Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I would like to recognize SGT Kimberly D. Munley of Fort Hood, Texas for her unbelievable bravery on November 5, 2009 at Fort Hood, Texas. Kimberly, selflessly, helped put an end to the horrific massacre that took place, killing 12 soldiers and 1 civilian and wounding more than 40 others. She had the courage to defend, despite her own gunshot wounds from the shooter. Her leadership, skill and bravery are truly heroic. We, as one Nation under God honor her today for her heroism. Her actions will not be forgotten, and she will forever be recognized for her leadership and bravery.

It is an honor to recognize SGT Munley, as she continues to be a true leader at Fort Hood, in Texas District 31, and The United States of America.

Madam Speaker, on December 9, 2009, I was unable to be present for several rollcall votes. If present, I would have voted accordingly on the following rollcall votes:

Roll No. 942--``nay.''

Roll No. 943--``nay.''

Roll No. 944--``yea.''

Mr. Speaker, a constituent statement to Congress by Judy Brady of Texas District 31 on health care reform. I received this, and I wanted to read it to the rest of the Congress:

You tell us that the government needs to control health care because the government can administer programs more cheaply and fairly than the private system. Of course, recent studies show that nearly 10 percent of all Medicare payments are fraudulent. Why should we believe that government can do a better job with the entire Nation's health care system than it already does with Medicare?

We ask you to leave health care in the hands of doctors and patients and that you help drive down the costs of insurance so that more of us can be covered. Give us nationwide competition between private insurers, allow us tax deductions for insurance we purchase, and promote tort reform. Don't force us into a government system that will cost us more and cover us less.

Mr. Speaker, again tonight I rise here to talk about the rule of law and the fact that there are those in our society who seem to want to circumvent the rule of law and think because of their position either in Congress or in the government that the law shouldn't pertain to them the way it pertains to other Americans, that they should be treated specially. And even though our President stated that he didn't think that that's what the American people--that he was going to fight to make sure there was no special treatment for people other than everybody get treated equally, we've still got this issue going on. And I've been talking about this, and I've been talking about Chairman Rangel and his issues with the tax folks and about how the rule of law didn't seem to apply to him, and tonight I am going to talk about Secretary Geithner, the Secretary of the Treasury.

Before I start talking about this, I was thinking, as I was sitting here listening to people talk--and everybody was very informative--that there may be people who really don't understand what I say when I talk about the rule of law.

The rule of law is a very basic concept. It is a prevailing concept that holds our Republic together here in the United States. But in truth and fact, the whole world seeks a system where the rule of law prevails, because it is that system which gives recourse to the ordinary person. So let me just point out some of the things that we're talking about here tonight that the rule of law is part of.

When I say ``recourse,'' the average American citizen, if someone is breaking into their house, if they hear a burglar prying open the back door of their home, they call 911 and ask them to send out a police officer or a sheriff's deputy or someone to protect their home. And they know that we have procedures whereby that officer has the authority to come in and make an arrest of that person, to protect the homestead of the person that is being violated. They know that there's someone they can call who will help and that there are rules that the society they live in has established so that they get treated fairly in being protected by the law. And the person who is accused of breaking the law is also treated fairly, because they know that we have rules that we have all agreed upon. These are the rules that our society will follow. That is the rule of law.

When we talk about Afghanistan--which is an issue that probably, as I am speaking, the President is speaking on some other channel about this--the issue, when you're talking about counterinsurgency cut down to its finest point, is establishing the rule of law in a war zone, if you will. We did it in Iraq. And basically we did it with a civil principle which we've used in New York City to lower the crime rate. We used it in Philadelphia to lower the crime rate. Big cities have used it from time to time everywhere, and that is community policing. That is the idea that there is somebody in your neighborhood you can turn to and say, ``Help me. I need your help.''

And really, counterinsurgency is using the military to train up the local folks in their police force and their army so that their citizens know that they can be protected by their police force and their army and their court system and their government from those who would do them harm. So they don't have to look to the strongest guy in the neighborhood--which may be the Taliban--to protect their interests; they can look to the government and the society that's been established by that government.

And counterinsurgency is basically putting American forces and indigenous forces in place in neighborhoods all over Afghanistan so that the Afghan citizens realize there's someone there permanently to make sure that they are treated right and treated fairly. And so it's the beginning of the establishment of the rule of law.

We in the United States have been blessed for our entire history with a rule of law. And, in fact, we don't salute a king. We don't salute a dictator. We don't salute an individual that sovereignty comes from that individual. We salute a document.

