Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise to oppose the Fiscal Year 2004 Interior appropriations bill conference report for a number of reasons.

I applaud the committee for approving $400 million to reimburse accounts that the Forest Service borrowed from to fight this past Summer's forest fires. Unfortunately, the Forest Service borrowed $695 million this year to fight fires. This appropriations bill leaves the public land management accounts that were borrowed from in the hole by nearly $300 million--and most of these accounts were underfunded to begin with.

Accounts that the Forest Service borrowed from this fire season include the fuel reduction, law enforcement, forest research, recreation, forest jobs programs, fish habitat enhancement, and road and trail maintenance, among many others. These accounts represent some of the most important public lands management programs the federal government funds, and they will be reimbursed at just 57 cents on the dollar.

One of the most important is the fuel reduction account. Even if Congress fully reimburses the fuel reduction account, fuel reduction projects get delayed and pushed to the next year when the accounts are once again robbed. For the safety of our communities and the health of our forests, this cycle cannot continue.

This cycle of robbing other accounts is perpetuated every year by not adequately funding wildland fire suppression. The Forest Service borrowed almost $700 million this year, in what was a below average fire year. This appropriations bill has a $289 million increase over last year, but it's not near enough. Regardless of how severe next year's fire season is, this bill guarantees that the Forest Service will have to borrow yet again because Congress is not stepping to the plate and sufficiently funding fire suppression.

In addition to under-funding firefighting, this appropriations bill has a wholly inadequate increase for hazardous fuel reduction projects.

The build-up of hazardous fuels in our national forests is a problem brought about by nearly a century of forest mismanagement. It is a problem with a multi-billion dollar price tag to fix, but so far the President and the Congress have been unwilling to put up the money. This appropriations bill does nothing to rectify the dismal record of under-funding fuel reduction.

The project in the Metolius basin, the location President Bush originally planned to visit during his August trip to Oregon, is an excellent example why restoring forest health will require a substantial investment.

The Metolius project is on relatively flat ground, with sufficient road access, and a substantial amount of large, commercial Ponderosa pine. The project will log more than 20 million boardfeet of timber. Yet, even with that commercial return, it will still cost the Forest Service $400 an acre to complete the project. It's clear that even under optimal conditions, with ample commercial timber, it is impossible to clear the large amounts of brush and small trees necessary in successful fuel reduction projects, without spending substantial sums of money.

In contrast, the nearby area where the Davis Butte fire burned is more typical than the Metolius and provides a better picture of the real costs of fuel reduction. Visiting the Davis Butte fire one can see where dense stands of lodge-pole pine provided ladder-fuel for the fire to climb into the crowns of the ponderosa. It is essential that these types of trees be removed, unfortunately, they have little or no commercial value. They may have some value as pulp, mulch, or hog fuel, but most of the vegetation would have to be burned, or chipped and left on-site.

This type of treatment would be in line with the Pacific Northwest Research Station study that was conducted on the Klamath National Forest that estimated cost of fuel reduction at $1,685 an acre. So not only can we pretend that fuel reduction won't cost anything--as the President has done thus far with his ``Healthy Forest Initiative''--we can't pretend that it will be cheap.

There is a multi-billion forest health problem that needs a significant federal investment, but this bill does not make that funding commitment.

Another glaring problem with this appropriations bill is that it includes a fifteen month extension of the Recreational Fee Demonstration program.

This program was created by a rider to the 1996 Interior appropriations, and has been extended numerous times through appropriations riders, without ever having gone through the appropriate authorizing process. It is well past time to end these back-door extensions and allow the Resources Committee to do its job.

Under this program, the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, and National Parks Service can charge citizens fees to recreate on public land, including primitive trails and unimproved campgrounds. Charging citizens a stealth tax for hiking in the woods, walking on the beach, or picnicking with their family is unfair and punitive. It is appropriate to charge a modest fee for campgrounds or boat launches to pay for facilities and upkeep. But to charge a fee to park a car on the side of a logging road or at a trail head turns our public lands into the king's domain.

Beyond my philosophical objections, the mismanagement of the program by the Forest Service is staggering. The program was created to address the maintenance backlog on public land facilities, but only 50 cents of every dollar collected goes toward maintaining or improving our public lands. The rest is eaten up by administrative and collection costs. Fifty percent overhead costs does not make an effective government program.

And a recent investigation by the General Accounting Office (GAO) found that in 2001--the last year for which data is available--the Forest Service erroneously used $10 million in appropriated funds to bolster the program. The Forest Service did not report these additional costs to Congress in their annual report. Nor did they report $2.8 million of other administrative and vendor costs. This kind of deceptive representation in the Forest Service's annual report on the effectiveness of the program is disgraceful.

In addition, it is entirely unclear whether the program is actually fulfilling its purpose of reducing the maintenance backlog on forest system lands. The GAO states that ``the Forest Service does not have a process for measuring the impact of fee demonstration expenditures on reducing the deferred maintenance problem. In addition, the GAO found that the Forest Service has yet to reliably estimate its deferred maintenance needs. Why would Congress continue to renew a program through an appropriations rider when the beneficiaries of the program don't know to what extent it's working, or even to what extent it's needed?

It is time to end the Forest Service's abuse of the Recreational Fee Demonstration program, but this appropriations bill perpetuates the abuse by again extending the program, this time by more than a year.

Finally, this bill negates a federal court's decision that Native American tribes have a right to a full accounting of their own trust monies and assets. I find it hard to believe that this Congress would support an appropriations rider that amounts to an unjust taking of properly without just compensation or due process of law.

