Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise today to express my strong disappointment with the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, H.R. 6304. While proponents of this bill have claimed this bill was designed to monitor foreign-to-foreign communications that pass through the U.S. without a warrant, the bill actually goes much further--providing a broad expansion of authority to conduct domestic surveillance.

We all want to protect our country's national security interests and protect Americans from those who would do us harm, but to do so without accountability or without adequate checks and balances is contrary to the vision of our Founding Fathers.

I recognize that some changes have been made to this bill over the past 6 months but those cosmetic changes have failed to adequately protect the privacy rights of innocent Americans.

This bill permits the Government to collect all Americans' international communications, even communications of innocent Americans with no connection to terrorism or other national security concerns. This bulk collection of innocent Americans' private communications is unacceptable and contrary to American values and fundamental Constitutional protections.

While this administration has ignored the congressional mandate that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is the exclusive means for conducting wiretapping activities on American citizens, Congress can not ignore the weighty constitutional issues being decided here today.

I am also very troubled that telecom companies will not be held accountable for participation in the Bush administration's warrantless surveillance program. Congress should not be providing blanket immunity for telecommunications companies that cooperated with the administration's warrantless wiretapping programs. We don't know precisely what those companies did or the full extent of what they did.

This bill effectively grants retroactive immunity to companies that aided the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping over the last 7 years. It would effectively dismiss 40 cases pending against the telecommunications companies that are undergoing judicial review. Judicial review is a critical component of our Government to check potential overreaching by the executive branch.

This administration wants to ensure that no court has the opportunity to review potential illegal activity, effectively slamming the door shut before the judicial system can determine whether American citizens' rights were violated.

This is why I voted in support of Senator Dodd's amendment to strike the immunity provision today, and I am disappointed that it was not adopted. Congress should respect judicial review and not take away the only opportunity for redress available to American citizens for potential overreaching by this administration.

According to public documents and media reports, a telecom company allegedly split off a copy of the Internet traffic transported over fiber-optic cable running though its San Francisco office and diverted it to another room under the supervision of a Federal Government agency, where the copy was transported to equipment that could review and select out the contents and data mine call patterns of communications.

The reason I say allegedly is because all the details are classified, sources and methods, and those who do not know can at best only make educated guesses while those who do know can not or will not say.

Now the Electronic Frontier Foundation believes that the telecom company has deployed similar facilities in 15 to 20 different locations around the country, implying a significant fraction of the communications to and from the telecom firm's domestic customers could have been examined illegally. And it is critical that we get to the bottom of this.

Congress would be acting even though only last week Judge Walker issued a key ruling holding that held that the government could not prevent plaintiffs from submitting unclassified evidence to support their claims against telecommunications companies. Congress should respect the judiciary's role and allow it to move forward with these cases.

Mr. President, I stand today for the 47 million Americans who are uninsured and looking to Congress to address an issue that has reached critical proportions.

I stand for the millions of Americans who are underinsured and cannot afford to pay the difference between their

health costs and their meager coverage.

I stand for the millions of Americans who have lost their health coverage along with their jobs.

And, I stand for the small businesses that cannot afford to cover the costs of their employees.

That is why I am joining Senators Ron Wyden, Bob Bennett, and many of my other colleagues in taking the first steps towards a bicameral, bipartisan, comprehensive solution for all called the Healthy Americans Act.

The Healthy Americans Act recognizes that our health care system is fundamentally broken and requires Congress, the President, and the Federal Government as a whole to engage in a serious dialogue about our country's health care priorities and the solutions that can make those priorities attainable.

The Healthy Americans Act guarantees affordable, high quality, permanent health coverage for all Americans. It provides benefits equal to those available to Members of Congress, and gives incentives for individuals to make a commitment to prevention, wellness, and disease management.

It changes the crumbling foundation on which we have built our system, challenges the status quo, and makes a commitment to the right of all Americans to live their lives without fear of losing, or not being able to afford health coverage.

This solution is affordable for us. In fact, according to independent studies, this piece of legislation is fully paid for using the $2.2 trillion currently spent on health care in America and saves $1.48 trillion over 10 years.

The benefit to Americans will be profound.

The Healthy Americans Act changes the way we think of health care in America through the modernization of fundamental relationships in our current system. By redefining the relationship between employers, employees, and health insurance, we give the American people a choice when it comes to the coverage, the cost, and the benefits they need for their families and their health.

The Healthy Americans Act marks the beginning of a comprehensive, bipartisan effort to health care reform. There will be many challenging issues to consider as my colleagues and I work to provide every American with quality coverage. These include concerns over the potential disruption that such a profound change to the system would have on those with existing coverage, as well as the lack of a publicly sponsored health plan option.

I hope to work with Senators Wyden, Bennett, and my Senate colleagues in ensuring that this legislation addresses those concerns, as well as others that may be raised in the future.

Although complex, the health care crisis is one that we cannot afford to ignore any longer. Together, we can turn the health care system in American into a transparent, affordable, efficient and healthy system that can help those that need it most.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today to ask for my colleagues' support for the Air Medical Service Safety Improvement Act of 2008, a measure that redefines our commitment to improving the safety for the flight crews, flight nurses, and passengers aboard emergency air medical service helicopters and fixed wing aircraft.

These EMS aviation operations provide an important service to the public by transporting seriously ill patients or donor organs to emergency care facilities. Each year, on average, air medical companies transport about 350,000 patients by helicopter and 100,000 by fixed wing aircraft.

Providing emergency air medical service is dangerous work. Unfortunately, we have been reminded of this fact all too many times this year, most recently by the tragic crash in Arizona.

I first became involved in the issue of emergency air medical service safety when an EMS helicopter crashed near my hometown in Washington state. On September 29, 2005, an Airlift Northwest EMS transport helicopter crashed into the waters of Puget Sound at Browns Bay, just north of Edmonds, Washington. On board were pilot Steve Smith, and nurses Erin Reed and Lois Suzuki. There were no survivors. Over time, I have communicated with both Erin's mother and sister about their loss.

The cause of the crash remains unknown as EMS transport helicopters are not required to have a ``black box'' or flight data recorder on board, and only part of the helicopter could be recovered from Puget Sound. Some in the area think the wind, rain, and heavy fog were to blame. Others claim that the helicopter sounded like it was having engine trouble.

All we do know is that three people dedicated to saving lives were lost in the ocean that night. And sadly, their story is not uncommon.

According to a study by Johns Hopkins University, one in four medical helicopters will crash during its 15 years of service. In just the last six months, there have been nine medical helicopter crashes and 16 deaths.

This alarming epidemic of accidents has opened the eyes of the Federal Aviation Administration, National Transportation Safety Board and policymakers in recent days. But the recent spike in accidents is not a new trend. In fact, between January 2002 and January 2005, there were 55 crashes of medical helicopters. On January 25, 2006, the NTSB released a report identifying recurring gaps in safety that must be addressed, including: Less stringent requirements for emergency medical operations conducted without patients on board; a lack of aviation flight risk-evaluation programs; a lack of consistent, comprehensive flight dispatch procedures; and no requirements to use technologies such as terrain awareness and warning systems that have the power to enhance flight safety.

