Access to Hospitals Act of 2003

Mr. President, let me begin with a brief opening statement about why we are here and what brings us to this point. My colleague from Arizona, who will speak in opposition to this resolution of disapproval, is here to make a presentation and my colleague with whom I have worked on this resolution of disapproval, Senator Lott from Mississippi, is here and will make a statement. I believe others will arrive as well.

Let me describe what we are doing. There is a provision in Federal law that allows the Congress to effectively veto a rule offered by a Federal agency under certain circumstances. This is called the Congressional Review Act. I call it a legislative veto. It is rarely used. In fact, this is only the second occasion on which it will be used. It requires 35 signatures of Senators to discharge a proposition from a committee and bring it to the Senate floor, with 10 hours of debate. Following the 10 hours of debate, there is then a vote on the resolution of disapproval.

The specific rule that brings us to the floor today with a resolution of disapproval is a rule by the Federal Communications Commission dealing with broadcast ownership rules. This is an issue that is controversial. It is highly charged and very significant. Some

Members believe very strongly that what the Federal Communications Commission has done is horribly wrong for the interests of this country.

I said at the Commerce Committee when we discussed this, especially in the aftermath of the FCC making and announcing its rules, never have I seen a Federal agency that is supposed to be a regulatory agency cave in so quickly and so completely to the large economic interests. That is exactly what I think has happened. It has happened at the expense of the public interest.

The foundation of our democracy is information. The free flow of information is what nourishes and refreshes this democracy of ours. When what the American people see, hear, and read is controlled by fewer and fewer interests, in my judgment, it is detrimental to this government and to our country.

The ruling by the Federal Communications Commission says, among other things, this will be just fine in the future; in America's largest cities, one single company can own the dominant newspaper, the dominant television station, and two other television stations, eight radio stations, and the cable company in that same town. It is just fine. And they can do it in that town and another town and another town and another town, and that is just fine, according to the FCC rule.

Pardon my expression, but I think that is absolutely nuts. It is not fine--not fine with me, not fine with a good many of my colleagues. What we design to do is to pass a resolution of disapproval in the Senate to say to the Federal Communications Commission: Do it over, and do it right.

The Federal Communications Commission held only one public hearing before embarking on the largest rule change in the history of this country with respect to ownership of broadcast properties. Having held only one hearing, they then said: Well, let's do this Katie-bar-the- door approach to allowing the additional concentration and this new orgy of mergers that almost certainly will occur as a result of this rule. They said: Let's allow newspapers to own television stations in the same town, have the same television stations and radio stations marry up.

We know what has happened since the 1996 act. Ownership rules have changed; we have seen galloping concentrations. One company in this country now owns nearly 1,300 radio stations. In one city in North Dakota, we have eight radio stations. One of them is a religious station, one is a public broadcast station, and six are commercial stations. All six are owned by the same company.

I ask my colleagues, does anyone think there is a public outcry in this country for the need to have more concentration in broadcast ownership? Has anyone heard that public outcry? I have not.

The airwaves in this country belong to the American people. They do not belong to the broadcast companies. They do not belong to a television or radio company. They belong to the American people. We license them for use by companies that want to send a television or radio signal and we say that, attendant to that use, you have certain responsibilities and obligations: Competition, diversity, and localism.

What does localism mean? It means we anticipate that when you have a property to broadcast radio or television signals in your local community, you have a responsibility to that community to broadcast some of those local basketball games, talk to the people in the community about the local charity event this weekend, tell them about what is happening on Main Street. That is localism.

What do we have these days? All too often we have the concentration that has developed in all broadcast media. Now we have something instead of localism; it is called voice tracking.

Do you know what voice tracking is? With this massive amount of mergers, with one company owning many stations, voice tracking is that which occurs when you drive down the street in Salt Lake City, UT, and turn on your dial on the radio station and hear someone saying, ``It is sunny out here in Salt Lake City this morning,'' and that person may be in a basement in Baltimore, MD, broadcasting from a broadcast booth. Do you know what that is called? Voice tracking; ripping a sheet off the printer from the Internet that shows the sun is shining in Salt Lake City so they can pretend they are broadcasting from Salt Lake City, UT, from a Salt Lake City station, when in fact they are not 1,000 miles near Salt Lake City, they are halfway across the country pretending there is some local element to that radio station.

That is not moving in the public interest.

As we engage in this debate, I want someone to tell me that localism is old fashioned. I want someone to tell me that what I consider to be a transcendent truth about the value of requiring localism in exchange for being able to use the airwaves with a radio or television license is somehow an old-fashioned value. For me, it is not.

There is so much to say about all of this, and I will speak at great length, but I have a chart that shows where we are with respect to these broadcast properties these days. I will not attempt to tell you about all of this, but the News Corporation, of course, is Fox and Rupert Murdoch; Clear Channel; Viacom; Disney; AOL/Time Warner. Let me use Disney as an example: Ten television stations, including in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Houston, Raleigh, Fresno, Flint, Toledo; 53 radio stations. The ABC Network, Disney Channel, ESPN, A&E, SoapNet, History Channel, Lifetime, Disney Pictures, Touchstone, Hollywood, Caravan, Miramax. It goes on and on and on.

People say: What is the big deal here? We have so many more outlets in which you can get information. We now have the Internet. We didn't used to have that. You have so many different outlets. Do you know something. Go to your cable system and find out who owns the major channels. The same people. Go to the Internet and find out who owns the top sites on the Internet. The same people.

So you have many different voices; yes, from the same ventriloquist. Many voices, one ventriloquist or two or three or four--at least fewer ventriloquists in terms of what the American people see, hear, and read.

I do not accuse the Federal Communications Commission of bad faith. I happen to like the Federal Communications Commissioners. I believe I know all of them personally. The chairman is someone I have had lunch with a couple times. I like him a lot. I just think they have made a horrible mistake, and I think they did it without the due diligence that is required of those in a regulatory commission position.

We expect them to be the referees of sorts. We expect them to wear the striped shirts with the whistles that say: We are here to call the fouls. We are here on behalf of the public interest to call the game. The fact is, this regulatory agency did exactly what the big economic interests and the broadcasting industry wanted. And they did it cleanly and quickly, with minimum nuisance of public participation. There was only one hearing in Richmond, VA.

Well, they did get three-quarters of a million pieces of mail and communications over the Internet saying: Don't do this. It is against the public interest. But it did not matter to the FCC. They did it anyway.

As a result, I hope this Senate will send a message to the Federal Communications Commission: This rule is a bad rule. This rule opens the gates to massive additional concentration, mergers, and acquisition to fewer and fewer companies owning more and more properties, at least in the circumstance with respect to broadcasts and newspapers. And, by the way, they also eliminate the ban on cross ownership. At least in this circumstance, we don't think it is in the public interest. That is what I hope the Senate will tell the Federal Communications Commission today.

By this vote, it will be the first step--a big step--in a process of saying to the Federal Communications Commission: We in Congress veto this rule. You must go back and do it again. Do it over and do it right.

Mr. President, I have a lot to say today, and I know my colleagues do as well. But I think in the interest of time, having described why we are here, and the origin of this effort, I will yield the floor. My colleagues from Arizona and Mississippi want to make presentations, following which I will again then amplify my remarks.

I yield the floor.

I yield such time as he may consume to the Senator from Colorado.

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

Mr. President, let me begin with a chart that I had used previously. There is the suggestion that somehow concentration is not of any significant interest and, gosh, there is nothing wrong. This is all localism and mom-and-pop operations. I used this chart before. I mentioned Disney.

Let me just say that although I picked Disney out, I happen to like Disney. Disney has given me some of the more rewarding moments of my life when I was young. Disney is a great company. But it is a very large company doing a lot of things.

Let me go to News Corp: 22 TV stations including duopolies in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, Washington, Minnesota, Houston, Orlando, Phoenix. They have newspapers: the New York Post, the Times, the Sun. They have books: Harper Collins, Regan Books, Amistad Books, William Morrow & Co. They have sports teams: the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Los Angeles Kings.

I could go through all of this and describe the largest media companies, and you would see these are significant concentrations, dramatic concentrations in broadcast ownership, newspapers. And I don't know. Maybe some say it doesn't matter much.

I think it does matter. Let me describe at least one part of why it matters. The issue of localism, by which we say you may use the airwaves--they belong to the American people, but you

and your radio or television company may use these airwaves--not own them, but use them--in exchange for certain requirements. One of them is localism. That means you have to serve local interests.

The question is, how do you serve local interests from a thousand miles away, where you create some homogenized music and run it through a board and play it though your radio or TV operation in that hometown. Earlier, I described voice tracking. Someone may be driving down the road in Salt Lake City listening to the radio station, and the announcer, with a sonorous voice, says, ``Good morning, the sun is shining here in Salt Lake City; what a wonderful day to wake up and be in America.'' You would think, what a great resident to have broadcasting for our radio station.

The problem is, that person isn't in Salt Lake City; he is in a basement in Baltimore, MD, in a studio, ripping off a printer something that came from the Internet that says it is sunny in Salt Lake City. It is called voice tracking--pretending there is a local announcer on that radio station. That is going on all over the country now.

There is something called central casting on television. You can turn on two television stations in two cities and see the same television personality giving the news--homogenized regional news, because they cannot quite do it locally. They are trying to convince people this is a local news person. Let's pretend there is localism. That is what it is all about.

When you have these concentrations of ownership, this orgy of mergers that has occurred in recent years in both radio and television, it hurts there isn't much localism. We have had testimony before the Commerce Committee by a man who runs a pretty substantial television station. He said:

I can't decide that my viewers don't want to watch a piece

of trash that will come down from the network. Even though it

is awful stuff they say you have to run it.

Here is an interesting letter. It is dated July 25, 2003, by a television station in Kansas City, Missouri, to someone who complained to them:

We received your letter dated June 30, 2003, regarding the

content of [a certain show] that aired on [this date].

We forwarded your letter to the . . . Network. The Network,

not [our station], decides what shows go on the air for [this

network-owned station].

So it says that they don't decide what goes on the air in Kansas City. You can complain to us, but we don't decide. The network does. Is there localism involved in that?

