Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, as a boy growing up in southern Oregon, Medford, Oregon, I was blessed with a wonderful public school system. Of course, that is about a half century ago now, but you only have a good school system if you have good teachers, and I did: Mr. Merriman and Elsie Butler and Devere Taylor and John Smock and Mrs. Leininger and Irv Myrick, and I do a disservice to all of them by naming just a few.

Chuck Nevi was one of those teachers, and he helped me explore America and humanity through the words of Mark Twain.

For a boy growing up in 1950s America, the world of riverboats, scalawags, runaway slaves, and sassy, independent, barefooted boys was magical. The world of Mark Twain taught readers universal truths about the human animal, and some of those truths are not flattering. Like all youngsters, I imagined myself to be Huckleberry Finn, and when Huck Finn chooses what he believes will be hell and eternal damnation so that his love, loyalty, and friendship with a runaway slave will be preserved, well, for me, being raised in a town with few minorities, I learned both about racism and about the power of even young boys to find the real truths and confront confusing human institutions that allowed racism to persist.

A few weeks ago, I saw the news report of Tina Fey winning the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, and it reminded me that this year, 2010, should be acknowledged for the 100th anniversary of Mark Twain's death and the 175th anniversary of his birth. And so even though it was late in the session, I filed this resolution on his birthday to honor Mark Twain.

Mr. Speaker, when parents are away from their babies, particularly during these holidays, we talk about our kids, and so I will. My 4- year-old, Penn, and my three 2-year-olds, Aubrey, Wyatt and Sullivan, are the four little boy Huck Finns in our Arkansas household geographically not far from Huck Finn's world, but such a different world now, one that 19th century contemporaries of a young Sam Clemens would not recognize, except, of course, for his insights into the strengths and weaknesses of human nature. And because of that genius, that genius expressed with humor, I hope my young boys, my young Huck Finns, learn to love the world and works of Mark Twain.

Probably there is no greater honor serving in the House than to support our military families. Each of us on the Armed Services Committee, as well as do all Members of the Congress, take this responsibility very seriously. No one has served more honorably than the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton). No one is a prouder honorary marine than the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton). Semper fi, Mr. Chairman.

One important provision in this bill gives military families the same right civilian families now have to keep children up to age 26 on their insurance. That will not occur unless this bill passes, and I strongly recommend a vote for the bill.

Mr. Speaker, my 4-year-old, Penn, and his three 2-year- old brothers, Aubrey, Wyatt and Sullivan, like all babies came into a changing world and a changing America, and yet, in many ways, when it comes to issues regarding gays and lesbians, America has already changed.

Their first home church would not have thrived without the labor and dedication of numerous gay and lesbian members. My babies' child care benefited from several loving lesbian couples who have given their time to help my wife and I raise them. And America benefits from gay and lesbian pilots, doctors, scientists, diplomats, teachers, police, firemen, EMTs, construction workers, many other professions, somehow all without distracting each other.

Implementation by repeal, not by court case, allows the military to catch up with the rest of America, and my boys and all American children will be the better for it.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 1724) commending the city of Jacksonville, Arkansas, for its outstanding support in creating a unique and lasting partnership with Little Rock Air Force Base, members of the Armed Forces stationed there and their families, and the Air Force, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on the resolution under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

People in America support our men and women in uniform. Everywhere, from coast to coast, regardless of political view, Americans support our military. Nowhere is this more true than in

Arkansas. Nowhere is this more true than in the city of Jacksonville, Arkansas. Any Arkansan can tell you the Little Rock Air Force Base is not in Little Rock. Until this debate today, however, I would guess that most Members of Congress assumed the Little Rock Air Force Base is in the town of Little Rock. Be assured it is not; although all of central Arkansas, including the people of Little Rock, are supportive of the Little Rock Air Force Base.

Recognition of the great work done by the men and women of the Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville, Arkansas, is apparent to anyone familiar with the C-130 mission. Every Member of Congress who has flown in a C-130, including the one Member, Mr. Boccieri, who flies C-130s, relied on the training done at the Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville, Arkansas. Yet compliments don't tell the full story.

When the attacks of September 11, 2001, occurred, community access to all our military bases was disrupted, including access to on-base college classes by the civilian faculty and students. Yet we all know higher education is essential to our military. Anticipating a solution, the city of Jacksonville, Arkansas, and the leadership of the Little Rock Air Force Base came up with a plan to build a Joint Education Center on base property but outside the perimeter. Time went by, but the city of Jacksonville, Arkansas, did its part. Tax votes in a community are difficult, but the city of Jacksonville taxed itself through a vote of the people and raised $5 million to donate to the Air Force to help build the Joint Education Center.

Soon after that vote, the money began accumulating. Unaware, in fact, that there would be a delay in construction approval, $5 million sat in the account for quite a long time. Legally, permission finally was given for the $5 million to be transferred to the Air Force. Long after the vote in Jacksonville, construction began. You will be very pleased, Mr. Speaker, to see the almost complete Joint Education Center underway. It is about ready.

It came about because of the people of Jacksonville, Arkansas and their willingness to donate $5 million to the Air Force.

They have also raised money for the air show, which I attended with my little boys this year, and for the rodeo teams. The community council has been very, very active through the years and, in fact, the city of Jacksonville originally put together the land that was donated to the Federal Government, to the Department of Defense and the Air Force, on which the Air Force base is located today.

