[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 154 (Friday, September 26, 2008)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9634-S9635]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 DOMESTIC INFRASTRUCTURE GAPS POST 9/11

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, it has been more than 7 years since al-
Qaida attacked us at home. There are many lessons those attacks should 
have taught us, many things we should have been doing as a nation since 
that date which we have yet to do. These post-9/11 gaps in our efforts 
and strategies need as much if not more attention today as they did on 
September 12, 2001. The largest gap we face is a strategic gap between 
what we should have done and what this administration elected to do in 
response to the tragic events of 9/11. The administration chose to 
attack Iraq rather than complete the mission in Afghanistan--where the 
9/11 attacks were hatched--and address al-Qaida's expanding influence 
in northern Africa, Southeast Asia, and beyond. Those threats are real 
and have the continuing potential to manifest themselves again in 
disastrous ways here at home and around the world.
  There are other gaps--failures by this administration to address the 
real challenges of our post-9/11 world. We have created a gap in the 
readiness of our military. Our National Guard, an integral part of any 
large disaster response, has been severely strained. We continue to 
have insufficient intelligence and information resources posted abroad. 
We have insufficient diplomatic personnel, with insufficient language 
and other cultural experience, to cover the many places in the world 
where our national security interests require that we know more--and 
interact with those who know us least. And while I applaud the efforts 
of this administration to encourage more of our citizens to engage in 
international volunteer programs, there is room for much more to be 
done to strengthen our image and our impact abroad through citizen 
outreach and private diplomacy. In a post-9/11 world, these continuing 
gaps pose real threats to our security at home, and we cannot ignore 
them at the expense of a strategically misguided and perilously 
expensive ongoing military presence in Iraq.
  Closer to home, we are now beginning to suffer serious challenges to 
our economic stability and longer term economic outlook. We are 
squandering our wealth and failing to invest in our economic future and 
our domestic security. Osama bin Laden's stated goal was to bankrupt 
America. Well, the cost of our presence in Iraq may ultimately exceed 
the massive cost proposed to bail out our failed financial systems. And 
what do we have to show for the hundreds of billions spent in Iraq? 
What do Americans have as a return on their investment? A more perilous 
world in which al-Qaida has a safe haven in Pakistan, our power and 
influence are diminished and our military might is badly overextended.
  So where do we go from here? We go where Americans have always gone 
in times of challenge. We will take up the challenge we face head-on 
and work to close the gaps we face in the fabric of our domestic 
security.
  Here at home, we continue to have critical gaps in our domestic 
security, in our infrastructure, in our first responder systems. We 
still have not deployed an effective system to prevent the smuggling of 
radiological materials through our ports. We have not done everything 
we can to secure chemical facilities that could be the source of 
materials for domestic car bombs like the ones we have seen cause so 
much damage in Baghdad. We have not fully implemented the command 
system needed to ensure that first responders know how to work together 
across federal, state and local government.
  We have also failed to establish the military forces needed to 
conduct medical triage, search and rescue, and decontamination in the 
wake of a WMD incident at home. I tried to offer an amendment to the 
2009 Defense authorization bill that would have mandated that these 
forces be established by the end of 2009 and that they be maintained at 
the highest levels of readiness. This

[[Page S9635]]

