Bob Graham

Mr. GRAHAM

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following my remarks, Senator Murkowski be recognized to speak and that Senator Stabenow be recognized after Senator Murkowski.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I rise today not in opposition to the resolutions before us but, rather, to ask my colleagues to carefully consider our national priorities as we debate our course of action against Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq. Congress is preparing to consider a series of resolutions authorizing the President to initiate options against Iraq, including the use of force. If there is one matter upon which there would be unanimity of agreement, it is that Saddam Hussein is an evil man, an evil man in a region of evil men. He is a tyrant who has used chemical and biological weapons on his own people. He has flouted U.N. resolutions calling for inspections of his arms capabilities. His forces regularly fire on American and British jet pilots who are enforcing the no-fly zones in the north and south of his country, and he has the potential to develop and deploy nuclear weapons, a potential we need to monitor closely. The resolutions before us mean we as Members of Congress, acting on behalf of the American people, are investing our collective trust in the judgment of the President of the United States, because it will be his decision as to whether, when, and under what ultimate circumstances to utilize whatever authority we might grant. We are in a very similar position to where we were immediately after September 11, 2001, when the President asked for an authorization, and we gave him the power to launch a war against al-Qaida and the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. The latest White House draft of the resolution before us today attempts to link two challenges to our Nation's security: terrorism and Saddam Hussein. I am not certain it does so in the most coherent and effective way. Frankly, I fear elevating Saddam Hussein to our Nation's No. 1 enemy poses risks that have not been fully considered. In the constellation of threats to the American homeland, as well as to our interests abroad, in my judgment, terrorism represents the greatest and most urgent security threat to the American people. Saddam Hussein cannot be viewed in isolation. The region of the Middle East to Central Asia is a very tough neighborhood, and we have many threats and commitments in that neighborhood. We have commenced a war against terror in Afghanistan--not yet complete. We know that, as we leave Afghanistan, there will be other chapters in the war on terror, and it is quite probable that those future chapters will be more difficult than the one we have already experienced in Afghanistan. In addition to that, we have a tense, continuing standoff between India and Pakistan, two nuclear powers at virtual sword's point. We have a continuing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, and we have other countries in the region that have a substantial--in several instances greater capacity for weapons of mass destruction than does Iraq. So we must decide what our priorities are. In my opinion, our first priority must be the successful completion of the war on terrorism. When President Bush spoke before a joint session of Congress on September 20, 2001, just 9 days after the attacks, he declared: Our war on terror begins with al-Qaida, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped, and defeated. That is the challenge the United States of America undertook in the war on terror. In his State of the Union speech on January 29, 2002, President Bush again, standing in the House Chamber before a joint session of Congress, set this agenda: Our Nation will continue to be steadfast and patient and persistent in the pursuit of two great objectives: First, we will shut down terrorist camps, disrupt terrorist plans, and bring terrorists to justice. Second, we must prevent the terrorists and regimes who seek chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons from threatening the United States and the world. Mr. President, I concur with President Bush's ranking of our priority targets: First, to shut down terrorist camps, disrupt terrorist plans, and to bring terrorists to justice; and, second, to go after regimes that seek chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons. Clearly, terrorists pose the most immediate threat to America. They have, as their avowed goal, to kill Americans. They have the capability of recruiting and training in the skills of terrorism, in those training camps to which the President referred, waves of terrorists. And they have the capability to strike within our homeland, as was demonstrated again today by the arrest of six alleged terrorist cell members, four of whom were in Oregon and one in Michigan. There is no question that our national security paradigm changed with the events of September 11. We used to think about national security in terms such as ``balance of power''--particularly, the United States and the Soviet Union. Our concerns centered on big-picture questions, such as whether an adversary had the capability to launch nuclear missiles that could reach our homeland or how a dispute in a far-off region, in Southeast Asia, or the Persian Gulf, might affect our interests. We did not have to worry much about whether an adversary had the ability to execute a terrorist attack against Americans here at home. That changed on September 11. Our most dangerous adversaries are no longer nation-states but shadowy organizations with operations scattered around the world. They are not interested in the traditional prizes of power, such as geography or wealth. They are not deterred by the traditional means by which nations are constrained to operate within their borders and within some set of international standards. Their ambition is to win a trip to paradise by killing infidels-- killing Americans. On September 11, we learned how little these new adversaries need to launch a terrorist strike within our homeland. A terrorist organization requires only the ability to recruit people motivated by zealotry, generally religious fervor. They need someone trained in the particular skills of a specific method of attack, such as detonating a truck bomb or hijacking a commercial jetliner. They need a relatively small amount of financial support from internal or external sources. They need the ability to place operatives around the world, including in the United States of America. And they need a command-and-control system capable of developing the plot and then sending the signal for its initiation. Our efforts against al-Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan have been exemplary. But the United States today faces more deadly battles in the future as we move to the next phase of the war on terror. For the last month, we have been debating--and I hope it will shortly pass-- legislation to create a new Department of Homeland Security. That is a good thing. But the creation of that new Department will not guarantee the security of the American people. The most effective defense against terrorism is not to be found on the defense, as we attempt to protect our vulnerabilities but, rather, an aggressive offense against terrorist organizations abroad, taking the fight to them where they live. We must chop the head off the snake before it has a chance to strike us. As we move beyond al-Qaida and the Taliban, the terrorist organizations that we must target are more mature, better organized, and more competent. The most prominent example is Hezbollah, the Party of God. Hezbollah has been described as the A-team of international terrorists--more dangerous than even al-Qaida. Prior to September 11, Hezbollah, through its terrorist wing, the Islamic Jihad Organization, had killed more Americans, by far, than any other terrorist organization in the world. The bombing of U.S. Marine Corps barracks in Beirut, the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, the hijacking of TWA flight 847, numerous other brutal kidnappings and murders of Americans, all were the work of Hezbollah's Islamic Jihad Organization, as were other acts of terrorism where the link to Hezbollah remains classified. On July 4 of this year, with Senators DeWine and Bayh, I stood on the front lawn of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. We laid a wreath on a newly constructed plat. That plat contained the names of hundreds of Americans who have died in Lebanon at the hands of Hezbollah. Hezbollah is vehemently opposed to United States policy in the Middle East, and it is allied with the most extreme anti-American elements in Iran and Syria. Iran and Syria provide support, training, and weapons to Hezbollah, and both of these countries have weapons of mass destruction that they could provide to Hezbollah. Hezbollah also operates terrorist training camps in Iran, Syria, and Syrian-controlled parts of Lebanon that are preparing the next generation of terrorists. If there is one lesson we have learned from Afghanistan, it is the grave mistake we committed in allowing Osama bin Laden's terrorist training camps to operate for years, preparing thousands of terrorists, many of whom carried out the attacks against Americans, including the tragedy of September 11. What is it going to take to achieve victory in the war on terrorism? It is going to require a united and sustained effort that is based on a realistic understanding of the scale and capability of our terrorist adversaries such as Hezbollah. It is going to require the active support, or at least the avoidance of active hostility, in those countries in which the war is going to be waged. Just as we needed Pakistan's cooperation to fight al-Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan, we will need the assistance of other nations, many of them predominantly Muslim nations, as we move against these additional targets. And it is going to take action by Congress, action to authorize the President to use all necessary force against international terrorists. One might ask: Haven't we already done that? Didn't we do that on September 18, 2001? We did, in fact, pass a joint resolution that day. We gave the President this authority: . . . to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations, or persons. That is the authority that we have granted to the President. What we have not granted to the President is the full authority which he sought on September 18, which was the authority to go not only after those organizations, nations, and persons who had been directly linked to the events of September 11, but also against other international terrorist groups which, in his words, ``required action to deter and preempt any future acts of terrorism or aggression against the United States.'' In my judgment--and I am pleased to say I am joined by Senator Rockefeller in this determination--now is the time to extend the authority of the President to go after all terrorist groups, those that were linked specifically to the actions of September 11, such as al- Qaida, and those that, in my judgment, represent an equally or possibly greater threat to the United States, such as Hezbollah, which were not involved in the events of September 11. The State Department has identified 34 groups on its list of foreign terrorist organizations. Two-thirds of those 34 groups have their headquarters in the Middle East or central Asia. The State Department has also listed seven countries as state sponsors of terrorism. Five of those seven--Iraq, Iran, Libya, Sudan, and Syria--are in this same region. What the President is proposing today might be called an Iraq-first policy. I am concerned that a war with Saddam Hussein would be waged to the exclusion of or possibly to the detriment of the war on terrorism. There are indications that there has been a shift of focus already occurring. There have been reports of reduction in our intensity of efforts in Afghanistan as intelligence and military resources, particularly the attention of the leadership of the intelligence community and the Defense Department, have turned to Iraq. A Washington Post story in late August has an anecdote on this and quoted Chief Warrant Officer Mike Smith complaining of inactivity in Afghanistan: It's so boring. We're trying to figure out what we're still doing here. A second concern is that as a consequence of the threat to take unilateral action against Iraq, we have seen a hardening of anti- American sentiment in the Middle East, which puts U.S. persons and interests in the region at greater jeopardy. Finally, with the significant capacity that groups such as Hezbollah have within our country, within our borders, war with Iraq increases the chances that they will strike in our homeland. Like al-Qaida, Hezbollah has active cells within our borders, only more so. I cannot discuss the numbers and locations, but I can tell you, Mr. President, they have significant numbers and substantial capabilities. Therefore, we need to prepare not just for a war with Iraq, but for a broader war on international terrorism. Let me be clear, the proposal that Senator Rockefeller and I will offer next week at the appropriate time is not a reduction of the President's authority. To the contrary. It represents an expansion. It will authorize all necessary action against those international terrorist organizations which represent a threat to kill Americans. This is what the President had requested on September 12, 2001. This, in my judgment, is what we should give to the President. It will then be the judgment of the President to determine which of the authorities he will utilize--the resolution of September 18 that gave him the authority to move with necessary force against those responsible for September 11; the resolution that I hope we will adopt through this amendment to extend that to other international terrorist groups which threaten the people of the United States but were not part of the September 11 plot; as well as whatever resolution we may adopt--and I am confident we will adopt one--relative to Iraq. Then it will be the responsibility of the President to exercise his judgment as to which of these authorities he wishes to use, in what sequence, in what relative level of commitment, and he will be accountable for his judgment. At a minimum, we need the President to initiate actions that prepare us to respond to those who would use a war with Iraq as a justification to escalate their attacks on Americans here at home and abroad. As the President begins to exercise his judgment with these expanded authorities, I want him to have the capability to wage war as he sees most appropriate to give to the American people the greatest degree of protection that they can have in these days of threat. Of all the terrorist organizations and their sponsors, as well as the regime that now controls Iraq, there should be a single message: America is resolute; America is united; America is prepared to do what is required to assure the safety and security of its people. I thank the Chair.