Byron Dorgan

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, today I am introducing bipartisan legislation to address improvements that need to be made to the Nation's rail tracks and tank cars. I am very pleased to be joined on this bill by Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. It is vital that we address this issue of track and tank car safety. Rail accidents occur in our Nation too frequently, and can cause devastating harm, ranging from economic loss, environmental or health hazards, or the worst tragedy, the loss of human life. In my own State of North Dakota a terrible derailment took place in Minot, ND in January of 2002. At approximately 1:37 a.m. on January 18, 2002, an eastbound Canadian Pacific Railway freight train, derailed 31 of its 112 cars about \1/2\ mile west of the city limits of Minot, ND. Five tank cars carrying anhydrous ammonia, a liquefied compressed gas, catastrophically ruptured, and a vapor plume covered the derailment site and surrounding area. About 146,700 gallons of anhydrous ammonia were released from the five cars, and a cloud of hydrolyzed ammonia formed almost immediately. This plume rose an estimated 300 feet and gradually expanded 5 miles downwind of the accident site and over a population of about 11,600 people. One resident was fatally injured, and 60 to 65 residents of the neighborhood nearest the derailment site had to be rescued. Over the next 5 days, another 74,000 gallons of anhydrous ammonia were released from six other anhydrous ammonia tank cars. As a result of the accident, 11 people sustained serious injuries, and 322 people, including the 2 train crewmembers, sustained minor injuries. Damages exceeded $2 million, and more than $8 million was been spent for environmental remediation. Imagine the devastation that could have occurred if this accident had happened in a more populated area. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigated this terrible derailment, and in its report issued important safety recommendations on track inspections and tank car crashworthiness. The findings by the NTSB raised great concern. NTSB estimated that the pre- 1989 tank cars were insufficiently crashworthy. The cars were estimated to make up approximately 60 percent of the pressure tank cars in the rail system, and with a 50-year lifespan, could continue operating until 2039. The risks posed by these cars are significant, and the NTSB set forth recommendations on addressing these safety issues. Of further concern is the fact that statistics show that there were more than 1.23 million tank car shipments of hazardous materials in 2000, the last year for which the study had data available, in the United States and Canada. Of the top 10 hazardous materials transported by tank car, 5 were class 2 liquefied compressed gases, LPG, anhydrous ammonia, chlorine, propane, and vinyl chloride, that together accounted for more than 246,600 tank car shipments, or about 20 percent of all hazardous materials shipments by tank car. Consequently, the NTSB specifically stated concerns about continued transportation of class 2 hazardous materials in pre-1989 tank cars. Because of the high volume of liquefied gases transported in these tank cars and the cars' lengthy service lives, the NTSB concluded that using these cars to transport DOT class 2 hazardous materials under current operating practices poses an unquantified but real risk to the public. The NTSB also concluded that research was needed on improving the crashworthiness of all tank cars. With regards to track safety, the NTSB also found that improved track inspection, such as visual inspections, and additional oversight by the FRA was necessary. The accident was caused in part because of undetected cracks in the rail tracks, and NTSB concluded that track inspections to identify and remove cracked rail components before the cracks grow to critical size are the primary preventive measure to ensure safety. The findings from the NTSB's report are extremely troubling, and require immediate action by the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to implement the safety recommendations. Our legislation incorporates these recommendations and others on track safety, and sets forth time frames for the FRA to act so that we ensure that these critical and potentially life-saving recommendations will move forward. It is important to note that the terrible tragedy that took place in Madrid last year demonstrates that tank and track safety are vital to prevent not only against rail accidents, but also against terrorist attacks against our rail system. We cannot delay on investigating improvements to tank cars that travel every day across this country, often carrying dangerous loads of hazardous material. This is a necessary step in improving rail security. We will now work with the Senate Commerce Committee and the Senate leadership to speed enactment of this important legislation. Last year similar provisions were included in a larger rail security bill that passed the Senate, and I am hopeful that we can proceed along the same route this year, as both measures are vital to protect our rail system. I invite my colleagues to join me in cosponsoring this bill. I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, today I am introducing bipartisan legislation to address improvements that need to be made to the Nation's rail tracks and tank cars. I am very pleased to be joined on this bill by Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. It is vital that we address this issue of track and tank car safety. Rail accidents occur in our Nation too frequently, and can cause devastating harm, ranging from economic loss, environmental or health hazards, or the worst tragedy, the loss of human life. In my own State of North Dakota a terrible derailment took place in Minot, ND in January of 2002. At approximately 1:37 a.m. on January 18, 2002, an eastbound Canadian Pacific Railway freight train, derailed 31 of its 112 cars about \1/2\ mile west of the city limits of Minot, ND. Five tank cars carrying anhydrous ammonia, a liquefied compressed gas, catastrophically ruptured, and a vapor plume covered the derailment site and surrounding area. About 146,700 gallons of anhydrous ammonia were released from the five cars, and a cloud of hydrolyzed ammonia formed almost immediately. This plume rose an estimated 300 feet and gradually expanded 5 miles downwind of the accident site and over a population of about 11,600 people. One resident was fatally injured, and 60 to 65 residents of the neighborhood nearest the derailment site had to be rescued. Over the next 5 days, another 74,000 gallons of anhydrous ammonia were released from six other anhydrous ammonia tank cars. As a result of the accident, 11 people sustained serious injuries, and 322 people, including the 2 train crewmembers, sustained minor injuries. Damages exceeded $2 million, and more than $8 million was been spent for environmental remediation. Imagine the devastation that could have occurred if this accident had happened in a more populated area. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigated this terrible derailment, and in its report issued important safety recommendations on track inspections and tank car crashworthiness. The findings by the NTSB raised great concern. NTSB estimated that the pre- 1989 tank cars were insufficiently crashworthy. The cars were estimated to make up approximately 60 percent of the pressure tank cars in the rail system, and with a 50-year lifespan, could continue operating until 2039. The risks posed by these cars are significant, and the NTSB set forth recommendations on addressing these safety issues. Of further concern is the fact that statistics show that there were more than 1.23 million tank car shipments of hazardous materials in 2000, the last year for which the study had data available, in the United States and Canada. Of the top 10 hazardous materials transported by tank car, 5 were class 2 liquefied compressed gases, LPG, anhydrous ammonia, chlorine, propane, and vinyl chloride, that together accounted for more than 246,600 tank car shipments, or about 20 percent of all hazardous materials shipments by tank car. Consequently, the NTSB specifically stated concerns about continued transportation of class 2 hazardous materials in pre-1989 tank cars. Because of the high volume of liquefied gases transported in these tank cars and the cars' lengthy service lives, the NTSB concluded that using these cars to transport DOT class 2 hazardous materials under current operating practices poses an unquantified but real risk to the public. The NTSB also concluded that research was needed on improving the crashworthiness of all tank cars. With regards to track safety, the NTSB also found that improved track inspection, such as visual inspections, and additional oversight by the FRA was necessary. The accident was caused in part because of undetected cracks in the rail tracks, and NTSB concluded that track inspections to identify and remove cracked rail components before the cracks grow to critical size are the primary preventive measure to ensure safety. The findings from the NTSB's report are extremely troubling, and require immediate action by the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to implement the safety recommendations. Our legislation incorporates these recommendations and others on track safety, and sets forth time frames for the FRA to act so that we ensure that these critical and potentially life-saving recommendations will move forward. It is important to note that the terrible tragedy that took place in Madrid last year demonstrates that tank and track safety are vital to prevent not only against rail accidents, but also against terrorist attacks against our rail system. We cannot delay on investigating improvements to tank cars that travel every day across this country, often carrying dangerous loads of hazardous material. This is a necessary step in improving rail security. We will now work with the Senate Commerce Committee and the Senate leadership to speed enactment of this important legislation. Last year similar provisions were included in a larger rail security bill that passed the Senate, and I am hopeful that we can proceed along the same route this year, as both measures are vital to protect our rail system. I invite my colleagues to join me in cosponsoring this bill. I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I would like the Record to reflect that I was necessarily absent for the vote on the nomination of Paul Crotty to be United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York. Had I been present, I would have voted in support of the nomination.

