Larry Craig

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I want to address one provision of this very important bill having to do with Department of Energy facilities. This bill will require the Department of Energy to submit to Congress a plan for the infrastructure of the nuclear weapons complex. This will include those facilities that support the nuclear weapons stockpile, the naval reactors program, and nonproliferation and national security activities. In my view, we have not seen adequate investment in the Department of Energy's facilities over the last 10 years. This is true of the facilities and infrastructure that support both the defense and civilian missions of the Department of Energy. In addition to its vital national security missions, DOE is a premier science agency of the U.S. Government. I am encouraged that my colleagues want to begin to address the decline in DOE's infrastructure. I think this plan will be an opportunity for DOE to begin a dialog with Congress on what levels of new investment are needed. The Naval Reactors Program--a joint DOE and Navy program--has a very proud history at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory in my State. Although this program is not as active as it historically was in Idaho, the critical mission of fuel examination and storage continues at the Naval Reactors Facility. This work allows our country to have continued confidence in the ability to send our nuclear-powered naval vessels to any global hotspot or point of conflict, on short notice and fully fueled. In this way, nuclear power continues its critical role in our national defense. Given the technical excellence of the Naval Reactors Program, I am confident that as long as the Navy sends its spent nuclear fuel to Idaho for examination and storage, they will provide for the safekeeping of this material until a deep geologic repository is opened. In fact, the Navy is party to a court-enforceable agreement with the State of Idaho that commits to this very objective. I look forward to working with my colleagues in Congress, with the Navy and with DOE on securing a robust nuclear infrastructure within the DOE complex.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I have listened to the Democratic assistant leader, the whip. I appreciate the sense of urgency of moving this legislation at this late hour. We are dealing with a 5-year agricultural policy for our Nation. There is no question that it is critical and necessary that we deal with it. He and others have chosen to bring it before this body in the final hours of what should be a week toward recess or adjournment, awaiting the next session. I had hoped this would not be the case, but it is. I would truly appreciate--and I think American agriculture would appreciate--a full debate. We have had that on the bill of the ranking member, Senator Lugar--his alternative. It was important because it is a clear point of view that needs to be--must be--debated. We will have other alternatives up. I think the Cochran-Roberts alternative provision to the Harkin bill expresses clearly a balanced approach toward a 5-year agricultural policy. The Senator from Nevada has within the Harkin bill a provision that, for western Senators and arid Western States, is an issue that is an anathema to western water law and the rights of States to determine the destiny of their own water. I and others will want to engage the Senator from Nevada on that issue. That could take some time. I know of a good number of amendments that I think will be coming. The Senator from New Hampshire is now on the floor to offer an amendment in relation to the sugar program that is both within the Harkin provision and in the Cochran-Roberts provision. That, again, is another important issue for many of the Western States and many of the Southern States. My guess is it will deserve a reasonable and right amount of debate. In my State of Idaho, hundreds of farmers will be impacted, depending upon the success or failure of this amendment. What I am trying to suggest to the Senator from Nevada is that even at a late hour and this rush to get things done, you don't craft 5-year policy in a day or in a few days. You do a year's policy, oftentimes, because we know we will come back to revisit it again and again every year. We hope that when we are through here, our work product will be conferenced with the House and with the Secretary of Agriculture and this administration in a way that will establish a clear set of directions for production agriculture in this country. We know that production agriculture over the last good number of years has suffered mightily, under a situation of at or below break-even costs for commodities, for all kinds of reasons. The chairman of the Agriculture Committee is trying to remedy that in his bill. The ranking member has offered an alternative, and others will offer alternatives that have to be debated. I cannot, nor will I, support a rush to judgment. Agriculture policy for my State is critical to the well-being of the No. 1 feature of Idaho's economy, and we cannot decide simply, on the eve of Christmas, in an effort to get things done quickly, that we debate something that does not expire until next September. While I think we have adequate time this week to do so, and maybe next week, to address other issues--because it appears we will be here for some time--then we must do it thoroughly and appropriately. I hope the Senator will not push us to try to get us to a point of collapsing this into just a few more hours of debate. It is much too important to do so.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, let me use some time now. I know other colleagues want to speak to this issue of the Gregg amendment. I will speak for a time on it because there are some important issues to be discussed. The Senator from New Hampshire has, once again, portrayed the sugar program that has been a part of agricultural policy in this country for a good number of years as somehow evil and unjust, going to a small select group of people. For the hundreds of farmers in Idaho who, for the last 2 years, have lost a lot of money raising sugar beets--and under the new provisions within the Harkin bill or the Cochran-Roberts substitute would make no more money--I find the arguments of the Senator from New Hampshire interesting and unique--interesting because he said he would eliminate the recourse loan program and transfer the money to the Food Stamp Program. It is pretty difficult to transfer money that does not exist, No. 1, because under the no-net-cost approach that is provided within both versions that we are debating today, there is no authorized money specific to this program. As we know, over the last good number of years, because of the buyout of the market store and resell into the market concept, actually the Department and the Secretary of Agriculture were making money. There has been this brief period of time when recourse loans were purchased back, but from 1991 to 1999 about $279 million was actually made for the U.S. Treasury, all from the program. About 1.5 percent