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I would like to thank Senators Baucus and Grassley for introducing the Armed Forces Tax Fairness Act, and for including a very important provision within it. I, along with Senators Lincoln and McCain, am proud to cosponsor a specific provision that provides tax relief for members of the military and foreign service officers serving on assignment abroad. This provision provides tax relief on the profit generated by the sale of a primary residence-- allowing those who serve our country the ability to exclude their time living abroad from the calculation of total years living in their primary residence. This provision does not create a new tax benefit, it merely modifies current law. The Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 gave taxpayers who sell their principal residence a much-needed tax break. Prior to the 1997 act, taxpayers received a one-time exclusion on the profit they made when they sold their principal residence, but the taxpayer had to live in the residence for two of the five years preceding the sale and be at least 55 years old. This policy provided no tax relief to younger taxpayers and their families. The 1997 act corrected this flaw. Now, a taxpayer who sells his or her principal residence is not taxed on the first $250,000 of profit from the sale. Joint filers are not taxed on their first $500,000 of profit. To qualify for this tax relief, the taxpayer must meet two requirements: No. 1, they must own the home for at least two of the five years preceding the sale; and No. 2, they must live in the home as their primary residence for at least two of the last five years. Unfortunately, this second requirement unintentionally and unfairly prohibits men and women in the armed services and foreign service from qualifying for this beneficial tax relief when their service mandates that they live abroad for longer periods of time. The bill being considered today remedies the inequality in the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. While military and foreign service professionals working abroad would still be required to own and live in their home for at least 2 years, the Internal Revenue Code would be amended to suspend the five-year determination period--when members of the military and foreign service are away from home. The 1997 home sale provision was bad fiscal policy because as it unintentionally discouraged government personnel from owning their own homes. We all know that home ownership has numerous benefits. It provides Americans with a valuable sense of community. It adds stability to our Nation's neighborhoods, and generates valuable property taxes for our Nation's communities. Home ownership should be commended and encouraged, and members of the military and foreign service should not be penalized with higher taxes simply because they are on extended assignment abroad. Enacting this remedy will grant equal and fair tax relief to those U.S. citizens who serve our country away from home.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I commend Senator Leahy and Senator Hatch for their hard work on the Department of Justice authorization bill. This bill will strengthen our Department of Justice and increase our preparedness against terrorist attacks, prevent crime, and improve our intellectual property and antitrust laws. However, I am disappointed that the ecstasy provisions I sponsored in the Senate version were removed in the conference committee. These provisions would have directed the National Institute on Drug Abuse, NIDA, to continue researching and evaluating the effects of ecstasy on an individual's health and authorized money to the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas, HIDTA, program for combating ecstasy use. I am concerned that ecstasy has become the ``feel good'' drug of choice among many of our young people and drug pushers are marketing it as a ``friendly'' and ``safe'' drug to mostly teenagers and young adults. But we know this is not true. Just last week a new study conducted by researchers at John Hopkins University found that a single use of ecstasy could seriously harm the brain and put users at risk of damage that mimics Parkinson's disease. I ask unanimous consent that the following article from Reuters titled, ``Ecstasy's Brain Drain Possibly Wider Than Thought,'' be printed in the Congressional Record following my statement.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, several recent studies have also revealed an alarming increase in the availability and abuse of ecstasy across the United States. According to the Partnership for Drug Free America's 2001 National Survey, more teens in America have now experimented with Ecstasy than cocaine, crack or heroin. Approximately 2.8 million teenagers in America, roughly one of every 11 teens in the Nation, have now tried ecstasy. Even the Armed Services have been impacted by this dangerous drug. In July 2002, 82 marines and soldiers at Camp Lejeune, NC, were convicted in a military court for either using or distributing ecstasy. Despite the abundant evidence to the contrary, young people have been lulled into believing that ecstasy and other designer drugs are safe ways to get high without risking addiction or physical harm. As legislators, we have a responsibility to stop the proliferation of this potentially life threatening drug. I remain firmly committed to working on legislation to combat this dangerous drug and I appreciate my colleagues' willingness to work with me to pass this legislation next year. Exhibit 1 Ecstasy's Brain Drain Possibly Wider Than Thought (By Amy Norton) New York (Reuters Health).--The club drug Ecstasy may damage a broader range of brain cells than most research has suggested, according to a new study in monkeys. Researchers at Johns Hopkins University found that one round of the drug, designed to simulate what many Ecstasy users take in a night, was toxic to dopamine-producing cells in the brain. Dopamine is a brain chemical that helps regulate mental and emotional functions, as well as movement. This is the first time Ecstasy has been shown to have such dopamine effects in primates. Previous studies in animals and humans had shown the drug to selectively affect brain cells that carry out the work of serotonin, a chemical involved in mood, memory and other vital functions. Both serotonin-cell loss and memory problems have been found in regular users of Ecstasy, also known as

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, S. 2506, a bill to authorize appropriations for the intelligence community for fiscal year 2003, represents the first intelligence budget for the War on Terrorism--a war where intelligence is our most effective weapon. The Congress historically has considered the annual Intelligence Authorization bill to be important legislation, but now it has become a matter of national survival. Without an enhanced and effective intelligence capability integrated into the significant capabilities of the U.S. military and tightly linked to law enforcement and the new Department of Homeland Security, we will continue be at the mercy of international terrorists bent on the destruction of our society and we may suffer even more devastating attacks. Since the tragedy of September 11, the men and women of the U.S. intelligence community have worked every day, nonstop to protect us against those who would seek to do us harm. This bill represents an important step in our effort to provide them with the necessary resources and authorities to get the job done. In its budget request for fiscal years 2003 through 2007, the administration proposes significant resource increases for our national intelligence effort. Such increases build upon substantial supplemental appropriations approved for the intelligence community for fiscal years 2001 and 2002 after September 11. As the community has noted in past years, the challenges confronting the intelligence community have, for too long, received inadequate fiscal attention. I am encouraged by the commitment of resources proposed by the administration for fiscal year 2003 and beyond. The intelligence community is poised to benefit from an infusion of additional people and funding that can provide momentum for a range of intelligence efforts against those individuals, groups, and states--to include al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden--that threaten our security and safety. As the intelligence community is our first line of defense, the administration's fiscal year 2003 request for the National Foreign Intelligence Program is a necessary first step in correcting the deficiencies of the past. Earlier this year, the Select Committee on Intelligence conducted a thorough review of the administration's budget request for the National Foreign Intelligence Program for fiscal year 2003. This review included an extensive examination of the individual programs and agencies--such as the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office--which comprise the U.S. intelligence community. Building on the approach we took last year, our review once again focused on specific priority areas as well as individual agencies and functions. The committee highlighted five areas that must continue to receive priority attention in the near term if intelligence is to fulfill its role in our overall national security strategy and the ongoing war on terrorism. They are: (1) revitalizing the National Security Agency; (2) correcting deficiencies in human intelligence; (3) addressing the imbalance between intelligence collection and analysis; (4) rebuilding a robust research and development program; and (5) increasing the capabilities of measurements and signatures intelligence to fulfill key intelligence requirements. These priorities address the basic building blocks of intelligence--capabilities that will support the War on Terrorism as well as the multitude of other intelligence requirements. S. 2506 authorizes additional resources for these areas. While the additional funding for intelligence programs goes a long way towards alleviating existing near term deficiencies, other long term problems remain to be addressed. We face a looming crisis in our ability to collect critical information from key platforms as a result of unexpected failures; a major acquisition program is experiencing significant cost overruns and schedule slippage; and, we have inadequate funding to ensure that information collected by the next generation of space-based sensors will be processed, exploited, and disseminated appropriately to intelligence analysts. Higher levels or resources, however, will not address all of the important challenges which confront the intelligence community. The intelligence community must overcome an aversion to risk that has crept into the culture since the end of the cold war. The world will be a dangerous and unstable place for foreseeable future. In order to protect our country, we will need to deal with unsavory characters and we will need to operate in unsafe parts of the world. The CIA has suffered casualties in the war in Afghanistan and we must steel ourselves to the inevitability of more loss of life. Some problems, such as the intelligence community's current organization or its ability to exchange information effectively and efficiently with other government agencies, may require additional legislative actions in the future. The bicameral investigation into the events of September 11 is ongoing and I expect that the investigation will result in recommendations for actions to be taken to strengthened our intelligence community. The bill includes legislative provisions that are important additions to the work the Intelligence Committee did last year--both in the fiscal year 2002 Intelligence Authorization Act and the USA-PATRIOT Act. I will summarize a few of these provisions: Section 304 is designed to make improvements in the information available to the Committee each year as it prepares its budget authorizations in the areas of counterterrorism, counterproliferation, counternarcotics and counterintelligence. The provision requires the administration each year to specify in its budget submission the aggregate amount requested in each of these four critical areas. Currently, these numbers are spread throughout the budget submission in the requests for particular programs in individual agencies. The committee believes that it is essential to rational decision-making in the budget process--both for the administration and for Congress--to have ``cross-cut'' budget numbers so that it is clear how much money is being requested across the Government in these important areas. Section 306 is a provision that supplements changes implemented under the USA-PATRIOT Act. Under that act, foreign intelligence information that has been collected by law enforcement agencies in the course of criminal investigations can, and in fact must, be provided to the Director of Central Intelligence to be included in the all-source analytic products prepared by intelligence analysts. In other words, these ``dots'' of foreign intelligence that are collected in criminal cases, including grand jury proceedings and criminal wiretaps, now flow to the intelligence community. The purpose of Section 306 is to clarify that the intelligence committees of the Congress, in the conduct of their oversight of the intelligence community, shall also have access to that law-enforcement-derived information that has been provided to the intelligence agencies. The intelligence committees cannot conduct effective oversight of the intelligence agencies if there are categories of information upon which intelligence operations and analyses are based that is off limits of the committees. Sections 311 and 312 follow up on provisions that were included in the USA-PATRIOT Act and the FY02 Intelligence Authorization bill. Congress required the Director of