Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I offer a resolution (H. Res. 1107) providing for the printing of a revised edition of the Rules and Manual of the House of Representatives for the One Hundred Tenth Congress, and ask unanimous consent for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a privileged concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 503) and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Indiana for having this Special Order.

Woody Allen once observed that he was not afraid of death. He just did not want to be there when it happened, and it was a little like that on Tuesday night about 10 o'clock for some of us. We were there when it happened.

But I did want to reflect, I have been so blessed to serve in this great body for the last 12 years. I wanted to reflect a little bit about what it was like when I first ran for Congress, what it was like during those heady days, some of the highs and lows, some of the accomplishments.

The Congress itself is a living, breathing organism, and every 2 years we have an election, and in some respects every 2 years we have an entirely different Congress. A lot of the faces stay the same, but the dynamic is different. There will be different leaders. There will be different issues, and I was so fortunate and I really do mean blessed that, first of all, I had a chance to serve in the Minnesota State Legislature.

In that capacity, I served as what we would probably call here the whip. I was the floor leader, and every day it was my job to help organize the debate. I made sure that, and the years that I was in the position we were in the minority, but every year, every day I made sure that the other side was held accountable for what they said and what they did and what they proposed and how they voted. I really enjoyed that job. We had real debates in the legislature, unlike the Congress.

But it was really time for me to move on, and so I decided to run for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1994 and I was very fortunate. I picked a good year. The issues favored us. The wind was at our back.

I will never forget. It was kind of a cloudy day, and Members probably remember that as well, but it was a cloudy day when we all gathered here in Washington that fall to sign the Contract with America, and just as we went on the western steps of the U.S. Capitol Building here, just as we walked out there, the clouds parted and the sun came out. It was almost like it was a divine message that the sun was going to shine on the Republican Party that year and it did.

Most of us that day believed we were going to win, and most of us did. I came here with one of the largest freshman classes in the history of Republican Party, and I will never forget, when we came here we were the toast of the town. The Republican freshmen that year, we spent our days at orientation and looking for apartments and doing all the other things that freshmen have to do when they come here, but the evenings we were wined and dined by almost everyone.

I will also never forget one particular story. We were waiting outside the hotel, some of us, and a sweet little lady came by. I guess it is not politically correct to say a sweet little old lady, but she had kind of blue hair, and anyway, she looked at us and sort of gave a double take. Perhaps she recognized Sonny Bono, and she said, You are the Republican freshmen, aren't you? And we said, yes, and we started to introduce ourselves. Then almost with a tear in her eye, she said, you know, I have been waiting 40 years for you because it had been 40 years since the Republicans had been in the majority in this House of Representatives.

In fact, going back just a little bit before that, one of the first trips I made to Washington as a candidate for Congress, I was invited to a leadership meeting. I was star struck. Pretty soon Henry Hyde came into the meeting room. I sat in the corner, and there was a big pile of the best cookies I had ever since, and they had flasks of coffee, and so I sat in the corner and thought I am just going to watch this like a fly on the wall and drink coffee and eat these cookies. Pretty soon Henry Hyde comes bouncing in and those who remember Henry in his earlier days had quite a bounce to his step. I was in awe of Henry Hyde. I had watched him on C-SPAN. I had heard his speeches. I was a big fan of all that he had done to protect the unborn.

I am sitting in the back of the room and Dick Armey comes in, and pretty soon Newt Gingrich comes in, and I am just sitting there, my eyes are big, and I am watching all this. And then Bill Paxon walked into the room and he spotted me. He said, oh, hey, we have got Gil Gutknecht over here, he is going to win that seat back in the 1st Congressional District back in Minnesota; stand up and say a few words, Gil.

I was like a deer in the headlight for longer than I want to admit. Finally, when I gained my senses I said, you know, I was born in 1951, and when I was a child, a very small child, a baby, Republicans were in the majority in this House. I said I believe like Haley's Comet our time is coming again, and you know, I have been to auction college. One of the things they teach you in auction college is to read people's eyes. As I looked around the room at the leaders of the Republican Caucus that day, I could read their eyes. Some of them were saying, yeah, right, kid, but one of them, and I will never forget, Newt Gingrich, his eyes said, yes, we are going to be in the majority. Ultimately, Newt was right.

So we came to Washington. I think about that little lady who had been waiting 40 years for us, and I thought about her often. I hope we have not let her down too much. I think maybe in the last couple of years, maybe we did, but those were heady days, and we made enormous progress.

I remember coming down to the floor of the House with one of my colleagues, Congressman Mark Neumann from Wisconsin's 1st Congressional District, and Mark came to town with charts. He was the first person that I know that actually used charts on the Special Orders. Part of the reason he used charts is there had been a study done at the University of Wisconsin that said you are 40 percent more believable if you

use charts, and so we all started using charts. But it started I think with Mark Neumann.

He had this simple chart about what it was going to take to balance the Federal budget and it was not complicated. You have to slow the rate of the growth of spending, so that the Federal budget does not grow at a faster rate than the average family budget. Now, that is not rocket science, but you know what, we did it and it worked.

I remember in, and Ernie will remember this, too, when we locked horns with former President Clinton, and in December of 1995 we shut the government down. I remember also when it was all over, when we finally, and if I can say this, when Bob Dole capitulated and ended the government shutdown, I remember what Newt said to me. He said, you know, it was a dumb fight dumbly fought, and I think a lot of people thought that, but it was an important turning point because we sent a message not only to the President and the administration but to the American people that we were deadly serious about controlling Federal spending, the growth in Federal spending and, more importantly, allowing Americans to keep more of what they earned.

We did a lot of important things. It was not just about the Contract with America. We marched through those in the first 100 days, and I remember something that Henry Hyde said when it was all over. He said, you know, it was not a 100 days that was so tough, it was the hundred nights.

We literally were in session almost from Monday morning early, working most evenings till 8, 9, 10, 11 o'clock at night, but it was a wonderful time. We reformed the welfare system. We cut the welfare rolls in half, and we reinforced those time-tested values that I think have made America the special place that it is.

