Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, if and when the President has another prime time press conference, and if the President is asked again to consider the mistakes that he has made, I have a suggestion: he might mention the thousands of soldiers in Iraq who have and are now risking their lives without appropriate body armor and other life-saving equipment.

We are finding out now that the President and his advisers and Cabinet were thinking about this war in Iraq for a very long time. And yet here is an AP story from March 26 of this year. It says soldiers headed for Iraq are still buying their own body armor. In many cases their families are buying it for them despite assurances from the military that the gear will be in hand before they are in harm's way.

Last October, last October, that is 8 months after the war started, it was reported that nearly one quarter of American troops serving in Iraq did not have ceramic-plated body armor which can stop bullets fired from assault rifles and shrapnel.

The military says the shortfall is over and soldiers who do not yet have the armor soon will.

``Nancy Durst,'' I am still quoting from the AP story, ``recently learned that her husband, a soldier with an Army Reserve unit from Maine serving in Iraq, spent 4 months without body armor. She said she would have bought armor for her husband had vests not been cycled into his unit. Even if her husband now has body armor, Durst says she is angry he was without it at any time.'' Her husband also told her that reservists have not been given the same equipment as Active Duty soldiers. ``They are so sick and tired of being treated as second-class soldiers,'' she said.

That is from the AP story. No wonder she is mad about it. This armor costs about $1,500. And I hope the President will support legislation that will reimburse the soldiers and families for this expense. Clearly this was a mistake. And so if asked about a mistake, the President could not only say that it was a mistake, but maybe he would like to support H.R. 3615. The gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Larson) has a bill that would reimburse the families for the expense of buying their own body armor.

According to the Enlisted Association of the National Guard, as of November 30, 2003, the Army National Guard lacked $11 billion of the $40 billion in military equipment and training it needed to go to war. Among the missing crucial equipment components were nearly 11,000 Humvees, 20,000 radios, 156,000 night vision goggles and 148 Black Hawk helicopters that are required to meet modernization requirements.

That seems to me to be a mistake. Our troops were not properly equipped. Currently we are told that every member of the National Guard is being provided with body armor once they are in Iraq, but many of the soldiers are not even given an opportunity to train with the modern equipment before deployment.

On November 2, 2003, an Illinois National Guard Chinook helicopter was downed. This helicopter was not equipped with the latest automatic antimissile blocking system. I met the aunt of one of the soldiers who went down in that Chinook, who died because of that accident. I think she would like to tell the President that was a mistake, the cost of life of her nephew.

We know that soldiers coming home on R and R were being asked to pay to get to their homes once they came to the United States. Now, that was a mistake. The President could say that that was fixed, but is he going to support legislation introduced by the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ramstad) to reimburse the families for their travel?

How about the fact that soldiers, wounded soldiers in the hospital, were being charged every day for their food? Well, we have corrected that, thank goodness, but that is something that the President might think about as a mistake that was clearly made and affected our troops.

Now for the latest report that I heard of from my State of Illinois. This was on CBS local news today, I believe. The 333rd Military Police Unit in Freeport, which just had their tour in Iraq extended, may not be adequately supplied for battle. That is because everything they owned was shipped back home. The 333rd is presently sitting on the Kuwaiti border awaiting orders, but they have since surrendered their equipment such as radios and armored vehicles to the troops who replaced them. But now since the 333rd is going to remain in Iraq, they are without any supplies. Even their personal belongings were sent home, including spare uniforms, boots and toiletries. The soldiers only have what they are wearing and are being forced to purchase new uniforms and some equipment out of their own pockets. Military families have been receiving their soldiers' footlockers the past few days and are now frantically repacking boxes and sending all of this gear back at their own expense. This has angered families who did not believe the military thought this redeployment through.

Let me just say that the DOD has responded to these families, saying that they are looking into whether they will be reimbursed for sending equipment back.

A few mistakes. I will forward this to the President. Maybe he would like to use it at his next press conference.

Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate the opportunity to come here to speak about women's History Month and thank the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia for providing all of us with this opportunity this evening.

They do not call it ``history'' for nothing. In general, the history of our Nation and our world has been about ``his'' story, about men's story. And it is not surprising, as men have written history books and have been considered the leaders that books are written about.

And this is not meant in any way as an anti-male statement, just a fact that most of history is about the leadership of men in our world.

I wanted to just share tonight a study that was done very recently by the Center for the American Woman and Politics, about why it is that more women do not run for political office. The premise is that study after study has shown that when women run, women win in the same numbers that men do.

And, yet, if you look at this wonderful body, our august House of Representatives, we are about 14 percent women. And the same is true of the United States Senate. And so the question really is why do we not appear in greater numbers and why do more women not run since they have equal opportunity to win?

So they did this study and what they did is they created what they called an eligibility pool, 1,000 men and 1,000 women who were from the fields that produced most candidates, business, education, and law. And by definition, the thousand women and thousand men were equally qualified. These were people who were at mid- or upper-career level. They asked them a number of questions to determine the differences between them.

One of the differences that was really disturbing and chilling to me was that when asked about their own qualifications, the women in the study were twice as likely as the men to say about themselves that they were not qualified to run for office. Now, as I said, by definition these men and women were equally qualified.

And perhaps even more disturbing, that sense of being not qualified in twice the numbers as men ran across generations. The younger women were as likely to declare themselves not qualified as older women.

So clearly we have a challenge before us. What do we do to these qualified women to make them feel that they are not so?

But there was a hopeful part of that study. What it said was that the one factor that was in some ways the most responsible for someone making the decision to run for office was being asked to run for office, someone making the suggestion. And they divided those who make the suggestion into formal actors and informal actors. So, in other words, if someone is asked by a formal actor, that being an elected official, a party official or a political activist, to run for office, they are likely to think of themselves as candidates or potential candidates.

So to me that said, as a woman who is interested in getting more women involved in leadership positions, what we need to do is to encourage women, encourage young women and women older than that to run for office, to put that seed in their head and create really an old girl's network, if you will, that will bring women along to think of themselves as candidates.

We also need to, in this 21st century, explore what are those situations, what is the socialization process that ends up with women not feeling as qualified to run for office.

These were women who rated the activities involved in being a candidate as being something they were even more willing to do than men; and yet when it came to that final question, do you see yourself as qualified to run for office, twice as many women as men in this pool said they were not qualified.

So this is a challenge to us, to men and women alike. If we want to have the kind of diversity, if we want to have the benefit of women's leadership, then we are going to have to build in the systems that do that and the support networks that will encourage women so that we have the kind of equality as we move forward in this century.

So I wanted to share the outcome of this wonderful study. It is the Center for the American Woman and Politics. They are at Rutgers University. They are part of the Eagleton Institute, and over the years they have provided us with very useful information in moving forward to include more women in our political universe.

So I thank my colleague from the District of Columbia for focusing on this important issue and for allowing me to participate tonight.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman so much for yielding.

Madam Speaker, I stand here today with such a pride in joining true patriots who are coming to the floor tonight under the leadership of the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the distinguished chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus (Mr. Cummings), and my colleague the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), who has really been a conscience for all of us, that we have to ask the questions.

We stand here as people who love our country. We love our country so much that we fought to be here to represent over 600,000 people, to represent the views of ordinary Americans, and we are here tonight because we are concerned that our country is losing its credibility and its moral leadership around the world; and that our democracy is in jeopardy right now, because democracy depends on the truth.

