Jim Inhofe

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, that is correct. The EDA planning program is an important program which provides technical assistance to communities to develop and implement comprehensive economic development strategies. As a matter of fact this bill will provide an historic increase in funding for this important program and will give planning partners the additional resources to address local needs and improve the delivery of federal economic development efforts.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, pursuant to my remarks of October 4 on the management of Federal grant dollars at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, I ask unanimous consent that the document entitled ``Grants Management at the Environmental Protection Agency--A New Culture Required to Cure a History of Problems'' be printed in the Record.

Mr. INHOFE

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I rise today to shed some light on a subject that is very important to me in my oversight duties as the chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee. Earlier this year, the Environment and Public Works Committee held an oversight hearing where the committee heard testimony from the General Accounting Office and the EPA inspector general regarding a 10-year history of numerous problems with the management of grant dollars at the Environmental Protection Agency. Some of the problems included EPA not requiring grant recipients to demonstrate real environmental benefits for grants, EPA not requiring competition in its grants awards, and a general lack of oversight of EPA grant officers and recipients. The EPA inspector general released an audit only 2 days before the hearing, finding that a particular nonprofit guaranty had violated the Lobbying Disclosure Act, and with nearly $5 million of EPA grant funding. Members may recall, because I talked about it at that time, that it was the Consumer Federation of America, which is a 501(c)(4), that had been a recipient of discretionary grants from the EPA. That is a 501(c)(4) as in lobbying organization. They support candidates. It is strictly against the law. Over the last few months, my staff has done considerable research into the EPA grant and confirmed many of the problems and also found the EPA has a long history of awarding grant dollars without competition to some well-known nonprofit environmental groups that regularly engage in political activity. My staff has compiled some of these findings in this 30-page report to the chairman. In examining how the environmental groups receive and spend their Federal dollars, it became apparent they receive funding from numerous sources, including large foundations. Within these organizations, political and grassroots efforts quickly became difficult to differentiate the sources of their funding and how they spend them. Therefore, I instructed my staff to examine the funding and expenditure records of the organizations. That has resulted in a second report which is the focus of my remarks today. My staff has compiled this information into a 15-page report for the chairman to provide some preliminary examples describing five of the most widely politically active environmental groups, the description of their activity, the foundations that provide the financial support for these groups, and the interconnected web among all those organizations. Interestingly, these environmental groups are all tax-exempt, IRS- registered 501(c)(3) charitable organizations, meaning contributions to these groups are tax deductible. These groups profess to be the greatest stewards of the environment and solicit contributions from a variety of sources by that claim. But they demonstrate more interest in giving apocalyptic environmental scenarios to raise money for raw political purposes rather than working together to improve the environment for America. We have money from foundations, individuals, and government grants going into environmental groups, and then they turn around and put these out to the 501(c)(3), 527 organizations and 501(c)(4), these are political organizations. All these nonprofit groups are also closely associated and fund their affiliated 501(c)(4) lobbying organizations and the 527 political organizations. This report could not be more timely as the Washington Post, as recently as September 27 of this year, published an article demonstrating that IRS 501(c)(3), 501(c)(4), and 527 organizations are all engaged in political activity this election cycle with expenditures designed to circumvent the prohibitions in the bipartisan campaign Reform Act of 2002, otherwise known as McCain-Feingold. This article quoted a Federal Election Commission official stating: In the wake of the ban on party-raised soft money, evidence is mounting that money is slithering through on other routes as organizations maintain various accounts, tripping over each other, shifting money between 501(c)(3)'s, (c)(4)'s, and 527's. . . . It's big money. Why is this important? Because the environment is important to all Americans. Despite what we hear from the groups in their attack advertisements against President Bush and the Republican candidates across the Nation, our air is cleaner, water more drinkable, and our forests are becoming healthier. Keep in mind this is over a period of time when we have almost doubled the amount of miles that are driven, and our population is dramatically increasing. Yet things are cleaner than they were before. For instance, over the last 30 years we have cut air pollution in half. Why, then, are some extremists spending millions upon millions to hijack the conservation movement? It seems to me that it is more important to the leadership of these groups to turn their once laudable movement into a political machine by sending out their bipartisan snake oil, salesmen, and misleading the American public regarding their purely politically partisan agenda under the guise of environmental protection. Our Nation's father of conservation, Teddy Roosevelt, said: To waste, to destroy, our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed. These words ring true today, but unfortunately it is clear that the environmentalist movement is deaf to them. What we find now is the fleecing of the American public's pocketbooks by the environmental movement for their political use. What we find now is exhausting litigation, instigation of false claims, misleading science, and scare tactics to fool Americans into believing disastrous environmental scenarios that are untrue. Pay close attention to the webs of this incestuous activity of these environmentalists groups and their financial benefactors. Environmental organizations have become experts at duplicitous activity, skirting laws up to the edge of illegality, and burying their political activities under