John Ensign

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Yes.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I do want to address the map that the junior Senator from Alaska has put up over here. When he was talking to the Senator from Missouri, talking about the transportation through Missouri, he was saying these things are already happening, going through Missouri, going through her State, because that was the major reason she was voting against the Yucca Mountain proposal. This is not the same kind of waste that is going to Yucca Mountain; otherwise, you would need a different kind of repository. This is not as high a level of nuclear waste as is coming to Nevada. So to equate the two is irresponsible, I believe. We should not even have that map on the floor. I want to clear up two other quick things. The first is, the Senator from Idaho just said, Isn't it better to have one site? If, in fact, we had one site, and we are going to have all the nuclear waste at one site, that would be true. Except we are not going to have just one site. We are going to continue to have sites all over the United States with nuclear waste. Here is a very simple graph to understand. Currently we have 45,000 metric tons of nuclear waste in America. By the time Yucca Mountain is supposed to start receiving waste in 2010, we will have 65,000 metric tons. When Yucca Mountain is completed in 2036, it will have 70,000 metric tons in Yucca Mountain, but because we are producing new nuclear waste every year, spread around the country still will be 47,000 metric tons, virtually the same as we have today spread out all over the country. The Senator from Idaho has a very good argument to get the stuff out of his State. He has one of the few good arguments, but everybody else does not: If you have nuclear powerplants in your State, you will continue to have nuclear waste in your State for as long as you have nuclear powerplants operating. It is not a question of national security. It is going to be safer to have it in one site. But we are still going to have all these other sites, so national security is focused on transportation more than it is anything else. I thank the Senator for yielding.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, Nevada's slogan is ``battle born.'' It is on our State flag. It reflects the firmness of purpose and the willingness to fight for what is right that is so much a part of what characterizes Nevada. This is as true today as it was when our State entered the Union during the Civil War. When it comes to Yucca Mountain, we intend to fight. Nevada's other motto is ``all for our country.'' This is proudly displayed on our State seal. Nevadans have always been for our country. The ore taken from Nevada's Comstock load financed the means by which we preserved the Union during the Civil War, and Nevada has hosted aboveground nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site, the result being a weapon of such mass destruction that it swiftly brought the end to the World War II conflict. Too many innocent people in Nevada and Utah died from horrible cancer-related disease from the radiation fallout. So when it comes to our national defense, Nevadans have always proudly stood tall for our country. Yucca Mountain is not needed for our defense and goes way beyond patriotic duty. I want to address the transportation issue. These are some charts. Once again, because we don't know the exact transportation routes, these are the charts from the Department of Energy's final environmental impact statement. So it is all we have to go on. The darker lines--it is probably very difficult to see the real light red lines which are the rail--are the highways. This happens to be in Illinois. Chicago is up here. These are all the various transportation routes. Down here is St. Louis--all the various transportation routes through this part of the country upon which nuclear waste could and probably will travel. This happens to be the State of California. My State is here, but all of these are various transportation routes going through major cities--Los Angeles, Oakland, Sacramento. This happens to be Colorado, Denver, a major metropolitan area here as well. This is Utah where we have Salt Lake City. We see the highways and the railroads running through Salt Lake City. This is Florida, with a huge amount of population today, a very populated State--going through Miami, near Orlando and through Orlando, with the train routes through Jacksonville, Tallahassee. This is in Georgia--going through obviously their major population center in Atlanta. This is a summary of the country. These are just the highways across the country. We can see that so much of the country and so many population areas of the country are going to have nuclear waste transported through them. Once again, we don't know the exact routes, but these are the best routes we have to go on. The Department of Energy and the nuclear industry wants Americans to believe that taking tens of thousands of tons of dangerous radioactive waste, removing it from reactor sites around the country, and putting it on trains and trucks and barges now and moving it through cities and towns and waterways across America so it can be buried on an earthquake fault line in southern Nevada is a good idea. It is not. According to the Department of Energy, 50,000 to 100,000 truck shipments, 10,000 to 20,000 rail shipments, and 1,600 to 3,000 barge shipments would be required to transport high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain. The Government is trying to convince us that this project is going to be safe; as a matter of fact, they say more than safe. The Government would have us believe that getting this waste to Yucca Mountain is the key to keeping our children safe from radioactive waste that is going to be dangerous for tens of thousands of years. Anyone who believes the argument that this dangerous waste can be transported without incident only needs to look at what happened last July in the Baltimore Tunnel when a CSX freight train carrying hazardous waste derailed and set off fires that burned for days. The casks have been studied at about 1,475 degrees using computer modeling--casks similar to that. The Baltimore Tunnel fire burned at 1,500 degrees for days, which is way beyond what these casks have been put through--at least in the laboratories. Imagine a similar incident to that which happened in Baltimore, except this time if it is radioactive waste. Forget an accident. What about a terrorist attack? People have talked today about the record of shipping nuclear waste across Europe and the United States. But post-September 11, we are in a different world. We need to think about terrorism and the ways and uses and possible attacks on these nuclear canisters as they are traveling across our country. Hijacking or blowing up a truck containing nuclear waste would be an easy way to devastate one of our metropolitan areas. What we have on the chart here is difficult to see because it is taken off of VHS footage. This is a canister that is very similar. This is a newer company using their best technology trying to compete with the currently used canisters. This is a TOW missile fired down through there, and you can see that it penetrates it or would breach one of these nuclear waste canisters that are going to be shipped across major metropolitan areas in the United States. Indeed, the most senior al-Qaida leader in U.S. custody told interrogators that al-Qaida is seeking to explode a ``dirty'' bomb in the United States. Jose Padilla was arrested in Chicago after intelligence indicated that he was participating in a plot to detonate a ``dirty'' bomb in the United States. But al-Qaida doesn't need to buy nuclear material to smuggle a ``dirty'' bomb into our country. Congress is doing the hard work for them. Every truckload of nuclear waste going to Yucca Mountain on our highways through our towns and cities is a potential ``dirty'' bomb. All the terrorists have to do is breach one of these canisters on one of the trucks, trains, or barges, as the Senator from Michigan talked about, in the Great Lakes, and we will witness another severe act of terrorism. So let's call this legislation what it is and what it is not: This is not the Nuclear Waste Disposal Act. It is the ``terrorism facilitation act,'' and it needs to be defeated. Nuclear powerplant sites are among the most secure commercial facilities in the country. Following the events of September 11, they are being made even more secure, and there are even proposals for military protection at these sites. Modest infrastructure improvements can further increase the level of protection against any conceivable terrorist threat. Nuclear waste is safe when stored onsite in casks surrounded by concrete. But it is another story when these casks are going to be traveling by homes, schools, and churches. At this time, we cannot be sure they will survive real-world conditions. We may be able to develop the technology, but we don't have it today. So we should not have Yucca Mountain go forward until we develop the technology. As I have said earlier, the casks have not been tested in real fires--only with computer simulations, and not to the extent they need to be tested. I will repeat that because it is so important. The computer simulation is for 30 minutes at 1,475 degrees Fahrenheit. The temperature in the Baltimore Tunnel fire read 1,500 degrees, and it burned