Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 4044, the National Guard and Reservists Debt Relief Act of 2008, a bill I am proud to have authored. Since September 11, 2008, more than 460,000 Reservists and members of the National Guard have been called to active duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. These courageous men and women have selflessly left their families and their jobs to fight for our country on the battlefield, often with little or no notice and no time to prepare for the financial challenges that their deployments will present.

In April 2005, the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Act made it harder for individuals to discharge their debts in bankruptcy. That legislation requires debtors who file for bankruptcy to submit to a means test that assesses their eligibility for bankruptcy protection. H.R. 4044 would exempt members of the National Guard and Reserves facing bankruptcy as a result of their service from that means test.

When the changes to bankruptcy law were made, Congress understood the importance of exempting disabled veterans whose debts were incurred while they were on active duty from means testing. However, the men and women of the National Guard and Reserves were left out; their sacrifice was disregarded. That is why I introduced this legislation with my friend and colleague Congressman Dana Rohrabacher. Those heroes returning from active service in the Guard and Reserves deserve the same flexibility.

H.R. 4044 allows members of the National Guard and Reservists to file for Chapter 7 without the added paperwork burden and obstacles of the means test. The bill would apply to our citizen soldiers who have served in the armed forces for more than 90 days since 9/11 and would grant them an exemption from the test for up to a year and a half after they return home. It also requires a Government Accountability Office report which will help us quantify the hardships our veterans face when they return home by tracking how many apply for bankruptcy protection.

Many members of the Guard and Reserves leave for the war thinking they will only be deployed for 6 to 12 months and end up getting their tours involuntarily extended. One quarter of those soldiers have been deployed more than once. There is almost no way that they can anticipate or prepare for that extension of their service financially.

According to the National Guard, forty percent of Reservists and members of the National Guard lose money when they leave their civilian jobs for active duty. This is especially true for servicemembers who own and operate small businesses who put their businesses on hold while they serve thousands of miles away.

Now Reservists and National Guardsmen and women are coming home to a weak economy and record unemployment levels. Eighteen percent of recently separated servicemembers are currently unemployed. They are disproportionately feeling the pinch of record gas prices, housing foreclosures, and food costs.

We have all heard from constituent servicemembers who have returned home to find their families in financial disarray. Many reservists took a pay cut from their regular jobs to serve overseas; others find that when they are discharged, if they can find work, they are returning home to lower salaries--in many instances, lower than their combat pay. Twenty five percent of servicemembers retuning from Iraq or Afghanistan earn less than $25,000 a year. Some veterans are driven to homelessness--the VA estimates that there are 1,500 homeless veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The means test has a particularly adverse impact on servicemembers. Most servicemembers receive higher compensation in the form of combat pay and have fewer expenses while serving abroad, but upon leaving service they face lower incomes and higher expenses. Because the means test factors in a person's income and expenses for the six-month period preceding the bankruptcy filing, a veteran's income is artificially inflated and expenses are inaccurately low. As a result, veterans risk having their chapter 7 case dismissed and being forced to file under the stricter chapter 13.

The men and women of the National Guard and Reserves have risked their lives to protect us. If servicemembers, through no fault of their own, end up in bankruptcy, they deserve protection from Congress. This bill brings us one step closer to providing them with financial relief when they come home from their service.

I would like to offer my heartfelt thanks to Chairman Conyers and Subcommittee Chairwoman Linda Sanchez for their commitment to and work on this bill and to the minority Committee Members for working with us to find a compromise and get this bill on the floor today. And again, I thank my colleague Congressman Rohrabacher, whose passion and persistence on this issue have made him a wonderful ally.

I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I thank him for his leadership. I also want to thank Energy and Commerce Chair John Dingell and the Health Subcommittee Chairman Frank Pallone, as well as Chairmen Rangel and Stark of the Ways and Means Committee for their continued leadership.

Last year, we passed the CHAMP bill to prevent a 10.6 percent cut in payments to Medicare providers and to make critical improvements, and today we are trying again. This bill would prevent physician payment cuts in 2008 and provide an increase in 2009. And, something of particular concern to me, it would address the cuts to mental health providers that have already taken place.

While we need to do more, we have to act now. And there are many, many reasons to support the passage of this bill. It provides mental health parity. It expands access to low-income assistance for seniors and people with disability struggling to pay their health care costs. It extends the moratorium on physical therapy caps. It eliminates cuts to oxygen treatment and wheelchairs. It postpones competitive bidding for durable medical equipment. On the diabetes front, it includes a 2- year reauthorization of the special diabetes program, prompt pay requirements for pharmacies, and on and on.

If you think it is more important to continue excess payments to private Medicare Advantage plans, plans that are getting 13 percent more than Medicare, you should vote no. In 2008, this meant that Medicare Advantage plans saw a 6 percent increase, while physicians are scheduled for a 10.6 percent cut. Next year, Medicare Advantage plans will see between a 5 and 7 percent increase, while physicians are scheduled for a 5 percent cut. But if you think it is more important to prevent Medicare cuts to physicians and providers and to help senior citizens and persons with disabilities, then you will vote yes.

