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Show 61 of the organizations involved in the National Drought Preparedness Act that Senator Domenici and Representative Hastings have drafted and submitted and I co- sponsored. I think it is a great idea and I think it really does move the ball down the field on this issue. Yet that bill hasn't necessarily been referred to the Science Committee and so this is a longwinded way of asking you, in terms of basic research and research function in the government, is there something else we ought to be looking at doing or that we are not looking at right now? Dr. HAYES. I think you bring up an important point, that I think the Science Committee probably should look at this bill closely because one of the things that we haven't been doing well in looking at droughts recently has been incorporating the scientists into the policy and looking at that. So I think that is very important. As far as what I think needs to be done research- wise, I think there needs to be some encouragement made to look at some of these issues. For example, not just climate change issues but how do people look at climate variability? How do people use the forecasts that have been issued? We need to go a lot deeper than just the surface of looking at the global changes and issue forecasts. It has to incorporate political or social scientists and physical scientists as well. And I think that needs to be encouraged. So I encourage, I think, certainly things that can be encouraged and I think there needs to be some funding available through NSF or some of these agencies to help move us along in this whole process. FARMER/ RANCHER SEVERE DROUGHT PREPARATIONS Mr. MATHESON. At the risk of creating musical chairs, could I ask a question of Mr. Bowler. Could I do just an experiment here and ask would you tap your microphone. I suspect it doesn't work. I just want to ask you both as a farmer and a rancher, how do you go about preparing for a sustained drought and are there actions you take? Mr. BOWLER. The actions- Are you hearing me? Mr. MATHESON. If you speak up loud enough, I can hear you. I don't know if the other people can. Mr. BOWLER. The actions I have taken, if you can imagine, with the number of acres I have, I have got to be able to ride any drought through. I have lived through many of them, we have never had one like this in Southern Utah. And in the area that I am in I think the chart showed that we never had. But we have never had one in 70 years. And the problem that we have is just so much greater that I am not sure how we are going to live through it this time. Do you think that's better? Mr. CANNON. If you would move closer to the mic. Maybe we can try one of these two microphones on this side. We hate to move you but we actually do want to hear what you are saying. Mr. BOWLER. I assumed after 70 years of experience that I had planned for the worst type of conditions in that I had more than sufficient acreage to run my limited number of livestock on. I have BLM rights in Nevada and in Utah and I assumed that I had taken care of the problem. This problem has been so much greater than what we have ever seen that I think that what I would have done, had I known this was going to occur, is I would have either |