Congressional Record, Volume 143 Issue 104 (Tuesday, July 22, 1997)

[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 104 (Tuesday, July 22, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7803-S7812]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

DEPARTMENTS OF VETERANS AFFAIRS AND HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND
INDEPENDENT AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 1998

Mr. BOND. What is the pending business?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending business currently is S. 1034.
Mr. BOND. This is the Veterans Affairs, HUD, independent agencies
appropriations measure?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. It is making appropriations for the
Departments of Veterans Affairs, Housing and Urban Development, and for
sundry independent agencies, commissions, corporations, and offices.
The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

A bill (S. 1034) making appropriations for the Departments
of Veterans Affairs and Housing and Urban Development, and
for sundry independent agencies, commissions, corporations,
and offices for fiscal year ending September 30, 1998, and
for other purposes.

The Senate resumed consideration of the bill.
Mr. BOND. I thank the Chair.
Mr. President, I see that our colleague from Arkansas is present. He
has a very important amendment. I invite the attention of all Members.
We are planning on moving on this bill. There are a number of
amendments, and we look forward to dealing with them expeditiously
today. So we are open and ready to do business. We appreciate having
the matters brought to our attention. As I said yesterday, we hope, if
there are amendments or proposed colloquies, they will be brought to
the ranking member and me so that we can give them our personal
attention and continue the progress that

[[Page S7804]]

this body has been making on the appropriations measures.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas.

Amendment No. 944

(Purpose: To reduce the appropriation for the implementation of the
space station program for the purpose of terminating the program)

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The bill clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Arkansas [Mr. Bumpers], for himself, Mr.
Kohl, Mr. Wyden, Mr. Bryan, Mr. Durbin, Mr. Leahy, Mr.
Wellstone, and Mr. Feingold proposes an amendment numbered
944.

Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

On page 70, strike lines 17 through 18, and insert in lieu
thereof the following: ``sion and administrative aircraft,
$3,826,500,000, to remain available until September 30, 1999.
Provided, that of the funds made available in this bill, no
funds shall be expended on the space station program, except
for termination costs.''

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas is recognized.
Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, this is the sixth year that I have stood
at this desk and lamented the fact that we have become inured to
projects which have massive cost overruns if it means a few jobs in our
State or if it means you can cast a cheap vote and not pay a price for
it back home.
Now, I have been here for 22\1/2\ years, and I have watched this body
time and time again proceed continuously to vote for such things as the
space station whereas if it were a secret ballot it would not get 25
votes. The facts and the evidence are absolutely overwhelming against
going forward with the space station, and yet because of the issue of
jobs back home, it is very seldom that anyone casts a vote against it.
Also, there is no political price to pay, even if you do not have
jobs back home, hinging on going forward with the space station. There
is no political price to be exacted against you for voting for
something that people know very little about and have never honed in
on.
My wife, Betty Bumpers, a woman I admire very much for her courage,
started a peace organization in 1981, and I said, ``What you have done
is just assured your husband's defeat in the next election.'' She said,
``Yes, and you men are going to get my children killed.'' And so I had
to dance around that issue until I ran the next time fully expecting to
be confronted by my opponent about my wife's activities in the peace
movement.
Now, isn't it a strange dichotomy in America, that one has to be
defensive about being for all the things that would promote peace. That
is how strange this place is at times.
Of course, Betty has been active in childhood immunizations all of
her life, and all of my political life--she had started a program in
1972 to immunize all the children in my State, which had one of the
lowest immunization levels of any State in the country. We immunized
300,000 children one Saturday. She was known then and is still known as
the one of the foremost leaders in immunization programs in this
country. I remember one day in 1973 some smart reporter said,
``Senator, do you think your wife's activities''--he was referring to
peace, of course--``Do you think your wife's activities are going to be
a big detriment to you in your campaign?'' I said, ``Well, it will be
among all those people who favor war and not immunizing children.'' And
I never got asked another question about it.
I do not mean to sound arrogant about being willing to stand up
occasionally for something I strongly believe in, but occasionally I
chastise some of my colleagues who could save the taxpayers billions of
dollars and hasten the day we balance the budget, but who refuse to do
it because there is no political accounting for voting for the space
station, particularly now when the rover is roving around on Mars. As a
matter of fact, I know this is pure coincidence, but if you want to go
over to the Dirksen Building, it just so happens that, at the same time
we are considering the space station and the entire space budget in the
Chamber, NASA has a thrilling show in the Dirksen Building for all the
Senators to see of the rover roving around on Mars sniffing rocks.
Let me say--and I have said this for 6 straight years--I favor the
space program. I have never once lamented the fact that we have a
shuttle program and that we have the ability to place all kinds of
scientific and communications satellites in orbit. And in sending the
rover to Mars, NASA is doing exactly what it should do, because that
proves another point. We do not need a manned mission to do science on
Mars.
Mr. President, almost all the scientists in the country, virtually
every Nobel physicist, virtually every scientific group in America,
opposes the space station. Unfortunately, they don't have enough
political clout to fill a thimble. I admire them, I respect them, but
the truth of the matter is, they have very little impact on this body
or the House of Representatives on what they favor or don't favor.
One day on this floor, I said even Carl Sagan was opposed to the
space station. Carl Sagan, whom I had known for several years--we
weren't close friends, but I had been thrown in contact with him a few
times--called to say that I had misstated what he believed. What he
said was, ``I believe the space station is a legitimate thing, a highly
desirable thing, as a way station to get to Mars. But,'' he said, to
follow that up, something that I have always strongly believed, ``it is
not--it is not a wise expenditure of money if you are talking about
scientific experiments to be conducted on the space station.'' That is
one of the reasons the American Physical Society and so many other
groups oppose the space station.
People around here are sometimes influenced by how somebody feels
about it. I will tell you who strongly opposes going forward with the
space station: The Concord Coalition, which was headed up by our now
deceased, highly respected colleague, Paul Tsongas and by Warren
Rudman, also our former colleague from New Hampshire. The Concord
Coalition, Citizens Against Government Waste, the Cato Institute, the
Progressive Policy Institute, the National Taxpayers' Union, and
Citizens for a Sound Economy.
Then, in the scientific community, listen to this: the American
Physiological Society, the American Society for Biochemistry and
Molecular Biology, the American Society for Pharmacology and
Experimental Therapeutics, the American Society for Investigative
Pathology, the American Institute of Nutrition, American Association of
Immunologists, American Society of Cell Biology, the Biophysical
Society, the American Association of Anatomists.
Who comprises the American Physical Society? It is 41,000 physicists.
Dr. Robert Park, a professor of physics at the University of Maryland
at College Park, has testified time and again here about the folly of
justifying the space station by alluding to the kind of scientific
experiments they are going to do on it.
Mr. President, my amendment says we will terminate the space station
at a cost of $600 million and we will save $1.5 billion to put on the
deficit. Sometimes my staff presents me with some alternatives. ``Why
don't we say we are going to put this $1.5 billion in savings into some
other popular program?'' I said, ``I have been there and done that.'' I
remember when I first got into trying to torpedo the space station, I
would have transferred the money over to Veterans Affairs. That is
usually an item that causes Senators to jump under their desks. If you
are going to give it to the veterans, most people around here will look
very cautiously before they vote no. But I didn't get any more votes
than I have been getting since.
We have become so inured to cost overruns, we just simply cannot stop
a big project once it is started. Only two things that come to mind
that we finally did stop. One was the Clinch River breeder reactor,
which incidentally was also my amendment. Howard Baker was majority
leader. Maybe you think that wasn't an uphill battle. But the American
scientific community began to rise up in arms, and the
environmentalists threw a fit. So, finally we decided that we did not
want to follow the breeder reactor method of generating electricity in
this country and

[[Page S7805]]

we finally killed it after I spent 4 years standing at this desk,
talking about the folly of that project. We had already started digging
ground down in Clinch River to build it.
The other thing we terminated was the super collider. That's another
one of my amendments. I guess the reason they happen to come to mind is
that I happen to be the architect of killing both of them. The super
collider, this massive hole in the ground in Texas, nobody really
talked much about the science of the super collider. All they talked
about was all the jobs it was going to create in Texas, which indeed it
would have.

