Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to bring this bill to the floor today. In my home state of Colorado, outdoor activities such as skiing, snowboarding, mountain biking, and hiking are part of our everyday lives. These activities often occur in our fantastic ski areas--many of which are located on public lands.

The Ski Area Recreational Opportunity Enhancement Act of 2011 clarifies the authority of the Forest Service to permit appropriate summer or year-round activities for ski areas. My bill will expand access to outdoor recreation, providing more opportunities for families to spend time outdoors. In the 2010/2011 ski season, there were over 60 million skier/snowboarder visits to American ski areas with nearly 21 million visits in the Rocky Mountain region. Providing summer recreation opportunities at already developed ski areas means winter guests will be more likely to return to their favorite spots at other times of the year. It will also provide substantial benefits to our local economies, and help create stable, year-round jobs in the thirteen states that are currently home to ski resorts on public land. The Outdoor Industry Association estimates active outdoor recreation, including activities at ski areas, contributes $730 billion to the U.S. economy annually.

Furthermore, the act makes a commonsense change to the Ski Area Permit Act by expanding permitted activities to include snow sports such as snowboarding. Snowboarding now accounts for roughly 1/3 of all ski area

visits, and the law should reflect the reality of current winter activities.

I am proud to bring this bill to the floor today with broad bi- partisan support. We have worked closely with the Forest Service to develop a piece of legislation that is amenable to all affected parties, and I urge my colleagues to support this sensible piece of legislation.

Mr. Chairman, for too long too many people in this body have proposed that we must make what amounts to a devil's bargain: choosing between environmental protections and jobs. Today, the ideology behind that false choice brings us to the brink of gutting one of our Nation's fundamental laws, the Clean Air Act.

Mr. Chairman, the Clean Air Act has safeguarded our economy and our families' health for decades. And despite heated rhetoric from the other side, it does not stand in the way of creating jobs. In 2010 alone, the Clean Air Act prevented 160,000 premature deaths, 3 million lost school days, and 13 million lost workdays.

By 2020, the Clean Air Act's total benefit to the economy will reach $2 trillion, outweighing the costs by 30-1. But despite the actual numbers, today we find ourselves debating a full attack on clean air-- through the TRAIN Act--which would represent an unprecedented upheaval of our long-held pollution standards.

Now, Mr. Chairman, we had a 3-hour hearing in my committee, the Oversight Subcommittee, today talking about the alleged job loss that the majority claims would happen. I heard no--repeat no--evidence that these rules would cause a job loss. In fact, the evidence put into the record at the hearing showed that these regulations will create jobs at the same time they are preserving our citizens' health.

A key amendment to this act, which will be introduced later by Mr. Whitfield and which was accepted during the committee markup, is a dangerous measure that would indefinitely block two major Clean Air Act regulations. First, the Utility MACT rule, reducing mercury and other toxic emissions from power plants, and also the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, reducing sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants. Both of these rules are being developed after extensive cost benefit analyses.

Together, the two rules would prevent more than 50,000 premature deaths per year across the country. Now why would we delay implementation of the rules based solely on letters from constituents and anecdotal evidence? In fact, these two critical federal regulations correspond to successful pollution regulations in my home State of Colorado that are already bringing positive results for our State.

Now everybody in this Chamber knows the natural beauty of Colorado is a treasure for everyone to enjoy. People move there because of the clean air and safe water. It is also a primary driver in our economy through natural resources development and tourism. But because of mercury emissions from power plants, cement kilns, refineries, and commercial boilers, about 20 percent of our pristine lakes and reservoirs contain mercury-tainted fish, including in our alpine areas.

To combat that, Colorado has adopted some of the most stringent mercury rules in the country, with regulations on the books to cut mercury emissions by 80 percent by 2012 and 90 percent by 2018. These State regulations have been implemented successfully and to our collective economic benefit--a federal overlay to such regulations would bring the benefits that we have in States like Colorado to the entire Nation.

Colorado also has been a leader in cutting sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions to our economic and environmental benefit. While some States had a tough time designing haze-reduction plans in response to the Bush administration's now-defunct Clean Air Interstate Rule, Colorado didn't wait. We knew that we could clean up our power plants and also the power the economy.