One of my colleagues, on the floor of the Senate a number of years ago, when we were debating all of this, said something interesting. I decided to pull it out and read it today because it relates to this issue of localism. Should we care about whether someone in Bismarck, ND, or Chattanooga, TN, has an opportunity to decide this is not a program that meets our standards? Or should we say, look, let the networks decide, and whatever they decide to produce in New York or Hollywood is going to be shown in Bismarck, ND, or Chattanooga, TN, and it doesn't matter what the local folks think. My colleague, Senator Sam Nunn, in 1995, when we were debating this prior to the 1996 act, talked about violence on television, what was on television. He said:

To follow up on this issue, one member of my staff voluntarily conducted an unscientific survey of the topics on daytime talk shows. Every hour or so, he would scan the television on his desk and see what the day's topics were for the daytime talk shows.

The reason I point this out is this:

The first day, one show was called ``Stop Pretending To Be

a Girl'' and featured young boys whose parents were upset

that their sons dressed and acted like a girl. Another show

offered a show entitled ``Boys Who Only Have Sex With

Virgins.'' Yet another show offered a girl dumping her

boyfriend on national television and asking her new

``significant other,'' another girl, to commit to her.

He said:

Mr. President, I thought that surely the next day's shows

would pale in comparison to these. I was wrong. Subsequent

days' reviews of these shows found titles such as ``One-Night

Stand Reunions.'' Another show was entitled ``I Am Ready to

Have Sex With You Right Now.'' And another show was called

``I Cheat and Am Proud Of It. One show featured a woman who

chose to tell her fiance on national television that she

cheated on him with her sister's boyfriend . . .

It goes on and on. He said:

Perhaps the most appropriately titled show of all was the

one entitled ``You Look Like a Freak.''

Localism. Trash on television. Should someone who owns a television station in Tennessee have the ability to say, you know, what you are sending us in this time period is a show I don't think represents any kind of standard that makes sense for us. The answer is that too often the station are not allowed do that because someone else calls the shots, not the local folks.

When you have this concentration, local standards no longer matter. Will there be more concentration as a result of what the FCC has done with its rules? Of course. In fact, I will read a letter written by W.B. Grimes & Company that was written before the FCC even ruled. They wrote it to the publisher of a newspaper in Seattle:

As you know, the FCC is considering elimination of the ban

on cross-ownership of media properties within a daily

newspaper publisher's given markets.

They can then buy the television station in the same market.

It says:

In anticipation of that ruling, several newspaper groups

are already forging alliances and cutting handshake

agreements with both radio and television broadcasters in

their markets. If you are considering broadcast acquisitions

to bolster your market presence, we believe the time to act

is now.

We would like to be your broker.

This was before the FCC acted. Most people thought the FCC was going to do what the big interests wanted them to do. Here is a broker saying, let us get involved so we can help you buy television stations. Once again, more and more concentration.

I will talk about some of the voices opposed to this. Some of my colleagues talked about this. William Safire, a very conservative columnist, who worked for President Richard Nixon as a speech writer, and for the New York Times for many years, said:

The overwhelming amount of news and entertainment comes via

broadcast and print. Putting these outlets in fewer and

bigger hands profits the few at the cost of the many. Does

that sound unconservative? Not to me. The concentration of

power--political, corporate, media, and cultural--should be

anathema to conservatives. The diffusion of power through

local control, thereby encouraging individual participation,

is the essence of federalism and the greatest expression of

democracy.

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops:

Without diversity of ownership, our meaningful alternatives

to syndicated shows and info-mercials, and public affairs

programs, are in jeopardy.

NRA's executive VP Wayne LaPierre said:

Most cities have only one major newspaper to begin with.

Add ownership of the dominant local TV station, the top AM

and FM bands and the local cable TV provider. Then do the

same thing in 20 or 50 cities, and you see how a

multibillion-dollar corporation corners the market in the

marketplace of ideas.

Minority or unpopular causes--think of women's suffrage in

1914, or civil rights in 1954--would be downplayed or

dismissed to keep viewers watching and advertisers buying.

That's no way to run a democracy.

That is the executive vice president of the National Rifle Association. That is not a liberal organization.

Walter Cronkite:

The gathering of more and more outlets under one owner

clearly can be an impediment to a free and independent press.

I could go on and on.

Parents Television Council:

Almost 80 percent of families rely on their hometown papers

and TV for local information. People can't turn to a national

news network over the Internet. They provide one-size-fits-

all programming, controlled from an office hundreds, perhaps

thousands, of miles from your town.

Barry Diller, former head of Universal Studios, who has acquired a rather substantial enterprise in information:

The big, bad truth is--and I don't think it is given enough

importance--the big four networks have in fact reconstituted

themselves into the oligopoly that the FCC originally set out

to curb back in the 1960s. They may have controlled 90

percent of what people saw, but they operated with a sense of

public responsibility that simply doesn't exist for these

vertically integrated media conglomerates, driven only to fit

their next piece in the puzzle of world dominance.

Let me speak for a few moments about my colleague, Senator McCain, someone for whom I have great respect.

He gave a statement and I told him I was certainly not going to be supportive of his contention that anything we are doing here or any reason to come to the floor of the Senate on this issue has to do with the 1996 Telecommunications Act. That was his contention. Nothing could be further from the truth, in my judgment. I just disagree with that.

In 1996, when we rewrote the Telecommunications Act, beginning in 1995, we addressed these very issues. I offered an amendment on the floor of the Senate in 1995 to S. 652 during debate on the Telecommunications Act--an amendment by Senator Dorgan of North Dakota: To strike the provisions of the bill that would allow television networks and other chains to own no more than 35 percent of the Nation's households and take it back to 25 percent.

We had a vote on that amendment. Guess what. I won the vote by three votes. Senator Dole was standing at that chair--at that point he was majority leader--and Senator D'Amato from New York was at the desk in the back. I won the vote by three votes, to roll back the 35 percent, which was in the telecommunications bill, to say: You can't own more than 25 percent of the reach in this country when you own television stations.

Guess what happened? Dinner intervened. The worst thing in the world around here is dinner because over dinner--we call it supper back in my hometown--over that period when you eat your evening meal, although I had won by three votes at 4 in the afternoon, three of my colleagues had some sort of epiphany over their main course, apparently. Senator D'Amato came back and asked for reconsideration, and he and Senator Dole decided to overturn the vote by which I had won at 4 o'clock that would have prevented the 35 percent and gone back to 25 percent. They changed three votes. We came back 3 hours later and I lost. So I won for 3 hours.

My colleague--incidentally, Senator McCain made the point I voted for the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which I did, to be sure--my colleague Senator McCain voted against my amendment that would have rolled back the 35 percent back to 25 percent.

I was fighting then to stop this gross concentration that is going on in the broadcast industry, and I won for 3 hours. Then I forgot, when you get people out of this Chamber and get arms twisted, you can have a re-vote and several people will apparently come here with a different mind-set. Winning is temporary in those circumstances, and it certainly was that day.

This is a situation I understood then exactly what was going to happen, and it has happened wholesale. I mentioned earlier we have one company that has well over 1,200 radio stations in this country. The same is happening in television and happening very quickly.

With newspapers, this new FCC rule says: Oh, by the way, in addition to allowing more concentration in radio and television, let's let the newspapers own the television stations and more radio stations in the same marketplace. I was taught long ago never argue with anybody who buys ink by the barrel. I guess I never quite understood that lesson.

Here we take on the American Newspaper Association and the publishers, and they are lobbying furiously because they are opposed to what we are doing. They want to be able to buy television stations in the same city.

I said the extension of what the FCC is going to allow to happen as a result of their rule is this: That in the largest American cities one company will now be able to own the dominant newspaper, the dominant television station, two other television stations, eight radio stations, and the cable company, and they can do that in city after city. If you think that is in the public interest, then I say look up the term ``public interest'' in the dictionary or understand the public interest in the context of what we ask of radio and television stations, of what we need for the free flow of information in our democracy. It is not in the public interest.

I seldom ever come to the floor to say ``I told you so,'' but it is almost too tempting to avoid at this moment. In 1995, following what happened on the floor of the Senate when I was attempting to stop this orgy of mergers that was going to occur, when I won a vote for 3 hours and then lost because my colleagues left to have something to eat, this is what I said:

If these changes are enacted, the media industry in this

country will be controlled by a handful of conglomerates in

the future. The long-held principles of localism and

diversity will suffer.

I said that on June 15, 1995, when I was fighting then for the same principle I fight for today, and that is to stop the massive concentration. What the American people see, hear, and read will increasingly be controlled by a very few voices. That is not in the interest of this country.

I have more to say. I believe the Senator from Virginia wishes to speak either perhaps strongly supporting this resolution or maybe he will oppose it. Perhaps the latter. What I would like to do is allow him to speak, and I understand the Senator from New Hampshire is also going to be on the floor. I am going to make some concluding remarks this afternoon.

I yield the floor so the Senator from Virginia can make his presentation.

Mr. President, this has been an interesting discussion on the floor of the Senate today on an issue that I think is very important and one that will affect the life of every American citizen. It is complicated and difficult to understand. In some circumstances, it deals with cases of law in Federal court, ideals with arcane rules, and the history of the Federal Communications Commission with respect to broadcast ownership. So it has all of those aspects.

I respect the fact there are those who feel strongly on the other side of the issue. I believe very strongly, of course, that the Federal Communications Commission has created a set of rules that will benefit the largest corporate interests in this country in broadcasting. I think they will, however, be a significant detriment to the American people.

I was sitting here thinking about the issue of radio and television. Of course, we have not had radio and television in the lives of humankind for very long. It is a relatively recent phenomenon. And I was thinking of the statement that was attributed once to David Sarnoff. I don't know for sure that it was his. But he was asked to comment about the advent of the radio when he was presented with this new invention, and he said: ``The wireless music box--which he called it--has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?''

That was his vision of radio. But, of course, radio has become a very significant feature in our lives, and television as well.

Television is a central part of the lives of many Americans. I am told that when children go to school in this country, by the time they are a senior in high school and graduate from school, they have spent somewhere around 12,500 hours sitting in a classroom in our schools and around 20,000

hours in front of the television set. It tells you a little something about the importance of television in the lives of at least children.

