Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to my colleague and friend, the gentleman from New York (Mr. King).

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

I continue to reserve my time.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I don't think we do. I mean, I'm not trying to game you here on this process. I just don't think there are any more, and I would like to close.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask for how much time is remaining and how many speakers my colleague from New Jersey has.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.

Our great friends from both sides of the aisle, our great friends from New York, it has been an interesting battle, one that is very tough to be engaged in. They are right. You know, the folks who responded need care. They need to be supported, and that's what we think we have been doing.

When we started marking up this bill, there was $130 million in the fund. That was still there, cash on hand. The President, in his budget, said, We can do better than that. We need $150 million. So that started the process of us deciding what did we need to do and how did we need to do it, especially from the funding perspective.

Now the entitlement debate is an interesting one to get involved in. I am a military veteran. I served actively for 5\1/2\ years. I served another 23 in the Reserves. The first line responders are heroes. But our men and women in uniform in Afghanistan, our men and women in Iraq, and our men and women around the world, they are heroes too. They don't have an entitlement program. They go through the regular authorization process. They go through the appropriation process. And you know what? When we go into the political battle, which we are coming upon, people attack folks about whether they are authorizing enough money or whether they are spending enough money. This is what happens here.

We can spin it any way we want, but that's part of our debate. Do you use the same process to authorize funding to fight for the money and spend the money? And we would say, We should use the same categories we do with our military veterans, that we should use the same process we use for our active military forces. Again, the President wanted $150 million. That's what we agreed upon. That's the amendment that we authorized in the marked-up bill. And some would argue and say, Gosh, there must be nothing being done. Nothing is being done. Well, we know that's not true. CDC has been before the committee twice, saying they have a list. They do have a registry. They are following up. In fact, as of September 30, the World Trade Center Program has enrolled 55,331 responders. There are 55,331 responders in the program now. It's not like we're not doing anything.

There are other issues with the bill. One of the concerns is, when the new health care law cuts money to hospitals under part A, about $150 billion in payments, the CMS actuary says, Guess what? Ten percent of all hospitals are going to close.

That is under the new health care bill. And it is rural hospitals that are the targets under the new health care law.

Well, this provides more money under Medicare to New York City hospitals, at 140 percent of Medicare payments. We only pay 70 percent of Medicare payments in this country as a whole. But under this law, we are going to provide New York hospitals 140 percent of Medicare costs. So there are real issues of concern here, and it is unfortunate because it didn't have to be this way.

All we asked for was the number that President Obama thought was good. He said $150 million. We said, fine, 20 million more than what the money was still in the fund at the time.

And we are also saying they are all heroes. The 9/11 responders are heroes. Let's treat them like our veterans. Let's treat them like our active military. Why should we have a double standard? Can't we fight for their authorizations on an annual basis like we do for our active military and for our veterans? Of course we can.

So, with that, Mr. Speaker, it is, again, unfortunate that we are in this position. We could have had a strong bipartisan bill. We don't have that. People will cast their votes, and they will be held accountable.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, today I rise to congratulate the Teutopolis Wooden Shoes baseball team on the state championship.

Teutopolis recently upset the undefeated Harrisburg in the state championship by a score of 5-1 to claim their first state title in school history. The Wooden Shoes finished the season with an impressive 31-4 record.

My congratulations go out to Head Coach Justin Fleener, Assistant Coach Rob Bothwell and Assistant Coach Troy Bierman for their work with this outstanding group of student-athletes. But most of all, I want to congratulate the members of the 2010 Teutopolis Wooden Shoes state champion baseball team: Ryan Pruemer, Clint Lustig, Luke Bushur, Andy Hardick, Lance Niebrugge, Kyle Zerrusen, Jeff Bloemer, Derek Repking, Derek Thompson, Jordan Roepke, Damon Hoene, Bo Blievernicht, Dillon Hardick, Brock Swingler, Cole Borries, Josh Koester, Garrett Overbeck, Brett Deters and Mark Niebrugge.

They have represented themselves, their school and the community in an exemplary fashion, and I would like to join with the other members of this House in wishing them the best of luck in their future endeavors, both on and off the field.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the 100th Anniversary of the Collinsville, Illinois, Order of the Eastern Star, Chapter 666. A celebration of this occasion will be held on September 26, 2010, at the Masonic Temple in Collinsville.