This partnership between the city of Jacksonville, Arkansas, and the Little Rock Air Force Base has gone on for over a half a century. Particularly in view of their willingness to tax themselves and donate $5 million to the Air Force, it seemed to me appropriate to recognize their work today, and I recommend approval of H. Res. 1724.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I appreciate the kind words of the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, sophomores in high school are not often called on to lead a nation. Under the leadership of nine black students in Little Rock in 1957, including high school sophomore Jefferson Thomas, the Federal Government enforced the rights of all students to have equality of education.

Losing one of the Little Rock Nine is an event no one looked forward to. Losing one of the Little Rock Nine, sadly, is what happened on September 5, 2010, when Jefferson Allison Thomas passed away in Columbus, Ohio.

Yesterday's heroes, with death, become legends and such is the case with Jefferson Thomas. Perhaps no group of young people is as well known as Jefferson Thomas and the others we know as the Little Rock Nine. Every American, for all time, must honor and remember the heroism of these youngsters in 1957, as we have done in 1999 with the Congressional Gold Medal and also with a commemorative coin and a postage stamp.

None of us can imagine the daily torment and fear these students faced. No young person today can imagine what segregation meant for teens like Jefferson Thomas in 1957. But Jefferson Thomas knew; Jefferson Thomas acted. And Jefferson Thomas is an American hero who will be missed and honored.

With the death of Nick Bacon from cancer, Arkansas and

America have lost a hero, a Vietnam veteran and Army retiree, and a Medal of Honor winner. Yet for those of us who knew Nick, mostly we have lost a friend.

Advocacy for veterans was his life's work: touching the lives of military families by helping them with a problem; touching the life of Arkansas by participating in so many public events honoring our military.

The last time I talked with Nick he was working on some end-of-life financial issues, but in his matter of fact blunt way he said, But other than that I'm good to go. But other than that I'm good to go.

Nick Bacon is now gone, and we will miss him. Our condolences and gratitude go to his wife, Tamera, his six children, his grandchildren, and his brothers and sisters.

Mr. Speaker, Americans deserve a financial system that protects their savings and their money. Until this Congress passes the Wall Street reform package, America's families and small businesses are at risk. By supporting reform, we support the kind of financial stability that supports job creation.

Regulation, effective regulation, is the unbiased referee that protects us as we compete. Everyone benefits when Americans' savings are protected and small businesses can get loans. Yesterday's laws do not protect us today.

I commend Chairman Frank and Senator Baucus for their hard work going on right now to get a final version of Wall Street reform before this Congress for the American people.

When the history of U.S. national security is written, Secretary Gates' speech given at the end of 2007 at Kansas State will be remembered. Yet as a new administration pursued these policies with Secretary Gates kept on as Secretary of Defense, criticisms were heard, criticisms with which I disagree.

An America confident in more than just its military strength is a strong America. To remember our moral strength, not just our military strength, is to build a strong America. To build a strengthened diplomatic corps builds a strong America. Selling our products internationally and not fearing competition builds a strong America. Using our power to help other nations develop their economy, public health systems, rule of law builds our national security.

Listening to nations like Bangladesh regarding what climate change means to them strengthens us. Listening to the voices that want America to be a beacon of human rights strengthens us. Yesterday's view that only military strength makes us strong is indeed yesterday's view.

As we consider this very good defense bill, I applaud the administration's incredibly successful efforts at killing and capturing terrorists, but let us not forget our responsibilities to all aspects of national power and strength.

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to be here this afternoon to consider this resolution and will not add much to the good summary that the gentlelady from California gave.

I have to say that I believe Mr. Harington--and I had met Mr. Harington before his death--I think he would be delighted that this resolution is turning into a debate on the big issue facing this country this day, this year, perhaps this decade. I think he would probably be more delighted by the cast of characters that we all are, and he would see us all as that way, with all of our intricate motivations and complexities and life histories and would probably find this to be quite a glorious day. And I hope he is enjoying it from wherever his perspective is.

The gentlewoman from California mentioned the fact that Mr. Harington lost his hearing when he was very young. He was 12 years old. As you know, as we have seen America modernize, we all start talking more and more like Walter Cronkite did on TV, those of us who were born in the forties and fifties. And as we grew up, we started seeing this homogenization. The fact that Mr. Harington had lost his hearing, he always had in his mind that vivid recollection of what people spoke like in north Arkansas, and that comes out so well in his novels.

I did have occasion to meet him. He was a delightful man. He had a critical following in the country. But as was pointed out, some people did not know him very well, and some people consider him just the greatest novelist that America had that nobody knew anything about. Today we are doing our small part to acknowledge him to bring his legacy to a few more people, and perhaps a few more people will read his great books.

Now we can let this debate continue in whatever form it may take, knowing that Mr. Harington will enjoy the exchanges.

Madam Speaker, today, September 30, is the birthday of Mrs. Ruth Lincoln. I say today is her birthday because, unfortunately, she passed away 2 weeks ago, but she had been looking forward to turning 112 years old today.

This is a picture I took of her about a year ago. This is my son Penn Snyder. This is Mrs. Ruth Lincoln. She was born in 1897 as Ruth Myers. What I like about this picture is Mrs. Lincoln, born in 1897, spans the 20th century with my little boy who was born in 2006. It's a 21st century little boy connecting with the 19th century.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to call attention to recent encouraging developments concerning discussions between the Republic of Turkey and the Republic of Armenia.

On August 31, 2009, Turkey and Armenia, along with Switzerland, which acted as broker for the talks, announced two protocols and a timetable for normalizing relationships between Armenia and Turkey. These protocols have been initialed by both foreign ministries.

