Tom Harkin

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I turn my attention to another issue that is closely akin to education, an issue I have been working on for a long time, one which has come to the front now because of all the negotiations going on. That is the issue of child labor. In January of this year, my staff, Rosemary Gutierrez, and I traveled to Nepal, Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan to look at the issue of child labor. While we were in Nepal, the exotic city of Katmandu, I met with a young man who had been a former child laborer. He told me about the awful conditions that were in some of these countries, yet the official government line is, there is no child labor; it is prohibited. On a Sunday evening, right after it got dark, about dusk, we got into an unmarked car--the former child laborer, a driver, my staff person, and I--and drove to the outskirts of Katmandu to a carpet factory. It was thought by my host, this young man who had been a former child laborer, that the owner of the factory was not going to be there. He kind of knew the guard at the gate and said we could get through. So we drove out to the outskirts. Sure enough, there was a gate, there was a wire fence. The guard let us through. We went up, and the young man talked to him in Nepalese, since I don't speak Nepalese, and we were let through. What was on the outside of the gate before we entered? This sign right here, in Nepalese and in English. This is the sign; I took this picture with my camera. The brick wall states: Child labor [sic] under the age of 14 is strictly prohibited. Right on the gate it says this. I took the picture. We went through a gate, down a long hallway, turned left; there were doors; we opened the doors and walked in. Remember: Child labor under the age of 14 is strictly prohibited. Here are some more pictures I took. These are kids working at the looms. We asked our host to ask them their ages. We have a boy here who is 9 and a girl about 12. That is just two of them. This place was loaded with kids that age, working on a Sunday at 7 o'clock in the evening; it was getting dark. They are still working full-time in dirty, dusty conditions, making these carpets. Here is another picture I took. Again, don't tell me these are phony pictures. I took them with my camera. I was there. More kids are working at their looms--kids, 11, 12, 13, 10, 9 years old. And I have other pictures. I had my staff take a photo with me included with the kids to show that I was there. Again, there are other kids--not the same kids--other kids in the same place, all of whom basically are under the age of 14--there were some older, I admit, but a lot of them under the age of 14, working. What we are trying to do is do something about the issue of child labor. What can we do? In 1930, Congress passed what was infamously known as the Smoot-Hawley bill. Aside from the bad things Smoot-Hawley did in terms of restricting trade, there was section 307, which is part of the law today, which has been in existence since 1930. I will read the first sentence: All goods, wares, articles, and merchandise, mined, produced or manufactured, wholly or in part, in any foreign country by convict labor or/and forced labor, or/and indentured labor, under penal sanctions, shall not be entitled to entry at any of the ports of the United States, and the importation thereof is hereby prohibited, and the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized and directed to prescribe such regulations as may be necessary for the enforcement of this provision. It covers forced and indentured labor. We have prohibited that ever since. A couple of years ago, I made an inquiry of the Department of the Treasury. I asked if any items made with forced or indentured child labor had been prohibited from entering the United States under this section on forced labor. To my surprise, the answer was no. Furthermore, the Department of Treasury was not sure whether or not forced or indentured child labor was included in the definition of ``forced or indentured labor.'' This is outrageous. The law says ``forced or indentured labor,'' but we don't know if it covers kids. Last year, during consideration of the fiscal year 1998 Treasury- Postal appropriations bill, I inserted a provision which instructed the U.S. Customs Service to block from entry into the United States any imports made by forced or indentured child labor as they are inherently imports made with forced and indentured labor. However, this was only a 1-year provision. It was on an appropriations bill. But it passed. It was supported by the House and Senate. But it only lasted 1 year. That year is now up. That provision no longer is valid because it was only good for 1 year. In order to ensure that goods made with forced and indentured child labor are treated the same as goods made with forced or indentured adult labor, we need to change the law permanently. Well, this summer, the Senate approved my amendment to reflect the intent of Congress to include forced and indentured child labor under this umbrella. My amendment was quite simple. The Tariff Act already says that goods made with forced or indentured labor are prohibited from entering the U.S. market. I included the words ``forced and indentured child labor,'' so there is no ambiguity in the statute's interpretation. Unfortunately, my amendment was struck from the bill during conference because Members did not feel a tariff measure belonged on the defense authorization bill. I was told to find a more relevant measure. Well, I have it. Congress is considering a tariff measure, H.R. 4342, the Miscellaneous Tariff and Technical Corrections Act of 1998, which passed the House on August 4. It has a lot of provisions in it. There is page after page after page of technical corrections to the tariff laws. Examples: Over 100 provisions that would suspend or reduce the tariff applicable to certain specified products, most of these being a wide variety of chemicals and organic pigments, including a temporary suspension on the duties for a variety of HIV medications and anticancer drugs and other trade-related provisions--hundreds of provisions. Here is the report. As you go through it, there is page after page, including things like pigment yellow No. 151, pigment yellow No. 175, chloroacetone, benzenepropanal. Section 2143, textile machinery. Section 2144. Here are some things and chemicals I can't even pronounce that are being changed here. A lot of chemicals. Here is 4- hexylresorcinol. I don't even know what it is. My point is this: There are hundreds of tariff changes in this bill. This is a tariff bill. My amendment on child labor amends the Tariff Act of 1930--a tariff measure. So we have the right vehicle. But, Mr. President, because the House passed it on suspension, it came over here and it was never brought out on the floor for debate so that I could offer this amendment--an amendment which is noncontroversial. It passed the Senate twice, and passed the House once. It has been in effect for one year because it was on an appropriations bill. I just want to get an amendment to the tariff bill to indicate that forced and indentured labor includes forced and indentured ``child'' labor. Well, I don't know why we can't include it. I did have a conversation on the telephone with the chairman of the Finance Committee last week. I asked why this noncontroversial provision couldn't be put in. I don't know that anyone would come to the floor and object to taking the Tariff Law of 1930, which forbids the importation of goods made by forced and indentured labor, and adding the words ``child labor,'' so that forced and indentured labor would cover forced and indentured child labor. Would someone come to the floor and say, OK, we have to keep everything out of this country made with forced and indentured adult labor, but if you have forced and indentured child labor, that's OK, we will bring it in. Does anybody want to come to the floor and make that argument? I doubt it. I don't think anybody would want to make that argument, because it doesn't make sense. I think we are all fairly reasonable people around here. So I would like to get my amendment on the tariff bill--an amendment that, as I said, passed both Houses--it passed this body twice--and has been in effect for one year. I didn't hear any hue and cry from anyone. As far as I know, I never had one corporation, one business, one importer yell about it or say that ``this is awful that we are keeping goods out made with forced and indentured child labor.'' My amendment gives our Treasury Department, our Customs people, is a permanent law whereby it would say, in unambiguous terms, forced and indentured labor means forced and indentured child labor, also. Now, could there be an objection that costs money? Well, I have an opinion here from CBO, from back on July 16 of this year.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for another 10 minutes.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I hope not to even take that long. Here is the analysis from CBO on my amendment: ``This proposal would not affect direct spending or receipts, so there would be no pay-as-you-go scoring under section 252 of the Balanced Budget Act.'' There you are. It doesn't cost any money. It has no effect on the budget. It has been passed. All I want to do is get it added to this bill and, since I didn't have a chance to offer it as an amendment, I only have one recourse. I put a hold on the tariff bill. I don't want it to pass by unanimous consent. Am I opposed to the tariff bill? No. I assume everything in it is fine. It has all been cleared. The chairman of the Finance Committee assured me that it has been cleared by everybody. I don't know every section and title, but I assume it's all right. I want the opportunity to put this into permanent law on a tariff bill. I don't know when the next tariff bill will come across the Senate floor. I don't believe this language can be held hostage simply because the Senate didn't do its work. The House passed this on August 4. We had plenty of time to take it up here, but we never brought it up. So I am left in the position of having to do something that I don't like to do, which is to put a hold on the bill and not give my consent to pass the bill by unanimous consent, unless we can get this amendment added. An amendment, which I swear, I would like to know one person that could come over here and argue against it. I don't think you could find such a person. So I see no reason why it can't be added. It's time that we say about kids what we said in 1930--in 1930--what we said about adults. This Congress said that no goods, no merchandise, or anything that is mined by forced or indentured labor can come into this country. Here we are, 68 years later, and we can't add the words ``forced and indentured child labor.'' Nonsense. I hope that those who are working on the tariff bill would be so kind as to include this amendment so that we can take away any ambiguity, clean it up once and for all, and prohibit the importation of goods made with child labor.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. I thank the President.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I understand we are in morning business. I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak for the next 15 minutes uninterrupted.

