Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Physicians will see a 27.4 percent decrease in Medicare payments if we fail to act before the new year. If Congress fails to act, seniors may find that no physician in their area can afford to accept their Medicare card. That is not the holiday cheer our seniors deserve.

This bill is not perfect. As a medical doctor, I would prefer to be voting today on a permanent fix to this flawed physician payment formula in Medicare known as SGR, but I do not have that choice.

My choice, Mr. Speaker, is simple: vote for the physician fix or vote against it. Vote in support of my former patients who need access to their doctor when they're sick, or vote against them.

Vote to open up spectrum availability and bolster job creation within a growing telecommunications marketplace, or vote against it.

Vote for timely approval of the Keystone XL pipeline and, yes, create 20,000 immediate jobs, along with domestic energy independence, or vote against that.

Allow the EPA to enact job-killing Boiler MACT rules on every State and every industry in the United States, or vote to rein them in.

Today I'll be voting ``yes'' for the constituents of the 11th District of Georgia and for my country.

Mr. Speaker, I am glad to join my colleague from Illinois, the chairman of the Environment and the Economy Subcommittee on the Committee of Energy and Commerce, on this very important subject.

Our colleagues from Illinois specifically pointed out the existing situation in their State in regard to these nuclear reactor sites in Illinois and what they do with spent nuclear fuel.

The poster that the gentleman has presented in regard to my great State and my neighboring State of South Carolina as to what we're faced with is equally as telling. I think it might be instructive, Mr. Speaker, if I go back and take a walk down memory lane just a little bit in regard to my background.

When I was growing up in North Augusta, South Carolina, this central Savannah River area, which includes the southern part, if you will, or the western part of South Carolina and the eastern part of Georgia, is separated by the Savannah River. There was a facility built on the South Carolina side in a town called Ellington, South Carolina, back in 1950. I hate to tell my age, but I was 7 or 8 at the time. Mr. Speaker, my parents owned a little motel on the river, and they very insightfully named the mom-and-pop, 25-unit motel the Riviera Motel.

During the construction of this nuclear plant, there were 50,000 construction workers involved in constructing that facility for 3 years. Every evening when the Sun went down, I can't tell you how happy my parents were to turn on that ``no vacancy'' sign at the Riviera Motel, because all of these workers stayed with us. We didn't get rich; they were only paying $8 a night. It's just to point out the importance of jobs in the nuclear industry and the capability of expanding our employment sector in this particular lane of energy.

In this country right now, today, I'm told that we produce about 20 percent of our electricity from nuclear power. In the State of Georgia, it's 24 percent. It's not much higher. We have two sites and four reactors. We're in the process of adding two more right on the Savannah River, as the gentleman from Illinois points out, at Plant Vogtle; and, hopefully, we'll get that done.

The problem, which the gentleman is bringing before all of our colleagues--and hopefully to a lot of other folks who are viewing or listening--is: Why is it for the last 30 years we have had no new nuclear sites? We've literally had a moratorium. You have about 103 across the country--those in Illinois, those in Georgia--and what are they doing with this spent nuclear fuel? It is either shallow, underground in pool tanks, not very much above the water table or--even worse--it's aboveground in these concrete and steel containers. Talk about the risk of a terrorist attack in a radiation release.

So the gentleman was so generous to ask me to join him in this colloquy about the issue. I'm looking forward to continuing, as I yield back to him, to discuss the real problem here of what to do with that spent fuel.

Will the gentleman yield?

And the question of who is responsible in Hanford or Barnwell, South Carolina, or New Ellington to guard and protect, a tremendous burden on the States. But even if the Department of Homeland Security--maybe they do some oversight and protection of these sites. But 103 different sites across the country, how much simpler, how much safer, how much cheaper if they had one site to protect, that being 100 miles from Las Vegas at Yucca Mountain?

Well, if the gentleman will yield to me again, and I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this, because what year did we commission a group to study--and there were a number of potential sites for permanent storage from all these 103 facilities-- one unified central site?

I'm relatively sure--the gentleman could correct me if I am wrong, but it was at least a 5-year process before it was settled in 1987 and Congress at that time designated Yucca Mountain as the sole site for permanent high-level nuclear waste repository after years of contentious applications.

So this is set in law, is it not?

I have had the opportunity, as a Member of Congress, and particularly as a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Mr. Speaker, to travel to France and Scandinavia recently to look at their nuclear facility but, in particular, their ability to reprocess in France and their ability to store in Scandinavia.

We have described a little bit about the physiognomy, if you will, of the Yucca Mountain area, the nuclear test site, that arid desert of northern Nevada; and they have, in Scandinavia, developed a laboratory. I think they call it The Clad. But it is literally 1,400 meters below ground in bedrock, and you could drive 18-wheel trucks down to something like 2 miles deep in the ground where their spent nuclear fuel is stored. And that's the model, and that's really what we are looking at and planning for at Yucca Mountain. Nothing, really, nothing could be safer in regard to storage.

The other thing is, while we were in France, we looked at a facility where they take that spent fuel, Mr. Speaker, and they reprocess it. So at some point in the future, we decide and we have the technology to do that, that source of spent nuclear fuel that's stored in Yucca Mountain could be used to recycle and to get more energy out of this spent nuclear fuel.

It's beyond me how a President, by Executive order, can stop the will of Congress. And maybe we ought to talk about that in regard to things like the Keystone energy pipeline and expand this discussion a little further.

If the subcommittee chair from Illinois would yield to me, if the gentleman from the 11th of Illinois lets the gentleman from the 11th of Georgia be somewhat instructive in regard to the politics, because that pure and simple is what it is. Of course comments were made in regard to the chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

But the fact is that it is the Secretary of Energy, it's the Secretary of Energy. This Secretary of Energy, a Nobel Laureate in nuclear physics who was essentially told by this administration to tell the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that he was requesting that the license application for Yucca Mountain be withdrawn from the NRC, taken out of their hands, the licensing process stopped with prejudice.

Now, I'm not a lawyer, but if there are any lawyers in the body, they understand when you withdraw something with prejudice, that means you can't bring it back up. So this $14 billion that has been taken out of the ratepayers from the 50 States, or at least where these 103 reactors exist, they are paying for this. And yet this political pressure on a gentleman who's got to be much, much smarter than any of us, a Nobel Laureate in nuclear physics; if I were him, as soon as that word came down to me and I got the memo from the White House, I would immediately resign over righteous indignation.

