Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, when interest rates go up, the value of bonds go down. But this presents a dilemma for the newest and largest bondholder on Earth, the Federal Reserve.

With interest rates low, quantitative easing policies and record spending, inflation is coming. Normally, we would expect the Fed to raise interest rates to protect the value of our dollars from runaway inflation, but now that the Feds owe over $1 trillion in bonds, an interest rate boost of only 70 basis points would trigger a loss of the entire $51 billion of the Fed's remaining net capital.

Robert Eisenbeis, the former vice president for the Atlanta Fed, has highlighted this danger. With inflation coming, we do not want the losses that the Feds would have to their own holdings to stop them from doing what will be needed to protect us, and especially seniors, from next year's expected inflation.

Mr. Speaker, today I offer my strong support for the Coral Reef Conservation Act Reauthorization and Enhancement Amendments. Coral reefs are unique ecosystems that support over one million species globally, offer essential protection from hurricanes, typhoons, and tsunamis, and attract millions of vacationers each year. Unfortunately, these reefs face unparalleled dangers today from pollution, overfishing, coastal development, disease, habitat fragmentation, ship groundings, and warming waters.

Ten percent of coral reefs have already disappeared from U.S. waters alone while over seventy percent of the world's reefs are threatened. If this trend continues, more than forty percent of global coral reefs will be lost in the next two to ten years.

The Coral Reef Conservation Act Reauthorization addresses the coral reef crisis by taking strong actions in response to physical damages to reefs by developing scientific management strategies to promote reef resilience. I urge my colleagues to join me in support of this legislation critical to conserving our oceans' greatest treasures.

History is not kind to leaders who sacrifice our Polish allies. News reports indicate that our administration will end plans to build the long-planned American missile defense site for Poland. That site, carefully picked by the Pentagon, is directly

under the flight path an Iranian missile would take if shot at the American people.

The U.N. reports that Iran has accelerated its production of uranium. And last February, Iran became the first new nation to orbit a satellite when its newest and most powerful missile worked. Iran, a state sponsor of terror, now makes the longest range missile of the terrorist world.

The administration's decision is particularly ironic because Poland just announced it would be sending more troops to serve alongside Americans in Afghanistan. America is going to let Poland down, sending a message of weakness to our Polish allies and the people building Iran's new missile arsenal.

Madam Speaker, the administration is preparing to establish guidelines for the review and potential release of Taliban and al Qaeda terrorists held at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility, BTIF, in Afghanistan. This facility holds over 500 of the most dangerous Taliban and al Qaeda terrorists captured on the Afghan battlefield.

According to The Washington Post and The New York Times, each detainee will be given a counselor to grant rights and to review their potential release procedures. The press reports that the new guidelines were approved with a brief and limited congressional review. We know over 50 detainees released from Guantanamo Bay resumed jihad against Americans. The release of terrorists from the Bagram facility will form a clear and present danger to Americans serving in Afghanistan.

I urge Members to sign our letter to Secretary Gates, asking him to delay the release of these guidelines until Congress holds hearings and especially until all of our soldiers in Afghanistan are briefed on this potential danger.

Madam Speaker, I rise to honor Dolph Chianchiano, Senior Vice President for

Health Policy and Research, for his 30 years of service to the National Kidney Foundation.

As the co-chair of the Congressional Kidney Caucus, I have come to understand the need for kidney patients to have a strong advocate, and they certainly have one with Dolph.

Few people can say they have made a direct impact on the lives of millions of Americans as Dolph Chianchiano can. He has guided the NKF on almost every legislative and policy decision in the history of the Medicare ESRD program, which started 35 years ago.

He helped shape the National Organ Transplant Act in 1984, the Benefits Improvement and Protection Act in 2000, the Organ Donation and Recovery Improvement Act in 2004 and Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act in 2008. These laws have helped raise the standards for dialysis facilities, establish, regulate and improve the organ donation process, and provide funding for education, early screening and life-saving treatments for kidney patients.

He has been diligent to make sure that the promise of legislation becomes a reality for patients, making sure that the laws are implemented well through rulemakings and that appropriations follow the authorizing legislation. His ability to work to build support in the kidney community and his institutional memory of regulations and legislation over three decades makes his work even more profound.

We know Dolph's work will continue and for that we are thankful. But today, I want to honor him for his passion, commitment and dedication to kidney and transplant patients for the past 30 years and wish him the best as we work together to improve the lives of people touched by kidney disease.

I rise in support of this amendment. Coming from Illinois, we know the pace and timing of a Federal investigation. I think it's fairly clear that PMA and several principals will now be indicted.