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

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I object because I think while this maybe had some legitimacy at some time because of the projected shortage in computer programmers, every indication is that has not happened. Obviously, we don't need to pass this bill right now. I think we can take another look at it next year to see if, in fact, there is any problem. We can always come back and look at this again next year, but right now it does not appear that the demand is there that they anticipated a couple of years ago.

Mr. HARKIN. I object.

Mr. HARKIN. Will the Senator yield for about 3 minutes?

Mr. HARKIN. I appreciate the Senator from Indiana yielding to me to explain why I object to this. Before I get into that, let me say that I was here for part of his speech. He thanked his staff. I thought it was a very gracious and wonderful thing the Senator did. It was really nice. I must say, I will miss you here in the Senate, Dan. As I said before, you have been a wonderful person to work with. I hate to end it on this note, where I am objecting to something that you are bringing up. You have been a great Senator. You have been a great human being to work with. We will miss you. I will miss you, personally. All of my friends who have left said there is a life beyond the Senate. Quite frankly, it is probably a lot better, considering we are here at 7:30 on a Friday night. Mr. President, I just want to explain why I object to this bill. This is the bill that would have increased the number of H-1B visas from 65,000 per year to 115,000 for next year and the year after, then drop down to 107,500 in 2001 and back down to 65,000 thereafter. Now, ostensibly, the reason for doing this, and why this came up in the last couple of years, is that there was projected to be a big shortage in computer programmers. Thus, there was this big push to increase the number of H-1B visas, to get these computer programmers. It turns out that has, indeed, not happened. In fact, I have three recent articles. One is from the San Jose Mercury News dated October 6, 1998. It says: High-tech Layoffs are Accelerating. They pointed out in the article: Computers ranked second in total job-cut announcements, with 44,000. That represented nearly three times the number from last year. The article goes on to say: The changing job market can be seen at the Career Action Center, a career resource center in Cupertino, where counselors are seeing more people come in. Job searches are taking more time, companies are taking longer to make their hiring decision, and some businesses have even enacted hiring freezes, said Betsy Collard, the center's strategic development director. While the center posted 10,000 jobs in August, that was down from 13,500 it posted a year earlier. I ask unanimous consent the article be printed in the Record.