At my request, Section 508 of S. 1300, a bill to reauthorize the FAA incorporated the NTSB recommendations for addressing these gaps. Subsequent to that bill's introduction in the spring of 2007, I had the opportunity to discuss with stakeholders how to improve upon the language. The bill I am introducing today is essentially the amendment I filed this May when the FAA reauthorization bill was on the floor. Given the uncertain status of that legislation, and in light of the recent events, I felt the urgency to transform the amendment into stand-alone legislation.

This bill will implement new procedures and improve standards already in place through strengthened safety requirements, comprehensive flight dispatch and flight following procedures, improved situation awareness of helicopter air crews, and better data available to NTSB investigators at crash sites.

It is time to put black boxes in these helicopters.

It is time to require the same safety standards regardless of whether or not a patient is on board.

It is time to evaluate potential risks before take-off.

It is time to improve the situational awareness of air medical flight crews.

If not, we are bound to witness more tragedies.

I am committed to these changes and I ask my colleagues to lend their support in making the skies safer for the men and women who dedicate their lives to getting critically injured patients the medical attention they need.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today to ask for my colleagues' support for the Air Medical Service Safety Improvement Act of 2008, a measure that redefines our commitment to improving the safety for the flight crews, flight nurses, and passengers aboard emergency air medical service helicopters and fixed wing aircraft.

These EMS aviation operations provide an important service to the public by transporting seriously ill patients or donor organs to emergency care facilities. Each year, on average, air medical companies transport about 350,000 patients by helicopter and 100,000 by fixed wing aircraft.

Providing emergency air medical service is dangerous work. Unfortunately, we have been reminded of this fact all too many times this year, most recently by the tragic crash in Arizona.

I first became involved in the issue of emergency air medical service safety when an EMS helicopter crashed near my hometown in Washington state. On September 29, 2005, an Airlift Northwest EMS transport helicopter crashed into the waters of Puget Sound at Browns Bay, just north of Edmonds, Washington. On board were pilot Steve Smith, and nurses Erin Reed and Lois Suzuki. There were no survivors. Over time, I have communicated with both Erin's mother and sister about their loss.

The cause of the crash remains unknown as EMS transport helicopters are not required to have a ``black box'' or flight data recorder on board, and only part of the helicopter could be recovered from Puget Sound. Some in the area think the wind, rain, and heavy fog were to blame. Others claim that the helicopter sounded like it was having engine trouble.

All we do know is that three people dedicated to saving lives were lost in the ocean that night. And sadly, their story is not uncommon.

According to a study by Johns Hopkins University, one in four medical helicopters will crash during its 15 years of service. In just the last six months, there have been nine medical helicopter crashes and 16 deaths.

This alarming epidemic of accidents has opened the eyes of the Federal Aviation Administration, National Transportation Safety Board and policymakers in recent days. But the recent spike in accidents is not a new trend. In fact, between January 2002 and January 2005, there were 55 crashes of medical helicopters. On January 25, 2006, the NTSB released a report identifying recurring gaps in safety that must be addressed, including: Less stringent requirements for emergency medical operations conducted without patients on board; a lack of aviation flight risk-evaluation programs; a lack of consistent, comprehensive flight dispatch procedures; and no requirements to use technologies such as terrain awareness and warning systems that have the power to enhance flight safety.

At my request, Section 508 of S. 1300, a bill to reauthorize the FAA incorporated the NTSB recommendations for addressing these gaps. Subsequent to that bill's introduction in the spring of 2007, I had the opportunity to discuss with stakeholders how to improve upon the language. The bill I am introducing today is essentially the amendment I filed this May when the FAA reauthorization bill was on the floor. Given the uncertain status of that legislation, and in light of the recent events, I felt the urgency to transform the amendment into stand-alone legislation.

This bill will implement new procedures and improve standards already in place through strengthened safety requirements, comprehensive flight dispatch and flight following procedures, improved situation awareness of helicopter air crews, and better data available to NTSB investigators at crash sites.

It is time to put black boxes in these helicopters.

It is time to require the same safety standards regardless of whether or not a patient is on board.

It is time to evaluate potential risks before take-off.

It is time to improve the situational awareness of air medical flight crews.

If not, we are bound to witness more tragedies.

I am committed to these changes and I ask my colleagues to lend their support in making the skies safer for the men and women who dedicate their lives to getting critically injured patients the medical attention they need.

Mr. President, I rise this morning to talk about the ever-increasing problem and crisis we have in this country with the rising price of gasoline.

Many of my colleagues saw that yesterday oil futures hit $140 a barrel; I think today it is up to $141 a barrel. The stock market, I think, is responding to the anxieties that oil costs are causing to our economy and the future prospects of some people speculating it might even be going up to $150 or $200 a barrel. This is a problem for us and a problem that this body needs to address and needs to address quickly.

Many people at home are understanding--because at almost $4.30, whatever people are paying for gasoline across the country, in Washington State we seem to pay a higher price than the Nation, on average--are starting to understand what the oil futures market is and how much speculation is happening.

But we can see today that on world consumption, there are about 86 million barrels of oil a day that are consumed. But what people might find surprising is that the volume of that oil traded back and forth on a daily basis is over 1 billion barrels per day.

So we produce 86 million, but yet we trade it over and over and over again. In fact, 14 times we trade and sell one barrel of this oil back and forth every day. Many of my colleagues and myself have concerns about the fact that much of this trading, at least this chunk of it, done on the Intercontinental Exchange is done in a dark market. So we do not know what kinds of positions people hold, we do not have the same requirements for excessive trading that we do on NYMEX and on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

So we have a lot of anxiety that there is a lot of trading going on in the dark that people do not understand and that this situation, while we are out on recess, could be exacerbated; that we could have a grave problem while we are seeing this continue to shoot up.

A few weeks ago, we had the price shoot up $10 in 1 day. So my colleagues in the House responded to this, knowing it is an emergency situation. In fact, 402 House Members recognized this is an emergency situation, passed legislation yesterday that was brought to the floor, not a lot of discussion or debate. There have been many hearings, but the decision was made, because we are leaving, to bring up this emergency declaration to say to the CFTC that they should use their emergency authority to make sure they are cracking down on any excessive speculation in all markets, including those that currently have loopholes, such as the Foreign Boards of Trade, such as ICE, those exempt electronic markets and any exempt swaps and bilateral energy trading.

That is what 402 of our House colleagues said, is that they believe it is an emergency and that the CFTC should use its emergency authority and use that authority to make sure that excessive speculation is investigated, that they demand that people reduce position limits, that they have overall stricter position limits, and that they be aggressive while we are gone on recess.

So while we are taking a holiday, there is no holiday for consumers from higher gas prices. But one thing we can do is make sure the chief agency in charge of policing these oil markets uses its emergency authority while we are gone to do everything they can to protect consumers.

I think this is important legislation. And the fact that 402 of our colleagues also agreed in the House of Representatives, led by Representative Chris Van Hollen and Representative Bart Stupak, it is time we do the same thing.

As I said, they did not have a lot of time to discuss this, they were all in agreement that this is an emergency situation, and we should make sure the CFTC uses that emergency authority.

Unanimous Consent Request--H.r. 6377

I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of this House bill, H.R. 6377, the Energy Markets Emergency Act, which was received from the House; the bill be read three times and passed; and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

I do not agree to the modification of my request.