So I was so privileged to have been here as part of that, and we did make some enormous progress on so many fronts, and we literally went from a $250 billion deficit, and deficits for as far as the eye could see, to something people had even forgotten and that is by September 11, 2001, when we had a Budget Committee meeting that morning on September 11, 2001, the issue we were talking about was what are we going to do with this big surplus. We were looking at surpluses of trillions of dollars.

So it has been a very special time to be here. I really do think we lost our way a bit once we got into the surplus situation, but as I think about all of the areas where we were able to have an influence on the course of events, yes, we made a lot of mistakes. I made a lot of mistakes, but this has been a very special time in American history.

I never thought when I ran for Congress that I would vote in effect to declare war. I never thought that I would be called to vote on articles of impeachment. I did believe that we would have a chance to vote for a balanced budget agreement.

The high point perhaps, during my entire tenure here in Congress, was when the President of the United States, William Jefferson Clinton, joined us and he issued those immortal words that the era of big government is over. It may have been a bit premature because the empire has struck back in the last number of years, and as I say, we have made a lot of mistakes on the way.

I hope we have not let people down, but it has been a wonderful privilege for me to serve in this very special place. This is the people's House, and you know, sometimes when the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, of electoral ups and downs do not necessarily break our way, it is easy for us to blame the voters, but in the end I believe that the voters have a right to be wrong, even if they are wrong, but I also believe for the most part the voters are right. I think we lost our way in the last several years, and so they began to wonder were we still the party of reform, were we still the party that battled big government or that defended big government?

Were we the party that was trying to change Washington or had Washington changed us? And my only wish for all of you and particularly the Members of the Republican Study Committee is that you return to those time-tested principles and values, because in the end that is what this is all about. Government will either reinforce time-tested principles and values or it will undermine them. When government grows, freedom declines.

And I am sorry, I should remember who said it, and now I have even forgotten the quote. But I think our founders really understood that those who would trade liberty for security will lose both and deserve neither. Those words were true 220 years ago and they are true today.

And I know that we had an interesting debate this afternoon about the rights of the unborn. If you look at what our founders said and what they wrote, even Thomas Jefferson, who was not necessarily considered a religious man in the sense that a lot of our folks who were our founders, but he was a deeply religious man. And he said that the same God who gave us life gave us freedom.

Those rights and those inalienable rights that were talked about so much in the early days of our Republic need to be talked about again. And I think it really falls upon the Republican Study Committee and the people who are here, regardless of what the numbers are, regardless of what the polls may say today, those time-tested values and principles will win out.

And I don't believe the American voters voted against our values, I don't think the voters voted against our principles. There were other cross-currents. And even if they did, we simply need to do a much better job of telling our story.

I was privileged to come to Washington with J.D. Hayworth and that freshman class, and so as I leave I will have both some sad memories about how things ended, or at least they ended for me, but I will have mostly incredibly fond memories of golden days and golden nights and ways that we made a difference.

I will close by saying this. When I go to high schools and visit with students, I tell them a couple things. First of all, I always tell them I am one of the luckiest people that they will meet that day, and I say that because every day I felt like I made a little difference in somebody's life. And it didn't necessarily make the papers. A lot of times people talk about, well, what is said in the Washington Post and did it make the CBS News and did Fox News do something about it. A lot of the things that we do every day don't make the news.

It may be a woman who calls and her daughter is stuck at a New Jersey airport and she has lost her passport, and she is frantic and she says, ``Congressman, my daughter is stuck at this airport. Can you help get her passport?'' And that is a true story. And we were able to get that young lady a passport through the State Department in a matter of about 3 hours and get her on the next plane. Now, to this day that mother thinks I am the greatest guy who ever lived. And there are a lot of other things, whether it is a veteran's benefit, to helping people plug into the right administrative issue. There all kinds of things that people in Congress do every day that don't make the news but we are making a difference in people's lives.

And I do believe in that expression that you used earlier: If you want to change the world, you have got to first change your neighborhood. And if you can't change your neighborhood, at least be a good example. And I think the responsibility of the Republican Study Committee is to be that beacon of light, but most importantly, to be a good example. Because both America and I think many Members of Congress want to follow it, and they are looking for leadership.

So thank you very much for having this little event tonight and thank you for giving me one last chance to visit with the folks here in the House Chamber. As I say, it has been a wonderful experience. I want to thank all the folks who I worked with through the years, including, and especially, Mark Newman from Wisconsin's First Congressional District for getting us started using charts. Thank you very much.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time of the gentleman from North Carolina.

Mr. Speaker, Harry Truman once said, ``America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand.''

I rise today in recognition of Operation Hometown Gratitude. Operation Hometown Gratitude is an effort started by students from Rochester, Minnesota, Public Schools to recognize the hard work and sacrifice of our Armed Forces. The operation was formed to thank our troops by sending care packages and supplies.

I would like to recognize all of the students for their dedication. I am especially thankful to student organizers Katie White, Kelcey Evers, Brian Ehni, Corey Hinsch, Dayton Root, Greg Tri, Mitch Haack, Lucas Kirkam, Jon Nelson, Paul Keehn and Jayna Rench. As someone who has witnessed firsthand the gratitude of our Armed Forces when they receive these care packages and letters of encouragement, I can assure each of these young people that their work is important.

The energy and enthusiasm of these young people was harnessed by a great American. Gary Komaniecki is a teacher at both Rochester John Marshall and Mayo High Schools. Gary is the advisor for these young people and should be recognized for his continued support for our men and women in uniform. Gary has received assistance from Judy Evers, Brenda White, Deanna Mandler, Arthur and Shirley Scammell and Maggie Hovel.

I would also like to recognize the sponsors of this program: VFW Post 1215; all three Rochester HyVee locations; Terry Timm of Ye Olde Butcher Shop; Dave Evans from The Printers; Darel Nigon from Nigon Woodworks; Shawn Flippin from National Pawn Company; Rochester Culvers, both north and south; Jim Rush from A-Z Embroidery; and Homestyle Pizza.

