Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, the President breezed through a senior center yesterday, and he said, well, the Medicare drug plan seems perplexing, but he urged seniors to sign up anyway. It's a good deal, he said, of the program.

Well, it's a great deal for the pharmaceutical industry because it protects

their profits, and they get subsidies. It's a fabulous deal for the private insurance industry because they are getting subsidized to offer plans which they can change on a daily basis in terms of senior benefits, and seniors can only sign up once a year; but it isn't necessarily a good deal for many seniors. So the President gave bad advice.

Very low-income seniors, yes, they should, if they are not covered by another plan, look very carefully at their options and probably sign up. Others with very high prescription drug costs who don't have another plan, perhaps, but some would be losers under this plan. Many others, it is questionable whether they should sign up, and the government is not making it easy for them.

Minimally, we should extend the penalty deadline. After all, if the pharmaceutical companies and the insurance companies can change the seniors' benefits on a daily basis, why is it seniors can only sign up for one plan a year, can't change plans and will be penalized if they don't sign up by May?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Listeners should realize that truth is not required in debate on the floor of the House. The chairman of the Rules Committee stood up here and said there has not been one complaint about the use of the PATRIOT Act, or the abuse. He should talk to Brandon Mayfield from Portland, Oregon, who was considered to be a perpetrator of the Madrid bombing and they used the PATRIOT Act to accumulate the nonevidence about him. The government has subsequently apologized, and he sued the government, but I guess that is not a complaint.

Maybe we are not hearing the complaints because librarians, bookstore owners, and business owners can themselves be prosecuted if they tell anybody that there was an unwarranted gathering of records about innocent Americans from them. So, yeah, I guess there is sort of a dearth of complaints.

Then there is the other gentleman. He said, well, we can change this later. We heard that when we passed the first PATRIOT Act, which no Member of the House of Representatives had read, at 10 o'clock in the morning with one copy available on each side of the aisle. We said it sunsets; you can change it later. Now is later. It is time to change it. Guess what? They say well, no, we can't change it now; we might change it later after we make it permanent now. Before it was temporary; we are going to change it later. Now, it is permanent, maybe we will change it later.

Come on. Let's be honest about this debate. You are jamming this through on behalf of the White House and the Attorney General. They want this. It is bad legislation. It threatens the civil liberties of Americans, and I believe it will impinge on our investigation and finding of terrorists.

These national security letters, 30,000 national security letters, gathering huge amounts of data about the lives of innocent Americans. In the past, that would have to be discarded. Now they say, well, we're going to keep it; but don't worry, all the information we're going to accumulate about people, innocent Americans, is going to go into a databank; but it will only be available to the Federal Government, State government, local governments, tribal governments and appropriate private entities. I guess there is one person in America who might not be able to tap into this databank.

This is going to create such a huge haystack of irrelevant information about the lives of innocent Americans that the FBI, who had one terrorist in hand, Musawi, and had an agent in Arizona pointing at the plot, could not even see their hand in front of their face. Now we are going to create a huge mountain of irrelevant data about innocent people and this is somehow going to improve how they perform in finding terrorists in America? I don't think so.

Then the most cynical thing about this bill is to take a meritorious bill

that deals with methamphetamine precursors and trafficking, that passed separately in this House of Representatives, which I supported, and they are going to include it as part of this legislation in a cynical ploy to somehow basically force, bully, or trick people into supporting the underlying legislation with its unwarranted attack on the Bill of Rights, the Constitution of America, the foundation of our government, the gathering secretly of information about innocent Americans, and the permanent retention of that information for no good purpose.

This is bad legislation. The time has come to change it. It should be defeated, and we should change it now.

Well, with great fanfare last week and very belatedly, the President unveiled a document called A Plan For Victory in Iraq, and he said that this was a declassified version of the longstanding military strategy in Iraq.