To protect this House and to protect the Appropriations Committee, I think having a strategic pause in the spending of this money is necessary. It's clear that PMA and its key folks with so many Federal resources now dedicated to this investigation are going to face Federal criminal prosecution.

So to protect this House, this is a wise amendment to put forward to make sure that we can be beyond reproach. As someone who comes from Governor Blagojevich's State and already knows how Federal prosecutions and work goes forward, so many resources have been put forward on this case already that it is clear that an indictment is coming forward. And to protect this House, I think we should adopt the amendment.

Mr. Speaker, some are urging Congress to back a $1 trillion government health care bill because they claim 50 million Americans are uninsured. But when you hear the rest of the story, the numbers fall apart. While the Census reports that 45.7 million people lacked insurance during some portion of the year, we find that 9.5 million are non-citizens or illegal aliens, 12 million are eligible for public programs but have not bothered to enroll, 9 million lacked insurance for less than a year, and 7.3 million make over $84,000 a year but have chosen not to buy insurance.

When you do that math, you find that there are 7.8 million lower- income, long-term, uninsured American citizens. But this smaller number is not big enough to justify $1 trillion and raising your taxes to rates higher than France, which is why congressional leaders hope you do not look under the hood of their bill or the numbers they use to justify it.

Mr. Speaker, the worst State for health insurance in the country is New Jersey at $5,500 a patient. The best is California at $2,500 each. California has lawsuit reform to reduce the need for expensive defensive medicine and larger insurance pools to lower average risk

For this Congress, Republican moderates wrote a health reform bill to repeat these successes, lowering the costs for all Americans and expanding coverage. Indications are we will not be allowed to vote on these commonsense reforms. Instead, we will vote on a bill that is 1,000 pages long, at $1 billion a page, costing $1 trillion, raising taxes in the teeth of this recession to marginal rates higher than France.

I urge Members to reject this bill and put forward a commonsense set of reforms that will lower health costs without raising taxes.

Madam Speaker, on rollcall Nos. 596, 597, 598, 599, 600, 601 and 602 I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. Speaker, this is what the House government health care bill creates: $1 trillion, 1,000 pages, $1 billion per page. Here is the patient, and over here is the doctor.

Now, moderate Republicans have a much better plan we will put forward. Our Medical Rights Act says Congress cannot restrict the decisions of you and your doctor and eliminates the need for all of this, and puts you right next to your physician, without the need for $1 trillion in spending.

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

I'm pleased to join Chairwoman Lowey at the beginning of the consideration of this bill making appropriations for fiscal year 2010 for the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs. This bill funds programs that safeguard our national security and promote U.S. interests abroad.

It was first founded under the auspices of the Marshall Plan under the understanding that good diplomacy and development can dramatically reduce national security problems and troop deployments for the United States.

I want to commend Chairwoman Lowey for her bipartisan work on this bill. She's listened to concerns of Members on this side of the aisle and worked to address them.

I also want to thank the staff both on this and the other side of the aisle for so many long hours of work on this. That's Nisha Desai- Biswal, Craig Higgins, Steve Marchese, Michele Sumilas, Cecilia Alvarado, and Courtney Dunn. I also particularly want to thank Ann Marie Chotvacs, Mike Ringler, Alice Hogans, and Jason Small.

I know that Ms. Lowey and Ranking Member Granger, who is out today, appreciate their personal office staffs' work on this bill, especially Ann Vaughan and Rachel Carter. And I particularly want to thank my staff, particularly Rich Goldberg.

Now, on this legislation, we make one big key change, and that is with regard to the International Atomic Energy Agency's new report on the Iran nuclear program and related responses of the United States to their report. They showed that after producing low-enriched uranium at a rate of 40 kilograms per month over a 21-month period, Iran has now increased its stockpile by 60 percent in just 6 months, doubling its rate to over 80 kilograms of enriched uranium per month.

We know that Iran's greatest weakness remains her economic dependence on foreign gasoline. And we can all agree that the United States taxpayers should not be asked to help increase the supply of gasoline to Iran, especially now, especially after what we saw after the Iranian elections. Surprisingly, this is exactly what our taxpayer dollars have been doing.

In 2007 and 2008, the U.S. Export-Import Bank approved two separate loan guarantees totaling $900 million to expand the largest refinery owned by Reliance Industries Limited, an Indian company that provides roughly one-third of Iran's daily import of gasoline. In effect, the U.S. taxpayer is underwriting the increased supplies of gasoline to Iran.

