[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 46 (Tuesday, March 17, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3134-S3141]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




REVOLUTIONARY WAR AND WAR OF 1812 BATTLEFIELD PROTECTION ACT--MOTION TO 
                           PROCEED--Continued

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington is recognized.

[[Page S3135]]

  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 7 
minutes as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Newspaper Industry

  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, we have a lot of interesting landmarks in 
my home State of Washington, especially in Seattle. But one of my 
favorites has always been the globe that sits on top of the Seattle 
Post Intelligencer's building on Elliott Bay. The words, ``It's in the 
P.I.'' wrap around that globe, and it is more than just another quirky 
part of our skyline. It has symbolized the importance of the paper to 
generations of readers.
  For 146 years, the Seattle P.I., as everyone in Seattle calls it, has 
informed, investigated, enlightened, entertained, and, yes, sometimes 
irritated the people of our community. The P.I. staff has put 
politicians, businesspeople and bureaucrats to the test, and their work 
has distinguished the paper and won them well-deserved awards--from our 
cartoonist David Horsey's Pulitzers to a long list of prizes for public 
service journalism.
  But, today the P.I. published its last print edition. Its owner, the 
Hearst media chain, put it up for sale and hasn't been able to find a 
buyer.
  Hearst has said it will replace the paper with a smaller online 
edition, but it won't be the same.
  We have been lucky to live in a two-newspaper town. Two-newspaper 
communities used to be common, but they are rare these days.
  In Seattle, the Times and the P.I. had a Joint Operating Agreement 
for 26 years, but they were always rivals when it came to breaking 
news.
  Competition made both papers dig a little deeper and push a little 
harder. That competition meant everyone from corporate leaders to 
school officials to sports team owners were held to a higher standard.
  Our community is a better place as a result.
  Unfortunately, the P.I. is not the first major paper in our country 
to stop publishing this year. Last month, Denver's Rocky Mountain News 
closed its doors. And the P.I. may not be the last to close either.
  The reality is that newspapers have been struggling and cutting back 
for several years now. Many of the major papers across the country are 
worried about whether they will make it through the economic downturn.
  Like so many other companies, they are victims of the recession and a 
changing business environment.
  The depth of the problem hit home for me earlier this year when I 
visited the press in Olympia, our State's capital city.
  In 2001, there were 31 reporters, editors, and columnists covering 
the state house there. Now there are nine--nine.
  We have all noticed the shrinking press corps here in Washington, DC, 
too.
  Not too many years ago, we had more than a dozen reporters here 
covering the Washington State delegation. We have seen that number 
shrink to just a couple in the last year.
  This is really troubling to me because at the end of the day, 
newspapers aren't just another business. And if more close--and there 
is nothing to replace them--our democracy will be weaker as a result.
  For generations, newspaper reporters have been the ones who have done 
the digging, sat through the meetings, and broken the hard stories.
  A newspaper broke the Watergate scandal--and the story about horrible 
conditions at Walter Reed Medical Center.
  Newspapers have exposed graft and corruption at every level of 
government. They have uncovered environmental threats posed by strip 
mining, hog farming, and contaminated waterways.
  They have used the power of the press to expose injustice, prejudice, 
and mistreatment of people who don't have the power to speak up for 
themselves.
  And most importantly, newspaper stories have led to real change.
  In my community, the P.I.'s reports on asbestos led me to introduce 
my legislation to ban it and the P.I.'s investigation on the shortage 
of FBI agents in the Pacific Northwest has led to my work to increase 
the number of agents in Washington State.
  We need reporters to root out corruption, shine a light on the 
operations of government, and tell the people what is really going on 
in our communities.
  We need them to go to school board meetings, cover local elections, 
and attend congressional hearings.
  And, yes, we need them to push for information, to investigate, to 
request public records--and to fight when the government stands in the 
way.
  We are still working out what role the Internet will play in the 
Fourth Estate--and what role TV and radio have in the new media 
environment.
  There has been a lot of talk recently about whether online 
publications can--or will--adequately replace the paper editions.
  While there is something comfortable about the fact that we can pick 
up a paper, spread it out on the kitchen table, and cut out articles to 
stick on the fridge, what's most important to me is that if the media 
environment is really changing, someone will be there to step in and do 
the work newspapers do for our communities now.
  I really hope what we are seeing is just an evolution in the news 
business.
  I hope that when it all shakes out, the media will end up as strong 
as ever. I am going to miss the Seattle P.I., and I know all of Seattle 
and the Pacific Northwest will as well.

  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas is recognized.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mrs. Hutchison pertaining to the introduction of S. 
614 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa is recognized.


                       2010 Budget Tax Increases

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today is St. Patrick's Day. St. Patrick, 
the patron saint of Ireland, is revered by Irish and non-Irish alike, 
for many things. Among the many legends is one regarding snakes. St. 
Patrick drove snakes off the Emerald Isle. In looking at the 
President's budget, you could see that we might need St. Patrick to 
come back and drive all the extra taxes out of the budget. Certainly, 
like the snakes in Ireland, all of these new taxes, if left unchecked, 
could bite a lot of hard-working American taxpayers.

