Floor Statements

I appreciate the gentlelady's courtesy.

She had it exactly right. We've gone down this path. We had an opportunity for us to see how effective the Bush tax cuts were in creating employment in America versus those high rates in the Clinton era, a couple of percentage points higher. Look at the job creation: 22 million jobs in the Clinton years when we were actually balancing the budget for 4 years in a row, reducing the deficit, versus anemic job creation in the Bush administration that was less than 5 percent of that.

We've tried it their way.

With all due respect, it's really hard to characterize what happened in 2010 as bipartisan legislation. The Republicans in the Senate refused to legislate. It was going to be that all the tax relief expired. A consensus was reached. A compromise was made to extend it. Hopefully, we could have worked things out, but we didn't. We're now right back in the same spot.

I would respectfully suggest that what we are looking at now with my Republican colleagues, when they talk about the largest tax increase in American history, is when you put the Republican-Romney bill in effect. If you are going to have that massive cut for the wealthiest of Americans, the only way you can make that deficit-neutral is by raising taxes on the other 95 percent. And you can quibble with some of the assumptions of the various independent experts, but they all agree: if you're going to give people who make over $1 million an average of more than $100,000 in annual relief, you are going to be raising taxes on the 95 percent of the rest of America.

That's not right. It's not necessary. There are better alternatives, and you're going to hear it in the form of the Democratic alternative that's going to come forth later this afternoon.

It is an interesting question: Which lane are we going to choose?

The study that has been offered by our friends on the other side of the aisle is bogus, and I invite people to actually look at it and look at the critiques that have been offered up.

But we've had a real-life experiment because these tax rates that are being talked about were exactly what we had in the Clinton years, at which time some of our good friends on the other side of the aisle predicted calamity, job loss, and that the economy would crash. What, in fact, happened is that we created 22 million jobs.

What has happened is that, when they had a chance to experiment with their vision in the Bush years, where they put in place these tax reductions, if they would have worked, what would have happened? Did employment even match what happened in the Clinton years? No. In fact, it was less than 5 percent of what happened in the 8 years of Bill Clinton.

In fact, the Obama administration--after the first few months when it was in office and could be credited with responsibility for the economy--has produced more private sector jobs than the entire Bush administration in 8 years. The job loss that's gone negative has been slashing in the public sector, primarily teachers and firefighters and police officers at the State and local levels.

Mr. Speaker, the strategy here is to continue punting. My Republican friends are punting on the farm bill. My Republican friends are punting on SGR. They are now proposing a budget solution that gets us past the election because they can't face up to their own Tea Party extremists, and they're split.

That's what is at stake here.

I would suggest that we take what we ought to be able to agree on, the 98 percent of this tax reduction, agree on that, not punt, give some real certainty, and then have an honest debate about their proposal to increase taxes on the middle class at the expense of being able to provide for the richest of Americans. Let's have that debate. Let's not hold people hostage in the short term.

Mr. Speaker, I voted against H.R. 459 because our economy requires an independent central bank, free of short-term political pressures. Congress established the twin policy goals of maximum employment and price stability for the Federal Reserve, and it is important that the institution pursue monetary policy in support of those goals independent of political influence.

Congress conducts regular and robust oversight of the Federal Reserve and expanded the Government Accountability Office's audit authority in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. In that legislation, Congress expanded the types of audits GAO may conduct of the Federal Reserve and the data that must be shared with the public. The Federal Reserve's financial accounts have long been subject to audit both by the GAO and an outside, independent audit firm.

I wish to make clear, however, that the independence of the Federal Reserve has no bearing on the scrutiny that Congress must exert over the large commercial banks. Roughly four years ago, the banks were dragging the American people into a financial storm the like we have not seen since the Great Depression. The recession cost $19.2 trillion in lost household wealth--40 percent of the net wealth of American households. Thirty-one percent of homeowners with a mortgage are underwater, owing a bank far more than their house is worth.

As the magnitude of the rot, the corruption, the shady practices, the greed, misplaced institutional incentives unfolded, we experienced a near-meltdown of our economy. The second-guessing began even when we were in the midst of devising remedies to stop the fall. That controversy continues, but we're in the midst of a much larger question: ``What is it that we do now to speed the recovery and make sure that it never happens again?''

The crush of special interests and the near constant political campaigns places people with limited expertise in the worst possible circumstances as they make these decisions. New scandals have continued to unfold. The most recent is the LIBOR scandal that we are only beginning to unearth, where massive international banks gamed the system for their own financial advantage, to stave off regulatory action, to avoid a negative market response, or to gain an unfair advantage as they placed their own financial bets.

In response, we must move toward performance-based regulation-- providing greater clarity of what we want and linking those goals to clear measures. My acquaintances in the business community with long financial expertise suggest that we can start by actually enforcing the existing rules and providing the regulatory capacity to make sure they are enforced.

We must give adequate personnel and resources to the existing regulatory agencies--the SEC, the CFTC, the FDIC and the Treasury, among others--to allow them to better supervise the financial sector. Pay them fairly so they are not poached by the industries they regulate. In turn, they must prosecute financial felons and send people to jail.

There are people sentenced to prison for years who broke into a home or used a gun. But all of these crooks put together have not robbed the American public of a third of their wealth the way the financial crisis did. It is doubtful that all of the people in all of America's prisons have stolen a fraction of the money that disappeared from the balance sheet of America's families. But we see continue the fraud, collusion, sharp practices, and outright theft in the financial sector that has destroyed families, bankrupted businesses, and stunted people's futures. The sooner we bring the perpetrators to justice, the less risk we are going to have in the future.