The organization was chartered on October 6, 1910, by Worthy Matron Lucy M. Holding and Worthy Patron R. Guy Kneedler. The organization still meets today in the Masonic Temple in Collinsville. The current Worthy Matron is Betty Ruhmann and the Worthy Patron is Jack Kime.

I congratulate the Collinsville Order of the Eastern Star on this special occasion and extend my best wishes for an enjoyable celebration.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor Edwardsville, Illinois. The city was recently declared by Family Circle magazine as one of our nation's ten best towns for families.

Edwardsville was praised by Family Circle for meeting the magazine's criteria of having ``affordable housing, good neighbors, green spaces, strong public school systems and giving spirits.'' It should also be noted that Edwardsville is the only city in Illinois that appeared on Family Circle's list.

Edwardsville has developed substantially since its humble beginnings in 1805 with just a single log cabin into a thriving community. Today, Edwardsville is home to 46 acres of wildlife preserve, numerous parks, and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. It is also the location for some of the areas largest construction companies including: Dean and Sons Construction, Phelps Construction and Thiems Construction.

I would like to join my colleagues in recognizing the city of Edwardsville as it is recognized for its many accomplishments. Edwardsville has proven to be an excellent educational, economic and family community that deserves any honor bestowed upon it.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor Southeastern Illinois College in Harrisburg, Illinois, on the 50th Anniversary of this educational institution.

Discussion and planning for a college began in 1959. At that time, the State of Illinois rejected the plans, but a review was granted. The Harrisburg High School Board of Trustees created an advisory committee to help found the college. On June 21, 1960, a public vote was taken and over 93 percent of the more than 2,500 voters were in favor of the college. In September 1960 the name Southeastern Illinois College was officially adopted.

Instruction at the college began on September 11, 1961 with 314 students enrolled. The classes were conducted in a wing of Harrisburg Township High School. In 1965 the Illinois Junior College Act passed, and Southeastern officially became a Class II Junior College. In 1967 a referendum to become a Class I college carried, and the district was expanded to included five counties.

In 1968 the first Board of Trustees was elected and assumed governance of the college. The first President, Mr. Joe Deaton, was appointed. In 1976 the college was granted full accreditation by North Center Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. Also that year, the permanent facilities, still in use today, were completed and occupied.

Today, Southeastern Illinois College provides educational opportunities to a number of high school graduates and those returning to school in an ever expanding campus. I am please to congratulate this fine institution on 50 years of success. I look forward to the bright future in store for Southeastern Illinois College.

Madam Speaker, today I rise to acknowledge the hard work of a group of educators from the United States and Canada who have provided their services to the people of Lithuania for 20 years.

The American Professional Partnership for Lithuanian Education, better known as APPLE, is marking its twentieth anniversary this year. APPLE was founded in 1990, as Lithuania emerged from the Soviet Union's iron curtain, for the purpose of supporting education reform in Lithuania as part of that nation's transition back to democracy.

APPLE is a non-profit which partners with the Lithuanian Ministry of Education and Science to train Lithuanian teachers in subjects ranging from agriculture, civics and geography to art and music. APPLE has grown from its first two week seminar in one city in 1991 into a program which conducted an entire summer program in nine cities throughout the country in 2009.

I want to join with the other Members of this House in congratulating the American Professional Partnership for Lithuanian Education on

celebrating its twentieth anniversary and to wish them many more years of success in bringing the gift of education and democracy to the Lithuanian people.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the Salem United Church of Christ in Alhambra, Illinois for their 150th Anniversary of ministry.

The origins of the church date back to 1860 when German immigrants settled in and around Alhambra and formed a congregation with a small church that was without a tower or steeple. In 1877, the congregation decided to build a new Gothic style church. The congregation has since added a parish hall for a gathering place for young and old alike for many activities. Since they built their first church with timbers cut in a steam-powered mill, the members of the Salem United Church

of Christ have been diligent in care of their sanctuary.

While the congregation takes pride in their sanctuary and other buildings, it is not the property, but the worship and all the activities of the congregation that are the heart of the church. This anniversary is the celebration of 150 years of steadfast worship where there have been 2,189 Baptisms, 1,640 Confirmations, 690 Marriages and 1,514 Funerals recorded since 1860.

