought to team up and see if we could not stop the manufacture of these so-called chlorofluorocarbons and he said he thought that it was a great idea. So we spent several hours talking about it. And then we offered the amendment. And when it came time to vote, Mr. President, that hallway directly in front of me was so full of chemical industry lobbyists you could not get in here to vote. At that time this was a $2 billion-a-year industry. When I saw that, I did not think we had much chance anyway; but when I saw that crowd out in the hallway, I knew we did not have a chance. I think we got 32, possibly 35 votes. And believe you me, that was the most [[Page S 15096]] liberal Senate I have ever seen. I shudder to think how many votes we would get under a similar situation today. But the arguments abounded on this floor that this is not conclusive; there is not enough evidence to disrupt this industry. And we were only trying to phase it out; we were not trying to kill it all at one time. And all those industry arguments made about how this was even a conspiracy of the Soviet Union KGB, a disinformation attack by the Soviet KGB to sow seeds of discord in the United States. My argument was simply this: If it takes 15 years for these chlorofluorocarbons to work their way into the stratosphere, even if we banned all CFC's at that moment, it would be 15 years before we would begin to reverse the damage that had already been done. And I said, ``This is the time, if there ever was a time, to err on the side of caution.'' These comments are not self-serving. I actually said those things on the floor of the Senate. I said them to everybody I could find to say them to, that I thought our committee hearings had produced enough evidence that the ozone depletion theory was real, that we ought to err on the side of caution and no great damage would be done if we were wrong. Mr. President, we were not wrong. We were dead right. And the National Academy of Sciences started their studies. And in 1985, thanks to a slightly separate theory by Paul Crutzen, who was also honored yesterday, of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Mainz, Germany we discovered the hole in the ozone layer developing over Antarctica. And it created such a stir in this Nation that we had the big 1987 Montreal Protocol. We agreed to phase out the manufacture of all chlorofluorocarbons--and, incidentally, the principal one being Freon gas in your refrigerators and automobile air conditioners--that we would phase out the manufacture of all of those by this year, 1995, and hopefully we are going to. So, Mr. President, I really came to the floor to say, No. 1, I told you so--and that will get you about a half of one vote to say, ``I told you so''--but more importantly than anything else, to extend my profound and sincere thanks and congratulations to Mario Molina, who was just a postdoctoral fellow working under ``Sherry'' Sherwood Rowland. Everyone calls him Sherry. Yesterday they were awarded the Nobel prize for chemistry, along with Dr. Crutzen, the three of them. I cannot tell you how gratifying it is to me that the Nobel committee has chosen two people I feel that I have known all of my public life. As I say, I just came here this afternoon to publicly say on the Senate floor this Nation owes those two men a deep debt of gratitude. I am most grateful that we have people like that in this country. I yield the floor. Mr. DOMENICI addressed the Chair.

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. Zero. You are wrong, Senator. It is less than 2 percent. Here is a program that was going to be matched 50-50 with private money and ultimately be all private money from foundations and individuals. And there you have it, $30 million of the taxpayers' money, and less than 2 percent of it is private. And who gets it? And I do not mind telling you, this is the most offensive part of it to me, just as it would be the most offensive part to any citizen in America if they knew about it. Now, you see most people know about the Agency for International Development because that costs almost a half billion dollars. They know about the U.S. Information Agency because that costs almost a half billion dollars. They know about foreign aid because that is 12 to 15 billion dollars. All of those programs are designed to foment and enhance democracy around the world. And then we come in with a little piddly amount here. How did we get this thing passed in the first place? It is exactly like Dante Fascell said. ``We bought them off.'' Who did they buy off? You see this CIPE? FTUI? NDI? IRI? You see this ``R'' right here in IRI. You know what the ``R'' stands for? Republican. The Republican party gets 11.1 percent of that $30 million I just showed you. And what do you think this big ``D'' is in NDI? Democrat. That is right. The Democrats get 11.1 percent. The Democrats used to get quite a bit more. And now they have got us down equal to the Republicans. We both get 11.1 percent. And who is CIPE? That is a fancy name for the Chamber of