J. Kerrey

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I listened to the statements of the distinguished Senator from Rhode Island and the Senator from Massachusetts. I am struck, because I think an awful lot of people become confused about what this bill is. In part, that confusion comes as a result of a substantial amount of expenditures by the tobacco companies saying to citizens of this country that this bill is a tax increase. I heard the last few words the Senator from Massachusetts was saying. I believe he was saying this bill is not a tax increase; is that what the Senator from Massachusetts was saying? As I understand it, the underlying bill, prior to it being amended by the Senator from Texas, who has been arguing essentially that it is a tax increase, because he is using the same language the tobacco companies are using on television--that it is a tax increase; thus, we should have a tax cut in here as well. As I understand the underlying bill, it is not a tax increase at all. It is a $15 billion payment into a tobacco trust fund by the tobacco companies that they agreed to last June 20, 1997, and it phases up to a $23 billion fee that the tobacco companies would be paying into a tobacco trust fund as a result of another settlement which occurred in Minnesota where they basically agreed to 50 percent more. So this bill is not a tax increase. It is a fee being paid by the tobacco companies as a consequence of them now saying that they are stipulating in court documents--and the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts knows more about prosecutorial law than I do--because, as I understand it, they have stipulated now in court documents that nicotine is addictive, that they have been targeting our youth, that they have been failing to disclose all the dangers and risks that are associated with tobacco. So if you want to talk about tax cuts, I would love to come to the floor and argue about cutting the payroll tax. There are lots of inequities in our tax system I would love to debate. The distinguished Senator from Texas has converted, very intelligently, this debate from one of trying to help Americans who are addicted to stop smoking--they are not just smoking; we now know they are addicted. There is a big difference between just doing something sort of casually and doing what tobacco smokers do. Forty-five million Americans--likely a very high percentage of those individuals--are addicted. That means they cannot quit, they have a physical addiction, and when they stop smoking, they have withdrawal symptoms, and they have a very difficult time. There are 330,000 Nebraskans who smoke. They spend $250 million a year on cigarettes every single year. And I see what the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Arizona are trying to do is write a law so that we have resources at the State level to help those who are addicted to stop smoking. Just take Nebraska, I would say. We have $250 million a year being spent by 300,000 or so people who smoke. If we are able to get smoking cessation programs and educational efforts, that would mean, let us say, $50 million less a year being spent on tobacco as a result of helping people break away from this terrible addiction to nicotine. They break away from that addiction, and $50 million less, that is $250 million in their pockets. The Senator from Texas is talking about a tax increase. We are trying to help decrease expenditures on tobacco. And the more we decrease expenditures on tobacco, the more we get a win-win: Money in the pockets of our citizens, the people who are addicted, who did not realize that tobacco was addicting; and improve health consequences. I note with great interest that the Chamber of Commerce--U.S. Chamber of Commerce--and the National Restaurant Association are opposed to this legislation. They are opposed because they are misinformed, in my judgment. I can make the case at home--and intend to make the case at home--to my State chamber of commerce and my State restaurant association that it is in their interest to reduce the number of citizens in our State who are smoking. Their health insurance costs are going to be lower; their absentee rates are going to be lower; their productivity rates are going to be higher. I said yesterday that one of my most conservative business friends will not even hire people who smoke as a consequence of understanding the costs that are associated with it. I see that my friend from Texas has come to the floor. We perhaps can engage in a little colloquy about this, because as I understand this legislation that the Senator from Arizona and the Senator from Massachusetts have brought to the floor, there is a $15 billion fee in it phased up to $23 billion that the tobacco industry has agreed to pay. They agreed to pay $15 billion. And they have agreed in Minnesota to pay 50 percent more. As I see it, the more we are successful in helping people stop their smoking, break away from this terrible addiction, that is going to make them more prosperous, more healthy, as a consequence. I have talked, and there are a number of questions in there. I would appreciate very much if the Senator from Massachusetts could help me understand if that isn't what is in this legislation, if that isn't the intent of what is in the law as seen by the Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Arizona.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, first of all, let me say I appreciate the suggestion the Senator from Texas just made, because I intend to do approximately the same thing, only with the entire piece of legislation. Perhaps I am the only Member of the Senate who is becoming increasingly confused about what is in this bill. Perhaps everybody is crystal clear. I am not. As I understand it, the tobacco companies will be required under law to pay into a trust fund, $15 billion in the first year, growing to $23 billion. If I were to make an inquiry, I suspect, of the managers of the bill right now as to what is in this bill, I am not sure I would like the answer. What we have been doing since the bill was introduced is we have been deciding how we are going to allocate that money. As I understand it, the amendment of the Senator from Texas, which was accepted, will allocate a piece of that money for tax cuts, and the amendment of the Senator from Georgia will allocate a piece of that $15 billion to $23 billion for antidrug efforts, drugs other than nicotine. What the Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Missouri, Senator Bond, have is an amendment before this body that will allocate an additional amount for child care. What the Senator from Texas is saying is he wants to have all that money undesignated. So do I, only I believe that a substantial portion of the $15 billion to $23 billion needs to be allocated in as unrestricted a fashion as possible to the States so that we can help people who choose to stop smoking stop smoking. I appreciate that many Americans do not want to stop smoking. And if they have the freedom to choose, with full disclosure of what is in the substance, fine. Choose, and let the substance do to you what it is going to do. However, I have approximately 350,000 Nebraskans who smoke, and they spend about $250 million a year on cigarettes alone, they smoke over 100 million packages of cigarettes a year. My belief is, if we organize this correctly, we can help those who choose to stop smoking stop. We now know that nicotine is addictive. That is one of the reasons the tobacco industry was willing, on June 20, 1997, to say that, ``We will pay in $15 billion a year as well as a $50 billion punitive damage payment.'' Indeed the 37 million documents in the Minnesota case showed far worse. Yesterday, as we all know, a case in Florida was decided in the favor of an individual. I listened to a member of the jury this morning on television say he voted to give this individual damages because the tobacco industry is still saying that nicotine is not addictive, still saying it does not produce a powerful physical addiction. Now, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, I was a pharmacist. That was 1961 to 1965. I went to the University of Nebraska and graduated with a degree in pharmacy. I was given a physical examination by the Government and served time in the Navy, so I did not have a chance to practice very much. But in those days we understood addiction. We were trained to study it. So I am impressed with nicotine as a drug, because it crosses the blood-brain barrier and it is a powerful addictive substance. It is not just habit forming; it is as addictive, according to scientists, as cocaine, as heroin, and other drugs that produce such a strong physical pull on an individual that about a month ago a former mayor of Omaha, Gene Leahy, a wonderful human being, announced he is dying of lung cancer; and at the press conference he was smoking a cigarette because he can't stop. It isn't that he is choosing to smoke cigarettes; he has no choice; he is addicted to the nicotine. So I have 350,000 people in Nebraska who smoke, who spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year on cigarettes. By my calculations, if they are spending all that money, and if we are asking them to pay all of this additional money to continue to smoke, we ought to at least offer to help those who want to quit, quit. And if we can help them stop smoking--not only are they going to become healthier as a result of that help they are going to be more prosperous because they are not spending money on tobacco anymore. I have never been convinced by the arguments that simply raising the price of cigarettes is going to