Floor Statements

I thank the gentleman.

The Republicans are allowing nostalgia for a time before Medicare and Medicaid were ever on the books to replace the idealism that we need to have in order to deal with the real challenges of the future. But for the poor, the sick, the elderly and the disabled, the past is just a memory and the future is their hard reality. And that's what this budget will be for those people, a hard reality.

It takes no courage for the Republicans to stand here on the House floor and to call for an evisceration of the Medicare budget, of the Medicaid budget and all the other programs for the poor, the sick, the elderly and the disabled in our country that they opposed ever having been put on the books in the first place. If you kicked this budget in the heart, you'd break your toe. GOP used to stand for ``Grand Old Party.'' Now it stands for ``Get Old People.'' And that's what this budget is. It is a targeting of the poor, the sick and the elderly in our country.

Do they ask sacrifice from the defense budget? Do they ask for the defense budget to go down? No, it just keeps going up year after year. Do they ask for sacrifice from the wealthy? No, they say tax breaks for the wealthy year after year after year. Who do they target? They target Grandma. They don't even have the ability--the courage--to stand up and say to the oil companies, who at $100 a barrel are making $100 billion in profits a year, ``We're going to take away your tax breaks.'' No. Tax breaks for oil companies stay on the books.

What do they do? They say to the clean energy industry, We're cutting

your tax breaks by 70 percent, but we're leaving the tax breaks for the oil industry on the books and we are slashing the programs for wind, for solar and for all those energy technologies that are now the future.

I thank the gentleman.

That's your formula. It's a formula of the past. It's a formula for the nostalgic amongst the Republicans who wish we could go back to a time before Medicare and Medicaid and wind and solar and new energy technologies and their taking us on to a future.

Let me tell you something.

Fifty percent of the people who are in nursing homes in our country have Alzheimer's, and they are on Medicaid. That's how we pay for the bills. You people slash the budget for those people with Alzheimer's who are in nursing homes. That's 50 percent. That's grandma, ladies and gentlemen. You don't touch the wealthy. You don't touch the Defense Department. This budget is so cruel that, if you kicked it in the heart, you'd break your toe.

I thank the gentlelady.

In 2 days, the Republicans have proven that they always side with the biggest behemoth companies. Yesterday, they said it was okay for the biggest oil and coal and chemical companies to pollute the atmosphere. Today, they are saying that it's okay for the biggest communications companies to totally control the entire blogosphere. They want to spoil Mother Earth and Google Earth all in a 24-hour period. They want to allow the domination of the World Wide Web and the pollution of the whole wide world all in 24 hours.

Let me give you a little history here, ladies and gentlemen. We had no competition in the Internet, in the wireless world.

In 1993, there were two companies--analog, 50 cents a minute. No one had cell phones in their companies. ``We'' had to move over the 200 megahertz. ``We'' had to say there was a third, fourth, fifth, and sixth company so that there would be competition and then block the first two companies that were not innovating. Why were they not innovating? Because there was no Darwinian paranoia inducing competition to force them to move. Then in 1996, when the whole country was analog, we had to pass another bill to move them to digital, to move them to broadband, because the behemoths had yet to deploy broadband to one home in the United States.

No competition. No innovation. No benefits to consumers. The biggest companies that the Republicans support were happy with the way things were going because they could charge whatever they wanted to, provide whatever services they wanted to, ignore competition, and ignore consumers simultaneously.

That's what this debate is all about. We had to ensure that those behemoths--the oligopolies, the monopolies--were taken from the clutches of the Republicans and put out into the world where they had to compete.

So what do we have here today? Another Republican congressional resolution, which says let's go back to that era where the biggest companies, the monopolies, defy the one lesson that Adam Smith taught us, which is that monopolies and oligopolies are incapable of enjoying anything but the respect of those who are already in the wealthy class while ignoring those who are in the consumer class. That's their history. That's the number one lesson of Adam Smith, that we must beware of oligopolies.

Here, what we have on our hands is an effort to shut down the one job-creating engine that has driven our economy over the last 15 years, since we opened up the competition, and they want to shut it down. Ladies and gentlemen, 50 percent of the growth of our economy in the 1990s was in this sector. It's because we had competition. They want to shut it down here today.

Vote ``no'' on the Republican resolution, which ends this era of the open Internet and which allows every innovator in their garages and at home to dream big--that they could create new jobs in our economy.

I thank the gentlelady.

The microphone in the well on the Democratic side is shut down; so I will use the microphone on the Republican side.

And I will say to the Republicans that we already have rules that govern the Internet that have passed through this Congress. They deal with education; they deal with privacy; they deal with intellectual property; they deal with global Internet governance; they deal with network security; they deal with pornography; they deal with taxation of items on the Internet; they deal with protections to the deaf and blind on the Internet. We do have rules on the Internet, so don't pretend for a second that we don't.

Let me give you, though, another lesson from Adam Smith in the Wealth of Nations. Here is what he said:

``The Member of Parliament who supports every proposal for strengthening the monopoly is sure to acquire not only the reputation of understanding trade but great popularity and influence with an order of men whose numbers and wealth render them of great importance.

``If he opposes them, on the contrary, and still more if he has the authority to be able to thwart them, neither the most acknowledged probity nor the greatest rank nor the greatest public services can protect him from the most infamous abuse and detraction, from personal insults, nor sometimes from real danger arising from the insolent outrage of furious and disappointed monopolists.''

Adam Smith warned us of monopolies, of oligopolies as the greatest threat to capitalism. That is what we are debating today, to ensure that the Internet is open, not just to the monopolists but to every entrepreneur, the tens of thousands of them out there who have been creating the wealth, creating the opportunities, creating the jobs, creating the open communication that has revolutionized our world.

In Iran it is legal to shut down the Internet. In China it is legal to shut down the Internet. Let us make sure in the United States it is not legal to shut down the Internet.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today along with my fellow co-chair of the bipartisan Alzheimer's Task Force Mr. Smith (R-NJ) and colleagues Rep. McDermott (D-WA), Burgess (R-TX), Bordallo (D-GU), Christensen (D-VI), Grijalva (D-AZ) and Pierluisi (D-PR) to introduce the bipartisan Health Outcomes, Planning and Education (HOPE) for Alzheimer's Act.

