Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, on rollcall No. 224, had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Mr. Speaker, Members: Ignoring the facts, the experts, political reality, and the best interests of the American people, the Republican leadership continues to embrace a spending plan already rejected by the Senate that would destroy 700,000 jobs and derail the economic recovery.

The Republican spending plan is a doctrine of misplaced priorities. They want to lay off teachers, cut Pell Grants, slash programs for homeless veterans, and reduce Head Start, among other shortsighted and harmful cuts.

Incomes and consumer spending increased in February, helping to expand the Nation's economy. First time jobless claims decreased by 5,000 a week. The total number of people receiving benefits fell to the lowest level in 3 years, due, in part, to increased hiring.

The February jobs report shows a gain of 192,000 jobs, a significant employment increase that marks the 12th straight month of private sector growth and a drop in the unemployment rate to 8.9 percent, the lowest level in almost 2 years.

Let's don't hurt our fragile recovery by the Republican majority shutting down the government.

Mr. Speaker, on rollcall vote No. 173, had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Today, March 2, 2011, marks Texas Independence Day. A hundred and seventy-five years ago, the Texas Declaration of Independence was ratified by the Convention of 1836 on Washington-on-the-Brazos in Texas. This is an important day for Texas, and patriotic Texans observe this occasion with great pride.

In 1824, a military dictatorship took over in Mexico abolishing the Mexican constitution. The new military dictatorship refused to provide trial by jury, freedom of religion, public education for their citizens, and allowed for the confiscation of firearms--this last one particularly intolerable, particularly for Texans.

The Texas Declaration of Independence states that Texas' government had been ``forcibly changed, without their consent, from a restricted federative republic, composed of sovereign states, to a consolidated central military despotism.'' It stated that because of the injustice of Santa Anna's tyrannical government, Texans were severing their connection with the Mexican nation and declaring themselves ``a free, sovereign, and independent republic fully invested with all the rights and attributes'' that belong to independent nations; and a declaration that they ``fiercely and confidently'' committed their decision to ``the Supreme Arbiter of the destinies of Nations.''

The Texas Declaration of Independence was needed because this military dictatorship had ceased to protect the lives, liberty, and property of the people of Texas. Failure to provide these basic rights violated the sacred contract between a government and the people, and Texans at that time, and want to still today, stand up for their rights. In response, the Mexican army marched to Texas, waging a war on the land and the people, enforcing the decrees of the military dictatorship with brute force and without any democratic legitimacy.

Today, 175 years later, Texas President and Governor of Texas, Sam Houston, and other delegates signed the Texas Declaration of Independence. General Santa Anna's army besieged the independence forces at the Alamo in San Antonio. Four days after the signing of this Declaration of Independence, the Alamo fell with her commander, Lieutenant Colonel William Barret Travis, and former Tennessee Congressman Davy Crockett and approximately 200 other Texas defenders. All these men were killed in action in a heroic sacrifice for Texas freedom.

If this tragedy were not enough, weeks later Santa Anna's Army massacred 300 unarmed Texans at Goliad on March 27 of 1836. In a dramatic turnaround, Texans achieved their independence several weeks later on April 21, 1836. Roughly 900 members of the Texan army overpowered a much larger Mexican army in a surprise attack at the Battle of San Jacinto in Harris County, Texas. This battle is memorialized along the San Jacinto River with the San Jacinto Monument in our congressional district. The monument's larger than the monument here in Washington, the Washington Monument. Sam Houston High School, which we have a lot of schools in our district named for Sam Houston, actually received a Texas historical marker about 3 weeks ago.

Today we give thanks to the many Texans that sacrificed for the freedom we enjoy today. God bless Texas and God bless America.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to submit the following editorial:

Bad Language: English-Only Bills Once Again Attempt To Penalize

Immigrants

[From the Brownsville Herald, Feb. 13, 2011]

Among the various bills offered in Washington and Austin

are new efforts to force every US. resident to speak English.