Mr. DORGAN

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

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, yesterday I offered an amendment on behalf of myself and Senator Wyden from Oregon. I will now describe that amendment in some greater detail. I know others, including my colleague from Oregon, will be here. It is an amendment to terminate something called TV Marti, Television Marti. It is spending money on something that does not work, spending money we do not have on something that is not needed. Even waste, of course, has a constituency in this town, so there will be those who will oppose this amendment. I will describe why this is a tragic waste of the American taxpayers' money. This is a picture of an aerostat balloon called Fat Albert. Fat Albert has a great history. Fat Albert has been used for a number of things. At one point we had an aerostat balloon, Fat Albert, that got loose of its mooring in Florida. Eventually, it lifted fishing boats from the sea. They had to shoot it down. The Air Force had to shoot down Fat Albert. This is the aerostat balloon, along with a 20,000-foot tether cable that broadcasts television signals into the country of Cuba to tell the Cubans how good life is in America and to give the Cubans a straight story. We have spent $189 million on this program over a number of years since 1989. Over 16 years we have spent nearly $200 million. We have another program called Radio Marti. I don't propose that we terminate funding for that because by and large the Cubans are receiving signals from Radio Marti. Radio Marti is beneficial. I have been to Cuba and talked to the Cubans. They can listen to commercial stations from Miami, as well, and do. But Radio Marti gets its signals to the Cuban people. TV Marti, by contrast, has cost the American taxpayer since 1989 $189 million to broadcast television signals into Cuba that the Cuban people cannot see because the Castro Government routinely jammed those signals. In fact, for much of its existence, Television Marti was broadcasting signals from 3 a.m. until 8 in the morning--again, broadcasting signals the Cuban people could not see. That, of course, is no barrier in this country. The 20,000-foot tether on the aerostat balloon called Fat Albert sits up there in the sky with the technicians. By the way, since they had to shoot one down and since another one got loose and went over to the Everglades and they had to round up this aerostat balloon and figure out a way to catch it, since then they now have three different ways of communicating with and controlling Fat Albert which I am sure is of great comfort to the people who might be in the way of an aerostat balloon that gets loose in this country. Fat Albert is up there every day on the case, broadcasting television signals to the Cuban people. And every day, the Cuban people see this-- this is a television screen in Cuba--they see snow, because Castro jams the signals. So we have a program we pay for that doesn't work, that is not needed, and we keep doing it year after year. And this year, guess what. The President wants to double the funding. Yes, that is true, a program that does not work, is unneeded, is wasting the taxpayers' money, and the President's budget says, let's double the funding. Let me tell you what they did after they had this introduction of Fat Albert. Fat Albert gets loose, goes over to the Everglades, it is kind of a problem, and everyone is embarrassed about it. It is a worthless program that sends signals no one can receive to the Cuban people, and then they lose a balloon and they have all these embarrassing anecdotes of the fact that they are spending money to broadcast a television signal no one can receive, and so they decide they will do something different. October 10, 2003, in the Rose Garden, the administration announced new ``get tough'' measures with Cuba which, among other things, said we will stop using Fat Albert; we are not going to use an aerostat balloon anymore. Now we are going to take Commando Solo, a C-130 Air National Guard plane, special operations C-130 airplane called Commando Solo. They are going to now broadcast television signals from Commando Solo. The broadcast of TV Marti from Commando Solo commenced once a week for a 4\1/2\ hour broadcast. They use the same technology the current Fat Albert blimp uses. It broadcasts a signal from a high altitude which then is jammed by the Castro Government. The Commando Solo cannot overcome jammers in Havana, either. It can only reach areas if there are areas where the Castro Government is not jamming. Commando Solo is operated by the 193rd Special Operations Wing of the Pennsylvania National Guard. It was designed for psychological warfare in military situations. It has been used to broadcast television messages in Panama, Desert Shield, Grenada, Desert Storm, Afghanistan, and Iraq, largely areas where there has been combat that has occurred. There are half a dozen of these airplanes that exist. They are a precious military resource that is being used for what is now a nonmilitary operation. So now instead of Fat Albert, or in addition to Fat Albert, we have Commando Solo. There is no evidence, of course, that the Cubans can receive a signal from Commando Solo, but we are still pumping taxpayers' money into this folly. The President's budget says we are spending $10 million a year. We have been doing that for 16 years, and we understand this is a program we do not need, a program that does not work, but we still want to keep funding it and we want to actually enhance it. Now what we want to do is go purchase a new airplane, go buy a new airplane for $8 million so that it becomes the TV Marti airplane to broadcast signals the Castro Government will jam and that the Cuban people cannot see. If you sat around a smalltown cafe and talked about this, you would not get one person in a million who would say, well, if we have something that doesn't work, let's keep doing it; in fact, let's double it. Let's do more of it. Almost everyone would say: Are you out of your mind? What are you thinking about, funding something that does not work? If it is clear it does not work, why does it take you 16 years to decide it does not work? And if it does not work, why on Earth would you suggest doubling the funding? Yet that is exactly what we have. Now, we have people who will, I am sure, defend this, and they will say: Well, do you know something? There are some Cubans who say they have seen it. We have 19 million people in Cuba, somewhere in that neighborhood. I think when the State Department talks about this, they say: We have 250 sitings of people who actually have seen Television Marti. What they were doing is, they were interviewing people off the boats coming from Cuba in order to see if they could get some evidence that somebody was actually able to see something more than the snow on this screen. They got such an embarrassingly small amount of testimony from people who have said they could see this, they finally stopped asking people. So now there are no surveys because it was too embarrassing to get a survey completed that said this is a tragic, complete, total, thorough waste of taxpayer money. What we have is a bill on the floor of the Senate that promotes the President's budget that says we will double funding for this program that is a total waste from $10.3 million to $21.1 million in fiscal year 2006. And the $10 million increase would go toward buying an airplane that would transmit 4 hours of TV broadcast to Cuba each day that would be jammed by the Castro Government and that would not be able to be received by the Cuban people. TV Marti says it could operate a secondhand, modest twin engine plane for about $8 million. They would buy it for $8 million, and spend $2 million a year on the plane. There is not a shred of evidence--not a shred of evidence--anywhere that this would put us in a different position than now exists. The desire to use, for 16 years, an aerostat balloon called Fat Albert, and then the desire to expropriate military assets to send a highly specialized military plane, designed for psychological warfare, up in the air to broadcast for 4 hours a week signals the Cuban people cannot see--it is unbelievable. It is one of these things that leads me to say, as I have from time to time, that even waste has a strong constituency here in the Congress. But from time to time you can see waste for what it is. This is evident. It is clear. It is not about Republicans or Democrats. It is about whether we want to spend money on something that does not work. Do we want to continue to do that? My colleague, Senator Wyden, and I say absolutely not. Let's finally, finally, finally--after 16 years--have the courage to shut down a program that is a total waste of the American taxpayers' money. My colleague from New York wishes to, I think at this time, set aside and offer his own amendment; and then we will continue the debate with my colleague from Oregon immediately after the offering of the amendment. Let me at this time yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I used a picture of Fat Albert, the aerostat balloon. I will show that once again. Fat Albert was fearlessly broadcasting television signals that no one could receive, doing it for 16 years or so. And now, in order to continue broadcasting signals no one can receive, we have expropriated the use of the Pennsylvania Air National Guard's airplane called Commando Solo, one of only a half a dozen ever made, used in Bosnia, used in Iraq, used in Afghanistan, for very sophisticated electronic psychological warfare purposes. That has been flying now for 4 hours a week, broadcasting signals, without any evidence at all that the Cuban people can see those signals. So we have gone from Fat Albert to Commando Solo and now the next step, to purchase a new airplane, to purchase a new airplane so TV Marti has its own airplane to broadcast signals no one can see. Does it sound a little goofy? It would in my hometown, if you told this story. Sometimes there are people who serve here who think they know more than anybody else, they can see over the horizon things others cannot see. There is a broad common sense in this country that takes a look at things like this. And wouldn't it be the case that in a small town cafe in Oregon or a small town cafe in North Dakota or Alaska, people would take a look at this and say: What on Earth are you thinking about, spending money on something we don't need and doubling the funding for something that doesn't work? Where have you been? What planet are you living on?