  Nineteen days ago, President Obama sent his first budget up to 
Capitol Hill. The deficits and debt proposed in that budget are eye-
popping. President Obama is correct when he says that he inherited a 
record budget deficit of $1.2 trillion. I have a chart here that shows 
the pattern of the Federal debt.
  But, from the statements from the congressional Democratic 
leadership, you would think they just got the levers of power this 
January. You would think they had no role in creating that deficit 
President Obama inherited. In fact, congressional Democrats and the 
last Republican administration agreed on the fiscal policy in the last 
Congress. The congressional Democratic leadership, together with the 
George W. Bush administration, wrote the stimulus bills, housing bills, 
and the financial bailout. The congressional Democratic leadership 
wrote the budgets and spending bills in 2007 and 2008. So let's be 
clear. President Obama inherited the deficit and debt, but the 
inheritance had bipartisan origins--the Democratic Congress and the 
last Republican administration. What's more, the budget the President 
sent up would make this extraordinary level of debt an ordinary level 
of debt. What is now an extraordinary burden on our children and 
grandchildren would become an ordinary burden.
  In the last year of the budget, debt held by the public would be two-
thirds, 67 percent of our gross domestic product.
  The President's budget does contain some common ground. Whenever 
President Obama wants to pursue tax relief, he will find no better ally 
than we Republicans. Likewise, if President Obama wants to embrace 
fiscal responsibility and reduce the deficit by cutting wasteful 
spending, Republicans on Capitol Hill will back him vigorously. From 
our perspective, good fiscal policy keeps the tax burden low on 
American families, workers, and small businesses and keeps wasteful 
spending in check. For the hard-working American taxpayer, there is 
some good news in the budget. President Obama's budget proposes to make 
permanent the lion's share of the bipartisan tax relief plans

[[Page S3136]]

that are set to expire in less than 2 years. Republicans have been 
trying to make this bipartisan tax relief permanent since it was first 
passed.
  It will mean families can count on marriage penalty relief and a 
doubled child tax credit. It means workers will be able to count on 
lower marginal tax rates. It means low-income seniors, who rely on 
capital gains and dividend income, will be able to rely on low rates of 
taxation as they draw on their savings. It means middle-income families 
will be able to count on relief from the alternative minimum tax, AMT. 
President Obama will find many Republican allies in his efforts to make 
these tax relief policies permanent.
  Unfortunately, President Obama's budget also contains bad news for 
the American taxpayer. For every American who puts gas in a car, heats 
or cools a home, uses electricity to cook a meal, turn on the lights, 
or power a computer, there is a new energy tax for you in this budget. 
This tax could exceed a trillion dollars. The budget also raises taxes 
on those making over $250,000. That sounds like a lot of money to most 
Americans. But, we are not just talking about the idle rich.
  We are not talking about coupon clippers on Park Avenue. We are not 
talking about the high-paid, high-corporate-jet-flying, well-paid hedge 
fund managers in Chicago, San Francisco, or other high-income liberal 
meccas. Many of the Americans targeted for a hefty tax hike are 
successful small business owners. And unlike the financial engineers of 
the flush liberal meccas of New York, Chicago, or San Francisco, a lot 
of these small businesses add value beyond shuffling paper.
  There is bipartisan agreement that small businesses are the main 
drivers of our dynamic economy. Small businesses create 74 percent of 
all new private sector jobs, according to the latest statistics. My 
President, President Obama, used a similar figure of 70 percent 
yesterday. Both sides agree that we ought not hurt the key job 
producers, small business. President Obama also mentioned his zero 
capital gains proposal for small business start-ups. Republicans agree 
with him on that.
  We are still scratching our heads on why the Democratic leadership 
doesn't agree with the President on that small business-friendly 
proposal. So if we all agree that small business is the key to creating 
new jobs, why does the Democratic leadership and the President's budget 
propose a new tax increase directed at the American small businesses 
most likely to create new jobs?
  How do I come to that conclusion? Here's how. According to a recent 
Gallup survey, about half of the small business owners employing over 
20 workers would pay higher taxes under the President's budget. I have 
a chart that shows that nearly 1 million small businesses will be hit 
by this tax increase. Here is another chart that shows that roughly 
half the firms that employ two-thirds of small business workers, those 
with 20 or more workers, are hit by the tax rate hikes in the 
President's budget.
  According to Treasury Department data, these small businesses, 
account for nearly 70 percent of small business income. In addition, 
the budget would reduce itemized deductions for donations to charity, 
home mortgage interest, and State and local taxes. Combating tax 
shelters and closing corporate loopholes can be good tax policy, but 
higher general business taxes during a recession doesn't make much 
sense.
  If these higher taxes were dedicated to reducing the deficit, the 
Democratic leadership could argue this was their version of fiscal 
responsibility. We Republicans would disagree with this approach, but 
at least we would agree with the goal. But, a close examination of the 
budget reveals higher taxes and higher spending. So, from an overall 
standpoint, deficits will remain as far as the eye can see. Drawing on 
our principles, Republicans will work with President Obama on making 
permanent tax relief for families.
  We, however, will oppose tax increases that harm America's small 
businesses. We Republicans also will scrutinize and question a broad-
based energy tax that cuts jobs and could, according to MIT, cost 
consumers and businesses trillions. In these troubled economic times, 
we ought to err on the side of keeping both taxes and spending low and 
reduce the deficits. That will be a necessary condition to returning 
our economy back to growth and providing more opportunities for all 
Americans.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sanders). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. COBURN. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I rise to talk about the pending bill. I 
understand we will have a unanimous consent agreement that the majority 
leader and I have worked out on the omnibus lands package. Having spent 
10 years in a legislative body, I understand how things work, and I 
know we have a bill that is a compilation of 150-plus other bills that 
is so peppered with individual parochial interests that the hopes of 
defeating the bill are somewhat diminished. However, I would be remiss 
in the oath I took to the Constitution to not try to inform my 
colleagues in the Senate as well as--and more importantly--the people 
of this country what is coming about with this bill.

