Floor Statements

Will the gentleman yield?

The gentleman from Florida, Mr. Grayson, is still on the floor. He could have an opportunity to come down and apologize to the House right now for denigrating this discussion, this debate, for debasing Members of not just the House of Representatives, but this entire Nation. It's shameful what's been done.

Mr. Grayson, how about apologizing? Mr. Grayson? Mr. Grayson, how about apologizing?

I thank the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, what a glorious evening it is to come to the floor to remind my colleagues about a little fact and about a little truth. I have heard so many things over the last 15 or 30 minutes, Mr. Speaker, I am not quite certain where to begin.

But I guess I would begin by imploring my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to talk to the Speaker. Goodness gracious, talk to the Speaker. When they talk about expand drilling, oh, they could talk to the President as well, expand drilling. You betcha, Mr. Speaker, you betcha that that's what we want to do is expand drilling.

When they talk about clean coal technology and advancing clean coal technology, you betcha, Mr. Speaker. The problem is, the Speaker of the House and the President of the United States don't support it. That's the problem.

I would encourage them to talk to their own leadership because the principles and the policies that they have just espoused over the last 15 to 30 minutes are as strong as we have on our side of the aisle, the Republican side of the aisle, espoused over the last number of years. I would encourage them to talk to their leadership. I would point out, Mr. Speaker, that one of the things that was said is absolutely correct, and these aren't Democrat problems and these aren't Republican problems. They are American problems.

To that end, I want to talk about what America has been concerned about. Mr. Speaker, if you think about what happened in August in this Nation, all across this Nation, it was a remarkable outpouring, a remarkable outpouring of concern, yes, and of fear, yes, and of anger about the direction in which the American people see their Nation headed.

What they said, I believe, in town hall after town hall and meeting after meeting after meeting was, Washington, you are not listening. You are just not listening. We thought that we were electing change in November of 2008, and, in fact, we have elected change as a Nation.

The problem is the change that's being instituted by my friends on the other side of the aisle and the Speaker and the President are not the change that the American people wanted. That's the problem.

So they come out to these meetings and they come out to talk to their Representatives, if even they will meet with them. So many of my friends on the other side of the aisle refused to hold town hall meetings. But they come out to these meetings and they say, Please, please listen to us. Listen to what we're telling you. Your policies are killing us. They're killing us from an economic standpoint, too many taxes. You're spending our children and our grandchildren's money. You just can't do that. We can't do that at home. You can't do that at the Federal level.

And so what they want are solutions. And my friend on the other side of the aisle earlier talked about solutions. And I'm going to talk a lot--a lot--about solutions this evening, because even this evening my two grand colleagues from Ohio reiterated this fabrication, this falsehood. Oh, yes, Mr. Speaker, something that isn't absolutely the truth when they say that Republicans have no solutions; they don't bring any solutions to the table.

Well, we're going to talk about tonight a couple of solutions just in the area of energy and health policy. And if you, Mr. Speaker, would like to go look at our solutions, they're on our Web site. I'm privileged to chair the Republican Study Committee, the largest caucus in the House of Representatives, that puts solutions on the table for every single American challenge that we face, solutions that embrace fundamental American principles that are optimistic and forward thinking and upbeat and realize that the reason we're the greatest Nation in the history of the world is because we have followed fundamental American principles.

So you can Google Republican Study Committee or go to RSC.price. house.gov--RSC.price.house.gov--and look at our solutions. Look at our solutions for an economy that we've seen a nonstimulus bill that is driving more individuals into unemployment, that is losing 4 million jobs just in this year alone.

Look at our solutions, which is the contrast to a budget that was passed by this House of Representatives that spends money that we don't have, borrowed from the Chinese Government; money that makes us $1 trillion in debt year after year after year after year. And the American people are fed up with it, Mr. Speaker.

Look at our solutions that say that the way to be able to utilize American resources responsibly so that we solve the energy challenges that we have, there's a way to do that that makes it so that the government isn't put in charge and also so that we aren't taxing the American people to death.

Mr. Speaker, look at the solutions at RSC.price.house.gov for the health care

challenges that we face that we will be talking about a little more this evening.

I want to start with the health care issues because one of the things that drove me into public service after 20 years of practicing medicine--Mr. Speaker, I took care of folks who had broken bones and battered bodies as an orthopedic surgeon for over 20 years. I took care of them the best way I knew how and the best training that I was able to avail myself of, and I took care of them in a way that oftentimes led me to believe that the State government and the Federal Government were impacting the ability of myself and my staff in an adverse way--in an adverse way, not a positive way--in an adverse way to be able to care for those patients.

So my friends on the other side of the aisle, the presentation that we just saw, Mr. Speaker, the gentleman had six Ps. I only caught five of them. But they were: People, portability, preexisting conditions, physicians, and prevention.

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that none of those--none of those challenges that the gentleman from Ohio described--none of them are improved by the intervention of the Federal Government. Not one. Not one.

So when I talk about principles in the area of health care, which is what I think we need to be talking about here in the United States House of Representatives and the Congress of the United States and by the President, we ought to be talking about principles of health care so that we create a system that is responsive to patients. That's the goal. Correct, Mr. Speaker? Responsive to patients.

When we talk about principles, most of us have the top three. Most Americans have the top three principles. They're affordability. You ought to be able to afford the system that we create. Accessibility. You ought to be able to get into the system if you're a patient. And quality. You want the highest quality of care in the world, which is in fact what we have right now.

I add three more principles to those: affordability, accessibility and quality. I add three. One is responsiveness. You have got to be able to have a system that's responding to people, which is so often not the case in other nations where they have systems that are taken over by the government.

The second is innovation. We are a Nation that has allowed for the greatest amount of innovation in the world--in the world--in the area of health care. That has resulted in the highest quality of care for all of our citizens, for every single American. So we want a system that creates and incentivizes innovation.

Third and finally, choices. The American people want choices when it comes to health care. They want to be able to choose their doctor; they want to be able to choose where they're treated. They want to able to choose when they're treated and how they're treated. And that ought to be their right. That ought to be their right.

So principles of health care--affordability, accessibility, quality, responsiveness, innovation, choices. Those six principles, Mr. Speaker. And you may have some others, the people listening may have some others.

I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that those six principles, and the ones that were outlined by my friend from Ohio just a little bit earlier this evening, that none of those principles are improved by the intervention of the Federal Government. Think about it. Accessibility to the system. The Federal Government runs basically four specific medical programs: Medicare, Medicaid, the VA Health Service, and the Indian Health Service.

