Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to ask my colleagues to join me in the legislation that I have submitted today, which is the Respect State Marijuana Laws Act.

For too long, Washington's decisionmakers have pursued the same policies over a whole range of issues without regard for whether those policies are actually beneficial to the American people. In fact, they continue to support policies that have utterly failed--many of these things--because the intent sounds so good.

So, over and over again, we see failed policies remain in place, wasting money. Rather than evaluating the reason for the policy failures and ultimately deciding to change course in Washington, the habit has been simply doubling down on regulations, personnel, and tax dollars spent, believing that that will have and bring a different outcome.

Last November, the American people registered their dissatisfaction with this way of thinking by electing Donald Trump to the Presidency.

President Trump's statements on the campaign trail loudly and aggressively challenged the status quo. We haven't had someone here shaking up the status quo for a long time, but he did so by promising to revisit a whole host of failed Federal policies that have been crying out for attention for years and, in some cases, decades.

Once such failed policy has been the U.S. Government spending billions of dollars and wasting the time of Federal employees--hundreds of thousands, if not maybe tens of thousands of Federal employees--in order to prevent adults from smoking a weed, marijuana.

Candidate Trump told the voters this was an issue to be left up to the States, especially when it comes to medical marijuana.

At a 2015 rally in Sparks, Nevada, then-Candidate Trump said:

``Marijuana is such a big thing. I think medical should happen-- right? Don't we agree? I think so. And then I really believe we should leave it up to the states.''

It should be a State situation, I think.

``In terms of marijuana and legalization, I think that should be a state issue, state-by-state.''

I could not agree more with the President. Indeed, it is the very approach that I have advocated for several years.

In this vein, I have reintroduced today, as I said, the Respect State Marijuana Laws Act earlier today, along with Republican colleagues Tom McClintock, Ted Yoho, Don Young, Duncan Hunter, Justin Amash, and Tom Massie, as well as Democratic colleagues Steve Cohen, Mark Pocan, Earl Blumenauer, Dina Titus, Jared Polis, and Barbara Lee.

My bill, which has not received a designation yet but is entitled the ``Respect State Marijuana Laws Act,'' will permit residents to participate within the confines of a State's medical and recreational marijuana program without running afoul of Federal law.

Admittedly, my personal preference would be to lift the Federal Government's prohibition on marijuana entirely. However, I understand that this approach would be a nonstarter for many of my colleagues, which is why I have promoted an approach that simply gives the States and their residents the room they need to take a different approach to this issue, should they choose to take that different approach.

Under my proposal, if a resident or business acts outside the boundaries set by a particular State, or if a State has chosen not to allow medical or recreational use of marijuana by their residents, the Federal Government would still be empowered to enforce Federal law in those instances. If that is what the people of the State want--it to be legal--the Federal Government can still get involved.

Of course, the number of States that have resisted the shift in national opinion on this issue is small. To date, 44 States, including D.C., Guam, and Puerto Rico, have enacted laws that allow, to a varying degree, the cultivation, sale, and use of marijuana for medical or recreational purposes. For those States and territories that have discarded strict marijuana prohibition, my bill would align Federal policy accordingly.

This is to those States and the people of those States who have decided they don't want the marijuana prohibition. My bill would then make sure that Federal law is aligned with the States' and the people in those States' desires so that the residents and businesses wouldn't have to worry about Federal prosecution. For those few States that have thus far maintained a policy of strict prohibition, my bill would change nothing. I think that this is a reasonable compromise that places the primary responsibility of police powers back in the States and the local communities that are most directly affected.

Over the past few years, the disparity between State and Federal marijuana policies has confused and stifled banking, proper taxation, research, natural resources development, law enforcement, and related activities. A plethora of bills, many of which I have happily cosponsored, have been introduced in the House to tackle these problems on an issue-by-issue basis. However, my bill is the only one that would solve all these problems in one fell swoop.

My bill is short, straightforward, and easy to understand. It amends the Controlled Substances Act to add a new rule that reads as follows: ``Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the provisions of this subchapter related to marijuana shall not apply to any person acting in compliance with State laws relating to the production, possession, distribution, dispensation, or administration or delivery of marijuana.''

The major difficulties that landlords, dispensaries, banks, and others find themselves in in those States where the majority of people--maybe the vast majority of people--have voted to make marijuana legal in their borders stems from the fact that the Federal Government law considers that activity still illegal. By explicitly stating that as long as these folks are following the State law, their actions are, by definition, not illegal to the Federal Government, if we do that, many of these obstacles, many of these confusions that people have to deal with in those States, in the States where people have voted to make sure they don't want marijuana illegal, well, their problems and the complications, the banking rules and everything else would be solved immediately.

Now that we have established President Trump's policy preference as it relates to this issue, which is he believes it should be left up to the States, as well as my legislative proposal, let us turn to the reasons why Federal policy ought to change.

First, as a matter of philosophy, I, as a constitutional conservative, have great faith in the ideals articulated by our Founding Fathers. Their experience with the British monarchy, an all- powerful, centralized British Government in which people had little representation and no right to control their own lives and liberty, led them to establish--meaning, led our Founding Fathers to establish--a decentralized system of government, totally different from that of the British, that their government was meant to protect the freedoms of the citizenry.

One of the most important tenets of this system of government was the idea that nearly all police power should be reserved to and exercised by the State and local governments. Yet today, Congress continues to fund an enormous Federal bureaucracy that is built around the idea that we--meaning, the Federal Government--can and should regulate what people may or may not choose to consume and has justified the Federal Government's establishing a Federal police force and justified Federal police actions directly on the citizens throughout our country.

This is totally contrary to what our Founding Fathers meant. There was never an intent to have criminal law being taken care of by the Federal Government. All of our Founding Fathers would have opposed it and today would be supporting my legislation by bringing things back to the ideals which they had in mind of limited government, especially limiting the Federal Government's control directly over our lives.

Tragically, these laws, the laws which have been implemented and the laws that have been encouraged by the Federal Government, these laws concerning marijuana, disproportionately impact on the poorest communities in our country. There is an incorrect perception that poor people, particularly people of color, disproportionately break Federal marijuana laws, leading to their disproportionate representation in Federal prisons. However, as I indicated, that is an incorrect perception.

Statistics show that affluent citizens are just as likely to grow, sell, and use marijuana illegally as poor citizens. The sad difference between these two, however, is that the poorest among us are somehow unable to avoid prison time for similar offenses.

There is much that can be said about why this is. Some may respond to this unfairness with the idea that we should just lock up more of the affluent young people and older people as frequently as we lock up their poor counterparts.

Well, I happen to believe that the Federal Government shouldn't be locking up anyone for making a decision of what he or she should privately consume, whether that person is rich or poor, and we should never be giving people the excuse, especially Federal authorities, that they have a right to stop people or intrude into their lives in order to prevent them and prevent others from smoking a weed, consuming something they personally want to consume.

We have been down this path before, of course. In the 1920s, a coalition of progressives and evangelical Christians thought it would be a good idea to institute a national prohibition on alcohol, which was something else that people can do in excess--and do in excess-- which hurts them when they do it in excess or when they do it when they are not totally in control, and they hurt their lives.

People do hurt their lives on alcohol, no doubt about it, just like in all these other drugs and just as some people do on sugar, for example. But the motives of the movement, no matter how well intended, indeed, certainly they wanted to help the people that they were going to stop from drinking. But like most efforts to limit freedom, the freedom of Americans, they ultimately succeeded in convincing--they did convince--the country to enact an amendment to the Constitution that actually prohibited the production and sale of alcohol in the United States.

What happened? Well, predictably, the policy failed at achieving its intended goal, which is trying to prevent people from consuming a liquid intoxicant, alcohol; and instead of just achieving that goal, instead it resulted in a torrent of collateral damage that harmed everybody in this country and created problems that we still have today. The rise of organized crime, the death of people consuming booze that was contaminated or otherwise deadly, that is what was going on during Prohibition.

The mobster scene first arrived in America. We had organized crime. We had people who were consuming alcohol from stills, and they had no idea what company or what people were making this stuff that they were consuming. They ended up dying in great numbers, and we ended up with the Mob.

Does that sound familiar?

Fortunately, for future generations, the country wised up and repealed the Prohibition amendment just about a decade after it was put into place.

Today, the scourge of marijuana prohibition has fueled organized crime here and south of our border and in our inner cities and throughout the world. We now have organized crime on steroids, and there is little that we can do to stop that because we keep feeding them with money by having outlawed drugs that people want to consume, and especially that drug that we are looking at tonight, which is marijuana.

Yet despite the well-documented death and destruction permeated by organized crime, the two groups who are most tragically harmed by the Federal Government's intransigence--it is not necessarily the groups that they are trying to save, but, in reality, they are trying to save these people. They are putting them in jail. They are destroying people's lives in that way, but they are also victimizing American seniors and our veterans--yes, our veterans.

The Federal Government remains so fixated on the need to restrict marijuana use that it has effectively promoted an opioid addiction. The possibility that marijuana might be a viable alternative to the management of pain and certain chronic disorders has been ignored and, yes, suppressed. Thus, we have senior citizens who are in their senior citizens homes, people over 70 and 80 years old, and they are being prohibited from using marijuana that might make their day a little bit easier or might bring back their appetite. Marijuana is now, instead, designated as a schedule I substance and has prevented any meaningful use that might be, as I say, for our senior citizens.

It has also prevented a robust research of the drug to find out exactly what it could be used for in a positive way. Last year, to the credit of the Obama administration, at the insistence of myself and others here in Congress, the Drug Enforcement Administration announced a policy change to expand the number of DEA-registered marijuana manufacturers. That meant that they were able to expand that number.

Historically, only the University of Mississippi had been registered with the DEA to produce marijuana for research purposes. Well, what we have had in the past has limited the research supply of marijuana both in quantity and in quality, making access particularly difficult to legitimate scientists and practitioners. Thus, we have made it very difficult, if not impossible, for us to get a full understanding: If there are dangers, what are they? If there are some potential positive uses of marijuana, what are they?

Through the policy that we have had, it has been a negative impact on those people who are suffering who, needlessly, don't need to suffer. They do not need to suffer, whether they are our veterans coming home or whether it is our people who are basically older or are suffering from other types of diseases. The policy change that we have made is a positive step in the right direction so that now there can be more research into marijuana to find out what the dangers are and what the benefits can be.

We now can expect that research to pick up to some degree, although barriers remain. It is unfortunate that barriers remain because a plethora of anecdotal evidence suggests that this plant and its constituent parts may offer relief from ailments such as post-traumatic stress disorder, cancer, chronic pain, epilepsy, glaucoma, and multiple sclerosis; and, yes, we know

that in some cases they have noted childhood problems where people go into seizures, and it has been effective in that.

Why have we held marijuana back and not researched it even?

This paranoia has had severe negative consequences on the American people, and that is not even considering the number of people whose lives have been affected. You arrest some person who doesn't have the money for a lawyer and they can't get it expunged from their record, for the rest of their lives they have lower pay and they have trouble getting jobs. We have trapped people in our poorer areas because we have put this stigma on them when what we are talking about is the consumption of a weed--not hurting somebody else, the personal consumption.

I can't think of anything that our Founding Fathers thought that some people have a right to control their lives, especially what they consume. I, of course, don't agree that we should outlaw cups bigger than this because some people might drink more soda pop if we have bigger cups, no. People need to be responsible for their own lives. That is what freedom is all about, and that is when people will start being more careful about what they do.

Yes, we also know that marijuana can adversely affect the mental development of an adolescent brain. As such, it is vitally important to discourage our youth from chronic use. Right now the youth won't even believe what we are talking about half the time when it comes to marijuana. So now we need to establish our credibility that we are not being paranoid, we are being responsible, and we are being realistic. We need to discuss with our young people and discourage the chronic consumption of marijuana, just like we do when we discourage them from the chronic consumption of alcohol use, which also is bad for young people's brains.