Mr. DORGAN. The point I have not made is, we don't propose to spend this money in other ways; we simply propose that we strike the funding for TV Marti, a program that doesn't work, and thereby reduce the Federal indebtedness. So we are not suggesting taking this money and spending it in some other way. Get rid of this program that doesn't work, that is unneeded, and thereby eliminate at least this small amount of Federal indebtedness. I yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. DORGAN. I simply wanted 5 minutes to respond to some of what has been said. I have no objection at all to the vote.

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I regret that we have a disagreement on the Senate floor, but I am not surprised. I would like to make a couple of comments. First, those who have opposed this amendment apparently have tried to win a debate we are not having. This debate is not about nurturing the flame of freedom. It is not about resisting tyranny. All of that is wonderful. I could stand here and tell a story about Vaclav Havel on a late night on a street corner in Prague, Czechoslovakia, hearing the Declaration of Independence for this country being recited by someone in Czechoslovakia. I could tell a story about Lech Walesa and what he did to light the flame of freedom in Poland, but I will not do that. That is not what this debate is about. My colleague from Florida, Senator Martinez, talked about how important these television signals are and that is why the Castro Government jams them each and every day. That is the point he made. That is exactly the point I was making. If, in fact, these are jammed--and they are--let me read the expert from the U.S. Government. He says: Even though TV Marti is jammed, it is well positioned to be an important instrument of U.S. foreign policy or a crisis will occur on the island. Transmission to Cuba ``has been consistently jammed by the Cuban government.'' That is a U.S. official saying that. So we spend $10 million a year to send television signals no one can receive in Cuba to a Fat Albert, the aerostat balloon, and now we have decided we are going to Commando Solo, a C-130 specially equipped. By the way, there is no new technology here. I know several people have said this is new technology. Nonsense. This is plain old-fashioned waste of the taxpayers' money by now using a C-130 airplane to send television signals into Cuba the Cubans cannot receive. This is the same technology that is used by Fat Albert, the aerostat balloon. We have been doing it for 16 years. We have wasted $189 million. I support Radio Marti. I have been to Cuba. That gets through to the Cuban people. I believe we ought to remove the embargo and allow trade and travel to Cuba. That is the quickest way to get rid of Fidel Castro, but that is not even the subject. The subject is will this Congress, when they see colossal waste, fraud, and abuse, stand up and decide to stop the spending? When we talk about freedom, the question is this: Is there freedom from waste, fraud, and abuse for the American taxpayer? Does that freedom exist? If it does, will we decide to take that step in this vote? I started this morning by saying even waste has a constituency in the Congress. It seems to me quite clear that we have had our colleagues say: Well, this is not perfect. Not perfect? What do they mean, not perfect? We broadcast television signals that the receivers cannot get and spend $10 million a year, and now we are going to double funding with the ``purchase of a small airplane''? Eight million dollars to buy a new airplane now to broadcast signals the Cubans cannot receive? We are going to double the funding? I am sorry. This is simply wasting the taxpayers' money. I am all for doing things that remove the boot of oppression from the necks of the Cuban people, but I am not for wasting the taxpayers' money. We have been told now by the opponents of this amendment that this would send a bad message if we cease TV Marti, sending signals they cannot receive. Stopping that would send a bad message. That is the point of all of this, is it not? Are we sending a message or are we not? The point of it all is we are spending a lot of money believing we are sending a message that is never received. Sending a message to someone who does not receive it, sending a message by aerostat balloon or by a C-130 or by a new $8 million airplane to 11 million people who cannot see it is fundamentally foolish. Where is the freedom from waste, fraud, and abuse that the American people ought to expect from this Congress? We will see whether that freedom exists in the next 5 or 10 minutes. I yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I said 19 million Cuban people. I meant 11 million people who live in the country of Cuba. Madam President, before I yield the floor so my colleague from Oregon can have the floor, let me say again, I think we will have people come to the floor and say: What do you mean ``a waste of money''? We have to deal with the Castro government. We have to get tough. We cannot back away. I do not come to the floor to say anything good about the Castro government. The Cuban people deserve to be free and deserve to have the boot removed from their neck, the boot of oppression from a government that does not allow that kind of freedom. But let me say this: This country has stated as its purpose for a long while with respect to China and Vietnam, both Communist countries, that the road to progress toward democratic reform in those countries is through trade and travel and engagement. We have believed that fervently, Republicans and Democrats. We trade with Vietnam. We trade with China. We travel to both countries. We believe that advances both countries toward more human rights and better human rights. It is only with Cuba we have this obsession--believing if we can track down Americans who attempt to travel in Cuba, and slap them with big fines, restrict travel, restrict trade, and somehow waste money on things like TV Marti--it is only with Cuba we are obsessed with a policy that does not work. Fidel Castro has lived through 10 Presidents. The fact is, the embargo this country slapped on Cuba is the best weapon he has to continue in office, to continue his power in the Cuban government. He says it is the 500-pound gorilla up North that has its fist around the throat of the Cuban people. It would be much smarter, in my judgment, to remove the travel restrictions and all the trade restrictions from Cuba and do with Cuba as we do with China and Vietnam. The quickest way to move Castro out of Cuba is through trade and travel and engagement, and I believe that strongly. But this amendment of ours does not address that. It addresses one piece of this obsession with Cuba; and that is, the continued spending of money for TV signals into the Cuban country that the Cubans cannot see. It is one thing to do things that are wrong; it is another thing to do things that are dumb. I understand somebody shooting themselves in the foot. But after you have done it the first time, to take aim at your foot the second time--there is something fundamentally wrong and unsound about the thinking that allows you to do that. That is exactly what we are doing. I will yield the floor so my colleague from Oregon, who is a cosponsor of this amendment, can speak.

