A resolution honoring Vice President Albert Gore, Jr., and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for receiving the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, in recognition of their efforts to promote understanding of the threats posed by global warming.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to S. Res. 349.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table en bloc, and any statements relating to this matter be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I am so pleased to rise in support of this resolution. It has now passed, and it is very important that it has. It is to honor our former colleague, the Vice President of the United States, Al Gore.

When I was first elected to the House of Representatives 25 years ago, I was placed on the Foreign Affairs Committee, which was wonderful. I loved it. Clement Zablocki from Wisconsin was the chairman of that committee. I have told people it was like going to school and not having to take the test. I was also put on the Science and Technology Committee. That was a wonderful committee. It opened my eyes to so many different things that I had not seen before and had not been exposed to before.

The first day we met on that committee for organizational purposes, a young man came up to me and he said: I am Al Gore from Tennessee. He said: There is going to be a lot of activity here, people wanting to go to subcommittees. He said: Just wait. They have formed a new subcommittee. I am going to be the subcommittee chairman. Take my word for it. It is going to be the best subcommittee. Don't try to get on all those others. Get on mine.

I did. I followed his suggestion. It was wonderful. I knew at that time that not only was he a very nice man--and I knew, of course, of him because of his father having been a U.S. Senator--but I came to learn what a brilliant man he is.

We did such outstanding things on that subcommittee. We uncovered corruption within the Federal Emergency Management Agency. We held hearings on that. He got into, for the first time, looking at how people are affected who do shift work. Those people who come from manufacturing areas are aware of that, the people who work the graveyard shift, the swing shift. For Las Vegas it is very important because it is a 24-hour town. People work 24 hours, around the clock. He approached it from what does it do to the minds and the bodies of people who have had this shift work. It was a wonderful, enlightening hearing, not only for members of the committee but for the country.

Also, he did, for the first time, public hearings on organ transplants. Remember, this was 25 years ago. I can remember it as if it was yesterday. He brought in before our subcommittee a little girl by the name of Jamie Fisk. I will never forget this little girl. Her color was the color of a light-colored lemon. She was so yellow. She was so jaundiced. This little girl was dying. She needed an organ transplant, a liver transplant, and this wasn't done much. But she was going to die. As a result of this hearing, she was able to get an organ transplant, a liver. I don't know what has happened to Jamie. The last time I checked a number of years ago, she was doing just fine, and I am confident she is. She was able to live as a result of this hearing held by Al Gore. It really paved the way for organ transplants and what we do with people who are on a waiting list to get these organ transplants.

The former majority leader, Dr. Frist, was an organ transplant specialist. I talked to him on a number of occasions about the important work Al Gore did in that subcommittee.

That was only the beginning. Al Gore came to the Senate. I can remember coming to him when I decided to run for the Senate. He came here 2 years before I did. He gave me great advice. He was very concerned about campaign spending laws that needed to be changed. He was totally supportive of McCain-Feingold and was a real leader and a leader in so many different respects as a Senator.

President Bill Clinton, using such good judgment, chose him to be his Vice President. Prior to that, Al Gore ran for President, and I am happy to say the first time he ran for President, other than the Senators from Tennessee, I was the only Senator supporting him. I have never, ever regretted having done that. I think the world of this man. His wife Tipper, if there were an all-American boy, she is the all- American girl. She is just what you would want your daughter to be like. I have a daughter, and I certainly hope she turns out like Tipper Gore.

The Vice President and Senator Gore--I visited him in his office years ago. He had in his office a chart, and it was so unusual. It showed how global warming was taking place, what was happening in the environment, and it went way up into the ceiling. Way back then, 20 years ago, he knew it was a problem. He knew that global warming was a problem.

He is a man of humor. He is real family person. We all lived with him here when he took his little boy to a baseball game and his little boy darted in front of a car and was hit and almost killed. For me personally, he is my friend.

What he has done for the State of Nevada is remarkable. Lake Tahoe. There are only two lakes in the world like Lake Tahoe: Alpine Glacial Lake, and the other one is in Russia--Lake Baikal. Lake Tahoe that we share with California is a wonderful lake. It is almost a mile deep. It was in a state of distress. I talked to Al Gore and said: We need to do a Presidential summit at Lake Tahoe, and we did. He and President Clinton came there 10 years ago and spent 2 days at Lake Tahoe. There was international coverage of what they were doing at Lake Tahoe to show that this wonder of nature was being destroyed. As a result of their having been there--they had 7 Cabinet officers who spent time with more than 1,000 people preparing them for the summit. I thought it would be a photo-op, and it certainly was more than that. It led to our turning around the environmental degradation of that great lake, and we have made progress. Since they came there, we have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on that lake, and it has been worth every penny of it.

Mr. President, Al Gore has had a pretty good year. He won an Emmy, an Oscar, and now the Nobel Peace Prize. I, of course, know he got more votes than the person who beat him in the Presidential election. We not only know he got more votes, we know the tremendous problems they had in Florida. The Supreme Court made a decision. Even though I disagreed with the 5-to-4 decision, it was made by the Supreme Court. As hard as it was for me to accept it, the minute the Supreme Court made that decision, George Bush became my President. Think about how Al Gore felt about that. Al Gore had gotten more votes than the man the Supreme Court said would be President. How did Al Gore lead the country after that disappointment to him? He didn't whine or cry or ask for there to be a contest in the House of Representatives, which he was entitled to. He led the country in saying George Bush is the President.

I say to you there wasn't a single rock thrown through a window and there were no demonstrations held; it was a changeover to George Bush being President. I give that to the greatness of Al Gore. He could have whined and cried and complained. He didn't do that. He set out, in spite of the fact that he was not President of the United States, to change the world. He has done that, earning an Emmy, an Oscar, and now the Nobel Peace Prize. It is one of the all-time great stories in history.

I have to also say that Al Gore, this very serious man, is also very funny; he has a great sense of humor. When I was first elected minority leader, and then became the Democratic leader, he is one of the first people I called. What did he do? He said: How much time do you have? I said: All the time you want. I was on the telephone and he talked to me for more than 2 hours. I took notes. I still have those notes. He gave me such a good view of my job.

I want everyone within the sound of my voice to understand what an extraordinary man he is and how much good he has done. I have watched his progress from the days we spent together on the subcommittee and the committee in the House, and we talked about the environment. This Nobel Peace Prize is a reflection of the man and his accomplishments.

Is there anyone who doubts today that global warming is real? I don't think so. If they do, they are in a very distinct minority. Global warming is here and we must act. Listen to what Vice President Gore says regarding the challenge. He says we must have optimism. He said:

We sometimes emphasize the danger in a crisis without

focusing on the opportunities that are there. We should feel

a great sense of urgency because it is the most dangerous

crisis we have ever faced, by far. But it also provides us

with opportunities to do a lot of things we ought to be doing

for other reasons anyway. And to solve this crisis, we can

develop a shared sense of moral purpose.

Does that depict what a great man he is? Al Gore looks at this optimistically, saying these are things we should have been doing, but we are not doing it, so let's work together to fight the scourge facing our world.

On behalf of our former colleague and my friend, Vice President Al Gore, I am so pleased to support this resolution. More important than passing this resolution, which has happened, I hope all my colleagues will honor his cause and moral purpose to continue the fight to reverse the threat of global warming and leave an Earth to our children and grandchildren that is safe, clean, and livable.