Protect Children from Video Game Sex and Violence Act of 2003

Mr. Speaker, I think that our recent military successes in Afghanistan and Iraq have demonstrated very clearly that we are the preeminent military force in the world. Our economy, although it has been somewhat slowed recently, is certainly the strongest in the world.

By most measures, the United States is the most powerful Nation in the world. At the present time, we stand alone in a position of preeminence; and so sometimes when one is in that position, it is easy to begin to think that we are invincible and that this will go on forever, and certainly we hope that that is the case.

Then I think it is important that we cast a historical frame of reference on all of the recent circumstances on things that have happened.

Certainly 2,500 years ago, the Greeks were preeminent; and they, I am sure, felt that their culture would last forever and that they would be in a preeminent position until history ended; and then 500 years later, 2000 years ago, we found that the Roman empire had superseded Greece, and again, for a period of time, it was the most powerful nation in the world, just dominated the then-civilized world as we knew it.

150 years ago, the British Empire certainly was the most dominant nation in the world and controlled most of the affairs in the discovered world at that time; and of course, even the Soviet Union just 20 years ago appeared to be an almost invincible force. It was our rival. And so the United States and Soviet Union were the two most powerful nations in the world; and yet in each case, each one of these great civilizations, each one of these nations fell, and the interesting thing was that they did not fall from outside forces. It was not because somebody took them over. Rather, they fell from internal factors; and so their unity of purpose, their national resolve, the character of their people began to crumble, and as a result, they all to some degree became less powerful, and to some degree they became history.

So what is America's greatest threat today? I am sure some would say al Qaeda. Some would say it is the ongoing conflict in the Middle East between Israel and Palestine. Some would say it is the nuclear capabilities of North Korea and possibly Iran. Others would say the biggest problem we have is the economy, and certainly all of these things are important, and certainly they are all worthy of our attention, and they certainly get it in this body on a daily basis.

I would submit to my colleagues that from my perspective the greatest threat that this Nation faces today is not outside forces, but rather, it is unraveling of the culture from within. So I am going to tonight, Mr. Speaker, document this thesis in some ways, and the reason I say this is because I have had considerable experience working with young people over 36 years.

From 1962 to 1997, I spent almost all of my time working with young people.

Most of them were ages 17 to 22, but I also spent a lot of time in high schools with summer camps where I worked with kids in the 9th, 10th and 11th and 12th grade. I coached 150 young men every year, visited 70 to 80 high schools in all parts of the country. Some were in inner cities, some were in suburbs, some were in rural areas; and I sat in 70 to 80 living rooms all around the country from wealthy to poor to rural. So I am not saying, Mr. Speaker, that I understand the whole situation that is going on in our country; but over those 36 years, I began to see some things that were of concern, some things that I think are worthy of note.

The young people I worked with were talented; and as time went on, they became bigger and faster and stronger and in some cases smarter, but they also were more troubled. I saw more personal problems. I saw more stress. I saw more young people who were off balance; and as a result, over that 36-year period, I progressively spent less and less time coaching and more and more time dealing with personal issues; and I think almost anyone in education would tell us the same thing, whether they are a school administrator or a teacher or a coach. Anyone who works consistently with young people over a period of time will tell us that things have changed. There has been a shift, and as far as stability, it has not been for the better.

I think, Mr. Speaker, there are several factors that have contributed to these changes, and the first of these that is very obvious, and I think almost anyone would recognize this, is a change in family stability. In 1960, when I first started working with young people, the out-of-wedlock birthrate was 5 percent. Today, it is 33 percent. So roughly one out of every three children are born out of wedlock, with no stable marriage and have two strikes against them. That is an increase over that period of time of 600 percent.

In 1960, the great majority of young people lived with both biological parents. We would occasionally see a young person who was from a single-parent family, but usually if we did so, it was because one parent or the other was deceased. Today, roughly one-half of our young people are growing up without both biological parents, again, an increase of probably 3 to 500 percent in terms of lack of stable families.

Today, only 7 percent of our families are so-called traditional families. So the family that we have is generally a father works, a mother stays home with the children and is a full-time homemaker or at least if the mother works, the father stays home, and yet only 7 percent of our families are of that nature today.

So we often think of latchkey kids belonging in the inner city where they come home after school and nobody is there, but I can tell Members from personal experience that there are roughly 80-90 percent of the young people in the suburbs and rural areas, nobody is home at 3 o'clock and they are latchkey kids as well.

So this has been a tremendous shift in our demographics. Parents today spend 40 percent less time with their children than a generation ago. The average parent spends no more than a few minutes with each child, and a huge amount of time is eaten up with the television set and work activities. The divorce rate has increased, from 1960 to 1995, 300 percent. Currently today, 24 million children are living without their real father.

I dealt with a lot of those young people and I remember particularly one case where this young man was a good football player, and by his junior year he was being mentioned as being an All-American. One day I got a phone call from a man living in another State and he wanted to know if I knew this player. I said, I coach him. He said, ``That is my son. I would like to talk to him.''

So I talked to this young man and I thought he would be thrilled being reunited with his father. He said, ``He left me when I was 1 or 2 years old and now the only reason he wants to talk to me is because I am somewhat famous as a player, and I do not want to talk to him.''

I sensed the anguish. I saw young people time and time again who had a father who was missing in their life and they were trying to fill that void, and usually it was with all the wrong stuff; and it was not just young men, it was young women as well.

This Sunday is Father's Day, and fatherless children are in some difficult circumstances at the present time. Fatherless children are 120 percent more likely to experience child abuse, twice as likely to drop out of school, 2-3 times more likely to have mental or emotional problems, 1\1/2\ times to 2 times more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol, and 11 times more likely to commit a violent act.

I ran into a story recently that is true, and this had to do with a greeting card business that contacted a prison. Mother's Day was approaching and they notified all of the prisoners that they would provide a Mother's Day card free if the prisoner would use it and send it to his mother. They had almost 100 percent participation. Practically all of the inmates took the card and mailed it to their mother. They thought this was quite a success.

So Father's Day was rolling around and they thought they would do it again. And the interesting thing, Mr. Speaker, in that particular prison there was hardly anyone who asked for a card to send to his father because, I would assume, because none knew their father, or their father had abandoned them.

What I am saying as far as the family is that the launching pad, the family, is not totally broken. We have some good families in our country, but the launching pad is certainly cracked, and changes have been undertaken in our society that are going to be really difficult for us to rectify in the immediate future.

So on top of the family disintegrating to some degree, we find that the environment in which young people are living has changed dramatically. When I began coaching in the 1960s, drug abuse was almost unheard of. We had never heard of cocaine, steroids, methamphetamine. We heard a little bit about marijuana, but that was somebody out in Hollywood, and none of the young people I was dealing with had experienced it. Of course today, currently, we find that we have a drug epidemic on our hands, and that includes alcohol. We have between 2 and 3 million teenage alcoholics in our country today. So the drug issue has become one of epidemic proportion.

The thing that is really interesting to me and astounding to me and discouraging to me is at one time we assumed rural America was the bastion of the family, and that was the one place we could count on traditional values. Yet we find at the present time that drug abuse in rural areas is equal to that of the urban areas, if not greater. The greatest scourge currently in rural areas that we have is methamphetamine abuse. It is roughly twice as prevalent as it is in the cities. If you are addicted to meth, the time that you are going to have to spend in inpatient treatment to have any chance of being cured is not 3 months as it is for alcohol and other drugs, it is roughly 24- 36 months, and then the odds are very good you will not beat it and meth probably at some point will kill you.

The average meth addict will commit roughly 130 crimes per year to support that habit. Imagine the cost to each community of one meth addict, and we have rampant meth abuse in the rural areas. We also have the highest rate of violence of any civilized nation in the world at the present time. The United States has the highest homicide rate. We have the highest suicide rate, and of course we have had numerous school shootings in the United States in recent years, and Columbine is almost the catch word for that type of activity. So the violence activity has escalated astronomically over the last 25 years.

Also, pornography has exploded. There are over 1 million porn sites on the Internet today. Sixty percent of all sites on the Internet have to do with pornography, and that is more than one-half. Additionally, there are more than 100,000 child porn sites on the Internet. Child pornography is illegal, and yet we have 100,000 child porn sites. So our children, our young people, are being engulfed by a wave of pornography.

It has been estimated that 1 out of 10 children between the ages of 8 and 16

have viewed pornography on the Internet, and mostly this has been unintentional. They have used a search word such as Pokemon, Disney, Barbie, ESPN, and those search words bring up a porn site, and once you bring up a porn site, you begin to get spam, which is dozens of porn sites and the child is inundated with pornography.

I was really surprised about a year ago, Mr. Speaker, to realize that my name used as a search word brought up a porn site. We were able to get that rectified, but the average young person in my district who is maybe doing a research paper on his or her Congressman and plugged in my name would all of a sudden be confronted with a porn site. In a civilized Nation that simply should not happen. I have grandchildren ages 3-10. I have four of them. I can imagine that they will someday be exposed to hard-core pornography, and this should not happen. Many people say pornography is a victimless crime. It does not really hurt anybody so what you see and hear does not make any difference in terms of how you behave.

If that is true, why do we have an advertising industry that spends billions of dollars on advertising? Obviously, if you see a soft drink advertised in an appealing ad, it changes your behavior. You are more apt to purchase that soft drink or automobile or whatever is being advertised. Obviously what we see and what we hear has a tremendous impact on our behavior, and our young people today are being inundated with these kinds of messages, and that is discouraging to see.