Let me just, while I am on the subject of jobs, point something out.
The space station--if you want to make it a jobs program go home and
tell the chamber of commerce that it costs $140,000 for every job it
creates. Take the same proposition to General Motors or anybody else:
You come into our community and we will give you $140,000 for every job
you create. They will be standing on line from here to New York to try
to take you up on that offer.
You think about the fact it costs $10,000 to $12,000 a pound for
every pound of material we send to the space station. And now there is
an estimate, if you have four astronauts on board, they can only devote
4 hours a day each to research-related activities. So, if you have four
American astronauts, that's 16 hours a day that they could put into
science. Do you want to know how expensive that is? Well, NASA says it
will cost $1,300,000,000 a year to operate the station. So, it will
only cost the taxpayers $230,000 for each hour the astronauts put in
actually working on scientific experiments on the space station. Do you
want to hear one better than that? The space station is to have a 10-
year life and it will cost all-told about $100 billion. Figure that one
out: $25 million a day is going to be the cost of keeping the space
station up there.
Do you have any idea, when we sit in the Agriculture Committee
talking about research, how we have to grovel and fight and scratch and
claw for every dime we get for research? Do you have any idea what $25
million will do? Do you know the National Institutes of Health can only
fund one out of every four good scientific projects that are brought to
them? And we are talking about honest to God research. Research on
cancer, on AIDS, on arthritis--every conceivable kind of disease that
afflicts mankind is handled through the National Institutes of Health,
to which we give about $13 to $14 billion a year. And they can only
fund one out of every four experiments. That is real science. You can
book it. Do you know what real medical research could be done if we
simply gave them the cost of one space shuttle flight? They could fund
one out of every three proposals.
Last week I conducted a hearing on immunizations. There is going to
be a big to-do over at the White House tomorrow on the remarkable
success we have had on immunizations. In a hearing last week it was
revealed by some pharmaceutical companies, and the Centers for Disease
Control in Atlanta, that we now face the possibility of eliminating
measles worldwide, as we are about to eradicate polio worldwide. We now
have new vaccines, even for children's earaches; even for dysentery.
Last year we had 50,000 hospitalizations last year of children with
dysentery, and 20 children died--but worldwide those figures are
nothing. Worldwide, dysentery kills so many children--but not as many
as measles. Does that shock you? Measles is still the biggest killer of
children in the world; 1 million children a year die of measles.
At the hearing they told us about all these new vaccines. For
example, for infants--put a little something in each nostril of the
nose and they will never get flu. You can also use that in combination
with another vaccine which, as I say, will keep them from getting
dysentery.
I'll tell you what I'll do, I'll stand on my head on the top of this
Capitol if you ever get anything even remotely close to those kinds of
advances after you spend $100 billion. For 6 years I have listened to
Senators come over here, they are my friends and colleagues and I don't
denigrate their feelings about it, but when you start asking, ``What
are the scientific experiments we are going to conduct?'' ``Well, we
don't know. We have to get up there and find out what we are looking
for.''
It was Dr. Nicolaas Bloembergen, of Harvard, who made the best
statement I ever heard about research on the space
station. Incidentally, he is adamantly opposed to it. I'll come back to
that. I'm going to take about 20 minutes just reading quotes from the
top physicists, medical doctors, you name it, about the space station,
before I sit down. Do you know what he said about microgravity
research, which is the big thing everybody talks about; that is
research you do in weightlessness? He said, ``microgravity is of
microimportance.'' That says it all. Why else would we be sending a
station up there to do scientific experiments except it is a weightless
situation?

Another great physicist whom I will quote in a moment said, ``It is
the worst place to do microgravity research with men on board or women
on board.'' That is because, if you are looking for an experiment that
requires weightlessness and you have people tromping around in the
station and vibrating it, you lose the benefit. You would expect a 6-
year-old to understand that.
Mr. President, let me just bring you up to date. In 1996, the General
Accounting Office to do a report on the space station. It was not the
most devastating report I ever read in my life, and of course I was
looking for something that I might hang my hat on that just might jar
this place into action. But there were really no bombs in the 1996 GAO
report, except they predicted that unless certain things happened
certain other very undesirable things were going to happen, namely
unless the Russians came through with their part of this project the
cost was going to skyrocket.
One Senator came to me in 1994 and said: ``Dale, I think this
cooperation with Russia is a tremendous idea. We can keep their space
scientists busy and they won't be off in Iraq and Iran, building
missiles for some of the rogue nations.'' And he said, ``You know, we
have to help the Russians all we can. They have big problems.''
I said: ``That's right. But if we are going to send them $200 million
for openers, just to say they will be a part of the international space
station, I say send it to them in economic aid or food. That is what
they need. They do not need to be participating in one of the biggest
boondoggles ever conceived. What they need is something to help their
people with their infrastructure, build industry, feed their people.''
So what has happened, as predictable as night following day, is
Russia has reneged. We gave them close to $200 million for openers to
build the first section of the work they were supposed to do. We gave
them that money.
They were supposed to build the service module. There are nine
modules on this space station. They were supposed to build the third
one, but a very important one, called the service module, and they have
not been able to come up with all the money, nor are they likely to. I
will return in a moment to some of the consequences of that.
But back to the GAO report. Congressman Dingell and I asked the GAO
to update their 1996 report. Here is the update, which we received last
night and which anybody else who wants it can get this morning. Here is
what the GAO update says. If there is anything people around here
detest, it is somebody going around telling them, ``I told you so,'' so
I won't say it.
Listen to this:

The prime contractor's--

That is Boeing's----

cost and schedule performance on the space station, which
showed signs of deterioration last year, has continued to
decline virtually unabated. Since April 1996, the cost
overrun has more than tripled.

Let me repeat that:

Since April 1996--

A little over a year ago--

the cost overrun has more than tripled and the schedule
slippage has increased by almost 50 percent.

Does it not take nerve to come in here asking us to go forward with a
$100 billion project in the light of that?

Financial reserves are dwindling with up to 6 years
remaining until on-orbit assembly of the space station is
completed.

That is what we are looking at now. We still have 6 years to go
before we

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even get that sucker assembled in space:

. . . with up to 6 years remaining until on-orbit assembly
of the space station is completed. NASA has already
identified actual and potential resource demands that exceed
the station's remaining financial reserves.

As the French say, here comes the piece de resistance:

NASA transferred $462 million from its science budget to
the space station development budget in fiscal years 1996
through 1998.

Why did NASA transfer $462 million from its science account to the
manufacturing of the space station? To cover the cost overruns. And the
$462 million comes out of the science budget. Either you are going to
reduce the scientific experiments on this thing by $462 million, or
NASA is going to come back to Congress and say we need $462 million
more. Which do you think that is going to be? We all know what it is
going to be, and this is just the beginning:

It is also planning to transfer another $70 million in
fiscal 1999 from the science fund to the station development
budget.