for days. The NRC stated that it is doing a top- to-bottom review--partly because of September 11 and the Baltimore Tunnel fire--to review the security requirements, including a review of the transportation casks' vulnerabilities to terrorism. Let's make sure these casks are properly tested before Congress votes on Yucca Mountain. I want to talk about the Government's big lie. Not only is the Government's plan dangerous for America, it also won't solve the problem. The Government's big lie is that we Americans have a choice to have one central nuclear waste storage site at Yucca Mountain or to have waste stored at the reactor sites around America. We talked about it earlier today. That sounds as if it is an easy choice except that it is not true. Even if, by some luck, waste is shipped safely across the country to Yucca Mountain, there will continue to be nuclear waste stored at all operating reactor sites. You see, even if it were possible to immediately and magically, as one of the Senators talked about today-- like our garbage is picked up, we simply, all at once, pick it up and take it to the dump. It is not done that way with nuclear waste. There will continue to be spent fuel stored at each and every operating reactor in the country. That is because nuclear waste is highly radioactive, thermally hot, and must be kept at reactor sites at water- filled cooling ponds for at least 5 to 10 years. The only way spent fuel storage can be eliminated from a reactor location is to shut down the reactor and wait many years to ship the material after that. I don't think that option of closing down figures into the nuclear industry's long-range plan. We will have 65,000 metric tons of commercial nuclear waste by the time Yucca Mountain is scheduled to open. We produce about 2,000 metric tons of nuclear waste per year. The DOE plans to ship about 3,000 tons. Just do the math. We won't get rid of the nuclear waste backlog in the country for nearly a century--even if, as somebody talked about, we expand Yucca Mountain, which would obviously be politically a very difficult thing to do--excuse me. Yucca Mountain will be filled long before then--as we see on the chart, in 2036. I think it is important to understand this because the DOE and the Secretary of Energy have been saying that it is safer to have this fuel all shipped to one place. This is today. We have 45,000 tons of spent nuclear high-level radioactive waste around the country. In 2010, when Yucca Mountain is scheduled to open, we will have 65,000 tons. If we start shipping about 3,000 tons a year, by 2036, when Yucca Mountain is full, we will still have virtually the same as what we have today. So we really have not accomplished too much. If we don't have Yucca Mountain, it will be way up, but there is not a lot of difference. It is a management thing, not a security risk. The other thing is after Yucca Mountain is full, we start producing more of it, and we get out to 2056, we can see what happens. So Yucca Mountain doesn't really solve the problems people say it is going to solve. Moving waste to Yucca Mountain will just create one additional large storage facility. To do that, the cost will be tens of thousands of shipments of deadly radioactive waste on the Nation's highways and railroads and waterways day after day, month after month. Obviously, it will never end. I want to talk briefly about the history of the process. This is really Washington power politics. The reason I talk about this is because we are going to get to the cost of Yucca Mountain in a moment. In 1982, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act gave the Energy Department until 1998 to open a permanent underground geological depository for high-level nuclear waste. At the time, they were studying several sites. But because of politics out of the States of Nevada, Washington, and Texas--Washington had the majority leader in the House, and Texas had the Speaker of the House--Nevada ended up with the nuclear waste ``queen of spades.'' The deal reached was not by a scientific determination of which location would be suitable. Basically, they just decided on politics that Nevada would get this. The site originally was for geology. They said: We are going to house this waste underground, and it is going to protect us. Over the years, they found that the geology would not protect us. So what they had to do was build in manmade protections, and that drove the costs up significantly. Prior to 1987 when they said they were going to study one site, the original cost estimate was $24 billion. In 1985 the cost estimate went to $27 billion, and in 1987 it was $38 billion. They were studying three sites. They said: We cannot do that; we will just study one site. Now they are studying one site. The cost in 1995 was $37 billion, in 1998 the cost was $46 billion, and in 2001 the cost is $58 billion. That is the equivalent of all 12 aircraft carriers for the United States combined. As a matter of fact, that is more than in today's dollars the cost of the Panama Canal, the World Trade Center, and Hoover Dam all combined. That does not include building a rail site to Yucca Mountain which, according to the DOE, is going to be needed. So this is a boondoggle, and we do not need to do it.

Mr. ENSIGN. I ask unanimous consent for 5 more minutes.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, according to the NRC Chairman, people have said: Do we have to do this right now? According to the NRC Chairman, we do have the capacity to store these materials safely for decades to come--NRC Chairman Richard Meserve. There has been a lot made of one of the Senators talking about what do we do with this waste if we do not transport it, and I wish to conclude my remarks by giving people an answer. If not Yucca Mountain, then what? Onsite dry cask storage is good for at least 100 years. We know that. These canisters are safe for at least 100 years, according to the Department of Energy. It is about $4 billion to $5 billion to store it onsite, and that includes all of the costs associated with storing it onsite--$4 billion to $5 billion instead of $60 billion plus. It is going to be at least $60 billion, make no mistake about it. Every year, we have been taking the cost up by over $10 billion in the estimates. Where is the cost going to go from here? We know this situation is going to be too expensive. What we need to do is keep the waste onsite. It is a lot cheaper. There is promising science. There is pyroprocessing. There is what is called accelerator technology transmutation. These are fancy scientific words. The bottom line is they are modern recycling of nuclear waste or partially spent nuclear fuel rods. We are recycling everything we can in this country. We need to continue to invest in recycling technology. For those who are supporters of nuclear power, as I am, recycling will make nuclear power more viable in the future, I believe, because if we have solved the waste problem, instead of burying it in the ground where it is too expensive and waste partially spent nuclear fuel rods, if we invest in recycling technology, we will have a permanent energy supply for generation after generation of Americans. If one believes in nuclear power, let's make it less costly and let's invest in the recycling technology and keep it onsite without the risks of transportation. I wish to make one other point before I close. The senior Senator from Idaho talked about 1957. We are talking about a procedural motion. He talked about 1957 where somebody offered a motion to proceed, and I have been saying all day we are violating Senate tradition today. He said that in 1957, somebody in the minority offered a motion to proceed and that debate took a week. At the end of the week, that motion to proceed actually was voted for by a vote of 70-something to 28. While that vote is accurate, what he is inaccurate about is the majority leader supported the vote. What we have said is no motion to proceed has ever come to the Senate floor successfully over the objections of the majority leader, and that statement is still true, even with the 1957 precedent. We think this still sets a very dangerous precedent on Senate tradition if this vote goes forward today. Lastly, I wish to thank a few people in our State who have done a phenomenal job of fighting this fight for the people of the State of Nevada and I believe for Americans in general. First, the senior Senator from Nevada, the assistant majority leader. No one has worked more tirelessly on this issue than he has. His staff has done an incredible job, as has my staff. I am thankful for the yeoman work of our Gov. Kenny Guinn and other elected officials, both Republican and Democrat, in our State who have tirelessly fought this issue. If we lose this vote, I am committed to the belief that one day, years from now, leaders will look back on what the Senate did today and simply say: What were we thinking? Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Except, according to the EIS--and I don't know whether the Senator will address the EIS--on dedicated rail, it is around 175 shipments per year. According to their EIS, they don't use 175. That is only if it is dedicated rail.

Mr. ENSIGN. Correct.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I understand my time is up. I think this is an important question which we will have to deal with a little more this afternoon. I yield the floor so the Senator from Idaho can be recognized.

