Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak in support of adoption of this conference report which authorizes $447.2 billion for the U.S. Defense Department (DOD) and the national security programs of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

As is always the case, there are many provisions in the final version of this massive bill every year which I enthusiastically support and others that I do not. On balance, this conference report has more merits than shortcomings.

First, I am pleased that it provides more generous pay and benefits for the men and women who currently serve in our armed forces and for those who have done so in the past.

It authorizes a 3.5 percent across-the-board pay raise for our troops. This is the sixth consecutive year that Congress will have provided a pay raise for our men and women in uniform greater than the level of private sector pay raises. This will help to further reduce the gap between average military and private sector pay. Similarly, it makes permanent the increased rates for imminent danger pay from $150 to $225 per month, and the family separation allowance from $100 to $250 per month, while also eliminating out-of-pocket housing expenses.

For members of the National Guard and Reserves, it extends several special pay provisions and bonuses through December 31, 2005, including bonuses for enlistment, reenlistment, and prior service. Reservists and family members will also receive enhanced TRICARE benefits.

For our Nation's military retirees and their survivors, this legislation goes further in protecting their financial security. It will eliminate the Social Security offset under the Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP) by increasing in stages the annuities paid to survivors of military retirees who are 62 years of age or older from 35 percent of retired pay.

Last year's version of this legislation, made significant and overdue strides in redressing the disparity by which disabled military retirees have their pension benefits reduced, dollar for dollar, by the amount of disability benefits they receive from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). It authorized full concurrent receipt to be phased in over 10 years. This bill makes further progress by removing disabled retirees, who are rated as 100 percent disabled, from the 10- year phase-in period. These deserving military retirees will be authorized for full concurrent receipt effective next January.

Second, we now know that our troops were poorly served by Pentagon war planners in advance of the invasion of Iraq. Many of them were sent into harm's way without adequate supplies of body armor, armed Humvees, and other essential equipment. This bill will help correct these inexcusable miscalculations by providing a $572 million increase to speed the production of up-armored Humvees plus $100 million for add-on armor kits for Humvees already in use.

Third, it is no secret that current troop strength is inadequate and our troops in Iraq and elsewhere are stretched too thin. To redress this military manpower shortage, this bill increases active Army end strength from the present level of 482,400 to 502,400 in 2005 and authorizes further increases to 512,400 by 2009. Similarly, it increases the Marine Corps from its current level of 175,000 to 178,000 in 2005 and to 184,000 by 2009.

Fourth, in their recent presidential debate, both President Bush and U.S. Senator John Kerry spoke about the importance of stepping up nonproliferation efforts to curb the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and to lessen the danger of terrorists acquiring these horrible weapons. While I'd have preferred a higher level of funding, this bill provides $409.2 million for the Cooperative Threat Reduction Initiative that will help dismantle, secure, and eliminate WMD and WMD facilities in the former Soviet Union.

On the negative side, this legislation provides $10 billion for a bogus missile defense program. In defiance of physics, this Congress continues to shovel ever increasing sums of taxpayer funds to deploy a missile defense system that has not been tested adequately nor demonstrated to work.

There is continued authority and funding in this legislation for further research on new tactical nuclear weapons. Specifically, it provides an additional $27.9 million for the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator--the so-called nuclear bunker buster, plus an additional $9 million for advanced concept initiatives. While these sums may not seem all that significant in a $447.2 billion bill, they continue our nation down a dangerous and destabilizing path. By continuing to fund this type of research; the U.S. is opening Pandora's box and encouraging other nations to develop and deploy supposedly more usable nuclear weapons.

Finally, I am disappointed that a provision authored by U.S. Senators Boxer and Collins was dropped from this conference report that would have afforded stronger protection for women serving in our armed forces who are victims of rape. More specifically, it would have permitted women victimized by rape to receive medical abortions without having to pay for the procedures themselves.

Recent statistics from DOD reveal that as many as 6 percent of active-duty service women report having been sexually assaulted. There have been 112 reports of sexual misconduct over the past 18 months in Iraq, Kuwait, and Afghanistan.

U.S. Army officials recently issued a policy statement to Army medical professionals clarifying their position on care for victims of sexual assault. In it, they instructed that ``the Army has existing medical and legal policies and programs to assist leaders. Use these resources to provide victims with immediate medical care, follow-up counseling, and seamless victim assistance.'' However, by banning abortion funding for rape victims in the military, this provision will severely impede the ability of rape victims to receive the appropriate medical care and assistance they need. This ban further injures the women who are bravely defending our country, and keeps victims who have already suffered an unspeakable assault from exercising their constitutionally-protected right to choose.

On balance this legislation will enhance our Nation's security.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time. I commend the chairman and the ranking member for their leadership.

