John Kerry

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, today I am introducing a resolution to insure that our troops get the pay raise they deserve. We are all proud of our men and women in the American military who continue to perform magnificently in Iraq, Afghanistan and around the world. They represent the best that this country has to offer, and America owes them and their families a special debt of honor and gratitude. In light of their sacrifice, my resolution simply states that the Congress and the President should support a 3.5-percent increase in military pay in 2008 and provide a special survivor indemnity allowance to help American military families. Unfortunately, these provisions are opposed by the Bush administration. On May 16, the Office of Management and Budget's Statement of Administration Policy for the House fiscal year 2008 Department of Defense Authorization bill opposes section 644 of the bill, which would pay military families a monthly special survivor indemnity allowance from the Department of Defense Military Retirement Fund, calling the existing benefits ``sufficient.'' The Statement of Administration Policy also ``strongly opposes'' the provision of the House bill which provides a 0.5-percent increase in military pay above the President's proposed 3.0 percent across-the-board pay increase, calling it ``unnecessary.'' I am concerned that the Bush administration's actions have failed to appropriately honor our military families who have made the ultimate sacrifice. These actions also stand in direct contrast to the will of the American people who support all efforts to support our troops. Just go to the Military Times' own blog and read what the troops themselves say, more eloquently than any politician could put it: ``If there is someone in the administration that feels that we, the hard working American soldiers, don't need additional pay raises, then maybe they should get from behind their desk and pick up a gun and vest and go stand guard at the entry control points in Iraq. And while they are out there, lets take away their 6 figure income and give them $3.50 per day on top of anywhere from $15 to $45K per year. For all that we give to keep our country safe, the administration should at least want to help us eliminate any burden we may have financially. No I'm not saying make us rich and no one who enters the armed services expects to ever be rich but we don't expect to have to take out loans just to put food on the table for our families either.'' On this issue of fundamental fairness, the administration told Congress to back down. On this question, the troops will not back down and neither will we. Those who have stood for us should know that we stand with them, today and always. Maintaining these provisions can do something to ease their burden, but truly supporting our troops requires that we act not just as individuals, but as a nation. I ask all my colleagues to support this resolution to honor our troops and our military families.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, history has proven it was a mistake to give this President the power to go to Iraq, and I believe history will prove it is a mistake to give him the open-ended power that this supplemental bill leaves in his hands. This war is not what this President says it is. I believe we have an obligation not to vote for the continuation of a policy that empowers the President to simply continue the war at his discretion. I have listened to some of my colleagues and others who have suggested that this bill will somehow change the course. I have to respectfully disagree. This bill does not provide a strategy worthy of our soldiers' sacrifice. Instead it permits more of the same, a strategy that relies on sending American troops into the alleys and back roads of Iraq to referee a deadly civil war. Instead of the same misguided strategy, I believe we had an opportunity. While I understand the votes and I understand the threat of veto, and I am not new to this process, I still believe we had an opportunity to elicit a legitimate, fundamental change and some commitments from this administration with respect to the way in which we would hold Iraqis accountable and the way in which this administration itself would be held accountable. I say with all due respect, that is what the American people voted for in November 2006. That is what they have a right to expect from this Congress. The fact is, we could show our support for our troops in many different ways in this legislation. I don't believe the only way to show that support is by letting the President have full discretion to continue to do what the President has been doing for these last years. I believe the way you do it is by requiring--and setting up real measurements with real consequences--the Iraqis to stand up for Iraq. I am convinced, because the last years have proven it, the President is wrong to keep suggesting we will stand down when they stand up. I believe they will not stand up until we stand down. That is the reality. The fact is, the benchmarks in this supplemental are not meaningful benchmarks. The President has a complete waiver. All we require is a report, a certification from the President. Is there anybody here, based on the statements the President has made for the last 5 years, who doesn't know exactly what the President is going to say with respect to progress? All we require is that there be some measurement of ``progress.'' Let me say very clearly, because I have been there before in this argument, I know what happens when you vote in a way that people can easily try to pick up and construe as a vote other than what it is. There is good in this supplemental. Yes, we need money for readiness for troops, and every single one of us wants our troops to be as ready as they can be. Yes, it is good that there is money for care for veterans, and our veterans deserve the best care in the world. In fact, the money available in this bill is a far cry from the real needs of our veterans with respect to mental health, outreach centers, the veterans centers, the VA, care in the hospitals. That could be a great deal stronger. But we are for that. We are also for the money for Katrina. So let me make it clear to anybody who wants to try to distort this vote: I am in favor of the money for readiness. I am in favor of giving our troops all the care they need and deserve. I am in favor of money for support for Katrina. But the fundamental gravamen of this bill, the heart of this bill, is the strategy with respect to the war in Iraq. The heart of this bill are the consequences that we invite as a result of our votes. In the last week or two, I have been to three funerals, one funeral, the son of a man who was opposed to the war, a military man, a West Pointer, a man who gave his career, but he is opposed to this war. He dared to use the word to me in a conversation on the very day that his son was being buried about how it was important for us to redouble our efforts in the Senate to bring this to a close, how it was important for us not to allow these young men and women to have their lives ``wasted,'' a word that if any politician used, we would be pilloried for. But the father of a man who was being buried used that word on the very day his son was being buried. Another funeral I attended with a father who was overcome from emotion speaking from the pulpit, left the pulpit, came down, stood beside his son's coffin and said: I have to talk beside my son. He put his hand on the coffin and talked to us about his son's pride, his son's patriotism, his son's love of his fellow soldiers, his son's and his commitment to what he was doing personally but, obviously, the agony they feel over a war that so many people don't support. We have a responsibility with respect to those young men and women, with respect to those families. I believe that responsibility is not met when you give the President the very same power to continue on a daily basis what he has been doing for these last years. There isn't one person in this body who doesn't know what this President is going to say with respect to progress. How many times have we heard, in the midst of this war, Vice President Cheney come out: We are making progress. The President yesterday talked about progress, even as he mischaracterizes what this war is about, talking principally about al- Qaida, when all of us know this war is principally a civil war, a slaughter now between Shia and Sunni over the political spoils of Iraq. Our presence is empowering that. A few days ago, we set a new strategy, forcing Iraqis to do what only Iraqis can do. We gave the President the full discretion to leave the troops necessary to complete the training of Iraqi security forces, to chase al-Qaida and protect U.S. forces and facilities. In the sixth year of this war, which we will reach by next year, it seems to me fair that we should expect that Iraqis can assume that responsibility. The Iraqi Government has said they can. The Iraqi Parliament has said they don't want us there. Our own CIA tells us our presence is creating more terrorists, that we are creating a bigger target. We have become a recruitment tool for fundraising by al-Qaida out of Pakistan and Afghanistan. We now know that al-Qaida is using our presence in Iraq to raise money and recruit jihadists around the world. This policy is counter to the best security interests of our Nation. This vote is a vote about those best security interests. We demanded a little while ago a strategy of real benchmarks. There is not in this supplemental one benchmark that can be enforced, not one. I don't disagree with the benchmarks themselves. Yes, we want an oil deal. But I listened to Secretary of State Rice in front of our committee months ago say: The oil deal is just about to be approved, right around the corner. It hasn't even been put to the Parliament. It is not approved months later and too many lives lost later because of the procrastination of Iraqi politicians. How do you say to an American family that their son or daughter ought to give up their life so Iraqi politicians can spin around and play a game between each other at our expense? It is unconscionable. It is bad strategy. It is bad policy. It defies common sense. That is what this vote is about: why and when we, as a Congress, are going to insist--now, I understand they do not want the deadline, and the President insists he is not going to have the deadline, notwithstanding--notwithstanding--we gave the President full discretion to leave troops there to complete the training, to leave troops to chase al-Qaida, to leave troops there to protect American facilities and forces. Those kids we are burying deserve an honest debate, not a debate where people come to the floor and say: Oh, these are the cut-and-run folks. These are the folks who are looking for defeat. It is an insult to any Member of the Senate to suggest somebody is actively looking for defeat. We have a different way of finding success. As Thomas Jefferson said: Dissent is the highest form of patriotism. Even the patriotism of people who offer a different road has been questioned. Well, not any longer, and I have no fear about casting this vote against this because this is the wrong policy for Iraq. This continues the open-ended lack of accountability. This allows the President to certify whatever the President wants, to waive whatever the President wants. I promise my colleagues, we will be back here in September having the same debate with the same benchmark questions, and they will not have moved in their accountability. Even the strategy is still changing. Let me ask my colleagues something: When can you remember in American history hearing about a President of the United States casting about to find a general to act as the czar for a war, where four four-star generals said no to the President? Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute.