Let me respond to just a couple of the thoughts that have been expressed by my colleagues. My two colleagues who just spoke are on the Commerce Committee, and on the Commerce Committee they supported the FCC and believe these rules are appropriate. They indicated, for example, that in many ways these rules are for the purpose of protecting--they don't use the term ``mom and pop,'' but let me use it--this is really for mom and pop television stations--you know, the little guy. It is helping the little television station out there that you know is going to go by the wayside if we don't let the big guys buy them up, I guess is the contention.

In fact, Commissioner Powell has an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal today. He begins his Wall Street Journal op-ed piece by saying: ``The days of free television may be numbered.''

That is Commissioner Powell in today's Wall Street Journal. And he uses the title ``And That's the Way It Is.'' I guess that suggests Walter Cronkite, who actually opposes what Commissioner Powell is doing. ``And That's the Way It Is.''

The days of free television may be numbered.

Interesting. This rule is nothing about free television. It certainly is nothing about mom and pop. It is nothing about saving small television stations. Its point is that we are in the midst of a lot of change that has a dramatic impact and the only way the television industry can make it is to allow this concentration.

Well, perhaps we could just separate some fact from fiction. There is no evidence anywhere that the television industry or television stations or mom and pop stations are in any kind of financial trouble. We have a substantial amount of evidence, in fact, that that is not the case.

Let me quote Barry Diller, who is a giant in this industry. He recently said: ``Anybody who thinks the networks are in trouble hasn't read the profit statements of those companies. The only way you can lose money in broadcasting is if somebody steals it from you.'' That is Barry Diller.

The Wall Street Journal reports that:

Fox's president for sales said, ``We all knew that it was going to be big, it just turned out to be the biggest year that we had ever had.'' The chairman of Fox Entertainment noted that Fox will generate significantly more revenue this year than in its previous 17 years, with revenue growth up more than 20%.

So free television in financial trouble? I don't think so. It is interesting to hear this discussion, that somehow the rule the FCC has developed--that is really just a high dive on behalf of the largest corporate interests--is being done in order to save the little guy. I have heard a lot of things on the floor of the Senate but never anything quite as entertaining as that. But it is so far from fact that it is almost hard to respond to.

The FCC, we are told, in another argument, did what the court said it had to do. The court said: The rules you have on broadcast ownership cannot be justified. You must change them.

That is not what the court said. I have what the court said in my hand. The court said: ``It is entirely possible that the Commission will be able to justify a decision to retain the cap.'' It just said that in the response the FCC provided, it did not provide the justification. It did not say: Go change the rule and give the largest corporate interests everything they want. It said: Justify it.

The FCC did not even appeal the court's ruling, and now has not tried to justify it. It just said: Well, apparently the court said we must cave in here and decide that there is a kind of ``Katie bar the door'' limit, and we will do what the big interests want.

Again, this is a regulatory agency that ought to be concerned about the public interest but, in my judgment, with respect to these rules, is not concerned much about the public interest.

My colleagues say: This is all about the market system and the Constitution. The first amendment says you have the right of free speech and the right to buy what you want to buy. One of my colleagues talked about being able to acquire property you want to acquire.

That is not an inalienable right in this country. We have things such as antitrust. We have laws dealing with antitrust. When somebody wants to steal from you by creating a cartel and jacking up the price, that is called stealing. It violates the law, and we put people in jail for it. So you do not have an absolute right to do whatever you want in the marketplace.

We have had some experience with this over time. The most recent experience, of course, is the Enron Corporation. And I suppose some of those Enron folks are going to get 2 years of hard tennis at some minimum-security institution some place.

Some of them are still waiting to see if indictments and charges will come. Hundreds of millions of dollars were bilked from people because of concentration in the marketplace monopoly, pricing, and so forth.

Look, the point is this: If, in this circumstance, what people see, read, and think is controlled by fewer and fewer interests, it is, in my judgment, detrimental to the democratic way of life and system of government that we have because the foundation of this system of government is the free flow of information.

Now, if somebody decided tomorrow, look, we are going to buy up all the hamburger stands in America, and instead of driving down the street and seeing a McDonald's or a Burger King or a Wendy's, one company decides we want all the hamburger stands in our name. We just want to call all those hamburger stands ``The World's Best Burger Stands,'' and we are going to buy them all. That would be awful, would it not? It would not affect our lives very much. We might have indigestion once in a while, and there would be no variety. Somebody would probably say it violates the antitrust laws for a company to own them all, but I wouldn't have an apoplectic seizure on the Senate floor because I don't stop at those stands much.

But what about instead of hamburger stands, we talk about information? Information is what makes a democracy work. What about the control of information in fewer and fewer and fewer hands? Is that something we should be concerned about? Yes, of course. That is something that is important. They say, well, but the market system should make this judgment. Look, that market system is wonderful; it is a great thing.

I used to teach economics briefly. I taught about the market system. I love the market system. It is a wonderful allocator of goods and services. But it is not perfect. That is why we have regulators and regulations. Under the market system--Judge Judy, that woman on television with an attitude, gets $25 million a year. Good for her. That is the market system. Judge Rehnquist, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, gets $180,000 a year. That is the market system.

A shortstop for a Texas baseball team makes the same amount of money in a year as 1,000 elementary school teachers. Good for him. Is that a market system judgment that you think makes sense? I don't. But that is the market system.

The market system is not perfect. In circumstances where you are dealing with ideas, and the free flow of information in a democracy, we need to be concerned about making certain that we don't have fewer and fewer people, fewer companies or institutions, determining what we see, read, and hear in this, the greatest democracy on Earth. That is what this is about.

I mentioned earlier that there are some trashy things in the media. I talked about the television programs that my colleague, Senator Nunn, talked about on the floor of the Senate. I could have updated it and used the same things for this year or last year. I should hasten to say, however, there are also some wonderful things. I don't want to just tarnish an industry. I think there are wonderful things, gripping things, things with such incredible, utter beauty that you can hardly describe them, on television and on the radio. It is really quite remarkable.

Some of the things that we are able to see and experience are great. I don't want anybody to think that I am somebody who doesn't watch television, doesn't appreciate television, or radio. I just want there to be some vibrancy with respect to the use of the airwaves,

which belong to the American people and are licensed to companies. I want there to be vibrancy with respect to serving the local communities they serve. The reason we license a radio station in a community is to be responsive to local needs and interests in that community. It doesn't attach at all when properties are purchased by companies that only want to run homogenized music from a thousand miles away. They are selling advertising and making profits, but they don't do anything with respect to the localism requirements in those local communities. That bothers me.

I offered this amendment with my colleagues, Republicans and Democrats. This isn't a partisan or political issue in any way. Senator Lott from Mississippi and I, and many others, including Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and others, have been very concerned about what is going on with respect to concentration in the media. This battle that has shaped up in the FCC to write a new rule is a battle between the public interest and the special interests.

Frankly, the special interests won everything. They won the whole pot. By that, I mean it was put in the middle of the table and they turned over a card and the FCC said: You win, big interests; you get it all.

We have a procedure called the Congressional Review Act by which we can, as the Senate, vote on whether we want to disapprove this rule. I want the Senate to decide that now in this time we will say to the FCC that we disapprove of that rule. That rule is not in the public's interest. That rule is not what we expect this regulatory agency to do on behalf of the American people.

I mentioned earlier, I come from a very small town. We didn't have a radio or television station. I come from a town of 350 people in a southwestern corner of a sparsely populated State. North Dakota is a wonderful place, but we have 640,000 people spread out in a landmass the size of 10 Massachusettes. The nearest television station to where I grew up was 125 miles away. The first television in our little town was at a place called the Regent Garage. The people in town--at night, especially, because that is when you can catch disparate signals being broadcast--would gather at the Regent Garage. With this one television set--the only one in our town, they would all peer into that set and see this grainy, snowy vision coming from Bismarck, ND, 125 miles away.

Occasionally, there would be some sort of a skip and they would pick up professional wrestling from West Virginia, or a strange program from way out East. The people in my hometown thought it was just incredible. The people began to get television sets. It wasn't just the Regent Garage; they got sets in their homes. So it has gone for some 60 years.

There wasn't any question years ago about localism. When stations were developed, one developed closer to my hometown. It is still the closest television station now. It was 60 miles away--KDIX television in Dickinson. As television stations developed, they were locally owned. The only way they got a television station in Dickinson is folks in the region put in money. They asked people to contribute $100. So my dad contributed $100. He was one of a lot of people who contributed to building a television station in Dickinson, ND. So we had localism, local ownership.

But that has changed dramatically. The question is, Do we want it to change more? Do we want most of our properties in broadcast radio and television to be owned from a thousand miles away? Do we want, in most of our big cities, the dominant newspaper to own the dominant television station? Do we want, in most big cities, to have one company own three television stations, eight radio stations, the dominant newspaper, and the cable system? Does anybody think that will benefit the consumers of this country? The answer ought to be no to those questions.

That is not what we want or expect from the FCC. It is not the direction that we anticipated when we created the 1996 Telecommunications Act.

Mr. President, there is a lot to say. I want to correct one other thing with regards to the discussion about the quality of programming. Somebody talked about the quality of programming and said network-owned stations, where you have one big owner, you get higher quality programming from those folks because they have the money and they are big shots and they have it all going. They are producing great things.

Well, here is something I think is interesting. Two organizations, NASA (Network Affiliated Stations Alliance) and the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), were highly critical of a study that the FCC did on the quality of news programming between affiliates and network-owned stations. While the original study indicated that network-owned stations did better than affiliates because they won more awards, NASA and NAB demonstrated that the conclusion was untrue once the study was adjusted to take market size into account. After controlling for market size the data showed that independent affiliates outperformed network-owned stations on all measures of news quality. Affiliates win substantially more Dupont awards and substantially more Peabody awards. In addition, the Project for Excellence in Journalism study showed that affiliates are superior to network-owned stations in terms of news quality. I think that is important.

Finally, it is also important in the context of what kind of program is going to come into your community. Is it going to be programming that someone in your community can decide they do not want? We see the programming these days on some of the national shows. It is almost embarrassing to read the names of the programming, and yet if you tune in some evening, when your television set comes on you will see someone standing in front of a bowl of maggots and they are beginning to eat this bowl of maggots. I forget the name, ``Fear Factor''--it is one of those shows. I have only seen it momentarily.

