Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, ExxonMobil profits surged 36 percent to $10.4 billion in just the last 3 months. That means they made $1,310 a second in profit. In the 1 minute I have to address this Congress, ExxonMobil will make $79,080 in profit. In 1 minute they will make more than most hardworking Americans make in a year.

As consumers are being gouged at the pump, Big Oil runs the administration, bringing us war and environmental disaster and economic decline. Oil was at about $23 a barrel at the start of this administration. Now it is at $74 a barrel. If this administration goes ahead and attacks Iran, it will go to $130 a barrel and about $5 a gallon for gas.

This Congress must do more than genuflect with tax breaks and subsidies to Big Oil. It is time we took the side of the consumers whose budgets are being crushed and mobility being crushed by $3 a gallon gas. It is time for a 100 percent excess profit tax on the oil companies. That is what my bill, H.R. 2070, does. It will lower the price of gas because it will tax excess profits of oil companies and it won't increase the price of gasoline.

My minute is up, but the oil companies' profits are eternal, unless we stop the price gouging with a 100 percent excess profits tax.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the bill.

I will quote from the Good Book, not the Internal Revenue Code, but the Bible, Mr. Speaker. Isaiah 10th Chapter, First and Second verse: ``Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people. . . .''

Tonight we debate an unjust law which steals from the poor to give to the rich. It is unjust to attach a minimum wage increase to tax cuts for the rich. It would cost about $26 billion a year to give a $2.10 increase in the minimum wage to the least wealthy workers. The estate tax cut could give about $80 billion per year for 10 years to 3 families out of every 1,000.

Some call it a death tax, cut this poison pill will be the death of the minimum wage increase for millions of working Americans.

It is unjust that here, in the richest country on earth, there is no guarantee that a full-time job will lift a family out of a situation of dire poverty. That's because full-time year-round minimum wage earnings at $5.15 an hour leave a family of three $5,000 below the poverty line.

Since 1997, the last minimum wage increase, the cost of living has increased for all Americans. The cost of putting food on the table, of keeping a roof over your head, the cost of gas--all going up, up, up. The only thing that hasn't increased is the minimum wage. Congress's response: Give a tax cut to the wealthiest Americans. This is a perfect example of single-minded economic policy--surpluses: tax cuts to the wealthy; deficits: tax cuts to the wealthy; war: tax cuts to the wealthy; high gas prices: tax cuts to the wealthy. A much needed increase in the minimum wage to the humblest of workers: tax cuts to the wealthy.

``Woe to those who make unjust laws'' said Isaiah.

Mr. Speaker, casualties are mounting on all sides in the Middle East, and yet our government, representing the most powerful Nation in the world, stands aside and watches as civilian casualties mount everywhere.

Why in God's name aren't we getting involved to call for an end to the violence, to bring the parties together so that they can find a way to create peace?

We are required, by virtue of our standing in the world, to bring people together. Not to create more isolation, not to create more war, but to bring people together. We must get involved as this continues to spiral out of control. The whole world is watching and the entire world is at risk.

Mr. Speaker, in the Hindu religion, Brahma, the Creator; Vishnu, the Preserver; and Shiva, the Destroyer exist simultaneously and represent the multiplicity of God.

Today, we are going to be called upon to determine which of the principles, Creator, Preserver or Destroyer, shall work through each of us. If we continue to pursue nuclear proliferation embodied in the nuclear agreement with India, we will be open to the principles of destruction. At this moment when world tensions are rising and violence is cycling higher, we need to take the direction of preserving the peace and creating a new opening through abolishing all nuclear weapons.

August 6, 2006, will mark the 61st anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima which obliterated the city and killed about 140,000 people. Today, 30,000 nuclear weapons remain in the world. Many nuclear weapons are deployed. Any use of nuclear weapons would be unthinkable devastation. The only way to prevent the use of nuclear destruction is to abolish all nuclear weapons.

To that end, I will be introducing legislation today.

I rise in opposition to the rule and the underlying bill. This proposal would threaten global security and unilaterally modify the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

This administration has pursued contradictory policies with respect to the NPT, both misusing and disregarding the NPT to suit its stumbling interests. Regarding Iran, for example, the administration cited Iran for minor breaches of the NPT and are trying to rally support based on that for a military attack. At the same time, the administration itself undermines the NPT by this proposal which would help develop nuclear weapons.