When those of us who are fortunate enough to be elected to Congress and are able to serve our constituents back home here in Congress and we have the opportunity to be here in Congress, we stand up and we take an oath. And that oath is to the Constitution of the United States, that we will preserve, protect, and defend that Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic, because the Constitution is that set, beginning set of rules of law that we established this Republic under. So we are a very blessed Nation. We started with the rules of law.

Today, in many nations around this world, there are still folks who don't have some rules that they can feel comfortable will be there to protect their society. And a lot of what happens when you create a counterinsurgency force like we're doing in Afghanistan, we're establishing that security for those people who live in that country. So that is a little bit off subject, but it gets you to the idea of how important it is that a people, whoever the people are, wherever they exist on this Earth, have some set of rules they can feel they will be treated just like their neighbor next door or the guy clear across the country. They're going to be treated fairly, they're going to be treated well, and they're going to have a source that they can get recourse for something that happens to them. It is a very simple concept, but it is the foundation concept of a civil society, of a society that functions properly.

And one of the things that offends the rule of law and that has offended Americans at every stage of our history is when there are those who think, The law doesn't apply to me. It applies to you, but it doesn't apply to me. I am more important than you. I am a big shot or I am a powerful person or I am a rich person, so the law doesn't apply to me. It applies to you.

And there are always going to be those misdirected people in any society who feel that way. But it is our duty when we see people who are taking that position or where a group of people is taking that position on behalf of a individual, that they are above the law, they are above being treated the same as you might be treated or that I might be treated, they are special, they should have special treatment.

Let me show you what the President said about that. President Barack Obama on February 3, 2008 said, ``I campaign on changing Washington and bottom-up politics. I don't want to send a message to the American people that there are two sets of standards: one for powerful people and one for ordinary folks who are working every day and paying their taxes.''

That is what the President of the United States said about the rule of law as it pertains to what he wanted in his Presidency.

There are lots of laws in the United States that pertain to all of us. Most of us don't feel pressure about most laws. The vast majority of Americans citizens are very law abiding. They do what they are supposed to do. They may speed once in a while, and occasionally they get caught and they expect to be treated like everyone else. And they may do some other minor things that they shouldn't do. But the truth is the American people, we are very law-abiding people.

But there is one area that we are all affected by every day, and I would argue that many of us in this country fear, and that is the area of the Internal Revenue and our taxes. Quite

frankly, our Tax Code would just about fill this giant room, and we all wonder if anybody could possibly know what is in the Tax Code; and yet we are all supposed to fill out a form and pay our taxes every year. That is why people go to CPAs to help them with their taxes, because they are worried that they might not get it right and they might be punished for not getting it right. Some of them even worry that they might go to jail for not getting it right.

So Americans very diligently spend large amounts of their income every year to make sure that they get their taxes right. That goes for the ordinary guy and for the Ph.D. at the major university, the smartest guy in town. They all have to deal with the IRS and make sure that they do things right.

Well, everybody makes mistakes and sometimes somebody is going to make a mistake. Some people make those mistakes unintentionally; some, they intentionally do something wrong. The Tax Code has punishments to fit those individuals.

But what I want to talk about tonight is the fact that the man who is the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, he is the man who is in charge of our money and in charge of our tax system. The IRS reports to Secretary Geithner. Secretary Geithner did not pay some taxes that he was supposed to pay. So let me talk to you a little bit about that.

First, let me explain to you what happened with Mr. Geithner. Mr. Geithner has a master's in international economics from Johns Hopkins University. He is a director of policy development and review for the International Monetary Fund, a senior fellow on the Council of Foreign Relations. He is the U.S. Treasury Secretary, the head of the Internal Revenue Service. The specific tax violation he had was he failed to pay Social Security and Medicare taxes on the IMF earnings for tax years 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004. The total liability that he owed was approximately $43,200.

Now so you understand what this is, the International Monetary Fund was paying him separate and apart from what he is doing, and he has to be treated like self-employed. A self-employed person has to pay not only his share of payroll taxes, but he has to pay the employer's share of payroll taxes because you are self-employed. Self-employed people pay the employer's share of payroll taxes, which is basically Social Security and Medicare, and they pay their own share. If you look at your check, you will see your payroll taxes and how much you pay every month to the government.

Well, when you are paid by the International Monetary Fund, they give you a check every month or every year, I don't know which it is. It tells you how much you make and how much income taxes they paid on your behalf, and they tell you on that document you are responsible for paying your payroll taxes. It is not like someone didn't tell you. You read it when you get your check, when you get your statement about your income. You read it and it tells you, you have to pay this. We didn't take this out. You have to pay it.