of the commodity program expenditure actually got caught up in recourse loans over the last year. But, again, that is that pool of money out there used for these purposes, with no specificity directed to the sugar program itself. As the Senator has mentioned, the sugar program, as we call it, has-- and his graph showed it--brought relative stability to the sugar market in this country. I say relative stability because during that period of time that he was talking about, in which there was not a program, there was a substantial runup and decline in price. Not only were there dramatic peaks and valleys, not only did the consuming public feel it, but the large wholesale consumers were, when it was at its peak, very concerned. It shoved the cost of their commodities--candy bars or soft drinks, other uses of sugar--up. But when that price then declined, of course, they didn't reduce the price of their product because they had already established a price in the market. I find it most fascinating because there is the general assumption on the part of the Senator from New Hampshire that, if his amendment were to pass, the consumer would benefit, and there is absolutely no evidence in fact that that would happen. In fact, there is argument quite to the contrary. Over the last couple of years we have seen a dramatic decline in sugar prices in this country, even with the current program. Nowhere have we seen any one retail product on the consumer market shelf decline as a result of the reduction in sugar. Where does it go? My guess is it goes into the profitable bottom line of that commercial producer out there. I don't argue that. It is the reality of what we are dealing with. I don't think the amendment the Senator is offering brings down the price one penny on a candy bar, one penny on a bottle of pop, or any other commodity in the marketplace, from boxed cereal to any other product that has sugar added to it to enhance flavor and to characterize the product to see it come down. That is simply a false argument. The reason I use the word ``false'' is because the evidence that it would is quite to the contrary. The evidence is that it would not because clearly we have seen that kind of price not happen in the last several years. The U.S. producer price for sugar has been running at 20-year lows for almost 2 years, down more than a fourth since 1996. That is under the current program. That is why this past year we have seen some forfeiture of sugar, and that is why the Department of Agriculture now owns some sugar. The bill that is before us, the new policy that will become agricultural policy, changes that and moves us clearly back to a no-net cost to the consumer. Grocers and manufacturers are not passing through these lower prices, as I have mentioned, whatever the product. While we have seen this drop in price almost to a historic low, the harm has not been to the consumer because they have not felt it, or, the positive side, it has been to the farm family who has been the producer of the product and has had to offer the flexibility that they must in a production scenario to offset those kinds of costs. There are a good many other issues out there. I see several of my colleagues in the Chamber to debate this issue. I will deal with other portions of it as we come along. The United States is required to import, under current law, nearly 1.5 million tons of sugar or about 15 percent of its consumption. We already buy sugar off the world market. Each year, whether the U.S. market requires that sugar or not, that is the agreement. That is what the program offers. In addition, unneeded sugar has entered the U.S. market outside of the sugar import quota through the creation of products from import quota circumvention. We, for the last several years, have had the frustration of what we call stuffed product, product that is intentionally enhanced with sugar, brought into this market reprocessed. The sugar is pulled out of the product--in this case molasses--to get around these kinds of limitations in the marketplace and limitations to the market itself. Why? Obviously, sugar is a commodity that moves. And we have now had court tests against that saying, yes, those are violations. We also have an agreement with Mexico under the North American Free Trade Agreement that brings sugar into this market. So to suggest that we are immune to a world market is not all of the story. The story is that 15 percent of the sugar that is in the U.S. market is world market sugar. When the Senator from New Hampshire quotes the world market price, he is quoting the open price. He is not quoting the price of Western Europe. He is not quoting the price anywhere else in the world. All prices differ based on supply, demand, and access to markets. What we have tried to do over the years with the sugar program is create stability, stability to the consumer and to the producer. Historically, we have been very successful in doing just that. We have done it in large part at no cost to the American taxpayer and, in fact, at less cost to the American consumer. The dramatic runups in sugar prices that had to be passed immediately through to the consumer simply have not existed. There are a good number of other arguments I know my colleagues want to make on this issue. It is an important part of an overall agricultural policy for this country. It is an important part of an overall farming scenario for my State and for many other States in the Nation. It creates stability in the farm communities of my State. It has historically been a profitable commodity to raise in Idaho. It is no longer today. I hope the programs we are debating that are within the Harkin bill and that are within the Roberts-Cochran substitute will bring stability back to the sugar beet producer in the Western States and in the Dakotas and Michigan, and certainly to the cane producer in the South. I yield the floor. When the appropriate time comes, as the Senator from New Hampshire has already requested the yeas and nays on his amendment, I will ask my colleagues to stand in opposition to it.