Now, help to review that strategy: The initial strategy based on unrealistic assumptions by Mr. Wolfowitz, Mr. Rumsfeld, and others was that our troops would be welcomed as liberators, we would be drawn down to 40,000 troops within a few months, and that the Iraqis would be able to pay for their rebuilding themselves. Of course, all these things were horribly, horribly wrong. A number of us have called to remove Mr. Rumsfeld for more than a couple of years now, but he is still there. So we would assume that the President condones the incredible mistakes that he has made which have caused many, many American lives.

Now, with his support slumping into the 30s on his execution of the war in Iraq, the President has decided to shift gears. Now, that would be good if this was really a declassified version of a credible military plan for victory and return of our troops home from Iraq. Unfortunately, the White House and its folks do not quite understand high technology and the Internet, and by clicking on this, you could find out who really wrote it. It was not written by a military strategist, it was not written at the Pentagon; it was written by a political science professor named Peter D. Feaver from Duke University, and his specialty is polling and public opinion on military conflicts. He has a theory that Vietnam could have continued if only the American people had been given a vision that we were headed toward victory, and he is now testing that theory by writing this document which the President presented as an actual declassified version of a military document. It is not. It is a political construct based on a theory of a political science professor from Duke University who the President has named to the National Security Council. So the dissembling continues here for the American people.

We want a real plan on how we are going to bring our troops home from Iraq. We do not want any more dissembling, we do not want any more Pollyannas. The President seems in his recent speeches to be admitting to the numerous mistakes that were made, but if we look at this document and the way it has been presented, they just made another grievous mistake for the American people. In fact, the general in charge in Iraq, Lieutenant General Martin Dempsey, top military official in charge of training Iraqi troops, he surprised some reporters by saying that the first time he saw our strategy for victory in Iraq was the day it was released to the press. So this administration is still failing to create a clear vision.

I and others have proposed that the President should negotiate with the newly elected Iraqi government after the elections on a withdrawal, or enhance their credibility, their legitimacy. I think it would also begin to remove a crutch which they are using, which is the U.S. forces in Iraq. They are not settling their differences legitimately between the Sunnis, the Shiites, and the Kurds, and of course many predicted that before the war, but the administration also glossed over that. And they will not as long as the U.S. is there, and the Sunnis in particular resent the U.S. presence. So if we negotiated that sort of an agreement with them and had a timeline to draw down and remove our troops and stand up the Iraqis, I believe that then the insurgency would abate, as do many others, including others in the military who have said that in fact it is our forces that are the kindling for many, other than the foreign fighters who are there, and then soon the Iraqis would turn on the foreign fighters and hopefully then reclaim their own country. So I am very saddened to learn that this is yet one more deception by this administration in this sorry chapter in American history.

Mr. Speaker, well, just in time for the holidays, the Republicans have prepared a bevy of treats known as tax cuts favoring those who earn over $300,000 a year. One of the most delectable is a 60 percent tax cut in the tax on stock dividends for millionaires. It costs $13 billion in revenue foregone, unfortunately. But with new found concern about the deficit, the Republicans are going to pay for that tax cut for the millionaires by raising fees and interest rates on students who are struggling to get an education.

What a sweet trade. More tax cuts for billionaires as they trickle down on the students who are struggling to live the American dream.

It is extraordinary. If you assert something that is not true, it is true on the floor of the House. There is no truth test here. Cut taxes for the rich, it will stimulate the economy. Put the little people to work who will pay taxes for their job cutting the lawns or washing their yachts. That is the argument we are hearing from that side of the aisle. Trickle down economics works, they tell us.

Unfortunately, that is not what most Americans find with their real incomes stalled out over the last 5 years. No, trickle down economics does one simple thing: It rewards the benefactors of the Republican Party.

Let us just look at one of the elements of the ``not raising taxes today.'' It would be let the tax cuts in dividends on stocks. Now, I go to my town meetings and I say, everybody who has dividend paying stocks, raise your hand. And I have a lot of people coming to my town meetings, but usually it is one, maybe two. And I think that is pretty much the same across America. But the millionaires and, yeah, the billionaires, they have a lot of dividend paying stocks. In fact, their tax cuts average $127,000, while the average family averaged $800.