Mr. KERRY. General Sheehan, a career military man--these are people whose lives are committed to defending our Nation, whose lives are committed to the troops, who, when a President would call them, you would think would be so honored and so unbelievably challenged by the moment, they would say: Of course, Mr. President, I will do what I need to do for my country. But four of them said no. And one of them was quoted, in saying no: Why would I do that because they don't know where the hell they're going. And as he said it, he said: I would go over there for a year, I would get an ulcer, I would come back, and it would be the same thing. We have an obligation to vote for a change. That is why I will cast my vote ``no'' on this supplemental--yes for the money for troops; yes for care; yes for readiness; yes for all the things we need to do; but, most importantly, a ``yes'' that we are not able to cast for a change in the entire dynamic with the Iraqis themselves and the accountability we will hold this administration to, the accountability we hold the Iraqis to, and, ultimately, a strategy for real success, not just in Iraq but in the Middle East, where we have made Hamas more powerful, Iran more powerful, Nasrallah and Hezbollah more powerful, and our interests are being set back. It is time for us to get the policy right. That is how you support the troops.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 2 hours of debate. I don't think this is correct, the way I have been given it. I think we had a unanimous request that we have 2 hours of debate, initially equally divided, with 10 minutes to begin--the Senator from Oklahoma will speak in response to the Senator from Connecticut on Iraq. That will count against the time for the debate on my amendment. Then after those first 2 hours, we would again equally divide----

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I may also. But this is an important subject, and I do not want to get squeezed on the time. I had originally requested 1 hour, initially, and then 15 minutes at the back end, a half hour equally divided. I would like to stay with that. What we are really talking about is the difference of 15 minutes, which I may or may not use. But I say to my friend from Oklahoma, I think it is not asking too much of the Senate to have that protection of the extra 15 minutes. If we don't use it, we can both----

Mr. KERRY. I have no objection to that. I propound that request: 2 hours of debate initially equally divided and a subsequent half hour equally divided, and with the first 10 minutes to be taken by the Senator counted against him to speak on Iraq. Then I add, if I may, that no second-degree amendment be in order prior to the vote and, upon the use or yielding back of time but not before 5:35 p.m, the Senate would then proceed to vote in relation to the amendment; that the amendment by agreement must receive 60 affirmative votes to be agreed to; if it does not it would be withdrawn without further intervening action or debate.

Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair.

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I thank the Republican manager, the Senator from Oklahoma. I call up amendment No. 1094.

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

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that this be considered as an amendment to the Boxer substitute.