I hope that all my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will make the right choice. I hope you will side with Medicare physicians and their patients and pass H.R. 6331.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to oppose H.R. 6304, the FISA Amendments Act.

Among the casualties of the ``war on terror'' has been the guarantee of civil liberties and right to privacy of American citizens upon which our nation was founded. Time and again, throughout his Presidency, George Bush has shown absolute indifference to the Constitution and the principles upon which it stands.

This disregard for the Constitution was never clearer than last summer when President Bush signed into law the Protect America Act, which I opposed then and continue to oppose to this day, a law that gave the President unprecedented authority to spy on Americans.

As Congress began to consider new legislation, I had hoped that we could reach a compromise that strikes the right balance between protecting the rights of individual Americans and protecting our nation's security. Like all of my colleagues in Congress, I believe that our nation must aggressively pursue terrorist targets in the United States and abroad. However, I know the United States is capable of doing so within a framework that respects the Constitution of the United States.

Many provisions within this bill are an improvement over the Protect America Act, especially the provision on exclusively, which affirms that the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) is the exclusive means to conduct electronic surveillance of Americans for the purpose of foreign intelligence collection.

However, I believe firmly that the bill before us today does not do enough to protect the privacy rights of individual Americans and therefore I cannot in good conscience vote for its passage. Here are some of the problems with the bill before us today:

H.R. 6304 contains an ``exigent circumstances'' loophole that permits the Administration to conduct surveillance on Americans without getting a warrant for up to seven days every time ``intelligence important to the national security of the US may be lost or not timely acquired.'' The problem with language this open-ended is that an Administration, like the Bush Administration, can use this language as an invitation to repeatedly spy on

Americans without a court order and in each case claim that circumstances demanded it.

Secondly, while H.R. 6304 contains a general prohibition on ``reverse'' targeting, it lacks clear statuary directives about when the government should return to the FISA court and obtain a warrant. Reverse targeting refers to the possibility that the Government will try to subvert FISA by wiretapping someone overseas, when the real target is an American with whom that foreign person is communicating. As is the case with the exigent circumstances provision, this open- ended language leaves the law vulnerable to misuse by an Administration.

Lastly, the retroactive immunity language in Title II virtually ensures the dismissal of all cases pending against the telecommunications companies that facilitated warrantless wiretapping over the last seven years. This violates the fundamental American principle that people are entitled to their day in court, and that the courts, not Congress, should decide whether people were injured by the illegal acts of others. It is unacceptable for Congress to protect private companies from lawsuits filed by people the may have harmed through illegal actions.

Ultimately, I believe that the President has presented Congress with a false choice. Ever since September 11, the Bush Administration has put forward the idea that Congress must choose between the liberties we cherish and the security we demand. I disagree wholeheartedly with this premise. The Congress can and must take stronger steps to protect the civil liberties of ever American, to do anything less is simply contrary to everything for which this country has stood.

I would like to close by reading a quote from Benjamin Franklin. Though delivered centuries ago, it remains salient to today's debate. He said ``Those Who Sacrifice Liberty For Security Deserve Neither.''

I urge my colleagues to consider Benjamin Franklin's views as they vote today.

Thank you, Congresswoman Watson, for organizing this and allowing me to participate tonight. I also want to thank our colleague, Representative Conyers, for his long-time passionate leadership on universal health care. I don't know if he is going to get here tonight, but he certainly has been a steady and consistent voice for health care and health care reform. Thanks to his efforts and that of so many others, I believe we are on the brink of accomplishing this long-awaited goal, and that this time we will be successful in providing affordable, guaranteed health coverage for all Americans.

When I first ran for office in 1990 for the State legislature, I proclaimed that as my goal in public service, that one day to be able to contribute to the victory of allowing all Americans to receive health coverage. I have always felt that this richest nation in the world, that it is a shame and really an embarrassment that Americans, unlike citizens and residents of every other industrialized nation in the world, that we don't make health care accessible to all of our citizens. It is unacceptable and in many ways un-American. It is not in the tradition of our country, which is to take care of each other.

There are lots of people across the country who are ready to make this fight. Another one of the heroes I wanted to highlight tonight is my friend and until recently when he retired from active practice my physician, my personal physician, Dr. Quentin Young of Chicago. Quentin Young was the chairman of medicine at Cook County Hospital. He was the president of the American Public Health Association. He is a founder of Health and Medicine Policy Research Group in Chicago, and a co-founder of the Physicians For a National Health Program. And in each of his roles, expanding access to quality health care has been his top priority. He is one of the most articulate and passionate and consistent long-term spokespeople for single payer health care in our country, for providing affordable, comprehensive and quality health care for all.

And as Dr. Young frequently says, ``We feel universal health care is no longer the best answer, it is the only answer. There was a time when there were alternatives that might have worked, but that day is passed.''