When I saw somebody trying to eat a bowl of maggots, I thought: It is a good thing there is an off button on the television set. Maybe there ought to be an off button with the person who owns the local broadcasting company saying: I happen to think that is not the program I want to sell in Tallahassee, FL, or Chattanooga, TN. What I would like to do is put on an alternative program that I think is better than someone eating maggots.

You know what. They cannot do that. I described earlier letters from local stations who say: We can't do that. So the more stations you get under this umbrella, under single ownership, the less opportunity anybody anywhere at any time will have to say: I don't happen to like that program. You might have put it together in the recesses of a closet in Hollywood someplace where you thought it was wonderful, but back in our hometown, we think it is trashy. I don't want to play it. I want to play something that more reflects the values of our hometown.

They cannot change it. If you want more of that, if you want to move more in that direction, then you ought to vote to sustain the FCC. Like a cheerleader, shake some pom-poms, jump up in the air and say: We really like what you do; bigger is better. Katie bar the door, let them have anything. Let's have one big company give us a crooked smile every morning and say: We are for America, and we decide what you ought to see, what you ought to hear, and what you ought to read from Sunday to Saturday. Don't like it? Tough luck, we own it all.

If that is your philosophy, then you need to vote for this resolution of disapproval. But if you believe in enterprise, in local control, in owning up to the responsibility we have given those who own local stations, if you believe in that, then you ought to vote for this resolution of disapproval.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the Dorgan resolution. This is a debate and an issue that does bring us in touch with a number of the important issues discussed by the Senator from Virginia: free speech, media concentration, consolidation. It certainly affects our media markets and the shape of those media markets for years to come. But, at its heart, this is really a question of regulation, a new set of regulations, a different set of regulations put forward by the FCC, dealing with who can buy, who can own different kinds of media outlets--newspapers, TV, radio stations, and the like-- and what kind of limits we are going to put on them.

So it is a debate about regulation and how much regulation is the appropriate amount on the part of the Federal Government. To what degree do we want the Federal Government interfering with, limiting, and manipulating the media that we as consumers enjoy and use in our daily lives? What level of regulation is appropriate and is really required to uphold some very important principles that you have heard the Senator from Virginia and the Senator from North Dakota and many others speak of--principles of localism, competition, and diversity, principles that we support, that the FCC works to support anytime it looks at a regulatory issue such as this one?

How much regulation do we really require to protect these important principles? This is not a debate about the poor quality of the TV that we might go home and look at, or look away from, every night. In some ways, I wish this were a debate about improving the quality of television because if we could just do that by a simple adjustment of these regulations, then we probably would all feel much better about the quality of television. But we can't.

To suggest this is about the quality of the television we see in any part of the country is to suggest that you believe limiting, say, Fox Corporation to the 35 stations it owns today versus the 40 or 42 or 44, or some number it might own at a future date with the new regulations, that somehow that would affect the quality of the programming we see. I think that is ridiculous. I don't think that program quality would be improved if we forced NBC to get rid of 8 of its 29 stations or 10 or 12 stations within the limits that we are talking about that any one of these companies owns. I don't think it would in any way affect the quality of television.

I am the father of three children. I am as frustrated as any parent about the search for good quality programming. I am frustrated about the poor quality of programming that is often put on television in the prime time hour. But that is the nature of modern media--whether it is cable or radio or television or even newspapers. We are not all going to be happy as Americans with everything that comes across the channels.

At the same time, I very much support the process that the Senator from North Dakota is using here, the Congressional Review Act. I think it does bear some emphasis because some people have come to the floor and have been somewhat critical of the process being used here--using the Congressional Review Act resolution to repeal a regulation that a Member of Congress or a Member of the Senate doesn't like. But that is exactly what the law was intended to do.

It is a law that was passed, I am pleased to say, when Republicans took control of Congress back in 1995. They said we ought to have as a Congress--as a House or as a Senate--a way to register disapproval; to repeal regulations that are put forward all the time

by very large bureaucracies, or different branches of the executive regulating commerce, or regulating the environment, or regulating the forestry issues, or, in this case, regulating the media. It is a very appropriate use of the act, but it is a resolution with which I strongly disagree. I will talk about those reasons this afternoon.

We are here obviously because the Senator from North Dakota has submitted this resolution of disapproval, or rejection of these new regulations, but the regulations were put forward in the first place primarily because of a couple of issues.

The first was in 1996. The Telecommunications Act sets the guidelines under which the FCC acts; that calls on the FCC to reconsider regulations that do not serve the principles of localism, competition, or diversity, and doesn't seem necessary to promote these competitive forces, or to serve the public.

The 1996 act actually calls on the members of the FCC to do exactly what they did; that is, reconsider these regulations and modify them if they believe it is in the public interest and the right thing to do.

Second, related to that legislation but even more current is the action of the courts recently. The courts struck down or remanded several of the media regulations--in particular, the 35-percent cap which we will talk about--and called on the FCC to either revise or justify the regulations that were on the books.

So you have two forces coming to bear. I am sure the FCC Commissioners weren't dying to throw themselves into the issue, but they were called upon effectively to do so by the courts and by the legislation that this very Congress passed in 1996.

These are proposals--I think as the Senator from Virginia discussed-- which were very long in the making. It was not a spur of the moment recommendation or a spur of the moment change in regulations. For 20 months, there were deliberations, collecting comments, soliciting comments, and several hearings that took place. People came forward and spoke for and against different rules and for and against different concepts for changing those rules and to argue their point of view--to argue the very reasons they thought a change in the existing rules might be in keeping with the goals of the 1996 act and the three principles of localism, competition, and diversity.

There was a thorough process, not one that was without any disagreement but a great country, a strong country, and one where we take great pride in our ability to debate and discuss these issues with one another.

Let me talk about three of the proposals and the reasons I think at the end of this very thorough and very complete process, resulting in the rules put forward by the FCC, the reason I think the rules make sense, and why I don't think we should be rushing to repeal them or reject them. I believe there are several negative consequences of repealing these rules, which I will speak about at the end of my presentation.

First, we are talking about a proposal that will take the current 35- percent cap to 45 percent.

What does the 35-percent cap mean? Is it 35 percent of the television market share? It is not 35 percent of the television viewers on any particular night or any particular hour. It is not 35 percent of the television station. It is a cap on owning stations that can reach 35 percent of the population, the immense concentration that we hear about. Take NBC, for example, which owns 29 television stations. That is less than 2 percent of the number of full-power television stations in the country. I think they are the largest owner of stations. Perhaps Fox Corporation may own 35 stations, close to 2.5 percent of the full- power television stations. This is just a limit on the amount of viewers you can reach if every viewer out there happens to be watching your station.

If you look at, as I said, the number of stations that are owned, we are talking about a very small number on a percentage basis. Opponents of the rules and supporters of this resolution will say, well, let us talk about the six big companies. Those six big companies control 75 percent of the television viewers.

First, to suggest you are being controlled when you choose what you want to watch on television any given night, I think, misunderstands what television viewers are all about. But even if you look at those numbers--six companies, 75 percent of the viewers--let us go back 20 or 30 years; it used to be that there were three companies which had 90 percent of the viewers. I think things have changed in that regard for the better. But the numbers are even more striking if you break them apart further.

Those six companies may have 75 percent of the viewers because their shows happen to be popular, but they have fewer than 25 percent of the channels that would typically come through your cable or your satellite outlet.

On that cable dial, all channels are created equal. We used to be segmented in VHF and UHF. But today a majority of people receive their television through cable or through satellite. Channel 85 and channel 42 are just as likely to attract viewers, depending on the quality of their program.

It is a pretty fair fight when you think about it--pretty fair competition among the dozens of stations on the dial. Those six companies only control or own fewer than 25 percent of the channels. There is greater competition in that regard and greater diversity in that regard not only than we had 30 years ago but, quite frankly, than most people could have imagined 30 years ago.

With all the discussion about localism--it is a very important thing, indeed--there has been no connection shown between localism and a larger concentrated owner of these stations. Simply because a TV station is owned by one of the larger corporations does not mean it shows less local programming. It is a very important point. This has been studied. You can look at it empirically, look at NBC, Fox, or ABC- owned stations, and measure how much local programming they put on any given day and compare it to independently owned stations around the country and measure how much local programming there is on any given day. There is no difference. To the extent there is a difference, one of the most comprehensive studies the FCC relied upon showed a slight increase in local programming among those owned by the larger media entities.

Localism is important. To be sure, the FCC maintains its ability to press for and emphasize localism, diversity, and competition when they make decisions of who can and cannot purchase a license. And all of the purchases of licenses--radio, TV--are still subject to FCC review and still subject to antitrust laws that govern monopoly power in this country. So that is one of their regulations. Probably the one that gets the most discussion is the movement from a path of 35 to 45 percent of the audience that could be reached by all the stations.

The second regulation that received a lot of discussion is the issue of cross-ownership, whether you can allow a company that has a newspaper to also own a TV or radio station. Here we actually have cases we can look at. The FCC did look at it and asked the question, Where cross-ownership occurs, are localism, competition, and diversity poorly served? Do we have problems? Do we have conflicts of interest? Do we see a reduction in the responsiveness of the media outlets to local community needs? We can look at existing evidence because there were 40 markets that were grandfatherd by the FCC, 40 markets where entities already engage in cross-ownership. There was no harm found by the FCC. That certainly does not mean everyone is happy with everything that newspaper or radio station or TV that has cross-ownership produced. I am sure we will hear from Members that might in their remarks speak to personal experiences where they do not feel they were treated well by a newspaper or radio station. That is unfortunate for them.

But that is the nature of the country's free media and free markets. It is something that ultimately, when we get over the personal feelings, every member of this Chamber is proud of, that this country allows such a free and open media.

Again, where cross-ownership issues come into play and purchases of TV or radio station and all spectrum come into play, the principles of localism, competition, and diversity will be protected, but antitrust provisions still hold. That is important to remember.