Now, that is not even talking about the dividend tax. Let us talk about the dividend tax. This bill will extend the cut in dividend taxes. Now, the American Enterprise Institute, no liberal bastion there, they just issued a report and it says the dividend tax break has not generated more business investment or jobs or productive economic activity but it has enhanced investor wealth. That is what this is about. This bill is to enhance investor wealth.

Now, they have a newfound concern about the sea of red ink they have created, the 60 percent increase in our debt in the last 5 years. So a couple of weeks ago we jammed through a bill at 2 a.m. in the morning that cut things like student financial aid, Medicaid, health care to poor people, dumping that burden on the States; foster care, long-term care, the school lunch program. Those little kids are just eating too much. They are chowing down. They are going to help the obesity problem on this side of the aisle by starving kids.

Now, what are we buying with those cuts? Well, the student loan cuts, they say, oh, we are not cutting student loans, we are just charging them more for the loans. Right, you are not cutting student loans, you are just increasing their debt burden. You are not cutting the loans, you are just jacking up the interest rate, charging them twice as much to take out a loan, and charging them a special new fee to get a very high fixed interest rate, something they can get now for free at a lower rate.

But they are not whacking the students too hard, only $14 billion. And what do we get for that $14 billion? An extension of the dividend tax cut. That is great. So now the wealthy will be able to buy more yachts to float on the sea of red ink that the Republicans have created. They will be able to hire more help around the mansion. That is trickle down economics.

They talk about how great the economy is doing. Here is a few facts. Unemployment rate, yes, it is recently down, but it is up eight-tenths of a percent over when the Republican administration took charge. There is 1.6 million more unemployed workers than when George Bush took office. There is the slowest private sector job growth of any administration since Herbert Hoover. He is doing better than Herbert Hoover. That is great. The largest projected surpluses turned into the largest projected deficits, with $4.2 trillion more debt in 2008.

Now, that is the grand success of trickle down. And they come out here and assert baldly that giving tax cuts to rich people will not only stimulate the economy, put people to work, but that it will reduce the deficit. Sure. You really believe that? I do not think so. The American people do not believe it.

What you are doing here is giving very generous tax cuts to the people who give you very generous campaign contributions.

Mr. Speaker, despite a flood, a sea of red ink, tomorrow Republicans propose to cut taxes. Cut taxes for whom? The wealthy. They want to float the yachts of the wealthy on a sea of red ink.

One of the cuts is for people who get a chip dividend on their stocks and is paid for by dramatically increasing the costs of student loans.

I have met with students at Oregon State and the University of Oregon during the break. These kids are working hard trying to realize the American Dream. Some of them are holding down three jobs and borrowing as much as they can, and the Republicans say they have to pay more for those loans so that rich people can pay a rate of taxes on dividends less than someone who works for $25,000 a year.

That is an outrageous position for the majority party.

Mr. Speaker, at 2 a.m. before Congress adjourned a couple of weeks ago, we passed something called the reconciliation bill, theoretically the first attempt to begin to deal with the flood of red ink that is drowning our Nation. But these were kind of mean- spirited cuts that hit at those who really can't afford to give too much in order to protect the very wealthy.

Here is how it worked. The biggest single category of cuts in that bill was $14.3 billion out of student loans. On the Republican side, they said, We didn't cut student loans. All we did was increase the cost of student loans. Well, it is the same impact on the students. They are going to double the origination fee on the student loans, they are going to charge students a fee to fix the rate, and they are going to give them a really high fixed interest rate instead of the rather reasonable rate that is available now. It is estimated for the average Oregonian going to a public school who borrows the maximum amount for 4 years, they will incur another $5,800 in loan costs.

I went out to see what the students in Oregon thought about this and how they were doing. I was inspired. I went to the University of Oregon and Oregon State both, met with student government leaders and regular students who are getting financial aid. The stories were inspiring, what these young people are doing to try and better themselves. There was one couple, they had both been displaced workers. They have a child. They went through Lane Community College to get associate's degrees because it was cheaper and they borrowed $40,000 to do it. They are now at the U of O. They estimate they will graduate with over $100,000 in debt. There was the young woman who is holding three jobs, three jobs, and 14 credit hours. She said, Congressman, I'm going to have to reduce my credit hours. You know what that means. It's going to take me longer to finish school, which means I'm going to have to borrow more money.