  Yesterday, one of my constituents sent me a news article described as 
the following: ``Natural Gas Rig Shutting Means Prices May Double.'' 
Natural gas right now is under $4 a million British thermal units. It 
was as high as $13 in the height of what I would say was the 
manipulation of the commodity market but also in the height of the 
expansion we saw in economies around the world.
  Why is that important to the American public? When people look for 
natural resources, they look for natural resources--to find them--so 
they can sell them at a profit. Natural gas exploration in the 
continental United States--not offshore--is fraught with great 
difficulties in terms of finding great supplies. However, what we do 
know in terms of the law of economics is: If you cut exploration in 
natural gas by 45 percent--and that is just through February of this 
year versus July of last year--what is going to happen? What is going 
to happen to natural gas prices? Well, they are going to rise and they 
are going to rise significantly and, most probably, they are going to 
approach $10 a year from now.
  Is it a great policy we are going to pass a bill that is going to 
make it harder to find additional natural gas resources in this 
country, that shuts off 13 trillion cubic feet of known reserves right 
now? That is enough to supply our country for 2 years. Is it smart for 
us to pass a lands package that is going to take 2.8 million acres and 
say: You cannot ever touch it for energy, regardless if natural gas is 
$45 a million Btu's, you cannot touch it?
  But at the same time, if our demand rises, what are we going to do? 
We are going to import it. So we are doing two things highly negative 
in the long run that will have major effects on the average American 
family. One is, we are going to limit the ability to go find it; and, 
No. 2, we are going to continue to fund imports with our dollars to 
burn the same natural gas we could have developed here.
  The same thing could be said for oil. We all remember oil at $140 a 
barrel. We pretty well like that gasoline--in my hometown, I filled up 
with regular unleaded gasoline for $1.64 a gallon this weekend versus 
the highest it got in Oklahoma, I think, was $3.90 a gallon. We like 
that. But we are getting ready to pass a bill that says the likelihood 
of us going back to that era of demand--supply inequality--will be 
increased and that to pay for that will be a tax on every American 
family's budget. It is a pretty tough tax if you are commuting or if 
you are heating your home with natural gas our if you are buying 
heating oil. Many of our families in the Northeast and upper Midwest 
bought their heating oil at the peak of prices.
  So the opposition to this bill, from my standpoint, comes from a lot 
of areas, and I am going to spend some time outlining that today. But I 
want to be a predictor of what is going to happen. What is going to 
happen is energy prices are going to rise. If you are the greenest of 
green and think we can provide all our energy from renewables,

[[Page S3137]]

great. But what you cannot deny is the fact that it is going to take us 
20 years to get there. What this bill is going to do is markedly hamper 
our ability to supply needed energy products for American families. It 
is not just oil and gas.
  Ninety percent of the known geothermal and absolutely clean, safe, 
environmentally friendly way to produce steam and power a turbine to 
produce electricity is taken off in this bill--90 percent of the known 
geothermal reserves. So when we say we want to use renewables and we 
want to get away from a carbon-based source, there are some things we 
have to do. One is to recognize how long it is going to take us and 
make sure we do not have a disruption in our supplies; No. 2, markedly 
increase the supplies we need in the meantime; and, No. 3, not 
hamstring our ability to use completely renewable sources from sources 
we know are available to us right now.
  There have been a lot of claims this bill is not controversial. Well, 
coming from an energy-producing State, it is controversial as all get 
out for Oklahoma. When we say we are going to shut off large portions 
of this country forever to future energy exploration, it does not just 
impact--Oklahomans have cheap energy. We are the least impacted by it. 
What the American citizens ought to be asking is: What did we get 
individually that can put 150 bills together that will make your 
Representative in Congress vote for something that in the long term is 
damaging to our energy independence and will keep us more dependent on 
people who are supplying energy who do not necessarily believe in 
freedom, do not necessarily like our way of life, and do not 
necessarily believe we ought to have the standard of living we have?
  This bill has 1,248 pages--1,248 pages. There is a total of 170 
unique, different bills. This bill, also, is going to cost the American 
taxpayer--our kids--$10 billion, and it has $900 million of mandatory 
spending that is going to be spent no matter what anybody in Congress 
says. So we are going to add another $11 billion to our spending. It is 
opposed by over 200 different groups. Whether it is property rights 
groups, the Chamber of Commerce, energy-producing groups, recreation 
interests across the country, they are uniform in their opposition to 
this bill.
  It is not necessarily just in their own self-interests they are in 
opposition to it. They know what is coming. They are not thinking short 
term. They are not thinking about how I look good at home. They are 
thinking about what is in the best long-term interests of our Nation.
  One hundred of these bills have no effect on us as individual 
Americans. They will not have an effect on energy. They will not have 
an effect on property rights. There probably is no problem with them. 
But 70 of these bills will markedly impact every American.
  When this bill went through the House on suspension--and it is 
important you know what ``suspension'' means: You get a vote on it, but 
you do not get any opportunity to amend it--it did not pass the 
requirement to pass the House without amendment.
  This bill has been smoldering here for 2 years. I wish it would 
smolder a whole lot longer. I will have to admit that. This is the 
first time in 2 years we are going to be able to offer an amendment to 
change this bill. It is going to be a limited set of amendments: six 
amendments on 1,248 pages of legislation, on $11 billion worth of 
spending, but, more importantly, on a significant decline in the 
American people's standard of living because energy costs are going to 
rise. They are going to rise anyway, but they are going to rise 
dramatically because of what we are going to do in this bill.
  It is a massive collection of unique provisions, some quite 
controversial. There is actually a section of wilderness area in one 
Congressman's district that nobody from his district wants and neither 
did he, but it got put in the bill, and he has no ability to amend the 
bill. So we are going to take a section out of one of our States and 
put it in a wilderness area, where the citizens do not want that to 
happen and the Congressman does not have the ability to try to stop it. 
That is what happens when you start playing games in trading things in 
Congress to pass a bill that cannot pass any other way except for 
buying off votes with something that looks good at home.
  It creates 10 new National Heritage Areas. It creates three new units 
of the National Park Service. We have a $9 billion backlog in just 
keeping the buildings maintained in our national parks right now, and 
we are going to add three new parks--at a time when we are going to 
have an over $2 trillion deficit. We are going to have a deficit that 
will add $7,000 per man, woman, and child, $28,000 per family this year 
alone--this year alone.
  It creates 14 new studies to expand or create more national parks. It 
creates 80 new wilderness designations or expansions. It takes 2.2 
million acres of direct Federal land and says: You can never touch 
this, regardless of how much oil is there, how much natural gas is 
there, how much geothermal is there. You can never touch it. No matter 
what our need is, we will never be able to access it.