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

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, we will save rebutting the comments of our colleague from Nevada for another time. We do want to talk about the Yucca Mountain project this morning, but I want to talk about the procedure in the Senate on which people have been focusing. In the modern history of the Senate, nobody other than the majority leader or his designee has successfully offered a motion to proceed. That being said, supporters of Yucca Mountain claim that breaking tradition would be alright because the process outlined in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act is supposedly unique. The procedure in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act is not unique, nor is it required--it is merely permitted. There are many statutes containing expedited procedures. When the Congress has determined that it is appropriate to override the traditional power of the majority leader to schedule the floor, it has drafted legislation like the War Powers Act which does so. The War Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1544 et seq.) states: Any joint resolution or bill so reported (from Committee) shall become the pending business of the House in question (in the case of the Senate the time for debate shall be equally divided between the proponents and the opponents), and shall be voted on within three calendar days thereafter, unless such House shall otherwise determine by yeas and nays. Unlike this War Powers provision, there is no requirement in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act that Congress take any action with regard to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act resolution. Congress in the past has used a variety of techniques to expedite privileged business, and in the case of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act did not choose to use some of the more time-sensitive techniques. Indeed, the 1982 act anticipates that a vote on the Yucca Mountain resolution might not occur--that it might be blocked. If the deadline passes, then the statute giving the State of Nevada a veto will have been carried out. That was part of the 1982 compromise. It is true that an expedited procedure was put into law, pursuant to the rulemaking power of the Congress, as Congress has put in law many expedited procedures. But no one other than the majority leader or his designee has ever moved successfully to go to any resolution, or bill, which has expedited procedures written into law. Any successful attempt to do that now would change forever the way that the Senate sets its agenda. The junior Senator from Alaska stated that he does ``not know that it really matters very much'' who makes the motion to proceed to the Yucca Mountain resolution. I say that it does matter. It matters very much. It is the Senate rules that allow any Senator to move to proceed to a matter, or to force a vote on the motion to proceed, but it is now a well-established practice that the Senate will only proceed to a matter the majority leader wishes to call up, and that the Senate has not proceeded to any matter that the majority leader has declined to call up for decades past. It is the proposed change in this practice that is a direct challenge to the role of any majority leader. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act does not make the resolution the pending business of the Senate, even though some laws--such as the War Powers Resolution--do take away the prerogative of the majority leader by making a resolution the pending business without any motion to proceed being required. Had the Senate wished to do that in this case, it could have followed the language of the War Powers Resolution. If a Senator other than the majority leader feels he or she has the right to call up privileged matters without deferring to the majority leader, then the Senate will have undergone a dramatic sea change in the way it operates. The procedures in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act were put in place pursuant to the rulemaking power of the Senate, and they have no higher standing because they are written into law. There is no more fundamental prerogative that attaches to the majority leader than the right to set the Senate agenda. I hope my colleagues on this side of the aisle will think long and hard before they challenge the historic role of the majority leader. The traditions of this institution deserve to be protected. Madam President, in the coming days leading up to the vote, we will be laying out some of the things my colleague from Nebraska has asked. What do we do if we do not build Yucca Mountain? There are many alternatives, and we will get into detail, why the alternatives to building Yucca Mountain are better for the United States of America. They are cheaper, they are safer, and they are better for national security. We will lay out in detail, as we have in the past, exactly why our colleagues, we believe, should vote against proceeding with the Yucca Mountain project. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I thank my colleagues for coming to the floor so quickly to respond to what I believe to be an outrageous judicial decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Let me read from the Declaration of Independence: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. The fact that our Founders referred to a Creator means that they understood that we were a Nation founded under God. In the judicial decision, which I have with me--Mr. Newdow's daughter was the subject of this decision--it says: Mr. Newdow does not allege that his daughter's teacher or the school district requires his daughter to participate in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. Rather, he claims that his daughter is injured when she is compelled to ``watch and listen'' as her state-employed teacher and her state-run school leads her classmates in a ritual proclaiming that there is a God and that ours is ``one nation under God.'' It goes on further to say in a footnote that: Compelling the students to recite the pledge was held to be a first amendment violation in the West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette in 1943. That has been clear. They were not alleging that she was forced to recite the pledge; she was just injured for having to sit there and listen to the Pledge of Allegiance. I think that our courts are completely out of control. If we study the history of our country, the founding principles of our country, we read about the proceedings of the Continental Congress. We read that our Founders would actually stop in the middle of a session when they would be in a logjam, and that they would get down on their knees right by their desks and pray together--pray for divine guidance for the decisions they were about to make. Does anybody really believe that our Founders, when they were drafting the Bill of Rights and the first amendment, where it says that ``Congress shall make no law,'' forbidding the establishment of a state-run religion, that this Ninth Circuit Court decision is what they meant? No, our founding fathers explicitly ensured the free exercise of religion. Do we think that the Founders believed that a Pledge of Allegiance saying that our Nation is ``under God,'' or that we see up here ``in God we trust,'' or that we see on our money ``in God we trust,'' that was a State- established religion? The beautiful thing about our Creator is that he gave us the freedom to worship him or not. In America, we have the freedom to worship or not, according to what our conscience tells us. But to somehow say that having a child listen to the Pledge of Allegiance is establishing a religion and impeding on an individuals free exercise of religion, is outrageous. Let me read from part of the dissenting opinion of the circuit, according to Judge Fernandez: Such phrases as ``in God we trust'' or ``under God'' have no tendency to establish a religion in this country, or to suppress anyone's exercise or non-exercise of religion, except in the fevered eye of persons who most fervently would like to drive all tincture of religion out of public life or our polity. Those expressions have not caused any real harm of that sort over the years since 1791, and are not likely to do so in the future. I think it is up to this body to take it upon itself to correct what the Ninth Circuit has done. I agree with the senior Senator from Virginia that we need to reestablish in this country what this document--the Constitution of the United States--really says and really was about. Part of that is studying the history of the founding of this country. What did the Founders intend when they wrote this document? Based on their practices, they did not want the state to say this is how you will practice a religion. The Baptists are not going to be our official religion, nor the Methodists, who came from Europe, where they had an official state religion. They, our Founders, wanted the free exercise to practice their religion, not according to how the state dictated, but to recognize that individuals have rights given by our Creator to worship as they, as individuals, see fit, as they were given by our Creator. To say that these Founders would have somehow said that it would be against the Constitution they were writing to recognize the rights given to an individual by the Creator is outrageous. So I hope that all Americans will be as outraged as I am by this decision. I think they are going to be. I was on an aircraft carrier this last weekend talking to a lot of the sailors that sacrifice so much for this country. It was during the middle of a training session on the U.S.S. Constellation that I was visiting with them. Like we in Congress do, they take an oath to defend the Constitution. I would have liked to have heard what their opinions would have been regarding this judicial decision. As my father taught me when I was a young man, there are no atheists in foxholes. Any time our young men and women go in to battle, God is there to comfort them. We have chaplains in our military to counsel people because we recognize that during times of battle and war, people need spiritual guidance, not to establish a religion, but to understand that we have a Creator who has blessed this country and that we need His guidance. In conclusion, Madam President, I believe this country needs to reestablish that we are one nation under God. Madam President, you experienced that in New York City on September 11. We saw the people of your state and the rest of the people in the United States turn to God for guidance. We saw posters everywhere: ``One nation under God,'' ``United we stand, under God.'' This country recognizes its history, and because we have been established under God, and remain under God, we have been blessed. If we abandon that now and allow the courts to abandon that, I believe this country will be in trouble. We simply cannot allow that to happen. