Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize and honor the ``Sharing Dr. King's Dream Celebration'' in Arlington, Texas, which marks its 20th Anniversary this year.

It is one of the longest Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Celebrations in the country, with citywide events taking place over four days starting January 16th

The city's first MLK, Jr., celebration was held back in 1989. The organizing committee included groups from all over the community, including the Arlington Chamber of Commerce, City of Arlington, Arlington Independent School District, Arlington Ministerial Association, Black Citizen's Advisory Council, U.S. Postal Service, Marion Anderson Society, Fort Worth Star Telegram, The University of Texas at Arlington and Tarrant County College--South East campus.

That first event attracted nearly 1,000 participants. Over the years ``Sharing the Dream'' has continued to grow and it now includes diversity training, sensitivity workshops, banquets, festivals and other multicultural events. This celebration truly embodies what Dr. King's vision was all about and that is a reflection of all communities coming together.

And Arlington's MLK, Jr. Celebration committee continues to expand the event. Each year, in cooperation with the United States Postal Service, they produce an official cachet envelope and a special pictorial cancellation postmark to commemorate the citywide celebration. These special envelopes and postmarks have become favorites of collectors all over the nation.

The theme for this year's cachet envelope and postmark is ``20th Anniversary--Sharing the Dream''.

The design is always chosen from student submissions to various art or essay contests organized by the Arlington Independent School District. The celebration also recognizes special individuals who have taken the time to make a difference within their respective communities in the areas of Education, Community Service and Government.

This is a unique and very special celebration that each year honors the contribution's of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and on its 20th Anniversary, I am proud to recognize the individuals and organizations that have helped make this event possible over the years and all of the people who have shared Dr. King's dream by attending.

Madam Speaker, the Energy and Commerce Committee is vested with the responsibility for overseeing sports, and that includes the current process for determining a national college football champion: the BCS system. College football is more than an exhilarating sport, it's a billion-dollar business. I'm introducing legislation today because despite every effort to fix the problems of BCS, college seasons still end in sniping and controversy, rather than clear winners and losers determined on the field.

The BCS system was created to identify a broadly accepted national champion, but 50 percent of the time it has failed to do so. Most coaches who lose half their games would also lose their jobs. Yet that's what we settle for in determining a champion today.

The BCS system of determining America's top collegiate team was established in 1998 and has been plagued by controversy almost ever since. In some years the sport's national championship winner was left unsettled, and at least one school was left out of the many millions of dollars in revenue that accompany the title. Despite repeated efforts to improve the system, the controversy rages on.

In the 2003 season, the University of Oklahoma and Louisiana State University were selected to play in the title game, even though the University of Southern California arguably had an equal claim. LSU beat Oklahoma and USC also won its bowl game, leaving both schools claiming to be national champions and further chafing millions of college football fans, especially USC alumni. As a direct result of LSU's selection by BCS, the school's merchandise sales in both 2003 and 2004 were more than double previous levels, producing millions of dollars in additional revenue for the school.

In the 2004 season, again three equally qualified and, in this case, undefeated teams--Auburn, Oklahoma and USC--fought for the two slots in the title game, which once again produced an uneven outcome as USC defeated Oklahoma handily. Auburn won its game, but had no opportunity to play for a national championship and the millions of dollars that accompany it.

This year, we again have two teams with one loss each playing for the ``championship'' while two undefeated teams and four additional teams with only one loss will play in bowl games, but none can become ``champion.''

The distinction of being the best brings millions of dollars in revenue, but the BCS method of determining who is number one consistently misfires. When we held our first hearing on BCS in 2005, I didn't have legislation in mind, and I hoped none would be necessary. Simply exposing the flaws and subjecting them to discussion, however, hasn't led to improvement by those who run the system.

The legislation I am introducing along with Congressmen Bobby Rush and Michael McCaul recognizes the flaws of this system. Consumers, whether the millions who watch the game on TV or the lucky few who pay for a ticket to the computer-designated ``championship'' game, are being deceived. The BCS championship game is not a championship game under any sensible interpretation of the manner in which sports champions are determined.

The legislation we are introducing today will prohibit the marketing, promotion, and advertising of a post-season game as a ``national championship'' football game, unless it is the result of a playoff system. Violations of the prohibition will be treated as violations of the Federal Trade Commission Act as an unfair or deceptive act or practice, and provides the FTC with civil penalty authority.

The legislation does not specify the details of the playoff system; rather, it ensures that that all Division I, Football Bowl Subdivision, teams should be initially eligible at the start of every season. The existing bowl structure could easily be incorporated into or as the basis for such a playoff system.

We're never going to abolish all controversy, and who'd really want to be rid of it, anyway? People will argue about who should be in and out of playoffs, too, but I am confident when more of the most deserving teams can compete, a true national champion is much likelier to emerge.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this legislation this evening. I think it's important that members of the Republican Party in the House be for Main Street and the workers of America as much as sometimes we are for Wall Street and the financiers of America.

I have the privilege to represent over 2,500 GM assembly workers and managers at the GM assembly plant in Arlington, Texas. They produce the highest quality products, SUV, hybrids, pickups in the world. They export a fair number of the products that they manufacture, and they manufacture over 200,000 vehicles on an annual basis every year.

It would be an absolute shame if we either force these companies into bankruptcy or watch them totally go out of business because they had the misfortune to be in a business cycle where gasoline was $4 a gallon and their product sale fell 40 percent on average in 1 year.

If I lost 40 percent of my votes in this last election in 2008, I would not be coming back as a Member-elect of the next Congress.

If we can give the AIGs and the Wells Fargos and the J.P. Morgans of the world, each of those individual companies, between 40 and $25 billion, in what amounts to some sort of a very unsecured loan, to be generous about it, certainly we can give the American nameplate automotive industry a $15 billion bridge loan that has a 5 percent interest rate for, I believe, the first 5 years and then a 9 percent interest rate after that; that has an automobile czar appointed by President Bush to oversee the industry, and force them to be accountable on any expenditure over $14 million.

I would ask for a ``yes'' vote on the bill.

I thank the gentleman.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and in opposition to the underlying bill. The bill is trying to treat a symptom, not the disease. It's like you have a fire and instead of sending the fire truck to put the fire out, you develop a climate change model to cause it to rain everywhere so some of that rain may put the particular fire out that you're trying to put out.

The reason that our economy is in distress is because fundamentally we're becoming less competitive in international markets. If we want to do something to restore the value of the dollar, how about cutting spending here in the Congress? How about coming up with a tax program that encourages entrepreneurship in America? I could go on and on, Madam Speaker. We need to solve this problem, but we need to do it in a targeted way.

The underlying bill that has come back to us from the other body is basically the same bill we voted down Monday with some sweeteners to try to bribe enough Members to vote for it so that it will pass.

Vote no on the rule and no on the underlying bill.

I want to thank the gentleman from Alabama.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to this bill. And I am not opposed to it for political reasons, I am not opposed to it for partisan reasons, I am not opposed to it for emotional reasons. I am opposed to it because fundamentally it doesn't address the problem that needs to be addressed. We have a crisis in our financial markets, we have a crisis of confidence in our credit markets, and this bill only indirectly addresses those problems.

First and foremost, from the taxpayers' standpoint, it is not paid for. The underlying bill is going to raise the national debt ceiling $1.5 trillion. That is $1,500 billion. If you add the tax extender package that came over from the Senate, you end up with a price tag of approximately $2 trillion. Absolutely nothing in the bill addresses how to pay for those $2 trillion that puts taxpayers at risk. Really, for that one reason we should vote against the bill.

