Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 2658, the Department of Defense Appropriations Conference Report. I am proud to vote for this legislation that provides improved health care, more quality housing, and a pay raise for the brave men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces. I am especially pleased that this legislation gives our troops the tools they need to meet the challenges of fighting the continuing global war against terrorism and maintaining American military superiority and leadership around the world.

I am proud to report to veterans in my district that this bill also includes legislation that I recently cosponsored to stop unfairly charging soldiers for the food they eat during their hospitalization. Two weeks ago, I visited the Marines and sailors recovering at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, MD. Some of those young men lost limbs or sustained other permanently disabling injuries. Many more require sustained intensive care and will have long and arduous path toward rehabilitation. I hope that all of them are promptly decorated with one of the most distinguished medals that the U.S. Armed Forces can bestow upon military personnel--the Purple Heart--for their sacrifices and valor.

Every soldier, Marine, sailor, and airman deserves the best medical care this country can provide, but they don't deserve to be billed for food and water. It is unconscionable that these heroes owe $8.10 for each day they spent in the hospital.

Madam Speaker, I was proud to cosponsor Chairman Young's legislation to correct this injustice. It is the least we can do for our Nation's keepers of peace and defenders of freedom. I am pleased to vote for the fiscal year 2004 Defense Appropriations conference report and to support our valiant military personnel.

I want to thank my colleague again for organizing this Special Order to discuss the news in Iraq. I think it is appropriate to focus on the President's speech, but I am also very interested in Mr. Bremer's testimony the other day and the document they produced about the plan for reconstruction in Iraq. They have produced a blueprint to how they plan to spend $21 billion of American taxpayer dollars, hard- earned dollars to rebuild Iraq.

I just want to highlight some of the individual items. There is a $5.6 billion plan to rebuild the entire Iraqi electric grid. In the summer, America had a blackout. The response in the new energy bill for investment in the American electric grid, not a single dollar will be dedicated. As everybody has noted, Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal, we have the most modern economy on top of a Third World late-19th century, early 20th Century electric system. It is not up to the power that we need for an economy that is an information-driven economy.

They are going to get $5.6 billion for an electric grid, a new system in Iraq. Not a single dollar is in the energy bill dedicated to the United States, and we had a massive Third World-equivalent blackout that covered the east coast and parts of the Midwest.

I would like to also note, and it obviously was in the gentleman from Ohio's State primarily, but the estimates are for every billion dollars we spend, we could produce 10,000 jobs here at home. That would create 50,000 jobs here in America if we would spend that money on America's electric grid, upgrade it and bring it up to snuff and the level that is equivalent to the greatness of this economy.

Mr. Speaker, I have no idea, but two points on that, if I could, to my colleague. One is we do know it would produce 50,000 here at home if it was spent here. Second, there was an article the other day in The New York Times about how we are paying thousands of Iraqi workers who do not show up for work but just to kind flood the economy with money, thousands of no-show jobs. I am from Chicago. We think we have written the book on no-show jobs. We know something about no-show jobs. And thousands of people are getting paid a salary who do not show up.

Let me bring up a couple other things, if I could, because I think this is relevant to everybody's district. We are going to spend, according to the Wall Street Journal today, $4.6 billion of the $21 billion in Iraq, 4.6 is going to go for drinking water, wetlands restoration, environmental policy for Iraq, and also irrigation. I have a bill to invest $4 billion in the Great Lakes, Lake Michigan, Lake Erie, Superior, Lake Huron. Twenty-seven million Americans get their daily drinking water from the Great Lakes. Twenty percent of the world's entire freshwater exists here in the United States. It is the largest body of freshwater in North America. Not a single Federal dollar; yet we are going to spend $4.6 billion in Iraq for drinking water when we have got 27 million Americans here who get their daily drinking water from the Great Lakes and not a single dollar dedicated?

What I find most fascinating is we finally have an environmental policy for this administration. It is in Iraq because they are going to restore the wetlands.

Third, $850 million of the $21 billion will be spent in hospital construction. Of that, Basra is going to get $150 million for a new children's hospital; $150 million for a new children's hospital in Basra out of the $850 million.

Mr. Speaker, of the $150 million, I have a request to spend $1.5 million for the Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago. It is one of the top five pediatric hospitals not only in the country, but the world. In fact, that hospital saved my life when I was 16 years old. I was there for 8 weeks. 1.5, it equals to 1 percent, and I am struggling to find the money for construction for a new facility to keep it on the forefront of children's facilities in pediatric care; yet we are going to spend $150 million. So I am going to suggest tomorrow to the Children's Memorial Hospital in the city of Chicago at the corner of Lincoln, Halsted, and Fullerton that they may want to set up a sister program with the Basra Children's Hospital. They want 1.5 million? See if they can set up a sister program and borrow out of $150 million for the new Basra children's hospital.

I would also like to draw people's attention in this $21 billion that there is also money for Afghanistan. There is $40 million to build 275 schools and train 10,000 more teachers in Afghanistan.