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I thank the majority leader for objecting today, and I appreciate his opposition to this project. The junior Senator from Alaska talked about an obligation to move this legislation. I think there is never an obligation to do the wrong thing. I believe that proceeding on the issue of Yucca Mountain would be the wrong thing for this country for several reasons. There are a lot of misconceptions when it comes to Yucca Mountain. It is said we have a contract with the utility companies. That is simply because this Congress decided to enact a law based on politics and not based on what the country actually needed. Over the time of studying Yucca Mountain, we have a process that has become extraordinarily expensive, so much so that during the 1980s they dropped two of the sites they were studying because the costs were out of sight. Now, in the late 1990s or early 2000, the costs are going out of sight again. The latest cost estimate for Yucca Mountain is close to $60 billion. That is as much money as the cost of all 12 of our aircraft carriers. The stated purpose is so we can make nuclear power more viable in the future, if we have a solution for the waste. I submit to my colleagues that Yucca Mountain will not make nuclear power more viable because of the expense. We talk about the trust fund, that the ratepayers are paying into this trust fund. They paid in approximately $11 billion. When you count interest on that money in these phony trust funds that we have set up the trust fund is somewhere around $17 billion. We have spent about $8 billion of that so far, $4 billion on Yucca Mountain, constructing Yucca Mountain. People have no idea. Because they go out there and see this very impressive hole in the ground, they think we are almost done. We have hardly even scratched the surface. It is a huge project, hugely expensive. It is going to come out of the general revenues. That means taxpayers across the country who do not have nuclear power in their States are going to be paying for Yucca Mountain for years and years into the future. I will close. It is talked about that any Senator can bring this legislation to the floor. That is true. It says right in the act that any Senator can bring this legislation to the floor. Under the rules of the Senate, any Senator can bring any legislation to the floor, but the precedent and the history and the tradition of the Senate is that only the majority leader brings legislation to the floor of the Senate. There have been five pieces of legislation that had similar language to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, where it specifically stated that any Senator could bring the legislation to the floor. However, in that history of those five pieces of legislation, three of them were brought to the floor by the majority leader, and regarding two of them, the majority leader actually got them not brought forward to be considered in the Senate. If somebody besides the majority leader brings this legislation to the floor, we are breaking with the traditions of the Senate. Because we do not have a Rules Committee that says how legislation will come to the floor in the Senate, the same way the House has a Rules Committee, I believe we are setting a very dangerous precedent for the majority. On this side of the aisle we happen to be in the minority right now. Someday we would like to be in the majority. I think it sets a dangerous precedent for us on this side of the aisle, if we are going to be in the majority someday, for this type of legislation to go forward without the majority leader bringing the bill to the floor. He has announced his opposition, and we appreciate that. But I remind my colleagues it is said, because this legislation is so important, that we need to set this kind of precedent; that people do not believe, because of the importance of this legislation, that we are setting that precedent. I say, to the contrary, there are a lot of pieces of legislation that we look at around here that we say are very important. If a majority of Senators get together, regardless of which side of the aisle they are on, and offer a motion to proceed, they can control the floor of the Senate and thereby become the majority in and of themselves. I thank the majority leader for the work he is doing in trying to defeat this legislation. My colleague from the State of Nevada, the senior Senator, has done yeoman work over the years, and I appreciate all his efforts. We are going to continue to fight this legislation, not just because we believe it is bad for our State but, more importantly, we believe this legislation is wrongheaded for the United States of America. I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN

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

Mr. ENSIGN. I would have to object at this time until we can have a discussion about that.

Mr. ENSIGN. Could you repeat the unanimous consent request?

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I rise today to respond to remarks by the senior Senator from Idaho on the Senate floor procedures outlined in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act regarding Yucca Mountain. And I come to the floor today out of great respect for the traditions of the U.S. Senate. I am a freshman Senator. I have only been here a year. But one of the first things I did when I arrived was to seek the advice of the senior Senator from West Virginia, Senator Byrd, our very own Senate historian. I asked him for a copy of his history of the Senate which I have turned to often. I haven't had the opportunity to speak to him directly on this matter, but I turned to his books for guidance. Madam President, when you have the chance, turn to Volume II page 191, and see what Senator Byrd says about the powers of the majority leader. He says the majority leader . . . ``determines what matters or measures will be scheduled for floor action and when.'' The Senator from Idaho is planning to change that by asserting that it would be alright for any member to determine when the Yucca Mountain resolution comes to floor. he said that, ``the Nuclear Waste Policy Act provides a special statutory authority to make exception to contemporary practice.'' That is not the case. I have the act right here. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 does state that it shall be in order ``for any Member of the Senate to move to proceed to the consideration of such resolution.'' But the act also states that the procedures outlined in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act ``supersede other rules of the Senate only to the extent that they are inconsistent with such other rules.'' The Nuclear Waste Policy Act provision permitting any Member to move to proceed to the consideration of the Yucca Mountain resolution is consistent with Senate rules, therefore it does not supersede the rules of the Senate. In the modern history of the Senate, no Member, other than the majority leader (or a designee), has successfully made a motion to proceed to a matter or measure. Here are the facts: CRS indicates there are six statutory expedited procedures in current law which explicitly state that ``any Member of the Senate'' may offer the motion to proceed: Executive Reorganization Act; Atomic Energy Act; Defense Base Closure and Realignment Act of 1990; Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act; Balanced Budget Emergency Deficit Control Act; Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982. According to a March 28, 2002 CRS memorandum, the language in these six statutes which states that ``any Member of the Senate'' may offer the motion to proceed is ``consistent with the Standing Rules of the Senate, which permit any Senator to make a motion to proceed, but also with the general Senate practice under which Senators routinely concede to the majority leader the function of taking actions to determine the floor agenda. So the Nuclear Waste Policy Act is not, as the senior Senator from Idaho stated, ``a special procedure.'' Next, a June 11 CRS memorandum indicates that since the 100th Congress, consideration of five measures was governed by some statutory procedure explicitly permitting any Senator to offer a motion to proceed to consider. In three of these cases, action to call up the measure for consideration was taken by the Senate majority leader. However, in two of those cases, no Senator took action to call up the other two measures. The majority leader secured their indefinite postponement. That means no Senators offered a motion to proceed, even when explicitly permitted to do so by statute. The majority leader kept control of the Senate. The Senate is a body which, quite rightly, reveres tradition. We must, as we have so few rules. As a new Member, I relied on the guidance from the Parliamentarian, the Congressional Research Service, and my senior colleagues. I am certain that if anyone, other than the majority leader, successfully offers a motion to proceed to the Yucca Mountain resolution, it will break with Senate tradition, undermine the goal of the majority leader, and allow other Senators to control the floor. I hope the Members of this body will think before they move forward on the resolution. In closing, I thank the majority leader. He is keeping his word that he gave to the people of the State of Nevada, and the people of the State of Nevada say thank you to the majority leader.