Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 2112.

Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

Madam Chair, I want to, first of all, thank my good friend from Pennsylvania for talking to me about this amendment. Earlier this week, I expressed my concerns at that time, which I still have with it, and want to make a number of points.

Number one, we're not 100 percent sure what this scores out in terms of budget authority. So there is that question over it. Number two, I want to say that while conservation funding is down, farmers still have access to $5.8 billion in conservation funding. And that's for private landowners. Actually, it's $5.868 billion, to be exact.

I also want to make sure that my friends know that even though there are CHIMPs in this, changes in mandatory programs, that no conservation contracts will have to be canceled because of these limitations. The Federal Government cannot and does not break farm commodity or conservation contracts without significant consequences. We are aware of that. So we have made sure that none of the conservation contracts would be abrogated.

And then finally I want to say to my friend the ranking member, just to underscore some of the sensitivities that we've been through in the last couple of days, that this actually does cut the WIC program, cuts the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, and it cuts the Conservation Reserve Program and a lot of the other programs which there has been so much passion about on this floor in the last couple of days.

So with that, I do oppose the amendment, and I urge everyone to vote ``no'' on it.

Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

First of all, I want to thank my good friend from Tennessee for offering this amendment and her tireless work to try to reduce spending in our country, and I absolutely agree with all the statements that she has made.

I do want to point out, though, that the only budget that has passed either body is the Ryan budget. I supported, as I know she did, the RSC budget,

which is actually more conservative, but it did not pass. At least we did get a budget passed on the House floor. The Senate was unable to do that. Even though the Democrats are the majority party over there, the Senate rejected the President's budget 97-0, and apparently now they've given up and they're not going to try to pass a budget. The only bill that we have an opportunity to move is under the Ryan budget, which is what this bill reflects. It is a 13.4--actually it's higher than that because we cut it last night a little bit more, or we did some across- the-boards, but it's about a 13.4 percent cut already.

Where the big money is--and I know my friend from Tennessee is as frustrated about this as I am--is in the mandatory spending. In fact, I have a chart over there. We don't have any pages or I'd bring it up here on the floor; but 86 percent of this budget is mandatory spending, and I use the word ``mandatory'' loosely because it's really on automatic spending. That's where the big money is. Unfortunately, we can't get to it. This portion that we do have control over used to be $23 billion; and right now, under our budget, it's $17.2 billion.

Let me show my friend this because I think it's very important. The blue line is the mandatory spending of the Agriculture budget, and the red line is the discretionary spending. The point is that this committee has jurisdiction over the red line. We do not on this committee have jurisdiction over the blue line. Yet you can see the blue line is the one that's going up and that the red line is the one that's actually going down.

So that's one of my frustrations about the entire process and about the rules which we're governed by; but I want to make sure that my friend knows, under the portion we do control, that we did cut it 13.4 percent.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman yield?

I supported this when you offered it on the continuing resolution, and I plan to support it today.

I move to strike the last word.

I yield to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Madam Chair, I yield to the gentlewoman from South Dakota (Mrs. Noem).

Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

For clarification purposes, I yield to my friend from Texas (Mr. Flores).

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I reserve a point of order on the gentleman's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation--as I read the amendment, it looks like it is in order--and I move to strike the last word.

I oppose the amendment, and do so out of caution.

What I want to say to my friend, who knows a lot about this and I know is a very careful steward of tax dollars and very deliberative in his legislation in general, I am not that familiar with the issue. I am not certain why location is that important, and I am very reluctant to tie the hands of the USDA in seeking the best contract. I want them to do what a business would do and be free from micromanagement by the U.S. Congress. If the location is outside of the United States or the location is in Illinois or in Georgia or in California, I want them to do what is best for the USDA and the best for the taxpayers. As I understand this amendment, it would limit that sort of flexibility.

So I oppose the amendment; but I want to say to the gentleman from Illinois, I certainly will continue a dialogue with you on this, because I do realize I need to learn more about it. But on that basis, I do not want to tie their hands based on location.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentlewoman yield?

I thank the gentlewoman for yielding, and also to bring up the fact that the cormorants are a problem all over the country. And certainly, as one from Georgia, I know exactly that you in Alabama are having the problems that they have in the Northeast and in Mississippi and all the other places. I will absolutely work with the gentlewoman from Alabama to make sure that the USDA is addressing your cormorant problems. And I will work with the ranking member from California to make sure that it does not get forgotten.

I also appreciate your diligence on the cormorant issue. Realizing that the report is a little bit misleading as we have written it, I think you have underscored something that we all are behind you on. So we will work with you on it.

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

I want to thank the ranking member for working with us on this bill. I want to thank all the minority and the majority staff for all their fine work. We would not be here today without them. At their request and because the hour is late and Members are eager to vote on this bill, I will submit the names of all the hardworking people who made this thing happen, but I wanted to say thank you on behalf of both of us.

I yield to my friend from California.

The same to you. I wore my organic cotton tie on your behalf. Thank you very much.

This legislation would not be possible without the great working relationship I enjoy with our ranking member Mr. Farr. Again, we don't always agree but we do try to communicate and put together a sound product. I also thank all the staffers who have averaged about 50-60 hours a week since December to make this happen. Matt Smith and Martha Foley with the Minority, and Rochelle Dornatt and Troy Phillips with Ranking Member Farr's office, our majority staff clerk of many years Martin Delgado and his team Tom O'Brien, Betsy Bina, and Andrew Cooper. From my personal office, Allie Thigpen, Michael Donnal, Adam Sullivan, Chris Crawford, Caroline Black, and Mary Carpenter. You might not see them on the House floor, but their fingerprints are all over the bill.

Announcement by the Acting Chair

Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise and report the bill back to the House with sundry amendments, with the recommendation that the amendments be agreed to and that the bill, as amended, do pass.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion to recommit.

Mr. Speaker, I want to start off by saying, if this was a serious amendment, if this was a serious proposal--we have had 25 hours of debate--it would have been out on the House floor, and we could have taken a look at it. But let me say this: Very importantly, there is absolutely nothing in this bill that prohibits the CFTC from looking at oil speculation as it respects the supply or the cost of oil.

This amendment is not needed because of that alone. But let me also quote the Democrat Commissioner on the CFTC, Michael Dunn, a Democrat member of the CFTC. There has been a suggestion by some that once we set position limits, that's speculative limits, on physical derivatives, that the price we pay will inevitably drop. I believe this is a fallacy.

To date, the CFTC staff has been unable to find any reliable economic analysis to support the contention that excessive speculation is affecting the markets we regulate, or that position limits will prevent excessive speculation. The price volatility exists in our markets because of global supply and demand for physical commodities.

Now, why are the Democrats trying to get us bogged down in that the price of oil is going up because of speculation? Well, I can tell you. Go back to January 2009, and ask your constituents if they remember paying a 1.83 per gallon. And in that same month, who became President of the United States but President Obama, the Democrat.

The change you were asking for, the change we were promised was that gas went from $1.83 per gallon to now $3.80, a 90 percent increase. And the Democrats want us to believe it's because of speculators. You know why it's gone up? Because of more regulation, less permitting, more delays and more lawsuits.

Think about this. The President recently went down to Brazil and he told them, hey, we understand you're going to drill offshore. We encourage you to do so. We want to lend you the money, and we want to become your best customers.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, I've got news for the President. I've got news for the Democrats. American technology and American engineers do not need to hold second place to Brazil or any other country in the world. We are America.

We need to have an all-of-the-above energy policy. We do need to look at solar. We do need to look at ethanol. We do need to look at wind. We need to also look at nuclear and fossil fuels, and we need to do it here in the United States of America.

We are Americans. And if you want to bring down the price of gas at the pump, then let's increase our own domestic supply and quit playing games of blaming it on Wall Street.

I recommend a ``no'' vote on the motion to reconsider.

Will the gentleman yield?

As the chairman of Agriculture knows and is fully aware, I wanted to underscore the point that you just made that the ordinary mandatory authorization for this program is $165 million. That has been zeroed out, and the only thing we're doing this year is this $15 million. And so even at the current $15 million level, it's still 150 less than it ordinarily has been.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

I wanted to make a few notes on it. I appreciate my friend for offering it, and I think he's raised some very serious philosophical questions, particularly about Pub.L. 490, the foreign food program.

I wanted to point out we have reduced that by 31 percent in this account, but we've also reduced the Multifamily Housing Revitalization Account, as he's well aware, but his amendment would actually increase that 10 times. It's at $11 million, and he would bring that up to $111 million. The highest funding level for that was in FY 2010 at $43 million, and so we have been ratcheting it down using a voucher program but feel that it was overfunded.

The Rural Business Program Account right now is about $64 million, so this amendment almost doubles that. It doesn't quite double it. But there again, we have brought that account down from a high of $97 million; and with his amendment, it would go up to $164 million. These two accounts would go to higher levels than they historically had. And in contrast, the PL 480, the foreign food program, is at one of

the lower levels that it has been at. So I have to say to my friend that I'm sorry to reluctantly oppose you, but we are going to oppose the amendment at this point.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

I think Dr. Broun has raised a lot of good points in terms of our financial future. In America today, for every dollar we spend, 40 cents is borrowed. The national debt right now is 95 percent of the GDP. Clearly, we have to make some very difficult choices ahead. And that's why, in this committee mark, we actually have reduced WIC funding already $686 million.

Now, these numbers aren't random. WIC participation in 2010 was 9.2 million; in 2011, it's 8.9 million. Our committee mark for FY 2012 contemplates a participation level of 8.3 million. However, if the economy does not improve and the number goes back up, with contingency funds, we have enough money to fund a participation level of over 9 million.

But it's very difficult, Mr. Chairman, because, as we said many times during yesterday's debate, the only budget that has actually passed either House is the Ryan budget, and our 302(b) allocation funding level comes from that budget. The President's own budget failed in the Senate 97-0. The Democrat leadership in the Senate is unable to pass a budget. They're not trying to pass a budget.

So using the 302(b) allocation which we have, we have come up with these numbers, not done in random, not done with any recklessness at all. We're trying to be very careful to make sure no one falls through the crack.

But because this is a delicate card house, I rise in opposition to the gentleman's amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I move to strike the last word.

I want to thank my colleague from North Carolina for putting this discussion on the table, because I think that it is important for us to look at the WIC program and make sure we are doing everything as efficiently and effectively as possible and we are putting the money in the right direction.

We had a very thorough, about a 6-hour debate about WIC yesterday. It is a delicate card house that we are trying to balance with our committee mark. But I think the more sunshine we have, not just on WIC, but on other Federal feeding programs, I think the better product we are going to come up with. So she and I have had some discussions on this. We are going to continue to have discussions on it. But I wanted to say I think it is a good debate to be having, although I am not supportive of the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Number one, we have actually reduced this account 31 percent. Again, as I have said many times, passing an appropriation bill that is building a card house, there's a delicate balance. I have got my friend, Mr. McGovern, who believes that we've cut too much. I've got my friend, Dr. Broun, who believes we haven't cut enough. And so we're trying to move this legislation.

I wanted to talk a little bit about PL-480 and say a couple of things. Number one, there is a national security interest in it. This is not about international charity alone. We do have an interest. America needs to be engaged around the world. When there is a natural disaster or manmade disaster, if we're not there, who will be there? And this is very important. My friend Mr. Dicks is here, former chairman of the HAC-D Committee, and knows that in terms of the national defense, we have soldiers right now as I speak in 60 different countries around the globe. Now, they are engaged for a reason. It's not a job-creation program. They're keeping an eye on national security interests.

If you travel in Africa or travel in South America right now, you'll see a new player that was not there 10 years ago, and that is the country of China. China is not necessarily an immediate threat to us, but it is a concern to us. China is rising as a military force and certainly as an economic source, and they are engaged all over the globe. Often our international programs, including food programs, keep us engaged and gives us an opportunity to have some doors open which we would not ordinarily have.

America provides 57 percent of the food aid in the world, followed by the EU at 27 percent and Japan at 6 percent. Right now, China is not a major player. The oil-rich Middle East countries certainly aren't major players. But it is about engagement. And it's interesting that we have a balance between developmental aid and emergency aid. Because if there is a Haitian disaster, we're the first on the ground trying to get food to the people. But we need to also be there with developmental aid to make sure that these countries are independent and that these countries do know how to grow their own food and have their own resources.

So I just want to emphasize again that this program has been trimmed already 31 percent, and it seems to me the balance that will get this bill over to the Senate so that we can negotiate further on it. We are in many, many different countries around the world.