U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, has pledged to file an

English-only bill in Congress. Similar bills have already

been filed in the Texas Legislature.

State Rep. Dennis Bonnen, R-Angleton, has filed legislation

to make English the official state language and require that

all official business be conducted in that language. Rep. Tim

Kleinschmidt, R-Lexington, has offered a bill mandating that

driving tests be given only in English.

We doubt that such bills would pass constitutional muster.

The First Amendment clearly states that ``Congress shall make

no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech. . . .'' That

should include laws limiting the language that people choose

to speak.

The nativists who support such legislation forget this

country's honorable history of accepting troubled refugees,

such from Cuba in 1980, Indochina in the 1970s and various

defectors from the Soviet bloc countries throughout the Cold

War. It's unreasonable and cruel to accept these people, only

to impose our oppressive rules on their behavior.

Language restrictions on driver's tests make little sense,

especially in a border state like Texas. Many foreign

nationals spend significant amounts of time in this state,

whether on business or on vacation. Many of them drive on our

streets when they're here. With trade pacts calling for

greater access to shipments from other countries, we should

encourage people to show proficiency and knowledge of our

traffic laws; language restrictions will only discourage

people from working to get those licenses.

The ability to conduct business in other languages should

be evident to all state lawmakers. More than $150 billion in

goods are traded between Texas and Mexico each year alone.

Greater investment and trade coming from Japan, China, and

other countries should inspire officials to expand rather

than restrict languages that are accepted for legal

documents.

Language is not a major problem for this country. Many

immigrants come here unable to speak English but, more than

80 percent of their children are fluent in the language.

English is the primary language of some 94 percent of their

grandchildren.

However, such bills send a clear message to people in other

countries: We don't want you here. As America continues to

fall behind other countries academically and is losing trade

and commerce to other countries, we might be convincing some

of the brightest minds to stay home, and benefit their home

countries, not the U.S.

We trust majorities of lawmakers will see the folly in

these bills.

Mr. Speaker, while I am adamantly opposed to the EPA moving forward with regulations on large utilities and refineries in our country, I believe that the Congress should be the decision maker on carbon control issues. That is why I have cosponsored Rep. Capito's bill that would prohibit the EPA from issuing any greenhouse gas emission-related rules or regulations for two years so that the Congress has time to address this issue. A solution can be found for controlling carbon emissions by using nuclear and natural gas to generate electricity and I hope my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will work with me on this to give industry the certainty they need.

Mr. Chairman and Members, I thank my colleague from Connecticut for yielding to me.

Let me first say that I have read the bill. I was on the subcommittee and the full committee and served on the Health Subcommittee for many years. And I had many people ask me that. And believe me, when you spend hours and hours literally in testimony and amending the bill, you have the chance to read it.

And I would hope my Republican colleagues, and all of us, would do the same thing, our appropriators, I would hope they would read the appropriations bill if they are accusing us on the Energy and Commerce Committee who drafted that bill.

What this amendment would do would take away the funding that the Department of Labor and Health and Human Services would be able to enforce that insurance can't drop someone from coverage when they become sick.

They would take away that funding. Seniors would be saving money. They should enforce it, saving money for seniors for prescription drugs. Young adults up to age 26 are getting back on insurance with their parents. That would stop the Department of Labor and Health and Human Services from enforcing that law. Small businesses are receiving billions of dollars in tax credits to provide health care coverage. This would stop it.

Defunding health care would end these benefits and put insurance companies back in charge. The whole goal of the health care bill, whether you call it ObamaCare--I wanted it to be called the Gene Green bill. But I admit, I'm only one of 435 is to cut these benefits. That's what this bill is about in this amendment. It will defund the great things in the health care law.

Let's go back and talk about the things that we all agree that need to be changed. But if you take away the money, we'll lose this for all the folks in our districts.