Accessibility. All of those systems have some kind of rationing of care. You don't have to take my word for it. Talk to anybody who works in those systems. When I worked in the VA Medical Center in Atlanta, we would get to a point every single quarter when they would say, I'm sorry, you can't perform any more total joint surgeries this quarter. And it wasn't because we'd run out of total joints; it wasn't because we'd run out of prostheses. It wasn't because we'd run out of patients for whom the indication was to provide them with a total joint.

No, Mr. Speaker, it was because we had run out of money. And that's because when you get a government-run system, what happens is that the decisions are controlled by money; they're not controlled by patients and by quality. Accessibility is limited in every one of those.

For example, the Mayo Clinic, one of the finest health care providers in the Nation, in Jacksonville, Florida, is limiting the number of Medicare patients that it sees. Limiting the number of Medicare patients that it sees. Why? Not because they forgot how to take care of seniors. No, it's because the system is broken and flawed.

That's what happens with a government system, is that it limits accessibility. When veterans in our veterans health care system call up for an appointment, are they given the appointment in the way that happens in a personal or a private setting? No, because accessibility is limited in a government health care system, not just in the United States, but in every other system in the world that is run by the government. It's limited. Accessibility is limited.

So affordability is compromised; accessibility is compromised. Quality is compromised because of those first two. Responsiveness and innovation, certainly not consistent with anything that the Federal Government does with responsiveness and innovation. No, we know that responsiveness is in the private personal sector. We know that innovation is in the private personal sector, not in the governmental sector. Certainly, the government tries to catch up. And sometimes it does with relative efficiency. But it doesn't do so initially because there's nothing, nothing in the Federal Government that demands that you have responsiveness and innovation.

And then the final principle of choices. The Federal Government and choices are inconsistent with each other because the Federal Government defines what individuals ought to do, defines what individuals must do, and determines basically what is available to people. And if it's available in something that doesn't mean anything to folks by and large, it doesn't really make a whole lot of difference.

But in the area of health care, in the area of medicine, in the area of personal decisions that make it so that you are able to care for you and your family in the most personal and effective way, the government has no place in those decisions.

The government has no place in those decisions, Mr. Speaker, none. And they ought not. So our friends on the other side of the aisle say, Oh, no, the government is the only entity that can provide the balance to this equation. Mr. Speaker, you know that the balance in this equation in the area of health care means that individuals will not receive the kind of care that they desire, not receive the kind of care that they and their families choose for themselves. They'll receive the kind of care that the government chooses for them, but they won't receive the kind of care that they and their families desire.

In the fall of 2009, nothing could be more important here in Washington and here in the United States Congress as we try to talk productively about this issue that is of such incredible importance to the American people. One of the greatest concerns that I have is that at least half, and maybe more--at least half of the Members of Congress have been shut out of this debate. I mentioned that I'm privileged to Chair the Republican Study Committee, the largest caucus in the House of Representatives. We have attempted to solicit and take the President at his word when he said, If you have an idea, if you'd like to discuss the issues that we have before us in the area of health care, come on down to the White House. My door's open. Right, Mr. Speaker? That's what he said. My door's open. Come on down, and we'll go over the bill line by line.

Well, Mr. Speaker, this may come as a surprise to some folks, but we, the Republican Study Committee, have been asking for a meeting with the President of the United States since the week he was sworn into office. And the response every single week has been, Well, thank you very much. This is an incredibly important issue. There are nine Members of our conference who are physicians, like I am, who have significant passion about the

issue of health care and the reason that we ought not put the government in charge. Our friends on the other side of the aisle say cavalierly, Well, you just ought to let the government compete for this.

The fact of the matter is, Mr. Speaker, if the government competes for it, it drives over 100 million individuals, over 100 million Americans from personal, private health insurance that they choose, that they select for themselves and their families. It drives them, it shoves them, it forces them into the government program. Mr. Speaker, that's not what you want, or at least that's not what you say you want. That's not what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle say they want, by and large. But that's the system that we're going to have if, in fact, the Speaker of the House and the President have their way.

So we've got some incredibly important issues to discuss here in the United States House of Representatives. I'm joined this evening by a great friend and colleague, the gentlelady from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx) who has been front and center on the health care issue and on the energy issue. I know that she has been frustrated by much of the information we have heard this evening, especially in the area of energy policy, because we have been fighting tooth-and-nail to make certain that we could put forward an all-of-the-above energy strategy. My friends on the other side of the aisle earlier this evening talked about the lack of solutions that we have. So I'm pleased to yield to my friend from North Carolina, Virginia Foxx, for her comments on energy or whatever else she would like to chat about this evening.

Will the gentlelady yield?

I appreciate those comments because I was stunned as I was sitting here, listening to the gentleman from Ohio say--and I wrote it down just because I was so astounded--say that we ought to increase our use of ``coal, nuclear and oil shale.'' He said that, and in fact, that is exactly the opposite thing that his party has done; isn't that the truth?

Thank you ever so much, my dear friend from North Carolina, Ms. Foxx, who outlines very specific and clear and cogent discussion points in the area both of energy policy and in health care policy.

I think one of the important takeaways that I would offer in the area of energy policy is that we have been talking about and desirous of what we call an all-of-the-above energy solution that our friends on the other side talk about but, in fact, they have never voted for or introduced policy legislation that would accomplish that. And by ``all of the above,'' we mean sincerely that America has been blessed with incredible resources, remarkable resources, and that we ought to be able to utilize them in a very environmentally responsible and sound way.

What does that mean? That means that offshore from the United States, there are resources that we can utilize. Onshore there are oil resources that we ought to be able to utilize: oil shale technology that allows us to gain the fossil fuels from oil shale; shale out west, to be able to use that and supply the American people with appropriate resources in the area of oil; clean coal technology, which my friend from North Carolina discussed and our friends on the other side talk about but, in fact, they vote against every time it comes up; and then nuclear technology.

We ought to be able to use increasing nuclear resources to be able to provide energy for the American people. And we ought to be able to do so not just because it's the right thing to do for our Nation, not just because it's available to us and the good Lord has blessed us with this remarkable knowledge and expertise and resource base, but because in so doing, we make it so that we're not helping people across the world who don't like us. There are people that we are supporting to a huge degree, the Government of Venezuela, which is headed by an individual that has absolute animosity for the United States. There are governments in the Middle East that we are sending literally hundreds of billions of dollars to that are not fond of the United States or our government or our people.