Mr. President, I am obviously disappointed that my colleague on the other side of the aisle is objecting to this request because this legislation passed by us could go to the President's desk, and we would be sending a very strong message today, that while we are gone, this is a serious crisis, and we expect the Federal regulator, the policeman on the beat, to be doing their job while we are gone.

We have tried to say to this agency that they should be more aggressive. We have pushed them with letters; we have pushed them with oversight hearings. But now we have our colleagues in the House of Representatives saying: You shall use your emergency authority.

It is disappointing that even though 402 Members, a majority of Republicans and a majority of Democrats--I think only 19 people did not vote in favor of this particular measure--that over 400 Members thought this was such an emergency that we should take this action.

It is very unfortunate that while we are going on holiday, our consumers are not going to have a holiday from high gas prices and will not have the protections and the indication that we have said is critical to making sure oil markets are properly policed and that we do not continue to see this rising and huge increase in gas prices while we are gone.

I am very disappointed in the objection and will continue to fight this issue to make sure our consumers are protected by the Federal agencies that are supposed to be doing their job in protecting them from excessive speculation and manipulation.

I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise for a few minutes this evening to talk about a couple events from today. First of all, the price of oil today hit over $140 a barrel--another, I think, tragic milestone as it relates to the impact on our economy and the challenges we face as oil prices continue to go higher and higher and higher.

I also note for my colleagues that the House took very aggressive action today in basically ordering the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, on an overwhelming 402-19 vote, to take action to utilize its authority, including its emergency powers, which is critical for the CFTC to do if it wants to have proper oversight of these oil futures markets.

Now, I know this is something we have been pushing here in the Senate, saying there are loopholes we still need to close. Many of my colleagues joined in a letter last month--22 of us--to the CFTC telling them to use their authority and to act aggressively. They came back with a half step saying they were going to start collecting new information from the British regulators that oversee some of our oil markets in the U.S.

We told the CFTC that was not good enough. We told them to use their existing authority to start collecting information directly from the IntercontinentalExchange Futures Europe, a dark market that is subject to British oversight but operates in the United States under a CFTC staff no-action policy.

I think those pleas by us have basically gone ignored or at least half steps have been taken by the CFTC. So I was very pleased today that H.R. 6377 passed the House of Representatives 402 to 19. So there has been an outstanding margin of bipartisan support in the House of Representatives to pass a bill that requires the CFTC to use its existing authority, including emergency authority. This bill does not say the CFTC ``may'' utilize its authorities; it says they ``shall.'' So it is very direct. It says those broad emergency authorities that include investigating excessive speculation, reducing position limits-- basically overall stricter position limits--and including limiting or suspending trading. These are things the CFTC has the power to do in its emergency authorities to make sure excessive speculation and manipulation are not occurring in the markets.

So I want to say I think this is a very bold step the House of Representatives has done. They did this very quickly today, and in a very aggressive, bipartisan fashion.

I hope the Senate would take the same aggressive measure as soon as possible, and in the same overwhelming majority, to show we are serious about reining in excessive speculation and potential manipulation in the oil markets.

I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.

Mr. President, I actually applaud the Senator from Nevada in trying to move this amendment onto this bill. I say that knowing some of my colleagues on this side of the aisle are frustrated, but the American people are frustrated with the high costs of energy. They want us to be doing all we can to try to help alleviate those energy bills that are going to be affecting them not just this summer but next winter as they see higher home heating bills.

The Senator from Nevada and I are trying to say to our colleagues, it is important not to have this energy legislation tied up in a larger bill that is not currently moving before we adjourn for the July recess.

We are already seeing jobs being canceled, projects being canceled, people laid off, and generation not being ready to be put onto the grid to help assist with high energy costs, particularly in the area of natural gas.

The underlying amendment Senator Ensign and I are talking about giving tax credits to individual homeowners so they can make improvements to their homes, and it can result in more than a 20- percent savings in their heating bills this winter. Those are improvements, I guarantee you, we need to be making because many people in the Northeast are not going to be able to afford the high energy costs they are going to be seeing.

In addition, it puts additional megawatts onto the grid, not just in 2008, 2009, but for many decades to come. We need to diversify off the high costs of natural gas. The point is that natural gas costs are continuing to rise with other pressures. We need to diversify off of natural gas and coal as the primary source for our electricity grid. The fact is this produces and saves about $20 billion in natural gas because of the production we would get onto the electricity grid. We need to be doing this now.

We already know the result of our delay, that we have cost jobs in America, projects have been canceled, people have been laid off. We already know it is costing us in lost time and investment to stimulate our economy, and now we know it is also going to cost us in higher energy rates to our consumers. So I am for any plan that will get this energy legislation untangled from other bills and actually approved by the House and the Senate. My colleague and I are willing to work across the aisle and across the Rotunda with people who have any ideas how to get this done--either paid for or not paid for.

But we simply cannot stand here today and say this is a vehicle that should move without trying to put this housing and energy package together, since it is the underlying bill, and we do think it is stimulative to the economy.

I say to my colleagues that the return on investment of this investment in energy is a far greater ROI than some of the other stimulative activities we have done. So if we want to be true to our consumers' anxiety about the high cost of energy they are seeing, not only in gasoline but what they think is coming ahead, then we need to move. We need to stop holding up good energy legislation while we are trying to use it to get other legislation.

I hope we can pass this bill out of the Senate before we leave for the July recess.

I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise today to share my views on the preeminent environmental challenge facing our generation--climate change. I believe we must urgently address this looming issue--in partnership with the rest of the world--and I commend the bill's authors for finally getting this dialogue started after years of White House and congressional inaction.

Scientists have determined conclusively that an ongoing buildup of greenhouse gas emissions is causing the Earth's climate to warm and will likely lead to drought, flooding, and other catastrophic natural disasters.

The most recent United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report found that about 1 billion people will be affected by water shortages because of declining snow cover on land currently used by one-sixth of the world's population.

The report also predicts global warming will parch large swaths of the Earth, threatening the existence of up to 30 percent of its animals and plants.

Global warming's impact on the Pacific Northwest could be particularly harmful because our temperatures are rising faster than the global average. In Washington, climate change is expected to alter the region's historic water cycle, threatening drinking water supplies, wildlife and salmon habitat, and the availability of emissions-free hydropower. We are also already seeing the ominous beginning of ocean acidification off our coastline.

According to a University of Washington analysis, temperatures in the Puget Sound region will rise about 2 degrees by 2050. Cascade mountain temperatures could rise 10 degrees or more, causing snowpacks to be reduced to just 20 percent of their current levels by 2090.

In the eastern half of my State, temperatures are expected to rise even faster. By 2050, parts of the Columbia Basin could be up to 5 degrees hotter. In 2090, much of the basin will be up to 8 degrees warmer, very harmful to eastern Washington agriculture.

There has been a great deal of discussion of what the accumulation of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide is doing to change the Earth's atmosphere. I am very concerned about that. But today I would like to help my colleagues appreciate carbon dioxide is also slowly, silently, but surely devastating our oceans and the marine life that depend on them.

I would like to share with you the silent devastation of ocean acidification.