Last year this House overwhelmingly voted to strip a similar provision that would have kept the Department of Interior from conducting a complete accounting of the Indian trust fund. Rectifying the historic mismanagement of the Indian trust fund is one of the most critical issues facing Native American tribes, and is simply a matter of justice. This appropriations bill will surely delay the resolution of the Indian trust fund accounting for years.

This Interior appropriations bill conference report woefully under- funds wildland firefighting and hazardous fuel reduction projects. In addition, it extends an unwarranted recreation tax on the American people, and denies Native Americans a full accounting of their trust accounts. For these reasons I urge my colleagues to oppose the report.

Madam Speaker, the Forest Counties Payments Committee was created by Congress in 2000 to make recommendations and report on certain payments to counties. Perhaps most important, the committee was charged with monitoring and submitting a report on payments made under the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-determination Act (Pub. L. 106-393), also known as ``County Payments'' legislation. But the Committee and the payments were created by different pieces of legislation and were erroneously set to expire at different times. This bill will correct that error and extend the authorization of the Committee so that it expires with the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-determination Act.

County Payments legislation has provided rural counties in the West with some level of economic certainty following the precipitous decline in timber revenue from federal land. These payments have been critical for education funding in rural school districts that were once timber- dependent. In addition, payments have been used for road maintenance, successful community policing programs, vital search and rescue equipment, noxious weed control, collaborative forest health projects, and the restoration of important fish habitat, just to name a few benefits.

The committee submitted its Report to Congress on County Payments legislation in February. The report provided invaluable information about the implementation of the County Payments legislation, and recommendations for reauthorization. Unfortunately, Congress has yet to act to reauthorize this important law. As Congress prepares to reauthorize it, hopefully in the next year, the Committee's expertise and advice on the law will be vital to ensuring Congress acts in the best interest of those in need of County Payments funding. Approving this bill to authorize the Forest Counties Payments Committee throughout the duration of the County Payments law will make sure that happens. I urge the bill's adoption.

Mr. Speaker, recent incidents and undercover investigations have highlighted deficiencies in our nation's aviation security system. It is important, however, to remember how much things have improved since September 11th. How soon we forget about security on the cheap. It was only a few years ago that the screener of the year testified before the Aviation Subcommittee that he was only able to keep his job because he had additional income and wasn't dependent upon his screener salary. McDonalds was considered a step up for most screeners, turnover was 400 percent at some airports, and private security companies even had felons screening passengers and luggage.

After September 11th, everything changed. We now have dedicated, well-paid professionals protecting the traveling public each and every day. I want to take a moment to thank the hard working employees of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) who have dedicated themselves to improving security at our nation's airports. I recently received an e-mail from Daniel Bernath, a TSA employee at Portland International Airport, that I would like to insert in the Record.

It was nice meeting with you for a few moments as you got

your plane ticket at United Airlines at PDX. I'm the TSA

officer who thanked you for your work in aviation security. .

. . As TSA officers we see the holes and potential problems

in aviation security and are troubled by them. I have

reported several to my superiors at TSA . . . The TSA

officers are proud to be serving our country even though the

job is extremely physically tiring and dangerous (we are

looking for explosives, knives and guns, and up to one third

of us have been injured . . . one suffered a heart attack

last month, another TSA officer suffered a stroke at PDX). I

have no trouble falling asleep at night because, I, like all

TSA officers, am completely physically exhausted at the end

of my watch. . . . The TSA rank and file is a very impressive

bunch and I am proud to be one of them and again wear my

country's uniform and I hope that your fellow Congressmen are

proud of us too; we are all highly educated--many have

college degrees (I have a juris doctor), many have management

experience and we are all there after 9.11 to protect our

fellow Americans. We are there to defend our country and

unlike the screeners before the attack, it is not just ``a

job'' to us. At least three times a day a fellow American

will watch me search her bag and say ``we're really glad the

TSA is here--thank you.'' I remind them that we took an oath

to protect the United States and point to our TSA emblem

which has 9 stars and 11 stripes in the flag, symbolizing the

reason for our creation and our mission that it never happen

again; the attack on the United States on 9.11. I think our

physical presence and professional demeanor helps our fellow

Americans feel comfortable about flying again . . . Daniel A.

Bernath TSA at PDX.''

Mr. Bernath's e-mail says it best, ``the TSA rank and file is a very impressive bunch, I am proud to be one of them and again wear my country's uniform and I hope that your fellow Congressmen are proud of us too.'' I agree with Mr. Bernath, TSA employees are an impressive bunch and, although there is always room for improvement, I am very proud of the work they are doing. I want to thank Mr. Bernath and his fellow TSA employees who come to work each day dedicated to protecting the flying public. I hope my colleagues in Congress will join me in doing all we can to make sure they succeed in this mission.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman that preceded me in the well is correct. We should all celebrate Veterans' Day. In fact, we should celebrate Veterans' Day and honor Veterans' Day every day in this Chamber. But I do remember on the night that the war began in Iraq, we passed a resolution supporting the troops and an hour later we passed a budget that cut $2 billion out of the veterans budget.

I do remember that the President proposed doubling the prescription drug fee for veterans. I do remember that our veterans, the Democrats have offered a proposal to stop taxing disabled veterans, the disabled veterans tax. The President has threatened to veto any legislation which contains that.

So although the gentleman can rattle off those great statistics, that is not the experience of the veterans in my district. They are waiting longer to get minimal service. Fewer of them can get service. They have now established a new Category 8 of veterans who cannot get service even if they have served with valor in combat.

It is one thing to get up here and spout statistics and that, but the reality is can your veterans get the service they need that we promised when they need it; and the answer is for many, no.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. I am pleased we are taking up this bill today. For too many years the needs of the Coast Guard were neglected as we failed year after year to pass authorizing bills, and the amount of funds to the Coast Guard for their mission were inadequate.

