Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, It is my special privilege to honor the Capital Area District Library as they celebrate their 10th anniversary. I congratulate the Capital Area District Library community on behalf of all those who have benefited from their dedication and commitment to serving the members of the community.

The Capital Area District Library has an impressive history of community service and involvement since being formed in 1998, through an agreement between Ingham County and the city of Lansing, MI. Sensing most of Ingham County, the Capital Area District Library operates 13 libraries and it bookmobile, which stops throughout the county. Each library location provides residents with access to all materials and services offered by Capital Area District Library. For the past 10 years. the Capital Area District Library has been able to grow and adapt to the changing needs of the community. It has shown remarkable progress in serving the citizens of Lansing and the residents of Ingham County.

The Capital Area District Library is committed to the values of a democratic society. They aim to provide access to ideas and information that support continuous learning and enhance the quality of life of citizens. They reach these goals through community-based services, excellence in patron service and technology that links its libraries to the world of information. Their blend of a classic library decor, with new up-to-date technology, ensures uniqueness and utility. As part of their mission to provide assess to useful information, the Capital Area District Library offers an interactive website that is dedicated to assist the public with questions and keep them informed about their community. I am confident that the Capital Area District Library will continue to flourish and enhance the Ingham County area for years to come.

Therefore, Madam Speaker, I ask our colleagues to join me in honoring the Capital Area District Library as they celebrate their 10th anniversary. May others know of my high regard for the tradition and strength this organization represents.

Madam Speaker, I rise to honor the recent accomplishments of WHMI radio in Howell, Michigan, on the occasion of the station receiving the prestigious Associated Press ``General Excellence'' Award.

WHMI was recognized above all other medium market radio in the State of Michigan, including Flint, Lansing, Grand Rapids, Bay City/Saginaw, Ann Arbor, and Kalamazoo/Battle Creek. To achieve the ``General Excellence'' Award, WHMI earned recognition for Best Newscast, Best Continuing Coverage, Best Feature Story, Best Investigative Reporting and Best Natural Sound.

Celebrating 51 years of service to the Howell and Livingston County communities, WHMI adds to its many awards for broadcast excellence and community service this new recognition. All of this comes thanks to the hard work of owners Greg and Marcia Jablonski, General Operations Manager Reed Kitteridge, News Director Jon King, and the entire WHMI team.

Madam Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring WHMI for its contributions to the community. Their new milestone is truly deserving of our respect and admiration.

Mr. Speaker, two problems with where we're going: one is, this will, in effect, require intelligence officials to seek a Federal court warrant for foreign targets overseas. That is undeniable. Everybody in the intelligence community says it. The Senate even came across in a bipartisan bill, led by Democrats, who agree to the same principle and said that's the wrong direction to go to protect America.

The other serious problem: one of your great distinguished Members, Elijah Cummings, took a courageous stand in a courageous moment when he had serious crime in his district in Baltimore. He went out, went on TV on a PSA and said, please cooperate with the local police to solve this crime. Please step up and cooperate so that we can solve these crimes together.

What we are effectively doing today, we're effectively telling businesses, large and small, and citizens from neighborhoods to corporate citizens to individual citizens, everybody who every day across America says, I will cooperate with law enforcement to solve crime because it's the right thing to do, you send an absolute chilling effect across. And I've heard this from businesses not related to this particular issue, telecom companies, companies who cooperate on kidnappings, companies that cooperate on trying to find people who are fugitives, who have raped children, people who cooperate on catching drug dealers. They've said, you know, if you show up and ask me that, I want to help. But what this body is telling them, you might not be protected. It might not be just enough. And if you have enough money, and we have enough trial lawyers, you're going to find yourself in court.

So what these people are saying is, maybe I can't cooperate with my government anymore. Maybe I can't, in good faith, like good Samaritans have done all 200-plus years of this great Nation, come forward and say we are in this together. We are united to stop crime, to keep our homes and neighborhoods safe and to protect our country from terrorism.

The CIA case also said it's not good. The military leader said it's dangerous,

the intelligence community said it's dangerous, and so did the Democrats in the Senate. Let's join them and do this right.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my concerns with a provision contained in H.R. 1424, the ``Paul Wellstone Mental Health Addiction and Equity Act of 2007.'' I find it ironic that the House passed a bill intending to provide access to treatment for those with mental illnesses, but did so at the expense of the pharmaceutical researchers who we look to treat many of these conditions.

