Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, as always, it's an honor to speak here in the House of Representatives.

I heard Democratic friends mention earlier that what we need to do to get the economy going is start spending on infrastructure because our grandchildren will really appreciate the dollars that they have to pay years from now that we spent on infrastructure.

The only thing is, that's exactly what our friends across the aisle were saying in January of 2009 when they wanted an $800 billion stimulus package that turned out to be maybe $900 billion or $1 trillion. It was going to be for infrastructure. And many in the American public said, yeah, that's a good idea. It turned out that only around 6 percent or so, 6 to 7 percent may have been for infrastructure.

Okay. Fooled us once, shame on you. Fool us twice, shame on us.

The thing is, some of us weren't fooled even back then. We had already seen things that were said that would be done that were not done. So I voted against that so-called ``porkulus'' stimulus, or whatever you want to call it, bill. I voted against TARP because in America we're not supposed to just give one man $700 billion and say, go do whatever you want with all this money; we don't care, just fix things. Because he certainly didn't fix things, although he did engorge his buddies at Goldman Sachs.

Nonetheless, we do face economic difficulties. And within the last 2 weeks there were six of us, a bipartisan group, in Turkey. Their economy seems to be going very well, and we were seeing things growing and doing well in Istanbul. And they don't understand sarcasm very well and so, but I, nonetheless, said to some of their economic leaders, business leaders, so you must have had many huge stimulus packages to get the economy going. They looked at me like I was crazy because they don't understand sarcasm very well in another language I guess. But they spoke good English.

Nonetheless, they didn't use stimulus packages. But they did say they had dropped their corporate tax rate that was much too high down to 20 percent, and now businesses have been coming in. That works. It works whenever it's been tried.

But let me get to another point. Credibility is always relevant. In my days as a judge and chief justice that was one of the rules of the court. Credibility is always an issue. It's always relevant. So when this country makes promises to people and doesn't keep them, or they're stupid promises to people we know will not keep their word to us, we lose credibility.

We found out now that this administration is negotiating with the Taliban; basically, you know, just let us out. We're negotiating with the Taliban? Did Hoover negotiate with Dillinger, and Bonnie and Clyde?

Did Robert Kennedy, as Attorney General, negotiate with the Mob?

When people are involved and they're criminals and they're murderers and they're engaged in criminal activity and they've never kept a promise, do you really want to be making that deal?

Now, I know it seems like we should have learned a lesson from the Clinton administration. When North Korea was trying to build nukes, the Clinton administration sends Madeleine Albright, and she comes in, hey, hey, how about dropping pursuing nuclear weapons? We'll build you a nuclear power plant if you'll just--you'll build us a nuclear power plant if we just tell you we won't pursue it? Sure, we'll tell you that all day long.

So they cut a deal. We built them a nuclear plant, and that has been used to develop nuclear weapons, just like anybody should have figured it would. When you deal with criminals, with lying thugs, you can't trust that agreement.

For us to be negotiating with the Taliban is a blight on those who have given their lives there. I attended a funeral this weekend of Brad Gaudet, who went down in a helicopter accident on June 5. We owe those people who have given their lives fighting against those who want to destroy our way of life better than cutting a deal.

Let's rearm the Northern Alliance, the people that originally defeated the Taliban--just give them the advisers, the trainers, all that they need, and let them whip the Taliban for us again. Let's not negotiate with Dillinger. It makes no sense and we lose credibility.

Mr. Speaker, on Sunday, June 5, the State of Texas and our Nation lost a true hero. Chief Warrant Officer Brad Gaudet was killed in Afghanistan after his helicopter crashed near Kabul.

Brad was the best and brightest of what the First Congressional District of Texas has to offer. Raised in Lufkin, Texas, and a graduate of Stephen F. Austin University, he was truly a son of East Texas.

General MacArthur once said, ``Duty, Honor, Country: Those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be. They are your rallying points: To build courage when courage seems to fail; to regain faith when there seems to be little cause for faith; to create hope when hope becomes forlorn.'' For Brad, these three ideas were not just to strive for. He understood them, he embodied them, he lived them.

Brad, just 31 years old, was a husband, a father, a son, and a brother. Outgoing and aggressive, Brad truly personified the Army's old slogan, ``Be All You Can Be.'' The summer before his senior year in high school, Brad joined the Reserves and went to boot camp. His family joked that he was never more prepared for the upcoming high school football season than he was that year.

Upon graduating from Stephen F. Austin University in Nacogdoches, Texas, Brad enlisted in the Army and was sent to Fort Rucker in Alabama. There he pursued his dream of flying and graduating from flight school. The next stage of his military service brought him to Fort Drum in New York, where he met the love of his life, Ginny.

During his second deployment, Brad achieved Pilot in Command rank, a highly-skilled specialty officer which is very difficult to achieve for those who are not commissioned officers. This speaks to his hard work, his outstanding training, his performances, the respect his superiors had for him.

A true family man, last month Brad rushed home from his third deployment in Afghanistan just in time to help with the delivery of his newly born daughter, Addyson. His family will always remember his great sense of humor, his infectious smile, his kind heart, and his desire to brighten anyone's day.

Today I want to extend my prayers and condolences to Brad's wife, Ginny; his two young daughters, Tealie and Addyson; his parents, his relatives and his friends. Their American warrior is home. He has met his maker, his master. His duty is done and he is at peace.

George Orwell said, ``We sleep safely in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.''

A grateful Nation is so very proud of this son of East Texas. We grieve the loss of our warrior brother. We honor Brad for his courage, his sacrifice and his selfless commitment to duty, honor and country. He gave his all in service for the sake of safety, freedom and liberty.

May God bless the sacrifices and the last full measure of devotion that Brad Gaudet paid, and may he bless us all because he was such a patriot.

Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

I would like to address myself for a moment to Afghanistan. That is where Brad Gaudet and so many Americans have fought and have died. It was the place where the Taliban flourished. They trained terrorists; they prepared for the chance to come kill thousands of Americans in New York City; they came up with plans to kill Americans in other places in the United States, so it was important that we go take out the home bases of the Taliban.

For those that know the history of our fighting in Afghanistan, they know that what we initially did was send in advisers and trainers and people to help the Afghans to fight and take out the Taliban, and in fact a group that proved most helpful was the Northern Alliance. Some say it was run by warlords, but these tribal regions with their leaders accepted munitions, accepted training, accepted what it took to bring war upon the Taliban, and they whipped the Taliban, at least until later when the Taliban resurged.

But after the Northern Alliance defeated the Taliban, we did something that I was not aware of, until some of the warlords or Northern Alliance leaders wanted to sit down with somebody from our government and our State Department they said had refused to meet with them.

These were the leaders of groups who risked their lives. Many in the group lost their lives fighting the Taliban, and whipped them. And when my friend Dana Rohrabacher said, Hey, these folks want to meet with somebody from the U.S. Government, the State Department won't meet with them, will you go with me, I said sure.