He goes on to say, ``I certainly think it is attainable. It has been attained in certain countries that aren't very different from us. I totally come down on the side of health care being a human right. It is very hard for me to see a coherent let alone a moral or decent argument against it because illness doesn't distribute itself according to the ability to care for yourself and be cared for. It strikes children. It strikes the poor. It strikes the most needy, and the most ill-protected disproportionately. That is the correlation.''

Cardinal Bernardin, also from Chicago, a hero on health care, said it best. He said, ``Health care is so important to human life and dignity that it is the responsibility of society to offer access to decent health care to every person.''

And I was pleased that he didn't say every citizen. He said every person. So the answer is that it should be considered a right guaranteed by society, which means it must be a responsibility of government.

And as we enter this new round of discussions, more and more people and organizations have come to agree with Dr. Young and John Conyers' conclusions. New coalitions have formed, including small and big businesses, consumer and labor groups, providers and the faith community, and organizations representing people with disabilities and living with chronic diseases. The time has come for action.

In 2002, the Institutes of Medicine estimated that 18,000 people a year died because they were uninsured. They were unable to afford preventive services, screenings that would have provided early warnings, prescription drugs or medical care. Today the Urban Institute estimates that annual death from uninsurance are up to 22,000 people every year. That is 432 people each week, 60 people each and every day who die because the United States of America alone in the industrialized world does not guarantee affordable health care to our people. It is a horrendous statistic.

But it is only a partial description of the catastrophes we face. Our health care system is becoming completely dysfunctional for patients and for those who care for them.

Even being covered by insurance is no guarantee. The Commonwealth Fund has just released a new study that concludes between 2003 and 1997, the number of uninsured Americans grew by 60 percent. There are now 25 million insured people who could face financial catastrophe if they become sick or injured.

Consider this: One in five Americans under the age of 65, many of them insured, live with medical debt. I say under 65 because many people are waiting for that birthday, can't wait to get there because then finally Medicare, a national health insurance for people over 65 and those with disabilities who qualify, do get health care.

Medical bills are the leading cause of about half of all personal bankruptcies. High deductibles and co-pays, limits on payments, denials of needed care, all of these shift burdens to individuals and families who are already struggling. These numbers are staggering, and it's a national shame that while spending 50 percent more than any other country in the world on health care, we fall so dismally short in providing a health care guarantee.

But it's also important to remember that behind each number is a person, our friends, our neighbors, our family, our colleagues, ourselves; people like the Wells family from Illinois, who accumulated over $175,000 in medical expenses while waiting for their employer's 6- month waiting period for coverage to expire.

Or Susan, who can't afford the tests her doctor wants her to have to deal with her high blood pressure; or Constance, who moved back to Illinois to care for a family member and can't find a job that provides affordable benefits.

I want to close by saying that winning the fight for guaranteed health care for all is not just the right thing to do, it's the smart thing to do. Too many potential entrepreneurs are locked into jobs that provide health care, unable to leave and create new businesses that keep our economy strong and provide new jobs.

Too many businesses that are providing coverage for their workers are competitively disadvantaged because their foreign competitors operate in countries with national health care. They too want us to get it together and adopt universal health care.

So, again, I want to thank Congresswoman Watson and again, I want to thank Congressman Conyers for his leadership.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5669, the Poison Center Support, Enhancement, and Awareness Act of 2008, and I thank the bill's sponsor, Congressman Towns, for his leadership on this issue. I also want to thank Chairman Pallone and Chairman Dingell for working to bring this bill before us today.

The poison control centers program has proven to be a very successful program for communities across the country, by providing a national toll-free number for poison emergencies, a national media campaign to promote the use of poison centers, and a poison prevention grant program.

In my district alone, the Illinois Poison Center handled 7,021 cases last year. Statewide, 51 percent of the calls the Illinois Poison Center handled involved children under the age of 5. I just can't imagine what families would do without this tremendous resource. Surely, this legislation which will reauthorize this program through 2014 and increase its total authorization to $37.5 million annually will be money well spent.

Not only do poison centers save lives, they save time and resources by cost avoidance for patients who are cared for in their homes as

opposed to visiting a hospital and by reducing lengths of stay for patients who are cared for by a poison control center prior to arriving at a hospital.

Again, I thank the bill's sponsor and our Chairmen for their work on this legislation, and I urge my colleagues to give H.R. 5669 their support.

I'd like to thank Chairman Skelton for working with me on my amendment to prohibit private security contractors from performing inherently governmental functions in combat areas, and for offering his support.

We've all heard about the violent incidents involving private security contractors injuring and killing civilians in Iraq and elsewhere. This is a systemic problem that exists because private employees are currently being tasked with extremely sensitive jobs like gathering intelligence and providing armed security.

