michael barone has called, we have gangsster government when the federal government has set up a new cartel and private businesses now have to go begging with their handout to their local, hopefully well connected congressman or their senator so they can buy a peace offering for that local business. is that the kind of country we're going to have in the future? when i was on the phone today for over an hour with one of my local dealers, the very first thing out of her mouth was this, she said this is the most un-american thing i have ever seen many my life. i can't believe that i lived to see the day that my country would come to this point where having my dealership for 90 years, i get a letter fedexed to me that tells me that i have until friday to sign this document, to not only give up my

company that was made wrtless, worth $15 million, made worthless overnight. now gm is demanding that she hand over her customer list, her service customer list to gm. why? gm most likely will use the customer list and give it to her former competitors. what is she getting for this? she had the rug pulled out from her and from her husband. they virtually lost everything overnight. to what? to what michael barone called a gangsster government. we need to call this for what this is, my colleagues. we need to call this for what this is. call it out. the american people need to get outraged and figure out it could be them next. no business is safe when you see the administration appoint

czars, car czars, wage czars. there's over 20 czars that have been appointed. what do they do? they bypass the congress. we are the people's elected representatives. we have been bypassed. we have an imperial presidency where the president has appointed various czars reporting to him and reaching into the confines of private businesses and overnight rendering them virtually worthless, unless they have a special tug, a political tie to a local democrat congressman. is that what we've come to? and i yield back. . mr. akin: i appreciate the lady's passion and strong support for the concept of freedom. you know, what we're really talking about here is what is the job of the government? and we have come to a point where we have actually elected people who have forgotten this basic concept and that is the

government that can give you anything you want can also take away anything from you. including -- everything from you, including your freedom. and that's the great danger of this insidious creeping bureaucracy where the government inserts it self into all kinds of different businesses. the founders would have been outraged at what you've just described and even people from not so many generations before us would say, that is impossible, that could never happen in america. mrs. bachmann: if the gentleman would yield, the founders went so far as they began a revolution over a stamp tax. over a stamp tax. this is the actual outright taking of someone's personal property. and the founders were unwilling to pass the constitution without the bill of rights. and as the gentleman knows, the bill of rights was to protect

individuals, people, not to protect government, but to protect people from the encroachment of big government upon their leaders. and the fifth amendment guarantees the right of your personal property. big government cannot come in, they are prohibited from coming in and taking your personal property without just compensation. here's a perfect example of violation of these citizens' fifth amendment rights. mr. akin: you're absolutely right. we've seen other examples of it. the decision in connecticut where a local -- some local municipality decided to trample the fifth amendment, just walk right in and take somebody's private home in order to make a strip mall so they could tax the strip mall. and the supreme court jumped to the defense of the local government saying, oh, that's just fine and they just ignored the fifth amendment. and so we see this continuously growing government and if you take look at where we're spending money, it's just absolutely amazing.

and here's an example, this is a town that is supposedly almost bankrupt, i think it's in rhode island. the city on the verge of bankruptcy spends $550,000 in stimulus money for a skateboard park. now what in the world is the federal government doing, doing bicycle racks in d.c. in million-dollar neighborhoods, skate parks somewhere else? we're putting it all in here and claiming somehow it's going to make unemployment better and yet the numbers are going nuts. the president, what's going on with the white house press corps, he claims it just created 150,000 jobs and yet you see the data going, we're already at 9.7% and it's my understanding when you jump to the next big tax they're talking about they want to be like spain and spain has the envyble 17.5% unemployment. is that where we're going? how long is this going to go

before the american public says enough already, the time to change this big spending? if you want to see this thing graphically, this is a little bit chilling. this is historic budget imbalance. these are the different years of the presidents. these years over here are president bush and those of us here that are republicans, we didn't like the fact that president bush was spending too much money. this is deficit spending. this is a budget imbalance. but take a look. when we were kids, didn't you have to go and, what was it, first grade you say, what thing doesn't fit the pattern? take a look at this year. take a look at that budget imbalance that we're talking about. you think that's not going to affect jobs? you don't think that means the government's going to get its nose into all kinds of people's businesses? that's what we're concerned about. i'd like to go to my good friend, congresswoman lummis from wyoming. the thing i like about wyoming and the western states, you have a sense of freedom. a little bit of a sense of property ownership.

and you have a sense of small business. and i appreciate that perspective. please, joinous conversation. mrs. lummis: i thank the gentleman. in wyoming we have had surpluses in our budget for the last seven years. and it is because of the explosive growth in the production of energy. it has made our unemployment among the lowest in the nation. in fact, there were times during the last seven years that we have had statistically zero unemployment. incredible. while i was running for this position i stopped at a fast food place to get an iced tea late at night and they offered me a job and they offered my daughter a job at this fast food place because they are so much in need of employees. wyoming is unique in that regard. and it is because we are producing domestic energy and there are new discoveries of domestic natural gas all over the united states. the balkan in north dakota is

fantastic. it's creating wealth for people who have been farming at that very narrow margin of profitability, zero -- 0% to 4% for years. mr. akin: you're talking about we're creating jobs and wealth and the government's not doing it? oh, my goodness, that's a novel idea, isn't it? the government's not coming in and telling you how to run everything. mrs. lummis: not only are we producing the cleanest burning hydrocarbon that there is, natural gas, but we are doing it in a way that makes us less dependent on foreign energy and we're seeing in this congress are policies that will actually make us more dependent on foreign energy at a time -- mr. akin: let me just stop you there. what you said is very, very important. are you finding sources of natural gas, one of the cleanest burning fuels that we know in terms of hydrocarbon-type fuels, anyway, and you're finding that, which is making it so that you can have plenty of jobs in

