Floor Statements

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to offer an important amendment that will help continue our work in Congress to break the cycle of domestic violence from which we still suffer. We started that work in the Violence Against Women Act of 2005. We now need to extend it.

I want to recognize the chairman's strong showing of support for efforts against violence in this fashion by $60 million of funding. We appreciate that. But we do have several new programs that the Congress has authorized, has approved, has recognized as a valid effort that have not had an appropriation to date. We aim to fix that with an effort to provide that appropriation.

It would direct the Department of Justice to administer grants to fund four priority new programs for children and Native women in order to break this chain, this multigenerational chain of violence.

The amendment offered by myself and Mr. Burton would, for the first time, provide Federal funding to local domestic violence programs that provide direct intervention services to children who have witnessed domestic violence in their families. We know how witnessing violence ends up perpetuating violence down the chain of generations. We have to nip this in the bud.

We have to get kids treatment early. We know this amendment will do it. Men who have experienced violence in their families as children are twice as likely to become perpetrators themselves.

This amendment will also, for the first time, fund a competitive grant program for nonprofit organizations to provide community services to teens and young adult victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking. We know girls and young women between age 16 and 24 have the highest rate of intimate partner violence. Teens need to learn at an early age about healthy relationships. This amendment will help that.

My amendment also ensures that we can track crimes against American Indian and Alaska Native women through a national tribal sex offender registry. This is a place where we have been lacking resources in the tribes. One out of every three American Indian and Alaska Native women are victims of sexual assault on reservations.

Currently, every State has a sexual offender registry, but crimes against native women are rarely entered. We need to pass this to fix that problem.

So we know that this epidemic of domestic violence affects every State and community. We know that these VAWA programs can help break the cycle, and we know that we've authorized these programs, but we have not appropriated a dime for them. We have done this with some other new programs in this bill.

We have carefully selected four programs. This has the wide support of groups across the country who have selected these four programs as the highest priorities of those programs that have been authorized but not appropriated.

The Chair's done a good job with limited resources, but we hope that we can extend this effort and these authorized programs to nip and end this circle of violence.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition.

This is a misguided amendment. It is quite a surprise that of all of the decent efforts to help communities across the country, for some reason the gentleman picked this one. That is something beyond at least my understanding. The particular project involved here is a community center that is involved in a whole host of youth projects, including the Edmonds Boys and Girls Club, the Sno-King County Youth Club, the Triple Threat Basketball Club, the Brighton School, the Cascade Symphony Orchestra, the Edmonds High School Multi- Class Reunion, the Olympic Ballet Theater, the Sno-King Community Chorale, and Edmonds Community College.

I don't know why those seem like such un-American activities to the gentleman, but to our community and to the country at large, those are integral parts of our communities. I may note this is not a situation where somehow there has been some sort of Federal largesse, that is an intrusion into the community.

This is an effort where we have multiple parties that have been associated with funding this project. This is not just the Federal Government. In fact, it is less than 10 percent of the entire project. It is financed with Federal funds. It is largely a matter of local development, including a variety of local corporations. So where we have less than 10 percent in this final phase, why this has been selected doesn't make sense.

Now there is a difference, I suppose. I hold a press release from the author of the amendment dated February 28, 2007, announcing that the city of Winnsboro, Texas, had received $100,000 in Federal funds. The author of the amendment said: ``I am excited that some of the hard- earned tax dollars sent to Washington are flowing back into the county.'' There is a difference, I suppose, between that money flowing to Edmonds, Washington. In that case it was money going to the proponent of this amendment. In this case it goes to a different one. I am not sure I understand the difference.

I guess the difference is the money that went to Texas was chosen by the bureaucrats. The money that is selected here has been chosen by the United States House of Representatives. Now, I don't know why the proponent believes there is some intrinsic genius of the bureaucrats. Some believe all bureaucrats are smarter than all Congressmen, or the least wise bureaucrat is smarter than the most intelligent Congressman. Some may hold that view; I don't.

We have a valid community purpose here. We have a small Federal commitment, and we have a useful thing that is helping kids at risk as well as community development. I note that an economic evaluation of this particular project showed that it would have significant economic value as well as community value in helping the kids in these local communities.

So I would commend this small investment of Federal dollars in this community.

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

Mr. Speaker, the best way to stop a disastrous war would have been not to have started it, but the American people know that, it having been started, we did have a moral obligation to the Iraqi people to give them a reasonable chance to form a government. But after 4 years, after 3,600 lives, after $450 billion of American money sunk into the sands of Iraq, that moral obligation has been fulfilled in spades.

Now we have a moral obligation to our sons, a moral obligation to our daughters, a moral obligation to our husbands and wives. The moral obligation to Iraq has been completed. The moral obligation to our families now needs to be honored, and it could only be honored by passage of this resolution.

Now, people have said that we can't just leave; we need a way forward. There is only one way forward to security, to reduce the threats from the Mideast, and that is to break our addiction to oil from that region of the world.

Take one-half of the $80 billion and put it in energy efficiency, we'll give you security. Pass this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor of the House this evening to discuss the potential loss of Internet radio by Americans, a tremendous service that, because of Internet software and musical geniuses, 70 million Americans now enjoy the ability to listen to music by Web broadcasters over the Internet.

It is a tremendous service. It is as ingrained in a lot of Americans' daily lives as a cup of coffee and the morning newspaper.

Unfortunately, I have to inform the House that that service may be gone in a matter of a few weeks if we don't reach a resolution of a, frankly, wrong decision decided by the Copyright Royalty Board. What I am disturbed to report to my colleagues is that some time ago, March 2, 2007, we had a decision by a Federal agency, the ramifications of which would be to shut down the ability of Americans, on a realistic basis, to continue to enjoy Internet-based radio.

The reason this happened is that this board was given the authority to set the royalty that should be paid by Webcasters who stream out this great music, by the way, tremendously diverse music. One of the great things Americans love about Internet radio is you have such eclectic, different types of music, not just top 40. You know, I haven't progressed past the Beach Boys in the 1960s, but there are a lot of kinds of other music. Internet radio has been tremendous by allowing people to enjoy thousands of different genres and types of music.