A third and final area of regulatory change or regulations that has been discussed in this debate is radio ownership. There is a little bit of irony here because this is something that cuts close to home for the Senator from North Dakota, the celebrated case in his State where one company was able to acquire six or seven radio stations that all covered one particular region of the State, a very clear case of dominance of radio in a particular region of the State. But with regard to radio ownership limits, the FCC actually tightened the regulations. There is no change to the regulations on the number of stations you can own in a particular market in an attempt by the FCC to actually tighten the definition of market areas in order to prevent that unfortunate situation from happening again.

We can critique the radio stations or the large radio station owners, talk about their business practices or things we liked or disliked about them, and there are important points to make, but they do not really have any bearing on this debate because even if this CRA provision offered and were to pass, there would be no significant modification to the radio ownership structures.

If the resolution passes, it does have a number of other counterproductive effects that concern me. First and foremost, it would surely send these issues back to the courts. That is one of the reasons--not the only reason but one of the reasons--the FCC acted in the first place because the courts had said there is no justification for the regulations as currently structured. So if this resolution passes and were to pass the House and get signed into law--which is unlikely to happen, and I certainly do not support it--if it were to be signed into law, this would all be thrown back into the courts and we would have a very uncertain environment for ownership, for media, for evaluation, and for business. Whether you are an entity large or small, independent or corporately owned, it would create an uncertain marketplace.

Second, this resolution turns back the clock. I don't believe that is a good thing, in that turning back the clock would ignore the enormous changes we have seen to the industry over the last 10 years, let alone the last 20 or 30 years. A number of the regulations that are modified or adjusted by the FCC date back 30 or 40 years to their original crafting.

I know it is difficult to picture what the state of television was for many of the younger Members of the Chamber, but I amaze my children constantly when I describe it in a world where you had to walk across the room to change the channel on your television. I am old enough to remember those days and they seem not so long ago, indeed. Times have changed enormously. Regulations dealing with this industry and with the media markets need to be updated to keep pace with the evolution of technology, to protect the values of localism, competition, and diversity, but they do need to evolve with the changes in technology.

A third and final concern if this resolution were to pass was raised by FCC Chairman Michael Powell in a piece he authored yesterday or today for publication. That is, it could well portend the end of free TV. Rolling back these regulations with the passage of this act could result in the end of free TV. It sounds like a pretty dramatic claim. I think it bears some additional description. How could that be?

Free TV depends on advertising for its revenues. Cable TV depends on both advertising revenue and cable subscriptions--monthly fees or per- show fees paid to watch programming. Simply put, that is a better business model. Anyone can see that. Pay TV has a better, stronger, more robust business model. If you do not believe it, look at the migration of so-called quality programming--sports, entertainment, even certain forms of news programming from free TV to cable TV over the last 3 or 4 or 5 years, let alone the last 10 or 15 years. Go back 10 or 15 years, it is a wholesale migration, but you can see changes in the last 3, 4, or 5 years.

If we repeal the rules, we create a tougher competitive environment and more restrictive competitive environment for the free TV networks or stations. You put them at a competitive disadvantage relative to cable and pay TV. So the acceleration and the movement of that so- called quality programming to cable TV will only accelerate and make it tougher and tougher to sustain any level of quality among free TV in the marketplace.

I could be cynical and say, That is fine with me. I don't care. I have cable TV and I will still continue to get lots of channels, lots of entertainment, lots of news, and lots of sports. Many people would argue, and part of me certainly would argue, that there is a value and a benefit to free TV especially in those areas of our country that are at an economic disadvantage, where cable TV does not have the penetration of urban areas and where people simply cannot afford to pay for cable TV.

Those are serious considerations. The effect of free TV, turning back the clock with regard to the evolution of technology and throwing the issues back into the courts, all of those would be cause to reject this resolution in and of themselves.

But on top of that, we see that the radio ownership regulations are effectively untouched. Cross-ownership has already proven its ability to work in the marketplace without harming the principles of localism, competition, and diversity. And the adjustment from 35 percent to 45 percent of national ownership cap, I would contend, is modest. It is very modest, indeed, when you look at what the true market share numbers are and the number of channels.

This is an important debate. I appreciate being given time to talk on these issues. I do hope my colleagues step forward to reject this resolution, although, as I say, I certainly respect the way in which it has been offered and the process the Senator from North Dakota has gone through to get us to this debate.

We respect the ideals of free speech, of democracy, and we work to promote the idea of competition and diversity in media ownership. I believe that is exactly what the FCC has done and attempted to do in crafting these regulations. I hope we will reject this resolution and continue to move forward in a thoughtful way, and to a world and to an age of technology and media that, frankly, we can't quite picture today which will be exciting, will provide opportunities, and will continue to promote the ideals of free speech upon which this country was founded.

I thank you, Mr. President, and yield the floor.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague from North Dakota for, as always, informing, and sometimes with very startling information. I still find it very difficult to understand the situation that happened in his State. When there was a toxic spill, and the radio stations were attempted to be contacted to alert the population, the citizenry, there was not a single soul in any of the six radio stations. All the broadcasting was done from somewhere else. That, obviously, was not the intent of the law, the intent of Congress, nor, indeed, the intent of the Federal Communications Commission. But these examples happen today.

I rise to speak in opposition to S.J. Res. 17, which has already been described by my colleague from North Dakota. As a result, pursuant to the Congressional Review Act, these rules would have no force or effect, and the FCC would not be able to adopt any similar regulations until Congress authorized the Commission to do so.

I share many of the concerns expressed by my friends from North Dakota and Mississippi. I oppose the resolution because I believe that rejecting the rules without providing further guidance is not an appropriate congressional response. In addition, the nullification of all of the FCC's new media ownership regulations is, in my opinion, too sweeping.

Whether we agree with them or not, the FCC's actions are a direct result of the direction given to it by Congress in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which should have been called ``Leave No Lobbyist Behind Act of 1996.''

And might I add, as we are all responsible for our votes, my colleague from North Dakota voted for that bill, as did my colleague from Mississippi. I voted against it. I voted against it because I thought it was an outrageous exercise of lobbying power and special interest power and would have enormous unintended as well as intended consequences; and the unintended consequences we are dealing with today.

So let's be clear, all of my colleagues, what is the genesis of this problem. That is the 1996 Telecommunications Act. I say so because the DC Court of Appeals vacated the 35-percent cap and remanded it back to the FCC. The DC Circuit Court of Appeals found that:

Congress set in motion a process to deregulate the

structure of the broadcast and cable television industries

[in the act].

In fact, the court--I think very appropriately--characterized the 1996 act's deregulatory tone as not subtle but quite explicit, likening it to ``Farragut's order at the battle of Mobile Bay--`Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead.' '' That is how the court described the 1996 deregulatory act that my colleagues are on the floor now examining and wanting to reverse.

Let's at least take responsibility for our action that set this train in motion. I agree with my colleagues, particularly on the issue of radio. When there is an example such as what happened in Minot, ND, and testimony before our committee that there is an organization, Clear Channel--let's say who they are--that owns, as the Senator from North Dakota mentioned, 1,300 radio stations, the ticket sales, the promotions, and the concerts--artists have come to us and stated unequivocally that they have been basically blackmailed and told to do concerts at a certain place or their works would not be played on the radio stations.

Now, I can't prove that. I am only telling you what information was given us. So we have a tough situation.

The resolution offers neither congressional direction for the FCC's next review of these rules nor a remedy for the infirmities of the existing statute that pushed the FCC to its recent decision. Moreover, the resolution would throw out the entirety of the FCC's action, including some rules that would actually tighten radio ownership limitations. Finally, the resolution could result in significant uncertainty about the status of the FCC's media ownership rules.

Let me mention one other thing before I go into a little bit more about this process.

As usual, unfortunately, tragically, the Appropriations Committee has now gotten into the act. The Appropriations Committee, I understand, on the Commerce, State, and Justice appropriations bill is now going to remove the provision of 35 to 45 percent media ownership, but they are not--they are not--going to touch the cross-ownership aspect of the rules that the FCC issued. Why? Why would that be?

Well, my dear friends and colleagues, I only know one reason: The National Association of Broadcasters supports the 35 to 45 percent and opposes the cross ownership. Which is worse, that a conglomerate owns now 45 percent of the television stations in a market, or a conglomerate owns three televisions stations, the newspaper--the Los Angeles Times--the Internet, the cable company, and 8 radio stations? That is okay according to the Appropriations Committee. But they are going to take care of the 35 to 45 percent aspect of it and jam it into an appropriations bill, by the way, without a hearing before the Appropriations Committee, as usual.

The Commerce Committee acted with a piece of legislation that is on the calendar. S. 1046, which passed through the committee, addresses the entire issue. Do you think we will get S. 1046 before this body before this year ends, my friends? No. But we will have to fight like blazes a one single shot provision that has been placed in an appropriations bill, in clearly a gross excess of their responsibilities, which are to fund authorized programs.

So I guess if there is any lack of cynicism amongst my colleagues about this whole process we are undergoing right now, any lack of cynicism should be dispelled by the actions of the Appropriations Committee.

Whether we agree with them or not, as I mentioned, those actions are a direct result of the 1996 act.

In short, if the Congress is unsatisfied with the result of the FCC review, it should step in to provide new direction. Simply saying, ``You got it wrong, try again,'' in my view, is not an appropriate response.

Although they are not provided in the resolution before us, new directions to the FCC have been provided and reported out of the Commerce Committee. The bill is on the Senate calendar awaiting action. The bill would establish explicit, sustainable media ownership limits while preserving new radio ownership rules tightened by the FCC in its June 2 order.

While I don't support the resolution, I do support S. 1046. I have not always supported retaining strict limits on media consolidation, and in the past I have spoken frequently about the merits of deregulation of media markets. Over the years, I have written letters to the FCC insisting that they deregulate in this area of media markets. Moreover, even a few years ago, I offered legislation to raise the national television station ownership cap to 50 percent and to eliminate limits on newspaper and broadcast cross-ownership. I continue to believe in the principle of allowing markets, and not government, to regulate the way businesses operate.