We ought not be utilizing American resources, American tax money, American labor, and ingenuity to fund folks who don't care for us. That is just wrong. If it were the only option available, that would be one thing, but it is not. There are wonderful resources that we have, but we are blocked by the Democrats in charge and the majority party. And that is wrong.

The President has said over and over again that he doesn't believe that we ought to utilize our resources in this way. As the gentlelady from North Carolina says, he wants to double wind and solar energy. That is fine. That is great. But it will be ultimately 6 to 8 percent of the energy utilization of this Nation. That is not going to get us over the hurdle. It is not going to get us where we need to be.

So on the one hand, we need to conserve more. Absolutely. We need to utilize American resources for Americans. That is a responsible thing to do. That is a common sense thing to do. One would think if one was elected to the United States House of Representatives or the Senate that one would have that as a responsible feature of their policy, to utilize American resources for Americans. And we ought to be able to incentivize the creation of the new form of energy without the government picking winners and losers. That is a responsible energy policy. That is an all-of-the-above energy policy. That is an energy policy that we have been clamoring for for years, literally, and

have been blocked at every single turn by our friends on the other side of the aisle in their beholden nature to folks who would not allow us to use American resources.

I want to talk a little more about the issue of health care because it is driving the entire debate here in Washington today.

I have talked about principles in health care: accessibility, affordability, quality, responsiveness, innovation, and choices, and that none of those principles are improved by the intervention of the Federal Government.

I don't think there is a single American who sincerely believes that they are improved by more imposition of rules from Washington. So if you believe that, if we believe that, then the President would have us believe there are only two alternatives, that it is either the government in charge or it is the insurance companies in charge.

Well, Mr. Speaker, that is a false choice. That is a false premise. In fact, it is not just the government in charge or the insurance companies in charge; in fact there is a better way. There is the right way. There is the correct way, and that is to put patients and their families in charge.

How do you do that, to put patients and their families in charge so that accessibility, affordability, quality, responsiveness, innovation, and choices are all improved? In fact, all of the principles in health care are improved if the patients are in charge. In fact, the system moves in the direction that it ought to move, and the direction that our health care system ought to move isn't the direction I, as a physician or Member of Congress believe it ought to move; it isn't the direction that you believe it ought to move; it isn't the direction in which our collective intelligence here in the House believes it ought to move. The direction that it ought to move in is the direction that patients want it to move. The only way to do that is to allow patients to control the system.

Mr. Speaker, the bill that will do that is H.R. 3400. You can go to the Web site for the Republican Study Committee, rsc.price.house.gov. Look it up. It is right there. There is a side-by-side with H.R. 3200, which is Speaker Pelosi and the Democrats in charge here in the House, their monstrosity, a 1,000-plus-page bill. Or there is a responsible way to do it, H.R. 3400.

Now what does H.R. 3400 do? Well, it does five big things very specifically, in addition to a lot of other things, but five big things.

One is that it gets Americans insured. It is imperative that we make certain that those individuals who are unable or appear to have the lack of resources to be able to finance health coverage for themselves or their family have the wherewithal to do that. How do you do that as a good conservative? Well, you make it so for every single American it makes financial sense to be insured. Americans are bright people. They are making financial decisions right now not to be insured. So we devise a system, create the rules of a system that will respond to patients that will make it so each and every American citizen sits down at the end of the day and when they are doing their budget, they realize that it makes more sense for them financially to be insured than not.

You do that through a series of tax deductions, tax credits, refundable tax credits, advanceable refundable tax credits, tax equity for the purchase of insurance so that individuals are able to purchase insurance with pretax dollars, just like businesses, instead of post- tax dollars. So you get folks insured.

Secondly, you have to solve the challenges of the health insurance system right now. There are wonderful things about our health care system, but there also some things that are flawed. Those flawed things we ought to solve, and they are relatively easy to solve.

For example, the two main issues, portability, you ought not lose your insurance if you change your job or you lose your job. It ought not be the case. Preexisting injury or illness. If you happen to have a diagnosis that results in a major calamitous event for you or your family from a medical standpoint, or you have an injury that results in a major expenditure, you ought not be priced out of the market. You ought not lose your insurance. That is wrong.

So how do you solve that? Well, you make it so that individuals own and control their insurance policy so they can take it with them if they lose their job or they change their job. In addition to that, you make it so Americans can pool together with millions of other people for the purchase of insurance. So you get the purchasing power of millions even if you are one individual or a small group or small business or small employer in that market to purchase health insurance. So you solve those challenges. You get people insured, and you solve the insurance challenge.

Third is to make absolute certain that it is patients and their families and doctors who are making medical decisions. Not government bureaucrats, not insurance bureaucrats, not anybody else.

Medical decisions are some of the most personal decisions we ever make in our lives for ourselves and for our family. We ought to have the right, we do have the right, but we ought to be able to exercise the right of making those decisions ourselves.

It is a sad commentary, Mr. Speaker, right now in America that in order to get that accomplished you have to write that into law. That is a sad commentary, but it is where we find ourselves right now. So H.R. 3400 says that, that nobody else in the Federal Government or the insurance industry will be able to make decisions as it relates to the provision of medical services and care for individuals or members of their family.

Fourth, we solve the issue of lawsuit abuse. Lawsuit abuse, the lottery mentality that we have created in our society that makes it so that individuals believe if they just hit the right note, if they just are able to find the right cause of action against a physician or hospital, they might make millions. That results in the practice of defensive medicine. And the practice of defensive medicine are those tests and examinations that your doctor performs or orders in order to make certain, make absolute certain to as much scientific certainty as one can that the diagnosis or procedure he or she proposes for a patient and then carries out is backed up by all of the knowledge and evidence that is available to them so that if they find themselves in a court of law at some point they can look at the judge and jury and say look, I did every one of these things to make certain what I proposed to do and what I did was appropriate for this patient. And the judge and the jury nod their head and say, yes, he or she did.

It doesn't make any difference whether the first two of those things were what was necessary to perform the diagnosis or cure the patient, the next 15 or 16 were redundant; but that is the practice of defensive medicine. Hundreds of billions of dollars each year, and it is not necessarily that it harms the patient, because it doesn't; but it makes it so that the system spends so much more money than it has to in order to provide the care that it currently provides because of the lawsuit abuse that we have.

Mr. Speaker, so we can have everybody insured. We can solve the insurance challenges. We can make certain that medical decisions are made in their rightful place, that is, between patients and families and doctors; and we can solve the whole issue of lawsuit abuse.