And it is a systematic problem that private contractors do not wear the badge of the United States, are clearly not part of the chain of command, are not subject to the same accountability that those who are employed with the badge of the United States, and that those contractors have often damaged the credibility of our military and harmed our relationship with the Iraqi government.

We want to show the American people and the Iraqis, that there are inherently governmental functions that will only be performed by people in the U.S. military or our U.S. Government personnel.

I urge support for this entire bill and for this amendment.

Look, law enforcement is using videotaping because it not only is a matter of protection for the person that is being interrogated, but for the interrogator, him or herself, as well. There are rules that guide interrogations. Having those tapes is a safeguard that we can have to make sure that the rules of interrogation set down by the Department of Defense will protect those people as well. If they need to be disguised in some way, I believe that the amendment would allow for that. This is to protect both the interrogator and the one who is being interrogated.

Thank you so much, Congresswoman Clarke, for convening us tonight for this Special Order dealing with our close friend and a great friend of the United States, and that's our neighbor Haiti.

I first went to Haiti in January of 2003. And I went with the RFK Foundation, Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Foundation, and Ethel Kennedy was on that trip, to give an award to Partners in Health Clinic on the Central Plateau of Haiti. It's actually the one that was featured recently on ``60 Minutes'' where you saw Dr. David Walton, who actually comes from my district; Dr. Paul Farmer; Loune Viaud, who is the director of that clinic, serving people on the very poor Central Plateau of Haiti. And I have to tell you I think it was Representative Green who said his first trip he was thunderstruck. That's a good word for it. You get on the plane in Miami and you start reading the newspaper, and before you've even finished reading it, you're landing in the poorest country in our hemisphere.

But let's be clear. This is a country with beautiful and brave and hard-working people. This is a country where some of our colleagues of a certain age may have even gone for their honeymoon. This is a tropical island in the Caribbean with so much potential and such beautiful people and such incredible poverty.

I went again to Haiti in 2006 with Wyclef Jean, a son of Haiti and a musical artist who has created a foundation called Yele Haiti, who's hard at work right now in providing food for the people of Haiti.

So we can talk about the crisis first. There is a horrible hunger crisis in Haiti. They started out poor. They started out malnourished when these food prices went up so high. And in fact, the average daily requirement for calories is about 2,100 calories per day. In Haiti it's 460 calories below that as the average. So you know some people are eating more than their 2,100 and lots of people are eating less.

I implore parents who may be listening to us tonight to think about what kind of desperation it might take to feed your child to quench the hunger in their belly a mud cake, a mud cake, a cake literally made out of mud with a little flour in it, because you can't stand to leave that tiny stomach hungry. It's just more than one can even bear to think how one gets to that point.

And so the high price of food and the hunger crisis has begun riots in Haiti. There have been some political ramifications, and the United States has to some important extent responded. We're sending money. We're sending food. And all of this is really, really important.

But the other thing I found out in Haiti is that it's not just oh, poor, Haiti, we need to do more. The fact of the matter is, and I am embarrassed to say, is that the United States of America has had its heel on the neck of the country of Haiti and has actually been part of the problem that we are facing today.

Over the past 7 years, the Bush administration has absolutely turned a blind eye and has, in fact, actively stopped the Inter-American Development Bank from releasing loans to Haiti for projects on water and health and education and rural roads, the kinds of things that would actually make Haiti self-sustainable. Through the U.S. Treasury, the Bush administration officials, and this is all about ideology and politics, have repeatedly held back vital loans for Haiti in an attempt to force political change in Haiti, actions in direct violation of the Inter-American Development Bank charter, IDB.

In e-mails released in response to a Freedom of Information request, Treasury Department employees repeatedly discuss how to ``slow'' the release of loans to Haiti. In a Treasury Department e-mail in 2001, this employee stated that the loans would be released based on ``our assessment of progress on reaching a comprehensive political settlement.'' That is, a settlement to the liking of the United States of America.

In another shocking e-mail, a Treasury lawyer reveals just how deliberately they were working to stop the loans from being released to Haiti, despite the great need. Bruce Juba, Special Counsel, wrote: ``While this is not a 'bullet-proof' way to stop IDB disbursements, it certainly will put a few more large rocks in the road.''

It is astounding and unacceptable that the entire time that the Bush administration has talked about helping poor Haiti, they have been working behind the scenes to put ``rocks in the road'' to Haiti's development. By 2002 the Bush administration's plan to block the loans to Haiti by slowing them down has succeeded. Haiti fell into arrears long enough to trigger an Inter-American Development Bank policy that prevents the bank from releasing the loans when arrears have accumulated for too long. Success.

Instead of receiving the vital loans for public projects, loans that could have helped bring thousands out of poverty, reduced water-borne diseases, and aided in long-term development, the Bush administration successfully cut off Haiti's IDB funding in an effort to push Aristide out of power.