dramatically reduce smoking. Not if you are addicted. What does the price increase of cocaine do to an addict? They just steal the money and buy the substance. If it is an addictive substance, I do not care what the price is--a person is addicted to it--they are going to do what is necessary to buy the product. That is what we are dealing with. What we are doing with this piece of legislation, as I see it, is we are nicking away at the money raised as a result of this bill's increase in the price of cigarettes and thereby decreasing the chance we have to help those individuals who want to stop smoking not only become healthier but to become more prosperous. Again, the funds raised by this bill should be spent on reducing the number of people who are smoking in this country. In Nebraska, we should be concerned about reducing dollars spent on cigarettes from say $250 to $200 million-- which is a relatively modest though difficult goal to achieve. And while it may not sound like an enormous decrease, it is a quarter of a billion dollars every 5 years into the pockets of those individuals. So all the talk about this being a tax increase, to me, is misleading. It takes us in the wrong direction, puts us on the slippery slope of cutting taxes instead of reducing smoking. What we ought to be trying to do is cut people away from an addictive substance that, taken as directed, would decrease their chance of living a long and healthy life and decrease their chance, as well, of getting a shot at the American dream of having a little bit of prosperity. One of my friends in life is an extremely conservative businessperson. He will not hire anybody who smokes. I understand that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce opposes this legislation. I am a member of the Chamber of Commerce in my business. I think they are wrong. I think they have looked at this thing only as a tax increase, because some are describing it as that, and they are not understanding that if their employees decrease their addiction to this substance, that they are healthier. And if they are healthier, the cost of their insurance goes down, their absentee rates go down. Everybody who has employees working for them wants their employees to be as healthy as possible. The Chamber of Commerce, in my judgment, and the National Restaurant Association are missing the point. If there is cessation money in this bill, I can go to Nebraska and appeal to the business community, to the Nebraska restaurant association, to the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce, and say, ``Let's get involved with this cause of helping the people in Nebraska who want to quit, quit.'' You say, ``Well, that ought to be easy enough to stop.'' Mr. President, again, it is addictive, and to stop and to get off an addiction is not an easy thing to do. As a result, it is extremely hard for these people to not pay the price increase being imposed on them--they have a physical need for the product. And it is made even more difficult--I have met, on a number of occasions now, with Nebraskans who smoke, especially with young people who smoke; and one of the interesting things that I acquire from those conversations is an answer to the question, ``Why don't you just do smoking cessation if you want to stop?'' And one of the answers is, it is not only easier, it is cheaper to smoke than to stop smoking. Most places where you buy cigarettes, they are right there in the open. They are right there in the open. You can go and buy them for a current per pack price of about $2.50. But if you want to stop smoking--as we all know who have had friends who have either been addicted to this substance or addicted to alcohol or addicted to other sorts of substances, who are trying to get off the urge--the desire for this substance comes back. You need much more than just an opportunity to buy. But go into a store, go into any store in your home State, and try to buy a smoking cessation kit. No. 1, you are going to find out that it is substantially more expensive than a pack of cigarettes. For lower- income people, who tend to smoke in higher percentages, it is a barrier. And it is especially a barrier as I have talked to young people who say they simply do not have the out-of-pocket money to be able to buy it. So it is easier for them to buy cigarettes. The physical environment for buying smoking cessation kits in stores is more difficult, oftentimes kept under lock and key. So as I see this legislation, the original purpose of the legislation was to collect from the tobacco companies a fee, which started at $15 billion, and increased to $23 billion as a result of the Minnesota court decision, to help adults who want to quit, quit as well as to stop young people from smoking. That is a laudable goal--40 percent of my underage teenagers in Nebraska smoke; one out of three of them will die prematurely as a consequence. A very high percentage of them believe they are going to stop, even though all the statistics show that they do not stop because they are addicted. They do not understand the nature of addiction. They do not understand that nicotine is addictive. They have been told otherwise by the tobacco companies for all of these years. So, Mr. President, I have heard the distinguished Senator from Texas say that before he will allow a vote on this amendment by Senator Kerry and Senator Bond, which seems like an altogether reasonable amendment to me--at least it puts money into children; he wants an agreement that he is going to get a vote on his amendment. Well, I want the same. I am here to say that I will insist on the same, an amendment that allows us to say that this legislation will give each of our States a designated amount of money, that we will know what that amount of money is going to be, for a block grant that will go for smoking prevention and cessation. Let the States decide. I do not believe any of us really understands what it is going to take to get people to stop smoking. I think the people at the community level understand it an awful lot better. It is not going to be easy to get the job done. My amendment would create a single block grant, not only to help young people not to smoke, but also to help those who currently smoke to stop. I believe it will make our people not only healthier, as a consequence of getting off an addiction that causes them to have significant health care problems, but it will also make them more prosperous by decreasing the amount of money they are spending on a substance that, taken as directed, will make them unhealthy. So the Senator from Texas gave me an excellent idea. I had not intended on doing that when I came to the floor. One of the things I am trying to get to is--as I said earlier, I am confused about what is left in this bill. I understood it in the beginning that it was a $15 billion fee from the tobacco companies, growing to $23 billion; that 26 percent of it was going to be allocated to research; that 16 percent of it was going to be allocated to farmers; that 40 percent of it was going to be allocated to States; and the balance was going to be allocated to public health for education, cessation. As I understand it, of the total amount only 6 percent would go to smoking cessation programs. As I said, I had drafted an amendment that would have taken a significant portion--46 percent--of the funds raised by this legislation and given it to the States in a single smoking cessation and prevention block grant. I have prepared numbers that show what every single State would get under this block grant designed to work to reduce those people who are addicted to smoking, reduce their health care costs, and increase their prosperity by helping them kick the habit and get off of an addiction that is not only costing them their health but also costing them a great deal of money. I will insist on my amendment that will restore the money that was taken out of the $23 billion in the Gramm amendment, that will restore the money that was taken out with the Coverdell amendment, that will restore any other money that is taken out. I believe if this bill is going to be effective, if it is going to help us organize the coalitions at the community level to help Americans become healthier and more prosperous, we have to help especially those adults who are addicted to a substance that is extremely difficult to kick. One of the most frustrating things I am dealing with right now on this piece of legislation is I don't know what is in it. I believe before we proceed further with any additional amendments we need to know how that $15 to $23 billion is allocated. I heard some who are arguing in favor of the amendment of the distinguished Senator from Texas having to do with the marriage penalty, that we would still have 40 percent going to the States. It is 40 percent of a much smaller number. Forty percent of the people on the floor of this chamber is a much smaller number than forty percent of the people in this country. My math tells me the best way to look at this is to start off and say, $15 billion coming from the tobacco companies, growing to $23 billion, how much is going to be designated under this law for various items? At this stage of the game, I am not able to get an answer. I understand that the managers of the bill are going to try to crunch the numbers and give us an answer, but I don't think we can seriously consider it unless we presume we will accept every single amendment and write the bill in conference, which I think is a bad way of doing things. Our most distinguished Senator, George Norris, served in this body for a number years. He went back to Nebraska, hating the conference