Pete Domenici

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. I would be glad to yield a minute to Senator Specter.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to speak for a few minutes about a pending national disaster. Mr. President, I want to discuss something that is unfortunately not part of this fire package. For over a month, I have been working intensely with other Members and the Clinton Administration trying to begin to address a serious problem that in the West has been highlighted in stark terms by the events that happened to the community of Los Alamos in my state, as just one example. What happened to the homes and families of Los Alamos is unfortunately going to happen again unless we, as a Congress, can convince the Clinton Administration to join us in bold and deliberate actions. Throughout the United States there is an increasing amount of land in what natural resource scientists and firefighting experts call the ``wildland/urban interface.'' With more people moving into the West, and more homes being built in communities surrounded by federal lands, neighborhoods like those that burned in Los Alamos are becoming more numerous. At the same time, as a consequence of decades of fire suppression as well as years of increasing drought, many millions of acres--by the General Accounting Office's estimate, 39 million or more acres--of national forests are at high risk of wildfires. They are in this situation because fuel loads have risen to dangerous levels and forest management has been dramatically curtailed at the same time. The escape of the prescribed fire in Bandelier National Monument, and its subsequent effect on the town of Los Alamos make it clear, as Secretary Babbitt has already conceded, that in many places prescribed fire is not a viable management tool to reduce fuel loads. It is particularly risky to use in the wildland/urban interface because of the presence of homes and families. Therefore, joined by others Members on both sides of the aisle, I worked over the last few weeks to provide the Administration with both the resources and the tools to begin an accelerated program of fuel reduction in wildland/urban interface areas for communities that are at risk throughout the West. We suggested a number of proposals that the Administration found too hot to handle. For instance, we asked whether the Council on Environmental Quality would designate this an emergency situation and expedite NEPA compliance for hazard fuel reduction activities in the wildland/urban interface. The Administration representatives said no. They felt that this would be too controversial with national environmental special interest groups. They pleaded with us not to pursue this option. We asked whether they could suspend administrative appeals for these hazard fuel reduction projects. That would eliminate one source of delay. Anyone who wanted to stop one of these projects could still go directly to federal court. Here again, the Administration said no. They urged us not to propose suspending appeals because it would be met with opposition by national environmental special interest groups. We suggested the use of stewardship contracts to do fuel reduction work. A stewardship contract is one where the government can trade the value of any merchantable material removed through a fuel reduction project against the cost to the government of the fuel reduction activity. This is an authority that would be very useful, but that the federal government presently lacks. Here again, the Administration felt that there was too much national environmental special interest group opposition to stewardship contracting. They urged us not to pursue this option. Throughout this discussion we told the Administration that we would be sensitive to their concerns, as long as they would commit to us that they would not treat this crisis in a ``business as usual'' fashion. We weren't simply going to give them more money and say we had resolved the problem when we know that isn't true. Finally, Senator Bingaman and I came to an agreement on the additional tools and resources that we would provide the Administration while being sensitive to their concerns. We wanted to increase fuel reduction activity by $240 million. In the course of doing that, we were going to direct the Secretary of the Interior and Agriculture to use all available contracting and hiring authorities under existing law to do this work. We were also going to provide the Secretaries with authority which they now lack to do some of this work using grants and cooperative agreements. We asked the Secretaries, at their sole discretion, to do this work in a way that would provide jobs to local people, opportunities to private, non-profit, or cooperating entities, such as youth conservation corps, and opportunities for small and micro businesses. We must begin a serious dialogue throughout the West about the severity of the problem that we face. In order to accomplish this, we directed the Secretaries by September 30 of this year to produce a list of all of the urban/wildland interface communities, within the vicinity of federal lands that are at risk from wildfire. In that list, we asked the Secretaries to identify those communities where hazard reduction activities were already underway, or could be commenced by the end of the calendar year. We further asked the Secretaries to describe by May of next year, the roadblocks to beginning hazardous fuel reduction work in the remaining communities on the list. It was our view that this would provide an opportunity to commence a very necessary dialogue: (1) among communities at risk, and (2) between the affected communities and the federal land management agencies to gain some consensus on approaching this problem. That was the intent of directing the Secretaries to produce these lists. It was also our hope that, as communities recognized the degree of risk, they would match some of the federal contributions with their own money and effort. This would get the work done even more quickly. Regrettably, I must inform the Senate, including Members from western states who have communities at risk, and some burning now, that the Administration rejected our proposal because they thought that ``it might encourage logging.'' Now remember we weren't talking about wilderness areas. And we weren't talking about roadless areas either. Nor were we talking about areas of special significance for ecological or