So in 2010, Colorado enacted the Clean Energy Clean Jobs Act. The law calls for utilities to reduce haze-causing emissions of sulfur dioxide by about 80 percent and nitrogen oxide by about 85 percent. As a result, Colorado's largest utility, Xcel Energy, is on track to shutter four coal-powered plants, three in Denver, and replace that generation with natural gas-powered units. It will also install emissions controls for another 951 megawatts of coal-fired electrical generation. And, Mr. Chairman, Xcel expects that these improvements will only increase rates by 2 percent annually over the next 10 years.

Colorado's successful experience with these types of regulations stands as even further proof that effective and efficient regulations to protect our air and water bring ever growing benefits to our Nation. And blocking these regulations is a dangerous game where America's families will pay the price.

Mr. Chairman, the provisions of these amendments will fundamentally rewrite our approaches to the Clean Air Act regulations that have been the gold standard of our environmental laws since 1990.

I urge rejection of the amendments, and I urge rejection of this bill.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I want to thank all of the wonderful pages who are in the back of the room. You have really seen history the last 6 weeks in this Congress, and we are so honored and proud to have all of you here with us.

And this may not be my place, but we all want to welcome back our wonderful colleague Congresswoman Giffords here.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Well, here we are again, forced to stand up again to protecting women's health care against an extreme agenda. I disagree with the whole underlying bill, Mr. Chairman, but even so, even so, how one could tie restricting a woman's right to choose to graduate medical education is sort of beyond me.

Let me explain why this is just an extreme and direct attack on women's health.

What it would mean is that across the country residents would be barred from learning how to perform even a basic medical procedure required for women's health. This amendment would jeopardize both education and women's health care by obliterating funding for a necessary full range of medical training by health care professionals.

And here's the thing. The Hyde amendment is the law of the land right now. I don't like the Hyde amendment. I would repeal the Hyde amendment. But frankly, the Hyde amendment has been in place for over 30 years, and it's not going away. And what it says is no Federal funds shall be used for abortions except in the case of rape, incest, or the life of the mother.

Now, there is nothing in the Hyde amendment about restricting medical doctors' training to legal medical procedures. There's nothing about graduate medical education in the Hyde amendment whatsoever. And if we pass this amendment, we will not allow basic medical training that would even allow doctors to provide the procedures that are allowed under the Hyde amendment--life, rape, or incest.

And let me talk about why this is so incredibly dangerous for women's health.

Ensuring that doctors and nurses are fully trained in abortion procedures is essential to ensuring that they can be providing lifesaving care when abortion is a medically necessary procedure to save the life of a pregnant woman.

Now, most pregnancies, thank goodness, progress safely. But sometimes there's an emergency. And sometimes a medical abortion is necessary to protect a woman's health or life. For example, Mr. Chairman, in cases of preeclampsia, hemorrhage, and severe pulmonary hypertension, or bleeding placenta previa, which can be fatal if left untreated, an abortion is a life-saving procedure. In addition, in managing a miscarriage, sometimes an abortion procedure is essential to saving the woman's life.

Now, under this amendment, virtually any type of health care facility could face the loss of funding if they needed to provide abortion care in an emergency situation. And moreover, Mr. Chairman, residents need to be trained in how to handle these very complicated conditions that could necessitate an abortion.

I'm afraid to say these examples are tragically real. The case involving a woman experiencing severe hypertension that threatened her life at St. Joseph's Hospital made the news when a nun, Sister McBride, was excommunicated last year for allowing the woman's life to be saved through an abortion.

The Foxx amendment would also greatly expand the reasons why health care entities should give in to refusing care.

So, Mr. Chairman, here's the thing. Maybe we don't like abortions, and all of us wish abortions would be rare. But sadly, even in the case of a wanted child with a loving home and everything else, even in the case of an exception under the Hyde amendment, sometimes abortions are necessary. And if we say we are not going to train doctors how to provide a range of women's health care services, then we are basically allowing women to bleed to death in the emergency rooms of this country. And I don't think that's what this Congress is about. It is certainly not what the medical profession is about.

I would urge just for reasons of mercy for this House to reject this amendment. It's mean-spirited and it's far, far beyond current law.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this extreme legislation, and I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).

I am now pleased to yield 1 minute to a senior member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Engel).

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, in sitting and listening to this debate, it would be extremely easy to become completely confused. The proponents of this bill keep repeating the same mantra. They want to stop the Federal funding of abortion. They forget to mention that there is no Federal funding of abortion.