This bill includes the Kirk-Sherman amendment to prohibit further use of taxpayer dollars to guarantee or insure or extend credit to any company that supplies gasoline to Iran. I think that is a very important step that leads off to legislation that Chairman Berman and I have put forward that we hope, later in the year from the authorizing committee, that will begin to truly squeeze Iran and her need for foreign gasoline.

Now with regard to the overall bill, I am disappointed that we have departed from the tradition of considering appropriations under an open rule. I first worked on the Foreign Operations bill of fiscal year 1984. I was taught appropriations at the foot of Appropriations chairmen Jamie Whitten and Bill Natcher. It was under these historic chairmen that we always considered appropriations bills under an open rule, protected under clause 2 of rule XXI that only monetary amendments could be offered.

Now we have departed from the long tradition established by Jamie Whitten and Bill Natcher. The rule that governs this bill makes in order only eight of 89 amendments, a 90 percent death rate for amendments in the Rules Committee on what used to be an open rule.

I would suggest that the partisan pressures under Speaker Wright, under Speaker Foley, were as bad or worse as now, but we are responding with highly restrictive rules that I think hurt our committee in the long run. I hope that we can address this soon and return to what I would call the Whitten-Natcher tradition.

Now let me turn to the substance of this bill, the product of work of especially Chairwoman Lowey and Ranking Member Granger.

The American people are aware that we face many global challenges that are well addressed in this bill. The funds provide security assistance to our allies in support countries living in some pretty dangerous neighborhoods.

There is another reality of this bill and that is the financial crisis that we see and that we are helping countries through so that they do not collapse, triggering some sort of new global economic downturn.

The allocation given to the subcommittee, $48.8 billion, is an amount, when strictly compared to last year's base, that is very high. But the administration has pledged to eliminate the wartime supplemental spending in favor of a regular appropriations process. If it sticks to that plan, then funding levels in this bill appear to be much more reasonable, and it includes programs for State and USAID operations that I support.

I have to admit, though, I remain in doubt whether the administration really will not request a supplemental next year. In fact, I probably would lay a dollar bet with anyone that we probably will see a supplemental. I hope not. Chairman Murtha has already suggested that supplemental funds may be needed to sustain our troops because of the 302(b) allocation that his Defense Subcommittee received that in his view may not cover all of the FY 2010 needs. In that case, I hope we could restrict funding under this bill.

Now, I know Chairwoman Lowey and Ms. Granger have worked together on a number of very good governance provisions such as language to strengthen oversight of hiring, training and deployment of new staff funded by this bill; and a provision that launches a comprehensive review of roughly $8 billion in global health funding provided by this bill. Too often we forget that the United States has made the largest commitment of health funding ever in the history of mankind. It is something that the United States hasn't yet received enough credit for.

They also agree to language that closely mirrors the fiscal year 2008 bill which prevents U.S. taxpayer dollars from going to organizations that support or participate in involuntary or coercive methods of family planning, and that was the bipartisan commitment that Chairwoman Lowey just alluded to.

The bill also includes amendments from several of my colleagues offered in full committee, particularly like a provision requiring the Secretary of State to report to Congress on deals brokered with foreign nations that receive detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, like Palau.

The June 10, 2009, New York Times reported that the United States has agreed to provide Palau with $200 million in return for receiving 17 suspected Uyghur terrorists from Guantanamo Bay. Now, according to the CIA Factbook, Palau has a population of only 20,796 people. Its GDP is only $164 million. Under this commitment then, the U.S. would be paying the Republic of Palau nearly $11.7 million per Uyghur terrorist.

With average incomes in the United States of $56,000, $200 million would support incomes of over 3,500 Americans; with tuition at $25,000 a year annually, it could put 7,000 students through college for a year. And $200 million also compares poorly to the cost of Guantanamo Bay itself. Guantanamo Bay, as a total facility, cost just $54 million to build. This would be

four times that amount for just 17 Uyghurs.

There is also an amendment in this bill for new oversight and sunset restrictions on funding provided to the International Monetary Fund in the fiscal year 2009 supplemental, and language affirming intellectual property rights protections for U.S. energy and environmental technologies, critical in the G-8 discussions right now and the coming Copenhagen discussions in which China and India have pledged to require compulsory licensing over all climate change and energy technology. Compulsory licensing is a code word for stealing U.S. patents. There will be no green jobs if that provision goes through in the Copenhagen treaty. I am very happy that the House voted nearly unanimously on the Larson-Kirk amendment to prevent that.

Now, Chairwoman Lowey has also described highlights of the bill. I will simply reiterate three very important items related to our national security. This bill includes $1.4 billion for the expanded work of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, a $525 million increase to support prosperity and security of our partners around the developing world, a very important program that underlies the key point you cannot have long-term development without policy reform. You can build a dam, but if the government steals everything, all you will have is an empty structure a few years later. The MCC works to address that very problem in an effective way.