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, this amendment is a bipartisan amendment introduced with Senator Collins, Senator Feingold, Senator Carper, Senator Reed of Rhode Island, Senator Biden, Senator Whitehouse, and Senator Cantwell. This is an amendment regarding the impact of global climate change and the need for the Congress, as we consider spending money and requiring the Corps of Engineers to undertake certain projects across the country--it just seems logical as a matter of protecting the taxpayers' dollars as well as thinking about the future that we ask the Corps to include in their analysis of these projects judgments about the potential impact or the real impact of global climate change on that particular project. Now, I am going to speak more about the common sense of doing that, why it is important, but I will just say very quickly, if you look at New Orleans where we had a breach of the levees as a consequence of the hurricanes and the rise of the seas, it is clear that much of the infrastructure of America is designed without reference at all to what is now happening to climates, to water bodies, to the various challenges we face with respect to global climate change. So you need to sort of lay out the parameters within which we ought to be making a judgment about this particular issue. That begins by sort of setting forth the facts. We ought to deal with facts with respect to the situation on global climate change. This will be the first time Senators in the 110th Congress have been asked to vote on the floor in some way with respect to this issue of climate change. But it is an important opportunity for Senators to stand up and be counted with respect to this issue. All this amendment seeks to do, as a matter of common sense, is to ask the Army Corps of Engineers to factor climate change into their future plans. By doing that, we are taking a small corrective measure to a process that is currently flawed because it does not do that. Secondly, we are making a statement here in the Senate about the need to finally, once and for all, recognize the reality of what is happening with respect to climate change. The guiding principle behind this amendment is obvious: It is that climate change is real and it must be factored into our public policy in almost everything we do. If we are going to build buildings, those buildings have to be designed to a whole new set of specifications in terms of carbon emissions, in terms of energy use, because all downstream energy use will have an impact on how much coal and how much oil, alternative fuels, and other resources we need to consume. The fact is that other countries are moving much more rapidly than we are as a Federal Government. In fact, the States in the United States and cities in the United States are already moving with greater authority and determination than the Federal Government. So this is a chance finally for Senators to put themselves on record. Now, you can disagree on what--for instance, former Speaker Newt Gingrich and I held a debate a couple of weeks ago in which the former Speaker changed his position and agreed that climate change is taking place and that human beings are having an impact on that climate change. He agreed that we need to act, and urgently. Where we differed is in what actions to take, how those actions might be implemented, but there was no disagreement about the need to factor this into the policies in our country. As we contemplate these steps we need to take, we really need to understand that everything we do here is to inform our decisions as we go down the road. That is really the message this amendment ought to send, that when it comes to public policy, we understand the warnings of our scientists, the warnings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and we are going to respond effectively at the national level. The fact is, for too long this has been the subject of paid-for studies by industries that wanted to resist, but we know that in America, many of those industries have changed. USCAP is a partnership of some of the major corporations in America that have come together responsibly to take action with respect to climate change. Companies such as General Electric and Florida Power & Light, American Electric Power, DuPont, Wal-Mart, many others are now responding to the needs of this issue. It would be stunning indeed if the Senate somehow stood apart from what the private sector and these States and local communities are now engaged in. Let me summarize quickly some of the findings of the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The most recent report was written by about 600 scientists. It was reviewed by 600 experts. It was edited by officials from 154 governments. So you have Prime Ministers, Foreign Ministers, Economic Ministers, Trade Ministers, Environment Ministers, Presidents of countries all across the globe, who are engaged in moving forward. Only the United States has remained significantly on the sidelines. The basic facts are these: At both poles and in nearly all points in between, the temperature of the Earth's surface is heating up. It is heating up at a frightening and potentially catastrophic rate. The temperature we know has already increased about .8 degrees centigrade, 1.4 or so degrees Fahrenheit, and the warnings of the scientists I alluded to are that because of the carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere, about which we have the ability to do nothing, there will be an additional warming as a consequence of the damage that that does. So we are locked in, whether we like it, to a warming of somewhere between 1.4 and 1.6 degrees centigrade. These same scientists have reported to us through some 928 or so peer-reviewed studies. A lot of people are not sure what a peer-reviewed study is. After scientists have done their study and they have put it out to the public, that study is reviewed anonymously by another group of scientists with similar backgrounds and discipline. They then anonymously make an analysis of the methodology of those studies and of the conclusions that were drawn. What is interesting is that all 928 studies have determined that human beings, through our greenhouse gas emissions, are causing some of the increase of this temperature, and they have concluded similarly that there is a tipping point--nobody can predict precisely where it is--at which we get a catastrophic series of consequences which will then be too late to change. Scientists are inherently conservative people. They are people who make judgments based on facts, as they discern them, through their analysis, research, and experiments. They don't make wild pronouncements that can't be substantiated. Where there is doubt, they have expressed doubt every step of the way. Where something is not conclusive, they have said it is not conclusive. But now in this most recent report, they have reported to the world that there is a 90-percent likelihood that emissions of heat-trapping gases from human activities have caused ``most of the observed increase in global average temperature since the mid 20th century. Evidence that human activities are the major cause of recent climate change is even stronger than in prior assessments.'' In addition, they have said that the warming is unequivocal. The report concludes that it is ``unequivocal that earth's climate is warming as it is now evident from the observations of increases in global averages of air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snows and ice, and rising global mean sea level.'' The report also confirms that the current atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide and methane, two important heat-trapping gases, ``exceeds by far the natural range over the last 650,000 years.'' Since the dawn of the industrial era, concentrations of both gases have increased at a rate that is ``very likely to have been unprecedented in more than 10,000 years.'' These are some of the facts. I will relate more, if necessary, later. The bottom-line point to be made is, the opponents, those who say that it isn't happening, those who say that somehow we can't be certain that this is a contributing activity, have yet to produce one peer review study--not one--that conclusively shows why what is happening is happening and what is causing it, if it isn't the human activity that has been alluded to by these 154 countries and thousands of scientists. They certainly have an obligation to do that. Here is what is most alarming. I have been listening to and working with these same scientists since then-Senator Al Gore and I and a few others held the first hearings on global climate change in the Senate in 1987. In 1990, we went to Rio to take part in the Earth summit which George Herbert Walker Bush participated in as then President of the United States and signed a voluntary agreement to deal with the framework for global climate change. In the 17 years since we attended that conference, I have attended other conferences in Buenos Aires, in The Hague, and in Kyoto. I have watched while we have learned more and more with greater certainty about the impact of this science. Throughout that journey of 17 years, I have never heard the scientists as alarmed as they are today. The reason they are alarmed today is that what they have predicted for those 17 years is happening at a faster rate and in a greater quantity than they had predicted. What is our responsibility as public people? If the scientists, 928 studies strong, are saying to us, Senators, Presidents, Congressmen, here is what is happening, and they say it with conclusive evidence of exactly what is contributing to it, I believe we, as public people, have a responsibility to listen on behalf of the citizens. It is prudent to think about those things that we can do and ought to do in order to respond to this evidence. Here is what those scientists