Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, as we lurch into another series of artificial crises surrounding budget sequestration, there is a bright spot this week. We will witness an amazing series of visits on Capitol Hill by members of the Garden Club of America. Celebrating their 100th year as a national organization established in 1913, there is no more awesome group of citizen lobbyists than these women from all across America.

I first encountered the women's garden club in the person of the late Nancy Russell, who was a member of the Portland Garden Club and a ferocious, tenacious advocate for the protection of the national treasure that is the Columbia River Gorge. Nancy's personal commitment, insight, drive and passion made it possible for politicians in both parties to enact historic unique legislation protecting the magnificent Columbia River Gorge and establishing a framework of protection for generations to come.

Nancy would marshal her argument with facts, was an expert at generating positive publicity, could turn on the charm, and if that didn't work, she could play hardball politics with the best of them. Imagine my surprise and delight in coming to Congress when I found that there were other advocates--although there will never be another Nancy Russell--there are other women from across America who had their own commitment, passion, zeal, focus and follow-through who were enriching their communities while they helped the national conservation discussion.

The Garden Club has a broad and ambitious agenda seeking to promote our open spaces, and zealous in their support for our threatened National Park System. They're strong advocates and protectors of the Land and Water Conservation Act and the LWCF funds that have so rarely been fully budgeted in the program's 50 years.

Now, global warming inspires heated rhetoric here on Capitol Hill. And while garden club members are deeply concerned about weather instability caused by climate change, they do so with a calm, clear, dispassionate view of the facts in a way that should inspire and encourage everybody here in Congress.

For years, they have advocated for a farm bill that was stronger in the areas

of nutrition, conservation, and environmental protection while saving money. They advocate harnessing the power of that farm bill to protect sustainable agriculture and the production of specialty crops--which most of America calls ``food''.

In the midst of some of the most bizarre accusations one will ever hear, theirs is a clarion call of rationality and wisdom for the ratification of the Treaty of the Sea that is languishing. Despite the support of the Bush, Clinton, and Obama administrations and an unprecedented coalition of business, industry, and educational leaders, the United States continues to be an outlier, to the detriment of our defense and commercial interests.

These are just a few of the areas that they concentrate on during their Washington visit. Most important, they connect what is happening at the local level with people who care about clean air, the beauty of the landscape and the treasures that enrich our souls, as well as the things that protect the environment for future generations. I strongly urge my colleagues to find time to visit with the Garden Club representatives from their State not just here in Washington, D.C., this week, but reach out to them at home and hear what they have to say. There will be no more productive meeting you will have with the inspiration that comes from listening to clear-headed, clear-eyed voices of wisdom and restraint. These meetings will stand out as an oasis in the war of words over our next round of manufactured crises.

Mr. Speaker, it is extraordinarily frustrating for me that we have spent all week avoiding opportunities to make progress on areas on which we agree to avoid or minimize the effects of the sequester meat axe and instead singled out, again, our federal employees.

Suffice it to say, making them a repeated target is unfair, unproductive, and avoids the hard decisions we should be tackling.

Mr. Speaker, today, along with a bipartisan group of cosponsors, I am introducing the States' Medical Marijuana Patient Protection Act, legislation that will allow medical marijuana patients and businesses--who are complying with state law--the ability to access and distribute marijuana free from federal interference.

Eighteen states and the District of Columbia have passed laws allowing for the use of medical marijuana for people suffering from conditions such as cancer and severe nausea. As a result there are now hundreds of thousands of medical marijuana patients nationwide. Despite these laws, at the federal level marijuana is currently listed as a Schedule I substance under the Controlled Substances Act, meaning that it is considered a substance with a ``high potential for abuse,'' with ``no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States.'' This means that the 19 jurisdictions that permit medical marijuana are operating in a patchwork of inconsistent local and federal laws.

These inconsistencies create significant challenges for both patients and the businesses working to provide access to medical marijuana. Because of federal tax and banking laws, marijuana businesses--despite operating in compliance with state or local law--are not allowed to deduct their legitimate business expenses and are often unable to make deposits or maintain bank accounts. Simultaneously, the federal government has continued to enforce federal law, and many medical marijuana facilities across the country have been raided by the Drug Enforcement Administration or otherwise targeted by the Department of Justice.