And the fifth item in H.R. 3400 is that we can do all of those things that would solve 99 percent-plus of the challenges that we face in health care, all of those things we can solve without raising taxes one penny. Not one penny.

So, Mr. Speaker, when we look at 3400 and when we compare it to the bill that has been passed through three committees here in the House of Representatives by the Democrats in charge, a $1.3 trillion monstrosity, a 1,000-plus-page monstrosity that results in an $800 billion tax increase and a $500 billion slash to Medicare programs-- when you look at that, that's why the American people are confounded, they're confused. They don't understand what's going on because they know that that's not the solution. They know that the majority party-- the Democrats in charge, the Democrats in power--are taking us down a path that is not consistent with what they believe.

They cry out, clamor, and have said over August and earlier this month, Why aren't you listening to us? Why aren't you listening to us?

So that is why the opportunity that we have in this Chamber and in the Senate, right down the hall here in the Capitol, to solve the challenges that we face in positive ways that make fundamental American principles come to the table is so wonderful. We've got a great opportunity. In fact, we're ignoring that right now because of the leadership that we have--because of the lack of leadership from this Speaker and from this Congress to allow to be put in place the positive solutions that are available to us as a Nation.

My friend from North Carolina is kind enough to stick around and to remain here for these discussions. I'm happy to yield to her.

Thank you so much, my friend from North Carolina, Congresswoman Foxx, for your wonderful expertise and comments.

You alluded to significant misinformation on this issue, and there is a lot of misinformation out there. It's no wonder that the American people find themselves somewhat confused.

One of the problems that I have found is that one of the greatest purveyors of misinformation happens to be the President of the United States, himself. Again, you don't have to just believe me. I have a letter from the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, responding to President Obama's remarks about amputations, remarks which some of you may recall. The President has insisted on saying that physicians make financial decisions, and that's why they do things in treating patients, which is abhorrent to members of the medical profession. The oath that they take, as you said, Ms. Foxx, is, first, to do no harm.

The President, as you recall, Mr. Speaker, said sometime about 6 to 8 weeks ago that we have a system that doesn't allow or doesn't incentivize the treatment of a diabetic limb disease and then rewards by providing 30 or 40 or $50,000 in compensation for surgeons to take off a limb, amputate a limb.

Mr. Speaker, I was struck by that, because when I first heard it I was astounded. In fact, what it showed me was that the President has no clue about what it means to take care of patients and the incentives that go into caring for patients, not a clue.

I was so heartened when I read a letter from Dr. Joseph D. Zuckerman, who is the president of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, that I would submit for the Record, dated August 13, 2009, in which he said to the President:

``Dear Mr. President:

``On behalf of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS), I am writing to express our profound disappointment with your recent comments regarding the value of surgery and blurring the realities of physician reimbursements. The AAOS represents

more than 17,000 U.S. board-certified orthopaedic surgeons who provide essential services to patients every day. As you yourself have said, `Where we do disagree, let's disagree over things that are real, not these wild misrepresentations that bear no resemblance to anything that's actually been proposed.' In that spirit, we would like to bring some clarity to your comments and underscore the value that orthopaedic surgeons bring to Americans every day of every year.

``First, surgeons are not reimbursed by Medicare, nor by any provider for that matter, for foot amputations at rates anywhere close to $50,000, $40,000 or even $30,000. Medicare reimbursements to physicians for foot amputations range from approximately $700 to $1,200, which includes the follow-up care the surgeon provides the patient [for] up to 90 days after the operation. Moreover, orthopaedic surgeons are actively involved in the preventive care that you mentioned. We are a specialty that focuses on limb preservation whenever possible and when it is in the best interests of the patient. Our approach to amputation follows the same careful, thoughtful approach, always with the patient's best interest as the primary focus.

``It is also a mischaracterization to suggest that physicians are reimbursed `immediately.' The AAOS itself, along with numerous other organizations, has testified in congressional hearings investigating the delays in reimbursement by Medicare and other payers that create additional administrative burdens making it more difficult to provide access to care for patients.

``As you continue to pursue your health care reform agenda, we implore you to disengage from hyperbole,'' and it goes on.

[From AAOS Now, Sept. 2009]

August 13, 2009.

AAOS Responds to Obama's Amputation Remarks

President Barack Obama,

The White House,

Washington, DC.

Dear Mr. President: On behalf of the American Academy of

Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS), I am writing to express our

profound disappointment with your recent comments regarding

the value of surgery and blurring the realities of physician

reimbursements. The AAOS represents more than 17,000 U.S.

board-certified orthopaedic surgeons who provide essential

services to patients every day. As you yourself have said,

``Where we do disagree, let's disagree over things that are

real, not these wild misrepresentations that bear no

resemblance to anything that's actually been proposed.'' In

that spirit, we would like to bring some clarity to your

comments and underscore the value that orthopaedic surgeons

bring to Americans every day of every year.

First, surgeons are not reimbursed by Medicare, nor by any

provider for that matter, for foot amputations at rates

anywhere close to $50,000, $40,000, or even $30,000. Medicare

reimbursements to physicians for foot amputations range from

approximately $700 to $1,200, which includes the follow-up

care the surgeon provides to the patient [for] up to 90 days

after the operation. Moreover, orthopaedic surgeons are

actively involved in the preventive care you mention. We are

a specialty that focuses on limb preservation whenever

possible and when it is in the best interests of the patient.

Our approach to amputation follows the same careful,

thoughtful approach, always with the patient's best interest

as the primary focus.

It is also a mischaracterization to suggest that physicians

are reimbursed ``immediately.'' The AAOS itself, along with

numerous other organizations, has testified in Congressional

hearings investigating the delays in reimbursement by

Medicare and other payers that create additional

administrative burdens making it more difficult to provide

access to care for patients.

As you continue to pursue your health care reform agenda,

we implore you to disengage from hyperbole and acknowledge

that health care delivery can only be improved by recognizing

that health care is a system in which orthopaedic surgeons

play a crucial role. With $849 billion of our national

economy impacted by musculoskeletal conditions, orthopaedic

surgeons provide care that improves lives and puts peoplg

back to work. Pediatric orthopaedic surgeons provide life-

altering care to our nation's children and play an invaluable

role in ensuring Medicaid patients have access to needed

services. Military and civilian orthopaedic surgeons provide

care to our service women and men, which preserves limbs and

has improved survival rates over past conflicts. Orthopaedic

trauma surgeons perform limb- and life-saving procedures and

help to ensure that our communities have the medical services

that we all deserve. Total hip and knee replacement surgeries

are now two of the most successful operations in medicine

through a predictable reduction in pain, restoration of

function, and return of patients to both work and activities

of daily living. And we are working every day to ensure that

medicine provides Americans with disabilities the quality of

life to which they are entitled.