With that, I yield to the gentleman from Arizona, Dr. Gosar.

Mr. Chairman, I do want to point out some of the things that this program is doing in Pakistan, Haiti, the Sudan, and Afghanistan. And I will submit that for the Record.

P.L. 480 Title II

History

For more than 50 years, the United States Government has

played a lead role in meeting emergency humanitarian food

needs through P.L. 480 Title II (Title II). Some of the first

U.S. food assistance resources assisted the war-devastated

economies of Europe. As these economies regained their

strength they began to pay for American farm commodities.

President Eisenhower signed P.L. 480 Title II into law in

1954 and it was later renamed the ``Food for Peace'' Act.

Current Need and Impact of Cuts

Currently, overall U.S. funding to WFP feeds on average 35

million people. A cut of Title II to $1,040,198, as marked-up

by the House Agricultural Appropriations sub-committee, would

mean that 15 million people--primarily women and children--

suffering from hunger as a result of conflict and natural

disasters would lose access to life saving food. These cuts

would significantly reduce the United States' ability to

address instability in volatile countries and decrease its

capacity to respond quickly to the needs of hungry people

affected by natural disaster or armed conflict.

Title II Assists People Affected by Natural Disasters

Pakistan

In July 2010, floods ravaged Pakistan, affecting millions.

WFP was able to reach people quickly and began to distribute

food just days after the record monsoon rains began. The

first food to reach the affected population was funded by

U.S. Food for Peace. The first helicopters that lifted food

to remote valleys in Swat and the northern regions were also

carrying U.S. food. Within the first month, WFP was able to

reach approximately 3 million people and then scaled up very

quickly to 7 million. Life-saving support was then followed

by early recovery activities which included school feeding

and nutrition support.

Story from the field: Razia Bibi and her family were badly

hit in the floods that devastated Pakistan last summer. Razia

lives in a little village called Chandia in central Pakistan.

She and her family lived on an embankment for a month last

summer as monsoon flooding flattened all the homes in her

community. As floodwaters subsided in September, they started

to pick up the pieces of their lives. Monthly food rations

from WFP have kept them going while they have rebuilt their

house and life has slowly returned to normality. Razia and

her husband sold their three goats, their last major assets,

to rebuild their house using high-quality bricks that would

be more resistant in case of another flood. In December 2010,

Razia picked up the family's last food ration. Now that her

husband is back at work and they have a house, she and her

family are able to support themselves. Their six children are

back at school and because of food assistance they were able

to get back on their feet.

Haiti

In Haiti, in the immediate aftermath of the January 12th

earthquake, WFP began providing assistance within 24 hours

and swiftly organized general food distributions. Only six

weeks after the quake, WFP assistance, through partners such

as World Vision, was reaching more than 4 million people, 35

percent of which was from the U.S. government. In the

following months, WFP also put in place safety net

interventions--including school feeding and nutrition.

Following the large general distribution, school feeding was

the quickest safety net intervention to scale up, reaching

over 500,000 school children. At the request of the

Government, WFP then scaled up to assist 1 million children.

In October, a take-home ration was also given to family

members to get children back in school, especially those who

had dropped out after the earthquake. WFP also launched a

blanket supplementary feeding program to all children five

years of age and under and pregnant/lactating women.

Story from the field: When the earthquake struck Haiti in

January of 2010 Cassandre Chery and her family were just

leaving their home. A piece of concrete fell and broke her

foot but otherwise they were uninjured. Her home, however,

was badly damaged. ``It's difficult to find work now,'' said

Cassandre who used to be a beautician. Her husband also has

trouble finding work. Their two girls, who live with them in

a tent in Port-au-Prince, were forced to go hungry some days.

But now Cassandre is back to work and she is rebuilding her

country with a food for work project with World Vision and

WFP. She receives food and cash to work clearing rubble from

roads and drainage channels. ``This works means a lot to

me,'' she said. ``It has helped me pay school fees and feed

my two daughters.''

Story from the field: At Sister Mary Bernadette's primary

school in Port-au-Prince, students began gathering after the

earthquake, though classes had not yet resumed. Most had lost

their homes, and a family member or friend. They came in

search of support and in search of something familiar. As

plans came together to begin makeshift lessons, WFP started

distributing daily meals to Sister Mary Bernadette's

students. ``They'd simply be too weak to study if they

weren't able to eat something at school,'' she says. ``It's

important for them to have a meal here. Most of them come

from very poor families.'' Sister Mary Bernadette says that

the food ``helps [them] to study and stay focused in class.

When they don't eat, they don't hear, they don't listen, they

don't see.'' A year after the earthquake, things in her

school are improving. During the summer break, crews tore

down the damaged building and workers are now putting the

final touches to temporary classrooms. The students seem to

be recovering too, said the school principal. ``Some of them

are still struggling though. When you lose a member of your

family, your mother or your father, you just can't forget.

But we do our best to help them.''

Title II Assists Those Affected by Conflict and Helps Restore and

Maintain Stability in Volatile Regions

Sudan

WFP assistance in Sudan, reaching 6.7 million people, has

been a critical stabilizing factor since the Comprehensive

Peace Agreement (CPA) was signed in 2005. In 2010, nearly

half of assistance to WFP in Sudan was generously provided by

the U.S. government. This assistance has provided stability

throughout the South Sudan referendum process. Readiness,

contingency measures and pre-positioning, has allowed WFP to

respond quickly to any situation, including the current

population displacements in Abyei (an area between south

Sudan and Sudan). WFP's strategic engagement for post-

referendum South Sudan is vital for ensuring a smooth

transition. WFP's engagement will support the restoration of

sustainable assets for the communities, infrastructure

(feeder roads), safety nets (school feeding, seed protection,

nutrition), strategic food reserve, Government capacity in

food security analysis, and support to smallholder farmers

through purchase-for-progress.

Story from the field: Food assistance has played a critical

role in southern Sudan over the last few years and has been

key in supporting families returning home. Grace Lado, a 25

year old mother of 2, fled fighting in Juba in southern Sudan

when she was only 7 years old. When her family decided to

move back a WFP food ration made it possible. In spite of the

deteriorating security situation, WFP is currently feeding

some 530,000 people across southern Sudan. In addition to

food assistance WFP is also helping to repair roads and

assist farmers across the region so that those the country

can get on a path to sustainable growth. Until then, however,

these lifesaving food rations are helping people to build a

stable and secure foundation in a country that is hopeful for

a brighter future.

Afghanistan

In 2010, the U.S. government supplied 36 percent of the

assistance to WFP in Afghanistan, enabling WFP to assist 7

million people (or 25 percent of the population) and, through

its strategic engagement, helps deploy an effective system of

safety net interventions and build sustainable assets for the

communities through food-for-education, food-for-work, and

food-for-training.

Story from the field: When Taliban forces arrived in their

village Jamila's husband lost both his legs during the

fighting. Jamila's family was forced to sell their farmland

to pay for his treatment and they suddenly found themselves

unable to feed their four children. ``I will never forget the

day I realized we had nothing to eat,'' Jamila said. Her

husband's family refused to provide assistance and told her

to marry off her teenage daughters in order to get dowry

money. Jamila's husband, frustrated, depressed and hungry,

often took his anger out on her. All of that changed,

however, when Jamila began a training program with WFP that

provided her with a new set of skills while her family

received food rations. Now Jamila is able to support her

family by selling children's clothes to a local shop. ``Now

that I have a skill and am providing for my family, all the

members of my family respect me,'' she says. By providing

food aid while Jamila received training she was able to stave

off hunger while she built a new life for her family.

Story from the field: For years the people of Dega Payan

had to travel five hours on foot or by donkey to the nearest

medical clinic. Travel by car was impossible as there were no

roads leading to their remote village in one of Afghanistan's

poorest provinces (Badakhshan) which has high level of

undernutrition and food insecurity. Now, as a result of a WFP

program that employed local villagers to build a road while

providing their families with much needed food assistance, a

road has been completed connecting Dega Payan to the larger

town of Ziraki, where there is a clinic. This has made the

village accessible by road and allows local farmers to get

their crops to markets more easily and allows traders to

bring supplies into the village that were not available

before.

McGovern-Dole International School Meals Program

Background

Approximately 2.7 million children receive McGovern/Dole

school meals through WFP, which helps them fight short-term

hunger, increase their concentration/performance in school,

encourages parents to send them to school, and helps girls to

get an education. A better educated girl will make more

informed choices and will grow up to raise a more food secure

family. Promoting girls education is crucial in countries

where there are serious gender disparities. Every $50 cut in

the program would deny a child access to food for a whole

school year. Without a daily meal, many poor children would

not attend class with long-term ramifications for the child,

the community and the country.

Story from the field: In Afghanistan WFP hands out take-

home rations of vegetable oil to approximately 600,000 girls

(in addition to the on-site meals) as an incentive for the

parents to send their girls to school. In a school in Laghman

Province, one of the teachers told WFP ``There are more girls

coming to school now because of the food. Before I had six

classes, now I have twelve.'' In the same region, girls'

enrolment increased by 40 percent by end of 2008 from the

baseline data 2 years earlier, and attendance rate for girls

improved by 30 percent from baseline. Families realize that

girls are bringing income by going to school. A girl at the

same school queuing for her oil ration said ``We are so happy

to get this oil. We are poor and our family is happy with us

since we can bring something of value to our homes''.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

I rise in support of the Lummis amendment. I am disappointed that she is planning to withdraw it and that we will not be having a vote on it. We had a vote on it in full committee. It was actually Mr. Moran's amendment that pulled it out. I did not support the gentleman from Virginia's amendment because I believe there is a lot of emotion that goes on when we are dealing with a horse. It still is a private property issue, a personal property issue, and while I do not own horses, I have family members who own horses. I know that you do have to have someplace to move the horse on to when it ages out on you.

It is very emotional in America. We look down at other nations that eat horses, but I have eaten horse before. In Kazakhstan I ate horse, and it wasn't bad. But we as Americans, we have an obesity problem, so we can pick and choose what we want to eat and what we don't want to eat, and people feel like, well, we are too good to be eating horses. I understand that, but the rest of the world does eat horses and I think, frankly, that is a different discussion, as my friend from Virginia knows. But I wish we were having a vote on it.

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

I move to strike the last word.

I rise in strong support of the amendment and believe that while it may be an emotional issue--and as my friend from Virginia said and my friend from Indiana said, emotion is good. I think that there can be emotion on both sides. But there's also a lot of logic in the gentlewoman's position, and that's why I'm a strong supporter of it.

I yield to the gentlewoman from Wyoming.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I would like to speak to the point of order.

The gentleman says, If not now, when? It is our intention to restore this at the proper place in the bill, the DeLauro amendment. I wanted to clarify that because we've discussed that, and we intend to follow through with that.

Madam Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

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

Mr. Chairman, this amendment reduces certain accounts in the bill specified in the amendment by 0.78 percent, and it fulfills a commitment which the minority and the majority had discussed earlier regarding WIC funding.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

I do not have the expertise that my friend from Alaska has on it, but I wanted to say this. Earlier, or actually during the markup, Mr. Rehberg offered an amendment about the FDA using sound science. And I do believe, in this case, the FDA is using sound science in a process that was approved in January 2009, and they are going through a process right now to make sure that this product does not have a problem as respects human consumption. I think that, of course, should be the number one issue.

There are also some other considerations in terms of food supply, feeding more people, which is something that we all have debated on this bill. And also there is an issue with me about some jobs. So I'm concerned on this because it does seem like a pretty major change in my philosophy of sound science.

I yield to my friend from Alaska, who I think is out of time.

Reclaiming my time, I don't know all the ins and outs of this, but I do know that we're constantly getting on the FDA to use more sound science, less politics, and to have more transparency, and it appears that that's what they're doing here. And they may come out against genetically modified salmon, but they are just looking at it right now to determine.

And with respect to the food supply, if you could safely produce genetically modified fish, you could feed a great portion of the world with it. So I have some concerns on it, but I did want to oppose the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I oppose this amendment, and I don't quite understand what the problem is with the bill language at all.

Here's what it does: the report language, which this amendment tries to strike, it simply tells the Secretary of USDA to notify the committee of any trips related to the Know Your Farmer initiative and include the agenda and the cost to the American taxpayers. It doesn't prevent them from doing this. It simply says let us know. It also says put this information on the Web page. So if Know Your Farmer is that important, why would USDA have any opposition to this at all? In fact, I don't know that USDA does.