But, fortunately, if I might interject, the board of the NRC rejected that, rejected what he recommended.

Mr. Speaker, Medicare physicians are facing a 28 percent cut come January 1, 2012, unless this Congress acts to stop it. If left alone, these cuts will force many physicians to stop seeing Medicare beneficiaries, a move that could harm millions of seniors who are in search of care.

It is incomprehensible that congressional Democrats have already cut Medicare provider rates as a way to help pay for ObamaCare and that they again offered to cut provider rates during our debt negotiations this Congress.

Providers in my district and across this country have told me that if Congress continues to cut provider rates they won't be able to see Medicare patients, pure and simple. In fact, CMS actuary Rick Foster has told us that the cuts to hospitals in ObamaCare alone will force 15 percent of these facilities to close. The seniors in my district tell me they can't afford to lose their doctors. Let's get a fix to this problem done, and done permanently.

Mr. Speaker, maybe the President will listen to the advice of the gentleman from Ohio and sign up for public financing of his re-election effort.

But mainly I rise today in strong support of the combined efforts of my good friends, Mr. Harper of Mississippi and Mr. Cole of Oklahoma, to reduce Federal spending by ending the public financing of campaigns and conventions and to terminate this Election Assistance Commission.

As Presidential campaigns in this day and age are becoming increasingly expensive to the tune of billions of dollars, the idea of having taxpayers contribute matching funds to them has become ludicrous.

The end of this practice would save $617 million over 10 years, and I commend the gentleman from Oklahoma for his work to reduce spending.

As far as the gentleman from Mississippi's efforts regarding the Election System Commission, as a member of the committee of jurisdiction over EAC, the House Administration Committee, I've learned firsthand that this agency has outlived its usefulness, it's mismanaged its resources, all the while costing taxpayers, we the taxpayers, millions of dollars a year.

Mr. Speaker, the Election Assistance Commission budget request for 2012 devoted 51.7 percent of its budget to management overhead costs. Let's eliminate this commission and support this bill.

Mr. Speaker, following is my statement in its entirety:

I rise today in strong support of the combined effort of my good friends, Mr. Harper of Mississippi and Mr. Cole of Oklahoma, to reduce federal spending by ending the public financing of campaigns and conventions, and to terminate the Election Assistance Commission.

As Presidential campaigns in this day and age have become increasingly expensive to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, the idea of having taxpayers contribute matching funds to them has become ludicrous. Ending this practice would save $617 million over 10 years and I commend Mr. Cole for his work to reduce spending.

As far as Mr. Harper's efforts regarding the Election Assistance Commission, as a member of the committee of jurisdiction over the EAC-- the House Administration Committee--I have learned first-hand that this agency that has outlived its usefulness and mismanaged its resources-- all while costing taxpayers millions of dollars a year.

In the midst of our record levels of debt, we must scrutinize where every dollar of taxpayer money is being spent to ensure we are allocating these funds responsibly and delivering the best possible value to our citizens.

Mr. Speaker, the Election Assistance Commission's budget request for 2012 devoted 51.7 percent of its budget to management and overhead costs. It should be hard for anyone to argue that an agency that spends $5.5 million dollars managing programs totaling $3.5 million dollars is a responsible use of taxpayer funds.

The EAC has more than doubled in size--without an increase in its responsibilities--since it was originally supposed to sunset in 2005. It is long past time, Mr. Speaker, that we allow government programs that have outlived their usefulness to be shut down, rather than maintain unnecessary and redundant layers of bureaucracy.

Eliminating this red tape would save American taxpayers $33 million dollars over five years, while at the same time preserving the EAC's necessary functions--voting system testing and certification--at the Federal Election Commission, which can more efficiently handle these responsibilities.

Mr. Speaker, the National Association of Secretaries of State--who are the direct beneficiaries of the EAC's services--have themselves called for the EAC's dissolution. This body should follow suit today. I urge all of my colleagues to support this bill.

I thank the gentleman from Louisiana, Dr. Fleming, for yielding, Mr. Speaker, and I thank our leadership for giving us this hour to focus in on Medicare and ObamaCare, formally, I guess, called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. We all know it to be the Unaffordable Care Act.

But I think it's very important, Mr. Speaker, and instructive for the folks back home, especially our seniors, to look at this body and the other Chamber as well, Congress as a whole, and you look at the Members who are health care providers. In this House of Representatives, there are 435 Members, and 21 of them on the Republican side are health care providers: nurses, doctors, psychologists, dentists.

On the Democratic side of the aisle, three. You look at the other body, at the Senate, and you see four doctors on the Republican side. None on the Democratic side.

So as we get into this season, this political season, of course the Presidential election cycle, Mr. Speaker, you know, we all know, that we're already seeing the ads. I think Dr. DesJarlais referred to this add about cutting Medicare 30 percent. Don't let Congress cut Medicare 30 percent. And who cares more about seniors.

And I think those statistics are pretty darn telling in regard to who cares more about our seniors. Many of us, in fact, have practiced so long that we're seniors. Thank God we've got good health and vigor and enthusiasm for giving up what has been a wonderful profession, whether we were nurses or doctors or whatever, but caring for people and the compassion that goes with it, to come to Congress, come here inside the Beltway and really work on behalf of our seniors, work on behalf of getting the health care policy right. But particularly in regard to our senior citizens and the millions that depend on Medicare either because of a disability or their age.

So it's the Republican Party, Mr. Speaker. It is the Republican Party that is really working on behalf of our seniors.

What did the Democrats do when they were in control for that brief period of time and Ms. Pelosi was the Speaker? They brought the country a whole new entitlement program, ObamaCare. It had nothing to do with seniors. It had nothing to do with the poor, who are covered by Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program, the SCHIP program. In Georgia it's called PeachCare. They did nothing to strengthen Medicare.

In fact, to pay for this new entitlement program, health insurance for all, young and healthy people, they gutted the Medicare program.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Louisiana has a poster before us right now, the first slide, if you will, and we need every one of us on both sides of the aisle to focus on that. And as he points to the first bullet point, cutting $575 billion from the Medicare program. And most of it, in the next bullet, is from the Medicare Advantage program. And of the 40 to 45 million people that are on Medicare, most of them, because they're 65, maybe 10 million of them because they're disabled and younger, but so many of them, Mr. Speaker, get their health care on the Medicare program through something called Medicare Advantage. And that's the key word.

