Larry Craig

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I will be happy to yield to the senior Senator from Virginia.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I thank the senior Senator from Virginia. He is absolutely right. When I think oil, I think gas because, obviously, in lease sale 181 and in other areas where there is gas, there is oftentimes oil, and oftentimes where there is gas, there is no oil. We believe that to be the case off the coast of Virginia. The Senator from Virginia has been a leader, without doubt, in that very kind of effort to allow at least the seismographic effort, the exploration that would determine for us the kinds of reserves we have and may have for the future. I thank the Senator from Virginia for his leadership in this area.

Mr. CRAIG. Without question it is there today, and we know that. We are the leaders of clean drilling in deep water for the world, no question.

Mr. CRAIG. I will be happy to yield to the Senator from Florida.

Mr. CRAIG. I am more than happy to.

Mr. CRAIG. I do recognize that. I do appreciate what our military has said. I also understand a few years ago we took offline a naval training area in Vieques. Why? It was no longer a popular thing to do. If there is oil under this area--and we believe there is--and it is a training area, why couldn't we train here? Or why couldn't we train over here? The reality is, what is at this time more valuable? It is very easy to say don't do it. Or is it possible to say can we do both? There are a good many experts and professionals in the field who said that. We can have a military training area, and guess what we also can do. We can pull the oil out from under. How do you do it? Quite simply. You put a location, a location and you slant drill thousands of feet and you do not have to pepper the area with all kinds of drilling rigs. Today's technology is amazing. It is politically comfortable, I appreciate that, and I understand the State's politics and I do not deny that--but this is not the oil of the State of Florida. This is the oil of the citizens of our country. It is the politics of Florida today that deny us the oil, not the politics of America. So it is a simple question: Should we inventory it? Should we know what it is? And should we, under modern technology, reward the State of Florida for the potential benefit? It is ironic we did not move at all to stop drilling 45 miles off the Florida coast. We could even take a 45-mile zone here, or more, consistent with what is going on in Florida today and still protect this. But the Senator is right. It is a military area. Guess what. I am kind of a modern guy. I believe in technology taking us where we can go and having the best of both worlds. But right now the American consumer has the worst of the world we have created for them--a scarcity of a supply that is driving costs and impacting our economy in a significant way. I suggest the legislation I have introduced, while it will not impact the State of Florida, will give us a base and an understanding and knowledge of what we have as a reserve. We are spending millions of dollars a day to buy oil and put it in the ground when, in fact, we ought to spend a few million dollars and find out about all the oil we already have.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak as in morning business.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, over the last few weeks, I have taken note of the tributes that have been made about a great American who passed away on April 5, 2008. That American is Charlton Heston. This Senate even joined in those tributes, and I was pleased to cosponsor a resolution offered by my colleague, Senator Jim DeMint, officially honoring Mr. Heston's life and extending the sympathies of the Senate to the Heston family. Charlton Heston's significance was more than his distinguished career as an actor. In his lifetime, he became undeniably an American icon. But there is an aspect of his life that has not received the attention that I believe it deserves--his truly admirable record of public service. That is why I rise this afternoon to comment about his contributions to our Nation. This was not a man who only recited patriotic speeches; he put his words into action and put his reputation and career on the line for the causes he supported. This was especially true in an area that people seem to have forgotten: his work on civil rights. Charlton Heston freely allowed his fame to be used to draw attention and support to the cause of civil rights, and he did so at a time when it wasn't the popular thing for Hollywood stars to do. In fact, according to his autobiography, some of his associates warned him that his activism could harm his career and his financial success. But he pursued it anyway. He told the story of demonstrating outside some Oklahoma City restaurants that refused to serve black Americans in 1961, and while he modestly acknowledged this was a small effort that ``made no more than a ripple in the wider world''--those are his words, not mine--the restaurants did change their practices, and the episode was a significant personal milestone for him. His civil rights activism took him further. He was an admirer of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and wrote ``Many men who knew him better than I have written about Martin Luther King. I can't match their eloquence; I