I rise today in opposition to H.R. 10, a partisan and wholly inadequate bill, a pale shadow of the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. It does not come close to addressing many of the key issues raised by the Commission. I should underscore that this is not an academic exercise, this is not about boxes on a bureaucratic organization chart, Mr. Chairman; these are life and death issues, as the families of more than 100 9/11 victims would attest.

Let us remember why we are here. There are well-publicized failures and shortcomings in our intelligence, failures of intelligence agencies to communicate in the days and months leading up to 9/11, absence of anyone coordinating activities, absence of self-criticality, accepting and perpetuating unfounded reports of weapons in Iraq. That is what we are trying to address.

But this legislation does not give the intelligence director the personnel and budgetary authority to coordinate activities or to direct communications. There is nothing in here to guarantee that the intelligence community does not, once again, fall victim to false assumptions and group think.

Furthermore, H.R. 10 includes other changes unjustified by the 9/11 Commission or by the committee's own findings.

I am grateful that the Committee on Rules has allowed the amendment of my colleague, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Menendez) to come to the floor. It is clearly a superior alternative to H.R. 10 for many reasons, not the least of which it rejects the noxious provisions of H.R. 10 that would mindlessly shred civil liberties while sanctioning the outsourcing of torture of unconvicted terrorist suspects by transferring them to other countries with deplorable human rights records.

I urge my colleagues to reject H.R. 10 and to vote for the Menendez substitute.

Our constituents have asked Congress to reform the intelligence community because of a self-evident lack of coordination among agencies, a confirmed failure to communicate critical threat information, and repeated instances of the use of questionable assumptions and faulty conclusions in key intelligence assessments. The bill before us addresses none of these deficiencies in a meaningful way, and in many cases does not address the key problems at all.

With regard to this legislation's proposed budget and personnel authorities for the National Intelligence Director, I share the view expressed by 9/11 Commission chairman Tom Kean (Washington Post, October 1): ``This is not an area where one can compromise,'' he said. ``If you're not going to create a strong national intelligence director, with powers both appointive and over the budget, don't do it.''

serious flaws with h.r. 10

The bill before this House would also add other changes unjustified by the 9/11 Commission or by the committee's own findings. H.R. 10 fails to address the ongoing problems in the intelligence community with regard to information sharing. Congress must craft specific legislative language--not simply vague guidance to the executive branch--to create a mechanism for ensuring the sharing of information. I posed an amendment that would have done that by implementing the thoughtful, bipartisan solution incorporated in the Collins-Lieberman bill.

H.R. 10 also ignores the need for Congress to create an independent capability for judging the veracity of both finished assessments--be they NIE's or PDB's--and the sources that underpin those assessments. The executive branch's past failures in the area of ``Red Teams'' or ``Team B's'' have been well documented, including by the 9/11 Commission in its final report. Omitting this glaring necessity is simply irresponsible.

House Intelligence Committee Markup-up of H.R. 10: Bipartisan In Name

Only

With very few exceptions, H.R. 10 was not drafted in a bipartisan manner. During September's House Intelligence Committee mark-up of H.R. 10, a number of amendments offered were in the spirit of strengthening H.R. 10 and strengthening our capabilities against terrorists.

To be accurate, the Committee approved 3 amendments in a bipartisan fashion.

The Gentlelady from California, Jane Harman's amendment to add an independent Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, similar to a provision of S. 2845, passed on a bipartisan vote of 16-3. An amendment by Representative Gibbons to increase budget-reprogramming authority, modeled on the Intelligence Transformation Act (H.R. 4104), passed 12- 7. The Committee also accepted on a voice vote an amendment by U.S. Representatives Peterson and Boswell to strike a provision in Title V of H.R. 10 that would have allowed the President to ignore statutory direction and reorganize the Intelligence Community with only an up-or- down vote from Congress. Such a provision could conceivably be used to erase the reorganization of the intelligence community in Title I. It would also have undermined by HPSCI's oversight of intelligence community reorganization.

I note for the record that when the amended H.R. 10 went before the Rules Committee, these bipartisan provisions were stripped out, thus demolishing any claims that H.R. 10 was a bipartisan bill.

An independent bipartisan commission has determined that systemic problems across multiple agencies contributed to the 9/11 catastrophe, in particular, and that the essential problems that led to 9/11 remain unaddressed. The executive branch has not cleaned up its act. I certainly heard nothing in the multiple hearings in the HPSCI to convince me that the major problems have been solved.

Also, H.R. 10 makes no effort whatsoever to reform how the Congress handles our oversight functions in the national security arena. The Menendez substitute does begin to take some steps in this direction, but I hope my colleagues on both sides of the aisle understand that we have much more work to do in this area, as the Commission has made very clear in its final report.