  How stupid are we when we are going to tell the rest of the world's 
suppliers of oil we are going to limit our ability to influence their 
pricing to us?
  It creates 92 wild and scenic river designations--that is more than 
we have total wild and scenic rivers now--1,100 miles of shoreline. It 
is going to kill an LNG, liquefied natural gas, port in Massachusetts 
that is not a scenic river at all because we are so green we do not 
want to use natural gas, one of the cleanest carbon-based fuels we 
have, and we are going to eliminate the ability for people in the 
Northeast to have cheap natural gas. But we are going to do it.
  It creates six new National Trails. I will tell you, the trails it 
creates have eminent domain. Even though this bill says they are not 
going to use it, the bureaucrats are still going to have the ability to 
take private property from individuals without their consent.
  The Wild and Scenic Rivers Act will prohibit any gas transmission 
lines, any electrical lines, any utility lines, that may be in our 
Nation's best interest, to either pump oil from Canada or natural gas. 
You cannot go near the river, so you cannot cross the river. So what we 
are going to do is, not only are we going to raise the cost, we are 
going to increase the cost of getting it here because we are going to 
have to go circuitous routes to bring energy to people in this country.
  It includes 19 specific instances where Federal lands are 
permanently--permanently--withdrawn from future mineral and geothermal 
leasing. Three million acres are impacted by this permanent withdrawal. 
In the Wyoming Range that is in this bill, according to the National 
Petroleum Council, 12 trillion cubic feet of natural gas is proven and 
sitting there right now--and that is enough to run our country for 
almost 3 years--300 million barrels of oil. That is the most up-to-date 
study by the BLM. Each of the 19 withdrawal provisions of the 3 million 
acres also excludes future geothermal leasing. Studies performed by the 
Bureau of Land Management confirm geopotential on many of the 
designations in this bill. In other words, it has been studied. I will 
have a chart later to show that. We know where the geothermal sources 
are in this country--clean energy, cheap, abundant--yet we are going to 
take it away. We are going to say we are not going to use it.

  The threats posed by this bill to American energy independence have 
grown since the last time we considered this bill. Secretary Salazar 
has withdrawn 77 major leases in Utah. He has withdrawn eight--and 
these are leases that are already completed, signed, and paid for--
energy leases in Wyoming, outside of this bill. He has delayed any 
increase in offshore drilling because it ``needs more study.'' We do it 
with perfection in the Gulf of Mexico. The vast quantity of our oil 
that we produce domestically comes from there. He has delayed the 
development of oil shale because it needs more testing, except all the 
prototype plants have been highly effective in how they have utilized 
it.
  The bill is another direct challenge from Congress to President 
Obama's pledge to clean up the earmark process. There are multiple 
earmarks in this bill for things that none of us would be proud of and 
none of us would say would meet with any common sense, especially in 
light of the fiscal and monetary difficulties in which we find 
ourselves.
  There is $1 billion for a water project in California to repopulate 
500 salmon. There is $5 million for a wolf compensation and prevention 
program for