The video game is also a problem. Today, 8- to 18-year-old boys average 40 minutes a day playing video games. There is nothing wrong with that as long as the video games are within the lines. They might be a little bit violent, but they are probably not going to be a real problem. But we see that some of these games have gotten progressively more and more violent and more and more graphic. Many of them teach stalking and killing techniques that are actually used in training military personnel, Special Forces, to go out and kill people.

One particular video game that we saw recently here in Congress was such an example. It was one in which the young person would engage in stalking someone and shooting them, and if you hit them in the right place in the head and the blood flew, you were rewarded by a series of pornographic images. That was your reward. So people say that is for adults and those were adult-rated games, but the average person who plays those games is 12 years old. The marketing is beamed directly at young people who are teenage and preteenage children.

There is no way, Mr. Speaker, that you can play these kinds of games for any length of time and not have it impact you in some way in the depths of your psyche.

There was a school shooting in Kentucky a couple of years ago, and the young man who did the shooting went 9 for 9. He shot at 9 young people and he hit all 9. Many law enforcement people said that was amazing. Hardly any law enforcement individual could have done that, but the amazing thing was this particular shooter had not fired a gun before. He had played a lot of video games, and in playing those video games, he had shot lots of people. Apparently he got very good at it because he was almost perfect in his score. That shows you what video games can do.

We have much music, some television, many movies, some talk shows are very explicit and very graphic, and all of these things, if you think about it, simply could not have been put on the airwaves 30 years ago. It would have been impossible to present this kind of material, and yet we have drifted so far that this becomes commonplace and nobody objects. And obviously, this is impacting the minds and hearts of our young people.

The family is less stable. The environment young people are growing up in is more threatening, and also I would submit that our value system has shifted and shifted considerably. I would point to a study that was done by Stephen Covey who wrote the ``7 Habits of Highly Successful People'' and what he did was research everything that he could find that had to do with success. He said that he noticed a marked shift. He said in the first 150 years in our country's history, success was defined primarily in terms of character traits. A successful person was honest, a successful person was hardworking, a successful person was faithful, was loyal, compassionate. And so really it had to do with qualities of virtue, and that is what success was.

Then he said about 50-60 years ago he began to notice a shift in the literature that he was reading. He noticed that at the present time and for the last 50 years or so that success is now defined in terms of material possessions, in terms of power, and in terms of prestige. So a successful person has money. He may not be an admirable person, but if he has enough money, he is successful. He may have influence and power, and if that is the case, he may not be a good person or an admirable person, but he is a successful person. He may be very popular. He may have people wanting his or her autograph, and he may not be a very good role model, but if he has popularity, he is labeled successful.

So success is no longer linked to character and that is an interesting shift in the way that our value system has come about.

In 1998, there was a poll done that indicated a very high approval rating for the President who was in office at that time. Even though that particular President had misbehaved rather badly with an intern in the Oval Office and had lied to the American public, he still enjoyed a very high approval rating.

The thing that really grabbed my attention was that there was a poll that was done and the question that was posed to the American public was this: Is there any correlation between job performance and private behavior? In other words, what you do in your private life, does that have anything to do with your job performance? Seventy percent of American adults say it has no connection, that there is no relation. You can be a bank president and do all kinds of unscrupulous things in your private life, and it does not affect your job. You can be a very unscrupulous coach, and it would not make any difference in how you did your job. It was amazing to me that this many people in the American public would say that there is no correlation between job performance and private behavior, because what we are saying here is that character really does not count, because what you do in private essentially is an issue of character. The value system has certainly changed in that regard.

In the business world, we have seen some changes. I would submit that WorldCom and Enron and Global Crossing were not isolated instances. These were not accidental happenings. It was simply a reflection of the shift that we have had in this culture to an all-out infatuation with material success. And so anything goes in those types of situations. The Great Wall of China, Mr. Speaker, was breached twice. It was several thousand miles long. It was believed to be impenetrable. As a result, it was built to keep out the barbarian hordes. Yet twice it was breached. In neither case was it a situation where the barbarians overran the wall, knocked it down or had a military victory. It was because they bribed the gatekeeper. What I would submit at the present time is that a lot of our gatekeepers at the present time have not been responsible. As a result, we see a lack of trust in our country today that is almost unprecedented. Many people no longer believe that some of the leaders that we have in various industries and politics and athletics and the business world can be trusted. Of course, the alarming thing here is that democracy is based on trust. When trust evaporates, then it is very difficult to run an effective democracy.

The predominant world view today, Mr. Speaker, is something called postmodernism. Postmodernism is a belief that there are no moral absolutes, that nothing is absolutely good or bad in and of itself. As a famous individual recently said, the Ten Commandments are irrelevant. And so everything is relative. Theft is justified at times. If you need what you are stealing bad enough, it can be justified. Everything is relative. Murder certainly could be justified if you happen to kill someone who is really not an admirable person. You can rationalize that it is okay. Adultery is certainly something that is acceptable if nobody

is going to find out. Even treason would be okay if you were angry enough or hated your country badly enough. Postmodernism has dominated our thought and I think has had a tremendous amount to do with the way our young people and our country begin to see things.

In view of the fact that we have had a family breakdown, we have had a decline of the culture and a shifting of values, this is an extremely difficult time for our young people. They are being asked to weave their way through a minefield. In this minefield, there is alcohol and drug abuse over here, there is harmful video games over here, unwholesome music and television over here, there is promiscuity over here and gangs here, violent behavior and broken homes and all of those things; and somehow we are saying, you have got to get through this thing and you are probably going to have to do it by yourself because you are not going to get much parental support or adult support. And so we are asking our young people to do something that is very, very difficult and in some cases almost impossible. What we find is that our children's feet are not set on a rock but they are, rather, set on sand.

I think it is important we pay attention to these issues because a culture is never more than one generation away from dissolution. There is no permanence if the next generation coming up cannot pull it off. And so we need to think about this. De Tocqueville said something that was very interesting. It was a powerful sentence. He said, America is great because America is good. He said this probably 100, 150 years ago. He did not say that America was rich or powerful or perfect, but he said America was good and that is why America was great. I think America still is good, and I think America is great; but I would say that there are some signs on the horizon, some storm clouds that would lead us to wonder a little bit where we are headed and to cause us to sit up and pay attention.

What can be done? It is easy to state the problems, we hear that all the time, particularly around here, what is wrong. It seems to me, Mr. Speaker, that you do not leave an issue without at least setting out some possible solutions. One thing that I would submit that makes sense to me is the issue of mentoring. We cannot legislate strong families, we cannot legislate morality; but one thing that we can do is provide a mentor in the life of a young person who badly needs it. It is assumed that at the present time in our culture there are roughly 18 million young people who lack a stable, caring adult in their life and badly need a mentor. What is a mentor? A mentor, number one, is someone who cares, someone who has no ax to grind, someone who simply cares enough to show up and spend time with that person. He is not a father, not a mother, not a grandparent, not a preacher, not a teacher, no one who is paid to do this; but it is someone who simply cares enough to be there with that child and provide stability and a caring environment and a stable relationship in the life of a young person who probably does not know what that looks like.

The second thing that a mentor does is he affirms. I guess I saw that very clearly in athletics. If you told a player that you really believed in him, that you really thought that he could amount to something, that someday he had a future with you, oftentimes he would grow into that which he did not know that he was even capable of being. On the other hand, if you said, you know, I really do not think that you are going to make it, son, we do not really think we have a place for you here, his performance would begin to tail off and pretty soon he would play down to that level of expectation and he would be gone. So affirmation is critical. No one can live without some type of affirmation, whether you are 50 years old or whether you are 30 or whether you are 10. A mentor is someone who says, I believe in you. I really think you can do this. And you are important to me. A mentor is one who affirms.

Also, thirdly, a mentor is one who provides some guidance. So many young people that we have today have never seen anyone in their immediate family or their immediate life who has graduated from high school, maybe no one who has held down a steady job, no one who has a concept of what it is like to be a good parent. A mentor is someone who provides some guidance and says, I believe in you. I think you can do this. I think you can graduate from high school. I think you could make it in this college, or I think you would be really good at this. Guidance is critical. Mentoring works. It reduces dropout rates by roughly 100 percent, reduces drug and alcohol abuse by 50 percent, teenage pregnancy by 40 percent, violent acts by roughly 30 percent, and improves relations with peers and parents, improves self-esteem. Even though it is not perfect, it is the best thing that we know of, the best opportunity that we have to begin to rectify some of those relationships that have been so badly broken and have damaged those young people so badly.

The President has proposed currently $450 million over the next 3 years for mentoring. That is $150 million a year; $100 million would go for mentoring for all children and $50 million would be designated for children of prisoners. If that program is enacted, and I hope Congress will do that, I hope it will be funded, that will reach 1 million young people. That still leaves 17 million that are not being reached. But mentoring is cost effective, because a good mentoring program will cost $300 to $500 per child per year. It costs $30,000 to lock somebody up. As we mentioned earlier, a meth addict, someone who commits 130 crimes, would be almost difficult if not impossible to total up the dollars. What we are doing in our society today is we are spending huge amounts of money on the back end, and we are losing person after person after person, the recidivism rate is about 85 percent, and we are not spending the money on the front end where we can really make a difference. Mentoring is something that we think is a possible solution, at least a partial solution.