Descendents of families who first organized the church are among those who continue to welcome new members to worship. Together all the members of the Salem United Church of Christ honor the past as well as look to the future of their church.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor Carl Mescher of Metropolis, Illinois. Mr. Mescher will turn 90 on August 12, 2010. A reception to celebrate his birthday is being held in Metropolis on August 8, 2010.

Mr. Mescher grew up on the family farm, where he still raises cattle and crops. He served in the United States Navy from June 1940 to July 1946, where he achieved the rank of Chief Petty Officer. He was assigned to the USS Pennsylvania, which was in Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Mr. Mescher manned the telephone connected directly to the bridge during the attack.

On December 20, 1941, the USS Pennsylvania was sent to San Francisco for repairs of damage caused during the attack with Mr. Mescher on board. He then served as an observation plane radioman-gunner and participated in missions to retake the islands. He was awarded the Air Medal for courageous action in the Pacific theater at Makin, Kwajalein, and Eniwetok Atoll.

I am honored to thank Mr. Mescher for his service to our nation. May God bless him with continued health and happiness.

Mr. Speaker, our committee can do great work when we work together. This is not one of our finest times--a new mandatory entitlement program at $7.2 billion. There is $130 million in the fund right now. The President asked for $150 million. This is, on average, $700 million a year. It is mandatory. We don't do this for our veterans, and we don't do this for our military. This is a mandatory program.

What this is is politics. What this is is enfranchising a whole bunch of New York City hospitals which will get paid 140 percent of Medicare rates when we are cutting hospital rates in the new health care law under part A. We can do this, and we can do this in a better manner than what we are doing here.

It is on the suspension calendar. Your leadership put it on the suspension calendar. Do you know why? Because they can't pass it under regular order. It is your leadership that put you in this position, not House Republicans, and I am embarrassed about this tonight.

announcement by the speaker pro tempore

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members will be reminded to direct

their remarks to the Chair, and not to others in the second

person.

Mr. Speaker, there is one question. The question is: Where are the jobs?

We are at 9.5 percent unemployment and nearly 15 million people out of work. Since President Obama has been elected, we've spent over $6.1 trillion in just these 18 months.

Why are there no jobs? Because there is uncertainty displayed by this administration and this Congress--there is uncertainty on energy costs, there is uncertainty about health care costs, there is uncertainty about taxes. Like a businessman told me just yesterday, you can't raise our taxes and expect us to hire more people and create new jobs.

Mr. Speaker, I come in support of H.R. 4692, the National Manufacturing Strategy Act. I was pleased to support, actually, my two great colleagues from Illinois, Mr. Lipinski and Mr. Rush. I appreciate them bringing it down to the floor.

Basically, I think what can occur from this is a reevaluation of things that we know. When we are at 9.5 percent unemployment, 15 million Americans unemployed, 1.5 percent increase since the failed stimulus bill was passed at a cost of $1.2 trillion, what do businesses need to create jobs? And what does the manufacturing sector need to create jobs? They need certainty.

As I said in my 1-minute this morning, a businessman talked to me, You can't ask us to create new jobs when you raise our taxes. You can't ask us to create more jobs when you raise our taxes. That's issue one. I think that will come out of the national manufacturing strategy.

You can't expect us to create jobs when you raise our energy costs. The cap-and-trade energy bill passed through this House raises energy costs. It is a tax on carbon. Carbon is a fossil fuel. That raises manufacturing costs. We cannot create more jobs when we add costs to the manufacturing sector.

We cannot create jobs when there is regulatory uncertainty. When we've got EPA and OSHA and all these people poking around trying to protect the workers, which they do, it's that old saying: I'm from the government and I'm here to help you.

They are not here to help you under this administration. They're here to penalize. They're here to fine. They're

here to create uncertainty, which makes it very difficult to create jobs.

And the last one is the health care law. Additional uncertainty. ``We have to pass the bill before we know what's in the bill.'' What do you think the manufacturing companies are doing? They're trying to figure out what we just did to them.

So I hope this national manufacturing strategy, which I am a cosponsor of, will say: Reduce the tax burden, ease the regulatory burden, lower energy costs, make a competitive, vibrant market. That's how we create jobs in America.