Quite frankly, Mr. Geithner signed off on that document every year that told him that. And that part of the money he was being paid was for the purpose of paying these things. He has admitted that he made a shortfall in doing this. He said it was a mistake. He made a mistake. He had a signed statement. He signed a statement acknowledging that he owed the tax. He paid the taxes. His position with the IMF and his education specifically dealt with the issues of Social Security and Medicare, system integration in the world economy. He paid his taxes, but he didn't pay any--I think he paid his interest on the taxes--but he didn't pay any penalties on the taxes. But if you and I had done the same thing that Mr. Geithner did, we would have paid penalties.

The United States 14th Amendment is the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution. It states, among other things: nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law, or deny any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Equal protection of the laws.

When we are talking about property, money is property just like land is property. Now, the IRS has lately decided to establish certain back tax penalties that you have to pay for failing to pay your taxes. And in fact they have got a program going on right now where they are saying to people who have made money offshore, if you come in and give yourself up because you earned some money offshore that you should have paid taxes on and pay those taxes, we will make you a deal and we will set out in black and white what your interest and penalties are going to be.

This is about penalties. Offshore depositors amnesty offer, what they promised to give them if you turn yourself in, only 20 percent of the amount will be for penalties. Offshore depositors without amnesty would pay 50 percent penalty. The standard taxpayers' negligent disregard, that means he was negligent and disregarded what he should owe, is 20 percent. A standard taxpayer that defrauds the government, the penalties are 75 percent. So that's the rules that are supposed to apply to every American and every American entity, including corporations, partnerships, and so forth.

Secretary Tim Geithner paid zero on $43,200 in taxes that he didn't paid. Chairman Rangel paid zero. It seems that some taxpayers appear to be more equal than other taxpayers. That's what President Obama told us this administration is all about. No two sets of standards, one for powerful people and one for ordinary folks. That is what we are talking about in the rule of law. That is why I come down here and talk about the rule of law because quite frankly it is supposed to pertain to every one of us. Every one of us is supposed to be treated equally. And, quite frankly, there may be individual citizens that can negotiate this out, but we have asked the questions and we don't have the answers as to why they haven't paid this.

I have written letters to Chairman Rangel asking him to pay the penalties and interest. I got no reply. A good explanation would probably have prevented all of this, I don't know.

The same thing for Mr. Geithner. He has been asked in committee about this, and he said they didn't assess any penalties. That is kind of like saying the boss didn't punish himself for his malfeasance. I'm sorry, that's like the judge shouldn't punish himself if he did something wrong, and that is not how we operate in this country. People in authority should not be able to give themselves a break because they have authority over the agency that regulates and should regulate their behavior when they have violated the rules.

That is not what the rule of law is all about. That is not what we are trying to teach people in Iraq and Afghanistan with our military forces risking their lives to establish for them the safety and the assurance that the individual citizen in those countries will be treated fairly and will have somebody they can turn to to make sure that they are treated fairly.

This body, this Congress of the United States, should be about making sure that everybody is treated fairly. We should be about maintaining the oath that we took; and that oath said we will preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. The oath we take in Texas is not only for the Constitution of the United States, but it is also for the State of Texas and the laws pertaining thereto. And that is our job. When we see things like this, we should be upset about it. We should be concerned about it.

We have introduced, or are going to introduce, a bill in the Congress that we are going to call the Geithner Penalty Waiver Act. This bill is to provide the same penalty rate for taxpayers who voluntarily disclose unreported income from offshore accounts as was afforded Timothy Geithner with respect to his failure to pay self-employment taxes with respect to his compensation from the Monetary Fund. The law pertaining to section 1401 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, the key word ``same penalty.''

This formally recognizes the legal precedent already established by the IRS's treatment of U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner. So what I am saying in this bill that we are going to offer is basically, to all of these tax cheats that they seem to be talking about in the IRS right now that are offshore, if they come in and voluntarily do what they said they should

do, let's treat them like we treated the chief tax man of the United States, the top tax guy, treat them like him.

That's only fair. If he doesn't have to pay the penalties and interest, if he gets off from those penalties, I don't think any other people should have to pay penalties. Because the truth is, we want to do what the President said. We don't want there to be one set of laws for important people in Washington and another set of laws for the rest of the people in America and those who earn income that are Americans.

It's only fair. It's like the Rangel rule. If you haven't paid your taxes, you can write ``Rangel rule'' on your tax form and won't have to pay any penalty and interest--until Mr. Rangel does anyway. This is the same concept, it's the same indicator, that there are those, and they are in positions of very high power related to our tax structure, that are being treated differently from the ordinary American, the ordinary Texan that works in the oil fields or works in the computer industry and he fails to pay taxes or he is late on his taxes. He gets penalties and interest. And he pays them, just like any other taxpayer in the country.