Central Intelligence to review and report to the intelligence committees his recommendations of how best to create two new centers: ``The National Virtual Translation Center'' and the ``Foreign Terrorist Asset Tracking Center.'' We have finally received those reports and Sections 311 and 312 establish those centers in law as part of the intelligence community. We are hopeful that the very difficult problems of translation resources in the intelligence community and the efficient and effective tracking of terrorist finances will be significantly enhanced by the creation of these centers. Section 313 is similar to S. 2459, a bill introduced by Senator Wyden. This excellent provision addresses the problem we have all heard so much about in the press: Is there a complete and accurate list of known or suspected international terrorists that is derived from all- source information available to the U.S. Government and that is provided to all agencies whose job is to protect our borders from penetration by terrorists? This provision requires the establishment of a ``Terrorist Identification Classification System'' that will be available to all Federal agencies, State and local governments and, as appropriate, to foreign governments. It will solve a problem that we have identified in our committee of the proliferation of ``watch lists'' in our Government--all with different suspected terrorists names, used by different agencies for different purposes. Title V of the bill establishes in statute the National Counterintelligence Executive, the ``NCIX''. At the urging of our committee, the President created the NCIX in 2001 to provide the U.S. Government in the counterintelligence area with (1) strong, policy- driven leadership; (2) new and enhanced counterintelligence capabilities; and (3) coherent program, strategies and cooperative approaches. The committee's oversight of this fledging effort revealed problems, however, that Title V is designed to remedy. By establishing the NCIX in statute and placing it in the Executive Office of the President, with oversight by the intelligence committees, the committee believes that the NCIX leadership problems, resource constraints and, overall, lack of sufficient status and visibility within the Government, will be remedied. Finally, Title VI of the bill establishes a National Commission for Review of Research and Development Programs of the United States Intelligence Community. The committee supports a strong intelligence community R & D program. Research and Development supports virtually all other intelligence community efforts by laying the groundwork for the necessary modernization and innovation of intelligence capabilities. The purpose of the Commission, to be composed of government officials and private sector experts, is to review the current state of research and development in the intelligence community and, in particular, to determine if the level of resources devoted to various efforts across the community is in line with those scientific and technological fields judged to be of the greatest importance to the intelligence needs of the future. I mentioned earlier the tireless efforts of the men and women of the intelligence community. I am privileged as chairman of the Intelligence Committee to travel to the different agencies around Washington and to visit various installations around the world. I am consistently impressed with competence, professionalism and dedication of these individuals. For years they have been unsung heroes, serving under difficult conditions and often putting their lives on the line. They do this not for money or glory--indeed the nature of their work means that success goes unacknowledged--but because they love their country and they have a profound sense of duty. We owe these people a debt of gratitude of their sacrifices, now more than ever before. I must mention another group of people who are critical to the process of bringing this legislation to the floor. The staff of the Senate Intelligence Committee has once again done a superb job preparing this bill. The staff is led by Al Cumming the staff director and Bill Duhnke the minority staff director. They have guided the staff through a very difficult year including the anthrax evacuation and the launching of the joint investigation with the House Intelligence Committee into events related to September 11. Through all the turmoil they kept the committee focused on our work and our oversight responsibilities. They are assisted by Kathleen McGhee, Chief Clerk, Bob Filippone, Deputy Staff Director, Jim Hensler, Deputy Minority Staff Director, Vicki Divoll, General Counsel, Chris Ford, Minority Counsel, Melvin Dubee, Budget Director, and the rest of a very talented staff. A special thanks goes to Jim Wolfe, the committee's Security Director for his efforts to ensure the security of our people and our classified materials last fall and winter when the committee was forced to work from temporary offices during the anthrax episode. Finally and most importantly, I must acknowledge the excellent cooperation and support of Vice Chairman Shelby. Senator Shelby has served on the committee for almost 8 years and his experience and commitment have been critical to the success of the committee. We have not agreed on everything but we have agreed on the goal of giving the American people the best intelligence organization possible and have worked together toward that goal. I have appreciated his support and advice. At this time in our Nation's history, our support for the U.S. intelligence community is vitally important. I urge support for this bill.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I rise today to express my full support for the conference report on H.R. 3009, the Andean Trade Preference Expansion Act, which was passed by Congress and signed by the President just prior to the August recess. I was unable to come to the floor during the consideration of the conference report, but I wanted to take this opportunity to express my views on this important legislation. H.R. 3009 was by far the most comprehensive trade legislation to come before Congress in fourteen years. By passing this bill, we accomplished four key goals: granting the President Trade Promotion Authority for the first time in 8 years; dramatically enhancing Trade Adjustment Assistance for displaced workers; renewing and expanding the Andean Trade Preference Act to provide legitimate export opportunities to Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, and; extending for 5 years the Generalized System of Preferences providing tariff cuts for over 100 developing countries. I support all four of these goals, and I voted enthusiastically in favor of this bill. I am particularly pleased that the enhancement of the Andean Trade Preference Act is the underlying bill for this important legislation. This issue has been of great personal importance to me. When the Senate was considering its version of Andean legislation in May, we heard time and again about the success of new, legitimate, exports from the region like cut flowers and asparagus. Since December 4 of last year, when the original ATPA legislation expired, these and many other legitimate exports from the region have been subjected to substantially higher tariffs. These higher tariffs hit the fresh cut flower sector particularly hard as higher tariffs impacted peak sales periods for the Valentine's Day and Mother's Day holidays. This legislation will return trade benefits to all of those products previously covered by ATPA and, most importantly, this legislation has been made retroactive to December 4, so that any duties that were paid during the lapse of ATPA will be refunded. I am pleased that the conference report is not simply a renewal of ATPA, but includes enhanced benefits for new products. Times, and our trade policy in the region, have changed since 1991 when the original ATPA legislation passed. Most notably, the passage in 2000 of the Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act provided enhanced trade benefits to Caribbean countries, but inadvertently disadvantaged imports from the Andean region. Nowhere else was this more critical than in apparel assembly where some 100,000 jobs in Colombia alone were at risk of being relocated to CBI countries. Under the enhanced ATPA program in the conference report, the Andean countries will now be competitive suppliers in the region. And this new ATPA benefit will also benefit U.S. producers of textile, yarn and cotton by making these U.S.-produced components more competitive with Asian goods. In fact, the U.S. apparel importers predict that the ATPA provisions in this bill will lead to over $1 billion in new orders. The next time ATPA is debated in this chamber, I look forward to hearing floor statements that show that this projection has come true. I also hope to hear of new successes from increased exports in footwear, watches, tuna, and other new products afforded ATPA benefits under this legislation. Enhanced trade benefits in the apparel sector should, in my view, be the new norm in the Western Hemisphere. I continue to be concerned about the demise of the Multi-Fiber Agreement in 2005 and the effect the end of this agreement will have on U.S.-Caribbean and Andean apparel assembly partnerships. If we want a competitive apparel industry in the Western Hemisphere post-2005, we must be developing greater efficiency in the region now. Secretary of Commerce Don Evans has been leading this effort for the Administration, and the Commerce Department has developed a Western Hemisphere action plan to enhance post-2005 competitiveness in the region. I will be writing to Mr. Evans shortly to encourage a similar initiative for the Andean region. I also want to say a few words about two other key parts of this trade bill--Trade Promotion Authority and Trade Adjustment Assistance. It has been eight long years since Trade Promotion Authority expired. In my view, that is far too long for the United States to be sitting on the sidelines while other countries are aggressively negotiating trade agreements. With Trade Promotion Authority, the Congress and the President will be speaking with a unified voice during negotiations. TPA will strengthen the United States' negotiating position in ongoing Doha Round of negotiations in the World Trade Organization and will provide much needed momentum for the Free Trade Area of the Americas negotiations. With TPA, USTR will be able to close negotiations on bilateral agreements with Chile and Singapore with the confidence that Congress will consider the agreements as negotiated. I am pleased that the conference report retained a number of provisions that will help to ensure that import-sensitive agriculture products, such as citrus from my state, will be given an increased level of attention during trade negotiations. I believe these provision are necessary to help rebuild consensus in support of trade within the agriculture sector. TPA can also help our citrus growers gain market access in Europe and elsewhere around the world, if we achieve our goals in the WTO agriculture negotiations. Of course, TPA is only the first step toward trade negotiations. Whether or not we are successful in achieving our negotiating objectives will depend on close cooperation between the Congress and the administration. I look forward to working with the Administration on this effort. The final comment I will make is on Trade Adjustment Assistance. I am pleased that Members of Congress were able to work together in a truly bipartisan fashion to address the health care needs of American workers adversely affected by foreign trade agreements. This trade legislation will nearly triple the existing Trade Adjustment Assistance program by providing new and more comprehensive coverage options. These new benefits will provide critical assistance to the over 2,000 Floridians who presently receive Trade Adjustment Assistance, particularly those from the apparel and electronics sectors where job losses have been most severe. For the first time, displaced workers will be eligible for a 65 percent advanceable, refundable tax credit that can be used to pay for COBRA or other state continuation plans. Health benefits will also be available to individuals who work for businesses that supply or contract with firms affected by trade. This comprehensive legislation represents a critical step towards our overall goal of lowering the number of uninsured, and I applaud my colleagues who supported it. I was pleased to vote for the comprehensive trade legislation encompassed by H.R. 3009. Passage of this bill was a major accomplishment of this Congress and proof that the Congress can work together in a spirit of bipartisanship. I am excited about the opportunities I believe this legislation brings to not only our country, but to the rest of the world.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I thank the Judiciary Committee for recognizing the needs of Florida and favorably reporting the nomination of Mr. Jose Martinez. Jose Martinez's long and impressive legal career makes him an outstanding candidate. Beginning as counsel and now partner at Martinez & Gutierrez, Mr. Martinez has been associated with the firm since 1991. Jose Martinez has served as Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of Florida, and Legal Officer for the United States Navy, Judge Advocate General Corps. He took a two-year leave from his firm to become the Regional Director for the Office for Drug Abuse Law Enforcement of the United States Department of Justice. Mr. Martinez received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Miami. He was the President of the highest honorary on campus, the Iron Arrow. His involvement with Student Government ranged from working in the Student Activities Office to becoming the treasurer of the School of Business. Currently, Mr. Martinez is the vice chairman of the Federal Court Practice Committee of the Florida Bar. He is also a member of the American Bar Association, the Federal Bar Association, the Cuban American Bar Association, and the Hispanic National Bar Association. In summary, Mr. Martinez is a highly regarded and qualified candidate for the federal bench. I appreciate the Senate's consideration of Judge Martinez's nomination and appreciate the Senate's recent confirmation of Kenneth Marra and Timothy Corrigan, who will serve in Florida's Southern and Middle Districts, two of the largest and busiest judicial districts in the country.