Mistakenly, H.R. 10 provides new authority allowing the President to completely undo the intelligence reforms mandated by Congress. Under this provision a presidential plan to reorganize the intelligence community would be guaranteed an up or down vote, with no amendments, within 90 days of submission to Congress.

backsliding on human rights

Clearly, supporters of this bill learned nothing from the Abu Chraib prison debacle that stained our efforts in Iraq, when disclosed less than 6 months ago. H.R. 10 makes an exception to America's legal obligations under the U.N. Convention Against Torture and Other Forms of Cruel and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment for some aliens as well as terrorists and criminals. Indeed, I have introduced a bill (H.R. 4951) that would allow independent monitoring and mandate that interrogations of prisoners and detainees in the war on terrorism be video recorded, something that I understand that Pentagon has finally started doing, albeit on a limited basis. This proposal in H.R. 10 to potentially sanction further abuse in third world countries is simply unconscionable and it should be categorically rejected by both the House and the Senate.

more erosion of civil liberties and personal privacy

H.R. 10 would allow the U.S. government to spy on individuals without proving they are connected to a foreign government or terrorist group. Since when did we decide to bring back the ``good old days'' of allowing our intelligence community to spy on Americans without impunity? We know what happened the last time we allowed our intelligence community to run amok here at home: spying on anti-war groups whose only agenda was to end

our nightmare in Vietnam and make the government accountable to the people it was created to serve. This is a back-door effort to create a domestic spy agency without any genuine public debate or examination of the perils of such a proposal, and it too should be roundly rejected.

collins-lieberman-mccain and shays-maloney: real bipartisan reform

Let me turn now to a more positive, bipartisan alternative to H.R. 10.

In my view, the Collins-Lieberman-McCain bill provides the best available vehicle for strengthening the intelligence community, and I support Mr. Memendez's substitute which is based on that. The 9/11 Commission and the 9/11 families have endorsed this approach and it was reported unanimously out of the Senate Government Affairs Committee, and our Senate colleagues are on the verge of passing that bill as we speak. The Administration also released a Statement of Administration Policy supporting that bill, albeit with some caveats.

The Menendez substitute to H.R. 10 establishes a National Intelligence Director with strong authorities over the Intelligence Community's budget and a decisive role in appointing the heads of all elements of the Intelligence Community. In this way, it is consistent with the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. The creation of a strong National Intelligence Director with strong authorities over budgets and agency heads was also the number one recommendation of the bipartisan, bicameral Congressional Joint Inquiry into 9/11.

If the National Intelligence Director is going to have real power, he or she must have stronger budget and hiring authority than H.R. 10 proposes. The only way to get a dozen intelligence agencies to work together to help defeat the violent, extremist Islamic insurgency we are facing is to have a single director with real power.

The Menendez substitute also has the advantage of being a ``clean'' bill. It focuses exclusively on the 9/11 Commission's recommendations. In contrast, H.R. 10 is a 543-page bill loaded with provisions unrelated to the 9/11 Commission's recommendations. H.R. 10 makes changes to immigration laws that have nothing to do with the 9/11 Commission's recommendations, and are bad policy. Our legislative purpose must be to make American safer--not to undermine civil liberties, expand authorities for domestic spying, or erode the rights of immigrant communities.

Finally, the Collins-Lieberman-McCain bill is genuinely bipartisan, and thus the Menendez substitute is, by extension, bipartisan. Making America safer is not a Republican issue or a Democratic issue--it is an American issue. As my colleague, the Gentlelady from California, Ms. Harman, has observed on numerous occasions, terrorists are not going to check our party labels before they attack us.

I understand that the American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights advocacy groups expressed concern about the Collins-Lieberman measure that was passed by the Senate. Specifically, the ACLU stated that ``senators failed to address concerns about the creation of an ``Information Sharing Network,'' a system that the ACLU said lacks privacy and civil liberties safeguards.'' I understand and share their concerns, but I believe the Menendez substitute--which does create a civil liberties board--addresses this issue. I will also encourage the House-Senate conferees on this legislation to strengthen these provisions as well.

I want to close by appealing to my colleagues to remember why we're here: to pass legislation that implements the recommendations of a bipartisan commission that was created out of both the pain and the hopes of the families of 9/11. Those families have endorsed the Collins-Lieberman Bill. They will freely admit it is not perfect, a sentiment I share. But they know, as I do, that it is a far superior proposal to the one we're debating today and it is for those reasons I urge my colleagues to support the Menendez substitute to H.R. 10.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this tax bill, which is full of giveaways and loopholes for the special interest. I wanted to support this bill, I support an across-the-board corporate rate reduction for income from U.S. manufacturing activities so that more manufacturing jobs are created here in the United States.

Unfortunately, this bill is not about job creation or long-term investment in research. This bill is a laundry list of expensive tax breaks.