One in eight Americans over 65--or 5.4 million individuals--have Alzheimer's disease. Unless science finds a way to prevent or cure it, over 13 million Americans will have Alzheimer's disease by the year 2050.

The HOPE Act aims to improve the way we diagnosis Alzheimer's disease and other dementias and provide important information about care and treatment for patients and their families. The bill provides Medicare coverage for comprehensive diagnoses of Alzheimer's disease to guarantee that seniors who show signs of Alzheimer's can receive a formal diagnosis from their doctor and that this diagnosis is documented in their medical record. The bill would also improve care and reduce costs by providing information and resources to newly diagnosed patients and their families by including, for the first time, caregivers in discussions with doctors and patients.

At present, most people with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias have not received an official diagnosis. Data from a report done by the Alzheimer's Association found only 19 percent of people over age 65 with dementia had a diagnosis documented in their medical record. African American and Hispanic populations, at higher risk for Alzheimer's disease than whites, are even less likely to have been diagnosed.

Early diagnoses can help individuals receive treatments early, when medications are more likely to be effective, and they allow patients to participate in clinical trials to benefit from cutting edge research. With an early diagnosis, patients can prepare for the oncoming symptoms of the disease with their doctors and caregivers. Ultimately, this can bring down Medicare costs by helping patients better manage other preexisting medical conditions and avoid crises.

Each year, the federal government spends $93 billion out of Medicare, or almost 20% of the entire Medicare budget, to care for Alzheimer's patients. This money pays for hospitalizations, doctor's visits, and drugs associated with the disease. Facilitating conversations with doctors and caregivers and providing resources for families can help mitigate the number of hospitalizations and complications for patients with the disease.

While we work here in Congress to invest more funding for Alzheimer's research to find a cure, we must continue to help the families who have been impacted by this devastating disease. This bipartisan legislation is a good step toward ensuring these important measures are taken.

The Alzheimer's Association, Alzheimer's Foundation, Cure Alzheimer's Fund, and UsAgainstAlzheimer's have endorsed our legislation, which will increase the likelihood that Alzheimer's will be diagnosed sooner and help families plan for the necessary treatments and care. I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues on this important issue throughout the legislative process.

I thank the gentleman.

I rise in opposition to the dirty air act, which overturns the scientific finding that pollution is harming our people and our planet. But as long as Republicans are making an ideological decision to overturn scientific reality, I wonder if the Republicans could offer an amendment overturning inconvenient geological reality as well. Let's tell the United States Geological Survey that Congress doesn't believe that the United States only has 2 percent of the world's oil as well. What the Republican majority is bringing to the House floor today is almost as absurd.

Republicans want our only weapon against OPEC to be a bumper sticker slogan, ``Drill, Baby, Drill.'' Well, I have news for my Republican friends. We are drilling, baby. U.S. oil production is at its highest level in nearly a

decade. Domestic natural gas production is at an all-time high. But we will never be able to drill our way out of this problem.

What Republicans fail to acknowledge is that a clean energy revolution is already underway. Take a look at the new electrical generating capacity we've been installing in the United States in the last 4 years--the last 4 years. Eighty percent of all new electrical- generating capacity has been natural gas, 33,000 new megawatts; and wind, 28,000 new megawatts.

This is the last 4 years, ladies and gentlemen. Coal is down to 10,000, but rising very quickly. Solar at nearly 2,000 megawatts; biomass at nearly 1,000 megawatts. In other words, there is a revolution that is already under way. The only problem is, there is no long-term policy or certainty that has been put on the books. All we have are the Republicans fighting as hard as they can to prevent this revolution from coming to fruition so that we can dramatically reduce the amount of greenhouse gases that warm our planet, back out the oil that OPEC wants to send us, and create a new, clean energy revolution here in America that produces jobs for Americans.

This arbitrary rejection of scientific fact will not cause the gross domestic product to rise or for unemployment to fall. But here is what their bill will do: it will lead to higher pollution levels, which will rise; oil imports, which will rise; temperatures, which will rise; job creation domestically, which will actually go down.

Vote ``no'' on this assault on science, on public health, and on the American economic competitiveness that allows a revolution to take off, which makes it possible for us to solve the problems of employment, national security, and a dangerously warming planet.

Madam Chair, I offer an amendment.

Madam Chair, I rise in support of my amendment.

My amendment is quite simple. It just says that nothing, nothing that the Republicans are proposing today should put a limitation on the ability of the EPA to reduce the demand for importing oil from OPEC, which should be the number one objective in our country.

You know, we only have 2 percent of the world's oil reserves, and we consume 25 percent on a daily basis. That is our Achilles' heel, and there is nothing we can do about it.

So the only way in which we can solve the problem is if we reduce consumption by increasing the efficiency of the vehicles which we drive, of the boats which we use, of the planes that we ride in, of the other sources that consume the oil that we use in our country.

And what they are going to do, the Republicans, is tie the hands of the EPA to back out the 5 million barrels of oil that we import from OPEC on a daily basis.

OPEC is not afraid of the Foreign Affairs Committee. OPEC is not afraid of the Armed Services Committee. It is the Energy Committee that they are afraid of.

They are afraid that one day we will actually have a policy that backs out their imported oil, that denies them the $150 billion or $200 billion a year that we send over to them that allows them to continue their dictatorships. That's what they are afraid of.

And what the Republicans are doing today is tying the hands of our country to be able to tell OPEC we don't need their oil anymore than we need their sands. That's the message that they are sending here today. That's the message the Republicans are sending to OPEC.

Have a good night's sleep. Don't worry. We are going to tie the hands of the EPA to back out that imported oil. That's why this amendment goes right to the heart of the national security of our country, right to the heart of our economic independence, as well as reducing greenhouse gases. The national security of our country is at stake in this amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 1 minute to the ranking member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman).

I yield myself 1 minute.

And let me say this to you, the Republicans: I had an amendment out here to increase fuel economy standards from 25 to 35 miles per gallon in 2001, 2003, 2005. You voted against it every time. You said that it will ruin the auto industry if we improve the fuel economy standards. Do you know who ruined the auto industry? You did. In 2009, General Motors had to declare bankruptcy.