Initially we were going to try to meet near northern Afghanistan, but when the Uzbeks found out, as I understand it, they didn't want to give visas to these people. We thought maybe we would meet in India, and they didn't want to give them visas. So at the last minute we arranged to meet in Berlin. Five of the nine did meet.

Something that many Americans don't realize, the Taliban in preparing for 9/11 knew that there was a man who was charismatic, who was a powerful leader, who had the chance to bring together Afghanistan as a nation, the Afghans as a people. Even though it is so very tribal, one person had the chance to really pull it all together, and on either September 9 or September 10 of 2001, he was boldly assassinated so that when a day later 9/11 occurred there would be nobody that the U.S. could really turn to as one individual to rally Afghans against the Taliban.

They took him out before they committed their act of atrocity against Americans. They knew what they were doing. They planned well. But our American soldiers know what they're doing. And when we sent special forces and intelligence folks to help, they were able to whip the Taliban. And I didn't realize until we met with these Northern Alliance leaders that after they initially whipped the Taliban, we demanded that they disarm. According to them, they were told, Look, we're the United States of America. You have nothing to fear. We're here. We'll make sure that you're not harmed. You fought for us. You whipped the Taliban. It was our mutual enemy. And so turn in all of your weapons.

I said, You turned in everything? They said, Well, we've got some small arms. We can't fight the Taliban with the little bit we've got left. We gave all of that back--plus some of our own. And the Taliban has re-surged. The war has gone on much longer than it should have. There were reports of corruption. The poppy production has surged much more than anything else there in Afghanistan. And what they had heard was that our government was negotiating directly with Karzai, the leader of Afghanistan, and with Pakistan. And what they had been hearing was that our government was negotiating indirectly with the Taliban itself. They want to destroy America. And the word that they had gotten was basically that the United States just wanted out, and if they would let us get out without a major incident, between the Taliban, Karzai, Pakistan, they could just divide things up however they wanted.

I want our troops, I want our people, I want our resources out of Afghanistan. But we've got to make sure that people like Brad Gaudet and so many others that have given their lives haven't done it for nothing. But it seems that that initial success may have given us a good roadmap to how you succeed in Afghanistan. Equip the

people that are our friends, who have the same enemies as we have, and let them do the fighting. Things went well when that's the way it went. We provided trainers, advisers, gave them some intelligence, and they whipped the bad guys for us. What would be wrong with getting back to that point instead of what the rumors are that this administration is prepared to do--let the Taliban take back up where they left off once we leave.

If the Taliban gets a foothold again, as they want to do, if al Qaeda gets a foothold and if radical Islam gets a strong foothold in Afghanistan again, does anybody really think they won't come after us again? They have pledged that we're a great Satan, that we must be eliminated. The most free country in the world, the greatest country in the history of mankind, and these people want it destroyed because it didn't fit into their narrow scope of having a global caliphate where one religious leader dictates to everybody. We kind of like our freedom, where those of us who are Christians are free to worship and those who wish to worship any other way are free to do so. That's America. But it's not time to just cut our losses and leave.

It's time to act smartly. I am very much afraid this administration will continue to reward our enemies and to turn against our allies and friends. You can't keep maintaining foreign affairs and any credibility in the world when you turn against your friends, thinking that your enemies are going to like you better because you showed you would turn on your own friends. Your enemies don't like you any better when you turn against your friends. In fact, what happens is they not only don't like you, they no longer respect you. Because some in the world, they don't like us--they hate us--and they think we ought to be destroyed, but they respect our power. And once they see that a Nation will turn against its friends and hurt its own friends and allies, they know this country should not even be respected. As I've said many times, we don't have to keep paying people to hate us. They'll do it for free. It's time to quit paying our enemies to continue to nurture hatred against us. It's time to be a true friend to our allies.

We heard one of the greatest speeches I've heard in my 6\1/2\ years in Congress from that podium right there, and it didn't come from any State of the Union. It came from the leader of Israel. We heard from Palestinians. They thought the speech was a declaration of war. It means they didn't listen to the speech because, as Prime Minister Netanyahu made clear, as soon as the Palestinians are willing to tell their people there will be a Jewish State of Israel, peace can be worked out very quickly after that. But no one wants to say that on the Palestinian side. So, as Patrick Henry said, men cry, ``Peace, peace,'' but there is no peace, and there will be no peace in the Middle East.

Here, we think that gee--at least this administration--we heard our friends, our enemies will love us. They've been trying that since the Clinton administration when the Clinton administration classified an anti-Khomeini and Ahmadinejad, as of now, group called the MEK, their initials. They're an antitotalitarian regime group, and they're over 3,000 residents of Camp Ashraf in Iraq. We as a Nation gave them our sovereign promise we'll make sure you're safe and secure. When we turned things over to the elected government of Iraq, we were assured by that government that they would take care of that promise and they would keep the residents at Camp Ashraf safe. Yet nearly a week ago, when a group of six of us met with the Prime Minister of Iraq there in Baghdad and tried to discuss the issue of the Iraqi military going to Camp Ashraf and killing perhaps 35 residents of Camp Ashraf, wounding perhaps a hundred or more from reports from a video Dana Rohrabacher had seen--I had not--he said it's very clear these were unarmed civilians killed by the Iraqi military. That's not the promise we made to those people in Camp Ashraf. It's not the promise that the Iraqi leaders, including Maliki, made to those Iranians in Camp Ashraf. Yet the Iraqi military killed civilians in Camp Ashraf.

As I tried to explain to Prime Minister Maliki, when he said for us to be concerned and to try to do something about the killings would be a violation of their national sovereignty, I tried to explain that actually it does involve sovereignty, but the U.S. sovereignty was involved in promising their safety at Camp Ashraf, and his sovereignty was involved when they promised the safety of those residents at Camp Ashraf.

So we have a vested interest with all of the American lives and treasure that were laid down and invested in Iraq. We have a very strong vested interest in seeing that justice is done and in seeing that people who made promises to us keep those promises, because if we don't see to that, then how can we expect anyone to trust us? How can we expect anyone to truly negotiate fairly with us, expecting we'll keep our word?

Sometimes you make bad deals, but if you're going to keep your word and if you're going to be known for being a country and a people of honor and a people of their word, you've got to keep your word. As a former judge and chief justice, some things I've seen have been unjust, but when we can do something about it to help us keep our word to those who've trusted us, we've got to do it. We can't look back.

So we were a bit surprised when our group of six Members of Congress--four Republicans and two Democrats--flew up to Erbil and met with folks up there. It's always good to see troops around, American troops. They're the best I've ever seen. The 4 years I spent in the Army, starting in the late 1970s, left me concerned that, if we were attacked back in those days, we were in a lot of trouble. But the military I see and I meet and I visit with--those from my district and from all over the country--so impress me and so impress those around them. We have an incredible military, these days, of our service men and women.