The President has been talking about the Call to Service Act. This is legislation which encourages volunteerism in our country. One of the greatest resources that we have in this country today is our senior citizens. We have so many people who have retired in their late 50s or in their 60s, and they are going to live until they are 80 or 90 years old and they are still healthy and they are still vibrant. The greatest need that we have in our country today is extended family. Our kids growing up do not have grandparents, some do not have parents at all; and so we feel that the Call to Service Act can certainly be used to hook up people who will volunteer, who have some life experience to help our young people, to mentor them, to tutor them, to be supportive; and we think this is a tremendous opportunity.

The Internet gambling bill was passed today on this floor. I hope that it will have some success over in the other body. As a culture, we are trying to gamble our way to prosperity. The difficult thing is that it impoverishes those who can least afford to gamble, breaks up families, directs money from children's needs. It is tied to organized crime, and students are particularly susceptible. One thing that we noticed on Internet gambling is that the most high-risk group of people in our country is students. All you need is a computer and a credit card. Most college students and an awful lot of high school students have that and the more times that you gamble in a short period of time and the less troublesome it is to do it, which Internet gambling provides the optimal situation, the more addictive it becomes. For some it has the same addictive effect as crack cocaine. So a certain percentage of our young people are getting addicted very quickly. This is a powerful issue, and I believe that the Internet gambling bill if it is passed in the other body can certainly be a tremendous help.

We eliminated the marriage tax penalty which was certainly countercultural to tell people that if you live together, you are going to have less tax consequences, it is going to save you $1,000 or $1,500 a year as opposed to if you were married just makes no sense, because marriage is the basic family unit in this country. We have rectified to some degree that particular marriage penalty.

I think it is really critical that we fund drug prevention programs. Let me just mention one here, Mr. Speaker. Byrne grants. Byrne grants go out to fight meth. It is amazing how much

methamphetamines cost. If you find a meth lab, to get that dismantled and all the chemicals disposed of costs thousands and thousands of dollars. So if we do not fund this, and right now it is not scheduled to be funded, this is a tremendous blow to our culture and particularly to our rural areas where most of these meth labs occur. We need to make sure that we are giving people the tools that they need.

H.R. 669, the Protect Children From Video Game Sex and Violence Act of 2003. I am its cosponsor. I think this is certainly one that can correct some of the problems of video games. H.R. 756, the Child Modeling Exploitation Prevention Act, addresses the issue of some people trying to get around the child pornography statutes by having children pose as models in provocative poses, and so this addresses that.

Above all, Mr. Speaker, we need a fundamental shift in the way that we address first amendment rights in the courts. This is a dangerous statement for somebody to make, that we have got to watch out for the first amendment. Everybody is in favor of free speech and the first amendment, and I certainly go along with that as well; but I would like to point out some things that have happened in the courts in recent years that I think have been very damaging to this culture.

In 1996, Congress passed the Communications Decency Act that made it illegal to send indecent material to children via the Internet. Listen to what happened to that, Mr. Speaker. In June of 1997, the Supreme Court overturned portions of the law and made this statement. They said, indecent material is protected by the first amendment. And so what we are saying is those who produce indecent material have protection, and yet those children who receive that material and are influenced by it have no protection.

In 1996, the Child Pornography Prevention Act outlawed child pornography, including visual depictions that appeared to be of a minor and so it may not actually be a minor involved; but it could be a computer-generated image, or it could be an adult posing as a minor and how do you know? The Supreme Court ruled that unconstitutional and overturned the law banning computer graphics showing child pornography.

In October 1998, the Children Online Protection Act was signed into law to prohibit the communication of harmful material to children on publicly accessible Web sites. It makes sense that you should not be able to on publicly accessible Web sites send pornography to children. Yet the Supreme Court refused to rule on the 1998 law. As a result, it was never enacted; and it still sits there today and is void.

The 106th Congress passed the Child Internet Protection Act to require schools and libraries that receive Federal funds to use Internet filtering to protect minors from harmful material on the Internet.

In May of 2002, the Federal court declared the law unconstitutional. Free speech is protected, while women and children are attacked.

It is important to note that 80 to 90 percent of rapists and pedophiles reported using pornography usually right before they commit the act, and they will admit that this has shaped their behavior and made a difference. It seems to me our women and children ought to have rights and freedoms as well, and yet it seems the way we have phrased the argument that they are being victimized, whereas others who are perpetrators are being given freedoms to do so.

The Court has often ruled against school prayer. I would not do so necessarily, but some have traced some of the cultural decline I have mentioned tonight to the absence of school prayer, which began I believe in the 1960s. But there have been some decisions that really caused me to wonder. I will mention some of these.

In 1992, the Supreme Court declared an invocation and benediction at a graduation ceremony unconstitutional. On the floor of this House, every day we start with a prayer. In many public places, prayer is used. And yet at a school graduation it is not legitimate to have a minister, a priest, a rabbi, a cleric say a prayer. Again, this seems to fly in the face of the way our country was founded.

The Court also has held that a minute of silence in school is unconstitutional. Now, a child may spend a minute of silence and may say a prayer, may look out the window, may think about the upcoming test. He is not forced to believe in any doctrine. He is not forced to pray. Yet the Court said that a minute of silence is unconstitutional.

The Court also ruled not long ago that a student-led prayer at a football game was unconstitutional. The students voted in this particular student body to have a prayer. They wanted a student-led prayer before the game. The Court said this would really violate the rights of the football players who had to be there and also some of the cheerleaders required to be there. Yet this violated the rights I think of those who chose to have the prayer, the students themselves.

As most people understand, the words ``under God'' were struck from the Pledge of Allegiance by the Ninth Circuit court. Most of the framers of the Constitution obviously mentioned time and time again their dependence upon God, and yet we are trying to strip this away also from our Pledge of Allegiance.

I am not going to get into the abortion issue at any great length. It is very controversial. I realize there are many people on both sides of the issue. But I will mention one thing.

Just recently Congress and this House passed the partial-birth abortion ban. The reason I do not think this is particularly controversial is that this particular ban I believe drew something like 84 votes in the affirmative on the Senate side, and we had a fairly large majority here, and we saw a great many people who are for abortion, who are pro-choice, in quotes, vote for this ban. They were beginning to get the idea of how barbaric it really is.

So this was something where there has been a real shift. Currently 70-some percent of Americans do not favor partial-birth abortion; and many of them, as I said earlier, are in favor of abortion. Yet this particular law, I am sure, will be challenged in the courts, and there is a fair chance it may be overturned as somehow being unconstitutional.

So we have seen a steady erosion of the culture by some decisions that have been made in the courts. The reason I think this is so important to bring up today is that some people cannot understand why there is so much controversy over in the other body regarding the appointment of judges and justices; and the reason is that what is at stake, I believe, is the future course in many of these issues, particularly in moral issues, that our country is going to take. So these are monumental issues, and the shape of the Supreme Court, the shape of our district courts, our courts of appeal, are going to go a long ways in deciding what this country abides by in upcoming years.

Mr. Speaker, this country was founded upon principles of dependence upon God, a recognition that life is sacred, the importance of sound character, and the fact that children are our most important assets. There is no question that we are involved in a cultural and spiritual struggle of Titanic proportions. This struggle may present the greatest crisis facing the United States today, as I have outlined I think fairly clearly.

As Congress addresses critical issues such as national defense, the economy and health care, which we certainly need to spend a lot of time on, it is critical that we not lose sight of the fact that our Nation's survival is directly linked to the character of our people, and particularly our young people. I say it again, our Nation's survival, long-term, will rest primarily upon the character of our people.

Mr. Speaker, I was privileged to hear British Prime Minister Tony Blair speak in this Chamber a few months ago, and one comment he made particularly caught my attention. He said, ``As Britain knows, all predominant power seems for a time invincible, but in fact, it is transitory.'' I think what he was saying is that essentially nothing lasts forever, including great nations.

History teaches us that, most of the world's great powers are not overcome by external force, but rather disintegrate internally. And let us take a quick study of three such examples.

Rome, of course, 2,000 odd years ago, stood astride the then- civilized world and appeared to be invincible. Yet it fell from preeminence, and the reasons historians have given us, there was a general decline in morality, increasing corruption and instability in leadership, an increasing public addiction to ever more violent public spectacles, an increase in crime and prostitution, and a populace that had become more self-absorbed, apathetic, and unwilling to sacrifice for the common good.

Then, of course, the country that Tony Blair was referring to, Great Britain, had a colonial empire that dominated much of the world through

much of the 1800s, and, of course, that empire slowly began to crumble. The reasons that some have given for this demise was that Great Britain had lost the national resolve to maintain its territory, values that led to ascendancy were eroded, spiritual underpinnings were shifted at some point.

The third example would be the Soviet Union, one of two great super powers as recently as 20 years ago, and in a matter of months, Russian disintegrated before our eyes. Alexander Solzhenitsyn reflected on this fall when he observed that, ``Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall a number of older people offering the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia, men have forgotten God, that is why all of this has happened.''

And so, Marx and Lenin dismantled Russia's heritage and value system. Russia's foundation was broken, and it collapsed like a house of cards with nothing to sustain it.

These are just three examples. I think there are many others that history is replete with that show the declines of some great nations, again without any outside military intervention. I think some of the common themes that we begin to see are that in cases like these, citizens are less willing to sacrifice for others and for country, citizens become more self-absorbed, a greater desire for comfort, for the state to provide for their welfare, a weakening of commonly held values and a decline of spiritual commitment in those countries.