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

I would remind my colleague that wind and solar power is high-cost power. Wind and solar costs on average three times more per kilowatt hour. That's the whole energy debate. That's why you have to have low energy prices if you want jobs. And everybody thinks it's free. It's not free. It's more expensive energy.

But I'm here to thank my colleague and friend, Congresswoman Matsui, for her bill, H.R. 5156. That's what we're addressing today, the Clean Energy Technology Manufacturing and Export Assistance Act. This came through the Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee on June 30 and in a markup of the full committee on July 21, both times passing by voice vote, and it's to her credit for her great work in a bipartisan manner.

The purpose of this bill is to create a 5-year, $15 million annual assistance fund within the Department of Commerce International Trade Administration. The purpose of the fund is to promote policies to reduce production costs, encourage innovation and investment, and create a clean energy export strategy.

I also commend the chairman of the subcommittee, my good friend Bobby Rush, for working with the minority to address our concerns and for offering a manager's amendment at the subcommittee markup that made two important changes. The first was to amend the definition of clean energy technology so that the definition would include nuclear energy and carbon capture and sequestration. It is important to recognize that nuclear power and clean coal are essential elements to reducing our dependence on foreign oil and thereby strengthening our energy security, and as I was mentioning, also keeping energy costs low. The second was to include a provision that explicitly prohibits any of the $75 million to be allocated in the form of grants.

However, if this Congress and this administration truly want to revitalize the manufacturing sector, the easiest path would be to pass the existing free trade agreements that are pending: South Korea, Colombia, and Panama. These are all gains for us. In any projection by any export strategy, these are gains in the manufacturing sector and in some of the agricultural sector I'll talk about later.

We always have to be concerned. Jobs and the economy is the number one issue in the country, but trailing close behind is the deficit and the national debt. So we've been harping on the fact that we really need things paid for now. The public is not allowing us to go along, continuing with multiple authorizations without saying these things have to be paid for, and as we've said in numerous other debates, if it's important enough to do, it is important enough to pay for.

I will just read from the CBO, ``Federal Debt and the Risk of a Fiscal Crisis, Economic and Budget Issue Brief'' dated July 27. ``Unless policymakers,'' that's us, ``unless policymakers restrain the growth of spending,'' which is what we're not doing today, ``increase revenues significantly as a share of GDP, or adopt some combination of those two approaches, growing budget deficits will cause debt to rise to unsupportable levels.''

I would submit that we're already at unsupportable levels, and so that's why we do support the bill. But we will always be looking for and making sure that additional spending and growth is offset with pay- fors.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).

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

I am always honored to follow the dean of the House, Mr. Dingell, who is well known for his oratory ability and his passion, and we have great respect. But I have a few things to remind him too.

We passed a $1.2 trillion stimulus bill that was promised to reduce unemployment to 8 percent. Our unemployment is at 9.5 percent. We have 15 million unemployed Americans. Our issue is let's do things that help create jobs. And if we want to talk, you ought to go to the businesses that want to create jobs and they will tell you a cap-and-trade bill that raises carbon prices and energy cost does not help create jobs; in fact, it destroys jobs. It raises gasoline prices, at a minimum, 50 cents. It raises electricity rates. It raises consumer rates for what they pay for home electricity or home heating. And those are just the facts.

We are $13.5 trillion in debt. Now, part of my life--I don't talk about it very much--I taught high school for 4 years, and I taught government history. This authorization and appropriation debate is important because authorizing gives us the right to appropriate. You shouldn't--we do it sometimes--you should not appropriate without an authorization. So you can't hide behind the argument that it's just an authorization, it means nothing. Well, it does mean something. It does mean that you could go and get the money. If you don't authorize, you shouldn't. So that is why we are having this debate. $13.5 trillion. The public is concerned about debt and spending.

We can have a lot of feel-good legislation on the floor, and my colleagues are well-intentioned; but if we want to do things, if we want to fulfill the President's promise of doubling exports in 5 years, we ought to move on these three free trade agreements--Panama, Colombia, South Korea. As was stated, Harley Davidson would like to export motorcycles to Colombia, but they face a high tariff. A tariff is a tax. The tax imposed by Colombia is the only thing that makes our motorcycles not competitive in Colombia--and that's not Columbia, South Carolina, that's the country of Colombia.