When we left Erbil in northern Iraq and were flying out, we got word that our Embassy had been contacted by Prime Minister Maliki, and was told that our group was not welcome in Iraq any longer. I have attended far too many funerals of people from Texas and other funerals of Americans who laid down their lives and, in doing so, provided people like Prime Minister Maliki the chance to come back from exile, to be elected in that country and to be a leader, that I don't think it's too much to ask for a little gratitude. We're not asking for anything in return.

I know there was some discussion--it wasn't from me--about, Gee, maybe you could help us, instead of doing deals with China for your oil after we secured your country and got rid of the tyrant Saddam Hussein. Maybe you could deal with us. I'm not asking for those things. I'm just asking for a little gratitude for the lives and the treasure that were expended to give people in Iraq the freedoms they have today.

I expect people who have become leaders in Iraq to keep their word to us, because if they can't be trusted, if they won't keep their word, well, they can lock me out of their country all they want to, but we have the power of the purse.

I didn't join in the lawsuit against the administration over the War Powers. I think they're well-intended dear friends who are involved in that suit this week. I didn't engage in that as a party for one reason, which is that this body has the power constitutionally of the purse. We don't need a War Powers Act. We don't need any interpretation by the Supreme Court of whether the War Powers is effective or whether the War Powers is not, because we have the ultimate weapon in this body called the power of the purse.

If the President wants to send our American treasure and our American military, which composes 65 percent of NATO's military, what a joke to say, Hey, we're turning it over to NATO. We won't be involved anymore. We're 65 percent of NATO's military. If we're going to have a President who sends people over there, not because Congress thought it was a good idea and not because a majority of the American people did but because the Arab League asked us to and because some in the U.N. thought it was a good idea, then Congress has the ultimate power, and we don't need the War Powers to do it. We don't need the Supreme Court's okay. All we need to do is shut down every dime being spent in Libya until

such time as we can be sure that whoever takes over Libya will not be worse for the United States than the crazy murderer who is there now. We need to be sure of that.

I know the President made the mistake one day of saying he had visited all 57 States. I'm well aware that there are not 57 States in this country, although there are 57 members of OIC, the Islamic states in the world. Perhaps there was some confusion as to whether he'd been to all 57 Islamic states as opposed to all 50 U.S. States. Nonetheless, we have an obligation to the 50 American States, not to the 57 Muslim Islamic states.

Our oath that we took is in this body--in this House--and it's to the people of America. It's not to the Muslim Brotherhood, who may very well take over Egypt.

Once they do, they'll be bent upon setting up a caliphate around the world, including in the United States, and this administration will have been complicit in helping people who want to destroy our country out of the ignorance to think, if you help your enemies, they're going to like you better. Not only do they not like you, as I said, they disrespect you when they see how foolhardy you are.

It's time to quit involving this country in warfare around the world unless we can be sure that such warfare helps us keep our oath to the United States of America.

And to quote my dear friend from Texas, also a former judge, ``And that's just the way it is.''

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

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

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 3 o'clock and 37 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until Monday, June 20, 2011, at 10 a.m.

The Speaker is to be commended for bringing these two bills to the floor. Unfortunately, we have a President who cared more about what the Arab League and the U.N. thought than he did his own elected Congress. We've been kept in the dark about the basis for his decisions, and I voted ``no'' on our Speaker's bill because he didn't need any more time.

The President should be aware, Madam Speaker, that there are an awful lot of people who are ready to switch their votes and to vote ``yes.'' I would prefer that we not do it through the War Powers. We could do like the Democrats did in '74 and just cut off the spending.

It is ridiculous. He said we'd enforce a no-fly zone. That's it. We wouldn't put ground troops in Libya. He said that NATO was going to take over and that we wouldn't be that involved.

Wrong on all counts.

We know from the rules of the House the President wouldn't lie, but he sure is misrepresenting things.

I have an amendment at the desk, Mr. Chairman.

Under this amendment, no funds would be made available by this act for the new construction, purchase, or lease of any building or any space in the District of Columbia except where a contract was entered into before the date of the enactment.

Now, in the District of Columbia right now, the Federal Government had exactly 304 leases at the start of this year. These leases cover more than 23.6 million square feet. This bureaucracy has grown beyond the bounds of being reasonable.

The Federal Government, in addition to the 23.6 million square feet that it leases, also owns 109 buildings in the District of Columbia, and that doesn't even include all of the Department of

Defense buildings because those are administered by other than the GSA. The 23.6 million square feet come at a cost of around a billion dollars every year to the taxpayer.

Here we are in financially troubling times, and we need to send a message back to America we know you're tightening your belts. We know that States and municipalities are having to tighten their belts, and we get it here, also.

The Appropriations Committee and the chair is to be applauded. They have done a wonderful job on this bill. There is an amount zeroed out for new building space in a specific area of this bill. It takes that good step and goes one step further and says no funds made available in this act can be used in any way for construction, for lease or building out any space in the District of Columbia.

It also should be noted that every cubicle, every desk we add in the District of Columbia ends up requiring States and municipalities to add space there. They have to put somebody in that space, because every time we add a desk with a bureaucrat behind it in the District of Columbia, they have to justify their existence. They have to create requirements for people back in the States or in the municipalities to respond so that they can justify their existence in the District of Columbia.

The Federal funds that might be used for new construction or new leases to add to the 23.6 million square feet of space already under lease and the 109 buildings, not even including the Department of Defense buildings, that money could be better spent reducing the Federal deficit or protecting our homeland in other ways.

Let's let America rebound. Let's let America build back before we build or lease one more square foot in Washington, DC.

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

Will the gentleman yield?

Well, the intent is that since this is where so much construction and leasing has been done, that that's where it needs to stop, that the bureaucracy here in Washington has expanded to the point that this was a good place to draw the line. If the gentleman is wishing to extend that across the country, you know----

If the gentleman would like to add those to this amendment, I would be glad to accept that.

If the leases were appropriately drafted, then normally they would have an option for additional time. That under this amendment would mean that that was a contract entered into prior to the enactment of this bill. So that wouldn't be a problem. If it is a major lease expiring, then heaven forbid but they would actually have to come back to Congress, and it would be a form of sunset, for them to justify why they need to have a new lease. I think it's a great way of having oversight over groups that don't have their own building. We've leased a massive 23.6 million square feet of space. Let's sunset some of that or otherwise justify why you need another lease.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Offered By: Mr. Gohmert

Amendment No. 78: At the end of the bill, before the short

title, insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Gohmert

Amendment No. 76: At the end of the bill (before the short

title) insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Gohmert

Amendment No. 76: At the end of the bill (before the short

title) insert the following:

I thank my friend from Iowa, my very dear friend.

