Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I am sure that most Members spent time touring their districts in August, and I did as well. The major complaint that I heard was what probably most Members heard. That was concern about high fuel prices. We all know that fuel for automobiles, trucks, and airplanes have simply gone out of sight. One thing that we are not probably quite as aware of as a Nation is what it has done to agriculture, particularly where irrigation is concerned.

I talked to one Member of Congress who does some farming and irrigating. He was telling me that he had one center pivot that was powered by electricity; it cost him $1,000. He had one center pivot that was powered by either diesel or propane; that was $4,000. Same pivot, same size, and normally electricity would be higher than diesel or propane. So fuel has really eaten into the farm profits this year, and it is going to make farming very unprofitable for many people.

What has happened? Obviously, one major issue has been that global demand has increased. We realize that China, India, countries like these, have been industrialized, and over the last 4, 5, 6 years have been using much more fuel.

Number two, exploration has been curtailed. A 1998 executive order extended a moratorium on offshore drilling for 10 years. It is assumed that these areas would contain 75 billion barrels of oil and 362 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, but they are off limits. Federal law restricts access to resources in the Rocky Mountains and the Gulf of Mexico. Drilling in ANWR has not been allowed; and so whichever side of the environmental fence you are on, whether you agree or disagree, it certainly has made it more difficult to meet our fuel demands. Natural gas prices have increased 83 percent over the last 3 years, and this will cost our economy roughly $111 billion, and a lot of this is simply because of a shortage of natural gas, at least that is available to us; and we have a tremendous amount of it in Alaska and other places we are not able to get to.

Number three, refinery capacity has been reduced due to obsolescence. As a refinery gets old and equipment begins to go downhill, rather than being replaced, it simply is retired; and we have lost 30 percent of our refinery capacity since 1976. For the last 30 years,

we have been steadily losing capacity; and this, again, is mostly due to environmental regulation. We have mandated also 13 blends of gasoline. These are called boutique fuels, which add expense and time to fuel refining; and of course, in many cities, like Chicago, you may have to have three or four different fuel blends in a year. Every time you change a blend, you shut down the refinery, you clean the pipes and you start over again; and, again, that adds to expense. Katrina's destruction of refineries has pushed us over the brink. Obviously, just losing 5 or 10 percent, with such a thin margin, has made it somewhat inoperable.

Four, we have increased reliance on foreign oil, which everybody realizes. We are nearly 60 percent dependent on foreign oil at the present time. Much of this is from OPEC. So they can simply have a meeting, tighten the screws and prices go up. This contributes greatly, this dependence on foreign oil, to a $670 billion annual trade deficit, which this country simply cannot continue to sustain. We have to get more energy-independent, obviously.

I guess fifth, something that is in everybody's mind, is has price gouging occurred? To be honest with you, I do not know. I do not think anybody at this point knows, but I do know this: E85, that is 85 percent ethanol, was $1.60 in my State of Nebraska 4 weeks ago. Today, it is $2.75, an increase of $1.15 in 4 weeks. Katrina did not have anything to do with that because the cost of corn has remained low. All of the ethanol manufacturing is done in the Midwest, and so the hurricane had nothing to do with this issue. I think these are things that have to be looked into, probably by Congress.

The solution eventually, I hope, will be, what we have in our energy bill, will eventually provide relief, ethanol, biodiesel, solar, wind energy, nuclear, hydrogen fuel cells, and I think some additional refinery capacity; but it is all going to take time. This will be a difficult time, and I think Congress probably really needs to do some soul searching and look at some of the regulations we have placed upon ourselves.

Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 383 encourages the transitional assembly of Iraq to adopt a constitution that grants women equal rights. It was authored by the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Granger) and also the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Tauscher) and myself, who are cochairs of the Iraqi Women's Caucus.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say just a word about the Iraqi Women's Caucus. This was formed a couple of years ago by former Representative Jennifer Dunn and myself, with the belief that Iraqi women are critical to holding the social fabric of Iraq together and bringing Sunnis and Kurds and Shias together.

And as we have talked to them, we found that this is the case, that this is true. Because many of them are married. Sunnis are married to Shias and they have other sects within their families. And they consistently tell us that the divisions are not what people think in the United States.

But we think that women are the key and probably as important as guns and bullets and tanks and helicopters to achieving a peaceful resolution in Iraq. Some of us visited Jordan in March. And we met with 150 Iraqi women near the Dead Sea. These women drove from many points within Iraq. Two groups were shot at on the way, which shows you the resolution that they had, because they continued on their journey.

We visited with many women's groups from Iraq, in the United States and Iraq, as we have traveled. I visited with prime minister al-Jaafari in Iraq in March. And I asked him this question: I said, will you give Iraqi women a prominent role in the government? And the answer that he gave me was, yes, that he would do that, that he would ensure that.

So as many people are aware, one-third of the 275 seats in the transitional national assembly have been given to women, which is a very good thing. But on May 10 of this year, 55 members of the national assembly were chosen to draft a permanent constitution for Iraq by August 15.