What does all this have to do with the United States and our present situation? I hope I am not overdrawing the case here, but I would have to say that right now we are certainly on top, we have the most powerful military, the strongest economy, the most stable government of any nation in the world and so it is easy to think, as Tony Blair mentioned, that we are invincible but also as he said, as Britain knows, all predominant power for a time seems invincible, but in fact it is transitory. I think that was a well-taken word of warning.

Over 36 years of coaching and dealing with young people, I saw some very disturbing signs. I am going to take some time this evening to develop the theme that I saw occurring before my very eyes over that 36-year period that I think certainly bode a sense of warning, at least as far as I am concerned. The young men that I worked with were more talented with each year, yet they showed more signs of stress, they had more personal struggles, and they had less moral clarity as the years went by.

This chart here to my left reflects at least one alarming trend. In 1960, which was about the time that I started working with young people, we had roughly 400,000 cases that were referred to the juvenile courts. In 1999, that figure was well over 1.6 million. I would say today in 2003, this is the most recent figures that we have, but I would imagine that by 2002, 2003, the caseload is much higher. That represents a 400 percent increase. I really do not care what figure you look at; you will find that the chart looks about like this for issues such as teen pregnancy, teenage murder, violence, drug and alcohol abuse involving teenagers and, of course, the divorce rate for seniors and all the other social pathology that we are so familiar with. I think there are several factors that contributed to these changes that we see here. I would say the first major factor is simply some of the things that have happened to our family structure in the United States. In 1960, the out-of-wedlock birthrate was 5 percent. Today it is right at 33 percent, a 600 percent increase. So roughly one out of three children coming into our Nation today have basically two strikes against them and in most cases will not have both a father and mother to care for them. Some will, but most will not.

In 1960, the great majority of children lived with both biological parents. Today nearly one-half grow up without both biological parents. Only 7 percent of today's families are traditional families as we would normally define it, with usually a father working full-time, a mother at home full-time or vice versa, but at least one parent being at home and one parent being the primary provider. This is according to the Fatherhood Initiative statistics.

So actually in many cases, and as a matter of fact in some cases, in most cases with our children, nobody is home after 3 p.m., and between 3 and 6 p.m. we find the greatest source of problems, of criminal activity and so on with our children, because no one is home. Parents today spend 40 percent less time with their children than they did a generation ago. The divorce rate, of course, has increased 300 percent since 1960 and 24 million children today live without their biological father. Fatherless children are more likely to be abused, have mental and emotional problems, abuse drugs and alcohol, commit suicide, commit a crime and be promiscuous.

I think this is graphically driven home when we realize what a greeting card company did a few years ago when they approached the prisoners in one of our Federal prisons. It was Mother's Day. They said, we'll give you prisoners a Mother's Day card free if you'll just simply send your mother a card and they had almost 100 percent participation. And so they thought that this was somewhat gratifying. They thought, well, when Father's Day comes around, we will do the same thing. They made the same offer with Father's Day cards and as you may suppose, maybe you would not suppose, there were no takers. That shows you the devastation, particularly in some of our disaffected population, that fatherlessness has caused and I think really is at the root of most of the social pathology that we see in front of us.

The foundation of our culture, the family, is certainly under assault and we have seen great changes over the last 30 to 40 years. Another major issue that has contributed to some of the problems that our young people are dealing with today is that the environment has changed. The environment that they live and move and have their being in is not the same as it was back in the 1940s and the 1950s and even the early part of the 1960s. In 1960, drug abuse was almost unheard of. I know in the area of the country that I lived in, I had heard the word marijuana, I had never seen any instances of it, had never heard of cocaine, methamphetamines, ecstacy and so on; and of course today those drugs are of somewhat epidemic proportion. Alcohol abuse involving underage drinking has exploded.

I would like to take a little time right now, Mr. Speaker, to develop this particular theme because so often we feel in the United States that the drug problem has to do with hard drugs, but by far the biggest drug problem that we are facing today with our young people is that of alcohol. A recent National Academy of Science study that was released, I believe 2 weeks ago, showed that alcohol kills 6.5 times more children than all other drugs combined. More than cocaine, methamphetamine, ecstasy and all of those drugs put together, alcohol kills 6.5 times more.

Underage drinking costs the U.S. $53 billion annually, 2\1/2\ times what it is going to cost us to rebuild Iraq. There are more than 3 million teenage alcoholics estimated in our country today. This is by far the biggest drug problem. The average age of first drink in our country is currently 12.8 years of age, less than 13 years of age; and the discouraging thing is that when young people drink, on the average they will consume almost twice as much alcohol per occurrence as an adult will. So young people on average tend to drink to get drunk and they often do. Twenty percent of our eighth graders drink regularly. Children who drink before age 15 are four times more likely to become alcoholics because of psychological and physiological immaturity. Alcohol impacts them much differently when they are 12 and 13 and 14 and 15 years old than it impacts them when they are 24, 25, or 26. And so there is a great increase in addiction.

The thing that I would really like to emphasize, Mr. Speaker, is this, that young people for the most part do not start their experimentation with illegal drugs by using marijuana, they do not start with cocaine, they do not start with methamphetamine. They start with alcohol. Therefore, if you really want to stop the abuse of hard drugs, the important thing to do is start with stopping the abuse of alcohol with underage drinkers.

Yet we have really pretty much ignored this whole problem because we spend more than 25 times as much money on curbing illegal hard drugs as we do on underage drinking. We spend a minimal amount discouraging young people from drinking as underaged young people. We spend hundreds of millions to fight drug production in Afghanistan and Colombia and around the world and a fraction of that money spent on curbing underage drinking would be more cost effective. It would dry up the demand. I think some type of a national advertising program, a national education program with a fairly large infusion of dollars at the Federal level is warranted. It would probably help us cure and clear up the drug problem more than anything else that we could do in this country.

Another issue that is certainly affecting our young people as they try to weave their way through the environment that they are placed in is the violence factor. As many people know, the United States is currently the most violent Nation in the world for young people ages 14 through 23, 24. The second-place country is not even close to us. We lead the world in homicide rates and suicide rates for young people.

Pornography has exploded. We have over 1 million porn sites on the Internet. Not 1,000. Not 100,000. We have 1 million porn sites currently on the Internet. That is unthinkable. I think when the Internet first began many years ago, no one would have assumed that this was even possible or probable. And here it is and so nine out of 10 children ages 9 through 16 have viewed pornography on the Internet. Again, that is nine out of 10 children who are ages 9 through 16 have viewed pornography. Much of that is hard core pornography, which really sears an impression into your mind that sometimes you really cannot get out of it and most of that viewing has been unintentional. It has been by accident.

We have corporations such as AT&T that have been involved in hard core pornography. At one time AT&T I think was the gold standard as far as how a large corporation should be run. Yet we find some of our most reputable companies involved in this industry which yields profits of 10 to $15 billion a year. And so the profit motive certainly supersedes any national interest that they might perceive. Such words as Barbie, Disney, ESPN, at one time my name, would pull up a porn site. And so a child who innocently wants to do research or look at some information regarding their hobby will oftimes pull up a porn site, and we do not seem to be able to do anything about it.

Many of us are dismayed by the way the FCC is regulating obscenity on the Nation's airwaves. They are the primary arbiter. They are the ones who are supposed to be the watchdog in this area. According to the Parents Television Council as of July 23, 2003, the FCC had not fined a single broadcast station in the United States for airing indecent material. Also they had not suspended a single license in the United States for airing indecent material. Not in the entire history of the FCC have they done anything like this, despite thousands of complaints. This is something, Mr. Speaker, that absolutely needs to change. Many of us in this body are attempting to cause the FCC to begin to take their responsibility seriously.

The Department of Justice has been focusing on eliminating child pornography but has done relatively little to enforce hard core Internet obscenity laws. Of course the Department of Justice has had their hands full, particularly since 9/11. We realize that they have a very heavy caseload. But we have really petitioned the Department of Justice to get more active. In the preceding 8 years prior to 2000, practically nothing was done to enforce obscenity laws in the Department of Justice, and we feel that we have not seen a whole lot of action in the last couple of years as well.

Another issue that has been a concern is that of the video game industry, eight- to 18-year-old children average spending 40 minutes per day playing video games. Again, 40 minutes a day on the average, ages 8 through 18. And video games, as most people know, have become increasingly violent. A recent video game that was displayed to Members of Congress showed stalking and killing activities that are used on training films in the military to teach people how to kill people. In this particular video game, if you were a good shot and you hit somebody in a vital spot, such as the head, blood spurted and everything happened; the reward was several frames of pornographic material.

This is, as far as I am concerned, off the charts. I do not think the average adult can even conceive of some of the things that our children are seeing in terms of video games. The average player of video games is 12 years of age. The Kentucky school shooter who was very effective and killed several of his classmates had never fired a gun prior to the day that he took a gun to school, but he had been very proficient in playing video games, and he had done a lot of firing and shooting in video games which translated apparently quite well into his activities on the school ground that day.

Of course much music, some television, many movies are graphic. The current content would have been impossible to present for public consumption 30 years ago or even 20 years ago. This is particularly disturbing to me because I have grandchildren ages 4 through 11. I am very concerned about the environment that they are moving into and the things that they are either advertently or inadvertently exposed to because it certainly has an impact on the way they see the world.