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I rise to speak on behalf of the amendment of the Senator from Kansas. We deal with issues around this body often. We deal with issues that, frankly, sometimes don't seem very important. But this issue is an issue of critical importance. This issue is really what the human species is all about. I am a veterinarian by profession. I have studied embryology, as all veterinary students do, as all medical students do. We study it in detail. As a matter of fact, we study it in species after species. I have studied the cloning of the famous Dolly clone that we are all familiar with, Dolly the sheep. When that first happened, there was something very disturbing that went off in my brain. It was not because of the cloning of an animal, it was because cloning put people in the future. When Dolly was first announced, everybody said: No, we cannot clone people. We will never go there. Last year, during the whole issue dealing with embryos that people were talking about, they were saying: No. You know what. We will not have cloning. We will ban cloning. Everybody agreed, at that time, it seemed, that we were going to ban cloning. But now, as some of the research has gone forward, people are starting to say: You know what. Now we are just going to do therapeutic cloning. We are not going to do reproductive cloning. Well, as the Senator from Kansas has pointed out, we are not dealing with just therapeutic cloning. It is all reproductive cloning. Dolly was produced by the same technology that therapeutic cloning will be produced from. It is the same, exact technology. It is cloning. You can call it by any name you want to call it, but it is cloning. I know there are other Senators who want to talk tonight, so I will not talk too much more on this. But, Madam President, I send a second-degree amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, the issue of human patenting in this whole issue of cloning. And the whole cloning debate is really an egregious one because the idea of being able to patent a human being or the making of a human being is probably one of the most egregious parts of this whole issue. This really is a time when we are confronting a brave new world. The prospect of people in corporate America owning people and trading and buying and selling people as if they were property is something that should give us all a chill. So, Madam President, I think all of us should support the Senator's amendment, and the second-degree amendment as well. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, today it is a great privilege and honor for me to introduce the Clark County Conservation of Public Land and Natural Resources Act of 2002 with my good friend and colleague from Nevada, Senator Harry Reid. The introduction of this legislation today is the culmination of over a year of work. We held public forums in Clark County to solicit the input of interested parties. My staff spent many hours with local government officials, the environmental community, multiple-use groups, utility providers, home developers, sportsmen, and other Nevadans to reach a compromise on how we tackle the tough issues we face in Clark County. While it is a daunting job to bring Nevadans with opposing perspectives together on the controversial topic of wilderness, I believe we have achieved a consensus that is good for all citizens in Clark County. We will look back 30 years from now and realize how this legislation contributed to the quality of life we cherish in southern Nevada. Because the Federal government manages 87 percent of the land in Nevada, the federal presence imposes enormous barriers to land use planning in a state that, again, outpaces every other state in population growth. I know I speak for many Nevadans when I say that we wish we did not have so much federal land within our borders. But the reality is that we do, and that this legislation is necessary to plan for growth and to set aside our pristine lands for future generations to enjoy and visit. In many states, land use planning takes place in city council chambers. We do not have that luxury, as we have to obtain the consent of the Congress to make some of the most basic decisions. Despite those obstacles, Senator Reid and I are putting forward legislation that is a model for fast-growing communities struggling to balance the equally important goals of environmental protection, planned residential and business development, and the allocation of scarce resources such as water. One of my proudest achievements during my service in the U.S. House of Representatives was the enactment of the Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act, or what is probably better known in Nevada as the Ensign-Bryan bill. Like the legislation Senator Reid and I are introducing today, the Ensign-Bryan bill was the product of bipartisan cooperation and the spirit of inclusion. Senator Bryan, who deserves much credit for that landmark measure, and I hosted a public lands task force to identify and propose solutions to the unique problems we faced in the Las Vegas Valley. One of the major reforms that came about because of the Ensign-Bryan bill was the change in the way public land is disposed of in the Las Vegas Valley. We drew a disposal boundary around the valley and asked the Bureau of Land Management to auction the land to the highest bidder, in consultation with local governments. The proceeds of those land auctions millions of dollars have been going into a special fund to build parks and trails, acquire environmentally sensitive land, initiate capital improvements in our beautiful recreation and conservations areas, and maintain the Clark County Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan. We also allocated funds for water infrastructure and to the general education fund of the State of Nevada. This legislation continues to encourage orderly growth, improves the environment, and benefits the schoolchildren of Nevada. Federal land has become so valuable because of the infrastructure installed by private developers, local governments, and the taxpayers of Nevada. It is because of the phenomenal growth in southern Nevada that public land auctions have brought in millions of dollars. Eighty- five percent of the proceeds from public land auctions in southern Nevada are reinvested in environmental projects. So, I would challenge those who claim that the federal government is not getting its fair share of the proceeds from land sales. In fact, the federal government is receiving large sums of money because of the value-added infrastructure supported by Nevadans. In the Clark County Conservation of Public Lands and Natural Resources Act, we build upon the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act and settle a number of wilderness designations that have been pending since 1991. This bill designates 224,000 acres of BLM wilderness while it releases 231,000 acres of wilderness study areas. In the jurisdiction of the National Park Service adjacent to the Colorado River and Lake Mead, 184,000 acres of wilderness are designated. In all, 444,000 acres in Clark County will be added to our national wilderness preservation system. While the acreage is more than supported by a coalition of multiple-use advocates in Nevada, the acreage is about one-fifth of the amount requested by the Friends of Nevada Wilderness. This compromise is fair. I am particularly proud that the bill creates a second National Conservation Area in southern Nevada, the Sloan Canyon National Conservation Area. Having such a magnificent resource at the edge of the City of Henderson will provide countless new recreation opportunities for those residents and provide open space that is so important to the quality of life in the Las Vegas Valley. I am happy we were able to improve the existing Red Rock National Conservation Area by adding pristine land to the NCA held by the Howard Hughes Corporation. An important feature of this legislation I worked to include is the creation of a comprehensive Southern Nevada Litter Cleanup Campaign. As is the case in many desert communities, there is unfortunately a prevalence of discarded trash along our highways and on tracts of vacant BLM land within city limits. We must instill an ethic in our community and sense of awareness that we cannot continue to treat our desert lands as garbage dumps. While I attended college in Oregon, I saw how effective the ``Keep Oregon Green'' campaign worked. I am certain the same approach can produce results in southern Nevada, and that it can be accomplished through the leadership of volunteers, civic organizations, environmental groups, and private industry, without the bureaucracy. I look forward to leaving to my children a community that is much cleaner than the one we have today. I worked to include protections in the Clark County Conservation of Public Land and Natural Resources so that existing access in wilderness is preserved. In addition to reserving motorized access through cherry- stemmed roads on maps referred to in the bill, we make it clear that reasonable access to water developments is permitted in wilderness areas. Groups such as the Fraternity of the Big Horn Sheep provide critical water to ensure the health of big horn sheep populations in southern Nevada. Of course, all valid existing rights are honored including grazing and mining. Buffers of at least 100 along each side of the road are preserved. We also authorize fire suppression and climatological data collection. All in all, reasonable access to wilderness has been achieved and I am especially appreciative of Senator Reid's flexibility in addressing the concerns of multiple-use groups in this regard. This legislation ensures Clark County's orderly growth over the next several decades through the establishment of educational and research institutions, industrial parks, and residential development. The original disposal boundary defined in the Ensign-Bryan Act has been expanded to accommodate planned growth in Clark County, the City of Las Vegas, the City of North Las Vegas, and the City of Henderson. We have some of the finest planned communities in the world in southern Nevada and I know that the new lands will be showcases for quality living for a broad spectrum of Nevadans. The bill sets aside land for the Clark County Department of Aviation for the development of the Ivanpah Airport south of Las Vegas, the only major international airport in the United States that will be constructed from scratch in the next ten years. And very importantly, we have opened up an energy corridor that will augment Nevada's and the Southwest's electricity needs. I also wanted to mention the Clark County Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan. As the home to many threatened species, Clark County has entered into an agreement with the Fish and Wildlife Service so that the rapid growth