The United States has been directly involved in Haiti's food crisis in another way. The U.S. has forced Haiti to open its market to our subsidized crops, decimating the ability of Haitian farmers to compete. Thirty years ago Haiti raised nearly all of the rice it needed. It was exporting sugar. But because of U.S. intervention, Haiti is now reliant on food imports for survival. The International Monetary Fund forced Haiti to open its market to U.S. rice first in 1986 as a condition for loans, making it impossible for Haitian farmers to compete with subsidized U.S. rice. Then in 1994, as a condition for U.S. assistance in returning to Haiti to resume his elected presidency, Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced by the U.S., the IMF, and the World Bank to open up the markets in Haiti even more.

So, look, if we want to do more than put a temporary Band-Aid on the developing food crisis in Haiti, we're going to have to do more than allocate money for emergency food relief. We're going to need to recognize how forcing poor countries to open their markets to our heavily subsidized crops cripples their ability to sustain themselves.

As President Lula of Brazil said when he was visiting Haiti recently, ``Rich countries need to reduce farm subsidies and trade barriers to allow poor countries to generate income with food exports. Either the world solves the unfair trade system or every time there's unrest in Haiti, we adopt emergency measures and send a little bit of food to temporarily ease hunger.''

You talked about the level of unemployment in Haiti. Well, a number of these people are rural people who are at least sustaining themselves. Even if they weren't exporting food, the country was able to provide the rice and the beans that it needed to sustain itself.

So we need to have a sane and rational policy when it comes to Haiti, a policy of friendship to this country in our hemisphere, not a policy that cripples Haiti's ability to actually flourish. We have a huge responsibility here for the hunger that's going on here now, and we should understand that and not just feel so good about our ourselves when we send food aid to Haiti, which, of course, we should do and we should do even more of.

So I appreciate the opportunity to join you tonight, Congresswoman Clarke. I appreciate your leadership as a new Member of Congress. I so welcome your leadership on this issue and just want to offer my support in absolutely any way that I can so that we can be a good neighbor to Haiti and to the rest of the developing world.

Thank you for allowing me to speak tonight.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 1124) expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that there should be established a National Brain Tumor Awareness Month, and for other purposes, as amended.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I want to express my gratitude to Chairman Dingell for his support in bringing this resolution to the floor today. I want to also thank Congressman Roskam for his support and cosponsorship of this resolution.

For me, the heart and soul behind the effort to establish a Brain Tumor

Awareness Month has been the Lori Arquilla Andersen Foundation, which is in my home district in Illinois.

Many of us have been touched by cancer, my family included. But when Linda Magiera lost her precious daughter, Lori, to brain cancer in 2005, she made sure to continue her daughter's passion for life and desire to help others by creating the Lori Arquilla Andersen Foundation in her name.

Lori was diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme stage 4 brain cancer, one of the most deadly, at the age of 33, just 3 months after her wedding. She passed away 22 months to the day after her first of five surgeries.

I am told by those who knew her that Lori was always upbeat, positive, courageous, and smiling. The Lori Arquilla Andersen Foundation has exemplified that energy over the past years. They have made important strides in increasing awareness and raising funds for brain tumor research, but they are also responsible for bringing the issues that are important to the brain tumor community as well as this resolution to my attention.

While the Andersen Foundation has managed to put a face on these issues for me, the larger brain tumor community has also done incredible work over the past decade. They have worked tirelessly to support people with brain tumors and their families, raise awareness of the disease and its effects, and to attain resolutions from governors, State legislators, city councils, and mayors in support of establishing a Brain Tumor Awareness Month in May. Today, we take one giant step forward in advancing their cause. And it won't be a moment too soon.

Over 44,500 people in the United States are diagnosed with a primary brain tumor in the brain or spine each year; and among children, brain tumors are the second most common cancer and comprise approximately 25 percent of all pediatric cancers. Although less prevalent than other cancers such as lung, breast, or prostate cancer, brain tumors are in no way trivial for those who have them. Because they are located in the ``control center,'' the thought, memory, emotion, sensation, and movement, brain tumors have serious and at times devastating effects on the lives of patients and their families. Brain tumors can change an individual's personality, their ability to communicate, and their ability to walk or see.

Unfortunately, with over 126 different kinds of primary brain tumors, the development of effective treatments is uncommonly complicated.

The 5-year survival rate following the diagnosis of a primary malignant brain tumor is about 30 percent. However, the average survival rate for patients with glioblastomas is less than 5 percent, and most survive for only 6 to 12 months. We must continue to work towards finding a cure for this terrible disease.

Strong support for ongoing research is the answer, and increased awareness is the first step in getting there. I'm so pleased to be making progress on this resolution today. And with the recent Race For Hope which was held on Sunday, March 4, here in Washington, DC, and raised $1.62 million for brain tumor research, it is certainly timely.

Again, I want to thank Chairman Dingell and his staff for their hard work in bringing this resolution to the floor.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for his support. It seems that we have something in common. My daughter-in-law passed away from a secondary brain tumor as well, so I appreciate the special meaning that this has for you personally, and for your support for this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 1022) reducing maternal mortality both at home and abroad, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the resolution under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of House Resolution 1022, which is aimed at reducing maternal mortality, both at home and abroad. As an original cosponsor of this resolution and a member of the Women's Caucus, I am proud to speak out in support of its passage.