can confirm what they've written: He was a special man, put on Earth, I do believe, to be a twentieth-century Moses for his people. Dr. King sought him out to discuss how to integrate certain segments of the film industry. Mr. Heston was supportive but had doubts that it could be done; he was surprised and impressed when Dr. King accomplished that goal. Later in 1963, when Martin Luther King famously marched on Washington Charlton Heston was not only part of the march but helped organize and lead a contingent from the American arts community in participating. Their job was to help draw press attention to the cause but Mr. Heston characterized the role he played as essentially an ``extra'' at the event. Even so, he said of the march on Washington: ``In a long life of activism in support of some good causes, I'm proudest of having stood in the sun behind that man, that morning.'' I think many people fail to appreciate the importance of Mr. Heston's involvement in supporting the cause of civil rights at that particular time. It was a turning point in our Nation's history. His position put him at odds with many in his industry, not to mention the mainstream America that existed in those days. It was no small thing for Charlton Heston to commit his energies and his name to advancing a cause that was deeply controversial. Today, some have forgotten what those times were like and the risk he took. I would even argue that some prefer to overlook or rewrite the record of his civil rights activism because they disagree with other causes he took up later in his life. Maybe it just doesn't sit right with the predominately liberal majority in the media and Hollywood that Mr. Heston could both march with Dr. King and later publicly denounce the violent, pornographic lyrics of rapper Ice-T. Maybe they don't understand how the same man who picketed against racism could criticize the Screen Actors Guild--an organization he presided over for six terms--for practicing reverse discrimination. Or maybe they just don't understand the common denominator between his fight for civil rights and his fight for the Second Amendment. When he took the helm of the National Rifle Association for an unprecedented three terms Americans' firearms rights were under attack as never before. I met with him and encouraged his participation, as others did. Mr. Heston did participate and brought for formidable energy to the defense of this fundamental civil right of the law-abiding American citizen. It was my great privilege to work with him in those days. I came to know him as an unabashed patriot and a friend. He was amazingly modest about his accomplishments when he told me about his past involvement in policy and political issues, but it was from him I learned about his early work on behalf of civil rights. Charlton Heston is remembered by countless Americans around the world for the great roles he played and the characters he created, as only he could do. That legacy will live forever. As his movies are discovered by new audiences in the future, a new life for that memory will emerge. But Americans should also be aware and celebrate and treasure another legacy he left behind--his simple and quiet service to our Nation. Let the record show Charlton Heston did not sit safely on the sidelines. He strode boldly into the arena of public affairs and took on all the risks of fighting in that arena. He worked to make this Nation a better place through his activism in promoting civil rights and individual liberties, a legacy that will have an even more lasting impact on our lives and the lives of our fellow citizens. Goodbye, Charlton Heston. America misses you. I yield the floor. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I am going to address, very briefly, an action that will come before us this evening in a 2-week extension of current farm policy that will be sought by Chairman Harkin, as they work out, I understand, the final details of a new farm policy for our country. As my colleagues know, over the last several weeks, I have come to the floor to speak out about the urgency at hand of getting a new farm policy before American agriculture as we move into the spring season and before the early harvest in the grain belt of our country, which starts very soon in Oklahoma and northern Texas. As most of my colleagues know, both the House and Senate passed new farm policy last year, but because of their differences, we were simply not able to work out a compromise in conference. In fact, the House waited months to appoint conferees. Then the Speaker openly spoke out about being unwilling to provide the tax package to finance the necessary new policy. I began to object. After 6 months and 4 extensions, finally, last week on the floor I did object. But out of that we began to work together and worked out a compromise, and I must say to all the conferees on the House and the Senate side that their diligence appears to have paid off. In talking with my colleague and the ranking member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, Senator Saxby Chambliss, today, their work in large part is done. It is a matter of simply putting it in final form, bringing it to print and, of course, then bringing the conference report to the floor of the House and the Senate. Apparently, the White House has also signed off on that and their work is largely complete. It is with that