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I join with my colleague and partner from Idaho with what I think is, for Idaho, an arid Western State, probably one of the more critical debates of new farm policy for our country. Those who live east of the Mississippi have no comprehension of the value of a raindrop, the value of a bank of snow, or the value of a large body of water retained behind an impoundment, known as a reservoir. My forbears and Senator Crapo's forbears for generations have recognized the value of storing water under State law and allocating this very scarce commodity to make the deserts of the West bloom and to become productive. There is no question in anyone's mind, I hope, that the ability to allocate water is the sole responsibility of the States. That is a fundamental right that has been well established in law. While oftentimes disputed by those who disagree, it is rarely ruled against in court. Why are we gathered here tonight? Because an amendment would propose in some nature, yet to be argued, that that fundamental principle of western water law is somehow overridden by a Federal law. My colleague from Idaho was very clear in pointing out the rather perverse incentive created within this bill. The authors take a very popular conservation program known as CRP and suggest if you wish to enter it anew, somehow you have to give up something increasingly more valuable. That has never been the concept. The benefit of CRP and the intent of CRP--and I am one who has been here long enough to say I was there at the beginning of this idea--said it was to take erosive lands out of the market, give that land owner something in return for the value of the conservation that would result. What has happened in the meantime is a well established record that these lands once tilled were turned into grasses and stubbles and root base that held the water, stopped the erosion, and became some of the finest upland game bird habitat in the West. In my State of Idaho, it is an extremely popular program where pheasant, chukar, and sage grouse now flourish because of the program. The incentive was the right and natural incentive. It was not: I want to provide you something, but to do so, I want to take something away. The Senator from California, a few moments ago, opined about the fact of a dry river bed. I am not going to suggest States have allocated their water always in the proper fashion. We in the West are in a tug today, a tug of war over water because we are populating at a very rapid and historic rate compared to the last century. Agriculture, some manufacturing, and human consumption were the dominant consumptive uses of water. We failed to take into recognition the value of fisheries on occasion or riparian zones. We now understand that. But here is the catch-22. My State, for 100 years, added to its water base. My State created more water than that State ever had before the Western European man came. Why? Because we created impoundments, we saved the spring runoff, and we increased the abundance of water in my State by hundreds of thousands of acre-feet. But about a decade and a half ago, because of environmental interests and attitudes, we stopped doing that. The Federal Government said: We will build no more dams. It is not a good thing to dam up rivers. So it stopped. We stopped adding water to a very arid Western State. And it is true across the West. So we locked into place the amount of water that was there. We could add no more. Two decades ago, I joined with the Senator from Colorado to establish a new water project in southeastern Colorado and we have fought it for two decades. It still is not constructed. Yet it would have added an abundance of new water to that corner of the State. It was denied by environmental interests and others. That is really a very encapsulated history as I know it. Now what is happening, in an area where we have been locked into a limited amount of water, unable to store or generate more by spring runoff, we are saying you have to divide that which is currently used for other uses. I will tell you, the arguments are pretty legitimate: Fisheries, water quality, in-stream flow, riparian zones--something we all want. It is something we all believe in. But because of the situation the arid West has been put in, when we offer up to do this, we have to take it away from somebody else. We can't add because we have no more water with which to work. We are at the headwaters of a mighty water system in my State known as the Snake-Columbia system. The mighty Snake River begins just over the mountain in Wyoming, springs through Idaho, and picks up the tributaries and dumps from the Idaho into the Columbia River, and our rivers and our streams are the habitat for salmonoid fisheries--salmon, a marvelous species of fish. They come up from the ocean to spawn, and their offspring go back to the ocean. That has become an increasingly important issue in my State because they are now listed as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The State of Idaho has sent upwards, at times, of 700,000 acre-feet of their water, under law, downriver to help those fish. But there are those who want more. As my colleague from Idaho said, the Bureau of Reclamation in Idaho is, in fact, acquiring water from Idaho and its willing seller. That is the appropriate thing to do. It is not an adversary relationship. If you have surplus available and it is in a nonuse way, we will acquire it and put it to some other use. But that fight doesn't occur here in the Nation's capital. It occurs in Boise, in Idaho's capital, in the State capital of our State where water law, water fights ought to exist. If you are going to fight water in Colorado, you fight it in Denver, you don't fight it here, because it is not our right to do so. If you are going to fight water in New Mexico, you fight it in Albuquerque. And we will have those fights. The West is replete with a history of water fights. Why? Because it is a scarce commodity. It is a lifegiving commodity--to the human species, to the fish, to the wildlife, to the plants that become the abundant crops that have made our States the great productive States that they are. But it was the men and women of Idaho from the beginning who decided how Idaho's water ought to be allocated--not the Federal Government, not the Agriculture Committee of the Senate, not the Secretary of Agriculture, but the citizens of the State of Idaho. So the senior Senator from New Mexico offers an amendment to strike the provision for the water conservation program as proposed by the Senator from Nevada, and he is right to do so. It doesn't mean a program such as this couldn't exist. It doesn't mean a program such as this should not exist. But if it does exist, it ought to be the right of the State to decide whether its citizens can participate in it because it is the State's right to decide how that water gets allocated and not the Federal Government's. When I first came to Congress in the early 1980s, there were some very wise environmentalists who were scratching their heads and saying: Wait a minute, if Idaho is 63 percent owned by the Federal Government and the citizens of the Nation and most of the tops of those watersheds where that water system of the West begins are Federal land, why isn't it Federal water? And there was a thrust and a move to take it. We blocked it. We stopped it. Why? Because of the precedent and the history and the reality that when you are in a State such as mine and that of Senator Mike Crapo, where we get about 15 inches of rainfall a year, water is sacred. What do we get here, 60-plus in a good year? People east of the Mississippi don't worry about water so much. They don't realize that you have to control it and impound it. Actually, they are trying to control it to keep it off their lands most of the time, to keep it out of their farms because it floods and does damage. We have had those fights here--reclamation fights and all of that drainage kind of thing in wetlands. Quite the reverse is true out there on the other side of the Rockies, on the other side of the Mississippi.