But now this Copyright Royalty Board has issued a decision which will explode the royalty that these Webcasters are forced to pay to those who generated the music, to the extent that it will make it totally economically impossible for these businesses and these Webcasters to continue to stream music to the 70 million Americans who now enjoy it.

We need to fix this problem. We need to fix it urgently, because the decision will, this guillotine will come down on July 15 if either Congress doesn't act or an agreement is not reached between the parties to adjust this copyright fee that will have to be paid by the Webcasters.

So we need to fix this problem, and, in doing so, we need to do it in a way that is fair to the musicians and artists who create the music that 70 million Americans enjoy over the Internet. These artists work hard in producing this music. They share their genius. It's an artistic gift they have, and they share it with Americans. They need to be compensated fairly to allow them to maintain their business model as well.

Unfortunately, this was a wildly disproportionate decision by this board that is grossly unfair to the distributors of music and simply will allow them not to continue in business. And to give folks a feeling of how distorted this decision will be, I would like to refer to this graph which shows Internet radio per-song royalty rates under preexisting law starting in 2005, that started at $.00008 dollars in 2005, and by 2010, we will have foisted on us 149 percent increase in these royalty rates.

I am not sure any business model can tolerate a three-fold increase just in the per-song royalty rates that these folks are having to undergo. Unfortunately, this royalty rate means about a 300 percent increase for big Webcasters. But because of the particular rules here, it's a 1,200 percent increase for small Webcasters, so the small Webcasters, which are the vast majority of Webcasters will be hit potentially by 1,200 percent increases.

Now, this board, this Copyright Royalty Board has refused to reconsider their decision. What it means in the real world is the Internet going silent. Many of the stations a few days ago went silent to demonstrate and to protest its decision. I know Americans are disturbed by this, and they are now talking to my colleagues. I know thousands of them have communicated with my colleagues as a result of this, so we need to fix this problem.

I know in my district, I am from an area just north of Seattle, First District in the State of Washington, we have a Webcaster called Big R Radio. They stream to over 15,000 listeners who enjoy their product. But because of this decision, their rates are going to go up to a level, and you have got to understand how bad this is, the rates they would have to pay just for their royalties, not for their overhead, their rent, their salaries, the royalties they would have to pay for this exceed by 150 percent the revenues that this business is getting in.

Well, obviously, that's untenable, and this company will have to either go offshore or simply shut down if some change is not made. That is bad for Big R Radio, the company, and it's bad for the 15,000 people that enjoy their music right now. We need to fix this problem.

So the first damage that was done is this per-song radio royalty, but there was another, perhaps even more odious thing that this board did, the preexisting rule required a $500 charge, or, excuse me, a per- station minimum fee. This new ruling required a $500 charge for each streaming station that they offered. Webcasters, of course, stream under certain channels. But under this decision, there was no limit on the amount total in this per streaming channel that would be placed. Many, if not most Webcasters, have multiple channels.

So, if you look at what it will cost, just three of these Webcasters, Pandora, RealNetworks and Yahoo, because they are getting socked with this $500 per channel, and they broadcast literally thousands of channels with no limit, just those three Webcasters would have to pay $1.15 billion, with a B. These rates will dwarf the radio-related revenues by substantially more than $1 billion.

In other words, it will charge these businesses more than $1 billion more than the revenues they generate from this business. That's absurd. It's ridiculous. It has no relationship to economic reality, and it is a government glitch, a foul-up of the highest order that needs to get repaired.

This would result in 64 times more the total royalties collected by the group called SoundExchange that collects these royalties in 2006, an increase of more than, this is a pretty amazing number to me, 10 million percent over the minimum fee of $2,500 per licensee. Clearly, this is beyond the realm of economic reality.

Finally, this royalty board, the third thing that they did, they eliminated the percentage of revenue fees that many small Webcasters use to determine their performance royalty, which would be severely damaging to small Webcasters. So, to put this in perspective, in a global sense, I want to refer to what this will mean in total royalties.

If you look at this chart, you show total royalties in 2004 of $10 million. The estimated fee under the old royalty rule in 2006 would be $18 million. But under this decision, this flawed decision, it will actually be $1.150 million. So if you want to see the difference graphically of what the old royalty would be in 2006, this bubble would go to this supernova, I would call it, in 2006. This is untenable. It needs to be fixed.

Now, in order to fix this, Representative Manzullo and myself have introduced the Internet Radio Equality Act, it's H.R. 2060, and this bill would fix this problem by doing something that appears eminently fair to me, which would simply have the same rate to be paid by Internet-based Webcasters as broadcasters now pay over satellite radio, over cable radio and over juke boxes.

What we are simply saying is that we ought to have equality, fairness, that is why we named it the Radio Equality Act, by having parity, the same level, which is 7.5 percent of revenue, a transition rate, in 2010. This is something that is fair, equal, and economically realistic to allow 70 million Americans to continue to enjoy their radio over the Internet. And now, 128 Members of the U.S. House of Representatives have cosponsored this bill just in a matter of a month or two; and the reason they have done so is I think they have heard from their constituents who want to keep their service going and realize how ridiculously out of whack this particular decision was.

Now, I know it may surprise some Americans to know that government agencies can make mistakes, but certainly one was made here and we need to fix it, and we need to fix it quickly. On July 15, this decision will go into effect. I encourage my colleagues to look at this bill, H.R. 2060, the Internet Radio Internet Equality Act, and cosponsor it to add their voices to the choir to demand action by the legislature to fix this bureaucratic foul-up.

Obviously, this is supported by a large number of people, not just broadcasters. National Public Radio certainly has an interest in this. I know that many of my constituents enjoy it, and it is in great jeopardy tonight if we don't act. I know one station has already gone off the air because of this bureaucratic snafu. The NPR affiliate Rock Island Illinois-based WVIK served hundreds of thousands of citizens. They have switched off their Web stream because this is an economically untenable situation for them if it is not fixed. So what their constituents and their customers are now hearing over the Internet is silence. Silence may be better than some of the music my kids have listened to over the years, but it is not better than the thousands of stations and access that people have over the Internet. We want to keep that available for Americans.