In addition to some of these issues, I would have to say that our value system has shifted considerably. Stephen Covey wrote the book ``Seven Habits of Highly Effective People'' several years ago, and the thing that he noted was this: he said that in the first 150 years of our country's history, success was primarily defined in terms of character traits. A successful person was honest, a successful person was loyal, a successful person was hard working, kind, et cetera, generous. And then he said something happened about 50, 60 years ago as he began to survey the literature of our Nation as it had to do with the issue of success, he noticed that success began to be defined more and more in terms of material possessions. A successful person was no longer one who had good character; a successful person was one who had money; a successful person was one who had power; a successful person was one who had celebrity. And so today we find that many people who are labeled successful are really not people of character. They are people who have material wealth, celebrity, publicity, and so on. So certainly our value system has switched a great deal. And we have seen this affect the business world, WorldCom, Enron. We have seen it in the press. We have seen it in athletics, in the church, and in politics; and so it is quite concerning as to what effect this has on our culture at the present time.

The predominant world view that I noticed today, Mr. Speaker, is something called post-modernism, and what this states, the view of the world being post-modernism, is that there are no moral absolutes. So murder is not absolutely wrong. It depends on the circumstance. There may be cases when this is justified. Adultery is not absolutely wrong. There may be circumstances in which it is okay. Everything is relative. It may be okay to dishonor one's father and one's mother. It may be okay to steal or to lie or to do all of the things that have been taboo in societies throughout history.

So we have a system of relativism that leaves our young people with nothing firm to hold on to at the present time; and particularly on the college campus we will find that post-modernism is currently almost 100 percent holding sway in terms of the minds of our young people.

So, Mr. Speaker, in view of the family breakdown, the decline in our culture and shifting values, it is an extremely difficult time for our children. We are asking them to weave their way through a minefield littered with alcohol and drug abuse, harmful video games, music, TV, movies, promiscuity games, violent behavior, and broken homes; and we are asking them to do this with little or no parental guidance in an ever-shifting value system.

So it is a very difficult time, and I think we need to pay very close attention to these changes in our family, to these changes in our environment. And as de Toqueville said, he made an observation that I thought was rather astute a couple hundred years ago. He

said: ``America is great because America is good,'' and what he was doing was he was referring to the large number of churches, civic clubs, youth groups, and individuals who reach out and help others. This was somewhat unique to the United States at that time that we would help those who were less able to help themselves, and we had all of the different groups who were reaching out, and he had not noticed that in Europe. He said this is really the key to America's greatness. So he was referring to the inherent decency of the American people. He was referring to the strong moral and spiritual underpinning of the Nation. He was referring to the basic American ethic: ``Do unto to others as you would have them do unto you.'' So I think the important thing to remember, that these observations were made 200 years ago, and I suppose the corollary to his observation would be this: if America is no longer good, then America may no longer be great.

I am not one who believes that we are not a great country, and I believe there is a tremendous reservoir of innate goodness in our country today. But by the same token, I think it is important to point out that some of the standards and some of the values that have made us great have slipped considerably.

So one may say, what can be done? This has been a discouraging picture that I have painted, and sometimes I even hesitate to do this, but I think it is something that we need to face, we need to talk about on this floor. So some of the things that can be done in this body and throughout our culture are as follows: number one, we can do some things to provide mentoring for some of our young children, and mentoring is simply providing an adult who cares about the lives of young persons. So many of our young kids today do not have anyone who cares for them unconditionally and to have someone who is not a father, not a mother, not a preacher, not a teacher, no one who has an ax to grind, is paid to do so, to have a person who is a mentor, who is an adult who cares enough about someone, to show up and say I care about you unconditionally, and whatever happens, I am here for you.

It is very powerful in the life of a young person. A mentor is one who affirms, who says I believe in you, I know you can do it. I think that this is something that you are capable of. I see great promise in you. And I saw that in athletics, that if they affirmed a young person, they ofttimes became that which they did not even know they could be; and on other hand if they did not affirm them, if they beat them down, if they are negative, which so many of our kids experience all the time, it would not be long before that player played down to that level, and before long he would quit.

And of course a mentor also provides a vision. So many of our young people simply have no vision of what they could be, that they could go on to college, that they could do something in electronics, that they have musical ability. So a mentor is one who guides them in those directions. Mentoring reduces dropout rates, drug and alcohol abuse, teenage pregnancy, violence. And the President has proposed $150 million annually over the next 3 years for mentoring initiatives. Actually, the funding will be about half of that, but it is still much better than we had in the past.

The National Mentoring Partnership says that roughly 18 million children in the United States today are badly in need of a mentor, and yet at the present time we have roughly 2 million who are being mentors. Roughly one out of every 10 has a mentor. So I think one thing that could greatly change the shape of our Nation and our future would be to provide a much more systematic mentoring program, and I think the President is behind that.

I think some legislation can help. The Internet Gambling Bill, H.R. 2143, is something that I think could be very beneficial. We have a great many young people, particularly college students, who are inundated with credit cards. And anymore all one has to do to build a huge gambling debt is to have a credit card and a computer. So we would like to shut this practice down because some kids run up a 10, 15, $20,000 gambling debt in a matter of days; and of course their future and their credit rating is ruined. So we feel that this would be an important bill. H.R. 669, Protect Children from Video Game Sex and Violence Act of 2003, sponsored by the gentleman from California (Mr. Baca), of which I am a cosponsor, prevents marketing extremely graphic violent video games to children. We think this would be a step in the right direction; but, again, we would worry about the courts declaring it unconstitutional. So I think we need a fundamental shift in court decisions regarding the first amendment.

I am not a constitutional expert and do not pretend to be so, but I would like to point out some court cases that have certainly shaped the course of our Nation's history and its future. In 1996 Congress passed the Communications Decency Act that made it illegal to send indecent material to children via the Internet; but in June of 1997, the Supreme Court overturned portions of the law and, get this, said in the opinion: ``Indecent material is protected by first amendment.'' So this was one of the first times, I believe, that the Supreme Court said that indecent material is okay. The first amendment gives one the ability to do that, and we are not going to stand in the way of people sending indecent material to children over the Internet.

That was a landmark case.

In 1996 also, the Child Pornography Prevention Act outlawed child pornography, including visual depictions that appeared to be of a minor. So the issue at hand was this: You cannot have an actual minor involved in the production of child pornography, but if you use computer-generated images, which you can not tell whether they are real or not real, then that type of child pornography is apparently okay, according to this particular Supreme Court decision.

In October 1998 the Children On-Line Protection Act was signed into law to prohibit the communication of harmful material to children on publicly accessible web sites. The Supreme Court's refusal to rule on the 1988 law prevented the law from being enacted, so we were not able to protect children who were involved in receiving harmful material on publicly accessible web sites.

The 106th Congress passed the Children's Internet Protection Act to require schools and libraries that receive Federal funds to use Internet filtering to protect minors from harmful material on the Internet. In May 2002 a Federal Court declared the law unconstitutional.

What we have here is free speech is protected for pornographers and, in some case pedophiles, while women and children are attacked. Roughly 80 to 90 percent of pedophiles and rapists report using pornography, oft times before they commit an event.

So, some people say, well, what is the big deal? Pornography is harmless. It does not really have any victim. Yet, if you think about it, we spend billions of dollars in this country on commercials, and if those commercials did not change behavior, if what you see and what you hear and what you read does not change your behavior, then we are spending billions of dollars unnecessarily. So, obviously, the pornography industry does have a tremendous impact on behavior and the environments that our young people exist in.

I would also point out that there have been some issues that have to do with prayer that are somewhat concerning in our schools. In 1962 the Supreme Court ruled the following prayer unconstitutional. This was the landmark decision. This was the particular prayer: ``Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence on thee and we beg thy blessings upon us, our teachers and our country.'' It seemed relatively innocuous and relatively simple, but that prayer was ruled unconstitutional because of separation of church and state.

It would appear that many court rulings regarding separation of church and state have ranged far afield from the intent of our framers of the Constitution. The First Amendment states, ``Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.''

Of course, most everyone realizes where that came from, the Constitution, was that this country was founded by people who were attempting to

escape from a religious state, the Church of England, so they did not want a government-sponsored religion which took over the country.

But I think that in the interpretations that we have seen in the courts, we have ranged far afield from what the Constitution actually intended. The framers of the Constitution were assumed to be hostile to expressions of faith in the recent interpretations of the court that we have seen.

Benjamin Franklin, who was one of the framers of the Constitution, said this: ``We have been assured, sir,'' and this is his quote, ``In the sacred writings, that except the Lord build a house, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this. I also believe that without his concurring aid, we shall succeed in the political building no better than the builders of Babel. We shall be divided by our little partial local interests. Our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and a byword down future ages. I therefore beg leave to move that, henceforth, prayers imploring the assistance of heaven and its blessings on our deliberation be held in this assembly every morning before we proceed to business.''

What he was talking about was in this body, on this floor, he was saying we should have a prayer at the start of business every day. This is one of the framers of the Constitution. So at this point, both the House and the Senate begin their business daily with a prayer, and yet we have moved so far as a Nation away from what Franklin originally intended.

George Washington said this: ``The propitious smiles of heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which heaven itself has ordained.''

In assessing the writings of some of the Founding Fathers, David Barton, an historian, said this: ``Franklin had warned that forgetting God and imagining that we no longer needed his concurring aid would result in internal disputes, the decay of the Nation's prestige and reputation and a diminished national success. Washington had warned that if religious principles were excluded, the Nation's morality and political prosperity would suffer. Yet despite such clear words in cases beginning in 1962, the Supreme Court offered rulings which eventually divorced the Nation, its schools and its public affairs from more than three centuries of its heritage. America is now learning exponentially what both Washington and Franklin knew to be true. We are suffering in the very areas they predicted.''