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I wonder if the Senator from Oregon will yield for a question?

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, today I am submitting a resolution to disapprove of the extension of ``trade promotion authority,'' better known as ``fast track,'' for trade agreements. In 2002, the U.S. Congress decided to tie its hands behind its back when it comes to international trade. The Constitution, at Article I, Section 8, gives the Congress the power to regulate foreign commerce. But in 2002 we handed that authority to the President, and effectively gave him a blank check. We gave the President the authority to negotiate trade agreements in secret, and to bring those agreements back to the Senate for a vote, without the possibility of a single amendment being offered. What was the result? We saw the signing of agreements like the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA. This is an agreement that would integrate our economy with those of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. Do the American people think this is a good idea? Not on your life, certainly not after what they've seen with the NAFTA deal with Mexico. CAFTA promises more of the same: U.S. jobs going overseas, as companies try to take advantage of low-wage labor in countries with no environmental controls. If we were able to offer amendments to CAFTA, we could, for instance, have meaningful prohibitions on child or sweatshop labor, or pollution by overseas factories. Provisions that would protect American workers from having to compete with children working in filthy factories for pennies a day. But that's not the kind of CAFTA agreement that big business wants. They want to pole vault over basic labor and environmental laws in our country, and just move their factories to countries like Guatemala or Honduras. I am going to lead the fight against CAFTA in the U.S. Senate. But I want to make sure that we get rid of this fast track authority that helped create this awful agreement in the first place. Well, the legislation that gave fast track authority to the president in 2002 said that Congress would get to decide in 2005 whether to extend fast track. Any Senator can come to the floor of the Senate and offer a resolution saying that we should not extend fast track. And I am availing myself of that opportunity today. But there is a catch. The supporters of fast track authority buried a provision in the 2002 bill, which says that the Senate does not get to vote on this resolution unless the Finance Committee first approves it. And the staff of Chairman of the Finance Committee has indicated that there is no way they are going to allow the Senate to vote on such a resolution. I don't want to see any more agreements like CAFTA being negotiated in secret, and then brought to the U.S. Senate without the possibility of even a single amendment. So I am offering today a resolution of disapproval for extension of fast track, in accordance with the law. And I am going to do everything I can to see to it that the Senate gets a chance to vote on this resolution, one way or another.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I rise this morning to talk about three areas of accountability as we begin discussing a range of things in the Senate this week. The issue of accountability rises on the question of the report offered to the American people and to the Congress by Judge Laurence Silberman and former Senator Chuck Robb. It deals with the question of intelligence preceding the Iraq war. The 600-page report given us was largely a useless retelling of what we know already. I do not want to completely diminish the effort, and there are some things in that report that are interesting, but the fact is, we already know that the intelligence with respect to Iraq was dead wrong. The major question is, How was the intelligence used and for what purpose was it used? We know what we were told prior to the Iraq war. All of us went to briefings up in the room in the Capitol where we receive top secret briefings, and we heard all kinds of language there and in the popular press by people in this administration and others who said that this was a certainty, that they knew where the weapons of mass destruction were in Iraq; it was urgent; there were unmanned aerial vehicles to deliver weapons of mass destruction; this is a slam dunk. Now we know not only from this report but from previous reports that this intelligence was gathered, for example, with respect to one of the issues, as our Secretary of State told the world in the United Nations presentation, concerning the prospect that the Iraqis were developing a mobile chemical weapons lab to produce weapons of mass destruction. Now we discover that information came from a source named ``curve ball.'' It was a single-source piece of information. Some suspect that ``curve ball'' was a drunk, at least when he met with our intelligence folks. It says that he was suspected of having a hangover. We know that he was a fabricator. So on the basis of a fabricator, a drunk, single source, we told the world through our Secretary of State that Iraq had mobile chemical weapons labs that threatened our country. The aluminum tubes are another story. I am not going to go through all the stories, but the question is, Where is the accountability? We get a 600-page report that tells us what we already know; that the intelligence with respect to Iraq was dead wrong. Where is the accountability? Where does the buck stop? Mr. Tenet, who was the head of the CIA--and this 600-page report points certainly to him among others--was brought to the Oval Office, to the White House, and given the Medal of Freedom after he left the CIA. Where is the accountability? Is there accountability in this country for having gotten it not just wrong but, as the 600-page report says, dead wrong? Will this Congress require accountability? I think it is very important. This 600-page report is half the story. The other part of the story is not only bad intelligence, but how was it used, and what was the purpose of using it? Go to the Woodward book, go to the O'Neill book, and one gets some hint of the connection to this. I think this Congress is owed additional answers. I think this report was far too narrow. Second, I want to ask about accountability with respect to an independent investigation that is going on in this town. The Washington Post report was surprising to me because I was not aware of these facts. The Washington Post did a story that said the cost of the Cisneros probe nears $21 million over 10 years. This was a probe of Housing Secretary Henry Cisneros by independent counsel David Barrett. In May of 1995, Mr. Barrett was appointed as independent counsel to investigate allegations that a then Cabinet Secretary lied to the FBI about money that he had paid to a former mistress. That was May 1995. In September 1999, Mr. Cisneros pleaded guilty, paid a $10,000 fine, and then following that he was later pardoned by President Clinton. By then, the independent counsel had spent $10.3 million on his investigation, and since that time he has spent another $10 million- plus on the investigation. Is there a screw loose someplace? What are they thinking about? There was an independent counsel appointed 10 years ago to investigate an alleged impropriety by a Cabinet official. The Cabinet official pleaded guilty 4 years later, was pardoned a year after that. The independent counsel is still working? He is supposed to be supervised by three Federal judges, but the fact is, they are leaking money down there. I intend to offer an amendment to the supplemental to shut off the funding. Ten years later, $21 million, investigating the question of whether a Cabinet official lied about money paid to his mistress? He pleads guilty to it and we have a guy 10 years later still investigating it? I think waste is a disaster in the Federal Government. Talk about waste, this is shameful, and if the three-judge panel does not have the common sense to shut this down, then the Congress, I hope, will have the common sense to shut it down. I will offer an amendment during the supplemental that shuts off the money and does it now. The third area of accountability is this: As chairman of the Policy Committee on our side, I have held a good number of hearings on the issue of contracting in Iraq. There is massive waste, fraud, and abuse going on with respect to contracting in Iraq. All of us know there is money going out of this Congress in wholesale quantities, tens of billions of dollars. Last year, Congress passed a bill for reconstruction money in Iraq. I did not vote for it; I voted against it. In fact, I offered an amendment to shut it down, reconstruction money to the tune of nearly $19 billion for the reconstruction of Iraq. In addition to that, we have spent nearly $160 billion to $180 billion on the war in Iraq. There is an $82 billion request before the Senate right now. That is the supplemental I was referring