Sense of Congress Recognizing Contributions of Seven Columbia Astronauts

SENSE OF CONGRESS RECOGNIZING CONTRIBUTIONS OF SEVEN COLUMBIA ASTRONAUTS -- (House of Representatives - October 05, 2004)

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 57) expressing the sense of the Congress in recognition of the contributions of the seven Columbia astronauts by supporting establishment of a Columbia Memorial Space Science Learning Center, as amended.

(BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT)

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.J. Res. 57.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from California?

There was no objection.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, since the beginning of time, a thirst for knowledge has been the greatest of motivations for discovery and exploration. Our passionate pursuit of the unknown has resulted in opening new frontiers and tremendous technological and other opportunities that benefit humankind.

There are no better examples of this spirit than the courageous crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia. They made the ultimate sacrifice, we say paid the ultimate sacrifice, so we could exceed our limitations in exploring the heavens. This resolution is a fitting tribute to the Columbia crew, who dedicated their lives to scientific research and space exploration.

The fact that on their fateful mission they conducted experiments designed by school children demonstrates the value that the Columbia crew placed on young people. They believed in the participation of young people and the involvement of young people in America's space experience.

H.J. Res. 57 will continue this exalted tradition by inspiring future generations of American children to pursue opportunities in science and engineering and by providing them a facility with a history that is tied directly to the Space Shuttle program.

I visited the Downey facility, which will become, when this resolution passes, this space learning center, as a young reporter in the 1970s. At that time, I remember that I was ushered into this aerospace facility. It was a large building, and I was ushered in there to cover my story, and I was ushered right to the first mock-up of the Space Shuttle. It was in this Downey facility where the space shuttles were put together and designed. Certainly seeing that first mock-up, before there ever was a Space Shuttle, inspired me as a young reporter; and I am certain it will inspire young people as well.

As far as my inspiration, I went on later on after my journalism career to be a speech writer for Ronald Reagan.

It was my honor to work with President Reagan on several of his remarks dealing with the return of the first shuttles that were put into orbit and into space. So that bit of inspiration that the shuttle mock-up had on me paid off with dividends for the President of the United States and for the people of the United States.

I would think that the young people who go through this center will also, with their inspiration, serve our country and the cause of humankind well into the future; and this, of course, is a wonderful gift that we can give them that is tied to this history of the shuttle.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

(BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT)

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.

I would like to pay a special tribute at this time to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard) for the hard work that she put in on this effort. She has been working with local government in that area, as well as the rest of us, to try to make sure that this facility would be put to good use for the benefit of our country and for the benefit of young people.

So as we move forward with this legislation, we need to make sure that we thank the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard) for her hard work on the project.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Bartlett), an esteemed member of our committee, and a Ph.D. whose guidance and thoughtful reflection have helped many of us on the Committee on Science on very complicated issues.

(BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT)

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, as we move forward in this discussion, I believe that the words of the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Bartlett) and, of course, the words of the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee) should be taken very seriously when we are talking about young people and the molding or melding here of our space program along with the education of America's youth.

This has been a great experience for me in that it may be my last time as chairman of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics to address this House on an issue. I have been the chairman for 8 years, and let me just note that I have thoroughly enjoyed being the chairman of this subcommittee because by its nature, America's space program brings our people together, and by its nature then, we have had a tremendous bipartisan, positive relationship in our subcommittee and on our committee staff.

One of the projects I have worked on which I have yet to complete in terms of my ultimate goal, but one of the projects I have worked on and on which I have had some tremendous support from both sides of the aisle, is providing young people who want to study math and science and engineering full scholarships that would be set up by the various departments and agencies of our government, NASA in particular, in order to mold the education of young people so that they can fulfill the needs of these various departments for skilled people in the future, while at the same time providing engineering and scientific education for our young people.

These scholarships, by the way, would not be free; they would educate young people, and once the young person is done with the education, having received a full scholarship, for every 1 year of scholarship, they would be expected to work for that department or agency of government for 2 years. It would be a payback, one might say, although the student would then be receiving full pay like any other employee of that department.

Mr. Speaker, I will be working on that project for the next few years, and I would hope for this same spirit of bipartisanship that we hear today, and as we congratulate the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard) for her hard work today on behalf of children and the space program, that we would work together to try to implement the scholarship program that I have just outlined. And I will be making it a priority in my next few years in Congress, although I will not be the chairman of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics anymore.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

(BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT)

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, this is a fitting time for me to sort of step down because we had this tremendous success yesterday on Spaceship One. And one of my major goals as chairman of this committee was to make sure that commercial space remained an option so that in the future that we did not look at space as just an endeavor of the Federal Government, but instead looked at it as possibly offering services through the commercial sector and profit-making ventures as well as space exploration and some of the other types of things in space science that can only be done by the government itself or government working with private industry.