But the fact is we do not know more, and we need to know more, about the use of medical marijuana and the use of marijuana, period--both positive impacts and negative impacts. The fact that we don't know what it can be used for positively or what the negative impact is because we haven't done the research, that is a travesty. That is a travesty.

It is a crime against older people who sit there and are being denied the use of something when they are over 70 or 80 years old that might enlighten their day and might bring back their appetite after they have had some sickness.

It is a travesty when our veterans come home and they are given opiates instead of maybe something they can derive from marijuana. We need to research that. And our veterans end up killing themselves because now they are addicted to an opiate. The Federal Government should not stand in the way of the scientific community in learning more about marijuana.

Many who oppose the change in course for Federal marijuana policy will cite any number of excuses: Oh, but it is dangerous if people use marijuana and then get behind the wheel of a car.

Well, that is something that needs to be worked out. We need to make sure that we understand there are other challenges we have to face once marijuana is legal and how we are going to protect people from being in a situation. Well, I happen to believe that there will be no more people smoking marijuana and driving a car if it was legal than they are today. However, that may be an issue we need to look at.

What we need to do is find ways to discourage young people from driving while drinking. Let's have drug testing in our schools not aimed at putting young people in jail, not aimed at saying: Oh, you have tested positive for marijuana, you are going to get arrested. By the way, you can't do that because you can't force these kids to testify against themselves by giving them a blood sample or a drug test. But you can do it in order to say: If you test positive for drugs, we are going to talk to your parents about it. If you test positive for drugs and you are in school, you are going to have to take a class to show you what you are doing to your brain.

Ultimately, this is all about freedom. It is all about whether adults, not children, can use their decisionmaking process. This is the land of the free and the home of the brave. Too many people get so wrapped up in micromanaging our lives for our own benefit--of course, it is always for our own benefit--that sometimes they end up causing great harm to the people that they want to control for their own benefit.

Well, many of my Republican colleagues have joined me in letting the States do this. That is right. I understand it. I respect them. I hope more will go along with the constitutional provision that those things not enumerated in the Constitution are powers that should be granted to the States.

I hope that my Republican colleagues will join me in recognizing that, when we talk about individual freedom, this is what individual freedom is. It also includes individual responsibility on the other side of the coin. When we talk about limited government, we want limited government and we want government that is closest to the people, the State marijuana laws in the name of helping people. So that they won't consume a weed by their own choice, we are destroying all of those principles which we claimed as Republicans.

I believe in those principles. I think my fellow Republicans do as well. That is why we need to talk about it and have this type of discussion that I am opening up tonight on the floor of the House. In fact, if someone says they believe in the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution--we have heard it, and we will hear it in this body over and over again--let's send that back to the States. That is supposed to be a State rule of who is going to control the environment, who is going to control the gun laws or marriage laws, et cetera. We are going to hear that. But if someone really believes in the Tenth Amendment, they will respect the State marijuana laws, and let the States decide, and the people therein decide, what the laws should be.

Remember, as we discuss people's health care, Republicans over and over again say: You shouldn't get in between a doctor and his patient. We believe in the doctor-patient relationship. That is true for medical marijuana as well.

Do we believe in these principles?

I say the Republican Party does believe in those principles. We need to have a discussion and we need to make sure that the American people understand that we are not just down here saying that we can control their life when we think it is best. No. We are down here because we do believe in liberty, we do believe in freedom, we do believe what our Founding Fathers had in mind when they decided not to follow the dictates of the king, not to permit the British government to establish control over their lives here in the United States that they had in Great Britain where they had fled from to get away from that type of authority. We do not want to have Federal police--no matter what they call them, DEA or anything else--down in our cities and our towns conducting law enforcement operations.

That is not what our Founding Fathers had in mind. They had in mind also that people would be responsible for themselves. Yes, when people are free, some of them are going to make wrong decisions in their lives. We need to make sure that we understand that when we legalize medical marijuana, or even recreational use of marijuana, some people will hurt themselves, just like with alcohol.

It is up to us not to try to put them in jail, not to try to hurt them, not to try to force them to do what we want, but to try to reach out to them, to help people who are in need, help people make the right decision in our churches and our schools. This is the way to conduct when you have a problem that threatens to bring down the society, not establishing a Federal Gestapo to go and enforce laws that are going to make everybody just prim and proper. I am sorry. What we need is to reassert what our Founding Fathers had in mind for America: limited government, personal responsibility, individual freedom, and, yes, the Tenth Amendment.

I would ask my Republican colleagues to join me in supporting the Respect State Marijuana Laws Act. It presents us with a unique opportunity to support legislation that responds to

our constituent demands because across America, people are understanding the reality of this. They don't want to put people in jail, they don't want to have Federal law strike forces in their community just to prevent adults from consuming a weed in their backyard. It makes no sense at all. They know that people, once they are arrested for just smoking a weed that is not hurting anybody else, their lives are damaged and it is harder for them to become a decent citizen. Americans are concerned about each other, and we know we can't just leave it up to the government to control our lives.

With that said, I hope that my colleagues support this legislation and support Congressman Blumenauer and myself and others in the Cannabis Caucus that is being established in order to be consistent with the goals and ideals of American liberty to make sure that we have limited government and unlimited freedom in this country. That is what America was supposed to be all about.

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

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 8 o'clock and 24 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until Thursday, February 9, 2017, at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. Speaker, Americans should remember what makes us a great and free country. It isn't a gift. It is earned by those conscientious individuals who get involved, donate their time, and do their share.

Millions of them, from the first generation of Americans until the present time.

Louise Epting was one of these. She was a beloved mother, daughter, sister and grandmother. Born in New York City, the former bobbysoxer and Frank Sinatra devotee became a nurse before settling down to raise her three children with her then-husband. Following their divorce in the 1970s, Louise continued to work hard to support her children and ensure their needs were met. Later in life, Louise followed her children to California in order to be closer to them and her future grandchildren. Louise embraced her role as the family's matriarch.

Known by her nickname ``Sugar,'' Louise was also a dedicated volunteer for many Republican causes. She worked tirelessly for everything she believed in, dedicating time and energy to a wide variety of candidates and issues. Working to better her community, she spent countless hours volunteering at the schools her grandchildren attended in Huntington Beach, California.

A fiercely proud American, Louise ``Sugar'' Epting represents true patriotism, and is among the best our country has produced. A devout Catholic, she departs this world to enter the realm of heaven where we know she joins so many of her loved ones. Compassionate, caring, and cherished by many, Louise leaves behind a lasting legacy of love for her faith, family, friends, and country.

Mr. Speaker, today, I will reintroduce legislation entitled, Save the Christians From Genocide Act. The bill declares Christians and Yazidis in Iraq, Syria, Pakistan, Iran, and Libya as targets of genocide, and thus gives them a priority for immigrant and refugee visas.

Importantly, this bill does not circumvent or change current vetting processes, but rather simply ensures that these targets of genocide are placed at the front of the line for immigration and refugee visa processing.

The Save the Christians From Genocide Act was submitted but not brought to the floor for a vote in the last Congress. During that time, thousands of Christians have been killed and often turned into helpless and hopeless refugees on the run from radical Islamic terrorism. The Save the Christians From Genocide Act will give Middle East Christians a safe haven.

Christians are being slaughtered. As we speak today, Christians are being slaughtered in the Middle East. We must save them if we can.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to praise Senator Jeff Sessions, President-elect Trump's nominee for Attorney General. Senator Sessions, I am praising him today for his inspiring testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday. During his confirmation hearings, Senator Sessions was questioned on a wide variety of issues that will be under his purview as our Attorney General. Included in the numerous topics covered were questions about his intentions to enforce Federal law as it pertains to marijuana policy.

Senator Sessions is a patriot. He is a constitutionalist. He is a man of the highest moral integrity, and I have complete confidence that if confirmed as Attorney General, he will faithfully enforce our laws--not just those he agrees with, but all the laws duly enacted by Congress.

As it pertains to marijuana policy, Senator Sessions promised to do the same, to follow the law. During his exchanges on that topic of medical marijuana policy, being questioned by both Senators Leahy and Lee, Senator Sessions stated his intention to follow Federal law. At one point he indicated that if Congress no longer desired to make possession and distribution of marijuana an illegal act, ``Congress should pass a law to change the rules.''

At this time, I feel compelled to point out that Federal law has been changed and currently prohibits the Department of Justice from spending appropriated funds to prosecute individuals who are acting in compliance with their State's medical marijuana laws. In fact, a provision has been in the law since December 2014, when Congress passed and President Obama signed into law the Consolidated Further Continuing Appropriations Act. The act included a provision passed on the floor of the House as an amendment earlier that year by a vote of 219-189. The following year, a similar provision was passed by a wider margin of 242-186. That provision, offered by myself and cosponsored by my colleague, Sam Farr, restricts the Federal Government from superseding State law when it comes to the use of medical marijuana. This law will remain in effect through April 28 of this year, although I expect with the House and the Senate, both on record on this, that this provision will be renewed. I am especially confident of that when realizing that President-elect Trump is on the record, as he stated in the last campaign, that this issue should be left to the States. Thus, I am confident that this legal provision, which says that the Federal Government shall not supersede State law when it comes to medical marijuana, will be renewed.

Importantly, in August of last year, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in U.S. v. McIntosh that Federal funds cannot be used to prosecute those in compliance with their State's medical marijuana laws. This provision will be part of American law as long as it is renewed and Congress makes it part of the law. I am confident that if Congress does that, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, my friend, a person I admire greatly, will abide by the provisions and, thus, respect State medical marijuana laws, as dictated by Congress and enforced by the judiciary.

As he rightfully pointed out in his testimony yesterday, Senator Sessions said it will be his duty to see to it that the laws under his purview as Attorney General are faithfully executed, and this includes the Rohrabacher-Farr limitations that no funding shall be used to prosecute those throughout our country who are in compliance with our States' medical marijuana laws.

All of this comes down to a constitutional theory and a constitutional commitment to what we call the 10th Amendment, and that is the States have a right to make determinations in all of those areas that the Federal Government should not be involved in. This should definitely be left to the States.

Mr. Speaker, Ambassador Kairat Umarov of Kazakhstan has faithfully served in Washington, D.C. for the past four years. His steady leadership and commitment to building the relationship between our two countries has resulted in stronger ties and raised the profile of Kazakhstan and President Nazarbayev in the West. As he now prepares to complete his time as Ambassador, I wish to mark the occasion by recognizing his many achievements and extending my personal thanks to him.

The United States and Kazakhstan share a strategic partnership and a shared interest in preventing nuclear proliferation. Ambassador Umarov has fostered a close working relationship between our government and the Kazakh Embassy which has been a key ingredient for many positive steps. Although he will soon depart Washington, I must mention the Ambassador's significant contributions to the EXPO 2017 event which will take place later this year in Kazakhstan.

Over the course of Ambassador Umarov's time in Washington, I can attest that he is the consummate diplomat, always gracious, even in trying circumstances. While I am sad that his term in our nation's capital has finished he leaves behind a record of improved relations, not only between governments, but between the people of Kazakhstan and the United States.

Lastly, the Ambassador will celebrate his birthday on January 12th and I wish him the very happiest of celebrations.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H. Res. 11. Contrary to the U.N. resolution that we are condemning today, which condemns the settlements that are taking place in Israel, the new settlements that the Israelis find themselves permitting are not undermining the cause of peace. Let's get this straight. This is what we just hear over and over again that the settlements are undermining peace.

What undermines peace is when the Palestinian people continue with their policies of terrorism, both attacking with missiles and rockets, as well as stabbings, as well as the Palestinian people and their leaders unwilling to stand up and recognize that Israel exists. They don't have a right to flood into that country with a right of return. That is what undermines the peace.

The settlements wouldn't be taking place, except the Israelis and the United Nations and the supporters of the Palestinians have made a mockery of the deal that was made.

The Israelis withdrew from control of the territory. They withdrew, and they permitted the Palestinians to establish authority there with two promises: number one, they wouldn't use the territory to attack Israel; and number two, they would recognize Israel's right to exist, and this right of return permitting them to flood into Israel and eliminate it that way did not exist.