we have been experiencing does not destroy critical plant and animal habitats. Senator Reid and I have included language to ensure that the MSHCP is not revoked when releasing lands from wilderness study status. However, the agreement Senator Reid and I reached does not mean that lands will be unavailable for multiple-use in the future; we wanted to give Clark County and the Fish and Wildlife Service the flexibility they need to amend the MSHCP as circumstances warrant, particularly as this legislation is implemented. Senator Reid and I went through a spirited campaign for the U.S. Senate against each other in 1998. It was a very close race and I conceded it by 428 votes. Our friendship is now strong, and I believe that this bill is a testament to the fact that legislators from different political perspectives can come together for the good of their state. It is not easy work to bridge philosophical differences, but it can and must be done for the sake of the people we represent. I would like to thank Congressman Jim Gibbons for his support of this measure in the U.S. House of Representatives. Congressman Gibbons was an active participant in the development of this bill, and he offered several constructive and good changes to its content. I appreciate very much his guidance and assistance. Finally, I would like to thank members of my staff who worked hard on the development of this bill here in Washington and in Nevada: John Lopez, Margot Allen, Julene Haworth, and Mac Bybee are talented Nevadans who care very much about Clark County and our great state. I also appreciate the input and assistance of Clint Bentley, the tireless organizer of the Nevada Land Users Coalition. Clint was an articulate and reasoned advocate of multiple use principles and ensured that the Nevada Land Users Coalition spoke with one voice during these negotiations. I look forward to quick passage of the Clark County Conservation of Public Lands and Natural Resources in the 107th Congress.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, today it is a great privilege and honor for me to introduce the Clark County Conservation of Public Land and Natural Resources Act of 2002 with my good friend and colleague from Nevada, Senator Harry Reid. The introduction of this legislation today is the culmination of over a year of work. We held public forums in Clark County to solicit the input of interested parties. My staff spent many hours with local government officials, the environmental community, multiple-use groups, utility providers, home developers, sportsmen, and other Nevadans to reach a compromise on how we tackle the tough issues we face in Clark County. While it is a daunting job to bring Nevadans with opposing perspectives together on the controversial topic of wilderness, I believe we have achieved a consensus that is good for all citizens in Clark County. We will look back 30 years from now and realize how this legislation contributed to the quality of life we cherish in southern Nevada. Because the Federal government manages 87 percent of the land in Nevada, the federal presence imposes enormous barriers to land use planning in a state that, again, outpaces every other state in population growth. I know I speak for many Nevadans when I say that we wish we did not have so much federal land within our borders. But the reality is that we do, and that this legislation is necessary to plan for growth and to set aside our pristine lands for future generations to enjoy and visit. In many states, land use planning takes place in city council chambers. We do not have that luxury, as we have to obtain the consent of the Congress to make some of the most basic decisions. Despite those obstacles, Senator Reid and I are putting forward legislation that is a model for fast-growing communities struggling to balance the equally important goals of environmental protection, planned residential and business development, and the allocation of scarce resources such as water. One of my proudest achievements during my service in the U.S. House of Representatives was the enactment of the Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act, or what is probably better known in Nevada as the Ensign-Bryan bill. Like the legislation Senator Reid and I are introducing today, the Ensign-Bryan bill was the product of bipartisan cooperation and the spirit of inclusion. Senator Bryan, who deserves much credit for that landmark measure, and I hosted a public lands task force to identify and propose solutions to the unique problems we faced in the Las Vegas Valley. One of the major reforms that came about because of the Ensign-Bryan bill was the change in the way public land is disposed of in the Las Vegas Valley. We drew a disposal boundary around the valley and asked the Bureau of Land Management to auction the land to the highest bidder, in consultation with local governments. The proceeds of those land auctions millions of dollars have been going into a special fund to build parks and trails, acquire environmentally sensitive land, initiate capital improvements in our beautiful recreation and conservations areas, and maintain the Clark County Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan. We also allocated funds for water infrastructure and to the general education fund of the State of Nevada. This legislation continues to encourage orderly growth, improves the environment, and benefits the schoolchildren of Nevada. Federal land has become so valuable because of the infrastructure installed by private developers, local governments, and the taxpayers of Nevada. It is because of the phenomenal growth in southern Nevada that public land auctions have brought in millions of dollars. Eighty- five percent of the proceeds from public land auctions in southern Nevada are reinvested in environmental projects. So, I would challenge those who claim that the federal government is not getting its fair share of the proceeds from land sales. In fact, the federal government is receiving large sums of money because of the value-added infrastructure supported by Nevadans. In the Clark County Conservation of Public Lands and Natural Resources Act, we build upon the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act and settle a number of wilderness designations that have been pending since 1991. This bill designates 224,000 acres of BLM wilderness while it releases 231,000 acres of wilderness study areas. In the jurisdiction of the National Park Service adjacent to the Colorado River and Lake Mead, 184,000 acres of wilderness are designated. In all, 444,000 acres in Clark County will be added to our national wilderness preservation system. While the acreage is more than supported by a coalition of multiple-use advocates in Nevada, the acreage is about one-fifth of the amount requested by the Friends of Nevada Wilderness. This compromise is fair. I am particularly proud that the bill creates a second National Conservation Area in southern Nevada, the Sloan Canyon National Conservation Area. Having such a magnificent resource at the edge of the City of Henderson will provide countless new recreation opportunities for those residents and provide open space that is so important to the quality of life in the Las Vegas Valley. I am happy we were able to improve the existing Red Rock National Conservation Area by adding pristine land to the NCA held by the Howard Hughes Corporation. An important feature of this legislation I worked to include is the creation of a comprehensive Southern Nevada Litter Cleanup Campaign. As is the case in many desert communities, there is unfortunately a prevalence of discarded trash along our highways and on tracts of vacant BLM land within city limits. We must instill an ethic in our community and sense of awareness that we cannot continue to treat our desert lands as garbage dumps. While I attended college in Oregon, I saw how effective the ``Keep Oregon Green'' campaign worked. I am certain the same approach can produce results in southern Nevada, and that it can be accomplished through the leadership of volunteers, civic organizations, environmental groups, and private industry, without the bureaucracy. I look forward to leaving to my children a community that is much cleaner than the one we have today. I worked to include protections in the Clark County Conservation of Public Land and Natural Resources so that existing access in wilderness is preserved. In addition to reserving motorized access through cherry- stemmed roads on maps referred to in the bill, we make it clear that reasonable access to water developments is permitted in wilderness areas. Groups such as the Fraternity of the Big Horn Sheep provide critical water to ensure the health of big horn sheep populations in southern Nevada. Of course, all valid existing rights are honored including grazing and mining. Buffers of at least 100 along each side of the road are preserved. We also authorize fire suppression and climatological data collection. All in all, reasonable access to wilderness has been achieved and I am especially appreciative of Senator Reid's flexibility in addressing the concerns of multiple-use groups in this regard. This legislation ensures Clark County's orderly growth over the next several decades through the establishment of educational and research institutions, industrial parks, and residential development. The original disposal boundary defined in the Ensign-Bryan Act has been expanded to accommodate planned growth in Clark County, the City of Las Vegas, the City of North Las Vegas, and the City of Henderson. We have some of the finest planned communities in the world in southern Nevada and I know that the new lands will be showcases for quality living for a broad spectrum of Nevadans. The bill sets aside land for the Clark County Department of Aviation for the development of the Ivanpah Airport south of Las Vegas, the only major international airport in the United States that will be constructed from scratch in the next ten years. And very importantly, we have opened up an energy corridor that will augment Nevada's and the Southwest's electricity needs. I also wanted to mention the Clark County Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan. As the home to many threatened species, Clark County has entered into an agreement with the Fish and Wildlife Service so that the rapid growth we have been experiencing does not destroy critical plant and animal habitats. Senator