While many have seen the longstanding disputes between Turkey and Armenia as intractable, the recent announcement gives hope that these two countries have taken the first tangible steps on the road to reconciliation. The Protocol for the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations between the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Turkey reinforces the willingness of these two governments to open their shared border and to advance bilateral relations, including trade and economic cooperation.

Although this process still faces a number of hurdles, including ratification by the two countries' respective parliaments, I am encouraged by and applaud the initial important steps Turkey and Armenia have taken to strengthen their relations by beginning an open dialogue on some of the major issues that divide them. I commend Switzerland for its important role.

My four little boys--Penn, Aubrey, Wyatt, and Sullivan--and all of the children of the world, whether Turkish, Armenian or American, benefit when diplomacy succeeds.

Mr. Speaker, Bob Short died yesterday. Most people don't know the name Bob Short, but if you go back several decades and think back to the beginning of the first book series, ``The Gospel According to Peanuts,'' you are reading Bob Short.

I got to know him later in life when he began attending my wife's church at Quapaw Quarter United Methodist Church in Little Rock, Arkansas, just a few years ago. He developed an illness several months ago, and we lost a great American, a man who had great impact on the thinking of a lot of Americans, particularly those who loved Charlie Schultz and the Peanuts comic strips. Bob Short will be missed.

People in America, Mr. Speaker, mourn the loss of any of our troops in combat or not, here or abroad. Andy Long, private, United States Army, was killed in Little Rock, Arkansas in my district 1 week before he was to leave to be with his unit headed to Korea. We mourn his loss today. So, also, do we hope and pray for the rapid recovery of Private Ezeagwula who was wounded.

I attended the funeral yesterday of Andy Long in Conway, Arkansas, and met both families. The Long family is a military family: his great- grandfather served; his grandfather served; his father is a retired marine warrant officer; his mother served and is a veteran--and, in fact, she was in the parking lot waiting to give him a ride home when the shooting began. His brother Triston is in the military today and will be headed to Iraq this summer.

A family tradition for this family is that the father prepares a letter to give to the son when he deploys. Yesterday, Andy's father, Retired Marine CWO4 Daris Long, read the following letter to his son. He had these ideas in mind to give to his son and put them down in writing, and the letter was placed in the casket yesterday at the funeral. And this was the letter that Daris Long wrote to his son:

``Dear Andy, let me start by telling you how proud your mother and I are of you in your choice to serve this country. The profession of arms is not an easy job. It is not 9-5. You won't often get a choice in what you want, when you want to do something, or even voice some of your opinions.

``You took an oath, `I, William Andrew Long, do solemnly swear to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and bear true faith and allegiance to the same.' That means a lot. In my mind, it means that whatever your personal feelings are, you may have to put them aside because you don't get to decide who you are going to protect, you protect the rights of all. Oliver Hazard Perry, a War of 1812 Naval hero, once toasted the country with this, `My country, right or wrong, but first my country.' That statement was often quoted out of context by my generation in the end years of the Vietnam War by protestors. In light of your oath, its true meaning is revealed. Always remember, your loyalties are to the principles upon which this country was established. Your duty is to the country, not some cause, not some character, not to some party.''

Mr. Long continues: `` `That I will obey the orders of the President of the United States, the officers and non-commissioned officers appointed over me, acting in accordance with regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me, God.' You are to obey the rightful orders given you. I am sure you were given classes on the laws of warfare, what is right and what is wrong. This part of the oath charges you to do the right thing. This part absolutely absolves you from obeying illegal orders. It reminds you that the old `I was just following orders' routine doesn't excuse you from misconduct that results from following an illegal order. It does not mean you can refuse to follow orders you may disagree with but only those that are clearly illegal. You have to have a moral compass and rigidly follow it.

``You are now on your way to Korea. What we had talked about, filling your off-duty time with constructive pursuits, may have to go on hold with what is going on over there now.''

Mr. Long continues: ``You need to find someone in your unit who is good at what he does professionally and personally and get into his hip pocket. Learn what he knows. Your leaders are going to be pressed to have everything and everybody ready in case things go south. You may not have time to get your newly acquired skills down to an art. You need to support your leaders and fellow soldiers by being a good follower. Remember, as an infantryman, your life support system is the guy next to you. You need to trust him. He needs to know he can trust you. When you are in the thick of things your focus will narrow to your immediate brothers in arms, other things will fade the mere distractions. You need to have your head on a swivel, be aware of your surroundings. Follow your orders quickly and completely. Please, for your own sanity and to ease the burden of your immediate leaders, don't get bogged down with all the whining and back seat driving you may hear from `sea lawyers' in your unit--every outfit has them--they are known, some have more, some have less.''

Mr. Long continues: ``I was once where you are, at the bottom of the food chain. However, after having been promoted up the ladder to Chief Warrant Officer 4, I can tell you that at each level of command, at fire team, squad, platoon, company, and so on, the people in charge are always being pounded on to take care of their people. Your welfare is key to the success of the accomplishment of the mission. There will be times that you will have to be reminded of this and you may think I am full of it, but it is fact.''

Mr. Long continues: ``This quote has been used many times and I think it was attributed to some anonymous author who wrote on a c-ration box somewhere in the field in Vietnam: `For those who have fought for it, freedom has a flavor the protected will never know.' I am personally proud of your progression from boy to man. It's been hard, but the end result is my hero. You and your brother serving are a joy to me. You both are foregoing a lot by doing what you are doing especially now when your country is in peril. You both are heroes by having the moral courage to stand up when the country needs you most, when others are not willing to give up their creature comforts. These are times I wish I were still doing what you are. However, the profession of arms is a young man's game. The last recruits I trained are now coming up on 29 years, 3 months in service if any of them are still in.''