The federal government maintains a monopoly on access to marijuana for research, currently run by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). The mission of this Institute is to ``lead the Nation in bringing the power of science to bear on drug abuse and addiction,'' and many researchers have found it difficult to obtain marijuana for research into the potential therapeutic or medicinal effects of marijuana.

The States' Medical Marijuana Patient Protection Act would provide for the rescheduling of marijuana under the Controlled Substance Act to a listing other than Schedule I or II, which would mean the federal government recognizes an accepted medical use. It would also ensure that neither the Controlled Substances Act nor the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act would restrict individuals, doctors or businesses from consuming, recommending, producing, distributing or otherwise operating in marijuana in compliance with state or local laws. Finally, it would require that access to marijuana for research into its potential medicinal and therapeutic uses be overseen by an entity in the government not focused on researching the addictive properties of substances.

Nineteen jurisdictions have passed laws recognizing the importance of providing access to medical marijuana for the hundreds of thousands of patients who rely on it. It is time for the federal government to respect these decisions, and stop inhibiting safe access.

Mr. Speaker, part of the air of unreality in Washington is the myth of our inability to contend with budget reductions and the threat of sequestration in stabilizing America's financing. No doubt the draconian hand of across-the-board cuts in every program from food safety to border control to air traffic control would be foolish and destructive.

Let me be clear. The major problem in all of this is here in Congress and our political structure, which creates self-inflicted crises. Sequestration and the postal deficit are just two examples. We know what to do, but you would never know it because we spend most of our efforts around here describing and decrying the problems rather than doing something about them.

Let me repeat. The amount of budget reduction is something that can, in fact, be managed if only we change how America does business. Nowhere have the cries been more anguished than about the impact of sequestration on the Department of Defense, ironically, from many of the same people who insisted on the sequestration gimmick in the first place. As is widely recognized, sequestration over the next 10 years when applied to the Pentagon's budget would only reduce it in inflation-adjusted terms to what it was in 2007 when the most powerful military in the world was engaged in a war in Iraq and the challenge in Afghanistan.

If Members of Congress pay attention to the facts, they will see a clear path to dramatically reduce Pentagon spending without undermining America's position of being the most powerful Nation on the planet.

Nobody has done a better job of highlighting a path forward, an area of opportunity, than Walter Pincus, writing in the pages of The Washington Post over the course of the last couple of years as he details the sweep of our nuclear weapons program and the spending trajectory. This morning is his latest offering and should be required reading for every Member of Congress, and the ones who whine the loudest should be forced to read it twice. He details the vast array of nuclear weapons that are ready to be deployed within 30 minutes, a relic of our contending with the former Soviet Union, where deterrence was the order of the day and when we were relying on massive assured mutual destruction of that huge country with overwhelming force.

Now, not even the most delusional think we need a fraction of that firepower for today's threats, like North Korea, and it certainly wouldn't work against a nuclear weapon falling in the arms of some radical extremist. That, by the way, is most likely to happen with Pakistan's proven nuclear capability than Iran's, which is still being developed.

The cost of this overwhelming force, including its three delivery systems, ought to give people pause. Consider the 14 Ohio class submarines, each with 24 ICBMs and each missile armed with five warheads, each three times the explosive power of the bombs dropped on Japan. We've got 118 B-52 strategic bombers and, of course, all of the land-based missiles where people are in the silos, ready to launch at a moment's notice. It is, by any stretch of the imagination, extravagance that borders on lunacy.

The $80 billion the White House was forced to promise for the upgrades on the nuclear weapons complex and the at least $100 billion to replace the strategic delivery systems that were extracted in return for votes to pass the START treaty are obvious places to begin retrenchment. There are tens, if not hundreds, of billions of dollars to be saved over the next 10 years by refocusing our defense posture for the threats of today and the likely ones of tomorrow. Let's start cutting this massive Cold War deterrence based on the threat of nuclear weapons we've never been able to use, don't want to use, shouldn't use, and can't afford.

I invite my colleagues, especially those on the other side of the aisle, to join us in getting real and getting specific. There is a clear path forward that should command the support of Republicans and Democrats alike to achieve fiscal stability. Let's rein in outrageous crop insurance abuses. Don't fight health care reform--accelerate it. The work we're doing in Oregon, if applied nationally, could save up to $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years. Pay for the privilege of taking America's mineral wealth by reforming the Mining Act of 1872, and slash the fossilized nuclear weapons program.