Since the start of the Industrial Revolution 130 years ago, humans have released more than 1.5 trillion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, increasing the global atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration by 35 percent. But while carbon dioxide is accumulating in our atmosphere, it is also being rapidly absorbed by our oceans. At least one-third of our carbon dioxide emissions end up in the oceans-- more than half a trillion tons since the start of the Industrial Revolution.

For decades, we assumed that the oceans absorbed these greenhouse gases to the benefit of our atmosphere, with no side-effect for the seas.

Science now shows that we were wrong. Today, ocean acidification is actually changing the very chemistry of the oceans. As carbon dioxide is absorbed, seawater becomes more acidic and begins to withhold the basic chemical building blocks needed by many marine organisms.

According to National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration scientists, humans have increased the oceans' acidity by 30 percent since the start of the Industrial Revolution. In such acidic waters, coral reefs--the rainforests of the sea--cannot build their skeletons. In colder waters like the waters of Washington State, scientists predict a more acidic ocean could dissolve the shells of the tiny organisms that make up the base of the ocean's food chain.

A recent article in last month's journal Science detailed how acidic seawater is already moving closer to shallow waters off of Washington State, the habitat for most of my State's marine life.

These frightening findings were a surprise to researchers who didn't expect finding acidic water for several more decades. Because ocean acidification has the capacity to lead to a total collapse of ocean food chains, it will have major impacts on coastal communities that rely on the ocean's bounty.

And when we add ocean acidification to the effects of carbon dioxide coming from a warming atmosphere--increasing ocean temperatures, changing winds and currents, and rising sea levels, it is clear that our carbon emissions will impact our ocean environments in ways far too devastating to ignore.

Not many people think of orca whales, salmon, coral reefs, or oysters when they drive their cars to work each day, but as ocean acidification begins to take its toll, there is definitely a connection between the carbon emissions we emit and the ocean environments we enjoy and depend on.

Last week, I held a Commerce Committee field hearing in Seattle to examine how climate change and ocean acidification are impacting the marine environments of my State. What I heard from my constituents was nothing short of frightening.

Brett Bishop, a fifth-generation shellfish farmer in Mason County, WA, told me how his business is being devastated by the impacts of climate change and ocean acidification. His story can be summed up by two words he said to me: ``I'm scared.''

Climate change is killing his business, and threatens to destroy everything his family has worked for over the past 150 years. If things continue on their current path and Mr. Bishop can't grow his shellfish, then the bank will foreclose on the mortgage, his 27 employees will be left jobless, and his family will lose their farm, their homes, and generations of hard work.

This is not some obscure scientific theory pieced together by academic scientists. This is real, and it is happening now. Today it is shellfish farmers in Mason County, WA. but who will fall victim tomorrow? Commercial fishermen? Coastal tourism from dead coral reefs? Recreational fisheries?

These are frightening possibilities--but very real ones that our Nation will face in the coming years. And unfortunately, if we don't act, Brett Bishop will be one of the millions of Americans with similar stories. And, unfortunately, these dangers are largely under the radar because they occur beneath the surface of the ocean.

That is why one of the amendments to the Climate Security Act I am pleased to be part of includes a bill I introduced with Senator Lautenberg of New Jersey called the Federal Ocean Acidification Research and Monitoring Act. Our bill, which passed the Senate Commerce Committee unanimously last December, would establish a much-needed Federal research program on ocean acidification.

This amendment also incorporates my Climate Change Adaptation Act

which was also approved unanimously by the Senate Commerce Committee. This important legislation ensures that our Government plans for the changes that global warming will inevitably bring. Because the reality is that even if we were somehow able to stop using fossil fuels today, a certain degree of warming and ocean acidification will still occur over the next two or three decades. Planning for the future isn't just common sense--it is responsible Government.

That brings me back to the Climate Security Act the Senate is debating today. This is the first comprehensive effort to legislate on climate change that has come through the committee process. It is a historic feat, and in many ways it reflects the complexity of this issue and the varied views and stakeholder interests that accompany any effort to cap and trade climate change emissions.

I commend Senators Boxer, Lieberman, and Warner for their leadership in beginning this process and starting us on the path we know we must take soon. As Sun Tzu said in the ``Art of War,'' ``the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.''

Unfortunately, it looks like our debate may end up being largely confined to floor statements because opponents of the bill will succeed in blocking the consideration of any amendments. The minority even forced our hard-working Senate clerks to read the entire text of the bill, word for word, for almost 9 hours on Wednesday. Unfortunately, that is about as fitting an example of how opponents want to stall, delay, and preserve the status quo as one can imagine.

While I do believe we must act urgently and decisively to control our Nation's and planet's greenhouse gas emissions, I do have a number of concerns about the pending legislation.

Ironically, many of my concerns stem from the fact that Washington State is blessed with abundant, affordable, and emissions-free hydropower. Unfortunately, this bill fails to recognize that Washington State has significantly lower carbon dioxide emissions than other parts of the country and how that dynamic poses unique energy challenges going forward.

Some of these challenges are that Washington's hydropower system is largely tapped out, so any future electricity generation will largely come from relatively more polluting sources for which we will not receive any emission allocations under the pending legislation. Similarly, the bill does not provide Washington with any allocations we will need to provide electricity to the 1.5 million people moving to the Puget Sound region by 2020, unlike other parts of the country that rely primarily on fossil fuel generation.

As currently drafted, the bill also effectively penalizes the Pacific Northwest for its years of aggressive energy efficiency measures, which have avoided the construction of 3,400 megawatts of additional capacity. In other words, if we would have built fossil fuel plants instead of conserving, we would be getting emission allocations for it today. In addition, since we have already taken advantage of many of the low-hanging efficiency ``fruit,'' additional efficiency savings would be relatively more costly than in other parts of the country.

I also believe the legislation needs to more carefully consider how Federal climate legislation might preempt or overturn the groundbreaking efforts in Washington State, such as the Western Climate Initiative.

As a scarred veteran of the Western energy crisis, I also have strong concerns that there are not enough safeguards in the bill to prevent excessive speculation and manipulation of emission allocation trading markets. Even today we see what happens when there is not enough transparency and clear rules of conduct in energy markets. Excessive speculation and possibly market manipulation artificially elevate prices and hurt consumers.

And finally, we need to make sure that anything we do is actually going to do the job. Unfortunately, I understand that the emission- reduction caps proposed by this legislation are actually not strong enough to slow or stop global warming according to the latest science.

While I am disappointed that there probably won't be an opportunity to improve the historic legislation before us today, I am proud that after Congress came under new management last year we were able to craft and pass the greenest, most important energy bill in our Nation's history.

The Energy Independence and Security Act, which became law last December, will create cleaner, more diverse sources of energy supply, build new growth industries that support high-wage ``green-collar'' jobs, give consumers and businesses more affordable energy choices, and protect our environment. For instance, this landmark energy legislation aggressively boosts energy efficiency efforts by making our lighting and appliances more efficient and reducing the Federal Government's energy use.

Under the new law, fuel economy standards will increase for the first time in over two decades to a nationwide average of 35 miles per gallon, up from 25 miles per gallon today, by 2020 for all vehicles, including SUV's and light trucks. By 2030, these measures will displace the equivalent of one-third of our foreign oil needs and save American consumers at least half a trillion dollars in energy costs.