I also want to say that why I think this is so important is diversity. One of the best things about the Internet is it gives you what you want, not what the broadcaster wants you to listen to. And, frankly, because of the consolidation of the industry and the radio over-the-air industry, we are hearing a lot more of the same thing over and over and over again. And some of it is great music. We are still stuck in the 1960s, many of us, and we enjoy it, but diversity and having access to Appalachian bluegrass or music from the subcontinent of India; I heard of a genre, it was basically heavy metal, hip-hop, country at the same time, and that is quite a genre. But this provides diversity for people, and they ought to have their multiple tastes enjoyed and that is really in jeopardy tonight.

Now, the other thing I want to say is that this decision will go into effect July 15, and these stations will be in great economic jeopardy beginning just in a week or so; and, unfortunately, some of them as of July 15 might shut off their streaming. Others are going to start to consider what to do. Some may consider going offshore, which is not a healthy situation for us for a variety of reasons.

But I want to assure the parties who might be involved in discussions in this that after July 15 it will not be the end of this discussion. If Congress is unable to act before July 15 and if the parties don't reach some resolution of this, July 15 will not be the end of this effort. It will not be the beginning of the end of this effort; it might be the end of the beginning of this effort, because as these stations start to shut down, Congress will be deluged more than they have already been deluged with voices of protestation exercising their right to petition their government for redress of grievances, and one of the biggest grievances people are going to have is they can't hear their radios over the Internet anymore. The 128 cosponsors we have today even before the sword of Damocles has fallen on the music is going to grow, and we are going to be back here to continue to grow this until we get relief.

So I am hopeful that the parties are talking to one another to try to reach an economically viable and fair resolution of this so that artists, performers, songwriters can continue to have a meaningful economic model, so they can continue to do their work and they will be compensated for it; that Web casters can have an economic model to allow them to stream it over the Web, and 70 million Americans can continue to enjoy the pursuit of happiness over the Internet listening to this great music. If that does not happen by July 15, we are going to be back here until it gets resolved and this chorus, this drumbeat will continue. We do not intend to let, in the words of Don McLean's song, not allow the music to die. It is, too, a part of the American culture, and I will encourage my colleagues to help out by cosponsoring this bill.

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

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, behold the polar bear Ursus maritimus, one of the most magnificent creatures on earth, legendary in its strength and to date its survival.

But today its survival is at great risk. It deserves the protection of the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and it does not have it.

Today we seek to close the loophole that alone amongst marine mammals allows the importation of bear heads, bearskins, bear claws in opposition to the basic concept of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. And we do so because this animal certainly is at risk. It is at risk because where there is no ice, there are no polar bears. This creature is dependent on the ice, and the ice is disappearing. That is what has led the Bush administration's Secretary of Interior to propose to list it as a threatened species.

But it gets worse. If you look at what the future is going to bring this bear, by 2040 the recent studies indicate that there will be no meaningful sea ice in the Arctic ocean by 2040 upon which these bears depend for their survival.

Now, we have folks who do enjoy trophy hunting in the United States, and there is nothing wrong with hunting or any suggestion of that in this amendment. But the truth is this: At this moment of risk to these bears, polar bear cubs need their parents in their dens more than we need polar bearskins in our dens. And this will simply close that loophole to remove that lack of protection from these animals.

Now, these animals are not threatened just in the United States. The ongoing trophy hunt is going on in Canada, where the International Polar Bear Community has found that at least half of the specific populations of polar bears are at great risk for extinction. And we know that hunters can be a force for conservation. We know they help provide habitat for ducks with Ducks Unlimited.

But the fact of the matter is, is that with a bullet to a bear, you cannot conserve it. And the fact of the matter is that the $750 permits that go to this bear hunt cannot solve the problem of global warming. And we stand here today to say that we ought to have the same level of American national commitment to the polar bears' continued survival as we have had for the bald eagle. And if we demonstrate that commitment, our grandchildren will enjoy these polar bears. And if we do not, they will not.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. LoBiondo).

Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Bishop) for a brief question.

Mr. Chairman, this is an old polar bear species that has been around here for centuries, and the ice is melting under its feet.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Whitfield).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to Mr. Ferguson.

I would like to address this canard that this is an anti- hunting amendment.

In fact, Americans enjoy passing down the tradition of hunting to their kids, their sons and daughters; and that tradition should be able to continue. But if the prey is gone, there is no hunting. And if we don't get serious about recovering polar bears, we will not be able to hunt anything because they will not exist. And if we don't stop this loophole which allows importing polar bear heads, contrary to the Marine Mammal Protection Act, we cannot tell our children we are serious about recovering this species.

Listen to the science. In 40 years will there will be no polar ice cap. And shooting polar bears and putting them in our dens in Texas or any other great State in this country is not consistent with what we did for the American bald eagle. And if we work together, hunters, nonhunters, left and right, east and west, we can accomplish this goal. But I'm suggesting this is a commonsense measure to close this loophole and listen to the science.

These species are going to have a 30 percent decline in the next 30 years. Three of the six Canadian groups that are already hunted are deemed at risk by the international scientific community.

I don't know what the Canadians are thinking. It's a great country; they're the greatest ice hockey teams in the world. But maybe they haven't got the best polar bear policy like we do in the good old USA.

Enforce the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Bring some common sense. Tell our kids we're going to keep these species available to them and pass this amendment.

I will reserve to close.

Mr. Chairman, I would just like to submit that the day we yield to Canadian judgment, we would replace baseball with ice hockey. It is not the American principle. We have a strong Marine Mammal Protection Act. It has a clear loophole. We do not want the last polar bears to be head and skins in dens. We want this species to continue. This will do that. Pass this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, many of the 70 million Americans who enjoy music over the Internet woke up and their music was silent today, and the reason, because of an outrageous decision by a Federal agency that caused outrageous increases of 300 to 1200 percent of the copyright fees that Internet Web broadcasters have to pay. And in protest of that outrageous decision, Web broadcasters today have joined together in a day of silence to let Americans know what's going to happen if Congress refuses to act to right this wrong.