tell us. Jim Hansen is the leading climatologist of our country at NASA. He started warning about this in 1988. Since 1988, those warnings have become more urgent. He now says we have a 10-year window within which to get this right. If we want to avoid the potential of a tipping point, we have 10 years to act. We also know the scientists have revised their own estimates of what the tolerable range is with respect to global warming. A year and a half, 2 years ago, they were telling us we could tolerate 550 parts per million of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and that translated to a 3 degrees centigrade warming that could be allowed before you reached this catastrophic potential tipping point. They have changed that now. Those same scientists have now revised their estimate based on the evidence they are getting as a consequence of what is already happening all over the planet. All over the planet you can see the sea drying up. You can see the southern portion of the Sahara Desert getting dryer. You can see ocean currents shifting, species migrating. In South Carolina, they wouldn't have any duck hunting today if they didn't have farmed ducks because the patterns have changed. The same thing in Arkansas, where it has significantly altered. Hunters across the Nation are noticing changes in the migratory patterns of the prey they used to hunt. We are seeing 20 percent of the ice sheet in the Arctic has already melted and predictions are the entire ice sheet will disappear within the next 30 years. The Greenland ice sheet, go up there and visit, see the torrents of water rushing through the ice itself. The danger of that is, this is on rock. This is not floating on sea ice, where the displacement is already recognized in the ocean because it is floating in the ocean. This is ice on rock. As it melts, if it melts rapidly, it does spill into the ocean and it alters the levels. In addition, the warming of the ocean itself alters the levels. The warming expands the water, and as the water expands, the sea level rises and we are already seeing a measured level of increase of sea level according to all of our scientists. They don't doubt that. That is a stated fact. Sea level is rising. Are we going to have the Corps of Engineers go out and build a project that has to do with rising sea level and not take into account how much it may rise, over what period of time it may rise? What the consequences might be of a storm that is more intense, coupled with an increase of sea level? It is common sense that we ought to be taking those kinds of things into account. The scientists now tell us we can tolerate not 550 parts per million but 450 parts per million, and we can tolerate not 3 degrees centigrade increase but a 2 degrees centigrade increase. Why is that important? That is important because we can trace from before the industrial revolution the levels of carbon dioxide and temperatures of the Earth. Preindustrial revolution, the levels of greenhouse gases were at about 270 parts per million. It was about 500 or so billion tons of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It is measured by taking ice cores which we drill. You bore into the ice. You can go back tens of thousands of years, bore the ice and measure the levels of carbon dioxide, which also gives you an indicator of the temperature of the Earth. We see a complete parallel between the rise of the Earth's temperature, the rise of carbon dioxide and the industrial revolution itself over those 100 years. We have now changed the level of greenhouse gases from 270 parts per million to 380 parts per million. That is what we are living with today. So if we are living with 380 parts per million today and over 100 years plus we saw it go from 270 to 380, we only have a cushion of up to 450. If we have already increased the Earth's temperature .8 degrees and it is going to go up automatically another .8 degrees, that is 1.6, we only have a cushion of .4 to .5 degrees before we get to a tipping point. I can't tell you with 100 percent certainty that is what is going to happen. But the scientists, the best we have in this country, have told us it is a 90-percent likelihood this is happening as a consequence of the things we are doing. If you went to the airport today and got on an airplane and the pilot got on and said: Folks, we are about to leave and there is a 10-percent chance we are going to get where we are going, are you going to stay on the plane? This is a 90-percent certainty what scientists are telling us. We went to war in Iraq on a 1-percent doctrine. As Vice President Cheney said, if there is a 1-percent chance that harm could be done to our Nation, then we have to be willing to go to war and take the steps. Well, here you have a 90-percent chance that harm could be done to our Nation, and we are doing next to nothing at the Federal level. That is the cushion. So when the scientists say to us we need to have a response, when the CEO of DuPont, the CEO of Wal-Mart, the CEO of 3M, the CEO of General Electric, and a host of other companies across our country are already taking steps because they recognize this has to happen, and we have to respond, we ought to be listening and responding ourselves. Let me comment that, obviously, in California we already see a State taking action. California passed a landmark bill that establishes a first-in-the-world comprehensive program of regulatory and market mechanisms to achieve a reduction in greenhouse gases. The mayor of New York is working on a congestion pricing scheme to lower emissions and pollution. Today, as we stand in the Senate, he is hosting a meeting of the mayors of the world's largest cities, from Copenhagen to Calcutta, on how to achieve the same ends. Recently, my home State of Massachusetts, under the leadership of Governor Deval Patrick, has rejoined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Now you have eight States that have come together specifically to try to reduce global warming pollution from powerplants. Across the Nation, 500 mayors from 50 States have signed on to the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, which is an initiative to advance the goals of the Kyoto Protocol. Even President Bush finally saw fit to mention in his State of the Union Address ``the serious challenge of global climate change.'' We know specifically that climate change will challenge the way we manage water resources in the United States. It threatens our coastal communities and habitats with rising sea levels, more intense storms, storm surges, and flooding, especially along the gulf and Atlantic coasts. In many places, climate change is going to put added pressure on our water resources, increasing competition among agricultural, municipal, industrial, and ecological uses. That is why this bill is an appropriate place for us to have an amendment that merely asks for the Corps of Engineers--which is federally chartered, and we spend Federal dollars on--to make certain what they choose to do is thoughtful about what the impacts may be that are predictable or ascertainable. We know, obviously, what it looks like when we do not prepare for emergencies. We had it seared into our memories with the horrifying images of Hurricane Katrina. We saw the anguish of everybody who lived there and people across America. The fact is, we are especially vulnerable to changes of weather and climate extremes because of severe storms, hurricanes, floods, and droughts. Now we need to begin planning for those emergencies that global climate change is likely to produce. Over the last 100 years, we have seen an increase in heavy precipitation that has strained the infrastructure we have in place to deal with flooding. All across America, combined sewer overflows wind up putting raw sewage out into our rivers and lakes, which wind up poisoning and polluting those water bodies. Thirty-nine percent of the rivers in the United States of America are contaminated. Forty-five percent of the lakes in the United States are contaminated. Forty-nine percent of the estuaries in America are contaminated. In 19 States in our country parents and children are warned: Don't eat the fish because of the levels of toxins, chemicals that are in the water--19 States. In 44 States there are warnings about specific locations where you are not allowed to eat the fish. So these are the kinds of consequences we see up and down the line. The number of days each year now with more than 2 inches of precipitation has risen by 20 percent. If we know the precipitation levels have risen by 20 percent in the last 100 years, doesn't it make sense, as we conjure up levees or other projects to prevent flooding, to understand what the likelihood is of the size of that flooding, the extent of it, and the intensity, as it grows? The Southwestern United States is in the midst of a drought that is projected to continue well into the 21st century and may cause the area to transition to a more arid climate. The Corps of Engineers stands on the front lines of all of these threats to our water resources. They are our first responders in the fight against global warming. Hurricane and flood protection for New Orleans, levees along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, levees in Sacramento, CA, and port projects up and down our coasts, east and west--these are just a few of the sites that are in danger. All of these Corps projects and many hundreds more will feel the strain, impact, and consequences of global climate change. We also recognized, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the inadequacy of some of the projects in New Orleans that simply did not stand up. Just the other day, in the New York Times--Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the article of May 7, entitled ``Critic of Corps of Engineers Says Levee Repairs for New Orleans Show Signs of Flaws'' be printed in the Record.