The Palestinians have given up nothing. The Israelis have given up territory and made themselves vulnerable to the type of attack that leaves Israelis dead every day from terrorist attacks.

No, the U.N. has it wrong. That resolution by the U.N. makes peace less likely.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 810, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act of 2015.

I would like to compliment Chairman Palazzo and Ranking Member Edwards for a job well done. It has been tough. There have been disagreements. Matters have been handled fairly. And now we are getting behind the product of all of that labor.

There was a great deal of work and negotiation on these provisions over the past year, and the outcome of that work is this legislation, which embodies the bipartisan leadership both here at the subcommittee level and at the committee level and the bipartisan support in this House for our Nation's civil space programs.

I would like to note that significant differences of opinion remain on many of the provisions in this bill, but I won't go into any of them now. I think I might have worried some of my colleagues on that. But despite those differences, we all share a set of common goals for NASA. The foremost of our mutual objectives is that America must return to international preeminence in human spaceflight. This is true for both access to low-Earth orbit, for which we are trusting our commercial partners, and for far-reaching exploration missions to the Moon and beyond.

Our discussions and, yes, our disagreements will continue, but we will continue to work together to achieve America's shared goals.

H.R. 810 brings us closer to launching Americans into space on American rockets from American soil. It brings us closer to the next steps in exploration of our outer planets. It brings us closer to technological developments that can turn a seemingly impossible goal into an achievable one. It brings us closer to finding asteroids that may pose a threat to Earth or may provide vast resources that could help humanity in space. It brings us one step closer to moving beyond exploration and into pioneering, leading to settlements in space. It brings us closer to the stars. For these reasons, I ask my colleagues to join me in support of this important legislation.

Will the gentleman yield?

Let me just note that I have been here 26 years, and I have always tried to vote for increases in the specific level of funding for the National Institutes of Health, which, of course, oversees much of this health research that we are talking about today. I know we have people coming in all the time talking to us. They want us to sign onto a bill to increase this particular disease or that particular disease.

But I think the approach that we have to have is basically let's provide as much money as we can to this type of research and programs by people who are the experts, and let them determine where is the best use of our limited research money. So I have been very much supportive of your efforts and the other efforts of many bipartisan people in this Congress.

I would like to add that we can't just rely on the government. The next speech I will be giving in a few moments deals with the patent issue. We need to make sure that people in the private sector will be encouraged to invest in new types of technology and new types of approaches to curing these problems, like medical equipment and things that will really help save people.

I know Al Mann, for example, has a new inhalant so that 60 percent of the people who now use needles for diabetes won't have to use them. They can just do a little inhale before every meal.

It took him 10 years to get that through the FDA--10 years. We need to make sure the FDA is doing its job, and we need to make sure those people who are out in the private sector who are investing in new medical technologies have a way to recoup their money. At the same time, like you are focusing on tonight, we have to make sure the government is doing its part both in patents and in the FDA and, especially, for the National Institutes of Health. So thank you very much for what you are doing.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend my colleague, who has just presented a heartfelt case for scientific and health- related research by the National Institutes of Health. I concur with him that this is a very important part of what we do here. We have budgets that we have to meet, but this should be a significant part of our budget.

I would like to also note, as I did when he yielded to me, that, yes, the government needs to play a significant part--the National Institutes of Health--in trying to find cures and in trying to find ways of improving the health of the American people. It is not just up to the National Institutes of Health, and it is not just up to the government employees. My approach, which I will be talking about tonight, is something vital--that the private sector needs to be involved not only in this type of health innovation, but in all sorts of innovation and technological jumps forward that some people think only government can do; but, in fact, it is the private sector and, especially, the small, independent inventors who have played such a significant role in furthering human progress, in uplifting humankind.

So while I agree with the government role especially in these health- related issues, I think that we should dedicate ourselves to making sure that private money is going into this.

In my area, yes, the University of California at Irvine is doing exemplary work. Yes, but so are many private companies that have invested money in health care technology development. Some of them, I might add, have been taxed to death by a 2.5 percent tax on their gross simply for being the inventors of health-related technologies.

This type of medical device tax, which makes the manufacturers of devices the most heavily taxed people in this country, is a deterrent to having people in the private sector investing in exactly what my colleague was trying to suggest--into new approaches to these various diseases. That is also true not only of medical technology but of technologies across the board that really impact on the well-being and on the standard of living of ordinary people throughout our country.

I rise today to draw attention, my colleagues, to a legislative threat to the safety and well-being of the American people. We dodged a bullet in the last session of Congress on this very same issue.

Alerted by our aggressive yet unsuccessful attempt to stop that effort--that rancorous legislation in the House, which passed by a large majority last time around--we raised such a ruckus that the Senate was inundated with a wide spectrum of opposition to this supposed reform that had passed the House. There was so much opposition, in fact, that the Senate simply refused to bring up the bill for consideration.

What is the issue that is being rammed through the House right now and, once we exposed it the last time around, caused the Senate to turn back and to not let it go through? Well, there has been an ongoing fight here in Washington--one most of the public is totally unaware of, and worse than that, most of my colleagues are totally unaware of--that for the last 20 years there has been a classic case of crony capitalism that plagues our country at play here on a specific issue.

The big guys--the big crony capitalists--are trying to diminish the rights of the little guy in order to make more money. Surprise, surprise. And in this case, it will basically undermine America's prosperity and security in the long run while hurting the little guys while the big guys get their way.

I am certainly not opposed to the profit motive, but first and foremost we need to ensure that powerful forces don't change the economic rules in order to enrich themselves unjustly.

Unseen by most Americans has been the attempt by mega-multinational corporations to undermine and yes, destroy a constitutional right of our citizens, this in order to fill their pockets at the expense of American citizens who don't have the means to defeat such a power play.

I am referring to an attack on the fundamental constitutional right of Americans to own what they have created. This right, written into our law at the Constitutional Convention itself, which wrote our Constitution, is now under attack. It is a clandestine legal maneuver that would neuter our inventors' protections and permit powerful multinational corporations to steal what now rightfully belongs to American inventors, and thus, ordinary Americans will be hurt, and of course, the big corporations will benefit.

It is not just dispossessing individual inventors; this is a power grab that will undermine the prosperity we all have enjoyed as Americans. The less than forthright attack on our patent system will undermine the economic well-being of our working people who depend on the United States for being technologically superior to the working people of other societies. People in all these societies work very hard. It is not hard work--it is hard work coupled with technology--and we have ensured through the patent system that we would be developing the technology that would give Americans the edge.

Our Founding Fathers believed that technology, freedom, and yes, the profit motive was the formula that would uplift humankind. As I say, they wrote into our Constitution a guarantee of the property rights of inventors and authors. It is the only place in the body of our Constitution that the word ``right'' is actually used.

The Bill of Rights was added after the body of the Constitution, but in article I, section 8, clause 8 of our Constitution, it states:

The Congress shall have power to . . . promote the progress

and science of useful arts by securing for limited times to

authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective

writings and discoveries.

This provision has served America well. It has led to a general prosperity where we have technological advances that uplift our own people and give our own people the chance to outcompete those people who work their hearts out overseas but don't have the same technological support system in their economic endeavors.

Well, this provision in America has led to prosperity. It has helped our national security. The fact is, we could never dream of trying to defeat the enemies of freedom throughout the world on a man-to-man basis. It is only our ability to be able to bring technology and our genius to play that has given us a leverage over countries that have tens of millions of people and, by the way, don't really value human life.

We need to make sure we are technologically superior, and it has been our patent system that has given our inventors the chance to invent things that will protect all of us from aggression and prevent anti- democratic forces throughout the world--fanatic forces--from overwhelming us and overwhelming our defenses.

Of course, this having been the country of new ideas, the country where we encouraged people to be innovative, we have uplifted the life of average people. Average people here are now able to live decent lives as compared to the average people in so many countries of the world.

Yes, Americans work hard and, as I say, so do other people. It is the technology that makes the difference. Our technology has multiplied the results of the hard work of our people. That is the secret of America's success. Technology and freedom and our strong patent system is right there at the foundation of that principle. It is what has made the difference in this vital area to our security and our well-being.

Yet today, we have these multinational corporations--the same ones who run overseas to do business with communist China and with America's enemies and people who treat their populations with total disregard-- yes, these multinational corporations want to diminish the patent protection of the American people because they don't want to pay Americans for their creative new technologies. They don't want to give them their share when they create something that will uplift our people.

Over the years, we fought and turned back many efforts to weaken our patent system. I doubt whether half the

new Members of this Congress are fully aware of the aggressive and brutal fights that we have been in over patents and the patent system over these last 20 years.

A little over 20 years ago, they were saying we need to change the patent system in order to harmonize it with the rest of the world. Our patent system was out of sync with the rest of the world. Well, of course. Our constitutional rights are out of sync with the rest of the world. We are out of sync as we protect people's right to go to church and not be repressed by some other religion. We are out of sync with most of the world when we protect people's right to speak and to criticize their government or to assemble or to try to join unions or other activities in the economic area.

No, we actually are out of sync with a lot of areas, but they decided to say we need to harmonize our law on patents with the rest of the world, which has weak patent systems. Their laws have been determined by, basically, what is going to help the big guy and what is going to get new ideas out into the hands of the big industrialists.

Well, we have beat back major efforts. The first ones, as I say, were on harmonizing the law. They had two big issues. One was to harmonize our law with the rest of the world.

Our system has been that when someone submits their patent, no matter how long it takes for that patent to get issued, it is secret. In fact, it is a felony, I believe, for someone at the Patent and Trademark Office to disclose a patent application. And then, when you get your patent, it is published to the world, but you are granted 17 years of ownership.

Well, their goal was what? Their goal was to do it the European and Japanese way, which is--aha--after 18 months of applying for your patent, it is published. If you don't have it, or even if it takes another 5, 10 years to get it, it is published.

I called it the Steal American Technologies Act. We managed to turn that one around.

The other half of that particular onslaught was that we have now a guaranteed protection, as I said, in the Constitution, as I just read. For a specific period of time, we were granted a 17-year patent protection. That starts at the time when you are issued your patent.

Well, overseas that is not what it is all about. We are out of sync with them because what happens is, the minute that you file, the clock starts ticking, and 20 years later you have no patent protection at all, but that is from filing. It may take you 10 or 15 years to get your patent.

So they are dramatically reducing the ownership rights of the patent of a person who has applied for a patent, all to the benefit, of course, of these big guys who are saying, We can speed this up maybe with our contacts. And the little guys overseas over and over again get beaten up and their material stolen from them by these powerful forces. We don't want that to happen here. We protect the rights of the little guy here.

We won those fights that I was just talking about by standing tall and tough on the issue. And yes, there were some compromises over the years where we beat those first two issues that I talked about, we won that case, but over the years there have been several other hard-fought patent battles where we compromised and were able to come up with something that was acceptable to both sides.

Well, now, after a few years of preparing the political battleground in Washington, and now, after Google has provided more campaign contributions than any other corporation in the world on various issues and we have other big corporations providing big campaign contributions--and I am not saying they are buying votes, but what they are buying is attention; and people don't even know about the issue-- but now, Google has been able to explain their case. They don't hear the other side.

That is why it is up to us to make sure every Member of Congress knows what the issue is when it comes to the patent fight, instead of walking down to the floor unaware of how significant this is.

There is only one group of people that is going to be able to make sure their Congressman is focused on just how significant this issue is. The American people have to notify their Congressmen in order to let them know we should not be weakening our patent system.

There is no excuse to undermine the independent inventor when he is trying to protect his rights to a patent. We won't have independent inventors, and we won't be on the cutting edge of change, as we have been.

After a few years of preparing, as I say, a new onslaught has been prepared.

Now, as I say, they claimed in the beginning that they wanted to harmonize our system, but, of course, we don't want to harmonize and make our system weaker in order to be the same with other countries.

So that fight went back over 20 years, but now what they have laid the groundwork for and are bringing up is--in the last 3 years we have seen this fight for the second round. Three-and-a-half years ago, the House passed the America Invents Act, which fundamentally diminished our patent system, weakening its protection for ordinary citizens.