Mr. Speaker, our colleague, Jim McDermott, sent each of us a letter with a Time magazine cover article by Joe Klein entitled ``How to Die.'' This article is jarring to many because it's an issue that most would rather not confront. As a result, there's a great deal of unnecessary pain, confusion, and suffering. It masks one of the most important issues in health care, which, despite the manufactured controversy over ``death panels,'' is a rare, sweet spot in the health care debate. It can improve the quality of life, in some cases the length of life, and most importantly we can help people understand their circumstances and get the care that they want. If this happens, the cost of health care will go down even as satisfaction and quality goes up.

For most Americans, the protocols followed by almost every hospital and practitioner will be to give the maximum amount of the most aggressive care in end-of-life situations. Especially if patients have the money or insurance, they will be hooked up in their final stages of life to be resuscitated, their ribs cracked, and hearts massaged. There will be tubes inserted, chemicals pumped, and defibrillators will shock people, even if they have no awareness of what's going on, other than that they are being tortured.

When people are given the information, resources, and choices, the outcomes are much different. A telling story in The Wall Street Journal last February pointed out how doctors die differently. These are people with knowledge and where money is not usually a consideration. They can get any health care they want, but as a group, they regularly choose less intense, aggressive treatment and more palliative care. They are choosing the comfort and consciousness of being with family and friends in awareness over being hooked up in an ICU and struggling in their last minutes.

Doctors have a better quality of life, and it costs less money. Why can't all Americans spend their final days like doctors? The truth is, they can. My legislation--Personalize Your Health Care--was developed with leaders in health care insurance and palliative care. Patients and doctors alike would help make sure that patients and other health care professionals work with patients to help them understand what they're confronting, what their choices are, determine what works best for them and their families, and then make sure that whatever their decision is, that choice will be honored. Over ninety percent of Americans agree that this is the right approach.

There's an interesting little secret here that extreme treatments not only deteriorate your quality of life, but they're no guarantee of giving you more hours to live. Studies have shown that managing the pain perhaps in the hospice, along with the love and company of families in a familiar setting, in some cases actually leads to patients living longer. People can actually enjoy their remaining hours, and there are more remaining hours to enjoy.

If most of us were to script our departure, it would probably be to go quietly in the middle of the night in the comfort of our own bed. The second-best scenario would be to go at home in that same bed surrounded by family and friends, comfortable, and conversing until the end. The least favored option, I suspect, would be semiconscious with tubes in our bodies in an ICU setting with the institutional hum around and strangers bustling about. Is that anybody's hope for their final memories? Sadly, that's the fate that awaits many people who do not personalize their health care.

I strongly encourage my colleagues to look at this bipartisan legislation, H.R. 1589, and then to do what you can to have a thoughtful and rational conversation about this policy. Let's modernize Medicare to give people the care they want, to find out their choices, and make sure that those choices are respected.

We owe it to the American public, and we owe it to our families and friends to make sure that every American can have the same high quality of life in their final weeks as doctors have.

Madam Speaker, I voted for H.R. 6168, President Obama's Proposed 2012-2017 Offshore Drilling Lease Sale Plan Act. I emphasize that this is a qualified support. The President's plan maintains important protections for the Pacific Coast, the Atlantic Coast, and Bristol Bay. It is far better than the Republican alternative, which would open most of the American coastline to drilling, and which would eliminate important environmental safeguards in the process.

Should Congress move forward with the President's proposal, it should do so with care, ensuring sufficient protection throughout the process. In particular, I am concerned about the potential permitting in Alaska. The President's proposal does require additional research and comprehensive analysis before approval of any project in Alaska, I underscore the need to have a full understanding of the impacts of drilling on the Alaskan ecosystems before moving forward. Appropriate safeguards must be in place and I look forward to working with the administration to ensure that we move forward with projects only after being confident that they do not pose a threat to the environment, ecosystems, or existing local economies in the area.

Our biggest priority should be reducing our dependence on fossil fuels, regardless of whether or not those fuels are obtained domestically or internationally. I will continue to work with my colleagues to support policies that support clean energy production and energy efficiency.

There is plenty of blame for the near collapse of the economy over the last 5 years--greedy, even criminal business behavior, lax or nonexistent oversight with regulators asleep at the switch. Clearly, there were some reckless consumers and a failed political system. But as instructive as the postmortem might be, it's more important to avoid a repeat performance.

What should we do? I would suggest we simplify, regulate, and prosecute.

Let's begin by reinstating the Glass-Steagall, Depression-era bank regulation that helped promote stability in that industry. It would be a small step in the right direction, a signal that the era of deregulation, unfettered, is at an end. I hope we can move to performance-based regulation. The Dodd-Frank bill had many important and valuable features, but I fear that it is at risk of becoming a bureaucratic nightmare.

We do need to regulate. The cozy, light-touched, gentle--some would say diffident--approach that assumes that the gentle people in the financial industry will self-police must be a thing of the past. We should provide the various regulatory authorities with adequate staff and budget. We should pay them properly so that they aren't a training ground to be hired away for much higher salaries by the industry they're supposed to regulate. We should have high expectations that they will do their jobs, and then we should back them up and not undercut those efforts.

Finally, we should prosecute. Sending people to jail will send a message. All of the people in American prisons collectively have not stolen as much with guns as the American public, our pension funds, our businesses lost in the near meltdown of the economy. Every time somebody illegally profits from a financial transaction, somebody else loses. Crooks, whatever the color of their collars, should be held accountable.

To make this happen, the public needs to focus some of their frustration to make this an issue in the election. At a time when politicians and special interests are making strange and outrageous noises, here is a real issue for them to address.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to be here this evening following my good friends and their interesting discussion.