When taken together with supplemental funds, this bill fully funds our security assistance request for our strategic allies in the Middle East like Israel, Egypt, and Jordan, and continues the fight against illegal drug trafficking in this hemisphere. I think especially with Ranking Member Granger's full backing, we have full funding for the pending request for Mexico and Central America by providing $7 million above the request, also for continued gains made in Colombia.

In summary, this bill is focused on furthering foreign policy and national security interests. It monitors the wise use of our tax dollars and achieves some fairly balanced solutions to some complex problems leading to what I hope will be a fairly bipartisan debate today.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Crenshaw), a distinguished member of the subcommittee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

I just want to thank my colleague from New Jersey for his leadership on this.

UNRWA is an organization that is utterly irresponsibly run. Any corporation in America of UNRWA's size--which is $400 million a year-- would have an outside independent audit, and yet UNRWA has never had that--and in fact doesn't want it. UNRWA's staff has met with Republicans and Democrats up here and admitted that they, indeed, do make martyr payments to people that have carried out attacks against the people of Israel. And then we've seen all the video of mortar rocket attacks being used from UNRWA schools where UNRWA security personnel clearly could have prevented that.

This bill helps increase the heat on UNRWA, one of the least accountable U.N. agencies. And I really want to thank the gentleman for his leadership on that.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.

I want to thank the gentleman because I have worked very closely with him to support I think one of the key combat-support elements of this bill, which is the National Solidarity Program of the Government of Afghanistan.

We won the war in El Salvador largely through the help of a program called Mayors in Action, in which we funded programs totaling between $5,000 and then $10,000, as long as the community could come together and decide on what project. Having government services and activities in support of the El Salvadoran Government quickly undercut the insurgency and helped win a counterinsurgency campaign there.

Based on the success of that program and others, the National Solidarity Program is now operating in Afghanistan. This bill provides $175 million, largely through the leadership of the gentleman from New York.

When I deployed to Afghanistan in December, I spent quite a lot of time working with Monty Greer and Minister Zia, who described how this program is now in hundreds of villages throughout Afghanistan, but they had a funding shortfall. And working with General Nicholson of ISAF Region South, we put together a plan so that this bill would fund community development programs right behind the advance of U.S. troops.

It has been little noticed so far in this body that 2 weeks ago the United States Marine Corps launched an offensive in the key poppy- growing region of Afghanistan called Helmand Province, and it was that funding shortfall which would have not enabled U.S. troops to have the money to do community development projects right in the wake of their advance, along with the Afghan troops. This legislation allows them to have those tools right away so that the Afghan people will see progress in community development right behind the battlefield. It makes our chances of success much greater. It makes the sustainment and expansion of the Afghan Government much more likely. And bottom line, I think it will save a number of lives, especially for those of our constituents right now working for what sometimes has been called ``Uncle Sam's misguided children,'' otherwise known as the United States Marine Corps.

I yield to the gentleman who has worked with me so much with Minister Zia on this.

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

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

It's also important to note that this bill carries forward the Kirk amendment that now prohibits any U.S. assistance to a Palestinian Authority that includes Hamas--a terrorist organization, as designated by the United States, President Clinton, President Bush and I believe now President

Obama--unless every member of the new Palestinian Government has publicly, in writing, recognized Israel's right to exist and renounced terrorism. Over 20 United States citizens have been murdered directly by Hamas, and having this provision included in this legislation I think is very important.

Also, this legislation reverses the administration's proposed cut for U.S. assistance to Armenia. We provide $48 million in economic aid and $3 million in military aid for Armenia while maintaining military funding parity with Azerbaijan and providing $10 million in assistance to Nagorno-Karabakh. The bill also includes a new requirement for the administration to consult with Congress before exercising its waiver authority for assistance to Azerbaijan granted under section 907 of the Foreign Assistance Act.

Now, according to the Congressional Research Service, between 100,000 and 500,000 Korean Americans still have family living in North Korea. Almost all of them have not seen their loved ones since the end of the Korean War, while many have not seen family members even since World War II. In the absence of diplomatic relations between the two countries, elderly Korean Americans are forced to contact their relatives without the protection of the U.S. Embassy or help from the State Department. Families are at the mercy of a black market group of smuggling rings that control access to North Korea.

This legislation urges the State Department Policy Coordinator for North Korea to make the issue of divided American citizen families who have their relatives in North Korea a priority and to establish a coordinator for this issue.