Commerce. What is FTUI? Why that is the free trade unions, and who is that? AFL- CIO. Everybody got bought off. And the poor old taxpayers, they was not even consulted. Now, I want to ask you, in this year 1995, when we are cutting everything under the shining sun, dramatically, we are not just cutting, we are cutting big dollars out of big programs. And programs like this have a way of being ignored. Nobody even looks at them. Out of the $30 billion, only 30.8 percent is discretionary. I will tell you what I am going to do. I am going to send a July 1995 article from Harper's Magazine to each one of you, and I hope your staffs will insist you read it. It talks about a meeting of nongovernmental organizations. Where? Zagreb, Croatia. They come to Croatia, to Zagreb. They stay in a fancy hotel. The best was in Zagreb. They watch C-SPAN2. They watch CNN. They watch MTV. They have a nice big opulent dinner. And then the President of the National Endowment for Democracy gets up and they are all thinking he has a big checkbook in his pocket. He is going to pull that sucker out and he is going to start writing checks to each one of them. What does he do? He gets up and he tells them they have all kinds of data, all kinds of information about the joys of democracy and they are going to put it on the Internet. This guy who wrote the story said you could see their shoulders go slack. People could not believe they had come all that distance to hear somebody say they were going to put a lot of information about democracy on the Internet. And who do you think is paying for the hotel bill and the opulent dinner? That is right, old Uncle Sucker. I am just saying if you cannot kill this program--if you cannot kill this program--I am not optimistic about balancing the budget in 7 years. Now, I am offering this amendment on behalf of Senators Brown and Dorgan. There are all kinds of things I would like to talk about. I know everybody wants to get away, so I am not going to belabor it. But I want to reemphasize the point that I will be back on the floor after the President vetoes this bill for a rollcall vote on this amendment or something similar to it. But anybody who votes to continue this program cannot be serious about deficit reduction. I yield the floor. Mr. McCAIN addressed the Chair.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, is there a pending committee amendment?

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the present pending amendment be laid aside so I may call up an amendment.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. BUMPERS. The Senator makes a very good point. I withdraw the amendment. [[Page S 14654]] So the amendment (No. 2845) was withdrawn.

Mr. BUMPERS. Yes.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, let me just conclude by saying the very organization, the National Endowment for Democracy, dooms it. It is self-contradiction to give money to the Republican Party and to the Democratic Party whose views on democracy are quite different. We all champion democracy, but can you imagine this group in Zagreb allowing me on my side to describe democracy for them, and we will say the Senator from Arizona on his side. We have strong philosophical differences. They would be so confused when we got through, they would not know what democracy is all about. And labor and the Chamber of Commerce, like two hornets in a jug. We give each one of them, look at that, the Chamber of Commerce, 13.6 percent and labor, AFL-CIO 29.4 percent. Do you want the people from the Chamber of Commerce and labor to sit around the same table explaining democracy? Mr. President, let me repeat, we spend an awful lot of money on foreign aid. Frankly, this year I do not think we spent enough. What is it designed to do? It is designed to help people feed and clothe themselves and to promote democracy. We have the Agency for International Development. I saw their work in Siberia about 2 months ago. Some of the things they are doing are very impressive. What is the Agency for International Development designed to do? To make them think well of the United States and help them create and maintain democracies. And then the United States Information Agency, a half-billion dollars. What do they do? Why, they broadcast all over the world the joys of democracy. When you add it all up, it comes to between $13 billion and $15 billion. What is this $30 million doing? I want you to read that Harper's article. When the president, Mr. Gershman, president of the National Endowment for Democracy, gets up, and these people have come from all over thinking that they were going to get a little largess for some of their own programs. They needed computers; they needed printers. And so the president gets up and he says to this crowd in this thick-carpeted ballroom in Zagreb: The National Endowment for Democracy is an independent, nongovernmental foundation which receives a grant from the Congress every year for the purpose of strengthening democracy around the world. First of all, it seems almost an