Now we have fuel economy standards at 35 miles per gallon. Do you want to know what they are reporting? Record profits. Do you know what Ford is reporting? Record profits and record hiring. Do you know who is opposed to your bill here today? The United Auto Workers oppose you. They believe it's going to undermine the efficiency and the job creation which is now possible. The United Auto Workers oppose you.

So, ladies and gentlemen, if you're looking for jobs or national security in this bill, make sure you vote for the Markey amendment because they are so historically so far off base with this bill that it cannot begin to be measured.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

What the Republicans are doing in their bill is stripping the EPA of their authority to regulate the fuel efficiency of vehicles that we drive in our country, of the planes, the trains and the boats where we put the petroleum. That's what their bill does. That's what the Supreme Court gave them as authority.

The gentleman says, EPA is misnamed. Well, let me just tell you under the Republicans, EPA stands for ``Every Polluter's Ally.'' Under the Democrats, it stands for ``End Petroleum Addiction.'' That's what the Markey amendment does. It gives the EPA the authority to back out this imported oil and to tell them that we're going to use the Oklahoma oil, the Texas oil and the Louisiana oil; but we don't need that oil coming out of the Persian Gulf any more than we need to send 100,000 young men and women over there.

Let's set a new policy path here today, ladies and gentlemen. Let's give those OPEC ministers a few sleepless nights. Let's not allow them to look at the Congress, once again ignoring the strength of our country, which is our technological genius, to be able to invent the new technologies that make us less dependent. And what did the Republicans do one month ago? They zeroed out all of the loan guarantees for solar and wind. They zeroed them out of the legislation. That's their all-of-the-above legislation.

Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chair, during rollcall vote number 208 on H.R. 658, on the Garrett of NJ amendment, I mistakenly recorded my vote as ``no'' when I should have voted ``yes.''

Amendment No. 9 Offered by Mr. DeFazio

This bill would wipe ``Car Talk'' off the road. It would wipe ``Lake Woebegone'' right off the map. It would close down ``Marketplace,'' and tell ``Wait Wait . . . Don't Tell Me!'' to take a hike.

GOP used to stand for ``Grand Old Party.'' Now it stands for ``Gut Our Programs.''

This bill prohibits public radio stations from using Federal funds to buy these programs and others produced by National Public Radio or its competitors. As a result, this bill would silence public radio stations across the country, depriving listeners of the news and information they depend on.

Public radio stations can just raise the money from private donors, some say. Not likely. Local public radio stations need signature NPR programs like ``Morning Edition'' and ``All Things Considered'' to attract audiences. By drawing listeners to local stations, these programs and others generate strong financial support from the local listening area. Without these

prominent NPR programs, local stations won't be able to attract the audience and sufficient fundraising base to keep running.

Every month, more than 170 million Americans turn to their local public broadcasting stations for free high-quality programs that focus on the issues most important to them. This bill would pull the plug. It would snuff out stations from coast to coast, many in rural areas where the public radio station is the primary source of news and information. This makes no sense. Public radio is widely supported by large majorities of Americans regardless of party affiliation. It is increasingly relied upon while fewer Americans watch broadcast TV and read newspapers.

This bill was rushed to the floor without a single hearing, completely bypassing the committee process. It is unwise, ill- conceived.

I urge a ``no'' vote.

I thank the gentlelady.

Mr. Speaker, in an era when Edwardian drama is the only way to characterize the way in which cable news deals with the public affairs of our country, there is an oasis of real news that begins with Morning Edition, goes right through the day to All Things Considered, which focuses on that most unusual of all subjects, hard news, that the American people can use to make judgments about the affairs of our country and the affairs of the world. It is an oasis of information that is supplemented, yes, by Lake Woe Begone, On Point, other programs that raise the cultural level but serve as a place where people, 170 million Americans, can go to get real information.

Now what is this debate all about? Well, it's really about an ancient animosity which the Republican Party has had to the very creation of NPR, through Newt Gingrich, through the

early years of the 21st century, right up to today where it's on a list of grievances which they have about this ability of NPR to provide this news and information. That's what the debate's about. You don't have to be Dick Tracy to figure out what this debate is all about. They have right from the very beginning of the creation of this network wanted to destroy it.

I think that they are going to run into a razor blade sharp edge reaction from the American public as they find that, in place of Morning Edition and Car Talk and All Things Considered, they want to move to radio silence, and when the American people find out about that, they are going to be outraged.

I would vote ``no'' and urge strongly a ``no'' vote for all Members of this body.

I thank the gentleman.

On September 11, 2001, when Richard Clarke, George Bush's terrorism czar, was asked to sit in the control room to take over the response on 9/11, the first call he made was to the port of the city of Boston to shut down the port because of the LNG facility in Everett, Massachusetts, in my district. That was the first thought in his mind. And why was that so? Because the al Qaeda had actually come in from Algeria, jumping off those ships in Boston Harbor in Everett, Massachusetts, in my district.

Now we've had a tremendous amount of development of natural gas in the Marcellus shale formation and all across the country, an addition of 30 percent to the natural gas reserves of our country over the last 4 years.

Now if a city, if a State determines that the terrorism threat is so great that they do not want an LNG facility in the middle of their most densely populated area, it should not be the right of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to override the public safety decision made by the State and local police that it is too great of a danger. That is why the Wu amendment is correct.

We have a bonanza of natural gas domestically. If a State decides they can get it from our own people rather than overseas, it is not up to the FERC to make that decision if they are going to override the national security, the safety consideration of that community, in making that decision.

I urge an ``aye'' vote on the Wu amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

I thank the Chair.

Mr. Chairman, we all agree that we have to do some serious work to reduce the deficit. But we need to start by first eliminating unnecessary taxpayer subsidies to big oil companies. I'm going to finish the rest of this opening statement in the well.