The AAOS is committed to improving the American health care

delivery system and increasing health care coverage. The most

expedient way to accomplish your goal is to ensure that the

debate is based in fact and reflects the value of the

services that all physicians, including orthopaedic surgeons,

provide. We request a meeting with you and your staff at your

earliest convenience to discuss these important issues.

Sincerely,

Joseph D. Zuckerman, MD,

President, American Academy

of Orthopaedic Surgeons.

Mr. Speaker, it is remarkable that the leader of this Nation continues to suggest, as do our friends on the other side of the aisle and the majority party, that the quality of health care that's provided in this Nation is not of the highest quality in the world. In fact, it is.

If you look at disease-specific criteria, whether it's cancer or heart disease or diabetes or trauma or virtually any disease you can think of, Americans have the highest quality of care related to that specific diagnosis than anywhere in the world. It's why my friend from North Carolina said that when people are injured or have a disease from somewhere else in the world, they come, they flock to the United States by the hundreds of thousands to get care. And in this whole discussion about health care, to denigrate the care that's provided by compassionate and caring physicians and other providers around this Nation does a disservice to the debate and it makes it so that we are not talking about real things, about real things that affect real people.

So I implore the President, I call on the President, I call on the Speaker, I call on my friends on the other side of the aisle to know of which you speak when you are talking about health care, to make certain that when you are talking about issues that relate to accessibility for patients and affordability for patients and quality of care and responsiveness of a system and innovation in a system and choices that patients must have in order to gain the highest quality of care and the care that's most appropriate for them and their families.

Because, Mr. Speaker, as you may know, and as I hope the President now recognizes, that a given diagnosis in one patient doesn't necessarily mean that the same diagnosis in another patient is followed up with the same treatment, because no two people are the same. It's what this whole debate ignores. No two American citizens, no two individuals in this world, given the same diagnosis, regardless of that diagnosis, are absolutely the same, and the treatment that those individuals ought to receive ought to be determined by patients, those patients, and their families and caring and compassionate physicians.

This notion by the Secretary of Health and Human Services, by the President of the United States, by the Speaker of this House and by members of the majority party that somehow you could come up with some algorithm that if you just answer the questions correctly and march through the maze that the American people will be better served, Mr. Speaker, you know that's not true and I know that's not true.

When we come to this House, when we come to the United States Senate and we recognize that there are challenges that we face in the health care arena, we ought to come together as Americans and solve this challenge in a way that respects those principles of health care and respects the fundamental American principles that have allowed us to become the greatest nation in the history of mankind.

I look forward to that debate. I look forward to that discussion, and I look forward to being able to vote and have all Members of this body vote on a bill that will reform our health care system in a positive and productive way.

Madam Chairman, here we are again--growing government. The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, an Orwellian title to say the least, marks the culmination of a 44-year journey to finally end the private student lending system, but is doing so in the midst of the worst economic downturn in generations.

Now, perhaps my friends on the other side didn't notice this fact, but they must be ignoring that there are more than 14 million Americans unemployed on their watch. This legislation has real consequences for the economy, specifically in regard to job losses.

Based on an employment survey of private lending loan participants, conducted jointly by the Consumer Bankers Association, the Education Finance Council and the National Council of Higher Education Loan Programs, this plan targets and may eliminate up to 30,000 private- sector jobs. So nearly every State could expect to see job losses when the Democrats ``invest in education.''

Remember, this is in the midst of the worst economic downturn in generations. It really has reached a point where the question has got to be asked: Is there any sector of the economy that the Democrats aren't planning to have the government control and dominate? Taking over the entire student lending system is just the latest example after health care, the national energy tax, financial institutions, and auto bailouts. Madam Chair, you could go on and on and on.

The other side is clearly more committed to creating more bureaucracy than in preserving jobs, and more bureaucracy is exactly what happens when you have a public option in this or in any other arena.

The finances, as my friend from Wisconsin talked about, would be laughable if they weren't so serious. Ten new entitlement programs convert the Perkins Loan Program from a discretionary program to a mandatory program. They create a new college access and completion fund with four new programs, costing $3 billion.

It creates a new $4.9 billion mandatory fund program to modernize, renovate, and repair public elementary and secondary schools. That's right, Madam Chair. It's Federal money for building local schools. They create the 70th--get that, Madam Chair-- the 70th program for early learning programs in this Nation at a cost of $8 billion. You'd think we could have relied on the previous 69. It's a bad idea, even after 44 years, whose time has not come.

I thank my friend from Alabama for yielding me time and for leading on this issue. What we hear from the other side of the aisle is this famous old phrase ``trust us,'' right? Now we know that folks on the other side don't have any real reluctance to have the government run things. We've seen it over and over and over again. In fact, we've just heard it from one of the speakers who said, We don't want to run private companies, and then he followed that up and said, But this is only part of what we need to do.

Mr. Speaker, the bill has language in it that would, in effect, allow the Federal Government to determine pay, compensation for employees; and that might be all right if it was just companies that were receiving tax money. That might be okay. But in fact, it's not. It is so many other companies. Covered financial institutions, the definition in the bill would expose companies like CVS Caremark--that's right, drugstores--WellCare Health Plans, Value Line, Textron, McGraw-Hill Companies, Medco Health Solutions, Lowe's Corporation.

Mr. Speaker, this is another far reach by the Democrats in charge who believe that the government knows best, not just about automobile companies, not just about energy companies, not just about how to spend your money, not just about your health care--they're working on that government-run health care plan--but also private companies across this land. They believe that they ought to be able to come in and say, Okay, this is what you can make, and this is what you can't make.

If you don't believe it, just read the bill. Nobody is concerned about having shareholders give their opinions, have a say about what executives make when shareholders own part of that company. That makes a whole lot of sense. But what we do have concerns about, grave concerns, is the intervention of the Federal Government into one business after another after another. This is just another example of that. It's a terrible idea. It strikes at the very core of the free market principles that have made us the greatest Nation in the history of the world. Bad idea, Mr. Speaker. Vote ``no''.

Mr. Speaker, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Speaker, the debate on this amendment is very appropriate and germane to the actions of this entire Congress. The amendment that was offered in committee in good faith, to try to make certain that there weren't any changes that could be made retroactively to compensation packages and incentive pay, was very specific.