to earlier. This is a massive amount of money being spent with respect to the operations in Iraq and also the reconstruction in Iraq. I will talk a bit about what we have learned. One contractor was feeding our troops and charged the American Government, the Pentagon, for feeding 42,000 troops a day. It turns out this contractor was only providing 14,000 meals a day. We are getting billed for 42,000 meals, but the contractor was only providing 14,000 meals. Someplace 28,000 meals are charged for that were never offered to our troops, or perhaps not needed. I come from a small town, and they call that cheating in my hometown. That contractor is still the largest contractor in Iraq being paid by the U.S. taxpayer. We had testimony from truckdrivers who were hired to move goods around Iraq, including fuel coming into Iraq by contractors. Truckdrivers testified that $85,000 brandnew trucks were left on the side of the road to be torched and looted because they had a clogged fuel pump or because they had a flat tire they could not fix. What did they do? They left the truck beside the road, just abandoned the truck. That is the kind of waste, fraud, and abuse that is going on. We had a guy testify and show us a picture of the bags of cash that were used to give to contractors in Iraq. One contract company started business in Iraq with $450. They have been paid tens of millions of dollars now. Two of their employees, by the way, became whistleblowers and said: What we are seeing is making us sick, so we are going to tell somebody about it. Here is what they said: These two people who started this company and are contracting with the U.S. Government--it is called the Coalition Provisional Authority that we created in Iraq; it was us, we paid for it--were providing security at an airport, and they were alleged by the employees to have taken forklift trucks off the airport property to a warehouse, repaint them blue, and then bring them back to the airport and sell them to the U.S. taxpayers through the Coalition Provisional Authority. Again, in my hometown, they call that fraud. We had a big picture that one of the other whistleblowers had taken who worked in Iraq, and he said: We told contractors in Iraq that when it was time to get paid, just bring a big bag because we are going to give you cash. He showed us one picture of the contractor I discussed, the one with respect to the forklift trucks. He showed one picture of $2 million wrapped in Saran Wrap in bundles sitting on a table and the contractor comes with a big bag and they get their $2 million and waltz off. This contractor, by the way, was also alleged to have created a subsidiary in the country of Lebanon for the purpose of buying and selling to and from itself so it could inflate prices and therefore further cheat the United States taxpayer. It is unbelievable what we have learned about contracting in Iraq. One whistleblower came forward and said he was the buyer who was supposed to buy towels for U.S. soldiers. He said this is the towel I bought under orders from my superiors. The company wanted to pay almost double the price of the towel in order to have the company's name embroidered on the towel the soldiers used--unbelievable waste. When you think of what is happening, this Congress is shoveling out tens of billions of dollars in pursuit of all of this and nobody is watching the store. You hear the stories about us paying for reconstruction of a building in Iraq--and we are doing it for thousands of buildings. We decide we are going to put an air conditioner in that building, so it is subcontracted to an Iraq subcontracting company. First it goes to the contractors who are in Iraq being paid by our Government, some of whom I have described here, and then it goes to an Iraq subcontractor, and then the subcontractor for that subcontractor, and pretty soon that air conditioner in the building became a ceiling fan and we paid for an air conditioner and the ceiling fan doesn't work. So there you are. The question is, who in this Congress is going to decide this matters at a time when we are up to our neck in debt, the largest debt in the history of this country, with a fiscal policy that is way off track, a President who sends us a budget with the highest Federal budget deficits in history, and trade deficits that are the highest in history, a combined fiscal policy and trade deficit of over $1 trillion in the past year? We are sinking and drowning in debt. Who is going to care about this kind of waste, fraud, and abuse, the most serious I have seen in all the years I have served in the Congress? I raise this because it relates to accountability, accountability with respect to the use of intelligence prior to the war in Iraq, accountability with an independent counsel who spent $21 million 10 years after the fact when he was supposed to investigate a Cabinet official who lied about paying money to his mistress. This is an independent counsel who is still operating and has spent $21 million. Who is accountable for that? Who is accountable for waste, fraud, and abuse in Iraq? Harry Truman had the famous sign on his desk, ``The buck stops here.'' These days the buck doesn't seem to stop anywhere. Nobody seems to be accountable for anything. I intend to offer another amendment. I don't know whether I will offer it on the existing bill or on the supplemental, but I will offer it again, setting up a Truman committee of sorts. In 1941, at the start of the Second World War, Harry Truman, then a Democratic Senator when a Democrat was in the White House, traveled around this country and saw waste, fraud, and abuse in military spending. He created a special committee and as a result of the investigation of that committee they unearthed massive fraud and massive waste. That was when a Democrat in the Congress did it, when a Democrat was in the White House. These days nobody wants to raise any questions. You don't want to make any waves because we have one-party control and we don't want to talk about this, that, or the other thing. The fact is, I have never seen the kind of waste that now exists with respect to our operations in Iraq. It undercuts and undermines our soldiers' efforts, in my judgment. It cheats America's taxpayers, and it represents the worst of Government. We ought to be able to hire contractors who will do the job without allowing waste, fraud, and abuse to represent the major impact of what we see happening in Iraq these days with respect to these contractors. Part of this stems from greed. Part of it stems from the fact that many of these contracts in Iraq are no-bid contracts--one company. I have not mentioned Halliburton, but I could because a lot of it deals with Halliburton and KBR--not exclusively, but a lot of it. Any time somebody mentions Halliburton, somebody says: Oh, you are attacking the Vice President. Not a bit. This happened after the Vice President left Halliburton. These are of recent vintage, these activities in Iraq. It is not an attack on anybody. It is in support of the taxpayers of this country. We ought not allow this to happen. Republicans and Democrats all ought to stand on their feet and demand accountability and demand that the waste, fraud, and abuse stop--$8,000 a month to rent an SUV; $40 for a case of pop or soda--Coca-Cola. There were 50,000 pounds of nails ordered by a contractor to Iraq. They were the wrong length, so they dumped them. If anybody wants to pick up 50,000 pounds of nails, they are laying in the sand in Iraq. It is unbelievable the waste, fraud, and abuse we hear about. The reason I have held the hearings in the Democratic Policy Committee is nobody else will hold hearings. No one else wants to hold these contractors accountable. There are whistleblowers all over who are disgusted with what they saw, working for contractors and supervising contractors in Iraq. I have only described a brief portion of what we learned in these hearings. We intend to conduct additional hearings. My preference would be that we not conduct these hearings in my committee. My preference would be that the authorizing committees and the relevant committees that should be assuming oversight of this would hold aggressive hearings, but they don't and they probably won't, and as a result we will continue to do this. I am intending to offer an amendment to create a Truman-type committee here in the Congress, as we did some decades ago, to take a hard look at what is happening through that kind of committee, an investigative committee that would include Republicans and Democrats, all of whom I hope would be committed and dedicated to the task of deciding that waste, fraud, and abuse is not something that should happen on any of our watches here in the Congress. Again, I think the key issue here is accountability. There seems to be none these days in almost any direction. I hope in all of these areas we can begin to decide there is accountability, at least here in the Congress. I yield the floor and make a point of order a quorum is not present.