As a result of a poorly drafted law passed by the Republican Congress in 1995, oil companies are now drilling for free on public lands offshore in the Gulf of Mexico. The Government Accountability Office projects that the American people currently stand to lose as much as $53 billion in royalty payments over the life of these leases. And according to a brand new study, that's as much as $1.5 billion just this year. And with oil prices at $90 a barrel, we do not have to be allowing them to drill on public lands for free and take all of the profit for themselves and giving nothing back to the American taxpayer.

This amendment is very simple. It says to these companies we will allow you to continue to drill and not even pay any royalties, but we're not going to give you an opportunity to bid on any new leases on public lands in our country.

So if you renegotiate so that you are paying your fair share back to the American taxpayer, then fine, you can drill in the future. But we need that $53 billion that they owe in royalties, in taxes to be put towards reducing the Federal deficit.

That's what this debate should be all about: Where do we go to find where the waste is in our Federal Government? The oil companies drilling for free, paying nothing to the taxpayers while reaping windfall profits is absolutely something that we should not tolerate.

This amendment passed in 2006 on the House floor. This amendment passed as part of the BP response bill last year. This amendment passes over and over again with significant Republican support, 60 votes just 5 years ago. In order to reclaim this money, I urge an ``aye'' vote.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the ranking member of the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New York, the author of this amendment in 2006, Mr. Hinchey.

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

I yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from California (Mrs. Capps).

I yield myself the remainder of the time.

This amendment encapsulates this entire week. This week's debate is all about priorities: Will we stand with Big Oil or with Big Bird? With the big corporations or with the little guy?

Shell Oil isn't curing our addiction to oil, but the millions of Americans afflicted with Alzheimer's and Parkinson's need a cure for those diseases; and they need these revenues from the oil companies.

Executives from BP won't be shivering in the cold any time soon, but our Nation's poorest families and senior citizens will be.

ConocoPhillips doesn't need help feeding their profits; but millions of America's poorest women, infants, and children who don't have enough to eat need help staying fed.

Chevron doesn't need special treatment, but special education programs for our neediest students are on the chopping block.

ExxonMobil doesn't need a head start on success, but our kids do need the Head Start program to send them on the right educational path.

My amendment focuses on just the kind of special interest loophole that should be closed before we open attacks on programs for the poorest Americans most in need of help.

One of the several dozen companies receiving this windfall is BP. Imagine that. BP spilled oil freely into the Gulf of Mexico for nearly 90 days, and yet they are now drilling for free in some of those same waters at the expense of the American taxpayers.

Just last week the former president of Shell Oil, John Hofmeister, was quoted in the National Journal as saying, ``In the face of sustained high oil prices, it was not an issue for large companies of needing the subsidies to entice them to looking for and producing more oil.''

Well, I agree with Mr. Hofmeister. At nearly $90 a barrel, subsidizing oil companies to drill is like subsidizing a bird to fly or a fish to swim. You do not have to do it.

Unless this amendment is adopted, ExxonMobil, BP, Shell, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron will continue to hold leases that let them drill on public land without paying taxpayers a single dime. These companies are already getting 100-year-old tax breaks to sell $100-a- barrel oil to make $100 billion a year in profits. They don't need a $53 billion windfall courtesy of the American taxpayer and our national debt.

Vote ``aye'' on the Markey amendment. Cease paying big oil companies' windfall profits for the American people.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

I thank the gentleman. And I rise in opposition to the Herger amendment.

In 2001, the Forest Service finally admitted the obvious--the road system through our national forests is far larger than it should be. Though the Forest Service can't tell us for sure, the best estimate is that the national forests are crisscrossed by more than 308,000 miles of roads. That is eight times the length of the entire United States interstate system. Forest roads could wrap around the Earth 15 times.

From 1975 to 1985, the Forest road system doubled. And that is just the authorized roads. It is estimated that there are an additional 60,000 miles of user-created, illegal roads through the forests, cut through sensitive areas just because it looked like fun.

The massive tangle of roads fragments the forest, destroying habitat, increasing erosion, and decreasing water quality. And the problems get worse each year as the Forest Service road maintenance budget falls further and further behind. Real maintenance needs for this massive road system just don't happen. The current backlog is estimated to be $10 billion.

And do you want to know how we know it's really so bad? Because it was the Bush administration that finally announced in 2001 that a planning process for inventory of the road system to figure out how many miles of roads it really needed, closing illegal roads, and starting to work on a more efficient system, were needed.

The Herger amendment stops the Bush administration planning in its tracks just as it is about to be completed. And I just believe that the Members really should not take it upon themselves to end this 7-year process that is going to finally bring some order to the Forest Service. I urge a ``no'' vote on the Herger amendment.

I thank the gentleman from California.

This language is going to destroy the early warning system that has been put in place in order to give parents the information they need in order to protect their children. If this amendment passes, it will grant industry's wish to once again make the government its secret partner in crime by keeping reports of serious injury or even death hidden from public view.

In 2000 and again in 2003, the Consumer Product Safety Commission documented cases of children suffering intestinal injuries after swallowing small but powerful magnets that had fallen out of toys. The public didn't know, and the CPSC did nothing. By mid-2005, after more reports of safety concerns associated with the magnets and two reports of serious, life-threatening injuries, the public still didn't know, and the CPSC still did nothing.

On Thanksgiving Day 2005, 22-month-old Kenny Sweet of Redmond, Washington, died after swallowing magnets that had fallen out of Magnetix toys. It was only after Kenny's death and an additional four hospitalizations that the CPSC finally gave the public an inkling of what was going on. But it actually took until April of 2007--after 7 years of reports of risks, numerous serious injuries and a death-- before a full recall of all the products was undertaken. And that is not the only example of deaths and injuries that could have been avoided had parents known the risks to their children.

In all of these cases, we heard the same story. There simply aren't enough resources for the CPSC to quickly and fully investigate every complaint. In 2005, the CPSC investigated only 1 percent.

This is a ``no'' vote. Otherwise, we are going to see that choking hazards and cribs that kill are once again hidden from public view.

Thank you.

Monument designations do not take non-Federal land. The Antiquities Act only allows monument designations on land the Federal Government already owns.

There is nothing improper about these designations. This authority has been upheld by every court which has reviewed it since 1906.