Of that 55, approximately 10 or 11 were women, which again does not sound too bad. But as we met with Iraqi women last week, they said the women that were chosen were among the most conservative, among the most fundamentalist group within the national assembly, and therefore they were really concerned about what was happening in regard to Sharia.

And so as everyone knows, Sharia is Islamic law, and this was what was written in a draft of the constitution

that was given to us by these women. And in the eighth article this is what it says: ``The government vouches for women's duties toward family and their work in the society, equalizing her to men in all political, educational, social and economic fields.'' So far so good.

All sounds good. But then there is this last phrase, without infracting Islam, which means that whatever rights a women has cannot be in contradiction to Islamic law. This was the thing that concerned these women so much.

As was mentioned earlier, one of those women who came here was a judge, who had been installed on the court, but was removed from her judgeship because of Sharia.

There is great concern at this point. So this resolution urges Iraqi leaders to accord Iraqi women equal rights under the Constitution.

Let me just close, Mr. Speaker, by saying this: Iraqi women as we meet with them are really concerned about security. We do not want to minimize that. We do not want to pretend that Iraq is a real safe place. They are really concerned about the infrastructure, and there are some problems in the infrastructure. But when asked if they would prefer life under Saddam or if they would prefer that the United States pull out, they will almost unanimously say things like this: Things are better now. We see help for the future. We have a hope. We see a brighter future. Please do not leave now. Thank you for removing Saddam.

So even though things are difficult, there is hope. And as long as you have hope, we think that there is a brighter future. And I think that women are truly a major part of whatever resolution we may receive in Iraq that would be of an optimistic nature.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to speak on behalf of the rule and the underlying legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to just mention a personal story. I have a son-in-law who manages 150 stores. They are part of a franchise and are spread across 40 different States. If they have to purchase health care store by store, it is prohibitively expensive. Their costs are going up 10 to 20 percent a year. One of the previous speakers said it may not add a whole lot of people, but what is happening is we are losing more and more people out of health care plans each year because small businesses simply cannot afford it.

If they can band together, those 150 stores, and pool their resources and have 500 employees in a pool, they have a chance to keep their health care. I think it is critical.

Mr. Speaker, 60 percent of all Americans work for small businesses, and this is key to this legislation. Small businesses are particularly important to rural areas like Nebraska. The measure would do three things: one, increase small business' bargaining power with health care providers; number two, give them freedom from costly state-mandated benefit packages. In many cases, the State regulations simply stifle the health care packages. And, number three, lower their overhead cost by as much as 30 percent.

Republicans and Democrats alike have joined together in each of the last two Congresses to pass this legislation. I urge support of the underlying rule and the bill.

Mr. Speaker, I am here this evening to speak about the Federal Youth Coordination Act. This act was written in response to a report issued by the White House Task Force on Disadvantaged Youth in 2003. This task force report indicated that 25 percent of U.S. teens are at risk of not having productive lives, not growing up to be people who can hold a job, who are free of substance abuse, and are able to contribute to the society. The estimate is that roughly 10 million young people fall into this category.

This is a very difficult time to be a young person. As almost anyone in our culture knows, we have drug and alcohol abuse, we are the most violent Nation in the world for young people in terms of homicide and suicide, and roughly one-half of the young people growing up in our country today are going to be growing up without both biological parents, so they have undergone a significant amount of dysfunction at some point in their lives.

In response, the Congress, being generous and compassionate, has devised 339 Federal programs which serve youth and their families. There are 339 of these programs. These programs are disbursed over 12 different agencies. The greatest number are in the Department of Education, Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice. Some are in the Department of Labor, some are in the Department of Agriculture, and so on; and so they are spread all over. The cost of all of these programs was $223.5 billion in 2003. So it is a huge part of the Federal budget.

Now, the problem is that these programs are not coordinated in any way at all. They have kind of grown like Topsy. In many cases, they have no measurable quantifiable goals; and in many more cases, no one really knows whether they even serve the purpose which they were first intended to serve. So we have a very confused picture as far as these programs are concerned.

The General Accounting Office refers to this confused government response to troubled youth as a perfect example of ``mission fragmentation.'' The GAO recommends that programs with similar goals, target populations, and services be coordinated, consolidated and streamlined.

As a result of this report and the GAO commentary on it, the Federal Youth Coordination Act was written. It was written in response to the White House Task Force, and it creates a Federal Youth Coordinating Council. Now, this council is designed to do several things.

First of all, it is composed of members from each of the 12 agencies that have these youth-serving agencies. Also included on the council are some young people who actually have been in dysfunctional situations, young people who have been in foster care, and young people who have been through the system and have seen some of the problems. So what this council will do is to meet regularly, at least four times a year; and they are charged with these different responsibilities:

First of all, evaluate youth-serving programs. Does each program really serve any good objective? What programs are duplication? What programs could be combined; what programs could be eliminated?

Secondly, coordinate among Federal agencies with programs serving youth. There may be a program in Health and Human Services that mirrors a program in the Department of Education. Why have that duplication? Why is there no coordination or even communication across agency lines?