committee--hating the process by which House and Senate differences are resolved. We keep hearing that the problems with this bill can be fixed in conference, that a conference committee will take care of them. That is undemocratic. We should not be writing a piece of legislation as important as this one in a conference committee. I think it is a very bad thing to do, and I think we need to consider every single amendment that is brought down here as seriously as possible, based upon an understanding of what is in the bill. I do not know what is in this bill right now. I do not know how the $15 to $23 billion is being allocated. I know every single amendment that has been passed has changed that allocation, but I don't know what we are left with. I knew prior but I don't know now. I am hopeful we are able to get that. I will declare, as the Senator from Texas did, that before we have a vote on the Kerry-Bond amendment, which I support, I want to vote on my amendment which will take this bill back to what I think it was originally intended to do, which is to reduce addiction in the United States of America on a substance called nicotine, that we discovered on the 20th of June, 1997, is addictive. For those who understand the nature of addiction, it is a very serious public health problem. I thought we were going to try to solve a very serious public health problem. I thought we were going to try to empower our citizens to participate in solving that problem, as well. I hope that at some point in this debate we are able to get back to that. As I said, I appreciate very much that there is a lot of enthusiasm to move this thing along. I read in the paper we have dealt with this controversial tax issue and all that is left is the controversial farm provision--we just deal with that thing and this thing will move out and put pressure on the House then to pass it. All of that legislative process confuses me, let alone confuses the people I represent. What they are not confused about is their desire to have an opportunity to improve their health and improve their prosperity through this legislation. As I see it, we decrease the chances of that happening with the amendments that have been agreed to thus far. I have come to the floor to ask for two things, and I hope at some point I can get them. One, what is in the bill? How is that $15 to $23 billion allocated? How much goes to the reduction in tax in the marriage penalty and whatever else was in the Gramm amendment? How much of it goes now to fight the war on drugs? For gosh sakes, we don't have the political courage to put enough money in the drug war on our own without taking it from this bill--I don't understand that, frankly. How much is now going to the war on drugs? How much will be going to child care under the Kerry-Bond amendment? I want to know what the lay of the land is. Second, I will insist, as the Senator from Texas has just done, that my amendment be considered as well, that we convert this bill into what it was intended to do in the first place, and that is to give our people at the community level the opportunity to fight this war against nicotine addiction. I believe when we win this war, this piece of legislation is going to be seen as a very important piece of legislation. But if we don't win this war, if all we do is go home and issue press releases saying I cut your taxes, I gave you some more money for this and some more money for that, then it seems to me, Mr. President, that whatever else it is that we get done through those peripheral efforts, we will have not empowered the people in our States and our communities to be able to fight a battle that we now know--and, indeed, I argue one of the problems we are having is we don't know the full ramifications and details of all of the new information that we have since the 20th of June, 1997--about the seriousness of this health care problem. I am hopeful, as I said, that not only can I get the information about what is in the bill right now, but I will hopefully not offend too many by insisting, as the Senator from Texas has, that my amendment be given an opportunity to be voted on at the same time that the Kerry- Bond amendment is considered. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss the Conference Report to the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1998 (ISTEA). During this period of tremendous economic growth, I believe investing in the nation's transportation infrastructure should be one of our highest priorities. I am pleased to offer my support to the passage of this legislation. Mr. President, despite my support for the improvements in the transportational infrastructure that will occur as a result of this bill, I have strong concerns about one of the funding sources contained in this legislation. I do not believe that we should take money from veterans disability programs to be spent building roads. At a time in which the veterans hospitals in my state are experiencing budgetary shortfalls, I am troubled about transferring funds away from the Veterans Administration (VA). We in the United States have a long- standing commitment to providing benefits and healthcare to those who have served our country in the Armed Forces. In my opinion we should be working to strengthen that commitment, not weaken it through budgetary slight of hand. The issue of providing compensation to veterans for tobacco-related illnesses is one which the Congress must take closer look at in the coming months. During consideration of the FY99 Budget Resolution, I voted in favor of an amendment that requires the Veterans Administration, Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and the General Accounting Office (GAO) to jointly study the VA General Counsel's determination regarding compensation for tobacco-related illnesses. I fully expect Congress will conduct a detailed examination of the results of this study and will engage in full debate before any change in permanent law is enacted. Regardless of the ultimate outcome of that debate, any savings as a result of a change in VA compensation policy should be redirected into VA health care and benefits programs, not into transportation infrastructure. Mr. President, despite my concern about this funding provision, I will vote in favor of this Conference Report because I believe today's investment in roads and transit systems lays the groundwork for economic growth for decades to come. The Senate's passage of this legislation will improve the safety of our roads, create jobs, spur economic activity and give more Americans a shot at the American Dream. I strongly urge my colleagues to join me in support of this legislation.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I stand today to join Chairman Shelby in presenting the nomination of Ms. Joan Dempsey to be Deputy Director of Central Intelligence for Community Management. The President has chosen well. In my view, there is no one in the country more qualified to be Deputy DCI for Community Management than Joan Dempsey. I recall when Congress created these new confirmable positions there was concern voiced in some quarters that they would be filled by political people rather than by professionals. Ms. Dempsey proves the concern groundless. In fact, she is the consummate intelligence professional. She has managed a major national intelligence budget. She has brought together the strands of different intelligence disciplines to produce finished intelligence to support our military. She has overseen all the national intelligence agencies which are also combat support agencies of the Defense Department. She knows this business. Community management means allocating resources and work among the different agencies in the optimistically-titled ``intelligence community,'' and then combining the product of different agencies and disciplines into a piece of intelligence that helps keep the country safe. The Director of Central Intelligence has the responsibility to perform this function for national intelligence, and he has a staff to help him do it. Congress has believed for several years that he needed the clout of several Presidentially-appointed, Senatorially-confirmed officials to help him execute this management responsibility, and today we consider the nominee for the first and most senior of these positions. Success in this position will require the full range of management traits, but professional knowledge will probably be the most necessary: knowing the strengths and limitations of each agency in the community, knowing the technologies to improve analysis, production, and dissemination, knowing the needs of the many and varied customers for intelligence, from the President right down to the combat pilots getting briefed for a mission. You don't get this kind of knowledge out of a book. You get it from years of experience and the constant challenges of the real world of intelligence. Ms. Dempsey has that experience and has met those challenges. Intelligence is an essential element of our national power. Intelligence has always had the task of warning our policymakers and our military so they can deter war. Intelligence is also a force multiplier for our military, particularly now that intelligence rides and guides America's smart weapons. Really complete intelligence coverage provides a sense of American omniscience in the minds of our adversaries, and this sense alone can have a deterrent effect. We are sometimes well short of omniscience, as in the recent case of India's nuclear tests. But knowledge superiority should be our constant goal, and the position for which Ms. Dempsey has been nominated has a central role in achieving it. Technology has changed, the threats have changed, but the requirement for the best intelligence is as acute as ever. I am certain Ms. Dempsey will help us achieve that goal.