Mr. HARKIN. Another recent article from Computer World, dated October 5, 1998, talked about the same subject: The year 2000 retention drama is playing out differently from what was expected. The widely anticipated programmer shortage never quite materialized, but another shortage has proved far more dangerous. ``We'd always heard the industry speak of demand for programmers, but the more critical and unexpected demand is for project managers,'' says Irene Dec, vice president of information systems at the Prudential Insurance Company of America in Newark, NJ. The article pointed out, quite frankly, that the programmers are in fine shape. What they are really looking for are program managers. I understand the H-1B visa does not in any way address that problem at all. I ask unanimous consent this article also be printed in the Record.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I think this bill, at the time it came up, was probably well intentioned. Another article I want to have printed in the Record is an article from Labor Relations Week, dated September 30, 1998: The latest data from the Challenger report showed that so far this year, electronics industry job reductions announcements have totaled 60,845, and those in the computer industry totaled 40,642. I ask unanimous consent this article be printed in the Record.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, today I want to recognize the anniversaries of some important milestones along the road to ending nuclear weapons testing. This month marks some major steps we have taken toward an international ban on nuclear weapons tests, a cornerstone of our Nation's nuclear weapons non-proliferation policy. These anniversaries also remind us how much more remains to be done if we are to honor the vision of those who have worked to reduce the threat of nuclear war. On October 11, 1963, the Limited Test Ban Treaty entered into force after being ratified by the Senate in an overwhelming, bipartisan vote of 80-14 just a few weeks earlier. This treaty paved the way for future nuclear weapons testing agreements by prohibiting tests in the atmosphere, in outer space, and underwater. This treaty was signed by 108 countries. Our Nation's agreement to the Limited Test Ban Treaty marked the end of our Nation's aboveground testing of nuclear weapons, including those at the U.S. test site in Nevada. We now know, all too well, the terrible impact of exploding nuclear weapons over the Nevada desert. Among other consequences, these tests in the 1950's exposed millions of Americans to large amounts of radioactive Iodine-131, which accumulates in the thyroid gland and has been linked to thyroid cancer. ``Hot Spots,'' where the Iodine-131 fallout was the greatest, were identified by a National Cancer Institute report as receiving 5-16 rads of Iodine-131. The ``Hot Spots'' included many areas far away from Nevada, including New York, Massachusetts and Iowa. Outside reviewers have shown that the 5-16 rad level is only an average, with many people having received much higher exposure levels, especially those who were children at the time. To put that in perspective, federal standards for nuclear power plants require that protective action be taken for 15 rads. To further understand the enormity of the potential exposure, consider this: 150 million curies of Iodine-131 were released by the above ground nuclear weapons testing in the United States, about three times more than from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster in the former Soviet Union. It is all too clear that outlawing above-ground tests were in the interest of our Nation. I strongly believe that banning all nuclear tests is also in our interests. October also marked some key steps the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty or CTBT. On October 2, 1992, President Bush signed into law the U.S. moratorium on all nuclear tests. The moratorium was internationalized when, just a few year later, on September 24, 1996, a second step was taken--the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, or CTBT, was opened for signature. The United States was the first to sign this landmark treaty. Mr. President, a little more than a year ago, President Clinton took a third important step in abolishing nuclear weapons tests by transmitting the CTBT to the United States Senate for ratification. Unfortunately, the Senate has yet to take the additional step of ratifying the CTBT. I am hopeful that we in the Senate will debate and vote on ratification of the Treaty, and continue the momentum toward the important goal of a worldwide ban on nuclear weapons testing. Many believed we had conquered the dangerous specter of nuclear war after the Cold War came to an end and many former Soviet states became our allies. Unfortunately, recent developments in South Asia remind us that we need to be vigilant in our cooperative international efforts to reduce the dangers of nuclear weapons. It is especially important that the Senate act before the September 1999 deadline for ratification by 44 countries. If the United States fails to ratify the CTBT, then we will not have a voice in the special international conference which will negotiate how to accelerate the treaty into force. Yet, as a signatory, we will still be bound by its provisions. The CTBT is a major milestone in the effort to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons. It would establish a permanent ban on all nuclear explosions in all environments for any purpose. Its ``zero- yield'' prohibition on nuclear tests would help to halt the development and deployment of new nuclear weapons. The Treaty would also establish a far-reaching verification regime that includes a global network of sophisticated seismic, hydro-acoustic and radionuclide monitoring stations, as well as on-site inspection of test sites to deter and detect violations. It is vital to our national security for the nuclear arms race to come to an end, and the American people recognize this. In a recent poll commissioned by the Coalition to Reduce Nuclear dangers, nearly 50 percent of voters supported ``eliminating nuclear weapons worldwide'' and an additional third support ``reducing the number of nuclear weapons worldwide''. In addition, a 1997 poll by the Mellman Group for the Henry J. Stimson Center found that 69 percent of voters believe the goal of the United States should be to reduce or eliminate nuclear weapons. It is heartening to know that the American people understand the risks of a world with nuclear weapons. It is now time for policymakers to recognize this as well. There is no better way to honor the hard work and dedication of those who developed the LTBT and the CTBT than for the U.S. Senate to immediately ratify the CTBT. Our Nation's role as the world's only remaining superpower demands no less.

Mr. HARKIN

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

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, we are in morning business?