And the new energy law includes mandates and incentives that biofuels from nonfood feedstocks such as agriculture and wood waste become a much more significant part of our Nation's effort to end our dependence on fossil fuels and imported oil.

All together, these measures and others will reduce our Nation's carbon dioxide emissions by the same amount as all of our vehicles on the road produce today.

I think it is important to note that while tackling climate change will not be easy or free, moving to a clean energy system, which is a prerequisite to any serious effort to reduced greenhouse gases, has many benefits beyond reducing greenhouse gases and the costs of inaction will be far more significant.

According to a study by the Natural Resources Defense Council and Tufts University, if the United States doesn't do something soon to dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, it could cost the country $3.8 trillion annually from higher energy and water costs, real estate losses from hurricanes, rising sea levels, and other problems.

According to the Apollo Alliance, a labor-environmental partnership, investing $30 billion per year over 10 years would create 3.3 million jobs and boost the Nation's GDP by $1.4 trillion. The Apollo Alliance estimates that dollars invested in clean energy create more jobs than those invested in traditional energy sources because renewable energy is more labor intensive. It is possible for a Nation to grow while being environmentally conscious. For example, the British economy grew by about 40 percent since 1990 while their greenhouse gas emissions decreased by 14 percent.

The science is undeniable that human activities are changing the world we know and love and depend on for our well being. We are already seeing the effects on our oceans, our forests, our crops, and our wildlife--and unless we act, I am afraid the worst is yet to come.

We will only succeed in combating climate change if we work together, across the aisle here in Congress, across our States with their very different greenhouse gas profiles, and across the world. By working together we can find a path forward to solve this greatest of challenges. And if we do it right, the solutions we create will also help address other pressing needs such as providing more clean and renewable energy sources, high-wage manufacturing jobs, and new export markets.

Our Nation and the world is waiting for us to take action--and the lead in preventing and mitigating the catastrophic effects of global climate change. Our children and their children and all of the world's citizens' future depends on it. I look forward to continuing this dialog with my friends on both sides of the aisle.

Madam President, I rise, similar to many of my colleagues this afternoon, to talk about the high price of gasoline and what we need to do as we are leaving Washington and going home for Memorial Day recess to hear, I am sure, from many constituents that they are very concerned about this crisis of paying an ever-increasing amount for gasoline.

Today, I am sure, the market is going to set another record for the number of days gas prices continue to go up, and our constituents want to see relief. I know many of my colleagues have come out here and talked about new supply. I certainly feel one of the biggest priorities the Senate has is to pass a tax credit bill for renewable energy so we can get predictability in the market and continue to get new energy incentives in place. That will take pressure off some of these other supply issues. But many of my colleagues keep talking about the United States looking for more oil or things the United States can do to get into the oil game in a more robust way.

This chart shows it pretty clearly. The United States has 2 percent of the world's oil reserves--2 percent. These are all the other countries with which my colleagues are familiar: Saudi Arabia at 20 percent of the world's oil reserves; Iraq and Iran, another 18 percent. These are the big players.

The point is, the United States is not going to dramatically impact the price of oil by what we do with only 2 percent of the world's oil reserve. So if we want a solution, we are not going to get a solution out of what the United States can do in continuing to be addicted to oil.

It is very important to also note that in the past, we have had many a conversation about this problem and what is the high price of gasoline. We had the same debate when it was the high price of electricity. No one wanted to hear about any other issue than the fact that it was just a supply-and-demand problem. In fact, the Vice President in 2001 said, when talking about the electricity crisis, when prices were going through the roof:

They have got a whole complex set of problems out there

that are caused by relying only on conservation and not doing

anything about the supply side of the equation.

We found out very shortly thereafter that, no, that was not right. It was not about conservation and supply side; it was about the manipulation of the electricity market. There were lots of people like that. The Cato Institute had a similar take on it. This was in 2002. In 2002, we had gone through much of the Enron debacle, and we had seen prices in the State of Washington for electricity rise almost 3,000 times what they had been. Yet people were still saying:

Most of the price spike in 2000-2001 is explained by

drought, increased natural gas prices, the escalating cost of

nitrogen oxide emissions . . . and retail price controls.

We all know the history, now that we have had a few years to look back on it. It wasn't those supply and demand factors but the fact that we actually had unbelievable manipulation of the electricity market.

The reason why I am bringing that up is because I wish to make sure we are policing the oil markets. I wish to make sure we in the United States are doing everything we can to burst this oil price bubble we are seeing. We want to pop this price bubble and give consumers a more reliable number about supply and demand that even the oil company executives are saying. They have testified before Senate committees saying oil should be anywhere from $50 to $60 a barrel; that what we are seeing in the marketplace is not about the normal supply-and-demand features, but it is actually about the fact that something else is going on in the marketplace. This is one CEO from ExxonMobil, recently in early April, who testified:

The price of oil should be about $50-$55 per barrel.

I am not against discussions about future oil exploration. That is not the point. The point is, what are we going to do to solve this problem and burst this price bubble that while we are going out for the Memorial Day recess is going to continue to plague the economy, continue to plague our consumers, and continue to cause major havoc to our economy.

I think one of the solutions is to ensure effective oversight in the oil market as it relates to oil futures. I know people say they might not wish to talk about oil futures, but I am going to talk about oil futures because of the effect of substantial deregulation has had on these markets. On December 15 of 2000, at 7 p.m. on a Friday night as Congress was adjourning a lame-duck session, the last day of the 106th Congress, on an 11,000-page appropriations bill came to the floor of the Senate, we added a 262 page amendment--the Commodities Futures Modernization Act--that basically deregulated the energy futures market and said it didn't have to have the oversight of other products.

While the Commodities Exchange Act Reauthorization that recently passed as part of the Farm bill gives the CFTC more teeth to police these U.S. futures markets, under an administrative loophole speculators are still free to trade U.S. based energy commodities on U.S. trading engines free from full U.S. oversight meant to prevent fraud, manipulation, and excessive speculation. This is done under and informal CFTC staff ``no-action'' letter, which essentially means that the CFTC will not take action against

a foreign exchange to prevent fraud, manipulation, and excessive speculation. That means, at least on ICE Futures Europe, trading of U.S. crude oil futures, particularly the West Texas Intermediate oil contract, and U.S. home heating oil futures and U.S. gasoline futures-- products that are produced in the United States, delivered in the United States, consumed in the United States, and traded in the United States--are escaping U.S. oversight. I think that is a great concern to the American consumer who wants to make sure we have transparency in energy markets.

If we think about other trading, stocks for example, we have the Securities and Exchange Commission. They look at the stock market, and they have oversight to make sure there is nothing untoward happening in the market, like manipulation. We also have NYMEX, another exchange in the United States. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission oversees that futures exchange and has oversight. Also the Chicago Mercantile Exchange--the CFTC has oversight of that futures exchange. The CFTC implements market rules. But as for trading U.S. energy futures on ICE Futures Europe, the CFTC has said: No, we don't have to have oversight of that exchange.