the guise of nonprofit environmental improvement. Chart No. 2 demonstrates the interconnection environmental family affair with nonprofits and their benefactors. As we can see, six organizations at the bottom of the chart are all either 527 groups or 501(c)(4)s. These are political organizations. Money that comes up here--for example, the Heinz Foundation, goes to the various organizations and ultimately gets to the Environmental Accounting Fund, the Save the Environment Organization, Action Fund, Sierra Club Votes, Defenders of Wildlife, Environment 2004. These are all either 501(c)(4)s or 527 organizations. The LCV calls itself the political voice of the national environmental movement, and much of its grants from even its 501(c)(3) organizations go to fund voter mobilization and education drives. In each election cycle, LCV endorses congressional candidates and since 1996 has published a ``dirty dozen'' list. They brag about the dirty dozen list that has been very effective, but the LCV mostly singles out only Republican candidates. What we are talking about is the money that is channeled from 501(c)(3) organizations is going to defeat Republican candidates. Mr. President, let me provide some examples. So far this year, the LCV has released a ``Dirty Dozen'' list of eight congressional candidates--seven Republicans and one Democrat. For the first time ever, it includes the President and Vice President. I cannot forget that LCV has, of course, endorsed the junior Senator from Massachusetts for President, the earliest endorsement of a Presidential contender in its 34-year history. The LCV's 527 organization last reported to have raised over $3.3 million in the 2004 election cycle. This is chart No. 3: $3.3 million. It has also joined with Environment2004, another 527 political organization directed by former Clinton administration EPA staffers purchasing air time to run ads against the President. Interestingly, not all candidates appreciate LCV's help. I recently read where the senior Senator from South Dakota requested the LCV not air advertisements in the South Dakota Senate contest this year and even characterized outside organization advertisements as ``often too negative, too personal, and lack any real substance.'' However, LCV has a long history of political involvement. This is chart No. 4. In 1996, LCV spent a total of $1.5 million in ads trying to defeat its ``Dirty Dozen'' list of targets of 11 Republicans and 1 Democrat. In 1998, LCV spent $2.3 million targeting its ``Dirty Dozen'' list of 12 Republican candidates and 1 Democratic candidate. In 2000, the LCV spent a total of $4 million, again targeting 11 Republicans and 1 Democrat on its ``Dirty Dozen'' list. And I cannot forget, in 2000 the LCV also endorsed Al Gore for President. In 2002, the LCV once again targeted 11 Republican congressional candidates and 1 Democrat. I see a partisan pattern that is well developed here. LCV spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in congressional contests against Republican candidates. However, the strongest effort seems to have been focused on Senator Allard. The LCV claims to have budgeted a total of $700,000 for that race alone and hired a campaign staff of 12 to coordinate phone banks and precinct walks in addition to running television and radio advertisements. Altogether, LCV is reported to have spent $1.5 million in independent expenditures during the 2002 election cycle. Of that total amount, LCV spent $1.313 million benefiting Democratic candidates while only spending $136,000 for Republican candidates. Another example is the Sierra Club. The Sierra Club describes itself as ``America's oldest, largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization.'' Sierra Club is also an IRS-registered, tax-exempt, nonprofit 501(c)(3) foundation. Here we go again. The Sierra Club Foundation is closely affiliated with its Sierra Club 501(c)(4) and section 527 political organizations. In fact, the Washington Post detailed the interconnected organizations of the Sierra Club in an article it featured last Monday. This is what the Post printed: Perhaps no one better illustrates the host of interlocking roles than Carl Pope, one of the most influential operatives on the Democratic side in the 2004 election. As executive director of the Sierra Club, a major 501(c)(4) environmental lobby, Pope also controls the Sierra Club Voter Education Fund, a 527. The Voter Education Fund 527 has raised $3.4 million this election cycle, with $2.4 million of that amount coming from the Sierra Club. A third group, the Sierra Club PAC, has since 1980 given $3.9 million to Democratic candidates and $173,602 to GOP candidates. The Sierra Club is consistently critical of the Bush environmental record and sometimes others as well. The Sierra Club even accused me of trying to raise the levels of mercury pollution. The Sierra Club's 527 political organization reports to have raised over $6.8 million for the 2004 election cycle alone, with a goal of over $8 million by the end of the month. Like the LCV, the Sierra Club has a history of involvement in politics. In the year 2000 Presidential contest, the Sierra Club spent several hundred thousand dollars in advertisements attacking President Bush. And in the 2002 election cycle, the Sierra Club endorsed 184 Democratic incumbents and challengers and endorsed 10 Republican candidates--184 Democrats and 10 Republicans. Not surprisingly, the Sierra Club is heavily involved in the 2004 political cycle. The Sierra Club began spending early in the 2004 Presidential contest and has made a series of endorsements this year. Of course, the Sierra Club has endorsed the junior Senator from Massachusetts for President, and it has endorsed 16 Democratic Senate incumbents and challengers and no Republican candidates--16 Democrats, no Republicans. In races for the House of Representatives, the Sierra Club has endorsed 114 Democratic incumbents and challengers and has endorsed 7 Republican candidates. Let me use one more example briefly--the Natural Resources Defense Council. The NRDC is also an IRS-registered, tax-exempt, nonprofit 501(c)(3) receiving $55 million in tax-deductible contributions--these are tax-deductible contributions; no money going into the Treasury--in just the last year running bogus ads like this one on this chart claiming President Bush is rolling back a mercury regulation that never existed. This is an outrageous lie. I do not remember how much this ad cost, but if you look, this was a full-page ad run in the New York Times. Down here it says: Yes, I want to join the Natural Resources Defense Council and help thwart President Bush's plan to weaken controls on toxic mercury. There are already controls on toxic mercury. This is an outrageous lie. How can you lower something that does not exist? The truth is, President Bush's