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, last evening, President Clinton did the right thing, did the right thing for this country and did the right thing for our farmers and for people who live all across rural America. He did the right thing for farmers who are suffering because of a drastic drop in prices. He did the right thing for farmers who are suffering because of a loss of crop in disaster areas in the South and Upper Midwest. The President did the right thing by vetoing the woefully inadequate farm disaster bill that this Congress passed and sent to him for his signature. Now it is up to us to see what we can do to make that bill better and get it back to the President for his signature. Rural America needs help. Farmers need assistance. Disaster-hit areas need help. And yet they do not need the woefully inadequate bill that was passed here. I likened the bill that was passed by the Congress as giving a thimbleful of water to a person dying of thirst. It may assuage their thirst momentarily, but it is not going to keep them alive. We need to give those farmers who are dying of thirst out there the adequate water they need to get them through this year and the next to keep them alive. Mr. President, I was encouraged by what I read in Congress Daily, that the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Congressman Livingston, has said that they expected a veto and that after the veto comes negotiations. I do not have the exact quote, but that is about what he said. I think that gives us some hope that we can work together here, we can negotiate out some differences, and we can come up with a bill that the President will sign and that will, indeed, benefit our producers. There are some principles that we must maintain, however. First of all, there must be adequate disaster assistance. There needs to be equitable treatment regionally both within the distribution of the disaster assistance and within the overall package of disaster-related, commodity-based assistance. That means it has to be equitable, and it has to be adequate. It does not necessarily mean the dollars have to be spread around evenly. Equitable treatment is the key for farmers who have suffered from natural disasters. A second principle is that assistance must go to producers who need it. Assistance based on low commodity prices should be delivered to producers suffering from low commodity prices. That is the advantage of the marketing loan proposal that those on our side have advocated. The proposal just to add on some money to this so-called AMTA payment has no relationship to the level of commodity prices. And not all commodity prices are depressed equally or substantially, particularly in cotton and rice. So assistance must have some relation to market conditions. I always wonder what it is about some of my friends on the other side. They always talk about the market, the market, the market, yet the direct payment that goes out to farmers has no relationship to the market. Removing the loan rate caps, as we want to do, does have a relationship to the market. If the market price goes up, the exposure to the Government is less and farmers will get their money from the market and not from the Government. Just giving out a direct payment has no relationship to the market whatsoever. I think a third principle that we must have in any negotiated settlement is assistance to actual producers. Lump cash payments in a fixed amount are less likely to remain in the hands of the actual farmer than is assistance provided in a way that is contingent on market conditions. The additional AMTA payment that is in the vetoed bill is readily identified by landlords who are in a strong position to capture the payment in land rental rates. That is why raising the marketing loans, raising those caps will get to the producers. Another principle. We must restore the safety net. Farmers are in their current predicament in large measure because the safety net feature of previous farm bills was abandoned in the 1996 farm bill. A set cash payment does nothing to restore the safety net because it is not responsive to market conditions. By contrast, removing loan rate caps would help restore a safety net responsive to market conditions. Two last and final principles. Some linkage to actual production. The marketing assistance loan is tied directly to actual production. The Republican plan in the vetoed bill would have provided an additional money windfall even though no crop had been produced on the land. Why would we want to do that? Let's have assistance out to farmers who actually produced a crop. And last, let's have a major measure of fiscal responsibility. This idea of just throwing out another payment to farmers is not fiscally responsible. If commodity prices should rise next year, which we all hope will happen, our plan would cost less than expected. But if the commodity prices rise next year, after the Republican plan payment went out, we would not recapture any of that money. It would be gone. That is why raising the marketing loan caps is, indeed, more fiscally responsible than just giving out a payment. Mr. President, I believe within those principles there is room for negotiation. I look forward to the negotiations. I hope we can very rapidly come up with a bill that will meet these principles and that the President will sign into law, because our farmers need the assistance, and the disaster areas also need that assistance. I will yield the floor.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, for many years I have spoken of the promise of hydrogen energy as our best hope for an environmentally safe sustainable energy future. My vision, and the vision of many of our top scientists is simple. Hydrogen, which is produced by renewable energy with absolutely no pollution and no resource depletion of any kind, will prove a truly sustainable energy option. I recognize that hydrogen is not yet a form of energy widely known to the American public. In fact, hydrogen has an unfortunate association. I would like to spend a few minutes dispelling one unfortunate myth of hydrogen energy. Mr. President, mention the word ``hydrogen'' and many people remember the Hindenburg--the dirigible that caught fire back in May of 1937, killing 36 of the 97 people on board. Now, thanks to the scientific sleuthing of Addison Bain, a retired NASA scientist with 30 years experience with hydrogen, we can state with a fair degree of certainty that the Hindenburg would have caught fire even without any hydrogen on board. This detective story was reported in a recent issue of Popular Science. I ask that the Popular Science article be printed in the Congressional Record at the conclusion of my remarks. Addison Bain collected actual samples from the Hindenburg--the cloth bags that contained the hydrogen--which were saved as souvenirs by the crowd awaiting the Hindenburg at Lakehurst, New Jersey on May 6, 1937. When these samples were analyzed by modern techniques, Bain discovered that the bags had been coated with cellulose nitrate or cellulose acetate--both flammable materials. Furthermore, the cellulose material was impregnated with aluminum flakes to reflect sunlight, and aluminum powder is used in rocket fuel. Essentially the outside of the Hindenburg was coated with rocket fuel! Addison now believes that the Hindenburg probably caught fire from an electrical discharge igniting the cellulose-coated gas bags. Remember, the ship docked at Lakehurst with electrical storms in the area, which was against regulations. I would like to personally thank Addison Bain for his valuable contribution to the history of the Hindenburg, and to lessening the public's concerns over the safety of hydrogen. Hydrogen, in my judgment, will become a premier fuel in the 21st century, since burning hydrogen produces no pollution of any kind, just pure, clean water. And hydrogen can be produced by using sunlight or wind electricity to split water. Hydrogen energy has been used safely in the Nation's space program for many decades, and I believe it can be used safely for many other applications here on Earth. For example, hydrogen could be a safe alternative fuel for cars. It would be much less dangerous than gasoline in an accident. Hydrogen gas disperses rapidly, while gasoline lingers in the vicinity of the accident, increasing the risks to survivors of the crash. I believe there are also countless other uses for hydrogen. We can pursue those options without fear because of Addison Bain's efforts. Thanks to Addison Bain, we can continue down the path toward a renewable hydrogen future without the undue fear of a singular event from 60 years ago. The article follows: What Really Downed the Hindenburg (By Mariette DiChristina) May 6, 1937. The sky still appears moody after a stormy day. A stately, silvery marvel, the 240-ton Hindenburg airship glides 200 feet above Lakehurst, New Jersey, at around 7:21 p.m. In a 6-knot wind, the Zeppelin is attempting its first ``high landing'': The crew throws the spider lines out, preparing for mooring. The gigantic ship, nearly three football fields in length, would be slowly winched down. If you think you know exactly what happened next, Adison Bain has a surprise for you. Six decades after the infamous Hindenburg disaster, when 36 of 97 aboard died during the horrific blaze that halted rigid-airship travel, Bain has revealed a stunning new explanation for what started the fire. Bain, a recently retired engineer and manager of hydrogen programs who spent more than 30 years at NASA, has recently concluded several years of scientific sleuthing work in search of the culprit behind the conflagration. He combed through thousands of pages of original testimony and materials at four archives in the United States and one in Germany, interviewed survivors and airship experts, and ultimately tested original materials from the model LZ-129 Hindenburg and its contemporaries. Contrary to what the investigators ruled at the time, asserts Bain, the fire did not start with free hydrogen lit by natural electrical discharge or sabotage. The hunt for the truth about the Hindenburg began in the late 1960s for Bain, a genial man with slicked-backed dark hair and a face lined by many smiles. He was working on a hydrogen safety manual for NASA. Sitting in a ``Florida room'' of mint and mauve tiled floors and furniture in a Cocoa Beach apartment, Bain recalls how he paged through the literature on hydrogen. ``Invariably,'' he says, ``the topic of the Hindenburg would come up. At the time, I didn't think a lot about it.'' Over the years, however, as he continued his NASA work in hydrogen systems, the reference began to accumulate in his mind. ``What I was starting to notice is that the authors were inconsistent,'' he says. Hydrogen detractors said the gas was so flammable it killed everyone on the Hindenburg, which wasn't true--about one-third of those aboard had died. On the other hand, hydrogen promoters pooh-poohed safety concerns and claimed that those who perished did so only because they jumped from the burning airship, which also wasn't true. Says Bain: ``I thought, wait a minute! Where are they getting their information?'' He has also seen the famous photos of the Hindenburg's bright, blistering hot fire and knew that hydrogen doesn't burn in that way. A hydrogen fire radiates little heat and is barely visible to the unaided eye. By 1990, Bain pulled a one-year assignment in Washington, D.C., at NASA headquarters, then across the street from the National Air & Space Museum. ``I like airplanes, so I went