We have talked a lot about the crisis in the credit markets. My good friend from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan) just put up a chart on the LIBOR rate, which is the overnight interbank loan rate from London. It is at 4 percent. It was at 4.5 percent 1 year ago. It is within its normal range. The spread has gone up between the overnight Treasury rate and the LIBOR rate, but that is because the Treasury rate has gone down to 2 percent.

An auto loan that my good friend was talking about, the distinguished Financial Services chairman, the auto rate loan right now is 6.5 percent, about what it was a year ago. The credit markets are working, but there are some people holding back credit, hoping that the taxpayers will bail them out.

Fundamentally, we need to address the American economy. This bill doesn't do that. You want the value of the dollar to go up? How about cutting spending and lowering the deficit? You want to do something on auto sales? How about produce more domestic energy to bring gasoline prices down.

Madam Speaker, this is not the bill to address the problem. I hope we will vote ``no.''

Madam Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

As the vote currently stands, the ``noes'' have it, and I am on the prevailing side.

If I were to move to reconsider, when would the Chair bring the bill back up?

It would be immediately. Is that not at the discretion of the Chair?

Madam Speaker, I withdraw.

Madam Speaker, today, I rise today to honor the life and accomplishments of the late Jack Gillespie. This American, immigrant, veteran, and patriot passed away on April 17th, 2008. Today would have been his 87th birthday and, in his honor, I would like to submit for the record the eulogy his son Ed read at his funeral on April 22nd of this year.

In November 1929, young John Patrick Gillespie--called Sean

at the time--left his home by the Eanybeg stream at the base

of Carnaween Mountain to head into Donegal Town with his

mother and brothers and sisters.

He was beginning a journey to a new life in a wonderful

place where he would find happiness, achieve glory, and

eventually discover waiting for him there the woman he was

meant to be one with.

By the time he came to be called ``Jack'' in his new

country, he had figured out what success in America required.

He may have read some tips on board the Lititia, the

steamer on which he spent two

weeks crossing from Ireland to Ellis Island. Many of the

boats that sailed that route posted in their galleys a notice

with the heading, ``Advice to Irish Emigrants.''

The posting included these words: ``In America, a man's

success must altogether rest with himself--it will depend on

his industry, sobriety, diligence and virtue . . . and he may

rationally expect to raise himself in the world by his

labour.''

People who met Jack Gillespie quickly realized that their

friend or coworker or fellow soldier was extremely diligent,

very industrious, generally virtuous and--most of the time

sober. And he certainly wasn't afraid of labor.

His high school sweetheart Conny Carroll noticed something

else about him--something other pretty lasses tended to

notice too. He was a strikingly handsome man.

She wrote to him regularly during the war, and clipped

newspaper articles on the progress of the 28th Infantry--the

famed and feared ``bloody buckets''--and kept the clips in a

scrap book.

Sergeant John Patrick Gillespie fought for the cause of

freedom. He fought for the honor of his country. And though

he never fought for the sake of glory, at war's end he was

draped in it.

After landing in France, his Company L was among the first

to confront the hedgerows that made a patchwork of the French

countryside. His commanding officers spent days hunkered down

trying to figure out how to advance over the thick, eight-

foot-high lines of brush that separated them from an enemy

whose size and strength they had no way of knowing.

Eventually a frustrated, impatient Sergeant Gillespie

carved toeholds into the knotted hedgerow and told his

lieutenant to listen for him after he went over the top.

When this fearless soldier dropped to the ground on the

other side, he began firing his weapon to find--nobody firing

back. Sixty years later, when asked what he did to get his

Bronze Star, he laughingly said, ``Nothing, really.''

Of course, it wasn't for nothing. Nor was his subsequent

Silver Star for Valor in Combat, earned saving a wounded

platoon mate, or the Purple Heart for the bullets that ripped

through both his legs in the Hurtgen Forest.

He was a successful salesman and a savvy entrepreneur

willing to take risks--but calculated ones. He said he never

took a chance in business unless he assessed better-than-60

percent odds for success. And he won a lot more often than he

lost.

He was an opinion leader in his community. Bobby Kennedy

was once asked how his brother Jack won the Democratic

nomination in 1960. He said that when other campaigns went in

to organize a town, they'd ask, ``Who's the Mayor?'' or

``Who's the county party chairman,'' or ``who's the Chamber

of Commerce President?'' And we always asked, ``Who's the man

to see?''

For a long time in this community, Jack Gillespie was the

man to see.

What he cared most about was his family--his wife and

children.

He was a devoted husband. As a father, he was a

disciplinarian who gave the greatest gift you can give your

children: unconditional love.

And sage advice. If Jack Gillespie said ``that's a good

house,'' you should buy it. If he said ``you can't trust that

guy,'' you couldn't. If he said ``you ought to marry that

girl,'' you ought to.

Because of the guidance and advice he gave to me, I have

been able to give guidance and advice to Congressmen,

Senators, governors, Supreme Court Justices, prime ministers

and, yes, the President of the United States of America.

Remarkable men and women, all. Yet I never felt intimidated

in their presence.

You see, the most remarkable man I've ever known lies

before us here today.

John Patrick Gillespie has left home again--on a journey to

a new life in a wonderful place, where he will find happiness

and achieve eternal glory. And waiting for him there, the

woman he was meant to be one with.

Farewell, poor immigrant.

Farewell, successful businessman.

Farewell, brave soldier.

Farewell, loving husband, son, brother, uncle, grandfather,

and friend.

Farewell, Dad.

Mr. Speaker, I stand today in support of the ``Protect our Children Act,'' a bill that will authorize funding for law enforcement and the Department of Justice to fight the sexual exploitation of children over the Internet.

This bill is the result of over two years of work in the House and the Senate on the issues relating to child sexual exploitation. When I was Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the Committee conducted a wide-ranging, comprehensive investigation of Internet child pornography. We had nine hearings and interviewed numerous witnesses involved in the fight against child sexual exploitation: Federal and local law enforcement, Federal and local prosecutors, victims, educators, Internet Service Providers, and financial institutions.

What we learned during that investigation was shocking. At that time, three million images of child pornography were on the Internet. Even more disturbing was that law enforcement officers told the Committee that the images were becoming increasingly violent in nature, and that the victims in the photos were getting younger, some as young as two years old.

The children shown in those images suffer unspeakable pain and suffering. While law enforcement is working to tackle the epidemic of abuse that existed on the Internet, it was clear to us on the Committee that they did not have the resources to win that fight because child predators were working just as diligently to continue flooding the Internet with images of child sexual abuse.

I am proud to be the lead cosponsor of the House version of this bill, H.R. 3845, with Congresswoman Wasserman-Schultz. I would like to thank her for her leadership on this issue and her work to get this bill before us today before we adjourn. The Senate did make some changes to the bill we passed last November. While I wish this bill had increased the funding for the law enforcement agencies that work child pornography cases--as our House bill did--this bill provides law enforcement with tools it did not have before to fight those predators who seek to exploit and abuse children, often for their own financial gain.

The bill requires that the Department of Justice develop a national strategy for investigating and prosecuting child exploitation cases. A number of law enforcement agencies are involved in investigating these cases: the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Postal Service, and state law enforcement. With a national strategy, the Justice Department must make sure that this fight is a priority, and that everyone is on the same page so that valuable law enforcement resources are not wasted when pursuing these criminals.

A national strategy doesn't work, though, if you don't give law enforcement agents the resources they need. The Energy and Commerce Committee investigation found that just as important as the Federal law enforcement effort against child pornography is the effort of State and local law enforcement Internet Crimes Against Children, or ``ICAC'' task forces. The vast majority of child sexual exploitation cases are prosecuted at the state level, but the funding nowhere near matched the needs of these state task forces. By authorizing $60 million per year over the next five years, the Protect Our Children Act ensures that state ICAC agents will finally receive the support they need.