Clear Skies legislative proposal, which I support, is the biggest emissions reduction plan ever proposed by any American President. Over 14 years, it would reduce emissions from powerplants of nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, and mercury emissions from powerplants by 70 percent. Let's be sure and understand that the NRDC deliberately lied in this ad because you cannot roll back standards that do not exist. The NRDC is affiliated with the NRDC Action Fund, a 501(c)(4) organization--here we go again--and the Environmental Accountability Fund, its section 527 political organization. The NRDC describes itself as ``the nation's most effective environmental action organization,'' and has a long history of political activity. The NRDC has joined this year with LCV and the Sierra Club to air television and radio ads and hire campaign staffs to work against President Bush in several States, including New Mexico, Florida, Arizona, and Nevada. Overall, the Environmental Accountability Fund, NRDC's 527 organization, last reported to have raised nearly $1 million in the 2004 election cycle. Well, that is three of the culprits. The report outlines two others in depth--Greenpeace and Environmental Defense--and shows similar patterns of partisan fundraising and spending, such as this Greenpeace ad that equates President Bush's conservation policies to the Texas chainsaw massacre--a disgusting comparison, especially considering that historic healthy forest legislation was proposed and passed by this administration. It is sad that many of these groups would rather watch our forests burn and our watersheds become destroyed rather than employ 21st century forest management technology to improve forest health. But misleading and scaring the American people during a Presidential election year, I guess, is more important to them than true forest health. 501(c)(3)s, 501(c)(4)s, political action committees, and 527 political organizations--it is all tangled up in a web. Back to that chart we used, chart No. 2, you can see how convoluted it is. But the money all ends up down here being used for political purposes, millions upon millions of dollars going for partisan political activity while these groups attempt to maintain a nonpartisan cloak and justification that they are helping our environment. But these funds do not just come from scared mothers and others furiously writing checks because these groups have lied to them and told them that eating fish will kill their children. Our research has found that much of the funding these groups receive comes from independent foundations and trusts which also claim to be nonpartisan. Let's take a look now at some of these nonpartisan institutions and how their money finds its way to this intricately growing web. The Heinz foundations are a few of the largest contributors to these nonprofit environmental organizations. And, of course, Mrs. Teresa Heinz Kerry is either a chairperson of the board of trustees or a member of the board of trustees of each one of these foundations. In fact, Mrs. Heinz Kerry is the head of the $1.2 billion Heinz Foundation Endowment. Since 1998, these foundations have contributed nearly $3 million to the Sierra Club, LCV, the NRDC, and Environmental Defense. Each foundation is also a large contributor to the Tides Center and the Tides Foundation, contributing over $6 million since 1998. The Tides organization has in turn also contributed over $1.4 million to the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the NRDC over the same period of time. Another major supporter is the Turner Foundation, founded in 1990 by Ted Turner, who is chairman of the foundation board of trustees. The Turner Foundation sponsors the work of its special projects which include the Partnership Project, comprised of 20 national environmental groups. Since 1998, the Turner Foundation has contributed over $6.4 million to the Partnership Project. Individually, the Turner Foundation has contributed more than $20 million to the LCV since 1998; over $2.6 million to the NRDC; over $1 million to the Sierra Club; and nearly $2 million to Environmental Defense, Earth Justice, and Greenpeace. Finally, another large supporter is the Pew Charitable Trust. You can follow the lines of the money there. It claims it is an independent nonprofit serving to inform the public on key issues. Two of the Pew's environmental priorities include global warming and wilderness protection. Pew has contributed $17.4 million to Clear the Air Campaign since 1999, with which it publishes materials such as this claiming that the Bush plan means more pollution. Again, another impossible lie because you can't roll back mercury standards that don't exist. Perhaps wilderness protection is where the Pew shows its true colors. It has joined with the Heritage Force Campaign, the Natural Resource Defense Council, Environmental Defense, and the Sierra Club in a campaign characterizing the President's conservation policies as ``Crazy George's National Forest Give-a-Way.'' Once again, it is silly scare ads like this. For them, it is only about politics, not about true forest management. We should be more scared of this tangled web of political financing and the fact that there is no way to tell where taxpayer funded grants and private dollars cross. These are the grants we started out talking about. It is also convoluted where advocacy funding and political funding intermingle and even if environmental groups really spend any money actually improving the environment. Since 1998, Pew Foundation has contributed several million dollars to various environmental organizations. These contributions have included nearly $18 million to Earth Justice; over $3 million to NRDC; over $3.7 million to Environmental Defense. Pew has also contributed $32.6 million to the Tides Center and Foundation over the same period. The Tides organization has contributed over $1.4 million to the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, NRDC, among others, since 1998. This does not even represent all of the political involvement of environmental extremists. These groups have established an unquestionable record of partisanship and demonstrated a slithering flow of money among themselves and from their financial benefactors. Today's environmental groups are simply Democratic political machines raising millions of dollars in contributions and spending millions in expenditures each year for the purpose of raising more money to pursue their agenda. Especially in this election year, the American voters should see these groups and their many affiliated organizations as they are--the newest insidious conspiracy of political action committees and perhaps the newest multimillion dollar manipulation of Federal election laws. I ask unanimous consent that the reports be printed in the Record.