wildlife values. We were just talking about the federal lands adjacent to communities. We were talking about the woods next to subdivisions. We were talking about places like the city of Los Alamos, or people burned out of the Lincoln National Forest in New Mexico. We could have easily have been talking about Santa Fe, New Mexico, or Bend, Oregon, or Sedona, Arizona, or Missoula, Montana. We could have been talking about neighborhoods in each of those cities, and many dozen more scattered throughout the semi-arid, western states. Even though we were talking about these kinds of areas, the Administration was much too concerned with offending environmental special interest groups to move aggressively and effectively to reduce fire risks because it might involve encouraging logging. Well this is a tragedy. And it's a tragedy that will be repeated as the summer progresses. It is a tragedy that will probably occur each week until the snow falls later this year. I want to advise the Senate that when you next look at footage of forest fires on CNN, just remember that the Administration didn't want to address this problem because they were afraid it might encourage logging. When you look at footage on CNN of burned out forests, dead and dying wildlife, and devastated watersheds, just remember that the Administration didn't want to address this problem because they were afraid it might encourage logging. When you see footage on CNN of burned-out neighborhoods, destroyed homes, devastated families and ruined lives, just remember that the Administration didn't want to prevent this problem because they were afraid that by doing so they might encourage logging. And next winter, when you see the first CNN footage of dramatic flash floods in watersheds that were burned-over the previous summer, and you see homes buried in the mud, just remember that the Administration didn't want to prevent that problem because they were afraid it might encourage logging. And finally, when you're forced to see it up close, when it affects a community in your state, when you're not just watching it on TV, but actually meeting with the citizens of your state who have been burned out of their homes and their neighborhoods--just tell them that the Administration didn't want to prevent the problem from occurring because they were afraid it might encourage too much logging. Just tell them that the Administration didn't want to prevent the problem from occurring because they were afraid of the national environmental groups who claim to want to save the environment. Maybe then the Administration will realize that they should have been afraid of what would happen if they did listen to the national environmental special interest groups. The publicly owned forests of America are not very happy today. I intended to put on the supplemental bill a provision that I was going to call ``happy forests.'' That is a strange name. But it is either happy forests or it is what we have today. What we have today is a philosophy that seems to say to the forests of our land: Burn, baby, burn. That is the theme. The administration fears logging and it is frightened to death when anyone suggests something that might sound like ``logging.'' It is all right if they keep their policy not to cut anything going, but it is not all right where the forests of America come in contact with communities. The interface between communities, buildings, churches, and the forests of America is just crying out while waiting for a forest fire that will devour communities and burn down buildings. I have a city in my state called Santa Fe. Everybody knows of Santa Fe because it is a great place to go. The mayor recently has taken many people to see the forests around Santa Fe and the community. Santa Fe is frightened that their watershed is going to burn down. It is right up against the community and provides its water. That watershed will burn down while the U.S. Government sits in its ivory tower and says don't do a thing that might look like logging, might smell like logging. Even on this bill that we have before the Senate, which provides emergency fire relief, the administration ended up rejecting, after negotiating for weeks, language that would have helped thin forests to protect communities. This was a small, but very necessary, program. Before we are finished this year, the American people are going to have such a fear about the forests burning down they will support a policy across this land of thinning these forests in the interface with communities and buildings. We had a fire that cost the Government over $1 billion in Los Alamos, affecting our laboratory and the people that work there, because the Interior Department started a fire, a ``controlled burn'', on a national monument right next to Los Alamos. They didn't follow the right rules, didn't have the right weather; they did everything wrong. The little fire got to be a big fire and the U.S. Government burned down 48,000 acres, put 400-plus families out of their homes by burning them to the ground. The Cerro Grande fire burned almost $200 million worth of Los Alamos scientific buildings. We are lucky that the whole community didn't burn to the ground. Sooner or later, we are going to have to get serious and pass the kind of legislation which would have been on this bill. The administration called it a rider. The distinguished newspaper, the Washington Post, today argues against riders on this pending bill. They said one of riders removed encouraged ``timbering.'' I ask the editors to read the language. It did not encourage timbering. It said thin the dangerous forests where communities are at risk, and it provided great limitations. It encourages the use of locals in rural communities, and give jobs to their young people, to clean out the forests in the summer. This committee of appropriations is willing to get it the program started. This administration said we will veto this whole bill, even as far as defense of our Nation goes, if you put something in that changes the way we are doing things on federal land. A panel of experts recently visited the watershed of Santa Fe, NM. They made a statement. They are frightened that watershed will burn down because the area hasn't been thinned and nothing is being done to the forest land to keep it from turning into a tinderbox. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an editorial from the Washington Post and an article from the Santa Fe New Mexican.