Many of my constituents enjoy NASCAR but I do not believe that they want a $101 million tax break for NASCAR, when they are trying to figure out ow to pay for college.

While, some of my constituents have some Chinese ceiling fans, I am sure they would not want a $44 Million tax break for importers of Chinese ceiling fans, when they are trying to pay the mortgage on there homes.

Many of my constituents enjoy target shooting with bow and arrows but do the makers of bow and arrows really need the tax break that this bill provides? And even if they do should they get their tax break before we pass a tax credit for families who are trying to pay for health insurance?

This bill is a textbook example of legislative give away. What started as a modest effort in Congress to replace a $5 billion-a-year export subsidy that the WTO ruled was illegal has turned into a $145 billion, 633-page corporate tax giveaway.

As if all this were not bad enough the conference report uses a large number of gimmicks, such as long phase-ins, sunsets, and changes in scoring rules, fudge its true cost.

We know that this bill will drive us even deeper into debt. And a larger deficit is something we cannot afford. Massive deficits create high interest payments that will crowd out spending on public investments for future generations. Moreover, the resulting high interest rates make it harder for Americans to purchase homes, make college tuition payments or start business ventures.

Voting for this bill would not only be a mistake, it would be grossly negligent. Using scare resources to pay for corporate special interests, tax breaks when we have an enormous budget deficit and unmet needs like homeland security is an abdication of a responsibility to our constituents.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the ranking member for yielding me time.

Mr. Chairman, we have discussed this matter quite a bit in the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and we agree that there should be more use of open sources. In fact, it should be routine, an integral part of every analyst's and every agency's work. It may not be necessary to have a center, as the gentleman suggests in his amendment, but I think as a sense of Congress this amendment is useful to emphasize the importance that open sources of information bring.

Excessive reliance on information obtained from secret sources is not necessarily a good thing, and time and again, in example after example, we have discovered that openly published and openly discussed information is indeed superior, more correct than some of the secret information that analysts have been relying on excessively. So we think this is heading in the right direction.

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

Mr. Speaker, while I support this temporary extension of the Higher Education Act, I am very disappointed that we have not passed the full Higher Education Act reauthorization.

The committee chair is correct. Higher education is more important than ever to ensure America's economic prosperity, security, and health. Just as college has become essential to both individuals and society's success, college tuition has risen dramatically, causing students to take on high loan debt, $17,000, on average; to work long hours that interfere with academic success sometimes; or to forgo college altogether. Yet, Congress has failed to pass the Higher Education Act.

Now, one party controls the White House, the Senate, and the House; the same party. Yet, they have failed to pass a Higher Education Act. Where are the priorities? Congress seems to have no trouble passing tax cuts for the wealthy, but to provide opportunities for students to attend college does not seem to be a priority.

Mr. Speaker, the failure of the House to pass a higher education reauthorization is emblematic of this ineffective Congress. In past years, the Higher Education Act was one of the easiest to pass, one of the most bipartisan, a bill we could count on. And with this temporary extension, we have missed many opportunities today. We could have increased the Pell grant and provided it year-round. We could have significantly increased aid to minority-serving institutions. We could have increased assistance to low-income and first-generation college students. We could have increased loan forgiveness. We could have eliminated origination fees on student loans. We could have provided child care for parents who are attempting to go back to college. We could have changed the student aid formulas for working students. But, today, we pass a temporary extension. We have failed to do any of those things, and American college students and their parents are paying for Congress' failure.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member on the Committee on Education and the Workforce for yielding me this time.

We are talking about education, so maybe we should take a moment for a textbook example of euphemism, Taxpayer Teacher Protection Act. Now, one would think this would mean to save the taxpayers money. In fact, what we are doing is allowing lending institutions to continue to get a guaranteed exorbitant rate of return and make a killing.

Let me just review what this bill does. I rise in support of H.R. 5186. It is an improvement over current law. But it fails to address the problem. It ignores the Government Accountability Office's recommendation to immediately stop lenders from issuing new loans at 9.5 percent. It ignores the GAO's recommendation to close the loophole permanently.

It allows hundreds of millions of dollars in new loans to be issued at the bloated rates of 9.5 percent. It denies additional loan forgiveness to 10,000 teachers working in the Nation's most needy public schools. It chooses special interests over taxpayers by allowing the loophole to continue for up to 40 percent of the 9.5 percent loans.

As the outcry around the country over this wasteful subsidy increased, the Republicans decided to move last-minute, half-baked, barely adequate

legislation. It contrasts sharply with the year-long efforts by the gentleman from Michigan, Maryland, and California, the Kildee-Van Hollen-Miller bill, H.R. 5113, which would permanently and completely close this wasteful lender subsidy.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5061, the Comprehensive Peace in Sudan. The bill expands the Sudan Peace Act by authorizing a total of $450 million in humanitarian assistance over the FY 2005 to FY 2007 period, including at least $150 million for humanitarian assistance for Sudanese refugees in Darfur and eastern Chad. The $150 million could also be used to support an African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur.