It depends on the light of day. It depends on discussions being held out in the open, so that people can make up their own minds, so the facts, the real facts, get laid on the table. And to question, yes, even to question the President of the United States, Madam Speaker, about things that have been said, and the Vice President of the United States.

No one in this great democracy is beyond being questioned, and that is the duty of Americans, not just of Members of Congress, but of citizens of the United States, of the media, of the press, to find out the truth.

Madam Speaker, for over 6 months this administration has been fighting tooth and nail against all of the facts being laid out in public before this commission investigating 9/11 and what happened. It is not just the 3,000-plus people that died that day, and it is not just the 570, 580 or 590-plus people now that have died in Iraq and their families that are suffering, presumably because we were fighting terrorism, and some of us question the rationale for that war. But all Americans deserve to know the truth, and this administration over the last 6 months has battled against the commission over access to documents and witnesses.

The panel has issued two subpoenas to the Federal Government for aviation and military records, and twice had to threaten to do the same for access to presidential briefing materials. The panel fought the White House over an extension of its statutory deadline for issuing a report which was originally set for May 27 in order to really do its job. There has been pressure on this commission not to explore fully and readily exactly what happened on 9/11.

Now, fortunately, under tremendous pressure right now, we are going to hear more information, under oath, from the National Security Advisor, who has found it fit to speak on every single broadcast and radio station and television program about this. But now under oath she will appear. I think this is a wise decision, and I am glad that it is going to happen.

But I want to talk for a minute about one of the strategies that is used to silence people who would ask those kinds of questions, who would come up with information that the administration does not like, that runs counter to the administration's version of the truth.

I am not saying that the other versions are always true or more correct, but what I am saying is that anyone who dares to stand up and say something different is slimed by this administration. Let me give you some examples of the ways in which the integrity, the competence, the motives and even the patriotism of those who raise questions is attacked.

The Medicare actuary who came up with the numbers that said that this Medicare bill that passed in the middle of the night, after arm- twisting and holding the record open for 3-plus hours, the actuary who came up with dollar figures that said it really was going to cost about $140 billion more than the administration said, was warned that he would be fired if he told key lawmakers about a series of Bush administration cost estimates that would have torpedoed, or could have, any Congressional passage of this White House-backed Medicare prescription drug plan.

Richard S. Foster, the Chief Actuary for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, told colleagues last June that he would be fired if he revealed the numbers relating to higher estimates to lawmakers. This is a person who was supposed to give us the truth. That is his job. He is supposed to come up with the facts. For doing so, he was told he would be fired.

Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill, 3 days after Paul O'Neill criticized the Bush administration's Iraq policy, the administration, quoting from an Associated Press story, ``began an investigation into whether any laws or regulations had been violated by O'Neill.'' The probe came despite O'Neill having specifically ``cleared all of the documents with the Treasury General Counsel's Office.''

Of course, the problem ended by fully absolving O'Neill. But, right away, rather than answering the charges that were raised, the administration went after the man and tried to undercut his credibility.

White House Adviser Larry Lindsey was fired when he told a newspaper that an Iraq war could cost $200 billion.

General Anthony Zinni, fired, a retired Marine general who was Bush's Middle East mediator. He had the audacity to anger the White House when he told a public policy forum in October that ``Bush had far more pressing policies than Iraq and suggested there could be a prolonged, difficult aftermath to the war. He was not reappointed as Mideast envoy.'' The source, and that is a quote, was the Associated Press in July of 2003.

Even troops fighting in Iraq were threatened for telling the truth about combat in Iraq. After soldiers in Iraq raised questions about the Bush administration's deceptive WMD comments, General John Abizaid said no soldiers ``are free to say anything disparaging about the Secretary of Defense, or the President of the United States. Whatever action may be taken, whether it is a verbal reprimand or something more stringent, is up to the commanders on the scene.'' The source, ABC News.

No, we are not even going to let those who are putting their lives on the line publicly raise questions.

The CIA was blamed for telling the truth about bogus Iraq nuclear claims. Despite the CIA having made advance objections to the White House about false Iraq nuclear claims, ``President Bush and his National Security Advisor yesterday placed full responsibility on the Central Intelligence Agency for the inclusion in this year's State of the Union Address of questionable allegations that Iraq's Saddam Hussein was trying to buy nuclear weapons.''

So much for taking personal responsibility for words that come out of one's own mouth. Let us blame someone else.

And then, of course, there is Richard Clarke.

But even before I get to him, the Secretary of Commerce the other day, in talking about people who are concerned about losing their jobs, because jobs are being exported overseas, said that basically this kind of outsourcing is really a good thing for the economy.

``People who are out of work because of outsourcing, who said, no, they think maybe we ought to try and keep jobs at home, he called them economic isolationists, and he said economic isolationists wave the flag of surrender, rather than the American flag.'' That is a quote.

So, in other words, people who are out of work because their jobs have gone overseas and have the audacity to complain about our policies that do that are said to wave the flag of surrender and not the American flag.

What does that mean? They are not patriots? These people, whose children every day go to school and say the pledge to the flag while dad or mom is looking for a job?

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time.

My colleague across the aisle from Texas is feeling really proud of himself, because he thinks he found a Medicare cut in the Democratic alternative. Excuse me, we are talking about $800 million more for Medicare over the next 5 years. So he is just flat wrong, but there are a lot of things wrong in this budget.

It is true that when we talk about, well, it is just 1 percent, it is just a little bit here or there, we are talking about a $2 billion cut in Medicaid. What is that about? Medicaid? We are talking about the poorest of Americans, many of whom, by the way, are working 7 days a week or 5 days a week trying to earn a living and still do not have benefits. Their children are doing without.

Yes, it is true, we are talking about senior citizens in nursing homes. Medicaid pays for two out of three residents in nursing homes, one out of ten residents in assisted living facilities in addition to home-based and community-based care. We are talking about 52 million children, disabled persons, persons living with AIDS, parents, senior citizens who rely on Medicaid.

Is this what fiscal discipline is really about? Is this what we want to cut in this budget?

The Blue Dog budget, the Black Caucus budget and our Democratic alternative leave Medicaid intact because that is what government is supposed to do, help people when they need health care.

Mr. Chairman, I rise today against the Republican budget and for the Democratic and CBC alternative budgets.

The members on the other side of the aisle describe their budget as one that ``recognizes the fundamental obligations of the Federal Government.'' It does no such thing. In fact, it is nothing short of a political document that turns a blind eye to our obligations.

The House Republican budget is indefensible. House Republicans followed the lead of President Bush and passed a budget that goes after the poor, the homeless, and the elderly. Republicans value more tax cuts for the rich over meeting the needs of senior citizens, working families, the unemployed and the majority of Americans. Medicaid and Section 8 vouchers are slashed so they can pay for missile defense, subsidies to Halliburton and tax cuts for the wealthy.

The Republican budget cuts and underfunds programs that have been proven to strengthen our country and provide opportunities for the future. The so-called ``education President's'' own No Child Left Behind is underfunded by $8.8 billion. While college costs have skyrocketed, the GOP budget keeps the Pell Grant maximum at the same level it was three years ago. There is no money for the Family Opportunity Act, which would provide health insurance for disabled children. It tells my committee, Energy and Commerce, to make $2.2 billion in Medicaid cuts over the next five years, jeopardizing health and long term care for 52 million Americans.

