Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, the House voted this week on Medicare.

First, let me make one thing clear: We need to pay our doctors. We cannot continue to make it more difficult for doctors to make the decisions to see Medicare patients. A permanent fix is absolutely necessary.

Having said that, the bill we voted on this week took a very short- sighted approach. By cutting the successful and innovative Medicare Advantage program in order to pay for the doctors' payment fix, there will be cuts to Medicare Advantage plans that will reduce access, benefits, and choices for millions of our senior citizens, especially low income seniors and those in rural areas.

We can take care of our doctors without cutting benefits for our seniors, our Nation's senior citizens. The cuts to Medicare Advantage were $47.5 billion. This would do great damage to an effective aspect of Medicare that serves our senior citizens. We can do better than that.

Mr. Speaker, in light of last week's Supreme Court decision giving enemy terrorist detainees at Guantanamo habeas corpus rights, I thought I would offer a brief history lesson as described by my friend Gary Bauer.

On June 13, 1942, four armed German spies came ashore on the beaches of Long Island, New York. Four days later, four more spies came ashore at Jacksonville, Florida. All were sent to sabotage American defense sites. All eight were quickly captured, tried by military tribunal, not civilian courts. Less than a month later, their cases began, and by August 4, all were convicted.

Sixty-six years later, almost to the day, the U.S. Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision declared that foreign terrorists captured on foreign soil possess more rights under our Constitution than those Nazi spies sent here to ambush our domestic defenses.

I believe history will no doubt judge that this flawed Supreme Court decision has left the United States less safe as a result.

Madam Speaker, this week's Supreme Court decision regarding enemy terrorist detainees at Guantanamo Bay threatens the separation of powers by undermining the authority of the President as commander-in-chief and thwarting repeated efforts of Congress to address this issue. Taking enemy combatants from before military tribunals and putting them before civilian judges is a mistake.

Justice Scalia, who wrote a dissenting opinion to the 5-4 decision, said, ``America is at war with radical Islamists. The game of bait-and- switch that today's opinion plays upon the Nation's commander-in-chief will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed.''

Chief Justice Roberts said, ``Today the Court strikes down as inadequate the most generous set of procedure protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants.''

Madam Speaker, I believe history will judge the five Justices who supported this policy to be mistaken. Unfortunately, this most serious issue was stripped from the jurisdiction of America's elected officials, who are accountable to voters, and given to judges never elected and not accountable to the population at large.

Madam Speaker, a new oil refinery has not been built in the United States in over 30 years, and the refineries that we do have are operating at or near capacity. No matter how much crude oil is made available, the United States simply does not have the capacity to refine it. And today we are importing processed refined gasoline, last week, 1.2 million barrels of refined gasoline.

Less than a week after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf, the price for regular gasoline increased by 46 cents, because much of our refining capacity is located along the Gulf Coast. Oil refining capacity is just one of the many aspects of our energy policy that we need to reconsider as gas prices continue their steep climb.

My bill, H.R. 2279, the subject of this week's discharge resolution, would address one of the largest hurdles to building a new refinery; finding land. By using a few closed military bases, we can jump-start the process and help address our refining needs.

Madam Speaker, I rise today over the comments made by the brutal generals, military dictators in Burma, saying that Aung San Suu Kyi, Nobel Peace Prize winner and rightful leader elected by the people, deserves to be flogged. Come again?

These are the generals who stonewalled for weeks and refused to allow desperately needed humanitarian aid to get to the people after the cyclone, who order their military to attack ethnic groups throughout the country, who in 1988 issued a blood assimilation order to their troops to marry or rape the ethnic women in

order to ``purify'' the ethnic's blood line, who forcibly conscript children to serve as child soldiers in their army, who plant land mines around the villages they attack so that returning villagers get maimed or killed, who pillage or plunder the resources of Burma so they can have huge weddings with millions of dollars of jewels around the necks of their daughters.

It is the SPDC generals, brutal dictators with their crimes against humanity and campaigns of ethnic cleansing who deserve to be stripped of power and placed under arrest for many years to come.