As I mentioned, the Congress has charged the CFTC with protecting consumers by policing futures markets for fraud, manipulation, and excessive speculation. It does this by requiring certain market rules like position limits, large trader reporting, record keeping, and trader licensing and registration. These are tried-and-true tools that Government has used to protect consumers, to protect investors, to protect business, to protect our economy, to make sure manipulation is not happening.

I often think these are great programs, but wonder why we allow certain trading of critical energy commodities to escape such oversight requirements. I always like to give the example of cattle futures because somehow it seems we are more willing to regulate hamburger in America and than we are oil.

Here are two examples of U.S. commodities: cattle futures trading and oil futures trading. When we look at the rules, cattle futures are not an exempt commodity; but when you consider the ICE Futures Europe, oil certainly is. For cattle futures, the exchange trading U.S. cattle futures has to register with the CFTC, whereas oil trading on the ICE Futures Europe does not. And daily reporting requirements: more for hamburger and less for oil on ICE Futures Europe. What about speculative limits? more for hamburger and less for oil on ICE Futures Europe.

Why am I so concerned about this significant change that transpired? The significant change that transpired is since ICE Futures Europe-- which again is not subject to U.S. oversight meant to prevent fraud, manipulation, and excessive speculation--began trading West Texas Intermediate oil in February 2006, oil has gone from $60 a barrel in 2006 now to over $134 a barrel. You bet I want to get down to the brass tacks about exactly how this exchange is working, to have the oversight and to see what large trading positions are being used in this market.

Many people have a concern about this. One report in the Asia Times was quoted as saying:

Where is the CFTC now that we need [speculation] limits? It

seems to have deliberately walked away from its mandated

oversight responsibilities in the world's most important

traded commodity, oil.

This is by F. William Engdahl, who said this in early May of this year.

People are observing and wanting to know what we are going to do about this situation. That is why I think it is incredibly important to take action. What am I talking about, taking action? First of all, today Senator Snowe and myself and several of our colleagues are sending a letter to the CFTC insisting that they reverse their no action in oversight of this foreign market, noting that this is a dark foreign market where oil futures are traded. We are saying bring the bright light of day into this exchange and protect consumers by ensuring that market manipulation of oil prices is not happening.

As I said, the CFTC basically gave up this oversight under an informal staff no action letter process. How did this happen? Well, in 1999 the London based International Petroleum Exchange, the IPE, which was a much smaller and foreign owned exchange, asked the CFTC for a no action letter, and received it. The IPE wanted to locate trading terminals in the U.S. but did not want to be subject to direct CFTC oversight. The CFTC decided that the IPE did not have to have to be subject to direct CFTC oversight because the CFTC agreed that the United Kingdom was going to be doing it. Then, in 2001, the U.S. owned, Atlanta based, InterContinental Exchange, or ICE, came along and bought the IPE. After that, the now U.S. owned IPE continued to escape U.S. oversight even though it received the foreign exchange no action letter based on it being a foreign based exchange.

So, in 2001, we can see a U.S. based entity basically purchased this foreign exchange, and the CFTC did not take action. In 2006, now named ICE Futures Europe, it starts trading what is a U.S. oil product, trading on U.S. desks in the United States and the CFTC continues to basically take no action to review that.

Our letter says the CFTC should start reviewing these trades immediately and reverse their no action decision. We hope that while we are at recess, the CFTC will take this action.

Why is this so important? Because many are concerned that U.K. oversight over U.S. energy trading is not sufficient to protect our consumers from fraud, manipulation, and excessive speculation. In fact, CFTC Commissioner Bart Chilton, on April 22 of this year, said:

I am generally concerned about a lack of transparency and

the need for greater oversight and enforcement of the

derivatives industry by the [United Kingdom's Financial

Services Authority].

He is basically saying he has great concerns about the oversight by the government in the United Kingdom. He should have great concerns about that because the oversight in the United Kingdom is not comparable to the oversight in the United States.

The problems at the FSA led to the collapse of England's Northern Rock Bank. There was much written about this issue. They had high turnover in the staff, inadequate numbers to carry the load of what they were responsible for, very limited direct contact with the bank, incomplete paperwork, and limited understanding of their duties.

All this led to major problems, and it led the CEO of the Financial Services Authority to say:

It is clear from the thorough review carried out by the

internal audit team that our supervision of Northern Rock in

the period leading up to the market instability of late last

summer was not carried out to a standard that was acceptable.

There are those in the United Kingdom who are criticizing the oversight abilities of their Financial Services Authority to handle this area.

The CFTC could act today in helping the United States bust this price bubble by doing their job and step in to provide needed oversight of this market.

One energy trader analyst from Oppenheimer said in April:

Unless the U.S. Government steps in to rein in speculators'

power in the market, prices will just keep going up.

This is what energy analysts are saying. So we have a great deal of continuity in the marketplace of people telling us it is time for us to act. In fact, we are going to be having a hearing when we return on Tuesday after the Memorial Day recess. I know we are going to hear from many people, but one of them will be Professor Greenberger of the University of Maryland Law School, a former CFTC department head, who testified before one of our joint Democratic Policy Committee hearings. He says:

The ICE [oil trading] loophole could be ended immediately

by the CFTC without any legislation.

I want to make sure the CFTC knows we will continue to pursue this. We hope they take action. We hope they will address this issue. But if they do not, we stand ready to make sure oversight in this financial market, that is a dark market on the ICE Futures Europe exchange, has the bright light of day and that they take immediate action to start investigating what is happening in our U.S. commodities markets so we can give consumers better protection. It is time to burst the oil price bubble. I think people everywhere across this country, and analysts on Wall Street, are saying: This is

not supply and demand. So it is up to us to make sure we have the enforcement in place to protect consumers, and that is what we hope the CFTC will realize their role and responsibility is.

I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

I certainly want to say that I know of the work of the Senator from Utah, because we worked together on plug-in hybrids and other incentives, and he clearly does support renewable fuels and changing our tax credit policies, so I applaud that.

I am glad you brought up Boone Pickens, because I heard him on the TV the other day, I think it was 2 days ago, and he said that while he thought the United States had great opportunity in natural gas, he thought the way to get off our dependence on foreign oil, besides that, was to make investment in wind and solar. So I will look forward to working with the Senator when we return on trying to push those tax policies to make sure we continue to incent those good renewable energy policies.

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

Madam President, I rise today to talk about the out-of- control oil prices we are seeing and what we can do about it right now. I see we have reached another record in gas prices with the national average topping $3.79 a gallon, and today is the 13th day in a row we have seen an increase in gas prices.

It is time Congress be more aggressive at trying to solve this problem. We have taken some action in the last week, both on the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and on the farm bill, trying to put more teeth into the CFTC. But we need to do more.

Democrats certainly want to police the oil and gas markets. We want to make sure we are doing a better job at policing these markets and restoring the authority the CFTC once had, and in making sure the CFTC does its job in preventing fraud, excessive speculation, and market manipulation. But many of my colleagues may not remember exactly how we got to this point after we substantially deregulated the energy futures market. While the oil futures market may seem like an issue that many may not understand in America, I guarantee my colleagues that oil futures affect the price of gasoline today. In fact, oil futures out to 2015 are already over $100 a barrel and certainly affect the price of gas at the pump. But on a dark December night in 2000--in fact, it was December 15, the last day of the 106th Congress--an amendment was put on the Omnibus appropriations bill that received little attention and basically deregulated the energy futures market. That amendment that deregulated the energy futures market--the Commodity Futures Modernization Act--was added quietly to the 11,000-page must-pass Omnibus appropriations bill, right when Congress was adjourning. This deregulation has had a major impact on what we now lack in the oversight of markets.