I also want to say that, as somebody who represents rural southeast Georgia, there is this nostalgic idea that somehow the further food travels the more evil it becomes. But if you look at a plate of fresh vegetables that you

may have eaten sometime today, that food traveled a long way. In fact, asparagus travels a long way. Lettuce--my friend, Mr. Farr, gave me an article earlier today. I think 59 percent of the lettuce in America comes from his one district.

Now, if we start confining that to Monterey County, it might be great for the folks in Monterey County, but I don't mind eating California lettuce because if the California farmers can do it for less money and I can get lettuce year round for less money, that's not a bad thing. So I think some of the assumption that food traveling is a bad idea, I think it's flawed in itself.

But I want to get back to this bill report language. It simply says to the USDA, let us know how much you're going to spend. And why is that so important? I want my friend from California to know that if you look through the USDA budget request for FY12, there's not one mention of Know Your Farmer--Know Your Food. It's an initiative. There has not been a budget request for it. If there was a budget request for it for $3 million or $30 million, then we could have something we could be debating about.

But what it is, is an initiative; and all we're asking is, if you go forward with this--and we don't stop them from going forward with it-- we're just saying we want to know how much it's going to cost. So I do not believe that it's bad report language at all, and I strongly oppose the amendment.

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

I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I want to make sure I answer this question, because I'm hearing from our colleague that she can't possibly imagine why we are against the program. We are against it because it's not authorized.

The President of the United States is now bombing in Libya. By the way, I voted with the Kucinich amendment because I feel very uncomfortable with an unauthorized bombing as the use of force in Libya. The Federal Government frequently obligates the taxpayers to new programs. Yet the United States Congress hasn't had an opportunity to vet these programs or to vote on them, so I, myself, don't understand why that is a problem that we can have this transparency.

Now, as I've listened to this, I've kind of felt, well, Know Your Farmer--Know Your Food is one of these harmless little Washington sort of ``feel good about things'' initiatives, but I'm beginning to think it's just one big databank. I don't know why the USDA needs to know all of this information about the farmers. I'm wondering about that. If we want to help farmers--and I've had the opportunity of representing lots of farmers for a long time--I'm going to give you seven things that I thought about in just sitting here during the course of the last speech.

Number one: This administration has declared war on the community banks, which are the fiber and the heart of small communities. That's where farmers get their loans. Farmers need credit. We need stability and banking laws to help farmers.

Number two: We need consistent regulations and regulations that don't send the EPA out on the farm to play ``I gotcha.'' You may know right now, Mr. Chairman, that for organic chickens--and I know my friend from California probably knows this--you have the FDA requiring that they be raised on a slab of concrete and the USDA saying, no, they can't be. So we have two Federal agencies with two different regulations for one product. Farmers need regulatory consistency.

Number three: We need an H-2A program. Absolutely, we've got to get labor out there and a good guest worker program that works.

Number four: We need free trade agreements. We have had sitting on the desk of the White House free trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama, and this administration won't move them. That will create lots of markets for farmers.

Number five: We need estate tax relief. If you want to keep the family farm in the family, then get rid of the death tax so that it can be passed on to the next generation.

Number six: You need to have a good crop insurance program. More than any other farm program, farmers want a good crop insurance program.

Number seven: We need to cut the red tape out so that you can get to your local market. If you're a local farmer, it is impossible to sell right now to your local high school because of many Federal regulations. The small farmers can't compete with the big folks on this.

I want to say this about apples because the gentlewoman had mentioned apples. The average apples travel right now 2,500 miles to get to the consumer. Now, I don't find that horrible. We are a country of origin labeling laws, which our committee has debated for over a decade, and I don't know that it has made the world a better place. I think that consumers are actually driven by food safety, food taste and food price, and whether it comes from New York or whether it comes from the farmer down the street, those still are going to be the driving factors in making the decision. Carrots come 2,000 miles.

I would challenge my friends to look at Google food mileage and look at how much common, everyday food travels to get to your plate. What has it done? It has made America healthier. It has given us an abundant food supply, and it has given us a less expensive food supply.

But if we are serious about growing mom and pop farms--and I want to say

this to my friend from Maine--I am very interested in working with her on that. The seven things that I have listed, I can promise you, in any poll, farmers will choose before they choose to say what we really need to get farmers going in America is this program that is not authorized by the Congress, called Know Your Farmer.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Reserving my right to object, I just want to remind my friend about taking two bites of the 2,500-mile apple. I certainly do not object but----

Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order on the gentlewoman's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment.

We have had a very difficult time with the Food for Peace program already, and if this helps secure another supporter of the bill, we certainly would work with you on this amendment and support it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

I stand in opposition to the amendment, but with great admiration for the author of the amendment--but still disagreement.

Now, the previous speaker actually said that FDA funding has been slashed. FDA is funded both with direct appropriations and with fees. Last year, their funding level was $3.6 billion. This year, it is $3.64 billion. It is a little bit more. I would say it is level funding. But FDA funding has not been slashed, and it is very important for us to realize that.

Number two, let me show you something about the FDA funding history, Mr. Chairman. If you can see this, this chart actually goes back to 2000 and goes up to 2011. It has been nothing but a 10-year climb uphill for the FDA. And while a lot of people are saying the FDA funding is slashed, there is not even a slight dip in any of this 10- year funding chart. It is very important for us to realize that.

Now, the second point is, in the FDA hearing, I was concerned about FDA's ability to do food safety and to take on this big mission. Here is why:

You hear the figure of about 48 million foodborne illnesses--a very high number which we are enormously concerned about--but 20 percent of those illnesses are from known, or specified, pathogens. Nearly 60 percent of the illnesses from known pathogens comes from the Norovirus. So how do we address this?

The CDC tells us on their March 4 memo that appropriate hand hygiene is likely the most important method to prevent the Norovirus infection and to control transmission. Reducing any Norovirus present on hands is best accomplished by thorough handwashing. Now, in the FDA's 630-page budget request, there is not one mention of Norovirus. I believe that that's relevant.

The second point: The second highest cause of illness is salmonella; but under its authority, the existing authority, before the Food Safety Modernization Act was passed by the House, the FDA updated its own food safety as respect to salmonella. They are saying--and this was according to their own press release in July of last year--that as many as 79,000 illnesses and 30 deaths due to the consumption of eggs contaminated with salmonella may be avoided. That was last year. That was before a new bureaucracy. This bureaucracy, by the way, over a 10- year period of time, will cost $1.4 billion and will hire 17,000 new Federal employees.

The third highest cause of foodborne illnesses is clostridium. Again, in the FDA's 630-page budget request, it was only mentioned once.

I want to say something else that is very important. Do we believe that McDonald's and Kentucky Fried Chicken and Safeway and Kraft Foods--and any brand name that you can think of--aren't concerned about food safety? The food supply in America is very safe as the private sector self-polices because they have the highest motivation. They don't want to be sued. They don't want to go broke. They want their customers to be healthy and happy and to come back and give them repeat business.

Now, in response to the 2006 E. coli outbreak that happened in California with spinach, where three people died and 200 consumers were sickened, the California Leafy Green Products Handler Marketing Agreement was made. This is a private sector agreement which has done already 2,000 farm audits on a voluntary basis. Nearly 200 billion servings of lettuce and spinach and other leafy greens produced under this program have been surveyed. It is a successful private sector initiative, and those types of things happen all

the time in the private sector, but we're blind to it.

Here are some numbers from the CDC. It's very important because I think America loves to beat itself up over things all the time. The CDC numbers, Mr. Chairman: There are 48 million foodborne illnesses reported a year, 128,000 hospitalizations, 3,000 deaths. Those numbers are very high. I'm very concerned about it. That's why we spend a lot of money already on food safety.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I just want to continue with this, Mr. Chairman.

You have 311 million Americans eating three meals a day. That's 933 million meals eaten each day. That's nearly 1 billion food consumption events in our country, which is over 360 billion meals consumed. If you do the math in going back to the 48 million foodborne illnesses, according to the USDA, our food safety rate is 99.99 percent.

I want to address the 48 million, but what I also suggest to you is that we can spend $45 million more for FDA funding; we can spend $100 million more or we can spend $1 billion more, but I don't think you can increase this number of a 99.99 percent food safety rate according to the CDC. So, in these times of very tight budgets, it is very important to keep these facts in mind.

I am going to close with this statement by the Democrat Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, and this was as of yesterday. He said he is ``reasonably confident'' that U.S. consumers won't be faced with the same sort of E. coli outbreak now plaguing Germany. He goes on and explains why--because of the current food safety laws in place and the current food safety funding.

Mr. Chairman, I support the amendment.

Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

My dear friend from Texas has worked diligently to find something to work out with this. As I had indicated to her last night, we're trying to work on some alternatives and see if there's a way to do it. Just in the last 30 minutes, I've gotten something from GAO that says that you could actually cut out $45 million dollars from this program and that it would not affect the potential of it.

Right now what I will do--and I know my friend from California is rising. Let me yield to him because I know he probably has a different view, but I want to kind of keep the debate going.

Well, you've got 4 minutes from me. You could still strike the last word. That gives you 9 minutes.

If I could reclaim my time, I want to read this quote from GAO. It says: The committee may wish to consider reducing the request for this initiative for FY 12 by $45 million until the effectiveness of these

demonstration projects has been established.

And I want to say to my friend from Texas, we had some talks around this but not directly addressing it, not direct hearing; but I do remember and the gentleman from California might and I think Ms. Foley might remember that the Safeway in Washington, D.C., I believe has some sort of grant I believe to operate in an area that was considered a food desert, and I believe that that is one of the most profitable Safeways there is. Do either of you have a recollection of that? Thank you for pulling the rug out from underneath me this early.

Do you remember that, Mr. Farr, that discussion?

Was that not about food deserts?

Let me reclaim my time. GAO reported that a variety of approaches, including improving access to targeted foods, have the potential to increase the consumption of targeted food that could contribute to a healthy diet, but little is known about the effectiveness of these approaches.

And so I think what I would like to do, Mr. Chairman, is continue to oppose this; but knowing my good friend from Texas and from California will keep this as a priority, we'll talk about this. You know, the hour's late. The gentlewoman's been working on this for a long time, but I need a little more focus on it before I could accept it.

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

I want to say to the gentleman from Arizona, if I have time left over, I will yield you some. But you can also get your own 5 minutes if you want.

Mr. Chairman, I oppose this.

I want to start out by saying that the committee has taken a really close look at this over the years. And I wish you could see, from where you are sitting, better the saturation level of broadband access in the United States of America. That's in the blue. As you can see, the entire country is mostly blue according to this.

But I would not want your eyes to just strain from there, so I will give you some numbers here:

New Jersey, 100 percent penetration; Florida, 99.9 percent penetration; New York, 99.8 percent; Georgia, 99.4 percent; Arizona, 98.2 percent.

This program is not necessary. And in a time when we're talking about saving money, we do not need to increase this account. The process is burdensome. We get lots of complaints from people who have had applications pending for a long time and they can't get their questions answered, or they get approved but they can't get their money. Their eligibility is too broad. And in many areas, it competes with private sector broadband service.

Now, the IG report had a number of things that they found. They found that this rural broadband program granted loans of $103 million to 64 communities near large cities, including $45 million loans to 19 suburban subdivisions within a few miles of Houston, Texas. That's hardly the intent of the program.

The IG report also found out that they were competing with preexisting broadband access in many places and found that 159 of the 240 communities associated with the loans--that's 66 percent--already had service. I will repeat that. Sixty-six percent of the communities who got grants already had service.

Now, there was a little criticism, and the program was supposed to be reformed. But the IG took another look at it and found that, in 2009, only eight out of the 14 recommendations had had action taken on them. Thirty-four of 37 applications for providers were in areas where there were already private operators offering service, 34 out of 37.

So when our committee took a look at this, we felt like the program needed changing. It did not need new money. So I must respectfully disagree with my good friends who are offering this and stand in opposition of the amendment.

With that, I yield to my friend from Arizona.

I now yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gibson).

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I move that the committee do now rise.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet at 9 a.m. today.

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

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 12 o'clock and 28 minutes a.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until today, Thursday, June 16, 2011, at 9 a.m.

I thank the gentlewoman for the time.

I want to say to my friends from Texas and Connecticut that, number one, the DeLauro amendment which you alluded to that increases WIC $147 million is intact, and that increase has gone on. We do have to offset it from another portion of the bill, and the reason is because that Brazilian cotton agreement was a WTO agreement that President Obama agreed to. The money is restored. So if that helps clarify things, and if not, let me know.