Mr. Long continues: ``My heart is with you. My mind is still ticking through the pre-deployment checklists, what the priorities are, where I am going. I know you are in the Army and I'm sure you are tired of hearing how the Marines do it. Marines march to the sound of the guns. You need to do the same. Don't let others do your job,

your duty. I haven't told your mom in words, but all those times I left on a moment's notice and came back long after others were home, I volunteered. I wasn't going to be left behind to let others do my job or what I considered a job I could do better. I'm telling you this because your job is to stand watch on the wall, separating us, from those who would do us harm. Your day only ends when you've done your duty.''

And Mr. Long finishes: ``So you have a lot of long days ahead of you. I've told this to Triston, and now it is your turn. I hope you take this letter as it is meant--from a father who loves you, trying to give you some hard-learned life experience. Even though we have had our ups and downs, I have always loved you. You are in both my thoughts and prayers. You are my son. You are my hero. I love you. Semper Fidelis, Dad.''

Mr. Long put this letter in the casket, and then he reminded me today that he intends to write a similar letter to his son Triston when he deploys to Iraq this summer.

I want to make a brief comment about the resolution.

I was not involved with the writing of this resolution. I think I would have phrased part of it differently. It says, Resolved, that the House of Representatives, number 3, urges swift prosecution to the fullest extent of the law the perpetrator of this senseless shooting.

My own view is that we do not know all of the facts surrounding this shooting. If it turns out that, in fact, the perpetrator, whoever did this, was trained, supported by some overseas group affiliated with al Qaeda or any of the other terrorist groups, the hell with swift prosecution. We need to take him out.

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 329) recognizing the anniversary of the tragic accident of the steamboat ship SS Sultana, as amended.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on the resolution under consideration.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, American history is a rich one when it comes to the Civil War. Unfortunately, not all events are known or remembered as they ought to be, and the tragic story of the Steamboat Sultana, lost April 27, 1865, is one of those events. Books can tell us the story today.

Retelling the story one night in 1994, author Jerry Potter, as an after-dinner speaker on a modern Mississippi riverboat, brought to life the events of his 1992 book, ``The Sultana Tragedy: America's Greatest Maritime Disaster.''

Each of the attendees, including me, at that very warm and comfortable banquet that night felt the horror as we realized survivors and bodies alike floated and bobbed down this very same Mississippi River on April 27, 1865, the same place that we were bobbing and having dinner that night. This is Potter's book.

Years later, other books have appeared. In 1996, ``Disaster on the Mississippi: The Sultana Explosion, April 27, 1865.'' In 2009, just in the last few months, ``Sultana: Surviving the Civil War Prison and the Worst Maritime Disaster in American History,'' by Alan Huffman. ``The Sultana Tragedy,'' Jerry Potter's book, is printed by the Pelican Press, ``Disaster on the Mississippi'' by the Naval Institute Press, and the most recent book, ``Sultana,'' by the Smithsonian Press.

Today, April 27, is another anniversary of these events. But why do most of us know more about the Titanic than the Sultana, even though more died in the Sultana? The end of a horrific war a few weeks before; the assassination of Lincoln, his death; a new President; April 26, the night before the Sultana sank, John Wilkes Booth was killed; a war- weary Nation trying to move on, tired of years of carnage. And one sad detail; most onboard the Sultana were not prominent like some of the folks on the Titanic. Most were enlisted Union soldiers recently released from the hells of POW camps. As Jerry Potter says, ``Who remembers the steerage passengers aboard the Titanic?'' I do want to point out there was one prominent American onboard the Sultana, U.S. Senate-elect from Arkansas, William D. Snow.

Now, there were certainly people on the east coast at that time that would say the same thing Jerry Potter said, ``Who remembers the steerage passengers aboard the Titanic?'' And so today we remind America and ourselves with this resolution, and today in Memphis, right now a ceremony of remembrance is taking place.

So what story needs to be told? What was the Sultana? This picture was the last picture of this boat, and for many of the people who we see onboard this ship right now, it was the last photograph that was ever taken of them before their death.

The Sultana was an 1863 paddle-wheeled steamboat, modern and tough, built to handle the Mississippi River at flood stage day or night. Contracted in April 1865 to haul sick, emaciated, weakened Union prisoners of war who had been in the prisoner of war camps at Andersonville and Cahawba. And to give you a sense of how weak and emaciated they were, many of these men had lost up to 100 pounds of weight. The pictures of them coming out of the camp were comparable to what we saw coming out of the death camps in Europe at the end of that war.

The boat was built to handle approximately 400 people; it was loaded with perhaps 2,500. There were allegations of bribery amongst the steamboat companies trying to get government businesses. There were allegations of poor-quality repair work done in Memphis. The whole issue of whether it was overcrowded or overloaded continues to be one that is discussed by historians, the difference being if something is overcrowded doesn't necessarily mean that the ship can't handle the weight. And that was certainly the case with the Steamboat Sultana; it could handle the weight.

The other side of that argument is, as you can tell from this picture, with all the folks on top, it became top heavy, and there is one school of thought that says because it was so top heavy, in fact, as the boat would careen back and forth in the flood stage of the Mississippi, it would have affected the shifting waters in the boilers that may have led to the boilers blowing.