understanding that I will not object this evening to a unanimous consent request to extend the current farm policy for another 2 weeks while they work out and put to print their final effort. Let me thank them all for the sense of urgency that has developed over the last 2 weeks and the work in completing it. Obviously, the finance committee in the House, the House Ways and Means Committee and Senate Finance Committee had to bring about the necessary package. Senator Max Baucus and Congressman Rangel, apparently working with the Republican side, have solved those problems and put the appropriate finance package together. There are very important policies, new policies inside this farm bill. We are hearing for the first time, at least in my memory, a question about food shortages or at least some commodity shortages because of new demands we put on the production of American agriculture as it relates to the production of energy. There is no other time more important in our country to have farm policy in place and operative than right now, to say to the American people we can get our work done in a timely fashion--and that work is now complete; to say to American agriculture: Here is your policy for the next 5 years, whether it is nutritional policy for America's poor, whether it is production policy for America's farmland, whether it is conservation policy or energy policy; in large part all that is embodied. I thank my colleagues for the work they have done. I hope their sense of reality and their finishing the product and getting it before us meets that timing. With that in mind, I will not object tonight to an extension. But I am on the floor to personally thank them for the work they have accomplished in getting it completed in the next 2 weeks and getting it before us as soon as possible so we can say to American agriculture: The work is done. Here is agricultural policy for the next 5 years. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, before us is H.R. 2081, which is the reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration and, of course, that is the authority tied directly to America's airlines and the body of public policy under which they operate. It comes at a time when all of us are frustrated by what was once a great American industry, and that, of course, is the airline industry. We set the records, we established the world standards in all respects to aviation, and now our industry is in great trouble. It is in great trouble for a lot of reasons, but one of the underlying reasons today is the substantial cost in aviation fuel that all of these large carriers must acquire on a daily basis and the inability to simply pass it through to the consumer. Of course, that is exactly what is going on in nearly every industry in America today. We are experiencing an energy shock to our pocketbook--whether it be my private pocketbook or an Idahoan's private pocketbook or a corporate private pocketbook--in a way that leaves us with no ability to assume it, to consume it in a way that does not damage our choices on staying alive as a major air carrier or our choice as a consumer where we put our money--with what few discretionary dollars we have left. In that context, it is so easy to blame somebody else for a problem that largely this Congress has observed, talked about, and denied action on for nearly 20 years. Those of us on energy committees in the Congress who said the answer to a looming problem was going to be conservation, new technology, increased development, and production of existing energy sources over the last two decades--and we have largely denied ourselves those options--are now today wringing our hands in frustration about the phenomenal cost of energy to the American consumer. So what do we do? We reach out to blame someone when we cannot find it easy to blame ourselves. So to whom do we turn? We say it has to be ExxonMobile's fault; look at all of their profits. Or it has to be Chevron's fault or it has to be Marathon's fault or, if you read in the paper today, British Petroleum has record profits, a 12-percent increase in return on investment. Gosh, we have to blame those big oil companies because surely they are in control of the market, surely they demand the price, and it seems it has to be their fault. I have brought before us today a chart that might change our minds just a little bit. When we talk about ExxonMobile as it relates to their position in the world, well, my goodness, they don't control the oil supply of the world. They have a very small piece of it. Chevron, oh, my goodness, they don't control the oil supply of the world. They have a very small piece of it. Who owns the oil of the world today from which we buy? Not U.S. companies but world countries--Saudi Arabia, Saudi Armco, the largest producer by a magnitude of three or four times. Then walk right on down to 11, 12 of the leading major producers are not companies, they are countries, and it does not happen to be the United States of America that is in that top 12 group. We should be, but we are not because we have denied ourselves the ability to develop our oil reserves in Alaska, offshore United States, offshore west coast, offshore east coast, oh, all in the name of the environment even though it is our technology today that is the world-class, environmentally proven and sound technology for deep sea oil development. So then