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent I be recognized to speak as in morning business.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 502, H.R. 2771.

Mr. INHOFE. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read the third time and passed; that the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; and that any statements relating thereto be printed in the Record, without further intervening or action or debate.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I have had the honor for almost 50 years now of being active in aviation. I have had occasion to fly almost every kind of airplane that is up there, and it is an experience that not many people get a chance to have in their normal lives. Something is on the horizon right now that is an opportunity for people to do, things that they never dreamed possible; that is, to feel and to experience the thrill of flight into space. Yesterday marked a very significant day in history. Today, the SpaceShipOne, designed by Burt Rutan, who happens to be a friend of mine, and piloted by Mike Melvill, who is a 62-year-old pilot, made the first flight of the two required flights to claim the $10 million Ansari X-Prize for carrying three people, or an equivalent weight, to space twice within 2 weeks. The brilliant concept of the Ansari X Prize exemplifies the excellence that can be achieved through an incentivized approach rather than a governmental mandate of punitive approach. To incentivize and safely get government out of the way is the philosophy of the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004, H.R. 3752. Tempt not only the pocketbook but also the vision of anyone who has the creativity and imagination to pursue it. Space programs originally sprang to life in the face of international competition. The realities of the cold war stimulated creativity, and innovation in a dramatic new way. This government and NASA responded with successes that dazzled even the most optimistic dreamer. Since then, space advances have gone through the same channels with the same motivation, but without the urgency and vision of ``The Space Race.'' The Ansari X Prize is a refreshing new appeal to anyone who has the faith and vision to respond. It is an appeal that looks for the likes of Charles Lindberg--people who will think within the restraints of practicality but without the restraints of a rutted concept of how it is supposed to be done. I am grateful that this competition is doing what it was designed to do: spur a budding industry in commercial human space flight. Today's flight paves the way for making space flight available to the public, a long-time dream of many. Just imagine, ordinary people will be able to experience the thrill of flying in space. But despite the existing technology to make this dream possible, there are some obstacles. One such barrier stems from this body. The text of my bill, S. 2772, the Space CHASE Act, should pass the Senate right now as an amendment to H.R. 3752. H.R. 3752 readily passed the House of Representatives in March by a vote of 402 to 1. The House of Representatives and the Federal Aviation Administration have agreed to the improvements embodied in my Space CHASE Act, so it is better than the bill that passed the House by 402 to 1. However, some Democrats are blocking this legislation that is vital to the fledgling commercial space industry. The legislation would define FAA licensing rules for suborbital flights, as well as require passengers to sign waivers of legal liability. Without such a waiver, the investors fear excessive lawsuits by trial lawyers. Without investors, many of these fledgling entrepreneurial space companies will not be able to get off the ground, both literally and figuratively. Unfortunately, some Democrats want to cater to the trial lawyers who want the ability to file frivolous lawsuits and collect millions of dollars should something go wrong on a flight. Perhaps even more frustrating is that they will not explain exactly why they are objecting. Aviation Week is a magazine I have subscribed to for many years. It is a publication I have grown to respect. I have read it with frequency over the years. It has an excellent article in its September 27, 2004, edition. It states: One or more Democrats on the Senate Commerce Committee are holding up this bill, and, maddeningly, no one will say publicly what they object to. They are holding it up, and they won't say why they are holding it up. If they do not pass it, part of their legacy may be that of having strangled an infant industry in the crib. I compliment the chairman of the committee, Senator McCain. He has been very helpful. But there are some Democrats we can't identify, as the Aviation Week publication states. I ask unanimous consent that these four pages of Aviation Week be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I also want to call to the attention of the Senate a letter from nine discrete enterprises that are on the cutting edge of this burgeoning industry. They all endorse the text of my Space CHASE Act and call for the immediate passage of my legislation as a substitute language for a thus-perfected H.R. 3752. I commend these entrepreneurs by name: Jeff Greason, XCOR Aerospace; John Carmack, Armadilla Aerospace; Elon Musk, Space X; George French, Rocketplane, Ltd.; Eric Anderson, Space Adventures; Honorable Andrea Seastrand, California Space Authority; Bill Khourie, Oklahoma Space Industry Development Authority; Brian Chase, Space Foundation; Greg Allison, Chairman, Executive Committee, National Space Society. I ask unanimous consent that their letter also be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, it is a shame when we pander to trial lawyers and allow them to kill an industry before it is able to get off the ground. I urge these Democrats to stop the obstruction and pass this important legislation that will let the American people have the freedom to experience space, the final frontier. Exhibit 1 [From Aviation Week & Space Technology, September, 2004] Commercial Space--At a Tipping Point ``I have such faith in the private sector that I've dreamed of the day