One last thing I want to highlight. As the United States draws down our troop commitment to Iraq, and we have tremendous concerns about safe and secure and sustainable homes and businesses for Iraq's embattled Christian minority, this bill provides a historic $20 million dedicated to religious minorities in Iraq, a big step forward for building an autonomous administrative region for Chaldo Assyrians in the Nineveh Plain. It's an important group that we should be concerned about, especially as the United States leaves Iraq.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.

We rarely do this under this legislation, but we also have an important tradition of highlighting human rights cases, especially if they set a particularly dangerous precedent. And one of the most concerning precedents is the one set by the Government of Egypt when they imprisoned Kareem Amer, who is the first blogger ever to be arrested for what he wrote on his Internet blog, calling for reconciliation between Muslims and Jews on his personal blog. He was convicted. He's currently serving in prison, and it is a particularly dangerous precedent to have set that merely what you may write in your Internet blog will land you in jail.

It's interesting to me, too, that of all the Muslim countries around the world, Egypt set the precedent, and of all the countries around the world that could have set this precedent against the freedom of speech on the Internet, it was one of the largest recipients of U.S. foreign assistance under this act. We have not gone to the step yet of dramatically affecting the U.S. assistance provided by this, but we do have to highlight Abdel Kareem Nabil Soliman, his full legal name, and his time in jail, a very dangerous precedent under Egyptian law and one that should be highlighted here.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished minority whip, Mr. Cantor.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

I want to highlight a key provision of this bill, section 7006, which withholds 10 percent of the funding under this legislation for the Board of International Broadcasting, Radio Deewa. This is a service actually that the chairwoman and I helped sponsor and get rolling because of our perception that there was very little international broadcasting service and outside information in the main language of northwest Pakistan and Afghanistan of Pashtun. But we found that they were putting Batula Massoud on the U.S. taxpayer-funded radio, giving him a platform just 6 days after the Secretary of State put him on the Rewards for Justice terrorism list for his crimes against a number of terrorist targets, including the Prime Minister of Pakistan. So I really want to thank the chairwoman for including this because we sent a very clear signal that we want open and free communication with accurate news, but we do not give platforms to terrorists on the Rewards for Justice list of the State Department.

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

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

Let me just say this bill also contains one last program-- and then I will close--and that is called the Near East Regional Democracy program. It used to be called the Iran democracy program, and I hope that's still exactly what it does. We're providing $40 million for this, and it's very important. Following the suppression of democracy in Iran, we're particularly concerned about key minority groups there. The Azeris, representing 40 percent of the country, including the leading candidate for president whose vote was suppressed; the Kurds that we worked with so well in northern Iraq; and the Baluch, in which a significant Iranian military presence is there. And I want to pay particular attention to the plight of the Baha'i. The National Assembly of the Baha'i Faith is located in my district; but this is the faith that

was founded in Persia, now Iran. There are 330,000 Baha'is in Iran right now. Under this regime, we have now seen that they have been told to register their businesses and place of address, that this is the bureaucratic machinery that we have seen in other countries in other uniforms before. It is the machinery of oppression and potentially worse. We have seen now that just following the time President Ahmadinejad claimed that he had won the election--remembering, of course, that in 150 Iranian cities, the votes totaled more than the number of people living in those cities--that just following their claim to have won the election after only 2 hours of counting the ballots, that he moved against the Baha'i leaders, putting them on trial for their lives in that country. The Near East Regional Democracy program can help us build alternative voices in that country, all the more important.

Let me close on this bill by saying that this bill has one key and major component, which is assistance to the State of Israel for us. In my view, land for peace generally means no land and even more war, as we saw with Israel's withdrawal from Gaza where an area that used to be used for agricultural produce is now used for mortars and rockets against southern Israel, especially Sderot and Ashkelon. My worry is that we might have more of that kind of adventurism by the other side further if we see instability in southern Lebanon and especially on the West Bank. This legislation helps us underscore our commitment to the Israeli Air Force, their missile defense system and, especially, to their army to at least encourage the states in that region to make sure that no adventurism like we saw, especially in 1973, can move forward against our best allies in the Middle East. My hope is that we have very strong commitment for this on the floor today and in the United States Senate because I think this bill, more than any other, makes any potential conflict in the Middle East less likely; and that is good for us all.

With that, I recommend passage of the bill. I want to commend our chairwoman and our greatly missed Ranking Minority Member Kay Granger, who's out today, for bringing us a bill that adheres to the key principle that I try to follow at every possible turn, and that is the aphorism that we say, that partisanship should end at the water's edge. In my service in the United States military, I generally found that when we were being shot at, they weren't shooting at Democrats or Republicans. They were shooting at American citizens. The United States has bipartisan interests overseas, and this bill fulfills this.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I seek time in opposition.