This legislation provides for more than a 30-percent increase in Medicaid prescription drug rebates. This will do significant damage to domestic manufacturers. You read the headlines--one pharmaceutical company after another is laying off thousands of employees. This industry, like so many others in manufacturing, is facing significant challenges. We want these companies to continue to invest in America and create the research jobs, which find tomorrow's cures. We want to continue to be known as the innovators of the world, and we should not out source this intellectual capital. Therefore, I urge that the bill's sponsors strike this provision from the bill at conference committee and look to find solutions that do not jeopardize American jobs.

Mr. Speaker, I can't tell you how disappointed I am in the majority today because in this bill you effectively kill our opportunity to talk about FISA and the renewal of our opportunity to listen to foreign terrorists talking to foreign terrorists overseas. And it's intellectually not honest with the American people if you don't tell them what you're doing, because it's dangerous. It's really dangerous.

This is day 11, day 11 that you're starting to slowly turn off our ability to listen to bad guys plotting to kill Americans and to kill our allies overseas, men, women, children, Christians, Jews and Muslims. The danger of this is very real and very palpable.

They passed a bipartisan bill in the Senate and said this is urgent; let's do it. Two weeks ago, the Director of the ODNI came out and said, this is important.

We've often said here we should listen to our commanders in the field. They are screaming at the top of their lungs, give us this authority so we can continue to keep America safe.

I heard some argument that, gee, we can just listen if we want and we can come to the FISA Court if we want.

I used to be an FBI agent. It took me 9 months to develop the probable cause on my first case to get a criminal title III, which is the same as a FISA, to listen to somebody's conversations. And it should be that hard. It should be that hard for United States citizens. They deserve that protection under our Constitution.

But what you're saying is you think that those overseas criminals, a criminal in Pakistan, a terrorist plotting to kill Americans, making a phone call from Pakistan that ends up in Saudi Arabia, we ought to say, well, wait a minute; we need to come all the way back to the court, we need to work up probable cause and try to figure out if we ought to be listening to that conversation.

No American out there, including the majority of the Senate and I think the majority in this Chamber, believes that's the right standard to keep America safe. This is dangerous.

Now I know you're down here with the jangly keys theory and thinking, if we just distract them long enough they'll think this is about big oil companies and all of that mess. This is about the majority killing our opportunity to give this tool, this authority which they have used responsibly to make sure that we don't have attacks against Americans here.

What does a majority of the Senate and a majority of this House see that the majority leadership does not? What won't they see, and why won't they tell the American people what they're doing?

It's day 11. Every day that goes by we are in jeopardy of attack.

I will guarantee you this today. There is somebody picking up some electronic instrument to communicate what plan they may have to kill Americans or, as I said before, our allies, or Christians or Jews or Muslims.

What will it take for the majority to stand up and stop politicking on the lives of Americans, our allies and every global person, to stand up and say we will stand for the defense of the United States and its allies and we will stop terrorists in their tracks?

I would urge the strong rejection of this rule.

Mr. Speaker, this is really almost going beyond the pale of irresponsible and getting into dangerous.

I used to be an FBI agent, and every day in this country there is an FBI agent who goes up to somebody, an average citizen, it may be a coworker, it may be a neighbor, it may be somebody who owns a small business, it might be somebody who owns a big business, and says, We need your cooperation to catch child pornographers, and here is the evidence. Will you cooperate with your Nation? And we do it every single day, and great Americans stand up every single day and say, Yes, I will. I will go after child pornographers with you. I will go after crack dealers selling the drugs to our kids with you. I will go after murderers who murder our children in the streets of America, and I will stand with you and cooperate so we can eliminate the dangers from our communities.

And you know what the government did? It went and said, Hey, to whatever business it was, small, big, large, we had people kill 3,000 people, murdered, on one day. And you know what, they are coming back. Will you cooperate with your government to stop the next round of murders?

But we play a very dangerous game. It is about civil liberties. Then why did we pass the bill before, and before that? Because there is civil liberty protection in this bill. It is a farce.