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, writer Willa Cather fashioned from her experiences uncommon stories of the character of Nebraska's people and landscapes. It is my pleasure to pay tribute to Cather because, like many Nebraskans, her writing continues to inspire me. This year, we celebrate three major anniversaries in Cather's life. Seventy-five years ago, Cather won the Pulitzer Prize for ``One of Ours.'' One of her best known novels, ``My Antonia,'' will have its 80th anniversary on September 21st. Finally, December 7th marks the 125th anniversary of her birth. Cather's writings illustrate a Nebraska of stark landscapes, epic frontiers, and mysterious grandeur. Her characters are often placed in a Nebraska panorama to which Cather gave breathtaking expression. Shortly after moving from the east to Nebraska at the age of nine, Cather realized that that shaggy grass country had gripped me with a passion I have never been able to shake. It has been the happiness and the curse of my life.'' For Cather in ``My Antonia,'' Nebraska is raw and vast, the material out of which countries are made. . . naked as the back of your hand.'' Out of the passion she felt for Nebraska's materials, Cather wrote with unparalleled sensitivity about the soil, trees, and wildflowers of the landscape. In The ``Song of the Lark,'' the cottonwoods are the light- reflecting, wind-loving trees of the desert, whose roots are always seeking water and whose leaves are always talking about it, making the sound of rain.'' The inhabitants of the land are connected to and determined by this landscape. Thus, in many of Cather's novels, the character is a pioneer, whether literally or as artist, one breaking new ground, finding his or her own path, creating his or her own landscape. In the hands of Cather's sparse and evocative prose, questions of the pioneering self shaped by experience and tested by difficulty indicate Cather's commitment through her characters to integrity. Readers continue to feel the special relationship between the wonder of Nebraska and the dignity of its people through Cather's well known novels ``O Pioneers, My Antonia, One Of Ours,'' and ``Death Comes for the Archbishop,'' as well as her poetry and other stories. I invite you to join me in honoring Willa Cather on the 75th anniversary of her Pulitzer Prize, the 80th anniversary of ``My Antonia,'' and in memory of her 125th birthday. In ``The Wild Land,'' Cather writes, The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.'' Thanks to Cather's artistry, we continue to be moved by the written recordings of Nebraska's history.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, there are an awful lot of us who are now, as we head through the deliberation of this bill and the various amendments being offered--and, to be clear, I voted, on the budget resolution, in favor of the amendment being offered now by the Senator from New Hampshire. I will disclose, though, that I do not know how I am going to vote on the same amendment because I want to get a bill. I want the fine work that Senator McCain and the Commerce Committee have done to yield a piece of legislation that the President can sign. I think it is terribly important. There are parts of this bill, on the other hand, that give me a considerable amount of concern. First of all, I hope that at some point I can have this discussion in the presence of the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who understands these issues very, very well. First of all, I would like to talk about how we got to where we are today. The whole thing began back in 1996. There were a lot of discussions between the attorneys general, led by Michael Moore from the State of Mississippi. A settlement ensued as a result of one company, Liggett, disclosing information. This accelerated rapidly, and on the June 20, 1997, an agreement was reached. An agreement was reached between the tobacco companies and 40 States' attorneys general, and the settlement reached is very important for this debate because a number of things were in that settlement. First of all, there was a stipulation. The tobacco industry has said that nicotine is addictive. I know a bit about addiction. I was a University of Nebraska graduate of the College of Pharmacy. I practiced pharmacy for a while. I remember in 1965 waiting in a Lincoln pharmacy for the opportunity to have my character molded by the U.S. Navy, having passed a physical examination provided by my Government. I was practicing pharmacy. Remember, there was a great debate going on at that time in this country not just about Medicare but the regulation of drugs. At that time, in 1965, the most rapidly moving pharmaceutical in our store was a drug called Dexadrine, among other amphetamines. It is a very highly potent stimulant. At the time, the industry was saying it was habit forming, not addictive. In 1965, prior to the enactment of changes in the law that increased the power of the FDA--and I point out to colleagues that I believe perhaps the most important section of this bill is title I, which gives the FDA increased authority to regulate tobacco and tobacco products. The tobacco industry stipulated and agreed that nicotine is addictive on June 27, 1997. That should not be in dispute today. In 1965, Dexadrine was moving very rapidly with a powerful capacity to addict, and it was addicting a lot of people. We had to fill prescriptions for Seconal and phenobarbital just so people could get to sleep at night after taking this stuff. After this regulation went into effect, we saw a dramatic change in the accessibility to this particular drug. It went from being a very highly used medication to where, today, you would be lucky to see, even in a high-volume store, 100 Dexadrine a year. Today, it is only allowed to be used for narcolepsy. Mr. President, a couple of weeks ago I had a meeting with some high school students at Burke High. I talked as well to other young people who are smoking. About 7 to 12 of these young people were smoking. What is quite apparent to me, Mr. President--and my suspicions are, though I have not polled it and I don't have accurate information--my guess is that most people in Nebraska, or a large percentage of people, don't understand that the landscape changed last June 20 with the tobacco industry saying yes, nicotine is addictive. They don't understand what being addicted means. They don't understand that there is a physical need and withdrawal symptoms associated with individuals who try to stop. Certainly, these young people did not understand what it means to be addicted. Indeed, when I asked them if they expected to be smoking when they reached adulthood, the majority of them said no, they did not expect to be--even though we now know that 90 percent of the people who smoke today started smoking when they were young. The fact that we now know that nicotine is addictive and the tobacco industry is stipulating in their settlement that it is, it is an important and relevant fact, because what happens now is that we are transformed from dealing with an issue that has to do with personal freedom; we are now dealing with an issue that has to do with this question: Are we going to make an effort to save lives? In addition to being addicted, they are addicted to a substance that contains toxins, including carbon monoxide and other chemicals, which, if taken as directed, will result in the premature death of 1 out 36 people who start smoking, as well as all kinds of other health problems associated with tobacco. So I want to begin, as I evaluate--and all colleagues should--whether to vote for the McCain bill, to understand that the industry agreed to the FDA regulation on June 27, 1997, as a consequence of the effort of Michael Moore and 39 other State attorneys general, and a settlement was reached. What the Commerce Committee has done is report out almost everything that was in that settlement. The tobacco industry agreed to pay $15 billion a year. Indeed, they agreed to pay $50 billion in punitive damages. At the time, I remember in the aftermath of the settlement--and it seems like a hundred years ago, but it was less than a year ago--the big debate was: Would that $50 billion be tax deductible? Would the companies be able to deduct it from their income? Or would it have to be a post-tax payment? But it is $50 billion in punitive damages. They agreed to pay $15 billion more. What Senator McCain and the Commerce Committee have done is say, since that time, a number of things have happened. We had a settlement in Texas, a settlement in Florida, and, most important, a settlement in Minnesota, which has the tobacco industry not only stipulating everything they did before, but releasing some 36,000 documents, most of which are still unread, my guess is, by most Members of Congress--certainly me. But just reinforcing for our citizens the idea, yes, I knew it was addictive; and, yes, I've been targeting your kids; and, yes, I've been doing some other things to try to increase sales, even though I understand that it is a terribly big public health problem. The Commerce Committee has said we now have them agreeing to a 10- percent increase in Minnesota, and, instead of $15 billion, we are going to ramp it up to $23 billion a year. When we talk to citizens at home, please don't leave a citizen in your State with the illusion that somehow Congress or the Commerce Committee on their own came up with this number. This was agreed to by the tobacco