that government monopoly would be replaced by commercialization or at least some form of partnership.'' Those words, on the prospects of private manned spacecraft and industrial space stations, were penned by President Ronald Reagan in a letter to Aviation Week & Space Technology's publisher in March 1985. It has taken two decades, but now there are tangible indications that such a dream could indeed become a reality. Many of them are detailed in this week's cover story (see p. 54) and in the lead article of our World News and Analysis section (see p. 26) But one of the most visible indications is yet to come. This week, Scaled Composites' SpaceShipOne is set to make the first of the two required flights to claim the $10 million Ansari X-Prize far hauling three people (or an equivalent mass) to the edge of space twice within two weeks. The prize could be won as early as next week. Designer Burt Rutan and/or the team's backer, Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen, may even climb in for the ride. Should Rutan's crew stumble, there are others fast on their heels. A half-dozen or more serious competitors have spent many times the prize money in developing their vehicles. That is exactly what Peter Diamandis had in mind when he organized the X-Prize Foundation a decade ago to seed a private human spaceflight industry, and our hat is off to him. Dating even further back, there were entrepreneurs saying that making human spaceflight both reliable and affordable was possible with existing technology. The problems, they said, were not technical but financial and political, even psychological. Unintentionally, NASA made it hard for these pioneers to attract capital. First, the agency was a competitor because it operated its own expensive vehicle, the space shuttle. Then, when NASA tried to develop a new, cheaper-to-operate reusable vehicle, it opted to include challenging cutting- edge technologies, making program execution difficult and expensive. As one might expect, when entrepreneurs went looking on Wall Street for money for their simpler projects, they were rebuffed by potential investors who believed human spaceflight was inherently costly, dangerous and prone to failure. On top of that was a chicken-and-egg problem of economics. To drastically lower the costs of spaceflight, a vehicle needs to fly frequently. But to find enough customers to fly frequently, one needs to have low prices, and that requires low costs. The solution seemed to lie in new markets, and the one many believed could jump-start the private sector was ``space tourism.'' When the Russians began selling spare seats on Soyuz spacecraft to dot.com zillionaires and rock stars, it became harder to posit the economic impossibility of space tourism. But it was the first suborbital flight of SpaceShipOne to 100 km. altitude, back in June, that removed the giggle factor from discussions of space tourism. Pictures of pilot Mike Melvill sitting atop his privately financed craft and waving victoriously made the front pages of newspapers aroung the world. Meanwhile, things had changed in the government. Many in Congress ``got religion'' on commercial space (more about that later). NASA began working seriously with startups such as Bigelow Aerospace on manned spacecraft. And Adminstrator Sean O'Keefe bought into the prize paradigm, seeing to it that the agency itself would sponsor some of these fledgling enterprises. This week, Robert T. Bigelow will make some news on that front. He plans to announce a $50-million ``America's Space Prize,'' an orbital analog to the X-Prize. To be sure, taking humans into orbit and bringing them back safely is orders of magnitude more difficult than taking them on a suborbital ride, but don't dismiss the salutary effects of $50 million. Prizes have an important and glorious place in the history of flight, dating to the days of the Wrights, Curtiss and Santos-Dumont. The revolution in public understanding of the practicality and possibilities of aviation that Charles A. Lindbergh wrought in laying claim to the $25,000 Orteig Prize in 1927 is widely seen as having been a necessary ingredient for the growth of an airline industry. We night now be poised at a tipping point in public understanding of the commercial possibilities of human spaceflight. But if the X -Prize is to be remembered as something more than a stunt, there must be a legal framework in place for market-based spaceflight to grow. There is a measure pending in Congress that would go a long way to providing that framework--the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004 (H.R. 3752)--but it has been stalled in the Senate for months. It would spell but FAA licensing rules for suborbital flights. Most critically, the bill would make it clear that paying passengers are ``spaceflight participants'' who understand the risks. And it would require them to sign waivers of legal liability. Without this provision, the prospect of relatives of passengers suing and collecting millions in damages following an accident would likely scare off investors. And without outside investors, many of today's space entrepreneurs will go out of business in the not-too-distant future. This bill is not some wild-eyed libertarian scheme. It passed the House in March by a vote of 402-1. Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert of New York, perhaps the ``greenest'' Republican in the House, even went along with a provision that would exempt these launchers from some environmental regulations. Admitting he first thought the legislation ``flighty,'' Boehlert says he came to see it as essential: ``This is about a lot more than `joy rides' in space, although there's nothing wrong with such an enterprise. This is about the future of the U.S. aerospace industry.'' One or more Democrats on the Senate Commerce Committee are holding up this bill, and, maddeningly, no one will say publicly what they object to. Democrats say they want the job growth the Bush administration has failed to deliver. If they do, they ought to pass this bill. If they do not pass it, part of their legacy may be that of having strangled an infant industry in the crib.