And I call today on my colleagues who will be hearing and have heard from many of their constituents on this day of silence. I hope they will cosponsor H.R. 2060, the Internet Radio Equality Act.

The simple fact is, if we do not pass this bill, Web broadcasters are going to go out of business. Many of the 70 million Americans who enjoy music over the Internet will not get to listen to it.

Congress needs to act. It's the right thing to do. Let's pass this bill.

Offered By: Mr. Inslee

Amendment No. 17: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

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

Mr. Chairman, I'd like to engage in a colloquy with Chairman Visclosky and my colleague Rush Holt. I'd like to thank the chairman for including $22 million in funding for hydropower energy at the Department of Energy.

As the chairman well knows, U.S. wave and current energy resource potential that could be credibly harnessed is about 400 TerraWatt hours per year. That's about 10 percent of our total national energy demand. Just like the wind, coal, gas, oil, geothermal, conventional hydropower, and nuclear power industries have been nurtured through Federal research and development and other industry incentives, this new renewable energy source needs support from our government to get started.

The U.S. stands poised to take advantage of many of the technological opportunities available to ocean, wave and tidal power. While the Europeans profited in the early years of wind energy development, we're poised to lead the world in marine renewable energy technology development.

Early successes will lead to continued investment. Success begets success. The investor community is carefully watching and waiting to see what the government is going to do to help this industry, just like the research and development funding and tax subsidies we provided to all of the other renewable energy industries.

With that, I'd like to yield to my colleague Mr. Holt, who's been a leader on energy issues.

Mr. Chairman, I yield to the chairman.

Mr. Chairman, thank you. We look forward to working with you. We think the tide is coming in on marine renewables. Thank you very much.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize the Greater Seattle Service League, GSSL, for their commitment to raising funds and awareness for Childhaven, a Seattle-based organization dedicated to breaking the cycle of child abuse. The organization uses scientifically-supported programs to protect and treat children through 5 years of age while simultaneously providing counseling and education to victims' families. Childhaven currently operates four Seattle-area branches to reach people around the City. Anyone who visits the Childhaven facilities will see firsthand the miracles that can be established by the caring and proven efforts at Childhaven.

The GSSL began in 1979 as a group of recent college graduates committed to making a difference in the community; they have subsequently grown into a philanthropic force in the Seattle area. GSSL and Childhaven have been in partnership for 27 years. For the past 18 years, their yearly Hoopaholics fundraiser has allowed basketball enthusiasts to play a few games, raise money for Childhaven at the same time, and hear about the power of mentoring by committed people like Mike Pierson. Since its inception, the $300,000 that has been raised through Hoopaholics has gone toward continuing day-to-day program operations, furnishing the new Broadway Center and purchasing vans, books, furniture, and playground equipment for other branches, among other purposes. GSSL is truly a valued partner of the Childhaven Treatment Centers, and the efforts of its mentors are greatly appreciated.

Mr. Speaker, next week the House will take the second step in the clean energy revolution. The new Congress a couple months ago passed a bill, the first step, to reel back $14 billion of tax giveaways to the oil companies and create a fund for clean energy; but the second step starts next week.

When we take that step, we ought to be invested with the same ambition and innovative spirit of these companies that are doing great work around America, like A123 Battery Company that is making a battery so you get 150 miles a gallon in a plug-in hybrid; the Imperial Fuel Company, the biggest biodiesel supplier in the western hemisphere; the RAMGEN Company, making a compression technology to burn clean coal cleanly.

We ought to be invested with the same spirit of innovation that we had when John F. Kennedy stood behind me in 1961 and said we are going to do the Moon. So next week when we start, we should not hear the voices of timidity saying that we cannot improve our fuel mileage. We need a giant leap for mankind with innovation. Americans are a people with can-do spirit, and we will do it next week.

Mr. Speaker, I have come to the floor this evening with Mr. Cleaver of Missouri, and perhaps others will join us, with a message of optimism in the face of a great challenge that our country faces. And we have faced many challenges, but one of the more pressing for ourselves and our grandchildren is the issue of global warming, this concern that our increased carbon dioxide and other gasses is going to result in significant climactic shifts. And the science, of course, has been very disturbing recently about this threat.

But we have come to talk about a message of optimism that our country ought to have in our ability to solve this problem. And it is a large problem. It is perhaps certainly more global than we have ever had outside of war. But we today want to talk about why we believe America is ready to face that challenge, why we believe America is capable of succeeding in beating global warming, and why we believe the effort to defeat global warming will ultimately benefit the United States economy by allowing us to lead the world in new clean energy technologies.

And I would like to, in preface to our comments today, just set the stage about what the challenge is and why we believe the solution is one that Americans are fully capable of obtaining.

First, the challenge. The challenge, of course, is that we have created a condition where we may double the concentration of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere by about 2050, twice as high as carbon dioxide has ever been since before pre-industrial times. And, of course, all of the scientists in the

world agree that carbon dioxide is a global warming gas, and it does stand to reason that if you double the amount of this global warming gas, you could have problems in your climate. And, unfortunately, the evidence has become more and more disturbing.

Just last week, the Goddard Space Science Department at NASA came out with a new report authored by lead author James Hansen that said, ``If global emissions of carbon dioxide continue to rise at the rate of the past decade, this research shows that there will be disastrous effects, including the increasingly rapid sea level rise, increased frequency of droughts and floods, and increased stress on wildlife and plants due to rapidly shifting climate zones.''

This is not a quote from some fellow living in a tepee. This is NASA. The agency that sent an American to the moon has been looking at what is happening right here at home on Earth and has concluded that, indeed, we have trouble; and what is very disturbing is that the most recent science has been more disturbing.