Make no mistake, this job is not easy. The people of Iraq and Afghanistan lived under brutal regimes for decades. There is much to be done, and our Armed Forces continue to do their jobs well.

Mr. Speaker, the young people who have spearheaded Operation Hometown Gratitude, as well as the sponsors who seeded this work, are not just sending care packages and supplies. By their support and their effort, they are displaying what Harry Truman meant by ``unbeatable determination'' and playing a major part in doing the job at hand.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman of the committee for yielding time.

I rise in opposition to this bill. Now, I represent two prisons in my district, and grandma used to say that idle hands are the devil's workshop. We have to find ways to keep these people busy; but, more importantly, we have to give them real job skills.

Now, I understand that in some cases this may be taking jobs away from the private sector, but that is very rare, Members. Mostly what we are doing in those prisons today are jobs that either aren't done in the United States much any more, or they are jobs that nobody wants. And we need to keep these guys busy. We need to give them some job skills. And I am afraid we are going to throw this baby out with the bath water today.

Now, it may well be that we have to reform the Federal Prison Industries a bit. And I hear the talk about, well, we can find $75 million for job training programs. Maybe that is true. But in the middle are these folks who are working in the Federal Prison Industries in my district who are earning a little bit of money, who are making a difference, and are providing products that the United States military needs.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to speak in opposition to this legislation. I represent a number of employees and inmates at the Federal Correctional Institution in Waseca, Minnesota, and they have a vested interest in this matter.

Federal Prison Industries employs approximately 200 inmates in Waseca. The jobs they have give these inmates real-life skills that offer opportunity for rehabilitation and a chance at success when they leave prison. The program is carefully overseen by trained prison employees.

Mr. Chairman, changes might be necessary to improve the FPI program, but I am not convinced that the legislation before us accomplishes that. H.R. 2965 would authorize a $75

million work-based training program to replace FPI. The likelihood that Congress will not appropriate these dollars threatens to make a bad situation worse. Stresses on our federal budget could lead to a worse- case scenario of having no education or job training program at all for these inmates.

Many products made by FPI are used by our armed forces, and very few of these products are made by U.S. companies who make these products. In fact, the private sector companies who procure them already make their purchases from foreign manufacturers, not U.S. companies.

Mr. Chairman, the existing FPI program works well. This is a classic case of Congress trying to fix something that is not broken. I urge my colleagues to oppose this legislation and to work to improve the FPI program for inmates and small businesses alike.

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to be here on the House floor tonight to report to my colleagues and those who may be watching what I learned over the last long weekend. I was privileged to go with Chairman Pete Hoekstra of the House Intelligence Committee to Iraq. It was my first trip to Iraq. It was a very eye-opening experience, Mr. Speaker and Members, one that I won't soon forget.

Before I get started talking about that trip and some of the lessons that I learned while we were there, I would like to start with a quote. And I will come back to this later. The quote is: ``Do not try to do too much with your own hands. It is their war, and you are here to help them win it, not win it for them.'' I am going to come back to that quote later, Mr. Speaker, because I think it says so much about some of the things that we learned while we were in Iraq. Most importantly, I will come back and tell you who it was that originally said that.

The first thing I want to say tonight, though, is an enormous thank you and congratulations to the brave Americans who serve the United States in uniform.

When you get off the plane in Baghdad, you realize what they have to put up with, particularly during the summer. When the door opens on that plane, it is like opening the door of an oven. And there to greet you are bright young Americans, and they are in full uniform, helmets, heavy flak jackets. And I don't know what the temperature was, but it was the hottest I have ever experienced in my life. And those are the conditions under which our brave Americans do their business every day. And it is not just that they do it for 8 hours a day with long lunches and coffee breaks. The folks over there are working 12 hours a day and, in many cases, 7 days a week. And I don't think there is anything that we could say here in this Congress which would ever adequately express the

thanks that we have for the sacrifices that they make for serving this country.

I should also say a very special thank you to their families. The ones that I met and the ones that I was able to talk to probably had more to say about their families and wanted to make sure that they knew that they were okay and that they were doing their jobs and that they missed home. But more importantly, many of them said that they really felt that they were doing something that was important there.

So I want to, first of all, just recognize the professionalism that we saw every step of the way. When we left Kuwait, we were flying on a C-130, and I was lucky enough to get the long straw, so I got to sit up in the cockpit. And the young people who were flying that plane, and I almost called them kids, because I don't think even the pilot was 30 years old, but they were among the most professional pilots and crew that I have ever had the privilege to fly with.

As we got closer to Baghdad, all of a sudden this young pilot and all the crew became very animated and they were paying a lot of attention to what was happening on the ground. And I quickly figured out what they were doing. They were looking for any puffs of smoke or anything that might be fired at the C-130 we were flying in.

Finally, as we got closer to Baghdad, the pilot literally turned that big, fat C-130 into a dive bomber. And they make a special approach when they landed at the Baghdad airport. And in spite of that almost dive-bomb approach, he made an incredibly smooth and soft landing. And I want to thank him for that.

But as I say, we had an opportunity to meet with a number of the folks who were serving over there. I am going to talk just a little bit tonight about one of those units, a National Guard unit from the State of North Dakota.

What they do every day, Mr. Speaker, Members, is they go out on the roads, mostly at night, and they look for these IEDs, these improvised explosive devices. And they told us that since they have been there, and they have been there 10 months, they have found 562 of those devices that they were ultimately able to have disposed of so that they caused no damage to people or to property along the roads of Iraq.

Forty-two of those explosives devices, however, went off while they were trying to work with them. Forty-two. In fact, I talked to one young man, I believe his name was Lynch, from North Dakota, and he had been involved in four incidents where the IED went off. And I really can't say enough about the people who do that kind of thing every day.

As I say, there is no way that we in Congress, there are no words that we could offer here in Congress which could repay the debt of gratitude that I think we and the people of Iraq have to the brave Americans like that unit from North Dakota.