I wanted to spend a couple of moments this evening talking about reform.

Reform has been a major focus of my public service career beginning as a citizen volunteer, working as a State legislator, a local official. I was pleased to be part of innovation in my native State of Oregon in areas of tax reform, transportation innovation, environmental protection, land use, and government structure.

I am pleased to have been able to take some of the lessons that I learned in Oregon here to our Nation's Capital, working in Congress in areas of energy, bicycles, flood insurance, health care reform. For me, that's exciting and energizing. That's what makes me a little disappointed, to say at the very least, with what's happening in this session of Congress.

It's sad to see that today in the House the focus is not taking the Affordable Care Act where the questions of its constitutionality have been settled by the Supreme Court and moving forward to accelerate its implementation. Instead, the efforts are to slow it down, to repeal, to put sand in the gears. Not without a constructive alternative mind you, but just to be against the reform that's on the books.

It's depressing to see repeated attacks on environmental protections, something that Americans care deeply about that makes a difference to the quality of life of our communities, the strength of our economy, the health of our families.

It has been unfortunate that we were given by this Congress earlier this year what has been described, I think appropriately, as the most partisan transportation bill in history, and certainly the worst, undoing 20 years of transportation reform. Luckily, it collapsed under its own weight, but we were left with a pale 2-year extension, and we're soon going to be right back where we started.

We're watching, more recently, efforts that deal with agriculture in terms of the reauthorization of the farm bill, an opportunity to reform, to be able to save money, to improve the health of our citizens and the economic viability of America's farmers and ranchers. Instead, the bill that has passed out of the committee in the House would concentrate even more subsidy in the hands of fewer wealthy farmers and short-circuit the needs of Americans who eat, people who care about animal welfare, about the environment, and, most importantly, about the welfare of the vast majority of American farmers who, sadly, would have been shut off.

It looks now that the bill is so precarious that it may not even come to

the floor of the House, backtracking on efforts to rein in and reform military spending, when just last year there was a bipartisan agreement to deal with reducing the deficit that was balanced between spending for military and nonmilitary accounts. And now we see people retreating from that goal in the military appropriations bill that passed, despite aggressive bipartisan efforts to rein it in, and it is moving forward as a lost opportunity.

Well, it's in that context, Mr. Speaker, that I wanted to discuss the issues that surround the postal service. It's not by any stretch of the imagination that I'm not interested in changing how we do business. I think that's important across the board. I have demonstrated that with my past work, and by word and deed and what I do politically.

I often find myself in agreement with some of the editorial positions from The Washington Post and The New York Times. They're moving forward with an urgent effort to move legislation that would dramatically scale down the postal service, to cut a large number of facilities and suspend 6-day service, assuming that those are the only alternatives available for us going forward.

Well, as I say, I will be the last person to argue that we should not do business differently, but it seems to me that it's past time for us to take a step back and take a hard look at this so-called postal crisis and at potential solutions and their implications.

Mr. Speaker, it is important to note, from the outset, that the postal service has played a vital role in the development of the United States. It dates back to the beginning of our country. The first Postmaster General was Benjamin Franklin. The service was established 236 years ago. And the postal service actually has been involved, when we let it, with a variety of innovations.

There are those who are concerned that today, with the advent of email, that it has somehow made it impossible for the postal service to move forward in this climate. Well, it's interesting. The postal service has been able to survive the telegraph, the fax machine. It has, in fact, been part of the innovation. Airmail service was part of what the postal service did to help launch the aviation industry in this country. And we have, today, a pattern of development of the transcontinental railroad service and the nature of the postal service, itself, tying together American communities.

Part of what I think is important for us to focus on is the role that the postal service plays in rural and small town America. It's an important part of rural and small town America in Oregon and around the Nation, and these communities are facing times of economic stress and isolation.

The post office plays an outside role. Many people revel in the quality of life. It's very desirable in many rural and small town areas, with great traditions. But it's no secret that for many communities and the people who live there, it's a struggle. They have high unemployment, as young people leave and the population ages. There are real challenges in terms of connectivity, access to broadband for over 26.2 million Americans, three-quarters of them living in rural America.

Now, I think it is important moving forward, dealing with the changes to the postal service, to think about the implications for this part of America that often gets lots of rhetoric but not the attention that it deserves.

The postal service in rural and small town America provides services in terms of people being able to get access to not just mail services and a sense of community, tying people together, a sense of identity, but it is a source of good-paying, family wage jobs that play an outside role in this part of the United States.

It is important in terms of being able to access immigration forms, passport services. These are items that are, in some instances, difficult for people in rural and small town America.

And also, as we are watching the explosion of online shopping, which is playing a larger and larger role in the American economy, it's even more significant in rural and small town America. The postal service often provides that last mile for transactions that take place via the Internet--increasingly for senior citizens who rely on mail order pharmacy services to be able to get their prescriptions through the mail.

Looking at the wide range of activities that make a difference for rural and small town America, I think it's important for us to consider what the implications are going to be for them.

Now, there are those that say, well, wait a minute. They'll just have to pay the price because we are facing a funding crisis in the post office. It's bumping up against a $15 billion debt limit. Bills are coming due. And we have no alternative but to move forward with dramatic reductions in service, including Saturday service and closing facilities.

Well, it's important to reflect on what is the nature of the current funding crisis that faces the post office. Sadly, it is largely a manufactured crisis. The impending funding deadline is simply a result of the legislation in 2006, which was a compromise--a reluctant compromise, but it included a provision that would require the postal service to prefund its health insurance costs for retirees who haven't yet been hired--75 years in the future--and required that funding to be made over the course of 10 years.