Improve Federal programs that serve at-risk youth. What works; what does not work? What types of programs should we be promoting? What should we be putting more money into and what should we be defunding, and so on?

Fourthly, recommend improvements in an annual report. The commission has to file a report with Congress which examines exactly what they have been doing and what they have accomplished.

And then probably most important of all, set and meet quantifiable goals and objectives. In other words, each program has to have a measurable quantifiable goal, a series of goals and benchmarks as to whether they are accomplishing anything or not. We think this is critical in any type of program that is going to move forward.

Lastly, hold Federal agencies accountable for achieving results. Of course, accountability in government sometimes is lacking. So I urge support of this bill. We think it is very important.

Mr. Chairman, methamphetamine abuse has become the Nation's leading drug problem, according to a survey of 500 sheriff's departments in 45 States. Meth is cheap to buy, it is easy to make, it is available everywhere, it is highly addictive, and often causes addiction after just one use. It is sweeping across the Nation replacing cocaine and heroin as the drug of choice for so many people.

This is where we were in 1990 in terms of drug labs, and this is where we are currently in this country in 2004, where at least 20 or more clandestine drug labs have been shown in those counties. But, of course, those small drug labs are not the main problem, it is mostly drugs coming out of Mexico through the superlabs, which have been replacing cocaine and heroin.

This drug has led to an increase in crime, child abuse, and prison and jail populations are soaring. Sixty to 85 percent of the meth used in this country comes from the superlabs in Mexico. Pseudoephedrine or ephedrine is the one ingredient necessary for the manufacture of meth. It is manufactured, as said earlier, in six or seven locations around the world.

The Kennedy-Hooley-Osborne-Souder amendment attempts to keep pseudoephedrine from meth manufacturers. It identifies and publicizes the five export countries and the five import countries which have the highest rate of diversion of pseudoephedrine to manufacturers of methamphetamine. The Department of State could then use its existing authority to reduce or eliminate U.S. foreign aid to those countries which are most contributing to the meth problem.

It is a good amendment. It gets to the source of the problem, and I urge support of the amendment because this is something that is critical to the welfare of our Nation.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time, and I support the underlying bill, which is of great importance to U.S. commerce. The upper Mississippi and Illinois waterway project contained in the bill is critical to U.S. agriculture.

It is my understanding that an amendment will be offered that will cripple the modernization of the lock and dam system on the Mississippi River. Due to an increase in unscheduled maintenance closures, shippers have been forced to choose other higher-priced modes of transportation for their goods, resulting in less barge traffic and more cost for producers.

The upper Mississippi and Illinois river system is critically important to grain producers across the Nation because the price of grain nationwide is largely based on the price of grain that moves on the Mississippi River to our export markets. Over 1 billion bushels of grain, which is about 60 percent of all grain exports, move to export markets each year via the Mississippi River.

According to the National Corn Growers Association, the failure to build the seven new 1,200 foot locks will result in a $562 million loss in farm income annually by 2020. Of that amount, $264 million will be lost to exports and $316 million will be from lower prices and decreased domestic demand.

In addition to the economic impact on our country's farmers, shipping using waterways is one of the cheapest, safest, and most environmentally friendly ways to ship goods. The lock and dam system benefits the environment by creating backwaters and side channels that support habitat, recreation areas, and municipal water supplies. The backwaters created by the lock and dam system are estimated to support over 40 percent of the migratory waterfowl and fish breeding grounds and are home to over 500 miles of wildlife refuge.

So I certainly hope we will support the lock and dam system as part of the bill. It is a good bill, and I urge support.

Mr. Speaker, as many Americans are aware, the Senate has passed a version of the energy bill, the House has passed their version of the energy bill, and, as often happens, the two versions are not the same. So, at the present time, the energy bill is in conference.

One major difference between the House version and the Senate version is in the renewable fuels section. In the House, we mandate 5 billion gallons of ethanol be produced in this country by 2012. The Senate version requires 8 billion gallons rather than 5 billion. So there is a substantial difference.

In 2004, the United States produced 3.6 billion gallons; this year, 4.5 billion gallons of ethanol. And we should reach the 5 billion gallon standard by 2006. So the House version is relatively meaningless, because by saying that we want 5 billion gallons in 2012, we will have already reached that by 2006.

So we are obviously very supportive, many of us, of the 8 billion gallon standard, and I rise tonight to encourage that that be what is included in the conference report.

Currently, ethanol is produced in 20 States, including California and Kentucky. At one time, it was assumed that ethanol was something that was only produced in five or six midwestern states. Ethanol could be made from almost any type of biomass, and I think eventually we will see ethanol production in all 50 States.

The ethanol industry benefits all Americans, not just those in the corn-producing States of the Midwest. Currently, ethanol reduces the price of an average gallon of gasoline by roughly 29 cents, so if we are paying $2.20 a gallon at the pump today, if it were not for the ethanol industry, it would be $2.50, $2.51, something in that rage. E- 85, with 85 percent ethanol, at the present time is roughly 60 cents cheaper than regular gasoline. So in many areas of the country, E-85 is selling for $1.60 a gallon as opposed to $2.20 or $2.25.