I think it is important that the Founding Fathers really did not intend for the pendulum to swing as far as it has. I think that they obviously acknowledged the importance of issues of faith, and this was the foundation upon which the Nation was built.

There are some other decisions that I think are worth looking at. In 1992 a Supreme Court decision declared an invocation and benediction at a graduation ceremony constitutional, so a preacher, a rabbi, a Muslim cleric, cannot at a graduation exercise lead any type of prayer. That was decided in 1992.

The court also has held more recently a minute of silence in school is unconstitutional, so at the beginning of the classroom day it is not constitutional for a minute of silence to be held in which a child may choose to pray in his own way. He may look out the window, he may think about his history lesson, but it is just a minute of silence. There is no formal, organized prayer, no one is proselytizing, and yet that has become unconstitutional.

Then this, one of the strangest rulings that I heard of, was the court ruled that a student-led prayer at a football game was unconstitutional. This is not inside the school building, it is not a school administrator, it is not a teacher; this was a prayer that was chosen to be selected by the students, and a student was going to lead the prayer. Yet this was unconstitutional because the football players might have to listen to it and might be offended, I guess.

Of course, most recently, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the term ``under God'' from the Pledge of Allegiance, and that will now be heard by the Supreme Court, probably within the next few months, and it appears that those are there is a very strong probability that this may be a four-to-four deadlock, which means that the Ninth Circuit Court will be upheld and that will become the law of the land, at least for that part of the country.

Certainly I am not advocating here that teachers or administrators be allowed to proselytize in the schools. I do not think that would be appropriate. I do not think that is intended. But it does seem that we have come a long, long ways from where the framers of the Constitution originally intended us to go.

The Constitution is increasingly being interpreted as a ``living document.'' That sounds really good, does it not, because it is kind of progressive. It sounds like we are forward-thinking and the Constitution is not a dead piece of legislation, but it is currently alive and it is being changed and it is moving ahead.

Yet the important thing to realize is that the Constitution is often not interpreted as it was written, but rather as justices believe that it should be. Look at the legal decisions increasingly coming down, based not upon what the law states, but based upon the personal ideology of the jurists.

The Constitution is not based upon absolute principles, but rather the shifting sands of relativism. This philosophical bent of the Supreme Court justices and District Court justices determines the course of the Nation.

Over the last 20 or 30 years we have seen the Nation slowly but surely driven in certain directions that many people would believe is not what the framers of the Constitution intended. That, Mr. Speaker, is why the activities in the other body regarding the makeup of the courts and the court appointees is becoming such an important issue, because, within the next 1 or 2 or 3 years, the shape of the Supreme Court certainly will be determined, and, with it, the direction that our Nation proceeds over the next 15, 20, 30 years I think will largely be decided.

The willingness of Congress to focus upon the pernicious influences impacting our children, the willingness of the American people to demand that those profiteering at the expense of our culture and our young people be reined in, will largely shape the future of our Nation.

Terrorism is an ever-present threat. The economy is of concern. However, terrorism and economic distress will not prevail as long as our national character is sound. I would like to say that one more time. There is certainly no intent on my part to minimize the critical nature of terrorism, the crisis in the Middle East, the situation in Iraq, the difficulties with the economy, health care, Medicare, all of those types of things. Those are critical issues and they occupy almost 100 percent of this body's attention. But the reason I am here tonight is to try to point out the fact that we will handle all of those problems. None of those problems will overcome the United States if our character is sound, if our young people are nurtured in the right direction.

And, therefore, something that I think is very pernicious is slipping under the radar screen and something that this Congress, this body, and the American people need to address on a consistent manner. So this struggle may present the most critical crisis facing the United States today.

As Congress addresses important issues such as national defense, economy, health care, and so on, it is critical that we not lose sight of the fact that our Nation's survival is directly linked to the character of our people.

I would conclude by saying this our future rests with our young people and with the soundness of their character, their willingness to sacrifice, and their spiritual grounding. And I hope that we will give adequate attention to these issues some of which can be handled through legislation, some through expenditures of money, for instance, in the trying to prevent underage drinking, some in our attention to who goes on to the courts and who does not, but above all this really rests with the American people and with their willingness to persevere.

And I would like to echo what de Tocqueville said, ``America is great because America is good.'' And I think we need to maintain our vigilance that America continues to be good.

Mr. Speaker, I want to compliment the Committee on Rules and the leadership for getting this bill on a fast track, and I want to compliment my colleagues on the Committee on Energy and Commerce. We acted very swiftly to get this bill to the floor. In fact, we passed the bill out 49 to 1 just last week.

I would like to say as well that I think this rule is a fair rule. I think the amendments will be debated fairly. I think that the membership of the House will respond to those amendments; and obviously my hope is to adopt the bill, the legislation, overwhelmingly at the end of the day.

I want to say to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak) on media ownership, there will be a time and place for that debate. We had a little debate on this last year. There was a compromise that was made as part of the appropriations process. This issue is not going to go away, but I think it is imperative that we get this bill to the President's desk as fast we can.

The President did send a veto signal as a statement of administration policy last year on this very issue. If for some reason that amendment was attached to this bill, there is no question it would delay enactment of this bill. It is not in place to add that amendment to this bill. I accept what the Committee on Rules did yesterday. We had a good debate on it yesterday afternoon. I think they made a wise decision not to make that amendment in order, knowing there is another day and time when we can debate that issue.

Mr. Speaker, I compliment the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak) for offering virtually the same amendment in full committee last week and then withdrawing that amendment even though a point of order had been raised.

I urge Members to support this fair rule so we can get this bill to the President's desk as fast as we can.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 5 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I ask my colleagues to support this legislation this morning. This legislation actually appeared on my radar screen last year as we began to set our agenda for 2004. I introduced the legislation in early January, held our first hearing on the legislation before the Super Bowl, and the administration supports our bill. They sent us a statement that they supported our bill in committee, and I will include that Statement of Administration Policy as part of the Record in support of this legislation today.

Statement of Administration Policy

The Administration strongly supports House passage of H.R.

3717. This legislation will make broadcast television and

radio more suitable for family viewing by giving the Federal

Communications Commission (FCC) the authority to impose

meaningful penalties on broadcasters that air obscene or

indecent material over the public airwaves. In particular,

the Administration applauds the inclusion in the bill of its

proposal to require that the FCC consider whether

inappropriate material has been aired during children's

television programming in determining the fine to be imposed

for violations of the law. The Administration looks forward

to continuing to work with the Congress to make appropriate

adjustments to the language of the bill as it moves through

the legislative process.

I remember a speech well by Michael Powell, the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, where he said the fines under current law are peanuts. It is a cost of doing business. They are not high enough.

In fact, in the hearings that we held, we discovered that by the time you saddle up some of those attorneys at the Department of Justice and send them out to file a claim in Federal Court to go after the dollars that the FCC might have fined, they are not going to recoup their costs.

The Upton-Markey-Tauzin-Dingell-Barton bill has been cosponsored by more than 140 Members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats. Chairman Powell and his four other commissioners, two Republicans and two Democrats, when you look at their statements in support of this legislation, when you look at their statements as they imposed fines on broadcasters who cross that line, every one of them, Republican or Democrat, has lamented the fact that they cannot raise the fines higher than they are under current law, a maximum of only $27,500.

Because of the legislation we pursued on a strong bipartisan basis, and again, I commend my colleagues on the other side, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), we were able to pass this legislation out of the Committee on Energy and Commerce last week on a recorded vote of 49 to 1. The other body is beginning to move as well. They passed their legislation out 34 to 0.

Our bill was strengthened in the full committee markup. We added a provision on three-strikes-and-you-are-out. That is, if you are a repeat offender, a broadcaster, and you go through three series of fines violating the current standard, there is set up an automatic revocation hearing to take away that license.

We established a ``shot clock'' so that the FCC has to act on complaints within a certain number of days. We protected affiliated broadcasters. They do not always know what is coming down the pike in terms of what they are broadcasting. We raised the fine from the initial bill as I introduced it of $275,000 for the maximum fine to $500,000. We added a provision asking for the National Association of Broadcasters to make part of their code a Broadcast Decency Code, something they had years ago and was struck under antitrust violations.

We also added a provision making the performers, the talent, liable for their own words. You cannot tell me that they do not know what the standards are. I have heard them whine, I have heard them take out that violin and whine about what this bill will do. Well, guess what, Mr. Chairman? It is time to take away that violin and give them the fork. They are done. This ought to stop.

Guess what? Our bill does nothing to change existing standards. Zero. Nada. Not a thing. I would note that the 1927 Radio Act has held up in the courts for more than 75 years. The FCC has the authority to punish those who air obscene, indecent or profane language. It has been upheld by the Supreme Court, who ruled in 1978 that the government does have the right to regulate indecent broadcasts and to, in fact, establish a definition of indecency that remains the FCC's guiding principle.

There is language, material, that describes sexual or excretory material or organs, and it is deemed patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards. In the mid 1990s, the court limited the ban on indecent airing between the hours of 6:00 in the morning and 10:00 at night, when kids are most likely to be watching or listening.