We were briefed by Dr. John Schellenhuller, who is the lead scientist in Europe on this subject, last week, who told us about the increasing melt in the Arctic that has increased in severity, about the melting tundra. The rate of the melt of the tundra is melting much more rapidly than was anticipated even a year ago; and, of course, that can release methane gas, which is even 16 times worse for global warming than even carbon dioxide. My local scientists at the University of Washington in Seattle have confirmed these findings.

So, basically, we have got an issue that we have got to deal with. And right now there really is a race going on in the world of tipping points. These scientists have told us that we are approaching tipping points where the climate can tip into regimes where we would have uncontrollable global warming and that that could happen in as short as shortly after the next decade.

But we have another tipping point which we believe we are about to cross over here in Congress, and that is a tipping point where the U.S. Congress will tip from sort of an approach of the ostrich, where we had our head in the sand, to tip over to the approach of the American eagle, where we will have a new vision about a new clean energy technological future for this country.

So we are here tonight to say that that new approach of optimism is one that will prevail starting next Wednesday when the Energy Subcommittee in the U.S. Congress will start discussions about a new clean energy future for this country.

I will be introducing a bill in about a week called the New Apollo Energy Act, which will come forth with a whole suite of ideas about how to adopt new clean energy solutions. And, of course, we call it the New Apollo Energy Act because we think what Kennedy believed about America, which was that we were the greatest innovation country in the world, is something that we have got going for us. So we should use our technological genius just like we did when we went to the moon.

So before I yield to Mr. Cleaver, I want to talk about why I have optimism about our ability to skin this cat, why I believe we can dramatically reduce our carbon dioxide emissions and dramatically tell our grandchildren that we are going to use our know-how to solve this problem. And the reason I am confident about this is that in the last year I have been doing a rather intensive review of the technology that we hope to bring to bear on this subject and I have been getting to know the Americans really across the country who tonight are inventing new technological solutions so we can move forward on clean energy. I just want to mention a few of them.

First, there is a company in Massachusetts called the A123 Battery Company. I love the number. A123 Battery Company. And they have developed a lithium ion battery which is so powerful that basically in the size of about two or three shoe boxes you could put it in your car, which they are prepared to do this fall, and turn your hybrid car into a plug-in hybrid car. And I drove one actually, a converted plug-in hybrid that I drove around the capital a few weeks ago. This battery is so powerful that you will be able to plug in your car, drive it for 20 to 40 miles just on electricity, no gasoline. Then after 40 miles you use gasoline and you will get over 150 miles a gallon on either your ethanol, eventually, once it is a flex-fuel, plug-in hybrid, or your gasoline. Now, that is a heck of a deal for Americans for your first 40 miles to have zero carbon dioxide coming out your tailpipe. A123 Battery Company.

The second company called Nanosolar. Nanosolar is a new company in California that has developed a photovoltaic cell, a solar cell, which uses nanotechnology to dramatically decrease the manufacturing costs and the costs of solar energy. And they are going to make a solar cell that is 1/50 as thick as the current silicone-based solar cells. It is called thin cell technology.

A third company, Ausra Company, a former Australian company that has been moved to the United States that has breakthrough technology on solar thermal where you use parabolic mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays to heat gas to 1,100 degrees and turn a turbine, again, dramatically potentially reducing the cost of solar energy.

So I wanted to first start our discussion with the context of great Americans doing great things in energy, and here are three companies moving forward. And to continue this discussion, I want to yield to Mr. Cleaver, who has been a great leader on these energy issues fresh in Congress. I would like to yield to him for his perspective on our ability to move forward in global warming and clean energy.

Will the gentleman yield for a moment?

We are hopeful. I actually gave a speech in response to Prime Minister Tony Blair last week in Berlin. I was asked to present sort of an American response to the Prime Minister's ideas about global warming. One of the things he talked about is what the Europeans have learned is that we need some action, some policies to drive investment into these clean energy technologies that can produce the clean energy to avoid the kind of problems you are describing in Greenland. And of course the President is right now in Germany today at the G8 Summit.

We are hopeful, although probably not that optimistic, that the President would propound some ideas where we will guarantee our grandchildren that we are going to reduce our CO2 emissions. Now, one way or another, Congress needs to do that, because we've got an obligation to American grandkids to do it.

I want to just note a couple of things. It's not just Greenland that is experiencing it. It's the good ole U.S. of A.

I got to know some people in Alaska in a little town called Shishmaref that sits on the Arctic Ocean. That is the first city in America that is having to be relocated due to global warming because they live right on the coastline, and the tundra that supports their houses is melting, and the seas are encroaching, and it has actually eaten some of their houses already. They are actually going to have to move their entire city. They've already voted to do it. They are going to move it 13 miles inland to a little place called Fish Camp.

It will be the first American city to have to relocate its first victim of global warming. That's a sad day when you think Americans already have to relocate their cities. So this is not something that's 50 years in the future. It's here today.

Now, we have experienced off the coast of Washington and Oregon the same issues you've talked about, about new species of fish coming in. And our ranchers down in the western United States are having unprecedented drought they are having to deal with. This is something Americans are suffering today. And that is why, starting next Wednesday, we hope to have an aggressive congressional response to help these clean air technologies move forward. So I appreciate your observations of Greenland.

I wonder if I could maybe yield to Mr. Udall, who has joined us here this evening, who has been a leader and certainly has a long tradition in his particular family in leading environmental issues.

Mr. Udall.

I really appreciate Mr. Udall talking about efficiency, because I think we need to look at it as the first fuel. Before you start generating excess energy, if we could figure out how to use it more efficiently and not waste it, that's what I look at as like finding money in the street, it's the first fuel. And Europe has had tremendous success. England has increased their gross domestic product by 70 percent in the last 20 years, but their use of electricity has remained flat. That is a tremendous improvement of efficiency. You don't waste it.

But it is not just the English. We have something to brag about here, too. California has increased their gross economic activity by 50 percent in the last 10 years, and their per capita use of electricity has remained flat. They have done it through measures such decoupling utilities with the rate of growth of electricity so utilities now can make money by selling less energy by selling efficiency. And it has been effective.