When the IRS says you owe penalty and interest, you might question them. When they show you that you owe them and show you the law that pertains to you, we pay them, even if we have to work out a payment schedule, but we pay them. We don't get, Oh, well, I forgot who you were. Oh, I'm sorry. You don't have to pay penalties because I didn't realize you were the Secretary of the Treasury. I didn't realize you were the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, so just don't worry about it.

We don't get treated that way. I don't get treated that way. And I would argue that no Member of this House gets treated that way, with certain exceptions, and those exceptions are not right. And this political correctness we got going in this country, there are things that are right and there are things that are wrong. And you have to stand up and say, That's not right. That's what we're supposed to be. That's what we're supposed to do here. That's why we're here.

And I'm sure somewhere in this country today, as I'm speaking, there's some family that is almost sweating blood in their relationship with the Internal Revenue Service trying to figure out how they're going to meet the obligations. In some instances, people have messed up so bad in neglecting to pay their taxes that the penalties and interest are as much or more than the taxes that are owed. And sometimes this can be so onerous on a family, it can literally destroy that family because everything they have, or just about, is subject to a tax lien to be seized by the government and to be sold to force the payment of these things. This is serious stuff that happens to American citizens when they don't pay their taxes. And they all know that. Everybody here knows that. And everybody that might be watching this, they understand that failing to pay your taxes is serious business. It can be horrible for you and your family.

I don't want anything horrible to happen to Mr. Geithner, and I don't want anything horrible to happen to Mr. Rangel. But I want them to be treated like everybody else in the United States that's out there today. I want them to have to meet their obligations to our country just like every American citizen has to meet their obligations. And I will promise you that there are probably thousands of Americans out there today that are worrying where and how they are going to keep their family under the roof with the tax burden and the penalties and interest that have fallen upon them as a result of their failure to pay taxes. It's just not fair. It's just not fair.

More importantly, if you waive the rule for somebody because they're important, they have a title, they are special because you elected them or because somebody you elected appointed them to a job, this law affects every American in the country, the tax law. And so do all the other criminal laws and the other rules in this society. Are you going to let them get away with waiving those other rules, too?

We have talked some about this. We have had issues right here in this Congress about the President of the United States and the White House interfering in the rule of contract, and that's making sure that certain laws don't count for certain people. And that's not right.

When we had the takeover of the automobile industry, when they said the unions get their deal but the bondholders don't get their deal, they circumvented the law. Special privileges were given to special groups. That's wrong. We can't let this continue in this country. We can't continue to let the powerful dictate outside the law. Because where does it stop?

I see that my friend from Georgia (Mr. Westmoreland) is here to join me, and I'm proud to have him here, so I will yield to him for comments he may have on this subject.

This IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998, section 1203, termination of employment for misconduct, IRS employees can and are terminated for just what my friend from Georgia just read to you, willful failure to file a return or willful neglect.

Mr. Geithner is arguably the head of the IRS. All those beneath him, from the director of the IRS all the way down to the guy who answers the phone and helps you work on your tax return, if any of those employees do what Secretary Geithner does, by law, it says

they can be and are terminated for this action.

Should the Secretary of the Treasury have to comply with the same law as the regular IRS workers? Some employees appear to be more equal than others. That is, if you're the boss, you don't have to comply, and this mandatory fine doesn't pertain to you.

Recently, Kevin Brady of Texas called upon the Secretary of the Treasury to resign. And on this issue, I think if there was someone besides the President, I guess the President is above the Secretary of the Treasury, but based on following the same rules that his employees follow, he would be terminated under the law, the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998.

So you want to know where that rule of law is, there's the rule. And there's what happens--terminated. Except for Mr. Geithner.

I'm an old history buff. I believe that you learn from history. And in recent history, in the Clinton administration and in the George W. Bush administration, there were prospective Cabinet members who it was discovered had a domestic working for them that was possibly without papers to be in the United States and it caused them not to get confirmed for that position, because why? They were violating the laws as pertaining to illegal aliens. The rule of law. The Labor Secretary under the Bush administration had a domestic that was from another country that didn't have appropriate papers and withdrew the name because the rule of law wasn't being followed in her household. Inadvertently. I'm not saying he did this to be mean, vindictive or cheat the American public. That's kind of between him and the IRS, but I'm saying it happened and he admits it happened. And yet, for some reason, the rule of law is not an interference for him being Secretary of the Treasury. And yet in two previous administrations, violating a rule of law has prevented people from becoming a Cabinet member.

I think we should be concerned as we look at the Obama administration that gave us such glowing promises about nobody is going to be treated differently for their position, to start off and now have a whole year of people in positions where they violated the rule of law and they don't think it applies to them.