Mr. CRAIG. I appreciate the Senator asking the question. I am not sure I can respond. What the Senator has clearly demonstrated though, by the question, is the complex character of western water and western water relationships. The Senator is in the headwaters of the mighty Colorado River. Yet the citizens of the State of Colorado don't have a right to drain the river because the Colorado is the headwaters of a river system that goes all the way to the Gulf of California. All of those relationships have developed over the years. I am not sure I can answer that question. I think it is literally that technical. That is why, when somebody says, Oh, this causes no problem--until you review it and put it into the context of the law that governs water, a clear answer cannot be given. And I am not a water attorney.

Mr. CRAIG. The Senator from Colorado also mentioned something else in the context of his question that I think is often not understood. The Idaho Fish and Game Department would tell any citizen, or any questioning person, that there is more wildlife and more abundance of wildlife in Idaho today than ever in our known history except for maybe prehistoric times. Before the crust shifted and the glaciers receded totally, we were a fairly tropical area, and there may have been a more abundant wildlife at that time. But I am talking about known history. We have more wildlife in our State today, in the general sense, than ever in our State's history. They will tell us very simply why. There is more water. While some of our citizens are concerned that it isn't where they would like it to be as it relates to their particular interest--whether it be a fish or a riparian zone--the abundance of deer, elk, antelope, and some of our upland game birds is in direct proportion to the amount of water that is now being spread upon the land by humans. It is that multiplier that I talked about earlier on that Idahoans have been increasing the overall volume of water in their State, on an annualized basis, ever since we set foot in the State and began to homestead it and turn the land and make it productive. For example, we used to flood irrigate, spread the water openly on the land, over the Idaho aquifer. Because we wanted to conserve the water, we have moved from flood irrigation to sprinkler irrigation. We dramatically reduced the amount of water that is now being returned to the aquifer. We changed the very character of a climate that we created in the beginning upon which wildlife depended. Herein lies the question that needs to be asked of the impact of what the Senator might want to do with his amendment. Let us suggest that you, for a period of time, leased your water from a given acreage of land and it became arid, and certain wildlife moved on the land that liked arid land. Then, later on, you chose to irrigate the land which might drown out the particular arid species and somebody filed on you because you were threatening that species and risking its endangerment. Are you in violation of the law when you say you are only returning the land to its pre-existing use? Let us say you dried up the land and caused the species that were rare to leave because the lack of moisture turned it arid. Those are all the kinds of simple complication because we have made the law so critical and caused some of our friends to become such critics. Those are reasonable questions to ask. In the West and in the arid regions of our country, a long while ago this Congress recognized how important it was for those who lived in the arid areas to determine the use of the water. Some scholars called it the oasis theory. My grandfather said that very early on when he was homesteading; he homesteaded where the water was. Why? Because it is life for you and your family, and the livestock. In that case, it was my granddad's sheep ranch. It wasn't by accident that he became the owner and controller of water because it was a very limited commodity and it allowed him to grow and to expand his business, if he had to. That has been the history of the West. That is why we must not allow this amendment to exist. I am not saying the purpose isn't right, nor am I saying the Secretary of Agriculture might not want to ask the State to participate. But they ought to be asking and the State ought to have a right to say yes or no, and there ought not be any perverse incentive that if you do not, you won't get something in return that others can get. That isn't the way conservation programs ought to be developed. There ought to clearly be incentives. The additional CRP offers just that. It has been a very successful program in the foothill countries of the upland areas, in the steep countries, and the erosive lands that were once farmed. That is what ought to happen this time. I hope we can work out those differences. If not, we will have to not only attempt to strike, as the Senator from New Mexico is now attempting to do, but we will have to follow any effort through to conference and work with our colleagues in the House to make that happen. That is how critically important this is for the West and for all of us involved. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, debate on the Gregg amendment to the Harkin farm bill is nearly at an end. We have had an ample period of time to discuss the pros and cons of a national sugar policy not just for the producing beet or cane farmer in the great North, Northwest, or the South, but also a sugar policy for the American consumer, who has seen very stable sugar prices for well over a decade. What I have recognized in my years of involvement with this issue is that the producing side of the sugar industry is very willing to create a dynamic program that does not cost the American taxpayer any money, creates a stability of price both at the farm level and also at the manufacturing level and, ultimately, the consumer level. That has been the historic pattern of a sugar policy, except for just the last 2 years. In fact, over the course of the last decade, this program has not cost the American taxpayer any money. It has returned money to the Treasury of the United States. In fact, it has made money for taxpayers. The program of acquiring from the