However this bill alone will not be enough and authorization alone is not enough. The situation in Sudan is dire. The statistics are alarming and depressing. The numbers of causalities, deaths, rapes, injuries and displaced refugees beg the question, how can the world, the U.N., the United States and other civilized nations witness the murder of 30,000 innocent civilians, the forced removal of 130,000 people from their homes to Chad, and the displacement of more than one million people and do nothing.

Mr. Speaker, we cannot afford to allow this genocide that is occurring in Sudan to continue. We must rise to the occasion. We must forget about those partisan things that divide us. We must come together as a body, as a Congress, indeed, as a nation; and we must show the world the way to eliminate the kind of racial and religious hatred that exists in this world and we cannot afford to wait.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to express my strong opposition to H.J. Res. 106, the Marriage Protection Amendment.

Fredom. Equality. Inalienable rights. These notions are so enshrined in our national psyche that it becomes easy to think that they are just words, that we have attained these ideals, that there is no need for action, that all the battles for freedom and against discrimination have been fought and won.

But measures like the one we are considering today bring us back to reality and remind us how far we must go to achieve acceptance and fully equality under the law. Some in this Nation refuse to view this amendment as a blight on our democracy or as a measure that is in direct opposition to the ideals put forth by our Founders. They ignore that this amendment denies a minority population certain basic freedoms and continue to purport that our Nation's values and the institution of marriage is being threatened.

I certainly agree that the institution of marriage and a cohesive family unit are vital to the health of our communities and the success of our society. I strongly support initiatives such as TANF, which assist families and better our communities. Unfortunately, the amendment we are debating today does nothing to strengthen the bonds of matrimony, nor does it strengthen families or enhance or communities. In fact, it divides our communities, and sends a message of hate and contempt to a minority population and informs them that their government considers them to be second class citizens.

No one should be denied the opportunity to choose his or her life partner. It is a basic human right. It is a deeply personal decision. Throughout history, we have only moved forward when society has distinguished between traditional values and valueless traditions. Attacking gay couples who want to share lifelong obligations and responsibilities undermines the spirit of love and commitment and sends the wrong message to society.

In addition to the misguided policy of legislating a sensitive moral issue, this amendment is a misuse of the Constitution. The Constitution has been amended only 27 times in its more than 200 years. With the exception of the Eighteenth Amendment, which was later repealed, these amendments have reaffirmed and expanded individual freedoms and the specific mechanisms that allow our self-government to function. The amendment that we are considering today opposes this spirit of progress and reverses our movement towards extinguishing institutional discrimination that has harmed minority populations throughout our history.

I hope my colleagues will consider the cost this amendment will have on our democracy and more importantly the message it sends to those that are being judged by their government. I urge my colleagues to vote against this amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my strong opposition to H.R. 3193, the so-called District of Columbia Personal Protection Act.

I do not agree with the premise that more hand guns and assault weapons in the District will mean less crime on the streets of our Nation's Capital. The experts don't either. The Mayor of the District, Anthony Williams, strongly opposes this bill. The District's Chief of Police, Charles Ramsey, recently said that ``to reduce crime and prevent more senseless tragedies like the recent killings in Anacostia and Ballou, we need fewer--not more--weapons. . .'' The District's Delegate in the Congress Eleanor Holmes Norton, is strongly against this legislation, as is the City Council.

Why, Mr. Speaker, do all these District leaders oppose this effort to overturn their gun laws? Because, to cite just recent examples, they have seen their neighbors, their family, and their co-workers mourn the loss of 16 local children killed by guns this year. And yet, today in the House, a place secured from weapons by metal detectors at every entrance and protected by our own dedicated police force, we are voting on legislation that will overrule the District's own sensible gun laws.

Today, I have heard from a number of my colleagues who support this legislation that the District of Columbia is the murder capital of the United States and that the best way to solve this problem is to increase access to hand guns and assault weapons. But what I want to ask is why we are not actually helping the District with its real underlying problems. Why are we not doing more to support the police officers on the streets of the District? Why are we not doing more to support after-school programs to keep children off the streets and away from guns and crime? Why are we not providing funds for job training and other educational programs for the District's residents, who desperately want to end the cycle of crime that plagues many of their District's communities? The simple answer is that this legislation is based not on sound public policy or on a desire to end gun-related crimes; this is a politically motivated attempt to curry favor with the National Rifle Association and other opponents of reasonable gun safety.