Their mission, of course, today, is even more difficult than it was then; but I think that this bill is beginning to recognize the need for more funds, the need for better housing allowances, the need of fulfilling that expanded mission. So I am pleased to stand in general support of the bill before the House.

I mean, the Coast Guard is crucial to my District. I represent more than half

the Oregon coast, difficult port entrances, still an active fishing fleet and pleasure boats, and the Coast Guard is called upon many times to conduct rescues at the risk of their own life and also to do fisheries enforcement, drug interdiction and now, of course, the whole new emphasis on homeland security and all the problems in that.

There are two issues where I would raise concerns. The first, I will have an amendment on later, and that is the potential that the Coast Guard museum, which I support the idea of a Coast Guard museum, could be sited on property taken by eminent domain, and I think Congress should speak clearly on that issue, and I will have an amendment on that later.

The other is something I have raised with the Commandant in hearings, and it is just a general note of concern to other Members of Congress. I feel that the Coast Guard is doing an excellent job in its mission of homeland security, but the one place where I would fault them is as our lead negotiator with the International Maritime Organization.

The International Maritime Organization works by consensus, and often I feel rather than us setting down a hard marker and saying, this is where the rest of the world has to go on shipping, crew certification and safety issues, the Coast Guard gets much too involved in bargaining. We should lead by example with world standards. It is not enough to say, well, we always have port/State control issues where we can board these ships once they get here. No, we do not want those ships on the ocean at all. We do not want ships out there where we do not know who the owners are. We do not want ships out there where we do not know who the crews are, and we do not want ships out there when we do not know what the cargoes are.

Those are extraordinary threats both to the safety, the environment as with the New Carissa incident in my district. We had a totally incompetent foreign skipper, who did everything in defiance of good practice and managed to put his ship on the beach, spilling a tremendous amount of bunker fuel, causing an environmental disaster, and the ship is still there. He skipped out of the country before we could put him in jail unfortunately, but I do not think he will be coming back, but there are other skippers like that out there, not to say there are not many good ones.

But we need better crew certification requirements. We cannot have these paper schools that issue certificates. That is what we have got today. We are allowing to say, well, these schools exist in the Philippines. There is no one that goes around to certify that the schools exist, certify the curriculum, certify people have gone through the curriculum. We do not know who the crew members are. We do not have noncounterfeitable ID cards. We do not have a way of knowing better what the cargo is.

The Coast Guard is just starting to work on these things, and they are not taking the toughest position they could in the International Maritime Organization to secure our borders, our security and our safety, and I just want to urge them to redouble their efforts and set a higher standard to protect the homeland of the United States of America.

Madam Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Madam Chairman, as was discussed earlier, there were issues that arose. At least in my case I was contacted by an attorney representing a number of homeowners, Mr. Scott Bullock of the Institute for Justice, after the committee mark. I have discussed this with a number of members of the committee.

This is a simple amendment, and there seems to be some consensus on the objective. The problem is that the bill has no statement regarding the issue of eminent domain. It is silent on that issue. In fact, that was confirmed in a letter that I received today from the Chamber of Commerce of Eastern Connecticut, which says the bill does not address the issue of eminent domain and we believe it should be left to the local judicial process.

Certainly condemnation of property in New London, Connecticut, should be left to the local judicial process; but the issue of whether or not a Federal facility, the Coast Guard Museum, might be sited on property taken by eminent domain is the business of this Congress and this committee.

I feel strongly about this issue. We have families that have lived for generations on this site. I have letters from five people who are affected homeowners, but this is from the son of one: ``My great- grandmother's family moved to this neighborhood from northern Italy in the 1890s. My mother was born in her house at 87 Wabach Street in 1918, never lived anywhere else. She married my father, a merchant marine in World War II in 1945. They have lived in the house for 56 years. She has seen three of her four children die in this property, including her first. These houses are not simply buildings on a plot of land, but home for her with a lifetime of memories. I live with my wife, son, and niece in a home right next door.'' The letter has other sections that are pertinent.

I will just read one other letter: ``I hope all Members of Congress will recognize that if the Coast Guard Museum is ultimately built on property that has been taken through eminent domain, it will be forever tainted. There is no honor in kicking my mother, an 85-year-old woman, or my father, who fought for this country in World War II, out of the only home she has ever known to make room for a museum that celebrates the past, present, and future of the Coast Guard, a service whose history is steeped in honor and integrity.''

That is the issue before this body. It is quite simple. The bill is silent on this issue. A proceeding has begun locally, and that is up to the local jurisdiction to take this property by eminent domain with the idea that the museum would be sited there. The commandant of the Coast Guard, I have been told, says they do not want to take property by eminent domain. I would hope it would also mean that they do not want the museum to ever be sited on property that was taken by eminent domain with the intent of them moving there, and this would just make that clear.

This amendment would say any property condemned or taken after December 31, 1999, by eminent domain by the Federal Government, State or local government, or any other person acting under a delegation of authority. And that is what has happened in Connecticut; the local government has delegated to a development group the authority to take this property by eminent domain. It is pending in the courts of Connecticut.

If we do not adopt this amendment, the museum could end up on property that was taken from families who have lived there for generations by a local corporation, if it is upheld by the State courts to site the museum. There seems to be broad consensus on the objective. I offered to the gentleman whose project this is, and it is a meritorious project, and I congratulate him on that, to make this a friendly amendment since he agrees he does not want eminent domain used. I said I would be happy if we could do it as a friendly amendment. The gentleman does not want to do that. I hope the gentleman will explain why, and if he wants to contest that the bill somehow restricts eminent domain, I hope he cites from a specific section of the bill because I have read the only section that pertains to this. There is no mention of restriction on siting this museum on property taken by eminent domain, and it seems to me there is no good reason why we should not adopt this amendment. I would hope the committee would move forward and look at it as a friendly amendment and adopt it.