We also had a chance to visit a field hospital there, and it was kind of ironic because one of the people that we met there was someone that I already knew. He was one of the top surgeons at the Mayo Clinic, and I am privileged to represent Rochester, Minnesota and the Mayo Clinic. Dr. Mike Yaszemski. And Dr. Yaszemski was there and had been in Iraq since about the Fourth of July, and he and some of the other surgeons told me that they had been up since 2:00 that morning, performing surgery on five folks who were involved with an IED that night.

And later we got to go in and visit in the hospital there with some of the soldiers who had been treated. And one of them was more than happy to tell his entire story. And while they were pinning the Purple Heart on the sheet on his bed, he told his entire story and what it was like to go through one of these IED explosions. Perhaps the most moving moment, though, was, as he was telling his story, how the Humvee that he had been in had essentially been blown about 150 feet off the ground, and I can't remember whether it was he came down upside down or the Humvee came down on its side, but the vehicle was on fire, and one of his buddies, a private, said get out. You have got to get out. You have got to get out. And he said, well, I am paralyzed from the waist down. And he couldn't get out of the Humvee himself.

Now, this was a fairly large guy. I would guess he probably weighed 230 pounds. And he said that the private was a pretty small little guy. And here this private, when he realized that his buddy was caught in the Humvee and it was on fire and he hollered out that he was paralyzed from the waist down, he couldn't get out, this young private got in there and got him out. I don't know exactly how he pulled him out, but it was an amazing story. And this young individual wanted to make sure that before they loaded him on to one of the big transport planes, the C-17 to fly him to the hospital in Germany at Landstuhl, he wanted to make sure that he got a chance to say thank you to that private, because he said he saved his life.

And as he told his story, we were standing around, and I know what I was thinking. I was thinking, gee, is he going to be paralyzed for the rest of his life?

Well, thanks to the good work of surgeons like Dr. Mike Yaszemski, I am happy to report that that soldier is going to be able, as he laid there, he smiled and he says, ``I can wiggle my toes.'' And what a happy story it was for all of us in that room.

And we owe such a debt of gratitude to the staff, including people like Dr. Michael Yaszemski from Mayo Clinic for the magic that they do and the hard work that they do and the dedication that they have every single day.

You know, the U.S. military, I think, is unmatched in the world and perhaps in the history of the world in terms of the execution of conventional war. There is little doubt that we have no adversaries in the rest of the world who can match the firepower, the training, the technology and, most importantly, the professionalism of the Americans who serve us in uniform. No one can really challenge the United States in a conventional war.

But as we toured around Iraq and went to several of the bases and, more importantly, as we spent time in Baghdad, it became obvious to me that the security situation was not what I had expected. As a matter of fact, we had to fly in helicopters, Black Hawk helicopters, to fly from the airport into the Green Zone. And it had been my understanding that one time people who were coming to visit, like myself and the rest of our delegation, could actually drive into the Green Zone. But somebody told us that it is now the most dangerous highway in the world. And somehow after 3 years and over $332 billion, I guess I was somewhat surprised that the security situation in Baghdad was as bad as it is. And, again, I kept coming back to this notion that, indeed, our military is unmatched and unchallenged, I think, in the world in terms of conventional warfare. But I think we have to be honest with ourselves that our military is not well suited to be an occupation force, and probably even less suited to be involved in the nation- building business. And I think that is something that I felt and I believe other members of our delegation felt, that we are really asking our military to do some things which they are not particularly well suited to do.

And I just wanted to offer some of those observations because as we were returning from Iraq, and it is a long flight, one of my colleagues who was on the trip with us had a copy of an article, and I am going to submit it for the Record if it is possible, Mr. Speaker, but I would like to talk a little bit about the article, and I will enter this into the Congressional Record at the end of my remarks.

What it is is a column that was written by former Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, who served as Secretary of Defense from 1969 to 1973. He was also a counselor to the President for domestic affairs in the Nixon White House. And the article that I am talking about appeared in Foreign Affairs back in the November/December of 2005 edition. The title of the article is ``Iraq: The Learning Lessons of Vietnam.''

And in many respects, Melvin Laird is in a very unique position to talk about both the history of that but, more importantly, what we should learn from those years and how we could apply them to the situation the the United States finds itself in today.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to read from the article because I think it says

a lot in a few sentences right here that really illustrate what I think is a conclusion and the takeaway that I had from this particular visit to Iraq.

He says: Another great tragedy of Vietnam was the Americanization of the war. This threatens to be the tragedy of Iraq also. The war needed to be turned back to the people who cared about it, the Vietnamese. They needed U.S. money and training but not more American blood. I called our program Vietnamization, and in spite of the naysayers, I have not ceased to believe that it worked.''

And he goes on to say in another paragraph: ``We need to put our resources and unwavering public support behind a program of Iraqization so that we can get out of Iraq and leave the Iraqis in a position to protect themselves. The Iraq War should have been focused on Iraqization even before the first shot was fired.''

Mr. Speaker, I read this column on the way home, and I want to tell about where we went after we left that hospital, because we flew up and we were only the second congressional delegation since 1991 to actually go up and visit Kurdistan. And we landed there at their airport, and I was surprised. I was shocked because I, frankly, expected to be greeted by bearded warriors with AK-47s over their shoulders, and what we were greeted by were businessmen wearing business suits who were very friendly, very hospitable, and the first thing you see when you get off the plane are new buildings going up, high-rise buildings around the airport there.

And as we drove into town, and I want to emphasize as we drove into town with minimum security, I asked about those buildings. They said, These are new condominiums going up. They are luxury condominiums. They will sell for anywhere from $250,000 to $400,000. This is in Irbil, Iraq. This is in the Kurdish zone.