Mr. KERRY. There is evidence in some of those levees they are not going to be able to withstand the intensity of the storms we now project. The current guidelines for Corps project planning were written in 1983, long before scientists were focusing on the existence as well as the threat and impacts of climate change. So I believe it is critical for the Corps to begin to account for that. This amendment directs them to simply take climate change into account when conducting project feasibility studies or general evaluation reports. It ensures that Corps projects, particularly those that provide the first line of defense against climate impacts, are designed with global warming in mind. This amendment is supported by dozens of groups that represent coastal communities and resources, from the National Wildlife Federation and American Rivers, to the Association of State Floodplain Managers, regional groups that represent coastal interests, including the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, and the Great Lakes States Coalition. They all strongly support this amendment. They support it because it protects our wetlands. They support it because it advances our policy response on a subject where the politics has often struggled to keep pace with the science. On a weekly basis, we see mounting evidence and mounting alarm bells going off highlighting our need to act. This is our opportunity to do so for the first time. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, it is my understanding we asked for 2\1/ 2\ hours equally divided.

Mr. KERRY. An hour and 15 minutes, but we may well wind up yielding much of that back.

Mr. KERRY. I ask the Chair if she will share with me what the time is now at this point.

Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair. Madam President, let me try to find a place to begin. That is a pretty extraordinary set of statements that has been set forth here. I suppose the first place to begin is by setting the record clear that the amendment has been completely and totally mischaracterized. This amendment does not affect the projects that are in the WRDA bill. The Senator has said this would kill the WRDA bill and every project in the bill would have to go back and be redone. That is specifically not true because this is targeted toward future projects, and it specifically leaves out those projects currently approved and in the process. So it doesn't touch anything in this bill. That is No. 1. That is the first mischaracterization. Secondly, the Senator from Oklahoma spent a lot of time talking about Kyoto and how Kyoto would be terrible, Kyoto would require people to do this. We are not doing Kyoto. Kyoto is sort of out of the picture, in a sense, for us because we are well beyond the ability to ever meet Kyoto. More importantly, when he cites the European community not living up to Kyoto, Kyoto doesn't go into effect until next year. They don't have to meet it until next year and they have until 2012 to meet it. To be throwing around comparisons to Kyoto today and saying, well, they haven't met it; of 15, 2 actually made the target--that is pretty good, that 2 have made the target before it even goes into effect. Moreover, over the years, since 1990 when we began this process in Rio--and I might add, President George Herbert Walker Bush and Republican EPA Administrator Reilly and Republican Chief of Staff and former Gov. John Sununu all signed on and agreed we needed to take this seriously and respond. That is not George Soros, that is not some Hollywood crew. That is a Republican President of the United States who signed us on to a voluntary framework over the years. And since then, Europe has reduced their emissions by .8 percent. Guess what. The United States has increased its emissions by 15.8 percent. So Europe is reducing; the United States is not. The Senator mentioned a certain number of ``scientists,'' et cetera. First, we have done some research on a number of those folks previously. Some don't even qualify as legitimate scientists, No. 1. But No. 2, not one of them has ever produced a legitimate, scientific, peer-reviewed study that has met with scientifically peer-reviewed analysis that signs off on their conclusions. Not one of them, not one, compared to 928 peer-reviewed studies that have been put forward all over the globe by scientists from all kinds of countries. He says scientists are changing their minds and moving in a different direction. I don't know what scientists the Senator listens to or who he is talking about because the most recent analysis of scientists is several thousand scientists who make up the intergovernmental panel on global climate change. I know I heard the Senator talk about how this represents some kind of global conspiracy and global government and all of this, but it is something called the United Nations which Republican Presidents have used, conservative Republican Presidents, such as Ronald Reagan, often went to and found the ability to work cooperatively to achieve things. Whether it was President Jerry Ford, President Richard Nixon, or others, they respected the United Nations and have tried to enhance its ability to do some things on an international basis. These several thousand scientists have put out four reports. Each report has been stronger than the next, and those scientists who are part of that process have not been leaving, departing, changing their minds, recanting, or asking to rescind their opinions. In fact, they have strengthened those opinions. The most recent statement is pretty clear. It is unequivocal that the Earth's climate is warming. Evidence from observations of increased global air and ocean temperatures--and I quoted earlier the 90-percent likelihood they quote that it is human beings who are causing that. You can choose to ignore evidence or not. All through history there were people who argued man could never fly, and we did. There were people who argued we couldn't have a vaccine for a disease. There were people who argued putting fluoride in the water was going to kill you. There were people who argued all kinds of things. There were people who argued the Earth is flat. But the fact is there were always bodies of evidence based on real science that found a consensus, and that consensus has never been more powerful than it is today that what is happening is happening. Eleven of the last 12 years rank among the 12 hottest years on record since 1850, when sufficient worldwide temperature measurements began. Quoting from the IPCC: Over the last 50 years, cold days, cold nights, and frost have become less frequent, while hot days, hot nights and heat waves have become more frequent. The Senator said people are saying there is doubt about the increased intensity of storms, so let me quote what 2,000 scientists from over 154 nations, I think is the number, have concluded. The intensity of tropical cyclones, hurricanes in the North Atlantic, has increased over the past 30 years, which correlates with the increase in tropical sea surface temperatures. Storms with heavy precipitation have increased in frequency over most land areas. Between 1900 and 2005, long-term trends show significantly increased precipitation in eastern parts of north and South America, northern Europe, and north and Central Asia. Between 1900 and 2000, the Sahell--that is the boundary between the Sahara Desert and some of the fertile regions of Africa to the south--the Mediterranean, Southern Africa and parts of southern Asia have become dryer, adding stress to water resources in those regions. Droughts have become longer and more intense and have affected larger areas since the 1970s, especially in the tropics and subtropics. The Senator mentioned the scientists had revamped or revised their conclusion about ice melting from 39 inches to 23 inches. What they did was take out of that assessment the ice melting and looked simply at temperature--at the sea level rise that was occurring as a consequence of expansion and the other phenomena we are witnessing, and they found that is between 7 and 23 inches. Maybe people think 7 and 23 inches doesn't make a difference, but if you are in southern Florida, if you are on the islands, if you are in a port city, there are 100 million people who live within 3 feet of sea level. So you are looking at a potential threat of great significance. Those scientists have not walked away from that prediction. If you include the melting of the ice, which our best scientists are now telling us may well happen, it is even worse. It has the potential of 16 to 23 feet. When a doctor tells you that you have indications you have a cancer, you usually go and try to find treatment. Well, the doctors are telling us something is going on and we ought to be concerned about it, and they are pointing to what it is. I want to speak about the greenhouse gas concept for a minute, because it allows us to use our minds, the minds God gave us. It allows us to think about consequences. Why do we call it greenhouse gas? Where does the word greenhouse gas come from? It came long before we talked about climate change. The word greenhouse gas has been applied to these gases because they have the impact of creating a greenhouse effect on the earth, and the science is absolutely unequivocal. I defy any scientist to come in here, who is legitimate and bona fide, and tell us there is no greenhouse effect. Scientists agree there is a greenhouse effect. In fact, life on Earth would not exist without the greenhouse effect. It is this thin layer of gases in our atmosphere that in fact preserves the ability for all of us to live on Earth, and those greenhouse gases contain heat within the Earth that keeps the average temperature of the Earth at 57 degrees Fahrenheit. If