over there. Lo and behold, there's this 25-foot-long model of the Hindenburg used in the 1975 movie with George C. Scott,'' he recalls. ``I'm looking at that model and a plaque on the wall. The plaque says something about how the hydrogen exploded,'' As a hydrogen expert, he knew that the pure gas doesn't just explode. That was enough: He made an appointment with the archivists upstairs, dooned a pair of protective gloves, and lost himself in decades-old original documents in the museum's Hindenburg files for the rest of the day. His research soon became something of a part-time obsession. Over the next few years. Bain would steal away to the archive and travel to others in College Park and Suitland, Maryland, poring through thousands of pages and copying documents in search of answers. He even traveled to the Fires Sciences Lab in Missoula, Montana. He speculated that, perhaps, some of the airship's materials had played a role in the ignition. Maddeningly, however, he couldn't find the exact formulations used. ``I had the idea of the problem, but needed enough evidence to back my story up,'' he says. That was as far as he got until 1994, when he ran into Richard van Treuren, a space shuttle technician, at a conference on hydrogen. Van Treuren, a self-avowed ``helium head'' and member of the airship aficionados called the Lighter-Than-Air Society in Akron, Ohio, was seeking Bain to talk about hydrogen. Van Treuren had a book about airships. Bain spotted the book in the crook of van Treuren's arm and bought it from him on the spot. ``The rain still spatters the wet ground in starts and stops. The air is highly charged from the thunderstorms, investigators would rule later. Six and three-quarter acres of Hindenburg fabrics is kiting in the breeze. A witness later would recall a bluish electrical phenomenon that dances over the aft starboard side of the Hindenburg for more than a minute.'' Through van Treuren, Bain learned that pieces of the Hindenburg's skin still existed. Bain traveled around the country to procure them, spending hundreds of dollars buying original materials, books, and papers from collectors. ``What I was trying to find out is, what did they use specifically in the coating?'' he says. Hepburn Walker, who had been stationed in Lakehurst in the early `40s, was among those in possession of pieces of the Hindenburg, Walker had found them in the soil. Another sample, a part of the swastika painted on the Hindenburg's side, was kept in a safe by Cheryl Gantz, head of the Zeppelin Collectors Club in Chicago. Bain remembers meeting Gantz. ``May I have a little clipping, just anything to take to the lab?'' he begged. Gantz was willing, but wanted to impress upon Bain the fabric's value to her: ``How much do you value your firstborn?'' she asked. Bain laughs: ``I got the message!'' Bain also located fabric samples in Germany that were representative of the top of the Hindenburg, where the fire started. Materials in hand, Bain headed to NASA's Materials Science Laboratory at the nearby Kennedy Space Center. Over the next 14 months, he carefully laid out a systematic testing protocol involving some 14 researchers who would volunteer their spare time to assist in what became known as Project H. ``A jagged fire licks along the aft starboard side of the Hindenburg, another witness later recalls. Crewman Helmut Lau, on the lower left of the craft, looks up through the translucent gas cells and sees a red glow. In moments, cells begin to melt before his eyes. The fire crests the top of the Hindenburg and spreads outward and downward, toward lau and the others. Girders start cracking and wires snap. With hydrogen still in the cells, the giant airship maintains level trim.'' What was in that fabric? Work to create a chemical and physical analysis included using an infrared stectrograph and a scanning electron microscope, which provided, respectively, the chemical signatures of the organic compounds and elements present. A startling variety of highly flammable compounds proved to have been added to the cotton fabric base. ``They used a cellulose acetate or nitrate as a typical doping compound, which is flammable to begin with--a forest fire is cellulose fire,'' says Bain. ``OK, you coat that with cellulose nitrate--nitrate is used to make gunpowder. And then you put [on] aluminum powder. Now, aluminum powder is a fuel used on the solid rocket boosters on the space shuttle.'' The wood spacers and ramie cord used to bind the structure together, along with the silk and other fabrics in the ship, would also have added to the fuel-rich inferno. Even the duralumin support framework of the Hindenburg's, rigid skeleton was coated with lacquer, ostensibly to protect it from moisture. In a flame test, a fabric section ignited and burned readily. The arc test, in which 30,000 volts were zapped across a piece of fabric several inches long, was even more revealing: ``Poof, it disappeared. The whole thing happened faster than I can explain it,'' Bain says. ``I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel.'' Bain is quick to point out, however, that it's not that the Germans and other airship and aircraft makers of the era were simply foolish in doping the fabric the way they did. They had a number of technical problems to solve using the materials of the time. Today's synthetic fabrics, with their range of properties, did not yet exist. The cotton or linen fabric skin was swabbed with the chemicals to make it taut and reduce flutter for aerodynamics, and then painted with the reflective red iron oxide and aluminum so the sun's heat wouldn't expand the gas in the cells, to help prevent gas from escaping. The skin had to be protected from deterioration from sunlight and rot from moisture. When engineers changed one part of the formulation to address flammability concerns, the mixture might not have adhered well or other problems would crop up. ``And I'm not saying hydrogen didn't contribute to the fire,'' adds Bain. It is after all a fuel, he notes--and one he is hoping will develop into a replacement or supplement to natural gas. ``But it was a fuel-rich fire already; the hydrogen just added to it.'' Bain figures that maybe half of the 5 million cubic feet of hydrogen remaining aboard the Hindenburg after the Atlantic crossing burned in the fire. ``But so what? It's academic.'' Also made academic, perhaps, are decades of speculation over the causes behind the start of the Zeppelin fire. All have blamed hydrogen, with various ideas about how the gas became free and ignited. One popular theory has it that a wire punctured a gas cell. Bain, obviously, finds this doubtful. ``If that happened, it should have occurred during one of the final maneuvers.'' But, ``The ship was stationary for 4 minutes before the first fire was indicated.'' If cells were leaking gas that long, ``The ship should really start going like this,'' Bain says as he tilts a handheld Hindenburg model nose upward. ``And it's not. [At the start of the fire,] it's still in trim.'' What about the possibility of loose hydrogen from the vents? Hydrogen was released to help maintain level flight, and others have theorized that a valve may have stuck open. ``The Hindenberg had an excellent venting system'' says Bain, with vents between cells that measured some 2 feet high and 7 feet across. If hydrogen accumulated--difficult to imagine for the lightest element, which has the greatest dispersal rate in the universe--how come, he asks, none of the fires were observed at the vent sites atop the ship? ``In seconds, the rear half of the Hindenburg is engulfed in bright, writhing flames. Gas cells one and two expand and burst with explosive force; the released hydrogen adds fuel to the conflagration. The ship lurches forward, breaking off water tanks attached by light-release connectors near the bow of the craft. Having lost ballast, the airship's nose heads upward and people start jumping to escape the flames, some too far from the ground to survive the fall.'' What is perhaps most stunning about Bain's research is that what he has discovered comes 60 years after some German airship experts already knew it. While visiting an archive in Germany, he copied two 1937 letters handwritten in German that had not been seen by earlier investigators. Their shocking contents were revealed to Bain only after he returned to Florida and had them translated. They were written by an electrical engineer named Otto Beyerstock, who had incinerated pieces of Hindenburg fabric during electrical tests conducted at the behest of the Zeppelin Co. In the notes, Beyerstock testily dismissed the idea that hydrogen could have started the fire, stating with certitude that it could only have been caused by the fabric's flammability in a charged atmosphere. In a similar craft flying under the same atmospheric conditions that the Hindenburg faced in Lakehurst, the same sort of conflagration would occur, even if noncombustible helium were used as the lifting gas. (In fact, notes Bain, such a fire did take place in 1935, when a helium-filled airship with an acetate-aluminum skin burned near Point Sur, California.) ``I beg you to kindly inform me about the corrective measures to be taken or that have already been taken,'' Beyerstock wrote to Zeppelin. Some modifications were made in a subsequent airship plan, such as the addition of a fire retardant. ``They knew,'' Bain says simply. But shortly after the Hindenburg disaster, and probably because of it, the great Zeppelins were removed from service. Some detractors are still not ready to put aside the idea of hydrogen as fire-starter. ``Addison Bain's hydrogen background carries some weight,'' says Eric Brothers, the editor of Buoyant Flight, the Lighter-Than-Air Society's bulletin, but not everyone at the society is convinced. The bulletin this year ran three articles detailing the skin- ignition research, coauthored by van Treuren and Bain. As for Brothers: ``I would like to see more independent verification of the tests, though I recognize that that's difficult to do,'' he says. Still, ``I'm 90 percent convinced that the fabric had some role.'' One of the Buoyant Flight articles' most stringent critics is Donald E. Overs, a retired engineer and pilot who worked on Goodyear blimp construction and engineering for more than 20 years. ``Based on the authors' cover burn rate tests, it would have taken anywhere from 15 minutes to probably an hour or more for the cover alone to burn off. The entire ship, on the other hand, was consumed in less than 60 seconds,'' he says. Overs' detailed e-mail challenges to Bain's theory--and the various defenses supporters--would occupy some 50 printed pages. ``Bain can at most demonstrate or argue that the cover was a brief link in the early ignition of the hydrogen, but he cannot prove even that,'' concludes Overs. ``Like the mythical Icarus who ventured too close to the sun, the Hindenburg goes down in flames. As it touches the ground, the ship bounces lightly, perhaps still buoyant with remaining hydrogen.'' None of what Bain has learned has diminished his admiration for the engineering achievement in creating the great airships. ``With all due respect,'' he says, ``the Germans did a fantastic job. I admire their technology. ``It was just an unfortunate little flaw, just like the flaw on the Titanic and the flaw in the Challenger,'' he says, referring to the ``unsinkable'' ship's sulfurous, brittle steel and the space shuttle's O-ring--both of which failed under the prevailing weather conditions. ``You never know what Mother Nature is going to do to you.''