Another key problem identified in our investigation was that law enforcement's ability to find and prosecute those predators who create and distribute child pornography was held up by a backlog at forensic computer labs. This is unacceptable, when the price of that backlog is continued child abuse. We address that problem in this bill by authorizing $2 million per year over the next five years to increase the capacity of these labs.

The Protect Our Children Act also includes a few provisions that weren't part of our House bill, but I think they strengthen the bill and the ability of law enforcement to prosecute these cases. The bill makes it a crime to change a photo of a child to produce child pornography. In addition, the bill makes clear that it is a crime to transmit live, or streaming, images of child abuse over the Internet. I think these provisions are just common sense, and I am glad they are included in this bill.

The bill also clarifies the responsibilities of Internet Service Providers when it comes to reporting child abuse images to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Current law requires that Internet Service Providers report to the National Center, but it wasn't clear what information should be reported. This bill sets out what must be included in the reports and what the providers are required to do. This will ensure that law enforcement will have all the evidence the providers have when they pursue child predators. I think this is important, because our investigation showed that Internet child pornography is not just a law enforcement problem. If we are to win the war against child sexual exploitation, everyone must do his part, and this includes the Internet Service Providers.

We are long overdue in authorizing the resources law enforcement needs to fight the battle against the sexual exploitation of children over the Internet. The children who have been abused by predators, and who have seen images of that abuse spread over the Internet, cannot wait one more day. We must ensure that the efforts of child predators are more than matched by an aggressive law enforcement strategy to bring these criminals to justice. Our children deserve nothing less. I urge my colleagues to support the Protect Our Children Act.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to submit the following documentation consistent with the new Republican Earmark Standards:

Requesting Member: Congressman Joe Barton.

Bill Number: H.R. 2638--The Consolidated Security, Disaster Assistance, and Continuing Appropriations Act.

Account: RDTE, DW.

Legal Name of Receiving Entity: Raytheon.

Address of Receiving Entity: 2501 West University, McKinney, TX, Collin County.

Description of Request: I have secured $800,000 in funding in H.R. 2638 in the RDTE, DW account for the Hostile Fire Indicating System, Raytheon.

The funding will be used for final development of the Advanced Distributed Aperture System (ADAS) which is a transformational night vision augmentation system to operate in no/low-light conditions (day/ night) and adverse weather. The Hostile Fire Indicator, an integral component of the ADAS system, will allow for the detection and declaration of small arms fire and can geo locate the hostile shooter and present that information to the aircraft crew so they may respond with the aircraft equipped weapons or move outside the effective range of the hostile weapon.

This funding will be used specifically to develop and demonstrate an ADAS based HFI system.

Requesting Member: Congressman Joe Barton.

Bill Number: H.R. 2638--The Consolidated Security, Disaster Assistance, and Continuing Appropriations Act.

Account: RDTE, N.

Legal Name of Receiving Entity: Carbon-Carbon Advanced Technologies Inc. (C-CAT).

Address of Receiving Entity: 4704 Eden Road, Kennedale, TX, Tarrant County.

Description of Request: I have secured $2,400,000 in funding in H.R. 2638 in the RDTE, N account for the Strike Weapon Propulsion (SWEAP),

Thank you, Dr. Burgess.

Mr. Speaker, I want to rise in strongest possible support for H.R. 758, the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act.

As you know, as our distinguished subcommittee chairman Congressman Pallone has already said, this bill will guarantee that every woman in America in need of a mastectomy and certain other procedures related to breast cancer will have access to such care and, with her doctor's consent, will be allowed to stay in the hospital for up to 48 hours after that operation has been conducted. This is an important protection for every woman in America; and as Congressman Pallone said, while it is allowed in some States, it's not allowed in other States.

One of the things in this bill that I want to speak briefly about, Mr. Speaker, is that for the first time we put into Federal law a provision that says if an individual has a policy that's not a group policy but an individual policy and that individual has to have a procedure and the insurer, in looking into the primary procedure, discovers that there was some inadvertent omission of information on the person's health record that's not directly related to the procedure in question, then that person's health insurance coverage cannot be canceled.

I had a situation in my district, Mr. Speaker, within the last several months where a woman had decided to move out of State to take care of her parents. And when she did that, she lost her group coverage and she converted her group plan to a private insurance plan.

She moved, took care of her family, came back to Texas, and in a routine examination discovered that she had breast cancer. Her doctor recommended an immediate mastectomy. And when they went to schedule that, the insurance coverer began to go through her insurance application with a fine tooth comb and finally canceled it based on the proposition that she had failed to inform, in her private application, the fact that several years before she had been treated briefly for hypertension and taken some blood pressure medicine. She was no longer being treated and was no longer under medicine, but the fact that she failed to state on her original application that she had been in the past, the insurance carrier canceled her policy.

Now this is a woman who has been diagnosed with breast cancer. As we all know, if the treatment option that is recommended by the doctor is a mastectomy, that should be done as quickly as possible, yet this insurance carrier looked for a reason and finally found a reason and canceled her policy. Under the bill before us, Mr. Speaker, that would no longer be possible. The coverage would continue in force. And if it was discovered that there was an intentional fraudulent omission, then the coverage could be canceled; but if that's not the case, if it's truly inadvertent, it's not directly related, then you cannot cancel the insurance policy.

This bill and this amendment, if the other body passes it and it becomes law, literally can save tens of thousands of women's lives every year in America. So I am very honored to have played a small part in bringing this bill to the floor. And I am extremely pleased that the members of the Energy and Commerce Committee, on a bipartisan basis, included my amendment that I have just spoken about.

I urge this passage in the strongest possible terms. I thank my friend, Dr. Burgess from Texas, for yielding me time.

First of all, all you need to know about this bill is the title of section 1 of the bill. This is title 1, section 1, section 101, prohibition on leasing. Prohibition on leasing. This is a pretend bill. This is a bill that has, once again, been put together in the dead of night. I was notified by my staff about 10:30 last evening that the Rules Committee was going to meet at approximately 10:45 in the evening. I'm not sure what time they did meet. We had prepared a number of amendments. We were led to believe that it might be a rule that if you had an amendment to the Rules Committee, it might be made in order. We were even led to believe there might be a Republican substitute made in order. So we were prepared for all of those, ``we'' being the Republicans on the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Of course this is a closed rule, which means there are no amendments made in order. There is a motion to recommit. It is a 260-page bill. It has over 100 titles. If this bill were to become law, which it won't, but if it were, there wouldn't be one barrel of oil developed as a consequence of this bill because of title 1, section 1. This puts a permanent moratorium in place on any area that is currently not under lease unless you comply with the very specific instructions in this bill. And amongst those are if you have an existing lease in the Gulf of Mexico that was authorized under the Deep Royalty Relief Act, I believe, of 1998, you have to go in and renegotiate that lease before you can bid on any of these new leases. This is a bad bill. It is a terrible process.

This is a terrible process, a closed system and a political sham. We should vote against the rule and then let those Democrats that wish to work with those Republicans that wish to to bring a bipartisan product to the floor that can be voted on. The day before the election in the last Congress, the price for gasoline in Texas was approximately $2 a gallon. The day Speaker Pelosi became Speaker, it was $2.33. Today it's

pushing $4. If we don't do something about energy policy, it's going to go higher, not lower.

I would recognize myself, Mr. Speaker, for 3\1/ 2\ minutes.

Members of the House, we have before us a bill that proclaims to be one thing but which is, in reality, something entirely different. My good friend from Texas, the Honorable Gene Green, whose district has just been hit so hard by Hurricane Ike, made the point that under Republican majorities we only opened--his term was 8 million

acres and this bill pretends to open 300 million so it's a better bill.