What they want to do for the first time is to expand restrictions on funding into tax policy. Right now, under current law, we have the Hyde Amendment, which every year prevents Federal funds from being used for abortion except in the cases of rape, incest or in saving the life of the mother. I don't like the Hyde Amendment. Lots of people don't like the Hyde Amendment, but it's the law. This bill, however, goes far beyond current law. Now my colleagues across the aisle want to expand these restrictions and make sure that individuals and businesses can't get complete women's health care in their health insurance, with their own money, without paying for a tax increase. Businesses, which right now get tax relief for having full health insurance, would not be able to get it.

Let me say this again: At a time when everybody in this House and certainly when everybody on the other side of the aisle is saying we can't raise taxes, the leadership of this House is supporting raising taxes to advance a social policy.

I don't think, Madam Speaker, that this was in the Republican Pledge to America. I don't know how many times the Republican leadership is going to make this Congress vote to strip American women of their access to health care with their own money. I, for one, would like to encourage them to spend their time getting our country back to work rather than on an extreme agenda that the American people didn't ask for, didn't want, and that is going nowhere in the U.S. Senate but, if it did, would be vetoed by the President of the United States.

I urge the Members to vote ``no'' on this ill-conceived piece of legislation.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I don't know how many times this Republican leadership is going to make the House take the same vote again and again to deny women the basic health care they need. But repeating these votes just exposes the extreme agenda that the American people didn't ask for and that they don't want.

Continuing to debate defunding women's health care clinics like Planned Parenthood is not getting less offensive; it's getting more offensive every day. And the American public won't stand for this extreme agenda.

Not one Federal dollar goes to fund abortions--not by Planned Parenthood, not by anybody.

The last speaker was just plain wrong when he said this resolution would not reduce money for women's health. It would cut millions of dollars for women's health.

Let me tell you about a young woman from my district in Denver, Colorado. She hasn't ever had health insurance, but she took responsibility for her own health care, and she had her first annual exam and Pap smear at Planned Parenthood when she was 18 years old. Now she's pregnant and she depends on Planned Parenthood for her prenatal care so she and her baby can be healthy. Planned Parenthood is the only health care provider that she's ever had.

Vote ``no'' on this extreme resolution.

Mr. Chairman, I am frankly stunned to have to come to the House floor today to talk about a bill that defunds the largest investment we have ever made in our population's health: the prevention and public health trust fund. The trust fund specifically says what it is going to be used for: reducing tobacco use, expanding opportunities for recreation and exercise, bringing healthier foods like fruit and vegetables to communities in need; and helping kids to eat healthier meals at school.

All of us who have been involved in health issues for many years know that the biggest public health epidemic that we have right now is obesity. If we don't do anything to reverse these trends, then for our children and our children's children, we are not going to have good outcomes. Seventy-five percent of all health care costs are spent on the treatment of chronic diseases, many of them preventable. Our Nation's youth are confronting unprecedented levels of obesity, placing them at ever-increasing risk for those very same chronic health conditions. I think it is pathetic that we have children in this country who only have access to playgrounds at McDonald's with their 8,000 playgrounds in this country. And so what this trust fund does is it supports research that examines evidence-based practices relating to prevention, including the translation of interventions from academic settings to real-world settings.

This is not, as the opponents of this trust fund say, a slush fund or something that is simply willy-nilly spending. Instead what it is, it's evidence-based and it's looking at ways that we can prevent childhood obesity and nutrition, reduce tobacco use, and expand opportunities for recreation and exercise.

This is something all of us can get behind. This is something we should all support. I am sorry that it has become caught up in this partisan web, because frankly we should all support this for our kids.

I thank the ranking member for allowing me to close.

This amendment gives Members of the House what should be a very simple choice: recognize the overwhelming science or vote to deny the overwhelming science.

We in Congress can certainly change the laws of this country, but last I heard we cannot change the laws of nature. There is no serious disagreement on the science of climate change. In fact, the findings have been confirmed by all leading scientific academies around the world. The National Academy of Sciences last year issued a series of comprehensive reports that are unambiguous. It says, for example, ``Climate change is occurring. It is caused largely by human activities, and in many cases it is already affecting a broad range of human and natural systems.'' And even a team of scientists from UC Berkeley, who were

told to try to disprove global climate change, just reported last week to a congressional committee that in fact global climate change is occurring.

This is simple. This is clear. H.R. 910 represents an effort to deny and run away from science and reality. It ignores one of the chief drivers behind our need for a clean and modernized energy policy: massive and growing human consumption of carbon-based fuels.