Now I'm sure that somebody sitting out there is saying, Oh, come on, this isn't a big deal. My question is: Where do you draw the line? You back out there at home and most of the Members of Congress and their wives and children here in Washington, we know how scary the IRS can be if they're calling you and sending you letters and talking about tax liability and talking about tax liens and things like that, how scary they can be. And maybe that law doesn't scare everybody, but it sure scares me and a whole lot of people I know.

Now there's other laws that are even more serious, and you would say, Well, they can never be waived. They can never not pertain. How do you know? Once you decide that there are people that are above the law in a country, how far above the law do they have to go? Can they commit embezzlement? Maybe. If they're smart, swindle somebody a little bit. I don't know. How about murder? Are you going to waive the law as to murder? Just pick a bad one--that's a pretty bad one--and say, Does this pertain to everybody in the country equally? It certainly should.

But if you're willing to excuse one law at whatever level, then where do you stop excusing? Does somebody get so powerful and so important in this country when you set this kind of precedent--that somebody gets so powerful and important that we waive those other laws on their behalf? They can break our established laws, and we will waive it because they're so important to our country. We've got to have them, no matter what? I don't think so. I really don't think so.

I really think that's the kind of precedent that you saw starting in one of the most law-and-order places on Earth, Germany in the 1920s. And look what happened when they excused one law and then another and then another and then another. And then if you were a certain party member, it didn't pertain to you. And if you were a certain official, it didn't pertain to you. Then, they made the laws. That's not America.

We have to preserve the rule of law. I think my friend understands this seems to be going way off, but it's not way off. Once you start saying it's okay to do something that's breaking the law, then where do you draw the line at the next thing? Is not paying your taxes and not having the law apply to you here, does that mean the next step is you might take stimulus money and stick it in your pocket? Or you might do something else and we will excuse that because they're really important and they're trying do a good thing for the country, and keep going and going--and what do you have? Lawless society.

I yield back to my friend from Georgia for a comment.

That's right.

And let me just be clear on this from what I previously said. By doing the Rangel rule, which basically says everybody else gets treated the same, it's to give you that equal protection under the law that we promise in our Constitution. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do. I'm saying the right thing to do is for Mr. Geithner to pay the penalties that everybody else pays. I'm saying the right thing to do is for Mr. Rangel to pay the interest and penalties that everybody else pays. But if that's a precedent being established by this administration at this time, then everybody ought to be treated equally. It's only fair.

I will tell you it's probably a bad precedent. And I would argue that. I'll tell you that I don't expect this to pass. But I do expect us to raise the issue. And that's a way to raise the issue; to say to the American people just what the President said: There's no two sets of standards, one for the powerful and one for the ordinary guy who pays his taxes. It's exactly what this is all about. This is just as simple as those words from our President of the United States. There's no two sets of standards. If we are going to reinforce and continue to reinforce and not call into account the Secretary of the Treasury and the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, if we're going to continue to do that, then at some point in time these two bills that I've offered and that my friend has joined me in, that should become the law of the United States, because now we have decided that this particular offense is no longer a violation of the rule of law.

So, from now on, we pay our taxes when we get around to it, and there's no punishment attached to it. Maybe that is fair. Maybe we'd all be happy with that. Probably would. But I'm not advocating that as good policy. I'm advocating good policy is everybody be treated equally. That's what I'm advocating.

That's right.

Reclaiming my time for a moment, that's exactly right, and I agree with my friend from Georgia. I will say this. This all started when Chairman Rangel stood at that podium right there and told us about his problems. And, actually, I took it as a very courageous-- if I had been his lawyer, it would have made me a little nervous-- statement by Mr. Rangel, that he was laying it all out in front of us. And nothing about what he said really concerned me. I thought he was trying to work through the issues and let somebody determine whether or not what he had done had been a violation of our ethic rules or the law. But he paid the taxes and he would pay penalties and interest, if assessed, and it popped into my head, There's no option. I have never ever known anybody to have an option. They're going to be assessed.

You might bargain your way out of something, depending on the numbers. You might make a little bit of a deal of with them. I've never known anybody that didn't get the letter that my friend from Georgia just described that told you what the penalties are and what the interest is for what you have to pay. In fact, I think most CPAs that are doing your work for you are going to tell you, You should have paid on the 15th. You're going to owe some penalty, and you're going to owe some interest. Bottom line. When I heard that, I waited to see if that was going to occur. And when it didn't, that's how this all started.

This also has an easy solution. It really does. That easy solution is: Pay the money. These are not poor people. Pay the money. Or at least show the world that due process had something to do with this and everybody has this opportunity to have this due process. I certainly think, at the minimum, when you're talking to that IRS agent who's talking to you about some taxes you failed to pay, you should very politely say, Can you explain to me how I go about getting treated the same way as Mr. Geithner and Mr. Rangel got treated by the IRS? Don't be insulting. Don't make those people mad at you. No telling what they'll do to you. Might audit you.