Well, thinking about that for a moment, Mr. Speaker, this is actually a device that is not necessary. No other business or government agency is required to do it 75 years into the future. And, in fact, part of the charm for the people who devised this a few years ago was it actually artificially reduces the Federal Government deficit because these payments are credited to Federal accounts. Even though the post office has been an independent agency since 1971, operating without subsidy, these moneys are credited to the Federal Treasury and are used to try to disguise the true size of our deficit. There is no reason to accelerate the prefunding of this obligation of 75 years to make it occur here in the course of this 10-year window.

Mr. Speaker, I think it's important to point out, after putting it in this context, that this is an artificial crisis. The post office, if it weren't for this extraordinary, unnecessary, and unprecedented prefunding requirement, would actually not be hemorrhaging red ink. In fact, it's very close to being self-sufficient, and it does so despite the constraints that Congress has placed on the postal service. Because, bear in mind, even though it doesn't get support, the Congress has kept a very short leash on what the postal service can do. It doesn't have the flexibility to run like a business, to adjust its pricing, to be able to adjust its product mix, to take advantage of the fact that there is a skilled workforce of over 500,000 people and has more facilities around the country than McDonald's, Walmart, and Starbucks combined.

We don't give them the freedom and the flexibility to move forward to take advantage of that platform.

Now, you don't have to be very creative to think of ways that we might be able to work together to be able to slightly modify the services that are provided, and give them more flexibility on the implementation of their service. It is important, I think, to be able to think about what this connectivity means for the American public. If we somehow eliminated the postal service, turned it over to the private sector, cut down more dramatically in terms of what the offerings are, does anybody think we would be able to send a first-class letter from the Florida Keys to Nome, Alaska for 44 cents? The post office moves about 40 percent of the mail in the entire world.

Now there are those that say look at Germany, it has been privatized. Well, look at Germany. Germany is a country that is smaller than Montana, bigger than Wyoming, just to put it in the context of size. It is very densely populated, and it still charges more than 10 percent higher than we do in the United States, and they are competitive internationally, globally. The German postal service is doing business in the United States, competing with Fed Ex, our postal service, and UPS. It is an extraordinary resource that I think is worthy of consideration of what we've got and how we do it.

Mr. Speaker, as I stated from the outset, I happen to believe in reform. I believe that we need to do business differently, whether it is how we deal

with our farm policy, our military policy, tax reform, health care. I would hope that in Congress we can return to the days where we actually had regular order and we discussed things like this in committee, that every bill wasn't a partisan vehicle, and when there was give and take and challenging one another in terms of ways it could be done better, and listening to a wide variety of opinions. And I say by all means allow a wide variety of opinions to come forward to talk about the future of the postal service. I think that's healthy. I welcome it. I've spent a lot of time talking to people on the Postal Rate Commission. I've talked to leadership in the management of the postal service, postal employees, people who are customers, and competitors of the postal service. I want to explore these issues.

I'm absolutely convinced that the interests that are involved with the postal service, broadly defined, including its unions and employees, understand that there is going to be more change taking place in the future. That there are some adjustments where there is probably more capacity than we need, there will be changes going forward. We want to be careful and selective about what we do. But I go back to my point about the impact it will have on rural and small town America. I want to be sure that the changes that we undertake don't make great difficulty for people who don't have the access that some of us who live in metropolitan areas have, people who are connected to the Internet and people who have ready access to other resources.

I think it is important that when people are talking about reducing the sixth day of service, that they think about the implications for individuals who depend on that. For many people who work and get packages that are important to them, being able to have them delivered on Saturday is important, and particularly when you look at holidays that go over weekends, the difficulty of delivery of things like medicine is not a trivial question. And the fact that the postal service is in a sense a partner with some of its private sector competitors, cutting back on that service, what it does with those competitor-partners and what it does with people who are marketing through the Internet, through the mail, this needs careful consideration.

It is interesting as people dive into the numbers behind the elimination of Saturday service. You're eliminating 17 percent of the postal capacity and it would only save 2, maybe 3 percent, and there would be costs associated with that. It is kind of interesting. I would like us to think about what it does to the business model, if you're going to eliminate 17 percent of the service and you save a couple percent in operation; particularly, as I mentioned, that we constrain what they charge and we have an artificial financial barrier with the 75-year pre-funding of health care.

I think it is important for us to respect what we've got, think about the alternatives, and have a discussion where the interests--whether they are direct mail, they are marketing, they are online shopping, they are people in terms of the pharmaceutical industry, senior citizens, rural and small town America--let's get in and talk about this, find out not by declaring war against postal employees, but working with them in a cooperative fashion to find out suggestions that they have in terms of moving forward, and looking at what this tremendous resource that we have, what the value is.

I'm in the State of Oregon, where now all of our ballots are done by direct mail. It is a way to improve efficiency and lower cost for local governments. Broader application of mail-in ballots would improve the security, the efficiency, and cost savings. We have barely scratched the surface of that.

There have been deep concerns, and I note that we had a somber observance today about the death of a couple of our employees, guards who were gunned down on this day in 1998. We've lived through eras where there were concerns about anthrax, about opportunities that some may be involved with bioterrorism. And there have been scares about pandemics. Well, it may well be in our future that there would be great value to having a network that reaches 150 million addresses six times a week with a skilled workforce that can turn that around in a matter of hours.

You don't have to stretch your imagination very far to think of acts of disease or terror where that network may well make a difference. We're finding oftentimes in communities that it's the postal worker who is alert to problems within a family or somebody that is missing and not showing up. They are eyes and ears that do not just volunteer projects but connect people. Let's think about the value of that network before we start to unravel it.