Mr. Speaker, I also have a request. There is an academy in Chicago called the Chicago Academy, Carnegie endowment, called one of the landmarks for teacher trainings, a request for $1 million for a landmark facility doing new teacher training in the schools for teachers who get master's degrees. The truth is I have nothing against the reconstruction investment in Iraq, but to vote for these cuts here at home, to ask the people in the gentlemen's districts and my district to pay the taxes, work hard, get the kids off to school, teach them the right values, and see their tax dollars go over there when schools are being closed, teachers are being laid off, police and firefighters are being laid off, health care is being cut, 3 million unemployed Americans, 45 million uninsured Americans, and yet all this investment over there.

As my colleagues know, I have a bill called the American Parity Act, and it says whatever we invest in Iraq, we have got to do here at home. So when that bill comes on the floor, I will offer the amendment to ensure that our investment in Iraq does not in any way supersede our investment here at home because Iraq cannot have a future that is brighter and stronger than the one we are committed to to our families here at home and our children.

Mr. Speaker, to my colleague, I do think that the House Committee on Rules will give me ``welcome to the NBA'' treatment. I do see my bill getting stuffed.

Mr. Speaker, one last thing. I draw these health care analogies, these school analogies, infrastructure analogies, the producing of jobs and building a future at home. There is also a request in there for $100 million for a witness protection plan for Iraq. The entire budget for the United States on witness protection: $30 million, for the entire United States. The last time I checked, we could help people who wanted to finger drug dealers, who wanted to finger big gang leaders. We could use that money. Thirty million dollars is all we spend for fighting crime here in the United States, but we are going to dedicate $100 million to the Iraqi witness protection plan. I think Americans will look at that and think maybe we should have a dual citizenship program. Maybe they should apply over there and start fingering people.

No. It is in there. If we ever get a chance to ask Mr. Bremer or the people that developed this, I am not suggesting they do not need resources to help people who would turn on former Baathists that are living in the neighborhood, but $100 million for a witness protection plan in Iraq, and we spent our entire Department of Justice request last year in 2001, $30 million; $3 million in the State of California. Ten percent of the budget to that. Does anybody really believe that we could not use more money or that is going to be well spent? And yet the American

soldiers, their families and their kids in the recent tax credit get only $450 per child tax credit.

No, they will not get that. There are 12 million children in this country who will not get the tax credit; yet we are going to spend $100 million in Iraq on a witness protection plan.

There is a desire to build 3,500 units of affordable housing in Iraq. The President's budget submitted had 5,000 units of affordable housing. Iraq's entire affordable housing unit will be nearly equal to the President of the United States' plan for America.

Mr. Speaker, we have been joined by the gentleman from Hawaii, but I want to add one thing. What I described was the line items of the $21 billion for the Iraq and Afghanistan reconstruction. I went through the hospitals, the education, infrastructure, the water projects. I did not mention that today in the newspaper there is an additional $8 billion that was just recently offered for Turkey. I do not have anything against offering assistance to Turkey. They are a good American ally, but $8 billion so they would participate. What I find interesting is we spend about $11 billion a year on Pell grants. So Turkey in 1 year will get nearly what we spend for one of the largest Federal assistance programs for kids to go to college here in the United States. That is what we are going to offer Turkey.

So just to put this in perspective, we have $21 billion for the Iraq and Afghanistan reconstruction, the lion's share going to Iraq. That does not count what we are spending now in Turkey that was just approved yesterday. I do not know, but the last time I checked, we fought tooth and nail to get Medicaid reimbursement here at home for our hospitals for the health care of our citizens, and I know our colleagues from Ohio and Hawaii, and I do not want to take more time than is allocated here for me.

But I want to add that piece for Turkey to that number. As we talk about $21 billion, there is another $8 billion just offered for Turkey. Again, there are needs at home. It need not be an either/or situation that the President has put us in, America versus some of our allies.

The schools number has not been determined. What I do know is they have $40 million for an Afghan school program, 10,000 teachers trained. The budget is not line-itemed. There is a big number in there for the 1,000 schools that our colleague from Ohio noted the President has planned for Iraq.

The $21 billion, at this point, we just got this today and are still going through it. The whole line item, as I outlined earlier, it has numbers for the electric grid, for the water projects, for the hospital program.

As my colleague noted, there is a vision there. But there is not a person here among us whose constituents have not talked about after- school programs, teachers being laid off, police and firefighters being laid off, hospital doors closing on the uninsured in this country. So there is not one of us who are not begging for money for their districts and see plans and visions and dollars for Iraq that do not match up with what we hear here at home, in America.

I want to make one quick point that I left out of my notes, and I would like to draw people's attention to it.

There is $21 billion in this for rebuilding for Iraq. There is another line item for $150 million for retraining and recruiting police officers to guard the streets of Baghdad. Yet the President's budget zeros out the police program that funds police on the street here in the United States, the 100,000 police program.

So we will have dollars dedicated to recruiting, training, upgrading the police security for the city of Baghdad and the rest of Iraq, 40,000 of them; yet the President's budget zeros out the COPS program here in the United States to help recruit 100,000 police on our streets, to make sure we have the right types of police on our street, they have the resources they need, so we can actually bring crime down here at home.