market, holding, and ultimately entering the market with the product has served us well. There is now a large supply of sugar worldwide, including in the United States. We have seen some efforts of importers outside and inside our country to try to avoid the 15-percent volume level we allow coming into this country. Some have argued that if you kill the program, down comes the price and the consumer benefits. Ironically, that just isn't true. The price is now down well below what it was a few years ago. Yet the price of a product that has substantial sweetener in it--sugar, I should say, as there are other forms of sweetener--hasn't gone down; it has gone up. Nearly 80 percent of the price of any food product on the market today is not the food itself; it is the cost of labor, the cost of processing, advertising, marketing, and shelving. All of that goes into the price the consumer pays. So when a less than 20-percent item in the overall cost of a product declines, as other costs of input are going up, the consumer sees no difference and, in many instances, there is an increase, as some have talked about in the Chamber this afternoon. In the Harkin bill that is before us, in a substitute that will be offered, known as the Cochran-Roberts bill, the sugar industry, working with the Congress in shaping the new policy, has recognized again the need to change, to be dynamic--not only to comport to budget requirements but also to deal with the consumer and make sure the consumer gets a reasonable shake and the producer gets stability in the market. The sugar titles in both the House and Senate proposed farm bills direct the Secretary of Agriculture to operate the U.S. sugar policy ``at no cost to the Federal Government by avoiding the forfeiture of sugar to the Commodity Credit Corporation.'' It is that forfeiture that some have seized on today that has only happened twice in a period of well over a decade that we want to get away from. For somebody to suggest there is going to be a good deal of money to transfer to some other program within agriculture policy or the bill or the appropriations, that just is not the case. The new farm bill will restore to the Secretary of Agriculture a key authority that was suspended in the 1996 farm bill--the authority to limit domestic sugar sales during times of surplus through flexible marketing allotments. The bill also grants the Secretary the authority to reduce Government sugar stocks and the potential for future sugar loan forfeitures by accepting bids for Government sugar in return for reducing future production. The United States is required, as I mentioned earlier in the debate, to import 1.5 million tons of sugar, or about 15 percent of its consumption each year, whether the U.S. market requires that sugar or not. In addition, unneeded sugar has entered the U.S. market--again, something mentioned by myself and others--to avoid the import quotas in creative ways, what we call stuffing or the stuffing of the product. Because of the special concessions of NAFTA and the concessions to Mexico combined with this stuffing effort, we go beyond the 15 percent of total U.S. consumption or the 1.5 million tons. The Secretary's current lack of ability to limit domestic supplies in the face of large and relatively uncontrolled imports resulted last year in historically low domestic sugar prices and the first significant sugar loan forfeiture in nearly two decades. Once again, none of that translated to the market shelf; none of it translated to the consumer's pocketbook; all of it translated to the bottom line of the processor or the confectioners, and their profits went up at the cost of the consumer and not at the profit of the farmer. Under the new farm bill, sugar marketing allotments will automatically be in place unless triggered by a high level of imports greater than 1.532 million short tons. With domestic sugar supplies under control, we believe the Secretary will be able to balance market supply and demand and ensure market price sufficient to avoid sugar loan forfeiture and any Government costs. The Congressional Budget Office scoring of the new no-cost sugar policy, however, shows a modest cost. I recognize that even though it is clearly the intent and the purpose of the legislation not to have that. Since CBO cannot assume other policy changes, it must assume that import quota circumvention problems will persist, that U.S. sugar imports will be high, and that marketing allotments in other years will not be triggered, and absent marketing allotments, sugar loan forfeitures might occur again. Remember, I keep talking about the flow of product into the market. That is part of that world sugar my colleague from New Hampshire talks about, exposing well over 15 percent of the U.S. domestic market to the availability of that world product. The industry, however, is convinced that policy changes will occur to rectify the import quota circumvention problems. We have had court tests in our favor. We are working now to block the ability of importers to stuff product with the hope of pulling that sugar out and entering it into the market. A successful U.S. Court of Appeals ruling, as I mentioned, has halted circumvention of the import sugar quota by a product entering through Canada and, as we know, it is called stuffed molasses. Legislation is pending in the Senate, of which I am a coauthor, that addresses the circumvention problem. I hope we can move it. I hope all will join with us to disallow that kind of illegal act. I believe that brings the debate full circle. The Senator from New Hampshire is worried and wants to eliminate the existing program. We are concerned about the taxpayer and want to recreate the program in a way that not only protects the producer and stability but protects the taxpayer and offers the consumer stable prices in the market. We believe what we are offering today, what the Senator from New Hampshire is trying to strike, can accomplish that purpose. I ask my colleagues to join us in voting to table the Gregg amendment and to give the adjusted policy, again, the opportunity to work its will in the market with the producer, with the consumer, to the advantage of all. I yield back the remainder of my time.