oxymoron to say this is a non- Government foundation operating on a Government grant. But he goes ahead to say: We have a journal in which we publish essays and articles on democracy, and we organize research conferences on democracy. We're compiling a database which will soon be available over the Internet. We will hold our fifth World Conference on Democracy in Washington on May 1. We do work in 92 countries around the world. In China, Uzbekistan and, yes, the countries of this region. The author of this article goes on to say: Among the more experienced of the participants, the change in manner is immediately evident. They've stopped taking notes. The 92 countries, the broad friendly smiles, the global visions of building democracy, you can see them adding it all up to conclude there will be no computers, no printing presses, no radio transmitters, no money for paper, no hands-on assistance of the kind the participants are quick to inform you is given to them by the representatives of George Soros, the American financier.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I wish to tell my colleagues, No. 1, this will be very short and sweet, and it will not require a rollcall. I am saying this to the distinguished floor managers on the assumption that the President is going to veto the bill and that the bill is going to come back here at some point in the future, in October or November, and I will have an opportunity to offer this amendment and get a rollcall vote on it. Now, this amendment deals with the National Endowment for Democracy. A lot of the new Members are not familiar with the National Endowment for Democracy. Mr. President, Dante Fascell was a beloved House Member. Everybody knew him. He always wanted to do something to enhance democracy when the Communists were riding roughshod on everybody around the world. And when Ronald Reagan came to power, Dante Fascell presented this idea of a privately funded National Endowment for Democracy to President Reagan. President Reagan said he liked the idea of something that would counter communism with democracy. And here is what Dante Fascell said, ``We had found ourselves a powerful ally, the President of the United States. We had a horse and so we rode that horse. Changed the bill around and rammed it through.'' And then he said they gave money to the Democratic and Republican parties, to the labor unions, and to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. ``Hell yeah. They were on board,'' Fascell recalled. ``They got a piece of the pie. They got paid off. Democrats and Republicans, the Chamber of Commerce, along with labor.'' They got paid off. That was in 1982. It was passed in 1984. It was designed to be matched with private money. Here is what happened. Just like all other Federal programs, look how it started off here in 1983. $18 million. And it was to be matched within a short period of time with private money. [[Page S 14652]] Now, you talk about growing like Topsy--Topsy would blush at the way this program has grown. It started out at $18 million, $18 million, down to $15 million, went to $35 million, and $30 million in this year 1995. Now, how much would you guess of that budget is private money? We ought to have a little game show here and let everybody guess. The Senator from New Mexico is indicating he thinks it is 3 percent?

Mr. BUMPERS. The Senator is correct. If he will----

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. As Ranking Minority Member of the Small Business Committee, I join with the Senator from Minnesota in support of the crucial importance of the Microloan Program and the technical assistance portion of that program. I think the Chairman for his clarification.

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. I think everybody here is extremely sympathetic to the majority leader's problem in trying to get these bills passed and to get us out of here for a recess that everybody is looking forward to. Now, the chairman of the committee has just said that these bills are dead on arrival at the White House. But here is the problem I have with that, and in not offering a couple of amendments I feel very strongly about. The President, like every Member of the Senate, reserves the right to change his mind. One of the prime objections he had to this bill was legal services, torpedoing the Legal Services Corporation. We have just taken a giant step toward satisfying one of the objections the President had to this bill. If we legislate in a diligent way here, we might address a couple of others, and he might sign it. If I do not offer my amendments and the President does sign the bill, I am out until 1996, as is every other Senator here. I want to be as cooperative as possible. I have a couple of amendments. I think one will be accepted; I will agree to a short time agreement on the other. But I am reluctant to quit or to withdraw my amendments or not offer them on the proposition that the President is going [[Page S 14619]] to veto all of them because, as I say, he may change his mind.