This legislation pertains only to broadcast radio or TV. Why is that? Because it is the public airwaves, that is why. And for those that challenge the standards that are out there and do not realize what some of these broadcasters have said, I would ask them to come see me during the next couple of hours of debate on the floor, because with me I have a notebook, and in that notebook we have the specific language that broadcasters have used in defiance of the law.

You cannot tell me that this stuff should be on the air. It should not be. We need to make sure we stop it, and we do, in its tracks.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from the good State of Indiana (Mr. Buyer), a member of the subcommittee, a cosponsor of the bill, and a very helpful force in getting this bill to the floor.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from the State of Pennsylvania (Mr. Pitts), a very active member on this issue, an original cosponsor, one that has helped in many ways to get this bill to the floor.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton), the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, my friend and colleague.

(Mr. BARTON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden), who offered a very constructive bipartisan amendment that is part of the package of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Yes, I do. The testimony was provided by Brent Bozell, President of the Parents Television Council. The FCC claims, however, that they no longer adhere to that policy.

I agree with the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Rush), consumers should not be forced to record every program that they watch or listen to in order to submit a complaint to the FCC alleging indecent content. It is an outrage that the FCC continues its practice of dismissing consumer complaints for lack of a tape or transcript.

I agree with the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Rush).

The committee will closely monitor the FCC's action to ensure that the FCC actually changes their policy in that regard, and I thank the gentleman for bringing this to our attention; and I look forward to working with him on this issue to make sure that that change, in fact, is made in order.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).

(Mr. GINGREY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes), a cosponsor of the legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from the good State of California (Mr. Ose).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Smith), an original cosponsor of the legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Osborne), not only an original cosponsor of this legislation, but also one that came, before the Super Bowl, who sat through our first hearing, way back in January, to sit with the audience.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from New Mexico (Mrs. Wilson), another original cosponsor of the legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Pickering), an original cosponsor of the bill and, more importantly, a fellow dad.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte).

(Mr. GOODLATTE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence), a cosponsor of the legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Cox), an original cosponsor of the legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Gillmor), again, an original cosponsor of the legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I spoke last night with our former chairman, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin). He wishes that he was going to be here today, but he is preparing himself for cancer surgery next week. But I know that he would very much like to cast votes on every one of the recorded votes that we have the balance of the afternoon.

I want to remind my colleagues that we do not change the standards. That is not what this bill does. It strictly enforces the standards that are already on the books.

I told this story in my first hearing back in January before the Super Bowl. My staff prepared this broadcast indecency briefing materials book for me. Inside this book are the transcripts of broadcasters that have been fined for broadcasting indecent material. The material that is in this book was all on radio, it was not on TV. But what alarmed me more than anything else was the series of repeat offenders, whether they be in Detroit, Chicago, Washington or Los Angeles, and all broadcast on the public airwaves.

When I read through this book, I was embarrassed. I was embarrassed for the fellow that was sitting next to me on the airplane, because I had to read it like this. I had to shield the material in this book, the transcripts, that were fined thousands of dollars.

I made a mistake that day, Mr. Chairman. I read through the book, it was a long flight, we had terrible weather. In fact, frankly that day when we landed back at DCA, I thought we had gone back to Detroit, there was such bad weather here.

I looked through a lot of material, and I left it by mistake in the pocket in the seat that was in front of me. I walked off the plane, went back through the security, and got all the way to my car when I realized this book was still on the plane. Now, with the new security arrangements, I could not go back to the plane to get this book.

It has got my name on it, ``Chairman Upton, broadcast indecency briefing materials.'' Man, was I embarrassed, to go back into the Northwest Airline ticket line and ask someone to go retrieve that book. And, yes, they had found it. They saw my name, and they were very chagrined to get it back to me. But, thank goodness, I did get it back, and I do not think anybody read some of the material. But it is public record, and this stuff, this XXX smut stuff, should never be broadcast on the public airwaves.

I was asked the question by the press when we introduced our bill several weeks ago, ``Do you think, Mr. Upton, that your legislation is going to take this stuff down, that it will increase somehow the FCC's enforcement division?''

I thought about it, and I said, ``You know, I hope not. I hope that this legislation will send a message to the broadcasters and to the talent that is making these indecent remarks,'' and more than just a word, if you come over here and read these transcripts, it is more than a word, it is page, after page, after page, ``that we can get this stuff stopped with this legislation.''

I welcome the opportunity to work with my friend, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey). Together, we fashioned a very bipartisan bill every step of the way, from the calling of the witnesses to the questioning to the amendments, every step of the way, and I am pleased that the other body is working on that same procedure, where, again, they voted 34 to 0 earlier this week to pass similar legislation.

Our bill that passed 49 to 1 is a credit to this institution and to the Members on both sides who care about the public airwaves, to make sure that this stuff is not broadcast, and we send a message, whether it be to the shock jock or the DJ or the person with the finger on the pause button at one of those awards, whether it be the Academy Awards, Golden Globes or whatever else, we are going to make an impact,

and we are going to let our families know that this stuff has got to stop.

This bill does it. It is not an infringement of first amendment rights. It has all been certified, made legitimate from the courts of the land, from the highest court of the land down to the lowest court, and needs a positive vote here this afternoon.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Blunt), the distinguished whip of the House, an original cosponsor of our legislation, and once a proud member of our proud subcommittee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, obviously I rise in strong support of the Upton amendment. This amendment ensures that

those who are the subject of indecency complaints are provided with a constitutional right to due process. For instance, until a forfeiture penalty has been paid or a court has finally determined that a forfeiture penalty is justified, a complaint should not be held against the broadcast station license.

Just like someone who is presumed innocent until proven guilty, this amendment guarantees that a broadcast license cannot be revoked or license renewal rejected until all of the appeals have been heard. This is a good amendment, it was pointed out in our hearing at the very end, and I would hope has bipartisan support. It tightens the loophole.

I just want to say in closing in support of this amendment, I want to thank in particular, I think, the many Members who have been so engaged in this legislation, and I want to thank the staff as well. On our side of the aisle, we have had terrific staff that have worked with the very good staff, terrific staff on the other side as well; but I want to particularly cite a number of individuals: Will Nordwind, Howard Waltzman, Neil Fried, Kelly Zerzan, Joan Hillebrands, Sean Bonyur, Jim Barnette, Jaylyn Connaughton, and Andy Black for their hard work in making sure that this bill got to the floor quickly and swiftly, and that, in fact, it was in a very strong bipartisan fashion.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 7 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this legislation. This is a bipartisan bill that the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, led by the gentleman from Michigan (Chairman Upton) and the Chairman of the full committee, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton), have put together, working in conjunction with the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) and myself and the other members of the minority on the Committee on Energy and Commerce, working in a bipartisan fashion, in order to craft a bill related to the broadcast radio and television obscenity and decency and profanity issues.

Mr. Chairman, at the outset, I would like to note that this legislation was introduced before the Super Bowl this year, not after. It was an issue that had already percolated up to the attention of the American public and to our subcommittee, and we had already decided that extra attention needed to be paid to the Federal Communications Commission and its lack of enforcement of these very important provisions.

The Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet held three hearings on this issue, and from our hearings we confirmed a number of things. We have learned that although the Federal Communications Commission is charged with ensuring that licensees serve the public interest and that the stations do not air obscene, indecent or profane content in violation of the law and Commission rules, that until very recently, the Commission has not been an aggressive enforcer of the rules. Testimony from Federal Communications Commission

Chairman Michael Powell indicates that cases are still languishing from 2 to 3 years ago.

We also learned that although the Federal Communications Commission has numerous enforcement tools, including the ability to revoke a station license, it appears as though the industry has largely concluded that the Federal Communications Commission is a paper tiger. The rare and paltry fines the Commission assesses have become nothing more than a joke within the broadcast industry, and the Commission never raises license revocation as a consequence for repeated indecency violations, even in the most egregious cases of these repeat violators. This legislation will help us to address the serious enforcement shortcomings at the Federal Communications Commission that we have identified.

Finally, we have also learned that the industry needs to do a better job in educating parents about the tools that already may be in their hands that parents can utilize to address the myriad concerns they raise with us about what is on television. Parents can use the television rating system and the V-Chip, which stems from legislation which I authored as part of the Telecommunications Act of 1996.

However, we have a huge educational challenge with the TV ratings system and how parents can use it in conjunction with the V-Chip. Studies indicate that if a parent of a child 12 and under has a V-Chip- ready TV and knows this, that some 47 percent of such parents use the V-Chip, and they like it, because it allows them to program their TV set for their children 12 and under. Almost all of these parents who know about it are enthused about it. The problem is with the qualifiers. Almost half of those who have bought the approximately 100 million V-Chip capable televisions since 2000 are not aware that they possess a television set with a V-Chip in it.

In addition, many of these parents express confusion over the TV rating system itself, and one major network, NBC, still does not use the comprehensive rating system utilized by everyone else in the television industry. The industry did a good job with much fanfare after the TV rating system was initially finalized, in doing public service announcements and other educational messages regarding the ratings. Yet those efforts have waned in recent years.

In my view, we need a comprehensive, industry-wide campaign to address this issue. The TV set manufacturers and the electronic retailers need to do a better job in alerting television buyers to the V-Chip, in part because many retail employees at these stores who sell TV sets are apparently unaware that the TV sets have a V-Chip in it. In addition, print media ought to include the television ratings of programs in the television guide so that parents see them when they look up what is on television that day or that evening.