I want to just remind everyone, if you want to help hungry people you've got to have the money to do it. Now, both parties have overspent. For every dollar we spend, 40 cents is borrowed. Both parties. Under President Bush, in an 8-year period of time, the debt went up $3.5 trillion. Now, under President Obama, in a 3-year period of time it's gone up $5 trillion, a 56 percent increase. And President Obama now owns the wars in Iraq and Libya and Afghanistan in terms of this is his watch. He has had opportunity to change the direction. He has not done so. So let's quit hiding behind, We're at war, and therefore, it's the Republicans' fault.

I also want to remind my friends that the only budget that has passed either House is the Ryan budget, which is what we're operating under. The President of the United States' budget failed on the Senate floor 97-0. He did not even get Harry Reid's vote. So we're operating under the budget constraints that we have.

Let me say this--very important about the WIC program. From February 2010 to February 2011, the number of participants has dropped 300,000. The level now is 8.7 million. We will make sure no one falls through the cracks. There are three contingency funds which can be drawn on if that happens. And I want to point out for all the screaming and hollering and the self-righteousness, last year the Democrats cut WIC by $562 million and put the money into an unrelated account that had nothing to do with hunger. It was a political settlement. Where was the screaming and hollering then?

And I want to say this in terms of the World Food Program, if we want to

help these countries--and I am committed to it--we have to have our own financial house in order. Otherwise, all we're doing, Mr. Speaker, is borrowing from our children to feed children overseas. That does not make sense.

I appreciate it, and I urge everyone to support the rule.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 2112 and that I may include tabular material on the same.

Madam Chair, I yield myself 5 minutes.

I recommend to the Committee H.R. 2112, the House Agriculture, FDA, and CFTC funding bill for fiscal year 2012, and I want to make a few remarks about it.

Number one and foremost, because a lot of people are very concerned about the allocation for this bill and the funding level, I want to remind everybody of a couple of things: Number one, our national debt is now 95 percent of the GDP. It's $14 trillion. For every dollar we spend, 40 cents is borrowed.

Now, both parties have fingerprints all over this. We have all overspent. For example, for 8 years under President Bush the national debt increased $3\1/2\ trillion. Way too much. And yet, in contrast, in just 3 years President Obama has added to the national debt $5 trillion, an increase of 56 percent. And so much of this is due and owed to foreign countries, and much of it to China. Can you imagine what kind of deal Communist China, a major competitor of ours, would impose upon us if they forced us to restructure our debt? We have to do it ourselves.

Now, the House has passed the Ryan budget, which many people oppose, and I understand that. But I want to point out the President of the United States' budget failed in the Senate 97-0. Harry Reid voted against the President's budget. And in the House, the Congressional Black Caucus offered a budget that failed. The Congressional Progressive Caucus offered a budget and it failed. The Republican Study Committee offered a budget and it failed. The Democrat Caucus offered a budget and it failed. In the Senate, budget plans were offered by Mr. Toomey of Pennsylvania and Mr. Paul of Kentucky; both failed. The only budget that has passed either body is the Ryan budget, and that's what we are looking at today, those numbers.

Now, I understand there's a lot of reluctance to make some of these tough decisions. Today in America 61 million people receive monthly government checks. That's anything from welfare to Medicare to farm payments to veteran retirement to Social Security--lots of people receiving lots of money. These programs are enormously popular, and they're deeply integrated into our economic system and culture. Therefore, reforming these programs is very, very difficult. And to further complicate things, 47 percent of American households do not pay income taxes. For them the status quo is working just fine.

So addressing these things is very difficult. And if you look at the spending pattern in the last several years, it's frightening: March, 2008, $29 billion to bail out Bear Stearns; May of 2008, a $168 billion stimulus package from the Bush administration; in July of 2008, $200 billion to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; then in November of 2008, $700 billion for TARP, or the Wall Street bailout; and then in January of 2009, $878 billion for the Obama stimulus program, which, by the way, Madam Chair, was to keep us from getting to 8 percent unemployment.

Now, we're hovering between 9 and 10 percent, and I don't need to remind you but this is the 1-year anniversary of the ``summer of recovery.'' There has not been any recovery. We're still looking for those jobs. Spending our way into prosperity does not work. If it did work, we would be having prosperous times right now.

So the Ryan budget for this bill is $17.25 billion, our reduction of $2.7 billion, approximately a 13\1/2\ percent decrease in spending, and yet, despite this, because of the mandatory spending portion of this bill, the bill actually has a net increase, mostly driven by food stamps and the school lunch program, which have gone up about $7 billion between the two of them. We still have a net increase in this bill.

Now, there's going to be a lot of discussion on lots of different accounts, and one of them is the WIC account, the Women, Infants, and Children account, something that I'm very concerned about, something that all of our committee has always supported on a bipartisan basis. But last year, there was some money taken out of it, $562

million, to settle a lawsuit which had nothing to do with school nutrition. A lot of the critics are going to be saying WIC has never been cut. Last year, the Obama administration cut WIC $562 million.

Madam Chair, I yield myself 2 additional minutes.

USDA numbers show that WIC participation has dropped 300,000 from February 2010 to February 2011, yet we are still funding it at 8.7 million people. We do not intend for anybody to fall through the cracks. If there is a shortage, there are three discretionary accounts that we can draw upon: a contingency fund of $125 million; a carryover fund, which is in excess of $350 million; and the Secretary's interchange authority, which is $210 million.

There are a lot of things in WIC we can do to improve to make sure that children don't fall through the cracks. Right now, for example, 49 percent of the kids in America participate in WIC. Do we really believe 49 percent are impoverished? Perhaps it's oversubscribed. Maybe we can work with the WIC folks on that.

We had a very healthy debate about WIC overhead, and the USDA has given us conflicting numbers on that. We're planning to meet with the USDA and find out what the real story is. I understand there may be amendments to say let's all agree what an overhead limit should be for WIC and then not spend money on overhead for that.

We are concerned about these things, but I want to close with this. Today, in America, a child under 5 years old is eligible for 12 Federal programs. After that age, he or she is eligible for 9 Federal feeding programs. At 65, you're eligible for 5 different Federal feeding programs. We want to make sure no one falls through the cracks and no one goes hungry, yet at the same time, is it possible that some folks are eligible for not just three meals a day but maybe four and five?

And can we enter into that discussion without a lot of finger- pointing and a lot of emotion? Can we also talk about the fraud and the misuse and the administrative costs without a lot of screaming and hollering? I think we can. I look forward to that debate, and I recommend passage of this bill.

I. 14 percent down.

Reflects the House Rep/Ryan budget which reflects our attempt to deal with the national debt.

A. I don't need to lecture anyone on the national debt but I need to remind all of us on a few facts:

1. At $14T the national debt is 95 percent GDP.

2. For every dollar we spend $.40 is borrowed.

3. While both parties have been responsible for this the spending by this administration has been tremendous. For example, the national debt under President Bush increased $3.5 trillion in 8 years. Way too much! In contrast, however President Obama has increased it by $5T in 3 years. That's 56 percent.

4. Much of this almost half is due to foreign countries, China being a high leader.

If we don't address our debtor crisis eventually our creditors will. With a communist country as a major competitor can you imagine what China could impose on us? It's nothing I want my children and future generations to deal with. We have to do it ourselves.

B. Let me continue with the Ryan budget we hear non stop changes from its critics that it's too harsh but where is their alternative?

1. The Potus has been all but absent. In fact his own budget was rejected by the Harry Reid Democrat led Senate 97-0.

2. Other proposals have been furled as well:

a. In the House:

Congressional Black Caucus.

H. Amdt. 256 to H. Con. Res. 34.

Failed by recorded vote: 103-303.

Congressional Progressive Caucus.

H. Amdt. 257 to H. Con. Res. 34.

Failed by recorded vote: 77-347.

Republican Study Committee.

H. Amdt. 258 to H. Con. Res. 34.

Failed by recorded vote: 119-136.

Democratic Caucus:

H. Amdt. 259 to H. Con. Res. 34.

Failed by recorded vote: 166-259.

b. In the Senate:

Toomey's plan to balance the budget in 9 years:

Failed 42-55.

Rand Paul's plan:

Failed 7-90.

3. Having failed to pass a budget in either the House or Senate, it seems the POTUS and Harry Reid have given up. That's correct there no ongoing negotiations, conferences or hearings. They have totally abandoned their duty and obligations.

C. One can understand cowardice when we look at political realties.

1. Today in America 61 million people receive monthly government checks. That's anything from welfare to Medicare, to farm payments, veteran retirement and social security. Lots of people receive lots of money.

2. These programs are enormously popular and deeply integrated into our economic system and culture. Reforming these programs is at best politically difficult even if both parties dealt in good faith and earnestness.

3. To further complicate the situation 47 percent of American households did not pay income taxes. For them the status quo is just fine.

i. According to the tax policy center.

D. Continuing our spending path has not created prosperity. Think about the big ticket items in the last few years. March '08 $29 billion to bailour Bear Sterns, May '08 $168 billion for the Bush Stimulus Package, July '08 $200 billion for the Fannie May/Freddie Mac bailout, Nov '08 $700 Billion TARP/Wall Street Bailout. Jan. '09 $878 billion for the Obama Stimulus bill which by the way was to keep unemployment below 8 percent but it has bounced between 9-10 percent ever since.

Real growth comes from less government, less job killing regulations, a tax structure that is simpler, clean and fair.

E. One last word on the Ryan budget. Despite the spending reduction in discretionary accounts be of entitlements, food stamps and school lunch there is a net increase in spending! That's right at $17.25 billion, a reduction of $2.7 billion below FY2011 or 14 percent discretionary, the mandatory spending has still increased from $105 billion to $108.3 billion, resulting in an overall increase of 283 million! Food stamps have increased $5.6 and school lunch $1.5. Thus one more time underscoring the need for long term entitlement reform.

II. Our bill attempts to move us in this direction. Mr. Farr and I have had 11 hearings. These were long with several rounds of questions. We don't agree on all issues but we found much common ground and where we disagree no one was shut out of the process.

III. I will now go through some specific accounts.

A. Research is funded at $2.2 billion. Almost half goes to Agriculture Research Service at $993 million. This allows ARS to focus on high priority items such as food defense and food safety.

1. It also includes vital pest and disease research such problems with the:

Brown Marmorated Stink Bug.

Commerants.

Cotton Pests.

Sudden Oak Death.

Equine Disease.

2. Finally, I would like to point out that the bill assumes ARS will close 10 facilities, as proposed in the budget, and provides USDA with the authority to transfer those facilities to a land-grant or other agricultural college or university that agrees to continue agricultural related research at the facility for a minimum of 25 years.

One billion dollars on this account goes to the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) and gives level funding for land-grant university research.

B. Farm Programs are funded at $1.7 billion discretionary and $18.3 in mandatory or traditional as Ag programs specified in the five year authorized farm bill.

1. These programs are the target of much of the criticism and at least one awkward int'l into agreement w/ the Brazilian government over cotton. Mr. Fluke offered an amendment to affect this and committee act was passed; however if it is out of order and will be struck. Nonetheless our AS committees are planning to address it.

2. Also in this section of the Bill is Farm Service Agency funding at a level of $1.46. Modernization of FSA technology systems remains a committee priority.

The MIDAS, Modernize and Innovate the Delivery of Agricultural Systems, request was $96 million on top of $49.5 million from last year but USDA had reprogrammed $23 million for salaries. The heart of the MIDAS initiative is to improve the delivery of FSA farm program benefits and services through the re-engineering of farm programs business processes and the adoption of enhanced and modernized information technology.

3. Many members requested funding for the FSA Grassroots Source Water Protection program and the bill includes $3.6 million for this program.

Agricultural Credit loan levels are at $4.7 billion which is $95.8 million below the fiscal year 2011 level and the same as the fiscal year 2012 request.

C. The majority of the $910 million in funds for the Marketing and Regulatory Programs is slated in the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service-Salaries and Expense account at $790 million, which is $73.3 million below the

fiscal year 2011 level. These funds will allow the agency to continue to control and eradicate plant and animal pests and diseases. The bill includes language that allows APHIS to access emergency funding to address pest and disease outbreaks.

In addition to other related programs at USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Serves, this Bill provides $147 million for Specialty Crop Pests to control or eradicate invasive pests and diseases, especially for those pests and disease in California, and the west. Although this funding level is below the President's Request, this Program is funded at $4.4 million above the level spent in the fiscal year 2010. Within the program, we have also supported language from members regarding Sudden Oak Death.

D. Conservation Programs are funded at $787 million of which $770 million is for NRCS's Conservation Operations, which is $99 million below the fiscal year 2011 level. This allows NRCS to maintain its core conservation mission and will drive efficiencies to create more farmer- friendly programs.