I yield myself 4 minutes. I rise in reluctant opposition to this amendment. There are many parts of the amendment that I support, like moving funds away from accounts that received a significant increase in the stimulus bill in order to increase funds for safe drinking water and sanitation programs.

Unfortunately, I oppose this amendment for what it represents. We are continuing the movement away from bipartisan consideration of amendments because it appears that the new practice under the Rules Committee is to take a number of Democratic amendments and put them in one group under the chairman's aegis so that it looks like we have a balanced list of amendments offered but really a much larger number of Democratic amendments are being considered. This is a very troubling practice that has now entered into the appropriations bills.

Once again, I would point out, under clause 2 of rule XXI, the only amendments that are allowed under our rules on the floor are money amendments that cut or rearrange funds, not policy amendments. That gives awesome power to the committee on both sides to limit debate on this bill. It's very odd that in all the consideration of appropriations bills before, we haven't really made this a standard practice like is happening now.

I yield to the gentlewoman from New York.

I stand corrected. Under the rule it's allowed, but we didn't need rules for appropriations bills. I would reiterate my admiration for Bill Natcher who insisted that his legislation always come to the floor without a rule because it was protected under clause 2 of rule XXI.

I'm also worried about this amendment because it cuts off FMF, Foreign Military Financing, for Sri Lanka. Now the Sri Lankan-elected democratic government was fighting the Tamil Tigers, registered as a terrorist organization by the State Department. Their victory over the Tamil Tigers will bring human rights and democracy to the whole country and remove the need for any kind of military operations which could tempt either side to hurt civilians.

The victory of the Sri Lankan military against the Tamil Tigers is exactly what will bring order, rule of law and democracy to that country. So we're now sending a signal that a democracy who is fighting a terrorist organization and wins will be cut off in its financing by the United States. I would put it to you that if we ever had a rebel terrorist organization operating in our country, maybe like the Confederate States after our victory, it would be odd, indeed, to see some country cutting off funding for us. Yet that's exactly what we did in our civil war. And I would say that a cutoff now is an odd signal when I would expect that the record of human rights, respect for the individual rule of law and especially in democracy will definitely go up now that the Sri Lankan Government controls all of their territory.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I have remaining.

I would say that I think with this amendment it would have been better to have handled it under a different procedure. But the key point that I would make here is there are many good parts of this amendment. I particularly love the part about no first class travel and hope that that goes into the final bill.

I would urge us in conference to reconsider sending the signal that we are sending to Sri Lanka. The general signal should be that when a democratic government engages a terrorist organization, we support the democratic government. When that democratic government wins against that terrorist organization, we should support them. That means that we should support all the aspects of that government that can effect good order and a return to normalcy, which means helping refugees and which means helping the government, but it means helping also to maintain a good relationship with that democracy that just did a good thing in making sure that the world has one less terrorist organization.

So I would urge opposition to the amendment.

I yield back.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

I have an amendment for Ms. Granger under the rule.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to offer this amendment which refers to the following situation:

Last month through the 2009 supplemental bill, Congress provided an expansion of resources and powers to the International Monetary Fund as requested by President Obama. This included $108 billion in new funding and approval for the IMF to sell 13 million ounces of gold to fund their internal operating expenses. As part of that bill, and consistent with its oversight role, Congress gave the administration clear guidelines on how an expanded IMF should function.

On June 24, President Obama decided to disregard those congressionally mandated guidelines. Upon signing the 2009 supplemental into law, the President issued a signing statement that said he would ignore sections 1110, 1112, 1403 and 1404 of the supplemental.

These provisions provide some of the only oversight that the United States exercises over the IMF, an organization that will triple in size this year.

The Granger amendment, which I offer here, would prohibit funds in this bill from being used by the Secretary of Treasury to negotiate any agreement in contravention of these statutorily enacted provisions in the supplemental.

One provision requires the U.S. to oppose IMF loans to countries that are supporters of terrorism, countries like Iran. The Congress consulted the Department of Treasury while drafting this provision.

Additionally, the provisions give the administration guidance from the Congress as to how the United States should vote at the IMF on health care, education, labor rights, and transparency issues.

This Congress, Democrats and Republicans, should not allow any administration to disregard a statutory mandate, especially on issues of transparency and accountability. The Congress voted to provide oversight for the IMF, and we should stand by those provisions.

Giving $108 billion to the IMF without a clear path for the future is not a policy we would support. And so, therefore, I urge my colleagues to support this Granger amendment.