They said, when you were young and you went to school, and I think a lot of the Republicans have not thought about this maybe, you could take a summer job and save enough money to pay tuition at a public school. That was true. They said, If we get a summer job and save really well, we get just about enough money to buy our books. You can work full-time year round at a minimum wage job in Oregon where the minimum wage is considerably higher than the Federal minimum wage and still not have enough money to eat and pay your tuition, let alone your housing costs.

This is a dire situation. The response of the Republicans is that these are the people who should sacrifice. These are the people who can afford to pay more to help rein in the reckless, wanton spending and debt being piled up on that side of the aisle. What is the trade-off the Republicans want? They are going to take the $14.3 billion that these students will have to pay in additional costs, many of them will probably have to give up on getting a higher education and just go to work in a dead-end job, and they are going to give it to the richest among us. It is

going to continue the tax cuts for people who are lucky enough to clip coupons off of stocks, dividends. The trade-off is almost exact.

So students will pay more for their loans, kids who are trying to get ahead, start a life, start a family, do better, become productive citizens, have a good living and pay taxes so that the richest among us will not have to pay taxes on their investments. But under their bizarre theory of trickle-down economics, somehow those students and everybody else is going to benefit by the fact that the richest among us, those who live off dividends on stocks, will pay a lower rate of taxes. What a bizarre view of the world from that side of the aisle. What a mean-spirited cut.

I wonder how many people from that side of the aisle went and talked to students about this during the break. They probably went to the country club and chortled with the rich people over champagne after Thanksgiving dinner, but they did not go out and talk to the students who they are sticking it to nor the seniors who they are sticking it to in this bill or the hungry primary and secondary school kids whose school lunch programs they are cutting. Those are the people who have to sacrifice so the richest among us can have their tax cuts continue.

Last year, according to the Internal Revenue Service, 99 percent of the people in America saw their incomes decline in real dollars. One percent saw an increase, those over $300,000; and they did not even do really that well. It is only 4 percent for between $300,000 and 1.3 million, but the people over 1.3 million, the people that these students are going to pay for their tax cuts, they saw a 10 percent increase in their income.

There is something wrong here when we have young people working hard, trying to get ahead, and we are saying you are going to pay for the rich folks' free ride.

Mr. Speaker, this week is American Education Week and I would like to take this opportunity to recognize and honor all the men and women across the country who serve as Education Support Professional, ESP, in our Nation's public schools. Education Support Professionals are essential school employees who interact daily with students, staff and parents.

Public School drivers are essential school employees who interact with students, teachers, parents and the community every day. Bus drivers are the first and final link in the daily chain of events for every student in a school district.

Standards of performance for bus drivers in a given day will include but not be limited to: checking all safety and communications equipment on the bus at the beginning and end of each day, protect children from unsanitary conditions, returning lost and found student personal property, manage emergency situations, handle and stabilize student behavior which may put them and other students or staff at risk.

Take a moment to appreciate and recognize this fine group of Americans who are dedicated, loyal and committed to our future and the educational enhancement of all public school students.

Well, the Republicans are preparing for Thanksgiving, like many Americans. But early this morning they slaughtered the turkey. They chopped student loans, school lunch, foster care, long- term care, and Medicaid for struggling families. Now they are preparing to serve a huge portion, with gravy, to Americans with generous new tax breaks and extended tax cuts to those who earn more than $300,000 a year and who clip coupons for a living, hard-working Americans them.

They are a little worried about kind of the mixed metaphor here, whether or not they will be called Scrooge, and some people will confuse Thanksgiving and Christmas. So they might put the bird back in the freezer and wait until closer to Christmas and hope that the struggling students and families forget what was taken from them to help those who earn over $300,000 a year.