Mr. Speaker, I will conclude where I began. I think everybody whose is privileged to serve in this Chamber needs to think about how we do business differently. I think we need to be open to arguments, questions, evidence, to be able to squeeze more value out of the public dollar, to use the resources to protect the vitality and livability of our communities, and to build partnerships and relationships. And I welcome the discussion that we're having with the postal service in the media and here in Congress. But I would hope, Mr. Speaker, we could do it in a way that is thoughtful and broad-based. I would hope that we would be able to look at what the postal service has provided for 236 years. I would hope that we would think about the value of the workforce. It's not just over a half-million family wage jobs that makes a big difference, particularly in small town and rural America, but these are people who have a skill set and a distribution across the country which has other values, some of which I have just mentioned, and others we have not explored.

And last but not least, before we make changes, I think we ought to be sure that we know that they are going to get what is advertised because, despite all of the rhetoric, we have the lowest cost, most efficient postal service in the world, moving 40 percent of the traffic, doing it very cost effectively, despite the fact that Congress, in its wisdom, has tied the hands of the postal service, dictated rates, told them what they could close or not close, and changes course repeatedly.

I would hope we could do a better job working with our partners there and the people who depend on it to make this part of an area where we figure out how to do business differently, because I think there are opportunities not only to save money but to take advantage of this resource. I think it ought to be done thoughtfully, I think it ought to be done soon, and I appreciate the opportunity to discuss it here this evening.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Imagine the headline, ``Outbreak of Serious Illness Strikes; 12 People Killed, 58 Hospitalized,'' just like similar outbreaks, but the Federal Government prohibits the Centers for Disease Control from investigating.

Or another headline, ``70 Trapped in a Collapsed Building, 20 Dead or Critically Injured,'' and your government makes it illegal for government organizations to collect data to study what could be done to solve it, to minimize this carnage in the future.

People would be justifiably outraged. They expect government to protect them and to help understand the nature of threats in the workplace, the marketplace, or in our homes. At some level, we want to know about why cars malfunction or if there are patterns of disease, illness, injury, or mechanical failure.

That is what our government is supposed to do. If food safety, mine safety, or TSA fails, there would be calls for accountability. Sadly, that's not what is happening as the Nation recoils in anguish at another outbreak of gun violence. The 70 killed or wounded are the latest in a pattern that happens repeatedly, predictably, with overall loss of life being in the tens of thousands over the years.

What is as appalling as the loss of life is the fact that we not only refuse to do anything about it, but we allow political bullies to intimidate us from even researching the facts.

Now, there's never been a threat in this country that sportsmen will not be able to hunt or target shoot, that false specter raised by the gun lobby so successfully that today there's virtually no gun protection. But that doesn't stop the number one gun advocacy group, the National Rifle Association, from making things up, creating phony threats to gun ownership.

They're attacking the Obama administration, which has done, essentially, nothing in this field since they know that Congress would reject even the most reasonable of proposals. It has been impossible, for example, to even close the gun show loophole, where people can get unlimited amounts of guns without a background check.

The NRA is at work to make sure that people on the ``no fly list'' because they are threats to national security can purchase guns, that data cannot be shared between ATF and Homeland Security dealing with potential terrorists.

The NRA argues that all we need is for existing gun laws to be enforced, while they systematically set about to dismantle what laws we have and then defund even feeble government enforcement efforts.

Anyone who looks at the background of the recent so-called Fast and Furious controversy finds that, in part, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms is dysfunctional because it's constantly under assault by the NRA for its most modest steps and most minimal budgets. We cannot even study gun violence, patterns, causes, and potential solutions.

While I didn't know anybody in Aurora, this most recent tragic, senseless rampage touches home for me. As I was growing up, a young man in a family that I was close to was killed by an act of random gun violence.

As I've followed the issues over the years, I continue to feel that there's no reason to permit armor-piercing, cop-killer bullets to be sold like Tic Tacs; that automatic weapons should be available over the counter with hundred-bullet magazines like the killer in Colorado had that facilitate such sprees. These things have no useful purpose in sports activities or target shooting.

I find it appalling that we, as citizens, have enabled Congress to act in a spineless fashion, to be taken over in the area of gun safety by the NRA; that we refuse to deal with something that has serious law enforcement implications so that we, alone, in the developed world are most at risk for random gun violence. Any time there's a mass killing spree, I hope against hope for a more enlightened reaction.

Perhaps the gun owners themselves, the majority of whom disagree with the NRA's extreme positions, will join with politicians, business, the health

community to come together to deal with an epidemic of gun violence in the way we would treat any other threat to the safety of our families and our communities. We would study, we would work on solutions together, and we would act.

Sadly, we're still waiting.

I appreciate the gentleman's courtesy as I appreciate his leadership on this issue. He comes from an area that has seen its own devastations in terms of flood.

We're talking about a river system where we have engineered the area, and we have been fighting for years to try and attain an appropriate balance.

This is not a fiscally responsible approach. It's interesting that it is opposed by Taxpayers for Common Sense, the National Taxpayers Union, the American Conservative Union, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who have joined in common cause with a wide array of environmental organizations, as well as the professionals who deal with the management of floodplains, the Association of State Floodplain Managers, and a vast array of businesses, particularly those that are involved with the insurance and reinsurance. This is a prescription for disaster.

Now, bear in mind that in the transportation bill--recently approved--there were proposals that were part of the flood issue that were for five parcels. This legislation--that as my

friend from St. Louis points out has never had a hearing--would open it up to some 37,000 units of land in North Dakota. It doesn't restrict it.