Last Congress, and again today, I chose to be on the side of those who acted to address a climate disaster and put into place the framework for an energy policy which this country so painfully goes without and so little can afford. I urge my colleagues to do the same.

Vote ``yes'' on this amendment. Vote ``no'' on the underlying bill and stand with science.

Mr. Speaker I rise today to express the voices of the hundreds of people flooding my offices with calls and emails to plead for us to do the right thing and vote down this misguided legislation.

H.R. 1076 would cripple the public radio system in this country that currently provides vital news and information to over 27 million Americans each week.

I would first like to set the record straight--this bill will not save a single taxpayer dollar. Not one. And it will not reduce our federal deficit by one dime. Not one.

My colleague from Colorado and his leadership have tried to portray this bill as a savings to taxpayers--and with all due respect, that is simply untrue.

This bill is no more than a punitive measure reflecting an extreme agenda.

It would devastate 900 public radio stations across the country unfairly targeting smaller stations in rural and regional areas where there are fewer news outlets and where broadband is insufficient.

The bill threatens almost 9,000 jobs in the broadcasting community and, frankly is an unwarranted attack on the content of public radio.

And the ultimate agenda of my Republican colleagues is laid bare when one considers that the Leadership rushed this bill through, ignoring promises to take legislation through regular order, and in short, breaking all their own professed rules to get this legislation to the Floor.

Mr. Speaker, we've now been in session for 11 weeks, and the Republican leadership has not yet introduced a single bill to create jobs.

They've instead focused on advancing an extreme agenda that does nothing to get Americans back to work.

And today, rather than coming together to create jobs for the American people and address the fiscal situation squarely before us, we are spending our time debating and voting on a bill that is nothing more than social commentary in action to impugn one of our nation's most vital news sources.

When we began our session, we all proudly read from the Constitution, and in that process were reminded of our core values as a nation and a government.

One of those values is reflected in the First Amendment which supports the ability of Americans to access news and information through a free press.

Sadly Mr. Speaker, this bill would ultimately limit vital news coverage millions of Americans so desperately need.

So I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this damaging and unwarranted bill.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Offered By: Ms. DeGette

Amendment No. 505: On page 287, lines 17 through 20, strike

paragraph (2) (prohibiting the availability of funds for the

program under title X of the Public Health Service Act) and

redesignate paragraph (3) as paragraph (2).

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the extraordinary life and exceptional accomplishments of Mr. Charlie Burrell, known internationally as ``the Jackie Robinson of classical music'' and the ``titan of the classical and jazz bass,'' on the occasion of the celebration of his 90th birthday.

Charlie was born in Toledo, Ohio, in 1922, and raised in Detroit, Michigan. An acclaimed contrabass player, he was one of the first African-American musicians to break the color barrier of a major U.S. symphony. Honored by the Alphonse Robinson African-American Music Association for his invaluable contributions, he has received accolades from his colleagues for having opened the door for other African- American musicians by demonstrating that they did not have to be relegated to stereotypical musical styles.

Charlie began the pursuit of a musical career at an early age at the encouragement of his mother. A chance hearing of a performance of the San Francisco Symphony led to his desire to become the first African- American musician to perform with the company--a dream he would realize twenty-eight years later.

Although a dedicated student of classical music, Charlie and his friends embraced jazz music and practiced it whenever possible. At seventeen, Charlie was even asked to join the Lionel Hampton Big Band, affording him the opportunity to travel the country with some of the jazz greats of the time. Upon graduation from Cass Technical High School in Detroit, then one of the most prestigious music schools in the nation, Charlie saw his classmates move directly into professional symphonies, while he was unable to because of the color of his skin. But that never deterred his resolve to play.

In 1941, he attended the New England Conservatory of Music and then joined the Navy where he was stationed at the Great Lakes Naval Base outside Chicago. There, he was selected to join the first-ever all- Black Navy band, a recruiting device the Navy developed to encourage African-American enlistment. Following his honorable discharge from the Navy, he attended Wayne State University with an eye towards teaching music in the public schools. At the time of his graduation, he once again faced the challenge of discrimination when was told by the administrator of music for the Detroit School System there would be no African-American music teachers in their schools.

But Charlie continued to pursue his dreams. After he was turned down for auditions with four different companies, he moved to Denver, Colorado, where he worked at Fitzsimons Army Hospital and enrolled in the University of Denver to earn his teaching certificate. He later taught for the Denver Public Schools. A chance meeting with John VanBuskirk, the lead bass player with the Denver Symphony, led to an audition with the company. Charlie broke through the color barrier of the time to become the first African-American musician to join the Denver Symphony Orchestra.