Why is it Advantage? Because it gives them comprehensive care, it gives them an emphasis on wellness, prevention. It's not just treating disease. It gives them a drug benefit even before Medicare Part D was enacted by a Republican Congress back in 2003. And what do the Democrats do? They took--what was it, Dr. Fleming?--$135 billion out of the Medicare Advantage program over a 10-year period. That is a 14 percent cut.

And President Obama says if you like what you have you can keep it. Well, you can keep it if it's still available, but it won't be.

We're here tonight to let the American people know and let our colleagues know, and if we have to hit them over the head with a 2-by-4 to get their attention, we're going to do it. Because they are ruining a great program. And we're health care providers. It breaks our heart. We know. We see the patient. We are at their bedside in sickness and in health when they come to our office for routine checkups.

But we're here now I guess as policy wonks. It's our colleagues back home--we want to keep them in the Medicare program, particularly primary care doctors seeing those patients. It just breaks my heart to see what's happening.

I thank the gentleman from Louisiana for managing the hour tonight on behalf of our leadership to make sure that these points are made and

made very clear to the American people, particularly our seniors.

I thank the gentleman from Louisiana for allowing me to take up a little time--maybe just a minute--to interrupt the gentlelady from New York.

She has made such great points.

The thing that I wanted to mention to my colleagues is that if we do nothing--and I think Representative Hayworth pointed this out--it is really not an option. She talked about those dates--2024, maybe, but probably closer to 2021--when part A becomes fiscally insolvent. If we do nothing, then what would happen is our seniors under the Medicare program would take a 22 percent cut in their benefits package, or else we would have to raise the payroll tax 22 percent.

I'll yield back after making this comment as I think this is important.

Medicare was enacted as an amendment to the Social Security Act in 1965. I guess it's title XVIII. We didn't have all of the information we needed back then. As Representative Hayworth points out, situations were different. Back then, people were not reliant so much on medication. It was more surgery and that sort of thing. Now we have Medicare part D. The point is that things change; and if we hadn't changed with the times, we would still be watching analog television. It's just as clear and as simple as that.

For people to criticize what the Republican budget called for in regard to making changes to Medicare so that it remains solvent for our children and grandchildren--and, as Dr. Hayworth pointed out, to protect it, preserve it

and strengthen it for those who are already on it--it would not do anything in regard to them but would be a phased-in change for our children and grandchildren so they'll have it like we've had it.

I thank the gentlelady for letting me interrupt briefly.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I stand here in proud support of H.J. Res. 2.

I was listening to arguments on both sides of the aisle, particularly from my colleagues the Democrats, in regard to the gentleman from North Carolina talking about the ability of individuals to balance their own budgets, and he made a very convincing personal argument.

Yet I would like to remind him that 1995--I wasn't here then; maybe he was here--was the last time we had an opportunity to vote on a balanced budget amendment, some 16 years ago, and it failed by one single vote. The debt that this country has accumulated since that time is $9 trillion. The rest of us, obviously, need some constraints. We have proven that we do not have the discipline to balance the budget of this country--$9 trillion--and that's how we get to $15 trillion worth of debt.

So I would say to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to please support this. This is an opportunity for us not only to show the fiscal responsibility that 75 percent of the country wants us

to show but also to show that spirit of bipartisanship and break the gridlock.

I want to take just a moment, Mr. Speaker, to commend the gentleman from Virginia, Representative Goodlatte. As a physician Member, I sometimes think that there are too many attorneys in this body; but thank God for the gentleman from Virginia and for his ability and understanding of the Constitution. He has gone to the Democrat side and the Republican side, not just in this session, but for years, in promoting this balanced budget amendment and in bringing us all together in a bipartisan way to do something for the American people and for, as the gentleman from Indiana said, our children and our grandchildren.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

So without question, the time has come. This is my opportunity to cast a vote, the most important that I will have cast in 9 years. An opportunity like this just seldom comes. As I say, it has been 16 years since we have had this opportunity. Don't pass on this. Let's make sure that we do this in a bipartisan way because it takes a two-thirds vote.

I do disagree with the naysayers who say, Well, this has no chance of passing. God help us if this has no chance of passing. This is the one thing that we can do for this country to get us back on the right track and to finally prove to the American people that we do have the discipline to protect their money and to protect our children and our grandchildren.

I thank the gentlelady from New York for yielding to me.

Mr. Speaker, as I think most of my colleagues know, Congresswoman Buerkle is a member of the House GOP Doctors Caucus. There are 21 of us, all health care providers--some doctors, some nurses, some dentists, some psychologists. We've got a really good, diverse group that has--I would hate to say, Mr. Speaker, the total number of years of clinical experience that we all have in the aggregate, but it's several hundred. I have thoroughly enjoyed having Congresswoman Buerkle as a member of the House GOP Doctors Caucus. She is a Registered Nurse, who has worked for years in hospitals in the New York area.

As she has pointed out, the four hospitals in her district are probably, if not the major employer, one of the major employers; and it's so important to her community, the 25th District of New York. That is so true, Mr. Speaker, across so many of our districts. I happen to be an OB/GYN physician, having practiced in my congressional district, the 11th of Georgia, for some 26 years.

In our hospital system there, in the main town in Cobb County, Marietta, Georgia, where we have lived for the last 36 years, just as in Congresswoman Buerkle's district, the hospital system is one of the main drivers of the economy--that and the public school system. The hospital systems are employers, and we sometimes forget that.

I think, as a physician, a lot of times I may be guilty of concentrating on issues that mainly affect my colleagues in the medical profession--the practitioners, the MDs; yet Congresswoman Buerkle is pointing out--and I know she has got a number of posters and slides for us to look at tonight--the devastating effects that the so-called Affordable Care Act--the unaffordable care act, indeed--has had on our hospitals like hers, the four hospitals in the 25th District of New York, and on the WellStar Health System and its, I think, six different facilities in the metropolitan Atlanta, Cobb County area. It is devastating.

So I really appreciate the opportunity to join with her tonight, along with some of my other colleagues in the House GOP Doctors Caucus, to make sure that people understand that it's not just the doctors and the health providers outside of the hospitals who are suffering because of this unaffordable care act, but it's our hospital systems all across the Nation.

I thank the gentlelady for yielding to me, and I plan to be with her during this next hour.