The Watershed Rehabilitation Program is funded at $15 million, which is $3 million below the fiscal year 2011 level.

In addition to discretionary appropriations, USDA will provide $5.8 billion to farmers and ranchers through its mandatory conservation programs in fiscal year 2012.

(In the farm bill, the Agriculture Committee will review these especially the Conservation Reserve Program which pays farmers not to plant.)

E. More than $2 billion is provided in the bill for Rural Development Programs including section 502 low income housing loan level of $24.845 billion. The President's budget proposed a loan level for direct loans for $211 million and the bill provides for $845 million for this program that serves very low-income rural Americans.

Rural Water and Waste--$730 million is provided for loans, which is $242 million below the fiscal year 2011 level. $430 million is provided for grants, which is $28 million below the fiscal year 2011 level. We received many requests from Members for funding for the Circuit Rider program, and the bill provides $14 million for this purpose.

Electric and Telecommunications Program level is at $7.3 billion in the bill, which is on par with historical levels. The bill denies the budget request to limit the use of electric loans to renewable energy and retrofitting, and requests a report on baseload generation needs.

F. Food Safety and Inspection--$973 million--a funding level that will allow FSIS to maintain meat, poultry, and egg products inspection, as well as to expand poultry inspection system that results in a safe and more efficient poultry inspection regime that will result in a safer food supply.

III. Our committee had 2 good debates on the funding of Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) Nutrition programs.

Our mark attempts to address the aggressive marketing growth of WIC w/a funding level of $5.9 billion. Or 1.2 below FY 2011, which was 7,128,424,000.

A. We will hear from many that this hurts the nations most vulnerable but lets look at some fact.

1. Many critics act like WIC has never been cut but last year in order to pay for a completely unreduced program--a legal settlement on a farm loan dispute call Pigford the Democrats cut WIC by $562 m.

2. The latest data from the USDA shows a drop of 300,000 participants between fiscal year 2010 and fiscal year 2011. However; our level still funds at the higher number of 8.7 m people which is the projection for

I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished chairman of the committee, the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers).

Madam Chair, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Fortenberry).

Madam Chair, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished vice chair of the Republican Conference, Mrs. McMorris Rodgers of Washington.

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Crawford).

Madam Chair, may I inquire as to the time remaining.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from South Dakota (Mrs. Noem).

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Chair, I wanted to respond to the discussion of the CFTC. It's very interesting to me that there are those Members of Congress who believe that bureaucrats control the price of oil. While bureaucrats certainly do have influence on the price of oil, if you're really concerned about the price of oil, you need to drill for it. It's pretty simple--increase the supply.

Folks forget that Alaska is twice the size of Texas. The Arctic Wildlife Reserve area is the size of South Carolina. The proposed exploration area is 2,000 acres. It's about the size of National Airport here. We're talking about a business card on a basketball court. Yet you hear over and over again from people--who, incidentally, do drive fossil fueled cars--that we in America are inept and unable to drill for oil responsibly. If you want to decrease the price, you've got to increase the supply, and there is no better way than to drill your own oil.

Think about the absurdity of President Obama going down to Brazil and telling them, We want you to drill offshore. Apparently, the Brazilians are technologically more advanced than we are, and the President has much more of a comfort level with the people of Brazil than he apparently has with the people from Louisiana or from Texas or from Florida. He goes down to Brazil and says, Go ahead and drill offshore. We're going to lend you money, and by the way, we want to be your best customer.

Now, he never mentioned anything about the CFTC.

Let me tell you what Democrat Commissioner Michael Dunn said. This was, by the way, on January 1, 2011: ``To date, CFTC staff has been unable to find any reliable economic analysis to support the contention that excessive speculation is affecting the markets we regulate or that position limits will prevent excessive speculation.''

What I suggest to you, Madam Chair, is that the discussion of the CFTC and oil speculators is a red herring. The real issue that the Democrats have failed to address is that of drilling for oil in order to increase supply.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I want to go back over this food situation. I and the gentleman from California, the ranking member, have had 11 hearings on this. We've had 11 hearings on the Agriculture bill, not on feeding programs specifically.

I want to again remind the Chair that this bill represents a net increase in funding, which is largely driven by the increase of $5.6 billion in food stamps and in the School Lunch Program of $1.5 billion. I also want to remind Members of the many Federal feeding programs that we have. For a 3-year-old child, there are 12 different feeding programs. For a 10-year-old child, there are nine different programs. For a 35-year-old, there are seven programs, and for a 65-year-old, there are five programs that people can apply for.

It is not the intention of this committee to let anyone fall through the cracks. The numbers that we have funded, for example, in WIC, contemplate what we believe is going to be the participation. Should that participation fluctuate, there are three contingency accounts that the USDA can access. It would certainly be our intention to have those accounts accessed before anyone fell through the cracks.

Now, I share in the frustration of the stimulus program that was supposed to create last year's summer of recovery. I'm sorry it did not work, because I would like to be out celebrating with the President. Yet the stimulus program, which was supposed to keep unemployment below 8 percent, actually increased unemployment to the level of 10 percent. Now it's hovering a little bit above 9 percent.

The best thing in the world would be to have prosperity, and I believe that we can get there. One way we should get there is by drilling our own oil because, if you want to keep food prices down, you've got to keep the cost of distribution down, which would be something, I'd hope, that we could work together on.

I also think we need fundamental tax reform because I know one of the things that some on the committee have talked about are some of the tax loopholes taken advantage of by certain companies. I agree with them. That's why I support the Fair Tax, which is a consumption tax. It would actually give a tax credit to the poor so that it does not disproportionately hurt them, but it would close all the loopholes. That would be something else that we could do that would create jobs in America.

Finally, the excessive bureaucratic regulations that our farmers and small businesses have to put up with is killing job creation. If we want to do something to help people get off dependency and get to independency, we need to decrease the size of government. This bill moves us in that direction.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Wyoming (Mrs. Lummis), a great member of the committee.

Will my friend yield a minute?

I just wanted to say that we actually have had one more speaker show up. It sounds like you are closing. You might want to reserve some time.

I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton).

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

I have no further requests for time, I move passage of the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I move to strike the last word.

First of all, I think it would be real interesting, my friend from Massachusetts, and I mentioned this to you yesterday. I think we would both enjoy to see what the results would be if we googled our hearing and put in the word ``hunger'' and put in the word ``obesity,'' which one showed up the most; and I believe you are going to find we talked far more about obesity than we did about hunger.

The question that I have is, on the hunger, there are so many food programs out there and this bill does have a $5.6 billion increase in food stamps and $1.5 billion increase in school lunch, that maybe you and I together could focus on where this hunger is because it could be that there's maybe an ignorance issue more than a hunger issue, ignorance in that people do not know how to get these programs that are out there.

Let me yield to my friend from Massachusetts.

Then let me reclaim the time, because I'm trying to have an adult conversation, and I clarified what ``ignorant'' means, and if you don't know about a program, then you're ignorant about its existence.

Let me reclaim the time, because I wanted to continue the discussion. One of the things that perhaps we could do a better job at is not only explaining to people where these programs are but also coordinating the actual program.

Now, the previous speaker said that some children--and I can't quote her exactly--might be getting four or five meals a day. I think it would be good in a time of fiscal restraint that we talk about, well, can we coordinate better.

Let me yield to my friend.

And that is substantial. But let me say this, the numbers that we're operating on, 2010, there were 9.2 million participants. This year, it's 8.9. Next year, the projection is less than that because 450,000 people less are on it. The base number on the bill would be about 8.3 million; but with the contingency funds, it could go over 9 million people. And as I have said to my friend from Massachusetts

before, we want to make sure no one falls through the cracks.

But I'm looking at these numbers, too, and I know that the group that has been cited many times, the numbers that they're using are a different base than what we're using. So I think some of this is actually about, well, what is that level, and I'm thinking it is the 8 to 9 million.

I yield to my friend.

I agree that there is an unknown factor on the rising cost of food that we're not sure about.

Will the gentleman also agree with me, though--and we've had a very spirited debate, which I know my friend----

We don't know the percentage food prices are rising, but we do know that this budget would allow with contingencies 9 million to participate, which is above the current level.

Now, I'm hoping that the economy does turn around, but I think it's very important, though, for us to be talking about some of these things that are in the mix like solid numbers, coordination of benefits, and also sources that people can go to, because the gentleman said, Folks don't know about this program, and we want to help them out.

Let me yield to my friend from Connecticut with the hopes that when my time runs out, my friend will yield to me as well.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I do want to continue the discussion which we've had with our friends on the other side by pointing out something I think is very important. I have the vote from the CLAIMS Act, November 30, 2010, on which I voted ``no.'' This vote cut WIC $562 million. So far every speaker who's been on the floor voted ``yes'' to this bill. So in terms of following the rhetoric, it's very difficult.

I also want to point out we had a vote earlier this year, no, late last year, on extending the Bush tax cuts. I voted ``no.'' Did others on that side vote ``no''?

I'm glad my friend from Connecticut did.

I also want to point out we had a vote last week on the Kucinich amendment to get us out of Libya. I voted ``no'' on that. I'm not sure how you guys voted. I know my friend, Mr. McGovern, has been an absolute, very consistent critic of the money that we are spending and engagement we are having in the Middle East. And I respect his philosophy on that.

But the reason I want to point this out is because it appears that when one side tries to cut the budget, they're pushing children out the door. But when another side cuts the budget, it's okay.

The gentleman from Florida controls the time, and I recommend that he does yield to you.

I want to comment on that. But that's exactly what we're doing.

My friend from Connecticut, you know that's what we're doing.

The participation in WIC in 2010 was $9.2 million. Today it's about $8.8 million. This bill, because the level has dropped and is dropping, is at a level of $8.3 million, but can go over $9 million with the contingency. So I believe that when you cut WIC last year, you did it in good faith. I would only ask that you give us that good faith too.

Let me say my friend from Connecticut will agree, though, that if you, on your side, had not cut WIC $562 million, that money would still be there right now.

The point that I'm making, Mr. Chair, is that WIC is $562 million, not because of any Republican action, but because of the Democrat action. And you know what? I don't question anyone's motives on this side, and I admire their passion. And my friend from Connecticut is one of the most passionate persons in this body when it comes to WIC. And I respect that.

But we also have to look at some of these numbers because if they're just air-dropped into this bill, then I can certainly understand their outrage. But if we look at the long term, where WIC was 2 or 3 years ago, where it's going, and the fact that there are three contingency funds to pick up the slack on this, not to mention a number of other good programs.

Will the gentlewoman yield?

I want to remind you SNAP actually goes up $5.6 billion on this, and you're not talking about it, but school lunch also goes up $1\1/2\ million. So I did want to say that the SNAP portion of this bill does go up $5.6 billion.

I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.

I thank the gentleman from Indiana for yielding. I want to make a couple of points.

Number one, this bill increases food stamps by $5.6 billion. Now, somebody has said, But that's not as much as the President requested. Well, it is an increase of $5.6 billion. And I'm sorry, the President's crystal ball isn't always the best one. I don't need to remind you about last summer's celebration of recovery or whatever it was called. School nutrition goes up $1.5 billion under this bill.

We did what has been done in the past with WIC. We fund the participation level that is anticipated. Last year, the Democrats voted to cut WIC funding by $562 million. I have got the votes right here for any Democrat who is not sure how he or she voted. I want to give you the vote. I will put it in the Record so everybody can have a chance to look at it because after a while, I have to wonder. I also have the vote record for extending the Bush tax cuts, which was signed by President Obama. I have the vote record for that. I want to say to some of my friends over there, I voted ``no'' on that. Very important.

This bill funds WIC at 8.3 million participants. Now, if it goes up to over 9 million, the contingency fund is there to cover that. The contingency fund for WIC alone is $350 million. It would have been higher, Mr. Chairman, but the Democrats voted to cut it $562 million last year for an unrelated account. Now, to quote one of the well-known Democrats, That's an inconvenient truth to some of the speakers here tonight. But it is very important.

It is not the intention of this bill to let anybody go hungry. And any time the Bible is quoted on the floor of the House, I think it's a good thing. But I think there are some lessons in there that if there is a target on children's backs, perhaps it's the fact that our Nation is over $14 trillion in debt; and for every dollar we spend, 40 cents is borrowed, much of that from China. And who do you think is going to pay that back? It's not going to be the generations who are making the decisions. It's going to be the children.