And in 1959, realizing his childhood dream, Charlie Burrell went on to become the first African-American musician to ever play in the San Francisco Symphony. During his five-and-a-half year stay in San Francisco, he also became the first African-American to play with the San Francisco Opera and the San Francisco Ballet orchestras, and the first African-American professor at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Upon arriving back in Denver, he was hired again by the Denver Symphony Orchestra where he performed for more than thirty years. Whenever top jazz musicians performed in Denver, Charlie was often called on to play with them.

During his lifetime Charlie has mentored and performed with many musicians. He has played with nearly all of the great names in the jazz world: jazz bass great Milt Hinton; jazz stride pianist Fats Waller; Lionel Hampton; jazz trumpeter Clark Terry; bassist Major Holley; and jazz trombonist Al Grey. One of his favorite vocalists was the late Billie Holliday. He is especially proud of his cousin, the renowned pianist George Duke, and his two-time Grammy award-winning niece, jazz vocalist Dianne Reeves, both of whom he taught and mentored.

On a personal note, Charlie played bass in a jazz trio founded by my uncle Al Rose. The Al Rose Trio became the first racially integrated jazz group in Denver, and when my uncle passed, Charlie asked me if he could be my Honorary Uncle--which he is to this day.

Retired from the Denver Symphony Orchestra since 1999, Charlie continues to be an active member of the community, on occasion playing his bass with his Cousin Purnell Steen's swing quartet. A comment he made during a PBS ``Special Jazz in Five Points'' broadcast best sums up his life, ``Music is my great love affair, and, in fact, it is my first, and always has been, my first.''

Charlie has been and continues to be an inspiration to musicians young and old all across our country, but we in Denver are incredibly blessed and proud to call him one of our own. I join all my constituents in wishing Charlie a very happy birthday and congratulating him for his lifetime of achievement.

I yield myself 5 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, Congress needs to get going. We were sworn in over a month ago now, when the highest priority in this country, everybody agrees, is creating jobs. And, frankly, with unemployment still hovering around 9 percent, we have no time to waste dithering around arguing about what we should do.

This resolution does not do one thing to create one job. So, once again, what are we doing? We're standing on the House floor debating for 9\1/2\ hours, wasting the American people's time, which is time we could be using to sit down on a bipartisan basis and bring jobs, investment, and growth to this country. What we're doing here is time- consuming, but it really means nothing in the end. It's a resolution. It's a resolution that directs certain standing committees to look at regulations and to decide if they think that it has some impact on jobs. It lists a number of matters for consideration. It gives no deadline by which the committees have to investigate these issues. It gives no standards for the various matters for consideration, including impede private sector job creation, et cetera. So you can bet we'll have long debates over each one of those criteria.

But, then, what is most unbelievable about this resolution, it really doesn't say what we should do about it. Let's say all the committees meet month after month determining day after day, hearing after hearing that there's some impeding on business. Then what do they do? And that's what's so frustrating, because the American people don't want more review, inventory, or compilation of regulations. They want their families to have jobs. And so that's why we really need to sit down and talk about how will we create jobs.

This resolution won't save one home from foreclosure, it won't help repair one crumbling bridge or potholed road, it won't extend a mile of broadband. It wouldn't ensure one school lunch for our children or provide a patient greater access to hospitals or doctors. It won't do any of that.

What's worse, Mr. Speaker, is that, as we take this debate on today, we need to remember the committees are already bound by the rules of the House to provide proper oversight. We don't need 2 days to debate a resolution that tells the committees what they already have a constitutional duty to do.

Frankly, I am concerned, too, because there is nothing this Congress has done today to give us any indication that the majority intends to spend any time creating jobs. We had 7 hours of debate on a bill to repeal health care, which everybody knows is not going anywhere in the other body and which doesn't create one job. This week, today--it's Thursday--we passed exactly one piece of legislation, and we are done voting for the day.

While this resolution does nothing to create jobs and nothing, frankly, to make Congress expeditiously use its already existing regulatory oversight, at the same time it neglects the fact that laws and regulations can be important to protect our constituents' health.