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. I thank the Senator for his further explanation.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, again, this conference report needs to be rejected and sent back for further work to restore farm income protection by removing the marketing loan rate caps. There are also two other areas in which the conference report is not acceptable. I would mention the labeling of beef and lamb for country of origin. The House Republicans rejected this idea. It is too bad, because under the WTO it is allowed, to have country of origin labeling. It is not just for our beef and lamb producers in this country. I believe our consumers have the right to know, when they buy a steak or chop or other cut of beef or lamb at the meat counter, what its country of origin is. Second, we had mandatory price reporting in the Senate bill so livestock producers will have information to help them evaluate packer bids for fairness. The conference report converted that bill language into weak report language. We have had study after study after study on pricing practices in the livestock and meat business and the need for more openness and transparency. It is time we have real action, not another study on that. For those reasons I believe the conference report ought to be rejected and sent back for further work. If it is not, then I am afraid we will have a one-time payment to farmers this fall and we will be back again here next year with fewer farmers and even more economic devastation in rural America. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record ``Suggested Changes in Farm Policy for the 21st Century,'' submitted by Dr. Neil Harl of Iowa State University, and I yield the floor.

Mr. HARKIN. I would like to engage my colleague, Senator Bumpers, the ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, and Related Agencies in a colloquy regarding the pending legislation. For clarification, I would like the Senator to provide further explanation of language included in the Statement of Managers accompanying the conference report to H.R. 4101. It is my understanding that language under the heading of the Agricultural Research Service imposes a limitation on funding for the National Swine Research Center at Ames, Iowa, but is related to operational and maintenance costs for that facility beyond those normally associated with assignments of ARS personnel. This interpretation would not be inconsistent with the general provision of the conference report that prohibits the transfer of title of the Center to USDA.

Mr. HARKIN. Thank you, Mr. President. Privilege of the Floor Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Yvonne Byrne and Maureen Knightly, members of my staff, be granted floor privileges during the debate of the agriculture appropriations conference report and the vote that is taking place at 5:30.