Section 8, low-income heating assistance of LIHEAP, child care assistance--programs that help people pay the bills and keep roofs over their head in tough times like these--are cut by $3.7 billion. We could see 250,000 people lose affordable housing this year under the GOP budget. Veterans' health care is underfunded again, this time by $1.3 billion below what the Republican Chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee recommended. Over the next five years, the Republican budget will cut these and other domestic programs by $36.9 billion. At a time when so many families are worried about jobs, health care, and education, this budget puts their future on the chopping block.

Parents cannot afford to send their children to college. Seniors cannot afford their housing, heating bills or medicine. Veterans have to wait for months to see a physician at the VA. Teachers still have to buy their own school supplies. Democrats offered a clear alternative to the destructive plan Republicans pushed through Congress. We will continue to fight for a fair budget that will fund America's true priorities.

Mr. Chairman, I rise against the Republican budget because it cuts funding for women's business centers, among many other essential and effective programs.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution, never opened for committee discussion and now closed to amendments, is perhaps a consistent way to mark the anniversary of an unnecessary war that was built on misleading statements, dangerous disregard for the facts, and dangerous policies.

To a person, we believe that our military men and women have done a remarkable job in very difficult conditions, conditions like traveling in tactical vehicles that do not have steel armor, leaving them dangerously vulnerable to grenades, small arms, and roadside bombs. Soldiers in Iraq are hanging flack vests and even plywood on their Humvees in desperate attempts at protection, army officials are quoted as saying, and the casualties mount week by week.

Republicans who choose to slime the records of opponents of this resolution would be better to turn the mirror on themselves. Many of us will be supporting a Democratic budget resolution that will back up our rhetoric with the resources needed to provide equipment, compensation, military housing, child tax credits for military families, and other necessities that are missing in the Republican budget proposal. Let us put our money where our mouth is.

Madam Speaker, there is a president in the western

hemisphere who was chosen in what many voters believe is a flawed 2000 election. Many people in his country and around the world believe that this president misled his people into a violent conflict in which many lives were lost. Revelations of corruption including falsifying documents, financial mismanagement, gross overcharging by well- connected corporations, kickbacks to politically allied organizations continue to accumulate. What is the proper response of the people of that country who no longer wish to be led by that president? Because it is a democracy, the answer is clear: vote him out at the next election.

I speak of President George W. Bush, not President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti.

Those of us who do not support President Bush will work to remove and replace him in the November 2 election. That is the way we do it in our democracy. In a democracy, one does not take up arms against an elected President. We do not threaten his life nor is he forced out of the country nor are convicted murderers and drug dealers and armed thugs welcomed in to do the dirty work. In a democracy, one goes from elected President to elected President and not coup d'etat to coup d'etat.

So this is a very, very sad time for those of us who believe in democracy. The Bush administration had the choice of defending the democratically-elected government in Haiti or supporting its overthrow. It chose the latter. Jean-Bertrand Aristide was the first democratically-elected President of Haiti, his successor due to be chosen in the next presidential election in 2005.

Over the last several weeks, an armed insurrection was organized by former death squad leaders, convicted murderers and drug dealers. They used terrorist tactics to take over police stations and then cities which were protected by only a very small government police force.

The New York Times describes these so-called rebels: ``The public face of the rebel army is the smile of Mr. Guy Phillipe. He is suspected by both Haitian and United States officials of cocaine trafficking. Mr. Phillipe has few democratic credentials. In 2001 he stood accused of planning a coup. Government said he masterminded a raid on the Presidential palace that left seven dead. He is joined in this rebellion by Louis Jodel Chamblain, the convicted assassin from

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

It is actually insulting and certainly annoying that there is some sort of accusation that those of us who think that the substitute is preferable do not care about women and do not care about the babies that they are carrying. As a mother, as a grandmother of four children, we have to recognize this bill for what it is. If we want to go after protecting pregnant women, we ought to go after protecting pregnant women, not about threatening to take away their right to choose, which this is a thinly veiled effort to do because we are trying to create a special status of human being, of a fetus, of an unborn child. While I kind of admire the strategy, it does not get to the heart of this issue.

The proponents say we have to have this bill to protect pregnant women from violence, but the truth is this bill does not even address crimes committed against the woman at all, it only addresses the new crime created in this bill, which is a crime against a zygote, an embryo, a fetus. Furthermore, this bill would not even apply to the tragic Laci Peterson, as we understand the facts of the case, and as is true in the vast majority of domestic violence cases. Those crimes are covered by State law and not Federal law.

H.R. 1997 only touches on few and rare instances when pregnant women could be harmed by someone committing a Federal crime. The undisputed aim of this bill is to move forward a calculated antichoice agenda in which embryos and fetuses are codified into law as humans with all of the human rights afforded people in our society. This would bring us one step closer to overturning Roe v. Wade and taking away a woman's constitutional right to choose.

Instead, if we truly care about protecting pregnant women from violence and creating stiffer penalties for those who harm pregnant women, we should pass the substitute to this bill, known as the Motherhood Protection Act. The substitute recognizes that the pregnant woman is a victim when she is assaulted, instead of making the fetus distinct and separate from the woman, which anybody who is pregnant or has been pregnant knows is really not when you are carrying that child. The substitute classifies assault against her and assault on her pregnancy as two crimes, both crimes against the woman. Unlike H.R. 1997, the substitute gets to the heart of the matter: protecting pregnant women from violence.

I urge my colleagues to vote no on H.R. 1997 and yes on the substitute amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) for allowing me to share my thoughts on this.

I wanted to begin with something that may seem a little bit off point. I just returned from the White House meeting along with the Congressional Black Caucus that was kind enough to let me come along, in a meeting with Secretary of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice and the President, and we were talking about the crisis in Haiti right now. And one of the reasons now given for our going to Iraq was to liberate Iraq, to bring democracy to Iraq. And we stand here right now at a moment when violence and thugs and M-16s are moving toward the palace of the democratically elected President of Haiti, Mr. Aristide, and there seems to be a reluctance for the United States now to get involved in saving a democracy.

Whatever one thinks of Mr. Aristide, some of us do not like some of the things the President does, or we are talking about the Vice President tonight, but we are going to wait until November, until there is another election. We are not even so sure about the last election. They talk about some irregularities in the Haitian election in 2000. We think there were some here, too, but we do not do anything. And I got to thinking that what if there was some oil in Haiti? Maybe there would be a little more interest on the part of the United States in really doing something.

Our hope is that the President understands, and I know he understands, but that in the light of there being an imminent bloodbath in Haiti, that the United States takes some action. It would be pretty ironic if we were trying to bring democracy to Iraq and yet we let democracy crumble in Haiti.

Let me get back to the point. I have been watching these ads on television that Halliburton has been putting on. They are pretty glossy ads, and they show soldiers, handsome young men and women, getting meals that Halliburton says that it is providing to our soldiers; and says that Halliburton has been doing all this great work, and I am sure that over the years they can proudly point to some of their accomplishments. But they are bragging about meals right now, and what we have found out now is that, yes, they provide meals, but they have also been

charging for three times as many meals as were actually served in a major Army facility in Kuwait, that American taxpayers are paying millions and millions of dollars to Halliburton for meals that simply never got served. Whoops, a little mistake. Or is it just a mistake?