industry on June 20, 1997. And, after the settlement in Minnesota, it seems to me the Commerce Committee is well within reason to say that instead of $15 billion it ought to be $23 billion. That is where we are. Mr. President, the next thing I have to ask is, What are we going to do with it? What is the purpose? Where are we going? What is the idea that is most important with this legislation? For me, the most important idea--it may be different for others--is I want to save lives. I think that is what we are talking about. One out of three who start smoking dies prematurely. In Nebraska, $250 million is spent just on cigarettes; 100 million packs of cigarettes are sold every single year in Nebraska. I want to decrease the number of people who are buying cigarettes. If I can get 50,000 of the 350,000 Nebraskans who smoke, if I can help them stop smoking, not only do I save the lives, I save the money. All of this conversation about a tax increase and being concerned about low-income Americans and the taxes they are going to be paying, if they would do this bill right, we would help people stop smoking and reduce their out-of-pocket spending for tobacco, not to mention the out-of-pocket spending for health care, the out-of-pocket spending that occurs as a result of not being able to go to work, and the out-of-pocket spending for some other things. I ask Members: Have you ever talked to anybody who has been able, after a long period of time, to quit smoking how they feel? Are they happy? Are they glad? The answer is always yes. They can do more. They and their kids are enjoying life better. They feel healthier. They have more money in their pocket as a consequence of not having the addiction as a part of their life. They do not say, ``Gee, I am mad at you because you helped me stop smoking.'' They are glad. This piece of legislation, as far as I see it, that we are debating right now is an opportunity for me to go home and say, ``We are going to try to save lives, not just to try to prevent young people from smoking''--we have about 30,000 people in Nebraska who are underage who are smoking cigarettes--but also to go to the adults, the 350,000 adults who are buying 100 million packs of cigarettes a year, and help them stop smoking, to save their lives, to decrease their out-of-pocket spending for tobacco, and to give them a shot at the American dream--at least connected with tobacco--and able to say, ``I am healthier and, as a consequence of being healthier, happier as well.'' There are two provisions of this bill--I don't know if the Senator from Arizona wants to respond to any of them or not--that concern me. The first is the provision for the tobacco farmers. I will wait until my friend from Kentucky comes down to the floor. I will have a chance. The Senator from Indiana has an amendment down there. First of all, I want to say that without the Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from South Carolina, there would be no provisions in here for tobacco farmers. I agree with them; there need to be some provisions for tobacco farmers to help them as we move from the old era, when we were neutral as to the health impact of this naturally grown product, to a point where we now say we want to help people stop smoking because it is killing them, it is ruining their lives and ruining their health. As we go from that point, it seems to me reasonable that we ought to have some transition payments for Americans who earn their living by growing tobacco. There are about 740,000 acres of tobacco acreage nationwide. To put that in perspective, one of the reasons I am concerned about it is, in Nebraska we have about 22.5 million acres for other crops, and 1.5 billion nationwide; 740,000 acres of tobacco quota against about 1.5 billion acres for all other agricultural products. Freedom to Farm, which I think we ought to pattern the tobacco language after, Freedom to Farm was about $36 billion total for 1.5 billion acres. It seems to me we ought to be looking for some way to pattern the tobacco farmer portion on what we have done for other farmers in this country as we transition into an era where we say, ``You are going to have the freedom to make your own decisions, plus the market will allow you to decide how you are going to plant and what you are going to plant.'' I have a very difficult time voting for something that has $28 billion for tobacco farmers when I did $36 billion for all farmers, including mine in Nebraska. We paid out at that time about 10 percent of the value of the crop. Ten percent of the value of the crop was one of the bases to come up to use for the payment. I hope again I am able to work with the Senator from Kentucky, because I applaud his work, the work of the Senator from South Carolina, and the work of the Senators from Virginia and North Carolina. Lots of people have had input into this to make certain we do something to help the tobacco farmer. The question is, How much are we going to help? I am troubled by that provision, I say to my friend, the chairman of the committee, who is trying to figure out how to manage this across the line. I hope to be constructive in getting that done. I voted against putting another 40 cents on. I will probably vote against the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire, even though I voted for it before when it was on the budget resolution, because it seems to me that you have increased the cap on liability. I think it was 6.5 in the first bill. It is now $8 billion a year. That is a lot of money. We are not giving the tobacco companies--I think people said we don't want to give tobacco companies special treatment. They will be required under this legislation to pay $23 billion a year into a tobacco trust fund. That is not my idea of giving somebody in the private sector special treatment. It seems to me that it is a reasonable tradeoff in order to be able to fight this battle. To me, the most exciting thing about this legislation, now that we have the full truth about what tobacco can do, is I will be able to go home and say this legislation will enable us to organize community- based efforts to help not just our children keep from starting to smoke but also help in my State 350,000 adults who currently smoke whose lives, in all likelihood, are going to be shorter and they will be less healthy as a consequence. That leads me to the second concern I have. Again, I have an amendment on the tobacco farmer portion, depending on the disposition of the Lugar amendment, that will place a greater emphasis on prevention and smoking cessation. I really have come to a point now where I say what makes it work for me is to be able to go home to Nebraska and say this bill helps save lives. That is what we are doing. If I can get that done, if it enables me to save lives, it seems to me I have something that I can make work at home. To that end, the amendment that I have prepared--and I am not going to lay it down right now because we have one that we are debating-- would take the money and, instead of ramping up from I think $15 billion initially up to $23 billion a year, the breakdown is, 40 percent of that money goes to the States, 22 percent of that money goes to NIH, 22 percent of that money goes for smoking cessation, education, and international trafficking--to stop international trafficking--and, as I understand it, 16 percent I think is left that goes for tobacco farmers. As I said, I think that 16 percent is too high. We have prepared an amendment, depending upon the disposition of the Lugar amendment and depending upon my ability to be able to negotiate about the Senators who worked hard on this provision. But I believe what would also increase the likelihood of being able to save lives at home, being able to make this thing not just a situation where, as a result of increased Federal regulation through FDA, as a result of the tobacco industry raising the price because of the fees they will be paying into this national trust fund, another way to do it would be to take that 40 percent that is allocated to the States and add the 6 percent that ends up being estimated for prevention in the third area, and consolidating all that into a block grant that would go for smoking prevention and cessation, insist in the language of the law that the Governors put together a community-based organization to come up with a plan to help people stop smoking and have HHS approve that plan. I think it would allow us to have a steady stream of money that would come into each one of our States. I am uncomfortable about having anybody but Members of Congress deciding how money is going to be spent. I love my Governor. I love all Governors. They are all great Americans. But as far as I am concerned, the Constitution gives me the authority to vote to raise taxes and vote to spend money, and I think that is what we ought to be doing. As concerned as I am about getting more money into Medicaid, the thing that I have to do in order to make this successful is I have to have those people out there who are smoking stop smoking. So I would at some point come to the floor and offer an amendment. I hope to have some conversations with the chairman and the ranking member on this, because I think we could improve the bill substantially if our goal is to save lives and reduce the number of people who are smoking, not just stopping young people from becoming smokers but helping those who are already smoking stop in order to be able to save their lives. It seems to me we ought to consider that the funding language in here needs to be altered and a much greater emphasis placed--indeed, it ought to be the most important emphasis--on