Reserving the right to object, Madam Chairman, if the gentleman will give me the courtesy of an additional 2 minutes to respond, I would be happy not to object.

Madam Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Madam Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to strike the last word.

Madam Chairman, the point here is that this says that a private entity will build this museum and then gift it to the Federal Government for operation. This is ultimately going to be an official museum of the United States Coast Guard, a Federal museum. This amendment does not interfere in the litigation for a taking. If this local development corporation indeed has the right under Connecticut law and the United States Constitution to take the land and throw these people off their property, they will have that right as determined by the courts. All this amendment says is that this Coast Guard museum, which is going to be a Coast Guard facility in the future after it is built and gifted to the Federal Government and the Coast Guard, will not be built on land that was condemned for that purpose, throwing families out of their homes. It is very simple. That is the issue before this Congress.

Madam Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

I guess maybe we could establish at least one point here.

I would ask the gentleman from Connecticut if he would agree that the museum should not be placed on property that is condemned for that purpose.

Madam Chairman, in the previous exchange, I did not get a definitive answer. He read from something from the Coast Guard that says they are neutral on this. If someone else condemns the land and the museum is built there, they will accept it. That is what that letter says. That is the bottom line here. We are not protecting these families who have lived on that land for nearly a century and do not want to give it up. An 87-year-old woman and her husband, a merchant mariner from World War II. I would just like a simple answer. I know the gentleman does not generally support eminent domain, he added something with his own family, but the question is simple. Would the gentleman agree, will he stand up and say ``yes'' in response to the question, will the gentleman say that this museum should not be built on property taken from these families in New London, Connecticut, by eminent domain, yes or no. It is a simple question.

There we have it. As the gentleman said earlier in the debate, it does not interfere in the legal proceedings, and certainly we cannot do that. But what this amendment does, and this has nothing to do with the BRAC process or Federal excess property, a museum established under this section may not be located on any property that is condemned or taken after December 31, 1999. The land that was formerly a military base BRAC process does not meet that definition. By eminent domain. That is the key here. There is a group of people who are targeted. They are targeted. Families are targeted, living on this property. They do not want to give up their homes. An elderly couple. Their son and daughter-in-law and others who live on this property and have lived there for years, they do not want to give it up. This is simple. The Coast Guard has many options on where to put this museum and many adjacent and in the city of New London. It does not have to be on property that was condemned for that purpose.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Chairman, I demand a recorded vote, and pending that, I make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her leadership on this issue.

It is a funny thing here, we are being told that the Republicans want to inject competition into the insurance market. Well, if they really want to do that, why do they not support my bill to lift the antitrust exemption from the insurance industry? The only industries in America exempt from antitrust law who can and do get together in private resorts on an annual basis to collude, to fix prices and red line out a whole bunch of potential clients is the insurance industry and, of course, professional sports. These are the only industries in America in a country of capitalism and competition who are exempt from any restriction on collusion.

Now we are going to throw our seniors onto the tender mercies of this collusive, anticompetitive industry. Oh, that is great. My seniors already had this experience. We had Medicare+Choice, HMOs. Oh, this is going to be great. You are going to get more benefits than under fee- for-service. Well, the companies were not able to collude and set the prices quite high enough to satisfy their profits, so they up and left with very little notice. My seniors were left in the cold.

Now what we are going to do is not only recreate that structure which has already failed the seniors of America once, to throw them on the mercies of an anticompetitive and collusive industry that does not give a darn about them, but now we are going to jigger it even a little more so it can destroy the Medicare fee-for-service plan, to which my seniors returned when they were screwed by the insurance industry. That is right; they were screwed. Suddenly you do not have an HMO plan any more, tough luck, we do not care. They could at least go back to Medicare fee-for-service.

But under this plan, it is beautiful. They are not going to have that option anymore because it is going to undermine the fee-for-service plans. It is a little thing called adverse selection. We are going to let the private, anticompetitive, collusive insurance industry cherry- pick the people they want

to cover for as long as they might want to cover them. You can get a policy for a year; but if you get sick, next year we are not going to renew your policy. That is the way this industry works.

Mr. Speaker, Members need to talk to their constituents. It is happening to people who are young, people with small businesses. Someone gets sick, we cannot renew your policy. Or we can renew your policy, only there is a 400 percent increase in premiums. That is what they are going to do to seniors because this thing is even more dastardly because it is going to destroy the core problem because we will leave the oldest, the sickest, and the ones that the collusive insurance industry does not want to cover over here in the Medicare fee-for-service, and make them pay more for it. We are going to make them pay more for it.

So this is a great option for seniors. Either the collusive industry that does not want to cover people who are sick or incurring costs will offer you a deal, or you can go back over here to Medicare which we have undermined and jacked the premiums up dramatically. That is the so-called choice in competition that the Republicans are offering the seniors of America.

Mr. Speaker, this is just an incredible travesty for this House and for the people's Representatives to even pretend that this somehow is going to improve coverage for our seniors.

Mr. Speaker, next week is November 11. And often, I believe, in this Chamber we pay lip service to our veterans; and we fail to deliver on solid votes and programs that would better demonstrate our recognition of their sacrifice and service. And this year, unfortunately with the budget and the appropriations passed, is no exception.

I was astonished earlier today when a colleague from the Republican majority stood up to pretend to document how great things are for our veterans, all these new services and things we are providing. I am hearing a very different assessment from my veterans and their dependents. And facts are stubborn things.