Mr. GRAHAM

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

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I speak in opposition to the amendment, which would strike titles II and III from this legislation. These two titles together will provide, within the community concerned about securing the homeland, the direction and capacity to develop a comprehensive strategic plan of how to accomplish that very difficult objective, and then to place within the White House an officer who is responsible for the specific function of combating terrorism. The subfunctions of that office will be to coordinate the variety of agencies that will have some responsibility for implementing the strategic plan. Some have thought that no office such as this is necessary because we are about to bring a whole Department of Homeland Security. We have a Department of Defense, but we also have within the White House a national security adviser whose job is to coordinate national security issues. The reason is because, as broad as the Defense Department is, it does not contain all of the activities of the Federal Government that relate to national security. It does not include the State Department, which has our diplomatic and foreign relations function. It does not include the Department of Treasury, which has some important national security responsibilities as it relates to economic issues. It does not include the Department of Energy, where most of our nuclear development responsibility is placed. So we have an agency in the White House to bring all those Departments that have some national security function behind a common strategy. This is exactly the purpose of this office within the White House, and that would be deleted if this amendment were to be adopted. There will be no entity that has statutory status that will be responsible, or capable, of trying to bring all of these agencies together. That is the most fundamental reason. But there is another reason why I think this office is very important. In my judgment, the threats the United States will be facing in our homeland and abroad are likely to escalate over the next period of time. No. 2, it is exactly during this period of time that this new Department of Homeland Security is going to be trying to integrate almost two dozen agencies that have had their homes elsewhere--in some cases, for a century or more. It is at this very time that there is likely--I suggest not likely, but there almost certainly will be considerable resistance to achieving the cohesion that is going to be necessary to accomplish this objective. I suggest that it will not be long before we have a debate on the floor about why did a certain misstep occur or why was a gap allowed to go unfilled, as we try to put together a structure to protect our homeland. I suggest that an answer to those questions is going to be that there was so much support for the status quo and resistance to the sort of change that could not be overcome sufficiently and in time to avoid an unnecessary vulnerability. That is my prediction. I don't believe there is any suggestion that will give absolute certainty that my prediction will prove to be false. But I believe that having this office within the White House, where there is somebody who wakes up every morning thinking about fighting terrorism, and who is in an office within walking distance of the President of the United States, will give us a greater opportunity to achieve the speedy, expeditious, and effective coordination activities that will be necessary to protect our homeland. This office has some considerable powers. For instance, it has the power to certify budgets. Why does it have that power? Because I can tell you that there is going to be a tendency of an agency that has been doing a set of functions for a long time, and now they suddenly have a homeland security function, and when that new function is battling inside the agency with all of those that have had a long history and a constituency and a political support base, any new function is not likely to do very well. We learned that lesson in the war against drugs. The very fact that Congress made this a priority didn't result in it being a priority in the agencies that had their operational responsibility. I suggest the same thing is likely to occur here. Unless you have somebody to tell that agency that unless you put an additional $15 million into carrying out your part of the strategic plan of homeland security, we are going to decertify that part of your budget--that is the kind of clout it is going to take--if we don't feel that this issue is worthy of giving this office that kind of responsibility, then I am afraid we are going to be coconspirators in a plot which is going to have a bad conclusion. So I urge that if, as I anticipate, there will be a motion to table the Thompson amendment, that motion be supported so we can retain this important position within the White House, recognizing that its ultimate power is going to come from the President himself, but it will give the President, who wants to have the most effective homeland security, an agency that we in Congress have established and, therefore, have invested our confidence in, which he appoints, and which will have the capability to give us the best hope that we can accomplish our objective of defending the homeland against terror.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I would like to thank the Judiciary Committee for recognizing the needs of Florida and favorably reporting the nomination of Judge Timothy Corrigan. Tim Corrigan, an experienced Judge in Florida's Middle District, has been nominated to serve as a Federal judge in the Middle District of Florida. Tim Corrigan's qualifications make him an excellent candidate for service on the Federal bench. Prior to his appointment as a Magistrate Judge, Judge Corrigan spent 14 years in private practice with the Jacksonville law firm of Bedell, Dittmar, De Vault, Pillans and Coxe, P.A. As a Magistrate Judge since 1996, he has considerable experience handling a broad variety of civil and criminal matters, including conducting numerous evidentiary hearings and misdemeanor trials. Judge Corrigan received his law degree, with distinction, in 1981 from Duke University School of Law, where he served as a member of the editorial board of the Duke Law Journal. He received his undergraduate degree, with honors, from the University of Notre Dame in 1978. Mr. Corrigan is a member of the Florida Bar, the Jacksonville Bar Association, the Federal Bar Association and the American Bar Association. The Jacksonville Bar Association recognized Judge Corrigan in 1991 for his pro bono services. From 1987-1989, Judge Corrigan served on the board of Jacksonville Legal Aid and was honored for his efforts. I thank my colleagues for considering this nominee. I am confident that they will agree that Judge Timothy Corrigan posses the qualities needed to effectively serve on the Federal Bench.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, earlier today and, to a greater extent, at the end of last week, we had a debate on the issue of the establishment within the White House of an office to combat terrorism. The rationale for that office is several-fold. One, not all of the agencies that will have responsibility for protecting the homeland against terrorism are in the Department of Homeland Security. There are a number of important functions--all of the intelligence agencies, the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, to mention three, which clearly have a significant role in protecting the homeland--which are not within the Department of Homeland Security. So that creates the need for someone who is in a position of responsibility to coordinate their activities in order to achieve a cohesive, comprehensive plan to protect the people of the United States. That also raises a second necessity, which is that there be a consistent strategic plan of action around which all of these agencies will organize their antiterrorism activities. That is title III of the legislation that has been introduced by our colleague from Connecticut--the requirement that there be such a comprehensive strategic vision of how we are going to protect this very open and free society of America against terrorist attacks. A third reason why I think this office is important is because we know the resistance that is going to occur to the changes that we are now suggesting. We are asking agencies which, in some cases, are a hundred years or more old to change those old habits, to reprioritize, to put at the top of their list defending the homeland against terrorists. There will be, both within the agencies and among the agencies, some conflicts, inevitably. We need someone who has the voice, who has the ear, who has the appointment of the President of the United States to be able to moderate and resolve those conflicts, and to do so in a clear and expeditious manner so we do not exacerbate unnecessarily the vulnerability of the American people while agencies are engaged in bureaucratic catfights. A final reason why I think this is important is that we need someone to perform a function that, frankly, has not been adequately performed in the last decade, vis-a-vis our intelligence agency. That function is to constantly challenge the agencies that have homeland security responsibility as to their relevance. There is a tendency for an agency that has been doing its business in a particular manner for a long time to be resistant to taking on new habits--maybe it is the governmental equivalent that it is hard to teach old dogs new tricks, that it is hard to teach old bureaucracies new patterns of activity. I use the intelligence community as an example of that truth. They grew up, beginning with the establishment in 1947, as agencies which had as their role of being to develop and analyze information relative to the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies. It has been largely since the end of the cold war that the intelligence community has broadened its focus on the rest of the world, where the United States has important interests that it wishes to know more about and to have a greater analytical capability to decide what we ought to do about it. The intelligence community, in my judgment, was slow to make that transition. Part of the reason is that they were not produced adequately. They were not asked with sufficient frequency and aggressiveness: Are you relevant to the kinds of challenges that you face today? I believe that is part of the responsibility of Congress, part of our oversight. It also will be a responsibility of this new office within the office of the President to be asking these agencies that have homeland security responsibilities: Are you relevant to the kinds of challenges that we have facing our Nation today? So those are the essential rationales. Now, the concern that was expressed last week was not that we were going to have such an office. In fact, at one point, the Senator from Tennessee and I, I thought, had a common agreement that there was the need for an entity in the White House that could perform those functions. The question, then, became calibrating just how much influence and power should that Department have. I personally was, and continue to be, an advocate for a strong, very robust office of counterterrorism in the White House because I think the challenges of inertia and resistance to change are going to be significant, and there will have to be an effective, even more assertive force in the other direction to get the kinds of changes the American people expect our Federal Government to make in order to give the priority that we expect to protect the homeland against terrorists. But it is clear from the vote that we have just taken that the majority of the Members of the Senate feel that goes a little too far. So what Senator Lieberman and I have been doing over the past several days is trying to think through what could be essentially jettisoned from this legislation as it relates to the office within the White House that would still maintain the essential credibility of the office to perform its function but would make it acceptable to a majority of our colleagues. The two issues that we have identified for such discharge are, first, the provision that the Presidential appointee to the office of antiterrorism be subject to Senate confirmation, and, second, the provision that gave this office the capacity to decertify budgets of the agencies which had some homeland security responsibility if it were determined that they were not allocating sufficient funds to that function within the agency, which was that agency's part of the comprehensive plan to fight terrorism in the homeland. I offered this amendment with my colleague, Senator Lieberman, with some anguish because I think those two levels of accountability and capability are important to assure us that we can achieve what we must achieve in defending the homeland. But in order to be able to save the larger concept of such an office in the White House, which now will be almost a parallel to the office that is held by Dr. Condoleezza Rice, as the National Security Adviser--that office is a statutory office, appointed by the President, created by Congress, but not subject to confirmation. That will be this office. It will be an office created by statute by the Congress, so it will have the legitimacy of law. The head of the office will be appointed by the President and not subject to Senate confirmation. That is the model we will have if this amendment is adopted. What happens if we do not adopt this amendment and then proceed to adopt the Thompson amendment which will delete both title II and title III? There will be no congressional directive that it is important to have an agency to coordinate the multiple Departments of the Federal Government with homeland security responsibility. In fact, it could be interpreted as a congressional statement that we affirmatively do not want there to be a place in the Federal Government that can bring these Departments together; that, for some reason, the experience we learned since 1947 as to the importance of a National Security Adviser who can perform that function for national security is not relevant to the kind of challenges we are now going to face in terms of domestic security. Second, with the elimination of title III, we will have no congressional directive to establish a strategic plan for homeland security and to have the strength of Congress in support of that plan. I think it is worth giving up the confirmation and the budget certification if we can retain the fundamental principles of the importance of an agency that can achieve collaboration, can organize behind a strategic plan, will have the strength that comes from congressional creation and Presidential appointment, and will be able to move us as rapidly as possible into the best posture to defend our homeland and be a constant product to see that these agencies are cognizant of the changes that will inevitably be occurring in the environmental threat in which they will be operating and that they are prepared to constantly be reinventing themselves, adapting themselves to effectively respond to the challenges that will be different 10 years from now than they are today, and much different 30 years from now than they are today. I urge the adoption of this amendment which I consider a compromise offered in good faith that meets the primary concerns that were expressed in this Chamber last week and again today but allows us to move forward with a totality of national policies, including Department of Homeland Security, the responsibilities that will continue to be vested in other agencies outside of the Department of Homeland Security, and an entity within the White House with the ear and the confidence of the President capable of seeing that the whole of these work together in a cohesive team for the defense and protection of the people of America. I urge the adoption of this amendment and then the defeat of the underlying amendment. THE PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont is recognized.