So that is the big decision on the Republican side of the aisle today. When does the turkey, composed of benefits that should have gone to struggling families, as a gift to the wealthy, get delivered, Thanksgiving or Christmas? Tough choice. Stay tuned.

Mr. Speaker, in response to the speech of one decorated veteran of this institution, the Republican chairman of the Committee on Armed Services has taken this position of that Member, and he has written this abbreviated, interpreted version which mischaracterizes the position of Mr. Murtha. This is signed by Mr. Hunter, and it has a number on it. Just think of the mischief al-Zarqawi can do with this when he puts it on the Internet. We have a signed document from the Chair of the--chairman of the Committee on Armed Services asking for immediate withdrawal.

Now, I have an e-mail, too. We all get them. This is from the president of the Oregon War Veterans Association, who did disagree with Mr. Murtha and knows my position against the war. He said, ``I am writing not only to thank you for your service, but also to ask you to be cautious about politicizing the war effort in Iraq. It is our determination to keep our servicemembers safe from injury that may come from pure partisan political sabotage,'' and if a fabricated document fabricating the position of the chairman of the Armed Services Committee with his signature on it which is now winging its way around the world is not pure partisan political sabotage, I do not know what is.

If you have good sense, you will withdraw this resolution. We will even give you unanimous consent to do it, Mr.

Hunter. But if you will not, maybe you can start doing your job: Hold a few hearings and a little bit of oversight in what is going on in Iraq, and maybe we can even act like the bipartisan Senate and ask that the President report to us on his goals, objectives and progress in Iraq. But none of this has happened in this House. This is the only substantive action you have taken on Iraq since we went in there, and you should be awfully ashamed.

Mr. Speaker, I have been in Congress for nearly 20 years. And in all that tie, I don't think I have ever been more ashamed of the House of Representatives than I am today.

Deciding issues of war and peace should be one of the most solemn obligations we confront in Congress. Instead, what is going on today is pure political gamesmanship. Such gamesmanship demeans the sacrifice of our men and women in uniform, demeans our country's tradition of democratic debate, and is a total abdication of our responsibilities as Members of Congress. Rather than holding vigorous oversight hearings and having a full, open and honest discussion about the future of U.S. involvement in Iraq, the Republican leadership has rushed a resolution to the floor today that deliberately mischaracterizes the views of many Democrats, including the honorable Representative Jack Murtha, a decorated marine who served in both Korea and Vietnam, who have called for a safe and orderly withdrawal of U.S. troops over the next six months to a year.

Instead of debating the merits of the ongoing occupation of Iraq and the White House's lack of an exit strategy, the White House and the Republican leadership in Congress have viciously attacked the integrity of both Republican and Democratic critics of the administration's Iraq war policies. Senator Hagel, a Republican from Nebraska, was so outraged by such character assassination that he said recently, ``The Bush administration must understand that each American has a right to question our policies in Iraq and should not be demonized for disagreeing with them. Suggesting that to challenge or criticize policy is undermining and hurting our troops is not democracy nor what this country has stood for, for over 200 years . . . Vietnam was a national tragedy partly because Members of Congress failed their country, remained silent and lacked the courage to challenge the Administrations in power until it was too late . . . To question your government is not unpatriotic--to not question your government is unpatriotic.''

It is particularly galling when individuals like Dick Cheney, who has never served a day in the military, let alone been shot at by enemy soldiers on behalf of our country, questions the integrity of genuine heroes like Representative Murtha.

Let me be clear, I have not supported an immediate withdrawal from Iraq. But, I do believe that in the wake of the December parliamentary elections in Iraq that the U.S. should negotiate a timeline with the new Iraqi government for the withdrawal of U.S. troops next year.

I was heartened when millions of Iraqis, even at risk of life and limb, voted in late January to establish an interim government and constitutional assembly and again in October in support of a new Constitution. I wrote to President Bush just after the January election, suggesting that the U.S. negotiate a timeline for a phased withdrawal of U.S. troops with the newly elected government. I felt it would be an ideal time to signal to the Iraqi people in a concrete way that the U.S. has no long-term designs on their country. While the President ignored my advice earlier this year, I renew my call and ask that following the December elections in Iraq, the U.S. negotiate a timeline to withdraw from Iraq next year.