In my city of Seattle, in my neck of the woods, the same thing has happened by doing some of the commonsense things we have talked about.

There are some amazing technologies coming in in efficiency. I went and talked to an organization called SIPs, Structural Integrated Panels, last week. They had their national convention. These are panels that are sort of a foam core with a wood fiber sandwich on both sides that are a structural panel you can build a house with so you don't need studs. You build these things, and you can get 20 to 30 percent less heating cost for your home. This is an invention of folks in America, and we can build part of the construction industry by doing that. So I really appreciate your focus on efficiency.

I want you to know, you mentioned wind. I remember talking to, in the course of writing this book Mr. Udall referred to, I fell across a story out of Missouri, Mr. Cleaver's State. And there was a quote by this farmer that said something to the effect like, Man, there is nothing better than sitting there watching that turbine go around, and I just count the money every time the blade goes around. Because they get paid by the utility to put the turbine in the field. That's a good way to do it.

So I would like to yield to Mr. Cleaver for his observations.

That is an important point. I think the good news we can share with Americans is that there are a lot less people in this Congress than there used to be who believe it is a hoax, and that is, in part, because they have read the science. People are seeing it with their own eyes. Now they are hearing from their constituents, frankly, and they are hearing from their own scientists.

I just want to read this NASA report that just came out last week, and it talked about the urgency. Mr. Cleaver, you said, we don't have a lot of time to deal with this; we don't have 50 years to deal with this.

This report said that basically there are two ways we can go. We can go the business as usual approach, or we can have a second approach, an alternative approach to reduce our CO2. Basically this report said that with another decade of business as usual, it becomes impractical to achieve the alternative scenario because of the energy infrastructure that would be in place. This was a quote from Mr. Hansen of NASA, basically meaning we have about 10 years to change course here a little bit to have more essential efficiencies, to have more clean energy, to put our minds together to figure out how to have a cleaner energy future. So we don't have the luxury of a lot of time.

But again I want to come back to this idea of optimism, why I am optimistic about it. Mr. Cleaver mentioned Mr. Carnahan started a wind

turbine farm that is doing great. They are earning farmers a lot of money. They are earning construction crews a lot of money to build these things. They are generating revenues in Missouri. This is happening all over the country, that tremendous growth, 15, 20 percent growth a year in this wind turbine wind energy.

I want to tell one little story that I think is typical of what we are going to see in America. A fellow in Seattle, Washington, named John Plaza who is an airline pilot. He was a good airline pilot, but he sort of got tired of reading books while he was flying back and forth. That is what they do in the cockpits, a dirty little secret we can share.

He decided he wanted to do something entrepreneurial. He started looking around for an idea that he could advance to create a new, value-added business, and he started to think about energy. He started thinking, is there a way that I could sort of develop a clean energy resource and make some money as well? He started to focus on biodiesel.

So this fellow, who was not an engineer, not a chemical engineer, not a mechanical engineer, didn't have an MBA, he literally went home and started to tinker in his home about how to make biodiesel out of various vegetable products. He hit on a way to make biodiesel that he thought was as good or better than anybody else.

He went out and raised a few dollars, rented a little tiny room in an old warehouse and bought the old beer vats from the Rainier brewery in Seattle, Washington. The Rainier brewery used to be the iconic beer in Seattle, Washington. He bought the old vats they used to brew beer in and he started to brew up biodiesel.

John Plaza is now CEO or CFO of a company in Grace Harbor, Washington, that is going to be the largest biodiesel plant probably in the world, or at least in the Western Hemisphere. They are under construction. They are going to be open for business some time next year, over a million gallons a year.

This is a product that reduces carbon dioxide, uses products we make, either canola seed or perhaps palm oilseed or perhaps soybean oilseed they are starting to bring in.

But the point is, here is an American success story of a fellow with an idea who wanted to find a way to maximize clean energy. We just need a way in Congress to help drive investment to those new clean energy sources.

I want to mention one thing about how Congress can help people like John Plaza to develop these new businesses.

One of the things we can do is next Wednesday we will be hopefully passing what is called a low carbon fuel standard. A low carbon fuel standard will basically say that the fuels we burn in America every 5 years will get 3 percent cleaner when it comes to carbon dioxide. And when we pass that low carbon fuel standard, it will create an incentive for investment to go to these businesses to develop these new higher, cleaner forms of biofuels.

You know we are using corn ethanol right now, but it is really just sort of the first generation. I liken it to the Wright brothers Flyer of aviation. It is just the first craft we can get in the air. But we need cellulosic ethanol and advanced forms of biodiesel that will produce a lot more product per acre and a lot more CO2 savings, and we believe we can do this.

So here is one thing Congress can do, and I know there are many others.

I yield to the gentleman from New Mexico.

The gentleman is entirely correct. Later this year the House will consider what is called a cap-and-trade system. Americans are probably going to hear that term a lot. A cap-and-trade system basically means that we will set a cap, a limit, a total ceiling on the amount of carbon dioxide that will be a pollutant going into the air a year in the United States of America. That is not too much to ask for our grandkids to say we are going to have a total amount of pollution that we put into the air.

Now we have done it for sulfur dioxide. We have done it for nitrogen oxide. We have done it for particulates. But there is this giant loophole you can drive a Sherman tank through for carbon dioxide.

So it is interesting. We have all these laws that set ceilings for the amount of pollutants that go into the air, but the granddaddy of all, the most dangerous pollutant there is in the world right now, carbon dioxide, there is no limit whatsoever. So Congress owes to ourselves and our grandkids to set some limit, a cap, on the total amount of CO2 that is going into the air.

So then the question comes down, how do you allocate who is going to put the pollution in the air? Well, there are a couple of ways to do it. Congress can just hand permits out and we decide. But there is a better way, which is basically a trading system where these permits originally are allocated, but then businesses are allowed to trade them amongst themselves and establish a market for carbon.

Europe has done this. I have spent a week looking at how that system worked last week, and I can report that it has been successful to the extent that it has established a cap and a price on carbon. And once you establish a price on carbon, well, what do businesses do? They start figuring out

ways to not waste energy and how not to put more pollution into the air.