As my friend knows, he and I've both been extremely vigilant in following up on these issues. But I wanted to point out, there is a lot of confusion. There are people on television that are just making these claims that the Constitution has been thrown away, and they haven't looked at how these three provisions that have been extended for 4 years were being used.

Now, my first year here, 2005, we were taking up the Patriot Act, and I had concerns then. I still have concerns, because these things, these powers, these three have been held constitutional, and I think they are. The problem comes in the potential for abuse.

And the reason I ended up catching a lot of grief from some of the leaders in our party back in 2005 as a freshman was I wanted to have sunsets on some provisions so that we could get leverage, because as we saw from Attorney General Gonzales, when he was head of the Justice Department, and as we have seen with Attorney General Holder, Departments of Justice are not very forthcoming no matter what party they are when the Congress asks for information. Now, they will say, Oh, yeah, we'll give you whatever you need, but they're not very forthcoming.

And it's not until powers that they want to keep come up for sunset, that they could go away and they need them renewed, and they know they need them renewed because they are helpful in keeping the country safe, but it's only then that they come forward and say, Oh, by the way, what was it that you made in your request a year ago that we never did provide you? And that basically happened back in 2004 and 2005.

And that was one of the reasons I was pushing we've got to have sunsets, because the only way to deal with these issues and make sure the abuses are not occurring of these constitutional powers is to put sunsets, and that way they come forward with the information and those of us that have the security clearances can go in. Now, not everybody who has security clearances has enough interest to go wading through this material like my friend from Iowa and I have.

But I think part of the problem has been people have been confused with the abuses that occurred, the outrageous abuses that occurred with the national security letter power, which has been reined in some, still not enough for my liking. And I really would like to rein in the national security letter power even further because it is not required to go before a district judge like these powers that we extended tonight for 3 years. That's where the abuses were. That's where the IG report said they were. And so that's where a tremendous amount of vigilance needs to be placed in making sure that the Justice Department does adequate vigilance themselves in not abusing the power they have.

And I'm sure I didn't make the Director of the FBI very happy when I pointed this out to him in committee, but it's what I believe, and that is that this Director came in to the FBI and eventually implemented--he called it a 5-year up-or-out policy. So that if you were a supervisor in the FBI, of a field office anywhere in the country, and you did 5 years in that location, at the end of 5 years, you had to either move to Washington, move up to Washington, or get out of the FBI. Move out, basically.

We have lost thousands of years of experience from our FBI. Now, I know what it is to be an aggressive prosecutor, young, out of law school. Had a little more hair back then. And boy, we are going to get the bad guys. There's something to be said for experience.

So it's not been uncommon to have FBI field offices around the country go, for example, from having a supervisor with 25 years of experience, he or she had seen it, done it, been there, and able to learn from mistakes, make wise decisions, and yet because of the 5-year up-or-out policy, they end up having to leave because they're not moving to Washington. And when they do, we have had offices, for example, come in and the new supervisor has 5 or 6 years' experience, the head supervisor. We go from 25, 26 years to 5 or 6; it's not good for the FBI. These are fantastic agents. Take nothing away from their knowledge and ability, but there is something to be said for 25 years of experience as a law enforcement officer. We lost that.

As we lost that, we began to see these vast abuses of the National Security Letters. And people need to know that the National Security Letter power was not up for renewal tonight. It is something I would like to address further because it has such tremendous potential for abuse. I am hoping we can deal with that. I also further hope that those who were really upset or concerned will not just take demagogued statements, but will actually look into this, as I have.

And I have spent no telling how many hours pouring through material, classified material, pouring through the laws, the interpretation of the laws. These powers are basically the same powers the FBI has, these three that we renewed tonight, basically the same powers the FBI has to go after organized crime; and now they're allowed to do it with terrorism.

They pertain to terrorists, or agents, foreign agents of foreign powers. So if they're properly supervised, as I know my friend from Iowa and I will do unless we get kicked off of the Judiciary Committee, but as long as we're allowed to be there, and as unpleasant as some people find our positions at times, we want to make sure there's adequate supervision.

That's what I intend to do. That's what I know my friend from Iowa intends to do. That is what our friend Michelle Bachmann from Minnesota will do. That's one of the most diligent people I have ever seen in anything. And I'm not sure there is another Member of Congress or the Senate that has a master's in any area of law. She has a master's in law.

So you have got people that are diligent, that understand the law, have studied it, and are looking into the allegations. I am comfortable with what we did tonight only to the extent that I know that there will be an awful lot more nights like I have had the last two nights where I get 1\1/2\, 2 hours sleep because there is so much to review, so much to cover, so much to read because of this important responsibility we have been handed.

But I hope people understand National Security Letters have been the area where there has been great abuse. Supposedly that's been reined in. But the reason some of us on the Republican side demanded sunsets on these is not because we think they are unconstitutional, but because we have got to have leverage to use with the Justice Department, no matter which party is in power in the White House, to make sure that our freedoms are preserved and Congress can use its power, have power, have leverage that gets respected by the Justice Department.

I appreciate my friend for yielding.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I am so grateful that I have such a dear friend from Iowa as Mr. Steve King. There's no price you can put on a dear friend like that. Thank you.

I would like to continue on in this discussion about the President's speech. I'm not quite sure what the President had in mind when he decided to rush over to the State Department and make a speech, when he knew the Prime Minister of our dear ally, Israel, was traveling to come to the United States. He knew that when he gave the speech that the Prime Minister would be at a great disadvantage. It was a speech, as I understand it, that wasn't run by the Prime Minister, was quite a surprise to him, and, in fact, when there were hints that the President might make the statements he did, there was a pleading not to do so.

I don't know if those are stories or, actually, how it occurred. That's no way to carry on international relations. It's certainly no way to treat our friends. It's not hard to understand that when it comes to international relations, if you treat your enemies better than you treat your friends, then your friends will desire to be your enemies, and you will get what you desire.

I don't know what the people in the White House are thinking; this is a friend. You don't do this to friends. So he jumps out and goes to the State Department where he has got a captive audience. Well, I say captive, apparently from what's on statements that have been made, the president of the Islamic Society of North America, which is a listed coconspirator in the Holy Land Foundation trial for funding Hamas, a terrorist organization, this president of the listed coconspirator of funding, or in the Holy Land Foundation trial for funding Hamas, made comments about the speech because he had been invited to be in the inner sanctum of our State Department by this administration.

This administration, this President, chose to make a speech, basically slapping a friend in the face, and at the same time invite the president of a listed coconspirator for funding terrorism to be in attendance so he could talk about how wonderful the speech was. The same Imam Majid, the president of the Islamic Society of North America that we find from reading the transcript of the speech that the number two person in the National Security Administration, the deputy National Security Adviser, said this spring, as he addressed the All Dulles Area Muslim Society, which they like to call ADAMS, for short, he thanked Imam Majid, the president, this listed coconspirator, for his remarks and also to talk about how wonderful his prayer was at the White House Iftar celebration last year, which is the celebration in Islam that marks the end of the fasting of Ramadan.