What is at risk here is the future certainty by our intelligence agencies and every single American who wonders: If I cooperate against a criminal of any sort, a terrorist, are they coming to get me next?

We need to refocus on who the bad guys are. It is not the companies who cooperated with their government. If you are a small business selling insurance or you are washing windows, it is the terrorists who threaten the lives of Americans.

We ought to be proud of every American who has the courage in a dangerous world to stand up and say: I will stand with you, United States of America, to get the true enemy, the bad guys, al Qaeda, terrorists, crack dealers, child pornographers, and everybody in between.

I urge the strong rejection of this rule, and let's get back to business and give them the tools to keep us safe.

Mr. Speaker, I have such great respect for my fellow colleague and Michigander, Mr. Conyers, for his work and passionate belief and where he stands.

I do worry about where we're at. And I hear the gentleman talk about the fact that we just don't have time, and we need more time. You know, today we're going to spend hours and hours grilling a professional baseball player about he said/she said activities in professional baseball. We spent an entire day on this floor this year trying to figure out how we're going to designate scenic trails in New England; 162 bills commemorating someone or something, 162 on the floor this year; 62 bills naming post offices.

I think, if we put this in perspective, this isn't about needing more time. This isn't about that. We've obviously wasted a lot of time.

Our Constitution, as so many people point to, says some pretty clear things to me. It makes sure that you stand tall and you take an oath to defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic. It's one of the most important things that we do in this body.

If we can find time to put Roger Clemens in a chair and grill him for hours and make a media circus about professional baseball, you'd think we could spend a few minutes protecting the United States of America. Instead what we do is we kind of fool around and wring our hands and say, I'm for national security but kind of, not really. But, hey, did you see these jangly keys? Professional baseball could be in trouble. It maybe works for my kids when they were 3 and in trouble, but it doesn't work for the American people, and it certainly doesn't work to keep us safe.

This isn't about the Constitution. Many of your Members came down here and said, we think this is unconstitutional, but give us 3 more weeks of unconstitutionality in the United States. If I believed that, as a former FBI agent, I wouldn't vote for it. It's wrong.

This is about white hats and black hats. It's about good guys and bad guys. It's about Good Samaritans. You know, there are ads on TV today where they go into high crime neighborhoods and say, It's okay for you to tell on criminal behavior. Please call the police. Please call the FBI. Please make a difference in your community.

Think of the confusing message we are sending today because we're hooked up on the size of the company. So if I go in as an FBI agent to find the address that a pizza delivery company has for a fugitive, should we go after them, too? Should we go after that pizza delivery guy for, out of the goodness of his heart, telling us where there is a fugitive who may have committed murder or have committed child pornography or been selling drugs and is in violation of the safety and security of his neighborhood, his community? No, of course not. And we shouldn't punish people who say, listen, I want to help the United States catch terrorists and murderers, and if you ask me and I'm in lawful possession of it, I'll share it with you. We do it in banks. We do it in small businesses. We knock on neighbors' doors every day in this country and say, Help us help protect your neighborhood, your kids and your family. Will you tell us what you saw? Will you tell us what you know? Will you tell us where this information leads us to? It happens every day.

This is about black hats and white hats, good guys and bad guys. Let's make sure we stand up today for every courageous American who stands up for the safety of the community of this United States. I don't care how big or

how small they are, we ought to stand with them and not make them the enemy.

Mr. Speaker, I can't tell you how disappointed I am in my colleagues across the aisle. Many of us reached out and said we'd like to help craft the language that solves the problems that we all agree are problems.

Even the Speaker of the House acknowledged that illegals in that other bill was a problem; that adults on the bill was a problem; that people collecting over 300 percent, in some cases $83,000 or up to $100,000, that was a problem. The fact that we're taking millions of children and forcing them off of their private insurance and onto a government program was a problem.

All was acknowledged. But not one constructive meeting happened where we actually sat down and said, we all agree that those are problems. You agree and we agree. Let's work out the language so that we can get a bill that takes care of poor children. That's what we believe.

But, Madam Speaker, I would encourage you to read the bill. As a matter of fact, she was proud to say that they capped it at 300 percent. We got the bill last night. We're still finding some real gems in here.