Finally, I believe the broadcast industry should renew its educational efforts on the television ratings system and also consider a number of other ideas to better assist parents, which I will address to our television networks on an ongoing basis, in order to ensure that they know that this is an issue that Americans care about.

At our recent hearings, I challenged the industry to do several things to better help parents understand the TV rating system:

First, use the V-Chip and utilize available per-channel blocking technologies on cable television.

I requested that the television industry increase its public service advertisements about the television rating system and the V-Chip. I am happy to report that many, many industry participants on the networks and cable operators have agreed to do so, with some, such as Fox Television, including print advertising in their campaign as well.

I will come back in a while and outline what is happening in the rest of the television and cable industry, but I think it is important for the Congress to pass this legislation, and then to keep up the pressure so that parents are given the tools that they need in order to protect the sights and the sounds which their children are exposed to.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Wynn), who added two very important amendments to this legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Los Angeles, California (Ms. Watson).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 6 minutes to the gentleman from Chicago, Illinois (Mr. Rush).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes.

I just wanted to point out that I have requested that the television industry increase its public service advertisements about the television rating system, and I am happy to report that many in the industry have agreed to provide much more public education about this technology in TV sets so it is easier for parents to be able to figure out how to program it and to provide just the level of protection which they want for the children in their home, at whatever particular age they may be.

I also challenged the television networks to consider a couple of suggestions with respect to the broadcast of the ratings icon on the screen. I requested that the TV ratings icon appear not only at the top of a show but also after commercial breaks when the show resumes. That is because a lot of times people turn on the show after it has already started and they have no idea what the rating is. So I have asked them to actually put on the rating at each commercial break as well so that parents can see what the level of the rating is and make an adjustment for their own particular families.

I also requested that the networks add a voice-over when the ratings appear to also better alert parents. The ABC television network readily agreed to both suggestions, as did Bud Paxon on behalf of his PAX network. The other three major networks, Fox, NBC and CBS, have indicated that they are considering it but have not yet committed to doing so. I hope that they join ABC in doing it because I think it is helpful, quite frankly, to give parents this kind of additional information.

It does not detract from any network's ability to be able to put any programming on that they want. It just gives parents the information they need in order to shield their children from material which they believe may be inappropriate.

I also challenged the cable industry, in addition to increasing their public service advertisements, to increase consumer awareness of the provisions of the 1992 Cable Act that permits any cable subscriber in America to request that the cable company block any one of the cable programs that they believe is inappropriate for their family. It is a right that every American has in terms of their relationship with their cable company, but no more than 1 percent of all Americans even know they have the right to have any one of these individual cable channels blocked from coming into their home, even if they have bought the whole other part of the cable package.

I believe that if the cable industry made it clear in their bills, the information they give to consumers, that millions of American families would be much happier if they could take the whole cable package and then delete a couple of channels that they believe were too offensive for their young children and their family. I think it can be a real step forward, and I have received some very encouraging information from some of these cable networks that they will provide that option.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), who is the ranking member of the full committee.

(Mr. DINGELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price).

(Mr. PRICE of North Carolina asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, could the Chair tell me how much time is remaining on either side?

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Hinchey).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Ackerman).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Serrano).

(Mr. SERRANO asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, if there is no one seeking recognition in opposition, I ask unanimous consent to control the time in opposition, even though I support the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

I would like to say that this is a good amendment. It has been crafted on a bipartisan basis. We have worked very closely together, Democrat and Republican, on this issue right from the beginning; and this amendment reflects that continuing level of cooperation. I just want any of the Members who are listening to this debate to understand that that consensus has been reached.

Mr. Chairman, I have no other Members seeking recognition, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to the rules for H.R. 3717. Yesterday I offered an amendment to the bill that would end industry-paid travel for commissioners and staff of the Federal Communications Commission once and for all. I am very disappointed that it was not made in order. In fact, 5 of the 6 amendments offered by my Democratic colleagues were not made in order. I hope my colleagues would join me in opposing this rule and request an open rule.

My amendment was a modified version of a bill that I introduced last year in response to a report documenting over $2.8 million in travel costs spent by FCC-regulated private companies for more than 2,500 trips taken by FCC commissioners and staff over the past 8 years. Such practices have contributed to the FCC's reputation as a ``captured agency'' controlled by the industries it regulates.

I am aware that Chairman Powell promised last fall to eliminate the practice of corporate sponsored travel, but I don't believe a one-time promise is strong enough to eliminate the practice once and for all. What if the commission decides to re-institute the policy in a few years? What if there is a change in the administration this fall, and we end up having a new chairman? There is no guarantee that what the FCC has decided to do is not just a way to wait out the storm caused by the report, and that it could revert back to the old arrangement any time.

I support granting the FCC the authority to impose severe penalties for indecent broadcasting, but we must also ensure that the Commission uses the new enforcement powers this bill would provide. One way to do so is to eliminate, once and for all, any potential conflict of interest caused by the practice of corporate sponsored travel for FCC travel. I hope my colleagues would join me in rejecting this rule and allow consideration of my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, very quickly, I want all to know that I rise in support of H.R. 3717, the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act of 2004, but I am sorry that this was a closed rule on that bill. There are a couple of points I wanted to make.

I have received a letter from the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists on behalf of 80,000 actors, broadcast journalists, announcers, disc jockeys, and sound recording artists saying that they are asking us to reject the provisions of the bill that would fine individual performers and announcers for the programming decisions controlled and implemented by the broadcast licensees. And I would ask my colleagues to think about that particular provision. I understand we have already voted on the rule.

The next point I wanted to make is that since the FCC has already allowed the major networks to own up to 45 percent of the market, I feel that that is the root cause for some of this indecency that we hear through the media. And it is important for us to recognize that this bill taps into the underlying anger of over 2 million individuals who wrote to the FCC last summer opposing its relaxation of media ownership rules. And I just want to mention some shocking statistics that illustrate the connection between indecency and media concentration.

The 1996 Communications Act cleared the way for relaxing some media ownership limits. Since then, complaints received by the FCC regarding indecent programs on television have jumped from 26 in the year 2000 to 217 in the year 2003. Clear Channel Communications Incorporated, the Nation's largest radio chain with 11 percent of the Nation's total studios and stations, has

received about 52 percent of the fines that the FCC has imposed. Viacom's Infinity station, about 2 percent of all stations, has received 28 percent of the FCC's fines. So the fact is when big media gets bigger and the race for audiences turns to the lowest denominator in trash programming to appeal to the broadest possible audience, those conglomerates move further away from quality programming and the principles of ``diversity, localism and competition'' crucial for the service of the public interest.

Finally, I was in support of the Schakowsky amendment that would have exempted individuals from increases in indecency fines. And hearing from the industry, they are very upset about the possibility. So I am hoping that we can clear up some of these issues in another piece of legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 3717, the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act of 2004. While I support giving the Federal Communication Commission greater authority in the enforcement of indecency rules, I don't believe it addressed the root cause of indecency in media, namely, the current trend of unfettered media conglomeration and its impact on creative voices.

I think it is important for us to recognize that this bill taps into the underlying anger of the over 2 million individuals who wrote to the FCC last summer opposing its relaxation of media ownership rules, individuals who were truly turned off by a dumb-down media culture that has failed to serve the public interest. The bottom line is, a consolidated media market controlled by profit-driven conglomerates are bound to produce indecent, shock-value programming for the sake of viewership.

I just want to mention some shocking statistics that illustrate the connection between indecency and media concentration. The 1996 Telecommunications Act cleared the way for relaxing some media ownership limits. Since then, complaints received by the FCC regarding indecent programming on television have jumped from 26 in 2000, to 217 in 2003. Clear Channel Communications Inc., the Nation's largest radio chain with 11 percent of the Nation's total stations, has received about 52 percent of the fines the FCC has imposed. Viacom's Infinity Stations, about 2 percent of all stations, has received 28 percent of the FCC's fines.

The fact is, when big media gets bigger, and the race for audiences turns to the lowest denominator in trash programming to appeal to the broadest possible audience, those conglomerates move further away from quality programming and the principles of ``diversity, localism, and competition'' crucial for the service of public interest.

That is why the Senate this week adopted a provision to impose a 1- year moratorium on the FCC's new media-ownership rules pending the outcome of a new GAO study on the connection between media indecency and ownership. I am very disappointed that a similar amendment offered by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Hinchey) was rejected by the Rules Committee. Mr. Chairman, while I am prepared to vote for the bill, I strongly urge this Chamber to allow a thorough debate on the issue of media consolidation.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support to the Schakowsky amendment to H.R. 3717, which would exempt individuals from increase in indecency fines. While I support the goals of H.R. 3717 in giving the Federal Communication Commission more authority to enforce indecency rules, I don't believe individual performers and artists should be threatened by the same penalties imposed on multi-billion dollar corporations, who have the ultimate control on programming decisions.

I believe the provisions within H.R. 3717 to fine individuals would constitute a dangerous chilling effect on artistic expression and a threat to our first amendment rights. It is also completely unnecessary, since broadcast licensees and networks are responsible for programming contents and the decision to air, not the individual artists. Why else would networks start implementing the so-called ``five second delay'' that would remove any objectionable content before it is broadcasted? The broadcasters understand that they are the ones responsible for the contents they air, because they are the ones who eventually profit from the controversies generated by offensive, indecent, and dumb-down programming.

I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting Congresswoman Shakowsky's amendment that would prevent he broadcasters from scapegoating individual artists and hold them truly responsible in the enforcement of indecency rules.