I yield back.

This is exactly what you're talking about. At the bottom it said--this is something that Mr. Geithner signed when he got his money from--his statements and all this stuff from the International Monetary Fund. In accordance with General Administrative Order No. 5, revision so and so and so and so, I wish to apply for a tax allowance from the U.S. Federal and State income taxes and the differences between the self-employed and employed obligation of the United States Social Security, and I will pay on my Fund income. I authorize the Fund or any of the staff members designated by it for the purpose of ascertaining from the appropriate tax authorities whether tax returns were received. And he certifies that he will pay those taxes.

Well, that is false swearing.

In Texas, that's against the law.

I will stop. We're talking on top of each other. I'm sorry. I have learned a long time ago from court reporters that talking on top of each other is a cardinal sin for court reporters. I have

worked with them now going on 30 years of my life.

Seriously, that is exactly right. There is another crime in false swearing on a Federal form. And you know what, it may be a mistake. I'm not saying Mr. Geithner wasn't so busy--he is a busy man--that he forgot. He forgot? Well, it's convenient. If you read the newspaper report, when they caught him on '03, '04, he took care of it.

Now he should have had a memory jolt when he got caught on '03 and '04 that he really didn't do it on '01 and '02, but he didn't have that memory jolt. He paid that and then got ready to be Secretary of the Treasury. Somebody said, Oops. Wait a minute. What about '01 and '02? Well, he went back and paid that. So I don't know. It looks like special privileges to me.

Once again, just like I started off saying, this is about the rule of law. It keeps our society together. And if we start waiving it for individuals or groups or whatever, once we start down that path, who makes that decision, and what does it do to the rest of us? Do we ever want to get into a situation like that which was gotten into in Nazi Germany and in Communist Russia where, for certain people, the laws didn't apply to them at all. For certain organizations, the law didn't apply to them. Do we want to go there?

You say, That's crazy. It's like that leak in that dike over there in Holland that we got that story about. Once that little trickle past the rule of law starts, where does it stop? If you don't plug that hole, what happens next? It's what happens next that Americans seem to be worried about.

I will yield back to my friend from Georgia.

I thank you for joining me and being always loyal to come up here and help me out. I do appreciate that, and I appreciate the others that do too.

I think it's time to wrap up our time here today by saying that you're right. There is nothing easy about talking about your colleagues. I'm the first to say that people make mistakes. I have made mistakes, and every human being that's ever been around, I think, has made some kind of mistake, with possibly one exception. I won't go into that.

But the facts are that the rule of law is such an important part of keeping America what we are. You know, we brag about the land of the free and the home of the brave. We're only free and we only have the freedom to do the things we want to do because we establish rules that we're all willing to live by. So when you go out and you try to work on something, you know there are rules that pertain, and if you follow those rules, you can go forward. The only restriction that you have on your freedom to go forward in your life is that you've agreed to certain rules under the law. And you who abide by those rules should be horribly offended when some big shot, some politician gets special treatment.

I don't want to be a part of a group where somebody is accused of getting special treatment. I don't think any Member of this House really wants to be in that position. It's difficult to talk about these things, but somebody's got to do it.

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

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 8 o'clock and 50 minutes p.m.), the House adjourned until tomorrow, Wednesday, December 2, 2009, at 10 a.m.

Madam Speaker, on November 6, 2009, I was unable to be present for all rollcall votes due to the tragic event at Fort Hood on November 5, 2009. I had to travel to Fort Hood in order to be briefed on the latest findings in the shootings investigation, and to determine what steps could be taken to help comfort the wounded and the families of those who lost their lives in the tragedy. If present, I would have voted accordingly on the following rollcall votes: Roll No. 865-- ``nay''; roll No. 866--``aye''; roll No. 67--``aye''; roll No. 868-- ``aye''; roll No. 869--``nay''; roll No. 870--``aye''; roll No. 871-- ``aye''; roll No. 872--``aye''; roll No. 873--``aye''; roll No. 874-- ``aye''; and roll No. 875--``nay.''

Mr. Speaker, I rise to say this record job-killing bill tyrannically forces government health care on the American people.

Mr. Speaker, a couple of weeks ago, I was doing a town hall meeting, and I got an email from a friend. He said, There's an old saying: control a man's purse, and you control half the man. Control a man's health, and you control all the man.

We are talking about a massive change in the lives of every human being in America today. That massive change is because we've already turned over to the Federal Government most of our financial system for them to manage it, so they control our purse. This government controls the purse of America, and we have done that this year. It's there. We bailed people out. We are now voting members of financial organizations and businesses, like automobile firms. Now we want to control the American people's purse.