It said that no compensation of any executive having been approved by a majority of the shareholders may be subject to any callback, which is the retroactivity, unless it was part of the contract or unless there had been fraud committed. And that's what was accepted by committee, Mr. Speaker, accepted by committee.

The amendment was put into the bill with the caveat that the chairman wanted, potentially, a few changes. And I would quote from the chairman, who said, The impulse to retroactivity is not one of our finest and ought to be constrained. And he said, We could

work together to make sure this does not derogate from the SEC prospectively to say that you can't do this kind of thing.

Well, Mr. Speaker, I'm here to tell you that there weren't any discussions before the Rules Committee met. There weren't any discussions before the amendment that we now have before us was offered as the apparently good-faith effort to the amendment that was offered and adopted in a bipartisan manner majority in the committee. And what does the new amendment say? It says, No regulation promulgated pursuant to this section shall require the recovery of incentive-based compensation under compensation arrangements in effect as of the date of the enactment of this act.

Now, what does that mean? Well, it means that the SEC, that is the Federal Government, Mr. Speaker, will be able to dictate pay, dictate pay because of the language of this amendment, to publicly held companies. Now, that may be okay if they take tax money, Federal tax money, but this would be publicly traded companies that don't take a dime of tax money.

Mr. Speaker, this is a huge step in the wrong direction. Section 4 is the area of this bill that we have great concerns about. It puts the Federal Government, it puts the SEC into the agreements for compensation for executives in publicly traded companies. It cuts at the very core of our free market system.

I would urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Will the gentleman yield?

Given the agreement that you and I have reached on language, what is the posture about changing the language on this amendment? Is that a unanimous consent?

Mr. Speaker, until that language has been introduced, I will reserve the balance of my time.

Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

Has the language that has been offered at the desk been introduced as business allows?

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman, the chairman, for his desire and willingness to work together on this.

That being said, the challenges with section 4 are huge. The far reach of the SEC and the ability of the Federal Government now to get into the executive compensation packages for businesses for which there is no Federal money involved is remarkable in its extent. As we know, the Democrat majority has a great desire to have the government everywhere in our lives, whether it's in financial institutions, whether it's in energy companies or whether it's that the American people have to pay to turn on and off their light switches.

I just picked up the paper this morning, Mr. Speaker, and saw that there is an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal which talks about health reform and cancer and about how, if the Federal Government is allowed to control health care, it may result in decreasing innovation in the area of cancer.

I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that if the Federal Government is allowed in this arena that what we will see is a huge, depressing effect on the ability of businesses all across this land to be

able to create the most vibrant, entrepreneurial and active businesses that inure to the benefit of the American people, that create jobs and that allow us to remain the greatest Nation in the history of the world. It's just little bits that chip away at the fabric of our Nation that make it so that it is impossible to continue to compete on an international basis.

So, Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that the chairman was willing to clarify the amendment. However, it still gets to the heart of whether or not we are going to allow the Federal Government into decisions that ought to be left in a free market and in a private-sector arrangement, so I urge the defeat of the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, there's a health care bill that the Democrats have proposed here in the House that would have a major impact on the way that health care is provided in this Nation.

One of the areas that hasn't been talked about a lot is long-term care. Specifically, the CLASS Act, Community Living Assisted Services and Supports Act, is included, which would mandate government- sponsored, long-term care insurance on all Americans. Now, unfortunately, the $50-a-day allocation for long-term care insurance is only a portion of the actual cost for the long-term care. Consequently, this is a huge unfunded mandate on who, Mr. Speaker? On you, the American people.

Instead, Congress should consider positive solutions which would make long-term care insurance more accessible by allowing it to be covered under FSAs and cafeteria plans and other patient-centered plans. Without a doubt, Americans need a plan in advance for long-term care. They should be allowed to work with family and trusted advisers to ensure their long-term needs are covered. The government should not limit the type of long-term care Americans may select.

This is just another example of the government telling people what kind of care they should need and may receive.

Mr. Speaker, before I came to Congress I spent 20-plus years as a physician taking care of folks in the north Atlanta area, so this whole debate about the health care bill, there are many aspects of it that give me great concern. And the fact of the matter is, Mr. Speaker, there are many aspects of it that give the Nation great concern.

So whether it's the government-run program or the takeover of health care or whether it's the potential for huge mandates from the Federal Government, many aspects point to areas of different concern for the American people. And one of them is the issue of rationing, the issue of whether or not the Federal Government should be deciding to what extent which Americans receive medical care.

So earlier this year when there was a proposal that was passed in this House and in the Senate signed by the President for something called the Comparative Effectiveness Research Council, fancy name for a potential rationing board, many people voiced concerns about that, as did I.

And what we heard from the other side of the aisle, the majority party, the Democrats, they said, Don't worry about that. There will be congressional oversight. Congress will be able to hold their feet to the fire. Well, Mr. Speaker, what's now come out is that may not be the case.

The IMAC program, or the Independent Medicare Advisory Council, is a proposal that is being added to the current health care bill that would create a new Presidentially appointed board empowered to make recommendations on cost savings proposals. These are very, very personal medical decisions that we're talking about here, and cost savings proposals oftentimes means rationing.

This proposal in the health care bill right now would eliminate all congressional oversight of the Medicare program and put it in the hands of, you guessed it, the White House and the President. It creates a new executive branch agency with unelected board members appointed by the President to make recommendations on the reductions in Medicare payment levels, reimbursement for providers, potentially refusing to pay for services or care prescribed by doctors as they are deemed not to be ``cost efficient.'' That's the language, Mr. Speaker.

The bill says that the reforms must ``either improve the quality of medical care received by the beneficiaries of the Medicare program or,'' not and, ``improve the efficiency of the Medicare program's operation.''

Mr. Speaker, this is extremely concerning. This Congress has created the Comparative Effectiveness Resources Board that will have the power to ration care based on cost or quality. It would make the board's recommendations binding in the absence of action by Congress within 30 days if the President approved the recommendation.

Now, many Members of Congress are concerned about payment rates in rural parts of the country, yet this board eliminates State and community input into the Medicare program by rendering irrelevant the influence of local Medicare Carrier Advisory Communities, or MCACs, to develop and implement policies expressly applicable to their patient population.

Further, it would reduce the availability of patient advocacy groups to implement new policies that would improve the health care of our Nation's seniors.