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I join my colleagues, Senator Cleland and Senator Thompson, in offering an amendment to the Interior Appropriations bill that shows the Senate's support for funding our national parks. I am cosponsoring this amendment after hearing comments from park employees, park supporters, and park visitors about the importance of providing adequate funds to maintain our nation's natural treasures during my Third Annual National Parks Issues Forum, held at Zion National Park in Utah. Tomorrow marks one year since the horrific terrorist attacks on our Nation. Events such as these remind us of the importance of having places of refuge were we can go to refresh and renew our spirits. John Muir wrote in his book Our National Parks, ``Thousands of tired, nerve- shaken, overcivilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers but as fountains of life.'' John Muir's thoughts still ring true. Our national parks, be they mountains, deserts, or rivers of grass, are critically important places for Americans to go and escape the trials of civilized life. Our Nation's cultural and natural heritage are preserved in our parks. We have demonstrated our initial commitment to preserving this heritage by setting aside these special places as national parks. We must now continue to demonstrate our commitment to these special places by providing a level of funding adequate to operate and maintain them. Throughout the park system there are historic structures and buildings that require rehabilitation; there are utility systems that require repair or replacement; there are roads that require paving. In addition there are units that are woefully understaffed. Given our current fiscal constraints, we must be sure to invest each of our dollars in those places that will do the most good and make the biggest impact in our parks. I also want to take this opportunity to acknowledge Senator Akaka's leadership on this and other issues of critical importance to the national parks. Senator Akaka is the Chairman of the Subcommittee on National Parks and I have long enjoyed our work together to improve our parks. Like Senator Akaka, I believe that our national parks are worthy of our investment--worthy of our commitment. I urge my colleagues to help provide our parks with an adequate level of funding.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I would like to thank the Judiciary Committee for recognizing the needs of Florida and favorably reporting the nomination of Judge Kenneth A. Marra. Ken Marra, a skilled and respected Judge in Florida's Fifteenth Circuit, has been nominated to serve as a Federal judge in the busy Southern District of Florida. If confirmed, he will fill a newly created and much needed judgeship position. Judge Marra's solid qualifications make him an ideal candidate for service on the Federal bench. A circuit judge since 1996, he currently serves in the Palm Beach County Court's civil, family and criminal divisions. Before his tenure as a circuit judge, Judge Marra spent 16 years practicing commercial litigation in Palm Beach County and Washington, DC. He also served as a trial attorney with the United States Department of Justice. Judge Marra is a graduate of the State University of New York at Stony Brook and earned his law degree from the Stetson University College of Law in 1977. Before attending law school, the judge taught social studies to high school students in New York. The strength of Judge Marra's nomination is evident from the strong support that he has earned from his local bar. When asked to comment on his nomination for a January 4 Palm Beach Post article, Amy Smith, president of the Palm Beach County Bar Association, said, ``He is an absolutely perfect choice: impeccable background, extremely intelligent, consistently one of the highest rated judges in the judicial evaluations done here.'' Ms. Smith said Marra's judicial demeanor ``is gracious and humble. The President couldn't have made a better choice.'' When the Palm Beach County Bar Association released its biennial survey of circuit and county judges earlier this spring, Judge Marra ranked the highest in the neutrality and fairness category, with 63 percent of the attorneys rating him as ``outstanding.'' In Florida, Judge Marra submitted his application to a judicial nominating committee comprised of a diverse group of Floridians, who in turn recommended three candidates to the President for consideration. Senator Bill Nelson and I interviewed these candidates. In summary, Mr. Marra is an intelligent, well-respected, and qualified candidate for the Federal bench. I appreciate the Senate's consideration of Judge Marra's nomination and look forward to working with my colleagues to confirm additional nominees to Florida's Southern and Middle Districts, two of the largest and busiest judicial districts in the country.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, at the request of our colleague, Senator Lieberman, I will be managing the debate on this particular amendment, an amendment for which I feel a strong parental relationship. Shortly after the tragic events of September 11, with Senator Feinstein, I introduced legislation to establish such an office of terrorism within the White House in order to create a focal point for decisionmaking and informing the President and the Congress of a national strategy on how to combat what clearly was emerging as the major challenge to America's national security. My good friend, Senator Thompson, has just suggested that events that have occurred since that time, particularly the event of the President deciding, after a long period of consideration, to support a statutorily created Department of Homeland Security, had rendered irrelevant or, maybe even worse, redundant the idea of an office to combat terrorism within the Presidency. I disagree with that analysis and look forward to the debate which will lay out the case of why these two agencies--a Department of Homeland Security and an office within the Office of the President-- are, in fact, reinforcing in the same way that, in 1947, Congress found it appropriate to reorganize the previously distributed military, distributed by the various services, Army, Navy, a newly emerging Air Force, into a single Department of Defense. But at the same time they did that, in fact in the same legislation, they created the Office of National Security Council. They found those two actions to be reinforcing, cohesive, and both contributing to the Nation's security. I will attempt to make the case that the same is true for the action suggested in the legislation before us. I strongly support the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and the legislation before us today to do so. I wish to commend our colleagues, Senator Lieberman and Senator Thompson, Senator Levin, Senator Cochran, as well as Senator Shelby, who serves with me on the Senate Committee on Intelligence, for their leadership on this issue and for the wisdom which they have shown in the development of this specific legislation. The establishment of a Department entrusted with the security of our homeland, in my judgment, is a critical step to making our Nation safer. The vicious terrorists who struck out on September 11 may have succeeded in executing their plot, but they failed in achieving their mission. America is sad; America is not afraid. We are alert, not panicked. We are firm in our resolve to orient ourselves to protect against future attacks; without altering the fundamental aspects of our life, we are committed to a strategy that will both protect us against our vulnerabilities here at home, while we take the war aggressively and successfully to our enemies, wherever they might live. The Department of National Homeland Security Act of 2002 makes necessary changes in our governmental structure. It does so in a reasoned, careful way, preserving our constitutional liberties while increasing the effectiveness of our security organization. This legislation is consistent with our history where periodically we have reexamined what our national priorities are and how the Federal Government should be organized to achieve those national priorities. A perfect example of this is the agency most affected by this legislation--the U.S. Coast Guard, which will represent about 25 percent of all the personnel in the new Department. The Coast Guard began in 1789, the same year that George Washington was sworn in as President of the United States. At that time, it was known as the United States Light House Service, and its primary function, as its name implies, was seeing that lighthouses were operational. The agency eventually merged with four others and assumed a new role, and that was enforcing our customs laws, collecting tariffs. At that point, it was moved into the Department of the Treasury. Other than twice during World War I and again during World War II, when the Coast Guard was transferred by Executive order to the Navy, it stayed in the Department of the Treasury until 1967, when its role evolved yet again and it became seen as a maritime safety and security agency. The Coast Guard was transferred to the newly formed Department of Transportation. It has stayed in that Department since 1967. Today, the Coast Guard is recognized as a primary component of our Nation's homeland security force. Thus, the recommendation in this legislation is that the Coast Guard in toto be transferred to the Department of Homeland Security. I focus my remarks today on that portion of the bill which is the subject of the amendment that has just been offered by Senator Thompson, the amendment to delete from this legislation title II and title III, which would establish within the White House a national office for combating terrorism. The need for a coordinator within the White House has been recognized by a number of blue ribbon commissions in the last several years. Here are recommendations from three of the most prominent of those commissions. The Gilmore Commission, chaired by the former Governor of Virginia, stated: Recommendation No. 2: The next President should establish a National Office for Combating Terrorism in the Executive Office of the President, and should seek a statutory basis for this office. The Hart-Rudman Commission, chaired by two of our former colleagues, said this: Strategic planning is largely absent within the United States Government. . . . Across the Government, [a coordinator] should be given a stronger hand in the budget process. . . . Congress should develop mechanisms for a comprehensive review of the President's counterterrorism policy and budget. The Bremer Commission, chaired by the distinguished Ambassador Bremer, stated: The President and the Congress should reform the system for reviewing and funding departmental counterterrorism programs to ensure that the activities and programs of various agencies are part of a comprehensive plan. In a recently released--in July of this year--Brookings Institution report on the events since September 11, it was stated: Whether Congress establishes the broad-ranging department the Bush administration proposes or the more focused Department we advocate, there will remain a need for White House coordination. . . . By the administration's own reckoning, more than 100 U.S. Government agencies are involved in the homeland security effort. . . . Continuing, the Brookings Institution report states: There is a critical need to coordinate their actions with those of [the Department of Homeland Security] and to develop and implement a government-wide homeland security strategy. As I indicated earlier, this concept of an office within the White House with the responsibility for coordinating efforts to combat terrorism was originally embodied in legislation I introduced with Senator Feinstein last fall and is based on the lack of any central coordinating figure within our Government with a singular focus on terrorism. We believed then--and with the creation of the new department, we believe now--that it is essential the sometimes-discordant group of departments and agencies with counterterrorism responsibilities