In fact, we had one analyst, Gretchen Morgenson, being quoted as saying:

The Commodities Futures Exchange Act was an early Christmas

gift to a company that had worked hard to persuade Members of

Congress that the electronic energy exchanges and all the

trades made on them should be exempt from regulators' prying

eyes. The company was Enron.

So while many of my colleagues may not have realized in 2000 exactly what was happening, it was clear Enron knew exactly what it was lobbying for in getting the Commodities Futures Modernization Act attached to the Omnibus appropriations bill. In fact, Enron spent close to $2 million lobbying to make sure we deregulated the energy market. I can't tell my colleagues--besides what has happened with the electronic trading of electricity--how much this has impacted the rest of our energy markets that some of my colleagues may not understand.

What this CFMA bill did is it substantially deregulated the energy futures market. It did that because it allowed energy futures trading on dark, opaque markets, it substantially relaxed existing regulation of energy trading, and it wholly excluded volatile financial derivatives which are at the center of today's credit crisis--credit default swaps.

At that point in time, there were many who were arguing that the CFTC should have had an aggressive role in regulating credit swaps, and that bill that was passed, again, on December 15, 2000, at 7 p.m. at night, on an 11,000-page omnibus bill, basically prevented any regulation whatsoever of credit default swaps. I think many understand now exactly how detrimental it has been not to have more insight into credit default swaps and the impact they have had on the credit crisis.

We had good consumer protection tools in place before deregulation. I wish to make sure my colleagues understand that. We had good consumer protection tools in place prior to this deregulation. On all energy futures exchanges, we required records be kept for all trades. Large trades on all exchanges had to be reported to the CFTC, which means that if somebody had a large position in a particular futures or derivative contract, they had to report that to the CFTC. There were speculation and position limits required on all exchanges. The CFTC had to review all trading for fraud and manipulation and for excessive speculation. That was one of their responsibilities. Also, traders had licensing and registration requirements.

So all those things were a part of the regulatory framework the Commodities Futures Trading Commission used to make sure that all energy markets were not being manipulated and to make sure that particularly on large trades, people weren't using large positions in the marketplace to affect prices. In fact, it led the chairman of the CFTC at the time to say:

. . . Large Trader information system is one of the

cornerstones of the CFTC surveillance program and enables

detection of concentrated and coordinated positions that

might be used . . . to attempt manipulation.

So here is the chair of the CFTC basically saying that large trader information is most critical to policing the futures market. Yet that is exactly what we gave up on certain exchanges when we deregulated the futures markets. We ended up deregulating large trades reporting to the

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to use such time as I might consume.

Mr. SESSIONS addressed the Chair.

I expect to go for probably about another 5 minutes.

Thank you, Mr. President.

So to continue on this point, Amaranth actually tried to make some of these energy futures trades on the NYMEX exchange. What happened is NYMEX said: No, you can't hold such large positions on this exchange. NYMEX wouldn't allow Amaranth to do it. Instead, they just went to the ICE exchange--again, without the transparency--and promulgated some of these things which ended up costing consumers billions of dollars.

Another product is traded on the ICE, but on an exchange they own in London, the West Texas Intermediate crude oil contract, which is a benchmark for crude oil prices. It is interesting because West Texas Oil does give us some indication about what oil futures are going to be and what the price of oil is going to be. Since it started trading on ICE in February of 2006, the price of crude oil has doubled. So we can see it has had a big impact.

I wish to make sure people understand because Amaranth is an example. We had Enron, which had many impacts on the electricity markets in the West. It cost billions of dollars in our State and throughout the west coast. Many of my consumers were greatly impacted by that. Amaranth came along in the natural gas markets and there was similar manipulation. So we saw it in electricity, we saw it in natural gas, and now we want to make sure oil markets are being policed. But Amaranth, as I said, was told to reduce its positions because the NYMEX didn't like the fact it had large trading positions. Instead of doing that, they switched over to this dark market that is unregulated and continued to hold these large positions which caused volatility and again, as I said, cost consumers over $9 billion.

So where are we today? Well, we have in the farm bill taken a good step forward in trying to put some teeth back into the CFTC, but we need to do more. We need to ensure consistent market rules are there for all U.S. oil trading. We need to make sure our U.S. oil-trading platform has the type of transparency and the bright light of day on it. We need to make sure it is subject to U.S. trading exchanges, that those trading exchanges have the oversight of CFTC, and that energy traders can't simply justify any exemption and say the burden of proof is on the CFTC.

So what are we talking about? Some people say because the West Texas oil contract is being traded on ICE's London exchange it is an international exchange. But the crude oil we are talking about being traded is produced in the United States, it is delivered in the United States, it is consumed in the United States, and it is traded in the United States. The only question we have is if it is regulated in the United States, and the answer is no, it is being regulated by the Financial Services Authority in the U.K. It is a big question mark as to what is causing gas prices to be at $127 a barrel, when energy analysts and oil company executives will tell you it should be between $50 and $60 a barrel.

So if somebody wants to tell you this product is not a U.S. product and should be on this exempt ICE exchange, that is buying something they should not be buying. What is important about this is that since this deregulation, we have seen explosive growth in the oil futures market. In fact, this is 2002, where you can see this on the chart. I hope we can get some numbers for 2000. I guess we will probably see something that is a little more parallel.

Look at this futures market, this explosive growth in derivatives now--this huge growth compared to where the stock market is today. So people are investing all this money in what is a dark market--not all of it, but a big portion in what is the dark market. Here, again, is what oil prices were. We created the Enron loophole and then the ICE started changing the West Texas intermediate oil and the price went up. When the dark market--the lack of transparency of trading oil futures-- happened, the price shot up.

We need to get back to the basics. One of the CFTC commissioners said:

I am generally concerned about the lack of transparency and

the need for greater oversight and enforcement of the

derivatives industry by the [United Kingdom's Financial

Services Authority.]

We know that another analyst involved in oil trading said:

Oil's price records are less due to fundamental changes

than the increasing proportion of investor demand driving

prices higher. I think we'll achieve a price of $150 in the

coming six months.

That was Eugene Weinberg who said that. The people in Washington State cannot afford gas coming from $150 a barrel, and I am sure other consumers across the country cannot either.

One of the analysts who spent a lot of time reporting on this said:

Where is the CFTC now that we need [speculation] limits? It

seems to have deliberately walked away from its mandated

oversight responsibilities in the world's most important

traded commodity, oil.

I think it is time we get back to the CFTC and their responsibility. I will send a letter this week, along with my colleagues--Senator Snowe and others--to basically ask the CFTC to reverse its no-action letter that allows trade of crude oil, home heating oil, and gasoline futures contracts on ICE to be exempt from U.S. oversight and ask the CFTC to reinstate the authority it has to look at these dark markets.

One of the law professors who testified before the committee said:

The ICE [oil trading] loophole could be ended immediately

by the CFTC without any legislation.

