Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time and for all of his efforts on behalf of those who are in the welfare system, and I also thank the gentleman occupying the chair, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), for his long and successful efforts to reform the welfare system.

Mr. Speaker, since we first overhauled this country's failed welfare system back in 1996, some three million children have risen out of poverty. Today I rise to support this legislation as an important transition to the full reauthorization of those important reforms.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the number of American children experiencing hunger has plummeted to half its number of what it was in 1995. When States and local governments shifted their focus from writing checks to encouraging work, welfare case loads fell by 60 percent, as we predicted. As a result, 3.5 million fewer Americans live their lives in poverty than was the case back in 1995 when this process started. However, some 2 million recipients remain dependent on welfare assistance, and many still do not participate in work or in training programs.

While the success of past welfare reform initiatives are inspiring, and give lie to some of the claims we heard when we went through this process made by the other side, it is obvious that more work still needs to be done.

The House has passed the right kind of reauthorization of welfare reform boosted by tougher work requirements and reinvigorated work incentives for

States and welfare recipients. Full check sanction, marriage promotion, and other enhancements will only make welfare reform more effective.

We realize that some have come to oppose this legislation, some that had been listed on the other side of the aisle. But, in our view, we are going to stand fast to see this reform through.

Some opponents of welfare reform clearly are trying to run out the clock on this reauthorization so they can turn back the clock to the days of dependence. We will resist their efforts. These opponents of effective social policy have essentially filibustered our efforts to fight poverty and support economic independence for America's poor.

I am, Mr. Speaker, very encouraged by the Senate Committee on Finance's recent approval of TANF reauthorization, and I now implore the Senate to work toward final passage of this crucial legislation.

We have an opportunity to write a final chapter on welfare reform, the most successful social reform of the latter part of the 20th century. And much of the credit I want to give today goes to the gentleman sitting in the Chair, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Shaw).

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

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

Mr. Speaker, it has been painful for me to sit here and listen to some of the partisan rhetoric, which I think has trivialized a very serious issue. If this is about compassion, the House has already gone on record in a very compassionate way. The issue here, I would suggest to the gentleman from Tennessee, is really one of a more immediate nature, whether his party is going to continue to stand for maintaining a high level of taxation on working families. I am sad to say with this instruction to conferees, they are clearly going on record in favor of more taxes.

Mr. Speaker, accordingly, I rise in opposition to the motion to instruct the conferees. First, I want to set the record straight and commend the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means and the Republican leadership for already taking swift and meaningful action on the expansion of the child tax credit in June.

My freshman colleague from Ohio may have overlooked the fact that we have already voted on this issue. Contrary to what the minority has been arguing here tonight, the House took clear action on this issue and moved specific legislation forward in order to maximize the number of families that benefit from the jobs and growth plan.

The motion to instruct before us actually takes several steps back from the policy that we already adopted in June. It reduces the tax benefits and it reduces the number of working families that would benefit accordingly.

The motion, for example, calls for the child credit to drop, to be reduced from $1,000 to $700 after the 2004 election. Now, I have to think that is a coincidence. But under their motion, millions of low- and middle-income families will receive a smaller child tax credit right after the elections.

The House-passed bill ensures that the child credit remains at the $1,000 level throughout the decade. That is not only compassionate, it is good tax policy. This is a necessary and, in my view, reasonable element of the House-passed bill because it locks in the Federal commitment to this policy for future years.

If we truly support compassionately helping families with the costs of raising their children, then let us extend this policy beyond next year.

When debating the jobs and growth plan, I listened with interest to my colleagues on the other side howl that the child tax credit was set to expire in 2004. I was pleased to hear that they expressed such strong support for long-term tax relief. Now I am sorry to see the truth becomes clear. They are singing a very different tune.

Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, the motion to instruct does not eliminate the marriage penalty and the child credit until 2010. Even then it only does so for 1 year. Now you see the tax relief, now you do not.

Under the motion, millions of children will be denied the child credit

simply because their parents are married. The House-passed bill benefits middle-income families by eliminating the child credit immediately. That is compassion, Mr. Speaker.

I want to make one more thing very clear because this has been raised previously. The House-passed bill does not deny the child credit to military families. That is a matter clearly in the record. Military families, including those who are deployed abroad today, are already receiving a refundable child credit and will continue to receive a refundable child credit under the House-passed bill.