After chairing seven hearings on media ownership and observing unprecedented public outcry, it is apparent to me that the business of media ownership, which can so affect the nature and quality of our democracy, is too important to be dealt with so categorically. As a result, I have come to believe that stringent, but reasonable, limits on media ownership may very well be appropriate.

It is a testament to the vitality and health of our democracy that the public mobilized to defend what they perceived as a challenge to this democracy. If Congress is displeased with the Commission's new rules, however, we must accept some responsibility for them. Congress and the courts gave the Commission little choice but to deregulate the media industry. When the D.C. circuit court of Appeals vacated the 35 percent cap and remanded it back to the FCC for further consideration, it found that ``Congress set in motion a process to deregulate the structure of the broadcast and cable television industries'' in the Act. In fact, the court characterized the 1996 Act's deregulatory tone as not subtle, but quite explicit, likening it to ``Farragut's order at the battle of Mobile Bay--`Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead.'''

Led by the able chairman, Michael Powell, the Commission followed the direction of Congress and the courts.

The commission incrementally increased the network ownership cap to 4.5 percent finding that a ``modest relaxation of the cap will help networks compete more effectively with cable and DBS operators and will promote free, over-the-air television by deterring migration of expensive programming to cable networks.''

I ask unanimous consent that an article by Michael K. Powell that appeared in the Wall Street Journal this morning be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, two networks, Viacom/CBS and News Corp. have been operating at almost 40 percent for almost 2 years now due to stay from courts and waivers from the FCC. The Commission also relaxed its cross-ownership rules by permitting combinations of multiple television, radio, and newspaper outlets in more American media markets.

The Commission had limited discretion in its decision-making process. We, however, do not. If Congress is displeased with the results of the Commission's review, it should legislate a solution, not just disapprove of the Commission's actions. Unlike the Commission, Congress consists of elected officials who must consider the views of the American public, not court mandates and statutory directives, when tackling difficult questions like the ones posed here.

The public has strongly voiced its dissatisfaction with the new rules. The Commission received more public comments about its media ownership proceeding than any other proceeding. My office continues to receive numerous letters, phone calls, and e-mails from the public addressing the new rules. As representatives of the public, Congress should take a lead role in examining these rules, and if necessary, crafting new limits.

As William Safire wrote recently in an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times, itself a large owner of several media outlets: ``The effect of the media's march to amalgamation on Americans' freedom of voice is too worrisome to be left to three unelected commissioners. This far- reaching political decision should be made by Congress and the White House, after extensive hearings and fair coverage by too-shy broadcasters, no-local-news cable networks and conflicted newspapers.''

In discussing this resolution, we must also be mindful that its passage would roll back all of the FCC's rules, even those that tightened radio ownership limits. The Telecommunications Act eliminated the national radio ownership cap thereby allowing one company to grow at an unprecedented pace from 40 to more than 1,200 radio stations, including ownership of 6 of the 7 commercial radio stations in Minot, ND. At a hearing before the Commerce Committee, all five FCC Commissioners agreed that the consolidation of radio that has occurred in local markets has been excessive.

This brings me to the issue we must continue to discuss and to which I don't know the answer: How much is too much? In my home State of Arizona, Gannett owns a newspaper and a television station. Is that bad? I have seen no ill effects of it. I have seen no consolidation problems, no collusion between the two, no problem with the citizens of my State receiving correct and accurate and unbiased information. What if Gannett owned two television stations, or three stations or four stations? What is the point, I ask my colleagues--and that requires an incredible amount of knowledge, which I admit I don't possess, as to what the proper degree of media concentration is allowable.

Then you have a difference in markets. Minot, ND--with all due respect to the large population of North Dakota--I think has 27,000 or 37,000 people--higher than that. The valley which I was just describing has over 3 million people. So it is not only a problem of the criterion itself for ownership, it also has a lot to do with large or small populations.

I don't think a small town is going to have five television stations or eight television stations. So should the owner of the television station in Greenwood, MS, be allowed to own the newspaper? Is that control there? That may be excessive. But in Phoenix, AZ, ownership of one television station and a newspaper clearly is not of significant impact.

So this is why it is important that we continue to examine these issues carefully and try to get the best knowledge and information we have.

But I think there is one area of agreement, whether we succeed or whether the proponents of the CRA succeed: There is too much concentration in radio. I know of no credible person who disagrees with that. While it received little credit amid the outcry against the regulations, the FCC attempted to address this problem by prescribing new market definitions designed to tighten the limits on local radio ownership.

This resolution would therefore have the perverse consequence of eliminating efforts taken by the Commission to strengthen its radio ownership rules--a move that surely would be applauded in the corporate offices of large radio station groups that hope to perpetuate their ability to benefit from existing loopholes. Moreover, the resolution would limit the FCC's ability to reinstate its more stringent radio market definition, because the CRA precludes the FCC from adopting rules ``in substantially the same form'' as those that have been disapproved without further direction from Congress.

Finally, the use of the CRA in the present case will create a regulatory void likely to be filled only by uncertainty about the status of the FCC's media ownership rules. The absence of an affirmative Congressional directive will cast considerable doubt on the enforceability of the FCC's previous rules, given that one of the FCC's previous attempts to retain the rules was found by the D.C. Circuit to be arbitrary and capricious, and another was found not to have justified that the rules are ``necessary in the public interest.'' In both cases, the D.C. circuit remanded the rules to the FCC and directed the agency to either articulate a justification for retaining the rules or modify them. The lack of an enforceable FCC order will leave these court orders unanswered, risking additional court action that relaxes the rules even further, or even invalidates them entirely.

Moreover, passage of this resolution would appear to set up the FCC for failure when conducting its next biennial review in 2004. In that proceeding, the FCC will likely have to justify its new rules before a court that has stated that the Telecommunications Act sets in motion a process of deregulation, while remaining mindful of Congress' disapproval of its 2002 Biennial Review. Chairman Powell has stated that the courts placed ``a high hurdle before the Commission for maintaining a given regulation, and made clear that failure to surmount that hurdle, based on a thorough record, must result in the rule's modification or elimination.'' Moreover, the Commission will also be forced to explain how it reached a different conclusion after previously having made extensive findings that undercut the network ownership cap and cross-ownership limits. Whatever action the Commission takes will be ripe for challenge by an unsatisfied party.

These rules have been mired in litigation for too long. If Congress believes that it is appropriate to retain certain ownership restrictions under today's market conditions, then it should pass legislation explicitly stating so. Again, S. 1046 is the appropriate legislative vehicle to achieve this goal.

The Commission did its job by promulgating new rules after completing an intense twenty-month review. During that time the Commission reviewed twelve studies it commissioned to gather empirical evidence on the media industry, and studied over 500,000 public comments to better understand the media marketplace. As Mr. Safire suggested, it is now time for Congress to do its job. Congress has spent the past few months studying the previous rules, digesting the new rules, and holding multiple hearings on this issue. I have come to appreciate the importance of appropriate limits on media ownership. The media has a tremendous impact on the everyday lives of all Americans. By selecting and framing issues and ideas and promoting public discourse, the media facilitate a critical function in our democracy. It is now time for Congress to offer guidance, not simply reject the FCC's rules.

My decision to oppose this resolution has been a difficult one for me, in large part, because I hold the senior senator from North Dakota in such high regard. I commend Senator Dorgan for his leadership in bringing the issue of media ownership to the attention of his colleagues. Earlier this year, he raised the now-famous issue of radio ownership in Minot, ND, in the Senate Commerce Committee. That issue was the catalyst for the Committee's subsequent review of media ownership, which included seven hearings this year. Few, if any, members of the Commerce Committee or the Senate understands the intricacies of this issue better than Senator Dorgan.

Finally, I thank colleagues for their interest and involvement in this issue--especially three colleagues on the Commerce Committee: Senators Wyden, Lott, and Dorgan. They have been incredibly involved in these issues. We have had some of the best hearings I have ever participated in on these issues. I think we have contributed not only to the knowledge of our colleagues but to that of the American people.

I want to commit, no matter how it comes out today, that we will continue to bring the Commissioners before the committee, bring the smartest people we can find before the committee, and move forward in an orderly legislative process. I hope one of the things we can do as early as possible is get consideration of the legislation that we passed through the committee, after careful deliberation and discussion and a very spirited markup.

So I thank my colleagues. I think this is an important part of the debate and, for sure, we will be discussing this issue for a long time.

I ask Members to vote against S.J. Res. 17 but support passage of S. 1046.

I yield the floor.

I thank the Presiding Officer.

Mr. President, and anyone who may be listening to this ``debate''-- which is really not a debate yet but probably will be a debate when we vote on Thursday when the time is allocated for Members to speak to present their positions on the resolution that is before the Senate-- let us remind ourselves that the resolution that has been introduced, S.J. Res. 17, is a resolution to completely throw out all the work of the Federal Communications Commission that they have spent 2 years in crafting. That is not something this body should consider doing without a great deal of thought and understanding.

The Federal Communications Commission is a body of experts--people who have made careers of understanding the communications industry in this country--who are charged with looking after the best interests of the people of this country with regard to communications policy, and also to make sure that the system they devise, in keeping with what Congress has done, is a system that allows American industries to prosper, thrive, and to be successful in bringing about good communications to the people of this country, and at the same time try to create a level playing field that really balances the national interest with the public interest and with the interest of legitimate communications companies.

It is no question that it is a public interest we are talking about because the airwaves do belong to the public; they do not belong to the companies. The real challenge the Federal Communications Commission has always had is to create the proper balance that protects the public interests for those who use the public airwaves and at the same time allows companies to be able to make a sufficient profit to be able to operate and provide the services which are expanding at an incredible rate.

There is no question that America has clearly the best communication system in the world. We have more services available to more people at a price that is more affordable than any other country anywhere in the world. You can argue the Internet is not fast enough or we do not have enough choices between cable companies or that the rates are too high; those are basically issues we deal with through the commission, and they make recommendations.

Congress has enacted overall communication policy and the FCC has to follow what the Congress has said. They have come up, after 2 years of study and hearings and public debate, with recommendations dealing with ownership rules as to who can own and in what degree of concentration television stations and radio stations and newspapers to try and make sure we do not get out of balance; that the American public is protected by having a different choice and fair choices about what they want to watch, what they want to hear, and what they want to read. That is what the Federal Communications Commission does.