smoking cessation programs. Let the Governors write a community-based plan. Make them engage the community. It is much more likely at the local level that real answers are going to be found for this problem. It is not as easy as it sounds not just because of addiction but because of other reasons to stop smoking. I think it is much more likely they will come up with plans that work. Let us, as a consequence of our concern for public health, work with those community groups to make certain that the money is going in that direction. I discussed as well with the managers creating a tobacco scholar through NIH funding for every State. I don't know about other Senators, but I need a lot of help with numbers, with what the research is saying. Not only do we put more money into research, but it is likely that all of us are going to see State-based efforts to reduce smoking, and if we have to scramble around and try to figure out what the data is, to try to figure out what the facts are, it gets difficult to do it. So I am here. I say to my friend from Arizona, I like what you have done. You have a good bill, it seems to me, in the Chamber, one that if we can get it passed, get beyond all the problems of price increases and concern for the poor, and so forth, I say to my friend from Arizona, will enable you to say you have saved millions of lives as a consequence of this law. That will be my hope. And, indeed, I believe it is reasonable to assume, as I look at the language of this law, that we will as a result of helping people not smoke to begin with and stop smoking if they have made that decision and became addicted to nicotine, their lives will be happier and longer and healthier as a consequence of this legislation. Thus, there is an urgency to do it, an urgency to make sure we don't make the perfect the enemy of the good. There are lots of good amendments coming up. I have some ideas. All of them are not going to be incorporated. We still have the House to get through and the conference to get through. So I praise very highly the fine work the chairman has done on this thing, and I hope the wishes of the majority leader will be heard and that we are able to get this thing done before we get out of here for the Memorial Day recess. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I thank both the Senator from Arizona and the Senator from Massachusetts for allowing me to speak. I have come to the floor to speak about the tobacco bill. I began several months ago to have conversations with Nebraskans about this legislation. The first question I was asked is, Why do we need it? What has happened here? All of a sudden we have a $368 billion to a $516 billion piece of legislation being introduced and people want to know how we got to where we are today. I would like to describe, at least as I see it, how we got to where we are today in May of 1998, from a point just as recently as 2 years ago when there was no piece of legislation on the floor even remotely approaching something like this. ``Why all of a sudden is Congress taking on something like this,'' is the question I get asked. I will try to give Nebraskans an answer. The second question I get asked is, ``What are we going to do? What is the purpose here?'' On behalf of 1,600,000 Nebraskans, I will describe what this law is attempting to do, what is the piece of legislation which Senator McCain and Senator Kerry have brought before this body all about. The short answer to the question ``How did we get to this point?'' is that there was a potential lawsuit. There was litigation that was being proposed by States' attorneys general against tobacco companies. There was an attempt through the discovery process to get internal tobacco industry documents, and one of the tobacco companies said, ``We'll provide you the information you need to proceed with your case because we are concerned that what we know is going to be discovered anyway, that there was an effort to withhold information from the American people.'' What happened, in addition to some changes in State law, is that on the 20th of June, 1997, there was an agreement--it was not even a year ago--with 40 attorneys general in the United States and the tobacco industry. What they agreed to, Mr. President, on the 20th of June 1997, is very important, especially now that the tobacco companies have broken off from the settlement and are now advertising against this legislation in our States. Again, I emphasize that the reason we are debating this tobacco bill today is not because the tobacco industry is afraid of Congress, and what we may do to them. Rather, they are afraid of 12 faceless men and women of a jury. They are worried about the evidence being introduced and now stipulated in court, showing that the tobacco industry knew nicotine was addictive and lied about it. They were, and still are worried about what a jury would do with this evidence. They were, and still are scared that a jury will end up costing them a whole lot of money. That was the power that produced this offer to settle at $368 billion. That begs a question that Nebraskans need to try to answer. What was in that initial offer to settle? What were the tobacco companies willing to do back on the 20th of June 1997? First of all, they agreed to pay $368 billion over 25 years. They said they would make annual payments starting at $10 billion, going up to $15 billion by year 5, and every year thereafter. Although they do not spell it out in terms of a per-pack price increase like you hear them advertising against today, to make the $15 billion-per-year payment, the tobacco industry would have raised the price of cigarettes by approximately 62 cents a pack. Less than a year ago, they, not Congress, were going to raise the price of cigarettes by 62 cents a pack. Yet now, less than a year later, they have launched this huge advertising campaign trying to convince you that Congress is the bad guy trying to raise your taxes. They did this to settle lawsuits that they were afraid of. Indeed, the next amendment that we are going to talk about is their liability. They were concerned about future liability, and they were willing to pay out $15 billion a year, costing smokers about 62 cents a pack, so they would not have to worry about it anymore. They also agreed to pay $50 billion up front in punitive damages, meaning for all their past wrongs that they knew they were guilty of about misleading the American people, about nicotine's addictiveness, and marketing to our children. Next, they agreed to let the FDA regulate nicotine as a drug. Next, they agreed to pay huge fines if goals of reducing teen smoking were not met. And, finally, they agreed to restrict their advertising and marketing to youth. I say, Mr. President, that almost all of what I have just described is in this tobacco bill. That is what the Commerce Committee has voted out of Committee, and that is what we are debating on the floor today. Yet, less than a year after the tobacco settlement, the tobacco industry is spending millions of dollars trying to convince the American people that they had nothing to do with any of this and that Congress is the bad guy. This is the message they have paid lots of money to convince the people of. I have seen it in their television ads, on postcards that are being mailed in to my office, and from the thousands of phone calls that I have received. Everything that they are objecting to, and convincing others to object to, they agreed to back on the 20th of June 1997. A lot has happened since that settlement, Mr. President, that has caused significant change to this legislation. First, the tobacco industry settled a suit in Florida for $11 billion, they settled a suit in Texas for $15.3 billion--but the settlement that really changed the level of the playing field that we are on today was the one that happened 12 days ago in Minnesota on the 8th of May. After 3 months of a closely watched trial, just hours before the jury was going to get the case, Attorney General Hubert Humphrey III and the tobacco industry settled the case for $6.5 billion. There were lots of firsts in this settlement. This was the first settlement with a health insurance provider, in this case Blue Cross and Blue Shield, getting $469 million of the $6.5 billion. This was the first settlement where the tobacco industry signed a consent promising not to misrepresent the health hazards of smoking. And perhaps most significantly, this was the first settlement where the State received more money than it would have collected under the $368 billion settlement last June. The $6.1 billion they settled on 12 days ago is 50 percent more than the $4 billion they would have received under last summer's settlement. This is significant. This is the justification for going from 62 cents to $1.10 per pack. This is the justification for increasing the total amount that we are asking the tobacco industry to pay into the tobacco trust. Already, the tobacco industries have said they will raise prices to help defray some of their legal expenses. Indeed, in the past 9 months cigarette prices have been raised about 20 percent to help offset the tobacco industry's legal bills. Again, Mr. President, I tell you the history of this bill because it is important to understand how we got to where we are today. A single tobacco company broke away from the rest and disclosed information that enabled us to get a settlement on the 20th of June 1997. There has been additional settlements in Texas, in Florida, and most significantly in Minnesota that increased the dollar amounts from the base level agreement that was formed on the 20th of June 1997. Mr. President, the next issue