At approximately 11 p.m. the night of April 26, it left Memphis. It went across the Mississippi River that at that point was about 4 miles wide at flood stage. It went to Hopefield, Arkansas, got a load of coal, pushed out into the river. And when it was about 7 miles north of Memphis in the river at 2 a.m., the boilers blew. It was described as this thunderous, thunderous noise that was heard for miles, and thus begins the horror. And, of course, there were no photographs, no on- site CNN news. What we see are depictions of drawings of people trying to put together the recollections of survivors about what it looked like. This is, by the way, the cover of the most recent book by Alan Huffman, and that's the drawing that's on the cover of his book.

But thus begins the horror: death and injury by explosion and crash, death and injury by scalding from the boilers, death and injury by fire that went on for hours, death and injury by drowning. These were weak, emaciated people who did not know how to swim or were too weak to swim even if they knew how to swim, in very cold waters coming from the north. This was April 27, springtime. The river was at flood stage, and those waters were cold waters coming from the north. Death and injury by hypothermia, death and injury weeks and months later by complications of infection and other medical challenges of those weakened by war who were unable to fight injury. The boat had one lifeboat and it had 76 cork life preservers.

There were probably about 1,800 dead. We will never know for sure. Most of the Union POWs were from Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee. There were many volunteers along the shore or on boats that participated in picking up survivors and bodies. One of those was John Fogleman and his sons, Dallas and Leroy, from Arkansas. They built a raft of two logs and rescued people, six and nine at a time, and then their home was turned into a temporary hospital. The Fogleman family is still very much in Arkansas and active in public affairs.

Investigations began immediately, but the survivors were never satisfied that their story was ever told.

Probably the best description of the summary of why we need to remember this comes from the Jerry Potter book. He says: ``To say that the explosion on board the Sultana was purely accidental or unpreventable does not take into account the irresponsible conduct and criminal negligence that characterized the actions of an entire chain of army command and the profit-making schemes of various civilians. The Sultana tragedy is much more than a record of a steamboat. The deeper record is one of greed and the lengths to which men will go to achieve personal gain, even if that gain means endangering the lives of others.'' And that's the end of the quote from Jerry Potter's book ``The Sultana Tragedy.''

March 4, 1931, a man named Pleasant Keeble died. He was the last known Sultana survivor. So now we no longer learn from the survivors. We learn from Civil War historians and maritime and military scholars. Today we remember a little bit and today we resolve ourselves a little. And the resolve part of our resolution today says the following:

``Resolved, that the House of Representatives, one, recognizes the 144-year anniversary of the tragic accident of the steamboat ship SS Sultana; two, honors the memory of the soldiers and passengers who lost their lives in this disaster; three, regrets the lack of military and civilian oversight that led to the explosion and tremendous loss of life; and, four, rededicates itself to honoring all our veterans and military families with the highest level of support in quality resources, equipment and services.''

This is one of those stories, Madam Speaker. It's a rich part of American history. Unfortunately, it is not as well-known as it could be. We have not learned the lessons from these events as well as we could. I commend this resolution to the Members of the House to vote on today and to vote for this resolution to help in remembering.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, at this time I have no further requests for time, and I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the leadership of my colleague on this event.

These House resolutions, we know today that we're not passing a statute, we're not changing a law, we're not creating a memorial. What we are trying to do is call attention to what we believe is a very significant event in our Nation's history. And to the families and relatives of the folks who were lost or survived the sinking of the Sultana, to the day they died, they regretted that their country did not pay more attention to what happened. So there are lessons to be learned.

As we are doing this right now on the floor of the House, in Memphis there is an event going on recognizing this event. I want to call attention to my colleague, Congressman Steve Cohen, as a cosponsor of our resolution from Memphis.

So it is just another thing that we can do to say, hey, America, there is something to learn from our rich, rich history from an event that we all may not know enough about as we would like. And I commend the books that I mentioned to folks and to seek out opinions about what occurred on April 27, the anniversary today, in 1865 on the Mississippi River just north of Memphis.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Pallone. Here we are in Washington DC, the Nation's Capital and there is a good number of people tonight celebrating St. Patrick's Day. And for us, for you and I, it has come down to wearing green ties on the floor of the House tonight talking about health care.

But I was in my office, and I heard you talking, and I appreciate all the work you have done through so many years now talking about this issue.

I just want to share two or three stories, if I might, and they are somewhat personal stories. As you know, 3 months ago my wife had three babies, three baby boys, Wyatt, Sullivan and Aubrey, in addition to our 2-year-old boy, Penn Snyder.

Then shortly after the delivery, about a week later, my wife ended up in the coronary care unit and had an extended hospitalization of about 11 days. So I remember going back home one day, running back from the hospital and talking to one of my neighbors. She said, ``How is everything going?'' And I said, ``Well, two-thirds of our family of six is in the intensive care unit,'' because I had three babies in the neonatal care unit and my wife in the coronary care unit. I thought, okay, that's quite a burden for a family.

But my wife has insurance, she is a Methodist minister, she has good insurance through where she has worked. You and I are Federal employees, and we have insurance. We pay for our insurance like all Federal employees do. We have good insurance.

And one of the things I did not worry about during that period was who was going to pay the horrendous cost of the incredibly good care that we can get in this country. So all evening my wife has been sending me pictures of our four boys out on the lawn wearing green outfits with shamrocks on them, I guess just to brag about how nice the weather is in Arkansas this evening. But it brought home, here we are 3 months out and everybody is doing great and she is doing well.

Last week, I met with a young women that I think if anyone in Congress would meet with, we would say she is just a gifted young woman, a medical student in her mid-20s, in her final year of medical school making decisions about where she is going to do her residency. We got to talking about some of the issues of medical students like they have got too much debt.