[[Page S3138]]

wolves that we reintroduced in the wild that are now killing cattle. So 
we are reintroducing wolves, and then we are going to pay the ranchers 
for the cows the wolves killed.
  There is $3.5 million to celebrate the 450th anniversary of St. 
Augustine in 2015. Do we really think right now we ought to spend $3.5 
million to plan a birthday party in 2015 when we are stealing every 
penny we are going to spend this year--in the remaining portion of this 
year--from our kids and our grandkids? Is that really something we want 
to do?
  We are going to spend a quarter of a million dollars to study whether 
Alexander Hamilton's boyhood estate in St. Croix, the U.S. Virgin 
Islands, is suitable as a new national park. Well, let's do it after we 
get out of the mess we are in; let's don't do it now. Let's not spend a 
quarter of a million dollars. What would a quarter of a million dollars 
do? It would buy at least 20 families health insurance for a year, 20 
families who don't have it. It would supply lots of small businesses 
with the working capital they require to keep going and keep their 
employees on board instead of laying them off.
  This bill gives $5 million for the National Tropical Botanical Garden 
to operate and maintain new gardens in Hawaii and Florida. Is that 
really a priority for us right now? Is that something--if we were a 
family, would we be making those kinds of decisions? It gives us a new 
ocean exploration program which has as its No. 1 job to locate, find, 
and document historic shipwrecks. It may be a good idea in a time of 
plenty, but in a time of hurt it is a terrible idea.
  There is $12 million for the Smithsonian to build a new greenhouse 
for a national orchid collection. Is that something we should do now? A 
full waiver for the Cave Institute in New Mexico to be fully funded by 
the American taxpayers rather than by the State of New Mexico. It just 
happens to be one of those little things snuck into the bill.
  What about property rights? There is little transparency. It is 
estimated the Federal Government now owns 653 million acres, 1 out of 3 
acres in the United States, and 1 out of 2 acres in the Western United 
States. The 10 national heritage areas--what does that mean? The Park 
Service funds advisory committees in these heritage areas which means 
they have an advantage over the local residents because they have 
money. So they come in and pass requirements and code changes that 
impact private property rights in all of these areas.
  So if you are in the heritage area or if you are abutting it, you now 
have the Federal Government funding a group that may be counter to your 
own private property rights. Eighty wilderness areas and another 2.2 
million acres. Recent court decisions have now said being in the 
wilderness area isn't enough. If you are close to it, you can't have 
your rights; we will decide what you do with your land.
  Ninety-two national scenic rivers--again, eminent domain--anything 
touching it or anything they want to have touch it, they have eminent 
domain to take private property, and we are creating 92 of those. So if 
you live along one of those rivers, you should worry about whether you 
are going to have the freedom to do with your property as you want, 
whether you are on the river or not. You just have to be in proximity.
  Six national trail designations. The underlying National Trails Act 
grants land acquisition and eminent domain authority. So if they want 
to put a national trail through your backyard, they can come and take 
your home. Do we really want to give that kind of capability, and is 
now the time to do it?
  Here is a quote from the National Property Rights Advocates:

       This bill is a serious threat to all property owners in 
     this country. Over the past several decades there has been a 
     proliferation of programs dedicated to the preservation of 
     land that has extended the grasp of the Federal Government 
     and its influence over private property rights.

  Amen.

       As a result of this legislation, landowners will see their 
     property value diminish due to increased land use regulations 
     and outdoor recreation enthusiasts will find new restrictions 
     on both public and private land.

  So you can have private land where you allow people to horseback 
ride, but if you are next to one of these areas and they are not 
allowed in that area, you are not going to be allowed. So you may 
actually even lose income because you no longer have that as a 
capability of your property.
  The experts go on and say:

       This legislation should never arbitrarily attempt to seize 
     land from the public and restrict its use as this package 
     will.

  The problem is, there is no priority in this bill--there is no 
priority for energy independence or less dependence. There is no 
priority to protect rights that are guaranteed under the Constitution.
  Let's think for a minute about what we have tasked the American 
agencies with. The National Park Service, here is what they are 
responsible for: 84 million acres of land in the National Park Service, 
391 different units; 54 national wilderness areas which include 44 
million acres; 15 wild and scenic rivers, and we are getting ready to 
add 92 to that; 40 national heritage areas, and we are getting ready to 
add 12; 28 national memorials, 4 national parkways, 120 national 
historic parks, 20 national preserves and reserves, 24 national 
battlefields, 18 national recreation areas, 74 national monument areas, 
10 national seashores, 4 national lake shores, 3,565 miles of national 
scenic trails, 12,250 miles of unpaved trails, 46 miles of Canadian 
border, 285 miles of Mexican border to patrol and manage, 27,000 
historic structures--27,000 historic structures that are falling down--
26,830 camp sites, 7,580 administrative and public use buildings, 8,505 
monuments and statues, 1,804 bridges and tunnels, 505 dams, 8,500 miles 
of road that they have to maintain yearly, 680 waste water treatment 
systems, and 272 million visits annually.
  The National Park Service has a $9.6 billion maintenance backlog, so 
severe that the backlog grew $400 million since the time we first 
passed this bill and its coming back to us. The backlog has grown by 
$400 million, which includes some of our treasures--the USS Arizona 
Memorial, where 1,117 American sailors were killed--and faces a backlog 
of $33.4 million. It is not getting fixed; Gettysburg National 
Battlefield, 51,000 casualties in 3 days, $29 million backlog; the 
Grand Canyon National Park, $299 million backlog; the Statue of Liberty 
Park, $197 million backlog; The National Mall in Washington, DC--The 
Mall that is just west of here--$700 million backlog. There is even 
miscellaneous and supposedly noncontroversial provisions in the bill 
that could pose a threat to American families. It is not intended; it 
is just that it is a consequence.