While some have argued that announcing a timeline for withdrawal would undermine our troops and allow the insurgents to wait us out, I disagree.

Negotiating a timeline for withdrawal with the Iraqi government elected next month would show that democracy ended the U.S. occupation of Iraq, not terrorist or insurgent violence, and would allow our troops to come home with honor.

Announcing the termination of the open-ended U.S. military commitment in Iraq and

providing a concrete plan, including a timeline negotiated with the Iraqi government, for withdrawal could also undermine support for insurgents who have stoked the wide variety of grievances of ordinary Iraqis arising from the occupation to generate popular support for their cause. Most importantly, establishing a withdrawal plan and timeline would remove one of the chief causes of instability in Iraq, the occupation itself, by separating nationalist Iraqi insurgents trying to end the occupation, both Sunni and Shia, from foreign elements in Iraq for their own reasons. To the extent that a specific withdrawal plan, with benchmarks for measuring success in stabilizing Iraq, would turn Iraqis, both Sunni and Shia, against the foreign terrorists operating in Iraq, it could be a key turning point in stabilizing the country. Remember, the insurgency is made up of two primary camps--nationalist Sunnis and foreign terrorists. These two camps have different motivations and different goals.

A timeline and withdrawal plan negotiated with the Iraqi government would also boost the Iraqi government's legitimacy and claim to self- rule and would force the Iraqi government to take responsibility for itself and its citizens.

Just as importantly, a specific plan and timeline for withdrawal would provide much needed relief to over-burdened military personnel and their families and provide some certainty to U.S. taxpayers regarding the ultimate financial burden they'll be forced to bear.

A plan for withdrawal could also help the United States in our broader fight against Islamic extremists with global ambitions, most notably al-Qaeda, by taking away a recruiting tool and training ground. Porter Goss, the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, testified to Congress earlier this year that, ``Islamic extremists are exploiting the Iraqi conflict to recruit new anti-U.S. jihadists. These jihadists who survive will leave Iraq experienced and focused on acts of urban terrorism.'' He went on to say, ``The Iraq conflict, while not a cause of extremism, has become a cause for extremists.'' And, the Commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, General George Casey, testified to Congress earlier this year that ``the perception of occupation in Iraq is a major driving force behind the insurgency. ``

Finally, establishing a firm timeline for withdrawal could accelerate the development of Iraqi security forces and deepen their commitment to defending their own country and their own government by eliminating the conflicted feelings they now feel by working with an occupying force. It would allow them to be defending a sovereign Iraqi government, rather than fighting on the side of an occupation force.

The House should be debating this important issue and strategies for moving forward in Iraq instead of politically motivated straw man resolutions.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlemen for yielding me time.

Despite what the Member from Florida said, there are some who would like to speak to this issue. He said what does 30 days matter? Should it be 29?

Guess what? The Congress assembled on behalf of the American people, and this administration will borrow $1.3 billion a day every day for those 30 days. We will be $39 billion deeper in debt a month from today.

What would we do if we had an open rule? Well, perhaps we could make some real cuts in wasteful programs in the budget, instead of attacking the vulnerable, the students, kids getting lunches at school. They are just eating too much. Kids in foster care, long term care for seniors.

Maybe we could go where the real money is. They asked Willie Sutton, Why did you rob banks? Because that is where the money is.

The Republicans do not want to go where the money is because that is where the special interests are, the people who fund their campaign machine to keep them in the majority, to keep them borrowing $1.3 billion a day, indebting the American people as far as the eye can see.

What cuts might we have to make? Well, let us see. The President has this bizarre idea that we should borrow a trillion dollars, one thousand billion dollars to go to Mars while we cannot meet the needs of people here on Earth, here in the United States of America. We do not have money for levees, jetties. We do not have money for the school lunch program. We do not have money for student loans, but we should borrow a trillion dollars to go to Mars. But before that, let us borrow $100 billion to go back to the moon to get some more dust. Great idea.