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, first, I was listening to what the distinguished Senator from Idaho was saying. He raised one question. He asked the question, What do farmers want? That is a fair question. But there is an answer. A poll was prepared by Rock Wood Research, a subsidiary of the Farm Journal, Inc.--we are all familiar with Farm Journal--for the Nebraska Wheat Growers Association, the American Corn Growers Association, and the Nebraska Farmers Union. It was a widely disseminated poll. It was done between September 4 and September 10 of this year. And 1,000 farmers, actual producers, were interviewed--500 corn growers and 500 wheat growers. There were a number of questions. One of the questions asked was whether Congress should lift loan caps and raise loan rates 59 cents per bushel on wheat and 32 cents on corn, and 72.5 percent of the farmers polled said yes, they wanted the loan rates raised; only 19 percent said no. So if you are asking the question about what farmers want, I have a scientific poll done of 1,000 farmers, a pretty good cross section, and 72.5 percent said they wanted the loan rates raised. Another question: A farm program should retain planting flexibility, including farmer-owned and farmer-controlled grain reserves; 85.9 percent of the farmers interviewed said they would support that proposal. Only 9.9 percent opposed it. Yet the Republicans in this body and in the House would never vote to give farmers a farmer-owned and farmer-controlled grain reserve. We have had that in the past. I, for one, happen to be in favor of reinstituting it. But, obviously, the party in power will not countenance that. So when you ask what farmers want, it is here in this poll; it is as plain as can be. If we were voting on what farmers wanted, we would have lifted the caps from the commodity marketing assistance loan rates and we would have a farmer-owned and farmer- controlled grain reserve. So much for that question. It has also been said that our marketing loan proposals are undermining Freedom to Farm. That is not so. What has undermined Freedom to Farm is external events, which is weak export demand from the Asian markets, along with the strong dollar, generally favorable weather and bumper crops in many areas. Those are the factors that have undermined the hoped-for success of Freedom to Farm. Actually, the proposal that we have made would in some ways help Freedom to Farm. It is kind of odd that I find myself, who was opposed to Freedom to Farm because of its lack of income protection, saying that our proposal probably will help save it more than what is being done in this conference report. But, be that as it may, I still think that, looking at it both in the short and the long term, raising the caps on the marketing loans is the way to go. One other point that I wanted to raise is that I really take issue with any suggestion that Secretary of Agriculture Glickman has flip- flopped on loan rates. I don't believe that assertion is supported by the facts. Secretary Glickman for some time has talked about the need to restore a farm income safety net. In fact, he said that when the President signed the 1996 farm bill into law. He was not saying that he opposed taking the loan rate caps off; he just said there needed to be a safety net. When a specific proposal to lift the caps on loan rates was made, he endorsed it, as did President Clinton. So I can't see that as any kind of a flip-flop. A lot has been said here about generosity and how generous the Republican proposal in the conference report is for farmers, for disaster-related assistance. I divide the conference report in this regard into two areas. There is the part that goes for the natural disaster assistance and the part that goes for the income losses related to commodity prices. On the disaster side, the proposal that we offered in conference would provide $2.486 billion in disaster assistance. The conference report has $2.350 billion. Actually, the proposal that we offered would have been more generous overall to farmers suffering from disasters than the conference report in front of us. Mr. President, having said all of that, I must also say that there are many good features in this conference report. I commend the distinguished chairman and ranking member for their outstanding work under very difficult constraints to pull this conference report together. It has a number of provisions important not only to my State of Iowa but to the Nation that I am pleased to see included. So there are a lot of good things in the bill. But there is one overriding shortcoming in the bill that will, of course, compel me to oppose the conference report. And that is what we have been speaking about most of the afternoon, those of us who have been on the floor; that is, what I feel to be the lack of adequate assistance to help our farmers--our farm families--deal with the worst economic devastation in over a decade. It is a matter that is simply too important to let go. I regret that I must urge my colleagues to vote against the adoption of the conference report. Again, just to refresh my colleagues about the seriousness of the crisis facing American farm families and rural communities, in July, when this legislation was last on the Senate floor, 99 Senators voted in favor of a resolution recognizing the severity of the crisis that confronts us in agriculture and calling for immediate action. What was bad then has become even worse since. Commodity prices have fallen even further. In the period of 11 weeks, corn and soybean prices at Central Illinois Terminal Elevators have declined 39 cents a bushel for corn and $1.49 a bushel for soybeans. At Iowa Interior Elevators, prices have fallen by similar amounts to about $1.53 a bushel for corn, and about $4.65 a bushel for soybeans. And on the livestock side, hog prices have continued at low levels, remaining at or below $30 a hundredweight in southern Iowa markets since early September. Country elevator prices are expected to fall even lower as the fall harvest gets fully in swing. Cattle prices remain low. Wheat prices have been depressed for a long time and are expected to continue so. In addition to the low commodity prices, farmers in several regions of the country have suffered devastating losses from damaging weather, crop diseases, and other natural disasters. There has been severe drought in the South, Southwest, Southeast, and now followed by devastating hurricanes. In the northern plains, several years of crop disease have put farmers on the ropes. As a result of all of these forces, farm income is falling drastically. It is estimated that this year net farm income will be down by more than $11 billion from last year. That is over a 20-percent drop in farm income in 1 year. Again, this loss of income is having a horrendous effect on farm families and their communities. And there appears to be no relief in the market on the horizon. We are all talking about the market. The theory of Freedom to Farm supposedly was that farmers can plant for the market. Well, there is no market to speak of now. We have too large a quantity of commodities for the market. We have a glut on the market, and our Asian markets and other markets are suffering. I don't know when they are going to come back. So if the response is that farmers can plant for the market, I assume the advice to farmers is not to plant because there is no market. Well, how can that be when the farmer has his fixed costs. He has land. He has his equipment. He has all this money tied up. He has to plant. He has to plant his crops to try to make something. In fact, economically, that farmer will try to plant more. He will try to get more out of his fixed asset base to make up for his losses. He will try to get more production out of his fixed base to make up for lower prices. Therefore, we look again next year for another bumper crop coming on and continued low prices. The Asian economy is not expected to turn around quickly, the Russian economy is in the tank, and the relative strength of the U.S. dollar means that other exporting countries can offer more competitive prices than we can. So we are now in what appears to be a prolonged period of low commodity prices. And unless we take some action, action that is truly effective, we are headed into another round of farm foreclosures and families forced out of business and off the land. A recent Iowa State University study, for example, concluded that 2 to 3 straight years of low prices could push as many as a third of Iowa farmers into restructuring or liquidation with disastrous consequences for Iowa's economy. I want also to underscore the broad ramifications of this farm crisis on the wider economy. Agriculture is the largest industry in my State of Iowa, as it is in a number of States. When agriculture is in a downturn in Iowa, the entire State economy feels it. If we consider the drop in corn and soybean prices alone this year, leaving aside the precipitous drop in hog prices, Iowa's economy this year is going to take a hit of about $1.4 billion. Chopping that much out of Iowa's economy could cost upwards of 26,000 jobs, jobs that we can ill-afford to lose in my State. Again, I want to make it clear exactly what part of the conference report I disagree with--the part dealing with loss of income caused by low commodity prices. Again, I am not opposing that part of the conference report dealing with disaster assistance, although I did point out that what we had in our package was a little bit more generous to those farmers hard hit by the disasters than what is in this conference report. We had worked, Senator Daschle and a number of my colleagues and I had worked on an emergency request sent up by the administration. We made some modifications and additions to the administration's request. We came up with what we considered to be a well-balanced bill. The emergency package that we put together would have provided about $130 million more in disaster-related assistance than the provisions now in the conference report. The other essential part of the package, apart from the disaster assistance, is to restore some of the farm income safety net. If we consider those two aspects of the emergency package in tandem, then every State in the United States would have come out better under our proposal than under what is now in the conference report, and that includes the States hard hit by natural disasters. Let me explain further why what is in this conference report is inadequate to deal with the problem of low commodity prices. The conference report includes $1.65 billion that would be added to the Agriculture Market Transition Act, otherwise known as AMTA, payments that farmers will receive for fiscal 1999. I understand that these payments would mean an addition of about 19 cents a bushel for wheat and about 11 cents a bushel for corn when considered on the basis of program payment yield. Keep in mind there are no payments directed for soybeans or oilseeds in this conference report even though soybean prices have dropped dramatically. Also, keep in mind that actual yields are greater than the program payment yields used for calculating the AMTA payments. So if we consider the actual production on farms, the conference report would provide about 13 cents a bushel for wheat and about 7 cents a bushel for corn. Again, no direct assistance for soybeans. These levels of assistance are totally inadequate. In fact, a spokesman for one Member of this body said it better than I could. He said the proposal is a ``slap in the face'' to farmers. Well, it really is. I likened it to giving a person dying of thirst a thimbleful of water; it might relieve suffering momentarily but it really doesn't solve the problem of the person dying of thirst. The proposal that Senator Daschle and I along with others put forward is different. This proposal, which has been talked about by others this afternoon, simply would lift the caps from the commodity marketing assistance loan rates. If that was done, our proposal would add about 57 cents a bushel in added income protection for wheat, compared to 13 cents in the conference report, 28 cents a bushel for corn compared to 7 cents a bushel for corn in the conference report, and about 28 cents a bushel for soybeans compared to zero for soybeans in the conference report. I might also point out it would provide higher loan rates for both cotton and rice. Our proposal obviously was rejected in conference. That is very unfortunate because it goes much further than what is in the conference report toward addressing the devastating loss of farm income due to low commodity prices. Again, if we have low commodity prices caused by a glut, bumper crops, combined with the loss of foreign markets we are going to have to enact some reasonable income protection to help farmers make it through this economic disaster--a disaster not of their own making. I know there has been a lot of discussion about fast track as though that is the magical solution to everything that is wrong in the farm economy. If only we had fast track, it is suggested, everything would be beautiful. Let's be honest and let's be real about it. Fast track could help us 5 or 7 years from now, which is how long it took to get the Uruguay Round completed. But fast track doesn't help us now. Not in any way does it help the farm families who face foreclosure in the next few months. I say that as someone who has voted for fast track in the past, who voted for NAFTA and voted for the Uruguay Round agreement. I defy anyone to come to the floor and tell me how, if fast track were passed right now, it could possibly help farmers who are in dire straits this year and next year. So fast track may have some benefits down the pike, depending on what comes out of the negotiations, but none in the immediate future. Again, I and others who have proposed lifting the caps on marketing loan rates have been accused of going beyond the scope of the farm bill, of reopening the farm bill. Well, the fact is marketing loan are in the farm bill. The bill set a formula for loan rates, but then put an arbitrary cap on the loan rates for budgetary reasons. Taking off the caps and letting the formula already in the bill work, as we are proposing, is not really reopening the farm bill. We are simply taking what is in the farm bill, a tool that is in there, and using the tool to enhance the farm income protections within the basic structure of the 1996 farm bill--simply by removing the caps. That change, combined with extending the loan period, will help farmers well into next year-- and next year and the year after if the policy were adopted for the long term as I believe would be desirable. Added AMTA payments will go out this year, and that is it. A lot of the new AMTA payments will go to farmers who will not be farming next year. A lot of that AMTA payment will go to farmers whose landlords will seize the opportunity to increase the rent and take it back in rent payments. So basically the AMTA payment is sort of a one-time payment to farmers, but it really is not going to solve the problem. Again, I would like to illustrate the difference between the conference report and what the Democratic plan was. For a 650-acre corn and soybean farm in Iowa with 390 acres of corn base, 260 acres of soybeans, the conference report will provide a $4,230 payment to that farmer. The Democratic proposal, in removing the marketing loan caps, would provide increased income protection of $18,455 or a difference of $14,225 to the farmer with 390 acres of corn and 260 acres of soybeans in Iowa. So again, that is a very substantial difference, and it is a difference that would carry through into next year because of the improved income safety net aspect of the marketing assistance loan. The small AMTA supplement is a short term one-time payment. So again, I just ask my colleagues from the Corn Belt whether 7 cents a bushel paid out now, but soon gone, is anywhere near enough to address severe farm income problems. Is 13 cents a bushel enough even to begin to address the economic devastation in wheat country? And I ask my colleagues whether a proposal with no direct support for soybeans is adequate to address the steep decline in soybean prices. So that is really the question today. The question is whether or not those very small cash payments are going to be adequate for the tremendous farm income problems that are out there. I do not believe so. I do not believe that will help nearly enough--