Mr. Speaker, I cannot understand why those who, day after day, rail on the floor of the House about their support for federalism are now taking significant steps to trample the right of the District to decide its own affairs. If my colleagues who support this measure really feel that the District should repeal its gun registration laws, repeal its assault weapons ban, and allow ``cop killer'' bullets on the streets, then I recommend that they register to vote in the District and lobby their local councilmember for such a change. This is the appropriate way to change the laws of the District of Columbia.

The elected leaders of the District of Columbia do not want this legislation. The people of the District of Columbia do not want this legislation. If passed, this legislation will put more people at risk of being shot with assault weapons or handguns--particularly at risk are children and police officers. It's time to stand up to the gun lobby and oppose legislation that will make the District of Columbia less safe. I strongly urge my colleagues to vote no on H.R. 3193.

Mr. Speaker, today I rise to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of William ``Count'' Basie, one of the leading figures of the swing era in jazz. Bandleader of the renowned Count Basie Orchestra, Basie was integral in establishing swing as the popular music of subsequent generations. His orchestra was a unique band during a unique time in the history of jazz and American music.

Born in Red Bank, New Jersey on August 24, 1904, William ``Count'' Basie took an interest in music at an early age. He honed his skills on both the piano and drums in local theatres in Red Bank before moving to New York in 1924, at the age of twenty. It was in New York where he was influenced by two of the greatest early jazz pianists, James P. Johnson and Thomas ``Fats'' Waller. In 1927, Basie moved to Kansas City, Missouri to capitalize on its nascent jazz scene. He first joined the Blue Devils Band, but soon after he became a member of the famed Benny Moten Orchestra. Basie later took over as bandleader of Moten's orchestra, which was renamed the Count Basie Orchestra.

In 1937, Basie and his orchestra moved to New York City and established their home base in Harlem, where they became one of the leading big bands of the era. Basie's orchestra was best known for its unique ``Kansas City Sound,'' exemplified in such works as, ``One O'clock Jump'' and ``Swingin' the Blues.''

Throughout his career, ``Count'' Basie received nine Grammy awards as well as a Grammy Trustee award in 1981; he was also posthumously recognized for lifetime achievement in 2002. William ``Count'' Basie was an extremely talented and ambitious musician and bandleader; his influence has persisted throughout time and among many different generations. He made many important contributions to swing, jazz, and American music. Let us honor this great musician and man today. Central New Jerseyans are proud to say ``such as he came from among us.''

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the United Negro College Fund on its 60th anniversary of assistance in higher education. The United Negro College Fund (UNCF) was founded upon a mission to improve the quality of education through the provision of financial aid to deserving students, raising operation funds to assist member institutions, and increasing access to technology at historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Throughout the past six decades, the UNCF has raised over $2 billion, allowing the Fund to help over 300,000 students receive a higher education, thus designating the Fund as the largest contributor of funding, aside from the government, to help minorities attend school.

Today, the UNCF extends operational support through technological enhancement and financial assistance to 38 member colleges and universities, allowing these schools to maintain a tuition level 54 percent lower than that of similar schools. The UNCF also provides over 450 scholarships and fellowships that support deserving students through the doctorate level of education. Moreover, of the 65,000 students supported by the UNCF, 60 percent are the first in their families to attend college and 62 percent have annual family incomes of less than $25,000.

The Fund has also recently established Liberty Scholarships, which allow the children of the victims of the attacks of September 11, 2001--regardless of age, race or creed--to attend any of the UNCF's member institutions. Finally, through its efforts and philanthropic activities, the United Negro College Fund has produced innumerable graduates who have

made lasting and significant contributions in fields such as politics, education, law, business, health care, and the arts.

In its 60 years of existence, the United Negro College Fund has undoubtedly changed the lives of hundreds of thousands of students, friends and families, and has thus changed the communities and the country in which we live. Therefore, I would like to honor the United Negro College Fund in recognition of these great achievements and contributions to our society.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to H.R. 2028, which would prevent federal courts and the Supreme Court from hearing any claim that the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance violates the first amendment of the Constitution.

The Constitution--perhaps the greatest invention in history--has been the source of our freedom in this great country for more than two centuries. The framework of government it established has allowed our diverse people to live together, to balance our various interests, and to thrive. It has provided each citizen with broad, basic rights.

The judiciary was designed to be the one branch of the federal government that is not influenced or guided by political forces. This independent nature enables the judiciary to thoughtfully and objectively review laws enacted by the legislative branch to ensure that federal law is in line with the Constitution. Throughout the development of our nation, this check has been vital to protecting the rights of minorities.