Reid and I have included language to ensure that the MSHCP is not revoked when releasing lands from wilderness study status. However, the agreement Senator Reid and I reached does not mean that lands will be unavailable for multiple-use in the future; we wanted to give Clark County and the Fish and Wildlife Service the flexibility they need to amend the MSHCP as circumstances warrant, particularly as this legislation is implemented. Senator Reid and I went through a spirited campaign for the U.S. Senate against each other in 1998. It was a very close race and I conceded it by 428 votes. Our friendship is now strong, and I believe that this bill is a testament to the fact that legislators from different political perspectives can come together for the good of their state. It is not easy work to bridge philosophical differences, but it can and must be done for the sake of the people we represent. I would like to thank Congressman Jim Gibbons for his support of this measure in the U.S. House of Representatives. Congressman Gibbons was an active participant in the development of this bill, and he offered several constructive and good changes to its content. I appreciate very much his guidance and assistance. Finally, I would like to thank members of my staff who worked hard on the development of this bill here in Washington and in Nevada: John Lopez, Margot Allen, Julene Haworth, and Mac Bybee are talented Nevadans who care very much about Clark County and our great state. I also appreciate the input and assistance of Clint Bentley, the tireless organizer of the Nevada Land Users Coalition. Clint was an articulate and reasoned advocate of multiple use principles and ensured that the Nevada Land Users Coalition spoke with one voice during these negotiations. I look forward to quick passage of the Clark County Conservation of Public Lands and Natural Resources in the 107th Congress.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I would like to address the Senate today with regard to the amendment offered by Senators Kennedy, Smith, and Boxer on Wednesday, June 5. As you know, this amendment would provide $150 million in emergency spending for the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program for summer school programs. While I do support this program, I do not support the amendment offered by Senator Kennedy. The supplemental appropriations bill is designed to be a vehicle for emergency spending measures, most often funding for the defense of the United States. I am particularly disappointed with the Senate's version of the supplemental appropriations bill because it contains increased appropriations for every Federal department except for the Department of Defense while we are at war against terrorism. In my opinion, funding for summer school programs simply does not qualify as emergency spending worthy of placement in the supplemental appropriations bill. It is highly likely that school districts and other eligible grantees would not even get the funds in enough time to effectively utilize them. I do recognize that many States have been faced with difficult financial decisions because of constrained budgets and that many have had to cut summer school programs. The regular appropriations process for education programs is the appropriate time for the Senate to determine the appropriation for the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I stand before you today with a heavy heart. On Thursday, March 28, this country lost one of its prized sons. Lt. Cmdr. A. Jason Bayer was killed during a search and rescue training mission on a rugged Sierra Nevada Ridge. The son of Arthur Bayer of Carson City, NV, and the late Merry Ann Bayer, Jason's success as a fighter pilot was determined early in life. As his father recalls, the very first word out of his mouth was ``jet.'' Growing up in Carson City, Jason was a star student, an avid athlete, and a loyal friend. Jason graduated from Carson City High School in 1986 and the University of Southern California in 1990. Commissioned to the Navy later the same year, he was accepted to the Naval Aviators Officer Candidate School, from which he was an honor graduate. He graduated first in his class from Intermediate Jet Flight Training, and then first in his class from Advanced Jet Training. Jason was stationed in Japan then was a flight instructor at Cecil Field in Florida and graduated from the Navy Test Pilot School in Maryland. Most recently, he was a test pilot in the Naval Weapons Test Squadron at China Lake. Jason's career was distinguished. He earned the VT 22 Eagle ``Top Hook'' award, the Meritorious Service Medal, and the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal. Each achievement in his career took him closer to his ultimate goal of becoming an astronaut. His love for flying and the military and his devotion to God and this country never wavered and was only paralleled by his love for his family and friends. His life- long friend, Dan Bernal, described him as ``a true patriot.'' I share these details of Jason's life with you so that his wife Anne, their one-year-old daughter, Gabriella, and their unborn son, Jason Christian, will have one more thing by which to remember him. Anne and Jason were blessed with 6 years of marriage. Although cut short, they were filled with many wonderful memories. But for Gabriella and her brother, stories and pictures of their father are all that they will have. In speaking to Anne about her husband, I quickly learned what a remarkable and strong person she is as well. Jason's legacy and their children are in wonderful hands. As an F/A-18 Hornet fighter pilot, Jason was prepared to fight for his country no matter what the cost. He was focused on his mission as a pilot, and he never lost sight of his dream to challenge the sky's limits and be the first man on Mars. With our loss of Jason, I am reminded of our loss of seven valiant astronauts on January 28, 1986, on these space shuttle Challenger. Jason was a senior in high school with a bright future when President Reagan spoke of the astronauts' final journey in which they ``slipped the surly bonds of earth'' to ``touch the face of God.'' Jason is surely touching the face of God today. His service and dedication earn him a place among the outstanding men and women who risked their lives in the name of freedom and in the end made the ultimate sacrifice. Jason's life was cut tragically short, but his time here is an inspiration to me and an example of a true American hero for us all. God bless Lt. Cmdr. Jason Bayer, and God bless his family.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I rise today, along with the senior Senator from Maryland, Mr. Sarbanes, to introduce a bill that will help thousands of Americans achieve the dream of homeownership. Homeownership is the primary source of a household's net worth and the fundamental first step toward accumulating personal wealth. It is also one of the greatest driving forces to a healthy economy for our Nation. Congress must work hard to produce public policies that promote homeownership to further America's growth and prosperity. This legislation does just that. The legislation we are introducing today will make permanent an existing down payment simplification program that created a simplified formula to determine the proper down payment for FHA loans. This program has become an invaluable tool for helping thousands of families achieve the American dream of buying their first home. This bill will permanently eliminate the burdensome and unnecessary formulas previously used to determine the proper down payment for FHA loans, and will also lower the size of necessary down payments. The simplified calculation was begun as a pilot program in 1996 in Hawaii and Alaska. It proved so easy and successful that it was temporarily extended nationwide in 1998. In 2000, the calculation was re-extended 27 months, to December 31, 2002. Unless Congress extends the program, home buyers will be required to use the old, complicated and confusing method of calculating the appropriate down payment amounts for all loans after December 31. To help my colleagues understand the importance of making this program permanent, I should explain the basic difference between the two formulas. Under the down payment simplification program, FHA borrowers must make cash contributions of at least 3 percent of the acquisition cost, including closing costs of the loan. It is that simple. Under the old formula, different down payment rates were required for each portion of a mortgage. For example, if the acquisition cost of the home is $150,000, the borrower would have to pay 3 percent on the first $25,000, 5 percent on the next $100,000 and 10 percent on the final $25,000. And that's not all. There is also another set of calculations done based on the appraised value of the home to determine the maximum allowable mortgage in any transaction. Clearly, the streamlined formula is a far more simple process. In the end, the down payment simplification process results in lowering the amount of the down payment necessary to purchase a FHA single-family home and simplifies the formula for the homebuyer in the process. It is estimated that one-third of all FHA borrowers will have to make higher down payments if the simplification process is not made permanent. This could mean that without passage of this legislation, thousands of families that otherwise could afford to buy their homes will be denied the chance to do so because an unnecessarily complicated formula will create large, unaffordable down payments. The effects would be particularly acute in states where over 40 percent of the buyers would be affected, such as California, Colorado, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Virginia, Washington, Utah, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, Oregon, Connecticut, Alaska, Hawaii and New Hampshire. In 2001, in my home State of Nevada alone, over 16,600 families purchased a home with a FHA insured loan. Of those, all benefitted by having a more simple process to follow, while 6,761 homebuyers benefitted from the streamlined formula process with a lower down payment. That is an amazing amount of homes that may not have been purchased had this program not been in place. I ask my colleagues for their support of this important legislation. If passed, this legislation will help thousands of Americans throughout our country realize their dream of homeownership. In closing, I would like to thank the Senator from Maryland, Mr. Sarbanes, for all his hard work on this very important legislation. I appreciate his determination to make home ownership a reality for so many Americans.