For example, when we had insufficient laws and regulations to deal with outbreaks of foodborne illness, we acted on a bipartisan basis to reduce 76 million foodborne illnesses, 300,000 hospitalizations, and 5,000 deaths a year in the United States. This type of regulation and oversight is important. It keeps Americans safe. It reduces the cost to our economy, and it ultimately helps save jobs. There are billions of dollars of lost productivity for workers, damage to our economy, and lost profits due to foodborne illnesses, which this Congress acted on a bipartisan basis to reduce.

Mr. Speaker, I've also introduced legislation to foster the development of a clear and predictable regulatory pathway that enables better approval of safe and effective products and the support of regulatory research to promote the understanding of regenerative medicine. These types of regulatory initiatives can actually help create jobs in the future and are a critical part of our work in this body.

I yield myself 1 additional minute.

Look, there is nobody on either side of this aisle who thinks we should have an unnecessary or overly burdensome regulation, but that's not what this is about. We have a long history of regulatory review, and we can do that without spending 9 hours debating a resolution like this. A few hours ago, we all stood here and read the Constitution aloud together. I am sure everybody remembers that the authority for committees in this Congress to review and inventory regulations is already provided.

So I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that what we do is bring this debate to an end, that we focus on the regulations that we can repeal, and that we really focus on what the American people want us to talk about, which is creating jobs for the American public.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone).

Mr. Speaker, I would just say that in this hearing with Professor Sunstein, the evidence was that the regulations that came out in the first 2 years of the Obama administration were less than the regulations that came out in the last 2 years of the Bush administration.

With that, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee).

(Mr. INSLEE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I reserve the balance of my time.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. McNerney).

Mr. Speaker, I would like to inquire if the gentleman has any further requests for time.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, it has now been 36 days since we were sworn in in the 112th Congress. Yet, in the Energy and Commerce Committee, which I know Mr. Shimkus and I will both agree is the most illustrious and powerful committee in the U.S. House of Representatives, the committee with broad-ranging jurisdiction, everything from energy policy to food safety to health care, even to national league sports, we have not passed one legislative bill in those 36 days. We haven't passed one bill to repeal an onerous regulation. We haven't passed one bill to create one new job.

In fact, the first subcommittee markup in the Energy and Commerce Committee is tomorrow. This markup is of an extreme bill which will restrict a woman's right to choose. This is a divisive bill that has nothing to do with repealing one onerous regulation, and, in fact, it doesn't create one job, except maybe a job for lawyers who, if this actually became law, would have a field day litigating the legislation.

Look, Mr. Speaker, we all agree that if there are burdensome regulations, they should be repealed. But let's not let this discussion devolve into a partisan debate under the guise of regulatory reform.

So we know our colleagues on the other side of the aisle don't like the new EPA greenhouse gas regulations. We know that they don't like the new health care bill. But just because those bills have been passed and are being implemented does not mean that the regulations, per se, cause a loss of jobs.

So what I would suggest the American people would like us to see, what they told us in the election, what they've told us since the election, what all of my constituents told me when I was home last week is, when are you going to stop the partisan bickering? When are you going to create jobs?

I believe that if my colleague from Illinois and I, and all of the rest of us got together, we could identify a number of regulations, regulations passed under Democratic and Republican administrations that are burdensome, that are outdated, and that we could repeal. But in the meantime, let's just call it what it is. Let's have the debate if we're going to have it. But let's not call it a debate about burdensome regulations. Let's create jobs.

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

Mr. Speaker, over and over today I've heard supporters of this bill saying it is just the first step, then maybe they'll think about fixing the bill. Well, tell that to the millions of Americans who are now reaping the benefits of the legislation, who, if this actually became law, would lose what they have only just now gained: Citizens whose children suffer from diabetes or asthma and have finally been able to get coverage; citizens like the small business owners I met with last fall in Denver who, because of the health reform law's tax credits, are finally able to get health insurance for their employees; and citizens like the next generation of our country's leaders, like my young neighbor who has type 1 diabetes and is going to college but knows he will have insurance and he can stay on his parents' insurance.

I keep hearing ``repeal and replace,'' but, frankly, Mr. Speaker, that's not what we're doing today. We're repealing these benefits that help millions of Americans and we are replacing them with nothing.

If the proponents of this bill really intended to cover these things, why didn't they just put the 10 pages that my colleague talked about in the bill? The reason is because, if you want to give benefits like this to millions of Americans, to young people, to women with gender disparity, and to small businesses, you have to have comprehensive reform.

We all know it. And that's why we need to resist this effort. We need to resist repealing this legislation. And we need to work together across the aisle to implement it in a way that helps every single American.