Mr. Speaker, in the midst of budget turmoil, the upcoming debt ceiling limit, and looming sequestration cuts, I am introducing legislation that could save American taxpayers almost $40 billion over the next 5 years.

Right now, Americans are subsidizing some of the largest and most profitable companies in the world with their tax dollars. Taxpayers currently subsidize oil injection, extraction, exploration, drilling, injection, manufacturing, pricing, and inventory valuing, by offsetting foreign taxes, providing generous credits and deductions, and offering tax shelters.

The ``End Big Oil Tax Subsidies Act,'' would end 10 of the most egregious tax loopholes enjoyed by the oil industry--tax loopholes that have helped BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil and Shell make a combined profit of nearly $1 trillion over the past decade. The legislation is modeled on President Obama's proposal to eliminate oil and gas tax preferences in his FY 2013 Budget.

Extremely profitable, well-established, large corporations do not need enormous subsidies from the government and we simply cannot afford to let them continue. It is well established in a global petroleum market that this subsidy has zero impact on reducing prices for American consumers. Instead of padding the bottom of oil companies, this money could be better spent renewing and rebuilding our nation's infrastructure. It could be used to stave off some of the most draconian cuts that families will face this spring if Congress does not act on sequestration. Finally, the resources could be redirected to level the playing field for emerging technologies like wind and solar.

I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this important legislation.

Mr. Speaker, one of the few areas where Washington agrees with the general public is that our current path is not sustainable. It is not merely a case of spending too much or taxing too little, although we need to control spending and we must and will be raising revenue to meet the needs of an aging and growing population.

The key is to do business differently, to extract more value out of our programs. We need to have the courage to pivot, to do things better, to not follow the reflex of the usual economic and political groups fighting to continue to protect the status quo and the continuing trend lines.

In a world already impacted by climate change and global weather instability, these forces are going to intensify. One of the best examples of why we must change is how we deal with reengineering nature as a response to natural disasters.

I salute Governor Cuomo for the use of some of the Hurricane Sandy money from the Federal Government to move people out of harm's way, not just throw good money after bad by relocating and rebuilding in exactly the same way, in exactly the same place, where nature repeatedly shows that people are not wanted.

I was before the Rules Committee arguing for greater reform in the Federal spending, but the Governor is pointing in the right direction.

This week we are watching another chapter in the same drama play out in the lower Mississippi, where there is an argument to continue the self-defeating effort to fortify the Mississippi River, closing a gap in the levee, spending hundreds of millions of dollars to prevent an area in the flood plain from flooding every now and then.

The Federal Government has already made periodic flooding in that area as part of its relief valve, to take the excess water and avoid more flooding

elsewhere. Failing to allow nature to take its course invites a bigger disaster as more and more water is forced into the narrow fortified walls of the Mississippi.

Think about how we have shortened and narrowed that river. We haven't reduced the amount of water; we've just reduced the areas where it can go. It makes the inevitable flooding worse. Building a levee is simply going to move it a little further downstream.

The solution is to allow the river to go where nature wants it, not encourage farmers to cultivate even more land that will be vulnerable to crop loss, more disaster relief, more crop insurance loss, and to take away increasingly scarce wildlife habitat for the millions of Americans who would like to hunt and fish. Done right, this can be a virtuous cycle. It saves tax dollars, improves the environment, reduces the damage from flooding and all the attendant costs.

It is a classic example of where the Federal Government should learn from 200 years' experience of trying to engineer the Mississippi River and instead allow, in some cases, nature to take its course and avoid more expensive and worse damage.

This is what we need to do across the Federal Government. We don't have to spend twice as much money on health care as most of the developed countries for outcomes that are mediocre at best. We don't have to spend more money on defense than 12 or 13 of the remaining largest defense budgets and on weapons that in many cases, like our nuclear arsenal where we have far more than we need and can ever use and can afford, we can pare down, save tens of billions of dollars and still be the most powerful Nation in the world; or the outrageous crop insurance that encourages reckless and expensive behavior by paying farmers to plant crops on land that never should have been cultivated in the first place.

While we will control spending and increase revenues, the most important thing we can do is to change the way we do business, using common sense, proven technology, stretching our tax dollars, and making our communities more livable. We can start by not pressuring the Corps of Engineers to complete the levees, spending millions of dollars we don't have on a solution that will make the problem worse. Let's work, instead, to understand the impacts of global warming and extreme weather and then do something about it.