Ethanol creates more energy than it consumes. This is something lots of people are not aware of.

For instance, for every one Btu of energy, ethanol produces 1.389 Btu of energy. So by the time you have planted the crop, you have harvested it, you have processed it, you have refined it, you gain almost four- tenths of a Btu. The reason for that is that we are harnessing the energy of the sun in making ethanol.

Conversely, gasoline, for every 1 Btu of energy used, produces eight- tenths of a Btu of energy once it is refined. MTBE produces 6.675 Btus. So there is a considerable energy loss in these areas. Again, this is a misconception that many people have that ethanol uses more energy than it really produces. This is not true.

As MTBE is phased out due to groundwater contamination, ethanol is the primary remaining eliminator of greenhouse gas emissions. In 2004, ethanol reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 7 million tons in the United States, which was a huge environmental benefit.

The ethanol industry added $25 billion to the U.S. economy in 2004. The ethanol industry has added 243,000 jobs to our economy, and above all, it has moved us away from dependence on foreign oil.

There are just a couple of other things I would like to mention that we have on the following chart. You will notice that, currently, ethanol adds $51 billion to farm income over 10 years. The reason for this is that ethanol increases the price of a bushel of corn by 25 to 50 cents a bushel.

It reduces government farm payments by $5.9 billion over 10 years. The reason for that is it raises the price of corn. Therefore, there are fewer farm bill payments that drain money from the taxpayers, so this is a good thing

for the average taxpayer in the country.

It also reduces the U.S. trade deficit by roughly $34 billion, and this is huge, because what is eating our economy alive is a huge trade deficit at the present time. As we remove ourselves from dependence on foreign oil, which is the main cause of the trade deficit, we begin to see things turn around because of ethanol.

And as I mentioned earlier, it does significantly reduce air pollution. So we think this is a win-win for the American economy, for the American people; and I urge my colleagues to support the higher level of 8 billion gallons of ethanol that is currently in the Senate version of the energy bill.

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

We have actually done some good things for veterans over the last 4 years. I would like to point those out.

We have passed concurrent receipt legislation which we have been trying

to get done for a period of time. Death and survivor benefits have certainly been very helpful to servicemembers over the past 4 years. The VA budget has been increased from $48 billion to $68 billion, a 42 percent increase; and nearly 5 million veterans receive health care benefit services this year, which is about 1 million more than 4 years ago. So many good things have happened.

I realize that the current shortfall is really unacceptable and would like to comment that even though this was due to an actuarial miscalculation, certainly was unintentional and certainly is fixable, we do find that some of our rural veterans are really struggling for health care.

Many of these people have to travel long distances; and the older they get and the sicker they get, the more difficult it is to get them health care. They often have to have a friend, a child, drive them down one day. The next day they come back, and it may be for very routine issues such as blood pressure, adjustment of medications and so on.

What I am saying here at this particular time is that this seems to be a neglected group, and ofttimes our rural veterans are the people who really serve our country in the highest number, highest percentages.

What we would like to propose is that legislation that I have introduced, H.R. 1741, the Rural Veterans Access to Care Act, would establish a pilot program to assist highly rural or geographically remote veterans who are enrolled in the VA and are obtaining primary health care at a medical facility closer to home, in other words, their local hospital. If they need to adjust their medications, they can go and check there, and VA reimburses them for that. This would, I think, in some cases save money. It certainly would provide a lot more services for those who badly need the health care.

I would just like to make that comment, and I thank the gentleman for his time.

Mr. Chairman, this is what the methamphetamine epidemic looked like in 1990. These two States had 20 or more meth labs at that time. This is what the methamphetamine epidemic looked like in 1998. This is what it looked like in 2004. So we can see the spread of meth. I think it is the biggest threat to the United States other than possibly terrorism today.

We have heard statements on the floor tonight that education does not work, advertising does not work. This is a picture of a young lady who started taking meth at age 30. She was arrested every year for 10 years. This is the last picture, and she is in the morgue. She lasted 10 years. This is unusually long on meth.

But when we show these pictures to kids, when we get in the schools; in my district, there are 200 schools. We have been in 100 schools in the last 5 months. When we show this kind of Power Point, it does affect them. We have kids every time come up and say, my folks have been picked up, my folks ran a meth lab; this has affected me.

So I realize that where we are taking the money from is not popular. I hope that in some way we can get this advertising money out there because it does make a difference. This is a critical problem. I appreciate what the gentleman from Indiana is doing and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Larsen) and I would really urge, Mr. Chairman, that some way we get some of this money restored to this program because it is so critical to this Nation at this time.

Mr. Speaker, there has been a great deal of debate on this House floor recently about the war in Iraq and not so much about Afghanistan, interestingly, but certainly about Iraq. Some in Congress are clamoring for us to pull out of Iraq immediately. Some want a timetable indicating a date certain when we will withdraw. Some say there is no plan concerning postwar Iraq, no exit strategy. I would like to address each of these points just briefly.