you didn't have a greenhouse effect, the Earth would be 60 degrees cooler. The greenhouse effect got its name because it behaves like a greenhouse at a nursery or in a garden, where the light can come in through the glass, and it comes through transparently, the light hits the pots of earth and things that are in there, reflects, and creates its own energy. That energy then goes back out, reverberates the light, and comes back in a shortwave emission from the sun--and it is transparent--and it goes back in a longwave emission, which is less powerful. It is opaque. The veneer of the atmosphere, the greenhouse gas veneer is opaque to that energy trying to be released, which means it can't break through. It blocks it. A certain amount of that gas is trapped, and that is what creates the greenhouse effect, and it warms over a period of time. That warming is now absolutely conclusive. It is incontrovertible. As Professor John Holden, who is a professor of government and earth science at Harvard, and also affiliated with Woods Hole Marine, states very clearly, the folks on the other side of this argument have two major obligations, neither of which they have ever met. Obligation No. 1: They have to show the warming that is taking place is caused by other than the greenhouse gases. In other words, they have to show what is causing it if the greenhouse gases aren't. And No. 2, they have to prove the greenhouse gases that are going up and behaving in the way I just described are not what is creating the warming. And they have never, ever, ever, ever met that standard. They have never provided a study that meets either of those tests. They can't show you what is doing it and they can't show you why the gases we create aren't doing it. We do have, however, a group of scientists who are warning us about what we ought to do. The Senator dismisses very quickly the companies that are involved in this. Well, I have never met a company that goes off to do something and creates a storm about science based on complete fraud with respect to what they are doing. None of them came to the table willingly, may I add. They have come to the table because they understand the science. They have come to the table because they understand companies all over the world are exerting responsibility. The former Treasury Secretary, Paul O'Neill, was president and CEO of Alcoa, and for some 15 years now he has been taking steps as a CEO with a sense of civic responsibility to try to respond to this science. The fact is all of these scientists, and I might add the presidents of these other countries, are speaking, obviously, out of concern for their own countries, out of concern for their own constituencies, and for the threats they face in those nations. Prime Minister Blair, who is leaving office shortly, has made this one of his major issues, one of his major crusades, and obviously has done so at some risk. But the fact is he and many other leaders of countries accept the science and understand their responsibility to try to meet it and to do so in a responsible way. I have spoken to the sea level rise and to the United Nations, but there is one thing I might clarify very quickly. Mr. Hansen did not get a grant from the Heinz Foundation. Mr. Hansen was presented a Heinz award in honor of former Republican Senator John Heinz, who was a great leader on this issue. Senator Heinz knew global climate change was happening, he knew we needed to respond to these things, and Mr. Hansen received an award, with no strings attached, no communication whatsoever, as a recognition of his work. He has received awards from many other organizations and entities over the course of his lifetime, and I would put his credentials and his experience up against any of the other so-called scientists we sometimes hear referred to. I might also add we have heard a lot about the implementation of Kyoto. I led the floor effort on Kyoto when the so-called Byrd-Hagel amendment was brought to the floor, so I know something about that particular process. The fact is those who have always opposed doing something about global climate change have tried to use that vote and Kyoto itself as an excuse to sow fear in their own party, saying how much it is going to cost Americans and how terrible it is going to be, how it will ruin our economy and take us backwards. These are exactly the same arguments we heard in 1990 when we did the Clean Air Act. I sat in the room right back here, which is now the majority leader's room. It was then Senator Mitchell's office. We sat with EPA Administrator Reilly, with John Sununu, and with others. Republicans and Democrats alike sat at that table and we negotiated out the Clean Air Act. I remember all the ``Chicken Little'' cries we heard as people came and said, well, you know, if you make us do this, it is going to cost $8 billion to the industry and it is going to destroy the industry, and it will reduce American jobs, and we are going to be noncompetitive. The environmental community came in and said, no, no, no, those guys are wrong, it is not going to cost $8 billion, it is going to cost $4 billion. And it won't take 8 years, we can do it in 4 years. Guess what. It cost about $2 billion and took half the time. They were wrong, too. All the statements about how it was going to ruin America's economy? We wound up growing our economy by 123, or whatever, percent over those years. More jobs were created and Americans did better. We did it and we breathed cleaner air at the same time. The fact is, nobody has the ability to predict what is going to happen when you start down this road. Once you begin to kick these technologies into gear, then the entire basis of the judgments you are making begins to change, because the technology moves far more rapidly than anybody can surmise, and some things are going to appear that we don't even know about today. Let us assume the Senator from Oklahoma is correct and I am wrong, and the scientists are all wrong, and Al Gore is wrong, and everybody who has spoken out on this all through the years is wrong, and that we went down this road in order to deal with some of these issues. What is the worst that could happen? Given past experience with the Clean Air Act, and given experiences with where the world is moving on this issue, we are going to create a whole bunch of new technologies, create a bunch of new jobs, where we will have cleaner air to breathe, a population that is less impacted by asthma and emphysema and by other airborne particulate diseases, there will be less cancer, and we will wind up more energy independent, with cleaner fuels, and the United States will have greater security. We will lead the world in these technologies, because these other countries are committed to buying them. If they are wrong, what is the worst? Global catastrophe, according to every prediction. That is the ledger here. You can take your choice. You can be prudent and take the steps we need to take, or you can continue to keep your head in the sand and ignore the work of these thousands of scientists and these leaders around the world and these corporate citizens and others who have come to the table. All we are asking for here is that our Corps of Engineers makes a judgment. I mean, are we saying they shouldn't make a judgment; that they shouldn't make an analysis? Maybe the judgment they will make is they will agree the science is wrong. But shouldn't they be asked to make that judgment? Shouldn't they be asked to measure what in fact is possible, as a consequence of the evidence on the table? Wouldn't it be helpful to all of us to have them making those kinds of judgments? I think when we look behind the curtain of the sort of red herrings that get thrown out here, there isn't one that stands up; not one peer- reviewed scientific analysis, not one legitimate, cogent statement to the contrary to explain why what is happening is happening and what the impact is. Let's say it wasn't just the greenhouse gases, because we are not doing anything in this amendment to deal with greenhouse gases. Let's say it isn't the greenhouse gases but that the Earth is warming. Isn't it smart to have the Corps of Engineers at least make a judgment about what the effect of the warming may be with respect to water, since they are going to be dealing with water resources? This is, after all, the bill that deals with water resources for our country. It would be smart for the Corps of Engineers to be able to make some judgment with respect to that. The Chair of the committee has come to the floor and has some information with respect to the Corps of Engineers' willingness to do that, so I yield such time as the Chair might use, and I reserve the remainder of the time after that.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of the time.