Mr. Speaker, due to a long-scheduled event, I was unable to be in Washington, DC for the votes that occurred on February 4, 2013. As a result, I missed the votes listed below. I regret missing these and had I been in Washington, DC, I would have voted as follows:

H.R. 297: Children's Hospital GME Support Reauthorization Act of 2013--I would have voted yes on H.R. 297. This critical legislation, to extend and reauthorize payments to children's hospitals so that they can continue to educate the next generation of doctors, is essential not just for my district, but the entire country. As we move forward with implementing the Affordable Care Act and expanding access to health services for millions of U.S. citizens, it's essential that we continue to grow our medical workforce by partnering with our local hospitals.

H.R. 225: National Pediatric Research Network Act of 2013--I would have voted yes on H.R. 225. This legislation furthers pediatric medical research by bringing together a spectrum of experts working to advance treatments and cures for our children. By using a consortium model, doctors and researchers will be fighting disease instead of with each other for scarce research dollars.

Mr. Speaker, today, I am pleased to introduce the Marijuana Tax Equity Act of 2013, legislation to create a federal excise tax on marijuana sales and move this industry out of the shadows and into the daylight. Just over 106 million people live in a state or local jurisdiction that has decided that some aspect of marijuana use should be legally permitted. Eighteen states and the District of Columbia currently allow for medical marijuana and two states, Colorado and Washington, recently legalized the recreational use of small amounts of marijuana.

National trends reflect those state efforts. More than 40 percent of Americans over the age of 12 have tried marijuana at least once and public opinion research reveals half of the U.S. population supports legalization. Yet even as states and local governments have taken the lead in finding legal arrangements for marijuana, millions of people have been caught in the justice system for marijuana offenses and more than 660,000 people were arrested for marijuana possession in 2011. At the same time, the federal government spends approximately $5.5 billion per year on incarceration and enforcement associated with federal marijuana laws.

In addition, many marijuana businesses around the country--despite operating in compliance with state or local law--are not allowed to deduct their legitimate business expenses and often are unable to make deposits or maintain accounts as a result of federal banking laws.

It is time for Congress to end the federal prohibition on marijuana, remove it from the Controlled Substances Act, and create a tax and regulatory framework, similar to the frameworks in place for alcohol and tobacco. This represents a unique opportunity to save ruined lives, wasted enforcement and prison costs, while simultaneously helping to create a new industry, with new jobs and revenues that will improve the federal budget outlook.

The Marijuana Tax Equity Act creates a taxation framework similar to that in place for the tobacco and alcohol industries. It imposes an excise tax of 50 percent on the first sale by a producer, generally the grower, to the next stage of production, generally the processor creating the useable product. Along the supply chain it requires occupational taxes for those operating marijuana businesses. Those who do not comply with the taxation laws face civil or criminal penalties similar to those in place for the tobacco industry. The bill requires the IRS to produce periodic studies of the industry and make recommendations to Congress.

As I work with my colleagues and with our stakeholders to move forward with this legislation, I emphasize that there remain significant questions and challenges. In particular, in the context of legislation, significant changes will ripple through the marijuana industry, with new products created, new business relationships developed, new consumer standards demanded, and wide variations in state and local laws. As this process evolves, we hope to work with the industry to ensure that the tax rate and framework appropriately reflects federal concerns and the needs of this developing industry. I am committed to ensuring that the legislation's terms are adequately tailored to reflect the realities faced by marijuana businesses and consumers in an ever-shifting market.

In addition, the medical marijuana industry has distinct concerns about safe access and those should be adequately addressed in the federal framework. Together with my colleagues, I look forward to continuing our efforts on ensuring safe access for patients within the context of an administrable tax and regulatory regime.

It is important to note that states will remain free to make decisions about marijuana policy. Paired with Representative Polis' ``Ending the Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act,'' this legislation establishes a starting point for laying out a federal regulatory and taxation framework for marijuana sales that are legal under state law.

Mr. Speaker, since I was a high school student, I've watched the escalation of the war on drugs, especially marijuana. I slowly became aware of its widespread use. As a freshman legislator in Oregon 40 years ago, my opinion was set by a hog farmer from eastern Oregon who was a State representative named Stafford Hansell.