This week begins an entire week of maternal mortality awareness events. During this week, women from abroad will provide firsthand accounts of horrific maternal health challenges they've faced. Globally, it is estimated that 15 percent of pregnancies and child births involve unpredictable and often life-threatening complications that require emergency care. What makes this statistic so staggering is that nearly all of these situations are preventable.

Even more astounding is the fact that the United States ranks a staggering 41st among 171 countries in a United Nations list ranking infant mortality. We can and we must do a better job.

The resolution before us affirms our commitment to promoting maternal mortality and child survival, both at home and abroad. It also recognizes that maternal health is fundamental to the well-being of families and societies.

I want to thank my colleagues, Congresswoman Lois Capps, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and the rest of the Congressional Women's Caucus for their leadership on this issue, and I urge my colleagues to join me in support of its adoption.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 369) supporting the goals and ideals of National Osteoporosis Awareness and Prevention Month, as amended.

I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the resolution under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I rise today in support of House Resolution 369, supporting the goals and ideals of National Osteoporosis Awareness and Prevention Month. As a cosponsor of this resolution, I'm proud to offer my support for designating May 2008 as National Osteoporosis Awareness and Prevention Month.

Osteoporosis is a disease characterized by low bone mass, structural deterioration of bone, and increased susceptibility to fractures. Osteoporosis is a leading cause of fractures, which is of special concern to the aging as it takes longer for older bones to heal than younger Americans. In 2005 alone, osteoporosis was responsible for an estimated 2 million fractures.

While osteoporosis is rightly associated with aging, bone health is a concern for people of all ages. In this spirit, House Resolution 369 urges everyone to observe appropriate activities with regard to osteoporosis and to talk with health care professionals about bone health.

I want to thank my colleague, Congresswoman Shelley Berkley, for her leadership in bringing this resolution to the floor today. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join me in support of its adoption.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield such time as she may consume to the sponsor of this resolution and someone who has been a great leader in bringing attention to the disease of osteoporosis, the gentlelady from Nevada, Shelley Berkley.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the support from the other side of the aisle, and I certainly appreciate the leadership of Congresswoman Berkley.

I, myself, a while ago was diagnosed with a pre-osteoporosis condition, and it's rewarding to find that if you take the medication and you do weight lifting kind of exercises that you can actually reverse the process. Now my screenings indicate that I no longer have those symptoms, although I continue to take the medication and do the exercises. So people should not see it as totally irreversible or untreatable in any way. But most of all, I think the emphasis on prevention is so very important.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the Rules chairwoman for yielding to me.

Fourteen million dollars in an hour, 24/7, over 5 years, $10 billion per month, 4,000 dead Americans, tens of thousands of wounded warriors, untold sacrifice of military families, innocent civilians in Iraq killed by the hundreds of thousands, and one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world. That is the cost of this war.

And do you know, the President says that he has sacrificed, too. Yes. He has sacrificed. He has given up golf.

And the President has determined to veto the bill when it gets to him because it includes really a patriot tax on people who make over $1 million. They are going to help to pay for things like an expanded GI Bill for our veterans that come back, a GI Bill that will cost about 5 months in Iraq over 10 years, and yet the President has said that he wants to----

Yes.

I take back my time.

We are talking about people who are making over $1 million to pay a small sacrifice for this war where our military families are paying a huge sacrifice.

The question really is, though, what are we doing there? What is the mission of our young men and women? Who is the enemy? Who is our ally? What does victory even look like?

I am not going to vote for another penny for this tragic war except to bring our troops home or to resolve the humanitarian crisis our government has helped create. I am not voting to give more to the real winners of this war, the Halliburtons and the Blackwaters. And I am disappointed about my amendment to stop funding Blackwater. This company raises the question, is it the policy of the United States to let companies like that get away with murder? We should cut that contract and bring our troops home.

Madam Speaker, every minute a woman somewhere in the world dies of pregnancy-related causes. This staggering fact is not a failure of science but rather a failure of conscience. The United States possesses the medical knowledge necessary to drastically reduce the number of women killed during pregnancy each year. What we lack is a commitment by our Government to make certain that medical resources are readily available to women throughout the world.

The United States can and most do more. To demonstrate just how attainable this goal is, I would like to bring my colleagues' attention to an interesting and inspiring piece published in The Washington Post on Sunday, May 11, that highlights the efforts of two remarkable individuals to address maternal mortality rates in Haiti. Working closely with the Haitian government, Paul Farmer, Ophelia Dahl, and their nonprofit organization Partners in Health, have succeeded in reducing the maternal mortality rate in Haiti to less than half what it was a quarter-century ago. I hope that this piece will not only serve as a reminder of the tremendous opportunity we have to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of pregnant women all over the world.