So this great achievement of having a commercially sponsored and designed and paid-for spaceship that went into space and was capable of carrying passengers, this was a great success. And I want to commend everyone who was involved in the spaceship program.

By the way, that was done in response to a prize, the X Prize, which offered a $10 million prize to anyone who could accomplish that mission. And I will be introducing legislation within the next few days to try to systemize the prize concept encouraging space endeavors in developing new technologies.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, let me finish with this one note about space. We were talking a lot today about this particular legislation which is aimed at providing a link between children's learning and our future and the space program and the astronauts and the space shuttle, and these are links that certainly exist. But what we hear most often when we are talking about space is, why is space worth it? Why are we so involved? Why is there a space subcommittee of the Committee on Science? Why are we spending so much time, effort and money? Is it really worth the investment?

What I would like to leave in this debate and on the record is why our investment in space has been so valuable to the people of the United States and, yes, the people of the world.

I remember when I was a young boy, that I crawled into a pit underneath a little house in North Dakota because it had been reported that tornados were expected that night. And we had to spend the entire night listening to some little radio there in a hole in the ground underneath the floor boards of this small farm. And, in fact, today, we have the small farmers and people throughout the country and people in cities that know when tornados are coming and have adequate warnings.

There has been much progress made in this area, especially in the area of tornados and hurricanes.

I sat through a hurricane when I was younger. The people of Florida, one can only wonder how many more billions of dollars would have been lost in damage and lives would have been lost if it would not have been for the satellite technology that permitted us to track the hurricanes that slammed into Florida just recently. We had ample warning to people to prepare. We now have a GPS system that will tell us where we are located on the planet which has tremendous commercial applications but also tremendous applications to make sure that, in the future, our landing systems for our airplanes will be specifically guided to protect the passengers who travel throughout the country.

I remember, before there was space imaging, and as I say, my family came from a farming background where people farmed totally different. Today's space imaging helps us improve the yield and protects the crops that we plant so it helps keep the cost of food down. In each one of these instances, we are talking about billions upon billions of dollars that are saved by the people of the United States and the world by an investment in space.

We are talking about communication satellites. When I was young, I remember calling up my grandparents in North Dakota, and it was a long distance call. We called very rarely, maybe two or three times a year, because the call was so expensive, and we had to go through so many operators, and it was so disruptive. It was $5 at that time which was a lot of money. We rarely called. But, today, young people can call up their grandparents on cell phones from anywhere, aided of course and made possible by the investment that we made in space-based assets. Those telephone calls now cost a matter of cents. We have increased the communications between generations. People call their loved ones.

Our investment in space has increased the level of love in our society and saved us billions of dollars. And, of course, we have, the biggest issue when I first came to this Congress was what? The biggest issue was, should we regulate the cable industry, cable TV? And, of course, they said, there will never be any competition with cable TV because they have to put in the cables.

Well, I, for one, have Direct TV at my house, and that competition has kept the costs of cable down, and it has just proliferated information and entertainment, made our lives happier throughout the country and saved, again, billions of dollars because of that competition in keeping down the cost of entertainment and information.

Of course, our military assets in space have saved the lives of our soldiers and done a tremendous job of keeping the peace for the world, and that is in our hands.

This is what we have accomplished with our investment. A meager investment in space has given us tens of billions, if not hundreds of billions, of dollars worth of value back to us. And that value can be used in education. That value has been used to make our society better because of what we have achieved from our space program.

We are not at the end of the space program. We have a future to look forward to that is bright. We have a President that has offered us the guidelines for the future and the strategy for the future. We can see a possibility of generating power from space, from solar-based power in the future. We can see another colony, perhaps a colony on the moon, with its natural resources there, or on an asteroid. There are so many things that we can accomplish.

The future depends on our children which is what this amendment today is all about, and it depends on the willingness of this generation to make an investment and to keep that investment in technology and in space-related assets.

It has been my honor to serve as chairman of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics, to work with people from both sides of the aisle who are committed to this type of future for America and the world. May we always lead the world in conquering new frontiers. May we always lead the world into the unknown and make sure that America leads the world into a better tomorrow.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.