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I just be allowed 3 more minutes.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I want to thank the Senator from South Dakota. This an important issue. Audiologic services are critical in the diagnosis and management of hearing loss. I am concerned that under FEHBP, an efficient and effective avenue to appropriate care is unavailable because FEHBP law does not explicitly identify the option of direct access to audiologists. Senator Cochran introduced, and I supported, along with Senator Frist and Pryor, legislation in the 104th Congress to ensure that FEHBP beneficiaries who require audiological services would have the option of direct access to them. Earlier this year, I received a letter from Kenneth W. Kizer, M.D., Under Secretary for Health with the Department of Veterans Affairs. In 1992, the VA instituted a policy allowing veterans who suspect a hearing loss to make appointments directly with an audiologist. According to Dr. Kizer, ``The VA experience suggests that providing direct access to audiologists for civilian federal employees will result in high quality hearing care and reduce the cost of services.'' We are not talking about mandating additional benefits. In addition, I believe it would be advisable to add provider non-discrimination assurances to FEHBP plans. Of course, these matters involve a number of complicated issues, and to this point, the Governmental Affairs Committee has been unable to hold hearings to consider those issues. I would appreciate hearing Senator Cochran's and Senator Thompson's sense of what can be done, in this Congress or the next, to ensure that those issues are fully considered.

Mr. HARKIN

Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I would like to thank my colleagues, Chairman of the Small Business Committee, Senator Kit Bond, and Ranking Member, Senator John Kerry, for their work in moving H.R. 3412 through Committee. I would also like to thank Senators Bond and Kerry for agreeing to my language requesting a report from the Small Business Administration (SBA) on the 7(A) loan program's reporting requirements on the subsidy rate. I have heard from a number of community bankers in Iowa who have expressed concerns with the monthly reporting requirement. Previously, these reports were submitted quarterly. I am concerned that small banks, especially small rural banks, lack the loan volume or personnel to meet this requirment in a cost effective manner. I look forward to reviewing this report and working with my colleagues and the SBA in addressing this concern. In addition to improvements in popular SBA programs, H.R. 3412 also contains a Committee passed amendment, sponsored by Senator Max Cleland and cosponsored by myself, which will allow the SBA to conduct a disaster mitigation pilot program. It is my hope that this program will afford small business owners, particularly in rural areas, the ability to invest in their property to help prevent against natural disasters. By providing small businesses with the tools to invest in their business before disasters strike, property destruction can be avoided and insurance claims can be reduced.