to discuss, this bill and the goals of this bill, is a bit more difficult because things are changing at such a rapid pace. The way I see it, from talking to Nebraskans about this, is that the goal of this legislation is clear. We need to prevent teenagers from starting to smoke and to help those Americans who do smoke and want to quit. Why, Mr. President? Well, there are a couple of reasons why. The most important one of which is that we now know, stipulated in court documents, that nicotine is addictive. It is not habit forming, Mr. President. It is addictive. And the qualities of the addictive property of nicotine, taken together with the toxins that are contained in the tobacco itself, create a tremendous public health problem. I have 352,000 Nebraskans who smoke. I do not just want to raise the prices on those Nebraskans to try to decrease the amount of consumption, along with FDA regulation and advertising and other sorts of things, I want to make certain that the money in this bill helps them stop smoking. Now, that should be our crusade. That should be our cause. Tobacco kills prematurely nearly 400,000 people every year. Approximately 2700 of these are Nebraskans. Tobacco consumption produces tremendous health problems for the 352,000 Nebraskans who smoke. And the best way for me to mitigate the problem associated with an increased price is to give them a tax cut by helping them stop smoking so their medical costs and lost wages from missed work will be lower. My belief is, as we examine not only what this legislation does in terms of regulation, in terms of advertising, in terms of restrictions on smoking in public places to make sure that we reduce the number of people who become involuntary smokers as a result of inhaling secondhand smoke, is that we pay attention to how the money is spent. This is so we have some confidence that in our individual States those citizens out there who are currently smoking, who are addicted to nicotine as a consequence, that those individuals have a chance to get off this addiction that is reducing the quality of their health and decreasing their life spans. Mr. President, I examined the numbers in Nebraska. And 25 percent of the men in Nebraska smoke; 19 percent of women smoke; 39 percent of all my teenagers smoke. Nebraskans without a college degree are nearly twice as likely to smoke as those with a college degree. A third of Nebraskans with an income of $15,000 or less smoke compared to only 15 percent of those who earn $50,000 or more. Again, Mr. President, tobacco is killing my people. And 2,700 of the people who prematurely die every single year in the United States of America are Nebraskans. It is addictive. It causes a physical compulsion, a physical need. Taken in small doses, nicotine produces pleasurable feelings that make the smoker want to smoke more. A majority of smokers who become dependent on nicotine will suffer both physical and psychological withdrawal symptoms when they stop smoking. Their symptoms are going to include nervousness, headaches, irritability and difficulty in sleeping, among other things. Mr. President, a couple of weeks ago I met with 10 or 12 high school students in Burke High School in Omaha, NE. And I talked to them about this problem of addiction. I think about 7 of the 12 were smokers. One of the students explained to me that ``A cigarette,'' she said, ``is my friend.'' She is 16 years old. ``A cigarette,'' she said, ``is my friend . . . it is always there for me: When I'm driving in my car, when I'm stressed out, when I'm going through a crisis . . . cigarettes don't go out of town, I can count on them no matter what.'' I asked about 100 students to fill out a questionnaire about tobacco. And one of the more disturbing results in their answers was that the overwhelming majority of the current smokers said that although they smoked today at age 16, and though some may continue smoking until they are 18, the overwhelming majority of these students said, ``We're going to quit.'' Well, Mr. President, because unbeknownst to them--and until recently the tobacco companies were not stipulating that nicotine is addictive; now it is universally recognized that it is--unbeknownst to these students, they are addicted. They have a physical craving for something and it is going to be very difficult for them to stop. Unbeknownst to them, 90 percent of the 352,000 Nebraskans who smoke started smoking when they were teenagers. That is when it began. So unbeknownst to them, they may think they are going to quit, but unless we intervene, and unless we help them--and hopefully through this legislation we can help them--they are going to have a heck of a time kicking this addiction. Mr. President, cigarette smoking is harmful. Cigarette smoking, we now know, is not only addictive, but taken as directed it is likely to decrease your life span, likely to shorten not only your ability to work, but shorten your time on Earth as well. Mr. President, I intend during the course of the debate on this legislation to focus my attention on a number of things. One, this legislation must prevent teen smoking. It must reduce the amount of teen smoking. I think perhaps one of the most important things we are doing is giving FDA the authority to regulate. I was practicing pharmacy back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth in 1965, when Congress was debating whether or not to regulate Dexedrine, 15 milligrams. This was a weight loss pill. It was the most rapidly moving pharmaceutical in my drugstore in 1965. You could get a prescription from a doctor and refill it every other day if you wanted to for 500 Dexedrine. And the pharmaceutical industry was saying, ``No. It is habit forming; it is not addictive.'' Today, through FDA regulation, Dexedrine 15 milligrams is available only for narcolepsy, and only small amounts are sold. I think the most likely reduction of teen smoking is going to occur not through the price increase, but through FDA regulation. In addition, Mr. President, I intend to bring amendments to the floor to say that we have to make certain that we have community-based efforts in our States to reduce smoking of the adults out there who are also addicted. It has to do that. It cannot be a top-down effort. It has to be a community-based effort. The citizens are more likely to know what needs to be done. I believe every single State needs to have some kind of a research scholar connected to NIH to lead us in this effort. This is a tremendous public health problem. It has come upon us, the history of the bill and the seriousness of this problem, relatively quickly. I am hopeful we can make certain this legislation gives us a fighting chance in my State, at least not just of increasing prices and increasing the regulatory action, but of engaging the citizens themselves and the smokers themselves in a serious challenge of trying to break themselves from this habit. Finally, I know we are going to be debating on this floor the provisions relating to the tobacco farmers. I am of the opinion that tobacco farmers need some assistance. It was not in the original settlement. I praise Senator Ford and Senator Hollings for their work in trying to get provisions in there, but I believe these provisions are too generous and we need to scale them back. It is difficult for me in a State that grows corn, soybeans, wheat, barley, and lots of other products--under the Freedom to Farm Act they are getting substantially less than what tobacco farmers will be getting out of the program. I can make a case tobacco farmers ought to get more, but I cannot make a case they ought to be given all that is in this bill. It is my hope that during the course of this constructive debate we are able to pass a piece of legislation that will increase regulation, that will increase the price, will increase our involvement in our community and decrease the consumption and the addiction to a substance which is killing our people. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I know the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania has come here for other reasons. He used to be chairman of the Intelligence Committee. I know from listening to him that he has an active interest in this issue as well. I have heard him comment many times. In fact, he asked the administration officials why they don't attempt to resolve the conflicts between India and Pakistan and India and China, and why do we not pay more attention to it. I suspect the Senator from Pennsylvania would rather not spend too much time commenting on it, but by coincidence, we have another individual on the floor who has an active interest in this issue.

Mr. KERREY. Personally, I think it would be a waste of money to direct the CIA to read the New York Times and report to us what is contained in there relevant to any part of the world, let alone in India.

Mr. KERREY. If we head in the direction of finding a scapegoat here what we will miss is an opportunity to debate what our policy ought to be toward the largest democracy on Earth. In addition to the other things that the Senator said about India, this is also the largest democracy. A billion people live in India. Not an easy country to govern. They have a Hindu nationalist party that campaigned on a platform, and that platform was that nuclear testing would resume. They were not secretive about that. They did not operate in the shadows on that. They were upfront and they followed through. It seems to me we should blame ourselves for not paying attention to what is going on there and blame ourselves for not giving enough consideration or concern about the direction of the largest democracy on Earth.