And we went into town, and we got to meet with some of the political leaders including their Parliament. It was interesting to learn that the Parliament that they have there in the Kurdish area is very representative. Over 16 percent of the members of the Kurdish Parliament are women. We even met a Christian who is a member of the Kurdish Parliament. It is very open and very pragmatic. And we met with the Prime Minister. And he is coming to Washington here in the next month or so. I hope all Members will get a chance to meet him. In fact, I think he is coming in September. He is one of the most charismatic, articulate leaders that I ever met. He was very candid with us.

First of all, he thanked us. He thanked us for all that America has done for the Kurdish people. Now, admittedly, the Kurds from a cultural standpoint are different than many of the other Iraqis, but they are Muslim. And he told us that they faced all the same problems in 1991 that the southern part of Iraq is facing today. They had factionalization. They had terrorists. But they adopted what I would describe as a zero-tolerance policy. In fact, they described one particular incident where someone had committed an act of terrorism and then fled to Baghdad. They went after them, and they brought them to justice.

You see, they have the advantage that they speak the language, they understand the culture, but, most importantly, they know who the bad guys are. And as I sort of distilled this story, and I was surprised by the wealth of the Kurdish region, one of our colleagues said, Well, but you have oil.

And the Prime Minister smiled, and he said, The whole country has oil. He said, The difference is we have decided to work together to develop our resources so that we can have an economic future of prosperity for all of our people, whether they happen to be Christians or whether they happen to be Shiia or whether they happen to be Sunnis, whatever. And the only thing they have said is that they will not tolerate terrorism in their territories.

And there are two things that they demand from the national government: One is they will not tolerate a religious state. Even though they are Muslims, they tolerate other religions, and it makes an enormous difference in the way people are living and working together in the northern portion of Iraq.

The second thing that they said they demanded is an equitable distribution of oil royalties. And when you see what they have accomplished up there, you can understand why now that they have done all the work, they do not want to share all of their revenues with the people of the rest of Iraq.

But, most importantly, we asked him, Don't the Kurds really want to be independent?

And again he smiled and he said, Well, if you polled my constituents, I suspect that almost universally they would be in favor of independence. But, he said, that is not practical. In fact, he said, we Kurds have decided that we have our best opportunity to work with the rest of the people of Iraq and be part of a strong and united and economically prosperous Iraq.

We all sat there and listened to this, and we met with the members of the Parliament. They threw an enormous feast for us of some of the finest food I have ever had in my life. And as we sat and listened and visited and learned from them, I said to myself, and it is one of my favorite expressions, I said, Success leaves clues, and if you really want to know what Iraq can look like, you would have to visit the Kurds.

And it is unfortunate that too many of our colleagues have not had the chance or taken the chance when they visited Iraq to go up and visit the Kurds. But it is an enormous success story, and I think it is the model that if we can somehow imprint on the rest of the country and if the new Prime Minister, Mr. Maliki, will take that as the model, adopt it for the rest of Iraq, then I think that Iraq can have a very bright future.

Well, Mr. Speaker, I mentioned earlier that the leader of our delegation, Pete Hoekstra, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, was good enough to invite me along and, more importantly, get me into some of the most interesting meetings I have ever been at. So I would like to yield to the leader of our congressional delegation, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra).

I was talking about the Kurds, and I think every part of the trip, in my opinion, was a highlight. I hate to say one was more important than the other.

But what I had said before you came in, Congressman Hoekstra, was that I was so impressed with the Kurds and what they have done in taking responsibility for their own area, of having essentially a zero tolerance policy. I said that I think that may be the example that Maliki can use for the rest of the country. You mentioned, and this is what I think is the good story.

The bad story, from my view, is that Baghdad is far less secure than I thought it was. Maybe that is my fault. Maybe I had a different impression. Maybe I had been led to believe. I am not sure, and I am not really in the blame game.

But clearly Baghdad is still a very dangerous place. In fact, I think the phrase that some of them used is the road from the airport to the international zone is the most dangerous highway in the world. Maybe that is an exaggeration. But those are Americans who are serving there that used that term.

My takeaway is probably somewhat different than yours, but my conclusion and my takeaway is we need to press and continue to press for the Iraqis and exactly what you are talking about, where we have some of our Special Forces embedded and working with and training Iraqis. We trained, I think the number is 262,000 Iraqis so far. We need to really push them to step up, as they have in the northern parts of the country, to take responsibility for policing their own streets.

I think you said it exactly right. When I left, there was progress. I was looking for progress. I think it is a three-legged stool. I think you have to have military or security progress.

Exactly. That is where I really was disappointed. I thought Baghdad would be much more secure than what we saw or learned about it. But you have to have military security progress, and you have to have economic progress, and you have to have political progress.

Let me say, and I talked to the speaker today and I know you are working on this as well, one of the things we would like to do is invite at least a dozen of them to the United States. We may smile about our meetings with the parliamentarians, and they all had own political points of view and so forth, but, first and foremost, every Member of Congress, and I think Americans need to understand, if you are a member of the Iraq parliament, you are a hero. You are someone who has enormous courage.

Exactly. And not only are you a potential target, your family is a potential target. Most of us at one time in our political lives have had some goofball who has issued some kind of a death threat against us. Usually we don't even take it all that seriously. Fortunately, the FBI takes it very seriously, and I appreciate what they do for us every day. But in Iraq, it is a different ball game.

No. I was very impressed with the character of the parliamentarians. Hopefully, with the help of our Speaker, we can get some of them over here so that more Members of Congress can actually get a chance to visit with them, to learn from them, to talk to them and perhaps to ask them some questions.

What I was talking about earlier as well is from an article that I think we both read on the plane on the way home that was written by Melvin Laird. If anyone would like a copy, they can just send me an e- mail at [email protected]. We will send you a copy of this article.

I think from my perspective it actually put into perspective a lot of the things we saw on our visit and why it is so important as soon as we can and as much as we can, we need to turn more of the authority, the responsibility for managing the affairs of the Iraqi people, back to the Iraqis themselves.

That is exactly what Melvin Laird said about Vietnam. That is why it was important to turn Vietnam, as soon as possible, back to the Vietnamese people. He said the greatest mistake was the Americanization of the Vietnam War.