Mr. Speaker, on Monday the Investor's Business Daily printed an editorial entitled ``The Drill Nothing Congress.'' Here is a short quote from it.

``It is a problem driven by domestic supply restrictions imposed by the Democratic Congress in the face of growing worldwide demand. The Democrats preach energy independence while they do everything in their power to prevent it.'' The problem they are speaking of is $4 a gallon gasoline.

The American people are fed up with a Congress that can't seem to respond to one of their most basic concerns. People are tired of Democrat leaders blocking action to bring down skyrocketing gas prices. So we have introduced a discharge petition to force a vote on the No More Excuses Energy Act. We need to increase domestic production of energy in order to bring down the price of gas at the pump.

I urge all my colleagues to sign on to the discharge petition and support the bill when it comes to the floor of the House. There is no excuse not to.

Madam Speaker, President Bush recently went to Saudi Arabia to ask the gulf kingdom to increase its oil production to help bring down gas prices. Instead of flying all the way to the Middle East, perhaps he should have made the short trip down Pennsylvania Avenue for a visit with Congress to ask the lawmakers here to increase the supply of oil right here at home.

According to the Department of Interior, 86 billion barrels of oil are available in the Outer Continental Shelf, added to the 53 billion barrels available in land. According to the Bureau of Land Management, we have 139 billion barrels of oil right here at home. That's more than the oil-rich countries like Kuwait, Venezuela and Russia have. Last year we imported over 6 billion gallons of refined gasoline into the United States.

One might ask, considering these numbers, why aren't we attempting to access more of our fuel right here at home? The Democrat leaders have a roadblock to every bill to drill for oil, natural gas, shale oil, right here in the U.S.

How long is it going to take them to learn?

Mr. Speaker, since 2006 the Democrats have been completely in control of Congress. The Democrat leadership continues to put a roadblock in the way of accessing American oil. Gas prices have doubled in the past year. At the station down the street from my home, gas is now over $4 a gallon.

House Republicans believe in increasing production of American-made energy. Vast untapped American energy resources are currently under lock and key and off-limits. American energy resources can make our Nation more secure and less dependent on foreign oil.

House Republicans believe not only in technologies like wind, solar, and biomass but that we ought to make use of the billions of barrels of oil in Alaska, off the deep waters of the Outer Continental Shelf, and on Federal lands. We can do this in an environmentally sensitive way. And we should eliminate the red tape it takes to build a new oil refinery.

We should develop American-made energy.

On April 24, 2006, while campaigning to become Speaker of the House, the Democrat leader said, ``Democrats have a commonsense plan to help bring down skyrocketing gas prices.''

On the day the Democrats took control of Congress in January of 2007, gas in my home State of Pennsylvania was averaging $2.37 a gallon. Today, it's averaging over $3.75 a gallon.

Many people have taken to calling this $1.38 increase the ``Pelosi premium.'' This Congress has yet to do anything substantive to help American families who are paying nearly $4 a gallon at the pump.

The Democrats in Congress have been voting against increasing domestic oil and natural gas production as well as domestic refining capacity for years. This is a matter of supply and demand. We have billions of barrels of oil in Alaska and in the deep waters off the Outer Continental Shelf right here in the United States. Yet, due mostly to the Democratic opposition, we have been unable to access these vast resources. We should take steps now to increase production.

Madam Speaker, yesterday I visited a waste-to-energy facility in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and concluded, once again, Lancaster County gets it right.

This facility is a great example of the kind of ingenuity that we need to put America on a path toward energy independence, and it is disposing of waste at the same time. The plant burns solid waste at very hot temperatures, using the heat to turn water into steam which is used to turn a turbine and create electricity.

Ninety percent of that electricity is sold to the local electric utility. Metals, glass and plastics are recycled out in the process.

This process is saving pollution from ending up in the Chesapeake Bay. It's saving land by reducing the need for landfills, and it's creating clean energy in the process.

One ton of solid waste has the energy equivalent of 1 barrel of oil. Last year, over 342,000 tons of waste were processed at the facility, and I'm told that something like 30,000 tons of trash a day is trucked out of New York City to landfills.