The motion to instruct would only increase the refundable child credit for some military families by allowing them to take into account tax-free income when they compute their refundable credit. The House- passed bill provides more tax relief to military families because it includes $806 million of military tax benefits. And that, in my view, is something we need to remain committed to in the House of Representatives.

These provisions have passed the House on numerous occasions and are awaiting action in the Senate. I believe our tax system imposes too high a burden, not only on our military families, but also working families in places like Erie, Pennsylvania. This imposes a real and substantial social cost. And at a time when we are in an economic slowdown, I think it clearly applies a very substantial economic cost.

The House-passed All American Tax Relief Act, which the other side has conveniently forgotten about, proposes a direct solution to the needs of families struggling with the burden of dependence by offering a comprehensive expansion of the child tax credit.

The motion to instruct wrecks the House-passed bill. It guts it and it should be defeated convincingly to show that we are still on record in support of relief for working families.

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

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

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

Mr. Speaker, I would like to engage the last speaker. Since he refused to yield for a question, perhaps if he could briefly answer a question on my time. I would yield myself such time as necessary, if he will answer that question.

The gentleman made in his statement the claim that he knew that the House bill, or we should have known that the House bill, which was far more generous than the instruction provides for as a policy, that provides far more tax relief to working families, that provides much more well-rounded tax policy than is contained in their motion to instruct or in the Senate version, he said that we were in some way culpable because in passing this bill already and acting on this issue already, we should know that the Senate is not going to act accordingly.

May I ask the gentleman, how does he know that as a freshman?

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, the gentleman is really not being responsive.

May I say, I believe the House has adopted the correct policy. What this motion would do is gut that policy and remove some of the tax relief that I believe is essential for working families, particularly those who are the object supposedly of compassion on the other side.

Mr. Speaker, I think the important thing to understand here is that the House has already acted. We have already laid out and I have laid out in my remarks exactly what the House position is. The gentlemen are advocating a policy that would roll back that tax policy, and all of the remarks so far have not been responsive to my arguments.

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

Mr. Speaker, how much time do we have remaining?

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith), one of my most distinguished colleagues.

Mr. Speaker, I have one speaker remaining, and I believe the gentleman has the right to close.

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

Mr. Speaker, as I have listened to the debate I am afraid that the speakers on the other side from over and over again overlooked some basic points.

First, they talk as if the House had not acted, but the House in timely fashion has acted and has passed a bill to extend the child tax credit to these families. Second of all, we have done what the President asked for and more. And we are now in a position to move forward I think and make a compelling argument to the Senate at a time when the economy is slow that they should be considering, in fact, more relief. And what is more, one of things that I pointed out in my remarks and none of the speakers chose to address on the other side, was the fact that after all, this motion to recommit would effectively cut back on the tax benefits that the House has already chosen to extend. And to put that into context and allow people to judge the relative compassion, to use the other side's rhetoric, let me just suggest the following examples:

Under our bill we would extend the $1,000 child credit immediately and for good. But under their proposal in the year 2005, that $1,000 child tax credit would drop down to $700. That is a tax increase on working families after the election. And that is a fact that the other side has not chosen to engage on. That is a very significant tax increase for working families. When you consider that in Erie, Pennsylvania, a cop with three dependents would see his taxes go up or her taxes go up $900 dollars in the year 2005 under their proposal relative to ours. Two young teachers with two very young dependent children would see their taxes go up $600 in the year 2005.

I know people in these circumstances. I know people in my neighborhood who have had to face this tax burden and are facing exactly those circumstances trying to raise their kids with limited resources. What this motion to recommit does is force a tax increase on them after the 2004 election. I think that is bad social policy and it is bad economic policy. And I am immensely proud that this House has already gone on record in favor of addressing this issue, has done so eloquently. And I hope tomorrow when we have an opportunity to vote finally on this recommittal motion that the House will clearly go on record opposing this motion to recommit.

I thank the gentleman for his eloquence tonight. It has been a great debate.

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

Mr. Speaker, I was unable to attend the votes this evening for H.R. 2309 and H.R. 1533. Had I been able to attend, I would have voted ``yea'' for H.R. 2309. Had I been able to attend, I would have voted ``yea'' for H.R. 1533.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, as we have studied this treaty, and as I have talked to people in northwestern Pennsylvania who have had an interest in the results of this trade agreement, I have heard concerns regarding the so-called integrated sourcing initiative. Is it true that this provision can be used to openly transship products from China to the United States duty free?

Mr. Speaker, that is most reassuring.

On another point, if the gentleman will continue to yield, reading the proposal that is before us, can the administration add products to the ISI list as it sees fit without congressional approval and oversight?

Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will again yield, I want to thank the chairman for clarifying these points. Let me say that having participated in the process of vetting these two treaties, I believe they have been examined with a fine degree of concern, particularly for their impact on the manufacturing and agricultural sectors.

I feel very strongly that what we have here is the best kind of treaty that we can have to expand our economy, open up markets, and allow for trade on a very fair and balanced basis, with transparency and provisions that are very clearly enforceable.

So I want to thank the gentleman for his comments and add my voice to the long list of those who are urging that these two agreements be passed to create opportunities, to create good-paying American jobs, and to promote healthy trade relationships with two of our better trading partners.

Mr. Speaker, I recognize that as a very important parting shot, because that provides, I think, a greater level of protection and transparency by requiring any changes go through congressional oversight and the full legislative process.

I thank the gentleman for his points of clarification.

Mr. Speaker, unlike any of the speakers on the other side, I was also in the room. I saw what was said. I saw what was implied. And I saw the behavior of the chairman close up. May I say what is embarrassing the House today is not the behavior of the chairman. I think he did what in his judgment was right to proceed with what became a very contentious hearing. What I am very unhappy about is the fact that this resolution has even been brought to the floor. It is an embarrassment to this institution.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to strenuously condemn the Burmese State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) and its latest acts of violence against the democratic movement in Burma.

As many of us know, in 1990, the Burmese people elected Aung San Suu Kyi and her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), to lead their country. The NLD won an astounding 82 percent of the popular vote, dealing a shattering defeat to the absolutist State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). In perhaps one of the great crimes against democracy in history, the SLORC refused to seat the newly elected parliament and imprisoned the leaders of the NLD. Ms. Suu Kyi was placed under house arrest, where she has remained for much of the last 13 years.

The State Peace and Development Council, as the government is now known, continues to wage war on its own people and to lead Burma toward rogue nation status. The SPDC is notorious for using rape and imprisonment as an instrument of political influence on its citizens and is known to force children to fight indigenous ethnic groups in the country. This brutal form of governance is combined with military dominance of heavy industry and a sickly economy dependent upon black market and illicit exports.

Now, the SPDC seems committed to stiffening its repression of the Burmese people. After toying with several international initiatives aimed at restoring democracy to the country, the SPDC has essentially halted talks with a spasm of violence directed against the NLD organization. On May 30, a motorcade carrying Ms. Suu Kyi through the country was attacked by an organized group of armed criminals. In the process, a number of NLD members were reportedly tortured and murdered, while Ms. Suu Kyi was taken into ``protective custody'' by the government. It seems that the only ``protection'' was being given to an illegitimate regime against the popular, peaceful NLD leader.

This pattern of vicious oppression in Burma must come to an end and Ms. Suu Kyi must be released unharmed. I urge the President and Secretary of State Powell to take the necessary measures to ensure her safe release and to fully support the National League for Democracy. I further ask my friends in Congress to work with the Administration to ensure that we supply maximum support to the NLD and that we forcefully denounce the actions of the dictatorial junta now reigning over Burma.

Mr. Speaker, I really wish more of the American public were watching this debate because they would be able to fully appreciate how marginal the left has become to any serious debate about the problems facing this country. What we are going to be doing tonight is not voting to repeal Medicare, but instead voting to pass this bill, which is a bill that would provide more medical security for uninsured Americans as well as many low- and middle-income workers.

This legislation actually creates two new instruments to meet health care needs by rewarding Americans who open either type of account with tax advantages and maximum flexibility, so as the other side has noted, even the healthy can have a greater role in managing their own health care. Encouraging individuals to enroll in these new savings vehicles has multiple benefits. First, this is a big step to make health insurance more affordable and help reduce the growing number of Americans without health insurance. The tax-preferred nature of the health savings security accounts offers a powerful incentive for uninsured workers to take advantage of these accounts. The contributions to the accounts are deductible; the investment earnings within the accounts tax-free; and the distributions are also tax-free when used for health insurance. Many, including the self-employed, would find this enormously valuable. This results in significant savings on health insurance, an economic benefit that is certain to encourage many uninsured Americans to utilize these accounts.

Second, insured workers with high-deductible plans will also see similar incentives. Both savings vehicles give individuals a potent incentive to save for health care costs that do not fit within their deductible, giving them another option and perhaps some peace of mind about unanticipated medical expenses. The medical expenses that qualify for tax-free distributions are very far reaching and include expenses from preventive care to long-term care. When individuals use their own hard-earned dollars for health care, they will ask more questions, further inform themselves, and become better consumers of health care products. This bill undoubtedly promotes an educated and wise consumer of health care services and will result in all-around better health care decisions.