I thank the gentlelady for yielding to me.

I wanted to take an opportunity, Mr. Speaker. I have an article from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Atlanta's main newspaper--this was several months ago--referencing one of our best hospitals, Piedmont Health Care. The title of the article is ``Piedmont Health Care Cutting 5 Percent of Workforce.'' And this is what Misty Williams of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution says in this op-ed piece:

``Faced with a rising number of uninsured patients and unknown impact of the new health care law''--that would be the so-called Affordable Care Act--``Piedmont Health Care announced Thursday evening''--this was 5 months ago--``plans to cut 464 jobs as part of an effort to save an estimated $68 million. Totaling roughly 5 percent of its workforce, the cuts include 171 positions that were vacant or altered because of scheduling changes. Layoffs are coming from across the board, including Piedmont's four hospitals, physician groups, heart institute and corporate division, spokeswoman Nina Day said.''

And I quote Ms. Day: ``This is heart wrenching. This is not easy stuff when you're talking about people.''

``The move is, in part, a reaction to hurdles''--the hurdles that Congresswoman Buerkle and Congressman Benishek were just talking about--``to hurdles many hospitals are facing, including a growing number of uninsured patients, a new State hospital bed tax, anticipated cuts to Medicare reimbursements, and the Medicaid expansion in 2014.''

The article goes on, talking more and more about how devastating this would be. And in conclusion--without reading the entire article--I'll finish up and then yield back to my colleague.

The last paragraph of this article by Ms. Williams: ``While hospitals will get more insured patients as a result of the Medicaid expansion in 2014, it's a big trade-off with Medicare cuts. State officials have estimated Georgia''--my State--``could add more than 600,000 enrollees to its Medicaid program as a result of this expansion.'' Again, under ObamaCare. ``It's a challenge in time just trying to navigate all of these changes.''

Again, it's just so important that we're having the opportunity tonight on behalf of our leadership to tell our colleagues on both sides of the aisle--Congresswoman Buerkle moments ago said, It's not a Democrat or a Republican issue. It's a people issue. It's a community issue. And it's devastating. And it's sad news that we're bringing to our colleagues, but we need to do that. And the American people need to understand what's coming. The worst has not yet hit.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding once again.

Just a few minutes ago, one of our colleagues spoke also about this problem with hospitals, Representative Ellmers from North Carolina, who knows of what she speaks. She works in an office with her husband, a general surgeon. They see patients every day in the office, but they also have a largely hospital-based practice because it's surgery and you just don't do that in the office. But she had listed some of the things in ObamaCare, in this so-called Affordable Care Act, Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, when it was passed a year and a half ago.

We all realized that this was a new entitlement program, Mr. Speaker, and the American people need to understand that it's not about strengthening

and saving Medicare for our seniors. That entitlement program is struggling mightily. And as Representative Buerkle mentioned, to take $500-plus billion out of that program to pay for a whole new entitlement program, ObamaCare, for in many cases the young and healthy, and also to put some of the burden of paying for that new entitlement program on the Medicaid program, the safety net program for the poor, it only weakens that program. So you literally gut Medicaid for the poor and the disabled and Medicare for our senior citizens, when both programs need strengthening and saving, not gutting.

It was this whole idea of having Medicare for all, really, or national health care, there are all kinds of euphemisms to describe this, especially, not the least of which is the name of it, the Affordable Care Act. And as I said earlier, Mr. Speaker, and I know my colleague from New York would agree with this, it is the unaffordable care act. And both she and Representative Ellmers from North Carolina said, look, we know on both sides of the aisle that health care in this country is too expensive, and we need to go about changes that will lower the cost and not hurt the quality. And we can do that.

President Obama keeps denying that there are any ideas and certainly didn't listen to the physicians in this body or the health care providers or physicians and the nurses that said, look, let us come over and sit down and talk with you or any of your folks in the Executive Office of the Presidency and let us explain, because we have--and I said it earlier--several hundred years of clinical experience. We do have some ideas, and we really believe we want to be part of the solution and not part of the problem.

But my colleague who is leading the hour and doing such a great job of it, I know she will agree that I haven't been called, I haven't been invited over. I will ask my colleague and yield back to her and ask her the same question. And I know what the answer will be.

Again, the important thing for our colleagues, Mr. Speaker, to understand, is that the creation of this new program, this new entitlement program so that everybody can get health care, whether they want to buy health insurance or not, is so detrimental to Medicare and Medicaid that I fear for the future of those programs. I really, really do.

That's what it's all about here tonight, to take an opportunity to explain so people really understand the ultimate consequences of this.

Mr. Chair, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 822, the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011, which was introduced by my good friend, Representative Cliff Stearns from Florida. H.R. 822 is a sorely needed, commonsense reform to the enforcement of the concealed firearms permitting process. For too long, law-abiding citizens have been forced to struggle with conflicting and often confusing state laws. When traveling, many gun owners are sometimes forced to choose between safety and obeying the incompatible laws of another state, even if they have a valid permit in their home state.

In practice, the current system makes the permitted carrying of a concealed weapon legal on one side of an arbitrary line on a map and illegal on the other. Mr. Chairman, it makes no more sense for a state to deny the concealed-carry permit of another state than it would to deny a drivers license in the same scenario. This is simply another example in a long line of bureaucratic infringements on individuals' abilities to exercise their constitutionally protected Second Amendment rights.

Mr. Chair, I commend Mr. Stearns for his leadership on this issue. The Founding Fathers envisioned a country in which the government existed in order to ensure the rights to ``Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness,'' not to create a litany of rules and regulations that ultimately hinders the pursuit of any of them.

Mr. Chair, the American people are demanding a country in which they can freely exercise the rights guaranteed to them in the United States Constitution, and I believe H.R. 822 is a terrific step in the right direction. I urge my colleagues to support the Second Amendment's rights of law abiding citizens everywhere and vote in favor of H.R. 822.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today as a proud supporter of H.R. 2940, the Access to Capital for Job Creators Act and H.R. 2930, The Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act, both of which seek to help entrepreneurs and small business owners access the capital they need to start or expand their business.

Providing entrepreneurs with the ability to raise more capital will lead to further innovation and a more favorable business model, for small businessmen and women.

Mr. Speaker, the House has passed 15 jobs bills--the `Forgotten Fifteen' that are languishing in the Senate. With over 46 million Americans living in poverty, we cannot afford to wait any longer.