And in the remarks, the deputy National Security Adviser of the United States commented on the President noting that this was really a continuation of the Iftar celebration that Thomas Jefferson had, once again, marking that the President is not getting good information about our Nation's history.

There are not 57 States; we are not, as the President said, producing more oil now than we ever have. You don't have to go back that far. We were producing 9.6 million billion barrels a day, and now we are producing 5.5. Do the math, if somebody will be honest enough to give the President the right information.

He says we never had more people on the border than we do right now. Somebody show the history of 1916 when a President--who I don't have a great deal of admiration for, Woodrow Wilson--knew that it was wrong to have a Mexican bandit, or a bandit group led by Pancho Villa come into the United States and be responsible for killing a handful of American citizens.

That was enough to motivate the President at that time to call up something new called the National Guard and to send General Pershing down there with over 10,000 troops to go into Mexico, root out the troublemakers--many were killed even though he didn't catch Pancho Villa, but the murders stopped. The intrusions into the United States across our sovereign border stopped. The 100,000-plus National Guard troops that were placed on our border in 1916 made sure that the intrusions stopped.

And by General Pershing going in, they made sure that they were not going to want to come try that again. That's how you deal with domestic or foreign terrorism. You can't try to love people and you can love your enemies and in Christianity we are taught to do that. And as individual Christians, that's what we are supposed to do.

But when we take an oath to defend this Constitution, when we have the responsibility of an oath to defend this Nation, to provide for the common defense, then it is incumbent upon us to provide for the common defense, and we have a different standard for which we have to answer.

So, yes, Christians are supposed to love one another. But the government's responsibility, as noted in Romans 13, is, as the scripture tells, someone tempted to do evil. If you do evil, be afraid, because God does not give the government the sword in vain.

We have a responsibility to provide for a free society and a safe society where people will be free to love each other and to make free choices. And, yes, when there is a religion that has

been hijacked by radicals that says you give people freedom of choice, that's wrong, we need to have a caliphate. We need to have a religious leader that tells everybody what they can do. That way we avoid all the debauchery that you can see on any evening news in America.

The trouble is, God gave us freedom of choice. We can choose well or we can choose poorly, and the government ought to ensure, any government ought to ensure that people have that opportunity to do that as well.

So, after the President's speech, which basically amounted to a slap in the face of the leader of our friend, Israel, after the inaccurate representation by the White House that, gee, this is where all the talks have always started, well, not exactly. That was the point to which the Clinton administration pushed Prime Minister Barak, when he was the Prime Minister of Israel and, who knows, God knows, I think God hardened Arafat's heart so that when the Clinton administration had pushed Prime Minister Barak, what I think was far too far, which would have made Israel indefensible by any conventional means when Arafat had basically everything that he wanted, except the extinction of Israel, Arafat's heart was hardened and he said, no, I am not entering the deal, thank goodness for Israel. So Israel remained a defensible Nation.

Now, when the White House, when the President tried to walk back his comments and explain--and as someone besides me has said before, when you hear someone say what I said was, it normally means that it isn't what they said. It's them trying to get a better twist than actually was the words that were said.

But in the President's speech, where he tried to massage the words that he had given on Thursday, the President's word, and I have got a transcript of his speech here, President Obama said, ``The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine.''

He goes on and says, ``The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves and reach their potential in a sovereign and contiguous state.''

So this is the President's speech after he has been chastised by so many in his own party and so many across America who apparently are better friends to Israel than our President. He has had time to think about it, to pour over and make sure he doesn't make a mistake of saying something this time that he doesn't mean.

So if we want to give the President the benefit of the doubt that he made mistakes on what he said Thursday, then let's look at what he said this past weekend, and that should be what he really meant because he had time to massage the words he said.

I think it is helpful to look at a map of Israel right now. This is the West Bank where Palestinians are located, but it's under the control, ultimately, of Israel right now. This was originally Israel's territory after 1967. This down here is the Sinai Peninsula where Egypt is now.

After Israel was attacked unprovoked, Israel defended itself and took the Sinai Peninsula, took over the West Bank, took over Jerusalem, and took over the Golan Heights up here. And that was a defensible state. But Israel--and I didn't really understand it fully until I went to Israel for the first time. I couldn't understand, Why do you guys not get it, that when you unilaterally give away land trying to buy peace, you lose the land and you provide a staging area from which you are ultimately attacked again?

But once I had been in Israel and I saw locations of families and friends being blown up by suicide bombers, saw the location of children and families that were killed, terrorized by rockets, now about 12,000 of them, I understood a little better. They are so tired of being terrorized and losing friends and family that they're willing to say, Look, we'll give you this area up here in Lebanon that we were able to control after the '67 war when you attacked us, we will give it back to you if you'll just leave us alone.

Patrick Henry said, People cry, peace, peace, but there is no peace. Israel wanted peace, so they gave away northern Israel, what's now colored as part of Lebanon. And so it wasn't but a few years ago Lebanon starts attacking, comes across the border, takes hostages, attacks Israel from the very area which Lebanon had been given in Israel's unilateral quest for peace.

Now, during the times before they controlled the Golan Heights, this area is quite high. It overlooks the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River. And it was real easy to just lob artillery shells from the Golan Heights into Israel, terrorizing farmers and killing. It was indefensible. So by the grace of God, after they were attacked, they took the Golan Heights, and they still hold them. And it is an area that by holding they can avoid having cheap mortars that are a lot cheaper than rockets just being lobbed over into their settled areas, their civilized areas, killing and terrorizing all the more.

The West Bank--my hats go off to Prime Minister Fayyad for the efforts he has made in trying to bring up the West Bank and the Palestinian areas. I was critical because Palestinians have received billions of dollars, and yet they have not been building homes for the rank-and-file refugees, which seems to indicate to me they wanted to keep fomenting hatred toward the Jews, toward the Israelis.

Now let's take the President's words that he had time to massage. He learned from his mistake on Thursday, supposedly. He says that it should result in two states with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Well, you've got the Gaza Strip that Israel unilaterally gave back, and now they have suffered thousands and thousands of rockets, terrorism, and death as a result of that generous gift of the Gaza Strip back. If you'll just leave us alone, we'll give you this wonderful strip. They gave it back. People cried peace, peace, but there was no peace. There is no peace now. They're still ready--if you'll just leave us alone--to make peace.

But under the President's words, gee, he uses the statement, in a sovereign contiguous state. Well, Palestinians have the Gaza Strip and they are occupying the West Bank. For that to be contiguous, there's only one of two things that can happen, and that is, if you cut Israel up, or you give all of this area to the Palestinians that are now completely in signed agreement with a terrorist group, Hamas, then you give all of this for the use of a terrorist group, Hamas. And so then that would fulfill the President's desire as he had time to massage it and think about it, giving all of this land to Hamas, Palestinians, all of this area up here.