Monument designations do not lock up resources. Monument designations under the Antiquities Act grandfather valid, existing rights so any mining or other claim existing before the designation can still move forward.

If Members object to the Antiquities Act of 1906, they should file legislation amending the act and then come on over to the Natural Resources Committee. Doc Hastings and I will be sitting there waiting for you to testify to make your case to amend the Antiquities Act.

This amendment is based on an extreme ideology that the Federal Government should divest itself of the stunning national treasures managed by the Department of Interior and enjoyed by millions each year.

Vote ``no'' on this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I think a little bit of telecommunications history would be appropriate at this juncture. First of all, just let me explain that AT&T and the regional Bell companies had nothing to do with the invention of the Internet. In fact, they were asked by the Federal Government in 1966 if they wanted the contract to build the packet switch network that would operate simultaneously with the Long Lines Network across the country, and AT&T and Bell South and Verizon all said, No, we don't want to build the packet switch network. Give it to someone else. And so they did. They gave it to a tiny company, Bolt, Baranek and Newman up in Massachusetts, which built the Internet across the country, designed it, without any of the Bell operating companies.

Back in the 1960s and the 1970s, when people said to AT&T and said to Verizon and said to Pac Bell, How about allowing people to be able to go out and buy another phone other than a black rotary dial phone? Well, here's what AT&T and Bell South said. They said, If you allow someone to buy another phone other than a black rotary dial phone, it could destroy the entire phone system of our country.

Back in the 1970s and early 1980s there were new companies called MCI and Sprint that wanted to provide competing long distance service. Remember, up until the mid-1980s, whenever grandma called from California, people would run to the phone saying, Run, it's long distance. It costs a dollar a minute. That was AT&T, that was the Bell system across our country. No competition, no incentive to introduce innovation, no incentive to lower prices, no incentive to make the consumer the king.

And then along comes the 1990s and 2000s. We here on the floor of Congress said we must introduce competition. This system--this AT&T, this Bell South, Verizon, Pac Bell system--it does not innovate. Not one home in America had broadband in February of 1996 when we passed the Telecom Act here. We had to order it. There were no broadband users in America in any home as we passed the bill.

So what we tried to do is to induce Darwinian, paranoia-inducing competition. What do the broadband barons seek to accomplish? They, as the private sector, want to quash competition. They don't ever and they never will invent a Hulu, an Amazon, an eBay. They will never invent any of these thousands of smaller companies which are the engine of economic growth in our country, which leads to our ability to export these products.

Verizon is not going to invent anything to do. What they want to do is squeeze the competitors. Price them out of the market so that they can maintain a monopoly or an oligopoly across the country. That's what this debate is all about. That's what the FCC rules are saying. They're saying that the new Steve Jobs, the new Bill Gates, the new Sergey Brin or Larry Page in the garage somewhere--and there are thousands of them across the country--must be able to get into the marketplace to create these new jobs without having to be tipped upside down and having every last cent poured out of their pocket to pay these large companies. That's what this debate is all about. It's about whether or not we want vigorous competition in the marketplace. Those who are opposed to the open network, those who are opposed to giving every competitor equal access with the biggest broadband behemoth, that is what this debate is about.

They're covering it as though the government is really trying to control the Internet. Not so. They are siding with the broadband barons against those thousands of companies who are out there, who have reinvented telecommunications and information delivery in our country and across the planet just 14 years after the Bell system had 100 years to do so and had invented every single technology. They had invented them all, but they had no incentive to deploy those new technologies because they had a monopoly.

That's what the debate is about. If you vote for this amendment to give control by the broadband barons over the Internet once again, then you will see an inexorable, inevitable decline in innovation, in investment, in the private sector in these new products, these new technologies, these new applications, these new devices which are basically invented by hundreds and thousands of smaller companies in our country. That's the choice you have. Vote ``no'' on this amendment that shuts down the Internet.

I move to strike the last word.

This amendment is overbroad, to use a euphemistic term, in order to describe what its impact will be upon those who are the least powerful, and most agreed in terms of the impact in which the Federal Government has upon their lives as individual citizens.

Let me give you an idea of how broad the impact of this amendment is. If this amendment had been in place, would the citizens who had been unwittingly turned into nuclear guinea pigs in the 1940s and 1950s during Federal Government-sponsored radiation experiments using thousands of American citizens without their permission have been able to bring their lawsuits decades later in order to reclaim some small compensation for their families? Would they have been able to bring their suits against the Federal Government? Who do you want to empower, the people who were the guinea pigs or the Federal Government?

Would a widow who sued the Social Security Administration for refusing to provide the survivor's benefits that she was still due, would she be able to sue? Or are the legal fees just so great that the widow just has to live without the benefits? Would those who live downwind from a nuclear test and suffered cancer or other health effects, would they be able to sue? They've only found out years later what the impact is on them. How can they possibly afford the legal fees to take on the Federal Government?

Would the atomic veteran deployed at the test site during the atmospheric nuclear testing of the 1950s ever have been able to afford to bring their case to court? Would those people all across Nevada, Arizona, Utah, those States out West where these poor victims only found out later, how could they have ever afforded to have brought a lawsuit if they are not going to know that their legal fees would be covered when they win?

Would government whistleblowers be able to bring a case in response to retaliation by their supervisors? How can they sue the government? It's this lone individual against the Federal Government. We should be empowering these individuals against the Federal Government when it acts in an imperious, arbitrary, capricious way that ruins people's lives. Would citizens harmed by a contamination at a Superfund site at a military base in their neighborhood be able to sue the Federal Government because of the harm that has now gone into their neighborhoods? Or should we just say, Sorry, you are out of luck. The Federal Government did it to you. They did it to you in your neighborhood. You don't have the capacity because you are just some poor citizen living accidentally near a military base.

What would the black farmers who were discriminated against for decades by the Agriculture Department have been able to do in terms of bringing a lawsuit? They couldn't have done it. Those poor black farmers took a generation. Who funds that? How do they take on the Federal Government which had a policy of discrimination for 200 years against black farmers? How do they do it? You are defunding all of those lawsuits with this one amendment. What would have been the impact on Native Americans who trusted the government to protect their interests and natural resources and instead were ripped off? How do those Native Americans bring their case?