We are expecting them to pay for all this in medical school on their own. They are ending up with tremendous six-figure debt coming out of medical school. They don't get paid a lot as residents.

But in the course of the discussion it came out that while she was a medical student she was diagnosed with insulin-dependent diabetes and, of course, she is in a medical school. She knows where good resources are. She is at the best resource in Arkansas, except the health insurance that she has, by being a student, doesn't cover the cost of an insulin pump.

So she doesn't have it, and five shots a day doesn't give her the kind of control that we know helps prevent long-term problems. So here is this wonderful young woman, gifted young woman. She is our future, she is going to be taking care of you and I. And yet we, as a country, are not taking good care of her, even though she is in one of the medical centers of the world.

So I contrasted what happened with my family and me, and we do have health insurance, with what happens with a person who has health insurance, but it's just not the kind of coverage that they need. So I applaud you tonight for talking about this topic. I hope that we will make the kind of progress that you have been yearning for probably a couple of decades.

In the olden days, I was a family doctor before coming to this job here, and I always remind myself, people always come to me and say, oh, you are a doctor, you understand all this about health policy. I said, no, I used to do sprained ankles, nosebleeds and urinary tract infections. Health policy is that kind of mysterious nebulous world that many, many people don't understand. We are health care providers, we are patients, we are family, we are business people who try to go provide for our employees.

But we have this opportunity right now for all of us, whether we are providers or patients or business people or legislators or business people, to get up to speed on these topics. Because I think there is a real opportunity, with the mood of the country, with the international challenges we face from our economic competitors, that don't have the same kind of health care plan that we do and with the commitment of President Obama and his administration to do something.

I also think this really needs to be worked through with all components of our country. We talk about being across the aisle. Across the aisle is fine, but we need the business community and the providers and the hospitals and the insurance companies and patients and providers and all the advocacy groups and the research advocates to come together as best we can.

This is not going to be a 435-0 vote on whatever we do, but as best we can to listen to each other and move ahead. I think you gave an excellent outline on the kinds of issues that we need to be talking about.

But I believe that it is a very doable challenge that we have. I commend you for talking about this this evening.

I have seen that myself as a family practice doctor. I never owned a clinic, I worked at other people's clinics and met some wonderful people. But health care providers are business people too. They have got to pay their employees. Some health care programs don't reimburse as well as they would like.

Some clinics are in places that they may end up giving free care or have a group of patients that are not able to pay so well, and so it's like any business. It can be a strain to find the money for health care. It's one of the challenges we have to have.

You mentioned the economic issue, the one of our ability to compete internationally. I think that's an important one.

I want to also mention the national security issue, and I don't think this one has gotten as much attention as it probably deserves. We have had a lot of discussions about, you know, mental health coverage for our young men and women that come back that we think needed their families. The reality is we are expecting the military health care plan, or military health care programs and the VA health care programs to solve a national problem, which is we do not have a good network of mental health care in any of our States, particularly rural areas. But it's just difficult to find the kinds of providers you want for that kind of care.

I want to go before they go over. We had an issue, when we first started mobilizing our troops to go to Iraq and Afghanistan. When we were mobilizing our reserve component forces, about one-third of our troops were on some kind of a medical hold.

Now, a lot of it was for dental, a lot of it could be taken care of reasonably quickly. But the reality was, we had a situation. These are men and women who have been going on their weekends once a month for their training.

They go every 2 weeks in the summer and yet they are showing up on mobilization orders. We are finding out that they were not, under military standards, medically fit to be mobilized. I think for a lot of us that were on the Armed Services Committee, that was a bit of a wake- up call too.

Because one of the issues for dental, although I was in medical and not dental school, I actually think my teeth are part of the body and should not be divorced from the whole system, because we know it has tremendous ramifications on the overall health. Dental health is part of this overall picture.

And here we have a situation where you make a pretty good argument, our national security efforts were slowed down and more inefficient because of the kind of health care plans that we have.

Now, having good health insurance doesn't necessarily get everybody to the dentist, but I guarantee you, if you don't have good health insurance or dental insurance you are much more likely not to get preventive care. So that's an issue too.

I took my little boy to the State Fair in Arkansas this year. Me and my littles boys. Anyway, we're walking down the Midway and a couple were coming the other way in the crowd there, and he was a paraplegic in a wheelchair. And he stopped me. A very polite young man. And he obviously had had some significant health issues that he was dealing with--had been dealing with.

But he said, Man, is there anything you can do to help me with this. And he had an obvious need for dental work. But here's a man you would think would be in the system somehow--our system. But it just pointed out once again the inadequacy of the coverage in the country that can do the best job of solving his problem if we get him to the right person.

I want to bring up another issue, and I think it's one that you have had an interest in, too, and it's the issue of medical education. I think it's one that we will need to pay attention to as we go through the very important democratic process of looking at changing our health care system.

We need to be sure that we recognize at our hospitals that are involved in medical education that it is more inefficient and more expensive to teach while you're doing something. It is much quicker for a doctor, an experienced doctor, to come in and see the patient and get on to the next patient.

We have to recognize that there are additional costs for our teaching institutions. We make allowances for that through some of our government health care programs, probably not as well as we could or should, but it's certainly something that we need to watch to be sure that our teaching institutions, whether it's for nursing or doctors, that we recognize that there is an extra expense and inefficiency for them to provide the kind of quality teaching that takes additional time to sit down, not with the patient, but with the student.