These are the people, if we have a terrorist threat, we are going to be calling on. And yet, as I went through the hospital program, I went through the water purification program, I went through the electric program, comparing what was going on there versus the cuts or eliminations here or nonfundings here at home, I left out the police program that I think is also important. Somehow we have placed the safety and security of what goes on in the streets of Baghdad above what we are doing here at home. I did not want to leave that out from the discussion.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to celebrate the life of a respected and exceptional public servant for the people of Chicago, the Honorable Robert J. Egan, who passed away on September 15, 2003.

Robert Egan was born in Elmhurst in 1931. In 1958, he married his lovely wife Marie. Together they had five wonderful children, Beth, Margie, Sarah, Robert Jr., and Frank and four grandchildren, Tony, Meggy, Kaitlyn and Sarah.

Judge Egan served as a first lieutenant from 1954-1956 in the U.S. Army infantry in Korea. He then worked his way through law school at Loyola University and was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1959. He later joined the Illinois Attorney General's Office, where he served as Chief Legislative Counsel and Chief Attorney in its antitrust division.

In 1970, Judge Egan was elected to the Illinois State Senate. Although defeated in 1972, he was subsequently reelected in 1974. He served in the Senate until 1984.

During his first year in the State Senate, Judge Egan sponsored seven anticrime measures that were enacted into law. He also was a leader in the movement to strengthen sentences for serious and repeat offenders.

Judge was his last title, gained when he was appointed to the Cook County Circuit Court in 1987. He retired from the bench in 1988.

From 1990-1999, he served on the review board of the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission.

Mr. Speaker, I join with the people of the northwest side of the City of Chicago in recognizing the life of Robert Egan, and wish to express my deep sense of sorrow to Marie and the rest of Robert's loving family.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to join the people of Sweden in mourning the loss of Foreign Minister Anna Lindh, a dedicated public servant who died last Thursday.

Her brutal murder has shaken the foundation of that proud and peaceful nation. To lose such a young and promising leader is an international tragedy that is difficult to comprehend.

In only 46 years of life, Anna Lindh rapidly ascended the European political community to become one of its most capable, competent, and respected members. She was a singularly instrumental figure during the Swedish presidency of the European Union in 2001.

From joining the Swedish Social Democratic League at age 12, Ms. Lindh was destined for a career in public service. She was elected to the Swedish parliament the year she graduated from law school. She later became the Deputy Mayor of Stockholm, Minister of the Environment, and eventually, Foreign Minister.

The impact of her political skill and achievements touched people worldwide, most notably in the Balkans, where her remarkable talents helped prevent war in Macedonia.

Building coalitions was her calling, and her success in this critically important area earned the respect of leaders from around the globe. When asked once what he appreciated most about Sweden, our own Secretary Colin Powell once replied ``Abba, Volvo, and Anna.''

Anna Lindh truly epitomized a new generation of internationally- minded politicians. Her murder was a tragedy that cannot be forgotten, but it must not overshadow her achievements and her lasting contributions to the international community.

Mr. Speaker, I join today with the people of Sweden and more than 12,000 of my constituents of Swedish descent in their grief as they remember and honor Anna Lindh's life. And I send my condolences to her husband and her two sons.

Mr. Speaker, I rise proudly as an original cosponsor of the Charitable Giving Act and also in strong support of Cardin-Doggett substitute.

I signed on as an original cosponsor of H.R. 7 because our Nation's charities are struggling in this weak economy to meet increasing demands with diminishing resources. In response, this bill delivers tax fairness and strong incentives for America's donors to give generously, even those with modest means.

I am pleased that the substitute makes this bill even stronger by taking this opportunity to shut down tax avoidance schemes built into the Tax Code that encourage dishonest corporate transactions and bookkeeping practices. Another improvement is that the substitute pays for the bill. This is critical since the President has asked Congress for another $87 billion for rebuilding Iraq, twice the amount originally anticipated.

I am as pleased as the next person when corporations earn profits. But there is something wrong when tax breaks for working families are outnumbered by corporate subsidies for oil drilling, insurance, nuclear power, commercial real estate, equipment purchases, drug manufacturing, ethanol production, and more.

President Reagan criticized corporate tax subsidies as wasteful and in direct conflict with free market principles and economic growth. In 1986, he issued executive orders to cut back many of these subsidies. Republicans and Democrats should continue working together to follow his lead.

In recent years, however, subsidies have made a comeback. At the same time, corporate income taxes are virtually the lowest among the world's developed countries. The Bermuda scheme is the tip of the offshore iceberg now costing U.S. taxpayers $50 billion or more a year. Taxpayers subsidize overall corporate subsidies worth $125 billion. This amount is equivalent to the income taxes paid by 60 million individuals and families.

Many of these subsidies fail to serve any worthwhile economic or social objective. But since 2001, more loopholes and breaks for special and corporate interests have been added to the code. It is replete with sunsets, phase-ins, phase outs, and gimmicks that encouraged Enron, Tyco, and WorldCom to circumvent tax law. But nothing has been done to make it easier for working families to navigate the Code. There is something wrong when more than 60 percent of Americans found it necessary to pay an accountant or tax preparer to file their taxes in 2002.

Ending offshore havens, gimmicks and tax shelters should go hand in hand with simplification in any tax reform initiative. The Cardin substitute is a first step toward reforming a tax code that's proven more user-friendly to corporations and the wealthy than America's working families. Another important step would be for Congress to consider my proposal to create a Simplified Family Credit that merges the EITC, the child tax credit and the dependent exemption into one easy-to-claim credit. I will continue supporting legislation that simplifies the Code for reward working families as much as corporate interests.