Although the Constitution gives Congress the power to limit the jurisdiction of the federal judiciary and the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, I am certain that the founding fathers did not intend for Congress to use this power to shape the jurisdiction of the courts along ideological lines. This legislation will set a dangerous precedent by allowing Congress to insulate itself from judicial review so that it can pass legislation that it thinks may be unconstitutional. This is a clear misuse of Congressional authority and it is a cynical attempt to question the patriotism of Members of this institution.

Like every member of this body, I am proud to recite the Pledge of Allegiance as a way to express my loyalty to this Nation and its founding principles. I share the view of many Members that the current text of the Pledge of Allegiance is constitutional including the phrase ``under God''. I expressed my support for the Pledge in its current form when I joined many of my colleagues in voting for a resolution that expressed the opinion of Congress that the Ninth Circuit's decision in Newdow v. U.S. Congress was erroneous, This was an appropriate forum for me, as a Member of Congress, to express my belief in the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance.

Unfortunately, those who support this legislation do seek to alter our delicate system of checks and balances and make their own decisions infallible. They are attempting to alter the intended framework of our government, which has met the needs of a diverse population and allowed us to remain indivisible in

times of crisis for more than 200 years. They ignore the fact that we are a political institution guided by public opinion that is constantly fluctuating and believe that this institution is better equipped than the judiciary to evaluate what laws violate the Constitution.

It is unclear to me where the supporters of this legislation will end in restricting an individual's ability to seek redress. In July, we passed legislation that denied individuals the ability to question the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act. Today we are debating legislation that limits an individual's ability to bring a claim regarding the Pledge of Allegiance. What law will the Majority party choose next to put above the process of judicial review? At what point will the Majority party stop adding exceptions to the right to due process?

A vote against this bill signifies a desire to make the words of the Pledge of Allegiance a living reality and not a hollow promise. A vote for this legislation is a vote against the values that are embedded in our Constitution. I urge my colleagues to oppose this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my concern about H.R. 1308. The bill before the House today extends many of the tax cuts and tax credits that have wide margins of bipartisan support here in Congress. This includes a 5-year extension of the existing $1,000 family tax credit, marriage penalty relief, and an increase in the size of the 10 percent bracket. This bill also would provide for a 1-year extension of the current Alternative Minimum Tax exemption for married couples. I support all of these credits and extensions for individuals.

There are other good provisions contained within this bill. For example, the bill extends the tax credit for electric vehicles, extends deductions for clean-fuel vehicles, and extends the Research and Development tax credit extension--which I strongly believe should be made. These targeted tax credits would help to make our air cleaner and help our nation's innovative industries achieve advances in both applied and basic research.

However, the total cost of all of this is $146 billion over 10 years and it is paid for with borrowed money. In other words it's money we do not have. What this means is that we are paying for this with money taken out of Social Security and Medicare Trust Fund.

It is disappointing that the Republican majority in this House is not willing to offset the cost of these broadly supported tax benefits. Failure to offset their cost now only means that we will borrow the money necessary and our children and grandchildren will pay for them later.

The Republican majority in this House seems capable only of passing tax reductions, not dealing with the consequences of its irresponsible fiscal policy. We could have paid for this conference report quite easily by taking back a portion of the recent tax reductions enjoyed by couples who earn more than $1 million per year--$500,000 for single individuals. Had we done that, we could have passed this tax cut and still given those at the top of the income ladder a tax cut.

Mr. Speaker, governing is about making choices. Our constituents all across America sent us to Congress to make the tough decisions. They did not send us here so we can pass those decisions on to our children, and they certainly did not send us here to pass the cost of our decisions on to our children.

Mr. Speaker, today the national debt is the largest in history. Americans now collectively owe more than $7 trillion. That is more than $25,000 for every man, woman, and child. Yet rather than paying down this debt and getting our fiscal house in order, this bill would add an additional $146 billion to the debt.

Americans cannot run their own household budgets like this, and Congress is letting them down by its failure to manage money responsibly.

The national debt is not just paper. That debt is owned by other countries. Due to the failed fiscal management of the majority, Americans currently owe about $4 trillion to foreign countries. We owe Japan $607 billion; China--including Hong Kong--$205 billion; the U.K. $137 billion; Taiwan, $50 billion; Germany, $45 billion; OPEC countries, $43 billion; Switzerland, $41 billion; Korea, $37 billion; Mexico, $32 billion; Luxembourg, $26 billion; Canada, $25 billion--the list goes on and on.

More tax cuts without offsets will not only jeopardize critical public services now, but they will also hurt Americans well into the future. Massive deficits crowd out investments in education, healthcare and homeland security. These deep deficits result in increased interest rates that make it expensive for all Americans to buy homes, pay back loans, and raise capital for small businesses.

I believe Chairman Greenspan's comments are appropriate: ``Our fiscal prospects are, in my judgment, a significant obstacle to long-term stability because the budget deficit is not readily subject to correction by market forces that stabilize other imbalances. The free lunch has still to be invented.'' Just this week, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates. This is proof positive that it already considers that deficit out of control.