All of these things are now basically undermined by the amendment that we are now considering. That is this impact that is being visited upon all of these victims and all future victims, all actions by the Federal Government of the United States of America. This is where you get to show what your attitude is towards the Federal Government when they are acting in a way which does direct harm to the health, the well-being, and the safety of ordinary Americans in our country.

I will read the amendment. ``None of the funds made available by this Act may be used for the payment of fees and other expenses under section 504 of title 5'' of the U.S. Code. So this covers every suit that could be brought by any citizen against any Federal agency of the United States Government. I don't know how you can side with the Federal Government against ordinary citizens and their right to sue, especially those who have been harmed the most seriously.

So I urge a very strong ``no'' by every Member of Congress who really does believe that the Federal Government has to be put in its place when they harm ordinary citizens.

I rise just to make this very simple point so you all know what you're doing. The law that this amendment wants to prevent funding for was a Ronald Reagan law. This is a law Ronald Reagan signed and put on the books, just so you understand. And of course the reason he put it on the books was that he sided with the little guy against the Federal Government. This is a way to make the Federal Government accountable. And recovery of attorneys' fees and legal expenses is needed to ensure that the people can keep their own government accountable when they, the smallest of the

small, are having the Federal Government intrude itself into their lives and bringing tremendous harm to the health and well-being of the families in any particular community in our country.

As of 2009, by the way, Social Security and veterans cases make up the majority of Equal Access to Justice awards. So you're going to be disempowering, for the most part, Social Security and veterans cases that otherwise would not be able to be brought against the Federal Government. And I just think that this is not well thought out.

This is an across-the-board blunderbuss attack upon the rights of citizens all across the country who otherwise are just going to sit there in their home wondering what's going on in Washington. If ever there was a tea party amendment that has to be made to counter what you're doing, this is it. You guys are here representing Big Government against the essence, the heart, the soul of the tea party movement, wondering how the Federal Government can get away with intruding themselves. And all we're really providing here is minimal financial assistance if they win. If they lose it's a frivolous case. If they lose, the jury decided against them. This is only if they win, if they put up their life savings to try to take on the Federal Government and they win because the Federal Government had compromised the rights of their family.

So, I just want to let you all know, environmental cases amount to a very, very, very tiny fraction of all the cases that we're talking about. We're talking about, for the most part, ordinary families. And I understand why some people might not want to give these people the right to sue, but you're making a big mistake. It's at the heart, it seems to me, of what the tea party movement was about, and voting for this will be a very difficult thing to explain.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

What we are hearing this afternoon, Mr. Chairman, is a whole bunch of phony baloney numbers about how this is going to affect the cement industry, about how this is going to affect the concrete industry, when, in fact, industry after industry in the United States has been able to comply with rules which protect the public health and safety.

First, let's just define what we're talking about and why American families are concerned about what the Portland cement industry is doing:

It is airborne mercury which settles in lakes and rivers. It accumulates in fish and shellfish. In its most dangerous form, it is a neurotoxin that can lead to birth defects and stunted brain development.

Since we are at the top of the food chain and doctors and dieticians across the country are urging families to eat more fish, we are simultaneously urging them, especially those with small children or who are women who may be pregnant, to consume these fish that

have the neurotoxins in them that we know lead directly to brain damage, that lead to harm in children in our country.

So this is a concrete example of what the Republican majority is now trying to do. This is kind of a regulatory earmark for a single industry, aimed at giving it the right to pollute, to send mercury into our atmosphere, and ultimately into the bodies of the children of our country when we know that thousands of them are going to die from the consumption of that mercury and that thousands more will have an aggravation of asthma, which they already have. The same thing will be true for senior citizens. Yet they're over here and are almost ignoring the health care impacts on families in our country.

We have people all across the country who are now going through food stores, looking to find what the mercury count is in the food which they're purchasing for their families. Instead, what the majority wants to do here today is to put a pair of Portland cement shoes on the EPA and then throw it into the river. And if the EPA doesn't die from drowning, the mercury is going to kill it. That's ultimately what the impact is going to be of this amendment.

So I understand, if I were a trade association, that I would be arguing, You can't impose any kind of restrictions upon us to protect the children of our country. It's just too expensive. It's too hard for us to do. The Chinese will take advantage of our protecting children from having mercury put into their brains, into their systems.

But do you want to know what? That's not a good enough excuse for our country. Our country is supposed to be the leader in ensuring that the public health of our citizens is protected. What has been constructed here is a very careful balance which ensures that the industry can survive and thrive at the same time that it is protecting the health and safety of the children in our country.

There are, by the way, many other people in the cement manufacturing industry who have contacted me, including companies in my own district, who do not support this position. They say that it is actually quite within their power to be able to comply with these rules in terms of ensuring that mercury is reduced in the production of cement, of concrete in our country.

So this is for the narrow number of small companies which are seeking to be exempted from having to participate in something that the vast majority of the industry can comply with. I do not believe that our country is going to sink to a level where the health and safety of the children in our country are going to be allowed to be compromised by amendments on this House floor on behalf of a single small industry, without any scientific justification except the bleatings that come from those who do not want to comply, and knowing that the consequences will be the loss of thousands of lives and brain damage done to thousands of more who are children right now but who will be affected by the vote that we cast here today.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.

The Land and Water Conservation Fund is a nearly 50-year- old promise to the American people that if we are going to allow giant oil companies like BP to deplete our ocean energy resources, we will take a small sliver of their massive profits and deposit it into a conservation fund.

Since its creation in 1965, the Land and Water Conversation Fund has allowed Federal acquisition of critical acres inside the national parks, vital wildlife habitats, conservation easements, and water rights, as well as construction of local recreational facilities through grants to States. The fund has served as one of the most important tools in building and protecting our national resources heritage.