Mr. DOMENICI. I yield.

Mr. DOMENICI. I am happy to yield to the Senator.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to have printed in the Record the statutory language Senator Bingaman and I worked on that we wanted to incorporate here to get started, which language was denied by threat of the veto. I am not suggesting Senator Bingaman agrees with every statement I made on the floor, but one can read the proposed legislation and see that it is very reasonable. I ask unanimous consent that be printed in the Record.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I say to my friends who have spoken to this, there is a novel position in this legislation I think you will like. I am not sure it was not what brought certain environmentalists to the White House, along with some others. There are so many people such as mayors and councilmen in communities who ask us: Look. Right over there are all these dead trees, thousands of dead trees. They say: Why do we leave them there dead? The longer we leave them in that position, they are going to turn more and more into additional fodder for fires. What good do we get out of dead trees, just sitting there? Actually, what we are going to say when we finally get around to passing this is that the U.S. Government, which owns that property has to, in writing, tell that community why they cannot thin that forest, and what is holding up action. It is going to be interesting. This should become law because, sooner or later, I am going to ask the Senate to vote on it. We ask something that is very understandable and makes common sense. But you see, if you are holding fuel reduction up for a year and a half for a NEPA statement on land that just has dead trees on it, somebody is going to say: Why don't we hurry up? Why does it take so long? Getting that information is going to be part of this process of trying to get action. We should be saying to our forests and the communities abutting them: We want you to live together. We don't want one to burn the other one out. And you cannot promise them that if you do not thin those forests. With that, I am finished, and I yield the floor.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. I say to the majority leader, I have no objection. I withdraw my reservation. Mr. SHELBY addressed the Chair.

Mr. DOMENICI. Please.

Mr. DOMENICI. Reserving the right to object, might I ask the leader a question?

Mr. DOMENICI. I ask the majority leader, you said something about a freestanding nonproliferation bill?

Mr. DOMENICI. What is that?

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. But whether it is Congress or the President, someone should recognize formally a Ph.D. named Dr. Charles DeLisi, the dean of engineering at Boston University. In the year 1986, he left the National Institutes of Health in protest over their unwillingness to proceed with a genome project of national significance. He went to the Department of Energy. He said there were a lot of big brains in the Department of Energy, and maybe they would listen and come to the same conclusion. They were researching genetic projects because they were charged with deciding the extent of radiation incapacity generationally as a result of the two bombs that were dropped in Japan. The Department has all the scientists. He went there. They put together a team in DOE. I am very fortunate because they came to see me. They said: Why don't we do this since the National Institutes of Health doesn't want to? Why don't you start it? I got a little tiny bit of a bill through, saying the DOE will run the program. That was the beginning for the National Institutes of Health. As soon as they saw the bill introduced saying DOE would do it, they came running to me saying: We told Lawton Chiles we would like to get in on it. Of course, then we passed legislation that said both DOE and the National Institutes of Health would run this program. Since then, it has been a scientific marvel. The entire chromosome system of human beings is mapped. Pretty soon it will be available for scientists investigating grave diseases. They will have them at their fingertips in terms of transmutation. Perhaps we have just laid before the public and the people of the world the greatest wellness potential in the history of mankind. We may find locked up genetically the secret to most diseases. The scientists may pick it up and find solutions in the next 25 or 30 years that nobody thought possible. Sooner or later I will have somebody recognize Dr. Charles DeLisi. I have spoken to him. He is a marvelous educator at a great university. President Clinton is now aware of this and very interested. I am very hopeful he will be recognized. It is important people understand.