we blame corporate America for our own fault. Now our consumers are angry. And listen to the speeches given on the floor of this body accusing or blaming someone else for the problem we, in large part, created. What are we experiencing today? I believe we are experiencing something that is simply called petronationalism. The Saudis have it figured out. They got the oil, we got the bucks; they sell us their oil, they get our bucks. That is pretty simple, isn't it? Sixty-four percent of the energy consumed out of the pump at the local gas stations on the corners of America today comes from somewhere else in the world, not the United States. We are spending over $1 billion a day somewhere else in the world to buy their oil. And if Americans want to be mad, they ought to be mad at their politician or politicians who, for the last 20 years, have denied the reality of the marketplace, all in the name of being supergreen or all in the name of just not liking big corporations, and so we couldn't let the Exxons, the Chevrons, or the Marathons do something about it. Several years ago, I met with the president of American Oil before it merged. He was opining that they were never going to develop in the United States anymore because they could not afford to because of the regulations and the cost to produce a barrel of oil in the United States when they could go to the Caspian area of Central Europe or when they could go to Saudi Arabia or anywhere else in the Middle East. So today we suffer the reality of our own politics, and we ought to be able to do something about it. Some of you who might have been listening a few moments ago heard the Senator from Wyoming making good common sense that we ought to quit buying oil out of this current market and putting it in our Strategic Petroleum Reserve. We have enough there for the time being in case something happened in the Middle East that created a crisis. It would not last very long because we would suck it out of the ground and put it in our pumps to avoid an oil shock. But the reality is quite simple. When you have a world with a growing demand for the consumption of oil and its products and you are not producing more, the price is going to go up. Ten years ago the Chinese were not in the market. Ten years ago the Indians were not in the market. They are in the market today and they are increasing their demand out of the world's supply at a rate of 8 or 9 percent per year. Is the world's supply increasing? No, it is not. Is the world's refining capacity increasing? Very little. So Americans are competing against the Chinese and the Indians and everybody else for their gallon of gas. That is the reality of the market today. Oil is not a national commodity. It is a world commodity. As the dependency went up 60 percent over the last three decades, the overall consumer demand went up. Do ExxonMobil and Chevron and every other American company control it? No, they do not. Foreign nations control it and they are getting wealthy off of American's great ability to create wealth. If we do not get this under control as quickly as possible, we will simply spend ourselves broke and the rest of the world will have all of our money and then--guess what. They are now coming to the great banks of our country and saying: We see you have a financial problem. We would like to buy an interest in your bank and give you a big chunk of cash that we got by selling you oil. They no longer own their oil because they sold it to us and we burned it. But they have our money and they are now coming back and buying our financial institutions. Isn't that an interesting cycle? The wealth we once sent overseas to Saudi Aramco and to all of these other national companies is now coming back to the United States in the form of them owning our financial institutions. Does that make good sense? Right now we are going to look for any amount of cash we can get to bolster our financial institutions that are in trouble--possibly because of the housing industry or some other kind of large investment. So you might say that is a pretty good deal. I suggest the bad deal started 20 years ago when we began to progressively deny our country and its companies the right to produce and supply the marketplace. That is what we have done. Today we are paying the price. I am going to be spending a good deal of time over the next several months talking about every segment of the energy portfolio of our country, not only gas and oil but electricity in all other forms and conservations and photovoltaics, wind, and cellulosic. All of that is going to be terribly important for the American consumer in the years ahead. The bad news is what we have to say to the American consumer today is none of it is going to be ready for 4 or 5 or 6 or 8 or 10 years. In the meantime, your energy bill is going to become an ever larger part of your overall cost of living and your family budget. There is not much a politician can do about it because they have already damaged the marketplace in which you have to live. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following my remarks, Senator Schumer from New York be allowed to speak for 10 minutes.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, reserving the right to object.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, no objection, but this was the original at the desk, not the one amended by the Chair?