Number 1, we promised the Iraqi people that we would not pull out prematurely. Remember that back in the Gulf War in the early 1990s, we made a similar promise. We did pull out, and thousands of Iraqis died. We have had a very difficult time regaining their trust since. I think to this point we may have regained some of that status and some of that trust.

A date certain on which we will leave Iraq will encourage insurgents to hang on until that date and then intensify the attacks. I think the date certain of withdrawal will certainly be looked upon by many insurgents as a sign that they were winning, a sign of victory. I am sure they would claim victory at that point.

Also, I think it is important that a withdrawal without victory will dishonor the memories of those who have died and sacrificed, and I, for one, would very much hate to go back and face some of those parents and some of those husbands and wives who have lost soldiers in the war and try to tell them that basically their son, their daughter, their husband, or their wife died for no cause at all. That would be very, very difficult for them to swallow.

Then I think most of us who have been overseas, and a great many Members of Congress have, have been to Iraq and Afghanistan and Kuwait, and Landstuhl in Germany to the hospital, and up to Walter Reed, and one thing that we found almost universally is that our soldiers have tremendous morale. They have a very strong sense of mission, and they have a real sense of purpose. Almost to a person the military personnel that I have talked to would tell you that they absolutely do not want to leave this thing undone. They want to make sure there is a sense of accomplishment and a sense of purpose.

Finally, let us address the issue of no plan, that there is no strategy, no exit plan at all. We might refer to this chart here. One year ago, there was one Iraqi military battalion that was trained and equipped. Now there are more than 100 battalions trained and equipped, and those are reflected over here on this 75,791 total of Ministry of Defense forces. Also, in addition, there are 90,883 policemen and other patrol and security guards that have been trained. So it is a total of 170,000 Iraqis who are currently trained and equipped.

I have been to Iraq where I have seen some of this training occur. I have been to Amman, Jordan, where a lot of the police academies are held. So at the present time we are aiming for 270,000, and we are most of the way there. We still have 100,000 to go, and we are training about 10,000 a month. So that means in about 10 months we will be at roughly 270,000.

General Petraeus says there is no shortage of volunteers; we have more people applying for this position than we have slots to fill them at the present time.

So I think we are in reasonably good shape. The exit strategy is obviously to draw down our forces as the Iraqis are able to take control of the situation, and currently, in almost every military action, Iraqis are out in front. There are many areas of Iraq at the present time where there are no U.S. forces. Iraqi forces are totally in control, not a whole lot of those areas, but there are some. So the Iraqis are assuming more and more responsibility for their own protection. At the present time, there are 21,000 fewer Americans in Iraq than there were in January. So there has been some drawdown at the present time.

One of the wild card situations is the Sunnis. Recently, the Sunnis, it was reported, reached a resolution with the Shias and the Kurds as to their role in government. I think if that can be accomplished, then we are in reasonably good shape for a resolution.

A constitution will be written by August 15. It will be approved by October 15, and a new government will be elected on December 15.

So there is a strategy. Progress is being made. It is a very difficult situation. I really, truly believe all Members, both sides of the aisle, are very much in support of our troops. I think it is important that we support them with our votes, with money, with equipment, and also with our words, because our words that are spoken on this House floor and in the press certainly reverberate around the world and al Jazeera.

So I know our troops very much are hoping that we will show unqualified and tremendous resolution in resolving this issue.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Community Service Block Grant and in opposition to the cuts to this program. The Community Services Block Grant program distributes Federal money to more than 1,100 community action agencies nationwide that use those funds to lessen the effects of poverty.

In my Congressional District, there are six Community Action Agencies: Blue Valley Community Action, Central Nebraska Community Services, Community Action Partnership of Mid-Nebraska, Kearney, Goldenrod Hills Community Services, Northwest Community Action, and Panhandle Community Services. Each of these agencies provide invaluable services to the citizens of Nebraska.

Many people have asked about what CSBG funds do. In short, CSBG funds provide the glue that help Community Action Agencies coordinate funding and services across the spectrum of what families might need. An example of the success of CSBG was shared with me by Shelley Mayhew of the Blue Valley Crisis Intervention. Shelley worked with a young mother with a 5-year-old child who was abandoned, with no money or car, by her abusive and violent fiance.

Unable to search for a job because of her inability to pay for childcare, lack of extended family support, lack of domestic violence services, and her lack of a car, since in rural Nebraska we have no mass transit system, this young mother was referred to Blue Valley Community Action Crisis Intervention. There, through the actions of staff at Blue Valley, the child was enrolled in school, the family received domestic violence counseling and found affordable housing, and the mother found a job that allows her to support her family. Today, this young mother is even enrolled in a program to help her prepare for homeownership. Shelly's caseworker says, ``I watched a family struggling and hopeless become self-sufficient and optimistic about the future. I feel very fortunate to be part of an agency that makes a difference in so many people's lives.''