Our current Tax Code puts a punitive burden on working families who save their own money for medical and other expenses. The health savings accounts ease that burden by providing two simple and flexible savings mechanisms for working families.

This is commonsense legislation that makes health insurance and health care more affordable and tax advantaged for Americans. It does not destroy our health care system and it does not dismantle Medicare. Accordingly, I urge my colleagues to give workers control of their own health care and vote for the creation of health savings accounts.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the bill before the House today. This bill is the most historic and significant addition to Medicare in the program's history. This Medicare bill offers enormous benefits for all of Pennsylvania's seniors while saving the Commonwealth hundreds of millions of dollars. The Medicare Prescription Drug and Modernization Act provides all seniors with a thorough, flexible, and voluntary prescription drug plan while at the same time augmenting Pennsylvania's PACE plan. Importantly, for the nearly 2 million seniors in Pennsylvania, this bill would allow PACE to wrap around the Federal benefit which would largely supplant and build on PACE's current benefits. And to ensure that Pennsylvania's seniors get maximum drug coverage, this Medicare bill would allow PACE to pay for beneficiaries' copays under Medicare while at the same time counting those contributions toward out-of-pocket expenditures to more rapidly trigger catastrophic coverage.

Our seniors have waited too long to receive the benefits that they deserve. This flexible, voluntary, and affordable plan would provide seniors with dependable benefits. This is a huge benefit for seniors in the roughly 10 States that have a significant State plan already in place.

Mr. Speaker, this bill also provides real help to America's rural health providers to allow them to deliver the highest quality care to seniors and meet the demanding fiscal challenges that they currently face. In many rural areas like my own district of western Pennsylvania, inequities in Medicare's wage reimbursements and payments for hospitals often drive workers, especially skilled nurses, to look for jobs in higher-paying metropolitan hospitals and contribute to staffing shortages in many local communities.

Several provisions in this bill mirror legislation I introduced earlier this year to help alleviate those high costs by increasing Medicare's salary reimbursements to our hospitals. These two provisions would pump $13.3 billion into the struggling rural health systems, and I am pleased to note that hospitals in my district alone would receive approximately $65 million as part of this fix. I ask for support for the bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I particularly welcome the opportunity to come to the floor and invite my colleagues to support this extension on a bipartisan basis. I will talk more on this in a moment; but too often we have seen partisanship, as the gentleman pointed out, but not with the examples that he had cited. We have seen partisanship creep into the debate on welfare reform, and I think it has detracted from the seriousness of the endeavor.

As the chairman of the subcommittee noted, this has been, if not one of the greatest social reforms of the 20th century, certainly the most successful social reform of the last 20 years of the last century. We were successful in overhauling a failed welfare system. And as a result, some 3 million children have risen out of poverty since the bill that we had passed and we developed in the subcommittee, and I was there in 1996, and was signed into law by the last administration.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the number of American children experiencing hunger has plummeted to half the number in 1995. Now, the economy was growing during this period; but we also have to recognize that at different times when the economy was growing in the past, the welfare rolls had also been growing. During this period, the welfare rolls were literally cut in half. In all, 3.5 million fewer Americans lived their lives in poverty than in 1995.

The results of welfare reform are hard to argue with, although some on the left are continuing to try to make that argument.

While this success is inspiring, we recognize that more work needs to be done and further changes need to be made, which were embodied in the bill that we passed last year. May I say we need to recognize that some of the things that were included in the bill that we passed earlier this year, which was a replication of what had passed in the earlier Congress to fully reauthorize this program, including initiatives like full-check sanction, a very important reform that makes very clear if you do not follow the rules, you do not get your welfare benefits.

Some 2 million recipients now remain dependent upon welfare assistance and many still do not participate in work or training programs. In response, we have passed in our reauthorization, a boost of tough work requirements and reinvigorated work incentives for State and welfare recipients. Stronger welfare reform means less dependence and more economic independence for poor people in America. Perhaps more importantly, strengthening welfare reform means fewer American children will be living in poverty.

However, some opponents of welfare reform, as we have seen, have sought to turn back the clock by running out the clock on this reauthorization. We saw that in the Senate in the last Congress; and, unfortunately, in this Congress the Senate has not taken up the bill in as timely a fashion as we would like. Hence, we are with this bill today.