I think that is something we have to be very aware of when we look at where we are today.

What I said also, Congressman Hoekstra, is because the Maliki government is now in place and they have a Minister of Defense, they have a Minister of the Interior, which are the two key ministries I think in terms of domestic security, now that they have those people in place, and my impression of them was they are very strong people, my impression was they understood the risks, they understood what needed to be done, and I think the next two months are going to be critical.

They have to demonstrate, in my opinion, that they really are serious, that they will deal with these militias that are out of control, they will deal with the radicals and the others who have come in from out of country.

I think it is important that our perception, and we had very good briefings, I know that sometimes it is a little like the blind men describing the elephant, but all the terrorists are not the same. Some of them are religious fanatics. Some of them are just thugs that Saddam released from prison, and they are thugs trying to create a territory and using terror and using violence, much as Al Capone in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre did, used violence in a certain way to gain a certain amount of power in a neighborhood. So it is not as simple as sometimes we would like to pigeon hole what the violence is all about. It is about a lot of things.

But, most importantly, I think the Iraqi government now has to demonstrate, as the Kurds did, that they have a zero tolerance policy. They will hunt people down and bring them to justice.

You said something else earlier about the advantage that the Iraqis have when they are doing the heavy lifting. You said they understand the culture. One thing you didn't mention, I want to add, they understand the language. That is incredibly important. That puts our forces sometimes at a huge disadvantage, because they really don't understand.

You can't really understand a culture if you weren't raised in it. So in many cases we were asking our soldiers sometimes to do some things that are very difficult. Not that they aren't very professional and they do it very well, but there is no question that Iraqis out there policing the streets can do a much better job than Americans.

They have been up performing surgery since 2 o'clock in the morning. I mentioned that Dr. Mike Yaszmenski from Mayo Clinic, he did not take the credit for it, but the story that we were all standing there when they pinned the Purple Heart on that young man. He had had several broken vertebrae, which is the reason he could not get out of his HUMVEE, and could not walk.

At the end of his little presentation, he told the whole story, he sort of smiled. He said, I can wiggle my toes. Now, Dr. Yaszmenski did not take credit for this. I am piecing this together. Because he is a spinal surgeon my sense is that he had something to do with it.

He wanted to see that private that pulled him out.

I think the real progress that we are all looking for is for the Iraqis. Now that Prime Minister Maliki has got a government, and I think he needs to know that America is going to be there to support him.

You know, I was misquoted that I was in favor of immediate withdrawal. That is simply not true. What I have said consistently is America needs to be there for quite some time to come. We still have troops in Germany. We still have troops in Japan. We still have troops in South Korea. But our real role has to begin to change, so that we provide the umbrella of security.

If, for example, some militia being to mass and begin to directly confront the government or other forces, then I think from a conventional standpoint, we are in a strong position to make sure that that gets dealt with quickly and effectively. And nobody can do it better than our military.

But in terms of some of the sectarian things and the thugs who are at large in some of the neighborhoods, since we cannot speak the language and we do not understand the culture, it is just much more difficult for us to get to the bottom of that. That is where the Iraqis need to step up. That is the progress we are looking for.

When that happens, when people start to feel as secure in Baghdad as they do in Erbil, then you will see the economy begin to improve. Because, it is obvious to me that the overwhelming majority of Iraqis want what most Americans want. They want to live in peace. They want to be able to raise their families in a secure neighborhood. They want to look forward to an economic future that is worth living.

They can do that. And that is why, again, I hate to refer too much to what we saw up in northern Iraq. But it was like night and day. It was like going to a different universe.

We will always remember the North Dakota boys. Especially one young man, I think his name was Lynch. He had been involved in four of these explosions. And, yes, it is true the equipment they have is specially designed to sort of take the explosion and the concussion in a ``V'' section so that the folks inside are protected.

The concussion of it and what it did to those heavy vehicles, it is amazing that they have only had one KIA. Again, let me join you in sharing our sympathies to that family and that unit, because they were obviously a very close knit unit from North Dakota.

They went to war together. They do their jobs together. They live together. They pray together. And it was inspiring to meet those young men.

I mentioned earlier, we also need to say thank you and kudos to the families. You cannot help but think about what the families in North Dakota must feel every day. I am sure they do not know all that that group does in terms of going out and looking for these IEDs.

But not only do the folks in uniform, they pay quite a price for us, but their families, just worrying about what is going to happen today, what is going to happen tomorrow. You just really have to admire the families. And we need to say a special thank you to them. Because, you know, the guys that are over there, they are working hard all of the time. In fact, one of the things they said was we do not mind working long days and long hours because it helps the time go faster.

I am going to close up here. If you have any closing thoughts, Chairman Hoekstra, go ahead. Then I am going to close up and yield it back here in just a few minutes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to mention, and I am glad you did bring up the fact that we stopped in Bosnia Herzegovina.

Sarajevo. I was in Sarajevo 10 years ago, and at that time the city was essentially in, the center city, essentially rubble. Many buildings had large pockmarks. Some of them are still there. Many, though, have been fixed; and it now is a vibrant city.

If I had predicted 10 years ago that we would see the life in the city that we saw, a lot of people said it cannot happen.

Yes, Sniper Alley.

I think we should share the story that the general told us about the man who worked at the military facility there. Every day, when he would come to work, he would stop, and this is a Bosnian individual, he would stop and salute the American flag.

Then he would say a prayer. When he would leave work that night, he would again salute the American flag. They had a special ceremony that finally, the general said, we need to do something for that guy. So they presented him with a U.S. flag, one of these little wood cases that we have around here.

When they presented it, he literally, with tears running down his cheeks, he said, I thank God every day for America and what America did to bring peace to this city, because it was America that saved us from that war.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think there are reasons to be optimistic. But I want to close with this quote. I started with this quote tonight:

``Do not try to do too much with your own hands . . . It is their war, and you are to help them, not win it for them.'' That quote is from T.E. Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia.