This is just one story from my Congressional District. CSBG is a true State block grant program that allows States to establish and operate anti-poverty programs that meet the unique needs of their low-income communities. In Nebraska, it is critically important. I hope that the funding for this important program can be restored during the Conference Committee.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me, and I thank him for his work on this bill.

Mr. Chairman, over 36 years of dealing with young people as a coach, recruiting, and as a teacher, I have witnessed an unraveling of our Nation's families. Young people in America currently face more overwhelming obstacles than ever before. Nearly one half of all children grow up without one biological parent or are in some difficult home environment.

The main value of this program, as I see it, Mr. Chairman, is that it does give some very needy children on a college campus great supervision and through the vehicle of sports encourages them to do well in school, provides some character-building experiences. I have experienced personally these programs. I have participated in them; so I see great value and really appreciate the chairman's willingness to at least consider our proposal.

Mr. Speaker, symbols matter. Certainly the cross has special meaning for millions of people. The menorah, the Koran, we saw that recently where false reports on desecration of the Koran led to riots and hundreds of people dying.

The statue sometimes has special meaning. The symbolic meaning of the toppling of the statue of Saddam Hussein was not lost on the Iraqi people or the other people around the world.

Buildings have symbolic value. The buildings that were destroyed or attempted to be destroyed during 9/11 were not randomly chosen. The World Trade Center symbolized the U.S. economy. The Pentagon symbolized our military might; and probably this building was also targeted because it symbolized the government.

And so for millions of Americans, the flag symbolizes the very essence of this country. It is more than fabric. It is what gives this Nation meaning. Millions have fought under this banner. Hundreds of thousands have died under the banner. Many have died on the battlefield simply protecting the flag itself, keeping it from being captured or from even hitting the ground.

And so for 200 years, this was a commonly accepted understanding of the importance of the flag, the symbolic meaning of the flag. And then came two 5-4 Supreme Court decisions in the 1980s which allowed flag desecration under the banner of free speech, which has really offended a great many people in this country. I think an overwhelming number of States, more than 80 percent of U.S. citizens, disagree with those Supreme Court decisions.

So I urge my colleagues to support H.J. Resolution 10, which states, ``The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States of America.''

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner) for his stand on this issue and for giving me this time to express my views.

Mr. Speaker, I hadn't realized the juxtaposition that the speakers would have this evening. But my remarks, I think, dovetail somewhat with the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) in regard to addressing the issue of withdrawing from Iraq and exit strategy and so on. We hear a lot of debate about that.

And I am not here to debate the merits of the war in the Middle East. I am not here to talk about the intelligence leading up to the war, but I would like to address the current reality of the situation, we are there. We made sacrifices. We have lost roughly 1,700 soldiers. We have spent billions of dollars.

And yet as I traveled to the Middle East, I have been to Iraq three times, I have been to Afghanistan once, Kuwait once, I have been amazed at our soldiers' morale. And they often tell me this, they say there are two wars that we are fighting over here, there is the war that we see on CNN, the bombings, the beheadings, and then there is the war that we are actually experiencing.

And I wondered if you please go home and tell the American people what we are seeing and what we feel about the situation. So as far as Afghanistan is concerned, I met with a Colonel this morning who just returned from Afghanistan. We realize we have disrupted the terrorist training camps, their funding for terrorists have been disrupted, the Taliban has been removed, they have a representative government, constitution, and a great leader in Karzai. So we have made considerable progress.

It is not perfect, but things have certainly gone well there. As far as Iraq is concerned, Saddam Hussein has been deposed. And I am the cochair of the Iraqi Womens Caucus. So I meet with Iraqi women in Iraq and also here. And the one thing that they continually tell me is this: They say, you know, Iraq is still a dangerous place. There is a lot of bad things. But for the first time in 30 years, we now have hope. We now see a future. And hope is a very powerful thing.

As far as education is concerned, the school attendance has increased by 80 percent, most of those are young women for the first time going to school. Health care, 97 percent of the young people have been vaccinated for the first time. We all know about the elections and how that empowered the Iraqi people. And one thing that we do not hear much about is economic activity, Iraqi income has doubled in the last year. So a great deal has been accomplished. So as far as the strategy is concerned, or is there an exit strategy, what are we talking about here?

It is very clear. If you talk to General Casey, you talk to General Petraeus, they say here is the objective. We are going to train 270,000 Iraqis. And they will give you charts that show you explicitly that they have trained more than 150,000, and they are armed and they are proficient at this point. So we are training about 10,000 a month. So the math indicates that about 1 year from now we will be at 270,000.

The other thing that has to happen, in addition to the 270,000 trained, is we have to make sure that Iraq can control its own destiny, we have to have a stable government, and we have seen some improvement in that direction as well.

We have seen the Iraqis now out in front in most military actions. There are portions of the country where Iraqis are solely in control militarily. So we see signs that are good. The big question, the wild card at this point is Sunni involvement in the government. And Al Jafari will tell you, General Casey will tell you, we do not know how that is going to go, so we cannot give a precise timetable.

