WASHINGTON -- Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman wants Congress to give him more regulatory authority over slaughterhouses and processing plants to make the nation's meat and poultry safer.

But on Wednesday, even his allies on the Senate Agriculture Committee seemed more interested in other weapons in the war against food-borne illness, including irradiation, which uses low doses of radiation or intense light to kill bacteria.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, thinks both are necessary. Although he is sponsoring Glickman's legislation, he also urged the secretary to help speed final approval of what he calls electronic pasteurization -- a euphemism for irradiaton.