It still, even with that weakening, was better than what you had in Europe and in Japan. The negative impacts of that legislation are just now being felt. They are just now moving through the patent system and being implemented by the Patent Office.

We are going to find out what happens when you undermine the little guys in order to help the big guys because you don't--after a few more years, where is the innovation coming from?

From the big, multinational corporate bureaucracies, from the government bureaucracy? No. When we have undermined the small inventor, the individual inventor, we have taken the profit motive out of this. We have put roadblocks in the way of America moving forward.

The next wave began in this patent battle just a little more than a year ago. Last year, as I said, the onslaught aimed at neutering the rights of the small inventor was barely turned back, and that bill came forward, and we got it through. Actually, it passed the House with a substantial margin.

When citizens and universities and small businesses across America understood because of the great debate that we had here what was at stake, they inundated their Senators with calls and visits, and their message was: Don't undermine our rights. Don't undermine the rights of the small inventor. Don't undermine this constitutional right. It is just as precious as the rights of speech and press and religion. Let's not undermine that in the name of helping some multinational corporation squash an opposition to a guy who has invented something and wants to get his rightful payment for the work that he has done.

Of course, the power brokers don't claim that they must change the measure of legal protection that we offer inventors because they don't claim that it is because the inventors are bad and need to be deprived of longstanding rights or that the Constitution is just outmoded and we don't really want to follow it. They don't argue that.

No, these powerful interests, mega-multinational corporations, well heeled here in Washington, these powerful interests have to have a bogeyman to try to draw away attention from what they are really trying to do.

The issue won't become diminishing the rights of the small inventor, preventing the small inventor from enforcing his patents on people who are trying to steal it, who are big mega-multinational corporations.

No, they don't say that. There is always an excuse, something that has to sound very sinister, a sinister force at play, trying to hurt these innocent businessmen--unfairly at that.

We heard it before. About 15 years ago, we heard it was submarine patents. That was the real derogatory term, submarine patents. That was why we need to change the amount of time that someone is able to actually have, as a guarantee for their patent rights.

The submarine patent was used to say: Oh, so what if after 20 years and you haven't had your patent for 15 years, so you have only got 5 years of protection, so what?

It is the submarine patenters we are really trying to get at--forget the hardship on those little guys, which is the vast majority of people who want to get their patent as soon as possible--but the submarine patenters, meaning we have got to really restrict those little guys.

Well, now, the big guys have come up with another sinister label. That was a fraud. The submarine patent issue was a fraud, and we fixed it very easily, with a very small compromise, without having to have all the rights of the little guy eliminated, simply by saying if the little guy is--it can be shown that he prevented the issuance of his patent, trying to elongate that, well then that clock will start ticking during that time period and that time will be taken away from him.

If it is not him, if it is the bureaucracy that is holding off the actual issuance of the patent, we shouldn't be doing things that hurt the little guy who is trying to get his patent out.

Well, so we got that covered, but now, the big guys have come up with another sinister label because submarine patent doesn't apply anymore. We found a way to solve it without hurting the little guy.

Now, the big guys have come up with this other label which is aimed at confusing the public about who gets hurt and who benefits from the so-called reforms that are now being shoved through Congress. They are insisting that the need for patent change, basic changes in our patent system, is because of the so-called patent trolls. Over and over again, you will hear this sinister word.

Now, let me tell you how cynical this is. There is a guy who was a top executive at one of the electronic companies who is now on my side, on our side, the side of the little guy on this issue, but he was very high up in a big company. They got together with their people to decide what tactic they should use to get the changes done and passed through Congress.

They knew they couldn't just attack the small inventor. They knew they couldn't attack the innovators in our society. What are they going to do to diminish their patent rights?

Well, we have got to make it sound like it is somebody else who is going to get hurt, and that person has to be evil. The patent troll is what they came up with.

This gentleman who worked in the business said he was in a room when that term was formalized by a number of people in the industry. They went around in a circle and said: What is the worst and nastiest sounding term we can come up with in order to vilify that, to draw people's attention away from this issue?

He told me he had suggested patent pirate; and, no, patent troll sound really much more sinister. That is how cynical these people are. It is arrogant, and it is cynical because the patent troll is a creation.

Yeah, there are some people who misuse our system. There are frivolous lawsuits that happen in our country. You know what, it is not just in the patent issue. It is all across the board. There are lawyers that have frivolous lawsuits.

They are trying to claim that patent trolls are people with patents that are not legal patents, and they are trying to threaten lawsuits so they will get paid off. Well, that is happening throughout our system. They are called frivolous lawsuits.

There is no need to hurt our small inventors and to phase back their rights, as inventors, the rights of their ownership and the rights to enforce their patent, in order to get someone a lawyer who is engaged in a frivolous lawsuit.

These patent trolls are patent holders. Remember, when you hear the patent troll, just think: someone who owns a patent. Unless it is the inventor himself, they say the patent troll is anyone who owns a patent who is not the inventor. Patent holders or companies who represent patent holders are also people who own patents who get in infringement cases, but these are people who did not invent it themselves, and, thus, they are called trolls.

They are engaged in basically defending their rights against the infringement of large companies. Yeah, there are a few cases where small guys, we are told--that, again, is a front, to try to protect the big guys from the little guys, but there has been infringement on the patents that they own, these regular people, people who own--and patents are what? It is your property, intellectual property.

Patents should be looked at that the United States Government believes it is your right to own, for a given period of time, as I just read in the Constitution, your invention or your writing, and you own it.

If someone is infringing and if you want to buy it from someone, someone who has invented it but can't afford to basically enforce it, well, you have a right to do that. That doesn't make you an evil troll. That means you have bought something that is a piece of property.

By the way, after a number of years--10, 13, 14 years--that will no longer be your property because the patent protection lasts only a given period of time. Well, these owners are just as valid as any other patents that are granted by the Patent Office. We are not talking about phony patents.

They will try to make it sound like it is, Oh, these worthless pieces of paper. No, these are real patents and real pieces of paper that show you have rights to own this particular technology.

Huge corporate infringers would have us believe that these patents that they are talking about, that the people are trying to enforce, that these big companies have used, knowing that there is probably someone who owns that who has developed this new technology and just forgetting about them and leaving them behind, well, these big corporate infringers would have you believe that all these people are that way. They are not.

Almost all of the infringement cases happen by people who legitimately own a legitimate patent, and if not, it should be decided in court. There is nothing wrong with bringing this to court if it is a legitimate patent or if it is an illegitimate patent.

This happens all the time. Are you violating someone's property rights when they own a piece of property and you have built a road across them without asking whether or not you could use their property? No, that should go to court.

In fact, it is not a frivolous lawsuit for someone who owns a piece of property and someone who maybe owns a mine or something over here and just builds a road across and doesn't ask you about it. No, you have a right for compensation.

That is basically what we are talking about except, in this case, you have an inventor who has enriched a big company with something new, but the big company doesn't want to give him any of his royalties for building this new technology.

By the way, in the past, big corporations would try to do patent searches to make sure they weren't stepping on the little guy, and they would try to cut deals with these patent owners to try to make sure that they didn't face a lawsuit. They would be able to chart out exactly what their expenses were.

Then they decided, Don't do it, don't even look, don't check to see if we are stealing this new idea. You know why? They did that because what you have now--and what they have tried to eliminate is that if a big company intentionally knows that it is violating the patent rights of someone who owns that new technology and infringes upon it, that it knowingly does this, there are triple damages that the inventor can get in his lawsuit against that big company.

The big companies, they say, Oh, well, so we won't even look, so they can't prove that we knew we were stepping on these little people. They don't even look anymore. That is how arrogant they are. Then they worry when a small guy comes up and sues them for infringement?

By the way, why did they want to eliminate the triple damages? Because the little guys, regular people, don't have the money to pay for the lawyers necessary for these lawsuits. The little guy's ability to hire a lawyer on a contingency basis--if you take away the triple damages, you have eliminated the right of almost all of the small inventors to be able to have the protection they need in court, but that was one of their major goals.

By the way, we turned that one back, thank God, but it keeps going. They

keep going because this is a way to enrich these powerful, multinational corporations in a way that the public isn't seeing it. It is just a change in the rules; and the little guys, the wealth that should be going to them is extracted and put into the pockets of these big corporate entities.

They have the power, basically, and they are going to use it. They have the power in the economy, and they have the power in getting their case across to the Members of Congress because they have the ability to hire lobbyists again and to give campaign contributions, but not to buy votes, and I am not suggesting that.

When you are here and you have so much time, if you have lobbyists that are working just to get the attention of the Member of Congress on the issue for a short period of time, you have succeeded. These companies can do it, and the little guy can't. The little guy has no way of getting people's attention here.

The fact is that these big corporations--and especially Google--have hired the best representatives in town and spent the most money getting people's attention.

The only answer here is to make sure we offset that by making sure the American people call their Member of Congress and tell them: Don't diminish the patent protection for regular Americans, don't let this happen.

They have won the last couple of fights. Again, like I say, by the time it got over to the Senate, some people just started paying attention, but we lost it here in the House.

Well, the patents that we are talking about are patents; they are not frivolous lawsuits. These are patents that were issued by the United States Patent Office, but huge infringers would have us believe: Of course, don't worry, the Congress is just up there trying to protect people who really haven't come up with anything and just have frivolous lawsuits.

No, we are talking about tangible, tangible items that these people have used without paying the royalty to the man or woman who invented that particular item, that particular technology.

What makes these patents different than the good patents, by the way? These same large corporations own thousands of patents--by the way, most of these corporations are the megaelectronics industry companies, so they own lots of patents.

What makes the little guy a patent troll for being willing to try to get some help to fight these big guys? What makes that little guy's patent or the ``troll's'' patent any less real and any less valuable and official as these big companies?

They have their patents, too. If the small inventor doesn't have the resources to enforce his or her patent in the limited time--they only have owned this now. Remember, once you own a patent, you own it for 17 years, and then it is done; everybody owns it.

In the limited time they are granted for ownership, if they don't have the resources to basically enforce their rights, an individual or company can buy their rights and can create--or they can create a partnership with a small inventor, and they can see to it that way to see that there isn't a theft of this little guy's property, and they call it an infringement. There is nothing wrong with someone coming in and saying: Well, listen. If you can't enforce this, we think it is a good idea, you have 10 more years of patent protection. We will buy that patent right, just like buying a parcel of land. We are going to speculate that that land is going to go up in value or whatever. There is no difference at all. It is a piece of property. It is a property right. It is intellectual property.

This effort to change our patent law is an attack on the very nature of intellectual property.

Okay. So the small inventor can't do it. What is wrong with somebody coming in and offering to buy that patent right from him for those 10 years or to go into partnership with him?

Well, I have consulted with a number of outside individual inventors and groups, and they have reaffirmed that the legislation now being proposed disadvantages the little guy against deep-pocketed multinational corporations. This has been achieved in the guise, as I say, of targeting patent trolls.

You are not vilifying this poor little inventor, this guy who works his heart out in his garage, quits his job because he has got an idea, puts all of his money and sells his home in order to build something new, a new technology. No, I am sorry. That guy is a hero. And under the guise of getting patent trolls, whatever that is, they are going to smash this little guy that I just described because they are going to prevent anybody from helping him because that person who is helping him is a patent troll. This person and company who has contracted with the inventor to see that his or her rights are respected, I consider them to be a positive economic and also a moral force within the concept of determining ownership in our society.

How horrible, making a business--which some of these companies have done--of helping a business out of helping small inventors see to it that their patent rights are enforced. Oh, how horrible. Or how horrible it is for them to be buying patent rights from them. Oh, my goodness, a guy with money says: You can't afford to enforce your rights; I think it is a great idea; I will pay you for this. The fact that that happens and is able to happen in our society means that that little guy now has something of value.