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I rise today, along with the senior Senator from Maryland, Mr. Sarbanes, to introduce a bill that will help thousands of Americans achieve the dream of homeownership. Homeownership is the primary source of a household's net worth and the fundamental first step toward accumulating personal wealth. It is also one of the greatest driving forces to a healthy economy for our Nation. Congress must work hard to produce public policies that promote homeownership to further America's growth and prosperity. This legislation does just that. The legislation we are introducing today will make permanent an existing down payment simplification program that created a simplified formula to determine the proper down payment for FHA loans. This program has become an invaluable tool for helping thousands of families achieve the American dream of buying their first home. This bill will permanently eliminate the burdensome and unnecessary formulas previously used to determine the proper down payment for FHA loans, and will also lower the size of necessary down payments. The simplified calculation was begun as a pilot program in 1996 in Hawaii and Alaska. It proved so easy and successful that it was temporarily extended nationwide in 1998. In 2000, the calculation was re-extended 27 months, to December 31, 2002. Unless Congress extends the program, home buyers will be required to use the old, complicated and confusing method of calculating the appropriate down payment amounts for all loans after December 31. To help my colleagues understand the importance of making this program permanent, I should explain the basic difference between the two formulas. Under the down payment simplification program, FHA borrowers must make cash contributions of at least 3 percent of the acquisition cost, including closing costs of the loan. It is that simple. Under the old formula, different down payment rates were required for each portion of a mortgage. For example, if the acquisition cost of the home is $150,000, the borrower would have to pay 3 percent on the first $25,000, 5 percent on the next $100,000 and 10 percent on the final $25,000. And that's not all. There is also another set of calculations done based on the appraised value of the home to determine the maximum allowable mortgage in any transaction. Clearly, the streamlined formula is a far more simple process. In the end, the down payment simplification process results in lowering the amount of the down payment necessary to purchase a FHA single-family home and simplifies the formula for the homebuyer in the process. It is estimated that one-third of all FHA borrowers will have to make higher down payments if the simplification process is not made permanent. This could mean that without passage of this legislation, thousands of families that otherwise could afford to buy their homes will be denied the chance to do so because an unnecessarily complicated formula will create large, unaffordable down payments. The effects would be particularly acute in states where over 40 percent of the buyers would be affected, such as California, Colorado, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Virginia, Washington, Utah, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, Oregon, Connecticut, Alaska, Hawaii and New Hampshire. In 2001, in my home State of Nevada alone, over 16,600 families purchased a home with a FHA insured loan. Of those, all benefitted by having a more simple process to follow, while 6,761 homebuyers benefitted from the streamlined formula process with a lower down payment. That is an amazing amount of homes that may not have been purchased had this program not been in place. I ask my colleagues for their support of this important legislation. If passed, this legislation will help thousands of Americans throughout our country realize their dream of homeownership. In closing, I would like to thank the Senator from Maryland, Mr. Sarbanes, for all his hard work on this very important legislation. I appreciate his determination to make home ownership a reality for so many Americans.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President. I rise today to briefly speak about the importance of technology to our economy and our way of life. Just think about how technology has changed our lives over the past few decades. Not so long ago, documents could only be sent through the mail, computers were enormous metal boxes with limited functionality, and the Internet--although it had been invented--was neither user friendly nor accessible. When I was growing up, watching television meant the handful of network channels we could get from an antenna on the roof; and when our car broke down we'd have to hitch hike to the next gas station or pay phone to call for help. It's hard to believe that for my three young children, those are things of the past. They're used to cell phones and cable TV. We now live in a world where technology represents one of the largest and fastest growing sectors of our economy. Technology employs millions of Americans and was largely responsible for the tremendous economic expansion from 1994 to 2000. Technology certainly helped fuel the growth of my State's economy. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, Nevada is second in the Nation for net creation of high-tech businesses. And I strongly encourage that growth because those businesses paid my constituents over $1.3 billion in wages. Advances in technology have made our personal lives easier and our professional lives more productive. Speed bumps in the communication process have been eliminated and replaced with wireless phones and e- mail. Advances in technology and the Internet now allow me to visit regularly with my constituents in Nevada while I am working in Washington through a real-time video teleconferencing network. Constituents of mine back in Nevada are able to listen to my remarks here on the Senate floor by logging on to my website. Indeed, 10 years ago I would have never imagined technological advances such as these, and I am certain that there will be more unforeseen breakthroughs in the coming years. Although new technologies greatly benefit American society, new issues have arisen for legislators to address in order for America to remain a world leader in technological innovation. We must grapple with broadband deployment, copyright protection and enhanced wireless services if we want America to have a competitive advantage. High-speed Internet access, or broadband, will drive the economy of tomorrow and every American household should have access to it at reasonable rates. I believe that broadband Internet will serve as the foundation for technological and communications advances in the future. According to Commerce Secretary Evans, broadband is vital to America's economy and will produce over 1 million new American jobs and an additional $50 billion a year for our economy. The importance of this technology cannot be underestimated, and surprisingly few Americans have access to this service or subscribe to it due to its high cost and its lack of desirable content. While there are a number of legislative proposals currently before the U.S. Senate which aim to increase broadband availability, this issue is far from resolved. I am working with my colleagues on the Senate Commerce Committee to address this important issue in a way that will level the regulatory playing field for service providers, create incentives for private investment in the networks, and preserve competition in the marketplace. In short, instead of rolling out the red tape on private industry, we should roll out the red carpet to allow competition in the fairest manner possible. As more Americans subscribe to broadband, private industry must work cooperatively to ensure that copyrighted material is protected from piracy. While America leads the world in software, entertainment, and other kinds of intellectual property innovation, piracy is on the rise and has taken a serious toll on our economy. In 2000, piracy cost America an estimated 107,000 information technology jobs, $5.3 billion in wages and $1.8 billion in U.S. tax revenue. It is clear that the practice of piracy must be stopped. If not, the American economy will continue to suffer and we will lag behind other nations in technology innovations. We must aggressively protect copyrighted works--both at home and abroad--that will drive the economy of tomorrow. The Commerce Committee recently held a hearing on this important issue, and I am aggressively working with my colleagues to stop piracy and bring a new level of protection to copyrighted works. Finally, Mr. President, we must encourage further advances in wireless technology. In the last 10 years, wireless phone use has skyrocketed, and over 132 million Americans now have a cell phone. Prices have fallen and service quality has improved. Wireless has expanded beyond voice to include wireless e-mail and text messaging, like by Blackberry, which allows me to send and receive e-mail when I am on the road. Overseas, next generation wireless technology, such as wireless video and Internet, have been deployed along with many other exciting new services. Unfortunately, the United States has begun to lag behind other nations in offering advanced wireless services. A number of issues--such as spectrum management, spectrum harmonization, and wireless security--demand our immediate attention in order to bring these exciting new services home. As a member of the Senate Commerce Committee and Co-chair of the Internet Caucus Wireless Task Force, I will continue to work with my colleagues in the Senate to reestablish the United States as the global leader in wireless technology. In conclusion, we have accomplished much over the past year on many technology issues. The Republican High Tech Task Force has been an effective voice for technology on Capitol Hill. Members of the Task Force have helped secure additional funding for the Patent and Trademark Office, encourage greater copyright enforcement within the Department of Justice, and provide tax incentives to stimulate business investment in technology infrastructure. I look forward to another productive year.