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

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

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, when we consider legislation in this body, we have several different ways to put forward an idea or policy of the Congress--a Dear Colleague letter, filing a bill or a resolution. When we speak with more authority, we use report language to accompany a bill, which says a general direction that can be ignored, but at the peril of the administration. But when it is in a statute, that is, under the law of the land, the supreme authority, absent being overridden by a provision of the Constitution.

I really want to thank the clear, bipartisan message that we are sending here by virtue of the chairwoman of the subcommittee, the chairman of the full committee, and the chairman of the authorizing committee here, because I think this is a rare example of showing bipartisan concern on behalf of this institution against the executive branch.

Now, I would shudder to think that if ever we concede somehow the abuse of signing statements--which I am not really that in favor of, and I don't think have received any long-term sanction by the Supreme Court to try to override a statute--basic law 101 would provide that.

I yield briefly to the gentleman from Massachusetts.

And I thank the gentleman because he was critical of signing statements under the previous administration and is now being critical of signing statements under this administration.

But there is a much more important legal point here, which is that a signing statement which attempts to override a statute enacted by the Congress of the United States should not require litigation before the Supreme Court. And that's why the statement of the full committee chairman, Mr. Obey, is so critical here. Because in the end, the way that we enforce this absent court litigation is simply to deny funding. I learned that under Chairman Whitten, when I think I remember he defunded the Office of Legislative Affairs at the Department of Agriculture when he had a problem.

So the signal that we've sent to the Treasury is very clear: Ignore statute at your extreme peril. And this is on behalf of a bipartisan, overwhelming majority. We will be asking for a recorded vote on this and send a very clear signal to the Secretary of the Treasury.

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

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

I am, in its current form.

Mr. Speaker, I object.

Mr. Speaker, I object.

Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Speaker.

I do.

Mr. Speaker, the question I would ask is: How would the Chair know that a point of order lies if we haven't even read the underlying motion to recommit?

I would worry that we would enter into a parliamentary procedure something like the election counting in Iran where we quickly find out a result before----

Mr. Speaker, on that I appeal the ruling of the Chair.

I continue to wish to be heard.

On that I would think that due consideration would be to have the House hear the motion to recommit, and once you have understood its full import, we would then be able to hear from the Chair and have the body decide if it wanted to appeal the ruling or not.

Parliamentary Inquiry.

What is the point of order against reading the actual resolution that we have before us?

Mr. Speaker, I appeal the ruling of the Chair.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

I am, in its current form.

Mr. Speaker, in my judgment, we should support organizations that advance democracy and reduce the increase in funding for organizations which are ambivalent.

Under this bill, the National Endowment for Democracy was cut $15 million. Conversely, the Organization of American States and other international institutions got a $92 million increase. Yet, the OAS invited Fidel Castro back into the organization--by the way, Fidel then said no--and the OAS also leads support for the Honduran leader even after his supreme

court ruled that he could not extend his term.

Now many countries are forced into a dilemma by a would-be dictator who calls a vote but then ends all votes. Cuba has no votes. Venezuela has few remaining. And now Honduras was saved by a Supreme Court. Therefore, in my judgment, we should reduce the increase for the OAS, which doesn't know if it supports democracy, and give that money to the National Endowment for Democracy, which does.

I yield the balance of my time to the ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.

Mr. Speaker, I would recommend that this House adopt the motion to recommit so that we can say that we don't want to cut the National Endowment for Democracy and that we want to support that organization rather than the Organization of American States, which has done nada.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

I thank our ranking member, Mr. McKeon, and especially our chairman, Ike Skelton, for approving one of the amendments in the en bloc.

In December, I became the first Member of this House to serve in an imminent danger area in Afghanistan in uniform. During my time, I learned that most NATO soldiers with our command only deployed for 6 months and Americans deployed for 12. Only State and USAID personnel served for years in Afghanistan.

Major General Flynn, our former J-2 of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, now head of all intelligence for the African command under General McChrystal, convinced me that we need a core of experts in uniform who can deliver on years of commitment to the Afghan deployment, who can build especially an expertise in the Afghan languages of Dari and Pashtu. This amendment, the Larsen-Kirk amendment, allows a for-the- duration incentive for members of the military wishing to make a deployment to Afghanistan.

It's for-the-duration deployments that helped us win World War II. DOD and senior commanders feel that this language that will build a dedicated long-term Afghan core of enlisted officers will quickly become the leaders of our Afghan NATO effort.

Based on our bipartisan bill that Congressman Larsen and I introduced, our bill would lay out a $250,000 payment for a soldier willing to make a for-the-duration commitment and another $250,000 for a 4.0 or better score in Pashtu or Dari. In my discussions with the troops currently in the field in Kandahar, they are pumped up about the opportunity that this commitment would be.