Stafford held the Oregon House, and the people crowded into the gallery spellbound with his tutorial on marijuana and its comparison to other addictive substances, both legal and illegal. This older gentleman, who didn't smoke, didn't drink alcohol--let alone use marijuana--made his case. He pointed out how tobacco was highly addictive and killed hundreds of thousands of Americans per year. He discussed alcohol, whose damaging properties had once led the country into a foolish, costly and ultimately self-defeating experiment with prohibition. Alcohol use was damaging for some, led to dependency for many, while contributing to tens of thousands of highway deaths every year, and serious health problems for countless others.

By the time Representative Hansell got to marijuana, he'd convinced me that the bill he was advocating--two plant legalization--was not just worthy of my support, which I was already inclined to do, but something that I should advocate that Oregonians should be allowed this choice, less damaging and addicting than tobacco.

We didn't legalize marijuana in 1973, although I was assured that if the 22 of us who had voted for the bill had been supported by the people who used it but voted no, the measure would have passed easily. We did make Oregon the first State to decriminalize the use of marijuana. Possession of a small amount was made a minor infraction, treated like a traffic ticket. Today, 40 years later, the case is even more compelling. Fourteen States have now decriminalized policies like Oregon passed in 1973.

In 1996, California pioneered the legal use of medical marijuana whose therapeutic qualities have long been known and employed. And since then, 18 States and the District of Columbia have approved medical marijuana initiatives, allowing its use to relieve chronic pain, nausea, and other conditions. Notably, two-thirds of these approvals were a result of voter initiatives.

Last fall, voters in Colorado and Washington approved adult recreational use with 55 percent approval margins. Studies show that a majority of Americans now agree that marijuana should be legalized. It is time that the Federal Government revisit its policies. Drugs with less serious classifications, like methamphetamine and cocaine, have more serious health and behavioral impacts; yet marijuana retains its Schedule I classification.

In 2011, two-thirds of a million people were arrested for using a substance that millions use, many more have tried, and a majority of Americans feel should be legal. Because there are stark racial differences in enforcement and incarceration, there are wide disparities in the legal treatment for communities of color versus their white counterparts. Medical marijuana is

widely accepted but subject to inherent conflict with Federal law that is unfair, confusing and costly.

A bipartisan group of legislators is developing a comprehensive package of legislation to clarify and reform outdated, ineffective, and unwise Federal policies. In a time of great fiscal stress and a sea change in opinion of voters, this is a unique opportunity to save money on enforcement and incarceration, avoid unnecessary conflict and harsh treatment of users, provide a framework for medical marijuana, and even reduce the deficit--all by honoring the wish of two-thirds of Americans to respect states' rights for marijuana, just like we do for alcohol.

I would invite my colleagues to join this effort in developing a marijuana policy that makes sense for America today.

We continue to talk past one another. The issue isn't passing a budget or not passing a budget. The issue is whether or not we're going to take fundamental steps to reform the way that we spend money around here.

The Republican budget of my good friend, Mr. Ryan, that they've passed on a couple of occasions would have required 9 trillion dollars in additional debt ceiling increase and wouldn't be balanced for two decades.

Let's stop playing games with the form, and let's sit down and work on the things we agree upon. I think the American public would support us if we took out tens of billions of dollars of unnecessary spending for redundant nuclear weapons; to reform the scandal that is the crop insurance program that incents people to plant land that they shouldn't plant and drives up losses. Let's accelerate health care reform like we're doing in Oregon that would save over a trillion dollars if it were applied nationally.

Let's get down and do it. Act, don't debate.

It was exciting to hear the President make climate change a major focus of his inaugural address, and appropriately so. Mr. Obama's first term provided stark evidence of the peril to the planet: record-breaking heat waves, drought, hurricanes, forest fires, disappearing polar ice, all in accord with a prediction of the climate scientists, but the effects were happening faster and more severely than predicted.

The good news is that you don't have to believe the climate scientists to reduce carbon pollution and energy waste while reasserting American global energy leadership. Even balancing the budget could be made easier with this initiative.

Congress and the administration should begin serious conversation about a broad-based carbon tax. This would give the right signals on energy sources and use. It could raise money to reduce the deficit, restore our badly damaged infrastructure, speed and finance conservation while cushioning the impact on lower-income families and small business.

