Norman D. Dicks

Reclaiming my time, again, the regulatory process hasn't even been completed. People are still sending in comments, and so to use a blunt tool and put this prohibition in here doesn't allow the process to work to make sure we can clarify…

Well, you know, you Republicans are in the majority now. You are the chairman of a major committee. Why don't you have your committee system hold a hearing? We don't--you know, the fact is what you are trying to do in this appropriations…

Reclaiming my time, I would just say to the gentleman, why don't you, as chairman, do you have jurisdiction over this or is this the Commerce Committee?

And to hear this discussion over there about the Clean Water Act is really amazing. And this amendment, your amendment would improve it, would protect the environment, clarify the Supreme Court decisions so that we can get on with it and…

And it was lit on fire. And then the Clean Water Act was passed by Congress, and guess who signed it? Richard Milhous Nixon. He signed that bill. He signed the Clean Air Act, the Environmental Policy Act. I mean, in those days there were…

I would like to ask the gentleman a question. Does the gentleman not believe, as I do, that the Potomac River is far better today in terms of water quality because of the Clean Water Act? I yield to the gentleman from Virginia. {time} 1620

I was just going to say the reason we got the thing cleaned up was because of the Clean Water Act. That's how the Potomac got cleaned up.

The gentleman talks about the Potomac. I have been here for many, many years. I was on the staff in the other body. And at the time--and this was probably in the mid-seventies when what the gentleman says was an issue.

What I worry about is how many of our people live on the coast of this country who could be directly impacted by rising sea levels. And the seas have gone up more rapidly in this last 50 years than it has in the last 3,000 years…

I want to yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts, and then I will yield to the gentleman.

There also is another aspect of this that some people don't recognize, and that is ocean acidification, which is upon us. A significant amount of carbon dioxide goes into the oceans. And that's why getting a handle on this and trying to…

I held hearings when I was chairman of the Interior and Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, brought in the Federal agencies, and every one of them testified that they could already see signs of the effects of climate change: one was a…