Mr. CRAIG. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I send a second-degree amendment to the desk.

Mr. CRAIG. I appreciate what the Senator is working to do with our colleagues from New Mexico. This is a vast improvement without question over what I believe is a major intrusion into water law and the very reclamation laws that many of our colleagues before us have written. I am not quite sure we have bridged the gap yet. I do believe there is a very real precedent here that is risky at best as it relates to our reclamation laws. This particular amendment has not withstood that test. Nor has it had the very intricacy of water law reviewed against it. That is critical. I know the intent and the good intentions of the Senator from Nevada. This is a phenomenally complicated area. To study water law today and to look at the court proceedings over the last decades would argue that very clearly. My colleague from Idaho has spent a good deal of time with water law. I am not a lawyer; I have not. But I do recognize a precedent when I see it and something that is new and unique to a very important body of law. I hope we can continue to work to perfect this. I do believe there is a very clear perverse incentive here that no person, nor public policy, should have embodied within it. I thank the Senator for yielding.

Mr. CRAIG. I am happy to yield.

Mr. CRAIG. I thank the Chair.

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, reserving the right to object, might I inquire of the majority leader when he would want to bring this back up for the purpose of debate?

Mr. CRAIG. I ask the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, recognizing that the set-aside would not in any way infringe upon the right of myself as a person who offered the second degree, and certainly the majority leader offered the first degree, I do not object. Amendment Withdrawn No. 2511

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I, too, am glad that we have been able to protect the privacy rule, and I want to make one final point in that regard. Nothing in this bill is designed to create any new covered entities under the privacy rule. Our intention in safeguarding the privacy rule was to keep it intact but not to expand the class of covered entities currently contemplated by it.

