Pete Domenici: “I thank Senator Craig. It is a privilege to work with him on this entire matter. He is the chief sponsor, and I am here…”

“I thank Senator Craig. It is a privilege to work with him on this entire matter. He is the chief sponsor, and I am here to help him. I started working on it very late compared to Senator Craig. When I say ``it,'' I mean this issue, the terrible status of the American forests. Everyone in this Chamber, be they staffer or Senator, Democrat or Republican, has, over the last 3 rac{1}{2} months, looked at their television in absolute awe, for they have seen hundreds of thousands of what seemed from a distance to be beautiful American forests that ought to be enjoyed by millions of people, owned by all Americans, burning up. Sometimes they move a little bit out of the forest and catch a house on fire. If they are burning in California, they burn a house, almost every time. We have fires in my State of New Mexico where they burn and no houses are affected, but the beautiful forest is burning to the ground. You heard the numbers. It is absolutely incredible. What we are told is that there are, within this great forest, 33 million acres that, if you went and looked at it, they are not so beautiful, they are not so great.”