Here are some real facts, unlike what we heard earlier today: 150,000 veterans are waiting 6 months or longer for appointments; 14,000 veterans have been waiting 15 months or longer for their ``expedited'' disability claims; 560,000 disabled veterans are subject to the disabled veterans tax, something we have tried to rectify.

We have 373 cosponsors. There are only 435 people here. If 373 people want something, we should be able to do it, should we not? That is a super, super, super majority. But guess what. The Republican leadership, under urging from the President and Secretary Rumsfeld and threats of veto from the President, are refusing to bring up a repeal of the disabled veterans tax.

We can have tax breaks for people who do not work for a living, the investor class. We can have tax breaks for whole hosts of people and things. But we cannot have tax relief for disabled veterans. Is that not extraordinary? President Bush refused to spend $275 million in emergency money for veterans health care provided by Congress in the fiscal year 2002 supplemental appropriations bill. But of course he wants to do everything he can to recognize the service of our veterans and our young men and women.

January 8 of this year, the Bush administration cut off VA health care for 164,000 veterans. They put them in a new category called Category 8. They are wealthy veterans just like the wealthy people they are giving tax breaks to. Well, not quite. The wealthy people the Bush administration is raining tax breaks on earn over $311,000 a year. But these vets are wealthy. They do not deserve that veterans health care, according to the Bush administration. They earn $25,000 a year. They should pay for their own health care.

The President's budget also proposed doubling the prescription drug copayment from $7 to $15 for veterans, the ones who are still able to qualify, and a $250 enrollment fee on another category, Category 7 and 8. These could be people with low incomes, distinguished service, but under the Bush administration, we just cannot quite afford to give them the service we promised when they enlisted.

Now we either believe in the all-volunteer military or we do not. And we are either going to recognize the sacrifice and service of veterans or we will not. And if we do not, probably the next generation is not going to want to enlist for what is a very tough and today very bloody and dangerous job because they are not quite sure of the promise that we will take care of them and we will take care of their families and their dependents.

A few other problems. Rather than funding the VA, the Bush administration sent a memo to regional VA facilities that forbid Veterans Administration employees from proactively informing veterans about the services available to them in order to reduce the number of veterans using VA facilities.

That is supportive. Is that not great?

In March, House Republicans voted in favor of their budget resolution that cut $14 billion, ``B'' billion dollars, from mandatory veterans benefits over 10 years, including veterans pensions, education and other benefits. That was an hour after we voted to support the troops in Iraq.

Maybe it would have been a better message if we just had not bothered with the words, but had duly voted for the money. But, no, the Republican majority, pushed by President Bush, could not vote for that money, and that budget passed by one vote.

The House Republican budget resolution also cut $14 billion from veterans health care and other discretionary veterans programs. The Republican budget also included the President's proposal to impose a $250 enrollment fee on our veterans for the free health care that they were promised.

The Republican budget also included the President's proposal to double the prescription drug copayment from $7 to $15. The President had already raised it from $2 to $7, but, hey, we need money. We have got to send a lot of money over to Iraq, and we cannot ask them to pay any of it back, so we have to double the prescription drug benefit fee for our veterans.

Now, the House VA-HUD appropriations bill funded VA at the level requested by the President, which was $1.8 billion below the House Republicans' own budget, and it was $3.3 billion below the level requested by national veterans organizations in their independent budget proposal.

Let us really celebrate Veterans' Day, and give them the services they earned and need, and pay for them.

Mr. Speaker, the Senate on a voice vote yesterday, kind of pathetic, voted to borrow $87 billion from the American people for the conflict in Iraq. A substantial portion of that is to go to rebuild, or build, not rebuild, build the infrastructure of Iraq. As the gentlewoman from Ohio said, some of it is going to pay Iraqis for make-work or no-show jobs when we cannot get unemployment benefits for Americans here. If we took that money and we divided it up, there are 435 of us here in the House of Representatives, and we divided it up among our congressional districts, that would be $220 million per congressional district.

Now, my district has just about the highest rate of unemployment in the United States. My State has the highest rate of unemployment, my district and the gentleman from Oregon's (Mr. Walden) are unfortunately right up there in the State. Mr. Speaker, $22 million could mean a lot for us. It could put a lot of people to work.

Albany, Oregon, under Federal mandate, is going to borrow money to build a new water system. Of course, we are going to give $50 million to Iraq to build a new water system for one city. Sweet Home, Oregon, same thing. Federal mandate. They can borrow some money, but we are going to give money to Iraq to build them new water systems.

My port of Port Orifice sewage system, fell into the ocean after a big storm. Problem. The Federal Government says this depressed little coastal community, they will lend them some money to help them do that project; lend them some money. But, in Iraq, we are going to give them new sewer systems. The American people are borrowing money to build these projects

in Iraq with no prospect of being repaid under the leadership of President Bush.

We could also, with the same $220 million, guarantee my coastal ports, which were zeroed out in the President's budget for continued dredging maintenance, we could dredge those ports for 5 years. We still have not spent $220 million yet. We are working on it. This is just one district. Just imagine what this would mean across the United States of America if every Member of Congress got to take that $220 million home instead of sending it over to this deep pit in Iraq.

We could give 1,000 students full tuition, room and board at the University of Oregon or Oregon State in my district; 10,000 community college scholarships. Instead of them having to borrow money from the Federal Government, we could have given them scholarships. This is just one congressional district. We could give thousands, more than 10,000 students full tuition, a free ride for the year. We could put thousands to work on infrastructure projects meeting Federal mandates. That is just one congressional district. Imagine if that were repeated across the United States of America. If only the President would borrow money to invest here, or even spend money like the unemployment trust fund.