I urge my colleagues in the House and Senate to support these critical bills.

I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for yielding, and I commend him for his great work on this bill.

As a practicing OB/GYN for nearly 30 years, I believe that all life is sacred. Having delivered more than 5,000 babies into this world, I have a deep appreciation for how wonderful life is.

The issue of abortion is a very personal matter for me, as it is for many in this country and on both sides of the aisle of this issue. However, the decades-old debate on the issue of abortion in this country, that's not why we're on the floor today. We're here today to answer one question: Should taxpayer dollars be used to fund abortions? And when an elective procedure--a choice--can decide between life and death, I would suggest that it is an important question to answer. The Protect Life Act is a piece of legislation that seeks to answer that question and set right what the Congress got wrong.

Speaking as a grandfather, a father, a son, and an OB/GYN physician, I will be voting to ensure that our government does not put taxpayer dollars behind any person who seeks an elective abortion.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of H.R. 2250, the EPA Regulatory Relief Act of 2011.

This important legislation will greatly reduce the onerous regulatory burden caused by what is commonly referred to as Boiler MACT, the Boiler MACT rule that has been proposed by the EPA.

Furthermore, I commend the sponsors of the bill and fellow members of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Chairman Whitfield, Mr. Griffith of Virginia, and Mr. Butterfield of North Carolina, for their leadership on this important issue.

Unfortunately, the Boiler MACT rule has the potential to cost a broad base of industries a total of nearly $14.4 billion in compliance costs, and it could jeopardize upwards of 225,000 jobs. In my home State of Georgia alone, the Boiler MACT rule would put nearly 6,400 jobs at risk. At a time when 14 million Americans are out of work, we need to take the necessary steps to prevent adding even more people to these unemployment rolls.

Mr. Chairman, H.R. 2250 would simply delay this rule by 15 months in order to insert much-needed common sense into this rulemaking process. By providing this important delay, there will be ample time for the EPA to craft rules that will take into account the economic impact of these regulations and to provide industries with the needed time for their implementation. This has the potential of creating more certainty in the marketplace than currently exists and will help spur economic growth.

Mr. Chairman, critics of this legislation will say that we are simply ignoring the Clean Air Act and risking irresponsible harm to our environment. Let me assure my colleagues that this argument is false. The intent of H.R. 2250 is not to completely repeal this environmental rule. The legislation seeks to correct the regulatory overreach by the EPA, especially in this depressed economy, and to reconfigure this rule so that it can be functional for industries and save much-needed jobs in the process.

So, Mr. Chairman, in closing, I urge all my colleagues to please support H.R. 2250.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of this rule and the underlying legislation, H.R. 2401--the TRAIN Act. At a time when we have 14 million people out of work in this country, we must enact commonsense policies that will reduce the regulatory burden on job creators so that they can put people back to work.

Unfortunately, over the past 30 months under the Obama Administration, the EPA has issued a wide array of large, expensive regulations that affect virtually every facet of the U.S. economy, from homeowners, hospitals, and farmers to small businesses and manufacturers. H.R. 2401 addresses two of the more egregious of these regulations. First, the Utility MACT is designed to limit emissions of mercury, acid gases, and non-mercury metals from power plants. Next, the Transport Rule is designed to establish specific statewide caps for sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants.

Madam Speaker, through these proposed rules, the combined cost on job creators will be $17.8 billion annually and will jeopardize 1.4 million jobs by 2020. The Utility MACT rule alone is estimated to increase electricity costs on families by nearly 4% at a time when our economy can least afford it.

As a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, I commend the leadership of Chairman Upton and Energy and Power Subcommittee Chairman Whitfield for their leadership on this issue. H.R. 2401 would put the brakes on several of EPA's most damaging regulations until an interagency committee can fully study the cumulative effect of all proposed rules. This study would analyze both die health and social benefits as well, as the actual impact on economic competitiveness, trade, energy supplies, consumer spending, and jobs.

Madam Speaker, millions of out-of-work Americans are desperately crying out for us to help put them back to work. During these challenging economic times, we should not allow burdensome federal regulations from the EPA to add more people to the unemployment rolls. For this reason, I ask all of my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying bill.

The material previously referred to by Mr. Hastings of Florida is as follows:

An Amendment to H. Res. 406 Offered by Mr. Hastings of Florida

At the end of the resolution, add the following new

sections:

Sec. 2. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution the

Speaker shall, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XVIII, declare

the House resolved into the Committee of the Whole House on

the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R.

1366) to require the President to prepare a quadrennial

national manufacturing strategy, and for other purposes. The

first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points

of order against consideration of the bill are waived.

General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not

exceed one hour equally divided among and controlled by the

chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy

and Commerce and the chair and ranking minority member of the

Committee on the Budget. After general debate the bill shall

be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. All

points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. At

the conclusion of consideration of the bill for amendment the

Committee shall rise and report the bill to the House with

such amendments as may have been adopted. The previous

question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and

amendments thereto to final passage without intervening

motion except one motion to recommit with or without

instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports

that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the

next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the

third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV,

resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further

consideration of the bill.

Sec. 3. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the

consideration of the bill specified in section 2 of this

resolution.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, and I thank our majority leader for giving me the opportunity to take this time this evening to talk about two of the most important issues on the minds of every American, but especially on the minds of our seniors, and those two issues are, number one, Medicare, and, number two, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Now, if you go to the 11th Congressional District of Georgia, Madam Speaker, and you say, what do you think about the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act that was passed on March 23, 2010--1\1/2\ years ago--in this body, they would say I don't know what you're talking about. What is PPACA, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act? And then if you said to the folks in the 11th of Georgia, well, ObamaCare, they would say yes, of course, now I know what you're talking about. So tonight I will use the term ``ObamaCare''--not in a pejorative way, but it's the term that's most recognizable to the American people.

Of course even today, 1\1/2\ years after passage of ObamaCare, fully 60 percent of people across this country are opposed to it. They were opposed to it at its inception; and yet when President Obama was inaugurated and became our 44th President, just within weeks there was this push to have something that I would call national health insurance or government-controlled health insurance for this great country of ours.

Many times, Madam Speaker, the dialogue was, well, we have been wanting this government-controlled health insurance, national health insurance, Medicare-for-all government insurance from cradle to grave for years, way back in probably the days of Theodore Roosevelt. We have been wanting this and trying to get this passed, and now is our opportunity. Now finally we have the opportunity to bring this to the American people.