  In this bill is a little provision that if you are on Federal lands 
and you happen to pick up a rock--not intentionally to steal a fossil, 
but if it is a fossil, 5 years in jail, and they can confiscate your 
automobile, plus a fine. One of the amendments we have tries to fix 
that. We don't have a big problem with fossils being stolen, but we are 
going to fix a problem that isn't great by this amendment, by this 
bill, and we need to clean it up.
  There is a provision to codify an existing agency program at the 
Bureau of Land Management which will, in fact, consolidate power over 
38 million acres of land onto a few anti-energy, anti-recreational 
bureaucrats. This jurisdiction will extend the wilderness study areas 
lands, many of which have been deemed already nonsuitable for 
wilderness.
  I am going to make a point later in the presentation just to show my 
colleagues--as a matter of fact, I will make it right now. One of the 
things the law requires is that we, in fact, do studies on the 
applicability of lands for wilderness area. My staff just had time to 
go through California, Oregon, and Washington. By law, it is mandated 
there has to be a study to see if it is suitable. I am going to read 
through some of these.
  Granite Mountain, CA. It is not suitable for wilderness 
recommendation because resource conflicts in the WSA include modern to 
high geothermal resource potential. It should never get a wilderness 
designation. We are going to designate it a wilderness area.
  Spring Basin, oil and gas, moderate potential for occurrence based on 
several factors. Soda Mountain wilderness study area, California; 
again, the entire wilderness is considered to have a moderate potential 
for the occurrence of oil and gas. So we know in many of

[[Page S3139]]

these areas there is tremendous energy potential for us, and we are 
going to shut it off forever.
  Sabinoso wilderness study area, oil and gas; Pinto Mountain, CA, zero 
acres--this is by the Bureau of Land Management--zero acres were deemed 
suitable for wilderness. Yet we are going to put that area in a 
wilderness classification. Beauty Mountain, CA, no wilderness is 
recommended for this wilderness study area. The wilderness values for 
most of the area are not outstanding at all and commonplace.
  Little Jackson, Big Jackson, wilderness study area, Idaho, natural 
gas pipeline between it and a supposed source of minerals; Bruno River 
wilderness study area, geothermal resources are found at the northern 
and southern ends of it. The solitude of this area is frequently 
disrupted by flying military aircraft utilizing the U.S. Air Force 
bombing range just east of the wilderness study area.
  I can go through Oregon, Idaho, Washington--and we will go through 
the rest of them before this debate is over--but the fact is, we are 
not even paying attention to what the law says. When we have a study 
that says we shouldn't be, we are putting them in wilderness areas 
anyway.
  One of the things I would like to do is commend to my colleagues 
highlights of GAO-09-425T, a study released March 3, 2009, on the 
Department of the Interior by the GAO. I would bet my colleagues a 
nickel against a penny, or any multiple of that, that less than one 
person in the Senate besides myself has read this report because you 
can't read this report and come out and vote on this bill. This is the 
Government Accountability Office. What they say is, the Department of 
the Interior is essentially poorly run, poorly managed, and the safety 
and welfare of our people who are on BLM lands and in the national 
parks is at risk because of the poor management and the lack of 
oversight that has been carried out by Congress. It is the very same 
committee that brings us this bill.