I believe that there are opponents of this effective social policy that are trying to filibuster our attempts to fight poverty. I urge the Senate to end this obstructionism and work with us to enact a strengthened TANF program.

I am hopeful that this bill will pass today; but having heard some of the remarks earlier on the floor, I also want to take a moment to clarify the record. Yes, the bill that passed in 1996 passed finally with bipartisan support. But in its earlier forms it had been consistently opposed by the minority. The record shows very clearly the broad outline of what we had proposed and was signed into law was present in the earlier versions of the bill, but it was opposed by the Clinton administration and opposed by many on the minority side. We had sought bipartisanship in that markup in 1996 just as we had sought bipartisanship last year and this year. But bipartisanship requires both parties to engage. We also have shown on our side, in the majority, a strong and consistent commitment to day care, whereas, we were faulted by some for not adequately funding day care. In fact, in 1996 we put twice as much funding, substantially more funding for day care than the Clinton administration had originally proposed. So that has always been a red herring.

What we have done is give the States adequate resources to meet the needs of poor people; and as they brought more and more off the rolls, they have been extraordinarily successful in meeting those needs.

We need to continue that work and continue this bill by passing this reauthorization.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and honor the 100th anniversary of the founding of Congregation B'nai Abraham in Butler, Pennsylvania. Such a landmark event exemplifies a foundation based on both strength and unity. I wish the B'nai Abraham Congregation growth and prosperity.

In the year 1903, 25 Jewish families residing in the Butler community elected Abraham H. Goodman to serve as their spiritual leader and guide them in the Jewish traditions. That same year, the first service was held to commemorate the first Jewish High Holiday, Rosh Hashona, at the Knights of Pythias Hall, now the Reiber Building in Butler.

The congregation was officially deemed Congregation B'nai Abraham after obtaining a charter from the Common Pleas Judge James M. Galbreath in 1906. Over time Butler's Jewish community flourished and eventually established a large sanction and school facilities on Butler's North Main Street, which remains its home today.

During the 4th of July weekend, Congregation B'nai Abraham will celebrate its 100th anniversary and renew the relationships of both past and present members.

Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating the Congregation B'nai

Abraham on their 100th anniversary. And as they often say in the opening prayer of a Jewish mass, ``Ma Tovu Ohalecha, Mishknotecha'' or ``How goodly are thy tents, thy dwelling places.''

Mr. Speaker, I must say having been in western Pennsylvania, when you have been reading the headlines, looking at the economic statistics, things are indeed bleak out there. We are in a recession even if many within the Washington beltway do not fully recognize it, and that is why I rise today to applaud the Committee on Ways and Means, the gentlewoman from Washington, and the House leadership for recognizing the needs of the unemployed in this recession.

While we work, apparently in the face of partisan opposition, to enact a balanced and robust economic growth package, we also need to provide immediate help for these displaced workers. These are people who would rather have a job; but in lieu of a job during an economic slowdown, they need these benefits. Today's legislation will maintain a safety net for our Nation's displaced workers by providing up to 26 weeks of benefits for those who exhaust their State benefits. This type of measure is absolutely critical to move now so we make sure that no families fall between the cracks.

However, as we do it, I think we also need to recognize as a House that maybe the time has come to reassess parts of the safety net, look for ways of extending it, and that is why I have introduced the Safety Net Extension Act, a bill that would not only extend temporary assistance for the unemployed, but also enact some permanent reforms to the unemployment system. It would provide relief for those workers who are paying taxes on their unemployment benefits, many of whom are in my district. My bill would look to also reauthorization trade adjustment assistance, and I view this package as being of a piece.

Tonight we have an opportunity to move forward and extend the unemployment benefits for workers who have been laid off, making sure that they do not fall between the cracks. But in the long haul, I would hope that we in the House would come together on a bipartisan basis and look for ways of enriching those benefits and at the same time pass a real stimulus package that will get the economy back on a growth path.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the Pension Security Act, which is very similar to legislation that was passed last year by the House of Representatives in response to the Enron crisis.

This is mainstream legislation that provides fundamental protections to American workers and American pension systems.

Now, as I listen to the debate here, I am struck by a certain Alice in Wonderland quality to the entire proposal because we have heard on the other side an enumeration of some of the things that they think this bill does not do. They do not focus on the fact that this does include fundamental protections.

They complain that this has taken a long time to do, and yet it was their party in the U.S. Senate that held up the proceedings on this bill after we passed it in the last Congress.