Madam Chair, on rollcall No. 96, had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Amendment No. 575 Offered by Mr. Rehberg

Mr. Chair, I rise today in opposition to Amendment No. 27 by Rep. Markey to H.R. 1, the Fiscal Year Continuing Appropriations Act for FY2011. This amendment attempts to retroactively reverse the express intent of Congress in passing the Royalty Relief Act. In the case of Kerr-McGee Oil & Gas v. Allred, the Fifth Circuit Court specifically held that the Department of the Interior does not have authority to impose royalty relief price thresholds on deep water leases issued from 1996-2000. In reaching this decision, the Fifth Circuit held that Congress was unambiguous in guaranteeing royalty relief, without price thresholds, to holders of these leases up to the volumes specified in the statute. The Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act and other regulations allow our government to preclude a lessee from obtaining new leases if it has failed to act with due diligence with respect to its existing leases. This amendment would add a new requirement that imposes that same penalty but for an entirely different and unrelated reason. For these reasons, I strongly oppose this amendment.

I want to thank my colleague from Virginia.

For 15 seconds, I want to associate myself with the remarks of my colleague and member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Mr. Sullivan. I think we need to think how we are doing this with ethanol. It costs more. I don't want to import oil either. That's why we need to produce it in our own country.

I want to thank my colleague and ranking member from Washington State.

I rise in opposition to this amendment. Representative Burgess' amendment would endanger the $830 million already set aside for classrooms and school districts in Texas through the Education Jobs Fund that was passed last August. At a time when our State is facing an almost $27 billion deficit, these are crucial moneys that can be used immediately to help school districts throughout Texas.

Let me give you a little history.

During the Recovery Act of 2009, Texas received $12 billion. Of that, $3.2 billion was supposed to be for public education. Our Governor and the Texas legislature used $12 billion. Instead of supplementing the current education funding, they used the $3.2 billion in place of the current education funding. The Governor went all over the country, getting books signed, saying how bad the Federal Government is, but they didn't give back that $12 billion. They used it to plus-up the rainy day fund that's over $9 billion right now, and they don't even want to use it.

So, at that time, what the Democratic Members from Texas said was that we want to make sure this $830 million goes to the schoolchildren of Texas. That's what this would do, and that's what this law does. It would make sure that that money would go to the schoolchildren. It wouldn't get stuck in Austin. It would go down to my Houston school district, the Galena Park School District, which is having to cut its budget right now because it didn't get that $3.2 billion 2 years ago.

That's why the Burgess amendment should be defeated, Mr. Chairman, and that's why we put this amendment into law. It's in the law now, and I'm proud of it. Let the money go to the school districts instead of to the folks who decided to keep it in the State capital.

Mr. Chair, on rollcall No. 68, had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Amendment No. 249 Offered by Mr. Canseco

Mr. Chair, on rollcall No. 71, had I been present, I would have voted ``yes.''

Amendment No. 457 Offered by Mr. Flake

Mr. Chair, on rollcall No. 73, had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Amendment No. 532 Offered by Mr. Young of Alaska

Madam Speaker, on rollcall vote No. 20, had I been present, I would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. Speaker, as a Member of Congress from Texas, I supported the health care reform law proudly. Texas has some of the highest rates of uninsured in the United States.

Twenty-six percent of our Texans are uninsured--6.4 million residents--compared with the national average of only 16.7 percent. Over the past 8 years in Texas, employer-based insurance coverage has dropped 18 percent. Now, only 48 percent of Texans have health insurance provided by their employers--well below the national average.

Texas has some of the highest health insurance premiums in the U.S. A family of four making $44,000, the average premium out-of-pocket is $6,548--almost 15 percent of their income. In Texas, our State Department of Insurance report to the legislature acknowledged the positive impact of the Affordable Care Act.

The State of Texas Department of Insurance concluded the Affordable Care Act will have a positive impact on the State and help Texans gain access to private insurance coverage. As the Department of Insurance report states, ``the removal of underwriting restrictions, new premium rating reforms, availability of subsidies and limitations on out-of- pocket expenses for low- and middle-income families should make it easier for many low-income Texans to obtain private insurance.''