There are a number of other commonsense steps that would make progress on carbon pollution and energy conservation goals much more significant. First, the EPA should stop dragging its feet, permitting old, polluting, inefficient coal plants to continue to spew forth toxic waste harming not just the environment but the health of our citizens. It's past time that the Clean Air Act should be enforced. We should make sure there are proper safeguards for the fracking technology for gas and petroleum and making sure this vast reservoir of inexpensive gas does not undercut the critical addition of renewables to our energy portfolio: solar, wind, geothermal, perhaps even tidal energy.

We need global leadership on these technologies for a balanced energy portfolio and, ultimately, to reduce our carbon footprint. At each step, we should be looking to enhance energy conservation, because the cheapest kilowatt hour is one that you don't have to generate and use.

We should have a 10-year glide path in our support of renewable energy. The wind energy industry has already signaled receptivity to phasing out its subsidy, just giving it enough time to come to scale and then stand on its own. It's such a good idea, we should do the same thing for the petroleum industry. After 100 years, the most profitable commodity on the planet is mature and will be able to survive and even thrive without additional tax incentives.

Finally, and most important, we should have the Federal Government lead by example. The Department of Energy's management of four large power marketing agencies should be the gold standard for integrating renewables into the grid, upgrading transmission capacity, and leading on conservation. The GSA, with over 300 million square feet of Federal office space should demand that all our facilities, every square foot we lease, buy, or build, should be of the highest energy efficiency.

The Federal fleet should be on the cutting edge of fuel efficiency standards.

Finally, the Department of Defense, the largest consumer of energy in the world, needs to redouble its efforts. The Pentagon is already moving in the right direction. But it's not just about saving money in the long term; it's providing operational flexibility and reducing vulnerability from inefficient and dangerous fossil fuels. Those fuel tanker trucks in Afghanistan and Iraq might as well have had great big bull's eyes on them for terrorists. The military knows this, and we should give maximum support even in a time of gradually reducing Pentagon budgets. This will pay dividends for defense and to our family's budget if the Pentagon gets it right.

It's clear that America is ready and equal to this challenge. The President has signaled his interest and leadership. The question is whether Congress is equal to the challenge, ready with innovation, cooperation, and leadership.

Mr. Speaker, due to a family emergency, I was unable to be in Washington, D.C. for the votes that occurred on January 3, 2013 and January 4, 2013 and was not sworn in as a Member of Congress until January 14, 2013. As a result, I missed the votes listed below. I regret missing these votes but it was necessary to be in Portland

for my family. Had I been in Washington, D.C., I would have voted as follows:

H. Resolution 5: A resolution providing for the House Rules of the

113th Congress

I would have voted no on H. Res, 5. The House Rules package maintains the House of Representative's discriminatory stance on the Defense of Marriage Act, which I have opposed, restricts the District of Columbia's electoral representation, prohibits the House of Representatives from acting on health care recommendations from a nonpartisan scientific panel, and supports the partisan and unnecessary attacks on Attorney General Eric Holder.

H.R. 41: To temporarily increase the borrowing authority of the Federal

Emergency Management Agency for carrying out the National Flood

Insurance Program

I would have voted yes on H.R. 41. To limit the danger of future storms, it is important to ensure the careful reconstruction of areas damaged by Hurricane Sandy. That effort will take many years, however, and should not unnecessarily limit access to resources provided by the National Flood Insurance Program. I support the increased lending authority to that program to ensure adequate support to victims of Hurricane Sandy.

H.R. 219: Sandy Recovery Improvement Act of 2013

I would have voted to approve this legislation, which combines several changes the House had previously supported to improve recovery projects for Hurricane Sandy.

Madam Chair, although I am not opposed, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time in opposition in order to yield it to my friend from New Jersey because there are important messages to be heard.

Madam Chair, I strongly support what is going on, and I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from New Jersey to make sure that everybody from the affected area has an opportunity to be heard.

I appreciate the gentleman's courtesy.

My friend from Georgia completely misses the point. Mr. Holt pointed out

that this being able to process this ground-based information is important to being able to fully utilize the information from the polar satellite. The last Congress behaved recklessly, candidly, in terms of jeopardizing the flow of this information. It was not treated appropriately in terms of the budget.