Mr. DORGAN

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

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator. We are the chairmen of our respective policy committees, Republican and Democratic parties. We have on previous occasions decided to arrange some debates on the floor of the Senate about some significant issues. I participated in previous debates. For this evening, however, the debate will occur between Senator Durbin and Senator Stabenow on the Democratic side, Senator DeMint and Senator Santorum on the Republican side. This debate is about Social Security, the larger issue, and also the merits of private accounts in Social Security. I assume this will be a spirited discussion because it is a discussion that has been moving around the country at a very significant pace in recent weeks. It was said once that when everyone in the room is thinking the same thing, no one is thinking very much. I happen to think debate strengthens this democracy of ours. I recall several years ago I picked up the Washington Post and there was a big debate going on about something very controversial, and someone was quoted in the Washington Post. They said, This whole thing has degenerated into a debate about principles. I read that, and I guess that is why I came here. I hope so. I hope that is what debate is about. Tonight, we will one more time begin a discussion and a debate, in this case on a subject that is very important in this country. I thank the two Republicans and the two Democrats, distinguished colleagues, who have agreed to participate in this debate. As my colleague Senator Kyl indicated, this debate will be self-executing. The rules are known to all participants. With that, let me turn this debate period over to the participants who have agreed to begin.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, are we under a time agreement at this point?

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, let me make a couple of comments about this, and first credit my colleagues Senator Craig, Senator Baucus, and many other colleagues who have worked so hard on this. Their leadership is especially appreciated. Go back 5 years to the year 2000 when I, then-Senator John Ashcroft, and my colleagues Senators Craig, Baucus, and others passed an amendment here in the Senate that became law. The amendment we offered which became law said that American farmers could sell food into the country of Cuba as long as Cuba paid cash for that food. Since that time, we have sold over $1 billion worth of agricultural commodities into Cuba. When we debated that 5 years ago, I was on the floor of the Senate saying I think it is almost immoral for any country to use food as a weapon. Food ought not be a weapon in foreign policy. Does anybody here think that for 40 years when we prevented the sale of food to Cuba we injured Fidel Castro? Does anybody believe Fidel Castro missed breakfast, or lunch, or supper, or dinner, because of our embargo on food, because we decided to use food as a weapon? It didn't hurt Fidel Castro. When we use food as a weapon, it hurts hungry, sick, and poor people. That is what happens. One day not too long ago--a couple of years ago--22 train carloads of dried feeds left the State of North Dakota, my home State, to go from our farms to Cuba to be fed to the Cuban people. Cuba paid cash for it. It was the first shipment in 42 years. We have people who never liked that law; didn't like the fact that Congress passed that law; still want to use food as a weapon. What has happened is the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Asset Control has decided to illegally, in my judgment, redetermine how they interpret that force of law that requires cash payment for food. Normally, when you buy something, when they give you the product, you pay cash and they give you the product. That is the way it is. You pay the money, they give you the product. What the Department of Treasury has decided in OFAC is that the Cubans would have to pay for this. By the way, they paid cash through a European bank because they can't use a U.S. banking institution. They have to pay for it before that shipment even leaves the local country elevator. It dramatically changes the circumstances of being able to sell and be competitive. They are doing it for one reason, because those who did this don't want American farmers to sell food into the Cuban marketplace. The Canadians sell into the Cuban marketplace. The Europeans do. But they want to go back to the good old days when the American farmers were paying the cost of an embargo. They are dead wrong. It is interesting. We are told repeatedly and have been told for years that the way to move Communist countries into the mainstream toward democratic reform is through trade and travel. I have been to the country of China; I have been to Vietnam--both Communist countries. We encourage trade and travel with Communist countries, China and Vietnam. But when it comes to Cuba, a Communist country headed by Fidel Castro, who admittedly keeps sticking his finger into our country's eye--I understand that. It is not about Fidel Castro. It is about our farmers being able to sell food into the Cuban marketplace. When it comes to Cuba and Castro, he has lived through 10 Presidents and over 40 years of an embargo. The fact is this amendment is necessary in order to stop the Treasury from doing something that the Congressional Research Service says they do not think is legal. Let me make another couple of comments that relate more generally to a related issue. The Office of Foreign Asset Control is an agency down in Treasury that is supposed to be tracking money supporting terrorism. That money supporting terrorism is to be intercepted by OFAC in their investigations, trying to figure out who is supporting Osama bin Laden, and how do we shut down their funding. Guess what. This little agency, which has 21 people, triple the number of people who are working on Osama bin Laden's funding supply, is trying to figure out how they shut down trade and travel to Cuba. They are investigating American citizens who are under suspicion of having taken a vacation in Cuba without a license. I have a picture of a young woman I have shown on the floor of the Senate many times. Her transgression was she went to Cuba to pass out free Bibles on the streets of Cuba and OFAC tracked her down and fined her $10,000. Trade and travel are two related issues that I believe would work with Cuba, as they work with China and Vietnam. I believe the Communist countries I have described, China and Vietnam as examples, have moved toward more democratic reforms, not completely, but as a result of our policy called engagement, travel, and trade. With respect to Cuba, we have had this some 40-plus years embargo that simply hasn't worked. But the piece of the embargo, the piece of that issue my colleagues Senator Craig and Senator Baucus and I and others now want to address is to correct something that is happening down at the Treasury Department that we believe misinterprets current law to correct something the Congressional Research Service says is being done which they believe is not legal. We will find any way we can to force this correction. My colleagues have described--I shall not go into any greater detail--the provisions. It allows generally visas for agricultural sales to Cuba. If you are going to sell and have a trade relationship, you have to go there and talk about what you have to sell. It would express the sense of Congress that we should issue visas to Cubans who want to buy U.S. agricultural goods, and want to come here. They have systematically refused to give visas to some of these top food-buying Cubans who would come to this country to purchase food. It also fixes payment and advance issues and resolves those kinds of problems that have arisen in recent months with the new ruling by OFAC. One final point: The current Secretary of the Treasury knows, as did the previous Secretary of the Treasury, that what is happening is goofy; totally without good sense. They know that. I had a hearing one day when I was chairing a subcommittee, and Treasury Secretary O'Neill was there. I asked him about four or five times. He didn't answer. I knew why he wouldn't answer; it was because he would get in trouble if he did. But about the fifth or sixth time I asked the question--I knew he would eventually answer--he finally answered candidly. I said, Wouldn't you, if you had the choice, rather than track people suspected of vacationing in Cuba, rather than trying to shut down agricultural trade, if you had the choice, use your assets in OFAC to track terrorist money and shut down terrorism? He finally said, of course. The next day he was chastised publicly by the White House for saying that. We do not get that kind of answer out of anyone in the administration anymore. This is very simple. It is not a partisan issue. It is the expression of Congress, on a bipartisan basis, Republicans and Democrats, that we ought not use food as a weapon. It is immoral. Farmers should not the pay the cost of this country's foreign policy. It makes no sense to allow the Treasury Department to misinterpret law and to try to shut down the ability of United States farmers to sell food to Cuba. To close where I began, let me say again, these policies have never hurt Fidel Castro. He has never missed a meal. It hurts poor people, hungry people, and sick people in Cuba, and it hurts American farmers. The policymakers who do this know that, they know both of those circumstances and they do it, in my judgment, to perpetuate a political advantage they think exists somewhere in about two States in our country. I think they are wrong. On behalf of this country's farmers and on behalf of the people in Cuba who would buy and who would need that food, I believe we ought to pass this amendment to the underlying bill. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DORGAN