Maybe the gentleman has referred to it already, and he can stop me if he has, but the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) has been doing a wonderful job in calling for investigations of these overspendings on behalf of the American taxpayers. We should not be paying 1 cent more than we need to be spending, particularly in a war that, in my view, we should not have been involved in in the first place. But there we are, and Halliburton is there, too.

So he, along with the distinguished gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), sent a letter on February 12 to the Director of the Defense Contract Audit Agency asking them to look into some of the problems based on information that was provided to them by whistleblowers. It is not always so easy to be a whistleblower, to stand up and risk one's job and sometimes risk all kinds of retribution to tell what is really going on.

Halliburton deserves scrutiny. They were awarded in 2001 a global logistics contract worth about $3.7 billion, 90 percent of this total value for work in Iraq, and here is what these whistleblowers are saying that Halliburton is doing: that they are engaging in these improper practices, telling employees that price does not matter. This is from the letter: ``High-level Halliburton officials frequently told employees that the high prices charged by vendors were not a problem because the U.S. Government would reimburse Halliburton's costs and then pay Halliburton an additional fee. One whistleblower said that a Halliburton motto was `Don't worry about price. It's cost-plus,' '' which means they not only get their costs, but, on top of that, some profit. So do not worry about it.

``Wasteful spending: Ordinary vehicles were leased for $7,500 a month. Higher prices than necessary were paid for furniture and cellular phone service. Poor quality mobile homes were purchased and accepted even though much better units were available. Under Halliburton's cost-plus contract, all of these wasteful expenditures were passed on to the taxpayer. The company even sought to order embroidered towels at a cost of $7.50 each when ordinarily towels would have cost about one-third of the price.''

Those of us who are involved in decorating our homes, maybe once in a while we are going to splurge on an embroidered towel. I do not think that we need to do that when we are trying to be cost-effective in a war in Iraq and have a little money left over to help some people at home.

``Avoiding competition among vendors: Halliburton's objective was to keep as many purchase orders as possible below $2,500 in value . . .'' Because they are being frugal? No. The letter goes on to say: `` . . . so its buyers could avoid the requirement to solicit quotes from more than one vendor. Instead of having multiple vendors submit competitive quotes for needed materials and selecting the lowest quote, Halliburton frequently sought only one quote from a single vendor.''

``Inviting unjustifiably high quotes: It was routine for Halliburton buyers to copy a requisition, hand it to a single Kuwaiti vendor, and tell the vendor to submit any quote below $2,500 the next day. The focus was not on obtaining a reasonable price.''

And there is a lot more in this letter, but in the summary here, it says, ``Relying on an inadequate list of preferred vendors: Halliburton's supervisors provided buyers with a list of preferred Kuwaiti vendors. Many of the preferred firms were unreliable or charged `outrageous' prices. Supervisors did not encourage buyers to identify alternative vendors and, in some cases, wanted to use a higher-priced vendor on the preferred list rather than a new, cheaper vendor.

``According to the whistleblowers, improved business practices would yield significant savings.''

And they talk about ``Mr. Bunting,'' one of the whistleblowers, ``estimated that competition could reduce costs by up to 15 percent. The former procurement supervisor explained that when he obtained three quotes instead of just one, he typically saved up to 30 percent.'' So we are paying top dollar, unnecessarily high prices.

And just what is this company and its relationship to the Vice President? Because that is what we are talking about here today. The integrity of this administration is in question.

And when Mr. Cheney says in 2000, July of 2000, before the election, said, ``What I will have to do, assuming we are successful in the election, is divest myself, sell any remaining shares that I have in the company,'' the fact is a congressional report found that Mr. Cheney still owns more than 433,000 Halliburton stock options, including 100,000 shares at $54.50 per share, 33,333 shares at $28.00, and 300,000 shares at $39.50. That is from CNN in September of 2003.

Then he says in January of this year, ``I severed my ties with Halliburton when I became a candidate for Vice President in August of 2000.'' I do not know what ``severed'' means. I clearly do not understand the meaning of the word ``severed,'' because, to me, this is a pretty good and lucrative tie. ``Along with 433,000 stock options,'' and this is a quote from CNN, ``Cheney still receives about $150,000 a year'' from Halliburton.

I would like people I may have severed ties from to have that kind of deal. Severed to me means no, I do not get any money, but that is clearly not the definition of the word to Mr. Cheney.

So I think, look, there are just so many questions here, and I do not know if this issue would even come up so much if we could count on this company spending taxpayer dollars in the way that they should be spent. But it is not one issue, it is not two issues, it is time after time after time. Every time the light is shined on what Halliburton has done, we find taxpayer dollars that are being wasted there. We cannot afford to do that. The Vice President of the United States should take some responsibility for that. It is a company he was CEO of. This is a company he continues to gain benefits from, and I think it really does raise a matter of where does the buck stop, where is the responsibility and the accountability, and, fundamentally, it raises questions of integrity, of ethics.

So I appreciate the gentleman letting me raise the issues.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for his leadership on this and for this evening to bring to the attention of our House of Representatives just how really bad this media campaign is and how cynical it really is.

I heard the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown) talking about the windfall that will come to the pharmaceutical industry because of the passage of this bill, something like $140 billion in additional windfall profits. But I do not know even in their wildest imaginations if they realized the taxpayers were also going to fund the media campaign to sell the plan that will bring them the $140 billion. So we are talking about a neat little $22 million ad campaign that is beginning.

I am sure maybe you talked about some of these things earlier, but you were just talking, too, about the political nature that we feel is involved in this ad campaign, that the timing has much more to do with an election in November than it does with really educating and informing seniors about the reality of this legislation and what it is going to mean to them. Fortunately, the seniors are smarter than I think some people on the other side of the aisle may think.

However, to add to the political connection, some of us wrote a letter to Dara Corrigan, the Acting Principal Deputy Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services, and in that letter we were requesting an investigation of this ad campaign. Let me bring it to your attention.

The letter in part says, ``It has also come to our attention that a media firm currently working for the President's reelection campaign has been hired to purchase the $9.5 million worth of television ad time for this new commercial. National Media, Inc., stands to make a windfall from this campaign. This is the same company that has been repeatedly hired for ad campaigns primarily funded by the Republican Party and by the drug industry. National Media, Inc., has done ad campaigns for Citizens for Better Medicare, a drug industry front group that has spent tens of millions of dollars on ads attacking lawmakers interested in lowering the cost of prescription drugs.''

Now, we just passed a new campaign finance reform law that actually makes certain kinds of interlocking consultants and ad producers, et cetera, actually illegal.

I do not know if this is legal or not legal. We want the investigation to proceed forward, but it certainly smells bad when you have the Federal Government, with taxpayer dollars, taxpayer dollars, millions, hundreds of millions of Americans putting money into an ad campaign. I have seen it. I do not know if you have. It has been in the media market in the Chicago area. I saw it on television here in the D.C. area.

That ad campaign is promoted by the very same people who are working for the President's reelection campaign. To me, that is a smoking gun.

The worst part of this deception is that it is going after senior citizens who count on prescription drugs day in and day out to extend and enhance and perhaps save their lives, and it is telling them things like, the ad itself, where a senior says, ``So how is Medicare changing?'' And the answer, ``It is the same Medicare you have always counted on, plus more benefits, like prescription drug coverage.''