Additionally, it doesn't require that the Federal Government--that paid for this land to be taken and put in a natural state where it could absorb the floodplain, the floodwaters--that they get this for free.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I've worked in flood insurance reform now for over 10 years. The last major flood insurance bill I was coauthor with my good friend, Doug Bereuter. We worked hard to try and make sure that we weren't going to subsidize people to live in places where nature has shown repeatedly that they don't belong, and that we weren't going to be in a situation where one part of the Federal Government subsidizes to move the problem downstream.

What we see repeatedly is that, with major river systems that are fortified, that we try and fight against nature by putting in a series of levees. What it does is it channels that water, it accelerates and it moves it downstream and actually makes flooding worse.

Now, it also, in a very perverse way, increases the risk in some of these areas that get levees, because ultimately there are floods. When you put a levee in, you give the illusion of safety, and then there's more development behind the levee. So instead of having natural area absorbing the runoff and avoiding loss--because the taxpayers are now off the hook for loss in these areas that we have purchased and returned to a natural state--then you have the cycle repeating.

There's a reason this vast array of organizations are opposed to it. It's not environmentally sound; it's not fiscally sound; it violates important principles of flood control; it's going to make it harder for people. Bear in mind, these parcels were voluntarily purchased, but are people going to give up land in the future if it might be subject to a levee and development and a repetition of flooding? I think not.

So I would really hope that my colleagues pay careful attention to this legislation. Look at the vast array of groups and organizations that are opposed to it. Question why it is coming to the floor without ever having a hearing. And most important, look at the devastation that will occur if we move away from these established principles. Listen to the floodplain managers. Listen to the environmentalists. Listen to the taxpayer advocates. Protect the system. Reject this ill-conceived measure.

Groups Opposed to S. 2039

Taxpayers for Common Sense; R Street; National Taxpayers

Union; SmarterSafer.org; American Consumer Institute;

American Conservative Union; Competitive Enterprise

Institute; Less Government; Association of Bermuda Insurers

and Reinsurers; National Association of Mutual Insurance

Companies; National Flood Determination Association;

Reinsurance Association of America; National Leased Housing

Association; Association of State Flood Plain Managers.

Institute for Liberty; National Fire Protection

Association; Friends of the Earth; American Rivers; Ceres;

Defenders of Wildlife; Environmental Defense Fund; National

Wildlife Federation; The Nature Conservancy; Republicans for

Environmental Protection; Sierra Club; Clean Air-Cool Planet;

ConservAmerica; Association of State Wetland Managers.

There is a battle under way about the very existence of public broadcasting. We thought we were past this when, 15 months ago, the House Republican leadership targeted NPR and tried to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Luckily, last year, 170 million people--who don't just listen to or watch public broadcasting, but depend on it--unleashed an unprecedented show of support. As a result, the Republican leadership walked back.

One good thing about last year's budget was a requirement to have a study about alternatives to funding public broadcasting so that people would have hard facts for this year's budget discussion. Well, that study is in, and it clearly shows that there is no viable alternative to Federal funding for public broadcasting.

Many of the proposals that have been suggested would actually result in less money overall for public broadcasting in the long term. Yet the House appropriations bill, marked up yesterday, would slash funding now, defund NPR Federal support, and end public broadcasting as we know it within 2 years.

I had dinner with Ken Burns last night, and we discussed this. He pointed out that his five or six projects in the pipeline would never be seen if this budget goes forward. So enjoy his program about the Dust Bowl this November because you will never be able to see the Roosevelts, Jackie Robinson, Vietnam, Hemingway. All will never be finished or seen if the Republican budget proposal is approved.

The problem is that Governor Romney--who has singled out public broadcasting as one of five projects that he would defund--and the Republicans listened to a tiny fraction of the American public that is even a minority in their own party. Polls show that two-thirds of Republicans surveyed would either keep Federal funding for broadcasting as it is or increase it.

What resonates with Republican primary voters is not what America wants, needs, or believes. The unprecedented threat comes at exactly the time Americans need public broadcasting the most. NPR news, the object of greatest Republican scorn, is the most trusted brand in American news media.

PBS shows like ``Sesame Street'' have helped three generations of parents raise their children with effective, commercial-free educational programming.

Locally owned news is becoming only a memory for most America as large corporations buy up local stations and newspapers. There's no money to be made by commercial stations that cater to the special needs of rural and small town America. Luckily, public broadcasting is there because their mission is to serve, not make money.

We must stop this attack on the critical service, especially for rural and small-town America. It's time for the 170 million Americans who depend on public broadcasting every month to again fight back and for Congress to finally listen.

The radical proposal to slash public broadcasting, defund NPR, and terminate public broadcasting as we know it, is a powerful symbol of how far out of step the Republican leadership is from the country they're supposed to represent.

There's no reason to make public broadcasting a partisan issue. Public broadcasting has broad support from Republicans, Independents, and Democrats alike. That's why PBS and its member stations were named number one in public trust and a ``excellent'' use of taxpayer dollars for the 9th consecutive year.

It's time for people who believe in public broadcasting to stand up to this extremism and settle the question once and for all about the future of public broadcasting. Unless we fight now, there may be nothing left to protect.

I appreciate the gentleman's courtesy, as I appreciate him bringing this amendment to the floor.

I think it's telling that our friends in European NATO countries, since 2008, have reduced their defense spending 12 percent. They're having tough times. They're retrenching. They recognize the new posture in terms of security. We should do the same thing. We should do the same thing. Absolutely.