Denial of payments for expenditures for children health care assistance for children whose effective family income extends 300 percent of the poverty line. Basically, they said, we capped it, see?

And then you read down a little bit, under rule of construction: ``Nothing in these amendments made by this section shall be construed as changing any income eligibility level for children under this section.''

You didn't change anything. As a matter of fact, you made it worse, actually made it worse. So you know that same $83,000 family that we all agreed and the Speaker stood right on this floor and said is a problem is still a problem in this bill.

I encourage all of you to read the bill. The rhetoric is great. Who's against poor kids? Nobody. But if you want to do something that has meaning, if you want to say that everybody's vote counts, that everybody should participate in this process, and you want to stand for kids and not behind them, then we need to reject this rule and come back and write a bill that doesn't allow illegals to have welfare benefits, that doesn't take these 2 million kids and throw them off their private health care, that doesn't have families making $83,000 subsidized by hardworking middle-class families. We can do it if you just try. You didn't even try.

The only people that are welcome now on that side of the aisle's leadership offices are pollsters, focus groups, people who are running TV ads. Last night we had Members getting calls on the bill that we didn't see, advocating for the bill. Oops.

To say that this has been honest and fair and open is a disgrace to this institution, and it is a great institution.

There's lot of people over there I have just so much respect for, and so many of them were trying to reach out and do this; but they were completely cut off from anything that resembled reasonableness.

I just want to cover quickly, Mr. Speaker, the things that the Speaker said again. No illegals. CBO says that, in fact, is not true, and you confirmed in a meeting earlier with your leadership that no proof of citizenship is needed in this bill. Reason enough.

Adults, you said we took care of the adults issue. CBO scores 10 percent of all the participants by 2012 will be adults.

Nothing over 300 percent. You heard the language in there that actually obliterates that. We don't take these working-class families off of their private health care insurance. CBO says 2 million will lose it.

If you honestly believe by your words in this well that these were problems before that you tried to fix, we need to reject this bill, start talking, cooperating and negotiating; and we're going to have a bill that truly helps poor children.

I want to commend Mr. Hastings. We have worked on many issues of which we have agreed strongly in the betterment of national security. I couldn't more strongly disagree with this bill and where we are going today.

As one of the very few people on this floor that has actually gone out and developed sources and developed the leads that you possibly need to develop probable cause as a former FBI agent to either bug or intercept phones, offices, or other privileges communications between Americans, I can tell you the long and arduous process it takes to develop that, to go to the judge and say, Your Honor, I do believe that these people are engaged in criminal activities and here is why. And it takes months and months and months. So let me tell you what this bill does today that is so disturbing.

Non-United States citizens who are insurgents in Iraq building IEDs that our troops are trying to intercept electronically are now given more rights to privacy than we do for gamblers, degenerate gambling operations developed under the criminal code in the United States of America. That, my friends, is true. Incidental communications, you don't have to go back to the judge, you continue to listen. But what we have done is we have set a standard that every time they want to go overseas and intercept these folks, the standard of the bar is set so high they have to go get a court order. They have to get a warrant. And it takes months.

This isn't about Hollywood. This isn't about Jack Bauer. This is about

real people having to develop probable cause in accordance with the law of the United States. And what you said is that insurgent in Iraq has more privacy rights than any criminal, any United States citizen under the criminal code of the United States of America. That is what you have done with this bill. Oh, yes, sir, it is. Read the language and understand what it takes for them to go through the process to develop probable cause.

This is the confusion that led to the delay that may have cost the lives of United States soldiers. We all know the example of which we are talking about.

This bill encourages that confusion and that standard to give foreign terrorists in a foreign land more privacy rights than United States citizens under the criminal code here. It's wrong.

We often say, listen to the intelligence community, listen to our commanders on the ground. I implore you to do just that. They oppose this bill because it makes it harder for them to go after foreign terrorists in foreign lands plotting to kill either U.S. soldiers or even attacks against our homeland or our allies. This bill does all of those things.