  Mr. President, I also commend to my colleagues the testimony of Mary 
Kendall, the acting inspector general for the Department of the 
Interior, her statement before the U.S. House of Representatives 
Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on the Interior, Environment, 
and Related Agencies. When you read it, it will scare you to death. 
Here is what the internal inspector general is saying, and it mirrors 
what the GAO is saying. Yet this has received zero consideration from 
the authors of this bill; otherwise, we would see an opportunity to fix 
the problems that are outlined in these two documents in this bill. 
There has been no consideration to fix the problems and no significant 
oversight.
  What does it find? At no point during their testimony did they agree 
that it was a good idea to add any additional responsibilities to the 
Department of the Interior, based on what has been found: We find 
ourselves in the biggest mess in terms of maintenance. There is 
actually a public safety and health issue for people who are visiting 
our parks highlighted throughout both of these reports. There is no 
attempt to fix that, no attempt to authorize the money to get the 
backlog caught up with what we presently have and should be taking care 
of. There is no attempt whatsoever.
  In the GAO report--I quoted almost $9 billion--they are saying it is 
between $13.2 billion and $19.4 billion to get our national parks up to 
date and manage the things we should be managing. In contrast, the 
entire budget for the Department of the Interior in 2007 was under $11 
billion. We are going to take significant moneys that should be spent 
on the backlog of repair and maintenance and we are going to use that 
to implement this 1,243-page bill. I don't get it. I don't understand 
the lack of common sense. I understand the political drive. I 
understand we want to do things for people back at home. But I don't 
understand why there hasn't been a change in behavior given the 
economic situation we are in. I flat don't get it. I guess I have a lot 
to learn about politics.
  The GAO wasn't necessarily critical of the management of the 
Department of the Interior, they were really critical of Congress. They 
said that although Interior has made a concentrated effort to address 
its deferred backlog, the dollar estimate of the backlog has continued 
to escalate. It sounds as if they need help. The last thing they need 
is another 3 million acres for which they have to be responsible. They 
classify the backlog into four categories: roads, bridges, and trails, 
between $6 billion and $9 billion; buildings, including historic 
buildings, between $2 billion and $3.5 billion; irrigation, dams, and 
other water structures, between $2.4 billion and $3.6 billion; 
recreation sites and fisheries, between $2 billion and $2.93 billion.
  The Department of Interior by itself manages more than 500 million 
acres of Federal land, more than 1.8 billion acres of the Outer 
Continental Shelf, and its 70,000 employees working in 2,400 locations. 
Yet congressional leadership intends to add another 3 million acres and 
hundreds of new commitments to DOI in this bill.
  In one instance of mismanagement, in this GAO report, GAO points out 
that the Fish and Wildlife Service is responsible for 132,000 acres of 
farmland, most of which it doesn't manage. However, even though these 
farmlands are unwanted, the Fish and Wildlife Service cannot sell these 
lands because they are now part of the National Wildlife Refuge System. 
So Fish and Wildlife owns thousands of acres of good farmland that it 
doesn't manage and doesn't even inspect. It is less than 13 percent of 
the land they inspect yearly. It is land we could use for agricultural 
production, but we don't use it because we in the Congress have 
handicapped them.
  What the GAO report also said was, in describing the maintenance 
backlogs, that the deterioration of these facilities can impair public 
health and safety, reduce employee morale and productivity, and 
increase the cost for major repairs and early replacement of structures 
and equipment.
  Other groups have made similar observations. According to the 
National Parks Conservation Association, ``From neglected trails to 
dirty or deteriorating facilities, national parks across the country 
are showing the strain of budget shortfalls in excess of $600 million 
annually. . . .'' It will be greater than that this year. ``The visitor 
center at the USS Arizona Memorial in Hawaii is overcrowded, its 
foundation is cracking, and it is sinking. . . .a shortage of staff and 
funding limits the ability of the Park Service to maintain campgrounds 
at Nevada's Great Basin National Park. Broken benches, dilapidated 
buildings, and a crumbling boardwalk greet visitors to Riis Park in 
Gateway National Recreation Area in New York and New Jersey. Chaco 
Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico lacks funding to 
maintain and repair the park's 28 miles of backcountry trails. As a 
result, trails are damaged by heavy use and weather, compromising the 
experiences of visitors and the integrity of cultural resources and 
nearby natural resources that become trampled when visitors cannot 
follow the trails.'' They are not maintained, and that becomes an 
ecological problem.
  According to Acting IG Mary Kendall, ``Our work has documented 
decades of maintenance, health and safety issues that place the 
Department of Interior employees and the public at risk.'' She listed 
the following examples of where poor management has led to safety 
concerns:
  The U.S. Park Police, responsible for maintaining security at 
national icons, ``failed to establish a comprehensive security program 
and lacks adequate staffing and formal training for those responsible 
for protection [of those assets].''
  Opportunities for improvement remain in the security of our Nation's 
dams.
  The Department's Office of Law Enforcement, Security, and Emergency 
Management still struggles with issuing centralized policy and 
providing effective oversight of DOI law enforcement.
  In 2006, they found a National Park Service visitor center literally 
falling apart, severe deterioration at the Bureau of Indian Education 
elementary and secondary schools, and Fish and Wildlife employees 
working for almost 7 years in two buildings that were condemned and 
closed to the public.
  That is how good the oversight is that we have done.
  They identified abandoned mines where members of the public had been 
``killed, injured, or exposed to dangerous environmental contaminants''

[[Page S3140]]

by abandoned mines, and Congress is prioritizing a massive increase in 
the public lands without funding or prioritizing the true national 
concerns in DOI.
  What was also found in the GAO report is that despite increasing 
firefighting funds fourfold, there is incompetent forest fire 
management. The fact is that they are made worse because of poor 
management. We have done nothing for that.
  Her statement was:

       In other words, DOI has not managed to even develop goals 
     for maximizing fire management and prevention funds.

  Another statement is:

       High prevalence of waste and fraud in the procurement and 
     Federal assistance process.

  They also found problems throughout the solicitation process: a lack 
of presolicitation planning, a lack of competition, selection of 
inappropriate award vehicles, and poor administration of contracts and 
grants.
  Mary Kendall said:

       Financial management has remained a top challenge for the 
     department.

  Why don't we fix it? You cannot fix what you cannot measure. Yet we 
are going to add this bloated bill.
  There is something everybody should know. For the Native American 
schools in this country, we are spending a billion dollars a year for 
50,000 kids. And when you look at performance, what you see is 
something akin, in many areas, to Washington, DC--not all but in many. 
The cost per student running through that is $20,000. We could put them 
in the best private schools, with the best private teachers, and bunk 
them, for $20,000 a year. Yet we continue to allow this.