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. Madam President, I yield myself 3 minutes. I tell you who I put my confidence in: Every physicist in America who said you cannot do one thing in space that you cannot do on Earth for a lot less money. I put my faith in the guy who runs the Johnson Space Center. There will be life sciences here, but we have not finalized that. Really, it is hard to answer that question. This is the man who runs the program. I intentionally did not bore the Senate today with the myriad of hundreds of quotes from every physicist, virtually every medical researcher in America, all of whom say that this is a terrible, terrible way to spend the taxpayers' money when it comes to research. The Senator from Ohio, John Glenn, and I came to the Senate at the same time. We have been close, steadfast friends ever since. There is not anybody in the body for whom I have greater respect. It pains me when we disagree, which we do strongly on this issue. I know Senator Glenn's great talents. He is a genuine, certified America hero. But even Senator Glenn will only tell you what we hope to do. I tell you, we have been hoping for 30 years. That is how long we have been in space--30 years--and I am still waiting for somebody in the Senate not to just talk about AIDS and cancer and multiple sclerosis, but to tell me what the space station has done. I can tell you--zip, zero, for AIDS and cancer. When it comes to women's health issue, I thank the Senator from Maine very much for pointing out that nobody has been stronger for medical research in this country than I. I sit on the committee that appropriates money for the National Institutes of Health so I know how they are starved to death. They are located in Maryland. They cannot even begin to get the money they need to do the research that needs to be done. When have you seen a story out of NIH on what we are doing on hepatitis? What we are doing on Lyme disease? Cancer? Chemotherapy? Almost daily there are reports from the National Institutes of Health on gigantic medical advancements. I invite Members to tell me in 30 years when have you seen one single announcement come about as to what we have done for the welfare of our people from the space station. I believe strongly in the space program. I will tell you that I believe strongly they are cutting back on space programs that I applaud and you applaud in order to make room for this thing which Newsweek called a boondoggle. What is it for? Why, I have heard talk about children getting excited. It is a new frontier. It is all those things. I get excited about Apollo 13. I get excited when I see astronauts retrieving a satellite. But that does not mean I have to take leave of my senses and vote for $100 billion project--$100 billion. Do you know what children in this country are entitled to? They are entitled to grow up secure from crime on the streets. They are entitled to grow up not hungry. They are entitled to grow up with an education so they can do honest-to-God research when they are adults. They are entitled to grow up in a decent home that does not leak, that is warm in the wintertime. What is the U.S. Congress doing? We are assaulting the children of this Nation, cutting food stamps, cutting housing, cutting education. Educational loans will be cut $8 billion more over the next 7 years than this thing will cost. I look at it and I cannot believe it. I wonder, what kind of values does this place have? I believe in research. I believe in women's health issues. I defy anybody to show me where I ever voted against it. I do everything I possibly can from my position on the Health and Human Resources Subcommittee on Appropriations. Betty Bumpers has spent her entire public life taking advantage of the fact that her husband was Governor and Senator to bring immunization programs to every State in the Nation. The pharmaceutical companies of this country have been champs in the area. They have developed new vaccines--not on the space station; they did it in their laboratories. I agree with Carl Sagan. I agree with every physicist in the country who says there is only one rationale for the space station--that is to go to Mars. If you want to go to Mars, fine. We went to the Moon. I went down to the Johnson Space Center to see what we got. We got some drillings. It was exciting. I got as teary eyed as any Member of the Senate when Neil Armstrong stepped off, but I did not say I wanted to waste $100 billion because I am excited today, not at the expense of the tremendous needs of this Nation. I yield the floor.

Mr. BUMPERS. Madam President, I ask for an additional 2 minutes for a total of 4 minutes.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, is the time just used by the Senator from Alaska charged against our time?