I don't ever doubt the intention of my friends, but words matter in the legal code. And when you stand before that judge, believe me, there is no agent that believes they are Jack Bauer and are going to fudge a little bit on what the Constitution asks and tells them they must do. They are going to err on the side of the United States Constitution every time. And for those who don't, they deserve to go to jail, and we do prosecute those occasionally. But what you are saying is we are going to create this whole system for foreign terrorists to give them more rights than the privacy of United States citizens. I strongly urge the rejection of this bill. Let's go back to the table and protect our United States citizens.

Mr. Speaker, point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I rise for a point of order against consideration of the resolution because it violates clause 9(b) of House rule XXI for failure to disclose a taxpayer-funded earmark contained in the bill.

Section 618 of the Democrats' SCHIP bill contains an undisclosed earmark directing taxpayer funding to a facility located in Memphis, Tennessee, specifically in the district of the gentleman from Tennessee.

Under House rules, all earmarks are supposed to be disclosed, and the Member requesting the earmark is required to certify that he has no financial interest in this earmark.

The earmark contained in this bill has not been disclosed anywhere. In fact, at the Rules Committee last night, my friends in the Democratic leadership certified this bill as ``earmark-free,'' despite the fact that this bill includes an earmark for the gentleman from Tennessee.

The requirements of full disclosure and certification that there is no financial interest have not been met here.

This earmark was not in the House-passed bill, H.R. 976. It was not in the Senate amendment to H.R. 976. I would point out it was in the House-passed H.R. 3192, but it was never disclosed there either.

This bill threatens the important programs that protect the health of seniors and children, and that debate should happen.

This bill spends billions in taxpayer dollars on health insurance for families who make $83,000 a year and on illegal immigrants. This bill ignores House earmark rules to buy votes for its passage.

Mr. Speaker, the American people are entitled to know how their tax dollars are being used. This is why the Republican leadership for months has been requesting a vote on House Resolution 479, legislation that would clarify the rules of our Chamber to ensure all earmarks are publicly disclosed and subject to challenge and debate here on the floor. The majority leadership has unfortunately refused to allow H. Res. 479 to come to the floor for vote. And this is why Republicans had no choice but to file a discharge petition last week that will force H. Res. 479 to the floor.

Mr. Speaker, there is a reason that the American people hold us in lower regard than a twice-convicted used car salesmen. It is because we continue to, in a slap of the face of every American taxpayer who gets up in the morning and plays by the rules, to play politics and slip things into bills that are not only against the rules, but against the integrity and well-standing of this House.

Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. Speaker, my point of order is that this bill is in violation of 9(b) of House rule XXI for failure to disclose a taxpayer-funded earmark contained in the bill.

I appeal the ruling of the Chair.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to express my support for the ``We Don't Serve Teens,'' national campaign to fight underage drinking.

As Members of Congress, we have a responsibility to do everything in our power to protect teens from the dangers of alcohol abuse.

The ``We Don't Serve Teens'' will raise awareness of the important role retailers and private citizens play in making sure alcohol is not accessible to teenagers. Their website, www.dontserveteens.gov, clearly outlines the proactive measures we can all take to limit teens' access to alcohol. This will ensure a safer environment that is free of the unnecessary dangers of alcohol, including binge drinking, and drunk driving.

I believe we should applaud the alcohol wholesalers, brewers, distillers, their advertisement agencies, and the private and State- owned retailers for their willingness to cooperate and support this cause. Without their assistance it would be very difficult to get this campaign off the ground.

The FTC is successfully uniting all adults in one organized effort that agrees not to serve those under the legal drinking age. I wholeheartedly support this movement and hope to be an advocate for ``We Don't Serve Teens.'' If we can all understand the benefits of the drinking age and believe it when we say, ``We Don't Serve Teens. It's unsafe, illegal and irresponsible,'' we will create a safer today and a more responsible tomorrow. Please join me in supporting the ``We Don't Serve Teens'' effort.

Mr. Speaker, simply just to answer this distinguished chairman and friend and distinguished colleague from Michigan, reverse targeting is not in this bill. It is not in this bill.