If I am a senior and I am watching this, I am thinking, here it is, what I have been waiting for, a prescription drug benefit.

The first thing they are going to find out is, no, forget it, there is going to be nothing for 2 years except for, and we will talk about that later, this card. So there is not going to be any Medicare prescription drug plan of any sort for a couple of years.

Then when they really find out the details, some of them are going to find out, ``If I join this plan, I am going to spend more on my Medicare.'' Millions of seniors would spend more if they signed up.

So when they say it is the same Medicare you always counted on, plus more benefits like prescription drug coverage, it is not true. It is simply not true.

The most generous thing we can say about it is that it is certainly not the full story and, for many seniors, simply not true.

Then it says, ``Can I keep Medicare just how it is?'' And that is a question that seniors are asking. They love their Medicare, for good reason. They can count on it, they can take it to the hospital, they can make sure that they can go see their doctor. They know their Medicare, and they love it. ``Can I keep Medicare just how it is?'' they ask on the ad. They say, ``You can always keep your same Medicare coverage.'' The thing they do not say is how much you may have to pay for it.

Exactly. So, yes, you can keep your Medicare, but you

may not get the same benefits; your premium may go sky high because the HMOs are skimming off the healthiest and the wealthiest. And, yes, you can have your Medicare, but it is going to cost so much more. Again, at the most generous, it is an incomplete answer and, really and truly, a deceptive answer. Seniors have to watch for that.

And then, ``Will I save on my medicines?'' And the announcer says, ``You can save with your Medicare discount drug cards this June and save more with new prescription drug coverage in 2006.'' Do my colleagues know what? Many seniors already have a prescription drug card. Actually, they may have a few prescription drug cards. But under this new plan, they are only going to be allowed one Medicare discount card, which may not even provide all the medicines that they need.

The ad is misleading because seniors are led to believe that all of their medicines are going to be covered. It means that seniors will have to pay in order to get the discount card. It is not free. The ad does not mention that drugs that may be covered when you get the discount card could be dropped, leaving you with no savings, or you may end up in the middle of the year needing another medication you did not know about that is not on the card.

This is a bad deal, and this ad is telling seniors, in a glowing ad, it is a nice ad, is it not? I mean, it is pretty. It is pretty. I mean, it is so wrong. The ad is so wrong. But the fact that the seniors are actually paying for this ad that gives a false picture of their Medicare, which they love and they want to know the truth about, is nothing short of, I do not know if technically so but, in my mind, criminal.

Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, this is a full media branding operation. I am sure all of the Madison Avenue guys are in there figuring out, how many impressions does it take? Who reads their mail? How many people watch television? Oh, yes, it is a very slick ad in time for the election.

Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to reinforce the point that the Republicans never really liked Medicare, but that continues to this day in spades. When we heard one of the leaders on the other side of the aisle, one of the chief negotiators on this bill, or authors of this bill say, To those who say this will end Medicare as we know it, I say, I certainly hope so.

So seniors have to understand who is driving the legislation and where their disrespect for Medicare really lies.

Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, at the end of the day, I really put my faith in the senior citizens of this country. I have the pleasure of being the executive director of the Illinois State Council of Senior Citizens working on issues like this; and if I know the seniors, they will sit down, put pencil to paper, and figure out exactly what this bill does or does not do for them. They will know that this campaign is a sham and a scam; and if the other side of the aisle thinks that this is going to carry the day during the elections, I think the senior citizens of this country are going to prove them wrong.

Mr. Chairman, I rise today to speak out in opposition to H.R. 3030, a bill to reauthorize and amend the Community Service Block Grant program. While I strongly support the social services and organizations that these grants help support, this bill does not correct current law, which explicitly allows religious organizations that receive federal funds from the Community Service Block Grant Act to discriminate in their hiring. Instead, I support the amendment offered by my colleagues, Representatives Lynn Woolsey, George Miller, and others, which would prohibit discrimination in hiring based on religion.

Americans share a fundamental value that we must never discriminate on the basis of religion. Unlike other ideologies, our Constitution specifically protects religion in the first amendment of the Bill of Rights. Yet, H.R. 3030 says federal funds can, in fact, be used to discriminate against someone who may not share the same religion as that practiced by the organization receiving funds. We must not allow our taxpayer dollars to support discrimination.

The fact is that religious organizations have been providing secular social services, such as Meals on Wheels, adult literacy programs, homeless shelters and job-training programs, to people in this country for decades. And, in cases where federal funds are involved, these religious organizations have willingly done so without discriminating in their hiring. We must not go down a road where discrimination of any kind is allowed with federal money.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on H.R. 3030 and ``yes'' on amendments that prohibit religious discrimination.

Mr. Speaker, I thank both gentlemen for their vivid description on what is wrong with the so-called Medicare bill that passed, the nonprescription drug benefit bill that passed the House, but I want to tell Members my reaction to the chairman talking about now and very seriously looking at going to work for the pharmaceutical companies and how the Medicare administrator is going to benefit. I feel that very personally and very deeply, for this reason. This kind of breach of trust is something that really affects me because it confirms the worst nightmares of the public about what we as Members of Congress do here.

I think all too many people have this view that Members of Congress come here and they try and line their own pockets for their own benefit, working with special interests. And then what they find is the smoking gun, a guy like the chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, on which the gentleman and I both sit, taking a job and saying he is going to negotiate a job with the pharmaceutical industry, PhRMA, the lobbying organization. He has announced he is going to give up his chairmanship on February 16 and not run again, and that he is looking at this offer. We know he has turned down a million dollar offer already from another organization. We have heard it is between $2 million and $3 million, and go to work for PhRMA, the very industry that stands now to benefit the most from this so-called senior citizen prescription drug benefit.

The good news is that the seniors get how bad this bill is. But what I fear that they do not get is that there are Members of Congress who are sincere about trying to provide a real benefit to them and think that all that we are doing here is trying to line our own pockets, trying to rig the system so it helps the pharmaceutical companies, so it helps the HMOs, and that is pretty much what they have seen.

This bill is about an estimated $140 billion windfall for the drug companies, $140 billion windfall for the drug companies, because it is prohibited now from trying to negotiate. Like the Veterans Administration, we do not have to look far to see where an agency negotiates for lower prices. The Veterans Administration gets for veterans sometimes half the cost that other Americans pay when they go to the pharmacy, and about half the cost we are going to have to pay for under this bill because there will be no negotiation.

The Washington Post had an editorial on January 29 that said for the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) to leave so soon afterward to work for the pharmaceutical association whose companies reaped substantial benefits from that bill provides a particularly pungent example of how quickly the ``revolving door'' between Congress and K Street is now revolving, and how lucrative this game has become for its participants.

The only thing I would disagree with, this is not about a revolving door, this is about a locked door. This was happening while the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) is still in the Congress and still chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce. This is about a locked door where he kept out the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), the ranking member on his committee, who was here when Medicare was passed in 1965, an expert on the subject, locked out of the conference committee.

I hope the public understands how extraordinary that is for the appointed members of a conference committee to be locked out of the process.