No, personally, I would like to have an up or down vote on borrowing $100 billion to go back to the moon.

A few other things, let us revisit Star Wars. The general in charge of Star Wars gave us some very, very encouraging news. He said the system to protect us against missiles that will never be fired against the United States because we could track them back and retaliate, they will smuggle a bomb in if they want to attack us. But he said it has a better than zero chance of working, better than zero after $100 billion and abrogating the anti-missile treaty.

Whoa, that is good. Well, maybe we could visit that issue in an open rule.

How about corporate farm subsidies? The American people are going to borrow around $25 billion this year to give subsidies for surplus crops being grown by corporate farmers and others. Well, maybe we could visit that issue on the floor. No, they would not want to touch that. There is a lot of money coming in there.

How about the $19 billion in the energy bill in subsidies to the oil industry in the hope that they will take money, borrowed by the taxpayers, given to them to go out and explore? Of course, those same oil company execs, of course they were not under oath, I have got to admit that, said that that money, the head of Exxon said it is nothing, it is chump change, and it has no effect on our operations. So maybe we could take back that $19 billion and spend it on lunch for hungry kids or maybe we could put the money back into the student loan program that you want to cut out in the reconciliation bill.

Then we have a few tax giveaways out there, offshore companies like Accenture, largest homeland security contractor in the history of the United States, $10 billion, who has moved their headquarters to the Bahamas so they will not pay any taxes in the United States of America, but they are going to defend us against foreign enemies, but they just do not want to pay any taxes here. I would like to be defended against them and those giveaways.

I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would schedule some up-or-down votes on these sorts of major cuts in a much expanded reconciliation under an open rule.

I object to borrowing $1.3 billion a day between now and then without any attempt at fiscal restraint.

Mr. Speaker, that was the ploy of your party. That is not mine, but I would take the time to keep Congress here.

What we are talking about is Congress going on vacation, Congress going away for 2 weeks, have Thanksgiving at home, while we are taking food out of the mouths of kids and depriving students of loans through the reconciliation bill, borrowing $1.3 billion a day on behalf of the American taxpayers and getting them by another $39 billion. That is what we are talking about.

On the reconciliation vote, if you would bring the reconciliation bill up as an open rule, you know that is a closed rule, too. You are negotiating cuts only with your side of the aisle. You do not intend to get a single Democratic vote; and the biggest cut in the bill is student loans, the party of opportunity. The second biggest cut in the bill is Medicaid; dump those problems on the States and deprive people of needed health care. Then, of course, we have the cuts in food security and other things in that bill.

But we are not going to be allowed to offer amendments to cut Star Wars, the return to the Moon for $100 billion, corporate farm subsidies, tax giveaways. We will not be allowed to offer any amendments during the consideration of that bill. I would stay here through next week and have debate day after day and go through a series of amendments up or down on bringing some fiscal responsibility to this Congress.

Last night, the Ways and Means Committee pulled aside the curtain to show us what the direct link is between tax cuts for the wealthy and cutting programs for students and struggling families.

Dividend tax cuts for wealthy investors so they will have to pay taxes at a rate lower than a teacher or a supermarket checkout clerk. The trade-off is, well, student loans, $14 billion in cuts. But, hey, those rich coupon clippers need the money.

Then we have food security, school lunch. Those little kids are just eating too much. We get something called look-through treatment of payments between related CFCs under foreign personal holding company income rules for the same price. Nice trade-off on the Republican side of the aisle.

Then, of course, extending further tax cuts to those who don't work for a living but live on capital gains. The small trade-off for that is depriving millions of Americans under the Medicaid program of needed essential medical care and dumping those costs onto the States and those of us who buy insurance because a lot of it will be un-reimbursed care.

Great work, you guys. You're helping out your patrons and sticking it to the rest of America.

addressed the House. His remarks will appear hereafter in the Extensions of Remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the time of the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller) since I am next on the list.