It's particularly a poignant issue for you and me, Mr. Pallone, as we get older, because a lot of our doctors are going to be retiring and we are expecting these generations coming to take care of this big swell of the aging population as the Baby Boomers retire. So it's really important.

We are not going to get to where we want to go though in this process of doing health care reform and trying to find ways to save money, which we all want to do, if we don't recognize the cost of medical education.

I think this issue of the health information technology is really important. I notice that since the bill passed and the bill has been increasingly studied by people in the press and policymakers, that the health IT part, the health information technology piece of that bill, is starting to get a lot more attention.

There's been articles in the papers in the last couple of days. Wal- Mart is starting to look at doing some things.

The challenge--I mean, I'm somebody who most of my career was working for doctors who had small practices. And so there have been hospitals that have moved in this direction, large practices have moved in the direction of having a modern electronic medical record.

The problem has been that most doctors are in small offices of maybe one to five or six people. When the studies have been done about what does it take for that kind of an office to move to an electronic medical record, the kind that most patients will want, it takes several months from the time they start until it's where they want to be.

It takes several months to get back to that same level of efficiency as seeing patients; the installation, learning the new ways of doing things, just figuring out how to do things.

Now everyone recognizes, even the ones who don't have it, that ultimately it makes it more efficient, it's safer for their patient, safer for them because no doctors want to make mistakes, nurses don't want to make mistakes. There's nothing worse than having to have a clerk sit there and Xeroxing medical records off because you have got a patient that you have had for 40 years that's moving across the country. You can do it electronically and it just moves things.

I think the money that is in this bill is really going to motivate both physicians, physicians' offices, the folks that manage their practices, but also those kinds of business people out there who say, Wait a minute. Here's a chance to move America forward, to invest in our health care infrastructure and, by the way, create some new jobs, make some money for my business, and do some good things for the American people in anticipation of these changes that I hope will come in our health care system as part of President Obama's proposals. So I think that is very exciting.

I was talking to one of my Republican doctor friends who voted against the bill. I certainly understand his reasons for voting against the economic recovery bill. But I said, I want to know, what do you think about the health information technology piece? He said, Oh, I like that. He might quibble with little details of it.

But we have liked the bill before, as doctors. The problem has been for the last several years is finding the money to pay for it, and the opportunity came along through the stimulus package. And I think this is a real opportunity to be a good investment in the change that our health care system needs. So I find that very exciting.

I want to say a point about prevention. And I recognize that I am probably in the minority on this view. My own view is that we ought to not sell preventive measures, which I think are so important, but I think we ought to not sell them or oversell them as ways to save dramatic amounts of money.

My own view is that prevention is a quality of life issue. If I can work with a patient when they're 25 years old to get them to stop smoking, I know, I know their quality of life is going to be better. I know there are diseases they are not going to get when they quit smoking or if they never start smoking because of good health education programs when they're 16, 17, and 18.

Now, where I have a problem with this prevention-saves-money argument is if somebody lives to be 90, I know at

some point they are going to need health care. But, God bless them, that is a good problem to have. I would so much rather deal with the infirmities of a 90-year old than the emphysema and COPD and heart disease of a 45-year old who smoked for 25 years, since they were 20.

So I have a little different view on that. I think you can find arguments on both sides. But I don't think that we should ever be defensive about saying, You know, some preventive things cost money. But the quality of life, if you can keep a family from losing a family member from cancer, if you can cut down the number of kids that go to emergency rooms because their parents smoke, or whatever it is, it's a quality of life issue, and that can really turn into additional years of life and the pursuit of happiness for that family in this great country.

So I'm pleased that prevention is part of this.

This will be a true confession here tonight about a mistake that I made practicing medicine one time. It was about 15 years ago, I had a young boy, I think he was about 7 or 8, kind of a quiet boy, brought in by his grandmother. And he was there for a cold or something. I dealt with his cold or ear infection.

Then his grandmother started talking about some behavioral stuff he was having. We talked about it for a few minutes, and I didn't have much to offer.

It was like about 2 months later I was reading an article about Tourette's syndrome. And I thought, That's what that little boy had.

Well, the clinic I worked at had a wall about as big as the wall behind the Speaker here tonight that was all handwritten medical records. One of my nurses aids and I--we did it on Saturday because we were slow enough when we worked on Saturday, we could do this--we began systematically going through every one of those handwritten charts to see if we could find that little boy because I was going to call his family and say, Hey, I think I figured what you were talking about with this little boy. The reality is in Tourette's syndrome a lot of time they are underdiagnosed and, unfortunately for the family, it takes a while to sort it out sometimes.

We never did find that chart even though we systematically went through every handwritten chart. Well, if we had had a computer system we would have been able to pull up the names of appointments seen in the last period of time or probably could have pulled it up by approximate birth date.

There's so many tools that a good health information technology system gives you for the benefit of patients.

Efficiency of doctors, more prompt payment of doctors, less mistakes, but ultimately it is for the benefit of patients; and I think that is what you were talking about, looking ahead to doing things differently, doing things better. It is not just figuring out how to pay for the kind of care we are getting now, but it is better care in the future as part of this. And I think that is important.

It is interesting, we have a good number of physicians in the House now.

Physicians have figured out more and more, number one, that this Nation wants us to do something about health care. And I always tell my doctor friends, we can either do it with you, or we can do it to you. And most doctors have figured out they would like to have it done with them.