I think that this is an opportunity to accelerate in a small way something that is an emergency, tell the people who have been faced with a chain of natural disasters and storms where we have been able to refine our predictions. We can't stop the weather, but we can save lives, and this will get us back on track a little bit.

I cannot imagine a more misguided offset. If anything, we should be accelerating this work more. I strongly urge its rejection.

Madam Chair, I would offer the amendment on behalf of my colleague, Mr. Campbell, and myself.

Madam Chair, I rise in support of this amendment.

I must acknowledge the collaboration and support of my good friend and the cosponsor of the amendment, Mr. Campbell from California.

The amendment is a simple clarification to ensure that the Frelinghuysen amendment doesn't put taxpayers on the hook for 100 percent of the cost of projects that are unrelated to Hurricane Sandy.

The amendment waives the standard local cost-share for ongoing construction projects. This applies to beach renourishment projects, which are typically cost-shared at a 65 percent Federal and 35 percent local share.

While the waiving of this local cost-share for this type of project is unprecedented, I understand that for our friends in New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut, Hurricane Sandy was also unprecedented.

Our amendment does not change the language with respect to repairing the beaches damaged by Hurricane Sandy, but unfortunately the language could be interpreted to also waive local cost-share for future periodic beach replenishment unrelated to any damage caused by Hurricane Sandy. These typically can take up to over a 50-year period and can cost tens of millions of dollars. I'm confident that is not what was intended by the amendment as it was offered. But the amendment is necessary to make sure that that's not how it's interpreted at some point in the future.

Madam Chair, my heart goes out to the communities in the Northeast that have been devastated by Hurricane Sandy. I have strongly supported the efforts of the people in the region to step forward and be fully compensated to be able to have a robust package. I'm sorry that it's delayed, and I commend the leadership that has been displayed on both sides of the aisle.

I strongly support having the Federal Government provide assistance for people not only to recover, but to rebuild in a way that is stronger and safer. But it does not make sense to use this legislation to change standard, non-Federal cost-share procedures for projects unrelated to Hurricane Sandy. Doing so, I think, would be fiscally irresponsible, and it decrease local communities' involvement and investment in local projects that primarily benefit them and I'm afraid might be a reason for opposition for legislation that I hope passes.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I would be happy to yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from New Jersey.

I yield to the gentleman from Indiana.

Madam Chair, I deeply appreciate the hard work and the acceptance of the amendment. I look forward to moving forward with the passage of this, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, as the 112th Congress ends with a whimper, not a bang, not so much finished as worn out, I was prepared to come to the floor this morning and talk about some of the unfinished business that we kicked down the road with a proposal last night: a serious deficit reduction, the debt ceiling, tax reform. One thing I didn't expect to be confronted with is what you have been hearing from my colleagues today, that we do not have the time to address the disaster relief for Hurricane Sandy, which everybody thought was a given.

This is the crew that came to town shouting ``read the bill,'' that they were going to have 72 hours' regular order to move in a fashion. They gave us 154 pages, 24,000 words nobody had read, but we at least thought we would be dealing today with this emergency assistance.

I am stunned, frankly, that we find ourselves in this situation, but we have 24 hours left. How hard would it be to take up a bill that was already overwhelmingly passed by the Senate? How hard could it be, based on the bipartisan expression last night of support for a bill that almost everybody hated and had reservations about but would come together for something they thought was important for the country?

Remember when rebuilding and renewing America was a bipartisan objective? Maybe we could take a little bit of that spirit of bipartisanship and cooperation last night and rise to the occasion in the next 24 hours to do something for the people who deserve our help and support. If not, then it ought to be the first order of business of the new Congress, and we ought not to go home this week until this matter is addressed.

The agreement we are expected to vote on, perhaps as early as this afternoon, has many commendable and important items. Unfortunately, too many are short term; much is left out; and most important, we are losing an opportunity for reform.

We cannot continue to have, by far, the world's largest and most expensive military, the world's lowest taxes, the most expensive and inefficient health care system, and continue to allow our country's infrastructure to fall apart all while America grows and ages.

This agreement represents absolutely the least we could have done under these circumstances and tragically institutionalizes for the next Congress the madness of short-term frenzy around artificial deadlines that drives the American public crazy.

Not only can we do better; we must do better. This flawed, partial plan is not just a lost opportunity; it represents a real setback.