Mr. DOMENICI. Reserving the right to object--I will not object--I ask if you could add 5 minutes for the Senator from New Mexico on this general subject, your amendment. I ask 5 minutes be set aside for me.

Mr. DOMENICI. He and I are going to share a little time. Before I do that, I say to Senator Daschle, believe it or not, I was the first Senator involved in genome. Whether people know it or not, it was not the National Institutes of Health that started this program. It was the Department of Energy. In fact, the National Institutes of Health did not want the program, and a very distinguished doctor left them and went to DOE. They came to me. The first bill was introduced and Senator Lawton Chiles funded it. That is the origin, which I am going to talk with my friend, Senator Sessions, about in a minute. Let me suggest that I don't know what is in the Senator's amendment. But I do know from the very beginning that there has been concern about the effect of discrimination. I don't believe we should go from being concerned about the effects of discrimination to a 30- or 40-page bill that we--how big is it? Ten. Frankly, we need to make sure that what we are not doing is putting genome research into a vulnerable position where it is not stable and people do not know precisely what they can do on it. That is all I have to say about the amendment. I yield to Senator Sessions for a question.

Mr. DOMENICI. Thank you very much. I hope I don't use all of the time and that I can yield Senator Brownback time because he started this great discussion with his amendment, on which I support and commend him--the Ashcroft Medicare lockbox. I have a pretty good suspicion that sometime soon it is going to be adopted by the Senate. The Senator can take great credit, being one who from the very beginning wanted to have a lockbox on Social Security-- and even joined in the real lockbox bill, which, incidentally, was not the lockbox we are considering for Social Security today. He has been on the cutting edge of new ways to save both the Social Security trust fund and today on the Medicare HI part of the trust fund. I rise to talk a little bit about the Social Security lockbox. First of all, everybody should think for a minute. What kind of lockbox must the Democrats have when they have resisted a lockbox five times? That was a lockbox we came up with that the distinguished Senator from Michigan, Mr. Abraham, introduced with me and others. And five times the Democrats have resisted it and have not let us pass it. That ought to put up a little bit of a question: what is the difference between the two, since all of a sudden today on an appropriations bill--which probably means amendments are going to go nowhere other than to make a little racket here--we have two distinguished and good colleagues of mine adopting a Democrat lockbox for Social Security. First, let me change that to six occasions when we have offered a lockbox we put together. Most people who check for a real lockbox, in the sense of what that word means, say ours will do it and that others are questionable. Others are, in one degree or another, more easy to use in terms of violating the lockbox and spending the money elsewhere. The reason they are different is that ours is real. In the very sense of a lockbox written into law, ours is real. Let me essentially tell you what we did. We calculated where the debt of the United States would be if all of the Social Security money were left in, if we knew the numbers, and if we put in law and statute the level of debt each year for the foreseeable future. Then we said that statute locks that money in, except in the case of war or the case of economic emergency--we defined that as most economists do--and great national disaster. That is a lockbox. In order to spend it, we have to have a statute, a law that will change that level of debt that is related to Social Security. My friend on the Budget Committee, Senator Conrad, has for a long time been a proponent of making sure we have the debt down, and I commend the Senator. He has been concerned about Social Security, as have many of us. Essentially their lockbox is an invitation to waive the lockbox or, by a 60-vote majority, get rid of it. Thus, whatever you want you spend. I urge, instead of the lockbox they have before the Senate, serious consideration of accepting the lockbox that Senator Abraham, Senator Domenici, and Senator Ashcroft have tendered on six occasions. It is truly what the senior citizens deserve when speaking about lockbox. We should not be telling them it is a lockbox, but it can be waived simply on the floor of the Senate. How simple is it? We have just waived, for the two bills before the Senate, the Budget Act, which precluded doing what they were doing. We got up and said: Let's waive it. We could reach the point where we want to spend Social Security and Members could come to the floor with a vital program and say, just as we waived the Budget Act in order to take this off budget, let's waive it to spend it. If you do the Abraham-Domenici-Ashcroft lockbox for Social Security, you have to introduce a bill, say we want to change the debt limit as Social Security impacts it. Frankly, I am very proud to have come up with that idea. I think my friend from Michigan would acknowledge I came up with it. I am very proud of him. For a long time, he has been trying to get that voted on. He has told people what he was for, as Senator Ashcroft has. We have not had a vote. We tried six times to get a lockbox vote, and we were denied it by this institution, by our fellow Senators on the other side. Then all of a sudden, on an appropriations bill, with a pretty positive chance that the amendments aren't going anywhere because we cannot pass this kind of an amendment on an appropriations bill when it gets to the House-- you can take it out the door and send it to the House, but you are pretty sure if it is not dropped before getting to the House, it is probably dropped when you open the doors to the conference because it does not belong on this bill. I am not suggesting that either amendment is being offered knowing full well it is not going anywhere, but I am asking why doesn't the Senate vote on the real lockbox for Social Security. We are going to have our vote today. I am wondering whether the Senator might give consideration to offering the real lockbox and see where we stand. I ask Senator Abraham what he thinks of that idea in terms of being a chief proponent.