Mr. Speaker, first, I missed the earlier discussion of Chairman Ed Roybal, but I had the privilege of serving with him for a number of years on the Transportation Committee, and he was a wonderful inspiration to a young Member of Congress. I was much younger then, and I learned a good deal during his leadership and would say that he provided a tremendous leadership and a legacy for Californians and all Americans in terms of his investment in transportation infrastructure for America. So my condolences to the family.

I rise tonight to discuss the Medicare prescription drug benefit. I went online today to see what seniors would experience. It is fairly extraordinary, mind-boggling, particularly given the fact that a large number of seniors have never experienced the Internet.

Seventy-six percent of seniors have never been online. I have. It was still not easy. Twenty-six percent of people on Medicare have cognitive impairments. Some of my detractors on the other side of the aisle might say I have that, but I do not. Three million have visual impairments. I wear corrective lenses. And 2.3 million reside in nursing homes.

These are all extraordinary complications for an unbelievably, unnecessarily complicated program. Why was it constructed this way? For two reasons: the pharmaceutical industry and the insurance industry, not the 40 million seniors and others who are eligible for Medicare in this country. The bill was designed by the Republicans to reward their very, very generous contributors in the pharmaceutical and insurance industry.

The insurance industry is an industry, of course, which is exempt from antitrust law. It can and does collude to set prices, exclude people and is quite profitable. Then, of course, the pharmaceutical industry is the most consistently profitable industry in the world.

They are both given subsidies through this legislation. We could have done something much simpler, much less expensive. This plan will cost $1 trillion over 10 years for the American taxpayers in addition to incredible sums for seniors, particularly those who make wrong choices.

In my little survey, 41 plans came up; and in comparing three, it is going to take me all night if I wanted to compare all 41. I keep going back to the screen that only allows three at a time. My annual costs would vary between $2,457 and $5,243; and, of course, the pharmaceutical companies can change the drug benefit weekly. Seniors can change the plan once a year, and you know what will happen if they have large claims during the year and they actually get a benefit? They will be disallowed. They will not be allowed to reenroll in that plan by the private insurance sector next year. There is nothing that requires that they be reenrolled if they are willing to pay the premiums to get the benefits.

We could have had the government, like we do with the VA, go out and negotiate the lowest price for prescription drugs for the Nation's 40 million Medicare eligible citizens. That would have saved billions of dollars; but the Republicans said, well, that is unfair, that is anticompetitive. Well, no, actually we are forming a buying group. We are using market power to negotiate lower prices. They say, no, we should give subsidies to the pharmaceutical industry and subsidies to the noncompetitive insurance industry. That

is their version of a free market. Of course, again, they are generous campaign contributors so we can understand some of this rhetoric on their side of the aisle.

Nonetheless, an incredibly expensive, confusing plan which gives all of the benefit to the pharmaceutical and insurance industry, puts seniors at risk, puts taxpayers at risk, and we could have done so much better for so much less. It would cost nothing to negotiate those lower prices. The VA gets prices at a 70, 75 percent reduction from list price; but, no, the Republicans had a special provision in this bill.

Medicare, the default provider for anybody who cannot buy into an insurance plan that is red-lined by the insurance industry, and they can do that legally under this bill, they say, oh, we are not selling you a premium; you have got too many drug claims; we are not going to take you. But they can go to Medicare as a default provider, and guess what? Medicare is the only entity in the world, other than uninsured individuals, who will have to pay list price for drugs. Nobody can afford list price for drugs except the superwealthy and, according to Republicans, Medicare. This will bankrupt the program, but that is where the highest risk seniors, the ones that are not desirable to the industry, will get pushed after maybe 1 year of enrollment, if they are lucky enough to get enrolled in the first year.

So huge costs to taxpayers, confusion and risks for seniors, the end of Medicare in the not-too-distant future by bankruptcy, by design, by the Republicans, all to profit the private insurance industry and the pharmaceutical industry.

You should be really, really ashamed of this horrible product.