Well, I would point out that if we put in the bill that you can drill anywhere in the Pacific Ocean beyond 200 miles or anywhere in the Atlantic Ocean beyond 200 miles, which is the international limit, that we could claim to open up for exploration literally billions of acres.

The point is we don't have the technology in many cases to utilize that. And in any event, there is no prohibition now.

What we need to do is have an energy development bill for America that makes it possible to develop the energy resources where we think we have the highest probability of actually finding and developing, in an environmentally and economically safe fashion, those resources. This bill doesn't do that. It simply doesn't do that.

I would have liked in prior Congresses when I was chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee or subcommittee chairman of the Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee to have opened up more of our domestic energy resources. But in those Congresses, we literally didn't have the votes. We did have debate on the floor, we had amendments offered, we had an open process in committee and on the floor; but in some of those cases, we lost those votes.

This bill, we're not allowed to even have the amendment. I offered a number of amendments to the Rules Committee last evening, and they were not made in order. This is a closed rule, you know. Why not have this as the base text and then have a number of amendments to see what the will of the House is? That would be a fair process.

This is not a fair process.

When the first title, section 101 of your bill, is a title called ``Prohibition on Leasing'' and in the very first paragraph, notwithstanding any other provision of the Outer Continental Shelf and several other laws, no leasing shall be allowed unless expressly authorized in this bill itself, that's not a pro-energy development bill. That's not a pro-energy development bill.

So this is a bill that pretends to be one thing, Mr. Speaker, but in actuality is something completely different. If we had any kind of a regular process where the bill went through the gentleman's committee, the Resources Committee and the Ways and Means Committee and the Energy and Commerce Committee and the Agriculture Committee and the Science Committee so that we had these issues vetted, that would be a different thing.

This is a 290-page bill. Nobody knows what is in the bill in its entirety. None of this has been vetted. I think it will come as a surprise to some Members of the majority that you have mandatory random drug testing in this bill. I don't know that everybody on the majority side--I happen to think that's one of the few good things in the bill. But it is in the bill. Now, I have participated in floor debates in prior Congresses where we tried to do mandatory drug testing, and huge majorities of the current majority opposed that.

So, again, we've got a flawed process; we have a flawed bill. What we have is a title that pretends to be one thing and the substance of the bill is something else. We should vote this down and go back and have a bipartisan process.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I want to yield 2 minutes to a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Congresswoman Blackburn of Tennessee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Lucas).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Mr. Murphy of Pennsylvania.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Radanovich).

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I would like to reserve the balance of my time and yield back control of the Republican time to the distinguished ranking member of the Resources Committee, Mr. Young.

Mr. Speaker, I would point out for those States that are not coastal States, if they have Federal or State lands that have mineral development or hydrocarbon development, those States do get a royalty share if it's public. Now, if it's on private land, then the royalty goes to the private landowner, but if it's on public land-- State or Federal--and it's on an onshore State, there is a royalty that the Federal Government pays to the State.

We are here this evening because this is the climactic day, apparently, or evening on whether we're going to have a domestic energy production program for America that comes out of this Congress. The bill before us pretends to be just that bill.

The problem is in section 101. The first title of the bill is a leasing prohibition bill. There are so many prohibitions throughout the bill that, in point of fact, when you sort it all through, you have tax increases on coal because there's an existing coal tax that is set to expire in 2014, and it's extended to 2018. You have huge prohibitions against existing oil companies bidding on any of these new leases that might eventually come up. If you substitute Hollywood for Big Oil, that's like saying we won't let George Lucas or we won't let Steven Spielberg produce another movie because Star Wars or something like that made so much money the last time, which is simply silly.

We want our major oil companies to be out there producing and developing these leases because they're the ones most likely to actually find something and to produce it in a cost-effective fashion. I would point out that, for every dollar of profit our major oil companies make, they pay 3\1/2\ times that in taxes. It's a 3-to-1 return to the taxpayer when an oil company actually finds, develops, produces, and sells energy for America.

The bill before us has absolutely no permitting reform. As Congressman Shadegg has pointed out, if you eliminated all of the moratoria and just did that and really let any area that's in the public domain be leased, it still wouldn't be developed because the national environmental groups preemptively file these lawsuits.

If you really want to have development and production, we have to do something on permitting reform, and that is not in this bill either. We really do need to be working together. Congressman Abercrombie and Congressman Peterson have developed a bipartisan bill that, I believe, has over 100 cosponsors, I would assume, equally divided between the Republicans and the Democrats. Very little of that bill is in this bill.

We simply must stop posturing politically and must really start developing good, sound public policy. The way to do that, in my opinion, would be to defeat the base text, to vote for a motion to recommit or to send the whole thing back and start over, I guess, next week with a clean sheet of paper.

Vote ``no'' on the bill that's before us.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from New Mexico.

My comments on this last 1 minute are more on the process. I have spoken at length on the policy, or lack thereof. I thought it was ironic that we had Congressman Abercrombie and Congressman Peterson on the floor earlier speaking about their efforts to come up with a bipartisan compromise bill. I think they made a noble effort.

I went to John Dingell, the chairman of the Energy Committee, and asked if he would like to work with me on the Energy and Commerce section of the bill; and he said that, quite frankly, he wasn't able to do that.

I just asked Don Young if he was ever asked by Mr. Rahall to work on a bill in his committee, and Mr. Young said that never happened.

My guess is that if I asked Jim McCrery, the ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee, if he was asked by Mr. Rangel, the chairman, that Mr. McCrery would also say that he was never asked.

The point of fact is we have a 290-page bill that is being voted on the day after the evening it was introduced. There is no way you can have a substantive vetting, debate on this massive amount of legislation in less than a 24-hour period. And none of the relevant committees on a bipartisan basis have held a markup, have held a hearing, any kind of a legislative drafting session at all. And yet we are asking the 435 Members of this body and the delegates that are allowed to vote on the floor to vote on the most important domestic public policy issue before this Congress.

That is not fair to the American people. It is a disservice to the process; and for that reason alone, the bill should be voted down.

Well, thank you, Congressman Latta, and thank you for hosting this Special Order.

It's nice to be on the floor with the cameras on and with the microphones on. I was one of, I think, 135 Republican Members of the House who participated in what I called our American townhall meetings here on the floor during the August work period where we spoke to the tourists who were coming through the Capitol. We talked about the need for a comprehensive energy policy. We did it without the benefit of microphones and with the cameras off, just speaking extemporaneously to educate the American public and to keep a vigil for the American public for a real energy policy.

I notice that our distinguished Speaker today held a press conference at which she announced yet another attempt to politically confuse the American people by putting a so-called ``energy package'' on the floor perhaps on Thursday, perhaps on Friday, perhaps some day next week. One of her aides, in response to a question from the press corps after that press conference, said--and I'm not going to say this is an exact quote--that they would never allow the Republican energy package to come onto the floor because it was too radical. Well, that must be a different definition of ``radical'' than is in Webster's Dictionary, because what the Republican energy package is is the radical notion that Americans, themselves, can develop American resources so that we have American-made energy/American-produced energy to keep America's families and America's factories humming and being productive. I don't think that's radical.

I want to talk a little bit about a part of that energy policy, the Republican energy policy, which would be to allow drilling in ANWR, up in Alaska. I've been having my staff do a little bit of research, and I thought it might be beneficial to give the benefits of some of that research here to the Members on the floor and to others in the country.