Now we have to ask ourselves: Well, what's going to happen when we do? When we create this great system, how do we know what it's going to look like?

Maybe there's a lot of talk here. I think we've got a fairly independent vision. I want to use this vision, quite frankly, but it's not fair because it's one-sided, and this document is two-sided, but this document printed in smaller font is two-sided. So here is what we have in the way of what the government needs to create for a health care plan.

These are government ideas.

This is the substitute: the people's ideas.

It's the difference, ladies and gentlemen, between liberty and government. You know, this week, a whole lot of people came an awful long way so that they could express their opinions, and they were called radicals.

Vote against this bill.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, we have had a tragedy in my district. I am very sad to report that the latest report that I have received from Fort Hood, we have 12 Americans dead, 32 wounded. They have all been shipped to Scott & White Hospital in Temple, and they are calling for blood; so there are obviously some very serious wounds involved in the wounded.

There is one shooter that has been confirmed who has since died, but he has been confirmed, and there are two other people in custody.

We do not know the nature of this attack, but it is a serious attack on our warfighters. These are people at Fort Hood, most of whom have been deployed four times.

So it is a real tragedy that these families are losing loved ones, and I would hope that we could have a moment of silence not only for those who have died and those who are wounded but also for their families.

Mr. Speaker, as we debate this great debate, with regard to one thing, we're not keeping our eye on the ball. This is about people.

In 1965, I was in northern Europe, working for a group that was laying a pipeline across northern Europe. I got my nose broken and I got sent to the doctor. They had government-run, Pelosi-style health care. I stood in line for 2\1/2\ hours to reach the doctor. I went into a nurse's room and told her my name. She passed it through another window to a doctor. I walked in the doctor's office.

He said, What's wrong with you?

I said, I think my nose is broken.

He grabbed it and wiggled it. It started to bleed. He said, It's broken. Go through that door.

I walked through that door. They handed me a prescription, and I walked out. Everybody who stood in line for 2\1/2\ hours got the same style of health care.

Americans want relationships with their doctors--with their doctors. That's not the health care Americans want, but that's the Pelosi health care plan, and that's the future of health care in America if we go forward with this government-run, Pelosi-style health care. This is something Americans should stand up against.

Mr. Speaker, this is an exciting day for me. I was the author of this bill. I have been dealing with the gentlewomen who brought this to my attention a long time ago, and it's coming to fruition today, and I am pleased and honored.

I am the author of the identical companion bill, H.R. 1182. I represent Fort Hood, Texas, which is a pretty good-sized military base in the United States, the largest. I rise in support of these military spouses for this Military Spouses Residency Relief Act.

First, I want to thank everyone who has worked on this bill and worked hard to bring it to this point. Senator Burr and Senator Feinstein over on the Senate side took up this cause and shepherded it and got it through the Senate, and this past-due reform is now before us today. I would also like to thank Chairman Filner for supporting our military spouses and requesting the bill be taken up today.

We greatly appreciate all the VSOs who lent their support, including the Military Officers Association of America, the Air Force Sergeants Association, AMVETS, the VFW, and the Military Spouse Business Association. Above all, I would like to thank all the military spouses who have encouraged me and who encourage their Representatives and Senators to support this bill.

Finally, I would like to extend a very special thanks to Rebecca Poynter and Joanna Williamson, two entrepreneurial spouses who brought this issue to me and devoted so much of their time working with all the Members that are involved to get this bill passed. This is their baby, and they should be recognized.

This small measure will provide invaluable relief to numerous military spouses who regularly uproot their entire lives to accommodate our Armed Forces. When I first heard this story, I was shocked that there was such a difference between husband and wife, the two spouses, as it relates to the benefits we give them in the military.

The Servicemembers Civil Relief Act provides for basic civil relief to our men and women of the armed services in exchange for their voluntary service. These range from relief from adjudication while deployed in combat to maintaining a single State of domicile, regardless of where their military orders may send them.

This State of domicile provides an important stability for our soldiers, airmen, marines, and sailors. Though their orders may send them to numerous places or numerous States, they are able to simplify their State income tax requirements, maintain their property titles, and continue to vote for their Member of Congress or their elected official back home. Without SCRA protections, the servicemembers would have to deal with all those every time they move to military installations located in different States.

But spouses do have to deal with those every time they move to different States, and the spouses deal with these stresses even while faced with the challenge of moving, finding schools for children, balancing some unsupported relocation costs and the loss of a spouse's earnings as they leave the job to join the servicemember.