must be brought into harmony. The creation of the Department of National Homeland Security does not change that fact. While this new Department will subsume some of the existing agencies, there will be many others which remain outside the authority of the Secretary of Homeland Security but will still be performing vital missions related to our efforts to combat terrorism. As an example, the intelligence community itself is not going to be brought into the Department of Homeland Security. Clearly, it will play a very significant role if we are going to anticipate and be able to respond to terrorist attacks before they are launched. The Department of Defense has recently created a new central command called Northern Command. That command will have increased responsibility for the military's role in protecting the security of our homeland. The departments of the Treasury will still be responsible for coordinating economic measures to reduce the opportunities of terrorists who finance their activities through U.S. sources or international sources. The departments of State and the Department of Energy, which has a major role in our nuclear policy and will have a major role in the Department of Homeland Security's efforts to develop new technologies that will help us better confront terrorism--they will all play a role in our national efforts to combat terrorism. The Director of the National Office of Combating Terrorism will have three missions. First, the Director will be able to provide that coordination on counterterrorism for all of the agencies--not only the Department of Homeland Security but the intelligence community, Department of Defense, Department of the Treasury, Department of State, Department of Energy, just to list some of the other agencies that will be most directly involved in homeland security. He will be able to do this with his power to certify budgets, that they are consistent with the comprehensive plan for combating terrorism. The model for this is twofold. I mentioned earlier the 1947 National Security Act, created by statute for a National Security Council and a National Security Adviser to the President. In more recent years, we have created an office of drug policy. That office has been increased in authority over the years as we have seen that greater authority was needed in order to bring the Federal Government more effectively into a common army to combat the enemy of drug traffickers. That legislation now provides that the head of that office is appointed by the President, subject to Senate confirmation, and has the power to decertify budgets that are not consistent with the President's antidrug plan. Those two models--the National Security Council and the National Office for Drug Policy--are the models for the office that we are proposing to create today. This office and these powers, particularly the power to certify budgets, are what are necessary for the Director to effectively coordinate the counterterrorism efforts of the important agencies that will not be part of the Department of Homeland Security. The second responsibility of the Director will be to assure that his status and his effectiveness derives from law, not just the personal relationship with the President. Like the Office of Drug Policy, this is an agency that serves not only the interest of the President but also the interest of all of the American people and their representatives in the Congress. So it is important there be a level of shared responsibility and confidence in the individual who occupies that position. Third, the Director will be subject to the explicit oversight of Congress. This is important so that Congress is a full partner; that Congress is there at the launch of our comprehensive strategy to combat terrorism so that Congress will be there during the good days and the bad days, and there will be some of both as we move forward in this effort to protect the homeland. Fourth, this Director will have the confidence of both the executive branch and the Congress and will play the critical role of assuring that the agencies most involved in the war on terrorism will make the necessary institutional adjustments to move toward the era of terrorism and away from many of the concepts which have dominated us during the cold war. One of the concerns I have developed, as our Intelligence Committee has reviewed the events leading up to September 11, is the question of why was the intelligence community slow to recognize that the world changed in a very fundamental way in terms of its mission with the end of the cold war? It was not surprising that the intelligence agencies were very influenced by the history of the cold war because they were a product of the cold war. The United States had not had an organized intelligence service until World War II. During the war, a special security agency was established to develop and analyze intelligence for a military purpose. As soon as the war ended, so did that agency. Two years later, President Truman recognized that as the Soviet Union changed from being a wartime ally to now an adversary, we needed to know more about the Soviet Union, about its capabilities, about its intentions, and in order to do so, we needed to have a permanent and a mixed civilian and military set of intelligence agencies. Out of that decision came the 1947 National Security Act and the creation, in addition to the Department of Defense and the National Security Council, of also the intelligence community more or less as we know it today. The intelligence community grew up dealing with the peculiarities of the Soviet Union. We knew a tremendous amount about the Soviet Union. We probably, without question, had more information about issues of warfare in the Arctic Ocean than any other place in the world, including the Soviet Union itself because it was very much in our interest to understand that particular water body. As we were acquiring this tremendous depth of knowledge about the Soviet Union, we were doing it at the expense of not learning more about much of the rest of the world. Our intelligence agencies became focused narrowly--culturally, and linguistically--particularly on the Soviet Union. We were not acquiring competencies in other parts of the world. Second, we became very dependent on technology as a means of collecting intelligence. The Soviet Union was a hard place to get spies into and to support and to sustain them once they were there. Particularly our satellite-based technologies gave us the means of acquiring most of the information we wanted to learn about the Soviet Union without the risk and difficulty of putting human beings into a position to collect that intelligence. Finally, there was a criticism, which is subject to debate, that our intelligence communities became risk adverse; that we were reluctant to engage in operations that might fail and be embarrassing; it might fail and cost lives. All three of these characteristics, real or alleged, have disserved us in the post-cold-war era. Instead of being narrowly focused, we now must be broadly focused. We must understand the cultures and languages of countries that did not exist at the time the cold war started. We no longer can depend on our technology, although it continues to be a very significant part of our intelligence collection, but if you are going to understand the mind of Osama bin Laden, you cannot do so by taking a picture or even listening to a conversation. The fact is, modern international terrorists rarely use the kind of communication that we have the greatest capability to intercept. Rather, we must have an intelligence capability which is extremely diverse, that understands many cultures, understands many languages, and is able to function in alliances with the intelligence services from many other nations. Finally, this is going to be a riskier war than was the cold war. While the cold war posed the ultimate risk--nuclear annihilation--this is going to require human beings operating in very close contact with our adversaries and exposing themselves to the risk of that close encounter. The reason I use this example of the intelligence community and its necessity, but slowness, to make the conversion from its cold-war orientation to the orientation of the new era on terrorism is that these same challenges will be faced by the agencies which are now being given responsibility for homeland security. I can state with virtual certainty of correctness that over the next 10 to 20 years the nature of our enemy at home, the tactics that are used, will be substantially different than those that were used on September 11, 2001, and we must have a homeland capability which recognizes those changes and is prepared to adapt to the new challenges, the new threats that it will face. I believe one of the things that was missing in the intelligence community was having an office which could be constantly challenging the intelligence leadership: Are you relevant to the challenge we are facing today? Are you looking over the horizon at the kinds of capabilities you will need in the tomorrows in order to prepare against this emerging threat? In my judgment, the most important function of this office to combat terrorism will be its role as the constant challenger of all of the main line departments, from the new Department of Homeland Security to the Department of Defense to the Department of Energy, challenging them: Are you relevant to the current face of evil that we are continuing against? What are you doing to prepare for future emerging threats? What are you doing to identify those threats? What are you doing to recruit and train and provide professional advancement to your key personnel so they will be personally responsive to the new challenges? Those are some of the issues. Those are some of the challenges. Those are the fundamental rationales why the committee, under the leadership of Senator Lieberman, included title II and title III in providing for the Office for Combating Terrorism within the Office of the President. These four missions together will assure the Director has both authority and legitimacy, authority with respect to his colleagues who lead other Governmental agencies, and legitimacy with respect to the important role the legislative branch will play in the achievement of his goals. This position, as I indicated earlier, parallels the job being done today by the Director of the President's National Security Council. It does for domestic security many of the things that Dr. Condoleezza Rice does for foreign policy. It also parallels in many ways the emerging Office of Drug Policy and its challenge to have a coherent plan of action, and then assure all the Federal agencies that are responsible for that play their appropriate role. We are about very serious business. It is not just business that will fade after the sorrow and shock of September 11. It goes further into history. In my judgment, for our lifetime, as it is today, the issue of terrorism will be the single most significant security threat faced by the United States of America. So we must prepare for the long haul, the sustained commitment. There has been some criticism that Congress played a role in this failure of the intelligence community and other aspects of our National Government to make the transition from the cold war to prepare for the challenges of the new era of terrorism. Some of those criticisms are no doubt deserved. This is an opportunity for Congress to take action which will help prepare us to avoid the unstated criticism. I do not want to have our predecessors in the Senate ask the question 25 years from now: Why did we create, in the year 2002, agencies that would become the dinosaurs of 2022 because they were unable to make the transition as the rapidly evolving but not fully understood threat of terrorism confronted our people? This office, in my judgment, will reduce the likelihood of that criticism because, if this office functions as the architects intend, it will be the agency for continuing renewal within all of our Departments which have a responsibility for protecting the American people in our homeland. For those reasons, I respectfully resist the amendment offered by Senator Thompson, urge its defeat, and the continuation within this legislation of the important concepts contained in title II of the Office for Combating Terrorism.