The other thing, though, is, and I have clearly seen this change in the time I have been in medicine, doctors have figured out that the programs that help people are the programs that help doctors. So they are here to help make those programs better. Now, we may have philosophical differences about how to get there and how to pay for it, but we recognize that there is a role for government in trying to make sure that whatever that number is, 47 million, 48 million people who don't have health insurance over a year's time actually are able to participate in this system that we call American health care.

I want to ask about another topic, Mr. Pallone, medical research. We had a pretty good run there for a time under the leadership of Speaker Gingrich and President Clinton in terms of increasing the research dollars available for NIH. My own view of the last administration over the last 8 years has been very poor with regard to research, all kinds of research. There are, and I am talking now specifically about medical research, medical research funds in a variety of different budgets, from the military budget, veterans budget, NIH, agriculture budget, Department of Agriculture, they have research. Well, this is another place that is part of the kind of quality care we want for all of us. We need to be investing in that kind of research, because the reality is medical jobs are good jobs.

In fact, when you look at the numbers, as people have been losing jobs, the thing that stands out the most in terms of who is gaining right now is health care. It is kind of counter-cyclical. There are medical jobs out there that don't get filled that people will look at. Now, we need to do I think a better job of helping nursing home aides get paid and all. But there is a tremendous opportunity to create the kind of technology and new jobs and new treatments that this country can be selling all over the world, and we need to be the leaders in a lot of these things.

I think the whole issue of stem cells has gotten a lot of attention. Regardless of where you come down philosophically on the issue of stem- cell research, there is a ton of things out there that would benefit from more research dollars, and it has to be part of this picture, too. You mentioned the comparative effectiveness. That is probably too fancy a name. It kind of got bad-mouthed in some of the media when that bill came out. The reality is, why wouldn't we want to see what

works the best for the least amount of cost? We would do that as a family.

If I go in to my doctor and he said, here is my prescription, it is $180. And I say, well, is there anything better? Oh, yeah, there is a generic. It is like $14. Why don't I take the generic for $14? I mean, why not go for something that would work as well, perhaps even better, but be dramatically less expensive? I mean, we all are responsible as a country for these health care plans and making sure we pay for things. And somehow the idea that we would actually want to pay attention to what things cost and what works and what doesn't work, and are we prescribing things that we don't really need? I mean, that is just common sense, and I think families want that. They don't want us to prescribe things that are not effective or there could be something cheaper that would work just as well. So I think that is part of this picture.

Maybe I am making the universe bigger than it needs to as we are talking about health care and health care coverage, but it is all part of this investment in our future. And medical researchers will do better with a health information technology system. Those people who are responsible for paying the bills, who are processing claims will do better if that health IT system is more efficient. All this stuff builds on each other. Ultimately, we want to lead to better coverage for the best price that we can give.

We also have learned in a very difficult way for a lot of American families the challenges of what happens to our men and women in uniform overseas with the traumatic brain injury and some of the kinds of injuries that have occurred. And what happens in every war is, sadly, we have opportunities to learn new things and get better at treating these. And there are some real opportunities of helping these families in terms of looking at traumatic brain injury and how we respond to them.

Looking over the long run, we are just a few years into this thing, what impact will this have on their lives 10 years and 20 years and 30 years and 40 years from now? And what opportunities will there be for them 10 and 20 and 30 and 40 years from now depending on what we do in terms of investing in research? And we have had these discussions before, both in the Armed Services Committee and the Veterans Services Committee. There are research projects out there that can be funded if we have adequate funding for them. And that is not part of civilian health care for them; that is part of our responsibility as a government to be sure that we adequately fund medical research. And a lot of it is going to be done in our civilian facilities, also, whether it is medical schools or veterans hospitals. The research needs to go on, and it needs to be well funded.

If I might intervene for a minute. I think it is perfectly consistent for somebody to have been opposed to the plan in 1993 and be for something now. There is a broad spectrum of ideas out there. I am hoping that, and I think President Clinton would acknowledge, that we have learned from that experience 15 years ago, 16 years ago.

So I think that is a very important point you make, because we don't know what the ultimate product is going to be; but, hopefully, it is going to be something that will be shaped so you won't have somebody out there doing a huge media bite trying to kill a plan when the country is trying to come together to make something work. And I am not sure if everybody will be happy, but I am hoping that almost everybody can live with the ultimate result, because we all come from different perspectives.

May I close out my contribution here this evening. I want to tell you another story. And I appreciate your talking about this evening.

I began by talking about my four little boys who are age 3 months, three of them are 3 months and one is 2 years old, and how much we benefited not only from the quality of health care we had but also from the quality insurance plans that my wife and I had.

Over the weekend, Senator Blanche Lincoln had an event in Little Rock, and Vice President Biden was there and her family was there and there were a lot of people there. I was looking for her grandmother-in- law. Her grandmother-in-law, her husband's grandmother, is Mrs. Ruth Lincoln. Mrs. Ruth Lincoln is 111 years old. She is delightful. And I thought, well, surely she would be here. Well, she had fallen about a month ago and broke a bone I think in her pelvis. And I thought about that and felt badly about that, and then I thought later, well, of course I assumed she is going to bounce back from that, get healed up, and I am going to see her again. On her birthday she always does something special like cross the Arkansas River on a bridge. She always does a very special thing. And when you talk to her, she talks about how she loves growing old. She has loved growing old at age 111. And I think in a way that is what we aspire to through this health care reform. We want everyone to say, whether they are young with young children who benefit from our health care system, or people who go through the very frail years, that throughout they can say that I have loved growing old. Now, maybe we won't live to be 111, but if we all do this right, we will increase the chances of more people being able to have those kinds of long, long years.

I applaud you once again for spending this time this evening.