  BLM grazing fees collected were $12 million in fiscal year 2004--that 
is the latest year for which we have numbers, which tells you something 
about the accounting--even though the cost to implement the grazing 
program was $58 million. We would be better off eliminating the grazing 
program and saving $46 million.
  So what is it about this bill that has had me so persistent? I will 
tell you. It is a great example of what we do wrong. It is a great 
example of the worst tendency of Congress. We were in an energy-short 
environment, and even though it doesn't feel that way today, it will 
feel that way 10, 12, 18 months from now. We are going to eliminate the 
potential for us getting out of it. We are going to add significant 
responsibilities to an agency that both the GAO and their own IG says 
is in trouble. Yet we don't approach anything to fix it.
  We are going to make everybody feel good in this body because they 
all have something in the bill and they can go home and say: Look what 
I did, look what I accomplished. I got something that is important for 
our State. The problem with that thinking is that, when we only think 
in a parochial manner--if I only think about Oklahoma or if the Senator 
from Texas only thinks about Texas or any other Senator thinks only 
about their State and themselves--the whole country loses. Not once in 
our oath does it say that our allegiance is to our State. What it says 
is that our allegiance is to our country. And if our country is not 
healthy, no State can be healthy. Yet we have allowed parochialism and 
the politics of the Senate to design a bill that, for sure, will pass 
but which in the long run is going to be harmful to the country. It is 
going to pass. It will have 65 or 70 votes, maybe even 80 votes, 
because the press release at home is more important than the principle 
in Washington. Consequently, not only will we spend this $11 billion 
and overburden an agency that is struggling to keep itself above water, 
we will commit the Department of Interior to further backlogs, further 
problems, and we will strangle our ability to respond both with clean 
energy and the energy we know we are going to need for the next 20 
years the next time the supply-demand balance gets upset.
  The question the American people ought to ask is, Is it worth it? Is 
it worth it for somebody from Oklahoma to get something and to do this 
to the Nation as a whole? Is it responsible? Is that how our country is 
going to work in the future? Are we going to always place parochial 
interests first or are we going to go back and grab ahold of the 
heritage which made this country great, which says the politician 
doesn't matter; the principles and forbearance of our forefathers in 
accomplishing what is best for the nation, is that going to win the 
day? My thoughts are that it won't. When it doesn't win the day, I 
don't lose--I fought for it--but my kids lose, my grandkids lose, and 
so does everybody else in this country. In the name of playing the good 
game, what we are doing is undermining our country.
  We have a lot of financial problems in front of us today. We as a 
nation can get out of those problems. As a matter of fact, we will get 
out of those in spite of the U.S. Congress because what makes America 
great is its people, not its politicians. What makes America great is 
the fact that the people get up every day, and no matter what is ahead 
of them, they will struggle to try to defeat the problems in front of 
them to make a better life for themselves, their kids, and their 
neighbors. We could learn a great deal from the average American 
citizen as we approach the legislation.

  This little bill, which I assure you nobody in this body has read, is 
a compilation of 170 bills--some good; some don't have any of the 
negative effects I have described. But 50 of them are going to have 
devastating effects. And how we respond, how the American people 
respond to our doing this, is going to reflect on the character of the 
American people. They need to become informed about what we are doing.
  Later today, we will have a unanimous consent that I thank the 
majority leader for. He has the toughest job in the Senate, and I 
recognize that. I have given him fits on this bill. I don't apologize 
for that. I think this bill is the wrong thing at the wrong time for 
the wrong reason. But we will have a unanimous consent agreement that 
allows six amendments, which I will offer either later this evening or 
tomorrow, which eliminate some of the stupidity in this bill. It won't 
fix the bill. It won't fix the problem I have described.
  We are then going to walk out of here happy, because it will go back 
to the House, not have a chance to be amended in the House, and the 
President is going to sign a bill that is going to hurt our energy 
independence. We are going to hear all sorts of statements to the 
contrary, but that is not true. The fact is it is going to hurt our 
capability of becoming more self-sufficient for our own energy needs.
  So a year or 18 months from now, when you are no longer paying under 
$2 for gasoline, and it is $4, I hope the American people will remember 
this bill, because this is the start of the battle against undermining 
utilizing our own resources in our own country for what is in the best 
long-term interest--not the short-term--for our country. And it doesn't 
have anything to do with climate change or global warming. Because if 
it did, we wouldn't worry about 20 years of carbon usage when we know 
we are going to go away from it.
  Mr. President, I thank you for your patience and the time today. I 
yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kaufman). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I have a unanimous consent agreement 
that I am going to propound, and I believe it is acceptable on all 
sides.
  I ask unanimous consent that all postcloture time be yielded back, 
and the motion to proceed to H.R. 146 be agreed to; that once the bill 
is reported, the Bingaman substitute amendment, which is at the desk, 
be called up for consideration; that once the substitute amendment has 
been reported, it be considered read; that the following list of 
amendments be the only first-degree amendments in order; that upon 
disposition of the listed amendments, the substitute amendment, as 
amended, if amended, be agreed to, the bill, as amended, be read a 
third time, and the Senate then vote on passage of the bill, that 
passage of the bill be subject to a 60-vote threshold; that if the 
threshold is achieved and upon passage, the motion to reconsider be 
laid upon the table; that the

[[Page S3141]]

title amendment, which is at the desk, be considered and agreed to and 
the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; provided further 
debate time prior to a vote in relation to each amendment be limited to 
60 minutes, equally divided and controlled in the usual form; and that 
no amendment be in order to any amendment prior to a vote in relation 
thereto; that if there is a sequence of votes in relation to the 
amendments, then prior to each vote in a sequence, there be 4 minutes 
of debate, divided as specified above, and that after the first vote in 
any sequence, subsequent votes be limited to 10 minutes each.
  Here is the list of amendments: Coburn amendment No. 680, regarding 
barring new construction. The second is Coburn amendment No. 679, 
regarding striking provisions restricting alternative energy. The third 
is Coburn amendment No. 683, regarding striking targeted provisions. 
The fourth is Coburn amendment No. 675, regarding eminent domain. The 
fifth is Coburn amendment No. 677, regarding annual report. And the 
sixth is Coburn amendment No. 682 regarding subtitle D clarification.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The motion to proceed is agreed to.

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