So what our challenge is, Mr. Chairman, is to balance the fiscal need with the heart, and I believe that this budget very carefully does that. It increases food stamps $5.6 billion. It increases school lunches $1.5 billion. It funds WIC at a level of 8.3 million and has a contingency that will cover over 9 million participants. So for all the drama that we're hearing--and it is some very good rhetoric and some very good drama, but it's not accurate.

Now we could be talking about the WIC overhead, the WIC administrative costs. We could be talking about the fraud in WIC. We could be talking about the coordination of feeding benefits. If a child is 3 years old in America, he or she is eligible for 12 different programs. At 10 years old, they're eligible for nine programs. At 65, they're eligible for five different feeding programs. Those are Federal programs. It does not mention any of the State or the local participation in programs that are out there. It doesn't mention any of the charitable organizations that are out there.

So, again, we're hearing lots of great rhetoric, lots of drama; but it's not accurate. These numbers are important for reasonable debate for people who are trying to balance the runaway spending in this country--a 56 percent increase in the national debt under President Obama--and the need to take care of the poor.

I want to say to my friend from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich), because I know he has been very consistent--and I do certainly agree that everybody here has passion and conviction and idealism, which I think we all need more of--I voted with you, Mr. Kucinich, last week. I think we are spending a lot of money in Libya. And those are things that are very important for us to be debating on the floor of the House before the President of the United States--of either party--goes and obligates billions of dollars in a new overseas contingency operation. We need to be discussing that. So I would say, put that on the table.

I thank the gentleman from Arkansas for yielding. I wanted to make a couple of points that I think are very important, Mr. Chairman.

Number one, the only budget that has passed is the Ryan budget. The Democrats, for all their crying, have not passed their budget. The Democrats are the majority party in the Senate. The majority party in the Senate, the Democrat Party, rejected President Obama, another Democrat, they rejected his budget by a vote of 97-0. Now, what did Harry Reid and President Obama do after that? Nothing. That is it. It went to the House. No problem. Where is the leadership? I guess it is the same place as the jobs are. We are still looking for it.

If the Democrats were concerned about balancing fiscal responsibility and some of these vital programs which we are all trying to work through, then why aren't they working on a budget? That is point number one.

Point number two, this bill increases food stamps $5.6 billion and the school lunch program $1.5 billion. It also increases from the committee mark WIC $147 million in the DeLauro amendment. It will not be offset by the

Obama WTO cotton agreement, but it will be offset. That amendment is intact as respects WIC.

Number three, Big Oil. Well, when the Democrats were in charge of the House and the Senate and the White House, if they were concerned about tax cuts for Big Oil, why didn't they go after them? What they did do is extend the Bush tax cuts, which I voted against. If they were concerned about the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, why did President Obama and the Democrat House and the Democrat Senate extend them? I would ask you that, Mr. Chairman.

What this bill does as respects WIC, it funds it at a level of 8.2 million in participation. Should it go up to 9 million in participation, which is higher than the current level, there are three contingency funds that will pick up the difference.

We have reduced WIC, as did the Democrats. The Democrats cut WIC funding $562 million. I have the vote right here. For those Democrats who are forgetting how they voted on it, they might want to look. But they voted to cut WIC funding. Therefore, the contingency fund is not as high as it could be.

So if we want to talk about all these things, there is lots to talk about. But one thing that is very important for Members to realize is that no one is going to fall through the crack.

I keep hearing about how this is going to starve people. WIC is $42 a month. That is why WIC isn't the only program for these people. That is very important for everyone to remember. I don't even think most Members, if you gave them a pop quiz, could say what WIC is, because it sounds like it is thousands of dollars a month. But I don't believe $42 is anything more than a supplement. Yet that supplement will still be there, because, again, Mr. Chairman, we have funded this with an anticipated level of 8.3 million; but should it go up to 9 million--it has been trending down--but should it go back up, the contingency funds will be there that will pick up the difference.

I thank the gentleman for his time.

Will the gentleman yield?

I just wanted to make sure that my friends, the ranking member and former ranking member, know that the contingency fund data that we get did come from the USDA.

Mr. Chair, reserving the right to object, I want to say to my friend, the ranking member, that I understand the passion on that side and a number of people who want to start speaking, or who have been speaking. But if we are going to start speaking twice, then I hope you will give me the courtesy of speaking twice. I just want to mention that.

I've just been informed Mrs. Lummis spoke twice while I was going to the restroom, so, once again, I will sit down.

If I could continue on my reservation, I want to explain to my friend from Ohio that I was concerned about Members speaking twice. But I understand that you've done that now with Mrs. Lummis, so I certainly will not object.

I withdraw my reservation.

Mr. Chair, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

I accept the amendment and was wondering if we could go ahead and call the question and move on.

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

It is interesting. I want to read this amendment, because I have heard some comments about this bill isn't serious or whatever. Well, look at this amendment. I don't think you could call it serious. It says on page 2, line 14, ``after the dollar amount insert increased by $136 million, reduced by $136 million.''

The effect of this amendment is nothing. It is a legitimate vehicle on a parliamentary rule to discuss something. But if there is a problem with the CFTC not doing its job or being unable to do the job because of this, there should be an amendment that addresses that. This is not an amendment. This is just a discussion. But I will enter into the discussion.

First of all, I want to quote Michael Dunn. He is a Democrat member of the commission. Here is what he had to say as far as oil speculation goes. ``The CFTC staff has been unable to find any reliable economic analysis to support the contention that excessive speculation is affecting the markets we regulate.''

That is from the Democrat member of the CFTC. If I quoted a Republican member and they said the same thing, then the Democrats would be crying, no, no, no. But that was the quote of the Democrat member of the commission.

Now, why are the Democrats so interested in blaming high energy costs on the CFTC? It is because they have opposed our own development of energy domestically. We do not want to explore for oil in Alaska, but the President of the United States goes down to Brazil and apparently understands or in his view believes that they are maybe technologically superior to Americans, that they can drill for oil off the shore of Brazil, and they can do a better job than the good people in Louisiana or Texas or Florida can. So the President of the United States, a Democrat, goes down to Brazil and says, drill for oil here, and we will lend you the money, and we want to be your best customer.

Now, if we want to decrease the price of domestic energy, then we need to explore for our own energy, instead of this phony argument that somehow--and, by the way, I am not sure, but I think Goldman Sachs is a huge supporter of President Obama. In fact, I think they were his second-largest contributor. I am not 100 percent sure on that. I am sure somebody over here might be very quick to correct me if I am wrong.

But I know this: that I have heard over and over again that somehow Goldman Sachs is the problem with this bill. I wasn't listening to every single speech, but that was one of the things that we kept hearing. But if we want to decrease the cost of energy in the United States of America, you need to increase the supply and the production of domestic energy and get away from this, well, it is the CFTC is not getting enough money.

And I want to say this, which is very important about this budget number. The budget of the President of the United States, a Democrat, failed in the Senate, which is also run by the Democrats, by a vote of 97-0. Now, I keep hearing, not this bill, not here, not now. Well, where? The Ryan budget is the only budget that has passed either body. It has not passed the Senate. But the President's budget failed 97-0. So if the Democrats are concerned, then why aren't they working on a budget that is acceptable to them?

We had a number of budget votes here. None of them passed. There was one budget proposal, the RSC, Republican Study Committee budget that was Mr. Garrett's and Mr. Jordan's, and it failed because they felt the Ryan budget did not go far enough. But the Ryan budget did get a majority of votes. The President Obama budget did not. And what did the President and Harry Reid do when their budget failed? Nothing. They left. That was it. If they are concerned about funding for the CFTC and the USDA and the FDA, why aren't they working on a budget that is more acceptable? Isn't that what leadership is all about?

So what we are having here now is, because we won't explore for our own energy and we won't develop it, we are going to blame it on the CFTC's funding level. I think that this amendment, although it does nothing, I think we should move on to more serious discussions.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman from Nebraska.

I just want to say I find it incredible that I'm hearing people say that the fault of the Wall Street meltdown was because of the CFTC's not doing its job. I cannot believe that the meltdown and the financial situation is now being attributed to the CFTC and, to avoid it, we have to put in more money for the CFTC.

I voted against the Wall Street bailout. The President of the United States voted for it as a Senator, and again as President he wanted part two of it. So I'm not buying that the Wall Street bailout--AIG was mentioned earlier. That was done by the Fed. The Bear Stearns bailout, that was done by the Fed. The bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, that was done by the House Democrats.

So I don't need to be sitting here listening to people preach to me about bailouts and that the solution to lower gas prices is to fund a bureaucracy. It's a group that has been averaging about four regulations a year and between now and late summer 34 regulations.

I understand that those in the Big Government circles of Washington love more regulations, more government growth; but to say to the taxpayers that funding CFTC at a higher, unprecedented level is going to avoid the need for bailouts is ridiculous. And, again, Mr. Chairman, I'm somebody who has consistently voted against these bailouts and these stimulus programs.

I don't believe that government is the answer. I think the market still has the answer. I did not support the Dodd-Frank bill. What this is--a lot of it is just an overreach, more government telling people how to conduct their business.

Do I think there's a role for CFTC? Certainly I do. And can CFTC be effective? Yes. But their own Democrat member says, and I will quote again: ``The CFTC staff''--not his personal opinion but the CFTC staff, which is over 700--``has been unable to find any reliable economic analysis to support the contention that excessive speculation is affecting the markets we regulate.'' Now, that's not my opinion; that's what the Democrat commission member says the CFTC staff has reported.

Should we be concerned about speculation? Yes, we should. But I don't think it is fair for any Member of Congress to go back home to the taxpayers and say, I'm going to bring down the price at the pump because I have put millions of dollars into a Washington bureaucracy and they're really going to get tough on that Wall Street crowd now.

If we want to bring down the price of energy in America, we have to increase our supply. And I don't know of any other way to do it. Supply goes up and the cost goes down. If we want to help the consumers at the pump, we have got to explore and develop our own domestic energy resources. And discussion about CFTC funding comes second, third, fourth, fifth tier to that. So if the objective is to bring down the price of gas at the pump, let's don't pretend that increasing spending for the CFTC is going to achieve that.

Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman.

Isn't it true, for the record, that we do support the amendment?

Will my friend yield for a minute?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I want to point out to my friend from California of a number of the previous speakers who keep speaking about the DeLauro amendment. The DeLauro amendment does not do anything. We accept the DeLauro amendment, but I'm not sure that the folks over there who are speaking for the DeLauro amendment have read the DeLauro amendment because, if they had, they would know that it does nothing to restore the funding.

I will be glad to yield to my friend from California because I understand your speech was right, but that's not what the amendment did.

We are not in agreement on that. No, I did not support the Dodd-Frank bill, and I can tell you some of the problems with it.

The gentleman sounds like somebody who has studied the CFTC; but as you know, of the many rules which they are planning to implement under Dodd-Frank, some of them actually were implied under Dodd-Frank and not specifically laid out. A number of them have no cost-benefit analysis, and a number of them will strap American companies and not the Asian or the European markets.

The reason why that is important is because you are a market. You know, it is not like a manufacturing plant where you are making automobiles or tanks or something like that. The commodity business is more computers. So if you change the rules in an international marketplace where American companies have to deal with things at one level and their Asian and European counterparts and competitors don't have to, then what is going to happen is these companies are going to go overseas.

We keep talking about jobs, and the gentleman knows that this is the one-year anniversary of the summer of recovery, when I guess we were--I am not sure what we were celebrating last year because the jobs were not created. But this runs off jobs, and that is what we are concerned about.

The CFTC has averaged four regulations a year, and this year they want to put in 36 regulations. I am concerned about the cost-benefit analysis. I am concerned that American companies will have a different set of rules than their competitors. I am concerned about the overreach. I am concerned about the way the rulemaking sequence is going.

The gentleman also knows there is a lot of terms that they haven't even defined, like who is a swap dealer, a mega-swap dealer, a swap participant. And, by the way, I am not trying to filibuster. I think that franchise does not go to the Republican Party tonight.

I rise in opposition to the amendment.

And I wanted to say food safety is something that we all place a very high priority on and we're very concerned about, and we have been watching this situation in Europe daily as we're all concerned, and our prayers are with the people who have suffered and those who have died.

I do want to read a quote that Secretary of USDA Mr. Vilsack said yesterday, and I will just quote: Secretary John Vilsack said he is ``reasonably confident'' that U.S. consumers won't face the same sort of E. coli outbreak now plaguing Germany. And we're doing a lot and have done a lot in the last 15 years to make sure that we address potential E. coli infection. For example, the type of ground beef that has had a repeated problem with it has actually been cut in half.