The NPT requires that nuclear weapons states keep their weapons to themselves and allows nonweapons states to receive civilian nuclear technology only in exchange for their refusal to produce nuclear weapons. Yet this deal, in this deal the U.S. will provide India with civilian nuclear technology even though India is not a signatory to the NPT, is known to possess nuclear weapons and has no intention of limiting its nuclear weapons cache or production capability.

Moreover, since the U.S. will supply India with uranium fuel, India will be able to use more of its own limited uranium reserves to produce nuclear weapons. It is estimated India will be able to produce dozens more nuclear weapons per year under this deal.

We are going in the wrong direction here. At this time of great crisis in the world, we should be looking towards nuclear disarmament, nuclear abolition, saving the world, not ramping up for Armageddon by nuclear proliferation.

Mr. Chairman, as Congressman Markey just said, as this proposal now stands, there is nothing stopping India from using more and more of its domestic uranium for weapons program. Without the safeguards provided by the Sherman amendment, India could produce dozens more nuclear weapons per year under the U.S.-

India deal, which would surely lead to an arms race with neighboring rival Pakistan.

Mr. Chairman, I am a great supporter of India and of stronger U.S.- India relations. India is the world's largest democracy. It has contributed measurably to the legacy of peace of the great leader Mahatma Ghandi. India's long-standing goal of universal nuclear disarmament has not been acknowledged enough in this debate

This proposal will be harmful to security in India, in the region and the world. And this proposal will be harmful to the people of India in that it could escalate an arms race between India and Pakistan.

I support Representative Sherman's amendment, which requires the President to certify annually that India is not dedicating more domestic uranium to its weapons program, as a condition for the U.S. to cooperate with India on nuclear technology.

Pakistan wants a deal with the U.S. on nuclear technology, but the U.S. has refused. Instead, Pakistan has turned to China for this technology. To add fuel to the fire, it was just reported that Pakistan has begun building a powerful new reactor for producing plutonium, signaling a major expansion of the country's nuclear weapons capabilities.

Instead of giving India more uranium to develop nuclear weapons, the United States should take leadership in preventing an arms race in the region. A good first step would be to pass the Sherman amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

When you look at the resolution, and it says in part, ``steps should continue to be taken to restore cooperation between Venezuela and the United States Drug Enforcement Administration,'' I think everyone in this Congress would readily agree with that, but the language and condemnation actually separates us from that goal.

I think this is a consistent problem that we face here in the Congress. We desire a certain type of behavior from another government and then we tear them to shreds with our rhetoric. So it may be that we need to think again about our approach towards diplomacy and the approach that we take in these resolutions.

I understand the intention of my friend from Indiana who is a good man and who has been consistent in challenging illegal drug trafficking into the country, but I also understand that we need to look at the approach we are taking and see if this kind of approach is where a resolution is going to be most effective.

Echoing what Mr. Delahunt said, we need to also take a look very deep into our souls about what is driving this demand in this country for cocaine.

Mr. Speaker, as the work of the committee continues on this temporary reauthorization, I think it is important to have a few reflections. This is the 10th anniversary of the original sanctions law, and I think it would behoove us to ask what those sanctions have accomplished. This legislation seeks to renew for a period of 2 months a confusing, ineffective and, at best, counterproductive, at worst, counterproductive sanctions policy against Iran.

Iran justly remains a focal point of security concerns for our Nation. It supports those who use violence as a means of settling political disputes. It

is threatening rhetoric with respect to Israel. And there is world concerns about its desire to ramp up nuclear production. All these things, in my judgment, make it mandatory the United States seek immediate talks with Iran.

We must reach out to parties in the region to begin to negotiate an end to the violence and the beginning of a peace process leading to a permanent resolution. Now, our leaders haven't taken that approach. They are seeking to isolate Iran, and instead we are starting to isolate ourselves.