Mr. DOMENICI. One last point in reference to the Medicare lockbox off-budget proposal that my friends on the other side of the aisle have offered. There is a giant loophole that we have never considered in the Social Security trust fund lockbox, nor is it considered in their lockbox on Social Security. Current HI law permits all kinds of additions on the expenditure side of Medicare. If we leave that language in, we are opening that trust fund instead of closing it. When we take it off budget we open it to spend it, which, to me, seems almost inconsistent with why we are doing it. I am not going to vote for either of the Democratic lockboxes because I think the Medicare does not work and the Social Security is not a real lockbox. I yield the floor.

Mr. DOMENICI. For 10 years, we have had a written proposal with reference to the lockbox for Social Security and never have we put in language that said what their Medicare lockbox amendment says, that the surpluses can be used for spending related to the programs currently in HI. As a matter of fact, we have used the money for Social Security with a lockbox, a ``verbal'' like theirs, that never included such language, and we have spent the money on Social Security. What I am saying is this is an invitation to expansion and spending, rather than an invitation to protecting it. We could be making HI less solvent under this language rather than more solvent.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise today to join my fellow Senators in honoring Senator Daniel Inouye with the Congressional Medal of Honor. This man is a representative of our nation who has persevered through war, debate, and many had fought campaigns. I have had the pleasure of working with Senator Inouye and applaud my colleagues for bestowing this great honor upon him. Senator Daniel Inouye is a Veteran of World War II and was a captain in the Army with a Distinguished Service Cross (the second highest award for military valor), a Bronze Star, a Purple Heart with cluster, and several other medals and citations. Serving in the Senate almost 40 years, Senator Inouye is also the first Congressman from the state of Hawaii. His courage in combat is a testament to the Senator's true commitment to his country and to freedom. Serving on the Defense Appropriations Committee, I know how much Senator Inouye cares about the protection of our country and his professionalism and dedication to finding a balance for defensive spending. His diligence and dedication speak for themselves and I am proud to serve our Armed Forces with a man of this caliber near the helm. I have also had the pleasure of working with Senator Inouye on the Indian Affairs Committee for over 20 years and know first hand that his bravery did not cease on the battlefield, but still continues today. When he was chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, Senator Inouye was highly regarded among tribal leaders for his efforts to re- establish their sovereignty over their own people and their own affairs. Tribal leaders consider Senator Inouye to be a true leader and friend to the Indian people to this day. I thank Senator Inouye for his leadership and dedication to service to our country, and I thank him for his friendship and example. Mr. President, inscribed on the medal is the word ``Valor.'' Senator Inouye is one of the most valiant men I know. I praise the Members of Congress for honoring him and hope that our young people may see that it takes courage, bravery, and valor to enjoy the freedom which so many men like Senator Inouye fought to protect. Thank you, once again, to Senator Inouye for your example, and thank you to all of the veterans who have served to protect liberty and justice.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise in support of S. 2553, the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education and Related Agencies Appropriations bill for FY 2001. The bill provides $272.6 billion in new budget authority and $221.9 billion in new outlays for the operations of the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education and numerous related federal agencies. I have concerns about $6.1 billion in mandatory offsets in the bill. These offsets are likely to be challenged on the floor in a way that could put the bill over the allocation. I am also concerned about the advanced appropriation for 2003 in the SCHIP program. When outlays from prior-year budget authority and other completed actions are taken into account, the Senate-reported bill totals $335.0 billion in budget authority and $330.7 billion in outlays. The bill is exactly at the Subcommittee's revised 302(b) allocation for both budget authority and outlays. The scoring of the bill reflects the adjustments agreed to in the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 for Continuing Disability Reviews (CDRs) and adoption assistance. I commend the managers of the bill for their diligent work. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a table displaying the Senate Budget Committee scoring of the bill be printed in the Record at this point.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Madam President, the first thing I want to do is congratulate the distinguished Senator from Texas for her speech today. Before she leaves, I say that I summarize the problem we have today in a way that maybe down in your country, with Texas in mind, they might say it this way: The chickens have come home to roost. The truth is, we have no energy policy, and until something like a crisis occurs, nobody seems to worry about it--in particular, this administration. We have had a ride economically--up, up, and away. Part of it is because oil prices from foreign countries was so cheap, and America was reducing some of its own, and we just decided that there was no worry about becoming more and more dependent on foreign oil. Look at the facts. While we have had this booming economy, I might suggest to everyone that the unit utilization of petroleum products that make this economy go has come down--not because of anything we did but the high-tech industry uses a little bit less. Nonetheless, we have grown so much that we