Now, since this $87 billion that was borrowed or authorized yesterday by the Senate, the President will probably sign the bill soon, following the $79 billion that we borrowed last April which is not yet spent, we have to wonder, what is the plan? The plan was to vote on borrowing another $87 billion before they spent the $79 billion. And so what are we going to do to bring stability? Well, now they say what they are going to do is train Iraqis. Now, on September 5, Donald Rumsfeld said there were 55,000 Iraqis all told, including security guards, et cetera, trained. Since then the estimates of the Iraqi forces have grown at the rate that would mean they have trained 1,000 people a day. Wow. Must be some program. Unfortunately, they have not yet begun the $1.2 billion program to train Iraqis in Jordan to become police and security. Yes, that is right. We are going to pay $1.2 billion. The French and the Germans offered to do it for free, and they are good at training people do to that, but God forbid that we should save the American taxpayers $1.2 billion and take something from the French and Germans that they are good at. So the Jordanians and, of course, we know they are really good at this, are going to be training the Iraqis to become police. But somehow, magically the numbers keep going on up. It is like zip, zip, zip.

Then last week Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz speaking in Georgetown raised that figure to 90,000. Three days later Rumsfeld said 100,000.

Now, how is this happening? Do we think this is really happening? Do we think we can believe these folks? Now remember, these are the same people who told us, this is a country that can afford to rebuild itself and pay for its own reconstruction, and soon. That is what we were told. That is what the American people were told. They would be waving little flags, welcoming us as victors. Our kids do not have the flak jackets they need because Rummy said there would only be 30,000 Americans there by now, and we have more than 30,000 flak jackets. They have planned miserably.

I would recommend to my colleagues and everybody, Blueprint for a Mess from the New York Times on Sunday, November 2, New York Times magazine, the best compilation of the total abysmal failure to plan and, in fact, to reject planning for the postwar Iraq by this administration.

Mr. Speaker, it is my distinct privilege and honor to congratulate the Pearl Buck Center in Eugene, Oregon on 50 years of supporting families with special needs in Lane County.

When the Pearl Buck Center opened in 1953, it was one of the only educational programs in Oregon providing educational services to children with mental retardation and other developmental disabilities. The Pearl Buck Center has continued this tradition of leadership in the community, the state, and the nation, providing vocational training, employment, education, and case management services to people with developmental disabilities.

Annually, the Pearl Buck Center provides services to over 400 individuals with developmental disabilities and their children. Since it was founded, the Pearl Buck Center has helped thousands of adults and children meet the challenges of their disabilities and find opportunities to succeed in school and on the job; to succeed as parents and as self-sufficient individuals; and to contribute to the community and society.

I would like to acknowledge the vision and dedication that characterizes this organization. I hope that all Americans will reflect on the commitment of the staff and volunteers of the Pearl Buck Center and on the struggles and successes of the individuals they serve.

October 2003 has been designated as National Disability Employment Awareness Month. In this special month, I extend my deepest appreciation and thanks to the Pearl Buck Center for their efforts, past and present, to help individuals with disabilities more fully realize their abilities, potential, and independence. We are all richer for your half-century of service.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

I do not believe that either the chairman of the committee, and I certainly know that the ranking Democrat on the committee is not comfortable with this process, not comfortable with the allocations that have been put forward for crucial legislation for the American people.

At issue and still hanging out there are everything that goes to Health and Human Services and Education that the government does, things crucial to the health of our people, crucial to the education of many; also the issue of veterans health care, as the gentleman from Wisconsin said. We still have not adequately funded and taken care of identified problems with veterans health care, and yet money to do that in the bill coming up later today was stripped from the legislation late in the night.

We have the issue of homeland security. I serve on the Select Committee on Homeland Security, and we know that we are not meeting the needs adequately of aviation security; of port security; of the other aspects of homeland security; of first responders, those who we are going to call on, our fire, our police, and others in our home States who do not have the tools they need to respond day to day, let alone to potentially catastrophic emergencies and terrorist attacks. Yet here we find ourselves again on the floor of the House, yet again continuing through a temporary measure the operations of the government.

I guess things would not be this way if the Republicans held the White House and controlled both the House and the Senate. Oh, well, actually, they do. That is right, I forgot. So it must be the Democrats that are holding things up. Maybe it is Bill Clinton who is responsible for this. I think maybe it is his fault, actually, because he left us with a surplus and now we have a $500 billion deficit and we do not have the money to adequately fund these programs, so we are hung up and cannot get the votes together to pass anemic bills that will not meet the needs of homeland security, will not meet the needs of America's young people, will not meet the needs of our veterans or our seniors. We just do not have the money to do it. We do not have any money at all. We are just stuck here.

Except, wait a minute, later today we are going to take up a bill to borrow $87 billion to continue the conflict in Iraq and to build Iraq; to build an economy for Iraq, to build an infrastructure that is gold plated, a wonderful gold-plated infrastructure; but we do not have money here in the United States to perform some of the same functions. We are going to put another $50 million into the Port of Umm Qasr. I cannot get $8 million to dredge the ports in my district. The President says we are simply out of money. But we can borrow $50 million for the Port of Umm Qasr, and we will be voting on that later today.

Mr. Bremer, the proconsul in charge of Iraq, is appalled that many people

get their water through lines from open canals. He thinks they need a modern water system. The city of Albany in my State is doing a bond measure to meet Federal mandates for water supply because they get their water supply through an open unlined ditch, but they cannot get a penny from the Federal Government to help with that project; but we can borrow the money to do it in Iraq.