In 1910, almost 100 years ago--I think it was while Teddy Roosevelt was President--the Congress passed a law for the development of American resources. That law stated that the Presidents and Congresses could set aside certain portions of Federal lands for different purposes if they felt that there might be some economic development potential in these Federal lands. It was called the Pickett Act. So, in 1924, they decided to create what we now call the Alaska Naval Petroleum Reserve. Now, there is a reason they picked this part of Alaska, which is to the west of Prudhoe Bay, fronting on

the Arctic Ocean. Here is the scientific basis on which they picked the Alaska Naval Petroleum Reserve in 1924.

New England whaling ships, as they had gone after whales in the Arctic Ocean, noticed that there were some oil seeps. So, based on that scientific evidence, they set up the Alaska Naval Petroleum Reserve. They didn't have the benefit of modern seismic geology or of any satellite photography or of any of the 3-D seismic differentiation that we have today. Some New England whaling ships, as they went ashore to look for water and things of this sort, noticed some oil seeps.

Okay. Fast forward to 1960. Alaska becomes a State, and the Alaska congressional-senatorial delegations decided that we needed to preserve some of these Alaskan lands. Alaska had been a territory. Now Alaska becomes a State. So they passed an act in 1960 that created to the east of Prudhoe Bay an area that we now call ANWR. Now, of course, there was a little bit more science available in 1960. So, when they set up the Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve, they were searching for oil, and they had discovered in what we now call Prudhoe Bay a specific geologic formation that they thought had the potential to find some oil.

It turns out they found the largest oil field on the North American continent that has been discovered here today, and so they wanted to set up a wildlife reserve. They already had the petroleum reserve to the west of Prudhoe Bay, so they decided they needed a wildlife reserve, and they set up what we call ANWR, but they had done enough scientific exploration that they knew there was an area that might have a lot of oil and/or gas. It was called section 1102.

So, when they created this reserve for wildlife, they put a section in the law that said, in this area, we want to really do some exploration activity to see if there might be something that could be developed commercially. Lo and behold, when they did that exploration activity of the discovery well, which was, I believe, drilled by Texaco, which is yet to be made public--it's proprietary information-- there is enough that is known, we think, of that one area, of this one little section that is 3 square miles, that there could be 11 billion barrels of oil.

Now, as to the Alaska Naval Petroleum Reserve to the west of Prudhoe Bay, Speaker Pelosi and her Democratic friends have said we can drill over there; we can drill over there, but in the area that's now called ANWR to the east of Prudhoe Bay, you can't drill over there; you can't drill over there. There's no ecological difference. There's no environmental difference. There's really no wildlife habitat difference.

Just by happenstance, in the 1920s, we set up the petroleum reserve because whaling ships had seen oil seeps. In the 1950s and early 1960s when we created ANWR, as we were creating the wildlife reserve, we did carve out this section 1102 because we thought that might have some potential, and it appears it has huge potential, but today, we can't drill there because of moratoria that have been put in place in the last 30 years.

Now the question is: If we can only drill one well in America next year, where would it be? Would you drill down in Congressman Carter's district in Texas? in Mr. Latta's district in Ohio? in Mr. Broun's district in Georgia? in my district in Texas?

Mr. Carter and I represent a State in which we've drilled 2 million wells since 1895, 2 million. The probability of finding an 11 billion- barrel oil field in Texas by drilling one more well is one in 2 million. That's not very good odds. The probability of finding a major oil field in Ohio where they've drilled several hundred thousand wells is a little bit better. It's still not great. The probability of finding a major oil field in Georgia by drilling one well next year--I don't know how many wells have been drilled in Georgia. It's probably several thousand--is not too great.

If you drill one well in ANWR, you've got an almost 100 percent chance of finding a well that will produce tens of thousands of barrels a day, millions of barrels a year, billions of barrels over the life of the field, but we can't do it because, in the 1920s, we said the petroleum reserve is to the west of Prudhoe Bay. In the 1960s, we said the wildlife reserve is to the east. Even in section 1102, we put a moratorium in place.

Now the question to Mr. Latta and to the Members of the House: Is it radical to say let's drill up in ANWR? Let's see. I don't think that's radical. Is it radical to drill in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, which even the Democrats are beginning to think might make some sense? Is it radical to see what's off the Atlantic coast? Do you know how much exploration, how much seismic, how much geologic exploration we're doing off the Atlantic coast? Nada. Zero. None.

The Canadians are producing north of Maine. The Cubans are trying, and the Chinese are looking to produce south of Florida, but we've put the entire Atlantic coast off limits. Is it radical to at least see what's out there? I don't think that's radical.

Is it radical to try to develop our 2 trillion oil shale reserves, the 2 trillion barrels in Wyoming and in Colorado and in Utah? I don't think so.

So, Mr. Latta, if I were the Speaker, which I'm not, instead of these political flimflams that we've had now for the last year, here is what I would do--and I ask my colleagues: Is this a radical proposal?

I would pick a group of Republicans and Democrats who are respected in both parties. Let them put together a bipartisan proposal. Then on the proposals that cause the most angst in the liberal left of the Democratic Caucus, pick a conservative Democrat and a pro-energy Republican, and let them offer an amendment to the base package. Bring it to the floor. You don't have to bring the Republican bill to the floor. Bring this bipartisan bill with some amendments where we're not sure of the outcome, and let the House vote.

Now, in prior Democratic-controlled Congresses, that's basically why the energy packages were put together. They weren't put together by the Speaker's aides in a back room with no hearings and with no process. It was put together. It was bipartisan. It would come to the floor with amendments.

When we elect the Speaker for this body, the majority of the House-- which right now is Democrat--elects that Speaker. It's what we did with Newt Gingrich. It's what we did with Denny Hastert when the Republicans were the majority. It's what the Democrats have done with the distinguished lady from San Francisco, Ms. Pelosi.

That Speaker has an obligation to, in this case, her party, the Democrats, but the Speaker also has an obligation to the American people. The Constitution and the rules of the House do not say that, once you get to be Speaker, you can only let bills come to the floor of which you know the outcome and that fit the political profile of the majority within your caucus.

Let's let there be a real debate on the floor in the next 3 weeks. Let's let there be real amendments. Let's see where the votes are. Now, my guess is the American people are smarter than the Speaker and the Speaker's staff. They want a commonsense, comprehensive energy policy that develops American-made energy for American use in the United States.

We'll win those votes, I believe--``we'' being the American people-- if we get them. If we don't, as Leader Boehner has said, the Republicans are not going to accept a facade. We want the real deal. We want the real policies debated and voted on on this floor before we break for the elections in November. If we do that, Mr. Latta, the American people will win. Over time, energy prices will come down, and our economy will continue to grow.

I'm glad to participate in this Special Order. I appreciate the time. With that, I would yield back to you.

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

(Mr. BARTON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, on the next bill, the Consumer Product Safety Commission reauthorization bill, I will be standing in this very spot saying extremely complimentary things about Chairman Dingell, the process that he has used and that Speaker Pelosi has used to bring the Consumer Product Safety Commission reauthorization bill to the floor of the House of Representatives. But that's the next bill.

On this bill, I must say I still have the greatest personal respect for our distinguished chairman, Mr. Dingell, and our subcommittee chairman, Mr. Pallone, but I cannot say anything kind about the product of the legislation that they're bringing to the body today.

At the beginning of this Congress, Madam Speaker, our Speaker for the entire full House of Representatives, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, ``Bills should generally come to floor under a

procedure that allows open, full and fair debate consisting of a full amendment process that grants the Minority the right to offer its alternatives.''

That's not the case with this bill, Madam Speaker. The final product that's before us was given to the minority at about 1:05 this afternoon, which is approximately 3 hours and 5 minutes ago. We did have a committee markup. We did have some process. We did have some hearings in Mr. Pallone's subcommittee. We did have a legislative hearing on the bill, but once that was concluded, the bill disappeared into a sinkhole, only to reemerge today as a suspension bill.