The real concern as a physician is that nonmedical people will be making medical decisions. It's a terrible idea. It's not what the American people want, and they are actually waking up to the proposal that's before Congress right now. And that's why you see the numbers of support across this land decreasing.

Let's move in a positive direction. There is a positive direction, and that is to allow quality decisions, medical decisions to be made between patients and their families and caring and compassionate physicians. It's a simple way to do it, not put it in the hands of a bureaucrat, not put it in the hands of the White House, not put it in the hands of the President. Let patients and doctors decide.

Mr. Speaker, that's the right way. Mr. Speaker, that's the American way.

Mr. Speaker, on rollcall Nos. 677 and 678 I was inadvertently detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``no'' on No. 677 and ``no'' on No. 678.

Mr. Speaker, what was one of the major concerns with the nonstimulus spending bill and the national energy tax that have flown through the House? Well, you know what it was, Mr. Speaker. Nobody read the bill. So what should we do with this health care bill? Well, I would suggest that we read the bill; and as somebody has said already, There is just a draft form.

But what's in that draft? It would raise taxes on individuals, small businesses, and employers by $818 billion and spend $1.6 trillion to create a system that even the Congressional Budget Office admits would raise, not lower, health costs. The bill would ban the purchase of private individual health coverage as part of a government takeover of health care that independent entities confirm would result in over 100 million Americans losing their private, personal coverage.

The House Republicans are for health reform that works. We have a plan for reform that expands access to affordable health care and gives families the freedom to choose health care that fits their needs, not government needs. House Republicans support patients. We will oppose any plan that puts Washington bureaucrats between patients and the care they need. Fewer choices, higher costs, I don't think so.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to a question of the privileges of the House and offer the resolution previously noticed.

I do, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this House operates under rules, or it's supposed to operate under rules, rules that have been longstanding in the House and that are incorporated in written form. And rule IX of those rules of the House states specifically, Members may raise questions ``affecting the rights of the House collectively, its safety, dignity, and the integrity of its proceedings'' and those affecting the rights of Members individually in their representative capacity.

So the question is, Mr. Speaker, what is more fundamental to the rights of the Members of this House than the ability to represent their constituents and to affect the legislation that's brought to the floor?

The Democrat majority, under Speaker Pelosi, has unilaterally--some would say brazenly, some would say repressively--ended a 220-year tradition of allowing any Member to allow a spending bill.

And that's precisely what I'm attempting to do, Mr. Speaker.

When my constituents sent me here to Congress, they didn't send me here to just push buttons. What they sent me here to do was to exercise every single ability that a Member of the House is granted. And one of the abilities that the Member of the House is granted is the opportunity to affect legislation.

And under rule IX, which states, Mr. Speaker, that the proceedings should not affect the rights of the Members individually in their Representative capacity, so if being denied the ability to offer an amendment doesn't affect the rights of this House, if it doesn't affect the dignity and integrity of its proceedings, if it doesn't affect my rights as a Representative, then I don't know what does, Mr. Speaker.

I don't know what does. If Members are not allowed to offer amendments, then the Member, him or herself, is unable to represent their constituents and consequently is disenfranchising every single American.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would contend respectfully that the inability of Members to offer amendments is an indignity upon the House and makes it so that Members are not able to exercise their representative capacity.

And I appeal to the Chair to see the light of day and allow this privileged resolution to move forward.

Mr. Speaker, I appeal the ruling of the Chair.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam Speaker, pursuant to clause 2(a)(1) of rule IX, I hereby notify the House of my intention to offer a resolution as a question of the privileges of the House.

The form of my resolution is as follows:

Whereas the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Price, submitted an

amendment to the Committee on Rules to H.R. 3288, the

Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related

Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010;

Whereas the said gentleman's amendment would have required

that none of the funds made available in this Act be used to

establish, issue, implement, administer, or enforce any

prohibition or restriction on the otherwise lawful possession

or use of firearms in federally assisted housing;

Whereas the Second Amendment of the United States

constitution guarantees that ``the right of the people to

keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed'';

Whereas the Second Amendment applies equally to all

Americans, regardless of who owns or pays for their housing;

Whereas the gentleman's amendment complied with all

applicable Rules of the House for amendments to

appropriations measures and would have been in order under an

open amendment process, but regrettably the House Democratic

leadership has dramatically and historically reduced the

opportunity for open debate on this Floor; and

Whereas the Speaker, Mrs. Pelosi, the Democrat leadership,

and the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, Mr.

Obey, prevented the House from voting on the amendment by

excluding it from the list of amendments made in order under

the rule for the bill: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That H. Res. 669, the rule to accompany H.R.

3288, be amended to allow the gentleman from Georgia's

amendment be considered and voted on in the House.

Mr. Speaker, in the midst of the worst recession in a generation, so what did President Obama and Speaker Pelosi do? Well, they propose a government takeover of health care that will lead to fewer jobs, higher taxes, and less health coverage.

As a physician, I know that government-run health care will end quality care. In addition, since the recession began, 6 million jobs have been lost; yet the Democrats' health care plan includes hundreds of billions of dollars in new taxes on small businesses, the job engine creation in this Nation, $800 billion in new taxes.

According to the economic modeling by the President's own Chief Economic Advisers, the business tax hikes alone would destroy up to 4.7 million jobs, and amazingly, an independent analysis by the nonpartisan Lewin Group found that 114 million Americans would lose their personal, private health insurance.

Mr. Speaker, the American people want real solutions to get our economy back on track, not another excuse to raise taxes on small businesses and working families. House Republicans have a plan for reform that expands access to affordable health care and saves jobs.

Madam Speaker, on rollcall Nos. 552 and 553, I was inadvertently detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on rollcall Nos. 552 and 553.

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment made in order under the rule.

Mr. Chairman, this is a very simple amendment. It strikes $4.2 million from the bill, decreases the funding in the bill to strike the funding for the President's Council of Economic Advisers.

On January 20, 2009, when Barack Obama was inaugurated as President of the United States, the national unemployment rate stood at 7.6 percent, and the outstanding public debt of the Nation stood at $10.627 trillion. Confronted with this dire situation, the President urged Congress to pass an economic stimulus package. His solution--an end product containing $787 billion in new deficits for special interest giveaways.

Despite many of us who claimed, and I would suggest knew, that it wouldn't work, the American people expected immediate results because the President and his administration sold it as such.

Peter Orszag, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, in responding to a question from CNN on when would Americans feel some benefit from the job losses, stated that it will take weeks to months. Now the President and his administration are backtracking on the stimulus package. In his most recent weekly address, the President said, ``The Recovery Act was not designed to work in 4 months. It was designed to work over 2 years.''