Caterpillar would like to export more to Panama. Of course Caterpillar is a great Illinois company, big Earth-moving equipment. If there is talk of a new Panama Canal being built, we would like Caterpillar equipment building that. What prohibits that? A high import tax. That's why we have trade negotiations. And of course my corn and soybean, my pork producers and my beef producers would like to be in those markets.

So this is an important bill to talk about ``green'' industry and environment. I want to remind my folks that according to industry observers, lack of market expertise is not among the primary trade barriers. The three primary barriers to market entry are access to raw materials, labor rate comparisons, and access to foreign markets. This bill does nothing to address the serious market barriers. It also creates a risk of stifling future innovation and development once government picks winners and losers. The market will direct innovation and development once the government picks winners and losers.

Furthermore, China announced in the first week of July that it will cut rare Earth exports by 72 percent for the second half of this year. Rare Earth exports are the minerals needed in the green economy. They're going to control it. They're going to cut their exports. That's what we need, these minerals, to build this stuff. These resources are used in green technologies--in wind turbines, hybrid vehicles, as well as in national security and defense system, in consumer products such as new batteries on the Chevy Volt, mobile phones, PDAs and MP-3s. This cut will drop the amount of exports from just over 28,000 metric tons to just under 8,000 metric tons for the same period as last year.

So we have a challenge. We ought to be negotiating. We ought to get these rare Earth minerals released, or we ought to allow permitting to redevelop our mining operations for our rare Earth minerals. One is shut down; it will take us forever to re-permit it. Naturally we ought to be focusing on it.

Congresswoman Matsui is a well-respected member of the committee; we appreciate her good work. Of course, Bobby Rush, the chairman, does a great job in the city of Chicago. We appreciate the friendship. Unfortunately, we have to bring up other issues, but that is part of being the loyal opposition in these austere times.

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

Mr. Speaker, the people of Louisiana have suffered a lot of catastrophes: the BP explosion, fishing industry's down, the tourism industry is down. Now, to add insult to injury, we have the moratorium which is costing thousands of jobs in Louisiana.

What's the result? ``Three deepwater drilling rigs to be moved from sites south of Cameron Parish.'' ``First rig sails away over drilling ban'' to Egypt. ``Brazil sees silver lining in BP spill: more rigs.''

Mr. Speaker, where are the jobs? Well, in the deepwater drilling they're going to be moved to other nations.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

It is great to be down here with my colleague Mr. McDermott. Usually, I don't like resolutions, you know, but he approached me on the floor. This is a really important one, and I think it is important to go back over the history of what we did 10 years ago.

Mr. Speaker, everything was paper. You had to have paper copies. You couldn't do bank transactions. You couldn't do certifications. You couldn't do business documentation.

My colleague mentioned Anna Eshoo, who is a great friend of mine on the committee. Jay Inslee is also a great friend of mine on the committee. I serve on the Energy and Commerce Committee. I've been on the Telecommunications Subcommittee. I think credit goes to Chairman Bliley, and I think credit goes to Billy Tauzin. The great thing about Energy and Commerce is a lot of the issues that we address cut across partisan lines, especially on the Technology Subcommittee.

So the signing of this bill really helped, as my colleague said, and it really changed the way we can conduct business in the new digital age. It is really a great credit, and it does merit taking the time to think back on those folks who pushed for this, in a bipartisan resolution and through both Chambers, in order to get the bill signed into law.

I am sure there was opposition by Members in both parties. In fact, I know one famous Democrat on the committee who wasn't an original supporter of this. So the fact that Chairman Bliley and Billy Tauzin, as the chairmen of the subcommittee and the full committee, were all engaged in support shows what we can do when we work together.

The Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act, ESIGN, represents a critical step in harmonizing the world's global commerce and contract law with a modern electronic and increasingly Internet- dependent world. This happened during the 106th Congress. It was my second Congress. I came in during the 105th.

I think the other important information is with other digital e- commerce issues that we are approaching and discussing. We are discussing one in the committee now, which is the 21st century access to disabilities, which is trying to make sure that the digital age doesn't leave the disability community behind.

So the question that we faced in the committee today was: How much do we make sure that we set the standards but that we don't dictate technology? Because, if we dictate technology, we disincentivize the folks who are the smarts behind this new age.