These sanctions are indirect. They are not targeted at objectionable behavior. According to Anthony Wayne, the Assistant Secretary For Economic and Business Affairs, U.S. Department of State, testifying before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on June 28, 2001, talking about the Libya and Iran Sanctions Act, he says that ``it focuses on investment in order to limit revenue, rather than focusing directly on actions by Iran to procure weapons of mass destruction and support terrorism.'' He goes on to say that ``it goes against some of the friendly countries whose cooperation we need in working towards nonproliferation and counterterrorism goals.''

So these sanctions haven't been effective. There is a question about whether any sanctions are going to be effective here. These sanctions add to the price of gasoline in the United States. We are paying for these failed sanctions every time we fill up our tank.

Iran has the third largest oil reserves after Saudi Arabia and Canada, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, equaling 132.5 billion barrels. Iran has the second largest natural gas reserves after Russia, equaling 16 percent of the world's reserves. The administration hasn't done anything meaningful to break our country of its dependence on petroleum, so the reality is that sanctions against investments in Iran's oil and gas fields will cause U.S. consumers to pay higher prices for gasoline and natural gas.

High prices protect the Iranian government from economic consequences of decreased investment. A military strike against Iran, which this country seems to be nodding towards, could send oil to $130 per barrel, according to CNN, making the $3 a gallon currently look like the good old days.

Now, we have to take a new direction. The same geniuses who brought us the war in Iraq, who are standing by while violence overwhelms the Middle East, these same geniuses have this plan to keep sanctions on Iran, which will drive up the price of oil, so Iran can make more money selling their oil to other countries, and the oil industry in the U.S. isn't complaining about it because they are making record profits.

We need to take a new approach. That approach is to engage Iran directly and to stop isolating them and to bring them to a peaceful resolution of the issues that are currently inflaming so much of the world. This is a time for us to take a new direction. I don't think that we are headed that way, but I think that when we are looking at renewal of a sanctions regime we ought to be talking about whether or not it is in the best interests of this country to take the direction we are taking.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in tribute and recognition of the Virginia Marti College of Art and Design as they celebrate 40 years of devotion to artistic exploration and advanced academics.

Located in the cultural hub of Lakewood, Ohio, the Virginia Marti College was founded in 1966 by visionary Virginia Marti Veith to stimulate innovation in the field of art and design. The culturally diverse campus engages students on an individual level to develop their unique talents and creativity, making Virginia Marti an inspirational learning environment. For 40 years students from around the world have met the rigorous academic challenges of Virginia Marti College with determined passion and graduated on to successful careers, creating vibrant ripples throughout the fashion world.

In the early 1990s, inspired by a trip she made with her husband Herb to Africa, Virginia Veith founded Mission to the Fatherless, a nonprofit operating in Kenya to provide orphaned children with food, healthcare, education, and a loving home. The organization is supported by proceeds from Virginia Marti Designer Fabrics store, located on the college campus. Due to the devastation of diseases like HIV/AIDS, more than a million children are orphaned in Kenya alone, a number that grows from day to day. Mission to the Fatherless is dedicated not only to providing children with basic needs but nourishing their spiritual and moral development to inspire principled civic engagement. All of the proceeds from Virginia Marti College's 40th anniversary black-tie celebration will go directly to Mission to the Fatherless, with the hopes of building a third orphanage in Kenya.

Mr. Speaker and colleagues, please join me in honor and recognition of the Virginia Marti College of Art and Design as it celebrates 40 years of excellence in design with a noble fundraiser for Mission to the Fatherless, rescuing children from a life of poverty, starvation, and violence.

Mr. Speaker, at this historic moment, the United States is

failing in its moral obligation to bring a cessation to the violence in the Middle East. This policy of inaction will have great consequences for the region, the world, and for the safety of our Nation and our allies.

The United States stands alone in our ability to bring an end to the violence and relieve the humanitarian catastrophe which has engulfed the people of Lebanon, Palestine and Israel.

In the short-term, we must call for an end to the violence. Then, without pre-conditions, we must bring all parties in the region to a long term settlement which will be enforced by peacekeepers.

This is the purpose of House Concurrent Resolution 450. We should demonstrate concern about the plight of the Israelis, but we must not be indifferent to the plight of the Arabs, Muslims and Christians and all others who are suffering the destruction of their homes, their families, their hopes and their dreams.