use far more--as much as 14 percent more-- petroleum products now than we did a few years ago. Guess what happened. The foreign countries became our source of supply in ever larger proportions. We were happy-go-lucky when Mexico was starving on $11-a-barrel oil that we were buying from them. They could not pay their debts; we were just gobbling it up, and the American producer was disappearing. The price was so low we closed down the opportunity to drill. The litany of what this administration has done so we will produce less domestic oil is as long as this sheet of paper; from saying that in big areas in which you could look for oil 10 years ago, you can't look for it anymore because something is more important. Not very much is more important than our growing dependence, as the greatest industrial might in the world, upon the dictates of foreign countries who sell us that tremendous product, without which we fail. At least from what I can tell for the next 35 or 40 years, there is no substitute for it. I heard recently that this administration has somewhat of a defense because they are going to say: We asked you for some renewable energy research money and you didn't give it to us. I say right here before the Senate that we will take every single proposal this administration has made for renewables--wind, solar, and the like--and submit it to experts. And we will ask them: Would that have changed the crisis of dependence on foreign oil? And, if so, how much? Do you know what it would be? Zero. We don't use those kinds of energies in automobiles anyway. Frankly, we are getting answers that the way for America to go is to put more in renewable sources and the like. We ought to do that. But if anybody thinks that is a solution to America's growing dependence on foreign oil, they had better take a long sleep because when they finally wake up, they are going to be absolutely surprised that our dependence grew while they took a nap. The truth of the matter is we had better sit down with the President and decide how we are going to start fixing this. I want to say right now that it is in the worst condition it could be--less American production; more of our land taken out of production; and more demand from the foreign countries; and they have finally found out how to enforce their agreements. They did not cheat the last couple of times on each other; that is, if Saudi Arabia agreed to X number of millions of barrels, they didn't sell it to someone on the side to flood the market, nor did Mexico, nor did any country in South America. They are putting just so much oil on a world market that demands more. What do you think happens? The price goes up. It is now past $30 a barrel. It was as low as $10 a barrel. But, in the meantime, nothing is being done for the American producer--large and small--to substantially increase their domestic production. I am informed enough not to want to leave false impressions. We do not have the wherewithal to totally eliminate dependence. Look at our great Nation. We are going to be dependent on Saudi Arabia, Mexico, and a few other countries that produce for a long time after I have left the Senate, if I am successful in staying here 2 more terms. I don't know how long my good friend, the Senator from Texas, expects to be here. But we are going to be dependent. Let me predict the next thing. We are going to have brownouts in America, which means the electricity supply to a region of the country cannot quite supply enough because we are exchanging it between areas. Then there will be another hue and cry: Who did that to us? Just like the answer of this administration today--that it is gouging. They may find some gouging. But that is not going to fix this energy problem. We are going to have brownouts because we have not been producing enough electricity. We are scared to death to produce it anyway, other than through natural gas, which is the cleanest fuel around. Yet it is a carbon dioxide producer and is a small portion of the problem that we have in the ambient air and the so-called greenhouse effect. While we hide under the desk and don't want to even discuss nuclear power--which currently supplies 21 percent--it has literally zero greenhouse gases. Eighty-four percent of France's electricity is nuclear. Their ambient air is as clean as a whistle. They are not frightened one bit to have interim storage of nuclear waste. Here sits the greatest industrial Nation on Earth in a total logjam over the issue of moving forward with just a little bit of the nuclear energy and saying let's temporarily store it, while Europe is doing it without any difficulty and no fear. Where are we going to get the electricity in the future? The problem with greenhouse gases is so severe, according to some, that we aren't going to be able to build any coal-burning plants until we clean it up more. Are we going to do every single one in the future with natural gas? Then the citizens are going to wake up and say: What did you do to natural gas prices? Our bill went up in our homes, and now we are coming to Congress and asking them to do something about it. If you decide to produce all the electricity needs in the future with natural gas, you are going to put a huge demand on American natural gas. Who knows where the price will go? Yet we have literally an abundance of natural gas in the offshore regions of America. We are frightened to death to drill any more wells. Those who do not want to change that one bit because they are scared of environmental things have won their way, and we are not open to the production of natural gas as much as we should. I close today by saying I believe 7\1/2\ years of doing nothing has ``come home to roost.'' We are just going to get around the corner maybe with this election. But I submit this great Nation is in for two big problems: Where do we get our electric-generating power in the future? What do we do about nuclear energy? We ought to do much about it instead of falling under the table when a small percentage will raise their concerns. We ought to increase the domestic supply of oil so that the world knows we haven't gone to sleep by opening as many areas as we can.