Keeping New Mothers Alive--In Haiti and Rwanda, Reducing Tragedy in

Childbirth

(By Paul Farmer and Ophelia Dahl)

``Obscene'' is still the word that comes to mind when we

think of maternal mortality--and it has been almost 25 years

since we first witnessed death in childbirth. In 1983, as

students in one of central Haiti's fetid clinics, we prepared

to celebrate a birth. Although we'd just met the young woman

about to become a mother, her desperate expression as she

began to hemorrhage haunts us still. National statistics

could have predicted the outcome: A 1985 survey pegged

Haitian maternal mortality at 1,400 deaths per 100,000 live

births. By comparison, maternal mortality in the United

States last year was 14 deaths per 100,000 live births.

Worldwide, 500,000 women die in childbirth every year; more

than 90 percent live in Africa or Asia, and almost all are

poor by any standard. Obscene though it is, death during

childbirth isn't the end of the story. In the world's poorest

areas, many orphaned children wind up destitute and on the

streets within a few years of their mothers' deaths,

sometimes resorting to desperate or criminal measures for

food, shelter, clothes or school fees.

One of the 12 Millennium Development Goals is to reduce

maternal mortality 75 percent by the year 2015. But we are

moving too slowly to meet this goal, the United Nations says.

Today, the maternal mortality rate in Haiti is less than

half what it was a quarter-century ago. Across the broad

swath of central Haiti where we work, we estimate the number

to be well below 100 deaths per 100,000 live births--not good

enough but a vast improvement, most of it occurring in the

past decade. Change came largely for three reasons.

First, our nonprofit organization, Partners in Health, has

worked closely with the Haitian Ministry of Health to

strengthen public health infrastructure. We have rebuilt,

equipped, staffed and stocked hospitals and clinics; trained

nurse-midwives and other personnel, including more than a

thousand community health workers; linked villages and health

centers to district hospitals by modern telecommunications

and ambulance service; and established modern surgical

services for obstetrical emergencies.

Second, we have broken the rule that high-quality health

services are a privilege rationed by ability to pay, not a

right. The case was made first for affordable medicines. Now

it is being made for emergency Caesarean sections--an

essential tool to reduce maternal mortality. Faced with

evidence that maternal mortality was greater where fees were

higher, the district health commissioner for central Haiti

announced last August that all prenatal care and emergency

obstetrical services would henceforth be available free to

all patients. He was later echoed by Haitian President Rene

Preval.

Third, we have linked prenatal and obstetric care to an

all-out effort to improve access to primary health care. The

presence of functional, accessible public clinics and

hospitals restores faith in the health system, motivates

people to seek care before they are critically ill and allows

for preventive interventions such as prenatal care and family

planning. Consider Rwanda, another country where we work,

which is rising rapidly from its ashes scarcely a dozen years

after an appalling genocide. Rwandan maternal mortality rates

in 1995, the year after the genocide, are unknown. But they

are sure to have exceeded the 1,800 deaths per 100,000 live

births reported that year in relatively peaceful Malawi. The

situation has improved dramatically since then.

By helping to train and, importantly, pay community health

workers, the Rwandan Ministry of Health is taking steps to

link rural villages to health centers with the capacity to

make routine labor safe. Rwanda is also seeking to make

family planning available to citizens and to increase access

to preventive and primary care through basic health

insurance. Maternal mortality has dropped from more than

1,000 deaths per 100,000 live births between 1995 and 2000 to

less than 600 today--still terrible but well below the

average (940) reported for sub-Saharan Africa.

At the government's invitation, Partners in Health launched

efforts to strengthen AIDS treatment and primary health

services in one region of rural Rwanda in 2005. Mindful of

the lessons learned during two decades of work in rural

Haiti--and of that young Haitian woman whom we watched turn

abruptly from the anticipation of new life to a confrontation

with death--we have made reducing maternal mortality and

improving women's health top priorities. And we have welcomed

the opportunity to support Rwanda's commitment to breaking

the cycle of poverty and disease by including health care and

education (especially for girls) in its vision of the future.

It's probably no coincidence that Rwanda also boasts the

world's highest percentage of women in parliament.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor America's Second Harvest, which is being presented with this year's Ernest P. Bicknell Disaster Response Excellence Award from the American Red Cross.

America's Second Harvest, based in Chicago, is the Nation's largest charitable hunger-relief organization. I have long been an admirer of its work in Illinois, where 8 America's Second Harvest food banks help provide food to 900,000 people who are struggling with rising fuel, health care, and food costs. Nationwide, America's Second Harvest has a network of more than 200 member food banks and food-rescue organizations that serves all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

The America's Second Harvest Network secures and distributes more than 2 billion pounds of donated food and grocery products annually. The Network supports approximately 63,000 local charitable agencies operating more than 70,000 programs including food pantries, soup kitchens, emergency shelters, afterschool programs, and community kitchens. Each year, the America's Second Harvest Network provides food assistance to more than 25 million low-income hungry people in the United States, including more than 9 million children and nearly 3 million seniors.