Importantly, this cap-and-trade system is the most economically efficient way to distribute this resource. I got brainwashed by economics when I went to school at the University of Washington. Basically what we learned is that having a trading system, you end up having the most efficient way to find out how to drive economies and efficiencies in your system.

So later this year we will be considering a cap-and-trade system. We will set a limit, and it will be the first step in this road to really a clean energy economy.

Now I want to note something about a cap-and-trade system, and this is one thing I learned in Europe last week, it is not enough. It is only one tool in the toolbox. This is really important, because next week we will have before us in the Energy Committee a host of issues of ways to drive this clean energy future forward not waiting for this cap-and-trade system, issues like this renewable portfolio standard, where we tell people 15 percent of our electricity comes from clean standards, a green building standard, so that we require new building codes to have energy efficient buildings, a low carbon fuel standard so we use low carbon fuels, a whole host of measures like that. Those are very important. A cap-and-trade system is not enough.

In fact, it is interesting, in England, we met with a minister who basically they told us they might have had 15 million tons of savings in carbon dioxide from their cap-and-trade system, but they had 100 million tons savings in carbon dioxide by this combination of measures to have more efficiency in their industries.

So next week we will be taking some first steps in the road to a clean energy future that are very, very important, that are going to help these businesses grow.

Mr. Cleaver, I appreciate your comments, especially sharing the idea that I think all faiths share about this idea of responsibility to the creation and to our grandkids. I appreciate you bringing us back to that fundamental truth.

I want to address the issue of Greenland. Greenland is changing dramatically. I have had some people ask me isn't it true that Greenland has changed in the past as far as their weather and why is this a problem now. It is true during Erik the Red's time, Greenland did have more green involved in it. They had some agriculture in Greenland when you had this little warm period during the time of Erik the Red.

But what the scientists tell us is there is a huge difference between that situation because now we are going to drive carbon dioxide levels by 2050 twice what they have ever been for tens and hundreds of thousands of years and that those carbon dioxide layers trap energy and heat. It is going to make the days of Erik the Red look like the Ice Age.

So even though there have been wide fluctuations in the Earth's climate before, what the scientists tell us is the rate of change is unprecedented ever in the historical record and that we will go into a period that really is unprecedented as far as we know pretty much in global history. So the things you are seeing in Greenland are very much of concern, and I hope we are going to start working to move that forward.

I yield to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Udall).

I think you have put your finger right on the nub of the issue. The President says he now, finally, and I suppose this is a small ray of happiness, he now finally recognizes there is a problem of global warming. But he expects volunteerism to solve this problem.

Well, I can tell you one thing we all know, you can run a bake sale on volunteerism, and maybe you can run a boy scout troop on volunteerism, but you cannot run a war on global warming on volunteerism. Think about this for a second. Here is what the President proposes. He thinks that he can just send a letter, nicely handwritten, to the CEOs of the oil and gas companies, would you kindly think about not polluting anymore.

Well, that would be just about as effective, if he simply tries to run that on a volunteer basis, to just rely on the good graces, and I have nothing against the executives of these companies, they

are fine people, but just relying on them to volunteer would be just as effective as relying on consumers to volunteer whether you are going to pay at the pump when you pump gas.

Now you can just see the executives with their tin cup and their tithing cup out there trying to collect money from the pump. It doesn't work that way. You have to have some requirement that we both pay for gasoline and you have some measure to require these companies to reduce their pollution. That is a fair statement. It is required. It is the only way we are going to solve this problem.

Most importantly, it is the only way we are going to drive investment to companies like A123 Battery and Finavera Renewables which is going to have the first wave-powered buoy off the coast of Oregon in this next year to produce electricity from waves bobbing up and down.

So, Mr. Udall, you are correct. We have a responsibility in Congress to create these limits on CO2 pollution. We are going to do that; and, when we do that, we are going to unleash the innovative power that Americans have. The same genius that got us to the moon is going to get us to a clean energy future, and our grandkids will not have to deal with global warming.

I would like to yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Baca) on an unrelated subject.

Immigration Legislation Pending in the Senate

Mr. Speaker, we cannot, we should not, and we must not give President George Bush a blank check to squander the lives of our children and the dollars of our constituents in Iraq. We should not give him a blank check today, we should not give him a blank check next week, and we should not give him a blank check ever. The days of giving him a blank check to make repeated incompetent decisions in Iraq must be stopped and they should be stopped today by voting ``no'' on this supplemental.

And the inspiration for doing that should come from our proud men who are serving in Iraq. I heard a story a few weeks ago about a fellow who had his buddy shot by a sniper, he was being shot up by automatic weapons fire, and his buddy ran out into the field of fire to rescue his friend. We should look at our duty today as rescuing our children, brothers, sisters, husbands and wives in Iraq. And if we take hostile political fire in doing so, so be it. That tiny act of standing up to George Bush does not end up in the same league of courage of those who are serving in Iraq who take real hostile fire, that need to be rescued from the incompetence of the executive branch of the United States Government. And it is solely the power of the U.S. Congress to do that.

The people who established this institution had a very wise knowledge. They knew someday there could be a President who might make bad decisions on occasion, who might make bad decisions in the course of a war, and that is why in article I, section 8, they vested in the U.S. Congress the power of the purse to be used in exactly these circumstances, to rein in a rogue President who cannot seem to understand the reality on the ground in Iraq and has a hallucinatory policy that is exposing our children to harm. This power in section 8, the power of the purse, is one that is designed by the framers of democracy for exactly these circumstances. And the reason the framers put the power of the purse to rein in a rogue President is because they understood that this is the institution closer to the American people. This is the People's House.

And I know there's a lot of problems that none of us are geniuses on in Iraq, but there is one thing we know: In difficult times in America, there is one will, one sense of absolute genius that all of us should follow, and that is the will of the American people, the joint, commonsense consensus. From the cornfields of the Midwest to the coastlines, there is a common consensus that we need a change in policy in Iraq, and the only way we will get it, the only way that common sense of the American people will be followed is to vote ``no'' on this today. We can be united in understanding that. And when we do so, we will follow the Congresses of the past who on at least five occasions have used the constitutional power of the purse to insist on a change.