Well, who was it, Madam Speaker, that wanted it all these years? And why, if they wanted it so badly for 50, 60, 70 years, why was it never passed? Indeed, why was it not passed the last time before this passage in March of 2010? Why did it fail back in 1993-94, during the administration of President Clinton, when we referred to it as HillaryCare? Everybody remembers that very well. Well, it's because the American people don't want this. They didn't want it then, didn't want it in 1993-94, absolutely didn't want it in March of 2010. And yet this President and that majority--at the time, the Democrats controlled this House of Representatives. They controlled the Senate. They had the White House.

All their ducks were in a row. Everything was aligned. And they literally spent a year and a half, Madam Speaker, a year and a half forcing that legislation, literally, down the throats of the American people, even when folks of all ages, but especially seniors, were saying, you know, We don't really want this.

Part of that reason, especially in regard to our seniors, Madam Speaker, is the fact that they were worried, and still are worried, about their Medicare program. Medicare, of course, was an amendment to the Social Security Act that was passed back in 1965. I had just completed my freshman year of medical school, and I remember it very well. Medicare, of course, is a great program for our seniors. I would hate to think what our situations would be, those over 65 and those with disabilities, if it were not for the Medicare program.

But, Madam Speaker, the Medicare program is far from secure. I'm sad to say that tonight, but it's the truth, and I think the American people, and again, especially our seniors who are currently on Medicare, or those that are getting close to age 65, I think they know that our attention in this Congress and from this administration should be on preserving, strengthening the Medicare program for our seniors and not spending a year and a half, from January 2009, literally, until March of 2010, with almost nothing on the agenda but instituting, passing this new entitlement program called PPACA, Patient Protection Affordable Care Act, or, indeed, ObamaCare, that really has nothing to do with seniors, has very little to do with those who are poor in this country, through no fault of their own, and thank goodness, again, created in 1965, their health care system called Medicaid.

So, no, what we have done with ObamaCare, Madam Speaker and my colleagues, is just simply create a whole new entitlement program. I will make a little analogy and say that if, in the middle of a thunderstorm, you have a leaking roof on your house, you don't go out and add another room or a deck on the back of the house. You get up on that roof and you stop the leaking.

It's a matter of priorities, Madam Speaker. It's a situation that is beyond my comprehension that the Democratic majority and President Obama would spend all that time and effort trying to add a new room, put a deck on the back of the house when the roof was badly leaking. And the analogy is, of course, that roof is the Medicare program.

There's so many things that we need to do and we need to have the courage to do. I am very proud of my party, the current majority in this House of Representatives, when we passed our budget for fiscal year 2012, sometimes referred to as the Ryan budget. Paul Ryan, Madam Speaker, as you know, is our colleague that is the chairman of the Budget Committee. But it is a Republican budget, and it has the courage of conviction, the commitment to our senior citizens to say to them, We are going to fix the Medicare program and we're going to guarantee that it will be there for your children and your grandchildren and your great-grandchildren, and that the benefit program that you currently have and, indeed, even people who are not yet eligible for Medicare but they're 55 years old, 10 years away, we would enact no changes whatsoever to their Medicare benefits.

Medicare as you know it will be preserved and protected for those 47 million people who are currently on the Medicare program; maybe 7 million of those are younger individuals who are permanently disabled. Forty-seven million people currently on Medicare. When you add those who, today, men and women in this country who are 55 years of age or older but not yet 65, in 10 years, Madam Speaker, that will be another 20 to 25 million people on the Medicare program with absolutely no changes. You're talking about 65 or 70 million people 10 years from now who will be on Medicare, traditional Medicare as we know it, for the rest of their natural lives, and I hope every one of them, including myself, lives to be 93 years old like my mom is today and enjoying the benefits and the security of Medicare.

Again, we diverted our attention away from a program that our seniors can't live without but that's in danger of becoming insolvent. And that's not Congressman Phil Gingrey, Dr. Gingrey, the chairman of the GOP House Doctors Caucus speaking, although I do represent, Madam Speaker, that group here tonight as the designee for the Republican majority in this hour of time that is allotted to me. No, this is the trustees of Medicare and the Congressional Budget Office and the actuary of CMS, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, who every year they look at the sustainability of the program. And what they have told us, Members of Congress, on both sides of the aisle, in both bodies, we know very clearly that the best case scenario if we do nothing is that Medicare will be insolvent. We're talking now about the Hospital Trust Fund. It will be insolvent by the year 2024. Maybe it's worse than that, maybe by the year 2020.

For us to ignore that, just using the expression, Madam Speaker, whistling past the graveyard, pretending something doesn't exist that's as obvious as the nose on your face, kicking the can down the road thinking, well, gee, you know, all I really care about is getting reelected and let somebody else deal with the problems, unconscionable on our part.

And to suggest that this new program to cover those in the country, I don't know how many, 20 million people maybe, that are not poor enough for the Medicaid program and not old enough or disabled enough for the Medicare program, let's create yet another entitlement program. If money grew on trees, that might not be a bad philosophy, but it doesn't. It doesn't. If it did, we wouldn't be in debt $14.9 trillion, soon to be $15.5 trillion. We just can't do everything, and we have to set our priorities and focus on what is the right thing, what is the most important thing.

I say to my colleagues tonight, Madam Speaker, during this time, that that most important thing is to strengthen, to preserve, to save our Medicare program for our current seniors and for our children and our grandchildren.

There's so many things in ObamaCare, this new program, this new entitlement program, to make sure that everybody has health insurance whether they really want to or not.

There are so many things in this bill, which doesn't really fully go into effect until 2014, but yet the taxes that are burdening our citizens are already being applied, whether it's an addition to the payroll tax, taxing for the first time income that's not earned, income that's interest, income that's dividends, income that's rental income. If mom and pop happen to rent out a room in their basement, and they have income over a certain amount, the President says they're rich. Again, I used this word a few minutes ago, it's just unconscionable.

When ObamaCare was created, one of the largest pay-fors in that program, Madam Speaker, was cuts to Medicare, something like $550 billion taken out of the Medicare program--not to strengthen Medicare, not to pay for catastrophic coverage for our seniors, not to strengthen the prescription drug plan, part D, not to close the doughnut hole. No. That money was taken out of the program to pay for this new entitlement that most of us know as ObamaCare, or the Patient Protection and Unaffordable Care Act. In my opinion they should have called it that. That's what's hurting this country very badly right now.