Mr. Speaker, to that end, I am please to vote for the Cardin-Doggett substitute, and in support of the Charitable Giving Act of 2003. This important legislation, in addition to closing unfair tax loopholes, will recreate new incentives for Americans to make charitable donations for an array of worth and important social services in our Nation.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the time of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).

Mr. Speaker, people from around the world come to America for their medical care, yet Americans are forced to travel the world for their medications. A recent Families USA study found that the prices of the 50 drugs most commonly used by seniors in America increased by an average of 3.5 times the rate of inflation over the past year. Between 2000 and 2003, seniors' expenditures on prescription drugs increased by 44 percent. For too long, seniors have been paying premium prices for the same prescription drugs that are available in Canada and European countries at 30, 40, 50 percent reductions.

What we are proposing through the market access bill is allowing people here in the United States to buy medications in Canada and Europe, is free market competition, allowing the market to work. That competition will bring prices down in the United States and save our consumers and our taxpayers thousands upon thousands of dollars.

We as public officials are entrusted by the American people to represent them. We are not entrusted to ensure that they pay the most expensive price, but get the best price for the medications they paid for the research on. A recent USA Today Gallup poll showed that 71 percent of the American people showed support for allowing them to buy their medications in Canada or Europe.

I stood just Sunday with the Governor of Illinois who announced that for the first State ever in the Union, that they will now study what would be the savings to the taxpayers of Illinois if the 230,000 retirees and State employees would be allowed to buy their medications in Canada. In the last year, the cost to the State for prescription drugs increased by 15 percent. Illinois now spends $340 million a year for prescription drugs for their employees and retirees. It is projected in the Illinois budget that that will increase by 17 percent next year and another 15 percent the following year after that.

There are early predictions of what the savings will be, but I will wait for that study to be produced. The Governor asked for two actions: a, report back in a period of time for the savings to the State, if there are any; and, b, if there are savings, to then open up the health care contracts that the State has for its employees and retirees so they can cover prescription drugs bought in Canada.

That is the same program that the AARP does for its own seniors today. United Health covers 96,000 seniors who buy their medications in Canada and covers it with an insurance policy.

Now, nobody believes that the AARP would risk the health and welfare of our grandparents. Now, if there is an ability for a State government to save $50 million to $60 million, rather than lay off teachers, rather than lay off police officers, rather than close prisons, I think they have an obligation to the taxpayers and to their employees to get them those savings.

We too will face that choice. Just in July, prior to going home for the August recess, a bipartisan majority of the House Members came together and voted across party lines to allow market access, to allow Americans to buy the medications, the name-brand drugs that they need for cholesterol control, blood pressure control, arthritis, other types of medications, either in Canada or in Europe. That passed with an overwhelming majority. This is not a decision of Democrat versus Republican, or right versus left, but of right versus wrong. We can do better for the American people. We can give them the choice and the competition they deserve so that they can get the savings they deserve.

The irony of all of this situation is that Americans pay 50 percent more for the medications that their colleagues in France, Germany, England, Italy, Ireland, and Canada pay.

And yet what is ironic is every cancer drug, every AIDS drug, every major medication in this country was developed by the taxpayer funded research through the tax credit research and development credit or through direct funding by the National Institutes of Health.

The American taxpayers and consumers today are not only underwriting the research in this country, they are underwriting the profits of the American pharmaceutical companies. I have nothing against profits. I think they are a good thing. But they do not need to make up their profits in the United States from our seniors and our consumers when they can actually have the free market operate in the appropriate way so we can get the best price for our consumers and our seniors and for our taxpayers.

As we embark on this largest expansion of an entitlement in over 40 years, thinking of adding $400 billion to Medicare to cover a prescription drug plan, I think we owe the decency and respect to the taxpayers to ensure that we get them the best price, not the most expensive price for that $400 billion.

Now, those medications exist out there. Today you take Tamoxifen, which is a major cancer fighting drug, it costs $360 million here in the United States. In Canada that same medication for the same amount cost $33. In Germany it cost $60. You can go drug by drug and there is a major 40 to 50 percent reduction.

I would call on our colleague and I call on governors and mayors around the country to look at what we did in Illinois and see if you cannot save your taxpayers and your employees the cost that they need so we can plow that back into other health care coverage for the uninsured, to expanding our school, retaining our teachers, doing teacher training, and make sure that our police are on our street making them safe. Those are the right choices we owe to our employees, our consumers, and, most importantly, the taxpayers.

Mr. Speaker, I think the deficit has now become the centerpiece of his economic policy.

If we look at the administration's projection over the next 6 and 7 years, on the deficit going out to the year 2011, they actually borrow money every year consistently regardless of how big or how small the deficit will be from the Social Security surplus. Every year that is done. To mask the size of the deficit, they must borrow from the Social Security trust fund.