Mr. BUMPERS. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Mr. BUMPERS. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I said about all I know to say yesterday afternoon about this subject. I do not know that anybody listened, and I do not know that anybody is listening this morning. But when you are talking about $94 billion, somebody ought to be listening. Just for openers this morning, I want to recommend to my colleagues an article that appeared last year in Newsweek magazine, which I will be delighted to furnish to anybody who is curious. It is called ``NASA Space Station Zero Boondoggles; $11.9 Billion Has Been Spent So Far. Can Anybody Explain What it is Supposed To Do?'' That is the headline. It is a very telling article. It does not answer the questions because NASA cannot answer the questions. Here is one paragraph in this article, and it is replete with similar paragraphs. Yet, with the silly problems of the space station corrected, the serious ones stand, in greater degree, still unanswered. What's it for? ``It is primarily a research platform,'' said Randy Brinkley, manager of the space station office at the Johnson Space Center. ``There will be life science, but we haven't finalized what. Really, it is hard to answer that question.'' As for its prospects as a research platform, the National Research Council, a preeminent organization in this field, says the station ``cannot be supported on scientific grounds.'' Many scientific organizations have announced opposition to the space station. Mr. President, if you want to get up and argue or if any Senator wants to argue that the space station is going to cure cancer, AIDS, arthritis, or multiple sclerosis, be my guest, I will listen very intently. We have been in space for 30 years. The Russians have had space stations up since 1971--seven of them. I want the opponents of this amendment to tell the Senate what we have accomplished so far as life science is concerned. Name me the pharmaceutical companies who are contributing their own money to the space station. Name me one medical research organization in America that is contributing a thin dime to this gigantic research laboratory in space. Every single scientist worth his weight in the country, every single medical researcher in the country says you cannot justify this on the grounds that [[Page S 14232]] you are going to get some kind of life-saving pharmaceuticals out of it. As a matter of fact, the American Physical Society said, on January 20, 1991: ``Scientific justification is lacking for a permanently manned space station.'' Dr. Bloembergen and Dr. Rosenthal, both at Harvard, say you cannot justify this because, so far as we can tell, there is absolutely nothing to get out of it. As for microgravity. Well, we can do research in almost zero gravity. So what. You can do that on Earth and in satellites. One semiconductor company president has said, ``Do not build that thing because you think you are going to get gallium arsenide wafers out of it; we do not want the wafers.'' It is an utter, utter waste of money to try to grow crystals in space. You might grow some, but you can never make anything economically viable. And then the spinoffs--if there are so many spinoffs, why is American industry not hot to contribute to this almost $100 billion project? It will certainly run well over $100 billion over the next 17 years; $94 billion is the present estimated cost of the space station. Bear in mind, that assumes everything is going to go split perfectly. No disasters on the launch pad, no malfunctions like on Apollo 13, no debris in space hitting the station or any of the shuttles, or anything else. No, you get it for $94 billion only if everything goes absolutely perfectly. I heard the junior Senator from Texas last night talking about Velcro. I covered that as well as I could yesterday in talking about spinoffs, such as Tang, the orange juice substitute that the astronauts drink. It has been around for 35 years, long before we ever went to space. Then there is Velcro and magnetic resonance imaging. The space program had absolutely nothing to do with any of those things. Yet, people continue to talk about those spinoffs. I am willing to admit that we got one spinoff. We got a space suit. The demand for space suits is not just great enough in this country to warrant a $100 billion expenditure. I do not want one. I do not have a friend that wants one. I will tell you what it is all about. Right here on this chart. Eighty-six percent of the money spent for 14,000 jobs goes to California, Texas, Alabama, and Florida. So the Senators, as far as I am concerned, from those States, get a pass. Go ahead and vote for it. For the other 46 States, who put more into the space station of their tax money than they get back, what is your excuse? Now, it is not unusual around here for people to vote for big expenditures because there are some jobs in their State. I have done it, and we all do it. It is not unusual to vote for big-ticket items that big corporations who have big PAC's and big contributors want. I want to tell you before you vote, remember that 86 percent of all the money is going to these four States. Now, Mr. President, we had a revolution last fall. The Republicans wiped the Democrats out. Everybody has been analyzing