As you know, Madam Speaker, suspensions are theoretically about noncontroversial items in which there is little controversy and no disagreement between Members of the body on either side of the aisle. It's not the case on this bill, Madam Speaker.

This bill will cost jobs in the agricultural sector. This bill has been so controversial that we, as I said earlier, didn't even get a work product until early this afternoon.

On the substance of the bill, I disagree with the central premise, that the Food and Drug Administration should have the authority under this bill that actually certifies that tobacco is a responsible product. Isn't that an ironic thing? This bill is, in my opinion, a marketing allocation bill more than it is a regulation bill.

The FDA does not have the resources to do this new responsibility. The FDA is not the tobacco police. The FDA should not be responsible for going into every convenience store and grocery store and tobacco shop in America making sure that the tobacco products are sold exactly as required.

I could go on and on. I could quote Chairman Dingell and Subcommittee Chairman Pallone and Chairman Waxman of the Government Reform Committee where in a letter they said back in January about how short the FDA was of resources. I'm not going to do that. I might put it in the Record, but I won't quote them at this time.

The FDA has only increased its total number of employees in the last decade by 646. Its appropriations in adjusted dollars is about $300 million less than the inflation-adjusted dollars that the FDA says it needs. Yet we're going to give the FDA another huge responsibility and not give them the resources to do the work that the bill says they should do.

If we really need to do more to restrict advertising for tobacco products or to prevent marketing to children, we can do that by going to other agencies that have that responsibility in the marketplace right now. If there should be more enforcement to prevent children from buying cigarettes because they're under age, we should bring a bill to the floor that would strengthen the Synar amendment, a former congressman from Oklahoma and a former member of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

We could certainly encourage States to actually use their master settlement agreement funds to do things like the smoking cessation programs. It's ironic to me that less than 30 percent of the funds that have been given to the States under the master settlement agreement are being used for anti-smoking campaigns. That would be one area where I think both sides of the aisle, Republicans and the Democrats, could have bipartisan agreement.

In short, Madam Speaker, what we don't need is creating at the FDA a new, Draconian bureaucracy since they're already overburdened and have more work than they know what to do with.

I do agree that cigarettes are bad for people's health. I have never smoked a cigarette. I don't allow smoking in my office. I don't take any kind of campaign funds from tobacco companies. So I do practice what I preach, Madam Speaker, but I do not believe that this bill addresses the underlying problem in a satisfactory way.

And for that purpose, I will strongly urge a ``no'' vote--again, since this is a suspension bill which on process alone, it shouldn't be but it is--it only takes one-third vote to defeat the bill.

That would be the perfect solution to this bill, would be to send it to the boneyard of other suspension bills that shouldn't be on the suspension calendar in the first place.

Madam Speaker, it is getting a little tiresome to keep saying here we go again, but here we go again.

Once again we come to the House floor to consider a major piece of legislation under suspension of the rules. Traditionally, we suspend the normal rules for things like naming post offices and other noncontroversial bills. For those watching on C-SPAN, suspension of the rules means limited debate and no amendments. We all remember that Speaker Pelosi told us that--and I'm quoting here--``bills should generally come to the floor under a procedure that allows open, full and fair debate consisting of a full amendment process that grants the minority the right to offer its alternatives.'' The reality has been different. Promise made, promise unmade.

Madam Speaker, this bill is hardly ordinary. Honestly noncontroversial bills do not require committee mark-ups that stretch over multiple days. Noncontroversial bills do not contain billion- dollar tax hikes. Noncontroversial bills do not cause working people to lose their jobs or their farms. In fact, the provisions of the bill were so controversial that the majority could not even produce a bill to be seen in public until this morning because they couldn't agree among themselves about what should be in it. Madam Speaker, handling legislation of this importance in this way is not the open and transparent process that was promised. It is the opposite.

Now, on the substance of the bill, I disagree with the central premise of the bill that the Food and Drug Administration should be given this responsibility. The FDA is tasked with protecting the safety of the food we eat, and ensuring the drugs we take, and the medical devices we use are safe and effective. It is an agency that we have held numerous hearings on and have come to a bipartisan conclusion that the agency lacks sufficient resources to do its current mission. Congress affirmed that conclusion when we appropriated an additional $150 million in the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for the FDA. Speaker, the FDA is still the wrong agency, at the wrong time, to become the tobacco police. They need to focus on their current mission.

Here's what Chairman Dingell, Chairman Pallone and Chairman Waxman said about the current problem in a January 23, 2008 letter to FDA:

Experts from every affected sector agree that this

desperate funding situation has rendered FDA unable to

protect the American public from even the most basic threats,

including contaminated food, tainted and dangerous drugs, and

faulty medical devices. According to FDA's own Science Board

. . . American lives are now at risk.

FDA has plenty to do just to save those lives that are at risk. We, the Congress, have passed 125 laws over the last 20 years that directly impact FDA's regulatory responsibilities, yet our appropriated resources to the agency have not kept pace. During the same time period, FDA has only increased its total number of employees by 646 people; and its appropriations are about $300 million less now in inflation-adjusted dollars. We're pretty good at telling FDA what to do and how to do it, but not so good at paying for what we order. And here we go again. Instead of making it possible for FDA to do the jobs we've already given it, we are here today adding new regulatory responsibilities that dwarf any of those given to the FDA in the past two decades.

If we need to do more to restrict advertising or prevent marketing to children, we can find the right agency to do that. If there should be more enforcement to prevent children from buying cigarettes, we can strengthen the Synar amendment. The best way to reduce smoking is for States to use more of their Master Settlement Agreement funds on things like smoking cessation products. So let's talk about encouraging States to use more of their MSA funds for this purpose.

These are problems we can solve without creating a new, draconian bureaucracy at an already over-burdened agency that Members on both sides of the aisle agree needs to do a much better job at conducting its current mission.

Cigarettes are bad for people's health, period. Madam Speaker, if people believe there should be an increased Federal role in tobacco regulation, we can do better than this deceptive process and we can do better than this bill. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' and send a message that promises are meant to be kept.

With that, Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I want to yield 1 minute to our distinguished minority leader from the Buckeye State of Ohio (Mr. Boehner).

I would yield to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Buyer), a member of the committee, for a unanimous consent request.

(Mr. BUYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I now want to yield to the distinguished tri- captain of the victorious congressional Republican baseball team, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Davis), 1 minute.

Madam Speaker, can I inquire as to the time on each side that is remaining, please.

Madam Speaker, I wish to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble).

Madam Speaker, I wish to recognize a distinguished Member from the great State of North Carolina, a great former professional quarterback, member of the Democratic baseball team, Mr. Shuler, for 1 minute.

I give the gentleman an additional 1 minute.

I yield 1 minute to the distinguished deputy whip from the great State of Virginia (Mr. Cantor).

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from the committee, Mrs. Blackburn of Tennessee.

Madam Speaker, I yield for the purpose of unanimous consent to the distinguished gentleman from Connecticut.

(Mr. SHAYS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from Coppell, Texas and Flower Mound, Texas (Mr. Marchant).

Madam Speaker, I have no other speakers other than my close. I am going to reserve the balance of my time at this time.

Madam Speaker, I would assume the majority has got the right to close, so I am just reserving until they are ready to close.

Don't I have 4 minutes?

I would be happy to yield a minute and a half of my time to the majority so that they have 2 minutes and I have 2\1/2\ minutes, if that would help.

I am going to recognize myself for the balance of my time.