And the irony is as these deficits mount, tuition costs are rising 11 to 15 percent annually, and the ability of college assistance like the Pell grants, which once represented two-thirds of college cost, today represents less than a third with no ability to increase that. Health care inflation is running at an average of 15 to 25 percent, and there are no resources to deal with the two most important factors driving health care costs up, that is, we now have a record uninsured of 45 million, and we have prescription drug costs running 15 to 70 percent increases. Those are contributing factors to the increase in health care inflation. Those two factors in my view are creating tremendous pressure on the middle class of this country. We do not have the resources or the means nor a plan to deal with them. The deficit will tie our hands and tie the Nation's ability to address the very things that are squeezing on the middle class family's budget.

Mr. Speaker, to add to that point, we have 45 million uninsured folks in this country with no health insurance. The bulk of them work. We have a pension crisis and retirement plan crisis where there are $330 billion in arrears in private retirement plans. We have college education where families face a choice, take a second mortgage on their home, or the child is guaranteed to graduate $30,000 to $40,000 in the hole because they borrowed to go to college. And then we have the Nation's deficit on top of that which ties our hands and our ability to meet the needs of middle class families, whether their parents are retiring, health care needs to their own families and children, as well as the education of their children.

I believe that the deficit if we look at how it grows over a period of time is actually a ticking time bomb underneath Social Security and Medicare. In the immediate time, we are not able to afford the basic services and needs that our government provides in helping families meet the dreams that they have for their children, providing health care and education so they too can do what their parents have done and build a better future for their children.

So the deficit, although sometimes we want to ridicule it and people call it an abstract thing, people understand the consequences of the deficit as they try to do what they try to do for their own family and children. They cannot afford their health care and college education; and they are scared out of their wits when they come to retire, neither Social Security nor the plan they thought they had through their employer will be there. I think people understand that the deficit is in fact damaging the ability of both their government today and their own plans for tomorrow to be met.

Mr. Speaker, in 2\1/2\ years, we have added $2.5 trillion to the Nation's debt and 2.5 million Americans have lost their jobs. As Ronald Reagan used to say, facts are a stubborn thing, quoting former President John Adams. In the short order of 2\1/2\ years, 2.5 million Americans have lost their jobs, 45 million Americans are without health insurance. $1 trillion worth of corporate assets have been foreclosed on, and 2 million Americans have come out of the middle class to poverty, and we have added $2.5 trillion to the Nation's deficit. A record like that is starting to give mismanagement a bad name.

It is interesting that the President's request for rebuilding Iraq has a $2 billion request for Iraq's electric grid, and it was America with the blackout. In our energy bill, we say we do not have the money to invest in our own electric grid.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 1538, ``The True American Heroes Act'' and H.R. 911 to create a ``Memorial for Victims of Terrorism.'' Enacting both of these important bills today is a fitting tribute to the victims of the terrorist attacks launched against the United States two years ago this morning.

The September 11 attacks were devastating, but our Nation was never weakened. The attacks were perpetrated because of the terrorists' hatred of the American values of liberty, democracy and equality. Hundreds of the victims were parents working hard every day and praying for better futures filled with love and hope for their children. Some victims were young children on their first airplane flight. Others were sons and daughters, the pride of their families, making it on their own in New York City. Twenty were U.S. soldiers, thirty-three were sailors, sixty-one were federal civilian employees, and nine were Army and Navy contractors beginning their morning at the Pentagon, and all of them were living the American dream. Ordinary Americans were transformed into heroes as the two jets brought down the World Trade Center, when the third tore into the Pentagon, and when the fourth was thrust into a Pennsylvania field. Two years from September 11, we remember and honor those brave Americans, their sacrifice, and we promise to never forget them.

Our nation has remained robust because our strength derives not from tall skyscrapers or fleets of airliners, but because America is defined more by its values than borders, and is defined less by our past than by our promise. Rarely have those values of democracy and freedom been more clearly demonstrated in our country's short history than on September 11, 2001. As the gravest moments arrived, many ordinary citizens fueled by instinct, courage and grace, rushed toward the flaming buildings in order to rescue their fellow Americans or to overwhelm terrorist-controlled cockpits in order to defeat their destructive plans.

Every community was shocked and scarred by these catastrophes. My hometown of Chicago suffered the loss of five women, who left their friends and family bereft. But more than shock or horror, generosity, strength and selflessness characterized Chicago's response. Although my city is a thousand miles away from New York, Chicagoans rushed to assist New Yorkers, Pentagon workers, and rural Pennsylvanians and support them as our neighbors. Whether they were Chicago firefighters hurrying to Ground Zero or school children writing letters to comfort their fellow pupils in New York, Chicago responded with its renowned heart and generosity. And so did every community across the country.

Mr. Speaker, we observe September 11 not only to recognize the lives cut short by hatred, but also to honor the genuine American heroes. These many men and women include firefighters, police officers, paramedics, emergency technicians, and all rescue workers who cast aside concern for their own safety to rush to save the lives of other Americans in harm's way. Their bravery and commitment serve as shining examples of why they remain role models that our children emulate.

We must also pause today to honor the sacrifices and continuing heroism of our courageous service men and women who left family and friends in order to defend our nation in the global war against terror. U.S. troops are fighting, sacrificing and serving extended tours of duty so that the men, women and children of Afghanistan, Iraq and other nations suffering under the heavy burden of tyranny and terror may share the freedom and inalienable human rights that Americans enjoy. We owe them our resolve to defeat terrorism, and to ensure that here at home leaders are charting the proper course.