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I share Senator Dorgan's concern that the compliance plans called for in the House bill not be unduly burdensome. The terrorist attacks of September 11th, and concern about bioterrorism, are putting an additional pressure on our already overtaxed public health system, so imposing new burdens is something we should try to minimize. Therefore, we strongly encourage Health and Human Services Secretary Thompson to ensure that the requirement to file a compliance plan imposes as little a burden as possible.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I rise today to recognize a teacher from Idaho who has achieved national recognition for her work in physical education. Danette Lansing, from Eagle, ID, has been chosen to receive the Disney American Teacher Award, one of only 36 teachers chosen for such an honor. In fact, she was chosen from among that select group as one of the top ten teachers in the Nation, and the top teacher in the ``Wellness/Sports'' category. It is a great honor for the people of Idaho that a teacher from our State has won this award. It has always been my belief that the education system in Idaho is one of the finest in the Nation, and having a teacher from Idaho chosen for the Disney American Teacher Award only reinforces this belief. Our State has produced many fine teachers and students over the years, and this award is merely an outward indication of what Idahoans already know. One look at her career shows why she was chosen for this award. As a physical education teacher, she has done much for the students of Eagle Elementary School to make them more active and increase their physical health. As Bart Roen of Disney said about Miss Lansing's selection: ``If I had to pick one thing, it's the creativity . . . the kinds of things she does and how well it ties in with what she teaches the kids.'' For example, her success in creating a walking club at Eagle Elementary School has not only students walking during lunch, but also teachers and neighbors. Not surprisingly, this is not the first award Miss Lansing has won. In 1999, she was named Idaho's Physical Education Teacher of the Year. However, these awards pale in comparison to the high praise her students have for her. In fact, one of my own staff members had children who were students of Miss Lansing's, and he reports that she was one of their favorite teachers. It has been obvious to the people of Eagle and the State of Idaho that she is a great teacher, now it will be obvious to the Nation. As you can see, Danette Lansing is truly a treasure for her school, for Idaho, and indeed for the Nation in general. Teachers like Miss Lansing make education a rewarding experience for students and parents alike. I am proud that she was chosen for the American Teacher Award. She is a great example for the rest of the State and the Nation, and I hope this award gives her a platform so she can help other teachers to have the same success she has.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I am sorry at this time that I have to object because of the exclusive unanimous consent limitation.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, before my colleague from Connecticut leaves the floor, let me suggest to him in all sincerity that he has no reason to be ashamed, no reason to be ashamed of engaging in this debate, or in talking, as he has so proudly, about the legacy of Nuremberg and our Nation's leadership there. Nuremberg was a unique and terrible case and we addressed that issue as we should, and we did it in a most appropriate fashion. On other occasions, our Nation has engaged in international tribunals for specific purposes. But there is a very real difference today between that which we debate in the ICC and a Nuremberg example. Nuremberg was a case in point to address the dramatic crisis coming out of and during World War II and those who perpetuated those horrendous acts. It was a temporary tribunal. What we debate today is a permanent tribunal, one that stays in constant existence, one that has an international prosecutor, and one that chooses to operate under a set of laws that is constant. Not that we would ever again engage in a tribunal to deal with a Milosevic. We have. We will. And we should. Nor would we ever again engage in tribunals that would deal with terrorists who would bring acts against this country or other nations of the world. We have. We will. It is not that we are shucking from international leadership to suggest that we will not adhere to an international perpetuated body that takes away the sovereignty of our citizens and our men and women in uniform and our protections under the Constitution; that we should walk away from, that we should be proud to walk away from. That is exactly what the Senator from North Carolina is proposing with his amendment. We have dealt with this issue at length. There is a great deal more that we should probably talk about, and the time is limited this evening. The Senator from Connecticut talked about failing to assist countries. That provision was taken out of the bill of the Senator from North Carolina. If it were still in there and if it still qualified under the rules of the Senate, if you go on, it says we could waive that exception, that we could waive that prohibition on a selective basis. Does that sound like a weak Third World nation running from its international responsibility or does that sound like a world leader having the right to pick or choose for its citizens under its Constitution and not the rule of the United Nations? That is what we are talking about. That is fundamentally the issue. We all know the history of this. Even when President Clinton signed this treaty in the final hours of his administration, his own words were: Significant flaws exist in this document. Therefore, he did not send it to the Senate for ratification because he knew that it had great problems and some of those problems are the kinds of problems that the Senator from North Carolina is attempting to address. Rather it is whether or not we are fundamentally committed to the sovereign rule of the domestic law of our country under the U.S. Constitution as opposed to global justice under U.N. auspices. I don't know how to put it much clearer than that, for there can only be one answer, my guess is, for the majority of my colleagues. That means the United States must stand firmly against the concept and the reality of an ICC. No matter what we debate here today and no matter what action we take, if 13 more nations ratify this under U.N. rule, this is the law of the world, so to speak. Therefore, whether we try to shield our own from it, it is possible still that a rogue international prosecutor, using the ICC, could bring some of our men and women in uniform or any citizen of the United States over 18 years of age under its jurisdiction. This also means that trying to fix the treaty's flaws is in itself a great problem. Instead of mistakenly trying to fix the Rome treaty's flaws, the United States must recognize that the ICC is a fundamental threat to American sovereignty and civil liberty and that no deal, nor any deal, nor any compromise in that concept and under that reality is possible. We will engage internationally. We have and we will constantly do so. We are world leaders and we are proud of that. We also understand the awesome responsibility that goes with it. But to suggest that we hand this authority over to the United Nations and to suggest that they would use it in perpetuum, in a constant and uniform manner, we saw one of those rogue assemblies occur in Africa recently, and we had to walk away from it. We had to denounce it because of its outspoken racist arguments. It was something of which we could not be a part. Is this to suggest that something similar to this could not happen or would not happen in the future with this kind of a body if we don't have the right to selectively choose to create, for the purpose and the intent at the time, an international tribunal that ought to be assembled for the purpose of dealing with an unjust act to humanity around the world? That is the issue about which we are talking. That is exactly the issue that the Senator from North Carolina is attempting to address. Have we addressed this before? Yes. Have I been to the floor before to speak about it? Yes. Did we address it? Most clearly, we did. In the Commerce, State, and Justice appropriations bill this year, we prohibited the use of funds for the ICC or for its preparatory commission. That is the law of the land, as we speak. We passed it. We provided that protection this year in this Senate. It is important that we recognize that we have already made those kinds of observations. It said very clearly: None of these funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this act shall be available for cooperation with or assistance or for other support to the International Criminal Court or preparatory commission. I don't think we could get much clearer. Use of the State Department's funds for cooperation with the ICC or the preparatory commission is prohibited. That is clear. It was necessary to do. We spoke out as we should have on that issue. Let me talk about one other very important aspect because the Senator from Connecticut appropriately addressed the circumstances of today and how that all fits. I do not think by our acting this evening in support of the amendment of the Senator from North Carolina we are, in fact, turning our back on the bad actors of the world, the bin Ladens or the Milosevics or the Saddam Husseins. Not at all. We are speaking to the direct opposite. We are speaking to the right of an American citizen and the American men and women in uniform and their protection under our law. When the time comes--and it may well--to address the problems created by the gentlemen I have just mentioned, this country will stand up and ask the world to stand with it for the purpose of dealing with those kinds of international outlaws. As we develop our relationships around the world and the new coalitions that our Secretary of State is trying to form at this moment with Arab nations in search of terrorist groups, the renunciation of this Court has nothing to do with that. Those are case-by-case, nation- by-nation relationships. What the rest of the world knows is that we are a nation of law and we protect the right of our citizens under that law within the Constitution. To speak out now for that purpose instead of handing it over to--or to arguably do so, an international body, I think speaks quite the opposite; that somehow we have softened, adjusted, or changed. No, I do not think that is what we ought to be about. More importantly, I think that a loud, clear statement tonight to protect our men and women in uniform--and I wish we could go further to say all Americans--is a right and appropriate thing. Our men and our women are in the deserts and the sands of Afghanistan as we speak. As the year plays out and as we move into the next year and the next in our pursuit of international terrorism, they may be somewhere else around the world because we are a world leader, and we want and hope the world will follow us in our pursuit of international terrorists. If that day comes, beyond the military tribunals that our President has already shaped, that we need an international forum in which to address this issue, that is the day we assemble it, that is the day we bring the United Nations and the rest of the world with us. But not now, nor ever, should we arbitrarily give away the right of the citizen, wherever he or she may be around the world, to have the protection under our Constitution and under our law of that constitutional right that a native-born American or a naturalized American citizen has. That is the fundamental debate. The Senator from Connecticut and I really do not have many differences. We agree fundamentally on all of those things. I do not believe it is a negative statement to the world that we stand tall and demonstrate our leadership for our citizens and our people under our Constitution. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG. What I am saying is, hearings should have been held some time ago. It is a critical issue that the last President put before this body, in essence, by signing the treaty. Yet it has not been done. My guess is, this is a critical debate and the appropriate amendment to deal with it.