The underlying bill devastates this revered program by slashing the amount to be paid out of the fund for conservation by almost 90 percent compared to current levels--almost 90 percent of a cut from current levels. The funding level contained in the underlying bill is the lowest proposed amount since the program was created in 1965. This is not a return to fiscal year 2008. This is not a return to fiscal year 2009. This is a return to fiscal year LBJ. That's their goal, to go back right to the very beginning, and if they could, to the year before when it did not exist at all. That's the real goal of what this debate is trying to accomplish from the Republican side. And now this amendment proposes a further reduction in the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

To be clear, this amendment does not save this money. Rather, it borrows this money from a trust fund and uses it to offset spending that has already occurred. This is diverting oil money from its intended conservation purpose in violation of a promise made to the American people. The Outdoor Industry Association points out that outdoor recreation contributes $730 billion annually to the United States economy and supports more than 6 million jobs. The Land and Water Conservation Fund is good for the environment, it's good for the economy, and it's a 50-year-old promise to every American.

The cuts contained in the underlying bill would cripple the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Further cuts could kill it. This amendment should be defeated, and it should be seen in the context of this massive attempt by the new Republican majority to take the EPA and to turn it into every polluter's ally; to take the clean air and the clean water laws and begin to undermine them systematically; to take each and every one of these environmental areas that we've made tremendous progress in over the last 30, 40, and 50 years and begin to roll back those gains as though America was not the beneficiary.

There's a good reason why America is the number one box office smash in the world, and that's because they look at us and they appreciate the commitment that we have made to the public health, to the public lands, to clean water, to clean air. And if we begin to undermine that image, then we will be hurting our country; we will be hurting our tourism; we will be hurting our ability to be able to pass on this planet in better condition than the way we found it. I urge that under no circumstances we support a provision that would accomplish all those goals.

Madam Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Madam Chairman, we all recognize that we must make calculated decisions to drive down our deficit, but today we see the cold calculations of the Republican leadership, who are cutting hundreds of millions of dollars that would help our Nation's poorest families heat their homes while continuing the billions in taxpayer subsidies we send to big oil companies.

My amendment would fully restore LIHEAP funding and reduce the deficit by repealing these $40 billion in tax breaks for Big Oil. Oil companies don't need the 100-year-old tax breaks to sell $100-per- barrel oil while making $100 billion per year.

For millions of families across the country this year, heating bills have been piling up along with the snow, and so are the record numbers of people turning to LIHEAP to help them get through the winter.

In my State of Massachusetts alone, LIHEAP is projected to help 250,000 families this winter. But even as the mercury has dropped, House Republicans are now considering dropping this important safety net for millions of low-income families nationwide. The only way this bill is going to help families heat their homes would be if they tossed all 359 pages in the fireplace.

It takes a frigid heart for the Republican leadership to continue to defend tax breaks for oil and gas companies while putting heating fuel assistance for America's neediest on ice. But that's exactly what they are doing.

The majority spending bill presents us with a false choice. We shouldn't be cutting heating assistance for the poorest families before repealing the $40 billion in tax subsidies to big oil companies, the most profitable companies in the history of the world. The Republicans can continue to make their choices, but the American people will not stand with them. When they are faced with giving tax breaks to Exxon or fuel assistance to low-income Americans, they have chosen Exxon. When they are forced to choose between a free lunch for BP or lunch for hungry senior citizens, they make the choice for BP. We should not be balancing the budget on the backs of the poorest families. I urge support for this amendment to protect the neediest amongst us with a ``no'' vote on this cold-hearted funding bill.

Madam Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Point of Order

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Right now, 2010, we spent $172 billion on Alzheimer's patients--$172 billion, Medicare and Medicaid. You're cutting the budget for NIH to find a cure for Alzheimer's. By the time all the baby boomers have retired, the budget for each year is going to be $1 trillion to take care of the 15 million baby boomers that are going to have Alzheimer's in nursing homes.

So what are you guys doing? You're saying, We're going to cut the budget for Medicaid, which pays for Alzheimer's patients in nursing homes, and we're going to cut the budget for the cure for the funding for the NIH. You're having it both ways. No cure--and you're then going to cut the money for these poor families under the Medicaid and Medicare budget. You shouldn't do this.

The NIH are the National Institutes of Hope--researchers in medicine's field of dreams from which we harvest the findings that give hope to millions of families in our country. You are cutting this budget and you're not giving us an opportunity to make amendments in which we'll be able to put the funding in for the NIH budget. And that is just a very bad moral decision which you are making. And you're sending a false hope to people that you're actually solving the problem by cutting the NIH budget.

All of those people who are going to have Alzheimer's--and it's a demographic certainty--are going to cost $1 trillion by 2050. You are doing nothing about that right now. And, by the way; you won't have the courage to tell people you're not going to take care of them in nursing homes across the countries. That demographic is going be so strong. Put the money in NIH for Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, for all of these diseases. Please, God, let's at least agree on that as a bipartisan issue--that all our families are going to be equally struck by all of these diseases.

The gentleman from New York has put his finger right on this great moral and political dilemma for our country. A stitch in time will save nine. The money we put up now will save not 9 but 900 times the money that is ultimately going to have to be spent on all of these Alzheimer's and Parkinson's patients. It is a demographic certainty.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon that the majority has, unfortunately, ruled out of order.

In this continuing resolution, the Republicans are trying to dismantle one of the most precious landmarks of the entire media landscape. Public broadcasting is an electronic oasis for learning in what has been called the vast wasteland of commercial television.

Now, why do I say that? Well, I say it because you just have to look at what is on commercial television from the perspective of a parent with children trying to ensure that those children are given the educational and informational programming that will help in their development.

Here's a short sampling of what was on television during the day today. There's a spate of daytime soap operas which are full of adult themes not appropriate for young children. Then there were programs on this afternoon such as ``Hoarding,'' ``Buried Alive,'' and ``The Babysitter's Seduction.'' Again, more programming not suitable for children. In addition, there was ``Hollywood's Most Shocking Breakups,'' and ``Dog, the Bounty Hunter,'' and they were not talking about Clifford the Big Red Dog.

Ladies and gentlemen, what we hear is that the private sector, private television, commercial television is taking care of the children's audience. It does not. The Cartoon Network is in no way to be compared to what is on the Public Broadcasting System from 6 a.m. every morning until 6 p.m. every night, 12 hours every day, something that parents can rely upon for their children to see which is educationally nutritious for their development. And it's on every television station, every public television station in the country, every single day.