it ever since. What happened? How did it happen? Why are the people so upset? Why are they mad? I do not know the answer to it. I wish I did. I think it is a serious question. Certainly it is serious for my party. Let me make a couple of observations. We are getting ready to spend $32.7 billion over the next 7 years on this space station. Now, let me ask you, where is the money coming from? Take your choice. I want you to listen to this: $32.7 billion for the space station, which has absolutely no tangible payback to the American people. Where do we find the money to do it in these budget constrained times? As I say, take your choice. We are cutting education over the next 7 years $40 billion. What do you get out of this? A lot of ignorance. We are cutting the earned-income tax credit, according to the Senate version, $40 billion, which represents a $457 annual tax increase for the poorest 17 million people in America who work, that are not on welfare. Ask yourself, is it fair to penalize the people who are working to feed, clothe, house, and educate their children and the lowest paid workers on Earth trying to stay off welfare? Is it fair to levy a $457 tax increase against them to pay for the space station? If you believe that, vote against my amendment. If you think this country will be better off when we cut education by $40 billion over the next 7 years in order to fund the space station, you vote against my amendment. If you think it is right to cut Medicare by $270 billion--and I am willing to participate in some of that; not to provide this massive tax cut we are talking about, but simply because we do have to do something to salvage Medicare--do you think it is fair to cut Medicare by $40 billion of that $270 billion in order to pay for this? Do you think it is fair to cut $180 billion in Medicaid which provides health care for the poorest of the poor--yes, working people, too--to pay for this? If that is what the revolution last fall was about, then God save America. What else are we doing? We are spreading the already terrible disparity of income in this country. Everybody knows and they talk about it, but nobody wants to address it. The disparity between incomes in America is twice as great as any of the 18 developed nations on Earth. The only country even close is Britain and we have a 2-to-1 margin on Britain. How do we rectify this? We raise taxes for the poor, we cut health care for the poor, and we provide $250 billion in tax relief--for the poor?; no--for people who make over $100,000 a year. That includes everybody in the U.S. Senate. Yes, Senators, you will get a nice tax cut next year. So what happens to the working poor who have two or three children and because of the exemptions for those children do not make enough money to pay taxes? Do they get any of it? No. When you read in the paper that the tax increase proposed by the Republicans provides $500 tax credit for each child, do not believe it. That sounds so good. Is that not wonderful? That is a family issue, is it not? We will give it to families. One of the biggest hoaxes ever pulled off in this country--yesterday, I alluded to a woman I knew who is a waitress. She has two children. She has to keep both of them in day care in order to work and stay off welfare. The chances of her getting $1,000, $500 for each one of her children, is point blank zero. But Members of this body, Members of this body who have children will get it. All of this so we can pay for the space station? I could go on and on. The list is endless. I saw in the reconciliation bill passed out of the Senate Energy Committee big relief for the oil companies, the biggest corporations in America, if they drill below a certain depth in the Gulf of Mexico or off shore. It seems they they cannot take care of themselves. We have to give them a big tax royalty bonus to drill. The Minerals Policy Association says there are 625 applications for lands that have billions and billions of dollars' worth of gold, platinum, palladium, silver underneath it, from the biggest mining companies in the world. What do we do? We mandate that the Secretary of Interior give them a deed as we have done on 3.2 million acres of lands in this country since 1872. The 625 applications for deeds which Secretary Babbitt will have no choice but to deliver to the biggest mining companies on Earth for $2.50 to $5 an acre has over 15.5 billion dollars' worth of gold, silver, and hard-rock minerals under it. How are we going to pay for that? You already heard me give speech after speech on that subject. We are going to cut $70 billion off of welfare--very popular in this country. Those worthless, no-good, shiftless people on welfare. Some of them are indeed no-good, shiftless people. But some of them simply did not happen to choose their parents as well as I did. That is their only sin. They did a lousy job of picking their parents. What are we going to do? We are going to bless the poor unless they get pregnant at the age of 17. What are we going to do with food stamps? We are going to cut food stamps. Maybe we can get a few more homeless people on the streets. All so we can pay for the space station. Mr. President, the National Institutes of Health, who do honest-to- God research--go out to the National Institutes of Health and ask what