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, if the Senator will yield, I cannot speak for Senator Helms. I think all of us understand--whether by the lateness of the hour or the length of the amendment--that the ITC, with 13 remaining nations, does not blink nor cause it to react to any extensive hearings that may have been held by the Senator from Delaware. Action on the part of this Congress and our President to ultimately protect our own citizens and men and women in uniform and the protection of our sovereignty and our constitutional rights is really the question here. None of us should be frightened by a fear that somehow bin Laden or Milosevic would not be appropriately treated. We have now had the Judiciary Committee hold hearings for the last 2 days on a military tribunal. Our President has already spoken as to how they might deal with terrorists once captured.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, the majority leader has outlined for us what we will take up the balance of today and possibly tomorrow as we debate the most important issue of Department of Defense appropriations. There is something that has to be said in response to what the majority leader has just outlined because while he has opined with great emotion a frustration about the basis of opposition that those of us on this side are expressing to this particular bill, what he has failed to talk about are the very agreements he once made and once entered into with our President. That agreement first started on October 2, well after September 11, as this country was beginning to assess its needs in light of a terrorist threat and how we might ultimately conclude our efforts in Congress for fiscal year 2002. The President, the majority leader from South Dakota, the Republican leader, and the House met. They looked at all of these different issues and agreed on a couple of issues. First, they agreed that $686 billion in discretionary spending was an adequate level, plus $40 billion that would be dedicated to homeland defense and the very emergencies we are talking about and the effort to deal with the great tragedy in New York City. Forty billion had already been agreed to: $20 billion of it was to be spent immediately at the discretion of the President; $20 billion was to be worked out cooperatively with the Congress and the appropriating committees of the Congress. That work has been done. What has gone on in the meantime is the breaking of a word. I come from Idaho. The majority leader comes from South Dakota. Out there is a ground level expression called ``a deal is a deal.'' You walk up; you look your fellow person in the eye; you shake hands; you arrive at an agreement, and that is the way you operate. We went even beyond that. The President, in a letter, wrote: This agreement is the result of extensive discussions to produce an acceptable bipartisan solution to facilitate the orderly enactment of appropriation measures. This agreement and the aggregate spending level are the result of a strong bipartisan effort at this critical time for our Nation, and I expect that all parties will now proceed expeditiously and in full compliance with the agreement. Sincerely, George W. Bush. Today the deal is not a deal; the deal has been broken. The DOD bill that comes before us this afternoon is a deal breaker. What the majority leader did not say, as he opined the criticality of a homeland defense expenditure, was that it was not designed by the appropriate committees. It was not reviewed by all of the committees of jurisdiction. It was largely written in the back room of the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Senator Bob Byrd. I am not at all here today to impugn the integrity of Senator Byrd. That is not my intent. I work with him on a daily basis. I have high regard for him. But for the majority leader to come and say that $15 billion of spending is necessary in all of these categorized areas for homeland defense is totally ignoring the fact that darn few have seen all of where it goes. Our new Homeland Defense Director is at this moment developing an analysis of and an expression of need for a full implementation of homeland defense. That is where he talks, and the majority leader spoke, too--the issue of coming forth next year with recommendations, thoroughly vetted, looked at by all, examined by the committees of jurisdiction and not done in the back room of the Appropriations Committee of the Senate. I am a bit surprised when the majority leader comes to the Chamber and suggests that Republicans are attempting to play politics with the issue of the stimulus package. It has been openly discussed. That is appropriate. It has been reviewed by the authorizing committees, and that is appropriate. But what has not gone on and that which is being brought to this committee this afternoon is a thorough and responsible examination by all involved. That is why we look at it with great concern, and the very reality that the money we are spending today crosses that line of a balanced budget and into deficit. There is no question that a stimulus package that will be dealt with bipartisanly or not is going to have the impact of deficit spending or it likely could happen. But the reason we are willing to look at an investment in the economy today is the hopes of lessening that deficit, getting people back to work, causing things to happen out there. Before the August recess, 1 million Americans had lost their jobs. We were already in recession by August. The appropriate committees that examine it and the appropriate Federal agencies that examine it to make the official proclamation had not yet done so. That didn't occur until just a few weeks ago. Any of us going home, any of us spending time in our communities knew this country's economy had turned down dramatically. Now the figures show that it started well before George W. Bush came to town. It started in September of a year ago, and it was accelerating through the fall and into the winter months and across the summer. We now know that as a reality. It is important that we do a stimulus package. We responded to that when we did tax relief earlier this spring, and the then-chairman of the Budget Committee, who is now on the floor, spoke very eloquently as to why we did that. That is all part of the reason we are here. I am extremely surprised we would now attempt to do what we are attempting to do in this. We will oppose this effort. A deal is a deal. The President has said he will veto it. I am sorry the message did not get to the majority leader. I am sorry the agreement he once struck is no longer the deal because he says circumstances have changed. No, frankly, circumstances have not changed. There is still a lot of money out there to spend. This afternoon we will thoroughly debate this issue, but it is important that the statements made this morning be responded to. I yield the floor.

Mr. CRAIG

Mr. CRAIG. I thank the Senator for yielding. As the Senator from Minnesota knows, a hold is not absolute. It merely is to notify those who have objection to the bill that it might be coming up. I think the Senator has operated appropriately. I am not the person who has the hold on his bill, but it is important we deal with the issue in a timely fashion. There is much of what the Senator said I agree with. I serve on the Veterans' Committee. I do not say by this action I am not in support of veterans, homeless veterans, those who are in need. I understand where the Senator wants to go. My guess is ultimately we can get there, and I will work with the Senator to make that happen.

Mr. CRAIG. Briefly on this issue.