Also, I want to say I do have concerns about the FDA implementation of food safety. We hear quite often that 48 million people have suffered from food-borne illnesses--a very high number, a number that we're all very concerned about--but only 20 percent of these are from known pathogens. If you look at it even further, 60 percent of the illnesses from known pathogens come from norovirus.

And how do we address this? Well, CDC said on March 4, to update the norovirus, that appropriate hand hygiene is the likely most single important method to prevent norovirus infection and control transmission. Reducing any norovirus present on hands is accomplished by thorough hand washing with running water and plain antiseptic soap.

Now, in the FDA 630-page budget request, there was not one single mention of norovirus. I would ask anybody, isn't that odd to you? That's something we need to be concerned about. Why would they not mention that, if nearly 60 percent of the illnesses are from norovirus?

Second highest cause of illness is from salmonella. And under the authority that FDA had before the Food Safety Modernization Act and the authority that the FDA has right now, they finalized the salmonella egg rule in July of last year, almost a year ago. According to the FDA's own press release, FDA said that as many as 79,000 illnesses and 30 deaths due to consumption of eggs contaminated with salmonella may be avoided each year with new food safety requirements. They have that authority right now, and that was last year's budget. They can still do it this year with this budget.

The third highest cause of food-borne illness comes from crossbreeding, and crossbreeding is mentioned one time in FDA's 2012 budget request as it was related to food defense. And the reason why this is important is because the FDA always seems to be ready to take on new initiatives, and yet it doesn't seem to be tackling the food safety challenges that we have right now in an orderly fashion under its current budget.

Now, the CDC statistics, which we got through hearings, go back to that 48 million food-borne illnesses a year, 128,000 hospitalizations, and 3,000 deaths, very high numbers, numbers that we are all concerned about. But if you look at 311 million Americans eating three meals a day, that would be 933 million meals eaten daily or 340 billion eaten each year. If you do the math on this, the food safety rate is 99.9 percent safe.

Why is that relevant? Because something's working without the FDA and without the USDA and without the nanny state saying we're in charge of everything. And that's how the private sector--the private sector is a dirty word for many people in Washington, D.C. But food processing companies are very concerned about food safety and their customers' safety, because the way you keep your customers coming back to buy more is to keep them happy, and that means to keep them safe.

And it would be hard for me to believe that some of the leading companies in America, such as McDonald's or Burger King or Coca-Cola, have anything on their minds except for food safety.

So I appreciate the gentlewoman offering this amendment, but it's only $1 million. And if it were a serious amendment, certainly it would be more than that. But based on what we've seen so far, I don't think this amendment is going to do anything.

[From USA TODAY]

Vilsack: U.S. Largely Safe From European E. coli Outbreak

(By Dan Vergano)

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said he is ``reasonably

confident'' that U.S. consumers won't face the same sort of

E. coli outbreak now plaguing Germany.

But the European episode ``reinforces that we need to

remain vigilant here about food safety,'' Vilsack said

Monday, speaking with the USA TODAY editorial board.

Public health experts, however, warned that another serious

outbreak in the U.S. is just a matter of time and luck.

``Could it happen here? It already has,'' says infectious-

disease expert Larry Lutwick of SUNY-Downstate College of

Medicine in Brooklyn, citing past U.S. outbreaks that

involved strains of E. coli other than the one that has

struck Germany.

He points to last year's romaine lettuce-related outbreak

of an E. coli strain that sickened 26 people, and the 2006

fresh spinach-related episode that hospitalized 199 people in

26 states.

In Germany, officials backtracked Monday for the second

time in a week and said testing ruled out bean sprouts from

an organic farm as the possible source for the outbreak that

has killed 22 people and sickened more than 2,330 people

across Europe. Testing earlier ruled out cucumbers from Spain

as the culprit.

``This investigation has been a disaster,'' Michael

Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease

Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, tells the

Associated Press.

``This kind of wishy-washy response is incompetent,'' he

says, accusing German authorities of casting suspicion on

cucumbers and sprouts without firm data.

Some U.S. health experts say government assurances face

constant trials.

``Food isn't just grown locally, it comes from all over the

world, which poses a lot of challenges'' for food safety,

says epidemiologist Elaine Scallan of the University of

Colorado-Denver. She notes the current system heavily relies

on rapid responses to outbreaks but is not as well positioned

to prevent them.

``We are relying on state and local health departments to

pick up these outbreaks, just like their equivalents in

Europe,'' she said.

In January, President Obama signed a food safety act

ramping up Food and Drug Administration authority to police

food imports.

But Caroline Smith DeWaal of the Center for Science in the

Public Interest warns those inspections may be cut in the

ongoing congressional budget battle.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order on the gentlewoman's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word, and I wanted to object to this and explain the point of order.

I continue to reserve.

The reason is that the amendment may not be considered en bloc under clause 2(f) of rule XXI because the amendment proposes to increase the level of funding and outlays in the bill. And under the House rule, the amendment has to be budget neutral with budget authority and with outlays. This only does one of those.

I know the gentlewoman has worked very hard on this, and that was the intent. But because the budget authority and outlay both have to be considered, that is what the problem is under rule XXI. I know the gentlewoman is an expert in this, has put a lot of time and a lot of compassion in it, and it is something that the committee is not turning our backs on at all. But that's why we're objecting to it.

And I know that my friend from Houston is very passionate on this and will be back again doing other things to try to make sure that we address food deserts and so forth. I appreciate her conviction on that, and I wanted to explain that.

I reluctantly have to insist on the point of order. It's actually scored by CBO at $5 million, and that is beyond my authority to waive anything. And it's not a numerical thing. It's just a rule.

Let me say, we'll see what we can do. I'm not fully versed on it. But the gentlewoman knows that the door is always open to my office, and we'll continue to work with you. But I do have to insist on the point of order.

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

We do accept the amendment with reservations. I want to say to my friend from Nebraska, he's been working very hard on this amendment, particularly in the last 5 hours. But we had a debate about this in the full committee. Ms. Kaptur offered an amendment that restored funding for the REAP account. It was my intention to zero it out because I do want to reduce the number of Federal programs that are out there. The full committee did restore it. I'm not sure what $2 million in that account will do.

I do support renewable energy, but I will say that there are dozens of programs and dozens of research channels available to people for renewable energy, particularly in the rural area.

So I want to say to my friend from Nebraska and from Minnesota that we'll accept the amendment, but you need to keep your eye on us because it's not a program I particularly like. And I'm very serious about eliminating as many programs as possible. So we need to continue talking about that.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

I was going to ask my friend if he is planning to offer his other amendment. Don't you have another related amendment?

You don't have anything else on this section of the bill?

You are taking from the same account twice?

I wanted to explain to my friend about it. I am uncertain about this current amendment, but

that departmental account, as unglamorous as they are to all of us, has been cut about 15 percent, and then this cuts it, and then your food safety amendment will cut it as well. So that is what my dilemma is at the moment. I don't know if anybody over there has actually heard from the department. I am assuming they are going to be against it.

Also I want to point out to my friend that one of the things that I think our authorizing friends should do is combine this program with food stamps anyhow, because there is duplication and overlap.

I yield to the gentleman from California.

Reclaiming my time, we were talking earlier about some of the overlaps in these Federal food assistance programs. To me, this is a case where this is a program where there is a lot of overlap with food stamps, and we should look at that, realizing that that is the authorizing committee's jurisdiction. There is not much more that I can do than comment on it.

I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.

With that, I withdraw my objection, and we accept the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Madam Chairman, I oppose this.

I want to say to my friends who have offered it, I did support this budget on the House floor and did support this 302(b) allocation in full committee. However, as I pointed out several times to my Democrat friends during the course of the debate today, the only budget that has passed is the Ryan budget. The President's budget failed in the Senate 97-0. The RSC budget fell on the House floor. The Congressional Black Caucus budget fell on the House floor. The Progressive Caucus budget fell on the House floor.

Our job is to try to move this under the circumstances that we have and the restraints that we have. The bill before us represents a cut in discretionary money of 13.4 percent, which is one of the largest cuts that we will be considering in the 12 appropriation bills.

I want to point out also that in terms of P.L. 480, that account alone has been cut 31 percent. And I met with the World Food Program three different times now and certainly expressed lots of concerns about America's role around the globe. We need to be engaged in the countries that we are engaged in. Sometimes this program is oversold as national security, which I believe it contributes to. It is not necessarily everything people want it to be in national security, but it is a program that keeps America engaged around the world and therefore promotes stability around the world. And when you have instability, there is a concern in terms of national security. It also actually does have an implication for the merchant marine because there's a cargo preference clause to it. It keeps the American merchant marine healthy, and those are the ships

that take our military equipment overseas during engagements such as what we have going in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Ms. Jackson Lee had raised some of the points about the war. I voted for the Kucinich amendment the other day because I do not think we should be in Libya at this time. I'm very concerned that that's going to be one of those classic cases of mission creep, that right now we're saying no troops on the ground, but after we get through blowing up their buildings, who do you think is going to rebuild it? It's going to be America. So that mission is going to morph into troops on the ground in one form or another. That's why I thought the Kucinich amendment was appropriate.

I want to just conclude, though, that I think the spirit of the gentlemen--and they're very consistent in terms of their fiscal restraint, but, again, the only budget that has passed any body is the Ryan budget.

One of the balancing acts of this, if you go too far, you lose votes; if you don't go far enough, you lose votes. The Ryan budget got over the finish line and did not get all the Republicans voting for it, so I'm going to have to oppose this amendment, but I want to say to my friends, I appreciate the vigor in which you've offered it and your consistency on things.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

I move to strike the last word.

I want to clarify some things on this that are important. Number one, I want to make sure that we all realize that ARS is currently, in this bill, funded at $993 million and that the Foreign Ag Service is at $175 million. And the Foreign Ag Service actually does have an invaluable role in representing U.S. agriculture overseas. And it's not all about importing their products as much as it is working and making sure that it's kind of a two-way street.

But I wanted to yield to the gentleman if he wanted some more time to explain it. My inclination is to take the amendment--although ARS, as I am saying, has a pretty big funding level already. And I just wanted to invite you to speak a little bit more and maybe warm us up a little, because I am like Mr. Farr. There's a lot of criticism of ARS. So somebody coming in to increase it, the amendment is paid for. I don't know that $2 million is going to help significantly one way or the other.

I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

I will accept the amendment. I want to say to my friend from Florida, we're going to be looking at all this as the process goes on, and we'll certainly work with you. We, Mr. Farr and I and the committee, do appreciate all the research that the ARS does and all of the good things. And I am glad to know that you are following them because I do think it's a significant agency within the USDA.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I reserve a point of order on the gentlewoman's amendment.

Madam Chair, I insist on my point of order.

Madam Chair, the amendment may not be considered en bloc under clause 2(f) of rule XXI because the amendment proposes to increase the level of funding and outlays in the bill, and outlays in budget authority have to be equal.

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

I move to strike the last word and oppose the amendment.

Madam Chair, I'm continuing to study this. And you know, fortunately, one of the great things about the open rule that we've had is we've had a lot of good debate tonight, had a lot of speakers. I think we broke the record tonight on the speech contest about WIC. I'm not sure who Mr. Farr will be awarding, giving that award to, but we had a lot of good contenders.

Mr. Clarke, unfortunately, I just, within the last minute, have seen this, and I'm not sure that it will do what you're saying or what your intention is, and so I'm going to oppose the amendment.

I will promise to work with you. It's a million dollar transfer, and don't know that it accomplishes what you want. I don't know that it doesn't accomplish what you want. And I don't necessarily think it causes a big disruption in the bill either. But for right now, I'm going to have to oppose it. And let me continue to research it, and maybe as the process goes through we can see what we can do to work with you and Mr. Farr on it.

We are very concerned about food safety and the pathogens and the situation in Europe, and we want to make sure that we're studying this stuff very closely ourselves. So I reluctantly oppose it for the time being.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman from California yield?

I want to say that the concern that I have--again, not having the advantage of being able to research things thoroughly, but we're taking $1 million out of a $3 million account and putting it into a $77 million account, and it just seems disproportional at this point.

I'm wondering if during the process there might be an opportunity to emphasize that we want the Ag Marketing

Service to really be sure that they're following the E. coli situation. That would be helpful. I certainly would be interested in doing that and working with him, but I want to continue to oppose the amendment at this point.

Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

I oppose the amendment.

I want to go back to the earlier theme I brought up when we were discussing both WIC and the Chaffetz amendment earlier tonight. With regard to what Dr. Broun is doing, I think there is 10 percent with which you can make that argument there.