I feel that only a small number of soldiers would sign up, but each one of them, if strategically placed in key Afghan provinces, would become vital assets to our effort and the success of President Obama's campaign in Afghanistan. And I really applaud the chairman and the ranking minority member for putting this in the bill.

Madam Speaker, our Government will attempt to borrow $104 billion just this week, a world record. As Congress accelerates spending, Treasury has borrowed $560 billion in January, $707 billion in February, $750 billion in March, $665 billion in April, and $773 billion in May.

To cover increased borrowing, the Fed is now electronically printing money to cover our debts. Their records show they have printed $152.7 billion to cover our mounting debts.

We are quickly running out of other people's money. Printing dollars electronically will accelerate inflation next year.

Remember, inflation is the enemy of senior citizens on a fixed income. President Obama was right when he said, ``We are out of money.'' Our policies here in the Congress should reflect that sober assessment.

Madam Speaker, today I introduced legislation along with my colleague from Washington, Mr. Larsen, to enhance the ability of General McChrystal to bring our mission in Afghanistan to a successful completion.

One of the key problems facing our mission in Afghanistan is the limitation on service for nearly all military and most civilians deployed there. Nearly all Americans serve no longer than 12 months, costing the overall U.S. effort critical military, language and personal relationship experience needed to sustain momentum in the war effort.

General McChrystal intends to implement a ``classic counterinsurgency campaign'' designed to win the support of the Afghan people and drive a wedge between them and the Taliban. In a tribal culture like Afghanistan, it will be essential for General McChrystal to have people with established, personal relationships with local leaders in order for his strategy to succeed.

Our legislation authorizes a $250,000 incentive bonus for servicemembers to agree to serve in Afghanistan for the duration of the mission, up to six years. This bonus would be paid at the end of their service in Afghanistan. The bill authorizes an additional $250,000 incentive bonus for a servicemember who volunteers for the duration who scores a 4.0 on the Foreign Service Institute test for the dominant languages of Pashto and Dari. These soldiers would receive a payment of $500,000 at the completion of their service in Afghanistan.

These ``for the duration'' volunteers would quickly become the elite of our effort, bringing the most skills to bear for senior commanders and troops in contact with the enemy. The knowledge they would bring cannot be taught in the U.S., it can only be gained through experience in the field. Just a handful of these soldiers in each Afghan province will make a world of difference.

I thank my colleague and rise in very strong support for this bipartisan legislation. I particularly want to thank Mr. Aderholt and our Chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, for putting together this legislation. I have worked on this legislation in the past, particularly to build a staff gym, which is now one of the great successes of this institution. But lately was particularly concerned with the decision quietly made that gave the Architect of the Capitol Red Coats apparently the exclusive power to control Capitol tours in the Capitol. It's clear now that they abused this power. They blocked staff-led tours of the Capitol and on Facebook set a record for poor customer service in condemning congressional staffs--politically naively enough majority and minority staffs--and saying what a bad piece of work that they did.

Many Members came together under the leadership of Chairman Wasserman Schultz, concerned about this power grab in the people's House. While the CVC attempted changes, they maintained that they still wanted to control access to the Capitol, turning away one of our Members who had four mayors visiting here, but they only had three tickets.

What this legislation now does, as written by the chairwoman, is that we have fired the Red Coats' ability to control access to the Capitol by Members of Congress and their staff, that if constituents come in from whatever district, that Members should now know that your staff can get your constituents into the Capitol to see it. We have also removed the restraints so that you can see all provisions of the Capitol, especially, for example, my constituents and many others who have seen this institution on C-SPAN and want to look at it. Now we can get them in here.

I particularly want to thank the leadership for this legislation because we have returned a sense of order and control in making sure that the people who were elected to represent them actually can bring them into the Capitol. As I said in full committee, this institution can be quite frustrating--like yesterday; and the one thing that we can guarantee that was under our control is that we could guarantee that our constituents have a good experience in the Capitol. That had been denied by the Red Coats. This legislation returns that control.

I want to particularly thank Jenny Desia and Liz Dawson on our side; and Ian Rader in Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz's staff for helping out; and Brette Davis of my staff who helped bring this together. I also want to thank Congressmen Dave Loebsack and Jim Moran who helped me out so much.

We see ourselves as institutionalists here. I started working here as a staffer in 1984. And while the CVC is quite impressive, its restrictions were beginning to deny a number of Members of Congress the opportunity to show it to their constituents. This legislation restores that access.