Also locked out, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel), the ranking member on the Committee on Ways and Means. And let us be clear, when the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) got locked out, it meant that the only possible representative of people of color in this country who have a lot at stake in this issue, were also locked out of that conference committee, which is now an all-white committee, I guess. We do not know. Who knows who they invited in from the pharmaceutical industry or the HMOs because the leading Democrats in the House of Representatives were locked out of that process.

And coming out of that locked door is, number one, a bill that is just a payoff to the HMOs and the pharmaceutical companies; and what comes out of that committee are job offers, big job offers. So what we have is now the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) we think getting between $2-3 million, which is actually a pretty good deal for the pharmaceutical industry which stands to gain $140 billion. That is not too bad a deal to get a clever man like the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin).

They also got a guy named Tom Scully who was the Medicare administrator, the guy behind the scenes, who as a staffer helped write the bill and negotiate the whole bill. Where has Mr. Scully gone? Mr. Scully has gone to be a top health care lobbyist for the Washington firm of Alston & Bird. While serving as President Bush's director of Medicare and helping to craft the Medicare deal, Scully was actively negotiating with the lobbying firm. Recognizing the conflict of interest, the Bush administration granted Scully a special waiver to negotiate with the lobbying firm while serving in the Bush administration.

Here he is, he is with Medicare, he is the head man, he wants to look for another job, and Health and Human Services grants him a waiver while he is working on the Medicare bill to start negotiating for his next job. A waiver. Well, there was such an uproar over that, now they have said agencies cannot do that, only the White House can grant those sorts of waivers. So Scully is out the door.

Then there is the top aide on the Committee on Ways and Means, John McManus, who was negotiating this bill as well. He left and he is going to have a job outside helping him make some money from the pharmaceutical industry. Here is what he said. ``We accomplished what we set out to do. Helping people figure out how this gets implemented, that is what is interesting to me.'' Who are the people is he talking about that he wants to help figure it out? Is he going to help the seniors? I have not heard that he is going to go work for a senior citizen organization.

Mr. Speaker, the words that we want to come out of their mouths is that there will not be any more waivers, and that seeking a job in the private sector, particularly with an industry that you are now regulating in a sense or making decisions about, is not right. It is not right. It smells. People know that. They do not like it. This is why the public loses faith in government, and that is why I feel so strongly about it.

Mr. Speaker, there are some aspects of revolving door that apply here, although I still believe that was about a locked door. These individuals were servants of the public while they are negotiating or figuring out their next move with the pharmaceutical industry. But we have got the door going the other way, too. We have a situation where an HMO lobbyist turns up as a Bush Medicare official. A woman named Julie Goon was just hired by the Bush administration. She is the former vice president of legislative affairs for an HMO trade association in Washington, and she is now the new Director of Medicare Outreach. Congress Daily reported that Goon will be in charge of ``getting the word out to seniors, health care professionals, consumer groups and others about how the program works, HHS' progress in implementing it and what its impact on them will be, and for apprising the department of their reaction.''

Before she got this job, Goon was named one of Washington's top lobbyists in Washington in 2002. Now she is head of explaining this Medicare bill and why it is such a great deal as Director of Medicare Outreach.

This is not only disgusting, but it is also very costly. We know now that this bill which helps seniors little and pharmaceutical companies and HMOs a lot, is going to cost not $400 billion but about $540 billion. Now is that additional cost meaning that we are going to help seniors more, that we are going to provide a more generous benefit, that they are going to be able to buy their prescription drugs any cheaper? No. The reason that the cost of the Medicare bill has been reassessed is because the cost of prescription drugs are going to go up, so taxpayers are going to have to take more money out of their pocket.

The cost to get the HMOs to keep providing the care, because HMO costs go up every year, is going to raise the price of this bill.

The other thing that was not talked about that I think a lot of seniors do not get is that the premium can go up every year, the copayment can go up every year. So what may start out as $35 could end up being $85 or even more in a few years.

It is built into the bill, but it is quite remarkable that before the ink is even dry on this bill, the price has gone up more than 25 percent, from $400 billion to $540 billion, and it has not even started yet. Not one dollar in benefits, so-called, has even gone out.

The seniors know that this is a bad deal. The seniors who pay more attention than anybody else already know. In polls that have asked them, they do not think that they are going to benefit sufficiently. But it is important that it be explained. This comes from today, from the Associated Press:

``The Bush administration launched a $9.5 million television advertising campaign Tuesday to rebut criticism of the new Medicare law. Understand, this is not a political commercial paid for by a campaign. You and I and all of our constituents are paying for a $9.5 million television advertising campaign to rebut criticism of the new Medicare law. The ad is to run on network and cable television through March, clustered around soap operas, game shows and news programs. Its theme is, 'Same Medicare, More Benefits.' ''

That is correct.

I am reading to you this. This is not a campaign expenditure:

``The administration is spending another $3.1 million for a newspaper, radio, and Internet effort in both English and Spanish. The 30-second ad addresses some of the major criticism of the law, including assertions that it will force seniors out of traditional Medicare and into managed care plans and that savings will be paltry from drug discount cards and prescription drug insurance starting in 2006.''

This is correct. Quoting from the article:

``Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson played the commercial Tuesday for reporters. Four actors who portray Medicare beneficiaries ask how the law is changing Medicare. `Can I keep my Medicare just how it is?' one asks. The announcer replies, `Yes, you can always keep your same Medicare coverage.' At the end of the ad, another senior says, `So my Medicare isn't different, it's just more?' The announcer, `Right.'

``Several Democratic Senators already have criticized as propaganda a two-page flyer that HHS plans to make the basis of a letter to be sent later this month to the 40 million older and disabled Americans who are enrolled in Medicare. Asked whether he had consulted those Democrats about the accuracy of the ad, Thompson said, `It's accurate.' ''

Exactly.

This is taxpayer advertising: $9.5 million on television; $3.1 million for newspaper, radio and Internet; and a mailing to 40 million seniors and persons with disabilities, all at taxpayers' expense to explain why this lousy bill is, in fact, good for them.

If I can go on for just a minute, when President Bush ran for office, he said our first priority will be to restore honor and dignity to the White House. But when you look at President Bush's top official in charge of Medicare getting issued a waiver to pursue employment in the health care industry while he continues to serve as administrator of Medicare, how can we call that honor and dignity? This confirms the worst of what people think about the way government is run.

When this first happened, I along with our colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark), wrote a letter to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tommy Thompson. A part of the letter says, ``For 7 months Members of Congress who relied on Mr. Scully for information were kept in the dark about the fact that he was actively engaged in looking for employment with firms that have significant interests in the issues at stake. Financial conflicts of interest are designed to assure Members of Congress, entities with interests pending before CMS, and the public that Federal executive branch employees are independent and unbiased in their behavior. While we strongly believe that this waiver should never have been granted, at a bare minimum knowledge of it would have been valuable to us in weighing the advice provided by Mr. Scully.''

This is just shameful. I think in order to restore the confidence that the American public should have in Members of Congress that we are operating in the public interest, in their interest, that when we come up with a bill, it is because it is going to help them get their prescription drugs, then we cannot allow this kind of behavior to continue. No waiver should be granted. An advertising campaign, paid for by the taxpayers, should not be allowed. If the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) takes this job with PhRMA, for 1 year he will not be able to lobby Members of Congress and staffers, but he can still lobby the executive branch,

the people that are writing all the regulations that have to do with implementing this particular piece of legislation that he crafted behind a locked door. I think that this notion of restoring honor and dignity to the White House, that is an important goal; but that goal has been undercut and betrayed by this administration and the conduct by the chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

I am, Mr. Speaker, in its present form.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

I rise today with the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Loretta Sanchez) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) to offer this motion to recommit on behalf of our brave soldiers and their families and veterans across the country. My motion to recommit would provide basic protections to financially distressed military families and veterans from the harsher aspects of the means test found in the newly added text of S. 1920. This motion would provide safe harbor from the bill's means test for military and veterans' families and safe harbor for the widows of our servicewomen and men.