What we've been trying to do is to stack a card house on the Ryan budget. That is the only budget that has passed one House. I will point out again that the budget of the President of the United States failed in the Senate 97-0. Similarly, three other budgets failed in the Senate, and four other budgets failed in the House. There was a budget that was offered that was further cut by the Republican Study Committee, and then there were others that were less cut, the Progressive Caucus', for example.

So one of the balancing acts that this committee is trying to accomplish with this bill tonight is to reduce spending but also to get 218 votes to pass the bill so that we can continue this with the U.S. Senate, which right now has not been able to pass one single appropriations bill. They have been very remiss in their duty, so I find myself having to balance some things that, if I were a free agent, I would probably be voting for and some things I would be voting against as I just told Mr. Clarke from Detroit in rejecting a $1 million transfer of account because I didn't know exactly what it did. I want to keep that balance there.

So, with this, I am going to oppose the 10 percent reduction offered by my friend and Georgia colleague, Dr. Broun.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentlewoman yield?

The Ag Marketing Service actually gets that $77.5 million in appropriation, and in addition, has the ability to collect up to $61 million in fees. If you think about it, that's not unusual in this account. The FDA actually does the same thing. I think they get over $1 billion in fees. So some of these accounts do get an appropriation, and then they on their own can go out and get some fees, not just to supplement them, but in some cases to almost match them as the AMS has done.

Madam Chair, I oppose the amendment and move to strike the last word.

I want to point out that FSA, the Farm Service Agency, is already $181 million below the President's request and $32 million below 2011. It has been trimmed a great deal. But also I wanted to point out that we just accepted an amendment that increases the Commodity Supplemental

Food Program by $5 million. The gentlewoman may not be aware of that--I don't know if you were on the floor at the time. I know that doesn't mean that you wouldn't offer your amendment anyway, but I just wanted to point out that we did just increase it.

More importantly though, I have been in a mode of rejecting a lot of amendments in the last couple of hours because this budget, this bill, our 302(b) allocation is a reflection of the Ryan budget, which is the only budget that has passed either body in its entirety. There were budgets offered in the House that would have cut more, at least one. There were other budgets that would have cut less or cut in different directions. Yet the Ryan budget in the House or the Senate is the only budget that has passed, and it is a card house. I know, as you know, if we add to it we lose votes, and if we take from it we lose votes. For that reason, I do oppose your amendment. But I understand your concern here.

I want to point out, and I am sure the gentlewoman knows this, but a senior who is 65 years or older is actually eligible for six different Federal food programs, and it would certainly not be our intention to have anybody fall through the cracks. I think there is a lot to be said and some savings in combining the Commodity Supplemental Food Program and the SNAP program, and maybe cut out some of the administrative costs in order to increase the amount available.

Reclaiming my time, don't we know full well on this committee, because we have been champing at the bit to do a little bit of authorizing, but the authorizing committees keep a pretty strong eye on us. I certainly agree with that point.

Reclaiming my time, I do want to point out, and I am sure the gentlewoman knows, that this bill actually does increase SNAP $5.6 billion. Therefore, I think sometimes we do need to, even though that is an authorizing issue, I think as a practical issue that is something we need to explore and thrash about and make sure that we are not under-serving somebody because of two programs that could be so close that I don't know why we don't combine them. Again, I realize that would be farm bill authority to do that. But SNAP did go up $5.6 billion because of the mandatory spending side of it.

I need to continue to oppose your amendment, but I would not slam the door on looking at it as the process continues in the months ahead. Hopefully, the Senate might start doing their job and passing appropriations bills, and then we can get to conference without it being part of an omnibus, because I think in a conference we are going to do a lot better if it is just limited to agriculture and these accounts.

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

Madam Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to submit an article which explains some of the problems and unintended consequences of the Dodd- Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (P.L. 111-203).

[From Forbes Magazine, by Mallory Factor]

The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform & Consumer Protection Act

is supposed to shield consumers from problems in the

financial services sector that many believe led to the

financial meltdown. But Section 342 of the act introduces a

brash example of social engineering that masquerades as

consumer protection and financial reform. This section

imposes gender and racial employment quotas on the financial

services industry, which accounts for one-tenth of our

economy. The quota provisions will affect over 50,000

financial services firms and other businesses, and the

consequences will be enormous.

Dodd-Frank requires at least 29 federal bureaus to open

Offices of Minority & Women Inclusion, involving ten branches

of the Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve and its 12

regional banks, the Securities & Exchange Commission and the

Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The new diversity offices

will implement rules to ensure ``the fair inclusion and

utilization'' of minorities and women in all firms doing

business with each agency. The offices will terminate

contracts with any service provider that fails to meet these

as yet undetermined standards. Just running these offices is

estimated to cost over $58 million annually, says David

Patten in a recent story on Newsmax.com.

These new offices will also assess the ``diversity policies

and practices'' at all entities that fall under their

regulatory eye, including banks, broker-dealers, registered

investment advisors and now hedge funds. Along with more than

40,000 financial services firms, another 10,000-plus

businesses, including accounting and law firms that do

business with these government offices, will be subject to

this new diversity oversight of their hiring.

What does this mean for the financial services sector?

Assuming each firm hires at least one new worker to satisfy

the new law, this provision could raise costs $4 billion or

more annually, depending how far forthcoming regulations will

extend. Firms doing business with the government will face

additional expenses because they will now have to monitor the

hiring practices of their subcontractors as well. In addition

to these reporting burdens, firms must prove to their

regulators and to government offices with which they do

business that they are meeting or working toward racial and

gender hiring guidelines. In many cases this will require

additional hiring beyond the needs of the business.

Forcing America's private firms to hire on the basis of

racial and gender ``guidelines,'' rather than solely on need

and qualifications, is inefficient and makes our businesses

less competitive than their global counterparts. Moreover,

four out of the eight members of the U.S. Commission on Civil

Rights wrote a letter to Congress stating that this section

of the act would likely ``promote discrimination,'' and urged

its removal from the bill.

There is a better, more cost-efficient solution: Let

private companies come up with their own approaches.

Deloitte's 19-year-old Women's Initiative, for example, has

boosted the percentage of female partners, principals and

directors from 7% in 1994 to 23% in 2010. And minorities and

females currently make up 60% of kpmg's workforce.

While the idea of encouraging greater participation of

minorities and women in the financial services sector is

admirable, the government is overreaching when it mandates

gender and racial quotas for private businesses. An

affirmative action provision has no place in a financial

services reform bill and puts additional government burdens

and costs on an already struggling sector of our economy,

putting our recovery at risk.

The megabills that fly through Congress provide legislators

the opportunity to insert politically motivated provisions--

under the radar. As Rahm Emanuel famously said after

President Obama had been elected, ``Never allow a crisis to

go to waste.'' The financial crisis has given the President

and Congress cover to impose their political agenda on

private business activity. Watch out: Your industry could be

next.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, June 7, 2011; when the House adjourns on that day, it adjourn to meet at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday, June 9, 2011; and when the House adjourns on that day, it adjourn to meet at 2 p.m. on Monday, June 13, 2011.

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

I rise in support of the Cole amendment, and the reason why I do is twofold.

Number one, I do think there are some questions about what are the motives. Why should you have to tell the Federal Government absolutely everything in our society today when you're just bidding on a contract? I see some good in it, and the gentleman mentioned the L.A. Times article. I think it makes some good points. But I also see how there is a double-edged sword, that there's too much information that's out there.

But the other thing is this is a major change and a possible encroachment on your constitutional right of First Amendment freedom of speech as to whom you give.

So if we are going to make this the law of the land, public policy, it really should go through the legislative process--hearings and testimony--and let everybody have something to say about it instead of just one more Executive order from the administration.

So I think we should adopt the Cole amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I submit the following for the Record.

[From Forbes Magazine, Mar. 28, 2011]

What's the Real Defense Budget?

(By Mallory Factor)

The new Congress won the election by promising to cut

spending, and unsurprisingly the defense budget is on the

table for the first time in more than a decade.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates recently announced $78

billion in defense spending cuts over the next five years,

including reductions in troop levels for the Army and Marine

Corps. These types of cuts suggest that the military is

working to become leaner and more efficient. Still, many

Americans and congressmen are calling for deeper cuts.

Not counting the cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq,

the Defense budget is expected to be $553 billion in 2012, up

from $549 billion in 2011. That outlay currently represents

19% of the entire federal budget and over 50% of U.S.

discretionary spending; cutting it would go a long way toward

reining in government spending. But before further slicing

the military budget, Congress must reconsider the military's

mission and what activities it should undertake.

The purpose of a large standing army is to provide for our

national defense. In essence, the defense budget is an

insurance policy that protects the U.S. against threats from

other nations and groups. But in recent years a growing

percentage of that budget has been spent on activities that

don't involve traditional national defense. These include

nation-building, policing foreign nations, humanitarian

missions and ferrying executive- and legislative-branch

leaders and their attendants around the globe. While these

activities may be tangentially related to our standing in the

world, they do not enhance our war-fighting capabilities;

rather they relate more to the success of our foreign policy

than to our national defense.

This increase in nondefense missions has been accompanied

by a dramatic shift from war-fighting to nation-building. The

official White House website now describes the function of

the Department of Defense as to ``protect national interests

through war-fighting, providing humanitarian aid and

performing peacekeeping and disaster relief services.'' Is

war-fighting just one among the many functions we want our

military to perform?

Rightly or wrongly, we give our military these various

assignments because we don't want to pay someone else to do

them, and other government entities currently can't. Yet just

because our military can do these jobs doesn't mean that it

should. Indeed, these assignments shift focus away from the

military's core missions: keeping America safe and winning

wars.

Right now it is difficult for Congress to determine how

much money is spent on protecting the U.S. The ``military''

budget gives an exaggerated impression of the cost of our

national defense. When Congress adds burdens to the military,

direct costs like fuel, food and relief supplies may be

calculated and expressed in the budget.

But these items are just a small part of these missions,

and the larger costs get buried. These hidden costs include

recruiting and training extra troops, purchasing and

servicing additional equipment, additional layers of

bureaucracy, and maintaining and enlarging bases, none of

which are separated out in the budget as relating to

nondefense missions.

The military's nondefense activities may or may not be

warranted, but their total costs must be transparent. If

Congress does not consider these costs separately,

traditional defense missions and essential equipment upgrades

will be crowded out.

America is a compassionate nation and would surely engage

in humanitarian activities even if their true costs were

known. But why charge these costs to the defense budget and

then hide them? Only by demanding that the military budget be

limited to legitimate defense activities can Americans know

how many dollars we are actually devoting to our national

security.

Some military leaders have privately estimated that if

these nondefense-related activities were eliminated or given

a separate budget, defense spending could be substantially

reduced and at the same time the military's war-fighting

capabilities increased. Given this uncertainty, before any

additional cuts are made to military spending, Congress must

demand transparency with respect to the different roles of

our military.

Mr. Chairman, I stand in support of the amendment and the passage of the bill, but I want to raise a point which is of great concern to me as an appropriator and as a fiscal conservative, and that is the Pentagon's practice--and it's being practiced by the Obama administration as it was by the Bush administration--of putting the war on terrorism money for Afghanistan and Iraq and other places around the globe off the military budget.

We are debating a budget today which is about $550 billion, but there is another $120 billion which goes under Overseas Contingency Operations which we do not debate or scrutinize nearly as much as we should. What that money does is actually brings us to a military spending bill that is not in the 500 billions but is $670 billion.

A lot of that money is not going to emergency spending but ongoing operations. Did anybody last year think we were going to be out of Afghanistan or Iraq this year? No. That money should be in their base budget.

As a member of the Defense appropriations committee, I have submitted language on our bill to straighten this out, and I hope that Congress will take a look at it down the road. I do support this amendment, however, and I thank the gentleman from California for the time.

Mr. Speaker, can you imagine in your household, if, for every $1 you spent, 40 cents was borrowed?

That's the situation we're in with every dollar that we spend in the U.S. Congress today. And yet there are those who do not want to reform or change.

But if I brought in my family and said, listen, guys, for every dollar we spend, 40 cents is borrowed, we would say, okay, what can we cut out? Can we do with less travel? Can we do with fewer clothes? Can we cut back on the kitchen table a little bit? We would come up with some ideas. They might be tough choices, but it's the right thing to do.

It is time for Congress to get our house in order and to think about the next generation, not just the next election.

As a member of the Appropriations Committee, I can tell you, each and every day, people come to see me to ask for more money to be spent. We've got to change our culture of spending here and get the House under control.