In our district in Houston and Harris County, 40 percent of my constituents were uninsured when we passed the Affordable Care Act in March of last year. Repeal, H.R. 2, would be a major setback to what we're trying to do in our own district.

To cite a few local statistics from the repeal on my constituents: increase the number of people without insurance by almost 217,000; allow insurance companies to deny coverage to at least 102,000 people in our district, including at least 12,000 children with preexisting conditions; eliminate health care tax credits for 14,600 small businesses and 177,000 people; increase prescription drug costs for 4,400 seniors in my district who fell into that doughnut hole except for health care reform.

My Republican colleagues want to work on improving it. I'm here to do it, but repeal is not the answer.

Biennial Report of the Texas Department of Insurance to the 82nd

Legislature

(December 2010)

(Mike Geeslin, Commissioner of Insurance)

Texas Department of Insurance,

Austin, Texas, December 31, 2010

Hon. Rick Perry, Governor,

Hon. David Dewhurst, Lieutenant Governor,

Hon. Joe Straus, III, Speaker.

Dear Governors and Speaker: In accordance with Section

32.022, Texas Insurance Code, I am pleased to submit the

biennial report of the Texas Department of Insurance

(Department or TDI). The report summarizes needed changes in

the laws relating to regulation of the insurance industry,

provides information on market conditions, and includes

reviews required by Senate Bill 1 (81st Legislature, Regular

Session).

The Department is available to discuss any of the issues

contained in the report and to provide technical assistance.

Please contact me or Carol Cates, Associate Commissioner of

Government Relations, with any questions or if you need

additional information. Thank you for your consideration.

Respectfully Submitted,

Mike Geeslin,

Commissioner of Insurance.

Texas Department of Insurance: Securing the Future of Texas

Mission

To protect insurance consumers by: regulating the industry

fairly and diligently promoting a stable and competitive

market providing information that makes a difference.

Values

We have a passionate commitment to service in the public

interest. We are:

Responsible Stewards: accountable, efficient, effective

``Using resources wisely''.

Professional: knowledgeable and fair ``Adhering to the

highest ethical standards''.

Collaborative: cooperative, inclusive, diverse ``Respecting

others' opinions and expertise''.

Resilient and Creative: open-minded and proactive

``Learning from the past to enhance the future''

Balanced: fulfilled and well-rounded ``Celebrating personal

and professional successes''.

Senate Bill 1--Rider 18: Review of Health Insurance Availability and

Affordability

The 81st Legislature included in Senate Bill 1 a directive

to the Texas Department of Insurance to conduct a review of

``the accessibility of health benefit plan coverage for and

the affordability of health benefit plan premiums for low-

income families and families not eligible for employer-

sponsored insurance.'' Following is a summary of the results

of the review.

Like many states, Texas has struggled with increasing

healthcare costs and insurance premiums that have prohibited

many individuals from obtaining affordable health insurance.

The rising cost of insurance affects individuals at all

income levels and employers of all sizes but is particularly

challenging for low income workers and small business owners.

In 2009, the U.S. Census Bureau Current Population Survey

(CPS) reports that 6.4 million Texans were uninsured for the

entire year (Table One). Of the Texans who have health

insurance, slightly more than half (53.8 percent) have

private coverage, down from 56.9 percent in 2007 and lower

than the national average of 63.9 percent. Texas workers are

less likely to have employer-sponsored coverage with 48.2

percent of Texans enrolled in employment-based plans compared

to a national average of 55.8 percent.

Madam Speaker, I want to respond, because if the Constitution means anything, it also shows that as Members of the House and the Senate, the legislative branch, it's not our job to decide constitutionality. My opinion is just as important as yours. It's the nine people over in the Supreme Court that the Constitution gives that authority to.