Mr. DOMENICI. Madam President, I note the presence of the Senator from Alabama. I am sure he is here because he would like to speak as in morning business. I know we are going to go to an appropriations bill. I think the bill is open to amendment. In any event, I don't think the Senate would object. I ask unanimous consent that I may have up to 20 minutes to discuss two matters and, following that, Senator Sessions have 10 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Madam President, isn't it interesting. I came to the floor today to discuss a completely different subject. I want to do so briefly. It is very difficult to do this because, frankly, there is a great story about it in the United States today. The National Institutes of Health announced that they have just about mapped the human genome, which means in the future, at a minimum, every known dreaded disease of mankind will be located in our chromosome system by the mapping of the human genome. Where scientists used to take 25 years and devote an entire science department to try to locate where multiple sclerosis came from within the human body, in short order all of those dreaded diseases will be defined in reference to the genetics of the human body, and mutations of that will be discovered as the reason for the diseases. What an exciting thing. I have not been part of the ceremony, but I started the genome program in Congress. I am very thrilled to find that it has resulted in what we predicted in 1996 and 1997. I want to tell the Senate a rather interesting story of how the genome got into the National Institutes of Health and how today it is still one-third in the Department of Energy. A very good scientist who worked for the National Institutes of Health named Dr. Charles DeLisi had been urging the National Institutes of Health to get started with a genome program. He had described its greatness in terms of it being the most significant wellness program mankind had ever seen--wellness. They defied his request and would not proceed. He said: I quit. He meandered over to the Department of Energy, which had done a lot of research on genetics because they were charged with discerning the effect of radiation from the two atomic bombs that had been dropped on Japan. He joined their department. He came to see the Senator from New Mexico, who worked for the laboratories hard and long, and said: Why don't we start a genome program in the Department of Energy since the National Institutes will not do it? I am trying to recap for my future by writing it, and I am putting it together. But what actually happened was I proposed that the genome program start, and that it start in the Department of Energy. Guess what happened. The National Institutes of Health heard about it. All of their reluctance disappeared because somebody was about to give the genome project to the Department of Energy. What an easy patsy they became. They came to the office. Then we went to see Lawton Chiles, the Senator from Florida, who appropriated the science part of this budget. They said: Let's do it together--a little bit for DOE, and a whole lot for NIH. I said: Whatever it takes, let's do it. Within the next year--1997--we funded the first genome money without a Presidential request. It had come forth, I think, in the Labor-Health and Human Services bill that will be before us today at somewhere around $20 million, maybe $29 million. We funded it for another year. Finally, the President of the United States funded it in his budget in the third year of its existence. Ever since then, it has been funded in a President's budget and by us. It is up around $129 million or $130 million. I think it is something like that. But they predicted that within 15 years they would map the entire chromosome structure of the human being. Today, they made an announcement. I don't think they are really totally finished. But there is competition afield as to how to use it, and the private sector group is purportedly moving more rapidly. The NIH and another group of scientists announced at the White House to the American people and the world we have essentially mapped the chromosome system of a human being. We now know the site, the location, the map is there, for discerning what the genes contain with reference to human behavior and human illness. I predict, as I did at least five times before committees of the Senate from the years 1987 to about 1994, where I appeared more often than any other committee urging we fund the genome project, we are ready today to say the map is there; let's get with it and start using it. We will have breakthroughs of enormous proportions with reference to humankind's illnesses. I am neither scientific enough nor philosophical enough to know what else it will bring. When we do something of this nature, we bring other questions. There will be problems of abuse, of genetic mapping to decipher people in a society prone to cancer and who therefore will not be hired, unethical research using mutations in ways not good for humankind. Incidentally, we were aware of that problem from the beginning. Senator Mark Hatfield said: Let's set aside 5 percent--that is my recollection--of the funding to use for education and ethical purposes to try to make sure we are on track. I have not followed that well enough. I am not exactly sure how that is going. We still have some legislating to do in the area regarding uses in research, and legislating with reference to an insurance company taking a whole group of people and saying: We are not insuring you because we know something about your genetics. Those are serious problems. They are bigger than the problem itself. They could make America angry at this program. We don't want to do that. We want the American people happy that we have put this into the hands of human beings, for wellness purposes. That is our desire, so that people not get dread diseases, or we find out how to cure them when they get them. Genome mapping ought to be heralded as something we did right. I don't know where it goes. I close today by thanking Dr. Charles DeLisi for bringing this idea from the NIH to my office. Senator Lawton Chiles, now deceased, is the one to whom NIH ran, saying, let's get something going. He and I worked on these projects well together. We got it going in an appropriations bill. I thank him, and I thank many Senators who worked on this, principally in the committee, whose legislation is pending. That is the subcommittee that did most of the work and helped it along, more than any other group in the Congress. I am delighted to have a chance to speak today.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to file for the Record CBO estimates as promptly as I can get them.