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

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk on behalf of myself and Senator Wyden and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I visited with Senator Lugar and Senator Biden and indicated, on behalf of myself and Senator Wyden, I would offer the amendment. We would be prepared to discuss it in the morning, but we will be happy to have it set aside for other business on this legislation. I want to say also it is not our intention in any way to delay this legislation. It is a very important amendment to us and I think to the Senate. But when we come back tomorrow to spend some time talking about it, we will not necessarily take very much time, and we will hope for favorable consideration by the full Senate.

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

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, it appears there are a couple of minutes before we move on. I will debate the amendment, along with my colleague, Senator Wyden, more extensively in the morning. I will not take a lot of time. But as long as the floor was available, I wanted to indicate that the amendment we just laid down deals with TV Marti. We fund broadcasts into Cuba on something called Radio Marti which are very effective. The Cuban people listen to Radio Marti. Of course, they can listen to Miami radio stations as well. But we also fund something called TV Marti, and we have done it for years. The Government of Cuba, of Fidel Castro, jams the signals. We have Fat Albert, an aerostat balloon up there thousands of feet in the air, and the American taxpayer is paying for a fancy studio down on the ground. And up through this cable to Fat Albert we actually send signals into Cuba, television signals that the Cuban people can't see. Traditionally, they have been broadcast from 3 to 8 in the morning, and they are systematically jammed. We have been spending about $10 to $12 million a year, and we have been doing it for years. We have spent almost $200 million doing it. Now the President wants to double the funding. There is something called waste, fraud, and abuse. I am not exactly sure where this fits, but it is one of the three. It fits with something else called stupidity. We ought not continue to pay to send television signals to a country that can't receive them or television signals to people who can't see them because the Government is jamming them. Let me say that the Acting Director of the International Broadcasting Bureau, Mr. Brian Coniff, testified before the House Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights. He said: Transmission to China has been consistently jammed by the Cuban Government. The American official said that. This transmission of television signals has been systematically jammed by the Cuban Government. We don't have any official evidence that the audience has increased due to broadcast schedule change. They did have some anecdotal evidence that just a smattering of Cubans would be able to spot the signal that we broadcast into Cuba. Before the Castro government caught the signal and jammed it, they would get a minute or two. So that is a sighting. That is a Cuban who was able to see the signal of TV Marti. They finally stopped measuring that because the audience was so miniscule as to be almost zero. Finally their argument was, the same official says: TV Marti, though jammed, is well positioned to be an important instrument of U.S. foreign policy should a crisis occur on the island. So there we are. We have big, old Fat Albert up there, an aerostat balloon sending signals to the Cuban people they can't see. We spend $10, $12 million a year on something we don't have. And now the President says we should double that. And do you know how we are going to do it? A balloon isn't enough and a balloon causes problems because the balloon got off of its aerostat mooring and went over the Everglades, and we had people on grappling hooks and ladders trying to tame the balloon that was broadcasting signals into Cuba. So now they want to buy an airplane. If this were a television show, it would be a comedy. Now they want to buy an airplane for $8 million to send signals into Cuba that they can't receive. All of this would be funny were it not for the fact that this is paid for by American taxpayers. If ever there was a case of waste, fraud, and abuse in government spending, it is this. It is not partisan. There is no Democratic waste or Republican waste. There is just plain old waste. It seems to me when you see something that doesn't work, isn't needed, shouldn't be done and doesn't function at all, maybe it is time for all of us to say: This we can get rid of. This is not the largest amendment offered this year. It is roughly $20, $21 million. But it saves money; $21 million is a lot of money in my hometown. It saves the taxpayers money and stops doing something that has always been completely ineffective. We broadcast in Radio Marti. That is effective. The Cubans listen to it. They can listen to commercial stations from Miami for that matter. But Television Marti has never worked because the Castro government systematically jams it. So we send signals no one can receive. This amendment, I hope, should be simple enough. I know there will be some who may have an apoplectic seizure about my offering this amendment because there are a couple of States where the Cuban vote is very important and there are some in the Cuban community who think we are doing something very important and very worthy if we send signals from this country that can't be seen by the Cuban people. That escapes some notion of mine that would represent logical thinking. But nonetheless there may be some who will feel that way. We will have a broader discussion of this tomorrow. I support many of the broadcasting programs we have. Many have been very effective. But this is pure, solid, thoughtless waste. It is time for this Congress to take a stand to shut this spending down. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce a piece of legislation, along with Mr. Graham, that I believe is needed to solve our long-term energy need. It is imperative that our Nation implements a roadmap to achieving our goal of creating a hydrogen fuel-cell economy. I believe this measure is the best way to diversify our energy portfolio and protect our national security interests. This legislation would invest $7.9 billion over 10 years in hydrogen fuel cell research and deployment. Additionally, the measure would change the current direction of the hydrogen program, allowing each program related to developing hydrogen to build off of each other. Similar to what has been recommended by the National Academies, it realizes a more conscious systems approach to program design. You see, currently the hydrogen program is like a series of small block grants. We send money to the Department of Energy, DOE, and simply tell them to come up with a program. Under this scenario, with little accountability or direction, the program has not moved as swiftly as we would like. Changing the structure of the hydrogen program will ensure that the long-term goal is reached and the benefits are reaped. What this legislation does is compartmentalize each program at DoE related to hydrogen development. Instead of sending a chunk of money, the funds will now be targeted to programs that will be the foundation for building and commercializing a hydrogen fuel-cell economy. Additionally, this measure uses the successful ``learning demonstration'' technique of building institutional relationships among key industries and with the Government that has strong support from both the fuels industry and the auto sector, and applies this as a program design to all large scale systems demonstrations. These demonstrations are then linked to refining the R&D tasks again after the demonstrations complete their early phases, so