It's ironic that this Chamber is going to be considering massive cuts in food stamps to have more responsibility and accountability that some of us think are draconian. But for heaven's sake, why can't we, 60 years after World War II, almost 25 years after the collapse of the former Soviet Union, can't we help Europe assume a little larger role for their own defense? For whom are these troops positioned in terms of some sort of military posture?

I think most of us agree that it's highly unlikely they'll be used in combat. Any cost that would be incurred by accelerating it is money that's going to be spent anyway, notwithstanding all the costs to keep them there.

So I think the gentleman is spot on. I'm happy to cosponsor the amendment. I'm happy to speak in support of it. I hope this body approves it in a small way to help the Europeans assume their own responsibility and for us to be able to focus on things that are more important for us.

I move to strike the last word.

It is rare that I disagree with my good friend from Ohio, but I do. I think that it is appropriate to move forward in this direction.

As my good friend from the State of Washington indicated, we are probably going to do this, I think he mentioned, by 2015. The point here is that this reassessment has been proceeding at a glacial speed. It is important for us to be on record to move this forward. There are major things that we are going to have to do. This is relatively small potatoes compared with what we are going to have to do if we are going to meet our challenges both in terms of a different security arrangement with regard to the threats that the United States faces and our fiscal problems.

Now, we have had this sitting on the back burner for years. We are, if anything, late to the party; and of course, as long as they are there, that is a disincentive for our NATO allies to step up and to do what they need to do in their own defense. We have plenty of assets around the world. We have opportunities with naval and air strikes. The notion that we are going to be throwing ground forces that are stationed in Europe into the fray in Israel or in some battle in Africa, I think, is near-fetched at the least. Look at what we have done in the past and how we've gone about it.

With all due respect, I think, in a world where we have the capacity--as we have shown--to be able to stage and move troops when needed, this is a small step in the right direction. I think my friend from Ohio is overstating the case in the notion that somehow it costs money to do the redeployment so we should just keep them there. We are going to be redeploying them anyway, so the costs of redeployment are going to be incurred sometime this decade or sometime this century, but it costs money to keep them there.

I have a nephew who makes a very good living teaching Americans in Europe in military schools. I think it's time for my nephew to come home and teach in the United States. I think there are more cost- effective ways for us to meet our security obligations. I do think it is time for our European friends and allies to step up. We can no longer be paying almost half the defense costs of the world when many of the others in that mix are people who are our friends and allies. I think this is a small step in the right direction. I urge the adoption of the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

There is a sad, unnecessary battle shaping up again over the future of public broadcasting. It's not an exaggeration to say that this battle is about the very future, the very existence of public broadcasting. You might have thought that we were past this when, 15 months ago, the Republican House leadership targeted NPR and tried to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Luckily, last year, the 170 million people who don't just listen or watch public broadcasting but depend upon it, unleashed an unprecedented show of support. As a result, the Republican leadership walked back. They cut, but did not kill, the Federal support for public broadcasting despite the rhetoric. And there was actually a constructive sign in last year's appropriations bill that requested a study to examine alternatives to funding public broadcasting with Federal funding so that people would have hard facts to operate on this year.

Ironically, that study--requested by our Republican colleagues--now being circulated, clearly shows that there is no viable alternative to Federal funding for public broadcasting. Many of the proposals that have been suggested would actually end up with less overall revenues in the long term.

The House appropriations bill being marked up this morning would slash funding now, defund NPR Federal support, and end public broadcasting as we know it, within 2 years. At the same time, we have a Republican Presidential nominee who singled out public broadcasting as one of the five programs that he would eliminate.

This is because Governor Romney and the Republicans listen to a tiny fraction of the American public that is even a minority in their own party. A recent poll showed that two-thirds of the Republicans surveyed would either keep Federal funding as it is, or increase it. What resonates with Republican primary voters is not what America wants, needs, or believes.

The unprecedented threat comes at exactly the time America needs public broadcasting most. NPR News, the object of greatest Republican scorn, is the most trusted brand in the American news media. Listeners learn something, unlike Fox News viewers, who, surveys show, actually know less about the facts than people who listen to no news at all.

NPR News has again the highest rating for the ninth year in a row. PBS shows like ``Sesame Street'' have helped three generations of parents raise their children with effective, commercial-free educational programing.

Locally owned news is becoming only a memory for most of America as larger corporations buy up radio and television stations and local newspapers. There's no money to be made by commercial stations that cater to the special needs of rural and small-town America. But public broadcasting is there because their mission is to serve, not make money. Often, these locally owned and managed public broadcasting stations are the only source that is direct news, education, and entertainment locally managed for local needs.

We must stop the attack on this critical service for rural and small- town America. It's time for the 170 million Americans who depend on public broadcasting every month to speak out again and for Congress to finally listen.

The radical proposal to slash public broadcasting, defund NPR, and terminate public broadcasting as we know it, is the most powerful symbol of how out of step the Republican leadership is from the country they are supposed to represent.

There's no reason to make public broadcasting a partisan issue. The American public has broad support for it, Republicans, Independents and Democrats alike, especially when PBS and its member stations were named number one in public trust and an ``excellent'' use of taxpayer dollars for the ninth consecutive year.

Since I've been in Congress, we've beaten back this destructive effort, but our challenge now has never been more urgent. It's time for people who believe in public broadcasting to stand up to what can only be termed extremism and settle this question once and for

all about the future of public broadcasting. For unless we fight it now, there may be nothing left to protect.

I move to strike the last word.