If we take that away and say: Oh, these people buying them are all trolls--sounds sinister--oh, when you do that, the value of our patents for all of our inventors goes down. We are undercutting the wealth that is available to our independent inventors because we are devaluing what they have if they can't enforce it themselves, they can't sell it to somebody who is not going to commercialize it, thus you have got a situation where the patent value, we are taking wealth out of the pockets of the least able people in our society in the technology arena, the least able to weather that, and we are putting that money and that power into the pockets of the big mega-multinational, not just American companies, multinational companies. It is sinful.

The proponents of this legislation are covering the fact that someone has stolen someone else's patent rights, someone else's intellectual property, and now they want to change the system so they can get away with this theft. That is what it is all about. The big companies have been stealing. They want to get away with it. They need to change the rules of the game so they can get away with it, and the little guy will just give up because he can't go through all the steps now.

They would have us believe that all the lawsuits against these companies are frivolous. As I say, that is not the case. Well, the vast majority of them are not. The vast majority of patent infringement cases have very legitimate areas of concern, and they need to be decided by the court, not to have Congress step in and make it more difficult for someone to take someone to court who has stolen his intellectual property. Yes, there are frivolous lawsuits throughout our system. Why are these guys just focusing on patents? They are doing that because that is what these megacorporations will benefit from.

Tonight I draw the attention of the American people to H.R. 9, the Innovation Act, introduced by Chairman Goodlatte with 19 bipartisan cosponsors. The last Congress, the House Committee on the Judiciary held a hearing on this same bill. The same bill that came in last time, this bill that is being proposed now, H.R. 9, is exactly the same bill, except maybe with one provision that is taken out, which is a provision that I was able to get out of the bill on the floor in the debate and in the amendment process.

By the way, that provision was going to prevent inventors, if they believed they were treated unfairly by the Patent Office, that provision would deny them the right to take it to court. They would have to settle the issue with an ombudsman from the Patent Office. Get that? The right to use court of a U.S. citizen was going to be denied them, and the proponents of this legislation just let it drip off their back like water off a duck's back. Give me a break. That is a huge violation of rights of Americans, but it is just as huge a violation for us to try to diminish their ability to enforce the rights of their own property.

So I draw attention to H.R. 9. Last Congress the House Committee on the

Judiciary held a hearing on this almost very same bill. The witnesses at that hearing, including former Patent Office Director Kappos, made it clear that we should move slowly and with great care in making any changes to the patent law, especially in light of the fact that no one yet understands the implication of a similar patent law that was passed 2 years ago, the America Invents Act.

The process from that act is just now being implemented. I think it is going to have a very negative impact, and we need to know that that is what is going to happen, and we need to work that into our calculus of whether we should pass even more restrictions like are in that first bill.

So everybody says: Take it easy; go slow; make sure you are right before you go ahead. Well, we haven't even digested the last bite Congress has taken out of the patent law. We haven't even digested that at all, and now they want us to gobble down a few more apples. We need to make sure that we know what we have already gotten ourselves into by biting into this apple, but, no, we have got to now commit to having even more and more change before we even know whether that apple is going to turn sour in our stomach and cause us to be sick.

In and of itself, this legislation is too broad, H.R. 9, the same thing they tried to pass through here last year, rammed it through, too broad, its implications too unclear, its effects unknowable. That is what witnesses and other experts have indicated. The conclusion, as I say, is move forward with these fundamental changes in our patent system, and if you do so, you might be undermining that system.

We need not to move forward quickly on this, see what the impact of the past law changes are. That is what now has been indicated, but that is not what has happened. That is not what we have seen happen here on Capitol Hill. The House was railroaded into passing this new proposal on top of the previous legislation before we have a chance to see whether it is going to have a negative or positive effect, and it is not even being fully implemented yet. But yet we were pushed. This thing was rammed down our throats. It seems like some multinational corporations really wanted action now: Do it now.

Well, what is going on here? This congressional ramrodding exemplifies the battle to diminish America's patent system that has been going on for 25 years. This isn't something new. What I am describing to you is just one more hit, one more attempt by people to harmonize American law with the rest of the world.

We need to be more like the rest of the world. We have a strong protection of intellectual property rights. Oh, we should be more like the rest of the world--baloney. The fact is America should stand tall. If we want harmony with the rest of the world, they should harmonize with our stronger protection for the individual, for our caring for ordinary people.

This law and these changes are going to change the way we do business in America, all right. We are not going to have the creative and the cutting edge as these very same mega-multinational corporations go to countries like China in order to get cheap labor to accomplish their mission rather than using the technology of Americans, giving them the royalty for it, at least, in order to make sure our country and our countrymen are safe, our countrymen are secure and our well-being of our people economically, they have good jobs producing competitive products that they can sell overseas. No. No. These companies, they just want that power for themselves. They want to harmonize with the rest of the world so they can run roughshod over all of us.

According to the sponsors of H.R. 9, it is an attempt to combat the problem of patent trolls. That is it. You look at their arguments, it is all patent trolls, patent trolls, patent trolls, even though the study mandated by Congress shows that this much-heralded problem is not a major driver of lawsuits. It has not caused, as they claim, a surge of new lawsuits. In fact, the most recent data shows that patent lawsuits dropped dramatically in 2014 compared to previous years.

The provisions of this legislation are designed to make it much more complicated. Now, this is what it is. This legislation, H.R. 9, is designed to make it much more complicated, costly, and challenging to bring a lawsuit for patent infringement, thus hurting the little guy, the infringement that is taking place. That means the victim is the little guy. We are helping the big guy, the guy who is committing the crime.

By the way, if these people wanted to impact frivolous lawsuits, if they say, ``Oh, there are too many frivolous lawsuits with patents,'' they should just make it simpler and cheaper to defend against baseless infringement cases. Somebody that is accused of infringement and it is baseless, let's make it easier for these companies to defend themselves against that charge in court.

But, no, no, making it more easy to defend themselves, no, no, no. We are being asked to raise the bar for the inventor to bring lawsuits to defend his or her rights rather than lowering the bar to allow small businesses and others to defend themselves against frivolous lawsuits. When we weaken the little guy--that is what we are doing. They want us to weaken the little guy to protect the big guy from frivolous lawsuits.

Well, who gets hurt and who is helped? You have a sinister cover-up there, the trolls, and who is getting helped by that? These big megacorporations. And who is getting hurt? The little guys who can't go through all these extra steps; they can't afford to protect themselves. And we are going to side with the big guys, the big guys again who take their work to China without blushing? This legislation, H.R. 9, is consistent with the decades-long war being waged on America's and against America's independent inventors.

Here are a few provisions of this Innovation Act we have just submitted:

It would create new requirements for a patent holder, when a patent holder must, once filing a claim for infringement, provide information about all the parties who are involved with this; and, thus, you basically have the accused infringer is going to know everybody who is involved and, thus, be able to basically attack all of the people, not just the guy who has lost his intellectual property rights, but somebody who backed him up now will become a target of big corporations. This means the elimination of privacy for major business dealings.

The little guy no longer has that right of privacy. The little guy is totally exposed, as his friends and suppliers will be. The patent holder will be forced to provide a list of potential bank accounts to raid, and those bank accounts and all of that information will be made available to the bad guys, the people who are infringing. The big companies who are beating him down will now have all this information to use against him.

In addition, once the requirement has been invoked, the patent holder must maintain a current record of the information on file at the Patent Office or forfeit the rights.

What that means is the patent holder now has huge new bureaucratic reporting requirements, dramatically increasing his cost and vulnerability.

Now, you do that to a small investor or a small inventor, what does that say? You are increasing their costs dramatically. And why are we increasing their requirements for bureaucratic reporting? Because they have actually reported an infringement of their intellectual rights; thus, they have got to pay the price; they have got to have the burden on them. We are going to put the burden on them for saying, Somebody just stole my property. We are increasing the burden on them.

If they do that, from then on, they have a whole new obligation, a bureaucratic obligation.

In addition, the patent holder gains a new bureaucratic fee--not just a bureaucratic requirement but a fee--and is forced to pay record keeping fees to maintain the current record at the Patent Office.

More fees, more bureaucratic requirements. These are minor inconveniences to multinational corporations, these corporations with hundreds, if not thousands of employees. It is not going to cost them anything. In fact, when they go to court, they have a whole stable of attorneys, so it won't cost them much money there either.

So for these multinational corporations, this isn't even an inconvenience.

But for the little guy, all of these new requirements are killers because they don't have $100,000 that they can just drop into keeping better books over here or getting a hold of all of these people or exposing anybody who has invested in their patent.

The Innovation Act also enables large multinational corporations to create nested shell companies which have few assets but can infringe on patents while the inventor is unable to sue their customers, who are free to continue infringing. So they say: Well, we will just do all of our business with this technology, through that company, so if we get sued, they can't get at us--no way. While the first court case moves through the system, we are going to shield these big guys who are stealing.

This process could keep an infringing process in place for a decade or more while the inventor is trying to find ways to stop that infringement.

The Innovation Act authorizes the Patent Office director to create a patent troll database--how about that--and to create a strategy to teach small business how to defend themselves against patent trolls.

We are encouraging the director of the Patent Office to create an enemies list and a strategy guide for people who are infringing on other people's patent rights. That is what we are talking about.

They are trying to basically vilify a group of people who are involved in a perfectly legal and moral economic activity, helping out small business guys, buying small patent owners' rights to their patents. If they can't enforce it themselves, they are going into partnership with them.

No, no. Now we are going to have a list of these people who are going to be on an enemy's list mandated by the Patent Office, according to this legislation.

So we are encouraging this enemies list strategy. Instead of just, okay, if there is a frivolous lawsuit, let's just make it easier for someone to defend themselves in court.

The ultimate results of this legislation will be:

Increased patent infringement. Have you got that? This legislation, H.R. 9, will increase the amount of theft in our society because now we have made it easier.

Reduced legal remedies. We have basically reduced the legal remedies for the victim, for those who have been infringed.

We have reduced the investment in small business. Why are people going to invest in a new patent if they think it can be infringed upon, and this guy isn't going to get his money back? So we have dramatically hurt the amount of money that is going to be invested in the new technology, in the brilliant ideas that come from our students from university. You know, they come out and they have great ideas. We want them to go into small business and follow their dream. Oh, no, no. This would make it almost impossible for people like that. Our young people and small businessmen, people with a dream.

Irreparable damage will be done to our research universities, to our inventors and entrepreneurs. All of these people are going to be hurt.

Let me put it this way: our colleges and universities, they know that if this bill passes--the one that was going through the Senate passed-- there would be a dramatic reduction in the value of all the patents that they own, and that is a major, major asset to our universities.

Each part of this so-called reform is detrimental to the patent owners, especially damaging to individual small inventors. Every provision bolsters the patent thieves, the infringers, at the expense of the legal owners.

No, no. Let's not talk about that. Let's talk about patent trolls, how evil they are. ``Troll'' is a bad word. You don't want to be on the side of the trolls.

No, no. Everything they are proposing in the name of stopping the trolls, using that as cover, hurts the little guy and helps these big guys who are financing this campaign to undermine our patent system.

This approach assists thieves because they are powerful corporations versus little guys. The only hope for the little guy has always been that America stands for the God-given rights and that those rights are protected by our government, recognized and protected by it, as it was in the Constitution.

To all people, rich and poor, their rights are protected in this country, and we should not be about to let big corporate interests step on the little guy.

If a guy owns a piece of property and a big corporation wants to build a road across it, to build a whatever it is on the other side--an oil derrick or whatever it is--they have to pay that man's price because he owns that property. And in this case, we are talking only about an ownership for 17 years, granted to somebody who has actually come up with something that is of great value to our people.

No. We need to make sure that we remain the country where we protect everybody's rights and that the big guys can't get away with stepping on the little guys.

The rights of ownership are the same as all of our other rights: speech, religion, assembly. And this has been what we are seeing now in H.R. 9--the last couple of years have been a blatant power grab by the big guys to diminish the rights of the little guy.

When the bill identical to this one was previously submitted, opposition emerged to it, as people figured out what I am telling you. What I am saying tonight--finally some people, when they heard the debate over here, they mobilized. And when they found out what was about to be foisted upon them, we were speaking with loud voices.