Without changing the bill, military personnel, veterans and their families could be dragged into court by their creditors. They could be harassed because of an arbitrary standard, the means test, that has no true reflection of whether they can pay their debt or not. The men and women who in the past have and do today risk their lives to protect us deserve protection from us in return. We should be offering them relief, not greater hardships.

Since 9/11, 350,000 reservists and guardsmen have been called to active duty and almost 40,000 are serving in Iraq. According to the National Guard, four out of 10 members of the Reserves and National Guard lose money when they leave their civilian jobs for active duty. Additionally, many left for the war thinking they would be deployed for 6 months and have ended up staying for a year or even longer. There is almost no way that they could have financially anticipated and prepared for that extension of their service.

We want to help people like Mrs. Vicky Wessel. When she appeared on ``60 Minutes'' last year, she expressed the concerns that many families of reservists whose husbands or wives have been called to active duty experience. What she talked about was the financial difficulty. She said, ``It is because a staff sergeant's pay is a 60 percent cut in pay from my husband's regular job.''

There are thousands of families like the Wessels. Make no mistake about it, these families will not be protected under the bill as it stands. These are people who, through no fault of their own, may end up in bankruptcy. They are risking their lives for us. And the veterans who have done so in the past, we should protect them. This is what my motion to recommit does.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Loretta Sanchez).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland).

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, it gives me such great honor and pleasure to join in support of this resolution in memory and to celebrate the life of former Senator Paul Simon who was my friend and my mentor and my Senator and my role model.

Paul Simon was unique. He was the real thing, though. When we look at him with his bow tie and his suit, he was an authentic person. And those who might make the mistake of kind of relegating Paul Simon to the kind of politician of the past, that would be wrong. Paul Simon, although he had that kind of almost old-fashioned gentlemanly way about him, was someone who we can learn a lot from today. He had incredible courage. The thing that Paul Simon really understood was that it is not only important for your own personal integrity to stand up for your beliefs, but that it was also really good politics.

Paul Simon his whole life was an opponent of the death penalty, not always a popular issue in the State of Illinois; and it is an issue that inspired a lot of hot feelings about that. And yet people who would disagree with him on that or, like me, who disagreed with him on the Balanced Budget Amendment pretty strongly, nonetheless often would come up to Senator Paul Simon and say, you know, Senator, I do not agree with you on this or that, or even, I do not agree with you on most things, but I trust you. I am going to vote for you. I admire the way that you stand up for the State of Illinois and for the things that you believe in. It would be wonderful if more of us would do that.

I went to Iowa. We just finished the Iowa primaries. I went to Iowa for a month for Paul Simon in 1988 and, by the end, of course, everybody could say the speech with him. I could just hear that voice saying, the United States is a great country, but we can be an even better country. And he believed that so much. His desire, as he stated it: I wanted to do something where I could continue to contribute. I did not get into office just because I wanted a title; I wanted to get something meaningful done, and he did. He continued to do that. That is so true. He did not just want to be something; he wanted to do something.

So when he retired from being in the Senate, he continued in his role at Southern Illinois University and all the while prodding all of us. We heard mention of those personal notes. He wrote a book called ``Tapped Out,'' dealing with the water crisis around the world; and he really wanted me to get involved in that. He would write me letters. Then he sent me the book. He said, now look, your name is in the forward of the book. It said, to someone who is going to be working on this issue. I knew what he was saying to me: you better work on this issue; you are in my book.

Paul, I am going to be working on that issue and so many more where you forged the path.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bring attention to the hard work of some of our nation's oldest service organizations to improve global health. As described in a December 7, 2003 Washington Post article titled ``Service Clubs Living Up to Mission,'' Rotary International, Lions Club International and Kiwanis International have each conunitted themselves to bettering the quality of life for people around the world.

I represent the city of Chicago where Rotary International, our oldest service organization, was founded and Evanston where it is currently headquartered. The organization, in the early 1980s, made a commitment to eradicate polio and immunize children against infectious diseases. Rotarians have exceeded all expectations. Through the years, Rotary International has given $500 million to the polio-eradication effort and has sent thousands of volunteers abroad to work on the campaign. Partly based on the strength and success of Rotary International's campaign, the World Health Organization announced its intent to eradicate polio worldwide. I commend the commitment that Rotary International and its members continue to make to improving world health.

Lions Club International, which was also founded in Chicago, has spent the last decade working to reduce blindness worldwide. Over the last decade, this organization has spent $148 million on sight- preservation projects in 79 countries; it has funded more than 550 grants in 78 countries targeting the main causes of blindness.

Rotary International and Lions Club International paved the way for Kiwanis International's decision in 1991 to coordinate an organization- wide campaign to reduce the amount of iodine deficiency, which causes developmental delays, worldwide. The organization has pledged to raise $75 million dollars towards the effort, and has already delivered $57 million.

Rotary International, Lions Club International and The Kiwanis have demonstrated that we have the ability to make real change in the lives of people around the world. While I look forward to supporting the efforts of these amazing service organizations, I hope that Congress and the Administration will also increase efforts to meet those goals. Mr. Speaker, I would like to commit the article from the Washington Post into the Record, and ask my fellow colleagues to take a moment to read it.

[From the Washington Post, Dec. 7, 2003]

Service Clubs Living Up to Mission

Rotary, Lions and Kiwanis at Front of Global War Against Disease

(By David Brown)

Lunch is over, and the Rotary Club of Washington, D.C., is

taking coffee when Susan O'Neal starts her slide presentation

about the trip she and 65 other Rotarians took to India,

where they helped hand out oral polio vaccine to ragtag

children in a New Delhi slum.

She explains that the vaccine, taken in two drops of fluid,

grows in the intestine and is excreted by the body for a few

weeks while immunity builds up. She then clicks on a slide of

an open sewer.

``You can see how it's rather easy for people to get fecal

microbes on their hands,'' O'Neal says. ``In fact, even

though only 93 percent of children on average get vaccinated

in a campaign, the other 7 percent get immunized through the

feces in the environment.''

A groan briefly mixes with the tinkling of glassware as the

Rotarians settle in for the latest dispatch from their

organization's 15-year campaign to eradicate polio, the

leading cause of childhood paralysis.

This scene at the Hotel Washington recently is not one that

George F. Babbitt, the title character of Sinclair Lewis's

1922 novel, would easily recognize. A small-minded resident

of a fictional American city, Babbitt belonged to a Rotary-

like organization called the Boosters Club. Lewis lampooned

it as little more than institutionalized selfishness, and his

unflattering picture still lingers in the American psyche.

That may be the reason so few people know that the heirs of

Babbitt's Boosters--not only in Rotary but also in two other

large clubs like it--are now major players in the global

fight against disease. They are engaged in arduous and

thankless campaigns against ailments that have largely

disappeared from the places where their members live.