And I think the health care law is constitutional, because all those companies serve all of our States. It's across State lines. The commerce clause works that way. So hiding behind the Constitution--and we read it here on the floor--this bill will be constitutional because Social Security's constitutional, mandatory insurance in our States is constitutional. So we can have that argument. It doesn't do any good.

Mr. Speaker, I submit the following:

[From The Baytown Sun, Jan. 4, 2011]

Prepare To Die for Lack of Money

(By Gene Lyons of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)

As polemics on the Obama administration's health care

reforms re-emerge, I often ruminate about a horse.

Lucky was an American Standard Bred gelding I owned.

Compared to his quarter horse stable-mate, Lucky was

unathletic and halfway clumsy. But he was also a sweetheart.

As long as he could follow his buddy, anybody could ride him.

Regardless of age or experience, Lucky would carry them

carefully and bring them home safe. It's hard not to love

such an animal.

By the time I found him colicked in the barn, it was

probably already too late. He'd been down for some time. I

gave him an injection for the pain and walked him, but

nothing worked. After a while, he lay down and refused to

move. By the time the vet arrived, I'd been sitting wedged

against his back for hours to prevent him from rolling and

twisting his gut.

After Lucky proved unresponsive to treatment, the vet asked

me a hard question: ``Is this a $6,000 horse?''

He explained that there was an equine hospital over in

Oklahoma that could perform potentially life-saving surgery.

It cost $6,000 cash, up front. He warned that survival was

chancy, and might leave my horse an invalid.

I'd paid $1,000 dollars for Lucky; he was 25 years old,

almost elderly. After a long night of IV fluids and pain

meds, there was no avoiding the inevitable. Because there are

some things a man must do for himself, I administered a

lethal injection and ended up having to put a bullet into his

brain.

We buried him in his pasture.

It was a hard, hard thing to do. This was two years ago,

and it's a rare day I don't think about Lucky and his stable

mate Rusty, who also died that year. I pray that I never

outlive another horse.

Long introduction, brief polemical point: Observing

Republicans gear up to try to undo ``Obamacare,'' I suspect

the only thing that will satisfy some is to make medical care

in the United States work like veterinary care. You get what

you can pay for. Otherwise, tough luck.

Who would have thought that after Sarah Palin's imaginary

``death panels''--chosen by Politifacts.com, the fact-

checking website, as its 2009 ``Lie of the Year''--Arizona

Republicans would be denying heart, lung and liver

transplants to Medicaid patients because Gov. Jan Brewer says

the State can't afford them?

To save a lousy $1.4 million (out of a $9 billion budget),

Arizona's Health Care Cost Containment System has decreed an

end to organ transplants. Maybe the bitterest irony is that

the inhumane policy won't actually save any money. One of the

roughly 100 citizens affected explained to Arizona Republic

columnist E.J. Montini:

``I can't work anymore, and we ran out of (insurance)

coverage a while back,'' he said. ``It's terrible needing

help. It's not what I wanted. But when you run out of money,

what can you do? If I don't get a transplant, I guess the

state won't have to pay for me or worry about me until I walk

into an emergency room close to dying. They can't turn me

away then.''

No, they can't. Human hospitals can't refuse patients for

lack of cash. Meanwhile, not a peep of protest from Palin,

Rep. John Boehner or any of the Republicans who waxed

hysterical over the absurd allegation that ``Obamacare''

would lead to government-sponsored euthanasia.

But if people die for lack of money, that's the GOP way.

Too bitter? Maybe so. Nevertheless, avoiding medical and

economic reality has been the party's response ever since

Obama adopted much of the conservative Heritage Foundation's

health care proposals as his own. It's all to do with

partisanship, nothing else. Consider the legalistic, angels-

on-the-head-of-a-pin arguments GOP savants have made against

the bill's unpopular health insurance mandate.

Precisely because hospitals can't turn patients away, it's

impossible to make private insurance companies cover pre-

existing conditions (i.e. sick people) without encouraging

deadbeats to game the system by not buying insurance until

they need it. This defeats the whole purpose of a risk pool.