As the violence continues with no end in sight and with civilian casualties on the rise, this is the moment to call for the end of fear and the beginning of hope. House Concurrent Resolution 450 does just that.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for yielding me time. I also want to thank Mr. LaTourette for the work that he has done to bring this resolution to the floor of the House.

As someone who grew up in the city of Cleveland and had the opportunity as a young boy to watch the Cleveland Indians, or to listen to them on the radio, and to have had the opportunity to go to a baseball game with my father to see Bob Feller pitch, to dream that from that point to this moment that so many years later we would have the opportunity to personally recognize his achievements through this congressional resolution, for any of us who were Cleveland Indians fans back then to be here now in this Chamber, it is an honor for us.

Bob Feller epitomized everything that any of us ever hoped our professional athletes would be. In the fifties, there was a different type of iconography of professional athletes. They were people who we would aspire to emulate, people who carried with them not only exceptional prowess on the field, but also had stories of personal achievement that were so extraordinary.

The story then wasn't about how much money an athlete made. The story was about their quality of heart, and in Bob Feller's case, the quality of commitment to our Nation.

Is there any question that with the tremendous number of records he held in major league baseball that he could have set marks that would never, ever be reached had he pitched those 4 years in which he decided instead to serve his country at a much higher level.

But he enlisted in the Navy at the peak of his career, missing those four seasons, serving in World War II, served as an anti-aircraft gunner on the USS Alabama.

He earned five campaign ribbons and eight battle stars. Oh, yes, he played on eight All-Star teams as well. As a major leaguer, he took the Cleveland Indians to two World Series, in 1948 and 1954. I remember in the Kucinich household the World Series pennants from 1948, and I remember how proud we were of the fact that Bob Feller and then what was known as the Big Four of our pitchers helped to guide the Indians' fortunes for quite a few years.

We have such pride in our community and in baseball's link to the tradition of Cleveland, and Bob Feller has been an important part of that. He was elected to baseball's Hall of Fame in January of 1962 and inducted in July of the same year. As we know, he spent his entire career with the Cleveland Indians, from 1936 to 1956.

He pitched three no-hitters. And the first, as has been recounted, pitched on an opening day. Pitched his second no-hitter in 1946, and his third in 1951. He also pitched 12 one-hitters. Think about it: 12 one-hit games. And he won more than 20 or more games in a season six times.

Cleveland's Bob Feller, also known as Rapid Robert, amassed 226 wins and 2,581 strikeouts; led the league in strikeouts seven times during his career; voted the Cleveland Indians' Man of the Year twice.

Well, he is always going to be our baseball man of the year because he is someone who if you go outside of the Cleveland stadium, you will see a monument to Bob Feller. It shows him basically rearing back, ready to throw that fastball that always went over 90 miles an hour.

And it shows him in that perfect form of his youth, immortalized as the great pitcher. It also shows him as someone who carried with him the hopes and dreams of a community during times that were often very difficult. We love you, Bob Feller, and we love the fact that our Congress is recognizing not only what you have done for Cleveland, Ohio, but what you did for major league baseball and what you did for the morale of our country. Thanks, Rapid Robert.

This is really about fairness. It is about values.

I rise in strong support of Congressman Miller's motion to instruct. I commend my colleague, Mr. Miller, for his leadership in working to ensure that pension reform puts workers first.

This motion to instruct highlights a number of important provisions that

make clear the priority of our efforts. It must be workers. Pensions are not just investments to workers. To a worker, his or her pension is the centerpiece of economic security.

The promise of that pension becomes more precious as workers move closer to their own retirement. It is imperative that our efforts protect older workers. This motion to instruct recognizes that conversions from traditional defined benefit plans to cash balance plans harm older workers. Providing transition protections for older workers should not be a choice for employers but a requirement. Hardworking employees should not be rewarded for their service with a denial of pension benefits. I urge my colleagues to help ensure that older workers' pensions are protected.

This motion to instruct also highlights the importance of equity between workers and executives. Under the pension reform bill passed by this House, a pension plan that is less than 80 percent funded would not be allowed to increase benefits or establish new benefits for its workers regardless of the reason for the underfunding. But while worker pensions are held stagnant, executive benefits remain unrestricted until the plan is less than 60 percent funded. Patently unfair to workers. Pension plans are administered and funded by companies, not the workers. Workers should not be punished for faulty management of plans.