In some respects, I think it is prophetic. We can only do so much in Iraq. We are doing our share. Our military is doing a marvelous job. The next step, Mr. Chairman, is up to the Iraqis.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 8 o'clock and 3 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until Monday, July 24, 2006, at 12:30 p.m., for morning hour debate.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Jones Metal Products of Mankato, Minnesota, on receiving the National Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve's Above and Beyond award.

The National Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve, ESGR, was established in 1972 to promote cooperation and understanding between Reserve component members and their civilian employers. Their mission is to continuously gain and maintain active support from all public and private employers for the men and women of the National Guard and Reserve. Local and national representatives stand ready to help employers understand federal laws that affect the call-up of their employees. The Above and Beyond award recognizes those who have gone beyond what federal law requires for supporting activated Guard employees.

Minnesota businesses that employ Guard members are an essential link in family support for deployed service members. The state of Minnesota is recognized as a leader among those employing Guard and Reserve members and received the 2004 Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award.

Jones Metal Products, one of 475 companies nominated for the Above and Beyond award, was nominated by Staff Sgt. Juan Berrones. While Staff Sgt. Berrones was deployed to Iraq, Jones Metal Products provided him pay raises, two bonuses and showed continuous support to his family.

I extend my sincere congratulations to Jones Metal Products for receiving the Above and Beyond Award from the National Committee for Employer Support of Guard and Reserve and commend them for the extraordinary services provided to those who serve our country.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate St. Joseph's Mayo Health System Hospital of Mankato, Minnesota, on receiving the National Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve's Above and Beyond award.

The National Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve, ESGR, was established in 1972 to promote cooperation and understanding between Reserve component members and their civilian employers. Their mission is to continuously gain and maintain active support from all public and private employers for the men and women of the National Guard and Reserve. Local and national representatives stand ready to help employers understand Federal laws that affect the call-up of their employees. The Above and Beyond Award recognizes those who have gone beyond what Federal law requires for supporting activated Guard employees.

Minnesota businesses that employ Guard members are an essential link in family support for deployed service members. The State of Minnesota is recognized as a leader among those employing Guard and Reserve members and received the 2004 Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award.

Immanuel St. Joseph's Mayo Health System Hospital, ISJ-MHS Hospital, one of 475 companies nominated for the Above and Beyond Award, was nominated by Chief Master Sgt. Dennis of Mankato, Minnesota.

I extend my sincere congratulations to Immanuel St. Joseph's Mayo Health System Hospital for receiving the Above and Beyond Award from the National Committee for Employer Support of Guard and Reserve and commend them for the extraordinary services provided to those who serve our country.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Archer Daniels Midland of Mankato, Minnesota, on receiving the National Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve's Above and Beyond award.

The National Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve (ESGR) was established in 1972 to promote cooperation and understanding between Reserve component members and their civilian employers. Their mission is to continuously gain and maintain active support from all public and private employers for the men and women of the National Guard and Reserve. Local and national representatives stand ready to help employers understand Federal laws that affect the call-up of their employees. The Above and Beyond award recognizes those who have gone beyond what Federal law requires for supporting activated Guard employees.

Minnesota businesses that employ Guard members are an essential link in family support for deployed service members. The state of Minnesota is recognized as a leader among those employing Guard and Reserve members and received the 2004 Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award.

Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) was nominated by Sgt. Dave Bonnifield who has been mobilized twice with the Army Guard. ADM has been extremely supportive by providing pay differential and continuous support to Sgt. Bonnifield's family. Archer Daniels Midland was one of 475 companies nominated for the Above and Beyond award.

I extend my sincere congratulations to Archer Daniels Midland for receiving the Above and Beyond Award from the National Committee for Employer Support of Guard and Reserve and commend them for the extraordinary services provided to those who serve our country.

Mr. Speaker, today we have heard a lot about who is right and who is wrong. Let me quote, at the outbreak of the Civil War, from Leroy Walker, who later became first Confederate Secretary of War. He said that he could wipe up with one handkerchief all the blood that would be spilled in the coming dispute between the North and the South. He was wrong.

We have been wrong, too. We were wrong about weapons of mass destruction. We were wrong about the costs, and we were wrong about the tenacity of this insurgency. But Tony Blair came here about a year and a half ago and he gave a great speech, and he said something very important we ought to be reminded of.

He said if we were wrong about weapons of mass destruction, and all we did was liberate a noble people from a brutal dictator, he said that history would forgive. But had we failed to act, and had we been right about weapons of mass destruction, he said that history would not forgive.

So this debate about who is right and who is wrong, I think, misplaces the interest of the United States. We were right that Saddam Hussein and his sadistic sons were a clear and present danger to his people, his neighbors, the region, and to American interests. Saddam Hussein plotted to kill a former U.S. president.

And just like megalomaniac leaders of the past, he attacked his neighbors in Iran, and he invaded Kuwait. Some prefer to ignore the historic comparisons to the Sudetenland and Liebensprau. Montezuma was right, those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

Dr. Henry Kissinger was right, too, when he said that with domestic policy, actions have consequences. But with foreign policy, inaction can have consequences. We are now seeing the suffering played out in Darfur and Somalia because of inaction.

Millions of innocent women and children are now at the mercy of the followers of bin Laden and al Zarqawi, and al Qaeda understands what some in this body refuse to acknowledge, that Iraq and Afghanistan are part and parcel of their war against us. When they are defeated there, and I pray that they will be, their ability to wage terrorist war against us will be diminished dramatically.

When we talk to the troops who come home from that region, they talk about progress. They talk about schools and hospitals that are open. Members, let me read for you from an e-mail that came back from a Minnesota soldier back to Minnesota. This was after the first election in Iraq.

He said, despite everything that has been going on around them, they still voted. Despite all the violence, they stood in line to be heard. Word is that despite the insurgents' best efforts, voter turnout may be as high as 72 percent across the country. Shoot, even in the States, that would be a great turnout.

All I can say is that together we, the United States and the Iraqis, no kidding, we did it. I know full well that this doesn't solve everything. Sure, there will be tough days yet to come. But for today, we won, we all won.