Here is a list of some of those people who opposed or expressed major concerns over that act, a bill that was identical to H.R. 9, which is now perched and ready to be shoved through Congress:

The Association of American Universities; American Council on Education; Association of American Medical Colleges; Association of Public and Land-grant Universities; Association of University Technology Managers; Council on Governmental Relations; Eagle Forum; Club for Growth; American Bar Association; Patent Office Professional Association; Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure; American Intellectual Property Law Association; Intellectual Property Owners Association; National Association of Patent Practitioners; National Venture Capital Association; the Biotechnology Industry Organization; Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, PhRMA; Innovation Alliance; Coalition for 21st Century Patent Reform; Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

Let's just note, all of these groups were opposed or were very concerned about that act because:

It creates more paperwork for everybody, increasing the cost for anybody who wants to defend their rights.

It forces patent holders who file claims of infringement to maintain new bureaucratic reporting requirements and to pay new recordkeeping costs. It just complicates their lives and their expenses.

It eliminates the independent judicial review of patent applicants by striking section 145 of title 35. This is very important in order to keep the Patent Office honest. There should be an independent judicial review. That is what they tried to foist off on us last time.

And it dramatically increases the financial risks for anybody filing an infringement lawsuit.

We need to make sure that our country stays true to the American people, to what will give us security for our people. We need to be on the cutting edge of technology. We need to be ahead of our potential enemies. We can't defend our country man for man. We have got to have the best equipment and the high technology that comes from the creative thinking of our people. We need to make sure that our working people are producing more wealth with every hour of work they do; thus, we can afford to provide the services and the standard of living for ordinary people.

Every time there is a new idea, if we actually permit that to be stolen by multinational corporations, that is not going to improve the well-being of our people.

We have seen this going on in the past. This is not the first time. This is just in the last 25 years of onslaught. And what we have now in H.R. 9 is just the latest salvo in the effort to destroy the patent system that we have got.

But this happened a long time ago. We have had to reaffirm the rights of the little guy over and again.

There is a statue in our Congress, in our Capitol, of Philo Farnsworth. Do you know who Philo Farnsworth was? Philo Farnsworth was the inventor of the picture tube for the television.

Philo was a farmer and an engineer in Utah, a man with not many resources at all. But he figured out something that RCA, one of the biggest corporations in the country at the time, was trying to find out: How do you create a picture tube?

Well, he wrote them and said, I found the secret. And what do you know, they sent their top engineer over. Philo actually showed them what he had done. And they said, We are going to get back to you, and we are going to work with you as your partner. You know what they did? He could never get a hold of them again.

David Sarnoff, one of the richest, most powerful men in the United States, set out to steal the right to the patent for the picture tube from this lone American, this guy who had a small farm in Utah. And he led--Philo Farnsworth didn't give up. He led a struggle for 20 years to get his rights to own that technology, that intellectual property.

And when he was fighting this huge corporate interest that was trying to just squish him like a bug, he stood up there, and he couldn't have stood alone. People invested in his lawsuit. People invested with him so that justice would come and that inventors in the United States would know that when they invent something, they have a right, and the American people will stick by them.

In the end, the Supreme Court made the decision, and they decided with the little guy. They decided with Philo. What a great affirmation of our country. And there is a statute today of Farnsworth in the Capitol, the man who advanced communications in our country. You will never find a statue to David Sarnoff or any of these big moguls who tried to squish him, these multinational corporations.

Let's remember the heart of America, patriotism. Let's be loyal to our regular people. They will be loyal to us. That is what the American Revolution was all about.

I ask my colleagues to join me in opposing H.R. 9. And I invite people to talk about it and to talk to their Congressmen and their Senators and to make sure that they don't come in here for a vote not knowing how important this vote is on H.R. 9.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 9 o'clock and 13 minutes p.m.), under its previous order and pursuant to House Resolution 99, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Wednesday, February 11, 2015, at 10 a.m., for morning-hour debate, as a further mark of respect to the memory of the late Honorable Alan Nunnelee.

Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to have a discussion with my fellow colleagues and with those people throughout the United States who are watching this and reading this in the Congressional Record. The issue I wish to discuss is a matter of grave concern to me and I believe to the American people as well.

I came here 26 years ago. Prior to my arrival in the United States Congress, I had served 7 years in the Reagan White House. I was a speechwriter to President Reagan, and I was a special assistant to the President, which was a designated rank at the White House.

I recall what it was like in the time leading up to Ronald Reagan's election, and I recall specifically how Ronald Reagan dealt with the great challenges he faced. Before Ronald Reagan came to the White House, America was in retreat.

There was a sense of pessimism throughout our country. Our economy was topsy-turvy. There were high levels of inflation and high levels of unemployment. Our country was in jeopardy. Our country felt a danger because while we were in retreat, communism--Soviet communism--was on the offensive throughout the world.

Well, Ronald Reagan, in 8 short years, turned that situation totally around. He turned the economy around, and he turned around the spirit of the people. We went from being pessimistic to being the most optimistic and forward-looking people in the world. Yes, he helped the economy, but foremost, Ronald Reagan ended the cold war.

Mr. Speaker, I am 67 years old. During my life, most of us felt that some day, we would be at war with the Soviet Union--a shooting war--and that it might take the lives of millions of people. We were told to hide under our desk when we were young and cover up our heads in case there was a nuclear attack on our country.

Ronald Reagan expanded the United States military. Many times, when people look back and they understand the success that we had in ending the cold war, they believe that it was due to the increase in the size of our military.

Let me note that did play a factor because it was a deterrent factor, and it was a factor that awed many people in the developing world, as well as our enemies in the communist world, but that is not what switched and that is not what changed our retreat in the cold war to a great victory and the bringing down of the Berlin Wall.

What changed it was a change in strategy that Ronald Reagan initiated during the time that he was President. He was a strong leader. We came into the White House and people asked: What is your strategy for dealing with the Soviet threat to our freedom and the peace of the world? He said: The strategy is very simple. We win, and they lose.

That is what he set out. The guidelines that he set out for us who worked for him in the White House and throughout the administration were that our goal was to be that the United States would win the cold war and the Soviet Union would lose.

Well, during that time period, Ronald Reagan did not deploy American troops overseas like people think that he did. Yes, he expanded our military power, but he made very few deployments--major deployments--of American troops.

In fact, in one deployment which he made to Beirut, where he sent thousands of marines to Beirut, I personally was arguing against it in the White House and went around finding out what it was all about.

After a few short weeks, it turned into a fiasco. It turned into a tragedy, as well as a fiasco, I might add. 300 Americans, marines and sailors, lost their lives when their headquarters was blown up--their bunker, you might say. Their barracks in Beirut was blown up.

Ronald Reagan's advisers at that time advised him to send in tens of thousands of more American troopers, send in the entire 2nd Marine Division and show these terrorists they can't kill marines and get away with it.

Ronald Reagan made his best decision as President at that time not to make such a huge, major deployment of troops into Beirut; otherwise, we would have been in a quagmire for the rest of his administration. They would have been there, stuck in this war zone in Beirut, a no-win situation. Reagan knew that.

He also knew when he told us, No, we are going to get out of there as soon as we can rather than get stuck in the quagmire, he initiated another policy, a security policy based on a different doctrine from sending American troops to garrison in the world or sending American troops to fight other people's battles.

What it was, was Ronald Reagan initiated the Reagan Doctrine. The Reagan Doctrine was basically to recognize that the enemy of our enemy was our friend and to do everything we could to identify our friends around the world who would help us defeat the Soviet Union.

The Reagan Doctrine had us helping people in Nicaragua who were fighting against the Sandinista dictatorship which was allied with the Soviet Union. It was in Africa where you had Cuban troops being confronted by insurgency movements that we supported that were pro- democracy, or at least anti-Soviet, and in Afghanistan where the Soviet Army itself was being confronted.

The doctrine supported those who were struggling for freedom against oppression. We helped people in Europe, the Lech Walesas and the various leaders throughout Eastern Europe who organized resistance against the Soviet domination of their countries. Whether it was Poland or Czechoslovakia or Hungary, they received covert support from President Reagan.

Reagan wanted, yes, to defeat the Soviet Union, and that is what we did. We did it in a way by helping those who were on the front lines, struggling against what we saw as an evil--that is, a government in Russia that was controlled by an atheistic theory that an atheist dictatorship imposed upon people could reestablish new values among human beings and, thus, create a whole new world.

That monstrous philosophy--monstrous because it had monstrous implications in terms of human freedom, but also in the control and slaughter of those people who did not agree with that vision--that had to be defeated because it threatened the entire world.

By the time Ronald Reagan was finished with his Presidency and the leadership that he provided to the free world and all those who were struggling against communism, we succeeded. The Berlin Wall came down. This was done because of great leadership and a great strategy on the part of this man.

Today, we look at a totally different world from the world that Reagan left us. Unlike the world that he inherited from his predecessor, President Carter, Reagan left us a world where the upward trend toward our civilization was undeniable, that it looked like we could have generations of peace and that our enemies respected us to the point that they would not put us in jeopardy because it would be putting themselves in jeopardy. Reagan gave us chances for peace, prosperity, and freedom throughout the world.

Today, we face a totally different world. It is a frightening world. We have, today, an adversary that is every bit as evil, potentially harmful, and destructive to the people of the world as what we faced when Ronald Reagan came to the Presidency at the height of the cold war.

Yes, everything was dangerous at that time, and Reagan gave us peace and security. Today, we are facing evil and danger as even before in the cold war, but perhaps we can compare this even to the evil and danger that America and the Western world faced in the early thirties and the late twenties when nazism and fascism raised its ugly head.

What happened? During that time period, had we and the Western Allies been able to deal with Adolf Hitler, perhaps there would not have been this huge conflagration of World War II which took the lives of hundreds of millions of people.

But they did not deal with that as Ronald Reagan dealt with communism when he became President, and Hitler and the fascist threat eventually, with their aggression, put the free world and those other people who sought a better world in such a spot that war erupted and World War II, that great conflagration, happened. It was avoidable.

Well, today, we face a similar threat. We face an evil that, as I say, is every bit as dangerous as the evil that was faced by Reagan and faced before World War II.

It is a radical Islamic philosophy that will slaughter people in the West without thinking twice about it or, what is even worse, will slaughter people in great numbers in the West after strategizing of how to do it more effectively--not only slaughtering Christians and other non-Muslims, but this evil force is seeking to dominate that part of the world in which the majority of people are of the Islamic faith.

This radical Islamic terrorist evil murders more Muslims than, indeed, they murder Christians, although they have been very aggressive in their murder of Christians in a very demonstrable way, in a way that would try to intimidate the Christian world and the non-Muslim world, but we have brave and courageous people within the Muslim world.

We must not let ourselves be brought to the point that the radical Islamic movement wants us to be in, and that is to alienate the rest of the billion of Muslims who occupy this planet and make them our enemy.

Like Ronald Reagan, we must seek out our friends throughout the world who are struggling against radical Islamic terrorism and dictatorship and make sure that we back them up, so they will have a chance to defeat this threat and this ongoing murder and chaos that is engulfing their own countries.

Today, we have such heroes overseas. Let us note, in the last 6 years, this threat has grown, has gone from miniscule to being a threat that, if we do not deal with it, could erupt into the same type of global conflagration that we saw in World War II and perhaps--or at best--would leave us with a war, with a global split in the world like happened under communism that we defeated under Ronald Reagan.

Yes, we could see, if this threat of radical Islam is not confronted with American leadership, 10 years down the road, there could be a massive conflagration that would encompass, for example, what would happen if we do lose total control and things go totally out of control into the gulf areas, in the Persian Gulf and in the Arab world. If that part of the world becomes dominant, if the dominant force in that part of the world becomes this radical Islamic philosophy, it will then move to the ``stans.'' It will then move to the great parts of Africa and of Central Asia, and that will tip the balance of power in this planet and will lead to the type of global conflagration that all of us want to avoid and to prevent.