The resolution before the Congress says after 2 years and what has been presented as rules under the FCC, we will throw all of that out; that the Congress, in its wisdom, will take a couple of hours, debate this issue, and throw out 2 years of work by the FCC, 2 years of hearings, 2 years of debate, 2 years of discussion and we will have a hearing in the Commerce Committee that will last a couple of hours and debate it 30 minutes apiece on Tuesday and then vote on whether to throw out what the Federal Communications Commission has done for 2 years as a matter of public policy.

It is clear the administration says this is not the right thing for the Congress to do. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a statement of administration policy.

It says if Congress passes this, we will veto it. It is very clear. The administration says the new FCC local and national media ownership rules more accurately reflect the changing media landscape and current state of network station ownership, while guarding against undue concentration in the marketplace. They point out this resolution throws all of that out the window, replaces it with nothing, and says we do not like it. Maybe some people like some of it and do not like other parts, but they got rid of everything the FCC recommended.

That is bad policy and not something the Congress should do. I strongly oppose the resolution. I hope the Congress, in the wisdom of the Senate, will not adopt this resolution. Or at least I hope we do not adopt it in such a large margin that it prevents it from being successfully vetoed.

Many of the arguments, when talking about television, newspapers, and radio come down to big is bad and small is good. That is obviously a simplistic statement and a simplistic argument.

Many of the people who support the resolution talk about three areas: localism, diversity, and media concentration. In reviewing what the FCC has done in each of these areas, you will see we have a fair approach to guiding how the industries operate in the 21st century. This is not 1930, before we even had television. When Americans finally got a TV, citizens had a choice of maybe one network and then three. We have so many choices now people do not know what to pick. I have 150 television stations I can watch with diversity and differences of opinion.

When they talk of localism, they say we have to get rid of this resolution because of localism, we want to have more local people able to own the stations. I remember a group of businessmen came to me and argued about localism and how they wanted to make sure the networks did not own all the television stations because if the networks located in New York City owned all the local TV stations, everything would come out of New York. I am reminded of the television commercial. When they ask where they are from and they say New York City, they said, String 'em up, as if people in New York cannot be fair and make sure that local people get what they want, because they can.

They argued if the networks owned all the local television stations, somehow everything would be directed out of New York by the network owners who own the local station down in Louisiana. These people own stations in my hometown down in Louisiana. I asked them where they were from and they were from New York City. The idea that local ownership means a local group of people in the local town will own the local television station is not in keeping with the facts. Stations not owned by networks are not owned by a local mom and pop, people in the local community. They are, in turn, also owned by a large corporation, many headquartered in Los Angeles or New York or large entertainment centers around the country.

The argument falls when you talk about localism by saying if networks could own stations, you are preventing local stations from owning a local station in a community. It is simply not true. It is very rare indeed when a group of local owners happen to be from the local community as opposed to being very large companies and corporations that own the stations themselves.

They say if you have the local owners, you get better local news, because they will have more interest in providing what the local community wants. It is not borne out by the facts. In fact, studies we have received in the committee clearly show--and this is a factual determination--that the network-owned stations--ABC networks, NBC, CBS networks that own the local stations--on average present as much as 37 percent more local news than the non-network-owned stations. That is important for those who argue you have to throw the rule out because we do not want the networks to own the stations, because if the networks own the station you do not get local news coverage. The actual facts show when you look at the programming, the network-owned stations, on average, show 37 percent more local information programming, more local community needs shows and information-providing shows on local events, and they provide 37 percent more coverage of local events than the non- network-owned facilities. The fact is most of the locally owned stations are not locally owned but are owned by corporations all over the United States. The networks do a much better job of providing local input and local news than the network affiliates.

The argument some make that we need this resolution to throw out this rule because we do not want the networks to own the stations because we want to have more localism is clearly not borne out by the actual facts, just by reading the schedules of the local news available on network programming and network-owned stations as opposed to non- network-owned stations.

The other argument is you have to have diversity. I mentioned a little bit about this in my first argument. They say if the networks own the stations, you will not have diversity; you will not have diversity of opinion; you will only have the network's opinion broadcast and no diversity or difference of opinion. What we have to look at is who actually owns the non-network stations. They are, indeed, large corporate entities. Nothing wrong with that, but large corporate entities,

many of them on the Fortune 500 list of some of the most profitable corporations in America. Nothing wrong with that. But it is not a lot of difference, if any, whatsoever, from the networks that own the stations.

The Tribune Corporation, Gannett, Hearst-Argyle, Cox Communications-- are these mom-and-pop operations? Of course not. They are large corporations that operate all over the United States. They operate cable companies, newspaper companies, television stations all over the United States. They are not going to bring about any more great adversity than the networks that own their share of stations.

The final contention is media concentration. The argument that some would make is, well, the amount of media concentration is so bad, when you have the network-owned stations, with a rule that says you can go from 35-percent penetration in the market to 45 percent, it would allow this media concentration to exist to a certain extent that would be very bad for the American public.

We have about 1,721 full-power television stations operating in the United States of America. There are a little over 1,700 of those stations. The concentration of the networks owning these stations is indeed very small.

CBS, through Viacom, owns about 3.4 percent of the total television households in this country. On average, their concentration of the network-owned stations is about 2.27 percent of the stations in the country. Fox--we all know the Fox network--owns about 2 percent of the stations. NBC owns about 1.69 percent. ABC owns .58 percent of the stations that operate full-time, full-power television in this country.

Our hearing in the Commerce Committee showed very clearly that no one tried to defend this existing 35-percent so-called cap that we have as a rule right now; that the FCC moved up to 45 percent because the measurement of concentration is totally unjustifiable and unsustainable.

The current rule says if you have a television station in a market or in several markets that add up to 35 percent of the population, you have reached the cap. That is absolutely a totally inadequate measurement of media concentration. It is like saying if I sold cars in New York City, which has 6 percent of the U.S. population, therefore I am selling cars to 6 percent of the population of the United States, when, in fact, I just have one car dealership in a city that has 6 percent of the population.

If there were no other car dealers in New York, yes, then I could say that I am selling 6 percent of all the cars in America because I am selling them in the city and I am the only dealer there. But that is the problem with the measurement we are using today and the reason moving it up to 45 percent certainly makes sense.

If I had television stations in Los Angeles, New York, Houston, and Miami, I would probably pass the cap--even if no one in those cities ever watched my television station. The current measurement assumes if you have a TV tower and a station in each one of those cities, in those cities everyone is watching your station every day, all day, and only your station.

Well, some of these cities have 150 television channels that people watch. They don't just watch NBC or CBS or ABC or Fox. They have 150 stations they can look to. Yet the current rule says if you have one station in each one of those big markets, and the population of those markets adds up to 35 percent of the population of the United States, you have reached the cap, and you cannot go over the cap, and you can't have another TV station--when, in fact, no one in the city may be watching your station or maybe only a few people in the city watch your particular station.

So when you are talking about concentration, it is not where the TV tower happens to be located; it is how many of the people in an area are watching your station. If you look at the ratings, you see that none of these operations in prime time come anywhere close to having 35 percent of the people in the country watch their station.

For Viacom, what, 3.4 percent is the amount of people watching. It is 3.4 percent of total TV households. It is not 35 percent; it is not 45 percent; it is only 3.4 percent. But the way the FCC and Congress measure it, because they have stations in large cities, such as Los Angeles, somehow they have reached the cap and they can't go over the cap, and, therefore, the idea of raising it to 45 percent some believe is so bad because of this media concentration; when, in fact, it has nothing to do with concentration. The current measurement is really outdated and makes no sense whatsoever.

So when people say the FCC is raising the cap to 45 percent, and a station can have 45 percent of the viewing audience in the country, it has nothing to do with that. The measurement only indicates the number of people in a city who could possibly be watching the station. If they were the only station in Los Angeles, that may be true, but when they have 150 other TV stations they are watching--you see the highest concentration is CBS with 3.4 percent, Fox is 3.1 percent, ABC is 1.5 percent, NBC is 2.8 percent--I think it really does not make the argument on the question of diversity and media concentration by saying that because you are located in a large city, you have media concentration merely because there are a lot of people in that city.

It is just like back to my example of owning a car dealership in New York. Obviously, just because New York is 6 percent of the population does not mean because I own an automobile dealership in New York I have sold every single car that is bought in New York. If I did, I would have 6 percent of the concentration of car sales in the country. But there are probably 1,000 car dealers in New York, and, obviously, everybody has a little piece of the action, but nobody has 100 percent. Yet the measurement the FCC uses really measures not the amount of concentration, it merely measures the population of the city.

So those who say what the FCC did was incorrect because it allows greater media concentration, that is simply not true. So I think the resolution should be rejected. If Congress does not reject it, this administration will veto it, and the result ultimately will be the same.

But on the three principal arguments of localism, diversity, and media concentration that are used in order to say why this resolution should pass, I think the evidence and the facts, as opposed to the rhetoric, are very clear that those three reasons are not sufficient to overturn the Communications Commission that has spent 2 years in bringing this to us.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I withdraw my suggestion.

Mr. President, we have all been devastated by the repeated news flashes of violent crimes being committed against children across the Nation. In June 2002, Elizabeth Smart, a 14 year old from my home State of Utah was kidnapped at gun point from her home in Salt Lake City. Just this past week, the entire Nation rejoiced with the Smart family after Elizabeth was found alive and reunited with her loved ones.

Five year old Samantha Runnion was not so lucky. Just one month after Elizabeth Smart's abduction, Samantha was kidnapped while playing with a neighborhood friend down the street from her home in Stanton, CA. The following day, her body was found along a highway, nearly 50 miles from her home. California authorities have charged Alejandro Avila with Runnion's abduction, sexual assault and murder. Reportedly, Avila was acquitted two years ago of molesting two young girls under the age of 14.

Elizabeth Smart and Samantha Runnion are just two, among many, recent child victims. The list of tragic cases involving minor victims goes on and on.

These horrific incidents illustrate the need for comprehensive legislation--at both the State and national level--to protect our children. We need to ensure that federal and state law enforcement officers have all the tools and resources they need to find, prosecute, and punish those who commit crimes against our youth.