Our returning military personnel tell us something else. Iraqi and Americans have one thing in common. They want American forces to come home, but not just yet. Members, now is not the time to go wobbly. Let's give victory a chance and a lasting peace will surely follow.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the life of LCpl Robert G. Posivio III, who died a hero in a roadside bomb attack on May 23, 2006, while protecting his country and fighting for freedom in the al Anbar province of Iraq. As a devoted son, brother, and Marine, Lance Corporal Posivio will be missed by many.

Lance Corporal Posivio was born on October 4, 1983, in Mankato, MN, to Robert M. Posivio, Jr. and Patricia A. Posivio. He enlisted in the United States Marines while attending Martin County West Senior High School in Sherburn, MN, where he graduated in 2002.

Lance Corporal Posivio was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, based at Camp Pendleton, CA. He is preceded in death by his grandmother, Ardis Posivio; his uncle, Don Wood; his brother, Daniel L. Posivio; and other relatives.

Lance Corporal Posivio was on his third tour of duty in Iraq and was scheduled to be honorably discharged on July 28. He returned to combat on April 30 after suffering injuries in a mortar attack on April 13 in which two members of his unit were killed. Lance Corporal Posivio told his family that if he died, he wanted the following quote placed on his tombstone: ``Freedom comes at a price that the free will never know.'' We owe Lance Corporal Posivio and all the brave men and women serving in our Armed Forces a great debt of gratitude. We ask them to defend our Nation; we need to let them know they are not forgotten.

Mr. Speaker, I offer my condolences to Lance Corporal Posivio's parents, Robert, Jr. and Patti; his sister, Sarah Peltier, and her husband, Colin; his grandparents, Robert F. Posivio and Eugene and Evelyn McDonald; and the many other friends and family who loved him and miss him. In this time of sorrow, may our thoughts and prayers comfort them, and may his memory bring them peace.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I want to just comment on a couple of things.

First of all, I rise in support of this rule. Now, there are people on both sides who may say that this rule is not perfect and the bill is not perfect, and they probably would be correct; but I think considering what we can get done this year, this is a very good rule, and this is a very good bill.

I want to call particular attention to an amendment that was made in order that will be offered by me, Mr. Stupak, Mr. Peterson, and a group from the Congressional Rural Caucus. It deals with the issue that many Members of Congress, and I suspect many of our constituents, do not completely understand. It is a new technology called voice over Internet protocol. Why is that important? Well, it is a technology that is growing by leaps and bounds, and it has to ride on the telecommunications system, the interstate highway, if you will; and the interstate system is only as good as its weakest link. Everyone wants to serve the suburbs and most companies want to serve the cities, but when you get out into the distant parts of rural America, it becomes more and more difficult to serve those areas.

One of the ways that we have tried to level that playing field is with what is called a universal service fund, and the base bill says nothing about the universal service fund and the obligation that providers of voice over Internet protocol have to participate in the universal service fund.

So the amendment that we are going to be offering, and I hope Members will consider supporting the amendment, will simply say that nothing in this act shall be construed to exempt the VoIP

service provider from requirements imposed by the Federal Communications Commission or a State commission on all VoIP service providers, among others, to participate in the universal service fund.

This is a very important amendment. In many respects, it is innocuous but it is important, especially in rural America; but if you think about it, it is important for everyone because the chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1\1/2\ minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I rise on behalf of the Bipartisan Congressional Rural Caucus. The amendment we offer tonight is real simple: It preserves the right of the FCC to require VoIP providers to contribute to the universal service fund and pay appropriate intercarrier compensation fees.

Today, VoIP providers do not contribute to the USF, which is the mechanism that helps build and maintain the communications network that we all rely on, especially in rural America. All other voice providers contribute. Regardless of where you live, we all depend on a vibrant, strong communications network.

So why are we doing this on this bill? Title 3 of the COPE Act is a VoIP title. The language grants VoIP providers all the benefits of being telecommunications carriers, such as the right to interconnect with networks and access to right-of-way. It also gives VoIP providers some of the same responsibilities, such as providing the E-911 service, complying with regulations for the disabled, number portability, et cetera. However, H.R. 5252 does not classify VoIP providers as telecommunications carriers, and therefore they do not have all the same social responsibilities such as USF contributions and intercarrier payments. Our amendment would not mandate that VoIP providers contribute to USF or pay intercarrier compensation fees, nor would it require the FCC to force them to do these things; it merely preserves the FCC's authority to do so. We need to assure the FCC that it is not congressional intent to exempt VoIP providers from the duties required under other communications networks.

Mr. Chairman, I urge passage of this amendment and the underlying bill.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to my cochair of the Telecommunications Task Force of the Rural Caucus, Mr. Stupak of Michigan.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to our colleague from Nebraska (Mr. Osborne).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd), a very active member of the Rural Caucus.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Terry).

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 5441, the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2007. This bill will provide valuable homeland security dollars to communities and infrastructure in our country.

I'm particularly pleased about one provision included in this bill. It will prevent U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) from seizing the property of Americans. Believe it or not, this is being done today.

For years, individuals have been allowed to purchase prescription drugs for personal use from Canada and other foreign countries. Last November, without notification, CBP began to seize medicine that Americans had bought from Canadian mail-order pharmacies. We now know that between November 2005 and February 2006 almost 13,000 packages of drugs were seized.

Preventing these life-saving drugs from getting to their intended destination puts Americans' health at risk. Many seniors on fixed incomes lost hundreds of dollars worth of drugs when they were seized. That may not seem like much to a pharmaceutical executive, but this is a lot of money to someone on a fixed income.

Section 532 of H.R. 5441 states that ``None of the funds made available in this Act for United States Customs and Border Protection may be used to prevent an individual not in the business of importing a prescription drug . . . from importing a prescription drug . . .'' This will put a stop to our own government confiscating the medicine on which its citizens depend. I urge passage of this bill. We should insist that this provision remain in the final bill that the House receives from the Conference Committee.