Mr. DOMENICI. First, I say to Senator Breaux, while I was not physically present on the floor when you made your speech, I was listening. I am very privileged and pleased to join you tonight in suggesting that this is not a real vote on Medicare. Most of the time--in the past--Senator Robb is a very realistic and forthright Senator. But somehow or other we are getting close to an election, and somebody has suggested to him that this is a way to get a real Medicare vote. The truth of the matter is, everybody listening should know this is not a real Medicare vote. If anything, if we adopt this on an appropriations bill--that funds all of the priorities of the other side of the aisle--if they want to fund education, it is funded in this bill. If they want to fund community centers to treat the people that are poor, they are funded in this bill more than last year. But now they come along and ask us to attach an amendment, a huge bill that we have never had a hearing on, and we call it prescription drugs for America. We put it on with education, community centers, all the health programs for our seniors, and we say, just put it on there and tell the committee, that knows nothing about Medicare because they are not expected to, to bring back a comprehensive Medicare program on an appropriations bill. Then the suggestion to the American senior citizens is, we are doing something for you. What we are doing is trying to force a vote before we have a bill. This is not a bill that has been considered. It is not going to be voted out by our bipartisan effort. A great bipartisan effort is taking place. If I were a member of the Finance Committee--be it Dr. Bill Frist or the Senator from Texas or the distinguished Senators on that side working on it--I would be ashamed today to say: I am going to vote to usurp and take away all your power and vote in a so-called prescription drug bill that a few of us have written up. And we are going to pass it on an appropriations bill where that committee does not know anything about prescription drugs. They are sort of expected to robot out of here and robot back in with a great prescription drug bill. I submit that we should not vote for it. We should not use our procedures and our processes in this perverted way. I am going to ask five or six questions. They are not answered by this legislation, and they are not answered here. Let me first ask: How does this amendment affect the solvency of Medicare? Nobody knows. What are the premiums for drug coverage? Nobody knows. I don't know that anybody knows the official cost estimate of this bill. But I know it is expensive. Don't you think we ought to know those answers before we try to convince Americans that we are passing a prescription drug bill which could not become law? There are two more questions: Are there taxes in this proposal? If there are, the bill goes nowhere.

Mr. DOMENICI. I think we are going to do the right thing and deny this effort to make an issue out of something that is not ready to have an issue.