Mr. CRAIG. I thank the Chair. Mr. Chairman, let me thank you for that report. I do not know if there is anyone here in ag country who does not want your work product to become policy as soon as possible. I think the colloquy this morning has been extremely valuable. Please go back to work.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I am inclined to object. This is no reflection at all on the chairman of the Agriculture Committee and the ranking member. We are now 6 months into working on a new farm bill. In 2 weeks, we will probably start grain harvest in the panhandle of Texas. Last week, I came to the floor in a sense of frustration and urgency for American agriculture, for the Congress to complete its work. I am told by the chairman and the ranking member that a great deal has been accomplished this week and a sense of urgency is beginning to build. I would be willing to extend current farm policy for another week while the principals work on the finalization of a new farm bill because their work product is a good one. I am not here to destroy it. I am here to say, on behalf of American agriculture, they are sensing urgency--it is time Congress senses urgency. Six months negotiating a bill in most people's minds is about long enough. So for a full 2-week extension, I will object. I object.

Mr. CRAIG. Will the Chairman yield?

Mr. CRAIG. In everything I say, it is not a reflection on the work of the Senate, it is a reflection of reality, and 1996 doesn't have anything to do with it. This is 2008, and agriculture today is considerably different than it was in 1996. Today on the news you are actually hearing some supermarkets talk about the shortage of a food supply. I don't know if we have ever talked food supply shortages--ever in my lifetime--for American consumers. If what the Chairman tells me is accurate, and I have no reason to doubt him--and Senator Chambliss has done a wonderful job of keeping me and our colleagues informed--but collectively you have told this Senate more in the last 10 minutes than we have heard in a month from the collective principals on where we are with the progress. If by next week you have completed your work and we are simply ready to ink it and get it into a final package--I told Senator Chambliss I wouldn't be on the floor today if that had happened this week. But it has not happened. You have made progress. What is wrong, Mr. Chairman, with coming back here at the end of next week, reporting your work product and saying: Give us another extension and we will put it in final. That is a report to American agriculture, the kind they now deserve, more than they did 6 months ago. This is the fourth extension you have asked for, and I am simply saying I will give you one more, but you said it--the House is going out tomorrow. Is that a sense of urgency, that they are not staying here and working and completing the work? Give them 2 weeks and they will go out another 3 days. America's farming community senses urgency at this moment. I hope we do. I know you do, and I know the ranking member did. In no way is this a criticism of your work product and your work effort. You have done a marvelous job. But I think it is time collectively Congress get their work finished. I thank the Senator for yielding.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I understand we are under a unanimous consent agreement for a vote at 12 o'clock?

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I will be brief, only to amplify what Senator Burr spoke to clearly and, I hope, understandably. First and foremost, understand that my relationship with the chairman of Veterans' Affairs Committee, Danny Akaka, is a personal one and one of great affection. Here is a man today attempting to do the right thing and probably, in all fairness, is leading with his heart, and that I respect greatly. There is no question, there remain in the Philippines 13,000 veterans who fought gallantly to save their island from Japanese domination and fought with us and under our flag to do just that. They deserve to be compensated, and they have been compensated. Immediately following the war, the United States Government put $620 million into the repairs of the Philippines. In today's dollars, that is $6.7 billion. Then we left a VA hospital in place so that these veterans could receive first-class health care. And we did and they do and it is still there and it is still operating. Then we added $22 million--and that is worth $196 million in today's dollars--for equipment and construction. America did its part then, and it does its part today. The question is what is reasonable and right compensation. I stepped down as ranking member on the Veterans' Affairs Committee last September. In doing so, I was well aware of this bill, and the chairman knew at that time that I agreed with 99.9 percent of it. It is a good bill. It is an important bill for America's veterans, and it ought to be passed. At that time, I thought I offered what was a reasonable compromise; that we would reduce the level of the proposed increase in compensation to nonservice-connected Filipino veterans living in the Philippines; that we would not lift them to the standard to which Senator Burr has just spoken; that they would deserve some help. The chairman had found an offset in a court ruling that took money away from our veterans, and it was sitting there. I would have much preferred rewriting the law and reinstating that money to our veterans to abrogate the court decision, but we did not do that. So I offered a compromise at that time. It was roundly rejected by the committee. It simply did not fit where the chairman wanted to go. Therefore, from that point forward, I opposed the bill. It is a matter of fiscal responsibility. It is a near quarter of a billion dollars over the next 10 years, and it does exactly what the ranking member, Senator Burr, spoke to. It lifts these Filipino veterans above their poverty line into a middle-class status in Filipino society. Well, that is OK; none of us should deny that. But we don't do that for our veterans who live here. If you are a Filipino veteran living here legally, you get full compensation as a veteran living in this country. We do tie a benefit to a poverty level and a cost-of-living standard, and we always have. I certainly wish we could do more, but this budget is nearing $100 billion. The overall VA budget is nearing $100 billion. Four years ago, 11 percent; 3 years ago, 12 percent; 2 years ago, 13 percent; last year, an 18-percent increase. No budget in America, other than defense, has increased that much. And why are we doing it? Because collectively this Senate and this Congress have always believed in fair and responsible compensation to America's veterans--America's veterans. We also try to compensate those who support us and work in our behalf as the veterans of the Filipino society did what is right and what is reasonable.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I believe what the Senator has offered in this Senate bill that is on the floor, S. 1315, is too much. There is a middle ground. I offered it once, and it was rejected. I hope we can revisit that as a reasonable amendment when we get to the amendment process. I thank my colleagues, Senator Akaka and Senator Burr, for their work on this legislation. It is good legislation. With a little fine-tuning, then it will be fair, and we ought to support it. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak for up to 10 minutes in morning business.

Mr. CRAIG. I yield to the chairman and leader of the bill.