Mr. Speaker, there has never been, and there never will be, a nation in the world that has been strong, free, and bankrupt. We need to restore fiscal sanity in our decision making process. We need to make the hard choices that our constituents sent us here to make. And most of all we need to protect the Social Security and Medicare Trust Fund, not spend them and send the check to future generations.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Good Samaritan Volunteer Firefighter Assistance Act (H.R. 1787).

First, this bill would prohibit civil lawsuits from being brought against a person who donates fire-control or fire-rescue equipment to a volunteer fire company, under state or federal law, for personal, property damages or loss, or death caused by the equipment subsequent to the donation. But this prohibition against lawsuits would not apply in cases where the donor's actions constitute gross negligence, intentional misconduct, or where the person is the manufacturer of the fire-control or fire-rescue equipment.

Second, the bill would preempt state laws to the extent that those laws are inconsistent with the bill. But it would not preempt state law that provides additional protection from liability for an individual who donates firefighting equipment.

Finally, the bill would also require the U.S. Justice Department to review and report to Congress on donations of equipment made to volunteer firefighter companies in each state during the previous five- year period. Such report would include an analysis of the most effective way to fund firefighter companies for each state, whether first-responder funding is sufficient, and the best method to make sure donated equipment to volunteer companies is in usable condition.

This bill protects people, who out of the goodness of their own hearts, donate much-needed equipment to our brave firefighters who selflessly volunteer to defend our communities. We all know that there are many pressing and unmet needs among volunteer fire departments across the country. Yes, I was pleased to vote for the FY 2005 Homeland Security Appropriations Bill when it passed the House last June and it provides $32 billion to improve our nation's homeland security, including several billion for our firefighters and other first responders. We would like to have done more, but the dire fiscal condition of the federal budget precludes us from doing so.

It makes common sense to me that we then make certain that these so- called good Samaritans can make supplementary donations of equipment to help meet the needs of volunteer firefighters. This bill does that, while also safeguarding against shoddy donations that might jeopardize the lives of our volunteer firefighters and in our communities.

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

Mr. Chairman, following on the comments of the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), I rise to express my disappointment that this bill does not fully fund the amounts authorized in the Help America Vote Act for Fiscal Year 2005. We were proud to pass, on the eve of the 2002 election, ground-breaking election reform legislation that authorized almost $4 billion in Federal funding that would, among other things, improve the administration of elections; provide for increased accessibility to voting equipment and polling places for people with physical disabilities; fund the replacement of obsolete voting equipment; pay for protection and advocacy systems; provide for the establishment of State-based administrative procedures to remedy grievances, including grievances pertaining to accessibility; call for the establishment of an Election Assistance Commission to serve as a national clearinghouse and resource for the compilation of information and review procedures with respect to the administration of Federal elections; and to call for the establishment of a Standards Board, a Board of Advisors and a Technical Guidelines Development Committee, all of which would assist in the development of good voting systems.

Although over the past couple of years I have been primarily focused on standards for voting systems, specifically the lack of meaningful security standards for such systems, the Help America Vote Act funded many important things. And considering how important it is to our democracy to have fair, accessible, auditable elections and considering how many doubts citizens have had about elections in recent years, I am deeply disappointed that this appropriations bill provides so little HAVA funding, only $15 million, a pittance on the amount yet to be funded authorized under HAVA. Fifteen million dollars provided in this bill, leaving unappropriated more than $700 million of HAVA's total $4 billion in authorized sums.

The absence of consistent funding for HAVA has caused a fundamental problem; namely, that Federal funding of election systems outpaced the critical need for implementation of meaningful security standards. The Committee on Appropriations recognizes this. With respect to the $15 million appropriated for the Election Assistance Commission, $5 million is specified ``to address the desperate need for research and standardization of election systems.'' The committee urged the EAC to ``address standards and technology issues related to voting equipment.'' That is their quote. But the committee does not provide adequate funding. Forty million dollars was authorized to fund the protection and advocacy systems to ensure full participation in the election process for individuals with disabilities. Less than a third of that amount has been appropriated. One hundred million dollars was authorized to fund polling place accessibility and education and outreach to disabled voters. Only about a third, less than a third of that, has been appropriated. HAVA has called for the establishment of a Help America Vote college program and Help America Vote high school program. Each of those has received only about half of the authorized amount. HAVA called for $3 billion in payments to States to help them meet their audit trail, accessibility, language and other voting system requirements, and we fall far short of the appropriations in that category.

HAVA, I believe, will have to be amended. There are some improvements that need to be made. But that is no excuse for not fully funding this central part of the American democratic system to make sure that we have fair, accessible, and auditable elections.