Well, but wait a minute. He said that after he described the borders that we would demand for the Palestinians, he said they would have a border with Egypt and with Jordan, comes clear up here, and that Israel would have permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. Well, he described the borders he wanted for the Palestinians. So his massage words, it seems, would mean that for Israel to only have borders with the Palestinians, you also have to give Palestine up here into Lebanon so that you have this little area, this little strip left for Israel, because that's what the President said.

After he had days to think about his mistake on Thursday, this is the best that he can do? We're going to give Israel a little strip?

And, by the way, can you imagine if Canada or Russia or China, one of their leaders, made a speech and said, United States, by the way, we think you ought to give away Arizona? You know, you've got drug smugglers up there; it would be a lot safer. You basically let them have it anyway. Why don't you just give it to the drug smugglers?

Can you imagine that? Well, that's the interdiction of a meddling President. He is trying to tell another sovereign state where they can have their borders and where they can't. That is not what you do to a friend.

And I know that we're winding down to the minutes, and I know that some people have been taught or miseducated about our history. Well, we are not going to be in session here on June 6. June 6 is the anniversary of D-day, when we lost thousands and thousands of Americans who were trying to retake a beachhead in Europe

and eliminate the horrible force that was taking away freedoms and killing 6 million Jews.

And so to conclude tonight, Mr. Speaker, I want to read a prayer. Since we are not going to be in session on June 6, I want to read the prayer that Franklin Delano Roosevelt read live on national radio on June 6, 1944.

President Roosevelt said these words:

``My fellow Americans, last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our Allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far. And so, in this poignant hour, I ask you to join with me in prayer.''

And then Roosevelt's prayer begins:

``Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.

``They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph. They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest-- until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men's souls will be shaken with the violences of war.

``For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and goodwill among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.

``Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom. And for us at home--fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas, whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them--help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.

``Many people have urged that I call the Nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.

``Give us strength, too--strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our Armed Forces. And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.

``And, O Lord, give us faith. Give us faith in Thee; faith in our sons; faith in each other; faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment--let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.

``With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogances. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace--a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.

``Thy will be done, Almighty God, Amen.''

The words of Franklin D. Roosevelt on D-day, June 6, 1944.

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

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

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 9 o'clock and 4 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Friday, May 27, 2011, at 10 a.m.

Mr. Speaker, I am about to file a bill, its number will be determined later, but it expresses support for the State of Israel's right to defend Israeli sovereignty, to protect the lives and safety of the Israeli people, and to use all means necessary to confront and eliminate nuclear threats posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, including the use of military force if no other peaceable solution can be found within a reasonable time to protect against such immediate and existential threats to the State of Israel.

We have a President who doesn't know history as well as he should or he would be aware that last Thursday, instead of saying what his spokesman was saying, gee, this was the starting point for all negotiations, actually, the facts are that the Clinton administration pushed Prime Minister Barak into basically that proposal. And it's my belief that just as I believe that God hardened the heart of Pharaoh when Moses made his request, he hardened Arafat's heart. He rejected the offer, and it does not need to be made again.

Madam Speaker, I want to identify with the comments of my friend from Indiana. Well said. Great thoughts.

We have wonderful friends in this world, as a Nation. But we need to recognize who are our friends and who are our enemies and who are the places, the countries, the peoples that intend us harm, who are the people that are willing to assist us in encouraging and allowing for freedom to spread around the world.

We should be well aware that there are people across our border in Mexico who are not Mexicans, people who would like to see this Nation fail as such an important keeper of the peace.

We know that Hezbollah has been setting up camp across the U.S. border in Mexico; that they have been working with drug cartels in Mexico, and it appears we see some of the signs of that in the ways that people are murdered, the way the crime business has developed.

We know that people coming across our border into this country, a significant percentage at least, are other than Mexican. OTM, they're classified. So many of them from the Middle East, many who are taught to try to appear as Hispanic and come across and try to avoid indicating anything that would give away the fact that they are coming here, not for jobs, but to set up to try to do us harm.

So when you are aware that there is so much violence on the border, Americans being murdered down on both sides of the border, we have two lakes between Texas and Mexico, Lake Falcon and Lake Amistad, together about 85 miles of international border that should be patrolled by the United States Coast Guard. But this administration doesn't wish to see the Coast Guard there.

Visiting with the Texas Governor a few weeks ago, he had made clear, please help me in urging the administration to allocate some Coast Guard resources to these lakes, where the drug cartels are bringing dangerous people, bringing drugs, bringing mayhem across into the U.S. Texas is committing money, resources, manpower on the lake, but it's a Federal job.

And what we've seen with this administration, when a State does too good a job or tries too well to do the job the Federal Government is not doing in order to protect its State, this administration decides to sue them.

We've seen also recently that if there is plenty of evidence to support that people or groups are funding terrorism in the world, and it is radical Islamists that are doing that, then this administration wants to embrace the groups that we have evidence are funding terrorism, rather than confront them and stop them. It's an interesting time we live in.

I do want to follow up on the President's comments. Here Texas has suffered the loss of around 2.3 million acres burned in the last decade or so. Other Presidents, other administrations, and even this administration, have recognized that when 177,000 acres, 300, 400, 500,000 acres have been destroyed, that is certainly worthy of declaring a disaster area in order to provide Federal support.

Texas is a donor State. We always put much more into the Federal Government from Texas than Texas ever gets back. We're proud to be such an important, vital part of the United States.

It does follow that when there is such a compelling disaster as the wildfires in Texas, 2.3 million acres destroyed, that it would be nice to have the support of the President. But just as this administration snubbed all the contributions that Houston provided to the shuttle program, and refused to allow a shuttle to be on display permanently in the NASA Space Center in

Houston, also Texas was again snubbed there with the 2.3 million acres being burned, snubbed without any assistance or declaration of a Federal disaster area.

Then we know the President did have a rather nice fundraiser in Austin, during which probably hundreds of thousands of dollars were sucked out of Texas due to the President's fundraising, and then headed to El Paso.

And I have to say, much of the President's speech in El Paso was very good. It was unifying, coming from a man who said he was a uniter, not a divider.

But then, toward the end of the speech, the gloves came off and things were said that were not true. The President said, and I know they weren't lies because a lie requires intent to deceive on the part of the speaker, and I'm sure the President would not ever want to do that, but he did state things that were not true and they need to be addressed.

The President said the fence is basically finished, that the fence on our border is basically finished. Actually, our border is nearly 2,000 miles, around 1,969 miles of border between the United States and Mexico. Close to two-thirds of that are in Texas.

We know that the so-called ``fence'' was going to be largely consisting of a virtual fence, where there's no real fence, but there's technology utilized that would allow monitoring, checking to ensure that the border was protected even without a physical fence there. So not only was there no physical fence, the administration ended that program. No virtual fence, no physical fence. We're open for business for the drug trade. Despite the Border Patrol, the limited folks, they're doing all they can, it is such a massive border, it requires more help than is currently there.