But we must have the type of decisive leadership and the type of actual commitment to winning this battle against the radical Islamic dictatorship that these people are trying to superimpose upon the world. We need the strong commitment that we saw under Ronald Reagan. We need that, and we do not have it. We do not have the leadership we need or the type of chaos that is now erupting in the Arab world would not be happening.

What is happening in this chaos that we see is this rise of ISIL, a group of people who are so committed to establishing a Muslim dictatorship throughout their part of the world and throughout Africa and, yes, even throughout the rest of the world where other non-Muslim communities live. These people are dedicated to terrorizing the world into submission to their authority, and they see their authority as coming from their radical version of God, through their radical version of Islam.

Again, most Muslims deny and reject that type of Islam. But let us not forget, let us not ignore the fact that this radical philosophy is based on their interpretation of Islam. That it is a religious fanaticism that could, just like communism was a religious fanaticism-- it was an atheism fanaticism. And we have seen Christian fanaticisms in the past, and they did great damage and cost the lives of great numbers of people in their day. This radical fanaticism, unless we defeat it now, will perhaps drag the entire planet into a World War II-like conflagration. How do we stop that? How was Ronald Reagan able to stop the rise of communism, the Soviet expansionism that he faced when he took office and, in 7 or 8 short years, managed to turn that around and defeat that very enemy?

First, he had the commitment to defeat it. And I will say today that I don't believe our President has the commitment to defeat and destroy radical Islamic terrorism and the radical Islamic dictatorship that these fanatics would superimpose upon us. Instead, I think our President believes, in good faith, that he can reach an accommodation with these folks, with these fanatics, that an accommodation can be reached and that we should try to prove to them that we are not their enemy.

Well, they know they are our enemy because they get their word from God, not from the President of the United States. That is what they believe. They see these overtures, the fanatic radicals like in the Taliban, they see it as a weakness, and it only encourages the radical Islamic movement for our President to try to reach accommodation or to say pleasant things to them without being aggressive, with seeming to be unwilling to actually draw a line in the sand.

Our President, as most people know, has trouble even uttering the words ``Islamic terrorism'' in one sentence. We are not going to be successful in defeating this threat that would murder us by the millions of people if they get the chance if our President is not even willing to utter the words ``Islamic terrorism'' in the same sentence.

We have a President that, after our Ambassador was murdered in Benghazi, tried to foist off on the American people the false story that our Ambassador was killed because a demonstration against a movie that insulted Islam got out of control and the demonstrators killed our Ambassador. For weeks, this President himself participated in spreading that lie.

Now, what message does it give us? First of all, my gosh, our President isn't going to tell us the truth about radical Islam. But what did the Muslim terrorists think? At that moment, the Muslim terrorists were thinking: My goodness, we have a guy that is so weak that he can't even condemn us and condemn the killing of his own Ambassador by our movement. This emboldened them.

And that is why, we heard early on support for various ``reform movements,'' and we all hoped that the Arab Spring would be a reform movement. Instead, our President, unlike Ronald Reagan, who sought to help those people who were the most aggressive opponents of Soviet communism, this President has tried to seek out those people in the Muslim Brotherhood and elsewhere and reach an accommodation with them.

That is why today we see enormous chaos and the rise of a radical, fanatic Islamic movement, ISIL, that will burn people alive, that will recruit people throughout the West to murder people in a newspaper, like we just saw in Paris, for drawing a cartoon that in some way made fun of their beliefs, as if people aren't free to make fun of other people's beliefs. No, they think it is all right to murder those people, and that is less civil--that is not even a sin, that is a mandate, as compared to murdering unarmed people.

An unarmed cartoonist, newspaper cartoonist in France and his colleagues, a policeman who happened to be a Muslim, laying there helpless on the ground, and they murdered him outright. This is fanaticism. This is part of a fanatic, radical Islamic movement that has to be stopped. They will not stop at killing one policeman who happens to be a Muslim on the ground. They will murder millions of others if they get the chance. They are trying to establish themselves throughout the Arab world right now. We need to make sure we stand by our friends.

Yet, unlike Ronald Reagan, and there was no doubt he was standing behind our friends who opposed Soviet communism, but what are we projecting to those people who are standing firm against this fanatic, radical Islamic movement that would put an Islamic dictatorship on the people? What are we telling our friends who are standing up against that?

Well, how about President el-Sisi of Egypt? El-Sisi was a general who stepped in at a time when Egypt could have gone either way. We had a radical Islamic movement going there. Yes, there was an elected President, and he

broke his word to his own people in trying to institute a caliphate in Egypt. They rose up against him in an aggressive shout from the people of Egypt, saying: We will not let our country become an Islamic caliphate. This is Egypt. We believe in a democratic government here, and we believe in an Egyptian government--not some radical, fanatic Arab government that was superimposed on them by members of some Muslim Brotherhood that operates behind the scenes.

Well, we almost lost Egypt. And if Egypt would fall today or would have fallen then, there would be no chance of stopping this fanatic movement that threatens the world and threatens especially other Muslim countries. There would have been no chance at all. President el-Sisi is a courageous man who has stepped forward, and our President took a long time and is still taking a long time in getting solidly behind the effort to prevent Egypt from becoming a bastion of fanatic Islamic radicalism that would threaten the world.

General el-Sisi, I visited him a year ago, and he expressed: My goodness, we bought all of these helicopters from the United States, and we need them now because there is an insurgency going on with radicals out in the Sinai desert. We need these helicopters. And it took forever for our administration, this government, to provide them the spare parts, the spare parts for that effort. They have jumped through hoops. We were doing them a favor. No, we should look at these people as doing us a favor. They are on the front lines battling this.

And President el-Sisi just recently did something that all Americans and peace-loving people throughout the world should applaud, and that is he went directly to Muslim groups in Egypt and spoke to them and spoke on the record saying we have got to cleanse ourselves from this fanaticism in which we are intolerant of other people's religions, these people who would murder other people and commit acts of terrorism. President el-Sisi, that was courageous of him. We need other leaders to follow in his footsteps.

Has our administration done anything to congratulate President el- Sisi in making that incredible stand? What type of things have we done to prove that we are behind him in this effort? He also did something else. President el-Sisi was the first President of Egypt ever to visit a Coptic church, a Christian church in Egypt. Yet this administration has been just so-so when it comes to el-Sisi. Yes, we have not undermined him, but we have not given him support, which would have been a signal to all of the other leaders there to stand firm and America will stand behind you.

We have people like, for instance, the King of Jordan, who was only here just a few days ago, and what happened? A Jordanian pilot was put into a cage and burned to death as a public spectacle. A Jordanian pilot. Why did they do that? Why did these fanatics do that? Because they meant to terrorize the people of the world, terrorize the people of Africa, terrorize other people who would stand up against them. And what was Abdullah's reaction to that? He left his meetings in the United States and flew back to Jordan. It is now being said that he personally flew a bombing mission against the ISIL people who burned that man alive. Now there is a leader, and we should be backing him up.

But what do we hear just in the paper the other day? That Jordan is having difficulty in getting the supplies of weapons and arms that they need to make sure that they can stand firm against ISIL and this horrible, radical fanatic movement that is sweeping through their part of the world.

Ronald Reagan knew that we needed to support great leaders who would help us end the cold war. We will bring about war if leaders like King Abdullah in Jordan and President el-Sisi in Egypt--if people think we won't get behind them, how can we count on others to take that stand.

How about the Kurds up in northern Iraq? They are the ones bearing the burden, bearing the brunt of all of the fighting that is going on now in Iraq. The other people, when we tried to work things through Baghdad and tried to accommodate leaders who were halfheartedly in this battle and really weren't committed, what happened? We gave them enormous amounts of military equipment that ended up in the hands of radicals, ended up being used as vehicles and guns to destroy and kill people who want the type of world that we want to live in, which is a world of tolerance and freedom and peace and prosperity, not radical, fanatic Muslim dictatorship.

Instead, the Kurds have stood firm. The Kurds are the one group in Iraq that have stood firm and are the one group that has received the least support from the United States as compared to the others.

Now, Baghdad, which wants to put their thumb down on the Kurds, we are going along with a demand with those people that all our aid that goes to the Kurds goes to Baghdad first. That is recognizing the people who are not really on our side, their power, over the people who are on our side.

In fact, there was a meeting in London just in the last few days--I guess it was last week--to determine what would go on in Iraq. The United States was, of course, maybe not sitting at the table, but helped organize this and were part of the process of trying to get this meeting together. We didn't even insist that the Kurds were there. The Kurds weren't even at the table.

This is a betrayal of the people who are on the front lines fighting the big fight of today against radical Islamic terrorism. We betrayed them. This is horrible.

What kind of message does that send to other people around the world who have to stand up against this onslaught of radical fanatic Islamic terrorist dictatorship that would be superimposed on them?

We have got to make sure that these people understand--whether it is Abdullah--or how about the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, for example? Here is a man who is so strong in his conviction and leadership in that part of the world to try to stop this terrible threat. Yes, he is treated well. We should be honoring him.

Our administration should be leading the efforts to take the Abdullahs and the Crown Prince there in Abu Dhabi and President el- Sisi. These people deserve demonstrable support, not just sort of halfheartedly getting behind them.

What about, for example, even Qatar today? Qatar is trying to make a decision as to what to do in the face of this. For example, they permit us to have airstrikes against ISIL--this radical Islamic group up in Iraq--they are permitting us to use an air base in Qatar to launch those attacks, but we should make sure people understand and are grateful to them for it and be demonstrable about it.

Part of it is, yes, stand up with your friends. If somebody does something good, like Qatar has just done and wants to go back--and, by the way, has taken some steps in the right direction after taking some steps in the wrong direction--they lost faith in us, I believe, and now, they are coming back in our direction. We should encourage that.

The other half of the equation is we need to be tough on the guys who are our enemies, who are going the wrong way, who are supporting radical Islamic fanatic terrorism, like, for example, Pakistan.

We are still giving billions of dollars over a 10-year period to Pakistan. We are giving hundreds of millions of dollars of military equipment and foreign aid to a country that is, yes, supporting the Taliban.

Almost all of the people that we have lost in Afghanistan can be traced back to terrorists who are using Pakistan as a home base, but not only as a home base, the ISI have been actively involved in helping these fanatic terrorists that our people were up against in Afghanistan.

How do we know that? Well, we do know that it is known, but maybe just the fact that they were giving safe haven to Osama Bin Laden--the murderer of 3,000 Americans on 9/11--they gave safe haven to this man. This was, ``Oh, we didn't know.'' No one believes that. They knew.

Now, to add insult to injury, they have taken the doctor who gave us the location of Osama Bin Laden and helped us bring Osama Bin Laden to justice, that doctor, Dr. Afridi, is now languishing in a dungeon, in a 10-by-10-foot cell in Pakistan.

That act by Pakistan is a hostile act to the United States, and for us to walk away and ignore it is to encourage others to treat us in the same way.

We must be tough on our enemies and friends to our friends. Is that a difficult formula? Is that too difficult for people to understand?

We are losing today because I believe this President has been treating our enemies better than he has been treating our friends in many cases, in terms of willing to reach out to them. We should be reaching out and trying to do everything we can to help the friendly countries rather than reaching out to seek accommodations with these evil countries.

Nowhere is that better demonstrated than the announcement that we had secretly negotiated a deal with Fidel Castro's regime in Cuba--secretly negotiated. Congress didn't know what was going on, and now, he has announced by edict his executive orders.

Here is a President--maybe he likes Castro a little bit because Castro, after all, he could rule with edicts, just like our President now likes to rule with edicts, rather than go through what we call your regular order as seeking the legislative branch and seeking compromises and establishing policy in that way.

Instead, this President reversed 50 years of American policy towards Cuba on his own rather than coming here to Congress and working out something with us and trying to find what was the best way and opening up Cuba to having the beginning of an economic relationship and having Americans go freely there and then to come to the United States.

Well, he did that, and there were no concessions, none, that the Cubans made for this President to give up that 50 years, 50 years of ``this is what our policy is, you are going to have to do this--free elections, opposition parties, et cetera--then we will recognize you.'' This President gave it up and no concessions on the other side.