Let me give you a typical day. On WGBH up in Boston, but on every other public television station, beginning at 6 a.m., it's ``Between the Lions,'' then ``Clifford the Big Red Dog'' and ``Arthur,'' followed by ``Martha Speaks,'' ``Curious George,'' ``Dinosaur Train'' and ``WordWorld,'' which brings us all the way up to noontime. The parents are happy. The kids have good programming that they're watching.

And then rather than soap operas in the afternoon, on the Public Broadcasting System, the kids get to see ``Sid the Science Guy,'' ``WordGirl,'' ``The Electric Company,'' and on and on and on until 6 every night.

PBS is really the children's television network, and generations of children and parents have benefited from this programming being on.

What the Republicans are trying to do is just end this era and just toss these families over to this commercial world, which is fine if you really do believe that Cartoon Network and other networks like that targeted at children for commercial purposes can in any way substitute for this Sesame Street diet that children have been on for more than one generation and have immeasurably helped, not just those that come from the white upper middle class, but in polling it's actually above 80 percent, whether your family is Asian, Hispanic, white, African American. All poll out at 80 percent in terms of what those parents believe about the benefit that comes from the Public Broadcasting System in the children's programming that is presented to those children.

So CPB doesn't just stand for Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It also stands for Children and Parents Benefit. And that's why it's important. And that's why it was important in 1967, and that's why it is important today. This has been the crown jewel in our national media mix when it comes to the children of our country. And this attempt to take out a meat cleaver and to cut this programming source off in a way that would harm those families in our country is a huge mistake.

Now, Mr. Blumenauer has attempted to offer an amendment that would have restored the full $460 million in funding for the Public Broadcasting System. But in turn, what his amendment would have tried to do is to go to the big tax breaks for oil and gas companies in our country.

I would ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute.

And it's altogether understandable why the gentleman who did object objected because I know where he's coming from on this. He did not want to hear the next sentence, because the gentleman from Montana is someone who does believe that the tax breaks for Big Oil should stay on the books. It's $40 billion over the next 5 years, and he'd rather see a cutting of Big Oil be substituted by a cutting of Big Bird. Okay? That's what tonight's all about, just this misallocation of resources within our society.

And I understand why the gentleman from Montana doesn't want to hear those words spoken, but he should get ready to hear it over and over again. Big Oil is going to get all the breaks that they want, and it might come at the expense of children's television or poor people. But I will tell you this much. Grandma isn't going to get her lunch because of these people over here. And these guys want to continue to take Big Oil to lunch, but we're going to have a big debate about this as each and every day goes by.

I thank the gentlelady, and I congratulate the gentleman from Oregon for making this amendment.

Offered By: Mr. Markey

Amendment No. 27: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By Mr. Markey

Amendment No. 60: Page 293, line 4, after the dollar amount

insert ``(increased by $390,328,000)''.

Page 293, line 8, after the dollar amount insert

``(increased by $390,328,000)''.

At the end of the bill, before the short title, insert the

following new sections:

Offered By: Mr. Markey

Amendment No. 213: Page 290, line 13, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(reduced by $1,569,600,000)''.

At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the

following:

I yield myself 5 minutes.

This is a very important debate because it goes right to the very heart of what is needed in order to ensure that we provide the proper protections for families across our country, from the despoliation of the environment and all the public health and safety and environmental catastrophes that then can affect American families.

I have here a picture of the Deepwater Horizon in flames as it's about to go to the bottom of the ocean. This is what happened because of deregulation. This is what happened when regulations are not applied and enforced in a way that ensures that the public health and safety is protected, the greatest environmental disaster in the history of the United States, devastating the lives of 11 men and the livelihoods of millions of people in the Gulf of Mexico. This is the legacy of what happened during the Bush administration, a ticking timebomb that exploded across our country, leading to this environmental catastrophe.

The same thing, by the way, is true in our financial marketplace where, in the Bush years, they turned a blind eye to obvious problems with derivatives, obvious problems with chicanery inside of the financial marketplace, a ticking timebomb that exploded, that has wreaked havoc on millions of Americans, losing their home, their jobs.

When George Bush left office, the Dow Jones industrial average at 6,400, 6,400, after 8 years in office. That's what George Bush left in office, by turning a blind eye to the kinds of regulations that it needed there to protect the lives of families. Today, with Barack Obama on the job, with a Securities and Exchange Commission doing its job, the Dow is now over 12,000, almost doubled, because people have confidence in the regulations. They can trust their money in the stock market once again. That's what happens when regulations are there to protect ordinary people.

Now, what is their proposal? Their proposal is to take the Environmental Protection Agency and to turn the Environmental Protection Agency into every polluter's ally. They're going to bring a bill out here onto the House floor that says they're going to repeal the ability of the EPA to improve the fuel economy standards of the vehicles which we drive, to ensure that regulations are on the books that we have renewable fuels that we develop here in the United States, not imported from OPEC.

The result of that bill that they're going to bring out here on the House floor in the next 2 weeks? Some 5 million barrels of oil per day that otherwise would be backed out, that we would not import from the Middle East, will now have to be imported. At $100 a barrel with 365 days in a year, we're talking about $162 billion a year that the American consumer will have to send to the Middle East because they do not want to regulate.

They do not want to ensure that the efficiency of the cars which people drive, the amount of pollution that comes out of those cars, they say, is too high a price to pay. While here as we watch Egypt explode, Tunisia explode, other countries in the Middle East on the verge of having the same kind of explosions, this kind of environmental, this kind of safety protection that we put on the books enforces the need for us to ensure that we do not allow for the repeal of these environmental and safety protections. That's what this debate is all about.

This is the same kind of war on the environment that we saw during the 8 years of the Bush administration. This is the result of that, ladies and gentlemen. And that's where they're going to take us if we have this wholesale destruction of this environmental and safety regime which has been put on the books in order to protect the American public.

At this point I ask unanimous consent that all time on the resolution be yielded back and that H. Res. 72 be adopted so that we can move on to consider legislation to create jobs in our country, which is really what we should be debating out here on the House floor.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlelady from California (Mrs. Napolitano).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Grijalva).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Garamendi).