We withstood belittling from the President as he stood in El Paso, Texas, where just within a few miles, 3,000 people have been killed in the last year just across our border, the violence spilling over into the United States.

And the President chose this time and location to belittle those who say we should secure our border; we should comply with our oath. We have an obligation to provide for the common defense. That includes securing our borders. And the President wants to belittle those of us who say let's keep our oath. Let's keep faith with the American people by defending them, by defending our sovereignty.

This administration, on the other hand, the very administration that makes light of those who say let's secure our border; let's protect our people, instead of doing that, says: You know what, Arizona, with 30 miles or so of border with Mexico and wilderness area where we don't allow any mechanized vehicle to go, I tell you what: We'll put up a sign, which they did, and there's a lot of violent drug smuggling, dangerous people coming in this area, so we would advise American citizens to use the areas north of the interstate, because this administration has basically turned over our sovereign soil to foreign, illegal, violent drug smugglers. That should not allow for any smug condescension and belittling of those who are concerned about our security.

We were told in the President's speech that, since 2004, the President has more than doubled the Border Patrol. The actual fact is that, when President Bush took office, there were about 8,600 Border Patrol, around that number. When Bush left office, there were about 17,500 Border Patrol. And it took us a while to convince President Bush to do it, but President Bush did double the number of Border Patrol on our southern border. And since President Obama has taken office in the last 2\1/2\ years, that has increased 18 percent.

But if you want to know what the President personally feels about what should be done, you can look at his 2011 budget that he proposed, because he actually cuts the number of Border Patrol.

Yes, it is true: Bush doubled the number of Border Patrol. But the truth is, this administration has increased it only a fraction of that and shown its true intent. They would just as soon cut it. Well, this Congress isn't going to let that happen.

The President said, We've got more people on the border than we have ever had in history. That is simply not true. I realize that the President has spoken previously of what he says are the 57 States in our country, so perhaps he is not aware of the history that goes back to 1916 when a man named Pancho Villa from Mexico was involved in a handful of Americans being killed. President Wilson was not going to allow that to build. He wasn't going to allow renegades from Mexico to come illegally into this country and kill Americans. So he took a stand, he sent General Pershing there, and with 10,000 to 20,000 troops, Pershing went into Mexico chasing after Pancho Villa.

The way it was done may not have been well thought out; but the fact is that at one point during that time, in order to protect America from the small number of murders that had occurred from illegal Mexicans coming into the United States around 1916, Wilson had over 100,000 troops, early National Guard folks, down on the border to protect our sovereignty.

So obviously the President was not aware that any President had ever seen murders by illegal immigrants coming into our southern area as important as President Woodrow Wilson did, but hopefully someone on his staff can do the research that hadn't been done before in the White House and advise the President: Hey, there was a President who took it real seriously when Americans were killed along our border. He didn't go to El Paso and make a speech making fun of those who were concerned about our security. He actually sent over 100,000 troops, and they stopped the insanity before it could go any further.

Some historians talk about how Pershing was not able to get Pancho Villa and how much it cost. There was a lot of waste in that campaign, perhaps a lot more were committed than necessary, except he made his point: the violence stopped.

And when our enemies who would like to destroy our way of life here take away all the goodness that is developed in this country, take away the things that people, we are told maybe as many as 1.5 billion of the 6 billion people in the world would like to come to America at some time or other, there's got to be something good going on when that many people would like to come here.

But there are those who want to destroy that, take it away, and this President has an obligation and an oath to protect it. We hope that he will stop the belittling of those who want him to keep the oath and live up to his true commitments.

But we are dealing with a President who said: If you like your insurance, you can keep it. And we find out that wasn't true. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. We found out that wasn't true.

We were told here recently by the President in another speech just in the last week or so that we are producing more oil right now than at any time in our history. I know he doesn't know or he wouldn't have said that, but the fact is that we have produced as many as 9.6 million barrels of oil, and right now we are producing 5.5 million barrels of oil in this country.

We also know that this is a President who assured us that he would go line by line and scrub that budget, and that has never happened. He told us that Vice President Biden was not going to allow any fraud or waste. We know that hasn't happened. He said that he was going to close Guantanamo within the year. I'm very grateful that he didn't keep his word on that.

He said he was a uniter, not a divider, that he would bring people together, and I hope and pray that, at some point before his 4 years are up, he will actually do that.

But there are people that want to destroy this country. We can no longer play around, make fun of each other in this country while people are set about to destroy us. We've got to defend what we've got.

We had a hearing in Judiciary where the Attorney General of the United States testified, and we also know that there is a memo. He has been given the date and who provided the memo, and we asked for a copy of it. He hasn't been willing to provide that either to Pete King or to Judiciary thus far, so we are probably going to have to subpoena it if he doesn't; and we may come to quite a row, governmentally speaking, if they will not provide it.

Instead, the Attorney General said, Oh, I understand there was an article in the Dallas News where the interim U.S. Attorney down there said that politics didn't play a role in our administration not pursuing the co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation terrorist funding trial.

We want the memo. We don't need a newspaper article from the Attorney General. And when we have documentation from the FBI that arose in the Holy Land Foundation trial, five defendants convicted of all 108 counts in late 2008, we know that in 2005 massive amounts of additional evidence were obtained, and we have these transactions, journal vouchers, there are deposit slips, all kinds of things, that helped establish with the judge that co-conspirators like ISNA or CAIR should be left as named co-conspirators and not eliminated from being named in the pleadings in the Holy Land Foundation trial, we know the evidence is there. We know that there is a case to be made. And yet this administration not only refuses to go after the Islamic Society of North America, often referred to as ISNA, but we have the remarks on the White House's own Web site, and this was put up March 6, 2011, remarks of Denis McDonough, Deputy National Security Adviser to the President. Our Deputy National Security Adviser starts his remarks at this Muslim Society by, ``Thank you, Imam Magid, for your very kind introduction and welcome. I know that President Obama was very grateful that you led the prayer at last summer's Iftar dinner at the White House.''

The president of a known co-conspirator of financing terrorism is not only buddies with our Deputy National Security Adviser, he's leading the Iftar prayer, which is the ceremony that ends the Ramadan celebration. So the White House had the Iftar celebration and had the president of the named co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation leading the prayer in the White House. Who's running this henhouse?

And then we find out, as we hear in the news, and I know the President gets briefed and is aware, not only are there al Qaeda involved in going after Qadhafi, we're helping those people, including al Qaeda. Qadhafi needs to go, but, my goodness, intelligent people on foreign affairs know you should never help take out a foreign leader unless you can be assured that the subsequent leader will be better for your country.