Mr. President, NASA says that to assemble and build the space
station, the cost will be $17.4 billion, and within that are these
scientific funds. They are taking money from Peter to pay Paul, but
they are taking money out of the account that they say is absolutely
essential to justify the space station, namely, the science that we are
going to get. You can't have it both ways, or you can, too, in the U.S.
Senate.
Congress approved the transfer of $200 million this year. We approved
a $200 million transfer from the space shuttle. I just told you that
they have transferred $462 million from their science account over to
the space station account. Now we are giving them authority to transfer
money from the shuttle account, the manned space program that most
people around here applaud, and are putting it into the space station.
Why? To cover the cost overruns on the space station. It is the most
traditional, time-honored shell game that any of us know anything
about, and that is to cover the cost incurred because the Russians have
been so late in coming up with their money.

There is another $100 million pending in Congress for the year 1998.
That is in the House bill; that is not in the Senate bill. But, in
addition to allowing them to take $200 million out of the shuttle fund
and put it into the space station, now the House has said, ``We will
give you another $100 million to transfer to the space station.'' This
is actually outside the $17.4 billion. The $462 million in science
funds is inside the $17.4 billion and can only be classified as a
whopping cost overrun.
This is one of the most interesting things that the GAO report said:

When NASA redesigned the space station in 1993. . . .

You remember, President Clinton looked at a whole list of them and
finally came up with what was finally called International Space
Station Alpha:

When NASA redesigned the station in 1993, it estimated that
Russia, as a partner, would reduce program costs by $1.6
billion because the station's assembly would be completed
sooner.

It would be finished in June 2002 instead of September 2003, the
proposition being that if the Russians came through, we would build it
faster and, therefore, save $1.6 billion.
Mr. President, those are not my figures, those are NASA's figures,
those are NASA's statements. And this is what GAO said about it:

NASA has recently acknowledged that completion of the
station's assembly would indeed slip to 2003. . . .

Fifteen months later than we have been told since time immemorial
this thing would be finished.
While NASA has not acknowledged the 2003 date, they have yet to tell
us what the new milestone will be. And the GAO says:

Consequently, most, if not all, of the reduced costs
claimed by accelerating the schedule by 15 months would be
lost by slipping the schedule by a similar amount.

In short, now we are back to the old time schedule, and the $1.6
billion that NASA said they would save by bringing Russia into the
program and, therefore, building it 15 months sooner than we would
otherwise have built won't be saved.
NASA has not told us yet precisely when they expect to have this
thing finished, nor precisely what a 15-month slippage at this point is
going to cost, though I can tell you, based on the conversations I had
with people who know more about this program than anybody else, it is
$2 billion.
Mr. President, I tried to torpedo the space station since the memory
of man runneth not. I have tried in almost more times than there have
been design changes, new partners, and new promises by NASA, and until
this very moment, NASA is trying to con the Senate by showing this
magnificent film about Mars over in the Dirksen Building and still
smoothly promising that everything is running on target, on schedule,
and the only reason we know that isn't true is because GAO has done two
studies that contradict NASA 180 degrees.
We don't need a space station. The Mir is the seventh Russian space
station. The Mir has been in orbit, how long? Eleven years. The Mir has
been up there 11 years, and now it is in big trouble. I am not saying
that is predictable. I will say this, and this is not to bash Russia--I
believe in doing everything we can to help their economy and keep them
viable--but their space program is not as sophisticated as ours. While
I understand all the arguments for bringing Russia into this, I am not
sure scientifically and from a safety standpoint it is good to do it.
But the point I wanted to make is, again, I have stood on this floor
for 6 long years and said show me, tell me what are the scientific
achievements Russia has achieved in 20 years of having a space station
in orbit. And I have been met by a deafening roar of silence. There are
none. The only justification for a space station is as a way station to
Mars.
Mr. President, look at this chart, and I will say that in 1984,
Ronald Reagan, I think it was in a State of the Union Address, said we
were going to build a space station--that was in 1984; that has now
been 13-plus years--we were going to build a space station for $8
billion and deploy it and operate it. That was the initial promise of
the President. At that time, here were the justifications. Look at
them.
It was going to be a staging base, presumably to go to Mars.
It was going to be a manufacturing facility. We were going to
manufacture a new kind of sophisticated crystal in a microgravity
atmosphere.
It was going to be a space-based observatory.
It was going to be a transportation node.
It was going to be a servicing facility, presumably for people on
their way to Mars.
It was going to be an assembly facility, again, to assemble the parts
of a space station to go to Mars.
It was going to be a storage facility.
And, finally, it was going to be a research laboratory.
You can see from my chart how many of those exist today. Seven of
them have been torpedoed, and only one remains standing.
Go back to the original $8 billion that President Reagan said it was
going to cost. Here is an update on that. I tell you, I cannot keep the
grin off my face as I go through these things. You just cannot believe
it, you cannot believe it, and yet Senators will come in here and vote
for this thing.
The President said $8 billion. Here is what we spent on the Reagan
plan--$11.2 billion. That is gone. What we got out of that is so
infinitesimal you might as well have thrown the money off the
Washington Monument. It would have helped a few poor people.
So when Bill Clinton became President, he said this thing is out of
control, we have to have another look at it. So we have a big design--a
design-off I guess you would call it. And they look at dozens of plans
over at the White House about what kind of a space station it ought to
be.
Obviously, the first one was much too grandiose, going to be much too
costly. So they come up with the International Space Station Alpha. And
we are going to participate with Europe and Canada and Japan, and now
of course Russia.
And here is what the construction cost was going to be between 1994
and 2002--$17.4 billion. I have alluded to that figure several times
already.
Now, anybody who believes that the construction and development of
the international space station is going to be $17.4 billion, you go
ahead and vote for it. You have my permission. You

[[Page S7807]]

certainly will not lose my friendship, if you actually believe that.
But if you actually believe that, you haven't got enough you-know-what
to be a Member of Congress. But if you believe that, go ahead and vote
for it.
The GAO had just gotten through issuing a report this morning saying
that is nonsense. And here is the operating costs for 10 years, $13
billion.
Mr. President, do you know the cost of this program and the cost of
all the 83 shuttles it is going to take to get it up there and supply
it? The cost is going to be staggering. You know, the cost of gold is
$325 an ounce today. That is peanuts compared to what a pound of water
will cost to supply these astronauts, just peanuts. It is like 33 times
more to send a pound of water. Maybe not that much. I do not want to
exaggerate too far. So here is your operating cost, $13 billion.
Here are the shuttle flights needed to launch, service and use the
station in space--$50.5 billion. Mr. President, let me tell you
something about that. At present, that is 83 launches that are going to
be necessary to deploy it and supply it for 10 years after it is
deployed--$50.5 billion. That is calculated I think on the basis of the
space shuttle, the flights running around $475 million each.
I can remember when I used to get teary-eyed seeing that shuttle take
off when they first developed it. Such a magnificent thing to see. One
day somebody told me each launch cost almost $500 million, and my eyes
dried up almost immediately.
Here are just the related costs of the space station--$1.9 billion on
these shuttle flights. Let me tell you, if you believe that 83 shuttles
will leave within a 5 to 7 minute launch window without a hitch over
the next 15, 16 years, you vote for it, if you believe that every
shuttle is going to go up without a hitch, rendezvous with the space
station without a hitch, take the needed supplies to the astronauts,
all of that, and every launch launched within a 5 to 7 minute
timeframe, which is absolutely necessary. And if you do not make it
within that 5 to 7 minute envelope, you delay the launch and the costs
soar.
I have a chart here, Mr. President, about the cost of gold. I guess
we can all relate to gold. Here it is. The present cost of the space
station is estimated by GAO--incidentally, this is not Dale Bumpers;
this is GAO--$94 billion. That is 25 times its weight in gold. And, as
I said earlier, that is $25 million per day of operation.