This is clearly legislation whose time has come, and I am very proud of the work that two of our committees have done, in the Committee on Education and the Workforce and in the Committee on Ways and Means, on which I serve, to make this legislation possible. Ultimately, the bill before us is one of the most important measures to secure Americans' retirement futures that we will work on this year.

Our working families clearly deserve to know that their hard-earned dollars invested in pension and retirement savings are secure. We have seen the devastating effect of corporate scandal on employees' pensions. The House again is responding to the challenge to make sure that the Enrons and WorldComs of the corporate world do not destroy the savings of their employees. This bill clearly provides rights to workers to diversify pension plan assets and protections against corporate abuses and pension mismanagement; and it also helps small businesses provide retirement security for their workers, which is one of the most fundamental reforms given, that so many small businesses currently do not extend to their workers those options.

By giving small businesses just a little relief from burdensome and costly regulations, millions of small business employees will now have retirement security. This is a worthy goal. This is worthy legislation. And I hope in the end when the smoke clears that this body will support it on a bipartisan basis.

Today, Mr. Speaker, the House has the melancholy responsibility to take up a resolution memorializing one of the great leaders of the

Pennsylvania State legislature who passed recently. I am referring to former State Speaker of the House Matthew Ryan whose 41-year extraordinary career, including repeated service as Speaker of the House beginning in 1981, is an extraordinary testament to how so much of our legislative talent and our best legal minds are still concentrated in our State legislatures.

I worked for the State House. I knew Speaker Ryan. I knew what an extraordinary individual he was and how, at a time when affiliation with parties is something that has lost public favor, he was one of the finest products of the Delaware County Republican organization, a great friend, an individual who absolutely dominated the State House by the force of his mind and the force of his personality and led it in very positive directions, a man who was far more bipartisan than the reputation of that institution but always a strong Republican and always a strong advocate of creating jobs and of welfare reform. We will miss him dearly. I hope his memory and his example will long be with us.

Mr. Speaker, the bill before us is perhaps the most important bill for our economy that we are going to be voting on this year, and I strongly support it because it is a measure that provides a powerful tonic for economic growth and job creation.

We estimate that over a million jobs will be created as a result of this bill, and what I want to underscore here is that this bill is strongly and powerfully pro-manufacturing. It will stimulate manufacturing jobs in a sector which has been battered by the economic slowdown. Two provisions, the increase on the business expensing allowance and a 5-year carryback of net operating losses, will go directly toward preserving and creating high-paying manufacturing jobs in our economy.

A strong expensing allowance is the right medicine for the ailing manufacturing sector. It significantly reduces the cost of capital so that manufacturers can invest in new equipment and machinery and in the process dramatically increase workers' productivity. Allowing businesses to deduct more quickly the cost of capital investments makes those investments more affordable. This is seed corn for the economy. We need it now, and I urge passage of this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to applaud Chairman Henry Hyde and the International Relations Committee on their Herculean efforts to save lives in the developing world. As of last year, an estimated 42 million individuals were infected with HIV worldwide. Seventy-five percent of those individuals live in developing nations in Africa and the Caribbean. As the leading cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa, AIDS has killed more than 20 million people in that region alone. This global pandemic shatters families and wrecks any potential for prosperity in developing nations. Indeed, AIDS has nearly annihilated entire segments of society in Africa.

Like some of my colleagues, I have had an opportunity to visit some the nations hit hardest by AIDS. Just months ago, I visited a small town just outside of Capetown, South Africa. There, I was told that at least 30 percent of the town's residents were infected with HIV. The nearly incalculable costs associated with such widespread suffering almost certainly damn South Africa's children to poverty.

Notwithstanding this horrific situation, I was struck by the success of some heroic efforts to fight back against HIV. In the same town, the international aid organization Doctors Without Borders, has been running a small clinic devoted to treating pregnant victims of HIV. In treating these women, Doctors Without Borders has also prevented the spread of HIV to the unborn children of its patients. Efforts like this one have effectively saved the lives of hundreds of those who might otherwise face death as a result of AIDS.

Perhaps one remarkable aspect of this effort is that it shows what a small investment in public health can do to alleviate mass suffering in the developing world. Imagine what organizations like Catholic charities and Doctors Without Borders can do with a multi-billion dollar commitment by the United States of America. Today's legislation shows leadership and it demonstrates our resolve in the fight against AIDS. Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and congratulations to the International Relations Committee on a job well done.