Whose country are we trying to help here anyway? We know we've got people being killed on our southern border, and instead, because the President said, not Congress, but the U.N. and Arab League had encouraged us to get involved in Libya, we're going to go expend American treasure and American lives at risk in Libya? That we're going to push for an ally, whether he's a nice guy or not, he was helping keep the peace in the Middle East, Mubarak, in Egypt, and we pushed to take him out, so that instability is going to reign in the region.

Who's running this show? Who are we trying to help? We ought to be helping this country. That's where our oaths have been made and that's to whom the oaths have been made. It's scary stuff here. It is staggering what this administration is doing.

There's good information. Andy McCarthy and Patrick Poole have been publishing some good information on what has been going on in the Holy Land Foundation non-prosecution. It's time to defend this country, not be protecting other countries.

There have been some excellent things written and said encouraging the President on what would be appropriate action in the Middle East. Unfortunately, this administration has chosen to play handsy, be friendly with and encourage, it seems, the development of the relationship between Fatah, the Palestinian Authority leaders in the West Bank, with Hamas, who we have listed and know to be a terrorist organization that is in control of the Gaza Strip.

We have laws in this country that prohibit us from providing funds to any nation or any entity who is allied with terrorist organizations, and yet what we are seeing is this administration apparently being willing to somewhat embrace, I am hoping the President will come out and make clear he's not going this far, but embrace that, hey, the West Bank joining hands with Hamas, the terrorist organization, is okay, when the fact is our laws prohibit us providing money to Hamas.

We have had five defendants convicted in the Holy Land Foundation trial for providing funds, including to Hamas. And yet if this administration does not stop the funding of the Palestinian Authority when it is joined with Hamas, then whoever pushes for that funding may have some criminal sanctions to lie. This is a very, very serious issue and it needs to be addressed.

Caroline Glick, who writes for the Jerusalem Post, has an excellent article this week on that very issue, and I hope that, Madam Speaker, you and others will review that, because it makes very clear this administration keeps pushing the Israeli leaders to give away land, make unilateral concessions, when it is not Israel that is acting in terrorist fashion. This administration seems to be ignoring the fact that Hamas is still killing people in Israel, still killing people and promoting terrorism in the Middle East.

It is time to stop acting as if this Nation's administration is okay with terrorism in the Middle East as long as it is by the Muslim Brotherhood, as long as it is by Hamas or Hezbollah. We are helping rearm people who are Israel's enemies. This stuff's got to stop. It is insanity when we help arm people who want to see this Nation destroyed.

I hope and pray that this President will come to his senses, his advisers will give him better advice, and that we can stop this. We are hurting ourselves when we hurt our friend Israel. It makes no sense. It has to stop.

We are going to be fortunate to have the leader of Israel speaking to us from that second-level podium right here on May 24, and I know the administration is going to be trying, probably has already, to push Binyamin Netanyahu into making concessions. But the fact is Israel is still under attack, its enemies are still not willing to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish nation, they are still not willing to stop the pushing of hatred and the teaching of hatred and anti- Semitism in the Middle East. So Israel owes them no unilateral concessions. There should be nothing, and I hope and pray will be nothing in the way of concessions.

As I pointed out to Prime Minister Netanyahu, any time Israel in its long history going back 3,000 years or so has given up land to others, it is normally used as a staging area at some point from which to attack Israel.

The Tanakh is full of incidents where leaders of Israel have tried to placate terrorists, those who would want to destroy it; and giving them land, giving them things, paying tribute, it has never worked. It will never work. This is no time to do it now.

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

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the proponent of this amendment in his zeal to ensure that the environment is properly addressed, but those concerns are properly addressed in the permitting policy. The problem is that we had a company with around 800 safety violations, British Petroleum, that was allowed to continue drilling, and you wonder why. Could it be that they were negotiating at the very time of the blowout with Democrats in the Senate for making the big announcement that they supported the administration's cap-and-trade bill? Could it be that they were going to be involved in the carbon credit business and would work with the administration?

Perhaps a better question than the effect on the environment is, How close will the applicant for a drilling permit be politically with this administration? Because what we see time after time is a situation of political payback. We see crony capitalism. If you're a good buddy at GE, you're going to do well. If you're on Wall Street and you contribute four to one to this administration over its opponent, then you're going to do well. You may have to endure being called a fat cat from time to time; but, otherwise, we're going to make sure your profits exceed anything you have ever seen before.

We have seen this administration rush to Libya. We have seen this administration rush, appropriately, to help our friend Japan. We have seen them rush all over the place. But when it came to really helping the gulf coast region, this administration rushed in and did more damage to people's lives by putting this moratorium on than the spill itself did. At some point, it's time for the administration to stop the political payback game.

Perhaps Louisiana would be better off if they dissociated themselves from Texas. We know that you can have 500,000 acres burned and have it be a disaster area. You can have 2 million in Texas, and they won't come to your help because this administration is partisan and bitterly so. But it's time for this administration to quit playing political games and help people where they need it in our own country, on our own gulf coast.

Let's vote ``no'' on the amendments and get this bill through.

Mr. Speaker, we heard from our friend from Massachusetts the allegation that we over here on this side of the aisle were squeezing Medicare. Good grief. Even now has the gentleman from Massachusetts not read the ObamaCare bill? It cuts $500 billion out of Medicare.

We heard from Minority Leader Pelosi that we have a moral obligation to create jobs. Then what this administration has done under her definition is immoral, because this administration has been killing jobs. We hear so much from the other side about the working poor. Coming from an area in Texas where we have lots of hardworking poor folks, that's who is being hurt by this administration's policies. When you shut off the jobs in the Gulf of Mexico, when you come out and say we're going to tax these American companies even more, we're going to take away their subsidies, they're called business deductions, the cost of drilling, the cost of doing business.

And who will be taxed? American companies. We will be putting further tariffs on, not foreign products but American companies. We drive ourselves more and more to foreign oil, and that's a mistake. Price controls is what President Carter did. He was going to show the energy companies, and as a result we had no gas, we ran out of gas, it was a disaster. Salazar has shut down leases that were let after a 7-year process that could have produced as many as a trillion barrels of oil.

You could have an immediate effect if you would encourage your party's President to change course and start creating jobs. The energy industry would create a million jobs across the country if we opened up the OCS. We've heard the testimony a million jobs if ANWR is opened. A million jobs if the North Slope is opened.

What is more, we've also heard from people that know that a dollar out of four is most likely attributable to speculation. The speculators look at what we do. And we make it harder and harder to produce our own energy, the speculation keeps going up. You could turn around a dollar out of four overnight if we showed the world, we're going to use our own energy.

This country has been blessed with more natural resources when you put them all together, and this administration and the former majority has done more to put them off-limits. It's time to get back to what the former Speaker said was our moral obligation. You lower energy prices by using more of our own energy, you create jobs, and you bring down the price that is killing the working poor. And that's a moral obligation.