And I will say this. In the Constitution, this organization here is given the power to declare war. And we also have the power to end a war. Presidents do not have the authority to fight wars in perpetuity. There is no way that Congress would ever give that authority. And today using the power of the purse, a constitutional tool, we should stand up for the will of the American people and fulfill our rescue mission for our sons and daughters in Iraq and vote ``no'' on this supplemental bill.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to remove from H.R. 2060 the name of Nathan Deal as a cosponsor. His name was inadvertently added as a cosponsor to the bill I had sponsored.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to introduce legislation that will close the polar bear loophole and prohibit U.S. citizens from bringing sport hunted polar bear trophies from Canada into the United States. I call on my colleagues to support the Polar Bear Protection Act, which if passed, will help conserve and protect one of the most beloved American icon species by discouraging U.S. citizens from contributing to their decline through sport hunting.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 established a moratorium on the importation of marine mammals and marine mammal products, including the importation of all sport hunted marine mammals such as seals, walruses and polar bears. But in 1994, Congress enacted an exemption to this ban and allowed American sport hunters to bring home polar bear trophies from Canada for their personal use. There is no other such exemption in the Marine Mammal Protection Act. This exemption has had the effect of increasing Canadian polar bear deaths by U.S. sport hunters.

In 1994 the polar bears' survival was not known to be at risk. Today, we know their future is precarious. Polar bear populations are facing threats previously unprecedented in the history in the Arctic. The polar bear is dependent on sea ice for survival--it relies on the ice for hunting, breeding and rearing its young. Yet as a result of climate change, Arctic sea ice is receding at a rate even a non-scientist can observe, rapidly enough for polar bears to feel the impacts. An unknown number of these magnificent creatures--which can swim at least 50 miles--have drowned and are starving. Populations are changing their distribution, bringing them closer to human villages and exposing them to greater risk of negative interactions with people as they desperately search for food. Leading scientists project that the Arctic may be completely free of sea ice in the summer as early as 2040. This has disastrous implications for polar bears.

In July 2005, the World Conservation Union (IUCN) Polar Bear Specialist Group (PBSG) released its quadrennial report, which reviewed the status of polar bears. Although the world population estimate remains at 21,500-25,000, in fact many populations are ``data deficient,'' due to the difficulties of studying this species in its remote, harsh habitat. At least some populations are declining and more may be. The IUCN PBSG concluded that the species should be upgraded from ``a species of least concern'' to ``vulnerable,'' based on the ``likelihood of an overall decline in the size of the total population of more than 30 percent within the next 35 to 50 years.'' It further concluded that the principal cause of this decline is global warming, with pollution an additional negative influence. For the first time, they expressed a need for caution when determining hunting quotas.

The U.S. Department of the Interior has confirmed that warming temperatures and the receding of sea ice in the Arctic pose a threat to polar bears and has concluded that polar bears could be endangered within 45 years. Based on the threats posed to polar bears, the Interior Department proposed that polar bears be listed under the Endangered Species Act as ``threatened'' on December 27, 2006. As many of you know, I actively have supported the listing of polar bears on the Endangered Species List. I feel strongly that such a listing is vital to the bears' survival. I also feel strongly that sport hunting at this time is an additional unnecessary burden that these beleaguered bears can ill afford.

More than half of the world's polar bears are in Canada and most of these are in the territory of Nunavut. In 2005, Nunavut increased its polar bear hunt quotas by almost 30 percent without scientific basis, despite documented declines in some populations and the increased threats to polar bears from the effects of climate change. The increase was based on anecdotal accounts that more bears were seen near villages; however, this increase in sightings likely was the result of hungry bears being drawn to village dumps than an actual increase in bear numbers. As a result, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has expressed concerns with this increase in quotas. Indeed, I am concerned that the money generated by American trophy hunters in Nunavut was a motivating factor in this quota increase.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also acknowledges that at least five polar bear populations, of which four are hunted, have poor and/or inadequate information on population statistics. It admits that four populations are possibly being over-harvested, posing conservation challenges for the bear.

Some of my colleagues here today may have supported the polar bear trophy importation exemption in 1994. I recognize that the landscape was different then, when many polar bear populations appeared sound. However, circumstances have dramatically changed. Seventeen years ago it was inconceivable to think that we could envision a world without these magnificent animals. Now, in 2007, we are learning that polar bear extinction could become a reality. While long-term action clearly is required to address the significant environmental factors negatively affecting polar bear survival, immediate action can and must be taken to control direct human-caused mortality, including addressing the harmful effects of U.S. trophy hunting.

I hope you all agree that contributing to the mortality of these bears from unnecessary sport hunting is no longer justified. We need to eliminate the exemption that allows the importation of polar bear trophies into the United States. The Polar Bear Protection Act will further polar bear conservation at a time when these animals need it most. I urge my colleagues to join me by supporting this legislation, and I hope that the Natural Resources Committee will hold hearings on polar-bear conservation and this bill.

Madam Speaker, we have had the right to be disappointed in the President's abject refusal to do anything to give us auto efficiency and clean autos for years. And now we still have the right to be disappointed even though he has been ordered to do so by the United States Supreme Court. We sort of heard this sort of semi ``maybe I'll think about it'' approach the other day.

We need some bold action when it comes to new technology, including in our automobile sector; and we know we can get that. We know we can have efficient automobiles, and we know we can deal with global warming.

I've got to tell you, I just cannot understand why some folks here want to embrace ignorance on global warming. They point out that we didn't know about global warming in 1970. We didn't know about the Internet either, but I don't know why you shouldn't use it.

We've learned some things from 1970. We've learned that the planet is warming. We've learned that CO2 is responsible. We've learned that it's coming from our industries. And we've learned that if we have the Federal law followed, we will have energy efficiency and a clean energy economy in the future of this country.