Maybe our State and community leaders should take a cue from the people of Lancaster County as we search for more energy to meet our needs.

Today marks the 66th day since this House allowed the Protect America Act that affects foreign intelligence surveillance to expire. For over 2 months now, we have needlessly hampered our intelligence agencies' ability to conduct surveillance on foreign terrorists because some in this Chamber would rather allow the trial lawyers to have an opportunity to sue telecommunications companies that assisted the government following the September 11 terrorist attack in some 50 frivolous lawsuits in the San Francisco courts.

Sixty-six days have passed while the House considers bills such as the Beach Protection Act, National Landscape Conservation System Act, Arts Require Timely Service Act, and the National Integrated Coastal and Ocean Observation Act. This body is failing in its responsibility to protect the American people by continuing to delay passage of a foreign intelligence surveillance bill that will provide our intelligence community with the tools they need to listen in on international phone calls from terrorists plotting to attack the United States.

No matter what my friends on the other side of the aisle say, this is an urgent matter.

Madam Speaker, with the Olympic torch traveling the world right now, we are seeing the Chinese Government's true repressive colors. Everywhere it stops, it is accompanied by a group of Chinese guards who have been called ``thugs'' in the press.

I am not surprised that Chinese leaders would send secret police along to protect the torch, but I am surprised the United States would be so complicit in putting down dissent that they would allow members of the Chinese secret police into the United States to ensure the security of the relay.

Are we so concerned with appeasing China that we could not ensure the security of the flame ourselves?

The group designated to protect the torch is from the paramilitary People's Armed Police, the same force that helped to violently quash the recent protests in Tibet, now using brute force to ensure that protestors in cities like Paris, London and San Francisco, will not interrupt the ceremonial relay.

Maybe the Chinese need to be reminded that repression and torture are not Olympic sports.

Madam Speaker, taxes are a function of spending. If you spend more, you must tax more.

The spending budget we passed previously is predicated on the largest tax increase in American history. Tax increases are coming to all Americans. Tax increases are on autopilot.

Without even a vote, tax levels are going to snap back up to the old levels, the levels that existed before the 2001 and 2003 tax reductions. In other words, doing nothing is doing something.

One of the reasons for the uncertainty in the market is because people know these tax increases are coming. All marginal income tax rates will increase, capital gains rates will increase, the marriage tax penalty will come back, the child tax credit will decrease, the death tax will jump back up to 55 percent. This will hurt the economy.

The Democratic leaders have blocked free trade with Colombia, they have blocked efforts to produce more oil and natural gas resources, they have blocked lower taxes. All this will hurt the economy.

People are beginning to call this the Pelosi recession. Maybe they are right.

Mr. Speaker, the Middle East Research Institute, which monitors extremist media, recently reported on a disturbing children's production that aired on Hamas TV. The program, aimed at a child audience, depicted a little boy who accuses President Bush, along with Israel, of killing his family. In the show, the boy proceeds to take out a sword and stabs the President to death. This is a children's program.

There is little chance for peace in the Middle East if the young minds of the region are polluted with this type of hatred and violence. Many young people in the region are being exposed to similar messages in their school textbooks.

I commend the Council of Religious Leaders in the Holy Land, religious leaders from the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim faith who are working together to counter this type of hate speech and violent message, and they do it with moral authority. We need more brave leaders like those on the Council if we are going to create a condition for peacemaking in the Middle East.

Mr. Speaker, in a recent speech in my home State of Pennsylvania, one of the candidates for President referred to the possibility of his daughter conceiving a child as a ``punishment.'' In referring to his own two daughters, he said, ``I am going to teach them first about values and morals, but if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby. I

don't want them punished with an STD.''

I agree that teens should be taught about values and morals. But I find it disturbing that any candidate for high office finds the notion of a grandchild to be punishment, a punishment on the same level as a sexually transmitted disease. Have we come this far? Has the opposing party embraced an ideology that is so opposed to life that a grandchild is seen as a punishment?

In the same speech he said, ``This is an example where good people can disagree.'' Well, I see nothing good about believing a grandchild is a punishment. Not his most eloquent or uniting speech.