It is a jobs program. I said 140,000 jobs. Each job costs $147,000.
Three States--California, Texas, and Alabama--they get about 78 percent
of all the money. The other 22 to 24 percent goes to virtually every
other State. There are only a handful of States that do not have a
little piece of the action. NASA is not stupid. They took a leaf out of
the Pentagon's book. And they put those contracts into almost every
State. I think there is a little $50,000 contract in Arkansas on the
space station. That is just not quite enough to influence me. It
provides no commercial value. And it costs $12,880 to transport one
pound of material to the station.
Mr. President, let me now go to what some of the scientists say about
this project.
Before I do that, here is another little overrun. You cannot compute
the cost on this--this is manhours--but I want you to think about this.
In 1993, NASA said that the assembling of the space station would
require about 311 hours of EVA--extravehicular activity. It is space
walking. In 1993, they said it would take 311 hours of space walks to
assemble it. Then they decided they miscalculated, and they moved it up
to 434 hours. And then they decided they miscalculated it again, and in
1996 they said, ``We miscalculated, and it's going to take 1,104 hours
of space walking to assemble the station.'' And now, just very
recently, believe it or not, 1 year from the time the first launch is
supposed to occur, they say it is going to take 1,519 hours. NASA has
only miscalculated by 500 percent the number of hours it will take to
assemble the space station. And their calculations on everything else
are running pretty close.
Mr. President, let me tell you what people who know a lot more about
the science than I do are saying.
Incidentally, I watched Senator Glenn yesterday. He is not just one
of my very dearest friends, he came to the Senate with me in 1975. He
is one of the finest men--I think just the finest, most decent man I
have ever known. We do not disagree very often, but we disagree
strongly on this. We battle back and forth in the cloakroom about it.
He has circulated a brochure that ties the space station to research
on aging. God knows, I ought to be interested in that. Well, ironically
one space shuttle flight to the space station will cost almost as much
as the entire $454 million budget of the National Institute on Aging.
One space shuttle flight would finance the National Institute on Aging
for 1 year.
Now, you ask yourself, do you think you are really going to get
anything about aging out of the space shuttle? What you are going to
get is an expensive $450 million, and you are going to get nothing. If
you gave it to the National Institute on Aging, you at least have an
outside chance of something happening.
Here are the editors of Discovery Magazine from May 1997, 2 months
ago. Listen to this:

There is no use belaboring the point. Only the naive or the
vested still maintain that there is any good pragmatic reason
to spend the tens of billions of dollars it will take to
complete what started out in the early 1980s as Freedom and
now endures as the International Space Station. . . . Is it
possible to imagine a technological undertaking so enormous
that could garner less respect from the scientific community?

That says it all, but I am not going to quit.
Here is what Marsha Smith, who was interviewed in Aerospace America
in June 1995, said I visited with her in my office yesterday. She is
the brightest person in this country on this subject. She does not try
to tint it one way or another. She just calls it like it is. She is not
unalterably opposed to the space station, for that matter. But I say
this simply to demonstrate publicly my intense and high regard for her.

I don't know of any breakthroughs that have come out of
[Russian] space station programs in terms of new or cheaper-
to-produce materials or scientific discoveries . . . . Mostly
they have learned how to operate a space station for long
periods of time.

Now, Mr. President, I again issue the call. What have the Russians
got for 20 years of having the space station in orbit that is worthy of
the name ``scientific''?
Listen to what Tim Beardsley of Scientific American said in June
1996, a little over 1 year ago.

The value of biological and health research in orbit has
been challenged by Elliott C. Levinthal, a former program
director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
[that is called DARPA over at the Defense Department] . . .
Levinthal, who has been a professor of genetics and
mechanical engineering at Stanford University, asserts that
no neutral committee handing out funds for basic research in
biology would support microgravity studies.

And that is all the scientific justification you can find for the
space station--microgravity research. Anything else obviously you can
do here on Earth. As a matter of fact, you can do this in the shuttle.
You can even do it in unmanned flights.
James Ferris of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, in Scientific
American:

Nothing has come out of microgravity research to convince
me that a material can be fabricated in orbit that is going
to be better than what you can make on Earth.

Why do we want to spend $100 billion to manufacture something we can
do just as well on Earth, and for a fraction of the cost?
Here is what the German Physical Society said. And incidentally,
Germany is involved in paying for some of the costs.

Except for investigations carried out on humans themselves,
all experiments in this area of research can be carried out
unmanned, without loss of precision. This also applies to
microgravity. Therefore it is improper [it is improper] to
use microgravity as an effective argument in favor of manned
spaceflight.

That statement was endorsed by the European Physical Society, all the
physicists in Europe, the Physical Society of Japan--our physicists'
counterpart in Japan--the Canadian Association of Physicists and the
American Physical Society.
So, Mr. President, there you have it. International space station
Freedom, partly being paid for by the Japanese, by the European Space
Agency, by

[[Page S7808]]

Canada--forget Russia for the time being. And how do their physicists
feel about it? There is the European Physical Society, the Japanese
Physical Society, the Canadian Physical Society and the American
Physical Society, and that takes just about every physicist in America,
who says this is improbable nonsense. It reminds me of going to a
doctor and saying, ``Doctor, I have this hurting in my chest,'' and he
x-rays me and says, ``It looks to me like you have cancer.'' And I say,
``Well, it may be, but I will go find a Senator to validate this. I'm
not taking your word for it; I want to take the word of the U.S. Senate
and see if I have cancer of the lung.'' That is not far off. The
scientists all oppose the space station. Yet, as I said in my opening
remarks, it is so impossible to convince the Senate.
Incidentally, when it comes to the American Physical Society, its
spokesman in the past, as I said a moment ago, has been Dr. Park. Dr.
Park said, in July 1993:

It is the view of the American Physical Society that
scientific justification is lacking for a permanently manned
space station in Earth orbit. We are concerned that the
potential contribution of a manned space station to the
physical scientist has been greatly overstated and that many
of the scientific objectives currently planned for the space
station can be accomplished more effectively and at a much
lower cost on Earth.

Unmanned robotic platforms or on the shuttle. All he represents is
41,000 physicists in this country. He goes on to say, quoting Professor
Nicolaas Bloembergen of Harvard--and I said earlier I thought he was a
Nobel laureate, and he is, in physics--Dr. Bloembergen of Harvard, a
Nobel laureate and physicist, summed it up bluntly in testimony before
a Senate committee 2 years ago: ``Microgravity is of microimportance.''
How is it we know so much more here? After all, we are throwing $2.1
billion of the taxpayers' money at this project every year, and you saw
the figures and where we are headed-- $94 billion today, Lord knows how
many billions ultimately.
I think there is an assumption, says one physicist, that any program
that spends $15 billion per year is bound to produce something that
society can use, but few of NASA's claims stand up. Indeed, an interim
NASA study of technology transfer which became public in January
acknowledged that NASA spinoff claims were exaggerated. That is an in-
house memo that NASA's claims were exaggerated, including such famous
examples as Velcro, Tang, and Teflon. Contrary to popular belief, the
study found NASA created none of these. They merely publicized them.
Here is what Carl Sagan said: ``A space station is far from an
optimum platform for doing science.'' And the Space Sciences Board said
it ``sees no scientific need for this space station during the next 20
years,'' and went ahead to say, ``Continued development of Space
Station Freedom . . . cannot be supported on scientific grounds.''
Mr. President, I have two or three other scientists I will quote and
then I will turn it back to the managers of the bill. Incidentally, I
listened yesterday and I listened again today to all these gigantic,
frankly, highly specious, spurious claims about how we will find a cure
for this and a cure for that. If the doctors in the scientific
community say that is hogwash, who are we to question them? Somebody to
keep a few jobs in our State.
Here is what Dr. Rosenthal said on cancer research:

Statements have been made and published to the effect that
vital cancer research would be done in space, and that is
cited as a reason for supporting space station funding. We
cannot find valid scientific justification for these claims
and believe it is unrealistic to base a decision on funding
the space station on that information . . . Based on the
information we have seen thus far, we do not agree that a
strong case has been made for choosing to do cancer
research in space over critically needed cancer research
here on earth.