Mr. Speaker, it is appropriate to reflect today on how we as a nation can better demonstrate American values. As we nurture burgeoning democracies beyond foreign shores, we must also align our priorities with human rights and with freedom here at home. Let those left behind pay tribute to those who died by reaffirming our commitment as a nation to freedom and defense of human dignity, and in so doing keep our nation strong. To that end, I strongly support this legislation creating a memorial for the victims of terrorism, and ensuring that our public safety workers have all the resources that they need to do their jobs continuing to prepare and protect America.

Mr. Speaker, well over 6 months ago, Secretary of the Army, General Shinseki, was asked his opinion about how many soldiers we would need in Iraq. He said a couple hundred thousand. Today, we have about 180,000 troops in Iraq and Kuwait. The President's economic adviser, Larry Lindsey, was asked what he thought the cost of the war would be. He said around $200 billion. Today, we are nearing $160 billion.

When those two gentlemen were asked their professional judgment, they were run out of town, ridiculed, their careers were run down for what they did. Today, as we look at what they said 6 months ago, they were right on both accounts.

We do not do this enough in this town. So to General Shinseki and to Larry Lindsey, I want to thank you for your patriotism and I want to thank you for your honesty. Had we listened to you a long time ago, or at least had the willingness to have an honest debate, we would have known that we would have 187,000 troops in the Iraq theatre of war. And to Larry Lindsey, who predicted it would cost us about $200 billion of hard-earned taxpayer money, if we had listened to you rather than run you down, we would be honest and be able to handle this $87 billion that the President has requested.

So, again, thank you for your patriotism and thank you for your honesty.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank my colleague from North Carolina for his kind words. I would like to also congratulate the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Oxley), the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Bachus), the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Sanders), and the gentleman from California (Mr. Ose) for cosponsoring our amendment that deals with medical information and blacking out that information. This is a landmark bill that will help American consumers by giving them important new rights and protections.

Our economy benefits from a national credit reporting system like no other in the world, and this legislation strikes the right balance by safeguarding consumers while also ensuring continued access to our instant credit system. Medical information should have no place in employment decisions or credit determinations, and corporate affiliates should not be able to share it. This information deserves the strongest protection under the law, but beyond that it is important that we give consumers back some control over who can and cannot use this information. In fact, a recent Gallup poll showed 95 percent of consumers are worried that their health providers or insurers may be sharing their private medical information with others. Beyond this concern, however, they fear losing more control every day over sensitive medical information.

No longer will we ask whether you opt in or opt out. Your medical information, medical information in your family from here forward is blacked out. It protects you in the most sensitive area. It blacks out the use of medical information in the credit-granting process. It establishes strict limits on the use of medical information for employment purposes. It blacks out the indiscriminate sharing of medical information among corporate affiliates. It blacks out the use of medical information to create individualized or aggregate lists based on consumers' payment transactions for medical products; creates a new and higher standard for reporting by credit reporting agencies to others who have requested information; and establishes strict limits on the reuse of medical information.

This is both good for consumers and good for business. In a typical way when you have a win-win situation, it will also in my view garner great bipartisan support. Again I want to close by thanking the chairman and the ranking member for having a bill that brings together business interests and consumer interests not only throughout the bill but also in this particular area, by blacking out medical information and giving consumers again control over their own lives.

Mr. Chairman, just over a month ago, the Federal court ruled that IBM violated Federal anti-age discrimination laws when it converted from its traditional pension plan to a cash balance plan in the 1990s. As a result, over 130,000 of IBM's longest-serving workers, including many in my home State of Illinois, moved one step closer to receiving the retirement benefits they rightfully earned. Despite the court's decision, this administration is pushing regulations allowing companies to switch to cash balance.

Let us be honest: cash balance plans can work. We can create a win- win situation here just along the model that the Secretary of Treasury did at CSX, where you grandfather in older workers. We do not need to create a win-lose situation that only benefits employers and harms employees. There is a way to create a win-win situation that reflects the commitment of long-serving workers and older workers who are nearing retirement, and also gives younger workers a plan like a cash balance retirement plan that is a hybrid between both the defined benefit and the defined contribution plans.

When Secretary Snow was at his confirmation, he talked about what they had done at CSX when he was CEO and chairman. We always around here laud the private sector as a model. Well, I present to you a model, what CSX did for its own employees. It created a win-win situation for the company and for the individuals there, whether they were 58 and near retirement, or 38 and started as new workers. That should be the way we approach this situation.

I am a proud original cosponsor of this legislation. I think it reflects our values of rewarding work, loyalty, and taking responsibility. Thousands of companies are awaiting this decision.

I, along with the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Sanders) and the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), my colleagues, went to testify when there were hearings for this rule change.

It would be wrong to pull the carpet from underneath employees who are nearing retirement, relying on that retirement, planning on that retirement. As we say in our own legislation, if this is good enough for the private sector, let us adopt it here in Congress. Let us have a cash balance plan.

We all know the study that was done. It would affect older-serving Members who have years of service here who have relied open that retirement plan. If it is good enough for people in the private sector who are older workers, should we try it here in Congress? The answer resoundingly would be ``no.''