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, let me respond, if I can, to the Senator from Oklahoma. I regret that he has to leave. Almost every single one of the statements he just made does not apply to the question of global warming itself. Let me give you an example. The Senator just cited two peer-reviewed studies. One of the peer-reviewed studies he talked about talks about hurricanes and the scientists who found that hurricanes have not increased. We never asserted they have increased. I didn't come here and say they have increased. Maybe some people have talked about the increase in the number of hurricanes, but he has a peer-reviewed study, supposedly, that talks about hurricanes have not increased. He does not have a peer-reviewed study that says global climate change is not happening because of human-induced greenhouse gases. Not one. The second study he cited as a peer-reviewed study was vertical wind shear, decreasing the effect of wind. Well, I am not here to debate vertical wind shear. Yes, there are certain indicators within the framework of models that cannot predict accurately exactly what is going to happen as a consequence of climate change. We have admitted that for 17 years. The Senator, obviously, missed the fact that I said--I led the effort on our side on the Kyoto agreement with respect to Byrd-Hagel. I advised my colleagues to vote for it. I voted for it. And we voted for it because there was a simple principle at stake, which is whether we were going to treat this on a global basis, whether we were going to, all of us, join in. If the United States was going to be part of the solution, we could not be a solution by ourselves. We needed to have the less developed countries and others join in. That has been a fight we have been involved in now for a number of years. But, please, I ask the Senator, do not misinterpret what we were doing in that. We were not suggesting that it was the cost factor or because we did not need to do it. It is because we needed to do it in the most sensible way, and we needed to do it within a global framework. We still need to do that. Now, each of the statements the Senator just made is flat incorrect-- most of them, 90 percent. I will be very specific. He talked about how it was politicians who wrote this, not scientists. Well, in fact, that is not true. This report was created by scientists. And the EPW Committee itself had a briefing in which those scientists, including the cochair, Susan Solomon of NOAA, presented the results. The first page of the summary for policymakers lists the lead authors, every single one of whom are scientists. So let's get our facts straight. Moreover, the Bush administration made the following statement in support of the IPCC. They said that they continue to support and embrace the work of the IPCC and the science behind their most recent report. So the Senator is at odds even with an administration that has been reluctant to deal with this issue. Let me also point out that--he pointed out this question of the discrepancy of the 7 and 23 inches in the change in sea level. Incidentally, these little sort of twists of fact are not so little in the summary because they are being used in the conglomerate, one after the other, to try to confuse people and pretend that somehow this issue is not real. Each one of them gets blown away by the real facts, but they still keep coming back, something I learned a lot about a few years ago, where the facts don't matter. You just repeat something enough even if it is not true. Well, the fact is, with respect to the sea level rise, they try to make a big deal and say: Well, they have reversed the science; the scientists are going backwards. No, they are not. The sea level rise is still predicted to go up between 7 and 23 inches by 2100. That is what the IPCC report still says. The upper limit is lower than the previous report because they took out the contributions from Greenland and the Antarctic ice sheet. The reason they took them out is because the scientists believed, in keeping with their notion of accuracy and of trying to not be alarmists, that there was a lack of a reliable model to accurately estimate the melting rate. Now, you do not have a reliable model to accurately reflect the melting rate. But, guess what. To your eye, you can go up and see the melting. You can look at a satellite photo of 1979 and a satellite photo today, and your eye will tell you 20 percent of the ice is gone. It is not getting colder, it is getting warmer. The ocean is getting warmer. So what is the logical conclusion? The logical conclusion is more ice is going to melt. And what happens when more ice melts? What was a reflectent to the rays of the sun--the ice--no longer is there to reflect. The sunlight goes into the water. Guess what it does in the water. It is absorbed, it warms up the water, and then guess what happens. The ice melts faster. You do not need to be a scientist to do this. Any kid in school can figure that out, which is why young people get this. The Senator should not distort these facts. One after another he lays out something that suggests something that is happening that is not. Take Jacques Chirac's comment. First of all, he is the only person I know of who ever suggested that Jacques Chirac speaks for America. But having said what he said about Jack Chirac and global governance, global governance is something that Presidents have dealt with in the context of the U.N. without ever considering giving up the sovereignty of the United States. You can have global governance. Anytime you have a treaty, it is global governance. When you had the World War II treaty on the battleship Missouri, with Japan, that was governance. When the United States went over and Douglas MacArthur helped to create a constitution and create a democracy, that was global governance. It turned out it was a pretty darn good result as we rebuilt Europe and a lot of other places. Global governance does not have to be this bugaboo word that is used to scare people that somehow we are giving up the sovereignty of the United States. Every one of these arguments just kind of melts away like the ice itself. I think we ought to have a real debate about what is happening. Let's go to the economy. That is the big one that they love to pick on and say to Americans: Oh, this is going to cost you so much money if you do this, and it is going to wind up being terrible. Well, that is not what the best economists in the world say. That is not what the best business leaders in the world say. In fact, they have concluded if you do not do something, it is going to cost a lot of money. You want to pay a lot more money for insurance? You want to pay a lot more money for dams that are bigger, pay a lot more money for hospitalizations, more cancer, for more asthma, for more problems of the particulates in the air? Then you can go ahead and burn dirty coal and not be smart about the future. The fact is, Sir Nicholas Stearn, who is one of the leading economists in Britain, former head of the Bank of England and one of the people whom Prime Minister Blair tapped to give them an analysis, wrote this in a report last fall: The scientific evidence is now overwhelming. This an economist. Climate change is a serious global threat, and it demands an urgent global response. The review has assessed the wide range of evidence on the impacts of climate change and on the economic costs, and has used a number of different techniques to assess cost and risks. From all of those perspectives, the evidence gathered by the review leads to a simple conclusion. The benefits of strong and early action far outweigh the economic costs of not acting. Climate change will affect the basic elements of life for people around the world, access to water, food production, health, and the environment. Hundreds of millions of people could suffer hunger, water shortages, coastal flooding as the world warms. Using the results from formal economic models, the review estimates that if we don't act, the overall costs and risks of climate change will be equivalent to losing at least 5 percent of global GDP each year now and forever. Losing 5 percent of GDP now and forever, that is the economic prediction of not acting. And they say if a wider risk of impacts is taken into account, the estimates of damage could rise to 20 percent of GDP or more. In contrast, the cost of action, reducing greenhouse gas emissions to avoid the worst impacts of climate change can be limited to around 1 percent of global GDP each year. That is an economic standard that, in fact, MIT economists have also confirmed, not quite the same figures but very similar. The bottom line is there is a consensus that the cost of not acting is far more expensive to the American people than the cost of acting. I go back to the experience we had on the Clean Air Act in 1990. I don't remember Senator Inhofe being part of that discussion. But the fact is, in 1990, when we did that act, the same arguments were put forward about not proceeding forward, and every one of those arguments was blown away by the reality of what happened as well as by the judgments of Republicans and Democrats alike that it was important to act. Back then, incidentally, DuPont, which has already been castigated by the Senator as somehow being in this for the money--DuPont was the principal producer of the chlorofluorocarbons that were part of the Montreal Protocol. DuPont was unwilling to move until they knew that the marketplace was going to be the same for everybody, which is what happened when the protocol went into effect. Once they knew what the marketplace was going to do, then they proceeded forward with an alternative to the CFCs. So they proved that, No. 1, you can do it, but, No. 2, you have to do it where the marketplace is, in fact, working. That is why people believe--incidentally, this amendment has nothing to do with cap and trade. I happen to support it. We will have that debate down the road. But this amendment has nothing to do with it. This merely suggests if we are going to spend Federal dollars on water projects in America and levees and other kinds of projects, that we ought to know for certain every one of those projects is being judged specifically as to the impact of global climate change. With respect to the cap and trade issue, the fact is, those companies don't want to proceed ahead until they have the same kind of certainty that the marketplace will give them when there is a uniform standard throughout the marketplace. That is far from a bottom-line, profit- seeking motive. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum and ask unanimous consent that time be charged equally.