That was David Rosenthal, Harvard Medical School, testifying on
behalf of the American Cancer Society.
Dr. Shaun Ruddy, on behalf of the Arthritis Foundation:

Space station proponents have indicated that the Space
Station . . . will provide a ``first class'' laboratory . . .
We used to have ``first class'' laboratories in universities
and medical schools across the country . . . Reports by the
National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation
have indicated that over 51 percent of the biological
laboratory research is deemed inadequate for the conduct of
research . . . Furthermore, the National Science Foundation
report estimated that the capital construction backlog is
approximately $12 billion . . . Should our priorities now be
a ``first class'' laboratory in space, or correction of a
longstanding deficiency in laboratories throughout this
Nation?

Ms. MIKULSKI. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. BUMPERS. I am happy to yield to the Senator.
Ms. MIKULSKI. I bring to the Senator's attention that it is 12:10.
Mr. BUMPERS. I appreciate the Senator.
Ms. MIKULSKI. My question is, does the Senator wish to continue
before we adjourn at 12:30?
Mr. BUMPERS. I apologize for going longer than I intended. I was
having such a good time. As I told the Senator earlier, I do have a
little thing I need to tend to during the noon hour. Let me just
suggest I be permitted to leave while people on your side speak on the
other side of this issue, and then perhaps we can rejoin the issue
around 2:30 after the caucuses.
However, I understand there may be something else coming up.
Ms. MIKULSKI. I bring to the Senator's attention that at 2:15, the
Senate will go to consideration of military construction. Upon
completion of that, we will return to the bill.
Perhaps before the Senator leaves for his other Senate commitment,
you and I can talk about that.
Mr. BUMPERS. I am delighted to do that. I am sure we can reach an
agreement on a time certain to vote and even a wrap-up time for each
side, if that is possible.
Ms. MIKULSKI. We would like very much to be able to do that for the
Senator. We go to MilCon at 2:15 for 30 minutes, and from there we will
first have a vote on MilCon. Then we resume consideration of the bill.
At such time, I believe Senator Wellstone wishes to talk about
compelling needs of veterans, and you have to be in an agricultural
markup. We wonder if then around 4 o'clock, you could go to wrap-up and
we could have a vote?
Mr. BUMPERS. Let me suggest we agree on this without getting a formal
agreement. That we start on this again at 4 o'clock, and I promise,
say, 15 minutes would do me to wrap it up, maybe 15 minutes on your
side, and we could vote at 4:30.
Mr. BOND. If my colleagues will yield, first, let me enter into the
Record a unanimous consent to go to the MilCon measure, so we will get
that, and we can have that taken care of, and then I will speak with
the proponent of the amendment, my ranking member, and I hope we can
work out an accommodation acceptable to him.

Unanimous Consent Agreement--H.R. 2016

Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 2:15 today
the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar 117, H.R. 2016, the
military construction appropriations bill. I further ask unanimous
consent that the committee amendments and the manager's amendment be
agreed to, no other amendments be in order to the bill, there be 20
minutes for debate equally divided in the usual form, with an
additional 10 minutes under the control of Senator McCain. I finally
ask unanimous consent that at the expiration or yielding back of time,
the bill be read the third time, and the Senate proceed to a vote on
passage of H.R. 2016.
I further ask unanimous consent that immediately following passage,
the Senate then insist on its amendment and request a conference with
the House, and the Chair be authorized to appoint conferees on the part
of the Senate.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sessions). Without objection, it is so
ordered.

Privilege of the Floor

Mr. BOND. I further ask unanimous consent that Floyd DesChamps, a
detailee from the Department of Energy, with the Commerce, Science, and
Transportation Committee, be given access to the floor during the
Senate discussions on the VA-HUD-independent agencies appropriations
bill.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Amendment No. 944

Mr. BOND. Mr. President, if the ranking member will accommodate me, I
will make just a few remarks in opposition to the amendment and then we

[[Page S7809]]

will attempt to establish a timeframe for further proceedings on this
bill.
Mr. President, we have had a very eloquent statement by the Senator
from Arkansas about questions that have been raised about the
international space station. Needless to say, this question has been
addressed time and time again on this floor. There are those scientists
who have questions and objections. Nevertheless, the vast body, I
think, of scientific knowledge and scientific expertise indicates that
the space station is a tremendous opportunity for us to expand our
knowledge not only about space but to develop new processes, new
pharmaceuticals, medical advancements, and items that can be of
tremendous benefit for us here on Earth.
Yesterday, for example, I note that the distinguished Senator from
Ohio, our only space astronaut-Senator, talked at some length about the
tremendous number of advances in scientific knowledge that have come
from exploration in space. The bioreactor produces artificial human
tissue potentially useful in treating colon and prostate cancer,
production of kidney tissue and the cartilage tissue for implants.
Fluid physics, which can be observed in space, help us understand the
processes on Earth, such as how the soil behaves during earthquakes.
There is research in microgravity to develop new pharmaceuticals and
neurological research, important to patients with multiple sclerosis.
The list goes on and on, and I will not go into that here because there
are a number of other Senators who have expertise in this area who wish
to be heard on the measure.
Let me say that the international space station will be a world-class
scientific laboratory, with the unique feature of a near-zero gravity
environment. While it is impossible for us to know in advance, all of
the results of this scientific research, I think the vast body of
scientific expertise believes that microgravity research will lead to
new and pure pharmaceuticals, medical advancements, and the production
of new materials for use here on Earth.
With the imminent demise of Russia's Mir space station, the
international space station will be the only facility where these types
of research can be permitted.
The international space station will also provide operational
experience necessary for operating lunar outposts on Mars bases if and
when the Nation should decide to proceed with such bold plans.
Moreover, Mr. President, the international space station is a
hallmark of international cooperation between the United States and
other countries. Europe, Japan, and Canada have been involved with the
program since its inception, and the addition of Russia in 1993
enhanced the international participation. There is no greater symbol of
the end of the cold war than the United States and Russia--arch rivals
in space for decades--working together to build a space station for the
21st century.
Despite the challenges the program has had to overcome in the past
year--particularly the schedule delays resulting from Russia's failure
to complete the service module on time--the space station partnership
remains intact.
Russia has faced great financial troubles and uncertainties, and it
is impossible to say that all these troubles are in the past. But this
spring the Russian Government, though strapped financially, fulfilled
its promise to provide 800 billion rubles, and NASA reports that work
is progressing on the service module.
American taxpayers have invested significantly--$19 billion--in the
space station. We are now within a year of the first launch, which will
provide the benefits and the scientific advancements into that
research. Certainly, this is no time to give up on an experiment that
offers such potential.
The shuttle-Mir program, the first phase of the international space
station, is successfully underway. The experiments have led to
improvements in the design of the international space station, and we
have trained the crews. We are ready for tremendous scientific leaps,
and I trust that a significant majority of our colleagues, on a
bipartisan basis, will agree that the money we have invested has been a
wise investment, not only for science, technology, and the exploration
of the universe now, but for the developments in the scientific
advances that will come tomorrow for our children and our
grandchildren, who are fascinated by the opportunities of space. The
exploration of this frontier can deliver tremendous benefits. This is
not the time to abort the mission and say that we have gone nineteen-
twentieths, or 95 percent, of the way toward the discovery of a new
world and we are going to turn back now.
Mr. President, I hope that my colleagues will once again
overwhelmingly support the continuation of the space station.
I yield the floor.
Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, this is, once again, a bipartisan
agreement that we should continue to fund the space station Freedom.
This dazzling scientific endeavor was created under the Reagan
administration, sustained under the Bush administration, and maintained
under the Clinton administration.
Now, why have three Presidents of the United States all supported
space station Freedom? They have done it for several reasons. One,
because it accomplished significant science in space. Second, it is a
model for what the new world order will look like in which no one
nation dominates space, but each nation is best at what it best can do.
The United States of America, Canada, Japan, Europe, and now the
Russian involvement does show what the space program of the future will
be. It will be multilateral, multinational cooperation for multiple
gains.
Mr. President, I would like to speak more on why I support the space
station Freedom, but I note that on the floor is the Senator from
Arizona. It had been our agreement to let him speak before the
conference.
I want to say, before we break for the party conferences, that there
is no break in bipartisan support for the space station. We are going
to ensure that the space station does produce sound science, have
maximum international cooperation and, once again, make both our Nation
and the world proud of what we do. I will have more to say about the
space station and why I am an enthusiastic, unabashed, and unrelenting
sponsor of this later on this afternoon.