Well, Mr. Chairman, that is news to the American people who have taken notice and they have lost faith in the President's economic policies. Most folks think he simply doesn't have a plan that works.

And one of the biggest cheerleaders of the President's economic policies, the executive offices most responsible for the ineffective and destructive policies that we are seeing today, is the Council of Economic Advisers and its chairman, Christine Romer. She touted in a report which served as the basis for selling the nonstimulus plan to the American people that under such a plan the unemployment rate would max out at 8 percent if the plan were adopted. In fact, she said, without it, the unemployment rate would top out at 9 percent.

Well, Mr. Chairman, as you know, as well I do, to put it mildly, the administration and Ms. Romer were just plain wrong. The unemployment rate today stands at 9.5 percent, and more than 14 million individuals are unemployed under their watch.

Now the Council of Economic Advisers is championing a sweeping new health care reform and selling it as part of the economic recovery. A recent report by the Council of Economic Advisers entitled, ``The Economic Case for Health Care Reform,'' actually claims that slowing the annual growth rate of health care costs by 1.5 percentage points would increase real domestic product. Yet using the Chair's own modeling, House Republicans have determined that 4.7 million jobs would be lost as a result of the taxes on businesses which cannot afford to provide health insurance coverage.

So it has become abundantly clear, Mr. Chairman, that everything with this administration is about more government, more taxes, more spending and less jobs. If the stimulus and the health care package aren't proof enough, take a look at the auto bailout, the national energy tax, the upcoming plan to destroy the private student lending system, and on and on and on.

So the question must be asked, What responsible economist would actually advocate for this administration's job-

killing policies in the midst of a recession? And the answer, Mr. Chairman, is the Council of Economic Advisers.

My amendment is more than a vote to eliminate funding. It is a vote of ``no confidence'' on this administration's economic policies and those of the Council of Economic Advisers. They don't have a plan to get America back to work.

I would urge that we adopt this amendment, which is a commonsense amendment that moves us in the direction of not only saving money but coming up with a responsible, commonsense plan.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, how much time remains on each side?

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the comments of my friend, but if we could hear the American people and their response to, once again, this blaming previous administrations, they would say, look, give me a break. Give me a break.

The American people are hurting. Millions of Americans are out of work. Yet the Obama administration and congressional Democrats promised that their $1 trillion stimulus bill would create jobs immediately and that the unemployment rate wouldn't rise above 8 percent.

Instead, 1.96 million jobs have been lost since this administration started, and we are $2 trillion more in debt since this administration started. In June alone, almost half a million jobs were lost, driving the unemployment rate to 9.5 percent, the highest level in 26 years.

So it is clear that the Democrats' $1 trillion stimulus plan just isn't working. And every American has the right to ask, where are the jobs? Where are the jobs, Mr. Chairman? This is about jobs. This majority clearly doesn't have the appropriate program. This administration clearly doesn't have the appropriate program. Democrats are clearly on the side of more government and more taxes. Republicans, however, Mr. Chairman, are on the side of the American people.

I urge adoption of this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend from South Carolina for his leadership on this issue and for allowing me to speak for a few moments. This is clearly a bill that is supported on a bipartisan basis and something that ought to move forward. It's something that many care about. I would suggest, however, that what the American people mainly care about right now are the economy and jobs. The economy, spending, borrowing, the national debt.

The national debt, as of June 30, stood at $11,545,275,346,431. Mr. Speaker, I know that's hard to believe; but that's $37,609.23 for every man, woman and child in America. And over the last month, our national debt has increased by $223.7 billion, a remarkable amount of increase. Since the Democrats took control of Congress in January of 2007, the national debt has increased $2.9 trillion. That's over $9,300 a person. At the end of April, the U.S. Government owed China $763.5 billion. This year alone our debt to China has increased by over $36 billion. So the economy is front and center for the American people. It is what is causing them the greatest amount of heartache and the greatest amount of concern. It's what moms and dads across this land are worried about when they tuck their kids in at night. The American people are hurting. Millions of Americans are out of work, and hundreds of thousands continue to lose their jobs each and every month.

Now the present administration, the Obama administration, and the Democrats in charge here in Congress promised that their trillion- dollar ``stimulus'' package would create jobs immediately, they said, and unemployment wouldn't rise over 8 percent if their program was adopted. President Obama, in fact, said recently that the stimulus bill had ``done its job'' and is ``working exactly as we anticipated.'' Well, Mr. Speaker, I know that comes as a surprise to the American people, as 1.96 million Americans have lost their jobs since the stimulus was enacted. I'm not quite certain that they believe the stimulus has ``done its job'' and worked exactly as they anticipated. In June alone almost 500,000 jobs were lost, increasing unemployment to 9.5 percent, the highest level in 26 years. So it's clear that the trillion-dollar stimulus package isn't working, Mr. Speaker; and the American people have a right to know, where are the jobs, where are the jobs?

Now the good news is that Republicans have a real plan, a real plan for a real recovery--fiscal discipline here in Washington; tax relief for working families, small businesses and family farms, the job creation engine of our Nation. So the American people deserve a recovery plan. They do, indeed. They deserve a plan that puts Americans back to work. No more borrowing, no more spending, no more unemployment. Mr. Speaker, the good news is that Republicans have a positive plan, positive solutions for the economy, for jobs, for energy self-sufficiency and, yes, for health reform. So whether it's the economy and jobs that the American people are concerned about, whether it's being able to put gasoline in their cars so they can get to work for their second or third job, trying to make ends meet at home, whether it's providing health care for themselves and their families, positive solutions do exist. The American people want us, as a Congress, to embrace those positive solutions, and I urge the Congress to act in a positive way.

Mr. Speaker, our Nation is enduring one of the most troubling economic periods in its history: 3.5 million Americans have been laid off since this Congress began. Unemployment is approaching 10 percent.

Americans are looking for leadership and real solutions to promote economic growth and create good jobs, but the Democrats in charge only offer more borrowing and spending that's delaying recovery and job growth. Americans have lost confidence and trust in this majority to lead us to recovery.

Republicans have positive solutions that the American people support: in the economy, to encourage small business, the job creation engine of this Nation; in the area of energy, an all-you-can-create energy policy that would make us independent from foreign oil; and in the area of health care, no government takeover, but putting patients and their families, along with doctors, in charge.

Positive solutions are needed, and we ask all House Members of reason to work together for these positive solutions.