What we did on ESIGN was to say, Here are the standards. You smart people figure it out. Make sure that privacy is protected. Make sure that you can continue to keep data if people want hard copies. The other thing we allowed was for the consumers to choose. If people wanted to try this new venue, it was pretty scary. Can you imagine going on the Internet 10 years ago and saying, ``I'm going to buy a pair of tennis shoes, and I'm going to put my credit card number on the computer, and they're going to mail me this stuff, and it's all going to work out''? It was pretty scary. People do it all the time now, but you know what? If you want to go down to the store and pay cash for those shoes, you can still do it.

So the benefit of what we did was to say let the consumers choose. Also, the benefit of what we did was to say give the business community the standards. Don't try to squeeze them into a one-size-fits-all method. Let the great innovative minds--many of them are in my colleague's State of Washington State--really make this stuff work.

I've been on the Energy and Commerce Committee for, fortunately, my 14 years in Congress, and I've been on the Telecommunications Subcommittee. I should be an expert. I still don't understand it. I still don't understand how it all works, but I know that there are smart enough people who can make it work, and this is a perfect example. This 10-year anniversary, in essence, is a tremendous success story. I have a 17-year-old, a 15-year-old and a 10-year-old. They are growing up in an age where they don't know any other way of doing transactions and of doing business than what we did 10 years ago.

Jim, I appreciate your effort. I appreciate your coming to me on the floor. Like I said, I'm not a big resolution guy, but I thought this was one worthy of sitting back and of focusing on what we did in the hopes, as we move forward on other high-tech issues, that we will set the guidelines but that we will let the really smart innovators figure out how it can be done.

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

I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Texas, Dr. Burgess.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

I appreciate the comments. I was going to be cool, calm, and collected, of course, as I normally am on the committee, Mr. Chairman, as you know. But of course, I am required to respond to just a couple of points.

I agree with my colleague who just spoke that we want to get this fixed and that we want to do it now, and I'm going to talk about the importance of paying for it. Though, the public has to understand that we are 39 seats in the minority. The only bipartisan vote was the ``no'' vote on the health care bill. For the protestations that, from the Republicans, there was only one vote, the reality is you could do whatever you want, but the bipartisan vote was ``no'' against the health care bill.

Why? $500 billion cuts in Medicare--and we talked about this yesterday in committee--not on Medicare Advantage but on hospital cuts, on doc cuts across the board, and on tax increases. $1 trillion in new spending.

You'd think, if you're going to spend $1 trillion more, you could fix this. In fact, you all promised it, but because of the policy and the politics, you had to accept the Senate bill that really didn't do it. The promises you made to some doctor organization you could not keep. That is why we are here again.

We know the CBO and we know the CMS actuary say premiums are going to go up and that benefits are going to be cut. Our health care system is going to change because we are going to migrate away from the employer- based health care system. Some of us believe that was the intent of the law that you passed. So there is an important part of this debate:

First of all, we have a $13.5 trillion debt. Now, I'm not going to lay that all on my colleagues' shoulders, because a lot of it is our fault. We get it. We were put in the minority because of our frivolous, reckless spending, but I think you'd better be very, very careful that you're going down that same path. A $13.5 trillion debt makes the argument to the public today that we have to pay for things, that we have to pay for the services that we think are important.

As for all of the other things on the spending side that this was connected to, we didn't pay for it all. I don't know about you and your districts, but my folks are saying, Stop going into debt. Stop obligating yourselves to things that we cannot pay for. Stop mortgaging our grandchildren's futures.

So that's what this is about. That's why we support this bill, because you know what? It's paid for. Maybe we are getting the message. Maybe we are turning the corner. Maybe we realize now that, if it's important enough to have, it's important enough to pay for.

This costs $6.4 billion. It is a 2.2 percent increase in reimbursement levels. If the bill is not passed, Medicare physicians will face a 20 percent reduction in reimbursement rates. We want them to see our seniors, and we want them to be paid for their services.

It's curious. It ends in November. Things happen in November. December is not paid for. January is not paid for. In fact, as we went along this process, we had month extensions throughout this process instead of addressing the issue early on. I'll be honest, Mr. Speaker, we'll accept a lot of our blame for the position we're in.

But we're not in the majority now. And the public has changed, and they say, Start paying for the services that you think are important, whether it's discretionary or it's entitlement. And that's why we support this bill. The doctors need it.

I appreciate my colleagues and their support in the debate.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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