Today, I rise to reintroduce the ``Comprehensive Child Protection Act of 2003'' which enhances existing laws, investigative tools, criminal penalties and child crime resources in a variety of ways. I introduced this important bill with Senator Feinstein last year, but it failed to go anywhere. My unwavering commitment to this issue compels me to introduce it again this year. Let me elaborate on the Act's specific provisions.

By broadening existing laws, the Act enhances the ability of child victims to pursue and prevail in criminal proceedings against their predators.

First, the Act extends the statute of limitations period that applies to offenses involving the sexual or physical abuse of children under 18 years of age. Current law permits such cases to be brought until the victim reaches the age of 25 years. This amendment will allow meritorious cases of child sexual and physical abuse to be brought up until the date the minor reaches the age of 35 years.

It is well-documented that child abuse victims often do not come forward until years after the abuse occurred. Victims fail to come forward because they fear their disclosures will lead to further humiliation, shame, and even ostracism. Abusers should not benefit from the lasting psychological harms they have inflicted on innocent children.

I believe that there should rarely, if ever, be a time when we say to a victim who has suffered as a child at the hands of an abuser: you have identified your abuser; you have proven the crime; yet the abuser will remain free because you, the victim, waited to long to come forward. Our criminal justice system should be ready to adjudicate all meritorious claims of child abuse. This amendment is meant to recognize that the arm of the law should be long in the prosecution of crimes of this heinous nature.

Second, the Act amends an existing Federal evidentiary rule, Federal Rule of Evidence 414, to permit the admission into evidence of prior offenses involving child molestation, or the possession of sexually explicit materials containing actual or apparent minors. The current evidentiary rule permits such evidence to be admitted only where the victim was under 14 years of age. This amendment extends the rule to apply to any minor--any victim who was under 18 years of age at the time the offense was committed.

In addition, the amendment makes clear that even where an individual possesses what may be virtual, as opposed to actual, child pornography, and therefore, may have a valid defense against prosecution in light of the Supreme Court's recent decision in Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition, 122 S. Ct. 1389 (2002), such evidence is nonetheless admissible under Rule 414. Like the possession of actual child pornography, the possession of virtual child pornography is highly probative evidence that should be admissible in a case involving child molestation or exploitation.

Third, the Act also limits the scope of the common law marital privileges by making them inapplicable in a criminal child abuse case in which the abuser or his or her spouse invokes a privilege to avoid testifying. Where a child abuser is charged with a crime against the child of either spouse, or a child under the custody or control of either spouse, neither the abuser nor his or her spouse should be permitted a marital privilege to avoid providing critical evidence.

The marital privileges exist because we in society believe that forcing a person to testify against his or her spouse, or permitting a spouse to testify about confidential marital communications, may jeopardize a marriage. While we value trusting, harmonious marriages, our societal interest in the proper administration of justice far exceeds our interest in preserving marital harmony where a spouse has chosen a vulnerable, defenseless child in the home as his or her victim. In my view, it is more important to prosecute and punish child abusers than it is to minimize the potential risk to the life of a marriage in which child abuse is occurring.

The Act increases the investigative tools available to law enforcement agencies in several significant ways.

First, the Act amends the DNA Analysis and Backlog Elimination Act by increasing the categories of offenses that are included in the database of convicted offender DNA profiles, the Combined DNA Index System, CODIS. Without question, DNA--which is unique to each individual and maintains its evidentiary integrity for long periods of time--is a valuable investigatory tool. Time and again DNA evidence has aided in solving difficult criminal cases by linking suspects to crimes and by eliminating others.

This Act expands the class of offenses that are included in CODIS by adding all federal felony offenses to the database. Currently, the DNA Analysis and Backlog Elimination Act includes only select Federal offenses. The successful experiences of approximately 19 States, including Utah, which currently authorize the collection of DNA samples for all felony offenses illustrate the need for this extension. These States have solved numerous crimes where DNA has been found--frequently based on an offender's conviction for a nonviolent offense--such as burglary, theft or a narcotics offense.

Remarkably, not all States currently authorize the collection of DNA samples from all types of child offenders. Thus, the Act also expands the definition of qualifying offense to include all state offenses against children, such as those involving child kidnapping or abuse. This expansion will increase law enforcement's ability to solve such crimes where DNA evidence is found.

Second, the Act extends the Federal wiretap statute by adding sex trafficking, sexual abuse, exploitation, and other sex-related offenses as predicate offenses to the statute. As we all know, the Internet is becoming an increasingly popular means by which sexual predators make contact with child victims. Although predators typically initiate a relationship online, they ultimately seek to make personal contact with the child--both over the telephone and through face to face meetings. But as the law exists today, investigators are restricted in their ability to investigate such predators. This provision will enable investigators, who meet the statutory requirements of the Federal wiretap statute, to obtain court authorization to monitor such communications. This amendment will not only aid investigators in obtaining evidence of these crimes, it will also help

stop these crimes before a sexual predator makes contact with a child.

To obtain a wiretap, law enforcement authorities will still need to meet the strict statutory guidelines of the wiretap statute and obtain authorization from a court. Thus, the legislation will not undermine the legitimate expectations of privacy of law-abiding Americans. This expanded tool will be particularly useful to investigators who track sexual predators and child pornographers.

The Act also strengthens criminal penalties by extending the supervised release period that applies to certain offenders, increasing the maximum penalties that apply to offenses involving transportation for illegal sexual activity, and directing the United States Sentencing Commission to review the guidelines that apply to criminal offenses with which child predators are frequently charged to determine whether they are sufficiently severe.

The Act grants Federal judges the discretion to impose up to lifetime periods of supervised release for individuals who are convicted of sexual abuse, sexual exploitation, transportation for illegal sexual activity, or sex trafficking offenses. Under current Federal law, a judge can impose no more than 5 years of supervised release for a serious felony, and no more than 3 years for a lesser categorized offense. This amendment to the general supervised release statute will not require judges to impose a period of supervised release longer than 5 years; it will simply authorize them to do so where a judge sees fit based on the nature and circumstances of the case.

In my view, if there is any class of offenders on which our criminal justice system should keep a close eye, it is sexual predators. It is well documented that sex offenders are more likely than other violent criminals to commit future crimes. And if there is any class of victims we should seek to protect from repeat offenders, it is those who have been sexually assaulted. They suffer tremendous physical, emotional and psychological injuries. By ensuring that egregious sexual offenders are supervised for longer periods of time, we will increase the chance that they will be deterred from and punished for future criminal acts.

The Act increases the maximum penalties that apply to certain offenses, including sexual offenses that involve the trafficking of children and transportation. Stiffer penalties are needed to punish and deter individuals who commit such offenses.

The Act also directs the United States Sentencing Commission to review the sentencing guidelines that apply to various offenses that apply to kidnappers, sexual abusers and exploiters, to ensure that Federal sentences are sufficiently severe where aggravating circumstances exist, such as where the victim was abducted, injured, killed, or abused by more than one person.

In a number of significant ways, the Act enhances the resources that are available to investigate and prosecute crimes against children.

First, the Act directs the Attorney General to appoint a Deputy Assistant Attorney General to oversee a new section at the Department of Justice designated to focus solely on crimes against children. Among other things, the new section will be tasked with prosecuting crimes against children, providing guidance and assistance to Federal, State, and local law enforcement agencies and personnel who handle such cases, coordinating efforts with international law enforcement agencies to combat crimes against children, and acting as a liaison with the legislative and judicial branches of government to ensure that adequate attention and resources are focused on protecting our children from predators of all types.

In addition, the Act tasks the new Crimes Against Children section to create an Internet site that consolidates sex offender information which States currently disclose under the Federal reporting act. The Act also direct States that have not developed Internet sites to do so. The creation of a national Internet site will enable concerned citizens to find in one, easily accessible place, critical information about sexual predators.

Currently, all 50 States have registration statutes that require sex offenders to register and to share information with the United States Attorney General through the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and over 30 States make offender information available to the public on the Internet. A national Internet site will enhance the public's ability to find and access information that is already available in the public record, and will protect citizens in States where sex offenders move to try to avoid detection of their past criminal acts. In short, the national Internet site will provide parents and other concerned citizens with essential information about the whereabouts and backgrounds of child abusers, so they can take all necessary steps to protect our Nation's children from harm's way.

The Act also increases resources and funding for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The recent series of tragic events involving child victims has convinced me that we need to take a more proactive approach to prevent, deter and prosecute child predators of all types--abusers, molesters, pornographers and traffickers. And at the same time, we need to provide our children, the vulnerable victims of such predators, with the support systems they need to recover fully from such horrendous crimes and to assist law enforcement in effectively investigating and prosecuting these crimes.

To this end, the Act directs the FBI to establish a National Crimes Against Children Response Center whose primary mission will be to develop a comprehensive and rapid response plan to reported crimes involving the victimization of children. While the National Response Center is to be established by the FBI, in consultation with the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Crimes Against Children Office, it will integrate the resources and expertise of other Federal, State, and local law enforcement agencies, as well as other child serving professionals. By creating and training rapid response teams comprised of federal, state and local prosecutors, investigators, victim witness specialists, mental health and other child serving professionals, the Center will greatly enhance our national response and prevention efforts. The combination of valuable expertise and resources provided by such multi-jurisdictional and multi-disciplinary partnerships will increase the likelihood that law enforcement authorities will successfully identify, prosecute and punish child predators, and that child serving professionals will provide child victims with much needed support.

The ``Comprehensive Child Protection Act of 2003'' will enhance our ability to combat crimes against children, but it is by no means an end. Congress needs to continue to explore additional ways in which we can improve our ability on a national level to protect our children. Our children fall victim to many of the same crimes we face as adults, and they are also subject to crimes that are specific to childhood, like child abuse and neglect. The effects of such heinous crimes are devastating and often lead to an intergenerational cycle of violence and abuse.

I want to do all I can to ensure that we devote the same intensity of purpose to crimes committed against children, as we do to other serious criminal offenses, such as those involving terrorism. We have no greater resource than our children. I invite the Department of Justice, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other non governmental entities and professionals who are charged with protecting our children to work with me to improve our Federal laws and to assist States in doing the same.