There are many things in ObamaCare that a lot of folks are not really aware of. They don't fully appreciate what is there because as Speaker Pelosi said, you're not going to know until you read it. She suggested that once you read it, you might like it. That certainly has not turned out to be the truth.

Madam Speaker, I want to take an opportunity to go through a few slides. Here are some of the promises that were made as the ObamaCare law was developed.

``ObamaCare will reduce the deficit,'' Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa says of the Affordable Care Act, ``This historic legislation will reduce the deficit by $143 billion over the next 10 years.''

The next bullet point, colleagues, I know you can't see the small writing so I will read it to you: ObamaCare will create jobs and improve the United States economy. The White House claims that ObamaCare, and this is also a quote from Tim Geithner, the Treasury Secretary, ``helps businesses and the overall economy by eliminating hidden costs that currently contribute to higher health care premiums charged to businesses and the government.'' Tim Geithner, Secretary of the

Treasury, said that in a White House blog on January 19 of this year.

Another quote from the President himself: The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ``will save a typical family up to $2,500 on premiums yearly.'' President Obama said that, of course, back in 2009. He also said, ``If you like your health plan, you can keep your health plan.''

During the health reform debate, President Obama promised Americans that there is nothing in the new law that would force Americans to change plans or their doctor. Colleagues, do you remember that? Sure you do. Of course you do.

Then the last bullet point on this slide, Madam Speaker: ObamaCare will not ration health care.

Now, this is in reference to the provision that was added in the Senate creating something called the acronym IPAB, Independent Payment Advisory Board, kind of like MedPAC is an advisory board under current Medicare.

But this creates this new board, and Secretary Sebelius said this on June 23, just a couple months ago, ``IPAB is expressly prohibited from making recommendations that ration care, raise premiums, reduce benefits, or change eligibility for Medicare.'' That's a quote from Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius.

Here, Madam Speaker, are the realities. Those were the promises. Here are the realities.

Colleagues, please pay attention to this next poster because this is so important.

ObamaCare will not reduce the deficit. According to a report by the House Budget Committee, there will be a $700 billion increase in the deficit in the first 10 years of ObamaCare.

The second bullet point: ObamaCare will not create jobs nor will it improve our economy. According to testimony by the Director of the Congressional Budget Office, the American labor force will be reduced by 800,000 jobs due to ObamaCare provisions that will effectively increase marginal tax rates, which will also discourage work. That was the testimony of Doug Elmendorf, the Director of the Congressional Budget Office. He was put in that position by Speaker Pelosi. And that was at a House Budget Committee hearing in February of this year, some 6 months after the passage of ObamaCare.

The third bullet: ObamaCare will not lower health care costs for families by $2,500 a year. The President was wrong about that. Due to ObamaCare, families buying insurance on their own can expect a $2,100 increase in premiums. And that's from a letter from CBO to former Senator Evan Bayh, a Democrat from Indiana, and that was in November of 2009, some 5 months after passage of ObamaCare. I'm sorry. That was actually 6 months before. This is when the bill was being developed and debated in the Senate.

If you like your health plan, you cannot keep your health plan. According to the United States Census Bureau, the 2010 census shows that employer-provided insurance fell by 1.5 million to 55.3 percent from 56.1 percent in 2009. And it is continuing to fall. It would not surprise me if within the next 6 to 8 years, Madam Speaker, that a hundred million workers in this country will lose their employer- provided health insurance because the mandates of ObamaCare make it impossible to meet this requirement.

It's not just a matter of being forced to provide the health care for their employees; it is the type of health insurance coverage dictated by the Federal Government. That's why, my colleagues, 60 percent of this country remains totally opposed to this.

Finally on this poster, ObamaCare will ration health care. Don Berwick is the new director of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, CMS. He had to be appointed by the President during a recess because he could not pass advise and consent and approval by the United States Senate.

They didn't have the votes. They didn't have all the Democratic votes, I feel quite confident.

So the President used a little trick of the trade and put him in this position during a congressional recess. This is a gentleman who was quoted and who wrote about and talked about other national health insurance programs. In regard to rationing, here is what the Director of Medicare said, ``The decision is not whether or not we will ration care. The decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open.'' Don Berwick in Biotechnology Health Care, June 2009.

Madam Speaker, as we talk about these two programs--Medicare on the one hand, ObamaCare on the other--I just think it's so important for us to understand what kind of costs we're talking about. This new entitlement program, it's not paid for. They tried to say that it was paid for, and raised $1 trillion by slashing and burning Medicare of $550 billion and by raising taxes for the other $500 billion, and said in the final analysis that this is paid for and that it saves money. Nothing could be further from the truth.

This program is not paid for. It does not save money, and it is probably costing we the taxpayers $2.7 trillion. How can we afford to do that, to add that new room or to build that new deck when there are obligations that we have made to our seniors and our obligations that we have made--our promises, our commitment--to those who, through no fault of their own, are unemployed, who have little income or maybe no income? That hand up, of course, is the Medicaid program. It is just patently unconscionable for we as Members of this great Congress to ignore that.

As our supercommittee now is debating what needs to be cut in our overall spending of $3.7 trillion every year--and 30 percent of that is borrowed--that's how you get to a debt of $15 trillion. If you borrow $1 trillion here and $1 trillion there for 3 or 4 years in a row and if you create a new entitlement program that costs another $2.7 trillion, you can get to $15 trillion worth of debt pretty darned quickly.

So, to this bipartisan commission which has been set up to recommend additional cuts so that the President can have his request granted to increase the debt ceiling another $1.5 trillion so that he gets through the next election and so that this issue doesn't have to be addressed again, and as this bipartisan, bicameral commission of 12 Members debates where to find the offsetting cuts of $1.5 trillion, Madam Speaker, I would say, Hey, men and women. You're all very bright. You were selected by your respective parties and your respective leadership because of the respect all the Members have for you and for your work and experience in regard to dealing with these things.

You've got the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, the chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, one of the more senior members of the Financial Services Committee--and I'm referring to the Republicans on the committee. You have the ranking member of the Budget Committee on the Democratic side, and you have one of the highest leadership Members from South Carolina. You have good Democrats and good Republicans in this body and in the other body.