In the meantime, as a courtesy and collegiality to move our bill, I
yield the floor now and look forward to resuming my comments on the
space station later this afternoon.
Mr. McCAIN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, the Senate is making unprecedented
progress in considering the appropriations bills for fiscal year 1998.
We have completed action on five spending bills, with the expectation
that we will finish at least five more prior to the August recess. I
must congratulate Chairman Stevens and Senator Inouye, as well as the
subcommittee managers of the bills, on their efficient management of
these measures on the floor. On this bill, I want to congratulate my
colleagues from Missouri and Maryland, Senators Bond and Mikulski, for
the outstanding job they have done on this legislation.
I don't intend to unduly delay the Senate in completing consideration
of the pending appropriations measures. But I want to ensure that, in
our haste to act on these important spending bills, my colleagues are
fully aware of the funding recommendations that are contained in this
bill.
I don't enjoy returning to the Senate floor for the sixth time in a
little over a week to talk about the wasteful spending in these bills.
Mr. President, this is a very important measure. It provides $40
billion to fund programs for our Nation's veterans, who have served
their country and need and deserve our respect and attention. It
contains $25 billion for our Nation's housing needs, including low-
income housing programs, housing assistance for native Americans, low-
cost mortgage assistance, housing for the elderly, and much more. It
provides funding for our space program, programs to protect and restore
the health of the environment, disaster assistance, and the activities
of many other agencies. This bill totals over $90 billion.

[[Page S7810]]

Yet, at the same time we are struggling to balance the budget and
adequately fund necessary Federal programs, I find it somewhat
disheartening that the committee spent so much time and effort to
identify and protect Members' special interest items.
Mr. President, I have here a nine-page list of earmarks in this bill
and the accompanying report--nine pages of set-asides for specific
institutes, centers, projects, and even museums. These projects have
not been considered in the normal process of prioritizing among
competing requirements. They have simply been earmarked to receive
funds because a Member of this body wanted to bring it home.
I ask unanimous consent that at this time this nine-page document of
objectionable provisions in the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:

Objectionable Provisions in S. 1034, the Fiscal Year 1998 VA-HUD
Appropriations Bill

Bill Language

$10 million of HUD funds earmarked for housing demolition
and replacement at Heritage House in Kansas City, Missouri.
Earmark of HUD funds for an economic development test
program, including at least one Native American area in
Alaska.
$40 million earmarked for the Economic Development
Initiative within HUD, ``to finance a variety of efforts,
including those identified in the Senate committee report'',
namely:
$2.5 million for enlarging Scarborough Library at Shepherd
College in West Virginia.
$2 million for brownfield activities in Baltimore,
Maryland.
$2 million for economic redevelopment of Ogden, Utah.
$2 million to renovate Albright-Knox Art Gallery in
Buffalo, New York.
$400,000 for a regional landfill in Charles Mix County,
South Dakota.
$2.5 million for a construction project related to Bushnell
Theater in Hartford, Connecticut.
$2.5 million for exhibit and program development at
Discovery Place in Charlotte, North Carolina.
$600,000 for the West Maui Community Resource Center in
Hawaii.
$1.5 million for renovation of Paramount Theater in
Rutland, Vermont.
$1 million for Lake Champlain Science Center in Burlington,
Vermont.
$2 million for renovation of Tapley Street Operations
Center in Springfield, Massachusetts.
$2 million to develop abandoned industrial sites in Perth
Amboy, New Jersey.
$2.5 million for New Mexico Hispanic Cultural Center.
$400,000 for Riverbend Research and Training Park in Post
Falls, Idaho.
$2.5 million for University of Missouri for a plant
genetics research unit and the Delta Research
Telecommunications Resource Center.
$2 million for Cleveland Avenue YMCA in Montgomery,
Alabama, to build a cultural arts center.
$1 million for Covenant House in Anchorage, Alaska.
$7.1 million of HUD funds previously earmarked for an
industrial park at 18th and Indiana in Kansas City, is
instead earmarked for rehabilitation and infrastructure
development associated with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum
and the Jazz Museum at 18th & Vine.
$150 million of EPA funds earmarked for construction of
high priority water and wastewater facilities in the area of
the U.S.-Mexico Border, including $50 million for grants to
Texas for improving wastewater treatment for colonias.
$15 million of EPA funds for grants to Alaska to address
drinking water and wastewater infrastructure needs of rural
and Alaska Native Villages.
$82 million of EPA funds earmarked for grants to construct
wastewater and water treatment facilities and groundwater
protection infrastructure as specified in the report, namely:
$7 million for Burlington, Iowa.
$7.15 million for Lake Tahoe, California.
$5 million for Richmond and Lynchburg, Virginia.
$7 million for Ashley Valley, Utah.
$1 million for Ogden, Utah.
$4 million for Jackson County, Mississippi.
$50,000 for Kinloch, Missouri.
$1.2 million for Las Cruces, New Mexico.
$5 million for Virgin Valley Water District, Nevada.
$2 million for Epping, New Hampshire.
$4.3 million for Queen Annes County, Maryland and Pocomoke
River, Maryland.
$6 million for Bingham County, Rupert, and Rosell and
Homedale, Idaho.
$5 million for Missoula, Montana.
$1.7 million for Essex County, Massachusetts.
$3 million for Milton, Vermont.
$5 million for Fayette and Fallowfield Township,
Pennsylvania.
$6.3 million for Pulaski County and Kingdom City, Missouri.
$8 million for Abbeville, McCormick, and Edgefield
Counties, South Carolina.
$3.3 million for Jackson, Washington, and Cleburen
Counties, Alabama.