Declaring that we would pull out at a date certain, I think, would be counterproductive. It would be a like giving a playbook to an opponent, as a coach, something you would not do. You would not give insurgents a date certain, where they can wait and say, well, this is the time when a certain amount of troops will be gone and we can go therefore begin to attack, and certainly encourage terrorists.

A young captain in Kuwait told me this. He said, if we pull out prematurely, three things will happen. Number 1, the 1,700 soldiers that we have had killed there will have died in vain, and we will have to tell their families that. Number 2, tens of thousands of Iraqis will be killed in the ensuing conflict, and we promised them, we gave them our word that this would not happen, that we would not pull out prematurely.

And, thirdly, we would have encouraged terrorists around the world. And so it seems to me that the course that we are pursuing, while not perfect, makes some sense, and we definitely do have an exit strategy.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield.

Mr. Chairman, as my colleagues may know, methamphetamine abuse has exploded across the U.S. over the last 15 years. Many States now break up between 500 and 2,500 meth labs per year. Meth is relatively cheap, tremendously addictive, and ofttimes addicts in one exposure. It is available nearly everywhere, particularly in rural areas.

Even though local meth labs are a tremendous problem, most meth comes from the superlabs in Mexico. Mexican superlabs purchase the basic ingredient, either sudafedrine or ephedrine from China, often in amounts of one ton or more. Mexico is currently importing much more ephedrine and sudafedrine than it uses for medical purposes.

The Office of Narcotics and Drug Control Policy released the National Synthetic Drug Action Plan. This plan specifically recommends that the Drug Enforcement Agency and other Federal agencies focus resources on stopping large shipments of sudafedrine from Asia to Mexico which are destined for meth labs.

Law enforcement agencies need to identify and aggressively pursue those responsible for these superlabs, as they now account for more than two-thirds of the meth entering the United States.

I hope that the chairman agrees that Congress needs to work with the administration, Mexico and other countries to reduce pseudoephedrine shipments used to produce meth. I look forward to working with the chairman to address this critical issue.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Terry) for yielding me this time.

I would also like to thank the gentleman from Virginia (Chairman Wolf) for doing an almost impossible job and doing it very well.

Methamphetamine use has increased at an alarming rate in the last 15 years, and these charts illustrate this. This is what meth abuse looked like in 1990. Two States had 20 or more meth labs. In 1998, this is what it looked like, about two-thirds of the country. And this is what it looks like today. Almost the whole country has been inundated by meth.

I would also like to point out what meth does to a human being. It is the most addictive substance known to man. This is a 10-year snapshot of one life. It started out when this young lady was about 30 and ended when she was 40, in the morgue.

We are being inundated by this problem, and we think that we need to reintroduce the Byrne funding and sustain it at $634 million, which was what it was last year. Otherwise, our local law enforcement people will simply be overwhelmed by this problem. We hate to do it in this way. We respect the chairman, but this is about the only course of action that we were given in order to make this in order.

I thank the gentleman, and particularly thank him for organizing this Special Order and for his leadership on this issue. And it is great to see my friend and colleague, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak), and any others who will speak tonight.

Just a little background. Methamphetamine first came into prominence during World War II, and was used probably most prominently by kamikaze pilots. If you want to put a guy in a plane and give him enough fuel to hit a target, but not enough to get back, you had to maybe alter his thinking a little bit. And that is really where methamphetamine was first used and made prominent. At the present time it is rather easy to make and relatively cheap.

The good news is that in many areas we see cocaine and we see heroin decreasing. The bad news is the reason for this is that methamphetamine is so much more powerful and so much more addictive, it simply runs those other drugs out of business. So we are really alarmed by what is happening.

We find methamphetamine is available almost everywhere in our country. In 1990, California had 20 meth labs, Texas had 20, and the rest of the country was relatively unscathed from the meth problem. We will see the progression very rapidly here. In 1998, you can see that about two-thirds of the country had at least 20 meth labs in each one of these red States. It was still relatively uncommon on the east coast and parts of the Great Plains, the northern plains, were not affected.

Now we will look at what has happened more recently, and we see that in 2004, just a corner of the Northeast was pretty much left unscathed. And some of these States, for instance, Missouri, had 2,700 meth labs last year; Iowa, 1,300; Tennessee, 1,300; Oklahoma, 500; Arkansas, 800. Most of these States had 300, 400, 500, or 600 labs. And the important thing to remember is that a high percentage of these labs are not detected. So when we are detecting 400 or 500, that means there are probably three or four or five times that many out there, and these are simply indicators of the use of methamphetamine and how quickly this has spread.

Methamphetamine creates a euphoric state that lasts from 6 to 8 hours. It dumps a huge amount of dopamine, the chemical in the brain that enables us to feel pleasure, and may create as much as 1,000 times the amount of dopamine released into the system as a normal pleasurable experience; like making a free throw or asking somebody out for a date and being accepted, or whatever it may be.

The reason that people get hooked on this stuff is that many times you are addicted on the first occasion. And there are quite a few people who accidentally run into this thing. Maybe they are drinking; maybe somebody gives them something they are not even aware of what it is, and they are hooked. And it takes only, in many cases, one time.