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, just to respond to some of the comments of my friend and colleague from Tennessee, it seems to me, as this debate has gone on for the last couple of hours, that we have sort of narrowed the focus. One question is: Does America need--assuming that there will be created an Office for Homeland Security--an office in the Presidency for the specific purpose of coordinating our efforts to combat terrorism? I think the Senator from Tennessee just said he agreed--or he thought the President agreed--that some sort of office like that was going to be necessary. Basically, it is the office that Governor Ridge has been occupying now for approximately 10 months. So we agree there is a sufficient potential disorder, with the number of agencies that are going to have a role in our efforts to combat terrorism, and that is the specific and sole focus of this office in the White House; that it justifies somebody to attempt to bring order out of disorder. As I was reviewing the legislation, I found some agencies that, frankly, I had not originally thought were going to be part of the fight to combat terrorism which I did not mention in my earlier remarks. One of those is the Environmental Protection Agency. One might say: How in the world is the Environmental Protection Agency going to be a part of the effort of homeland security against terrorism? The answer is, if you list our vulnerabilities to terrorists, clearly one of the most significant of those vulnerabilities is our infrastructure, our basic water systems. If you were a creative terrorist and wanted to quickly disrupt America, identifying and targeting your efforts against our water supply would be one of the ways that you might consider doing so. Obviously, if that is going to be a vulnerability, then the agency of the Federal Government which has the primary responsibility, particularly for protecting the quality of our water--the Environmental Protection Agency--becomes an agency that has a role to play in deterring terrorists from access to that part of America's infrastructure. The list of agencies you can consider today, much less what we might be dealing with 10 or 20 years from now when the imagination of the terrorists in our own sense of vulnerabilities have become more mature, could be very numerous. So we agree there is a need for there to be an agency in the White House for purposes of focusing on the specific issue of terrorism. The second question then becomes: If so, how should that office be organized? Should it be called ``a meeting and hope people will come and, if they come, that they will cooperate'' type of agency, or should they have some agency with teeth that can sink in, if that is necessary, in order to accomplish the result? We have had some experience with the former type of agency in the original version of the National Office of Drug Control. That office had relatively little real teeth and, therefore, had little effectiveness on chewing on the difficult problems of getting the variety of Federal agencies that have a role in our drug policy to collaborate. We already are aware of some of the difficulties we are going to have in the area of homeland security because we are identifying areas in which various agencies, for reasons of their cultural attitudes or traditions, their isolation, their desire to not share the potential glory of success with other agencies, have been insular and the American people have paid the price because the agencies that should have known important pieces of information were denied that information and, therefore, their ability to be as effective on behalf of the American people in giving us security against terrorists was frustrated. We know that this office within the White House has to have enough power to be taken seriously. I believe it is the evolution of the Office of Drug Policy that is the most informing recent experience in American Government as to what kind of agency this needs to be and that we do not have the luxury of waiting 10 years for it to get there; that this office within the White House needs to have some ability to oversee and control the budget as it is being developed to assure that it is consistent with the strategy for combating terrorism that has been agreed to and that, in the implementation of budgets, agencies will devote the required funds necessary to carry out that strategy. I believe if we are serious about a war on terror--and the American people are very serious about an effective war on terror--they need to have what, in this beginning of the season, we might refer to as a head coach who can oversee all of the assistant coaches who have responsibility for individual components of the team to assure that the team in totality is focused on victory against its opponent. There is the third question, and that is: How do we prepare for the future? It was said that we do not need title III which calls for the development of a strategic comprehensive plan to combat terrorism because we already have a plan. It was the plan the President submitted a few weeks ago. Without commenting about the current plan that the President submitted, I can tell you--and I do not believe there would be anyone here who would speak to the contrary--but that is not the plan we are going to have 10 years from now. We are not so lame-headed as to be unable to learn from the experience that we are going to have over the next decade and to then incorporate that experience into what we think is the effective strategy to protect Americans against terrorism. Unfortunately, there is a tendency to want to revere the status quo and to resist change. In my earlier remarks I talked about some of the history of the American intelligence agencies, going back to their inception in 1947 and how they became so committed to fighting the cold war against the one big enemy, the Soviet Union, that when the cold war was over and we suddenly had a much different environment of enemies, that they found it difficult to make the transitions that were necessary to respond to the new set of enemies. The same thing is going to happen in our domestic war to secure Americans here in our homeland, but we have already demonstrated some of the slowness to respond. One of my critiques of the current effort at homeland security is that we have tended to focus our efforts on those vulnerabilities that have been attacked. Just think of all the things we have done to change the character of American airports and American commercial airlines, with many more changes still to be fully implemented. Contrast that to what we have done to substantially increase the security in areas that, in my judgment, are equal in their vulnerability and threat to the people of the United States, such as the water systems to which I referred earlier. What have we done to increase the security of our seaports and those thousands of containers which enter America every day? In my own judgment, they represent one of the greatest threats for a terrorist wishing to bring a weapon of mass destruction into the United States. We have almost a genetic tendency to support the status quo and a genetic tendency to respond when we have been hit where we have been hit. Hopefully, this agency, at its best, will be an agency that will challenge us to think creatively about what our vulnerabilities might be, and then to assess: Are we taking those steps that are reasonable and appropriate to protect us against an attack, against a vulnerability that has not yet been exploited? I believe an agency that has that kind of an orientation, mission, and responsibility will also then need the authority this legislation provides to see that, in fact, we act against that. It is easy to get Americans energized to deal with commercial airline safety when commercial airliners have been flown into some of the symbols of America's greatness, but it is more difficult to get Americans to respond to dealing with the potential threats at a seaport, or a metal container rolling down the highway when we have not yet been attacked at that point of vulnerability. This agency will have the opportunity, within the White House, with the power of the Presidency and the power of the Congress, through confirmation, and with the power that this legislation would provide, to be that creative watchdog to ensure that we are responding to the threat profile as it changes and that we do not require that we be attacked in a particular point of vulnerability before we take steps to secure that vulnerability. So I think those are the basic issues in this debate. Does America need such an office? I believe there is unanimity, yes. Once established, does the office need to have the capability, the authority, and the clout to assure that it can conduct a difficult job? I think the answer to that question is yes because it then answers the third question: Are we going to look to this agency to be, yes, a coordinative agency; yes, an agency that will help advise us as to the wisest strategy to combat terrorism, but, maybe most importantly, to be the agency that will be responsible for our creative inquiry as to what is the nature of the threat today, what is it likely to be tomorrow, and how do we prepare to give to the American people what they deserve and what they look to us to provide, the most effective security in the homeland of America?

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I rise today to commend the National Guard and urge my colleagues to support the National Guard Counter Drug States Plan Program. The National Guard role is to provide counterdrug and drug demand reduction support as requested by local, State, and Federal law enforcement agencies and community-based organizations with a counterdrug nexus. The National Guard provides this support in consonance with the Office of National Drug Control Policy and Department of Defense guidance. The mission of the National Guard Counter Drug Program is to assist and strengthen law enforcement and community-based organizations in reducing the availability of, and demand for, illegal drugs within the State and Nation through professional military support. The principal elements of counter-drug military support include highly skilled personnel, specialized technology, facilities, and diverse types of military training and skills. Operationally, this translates into port security assistance, operating nonintrusive inspection devices, aerial and ground reconnaissance, technical support, general support, community antidrug coalition support, youth drug awareness programs, and use of training facilities. The National Guard offers numerous military-unique skills to the counterdrug mission. These include linguist and translator support, investigative case and analyst support, communications support, engineer support, diver support, marijuana eradication support, transportation support, maintenance and logistical support, cargo and mail inspection, training of law enforcement and military personnel, surface reconnaissance, and aerial reconnaissance. In addition, the National Guard provides command, control, communications, computers, and information, C4I, integration; logistics planning; tactical and strategic operational and intelligence planning; the ability to support around-the-clock operations; liaison skills with civilian authority and interagency cooperation; resource integration; force protection training; operational security enforcement; communications security enforcement; and risk management skills. We must fully fund the National Guard Counter Drug States Plans Program. The National Guard's success in interdicting drugs and other contraband contributes to the security of the Nation as a whole. Using my home State as an example, Florida has valid support requests from law enforcement and community-based organizations that would require approximately 250 personnel. Under the constraints of the estimated fiscal year 2003 budget, the National Guard was able to field 111 personnel, resulting in unfunded requests for 139 personnel and an unfunded requirement of 99 personnel based on an optimal program size of 210 personnel. In fiscal year 2002, the State of Florida fielded 148 personnel, and unfunded personnel requests totaled 102. I am also a great believer in a balanced counterdrug program, both interdiction and demand reduction. The National Guard does some of the finest demand reduction work in the country. Young people look up to these citizen-soldiers and listen to what they say. Counterdrug personnel assigned to perform drug demand reduction activities utilize numerous military skills including command, control and communication skills, tactical and strategic planning, liaison skills and training design and implementation skills. These assist communities with work plans, realistic time lines and assigned responsibilities. This support is essential for many community-based organizations in order to mobilize and sustain their efforts. Additionally, the military value system and discipline instilled in all counterdrug personnel creates a significant demand to serve as role models and mentors supporting a wide array of prevention activities. Community based prevention organizations rely on National Guard personnel to incorporate this unique military orientation into activities such as youth camps, ropes challenge courses, high adventure training, high school drug education, Drug Education for Youth, mentoring, and other prevention and skill training activities. The National Guard also provides unique facilities and equipment such as armories, training sites, obstacle courses, aircraft and wheeled vehicles in support of community prevention strategies. These facilities and equipment are often the only resources available to conduct youth camps, coalitions meetings or experiential learning initiatives. The leadership skills and military values embedded within our youth hopefully provide a morale foundation for future generations, as well as conveying to many thousands of youth the value of military service. The National Guard Counter Drug States Plan Program benefits not only the States, but also the Department of Defense. The primary benefit is increased combat readiness, as well as significant Guard experience in Military Operations Other than War, MOOTW, within the continental United States and abroad. Service in the counterdrug program also provides members with joint experience and inter-service cooperation skills for immediate response to national emergencies. The National Guard, in many communities, is the only real connection the public has to our armed services. The visibility of uniformed National Guardsmen provides a deterrence to the smuggling of drugs, arms, explosives, weapons, aliens, and other contraband, as well as direct support for interdiction operations. I can not say enough good things about what the National Guard does for the State of Florida and the Nation. I am grateful that it appears we have avoided personnel reductions for fiscal year 2003, which we struggled through in fiscal year 2002, but I am concerned that we may have a funding shortfall and personnel reductions in fiscal year 2004. I urge my colleagues to review the great merits of the National Guard Counter Drug State Plans Program, given the National Guard's integral role in both the National Drug Control Strategy and Homeland Defense Strategy. Please help us fully fund and deploy the National Guard for the protection of our United States.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a series of questions? (Mr. NELSON of Florida assumed the Chair.)

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask the Senator to yield.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Will the Senator allow me to enter a unanimous consent request as well?

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak as in morning business up to 20 minutes immediately after the Senator from Utah.