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to executive session to consider the following nominations on the Executive Calendar, and for the information of Members, these are uniformed military promotions that were reported today by the Armed Services Committee: 867 through 900, and all nominations on the Secretary's desk in the Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, and Navy. I further ask unanimous consent that the nominations be confirmed, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table, the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action, and the Senate then resume legislative session.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I understand that there is a bill at the desk and due for its second reading.

Mr. INHOFE. In order to place the bill on the calendar under the provisions of rule XIV, I object to further proceedings.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 670, S. 2495.

Mr. INHOFE. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read a third time and passed; the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; and that any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I understand there are two bills at the desk, and I ask for their first reading, en bloc.

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask for its second reading and, in order to place the bills on the calendar under the provisions of rule XIV, I object to my own request, en bloc.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the HELP Committee be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 4278, the assistive technology bill, and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. INHOFE. I ask unanimous consent that the substitute amendment at the desk be agreed to, the bill, as amended, be read a third time and passed, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table en bloc, and any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 673, H.R. 2408.

Mr. INHOFE. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read a third time and passed; the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; and that any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Judiciary Committee be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 2714 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. INHOFE. I ask unanimous consent that the Leahy-Hatch amendment, which is at the desk, be agreed to, the bill as amended be read a third time and passed, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate, and any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. INHOFE

Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 9:30 a.m. on Friday, October 1. I further ask unanimous consent that following the prayer and the pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved, and the Senate then resume consideration of S. 2845, the intelligence reform bill.