Madam Chair, I deeply appreciate the difficult job that Chairman Young and Ranking Member Dicks have. This is important legislation, difficult balancing. It is a time of strain in terms of the budget, and it is a time of strain for the military. But I do think that my colleagues who come to the floor and who are questioning whether we need to continue the same policy, the same funding, the same direction with Afghanistan are right on point. This Congress should be spending more time actually engaging in a debate on our policy, our practices, our future in Afghanistan.

We initially went to war to deal with the protection of the United States. It was in Afghanistan that Osama bin Laden hatched the plot that led to the 9/11 attacks. He was protected by his Taliban enablers, and it was entirely appropriate for the Bush administration and this Congress to go after him to end that threat and obtain justice.

Sadly, before the job was done in Afghanistan, before Osama bin Laden was actually captured, we veered into a tragically misguided, flawed, and expensive mission in Iraq. As were many of the colleagues who are joining us today on the floor, I was strongly against it. It was a mistake in terms of strategy; it was a horrible price paid by our troops; and it was dramatically unsettling. It has limped along to an unsatisfactory resolution, but it wasn't until 9 years later that we finally finished the job with the death of Osama bin Laden.

I commend the President for being in charge of that operation. But it's done. It's over. We killed Osama bin Laden. It is time for us to stop the longest war in American history, whether it is formally declared or not, and I strongly identify with many of the comments from my friend Ron Paul on the floor here a moment ago.

It is time for the United States to stop spending more in a month in Afghanistan than it would cost to hire every man and woman in Afghanistan of working age. That's what we're spending. You could rent the country for a year for what we are spending for a month, and the resolution is going to be exactly the same. Whether it's 2013, 2014, 2015, whether it's another 100, another 1,000 American lives, whether it's $10 billion or $100 billion, it is time for us to give the military a break, to listen to the American public, to reposition and deal with the challenges at hand.

Madam Chair, I am haunted by the notion that we have lost more men and women to suicide than we have to hostile action. There are terrible consequences for this operation that need go on no longer.

I suggest it's time to end--to save lives, to save money, to save the strain on our military--and for this Congress to get to work on things that will make a difference for international peace and security, for restarting the American economy and for making our communities safer, healthier, and more economically secure. If we do our job in Afghanistan, in scaling it down and in getting the troops out as quickly as we responsibly can, we will take an important step in that direction.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, we take great pride in the American military, trained fighting force. We work hard to make sure they are properly equipped, but decades of military training has left dangerous explosives and harmful chemicals on millions of acres of United States land.

This contaminated real estate now serves as housing, schools, parks and playgrounds in every congressional district in the country. In fact, you may have read in the morning paper down at what is called The Yards near Nationals stadium, the development that is being done there, they discovered a thousand-pound bomb less than 1 kilometer from where we're debating today.

To help the Department of Defense become a better partner for our communities and our constituents, I strongly urge that my colleagues support an amendment that would preserve the Department of Defense efforts to employ skilled labor and high-tech companies to clean up these dangerous liabilities and create economic development opportunities on these dangerous properties.

Congress established the Defense Environmental Restoration Program- Formerly Used Defense Site Program, DERP-FUDS, in 1986 to remove hazardous material from former Department of Defense properties and allow for safe reuse. Over two decades later, 2,600 properties nationwide require cleanup at an estimated cost of over $18 billion; and I will tell you, my colleagues, after having worked in this area for over a dozen years, that probably understates it.

The current funding for the program is less than $300 million, one- half of 1 percent of base defense spending. At this rate, the Department estimates, at this low-ball figure of $18 billion, we will not finish cleaning up the sites we know about for the next 250 years. My amendment would simply restore funding to the current level to ensure that we continue work removing these dangerous burdens from our communities within our lifetime, to say nothing of our great, great grandchildren's.

At a time when total military spending amounts to more in 1 day than what we spend in an entire year, I strongly urge my colleagues to reprioritize our investments. These sites are decades--in some cases they are hundreds of years old.

Now, the Defense Department has an obligation to clean up after itself, and they have made great progress. They have made critical technological breakthroughs in removing unexploded ordnance, making it less expensive, and some of the investments that we have made have actually saved lives overseas, because the same technology that will help us figure out whether it's a hubcap or a 105 millimeter shell can make a difference in IEDs overseas in Afghanistan or Iran.

I strongly urge my colleagues to support this amendment. It has operational impacts today for our military. It has economic development impact, which will help us return millions of acres to productive use; and it's the right thing to do.

I don't want a situation where we shortchange what the Department of Defense does. Remember, in prior debates--Mr. Dicks, Mr. Young may remember--I brought to the floor Larry the Lizard coloring books that we were distributing to school children to warn them of the hazards because we hadn't invested enough to clean up, or the children that were killed in a former defense operation in San Diego because they found a bomb when they were playing.

I strongly urge that you approve this amendment and simply return the funding to the level that we have today. It will make a difference for the military now and for generations to come.

I appreciate your consideration and yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman yield?

I appreciate your understanding of the importance and your concern about prioritization. If we don't prolong it in debate and recorded vote and all of this sort of thing, would it be possible to work with you and the ranking member as we move forward to see if there is an opportunity for us to plus-up this fund a little further in other areas?

Mr. Speaker, tonight I offer an amendment to H.R. 5856 that would reduce spending on ``Operation and Maintenance, Defense Wide'' account by $88,952,000 and increase spending on the ``Environmental Restoration, Formerly Used Defense Sites'' account by an equal amount.

Offered By: Mr. Blumenauer

Amendment No. 8: Page 9, line 6, after the dollar amount,

insert ``(reduced by $88,952,000)''.

Page 16, line 24, after the dollar amount, insert

``(increased by $88,952,000)''.