How is it we can borrow money for all these projects in Iraq and we cannot find enough money here, under arbitrary limits, to fund education programs for Americans, to fund veterans health care programs, to fund homeland security? What is wrong with this picture? Well, it turns out that the Republicans themselves cannot agree, between the White House and the House and the Senate. So we find week after week we do these temporary bills, temporary bill after temporary bill; and yet they do not deliberate toward any real result.

I am certainly not on this esteemed committee, but I am on another committee that will be the subject of debate later today; and I was just involved in a conference committee, except the conference committee never met. The result was dictated by the White House, something that I believe will jeopardize public health and safety, and it was accepted by the majority party. But then they found they could not get the votes to do what the House was dictating they should do. Same thing is happening here with our education programs, with our veterans health care, with our first responders, with our homeland security. The dictates have come down from above the level of this committee that say this is all the money there is.

We can borrow money for Iraq, but we cannot borrow money to fund these vital programs here in the United States of America; and we put a higher priority on cutting taxes. Therefore, we cannot get the bills passed. The votes are not here. This is a very sad state of affairs.

Mr. Speaker, that was a wonderful exercise in obfuscation.

The critical thing is that the House voted unanimously to send a failed bill, a bill which had inserted privatization into a system that no one voted to privatize when the bill passed the House and the Senate will taken up and a majority voted to not privatize, and they had a press conference and then they brought the bill back. I was supposedly a member of that conference committee. There was no conference committee. We did not meet. We found out from the press that they had reported back the conference.

The conference in July, which was called in a very hurried way, yes, we actually had one meeting. We were to meet again after we had a series of votes. We are still waiting for that meeting. The point is, suddenly after both the House and the Senate had voted in the interest of public health and safety and control of the national air space and national security to prohibit the privatization of air traffic control of the United States of America, both bodies had voted overwhelmingly to not privatize. Suddenly a Senator shows up with an amendment to privatize 71 air traffic control towers.

When asked about it, he said, this was a de minimis sort of amendment. The chairman objected, the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young), because it included Alaska. So suddenly this great principle of privatizing 71 was dropped down to 69 like that.

Here is what the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young) said recently about this: ``My hotel room is on the top floor of the Sheridan and the airplanes take right off towards my hotel room. Every morning I look out and there is one coming right at me. It is an interesting experience and I want to make sure everything is done right in that field.''

So somehow in Alaska, nowhere near as busy as many of the other airports in question here, it is not safe to privatize, but somehow it is safe to privatize other major facilities. In fact, what the majority has done is they took out these 69 airports and they have opened the door wide because they have stripped the original exclusion of the House and the Senate on privatization from air traffic control from the bill entirely.

So now the President has determined that the air traffic control of this country, the control of our air space, the safety of the traveling public, is not an inherently governmental function. That is what the President has done, reversing an executive order of the previous President. That has opened the door to privatize the entire system or, worse yet, to fragment it up and cherry-pick out some profitable areas to be subcontracted or contracted to Halliburton or others.

That is what this is all about. We have the most productive and safest air traffic control system in the world, bar none. What problem are we fixing? We are fixing the problem that nobody is making money on it. It is run by the government. That is the problem. We should put this on the model of the private security we had at airports before 9/ 11.

Have we so soon forgotten the firms, Argenbright and others, who hired and maintained on staff known felons to provide screening at airports, paid minimum wage, had a turnover of 140 percent, that would be the model for our air traffic control system? They want to cheapen it, dummy it down. As one of my colleagues said, rent-a-controller.

Maybe we can get temporaries. Maybe we could transmit all the data to India and have the people there do our aircraft spacing. Come on. This is the safest, best run, most efficient system in the world, bar none. What problem are you fixing here? You are not

fixing a problem, unfortunately. You are attempting to open the door for someone to make money and to allow the airplanes, perhaps, to dictate how the system runs.

Maybe we can get those planes closer together. We do not really have to worry about wake turbulence. Maybe we could taxi them a little quicker. We do not really have to worry about collisions on runways. Maybe there are other places we could squeeze the system.

Every one of those things would jeopardize the safety of the American public which I put paramount and this bill does not, and this process is absolutely corrupt.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman has raised several issues. This bill opens the door even wider to privatization. The original House and Senate bills prohibited privatization. This bill does not. The President has determined that air traffic control is not an inherently governmental function. They want to contract it out. They want to make it into private for profit.

And on the so-called operational areas, guess what. They are voluntarily reported. And of the 219 contract towers, only eight of them voluntarily reported an error. To say they had a very low error rate, the GAO determined, the IG determined that this was not a valid study, because we do not have mandatory reporting. We do not know whether there were errors or not. We cannot say they are 4\1/2\ times safer.

And to say that we did this because of contributions is outrageous, and I should have had the gentleman's words taken down.

Mr. Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to inquire whether the rules and precedents of the House require that after the House has voted, that we meet in conference, that an actual meeting of a conference take place?

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry, the answer is yes then; when we vote to go to conference, there has to be an actual meeting?

Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I would make a point of order, since there was no actual meeting of the conference.

I do.

Mr. Speaker, this is a crucial issue of the privileges of Members in our representation of our districts, of our constituencies, and of the precedents of the House of Representatives on how we conduct business.

The House earlier this week voted unanimously to return to conference because the bill had been in dispute because of a contentious section regarding the privatization or contracting out of 69 air traffic control towers. The only way it seemed possible to resolve that issue was to return to conference. The House voted unanimously to return to conference, but no conference meeting was ever held. Earlier in the debate one would have gotten the impression that such a meeting was held. It was not held.

The Chair has ruled that an actual physical meeting of the conferees representing the various points of view on the bill in representing their constituents must be convened and they must have the opportunity to work through those issues.