I want to point out a couple of things. This bill does not ban tobacco. Most of the rhetoric on the other side has, rightfully so, been about the evils of tobacco. But the bill before us doesn't ban tobacco. In truth, what the bill before us does is allocate market share of the existing marketers of tobacco in the United States. It also sets up a huge regulatory machine at FDA, where the Food and Drug Administration literally has to go into every convenience store apparently in America and make sure that certain displays are at a certain eye level and all this kind of thing.

It bans, as I understand it, flavored cigarettes, except for menthol, in which it requires a study of menthol cigarettes to be reported by a date certain, which I think is 1 year. And then, in order to pay for this huge new bureaucracy that has to be created for the tobacco police, it sets up some sort of a gimmick in the Tax Code for people to choose between a thrift savings account and a Roth IRA. If you invest in a Roth IRA, you pay taxes before you put the money in the account. If you decide to invest in a thrift savings account, you don't have to pay taxes until you take the money out of the account.

Somehow, and we don't know much about this because we only got the bill with this section about 3 hours ago, there's something in there that they think scores about $2 billion over 10 years because more people will opt to take the Roth IRA, where they pay taxes up front.

Last, but not least, Madam Speaker, it sets up some sort of a records inspection for the Secretary of HHS to go in and look at the records to make sure that tobacco products are not smuggled or counterfeited unless those tobacco products are sold on Indian lands, in which case the Indian tribe has the right to opt out of that, which I think is going to set up a huge loophole because my guess is that the Indian tribes, not being foolish, are going to obviously opt out of Federal regulation of this inspection program.

In short, this is a bill that, while noble in intent, is very flawed in implementation. It shouldn't be on the suspension calendar. It shouldn't have come up only 3 hours before it's debated.

We should vote this bill down. If you really want to do something about tobacco products, let it go through the

regular process. I would urge a ``no'' vote on the pending legislation.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

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

(Mr. BARTON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, first let me say how delighted I am to see my good friend Bobby Rush back on the floor. We have missed him, but in his recovery from his situation, he has been a strong conferee. He hasn't known how strong he has been, I am sure, but he has been a stalwart in bringing this conference report to the floor, and we are delighted he is on the floor to taste the fruits of victory, which is well deserved because of his leadership on this issue at the subcommittee and on the conference.

Madam Speaker, we have a rare thing before us. We have a conference report that has actually gone through the regular process. I want to commend my good friend, John Dingell of Michigan, the chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, for his extremely positive leadership on this issue.

I want to compliment all of the House conferees: Mr. Waxman, Ms. DeGette, Ms. Schakowsky and Mr. Rush on the majority side, and Mr. Whitfield and Mr. Stearns on the minority side. The House conferees, under Mr. Dingell's leadership, have met numerous times at the principal level and uncounted times at the staff level.

The negotiations on this conference have not been easy. They have not been simplistic. They have been tense and hard-fought. On more than one occasion I have felt like getting up and walking away. I hate to admit it, with Mr. Rush being a minister, but I have thought bad thoughts about some of the conferees. But having said that, the end product is worthy of support by everybody.

This conference report shows how the House of Representatives should work. We took an issue that is not an easy issue. Chairman Dingell and Subcommittee Chairman Rush had a legislative hearing. They had a subcommittee markup. We had a full committee markup. We brought a bill to the floor. We had a motion to recommit. Mr. Dingell then got the House conferees together to make sure that we had a unified House position, and, when we couldn't, he kept bringing us together until we could. As has been pointed out, the leadership of the staffs on both sides have worked together.

Under the conference chairman's leadership, Senator Inouye of Hawaii, the conference actually met. The Senate made proposals, the House responded, and vice a versa. The end result is a conference report that I believe every House conferee signed, and, as far as I know, every Senate conferee signed.

So that is a rarity, Madam Speaker, but the result is going to be a bill on the suspension calendar which for once deserves to be on the suspension calendar. I fully expect to get the same sort of vote on the conference report that we got on the House bill, and I believe the House bill, that passed something like 407-0 or 407-1, I am hopeful that this bill will pass with that same margin.

Now let me talk about what is actually in the bill. This is a strong bill. It gives the Consumer Product Safety Commission added authority to inspect and test children's toys. It creates for the first time a national laboratory that is headed by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. It gives States the right to set up independent laboratories in the State or to do third-party testing of products. It sets the toughest lead standards in the world for products that are going to be used by our children.

Because of Senator Stevens' leadership in the other body, it bans three-wheel ATVs from the American market. These insidious products are products that have begun to creep back into the market after the lapse of the consent agreement between the industry and the Justice Department that this body helped negotiate when I was a junior Member 15 or 20 years ago. It requires a rulemaking for four-wheel ATVs.

On a chemical compound called phthalates, it outlaws three specific phthalates that there is adequate evidence that they might be harmful in children's products. It sets up a science-based study on three other phthalates that gives the CPSC the authority to also outlaw them if the science shows that they should be. But it does also require that there be real science, that we don't ban or outlaw products on no science or bad science. There has to be reputable science that is peer-reviewed.

I want to commend Mr. Waxman, who was one of the House conferees. He and I disagreed on a number of issues, but we also agreed that we should try to find compromise. And we did; the bill reflects that. One of the main reasons that we have a conference report is because Chairman Waxman was willing to compromise, and I want to compliment him for doing that.

I could go on and on, Madam Speaker, and I will during the course of the debate, but let me simply say that this bill represents the Congress at its best. It represents a tough issue where we used the process, where we gave everybody a voice. Chairman Dingell has been exemplary in allowing the minority to participate and to provide input and ideas.

This is not the perfect bill that I would have had if I had been the only conferee. But it is a very, very good bill. It is a strong bill. It will protect America's children, it is worthy of support, and I hope that every Member this body votes in the affirmative for the bill later this afternoon.

Madam Speaker, with thanks, I want to reserve the balance of my time.

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

I want to commend my good friend, Mr. Rush, for his efforts; and I see that we have a distinguished visitor from the other body. We are glad to have Senator Durbin on the floor.

With that, I want to yield 4 minutes to a distinguished member of the committee and a conferee, Mr. Stearns of Florida.

(Mr. STEARNS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 1 minute.

Madam Speaker, could I inquire as to the time on each side.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Madam Speaker, as we go through the debate this afternoon, I will mention some of the specifics in the bill. I would like to point out that the bill before us does have Federal preemptions so that there is one Federal standard and there is one agency to enforce that standard with regards to the safety of children's products, and that is the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

This is important to note, because if we didn't have that, you could have each of the 50 States setting different standards; you could have a conglomeration of rules that would make it very difficult for interstate commerce. So one of the compromises in the bill is that there is Federal preemption, that there is one standard for all the States, and I am very pleased that that is in the bill.

I would also like to point out that the pending bill gives the Commission new authority, gives the Commission new resources, increases the number of commissioners from three to five, and, as I have already pointed out, does create a CPSC testing laboratory so that our children's toys will be tested in the laboratory before they are tested by our children on the living room floors of America.

I would also like to compliment the staffs on both sides, as has already been done by full committee Chairman Dingell and subcommittee Chairman Rush. But on the Democratic staff, Consuela Washington actually I think served as the key that kept all of the staffs working together, and her patience was just extraordinary. She was even patient with members like me, and I appreciate that tremendously. Judith Bailey, Christian Fjeld, Andrew Woelfling, Valerie Baron all worked very, very hard on the majority side at the staff level. On the minority side, I am very proud of Will Carty, Shannon Weinberg, Brian McCullough, Chad Grant, Jerry Couri, and even our interns, Beth Manzullo, and John Hammond had some input into the work product, and I want to commend them, especially this past weekend where they worked both Saturday and Sunday so this conference report could come to the floor today.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Madam Speaker, I again want to talk about some of the specifics in the legislation. The bill before us would give the Commission new tools, such as greater authority to expedite recalls; would give the Commission the authority to strengthen reporting requirements to facilitate the identification of the origin of the problems that arise in the supply chain.