When I was a young FBI agent, this whole thing started a lot differently. We had to target the phone. We didn't target the individual. We targeted the phone. So we had to develop a probable cause case on the phone that an individual was using, that phone, that bit of copper wire, to further a criminal enterprise and have criminal discussions. Think about how long ago that was and how the world has changed. And the big thing for us, by the way, was to get a pay phone, where they would change pay phones because they were trying to outsmart us. They'd go to one pay phone and go to the other one, and if we didn't have a warrant on that other pay phone, couldn't listen to them even though we knew what the heck they were doing on that phone. We had to go back to the court, develop probable cause on that particular phone. You can see how technology even then started to get ahead of us a little bit.

Then we realized in America we got really smart and we said, hey, wait a minute, it's not the phone that's the criminal. It's the bad guy. Let's target the bad guy. So, if he goes to phone A or phone B or phone C, it shouldn't matter. We know that he's the bad guy using those instruments to further their criminal enterprise.

That's what we did, and we all did, and you did that. When I was an agent, you passed those laws and they were good. They were good laws and they helped us keep abreast of technology and changes and changing in criminal activity.

Think about today, prepaid phones. If I'm a terrorist, I buy a thousand of them. I don't ever use the same phone again. It means we have to be that much better.

And what this bill does, what the bill yesterday did not do, is make it technology neutral. Everyone got up last night and said this is about foreign-to-foreign. We don't care about that, but the bill and the language as it was written did, and it put technology in there. So now you had some FBI agent trying to figure out how do I catch this guy, because not that I don't know he's a bad guy and I can prove it to the judge, but because of the kind of technology he's using.

It took us right back into the 1970s and 1980s when we had to scratch our head and we came to Congress and said don't do that to us.

Yesterday, you're saying we're going to do it to you again, and it's wrong. And I guess I'm so disappointed. I know you hate the Attorney General and I know you hate the President of the United States, but don't you love soldiers? Don't you love people who are risking their lives to catch terrorists? Of course you do, and I know you do.

This bill helps us protect them so they can protect us. Right now there are billions, and I mean billions of conversations and communications every single day, and I mean billions. There is nothing in this bill that circumvents a United States citizen's right to the fourth amendment protections, nothing, nothing. It protects them.

What we are trying to say is, let us, let the intelligence community go overseas.

May I have an additional 30 seconds?

This bill is an important step to protect us to bring technology to the point where we don't make agents and officers worry about foreign- to-foreign communications between terrorists we ought to be listening to. The court should not be involved. America believes it. I know my colleagues believe it too.

Pass this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, quite simply, Mr. Murtha and I have worked out an agreement on this amendment, and I want to thank the chairman for working with me.

This is incredibly important. We are going to take a little bit of this money from the former Soviet Union Threat Reduction Act, some of these moneys, and we are going to destroy tens of thousands of liters of chemical weapons still stockpiled in Libya. I think we have all come to the conclusion that this stuff is better gone than it is negotiating away about who pays for the road or for the electricity or for the incinerator.

I want to thank the chairman. I think this is an important national security issue which we have come to an agreement that we will do something about, and I want to thank you for that. America, and I think the world, will be safer when these chemical munitions are exterminated.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back my time.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I can't tell you how disappointed I am in my friends. And I have the greatest respect for my good friend from Florida and the gentlewoman from California. We have worked so well together on so many issues that, I think, have made a difference in a positive way for national security for this country. I believe that with every fiber of my being.

I almost feel bad for you that you would be sent here on behalf of the Speaker to try to defend this today. I feel bad for you because I know you both. And I know that is not the direction you would have taken, had it been your decision.

Efforts to change this are not new. The level of concern by so many of us who sit in those classified hearings in our Intelligence Committee is not new. Last year, my colleague from New Mexico introduced a bill that would have fixed this problem last year, and it was stopped. Earlier this year, earlier this year, it was introduced again to fix this problem, and it was denied by the majority.

I have to tell you, when I was a young FBI agent, sometimes you would look up at the policies kind of flowing down at you. We were working awfully hard to develop probable cause to get wiretaps, which was the right thing to do. It was a difficult process with lots of vetting, lots of hours, lots of source development and source vetting, lots of surveillance, and putting it all together to make something like that work so that it could rise to the standard to go after a United States citizen and their communication. It is a pretty high standard. I argue, as somebody who did it for a living, it should be.

But what we have been arguing for for the last year is to say, listen, we should not give those rights to terrorists overseas who are conducting terrorist activities to target Americans or our allies, including the United States soldiers. They do not deserve the rights of a U.S. citizen.