I hope my colleagues will join in signing a letter that says basically these markets cannot continue to remain dark. We need, as in the stock market, recordkeeping. We need to have large trade reporting so we know who is moving large trading volume and impacting the market. We need speculation limits and we need monitoring for trade and manipulation. These are things we can get the CFTC to do tomorrow.

It is time to pop the oil price bubble. It is not based on market fundamentals of supply and demand. We owe it to our consumers to make sure we are policing energy markets. We are going to do all we can to make sure we restore whatever is the proper oversight to these markets to make sure the deregulation that happened in 2000 is put back into place to give consumers more confidence.

I yield the floor.

Would the Senator yield to me for purposes of a colloquy?

Section 8105 of this bill authorizes the Secretary of Agriculture to ``provide free of charge to Indian tribes any trees, portions of trees or forest products from National Forest Service land for traditional and cultural purposes as long as those products are not used for commercial purposes.'' Several Indian tribes in Washington State are successors in interest to tribes and bands who were signatory to treaties with the United States which expressly reserved the right to gather forest products from lands which currently include National Forest System lands. These treaties are regarded as the supreme law of the land and cannot be modified by Congress unless Congress clearly intends to do so. Am I correct that section 8105 is not in any way intended to modify or supersede the treaty rights of these tribes?

I thank the Senator.

Mr. President, I rise, obviously, to encourage my colleagues here. This is an issue we dealt with before. While media consolidation might be good for Wall Street, it is not good for Main Street. The diversity of voices has been a key component to our society, and preserving them by making sure we don't have a consolidation of media is very important.

I urge my colleagues to disapprove of the FCC rule on media consolidation.

Mr. President, for those who may not have observed that voice vote, it was a very positive result for the voices of America supporting diversity. I want to spend a few minutes talking about this issue, to make sure we give it the due consideration that is important.

I thank the Senator from North Dakota. The praise should go to Senator Dorgan for his leadership on this issue for the last year-plus time, continuing to make sure the Senate holds the FCC accountable for their actions, trying to pass a rule on media consolidation when they know there have been dissenting views all across America about this issue. Certainly there has been a dissent from the Senate.

The ownership of broadcast and print media does touch on some of the core values Americans hold for freedom of speech, open and diverse viewpoints, to have vibrant economic competition from a variety of sources, and local diversity.

Attention to diversity and localism has served our economy well and has also provided us a good civics lesson. These opportunities--when we hear from small companies, when we hear from minorities, when we hear from women--are the types of diversity we want to protect. We did that tonight.

The diversity in media does energize our democracy. Viewpoint diversity that comes from the various views that

can now be expressed are key to making us a stronger nation.

Having independent sources of news helps citizens to take opinions, not just locally but nationally and even globally. That is why I am glad we stopped the FCC from moving forward on their media consolidation proposal.

I remind my colleagues of the history here because I have a feeling this issue may come up again. Back in 2002, the FCC initiated its biennial review process, announcing the agency would fulfill and review the full range of broadcast ownership rules, but the announcement of the review was the only thing that was truly conducted in public.

On June 23, 2003, on a 3-to-2 party line vote, the FCC issued its new rules on media consolidation. Then-Chairman Powell did not issue the proposed rule for public comment prior to the vote.

The reason I am bringing this up is because what ensued is millions of people sent e-mails and weighed in with postcards and petitions to oppose the rule. In fact, the Senate sent a very clear message to the FCC at the time invalidating that proposed media consolidation proposal.

The Third Circuit Court of Appeals reviewed the FCC decision from 2003 and they determined it was ``not supported by reasonable analysis.''

What happened after that? Obviously there were a lot of people in loud chorus saying they disapproved of the FCC's action to further concentrate the media in this country. In 2007 the FCC passed the new media ownership rule, barely a month after it was proposed, allowing for little public comment and for even less time for consideration of the comments that came in. I know Chairman Martin likes to talk about allowing public comment for over 120 days and 6 hearings around the country, but all of that was done before the rule was even out there in public, what the actual changes would be.

In one example, they came to Seattle on November 9 and I think we had a mere 1-week notice for that. They had the meeting on a Friday afternoon. I think it was a 3-day weekend. Maybe they thought no one would show up, but it does not take a lot of notice in Seattle to get people to show up for a hearing about media consolidation, so 800 people showed up and spent 9 hours letting the Commission know their thoughts on what they thought the impact of increased media concentration would be.

It would hurt competition. It would lessen diversity. It would impact localism and was not in the broader public interest. I know Chairman Martin received an earful in Seattle, but clearly he didn't pay much attention to what we said, because a few days later he proposed new media ownership rules. They were released in a November 13 op-ed piece, I think in the New York Times, in a Commission press release.

So what we are saying is we do not like the process which the FCC pursued in not having the broadest public comment in this, and also when it looks at some of the issues that were discussed in trying to validate why the Commission continues to try to push for media consolidation.

I think it is very important. We have seen a pattern emerge. We see economic studies from the Commission where they cannot hold up to peer review, where data are not supportive of the predetermined conclusions that the FCC had, and that maybe they were ``checking the box'' when it comes to these public hearings and maybe giving mere lip service to localism and to women and minority ownership issues.

So all of those issues are going to continue to be duly noted by the Commerce Committee, and certainly we are going to continue to fight on this issue. The FCC media ownership rules were created decades ago to foster these longstanding goals that our country has to promote competition, to promote localism, to have diversity of voices.

The courts and industry experts and elected officials of all ranks across America have come together in an overwhelming chorus saying ``no'' to the FCC move to try to further consolidate the media.

I am glad my colleagues tonight as well disapproved of their action so we can continue to have the diversity of voices in America that I believe my constituents and Americans all across this country deserve.

I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, in recognition of May as National Foster Care Month, I want to extend my personal thanks to all of the families in Washington State and throughout our country who have adopted children from the Nation's foster care system. Foster children, through no fault of their own, face unique challenges in attaining permanent, loving homes. We can all agree that, regardless of background, all children in our country deserve to have a safe, loving home and the opportunity to pursue their dreams.

In 2005, almost 1,200 of Washington's children left foster care to join adoptive families--but that same year more than 2000 foster children in Washington were still waiting to be adopted. They had to wait an average of over 3 years to find adoptive families. Vulnerable children should not have to wait so long for the safe, permanent families that all children need.

The Federal Adoption Incentive Program, a program first enacted by Congress in 1997, plays an important role in encouraging adoption. The program provides States like Washington with incentive payments for adoptions that exceed an established baseline and includes additional incentives for adoptions of older foster children and children with special needs. Between 2000 and 2006, the Adoption Incentive Program helped 5,700 children in Washington's foster care system join adoptive families.

I am also pleased to support the Kinship Caregiver Act, introduced by Senator Clinton in February 2007. The Kinship Caregiver Support Act is intended to assist the millions of children who are being raised by their grandparents and other relatives because their parents are not able to care for them. Among other things, this important legislation would establish a Kinship Navigator Program to help link relative caregivers to a broad range of services and supports that they need for their children and themselves.

I join my colleagues in the Senate in paying tribute to the many prospective and veteran adoptive families, and I look forward to pursuing reforms that support children in foster care.