We also give the Commission expanded authority to better monitor

and regulate the tremendous increase in the number of products that we import from overseas. The Commission, for the first time, has got explicit authority to consult with United States Customs and Border Protection Service to better identify dangerous products before they enter the country.

The bill, as I have said earlier, also provides national uniform standards for many children's products, rather than relying on a patchwork of disparate State and local rules.

As has been pointed out, the bill before us has the toughest standard on lead, which is basically no lead in children's products as they come into the national market, whether they are manufactured here in the United States or overseas.

There is a concern on some part about the implementation for the schedule for manufacturers to comply with this new lead requirement, but I am confident that they have the resources to do so and will do so.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I want to yield myself 2 minutes.

Madam Speaker, I hope I can get that quote and frame it, that I was right. It is good to know that I have been right about something in this Congress. I will take that home and show it to my family and my children, and maybe they will appreciate me a little bit more.

I want to keep going through some of the substance on the conference report, Madam Speaker. I want to talk now, in this little segment, about the chemical compound called phthalates. Phthalates are the product, compound that are used in plastics to make them soft. There has been some evidence in the last several years that, in large quantities, in certain products, if a child were to ingest them, that it could cause problems in the development of that child in their teenage years. The science is uncertain, but there is growing concern.

Some States have begun to ban these products. The European Union has banned certain of these phthalates and, as a result, in the other body, the Senate bill had a prohibition based on a California standard on a large number of these particular compounds. I didn't believe then, and I am still uncertain whether it is necessary to specifically ban these compounds because they have been used in products for a large number of years and there is no known instance of any kind of a phthalate poisoning or phthalate deformity in humans.

Having said that, when Congresswoman Diana DeGette came to my office unannounced as I was trying to gather support to sustain a veto of what I thought would be a different bill, I did agree to work with Mr. Waxman and Senator Boxer in the other body and come up with a compromise.

I must also say that Chairman Dingell was instrumental in that, as he counseled me, in only the way that Chairman Dingell can, about the need for bipartisan compromise. The result is the bill before us where three specific phthalates are banned outright, and another three are temporarily prohibited while we do a comprehensive scientific study. That is the essence of compromise.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself an additional 1 minute.

And I do want to give, as I said, in the conference, Congresswoman DeGette should get the Henry Kissinger award for diplomacy because she actually was apparently shuttling between my office, Chairman Dingell's office, Mr. Waxman's office and maybe even Congresswoman Schakowsky's office. That was a tremendous amount of effort on her part, and it does show that when there is trust and bipartisan willingness to cooperate and, as Lyndon Johnson, the great former President and Member of this body once said, ``There is nothing that is not compromisable.'' And certainly, this conference report shows that that is a true statement.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Madam Speaker, in previous comments I have thanked the committee staffs. On this occasion, I want to thank some of our friends at the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

I want to thank Cheri Falvey, who is general counsel; Gib Mullan, who is the director of compliance; Lowell Martin, the deputy general counsel; Quin Dodd, chief of staff to Acting Chairman Nord; Jack Horner, director of congressional relations. They've all worked very hard on this legislation.

We also want to thank some of our hearing witnesses: Dr. Marilyn Wind, who is a pharmacologist who testified before the other body; Dr. Michael Babich, a chemist, who testified before the Energy and Commerce Committee. Some of our database presenters were Pat Weddle, who is director of IT services, and DeWayne Ray, deputy CIO. Some of the laboratory people who talked to us about how to detect lead: Dr. Joel Recht.

And finally some of the staff, some of the Commission staffers who worked with us on the budget numbers: Mr. Ed Quist, who is the director of financial management of CPSC; and N.J. Scheers, director of planning and budget.

Those are some of the staff people in the CPSC and the witnesses who helped us prepare this legislation. We should commend them for their efforts.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I have no other speakers, and I am prepared to close. I am also prepared to yield some of my time to Chairman Dingell if he needs additional time.

At this point in time, though, I would reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, I think we've seen in the debate today that when the Congress does decide to work in a cooperative spirit, the end product is a product that's worthy of support by all Members on both sides of the aisle, in most cases regardless of their philosophical affiliation.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission is a necessary and vital part of our effort here in the United States to make sure that the products that are sold to the American public are the safest in the world. The emphasis on this bill, in addition to reauthorizing the Consumer Product Safety Commission, has really been to beef up the standards and the enforcement authority and the technical ability of the CPSC for children's toys and children's products.

As Congresswoman Schakowsky pointed out, there are some very specific things in this bill that should provide over the years, as it is implemented, the prohibition of some of the unwanted tragedies that we unfortunately have seen in the past, and in her case on the crib issue that she's been so diligent in bringing forward.

We increase the number of commissioners; we increase the budget of the commission; we create a new laboratory; we in certain cases ban certain products, specifically three-wheel ATVs that are coming into the country; we require a study on four-wheel ATVs. As we have said on numerous occasions, for the first time we prohibit certain phthalates from being used in children's products, and we require a science-based study on three other phthalates. We have the toughest standard for lead in the world today.

By any definition, this is a strong bill. It is a pro-consumer bill. But yet it is also a bill that will allow the manufacturers of children's products to have the ability to manufacture in a safe way and to market in a safe way these products to the American public.

Finally, Madam Speaker, I want to say something about the distinguished chairman of the committee, Chairman Dingell. I am not a person who normally initially is willing to compromise. I don't think if you ask a Member of this body who's been in it very long who knows me does Joe Barton change his mind very often, I think the answer you would get is ``not frequently.'' But it became apparent as we went to conference with the Senate that compromise was going to be a necessity.

On the issue of phthalates, being a registered professional engineer, I was not a believer that we should automatically ban the number of phthalates that the other body's bill did and I was not somebody who was really seriously interested in finding a compromise. My position was the House position, which was we don't do single products. We should leave that up--if the science shows it should be banned later on, so be it.

Chairman Dingell came to me and said, ``You're going to have to take another look at that.'' And I said, ``Mr. Chairman, I don't want to. I don't think we need to take another look at it.''

And he said, ``Joe, I really hope that you will find it in your heart to really study this phthalate issue.'' And because of my respect for John Dingell, I promised him that I would do that.

And I spent the next week, both at the staff level and in phone conversations, with the leading scientists in the United States that actually manufacture and distribute the product, studying that issue.

And as a consequence of that, since I am an engineer, if the facts say something, you've got to look at the facts. And I was convinced, based on those conversations from the staff on the minority side and some of the scientists that there was some doubt and there was some reason on certain of the phthalates, that there should be a prohibition.

And we put forward a proposal from the minority side to Chairman Dingell. He massaged it. He put forward a position as a conference. It was not accepted, but it was a starting point for negotiations, and Congresswoman DeGette got into the discussion. She went to Mr. Waxman. Mr. Waxman went to the other body, to Senator Boxer and Senator Feinstein, and the result is we actually have a conference report that is a good compromise.

So I want to commend all of those, but I especially want to commend John Dingell because he is the dean of the House. He has served in this body over half a century, and if he had not had the wisdom and the leadership to say that you had to try to find a compromise, we wouldn't be here. We would, on my side, be rallying support to sustain a Presidential veto, and on the majority side, be trying to make sure that this got the two-thirds vote.

So, Madam Speaker and Members of the body, I have the utmost admiration for Chairman Dingell, and I have the utmost respect for the institution, of the process of the House of Representatives, and that shows in this bill.

Vote for the conference report.

I yield back my time.

Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.