Mr. GRAHAM. I am agreeable to the unanimous consent agreement that I follow the Senator from Utah.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, yesterday, July 31, the Senate voted not to waive the Budget Act to allow consideration of the Graham-Smith prescription drug compromise. This legislation was estimated by the Congressional Budget Office to cost $390 billion over the 10-year period, a cost which turned out to be within a few percentage points of the legislation offered by the Republicans. Although unscored by the Congressional Budget Office, the sponsors of the Republican legislation estimated that their cost was in the range of $370 billion. However, in spite of the fact that both the Democratic and the Republican plans were above $300 billion, which had been provided in the 2001 Budget Act, almost 18 months out of date, in spite of that fact, we could not get the 60 votes to waive the Budget Act and allow consideration of the substance of the proposal to provide a critical additional health care benefit for America's older citizens. Had we gotten to the proposal, what would the Graham-Smith compromise have provided? It would have provided full coverage to the 47 percent of America's seniors whose incomes were below 200 percent of poverty, approximately $17,700 for a single person. It would have provided a mechanism for significant discounts, in the range of 15 to 25 percent, as well as a Federal subsidy on top of those discounts for all Americans. For all Americans, it would have also provided insurance against catastrophic costs, costs beyond $3,300 of payments made by the beneficiary. Think of this: Had we been able to get to the substance of our amendment, Americans could have had the opportunity of purchasing an insurance policy for $25 a year that would have given them the peace of mind they would not be crippled, potentially financially devastated, by the consequences of a major health emergency, such as a heart attack or being determined to have a chronic disease such as diabetes. All seniors who fell into that category would have had all of their prescription drug costs above $3,300 per year paid with only a modest $10-per-prescription copayment. This compromise would have afforded very real protection and assistance to all Medicare beneficiaries at a cost which both Republicans and Democrats had deemed to be reasonable. One of the fundamental reasons this failed yesterday and I appear today is because at the last minute--I correct that to say, within the last hour before the vote was taken, the information on this chart was dragged from some source and reproduced on a floor chart used by one of my colleagues and in handouts which were circulated in the Chamber, which purported to show that the effect of adopting our amendment would be to impose massive new costs on the States. It was stated that the first-year cost would be over $5 billion, and the 10-year cost would be $70 billion. Madam President, I accept the fact that we have rules in the Senate and that one of those rules requires that to waive the Budget Act, you have to have 60 votes. But what I cannot accept is the method that some of our opponents used to defeat our plan. There is an old adage: Everyone is entitled to their opinion; no one is entitled to their own facts. It is impossible to have an honest debate without everyone using the same factual basis as the premise for their arguments and opinions. We can't pass legislation in 1 week to make businesses adopt honest accounting practices and standards and then not apply honest accounting standards to ourselves. Using only partial information that intentionally misleads U.S. Senators--in this case, misleading them to the wrong conclusion--is demeaning to this, the world's greatest deliberative body. Several of our colleagues used a chart which misled other Senators into believing that the Graham-Smith amendment imposed these massive unfunded mandates. In the words of one of our colleagues: ``$70 billion on the States.'' This is simply untrue. It is, in my opinion, an intentional misrepresentation of the facts. The floor chart used yesterday, as well as the paper distributed on the Senate floor, contained no source as to where the data was analyzed, or who among our colleagues would assume responsibility for distributing this information. No one--in violation of the spirit of the Senate rules--would accept personal responsibility for these distortions. What happened yesterday was Enron accounting come to the Senate Chamber. It makes a point based on an inaccurate representation of the facts. It seems to me that if we are going to require companies to be more accountable, require their chief executives to sign the financial statements before they are released to the public, we should require the same of ourselves in the Senate. In addition to distributing this distorted information, there were also statements made as to the motivation of the sponsors of this amendment. I will quote a statement made by one of our opponents who stated that: The sponsors chose to spring the text of this amendment on the Senate yesterday for the first time. Perhaps they thought they could slip in something new that we would not catch. Well, we caught it, and you know we have caught it by the speeches of the Senator from Maine. We actually have had a chance, and we have studied the Graham amendment. The Graham amendment imposes a massive new burden on States just when State treasuries are in terrible shape. We have been accused of bad faith in offering this amendment, surreptitiously attempting to commit the States to a massive new unfunded commitment. That is not true. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office is the basis of the analysis that we have done. It was the basis of the support that was sought and gathered for the Graham- Smith amendment. None of its supporters, intentionally or otherwise, would have allowed a provision to be included that increased State costs. On the other hand, we have an analysis that was developed by an unknown source, distributed by unknown persons to the Senate floor. The basis of our estimate is the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, a set of experts with no political stake in this debate. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the Graham-Smith amendment would not increase State spending. Let's look at an analysis upon which the Congressional Budget Office predicated that statement, realities which the Republican analysis totally ignores: States would receive considerable relief from the creation of this new Medicare prescription drug benefit. Let me explain why. Under current law, States are required to provide drug benefits to those eligible for Supplemental Security Income, SSI-- generally, those below 75 percent of poverty--and others fully eligible for Medicaid. In addition, some States have elected to go up to 100 percent of poverty. Those seniors' drug costs are now paid by the States at their regular Medicaid matching rate. Therefore, States are paying for part of total drug costs for these seniors, and the Federal Government is paying for part. Under our proposal, the Federal Government would assume 100 percent of the cost above $3,300 incurred by each senior currently covered by the Federal-State match. In addition, the Federal Government would be solely responsible for 5 percent of the costs incurred by each senior currently covered by the Federal-State match; that is, 95 percent of the costs below the stop loss would continue to be shared between the State and the Federal Government. However, all the costs above $3,300 would be assumed by the Federal Government. Additionally, the Federal Government will pay for 100 percent of 5 percent of the drug costs. The 100-percent Federal assumption of costs that are currently shared between the Federal and State governments would result in substantial savings to the States. None of these savings are included in this analysis. Just yesterday, the administration approved a Medicaid waiver for the States of Maryland and Florida. This waiver will allow those States to extend coverage for prescription drug costs to their citizens between 175 percent and 200 percent of poverty, respectfully, at the regular Medicaid matching rate. These States, plus others with similar waivers, would receive significant relief from having both a Medicare drug benefit and a higher Federal matching rate--including 100 percent matching rate for costs of those with incomes between 150 and 200 percent of poverty. None of these savings are included in the analysis presented by my Republican colleagues. The Graham-Smith amendment does not include a ``maintenance of effort'' provision on current State spending on these programs. According to the National Council of State Legislators, 31 States already provide pharmacy assistance programs and Medicaid drug waiver programs to seniors above 100 percent of poverty. Three more are authorized to do so, but have not yet implemented their authorization. All of these States would receive significant relief under my proposal. Yet, none of these savings are included in the analysis presented by my Republican colleagues. According to the Congressional Budget Office, states are currently spending roughly $95 billion on prescription drugs for Medicare beneficiaries through the Medicaid program. A significant portion of this amount would be assumed by the Federal Government under the Graham-Smith compromise amendment, resulting in savings to the States. The floor chart used by my colleagues showing $70 billion of new expenses was incomplete. I don't know if the $70 billion figure is accurate, but I do know that the State savings achieved by the Federal assumption of costs currently borne by the states is not reflected on that chart. So what we have is an analysis that only stated what the new cost to the States would be as a result of this program and failed to include the new savings to the States as a result of this program. Even the most junior budget analyst would not make the mistake of forgetting that States will save dollars as a result of the Graham- Smith amendment from the Federal assumption of many costs. This is more than an oversight; it is a deliberate omission intended--unfortunately, in some instances it apparently had this effect--to scare off potential supporters of a responsible prescription drug benefit for older Americans. This analysis is but one of several politically motivated analyses which have come out of the White House that conveniently support their policy positions. Let me just review a few of those positions. On July 18, 2002, the Office of Management and Budget wrote: However, the administration opposes S. 812, [the underlying generic drug bill that the Senate, by an overwhelming majority, passed yesterday] in its current form because it will not provide lower drug prices. No analysis by the Office of the Actuary supports that claim, and the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the bill will save $60 billion to American prescription drug consumers over the next 10 years. The Senate, by its overwhelming vote, obviously decided with the Congressional Budget Office and not with the White House Office of Management and Budget. Second, the White House produced an analysis claiming that the original Graham-Miller-Kennedy bill would ``bankrupt'' the Medicare trust fund--when this drug benefit, like the drug benefits in the Republican plan, is funded through a distinct fund that has nothing whatsoever to do with Medicare's Part A. Third, just this month, OMB made its midsession review look substantially more rosy by including only $190 billion for prescription drugs, despite the fact that the Secretary of Health and Human Services, former Gov. Tommy Thompson, stated before Congress in April: Congress has seen fit to raise the funding for prescription drugs to $350 billion, and I came here today to indicate to you that the administration wants to work with that latter number. This administration has not demonstrated in actions or words that it prioritizes State fiscal relief. As such, its concern for States, as expressed on this distorted chart, is a new revelation, only emerging when it is seeking an excuse to oppose an amendment to provide significant prescription drug assistance to America's seniors. Less than a week ago the Administrator of Medicare, Mr. Tom Scully, stated the administration opposed increasing the Medicaid matching rate even temporarily, an amendment which has been aggressively sought by the States in order to receive some relief from rapidly escalating Medicaid costs. The administration opposed that amendment. The Senate, by an overwhelming vote last week, adopted it. I might say that during the consideration of the tax bill, I was concerned that the proposal of the White House was to accelerate the repeal of the State's portion of the estate tax at a substantially faster rate than the repeal of the Federal estate tax. In fact, the State's portion of the estate tax will evaporate in approximately 3 to 4 years, while the Federal Government's share of the estate tax continues until the year 2010. The effect of that early acceleration of the repeal of the State component of the estate tax will have a significant adverse financial effect on the States beginning this fiscal year. The 47 percent of Medicare beneficiaries with incomes below 200 percent of poverty would have gained comprehensive drug coverage had the Graham-Smith amendment been adopted. Seniors in all States would have been helped. Seniors in all States would have been given the peace of mind that if they suffered a debilitating illness or disease or accident that they would have been helped with their catastrophic drug costs, and the States would have been helped by getting relief through the Federal assumption of costs that they are currently bearing. I conclude by saying that I hope in future debates on the Medicare prescription drug benefit that we will all rely on the facts, not on incomplete and distorted analysis. Our seniors deserve better than what we have done to date, because what we have done is talk about, talk about, talk about, the need for a prescription drug benefit. We have not yet delivered, delivered, delivered a responsible prescription drug benefit. It is going to be our challenge over the next few weeks, working with the facts and with honest analysis of those facts, to arrive at a prescription drug plan that will meet the needs of our seniors, will provide us with the basis of integrating a prescription drug benefit into a comprehensive health care program for older Americans, and to find the political will to act this year. That will be our challenge and that quest will be advanced if we all agree that we are going to differ in our opinions, yes, but that we will all agree that we would use the same set of legitimate facts. I thank the Chair, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. Chairman, I rise with my colleague from Florida, Senator Nelson, to engage in a colloquy with Senator Inouye, the Chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. Senator Nelson and I rise to note the critical importance of the Rapid Response Sensor Networking for Multiple Applications. The project will bring together the new concept of Impromptu Wireless Network Technology and emerging new sensors for use in detection and quantification of high priority biological and chemical materials in several nationally important settings--most significantly, for real time detection and response to biological and chemical materials which threaten public health and safety, environmental integrity or industrial processes. I yield to Senator Nelson for a few words about this important program.