amendment would have addressed what the Commission on the National 
Guard and Reserves characterized as an ``appalling gap'' in our 
domestic defenses. I was unsuccessful, but I will continue to press for 
enactment of this legislation. It is time that we get our priorities 
straight and put the defense of the American people first.
  State and local authorities will always be the first to defend the 
American people in any disaster, whether manmade or natural. We need to 
ensure that we give them the resources they need to fulfill their 
responsibilities. That is why I have long supported adequate funding 
for homeland security and emergency management grants. I opposed the 
administration's proposal to reduce funding for these grants this year 
and am pleased that 2009 Homeland Security appropriations bill, which 
we should vote on shortly, includes increased funding for these and 
other important State and local grant programs.
  The security of our borders is another critical priority. While I had 
serious concerns about some provisions of the Comprehensive Immigration 
Reform Act of 2007, the bill took some steps toward tightening border 
security that I strongly supported, such as requiring the Department of 
Homeland Security, DHS, to develop a national border security strategy 
and border surveillance plan. The bill also required DHS to develop a 
schedule for implementing the US-VISIT exit-entry program, created new 
criminal penalties for constructing border tunnels, provided grants to 
law enforcement agencies to address criminal activity along the border, 
and required the Government to work with countries south of the border 
to combat human smuggling and drug trafficking.
  While that bill ultimately failed, I have supported other measures to 
enhance border security which have been signed into law, including 
funding to hire 23,000 new Border Patrol agents, put in place vehicle 
barriers along the border, install 105 radar and camera towers, remove 
and detain undocumented aliens, construct barriers, and purchase ground 
and aerial surveillance devices. Congress must take a practical 
approach to securing the borders and provide the resources necessary 
for our Government to carry out that important responsibility.
  From our borders to the first responders in our communities, we face 
tremendous challenges. As we work to close those security gaps, we must 
also draw on America's boundless capacity for innovation and 
creativity. We need those talents more than ever as we face 
unprecedented challenges in our energy sector and elsewhere. We remain 
hostage to foreign oil sources, yet we have not invested adequately in 
the necessary alternatives. We face huge challenges in our 
transportation systems, which consume the largest proportion of our 
petroleum resources. We are beginning to understand that fresh water 
may be the next oil and that we have to use, conserve, and manage it as 
the scarce resource that it is. And where do these alternatives 
necessary to rebuild and sustain the economy of our future come from? 
Our history tells us they come from what President Eisenhower, in his 
farewell address to the Nation, called the ``solitary inventor, 
tinkering in his shop''--the entrepreneurial small businessperson.
  So we must invest in our skilled workers and our infrastructure. We 
must find ways to invigorate our creative and entrepreneurial small 
businesses so that we can not only drive innovation and employment but 
strengthen our own security in the process.
  Two programs--the Small Business Innovation Research and Small 
Business Technology Transfer Programs--are prime examples of how we can 
encourage innovation to improve our security. These highly successful 
programs not only need to be reauthorized, they need to be 
substantially increased and targeted at the key challenges of our time. 
Our domestic security, our innovative and entrepreneurial 
opportunities, our country's longer term employment prospects, and our 
economic future are all directly benefited by these programs, which 
provide Federal money for small business innovation. And the National 
Research Council, after an exhaustive study of the SBIR Program, tells 
us that Congress could effectively increase funding of this effort. 
This is the kind of investment we need to be making in our national 
security and in our economic future.
  As we make that investment, we should make security-related 
innovation a stated priority of SBIR, not simply a byproduct of some 
SBIR-supported research. There are few, if any, Government programs 
better positioned to develop technologies to protect the American 
people than SBIR. I have introduced legislation to make domestic 
security, water security and quality, transportation, and energy top 
SBIR priorities. By focusing SBIR innovation and research in all of 
these areas, but especially domestic security and water security and 
quality, we can do a great deal to address the security challenges we 
face.
  Today there are many technologies addressing areas such as first 
responder emergency responses, detection of radioactive materials, 
cargo scanning and cybersecurity, that demand more research and 
innovation to meet our security needs in a post-9/11 world. Recent 
reports from the Government Accountability Office and the National 
Academy of Sciences, for instance, identify troubling gaps in first 
responders' ability to deal with hazardous releases in urban areas or 
our ability to better track and detect radioactive materials. SBIR can 
fund the research that can close these security gaps, and that 
program--and most importantly the small business innovators 
themselves--deserve our full support in Congress.
  Mr. President, as this administration comes to a close, we have an 
opportunity to revisit how best to address the gaps that have arisen in 
our national security both before and since 9/11. Our need to act is no 
less urgent now than it was 7 years ago, except that we have squandered 
time and great resources in the intervening period. I urge those of us 
who will return in the next Congress to work with the next 
administration to address these gaps with a renewed perspective on the 
sense of urgency they deserve.

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