Mr. KERREY. I am at the end of my question, Mr. President. I just wanted, in addition to making the point that the distinguished Senator has been very critical of the CIA--and I think he is quite right in this particular instance to say though we may need some questions answered, the biggest question is why didn't anybody in either the administration or in this Congress notice that the Hindu nationalist party had campaigned on a promise to make India a nuclear power. What does the distinguished Senator from New York think this Congress needs to do to make certain that we are paying attention in the aftermath of these sanctions to what India is doing, to make certain that, first, we don't miss an opportunity to get them to ratify this treaty, and in addition, to get them to do a number of other things that not only would be in their best interests, but to be in our best interests, as well, since a third of the Earth's population lives between India and China in this very, very volatile region to which we obviously have not paid a sufficient amount of attention.

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I want to ask the Senator a question. First of all, I don't think there is anybody in the Senate who has been more consistently critical of the Central Intelligence Agency and has been more diligent in trying to change the way we classify documents. I find both of them to be a bit connected to his comments. One of the concerns I have in all this is that we look for a scapegoat. Now, one of the things that citizens need to understand is that increasingly we are getting our intelligence through open sources. That is good because when you get your information through open sources there is a debate. Is what somebody said true or not true--and you debate such things. I quite agree with what the Senator said earlier that for us to be going at the CIA right now because they didn't report this is a little ridiculous. All we have to do is read articles of John Burns over a half dozen months.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I rise today to voice my support for the Agriculture Research Reauthorization bill. This bill reaffirms our commitment to American agriculture in a number of ways. It reauthorizes existing research programs at our land grant universities and goes one step further in creating a new, competitive research initiative to study some of the most cutting edge agricultural issues of the day: food safety, agricultural biotechnology, precision agriculture and the competitiveness of small and medium sized farms. As well, it maintains our commitment to the federal crop insurance program, perhaps the most successful public-private partnership our government has to boast of. And just as importantly, it restores our commitment to legal immigrants who are elderly, disabled, or children. Restoring food stamp benefits to these groups of people is simply the right thing to do. But while I commend the conferees for their work in satisfying many parties with their work on this bill, I rise to say it does not go far enough. We have perhaps no more important research need than that of agricultural research. It represents 2% of the total federal research budget. Yet, between today and thirty years from now, we are going to add 5 billion people to the planet. And all those people are going to need to be fed. And they are likely to be fed on less acres, not more. The caloric requirement to feed those additional 5 billion people will be more than the caloric consumption for the past 10,000 years. It is a huge increase in consumption requirements. And our research is the key to solving that problem. There is a tremendous amount at stake here for those who worry about peace and prosperity. We take this agricultural research for granted. Indeed, we take all of agriculture too much for granted. But agricultural research has added so much value to our productive capacities, as well as to the quality of our lives, that it is ridiculous to be struggling to pay for it as we are right now. At the same time, we are going to double the funding for the National Institute of Health, and double the funding for the National Science Foundation. I support both of those things. But it won't do us any good at all to live longer through NIH investments if we short agricultural research and we aren't able to feed ourselves. And that's precisely what will happen if we don't come up with some satisfactory way to guarantee a long-term funding of ag research at higher levels than we have provided in the past.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, the Telecommunications Act of 1996 was clear; competition and consumer choice are to be the hallmarks of the new telecommunication's market. However, the transition to competition has been anything but clear to consumers. The growing pains of the telecommunications industry have proved to be very confusing to customers who lack full information about the various costs associated with telecommunications services. This lack of information is very troublesome for customers who are trying to make sense of the telecommunications market. In order to help consumers through this confusing morass of information, I recently joined Senators Rockefeller and Snowe to introduce S. 1897 the Consumer Protection Act. Today, Senator Dorgan joins us as cosponsor of this legislation in the form of an amendment to S. 1618 the Consumer Anti- Slamming Protection Act. Under the provisions of this amendment, if a company chooses to depict charges that are linked to federal policy on their bills, then the company will be required to depict the benefits of that action on the same bill. This requirement allows customers to see what they are paying for so that they can gain a better understanding of the costs associated with a national telecommunications network. As we transition from the rigid world of monopoly to a competitive market where consumers have choice, we must make sure that customers have all of the facts. Competition depends upon free flowing information and the Consumer Protection Act gives consumers the facts they need to make good choices in a competitive market. I strongly urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, we are down on the Democratic side to just one or two amendments that may require rollcall votes, and those we may be able to work out. We have a longer list on the Republican side. Mr. President, may we have order in the Chamber?

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendments be dispensed with.

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I am hopeful that on the Republican side, Members will come down and start talking to us or, if we can't work them out, get them offered. Senator Faircloth has an amendment which he is going to offer just as soon as I get two accepted that we have worked out with the chairman. I think we can run through this relatively rapidly. The previous amendment that was just defeated is one of the controversial ones. Senator Faircloth has one that is controversial. I think Senator Mack does. There are a few others. After that, most of the controversy is out of this bill. I am hopeful we can get Members to come down here so we don't end up, as the majority leader said, staying here longer than is warranted, given the general agreement that is on the legislation. Amendments Nos. 2358 and 2359, en bloc

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

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, these are two amendments on which I worked very closely with the chairman. They deal with two problems, one of which is a longstanding problem that we have had with the Internal Revenue Service, and that is how to deal with taxpayers who are willfully noncompliant. This requires the Commissioner to do a study of this issue and report back to the Finance Committee. Members need to understand, approximately the average for all taxpayers is nearly $1,600 per taxpayer for noncompliance, with penalty for willful noncompliance. The second amendment came as a consequence of a witness that we had in the hearings that the chairman held, Mr. Earl Epstein of Philadelphia. He was talking about putting teeth in the provision dealing with violations of fair debt collection practices. And at the chairman's suggestion, what we have asked for in this study is that the new Treasury inspector general for tax administration also look at this and provide Congress with a report, an annual report outlining any violations of the fair debt collection practices that we have included in this bill. Mr. Epstein notes, this is likely to result in better attention being paid to collection abuses as ``no Commissioner would be happy to report significant abuses, to say nothing of awards for damages [or] for failures to enforce proper authority over collection agents.'' It is an important amendment. I appreciate the source of it was the chairman's hearings, and I appreciate a chance to work with the chairman to get this worked out.

Mr. KERREY. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I send two amendments to the desk and ask for their immediate consideration.

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I have not seen the amendment yet. Can we get a copy of the amendment before we agree to a time limitation? May I ask the Senator, this strikes several lines, inserts several lines. It is not clear to me from the amendment what it does. Can you just----

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to. Ms. MIKULSKI addressed the Chair.

Mr. KERREY

Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I had an amendment earlier that I had withdrawn that would increase the amount of oversight, or actually create in statute a requirement for annual hearings by the Finance Committee, and I would prefer to merely in a colloquy with the chairman of the Finance Committee get this matter settled without having to put it into law. I would like to express again my concern and interest in making certain that congressional oversight is increased. I think it is a little bit like preaching to the choir here, asking this particular chairman to do it, but I would like to declare that I think we should be having a yearly hearing hosted by the Senate's Finance Committee with the IRS Commissioner, with the chair of the new oversight board created in this new law, the National Taxpayer Advocate, and the new Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration; as the four witnesses. The purpose of the hearing would be to review overall progress by the IRS in serving the needs of taxpayers. I would simply ask as part of this colloquy whether or not the chairman would be willing to hold such a hearing on a yearly basis?