Report Language

Veterans' Administration:
Earmarks and directive language:
$12.4 million add-on for a patient privacy/environmental
renovation project in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
$900,000 add-on for the National Veterans Cemetery in
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Directs the VA to proceed expeditiously with the expansion
of the Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery in St. Louis,
Missouri.
Directs the VA to move expeditiously to complete the third
floor of the Jackson, Mississippi regional VA office.
Sufficient funds are included in this appropriation for the
completion of the third floor should the VA be ready to
proceed in fiscal year 1998.
Directs VA to give priority consideration to construct a
new dietary complex and boilerplant at Southeastern Veterans
Center in Spring City, Pennsylvania.
Words of encouragement and support:
Urges or encourages the Veterans' Administration to
consider establishing or expanding Community Based Outpatient
Clinics in Vermont, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and southern
and western Maryland.
Urges additional funding to start up and test the coal-
fired incinerator at the Lebanon, Pennsylvania VAMC.
Urges VA to consider procuring a mobile clinic to be
operated from the Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania VAMC.
Language supporting a joint VA-DOD effort through the
Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston, Massachusetts to apply
methods to improve detection capability for those prone to
diabetes.
Encourages the VA to continue the VA-DOD Distance Learning
Pilot Program to transition clinical nurse specialists to the
role of nurse practitioners, which is established at the
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences at
Bethesda, Maryland.
Urges the VA to continue the demonstration project
involving the Clarksburg, West Virginia VAMC and the Ruby
Memorial Hospital at West Virginia University, with funding
up to $2 million.
Urges VA to provide adequate support for seven-site
National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Language expressing continuing support for the
establishment of a partnership with a private, not-for-profit
research and treatment center that could deliver new cancer
therapy to veterans; directs the VA to expedite efforts to
establish such a partnership, and mentions that Garden State
Cancer Center in New Jersey is internationally recognized in
this field.
Urges the VA to provide support for a cooperative program
with the Diabetes Institute of Norfolk, Virginia to develop
protocols for the diagnosis and treatment of diabetic
neuropathy.
Language noting the need for expanding the columbarium at
the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Hawaii, and
urges the VA to allocate necessary funds, estimated at $1.5
million for this project.
Urges favorable and expeditious review of the construction
applications for State veteran homes in Cameron and
Warrensburg, Missouri, which would require $13.2 million and
$13.6 million in federal funds.
Requests the VA to thoroughly and expeditiously consider
applications for cemetery sites for Springfield and
Higginsville, Missouri, which would require almost $4 million
in federal funds.
Housing and Urban Development:
Set-asides from Community Development Block Grant funds for
a variety of projects and activities in various locations:
$2 million for revitalization of Los Angeles, California.
$1 million for science and mathematics programs at Morgan
State University in Baltimore, Maryland.
$2 million for expansions of the Business Development
Center at Hofstra University in New York.
$1 million for St. Louis University for community
development program in LaClede Town, Missouri.
$1 million for University of Colorado Health Sciences
Center.
Environmental Protection Agency:
Earmarks for a myriad of add-ons:
$8 million to establish up to five university-based
research centers to address the most pressing unanswered
questions involved in the air particulates field.
$2 million for Water Environment Research Foundation
cooperative research program.
$3 million for American Water Works Association Research
Foundation.
$1.75 million for National Jewish Medical and Research
Center for research on the relationship between indoor and
outdoor pollution.
$2 million for Lovelace Respiratory Institute to establish
a National Environmental Respiratory Center coordinate
research on airborne particulates.
$1 million for Center for Air Toxic Metals at Energy
and Environmental Research Center.
$1 million for Texas Regional Institute for Environmental
Studies.
$1 million for Institute for Environmental and Industrial
Science.
$1.5 million for Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene
and Public Health to establish a National Center for
Environmental Toxicology and Epidemiology to study the effect
of urban toxics on human health.

[[Page S7811]]

$1 million to establish the Center for Estuarine and
Coastal Ocean Environmental Research at the University of
South Alabama.
$1.5 million for Integrated Petroleum Environmental
Consortium.
$3 million to continue a demonstration project involving
leaking fuel tanks in rural Alaskan villages.
$250,000 for the Nature Conservancy of Alaska for
protection of the Kenai River watershed.
$3 million for the Southwest Center for Environmental
Research and Policy.
$1 million for the Sacramento River Toxic Pollutant Control
Program.
$500,000 for continuing of the small water system
cooperative initiative at Montana State University.
$500,000 for a small public water system technology center
at Western Kentucky University.
$2 million for the New York City watershed protection
program.
$750,000 for the Chespeake Bay program to initiate a small
watershed grants program to implement the cooperative
tributary basic strategies.
$1 million to continue the sediment decontamination
technology project in the New York-New Jersey harbor.
$500,000 for the Treasure Valley, Idaho, hydrologic
project.
$2.5 million for King County, Washington, for a molten
carbonate fuel cell demonstration project at the Renton
wastewater treatment plant.
$800,000 for the National Center for Vehicle Emissions
Control and Safety to establish an On-Board Diagnostic
Research Center.
$500,000 to continue the Small Business Pollution
Prevention Center at University of Northern Iowa.
$500,000 to continue the Compliance Assistance Center for
Painting and Coating Technology.
$200,000 to complete cleanup of Five Island Lake.
$500,000 for the Ala Wai Canal watershed improvement
project.
$400,000 to continue the Maui algal bloom project.
$100,000 for the Design for the Environment for Farmers
Program to address the need to develop and adopt sustainable
agricultural practices for the fragile tropical ecosystems of
the American Pacific.
$1.5 million for the Lake Champlain management plan.
$600,000 to complete the solar aquatic wastewater treatment
demonstration in Burlington, Vermont although the report
language goes on to state that ``The Committee does not
intend to recommend funding for additional solar aquatic
wastewater treatment demonstrations in view of EPA's
assessment that this technology does not appear to offer any
economic advantages over conventional technologies.''
$1 million for the Alabama Department of Environmental
Management to coordinate a model water/wastewater operations
training program.
$150,000 to establish a regional training center at the
Kentucky Onsite Wastewater Center.
$550,000 for the Idaho water initiative.
$1 million for Lake Weequahic cleanup.
$1.75 million for the Three Rivers watershed protection
demonstration project in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.
$1.25 million to design an innovative granular activated
carbon water treatment project in Oahu.
$500,000 for a small public water system technology center
at the University of Missouri-Columbia.
$2 million for a Missouri Watershed initiative at the Food
and Agricultural Policy Research Institute.
$500,000 for a study of dioxin levels in the Ohio River
basin.
$300,000 for the California Urban Environmental Research
and Education Center.
$1 million to continue a wetlands-based potable water reuse
program for the city of West Palm Beach.
$700,000 for the Long Island Sound office.
$2 million for the University of Missouri Agroforestry
Center to support a floodplain initiative.
$300,000 for the Northeast States for coordinated air use
management.
Directive language:
Language directing EPA to consider testing ground water
remediation technology developed by the International
Research Center for Groundwater Research.
Language directing EPA to fund the water quality testing
program along the New Jersey and New York shorelines at no
less than current levels.
Language directing EPA to conduct a feasibility study for a
potential pilot project to demonstrate innovative
alternatives to the existing haul-water drinking water and
honey bucket human waste disposal systems in the Northwest
Arctic Borough.
Language directing EPA to assess whether the Edison
Laboratory should be replaced and, if appropriate, to include
funding in the FY 1999 budget submission.
Words of encouragement and support:
Language urging EPA to give strong consideration to funding
a proposal by the Hawaii Institute of Tropical Agriculture
and Human Resources to further the commercialization of
agriculturally based environmental remediation technologies.
Urges EPA to give priority to soil aquifer treatment
research program for indirect potable reuse of highly treated
domestic wastewater being conducted in California and
Arizona.
Encourages EPA to undertake a demonstration project at
North Dakota State University comparing satellite data to
field-gathered data on farming practices in the Oakes
irrigation test area in southeast North Dakota.
Urges EPA to support the Houston Air Excellence and
Leadership program which seeks to identify ways in which air
pollution control policy can be targeted toward the most
dangerous pollutants.
Directs EPA to strongly consider funding a proposal by Fort
Scott, Kansas for additional tertiary wastewater treatment
via a constructed wetland which will improve the Marmaton
River.
Urges EPA to give careful consideration to the
establishment of a Small Public Water Systems Technology
Assistance Center at West Virginia State University and the
University of New Hampshire.
Urges EPA to look at the sister lake partnership between
Lake Champlain Basin and Lake Orchid in the former Soviet
Union as a model for its own program.
Language stating that funding within the National Estuary
Program should be provided to Sarasota Bay, Buzzards Bay, and
Massachusetts Bay.
Urges EPA to provide support to exploring new ways to
control zebra mussels in Lake Champlain.
Urges EPA to provide assistance to the city of Gainesville,
Florida, for an innovative stormwater management project to
protect the Floridian aquifer from stormwater runoff.
Urges EPA to support the Sokaogon Chippewa community's
efforts to assess the environmental impacts of a proposed
sulfide mine project.
Language stating the Committee would entertain a future
budget request by EPA to construct a solid oxide fuel cell/
gas turbine power system demonstration plant at EPA's Fort
Meade research facility.
Language stating that EPA should provide adequate funds to
continue the Dover Township, New Jersey, cancer cluster
studies.
Urges EPA to provide $3 million from the border
infrastructure fund to El Paso for use in its Rio Grande
environmental monitoring program and $2 million for the
federal share for construction of the Jonathan Rogers plant.
Federal Emergency Management Agency:
Words of encouragement and support:
Recommends FEMA consider using the State of Maryland's
western Maryland flood task force as a model for work in
other states in identifying disaster mitigation
opportunities, and states that FEMA should work with the
State of Maryland to fund mitigation measures identified by
the task force.
Urges FEMA to continue efforts, in cooperation with the
National Institute of Building Sciences and the University of
South Alabama, to establish a universal methodology capable
of predicting damages and loss of life caused by natural
hazards.
Urges FEMA to support the Pittsford, Vermont, Fire Academy
effort to expand training to rail and toxic material
accidents, as recommended by the Committee in prior years.
Encourages FEMA to support the Coastal Region Development
Center's efforts to develop a new model plan for southeast
Georgia and other coastal states for hurricane evacuation
mitigation preparedness.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration:
Earmarks and directive language:
Earmarks an additional $10 million for Origins ATD for
additional astronomy test beds that contain significant
investment by U.S. institutions; directs that, in selecting
the new sites, one site permit search from the southern
hemisphere for candidate stars which show clear evidence of
planetary systems, and a second site use a large ground-based
interferometer that demonstrates new adaptive optics and
nulling interferometry technologies essential for the direct
detection of Earth-like planets of other stars.
Directs NASA to use $15 million to fund up to
five consortia to develop specific regional applications
with the use of EOS data; each consortium much include
academic institutions and end users as partners and
demonstrate a value-added application of EOS data to a
regional problem of significant consequence.
$20 million increase earmarked for the bantam flight
demonstrator.
$1.5 million earmarked for MSE-Technology Applications,
Western Environmental Technology Office.
$2.5 million for a science learning center in Kenai,
Alaska.
$500,000 for the Discovery Science Center, Santa Ana,
California.
$2 million earmarked for continuing development of a
national prototype space education curriculum by the Center
for Space Education at the Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii.
$5 million for facilities enhancements at the Stennis Space
Center.
Words of encouragement and support:
Commends the efforts to the Stennis Space Center in
commercial remote sensing and encourages that these
activities continue.
Urges NASA to use a portion of the $10 million earmarked
for the next generation internet initiative to develop new
internet technologies to improve interconnection to areas
such as Alaska and Hawaii; also recommends Montana as an
appropriate participant area in the next generation internet
initiative.