I know they're struggling. I know they're struggling. I know the President just sent them a document, a 29-page document, asking for another $2 trillion worth of cuts. Hey, repeal ObamaCare, and you'll get $2.7 trillion of reduction in the debt. It is so simple, and it's what the American people want. It's what the American people want.

Majority Leader Reid, pass the House-passed budget for fiscal year 2012. I know the Senate hasn't passed a budget in 900 days--I understand that--but just don't keep down that path. It's like trying to tax your way out of debt. The President seems to think that that's the way to create jobs. You just tax the so-called ``rich,'' who actually are people who have an adjusted gross income of $200,000 a year. These are the job creators. These are the small business men and women who, by the way, pay their taxes as individuals.

Colleagues, you know that, and you know that this is a lot about politics and that it's a lot about the next election; but we just need to take a deep breath and think about what the people back home are telling us. Think about the struggles that they're going through, those 15 million without jobs--and 45 percent of them have been without jobs for more than 6 months. When you add the underemployed or the people who have just given up, you're probably talking about not 14, 15 million; you're probably talking about 25 million people.

I see it. I see it, colleagues, in town hall meetings, and I know you do, too--both Republicans and Democrats. People ask questions. They shake their fingers at you. They're just not going to take some little smoke and mirrors answer to these tough questions. They're fed up with that, and I don't blame them. That's why our approval rating is so poor in the Congress. We as individuals like to think ``they love me in my district.'' You'd better hope so, but maybe not. Maybe not. Maybe every one of us is at risk of joining the ranks of the unemployed.

If we don't do the right thing, Madam Speaker, we deserve it. We deserve to be fired.

I stand here tonight, hopefully not in a partisan way. I think my colleagues on the Democratic side of the aisle would agree that my rhetoric is not over the top--maybe occasionally. Let's try to be honest with each other and work together and get things done and realize, when you've crammed a law like PPACA, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, down the throats of the American people when 60 percent or more say they don't want it, your first priority should be to create jobs and that your second priority and your third priority should be to create jobs and put America back to work and not spend a year and a half trying to pass something just because Democrats for 75 years have wanted this program of government control over health care. I think it was so wrong-headed. It's even worse than the previous year when we spent the whole year trying to please Al Gore and pass this scheme of cap-and-tax--or cap-and-trade--in regard to carbon dioxide. In the process, it would literally have cost every family in this country $1,500 a year in increased utility bills.

That's what the Democratic majority did when they took over in January of 2007. For a year and a half, I can remember distinctly, Madam Speaker, I was on the Science Committee and the very first hearing we had, we had one witness. That was the new Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, promoting cap-and-trade or cap-and-tax.

And the next hearing we had, we had one witness. That was Al Gore, former Vice President, again, pushing for something that was a job killer, maybe not a job killer for him, maybe not a job killer for certain sectors, special interests in this country, but for John Q. Public, Joe the Plumber, an absolute killer to jobs and has done nothing but increase unemployment despite spending $850 billion on a stimulus bill that, if it created any jobs, they were government jobs.

Then, in the default position, the Democratic majority says, oh, well, you know, if it hadn't been for this bill that we've passed, all this spending, a lot of jobs would have been lost. Well, that's easy to say, but how do you count that? How do you verify that? Trust but verify.

Again, Madam Speaker, I am not going to take all of the designated hour this evening, but I am proud to have had the opportunity tonight to talk about these issues, yes, on behalf of the GOP House Doctors Caucus, as a member, health care providers, nurses, doctors, dentists, psychologists, people that have been there, that walk the walk in regard to what's best for our country and best for our citizens and, yes, best for our patients, not just seniors. I talked a lot about Medicare tonight and this PPACA, ObamaCare, but we need to let the marketplace work.

Mr. President, we don't want, we didn't want, we never will want a U.K.-type system. We don't want national health insurance. We don't want bureaucrats coming between our health care providers and their patients.

If we don't repeal ObamaCare, we are going to destroy medicine as we know it, not just Medicare and Medicaid as we know it, but health care as we know it. Colleagues, that's one-sixth of our economy today, and it will be growing each and every year.

With that, Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on rollcall vote 706 that was taken yesterday on the adoption of H.J. Res. 77, I inadvertently voted ``no'' when I intended to vote ``yes.''

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a strong son of the south, Corporal Todd Love of Acworth, Georgia of the United States Marines. On October 25, 2010, while on foot patrol in Sangin Afghanistan, Corporal Love stepped on an IED, gravely wounding himself. Losing both his legs and part of his hand and lower arm. His will to win and his recovery are the stuff that movies are made of. Incredible, is his will to live, and his smile and can do attitude teaches all about the meaning of the words faith and courage. He makes every United States Marine whoever wore the uniform proud. And with the help of his family he is miles ahead of his recovery. I ask that this poem penned in honor of valor by Albert Caswell be placed in the Record.

The . . .

The Greatest Love . . .

Your Greatest Gift, as like from our Lord up above . . .

So selfless Todd, this!

The Greatest Love . . .

To march off to war . . .

All for God and Country Todd, as was your burden bore!

To walk into The Valley of Death . . .

All for our Nation, to so bless!

But, ready to die for your Brothers In Arms . . . so yes!

Is The Greatest Love!

Armed, with only but your fine courage so left!

All in your Most Magnificent Shades of Green . . .

As moving ever forth, as out into the face of evil you were

so seen!

To give up your two fine legs and arm . . .

And not to worry about what may come to you . . . such harm!

The . . .

The Greatest Love!

To come back home . . .

As all of this pain and heartache, you now so own!

As that most magnificent face of courage, to you now so

belongs!

As you rebuild, but with only your iron will!

The Greatest Love!

As you so Teach Us Todd, as you so would!

As You So Beseech Us Todd, as you so could!

As Out To All of Our Hearts, You So Reach Us Todd, create

such good!

As The Title of Hero Todd, you now so own!

As our Lord God Walks with you, Todd your not alone!

The Greatest Love!

As you make me weep!

With all of that splendid courage, all in your heart so very

deep!

For Heaven So Holds A Place!

All For Such Magnificent Men as you, of such Grace!

Who somehow will not so lose their faith!

No matter what the darkest of all days!

As you but bring tears to our face . . .

As to Heaven one day Todd, you will come home . . . and fine

your place!

As an Angel in The Army of Our Lord . . . his blessed son for

all you've faced!

All because of you, and your Greatest Love!

Amen!