Mr. KERRY. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. KERRY. Reserving the right to object, I respect the Senator. I would like to give him the time to speak but outside of my time. I would be happy to yield at this point in the day if he wants to speak as in morning business but not to be charged against our time. If he wants to take it off the Senator's time, he can.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, what is the time allocation at this point? How much time remains?

Mr. KERRY. Well, Mr. President, I will try to speed up and use such time as I may use quickly. Again, let me respond very quickly to some of the assertions that have been made. I want to try to get back to the bigger picture, but I will be very specific about a couple things. First of all, I never have suggested, nor have I heard anybody who has argued in favor of actions suggesting, there would be no cost, which is the term the Senator from Oklahoma used. We are not talking about no cost. We are talking about relative costs. It is clear from all the best analyses of every economic model that the costs of not acting are much greater than the costs of acting. That has become true, we have seen, in what has happened with respect to damages, migrations of species, other things that are already occurring and being observed as a result of the warming that is taking place. In addition to that, I still say to my colleague from Oklahoma, despite the scientists he quotes, he still cannot produce one peer- reviewed study that says global climate change is not happening as a consequence of human activity. He cannot produce one peer-reviewed report that does not say it is happening, period--not one. So he can come in with a report that says some little thing here, some little thing there, but that does not go to the fundamental question of who is causing what. As I said earlier in this debate, they have a fundamental responsibility, if they are going to stand up and say to Americans we do not need to do anything; and that responsibility is to answer what is causing the warming if it is not the human-induced activity; and, secondly, how can the human activity that is being created not be doing what the scientists allege it is doing. On both counts, they have never, ever had a sufficient scientific explanation. Moreover, again, I would point out--I did earlier; the Senator was not here--as to the so-called SPM, as it is called, the policymaker's summary, there is a list on the first page of that summary, and all the people who wrote it are scientists. They are the ones who put that report together. So there is a point where you can sort of be debating all the red herrings here, which is not what is important. What is important in the end is that the consensus, globally, of leaders, of scientists, is clear about what is happening and why it is happening, No. 1. No. 2, what we are trying to do is not even respond to that, even though I believe we ought to be; we are simply trying to guarantee there is an adequate level of congressionally mandated--not voluntary but congressionally mandated--review with respect to this in the activities of the Corps of Engineers. The fact is that climate change, obviously, relates to risk-based analysis. There are many climate change events that are taking place, all of which could affect the reliability of Corps projects. In this bill there is a program for ecosystem restoration in the Louisiana coastal area. Key is going to be ultimately developing a strategy for restoration that understands what happens with respect to coastal erosion and sea level rise. The Mississippi River Gulf Outlet in Louisiana, right along the coast, is dependent on storm surge information, hurricane prediction, sea level rise. Virtually every single beach replenishment project--what good is it going to do to replenish beaches in certain ways if the sea level is going to be rising and the intensity of those storms may increase? With respect to that, I would say to my friend from Oklahoma, the prediction was there would be more named storms, more hurricanes, and indeed there were more named storms. The level of predictions of storms was met, they just did not hit the United States. We lucked out. But the total numbers, in fact, were high. So you can play with these possibilities. You can ignore science, if you choose to. But I think responsible legislation at this point, given the scientists and the level of information we have, requires us to act, and this is one very small way to act responsibly. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I would like to ask the Senator a question, if I may.

Mr. KERRY. On my time. The Senator said he had a whole lot of peer-reviewed studies. I would ask the Senator a simple question: Does he have one peer-reviewed study that says conclusively global climate change is not happening as a consequence of human activity, and, No. 2, that it is not happening. Does he have a peer-reviewed study that says that?