The past decade is littered with examples of increasing executive pay and pensions while worker pension plans were underfunded or even terminated. In 2002, U.S. Airways' CEO received a lump sum pension of $15 million. Six months following that executive payout, U.S. Airways filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. One eventual outcome of the bankruptcy was the termination of the pilots' pension plan. The CEO, $15 million; the pilots . . .

Stories with a similar theme can be shared about United Airlines and Delta. Executives receive a protected pension benefit or extra stock options, while workers are left with terminated pension plans and a cut in benefits. Although this motion to instruct will not restore the pensions of those workers already harmed by executive abuse, it will make a difference to many others.

Pension plans do not belong to companies. They belong to workers. They are the workers' money and the workers' future. Pensions are the property of the workers, and as such, we have a duty to ensure that workers' pensions are protected from practices which threaten our security.

I urge my colleagues to support the Miller motion to instruct. I urge my colleagues to remember that there are millions of Americans out there who are looking to this moment to decide whether we are going to stand up for working men and women or we are going to turn them aside in order to slaver over the economic advantage that is granted to their executives.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in honor and remembrance of Mr. John Henry Lenear, dedicated husband, father, grandfather and friend, whose brilliant legacy as a journalist has served to elevate the lives of all who knew him and his work.

Mr. Lenear's convictions, framed by integrity and wisdom, consistently graced the pages of Cleveland's oldest and Ohio's most respected African-American newspaper, the Call & Post. During his decades-long career as a newspaperman, his unwavering focus and commitment to our African-American community's struggle for civil rights and equal opportunity for all helped shape public policy throughout the State of Ohio.

As an objective and conscientious journalist, Mr. Lenear developed strong ties with local, county, State and Federal government officials. Mr. Lenear's sense of compassion for those in need reflected in his numerous volunteer efforts and leadership, which included providing tangible assistance through neighborhood programs designed to help pave a way for individuals to rise above the cycle of poverty and despair.

Mr. Speaker and colleagues, please join me in honor and remembrance of Mr. John Henry Lenear, whose life and legacy served to bring critical issues into the rational light of day and whose deep sense of humanity will continue on in raising our own individual and collective humanity. I offer my deepest condolences to his entire family and to his many friends. John Henry Lenear lived his life with energy and joy, and the memories of his affable nature and kind heart will forever light the hearts of all who knew and loved him well, and will forever shine throughout Cleveland, OH and far beyond.

Mr. Speaker, how is it that even with the constant moral and financial support of our Nation, our friend and ally, Israel, is still not safe and secure. If we insist upon the security and survival of Israel, and we must, then we must also insist upon the security and survival of the Palestinians and the Lebanese.

We say we will never negotiate with those who have sworn to destroy us or our allies, but history shows us that every conflict was resolved by doing exactly that. We prepare for war so grandly; let us prepare for peace grandly by looking fearlessly and deep into the hearts of those who wish us harm, and find that spark of recognition that connects us to a common humanity and from that draw a flicker of hope to enkindle the warm glow of peace.

After 9/11, we asked, Why do they hate us? Isn't it time for us to ask, Why do we hate them?

Do we think about what hate does to our own hearts? Isn't it time to put on the invincible armor of human compassion to explore human relations as the science of the human heart, in which we always have the capacity through courage, communication, patience and understanding to turn hate into love, and to beat our swords into plowshares.

Madam Speaker, the Book of Ecclesiastes says there is a time for war and a time for peace. This is the time for peace.

Now is the time to stop the disintegration into a worldwide conflict. Now is the time to show the world that the United States is strong enough to be a leader in peace, not war. Now is the time to call for an immediate cessation of violence in the Middle East. Now is the time to commit the United States diplomats to multiparty negotiations with no preconditions. Now is the time to reaffirm our support for Israel by showing leadership and diplomacy.

Unilateralism breeds unilateralism. And then the awful dialectic of conflict moves as a force beyond our control and takes its deadly toll. One hundred civilians a day are being killed in Iraq. Things are spinning out of control. The war on terror has become a war of errors. We must bring a halt to this march of folly.

Communication is the controlling factor. Diplomacy is the controlling factor.

There is a time for war and a time for peace. This is the time for peace.