Now, by the way, what message does that send to all these other countries? Again, it is not just Cuba. What message does that send to all these other countries when we complain about human rights or we try to set a standard, some standard, that will, indeed, take that country in the right direction?

We end up giving up a 50-year policy with no concessions; thus every little petty dictator in the world or, even worse, every group that is out there who is trying to decide whether or not to go with radical Islamist terrorism or not, they know they can make whatever decision they want and eventually the United States is going to cave in because we are projecting weakness.

As I say, the one thing Ronald Reagan did that was terrific was to rebuild our military, and it did--it created a sense of awe, but it was a sense of strength. He used that sense of strength, but it was his strategy in helping those people throughout the world who are our friends and the friends of things we believed in and the enemy of our enemies. That is what worked. We are sending the wrong message to the people who will be the enemy of our enemies.

We are undermining by not providing positive and forceful support for those people who are standing up--the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and these others and Abdullah and Jordan and President el-Sisi in Egypt--by not demonstrably standing with them, we send the wrong message throughout the world. That is why things are falling apart. That is why things are not going in the right direction.

This isn't we just happen to live in a time when things are chaotic. That is not the case. Just like Ronald Reagan didn't just live in the times when there was a Soviet communist threat that was undermining the peace of the world. That didn't just happen. It was the basis of things that, yes, what they did, but also our response to that threat.

Today, this administration, I believe, has led us down a path that has created the chaos that we now see, created a situation where you have a radical fanatic Islamic dictatorship movement that not only tries to take over and dominate the Islamic part of the world, but is threatening terrorist acts and has engaged in terrorist acts.

We will have more and more bombings like we saw at the Boston Marathon. We will have more and more terrorist actions taken in Western Europe as we saw in Paris or in Africa, unless we step forward and let the world know that we are strong, we are strong in our commitment, and we stand by those who will help us in this battle.

I recently visited New York City, and I had not been there for a long time. I had never gone to the 9/11 Memorial. I visited the 9/11 Memorial, and I would advise anyone who has not been there to go there.

This is a memorial to the 3,000 Americans who died on 9/11, most of them there at the World Trade Center in those two great towers that were brought down on that day. You should go. Anyone hearing my voice-- my colleagues, others--should go and see this.

They have managed to get a picture of almost every one of the victims who died that day. Many, of course, were firemen and policemen who, when the airplane struck that building, instead of running away and rushing away, they ran towards the building, they ran there to see what they could do to help, and they gave their lives, these heroic people.

We have to have a government as heroic as our own people if we are going to triumph over the people that slaughtered those people today. They slaughtered them in 9/11, and they will slaughter them today.

I looked at those pictures of those 3,000 people--and I was in the government when that happened, and I worked with Reagan before that, but on 9/11, we had been here a long time, and we are all part of this.

We owe it to the people of the United States, all of us on both sides of the aisle and in the executive branch and whoever else who is the government of this country, we owe it to our people to make sure we are doing the right thing--and I looked into their faces, and I brought my children with me to see this, and I said: Look, all of those people, do you know what they are telling us? They are telling us, to me and to all of us here in this body, you let us down, you let us down.

Don't do it again. Don't let there be another wall in another city with 20,000 pictures on it because they have got some sort of dirty bomb or something. These people that we are facing today are capable of that.

I am not arguing for major deployments of military units overseas, occupation, garrison in the world, like we did for too long, and I do not think it was right for us to go into Iraq in the first place.

I do argue that when we find people on our side, like Ronald Reagan did, we need to have a strong military, and we need to make sure that the world respects us.

Then we need to have stands and activities and actions that win their respect, them knowing that we stand with those people who will stand firm against this threat to the world.

Otherwise, some day, there could be another World War II-like thing 10 years down the road when we say: Why didn't you stop that fanatic Hitler when he was just walking around, goose-stepping around in these towns in Germany when he could have been stopped? Why didn't you stop him then?

Then there was hundreds of millions of people. This could lead to that type of conflagration.

One thing we know, unless we stop this radical movement there now, they will find ways of killing thousands of Americans, and there will be other walls, with other pictures, saying: Why didn't you do something?

I call on my colleagues now to seriously look at this challenge that we face. My negative comments about what I believe is the President not dealing with this situation in the right way is something that I am saying from the heart, and I am not doing this for political reasons.

Let me just say today that we see examples of where we need to take stands. We need to make sure, for example, that the nouveau regime in Iran is facing a President of the United States and an American Government that are making demands that they do not use this system that they are developing now. They have signed a treaty saying they would not have a nuclear weapon. We should hold them to that treaty, and we should be helping

the people in Iran, who are struggling against that nouveau regime. I do not say we should attack Iran with American military might. We should be supportive, and we should have been so all along.

There were demonstrators in the streets of Tehran, and there was no message. There was no message at all of support from our government at that time. That was one of the first things this President did--he refrained from helping and supporting those young activists for democracy in Iran. The Baloch people are fighting against the corruption and oppression of the Pakistani Government, which is dominated by these radicals. We should be helping the Baloch, who can also be active in Iran, I might say.

There are options that we can have throughout the world today-- actions both in terms of policy and in terms of actually helping people struggle for freedom--that will ensure the peace of the world 10 years down the road, as Ronald Reagan did when he took over. He left us a better world. We need to take the steps now to make sure that, when we leave this body, when we leave Congress--and whoever becomes President the next time around--that we leave this government so that our people have a greater chance for freedom, a greater chance to live in peace. We need to make sure that our people can live in peace and prosperity.

Those pictures on the wall at the 9/11 Memorial shout out to us: Do your duty. You didn't do it. You let us down. Don't do it again. Make sure the American people are safe. You have a challenge now. Meet that challenge. Stand firm. Stand strong behind those who are with you.

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

Thank you very much.

America is about to send a message to the world exactly on whose side are we on, and I am very proud to stand here with my colleagues, standing on the side of liberty, of justice, of treating people decently, of government that serves the people rather than a systematic government that requires the people to serve them, the bureaucracy, the tyrants that hold power.

That is what this is all about. Let's get an understanding of who this Castro gang is. Castro murdered the freedom fighters who overthrew the dictatorial government of Batista back in the 1950s.

Castro, himself, took people out who had fought against the dictatorship of Batista and shot them in the head. These were people that risked their lives to bring democracy to Cuba, and this man co- opted their revolution.

He has allied himself, over the years, with gangsters and tyrants throughout the world. He has had a safe haven for the drug dealers of Latin America, who look to him as the moderator of any disputes between these monstrous gangsters who murder each other and murder anyone who gets in their way.

He has allied with these drug dealers. But also, during the cold war he was allied to the hilt to the communist movement throughout the world. He wanted his country to become a nuclear base to attack and drop nuclear bombs on the people of the United States.

Let's not forget that. This is the man who wanted to kill Americans by the millions. For us now, oh, well, that is history; let bygones be bygones.

Are you kidding me?

This is the guy that we need to send a message to. When people have that much hatred of the United States, undermine the freedom of the people in of the world, we are not just going to sit aside and forgive him of these things.

Oh, by the way, he is not even asking for forgiveness. The Castro regime is just saying, accept us as we are, a country that has had more political prisoners than almost any other country of this hemisphere, and we are just going to accept them as they are.

Well, remember, when people were struggling during the cold war against communism, Castro was on the wrong side. During the cold war, he was the one who wanted to kill Americans by the millions by having Soviet missiles in his country.

Finally, what does this agreement that this administration--what will be the effect of it?

Oh, yeah, they say, we have been told, well, if you just have free trade people are going to get better. There is going to be liberalism.

I call this the ``hug a Nazi, make a liberal'' theory. The fact is that Fidel Castro, just like the Chinese Communists, I might add, no matter how much trade we have, they will manipulate it so that the clique that is in power, the clique that has been able to monstrously oppress their own people, take that wealth, manipulate that wealth that is coming into the country to cement their own power.

It is very clear what this man has and his clique have in mind, and that is continuing their oppression of the Cuban people.

Let's not be partners to that. Let us again, stand for liberty, stand for justice.

The Soviet Union has fallen. It is time for Castro and communism in Cuba to fall as well.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 34, the Tsunami Warning, Education and Research Act of 2015. I would like to thank my fellow partner in this endeavor, Representative Suzanne Bonamici, for her tireless work on this. She has done a great job. She has done her constituents and our committee proud for the hard work that she has put into this.

In the end, if indeed we succeed and this bill becomes law and the things we are trying to do are accomplished and hundreds of lives are saved, we can sit back and say: ``It was a job well done. We have saved Americans and some lives overseas. That is what God wanted us to do with our time here in Washington, D.C.'' Thank you for letting me be part of your effort to accomplish this.

I would also like to thank Chairman Lamar Smith and Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson. Chairman Lamar Smith has been a wonderful leader who has demonstrated the type of bipartisan effort that can really get things accomplished, and I am proud to be on his team as well.

We have seen time and time again what tsunamis can do. That is what this legislation is all about. We need to learn more about them. We need to be more accurate in forecasting and reducing the impacts on our communities.

This legislation will help us make sure that all of our coastal communities--especially those in my district in California, which are some of the best coastal beaches in all of the United States of America--are adequately prepared and properly warned about this danger.

H.R. 34 will strengthen our tsunami warning system's ability to forecast a tsunami arrival, thus bringing damages down. It will establish a working group to provide advice on tsunami science and technology. This legislation does all of this in a fiscally responsible manner, and I am proud to ask my colleagues to join me in support of it.

I have served in the House of Representatives now for 26 years, and I have met good people and bad people, and I have met people I agree with and whom I like and people I disagree with and I like. We are reflective of the American people.

People ask me, ``What do you think about the United States Congress?'' And I always say, ``It reflects what the American people are all about.''

This is the House of Representatives where we represent all of these parts of our country. Well, Ralph Hall was one of those Representatives who represented the goodness in America and the greatness in America. Ralph Hall was first and foremost, I believe, a patriot who put that above every other one of his considerations.

I was proud to know Ralph. Ralph is still with us, so we shouldn't think of Ralph as being gone from the Earth. For Pete's sake, Ralph is still here, and I hope he is listening right now because we wish him all the best. Ralph Hall is a great American still, but he has left his legacy here behind.

I worked with Ralph on the Science and Space Committee, as they called it, at least they did then--Science, Space, and Technology. Ralph has made enormous contributions to the well-being of our country in two areas in particular.

Number one, he did much to help direct America's space program and keep it a viable effort on the part of the United States to utilize space for the benefit of humankind and, of course, for the purpose of the United States to become a dominant power in the next frontier. His leadership was indispensable to creating the potential that we have today of accomplishing great things in space. And to the things that we have already accomplished, Ralph was right in the middle of it, making sure that job got done.

He also very involved with energy development. I know that there is a little bit of confusion that just because someone is from Texas that they are going to be backing up the oil companies and things such as that. Ralph was a guy who, yeah, he believed in the oil industry, and he was grateful to the oil industry for the good things that it has provided us, the fact that energy and the production of energy is so important to our national well-being. But he was also a man who understood that science was going to develop new methods of energy and was always pushing our committee and the Science Committee to be on the cutting edge of research and development.

When you get people here running for Congress, they run for Congress because they have strong ideas and ideals, often which don't agree with one another. You can imagine trying to get legislation through committees and on the floor of the House, et cetera, when you have people who are having to interact but have different points of view. Well, tensions at that moment can be a blockage to making things better.

Ralph, if anything else, was the guy who was able to eliminate the tension in the air that was getting in the way of getting something done because he had the best sense of humor of any other Member I have ever, ever come across. Ralph, by doing that, kept this body a productive body, and we weren't at each other's throats.

One last note. My father was a pilot during World War II and he flew in the Pacific. I have a very special place in my heart for Ralph Hall and all those guys because Ralph Hall, too, was a pilot in World War II in the Pacific. He is the godfather to us all.

Ralph, we respect you, we honor you, we love you, we are grateful to you for what you meant to our lives and what you have done to help make our country better off. Thank you. God bless.