have they done. They have developed antibiotics; they have developed all kinds of drugs [[Page S 14233]] that give AIDS patients a little longer life; chemotherapy for cancer patients. They are doing honest-to-goodness research--a new chicken pox vaccine for our children, a new hepatitis vaccine for our children. Not one person in America quarrels with that priority. I had pneumonia twice before I was 6 years old and all my mother and father could do was pray. There were no antibiotics, nothing. When I was in the Pacific in World War II, we took sulfur to keep from getting malaria, sulfur developed by the National Institutes of Health. You will not get sulfur, you will not get penicillin, you are not going to get anything out of this $100 billion expenditure. I might just say here that the 40,000 physicists in this country belong to an organization called the American Physical Society. Do you know who one of the strongest opponents of the space station is? It is the American Physical Society. Do you know why? Because they know the benefits are very, very minimum and the costs of real research very, very great. They have a 50-percent backlog at NIH of applications for good research. And, yet, this space station is like Rasputin. You cannot kill it. There are too many big corporations, too many jobs-- 14,000 jobs at $147,000 each. I would like to go to General Motors and say, ``You know I come from a poor State. We need jobs. We will give you $147,000 for every job you create in Arkansas.'' General Motors would say, ``Where would you like for us to locate?'' That is what these jobs cost, $147,000 each. You can buy chicken downtown at the Giant grocery store for 69 cents a pound. But once you deploy this thing and you start sending chicken up to them to eat, it is $12,880 a pound. For 10 years of the operation of the space station, we will spend $25 million every day. Can you fathom such a thing? For every pound of water we send to the astronauts to drink, $12,880 a pound. That is in today's dollars; it will be more by then. Your mother used to tell you, ``Oh. Such and such is worth its weight in gold.'' The space station cost 25 times its weight in gold. That is right. The weight of the space station is 25 times the cost of its weight in gold. Carl Sagan says the only scientific reason in the world to build a space station--and he is not alone; every single physicist in the country says--the only justification for the space station is to explore Mars and beyond. So when you vote against this amendment today--and a majority of Senators will. This is my sixth year, I guess, to try to kill it. When you vote no today, you are going to be voting to go to Mars. In today's dollars that is $500 billion. That is twice NASA's budget every year for 20 years to go to Mars. Why? Because it is there. It is like climbing a mountain. Mr. President, Carl Sagan, as I was about to say, is a fine man, a good scientist, and he favors the space station because he says it will help us go to Mars. He says the only justification for this is to explore Mars and beyond. If you believe that, vote against this amendment. I would like to go to Mars. I would like to be able to fund this space station if we had a balanced budget and if we were not cutting every defenseless person in America. So, Mr. President, I have other people who are here who wish to speak. I thank them for it. But one final point on international cooperation, which Carl Sagan says he thinks justifies this program, is that the Russians are going to participate. Do you know why? We are going to give them the money. We are going to give them the money. And, by the way, where are the launches in Russia going to come from? There will be no launches in Russia. The launches will come from Kazakhstan, not Russia, where the cosmonauts of Russia are located. So I would like to say, for gosh sakes, colleagues, do your duty in the certain knowledge that my amendment will be defeated, and what a tragedy. Our priorities are so terribly skewed. I yield the floor.

Mr. BUMPERS

Mr. BUMPERS. I, and many of my colleagues in the Senate, commend the chairman for including that directive in the committee report. In addition, I would like to specifically address an issue which is of particular importance to both the Senator from Missouri and myself. That issue is the impact of the refinery MACT rule on smaller refiners around the Nation. The Senator from Missouri serves as the chairman of the Small Business Committee, and I am proud to serve as the senior Democrat on that committee. In its refinery MACT rule, EPA made no provision for lessening the impact of its rule on small businesses. In many cases, these smaller refineries are located in attainment areas--areas in which the need for expensive emissions control devices are questionable at best. In fact, EPA estimated that seven of these refineries would be forced to close under the refinery MACT rule. EPA's disregard for the impact of the refinery MACT rule on the small businesses of this Nation is disturbing to this Senator, as I am sure it is to the Senator from Missouri.

Mr. BUMPERS. I thank the Senator. I look forward to working with him on this issue as this bill moves to conference and as EPA carries out the committee's directive. environmental technology initiative