Since 1988, Rotary International has contributed $500

million and sent thousands of volunteers to work on the polio

campaign. The club is second only to the U.S. government in

the amount of money it has poured into the effort to

eradicate a human disease for only the second time in

history.

In 1994, Kiwanis International adopted as its cause the

elimination of iodine deficiency, the biggest cause of

preventable mental retardation in the world. Since then, the

club has provided more than $50 million to help ensure that

all salt used in food contains iodine.

Lions Clubs International, once famous for collecting and

recycling used eyeglasses, spent $148 million over the past

decade on sight-preservation projects in 79 countries. It

plays an important role in a river-blindness campaign in

Africa, has trained 14,000 ophthalmic workers in India and

helped pay for 2.1 million cataract operations in 104 rural

counties in China, where last year it became the only Western

``service club'' allowed to establish chapters.

The contributions of these clubs, however, go well beyond

money. Over the past decade they have essentially created a

new species of nongovernmental organization.

Unlike many medical charities in the developing world,

these are not small cadres of overworked, self-sacrificing

idealists. Instead, they are vast, permanent networks of well

connected people willing to put in small amounts of time--

often in the form of lobbying and consciousness-raising--

against a few targeted diseases.

``Their contribution goes way beyond pretty important. I

believe that eradication of polio would not have been

feasible without the participation of Rotary International,''

said R. Bruce Aylward, a Canadian physician who is the World

Health Organization's coordinator for the Global Polio

Eradication Initiative.

``Kiwanis is signed up indefinitely, not for donating money

but for raising their voice if they see any backsliding,''

said Frits van der Haar, a Dutch nutritionist who heads the

Network for Sustained Elimination of Iodine Deficiency.

``Outsiders like Kiwanis are the watchdogs. They see that the

work is done well and continues to get done.''

In the river-blindness campaign, Merck & Co. provides the

drug ivermectin and Lions Clubs International pays to train

African villagers to dispense it. The ``barefoot doctor''

strategy that has evolved from the program may become a model

for other medical programs in places with few health

professionals, said Moses Katabarwa, a Ugandan epidemiologist

and anthropologist.

``The Lions, they have triggered off a process in which

there is no reverse,'' said Katabarwa, who recently moved to

the United States to work on river blindness with the Carter

Center in Atlanta.

The three clubs came to their work independently, tracing

similar paths from their origins as social organizations for

midwestern businessmen.

Rotary, the oldest, was founded in Chicago in 1905. Kiwanis

(whose name is a shortened form of an Indian phrase meaning

``we trade'') began in Detroit in 1915. The first Lions Club

formed in Chicago two years later.

All made charitable works in their communities part of

their mission. The Lions chose blindness prevention as a

theme in 1925 when 45-year-old Helen Keller challenged them

to become ``knights of the blind in this crusade against

darkness.'' All eventually opened clubs on other continents.

In the early 1980s, several Rotary leaders proposed

beginning an organization-wide project separate from local

efforts. ``This was contrary to the beginnings of Rotary and

was also contrary to the feelings of a lot of senior

Rotarians,'' recalled William T. Sergeant, who at age 84

heads Rotary's polio activities. But the idea took hold.

At the suggestion of Albert Sabin, inventor of the oral

polio vaccine, Rotary chose as its goal universal

immunization of children

against polio and several other infectious diseases. In 1986,

it decided to support the effort through 2005, the club's

centennial year. It did not envisage eradicating polio.

A two-year campaign brought in more than twice as much

money as expected--$247 million, not $120 million. Partly on

the strength of that support, the World Health Organization

in 1988 announced its intent to rid the world of polio. A

WHO-led effort had previously eradicated smallpox in a

campaign lasting from 1966 to 1980.

``A lot of people have very ambitious ideas, but almost

nobody has the funding to kickstart a global initiative,''

Aylward said. ``Rotary was the Gates Foundation of 1988.''

But eradication has proved more difficult than anyone

anticipated. The target date was originally 2000; it is now

2005. The extra time required more money. Earlier this year,

Rotary completed a second fundraising campaign, which raised

$111 million--again more than the target, which was $80

million. The club's contributions. including interest, now

total more than $500 million.

Lions Clubs International, the world's largest service

club, decided to reorient much of its sight-saving efforts

after it held a symposium with experts in blindness

prevention in Singapore in 1989.

``We were astounded to hear that blindness was increasing,

particularly in the developing world,'' said Brian Stevenson,

a provincial judge in Alberta who had just finished a term as

Lions president. ``They told us there were 40 million blind

people in the world, and 32 million of the cases were or had

been treatable. So it gave us a lot of focus.''

Lions set a goal of $130 million but raised $147 million

for its SightFirst program. The organization has funded more

than 550 grants in 78 countries targeting the main causes of

blindness.

Kiwanis's entry into the global health arena was due in

part to the example of the two other clubs.

In 1991, William Foege, former head of the Centers for

Disease Control and Prevention, asked the Kiwanis president,

a physician named Wil Blechman, what the club was doing for

the world's children. Foege cited Rotary's polio work and

Lions' just-created SightFirst. While Kiwanis had urged local

clubs to have a charitable activity aimed at children younger

than 5, there was no organization-wide project.

``I will bring this to the attention of our board, because

I don't know at the moment,'' Blechman recalled answering

sheepishly.

The board discussed the idea and ultimately surveyed its

membership, which favored a global project 2 to 1. UNICEF

suggested a focus on iodine deficiency.

Iodine is an essential part of thyroid hormone, which in

turn is essential to brain development. In places where diets

contain insufficient iodine, generally because the soil

contains little and there is no seafood, the intelligence of

the entire population is shifted downward. In 1990, only 20

percent of the world's households consumed salt treated with

enough iodine to prevent deficiency.

UNICEF estimated the problem could be eliminated worldwide

in five years for $50 million to $75 million. Kiwanis took

the challenge because it was important, concrete and

``something we thought we could handle,'' Blechman said.

The organization pledged to raise $75 million and has

already contributed $57 million. The money pays for

iodization equipment for salt manufacturers and campaigns on

the importance of iodized salt.

Occasionally, members of service clubs do the work

themselves. Thousands of Rotarians, both local and foreign

volunteers, have participated in national immunization days

when vaccine is given to millions of children over a few

days.

Dave Groner, a 60-year-old funeral director in Dowagiac,

Mich., has led four groups of Rotarians to India and one to

Nigeria. Next month, he will take 14 people, 10 of them

nurses, to Niger. They will all pay their own way--about

$3,000 each. ``We've never been asked to not work or to get

lost,'' he said.

Occasionally, club members play a role nobody else can.

Angola has a single Rotary Club, 32 people who meet in the

capital, Luanda. They are led by Sylvia Nagy, who with her

husband owns a foundry. In 1997, a 25-year civil war, which

ended last year with the death of rebel leader Jonas Savimbi,

was underway. There had not been a vaccination campaign in

the rebel-held half of the country in years.

Nagy, along with representatives of WHO and UNICEF,

negotiated a truce so immunization days could be held in June

that year. Rotary rented planes, boats and four-wheel-drive

vehicles to deliver vaccine, and disbursed $4 million to far-

flung vaccinators. About 2.5 million children were

vaccinated.

On Sept. 2, Angola marked its second year without a single

case of polio.