In this case, there was no meeting of any conference. No Democratic Member, and, to the best of my knowledge, no Republican Member, was invited to a conference, there was no public notice of a conference, and no conference took place. Yet the bill was modified and returned to the floor of the House here.

So, Mr. Speaker, given the 200 years of precedent that an actual conference meeting must take place before you can have a conference report, I would respectfully make a point of order under clause 12 of rule XXII that there be at least one conference meeting. As I understand it, that same rule provides for a point of order in the House against the report and for an automatic request for a new conference if the House managers fail to meet in open session.

So I would ask that the Chair so rule, that this bill is out of order, and that we be mandated to return to actually have a physical meeting of a conference.

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

There is some confusion about what actually we are voting on here and what the impact will be, and I would just like to make that clear to Members.

This President early in his term issued an executive order finding that air traffic control is not inherently a governmental function, which opens up the potential for basically a contracting out of the air traffic control system of the United States. The original House bill, debated fully in committee, prohibited privatization of air traffic control. It made a minor exception, particularly for maintenance of the system. The Senate bill debated and voted on an amendment which absolutely prohibited any contracting out by the FAA, even for maintenance purposes. So we went to conference with a prohibition in both the House and the Senate bill on the contracting out of air traffic control, the control of our air space and the safety of the flying public.

At the one brief conference meeting last July, suddenly we were confronted with a proposal to privatize 71 air traffic control towers in the United States. For unclear reasons why 71, and then, of course, for policy reasons, two were stripped, which has been spoken to earlier because Alaska is indeed unique, but there were still 69 to be contracted out.

The leadership found they could not pass that bill. So this week we voted to go back to conference. There was no conference. There was a press conference by the majority, and then we are back now in the House, and as the Chair said earlier, there was no conference, and that would normally violate the rules of the House. It never met, but that rule is waived, so we are here now.

We have heard from that side that there is no mandate for privatization in this bill. That is correct, but what we have here is very clear intent. The President has said air traffic control, the control of our air space for safety purposes and national security, is not inherently a governmental function. I think that is an astounding finding, but that is what this President has found. And that means that with no language in the bill, the President can contract out any or all of the air traffic control system in the United States, and I believe that would be disastrous for the traveling public and disastrous for national security.

We are going to trust to some private, for-profit contractor, working perhaps under direction of the airlines, with spacing of airplanes and other critical things that go to safety issues in this country? I do not believe that is an experiment we need to conduct.

We have the most efficient air traffic control system, the safest air traffic control system in the world. There is nothing to be improved upon here except that no one makes money on it.

So that is what the vote is about. There is going to be privatization if my colleagues vote for this conference report. The White House has made it clear. They said they would veto the bill if they did not get the right to do at least 69 towers. So it is clear where they are going to go. They have said it is not an inherently governmental function. Protecting the flying public, their safety, protecting and securing the air space of the United States, according to this administration, is not an inherently governmental function. That is an absurd position for the Government of the United States, particularly after 9/11.

They also stripped out language in the bill that said that flight attendants shall get additional training to deal with terrorists. At the urging of Continental Airlines, it was changed to ``may,'' and I hope everyone who flies on Continental will remember that they do not seem to take seriously what happened on 9/11. Other airlines did not like that, but it was stuck into the bill.

Then the final issue of cabotage. Sounds exotic. It is very simple. Air China will now be able to deliver packages into the heartland of the United States, having landed in Alaska, something prohibited in existing law. We will lose jobs and security because of that. Vote no.

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

Mr. Speaker, I do sincerely believe that what is at stake here is the future integrity of the air traffic control system in the United States. There is none better in the world. I fear that in the future, fragmentation of that system, taking major control towers and putting them into the private for-profit sector, will bring pressures to bear that will ultimately cause a catastrophe.

Look at Europe. Just last year, a midair collision. We have not had a midair collision in a really long time in the United States of America.

This is not about making the system safer, it is not about making it more efficient. The Europeans, the Canadians and others admit that our traffic controllers are 75 percent more productive than their's. So it is not about making it more productive. It is not about making it safer.

The only reason that we are opening the door here, and we are blasting the door open here by removing any restriction on privatization, as was in the original bill, this White House has shown it will fight to privatize. They have already threatened to veto the bill unless we inserted the specificity of 71 towers. So they are clearly going to go ahead with privatization.

Now, they are going to go ahead, not because they think it will be safer, not because it will be more efficient. I do not even believe it will be less expensive. The other failed air traffic privatizations around the world have actually cost the taxpayers more, and they have had to be bailed out in England and in Australia.

This is a ticking time bomb that I believe one day will kill Americans, and I just cannot believe that we are going ahead in this form without the proper consultation, without a conference, but vitiating all the rules of the House, just so someone might be able to make a little bit of money on something that is run so well by the government today.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, the whining from the other side of the aisle is extraordinary. They can see all this waste, fraud, and abuse; but they control the White House, the Senate, and the House and yet they do not do anything about it. Puzzling.

Here is something else they do nothing about which is very puzzling. There are 4 million American workers who have exhausted their unemployment benefits and cannot find work. The President and the Republican majority say that we cannot afford to extend unemployment benefits to these people, despite the fact there is $20 billion sitting in the Unemployment Trust Fund of taxes paid by Americans.

No waste, fraud, and abuse here; there are just people who cannot find work and want it. Now, the Republicans say we cannot afford it, but they are borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars to pay Iraqis for no-show jobs. The anti-waste, -fraud, and -abuse crowd is happy to pay Iraqis for no-show jobs, but they will not give unemployed Americans benefits out of a trust fund. These are people who want to work and cannot find work because of the miserable economic record of this administration.