Somebody's got to pay, and absent an insurance mandate,

that somebody's you--one reason the United States has long

had the most expensive, least efficient health care system in

the world.

Ah, but in GOP Dreamworld, everybody's Huck Finn, an

independent actor in a 19th- century free-enterprise

paradise. They claim the Constitution forbids government from

making citizens buy something they don't want.

Alas, in the real world, people can't not participate in

the health care system.

I thank my colleague from the Rules Committee for allowing me to speak.

I rise in strong opposition to this rule on H.R. 2, the Patients' Rights Repeal Act. Just yesterday, the Congressional Budget Office said that this repeal would cost $230 billion in additional Federal debt. It's amazing, this is our first major piece of legislation and the Republicans are already adding to the national debt.

The issue facing our country is jobs. Instead of repealing health care, we should be bringing up a jobs bill like the China currency reform. Where is that bill on the floor with the new majority?

Let me tell you what this bill will do. At least in Texas, we will see tragedy happen. 161,000 young adults will lose their insurance coverage through their parents' health care plan--that's only in Texas--and 2.8 million Texans who have Medicare coverage will be forced to pay copays now for preventative services like mammograms and colonoscopies. Medicare will no longer pay for the annual visit of nearly 2.8 million Texans--and many more Americans for Medicare--and 128,682 Texans on Medicare will receive higher prescription costs if this law is repealed.

Madam Speaker, yesterday Congressional Budget Office said ``over the 2012-2021 period, the repeal of health care reform on federal deficits . . . will cost $230 billion.''

Texas and the rest of the nation cannot afford to add an additional $230 billion in deficit spending.

The issue facing the country is jobs. Instead of repealing health care, we should bring up a jobs bill like China currency reform.

The Republicans came into office promising to reduce federal spending and reduce the deficit, but their first act in the Majority is to try to pass a Rule that would exempt H.R. 2 for statutory PAYGO.

In addition to adding billions in dollars to the deficit, consideration of H.R. 2 would jeopardize the current and future health care benefits of my constituents. The negative effects repealing the Affordable Care Act will have on Texas and all Americans.

Up to 161,000 young adults would lose their insurance coverage through their parents' health plans. Nearly 11.8 million residents of Texas with private insurance coverage would suddenly find themselves vulnerable again to having lifetime limits placed on how much insurance companies will spend on their health care.

Insurance companies would once again be allowed to cut off someone's coverage unexpectedly when they are in an accident or become sick because of a simple mistake on an application. This would leave more than 1.1 million people in Texas at risk of losing their insurance.

More than 1.1 million residents of Texas would not know if they are receiving value for their health insurance premium dollars, as insurers in state would no longer be required to spend at least 80 to 85 percent of premium dollars on health care rather than CEO salaries, bonuses, and corporate profits.

Nearly 2.8 million seniors in Texas who have Medicare coverage would be forced to pay a co-pay to receive important preventive services, like mammograms and colonoscopies.

Medicare would no longer pay for an annual check-up visit, so nearly 2.8 million seniors in Texas who have Medicare coverage would have to pay extra if they want to stay healthy by getting check-ups regularly.

A total of 128,682 Texans on Medicare would see significantly higher prescription drug costs. In Texas, Medicare beneficiaries received a one-time, tax-free $250 rebate to help pay for prescription drugs in the ``donut hole'' coverage gap in 2010. Medicare beneficiaries who fall into the ``donut hole'' in 2011 will be eligible for 50 percent discounts on covered brand name prescription drugs.

Madam Speaker, when Texans and all Americans will soon be finally free from worrying that affordable coverage will not be available to them and their families when they need it the most, repealing the Affordable Care Act would be devastating.

I strongly urge my colleagues to vote no on the rule to consider H.R. 2.

``If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified; and the Congress may by law provide for the case wherein neither a President-elect nor a Vice President-elect shall have qualified, declaring who shall then act as President or the manner in which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall have been qualified.''