But, again, we are not going to debate today the principles underneath this bill. What we are going to say is while this decision is moving through the court, the funds through this appropriation process cannot be used to go around the court and implement this plan.

Yes, later on we will debate a pension plan and reform the system. We have the right values in this legislation. I believe it is correct to withhold the funds to ensure Treasury does not go around the court and have this decision work its way so we do not in any way send a signal to other employers to pull the rug out from underneath their employees. Let the court decision go its way. Do not allow them to fund this process and go around the court ruling.

Mr. Speaker, in Sunday's Chicago Sun Times, they had a headline noting the skyrocketing health care costs in America and how they were punishing consumers and businesses. One out of ten Illinois businesses are now looking at cutting their health care totally to their employees. We have double-digit insurance costs rising.

And what does the administration propose as we have record uninsured and record inflation in health care? Their proposal was to shut the hospital doors to the uninsured. And yet in Iraq, we are opening new hospitals. So on one day we shut the doors here in America to the uninsured, and on the next day we are opening new hospitals to deal with the uninsured in Iraq.

Today we have record unemployment, record uninsured in this country. In Iraq, we envision half the population to get universal health care and 100 percent maternity coverage. And yet today, we offer the uninsured in this country nothing. That is our vision.

We have a major health care crisis in this country, and the administration has not taken a single action to lower the number of uninsured. We cannot deny Americans the same dreams of affordable health care, quality education, a safe place to live that we promise to Iraqis. The same values and future that we hold for Iraq, we must pledge for all Americans as well.

Mr. Speaker, today in USA Today, they released a poll that showed that 71 percent of the American people believe they should be allowed to buy prescription drugs from Canada and other European countries. People from around the world come to the United States for their medical care, yet Americans are forced to go around the world for their medications. The American people know what is going on here, and they know the situation is wrong and it is unsustainable.

A recent Families USA study found that the prices of 50 drugs most commonly used by seniors have increased in price by an average of 3.5 times the rate of inflation over the past year. Between 2000 and 2003, seniors' expenditures on prescription drugs increased by 44 percent.

For too long, seniors have been paying premium prices for the same prescription drugs that are available in other countries. Take tamoxifen. It costs $60 in Germany, and $360 in the United States.

We cannot sit back and allow this situation to continue. Right before we left for recess in August, the United States House of Representatives passed legislation to allow Americans, elderly, folks of any age, to buy their medications in Canada and Europe. It is competition, the free market, and allowing choice to exist.

Today we exist in a closed market and Americans pay the highest price. If we had a free market system, allowing Americans to buy their prescription drugs if they want in Canada or Europe, their name-brand drugs, prices would drop dramatically in this country. Today we are paying 40 to 50 percent more than the poor starving French and Germans. That price would be reduced here in the United States.

A lot of folks in the pharmaceutical industry say it is a safety risk. Right after our vote here in the House, Pfizer, the largest pharmaceutical company in the country, said they were going to pull out of the Canadian market or limit their sales in Canada. It had nothing to do with safety. When people tell you it ain't about money, folks, it is about money.

The second argument the pharmaceutical industry raises is they say this will endanger research and development. Today the American taxpayers fund the National Institutes of Health for $27 billion. They also fund research at the pharmaceutical industry with a tax credit for

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I am anxious to make a point. I am glad my colleague started on this, asking the administration to come forward with what is our exit strategy, how long will the American troops be there and what will be the total cost to the American taxpayer.

My colleague knows that since 2001, about 3 million Americans have lost their jobs, 5 million more Americans have lost their health insurance, to the record heights of people working without health insurance. Nearly $1 trillion worth of corporate assets have been foreclosed on, and more than 1 million Americans have walked out of the middle class to poverty in this country. Yet at the same time, the United States Government has pledged $8 billion dollars to pay Iraqi Government salaries for people who do not show up for work in Iraq, $7 billion for repairs to public works and services, $5 billion in humanitarian aid and $3 billion to settle 1 million Iraqi refugees next year alone. That is some of the costs the American taxpayer is being asked to foot while we have record-high unemployment, record foreclosures, losses of health insurance, no plan for middle-class families to afford their college education.

I come from Chicago. We think we know something about no-show jobs. The notion there would be close to 100,000 Iraqis getting a salary with no-show jobs can make a workman in Chicago a little jealous; but let alone that over the summer, while we were also gone, America experienced an unprecedented blackout where the infrastructure and America's electrical grid was short and not capable of handling the type of economy we have. At the same time, the head of Iraq's reconstruction, American counsel Paul Bremer announced that he would like $2 billion to rebuild the Iraqi electric grid. Yet here in the United States we were the ones with the blackout, and we cannot get a single dollar from the administration to help rebuild our electric grid which is an important piece of our economic infrastructure to allow the economy to grow. As many people said, we have a world-class economy sitting on top of a Third World economic grid. Yet Iraq, $2 billion to the electric grid; America, a blackout.

Billions of dollars.

Mr. Speaker, one thing I want to run the statistics by is the people who remember, because I think it is often in this administration where the right hand misses what the left hand is doing.

In the area of health care, there is a proposal for 13 million Iraqis, half the population, to get universal health care. Yet America now has record-high uninsured in this country, with no plan on the table. A hospital and clinic in Baghdad is operating and one in every city will be up and running.