People who are ofttimes addicted are young mothers who are overwhelmed by the chores of taking care of their kids, maybe working two jobs. Sometimes college students are staying up late at night to study; truck drivers. And quite often alcohol is the gateway drug. When somebody is inebriated, sometimes they will take almost anything somebody gives them, and, as a result, they are hooked.

However, what goes up must come down, and the fruits of the continued

use of methamphetamine are anxiety, depression, hallucinations, and, in many cases, it actually results in psychosis. One person who is an expert in this area said it hard-wires the brain to become a paranoid schizophrenic. And if anyone knows much about mental illness, they realize paranoid schizophrenia is probably the most difficult mental illness to kill.

Ofttimes people experience crank bugs. They assume that there is some type of a bug under their skin, so they begin to pick their skin, trying to get the bugs out. So usually people on meth have huge skin lesions and ofttimes do not look very attractive, and, of course, ultimately the final end is death itself.

So why is it important to address this at this point? It is so powerful, it is so addictive, and it always damages the brain. For instance, if you take a brain scan of someone who has been on methamphetamine for 1 year, let us say an 18- or 19-year-old young person has been on meth for 1 year, you will find the brain scan will look almost identical to an 80-year-old Alzheimer's patient. There are that many brain lesions that have been created. Unfortunately, in most cases, those lesions have resulted in irreparable harm. There is nothing you can do to reverse it.

It is cheap and readily available almost everywhere, and this is the result of methamphetamine use. This is a young lady who was first arrested for using meth at about age 30, and then she was arrested each year for the next 10 years. You see the progression of what has happened to her. It was along about in here that the police assumed that she may have began to inject the drug, and from that point she went downhill very, very fast. Usually, the teeth are gone after a period of time. This was the final picture that was taken. It was taken in the morgue. And so she lasted roughly 10 years on this drug, and that is a little unusual. A lot of people who get into it use it heavily and do not last that long. So it is a devastating picture.

Just a few other things I would like to say before I turn it back over to my colleague. Actually, these meth labs are tremendously toxic. It costs about $5,000 to clean up one meth lab. As we said, many of these States have 1,000, 2,000, almost 3,000 meth labs a year to clean up.

One-third of the homes with meth labs in Nebraska were also homes where there were children. So almost all of these children suffer some type of harm from exposure to these chemicals. Much of the child abuse in Nebraska, I would say at least one-half of the child fatalities due to homicide are related to meth addiction. And we had roughly 3,000 young people, kids, in our country this last year who were harmed because they were in a situation where methamphetamine was being manufactured.

Roughly 40 percent of our Federal prison cells are occupied by those people who have been involved in the meth industry. In the State of Nebraska, each meth addict will commit 60 crimes a year to support that habit. So if a small community has 10 meth addicts, that is 600 crimes. So a lot of these communities where at one time left your keys in your car, left your doors unlocked, the whole atmosphere, the whole culture, has had to change.

I ran into a couple of farmers who called the hotline and said they were perplexed. They were having a hard time making it in farming, and somebody dropped by their farm and said if you stay away from your farm this year, do not show up much, you are going to make more money, we will pay you more money than you can ever make farming. They were going to use the barn or a couple of sheds to make methamphetamine. That is how insidious this whole thing is out in the countryside.

We have talked a lot about meth labs, and meth labs may comprise 25 to 30 percent of the total meth used in the United States. Most of it comes from super labs. At one time some came down out of Canada. This has been fairly well shut off, and now most comes from the southwest, most out of Mexico. It is critical that we get a handle on these superlabs, and particularly the pseudoephedrine used to make meth. There are only 7 or 8 countries where pseudoephedrine is made.

In Mexico, there is way more pseudoephedrine coming into that country than they will ever use in cold medicines. Somehow if we can get a handle on where that is going, I think we can begin to get a handle on the superlabs.

Lastly on the Byrne funding, the local law enforcement officers are the first line of defense. They break up the meth labs, but they also pick up the methamphetamine that is coming across Interstate 70, Interstate 80, and I-29. These are the people that have to intercept and interdict methamphetamine or it is not going to be done.

A lot of rural counties in Nebraska, 70 to 80 percent of law enforcement dollars are eaten up by the meth issue. It has become overwhelming. If we do, as is suggested in our upcoming appropriations bill, if we reduce this spending by one-half, and it was already cut in half, so we are down to roughly $300 million instead of $1 billion, we are simply going to be awash in methamphetamine.

I hate to oppose the gentleman from Virginia (Chairman Wolf) on this issue because he has done a remarkable job of working with limited resources. He has been a great friend of law enforcement, but his hands have been tied. Maybe at this point the gentleman's amendment is the only resource that we have, which is to take one-half of one percent of that funding and at least get back to where we were last year, and we are still only half of where we were 2 or 3 years ago.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his amendment and thank the gentleman for hosting this Special Order tonight, and hope we are successful tomorrow.