that concrete learning is integrated directly into a final round of more focused R&D. This bill enables a more strategic approach to program planning in the formation of a hydrogen economy. It also includes more interaction between R&D and demonstrations--with emphasis on development--that is the key to accelerating commercialization and movement to market. This measure does not reinvent the wheel. Instead, it takes what we have learned thus far and focuses our efforts for the future. Providing developmental targets and accountability will also allow us to adjust our priorities appropriately. Introduction of this measure could not come at a more critical time. Today, oil prices are at an all time high of $57.00 a barrel. This increase has directly hit consumers where it hurts most--in their wallets. Today in the State of North Dakota, consumers will spend $330,000 more for gasoline than they did this time last year. This is nothing more than an additional tax on hard working families who have to drive around during the course of their daily lives. It is no longer a question of whether you can afford to sign your children up for extra curricular activities like baseball or ballet; it is now a question of whether you can afford to even take them to these activities. It shouldn't be this way, especially in America. However, we continue to be beholden to the same generational argument: Where can we dig and drill next? We need to jump over this debate and I believe this measure does that. Let me describe why I think we ought to do this and why focusing our attention and resources is important. I will harken back to the Apollo program. On May 25, 1961, President John F. Kennedy announced our Nation was establishing a goal of sending a man to the Moon and having a safe return by the end of the decade. The Apollo project was an enormous undertaking. The NASA annual budget increased from $500 million in 1960 to $5.2 billion in 1965. It represented 5.3 percent of the Federal budget in 1965. Think about that. In today's terms, that would be over $115 billion. NASA engaged private industry, university research, and academia in a massive way and contractor employees increased by a factor of 10, to 376,000 people, in 1965. When President Kennedy said in 1961 it was his vision to have a man walk on the Moon by the end of the decade, there was no technological capability to do so at that moment and no guarantee it could even be done. During the height of the cold war, the Soviets had an advantage in space flight and that advantage was of great concern to us. They had put up a satellite called Sputnik and the technological barriers facing the U.S. in catching up were very significant. The expense and resolve were daunting, but yet, on July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stood on the surface of the Moon and pantomimed a golf game. In a single decade, the President and the country set and reached an unthinkable goal. Now let's talk about another goal, another big idea, one that we ought to establish now for this country and for its future. That is the goal of deciding, as President Bush has suggested, that we move toward a hydrogen economy and fuel-cells for our vehicles. I will describe why I think this is important. America's energy security is threatened by our dependence on foreign oil. Oil prices are at record highs and America now imports 62 percent of the oil it consumes. Our import level is expected to grow to 68 percent by 2025. Nearly all of our cars and trucks run on gasoline, and they are the main reason America imports so much oil. Two-thirds of the oil Americans use each day is used for transportation; fuel-cell vehicles offer the best hope of dramatically reducing our long-term dependence on foreign oil and protecting our national security interests. The American economy is and will be held hostage by our ability to find and import oil from outside of our country's borders. Should this cause all of us great concern? Yes. This is a very serious problem. If we wake up tomorrow morning, God forbid, and terrorists have interrupted the supply of oil to this country--and, yes, that could happen--this country's economy will be flat on its back. It will be flat on its back because we rely on oil from sources outside this country, much of it from very troubled parts of the world. And our dependence is only expected to increase. Whenever we discuss oil, the debate centers around two issues-- drilling in ANWR and CAFE standards. If it is only those two issues, we lose. We need to move beyond these issues. Yes, we can address them, but it seems to me if these are our only options, every few years we will debate exactly the same issues: Where do we drill next? and, How much more efficient can we make a carburetor, through which we run gasoline? If our energy strategy for this country's future is simply digging and drilling, then it is a strategy I call `yesterday forever,' which means it doesn't really change very much. Every few years we can debate the issue of how dependent we are on oil imports and how dangerous it is for us. I think we should have a different debate, one that breaks our normal cycle. That does not mean we should not dig and drill. We will, we can, and we should. We will always use fossil fuels. But these resources must be used in a sustainable and efficient manner. We will continue to dig and drill, but that cannot be all we do. If it is, we really have not moved the ball forward at all. So what else can we do? I believe we should chart a different course. First of all, using fuel-cells and hydrogen is twice as efficient in getting power to a wheel as using the internal combustion engine. Second, when we use hydrogen fuel-cells in automobiles or vehicles, we are sending water vapor out the tailpipe. What a wonderful thing for our environment and our economy. We double the efficiency of the energy source, while at the same time eliminating the pollution out of the tailpipe. That makes great sense to me. In the past I have introduced legislation saying let's move to a different kind of technology, a different kind of energy economy; let's move to a hydrogen economy using fuel-cells. This bill is different from my previous bills because it would not only authorize higher funding levels, but just as importantly, it would change the way the program works. My point is simple. We need accountability and targets and timetables in all the programs developing hydrogen. While this measure specifically states that we should set a target of 100,000 vehicles on the road by 2010 and 2.5 million by 2020, it also includes developmental milestones within each program, essentially giving us a roadmap of where we need to go and how to get there. If we do not set this out, we will not get there. If we do not have the same resolve towards establishing a hydrogen fuel-cell economy as President Kennedy had in putting a man on the Moon then we are not going to get there. Not without the focus and commitment needed. Are there issues that need to be resolved? Sure there are, but we will never resolve them unless we implement a plan to do so. That is why I feel this legislation is the best approach. We focus on what is needed, while building on what we have. Instead of having two or more projects moving in different directions, with no connection, we set out a more focused approach where we can see exactly the progress we are making. This commitment is what is needed and this direction is supported throughout the hydrogen industry. We cannot let this opportunity pass us by. If we sit and do nothing when the price of oil is at its highest, then I fear we will never do anything. This type of commitment and resolve is needed for our economic future, as well as to ensure our national security interests. If we start now, I have no doubt that hydrogen fueled vehicles will be to our grandchildren what gasoline was to our grandparents.