In education, there are proposals on the table to rebuild 1,200 schools in Iraq. Yet the administration fights and it does not have a single dollar for rebuilding and modernizing America's schools.

There are 25,000 units of affordable housing in Iraq, yet only 5,000 proposed here for the United States.

In the area of infrastructure we have a 10 percent cut in the Corps of Engineers proposed by the administration; yet the deepwater port of Umm Qsar in Iraq will be built from top to bottom.

We have a plan for Iraq's reconstruction and its economic growth in the future, and yet the entire proposal here for the United States is blackouts, cuts in education, cuts in health care, cuts in infrastructure and cuts in housing. My point is the American people, ever since World War II, have been unbelievably generous and they will continue to be. Yet we cannot offer the Iraqi people a future that is brighter than the one we are proposing for our own children.

I do want to add one point away from the financing to the issue of the loss of lives of Americans in Iraq. Some people have gone to Iraq and come back and said, what we need is more American troops. The fact is, we need more American allies, not more American troops.

Second is, there have been four major battles since the post-Cold War: Gulf War 1, Bosnia, Kosovo and Gulf War 2. In every war except for this war, the democratic nations of the world have spoken with one voice against tyranny, and the loss of life by Americans has been minimal. There is only one war where the democratic nations of the world were divided and the loss of life by Americans has surpassed all other wars.

Foreign policy based on ``my way or the highway'' has not served our men and women correctly. They deserve better. Their families are facing losses. They are doing their job under tremendous stress, unbelievably well, and we should have a foreign policy that brings people together to speak for democratic values in one voice, and yet we are not doing that. The American servicemen and -women are bearing a burden that is not being shared, and the American taxpayer is paying a price that is not being shared. The consequence both here at home and overseas in Iraq is devastating to Americans, and we deserve to give the American people and our American men and women in uniform a better national agenda and an international posture than the one they have been getting.

Mr. Speaker, if my colleague will yield for one last comment. In Bosnia, the United States troops share a burden with other Democratic nations under the command of a United States general. They are not serving under anybody else's command. There has not been any major deaths post combat. That is true also in Kosovo.

Right. This is the only war post combat, after the President has declared hostilities have ceased, that there have been more deaths in the aftermath of the war than during the war.

Again, I think it comes back to the fact that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant. That is not an arguable fact. The arguable fact was are we going to do this alone, or should we have done the hard work that was done by the first Bush Presidency, of calling up allies, calling up friends, having the Democratic nations of the world and others speak as one voice about ridding the world of an aggressive act.

But in this war, because we refused to do the hard work of listening and persuading and talking, deciding to go alone, deciding to make other political points, more Americans have died after the hostilities have ceased than prior. It is a policy that does not do justice to the sacrifice on the ground by our men and women. It is the only war post the Cold War in which, as I always say, the Democratic nations were divided, not united. And because of that, and because of the result that we do not have other American allies but we have mainly American men and women there, more Americans, such as the family from the gentleman's district who he just spoke about, touching all of us about how it has come home, this war.

There has not been an exit strategy provided for. We have not talked about what it takes to bring allies to bear, about burden sharing. We can do better. The American people and the American servicemen and women deserve better.

And then there is a whole discussion about the reconstruction of Iraq. At a time when the American people are paying astronomical taxes, property taxes, seeing service cuts at their schools, having their health care costs explode, having the cost of a college education for their kids explode, with no plan provided for that, and yet there are some in this Chamber and across the hall whose recommendation to the American people is we will stay the course. We will put more American troops, more American hard-earned dollars to work in Iraq while here at home that is not the recipe that the American people deserve. They deserve a plan for here as much as for Iraq. They deserve a policy that says we will bring Democratic nations together, not divide them.

Well, Mr. Speaker, having worked in the White House, I want to be clear, I do not think anybody here is saying the President, and I am sure the President, the First

Lady, and the entire administration feels for every one of these families. Having worked in the White House, I think we all know there are things either a President or even ourselves have said that we wish we had never said.

But when the President said ``bring it on,'' it was close to putting, unfortunately I think given the guerilla warfare and the terrorists that have now come into Iraq, I think it has put a target on the American service people that existed before but only heightened given the war psychology and world opinion that terrorists are playing against this administration. I do not know of another time a President has ever done that or an administration has done that.

I want to add one other thing. I think Mr. Bremer said that in a few weeks from now Iraq will run out of money, and they will have to come to the United States for more financial assistance for all the reconstruction they are planning. I plan on reintroducing my American parity bill that says whatever we plan on spending in Iraq for housing, health care, infrastructure, economic growth, salaries, for no-show jobs, we have to do the same here at home.

They should not have a better housing plan than what we plan for here at home. They should not have a better education plan in Iraq than we have for modernizing our schools. They should not have a better health care plan for half the population when we have nothing for our population. So I will be introducing that bill as an amendment to the Iraq reconstruction supplemental, that we should have an American parity act.

I am going to vote to help Iraq, but I am not voting for deconstruction in the United States.

One out of four children in America are covered by Medicaid for the maternal care. So the cuts in Medicaid affect directly the newborn children and the health care coverage, where we are talking about universal coverage in Iraq.