This was an easy fix. It said, let's be technology neutral. Times have changed since the 1970s when FISA was written. Technology has changed. People communicate completely differently.

What we said last year is let us change to keep up, because today we have asked soldiers to stand in harm's way. And the thing that I know that my colleagues understand, both Democrats and Republicans, is because this House has failed to act, they have stood in harm's way without all the information that they need and deserve to be safe, successful, and come home to their families.

This gamesmanship is dangerous, and I mean dangerous. My colleagues understand those classified cases that we talk about, that we know because this has not been fixed. Lives may have been lost because of it. Lives may have been lost because of it. We can change that today.

I just got a copy of this. As I go through it, just in my brief cursory look at it, this is not what we have been negotiating. There have been no new demands. This is so easy. This is so simple. It can be about a 2-page bill, and we can begin to protect Americans in harm's way, including the homeland, but, most importantly, the soldiers who are overseas who deserve that protection. And just because we shout and we yell, no, no, no, we believe that terrorists should not have to have a warrant overseas as well doesn't make it so, and you know that. That has been the stumbling block. The Court has said it. The intelligence community has said it. The DNI has said it. We have said it.

I am going to beg all of you, please, for the lives of the soldiers who are at risk today, for the homeland, this is not the place for gamesmanship. This is not the place that we argue about a bill that we have not even seen. This is the time that we should come together. This is the time that this bill should be out and done, negotiated, and free from all of the gamesmanship we see today.

When I go home and look at those families of those folks who have loved ones overseas, I want to be able to tell them we have done everything that we can do to make them safe. When somebody kisses their young child and puts them on the bus, I want to be able to look that family in the eye and say we are doing everything to make sure we get all the information of what the terrorists are up to to protect the United States of America.

We all know in good conscience we can't say that today, and we have not been able to say that for months in good conscience.

This is our chance to come together as people I know and I respect, who know the dangers of the gamesmanship on an issue this important. Let's stop it. Let's go back. Go back and tell the Speaker, I am sorry, we are not playing this game.

People's lives are at stake. We can do this. We can do this together. I know that is why I was sent here. I know that is what you believe in your hearts. Let's do this together. Let's put this stuff aside and fix this problem so that we can begin to listen to the conversations of terrorists we know are planning attacks against our allies and the United States of America.

I strongly urge the reconsideration of this. Let's do this. We can do this. We should do this. We ought to do it. And shame on us if we can't do it.

Madam Speaker, I was an FBI agent and I worked organized crime in Chicago, and I did criminal title III work, which is equivalent to FISA on the intelligence side. I developed the sources. I did the debriefings. I did the surveillances. I did the interviews. I talked to lawyers. I talked to more lawyers. It is a very high standard to gain probable cause to listen to United States citizens' conversations. And it should be, and we should protect it. It should be that hard.

But I am going to tell you what we are going to do with this bill today. We are going to make it harder for us to go after terrorists who are trying to kill Americans than it was for me to go after organized criminals in Chicago. That is wrong.

And I think the intentions are right, but we did take the time to read the bill that we got this afternoon. There are some real problems with the language in here.

Number one is this whole thing was established so that we could be technology neutral. And I am just going to address the first paragraph. I think others are going to talk about other things. Because often you are referring to section 105 where it says a court order is not required for those who are not located in the United States. But if you read that whole paragraph, it's not technology neutral. You have set the bar beyond what our technology will be allowed in order to comply with the law.

It shouldn't matter if a terrorist is calling a terrorist from Pakistan to Saudi Arabia. We shouldn't care how or what technology they use. It should not matter. If what you say that you don't care that foreign terrorists who are talking to foreign terrorists, that we should not have to have a warrant, this language is wrong. It's wrong. And the people who have to follow the law tell us it's wrong.

If you honestly believe this, then let's sit down. The gentleman from California was right. In about an hour we could have this worked out. Everybody would be happy, and we could protect the citizens of the United States, not only their civil liberties at home but from the terrorists who are today planning attacks against the United States.

And we all know in a classified way the fact that this is not fixed has cost American lives.

No more screwing around. Let's sit down. Let's work it out. Let's get this right.