[[Page S7812]]

National Science Foundation:
Earmarks and directive language:
$40 million to support a competitive, merit-based
initiative, which may include one or more university-based
research center, to enable the development of a U.S.-led
public/private research initiative supporting research into
plant genomes
$25 million earmarked for an incoherent scatter radar,
which the Committee directs be used only to construct the
radar collocated with the Department of Defense ionospheric
research site (i.e., the HAARP project in Alaska)
Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, what concerns me most is the growing
practice of earmarking funds for a myriad of projects in the report
language but then incorporating that report language by reference in
the bill itself. For example, on pages 32 and 33, the bill language
states:

Of the amounts made available under this heading, $40
million for the Economic Development Initiative (EDI) to
finance a variety of efforts, including those identified in
the Senate committee report, that promote economic
revitalization that links people to jobs and supportive
services.

The report identifies 17 separate projects, in specific amounts and
at specific locations, totaling nearly $30 million. The effect of this
bill language is to require HUD to spend three-fourths of this economic
development money for these particular projects without any assessment
of the relative needs of the communities which would benefit from these
projects compared with many other American communities. This is a very
bad practice, Mr. President. It is one of the worst that I have seen in
a long time.
Another section of the bill incorporates a similar list of earmarks
into the bill language. On page 62, the bill reads:

. . . $82 million for making grants for the construction of
wastewater and water treatment facilities and groundwater
protection infrastructure in accordance with the terms and
conditions specified for such grants in the report
accompanying this Act. . . .

It just so happens that the only terms and conditions contained in
the report are earmarks for particular projects for the entire $82
million set aside in the bill. Again, this is back-door earmarking and
it's the worst form of pork barrel spending that I have seen in a long
time.
As I have said, this bill also contains earmarks for museums,
particularly, $7.1 million for the Jazz Museum and the Negro Leagues
Baseball Museum in Kansas City, MO.
The bill also earmarks $150 million for water and waterwaste
facilities along the United States-Mexico border. While this earmark
could conceivably benefit my own State of Arizona, I cannot understand
why we cannot, instead, provide funding based on need and established
criteria, rather than setting aside millions of dollars for certain
States or areas of the country.
The report is replete with earmarks. One of the most interesting
reads as follows:

$600,000 for the final year of funding for the solar
aquatic wastewater treatment demonstration in Burlington, VT,
to be cost-shared by the participants.

Get this, Mr. President:

The Committee does not intend to recommend funding for
additional solar aquatic wastewater treatment demonstrations
in view of EPA's assessment that this technology does not
appear to offer any economic advantages over conventional
technologies.

So we are going to spend $600,000 more on a project where, in EPA's
assessment, the technology doesn't offer any economic advantages over
conventional technologies. It seems a little bit ridiculous to me.
Mr. President, I won't go through the nine-page list I mentioned, but
there are some fascinating earmarks in here. I will tell you, it's
really interesting. Here is $1 million for renovation of the Paramount
Theater in Vermont. It urges or encourages the Veterans' Administration
to consider establishing or expanding community-based outpatient
clinics in Vermont, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and southern and
western Maryland. You are going to have to help me out here, Mr.
President. Why not in Maine, California, or Texas? Instead, it is
encouraging the VA to establish expanding community-based outpatient
clinics in Vermont, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, southern and western
Maryland. The only thing I can say is in common there is that they are
low-growth States. Why would we not want to establish or expand
outpatient clinics in high-growth States--Nevada, California, Texas, or
Arizona? I don't know. I don't understand.

Mr. President, we don't want to do these things. I think, as I have
said on many different occasions, it doesn't help us with the American
people, and we waste millions of taxpayer dollars on projects that
serve our own narrow interests rather than those of the Nation at
large. It makes it harder for us to whittle away at the $5.3 trillion
debt.
I yield the floor.
Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I know the order was for the Senate to
adjourn at 12:30. I now ask unanimous consent that there be a period
for morning business, in which Senator Ashcroft be permitted to speak
for 5 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Missouri is recognized.
Mr. ASHCROFT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be
allowed to proceed as in morning business until the completion of my
remarks.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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