America's Second Harvest is being been honored by the Red Cross because it continues to be instrumental in improving preparedness and the critical delivery of disaster relief to individuals and communities across the country. America's Second Harvest has partnered with the American Red Cross in disaster response through its leadership with the National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD) Mass Care Committee. It has also worked to establish standards of care for victims of disaster, utilizing its proven expertise in providing 2 billion pounds of food and grocery products to our Nation's hungry each year. Unfortunately, the news of the devastating cyclone in Myanmar, and the catastrophic earthquakes that stole thousands of lives in China this week, highlight just how critical disaster relief plans are.

The Red Cross's Disaster Response Excellence Award is named in honor of Ernest P. Bicknell, who was the Red Cross National Director from 1909 to 1917 after having served as, fittingly, the General Superintendent of the Chicago Bureau of Charities. Today, America's Second Harvest is at the forefront of charitable work, both in Chicago and nationwide. As a proud representative of the City of Chicago, I am honored to recognize their incredible work.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to express my strong support for H. Res. 1011, which calls on the United States and the international community to develop, fund, and implement a regional strategy which addresses the security and humanitarian crisis in Chad, the Darfur region of the Sudan, and the northern region of the Central African Republic.

This timely and important legislation, of which I am proud to be a cosponsor, not only calls on the Governments of Chad and the Central African Republic to fulfill their obligations under international law to protect civilians, but also calls upon the President of the United States to continue humanitarian assistance to refugees and internally displaced persons in the region.

Chad has been plagued by intermittent conflict, both internally and with its neighbors, since it gained independence in 1960. The current President of Chad, Idriss Deby, took power after launching a coup across the border in neighboring Darfur, Sudan. He has since faced at least five coup attempts including one just this past February. Violence spurred by the Sudanese Government has also continued to destabilize Chad and the State Department's most recent Country Report on Human Rights Practices that, ``the [Chadian] government's poor human rights record deteriorated further'' this past year.

The refugee situation in Chad and the surrounding region continues to worsen. In the past three years, as fighting between the Government and rebels increased and 180,000 Chadians have been displaced, adding to the inflow of 290,000 refugees from the Central African Republic, CAR, and Sudan's Darfur region. The United Nations estimates that Chad is now home to 240,000 refugees from Darfur, 52,000 refugees from the Central African Republic, and more than 180,000 internally displaced people. In February 2008 alone over 12,000 new refugees from Darfur entered the country. We must develop a comprehensive plan to address the refugee crisis as well as the security problems that plague the region.

I visited Darfur and have seen the situation on the ground. Now high- tech GPS satellites and mass media allow everyone to bear witness to the tragedies in Chad, Sudan, and the

surrounding areas: the burnt holes where villages used to be, the mass migrations of the internally displaced, starving children, and victims of rape.

With this knowledge comes a duty to act. As the wars in Chad, Sudan, and Central African Republic become increasingly intertwined, and as the massive displacements continue across the region, the United States and the international community must engage the crisis on a regional level.

This resolution recognizes that reality and calls for a comprehensive strategy to protect civilians, facilitate humanitarian operations, contain and reduce violence, and contribute to conditions for sustainable peace and good governance throughout the region with all nations.

I thank the sponsor of this resolution, Mr. Wolf, for introducing this important resolution, and I urge all of my colleagues to support it.

Madam Speaker, I would like to offer my sincere congratulations to the Loyola University of Chicago team for being chosen as a winner of the EPA's 2008 ``People, Prosperity and the Planet'' Student Design Competition at this year's National Sustainable Design Expo. I am proud to represent Loyola University in Congress, and I am looking forward to sharing the news with my colleagues that students in my district are addressing the significant problems that climate change, greenhouse gas emissions, and rising energy costs present.

The importance of energy independence can't be overstated. Your project, ``Innovative Biodiesel Production: A Solution to the Scientific, Technical, and Educational Challenges of Sustainability,'' to convert vegetable oil waste from the cafeteria into fuel that will power campus shuttle buses, is an innovative and creative way to approach it. I believe that this is a model for the entire country to learn from and hopefully adopt.

I hope that during your time at the P3 Expo you have had the chance to interact with other students, professional scientists, engineers, and business leaders from around the country. Your work to advance economic growth while reducing environmental impact should be shared.

It is for that reason that I was glad to hear that your project has an educational component that will advance P3 concepts to students in the university, in preschool, elementary school, and secondary school, and to the general public. I hope that I will be able to stop in on the Solutions to Environmental Problems course so I can see for myself how to produce and use biodiesel fuel.

Again, I salute and congratulate Luke Beasley, Pamela Geddes, Dan Larkin, Shane Lishawa, and Professor Nancy Tuchman, and will look forward to hearing about your work addressing our most pressing problems well into the future.