This bill would amend the SCRA to allow military spouses to claim the same domicile as the servicemember for the purpose of State income and property taxes, as well as voter registration. Spouses could elect to stand united with their spouse, not only in support of our country, but in sharing the same State as the home base. This reform would prevent a military family from suddenly losing up to 10 percent of their income if they are called upon to relocate to a different State. This is a significant loss of income that occurs as a direct result of governmental orders.

S. 475 would also provide the impetus for military spouses to put their names on deeds and titles, which would build and strengthen their own credit and further ensure their legal protection.

This Veterans Day, which is coming up the 11th of this month, next week, I will ask each and every one of us to not only remember our servicemembers current and past, but take a moment to remember the military spouses who have sacrificed for and supported our soldiers.

Keeping that in mind, I ask my colleagues to grant this valuable relief to our military families and to support the passage of the Military Spouses Residency Relief Act.

Mr. Speaker, this past week, I discovered I made an error on my House financial disclosure forms for 2006 and 2007. Let's get this clear.

I properly reported my stock dividends, stock sales and capital gains on my Federal tax returns, and I paid all the taxes in full. I properly reported dividend income on my stocks and the sale amount of my stocks on my House financial disclosure forms in both of those years. My error was in leaving the amount of the capital gains from the sales off the forms. I have amended both of these forms to reflect these amounts, and this has not changed my net worth one penny.

There was a good editorial on this in the Roll Call this week, and I urge my fellow Members to read that editorial.

To make the point on this issue of my amending my House disclosures, today, I have posted online my Federal tax returns for 2006 and 2007 so there can be no question about whether or not I paid my taxes as they were due. I do this because I intend to continue my discussion of the rule of law, and I think it's important that I do that.

Yet I'm not the first one to take this step. In one of the same years that we're discussing here, then-Senator Barack Obama made the identical, same error that I made on my House disclosure forms. When he discovered that he made that omission, the same as the omissions I made, he did the same thing as I am doing. He corrected his return, and posted his Federal tax return online. I have followed the lead of the President of the United States in correcting this issue.

It's now time for House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to pony up. Could it be that the only reason these two hold back is that, maybe, they have something to hide?

Chairman Rangel failed to pay income taxes for over a decade on his Caribbean resort property while Secretary Geithner evaded withholding taxes on income from the International Monetary Fund over multiple years. Neither of these gentlemen has paid any penalty on their violations as would a normal American taxpayer.

The American public needs to know that Chairman Rangel has not again failed to report or pay Federal taxes while still not paying penalties and interest on his previous evasions, all while overseeing the IRS on behalf of the House of Representatives.

They also need to know that the Secretary of the Treasury is not using his high station to avoid complying with the same IRS rules as his fellow citizens. While Secretary Geithner is asking his fellow taxpayers to pay a 20 to 50 percent penalty for failing to report and to pay income taxes on foreign deposits, he has failed to pay a nickel on multiple years of evading Federal taxes on income from the International Monetary Fund.

My opinion is that anyone who fails to disclose income or to pay taxes should pay a reasonable penalty with interest. If not, our Tax Code becomes unenforceable.

I also believe there is a higher law here, which is the equal protection clause under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. Secretary Geithner cannot and should not legally charge his fellow Americans penalties when he has paid none himself. That would seem to be a violation of the Constitution.

Next week, I will introduce legislation dealing with the Secretary of the Treasury's failure to abide by the same laws as the rest of the country. If anyone thinks that I will slack off defending the rule of law because of a House disclosure error, they obviously have got another thing coming.

Madam Speaker, on October 26, 2009, I was unable to be present for all rollcall votes due to an unexpected travel delay.

If present, I would have voted accordingly on the following rollcall votes:

Roll No. 814--aye;

Roll No. 815--aye.

Mr. Speaker, the jury is out. The jury is looking right now, and they're wondering, What's going on with health care? We've heard all this evidence here today. Some say this; some say that. But the Democrats say, We're going to make it better, the government can do it better, and we're going to make it better. Our experience says, Wait a minute; the government doesn't do things very well.

So where's the evidence that it is going to do it better? Well, hold on. It's still behind closed doors. When we come out from underneath those closed doors, we'll give you 72 hours to try to

figure out what we're doing, and then we're going to make you vote. I think the American people and the jury of the American public want this thing out in the sunlight. Open the doors. Share the information. Let us know what's going on, Mr. Speaker. That's what the American people need to know. Their health care is at stake.

Madam Speaker, on October 20 and 21, 2009, I was unable to be present for all rollcall votes due to an unexpected delay. If present, I would have voted accordingly on the following rollcall votes: roll No. 790--``yea''; roll No. 791--``yea''; roll No. 792-- ``yea''; roll No. 793--``yea''; roll No. 794--``yea''; roll No. 795-- ``yea''; roll No. 796--``yea'' and roll No. 797--``yea.''