wyoming, you're not doing it with a lot of government help and yet the government is going to try to create policies to make us more dependent on foreign energy. what would that be? i would suppose that one way to do that would be tax your natural gas. because if that's taxed, then the foreigners have a better chance of getting business here. is that where you're going? mrs. lummis: and to the gentleman from missouri, we are also proposing in this congress to tax drilling costs, to raise the taxes on the brackets, to do away with the death tax, to put the recovery of natural gas under the safe drinking water act. virtually every time i turn around, almost every day here, we're doing something that will impair our ability to produce our own natural resources and the not just in wyoming.

there have been these fabulous new finds of natural gas that run up both sides of the appalachian mountains all the way from pennsylvania clear to the southern states. all of those states could have new natural gas production, the cleanest burning hydrocarbon that reduces our need for foreign energy, that reduces the out-migration of jobs, it keeps them here, grows revenue for those states. i can tell you that as our state treasurer in wyoming for eight years, just off interest income, the largest source of income for our state's general fund, from one source, interest income off state investments. and all of those state investments, every one of them, came from severance taxes on oil, gas, coal, uranium. mr. akin: isn't that something? are you an energetic congresswoman from an energetic state and it's encouraging to hear that we do have those supplies of energy here. it is ironic, i think, that when

you take a look back at the history of the department of energy it was created so that america could be energy-independent and they have added many, many jobs to the department of energy and yet we have become more and more dependent on foreign energy and if we had more people like new this congress, i think that would change and we would see that we'd be getting back to good, old american energy of a lot of different types and we would let the marketplace and not the government make the choices as to which type you're going to use in each state. now, my good friend from georgia, congressman broun. mr. broun: congressman akin, i appreciate you yielding. i wanted to come back to something you said think a think the american people need to understand very clearly. the president has talked about looking to spain as being the model of this energy tax. i call it tax and cap because

it's about taxes, it's about revenue for the federal government, it's about getting more revenue to socialize medicine and do other things to nationalize all of the business and industry that's already being nationalized and even more. but in spain i'd like to confirm something. it's my understanding, if you would please, sir, it's my understanding in spain when they put on their tax and cap or tax -- cap and trade policy a number of years ago, they touted it as creating green jobs and -- mr. akin: i think -- go ahead, congressman. mr. broun: the point is, they talked about creating green jobs. just recently one of their, i think it's members of parliament be was over here talking to the opportunities society, i don't know if you were there, but he

said for every single green job that was produced in spain, they lost 2.2 jobs. the green jobs that were created were temporary jobs. the jobs that were lost were permanent jobs. industrial jobs. and that's what i kind of recall. is that correct? am i just -- mr. akin: reclaiming my. that's exactly what he said. that made common sense to me because when you go back to this keynesian economic scheme, what they would argue would be, hey, we just took all this tax money and we hired these people. so when we hired somebody we created a job. so therefore we had a net -- we just hired somebody, increased the job by one. and what the economists found was for everybody when you take that tax money out of things, what happens is, when you you -- when you took the tax money away to hire the one person, you lost 2.2 jobs over in the private side. so that ratio seems to have kind

of follows economic principle that when the federal government -- yeah, you can have the federal government take a whole lot of money and hire a whole lot of people to dig holes in the ground or whatever, but when you do it by taking that money away from the private sector you're killing those small businesses which is a source of where your generating a lot of these jobs and so i think that's where he was going. mr. broun: if the gentleman will yield back just a half second. i want to go back to the outrage that my dear friend michelle bachmann from minnesota was showing us. the american people should be outraged. and the american people can call a stop to this. we can't. we as republicans have offered alternative after alternative. wall street bailout, we offered an alternative and president bush, henry paulson, the leadership in the house and senate wouldn't accept it. the nonstimulus as you call it, porkulous bill, i call it the nonstimulus stimulus bill, we offered alternatives. the leadership in this house

were obstructionists and wouldn't allow us to have an open hearing and discuss it. the omnibus appropriations, we had alternatives. we've had alternatives for all this. they call us the party of no, n-o. really we're the paret of know, k-n-o-w. we know how to stimulate the economy, we know how to create jobs, give money back in ways to create an environment where small business can create jobs. as the gentleman from missouri so aptly told us just a few minutes ago, small business is where those jobs were created. about 85% of them. . this tax and cap legislation has been estimated it's going to cost america somewhere between $1.7.

in my district of northeast georgia, we have in multiple counties, 14% unemployment. mr. akin: millions of job loss as a result of this new tax that's being proposed here. i would like to recognize another doctor who has joined us. we have doctors out there tonight and my good friend, dr. burgess. what we have been talking about is this incredible trend in unemployment. and also the trend of excessive spending. and would be happy to have your perspective. mr. burgess: i thank the gentleman for yielding me a brief amount of time. i was in my office and heard this discussion and wanted to come over and say a few words. of course you're correct. we have had a report on the joint economic committee last friday about the current unemployment rate of 9%. we spent $780 billion. and the president told us that

we what needed. we have seen that number exceeded. and we heard the beginning of this week that because of those numbers, the president was going to accelerate the pace of distributing the stimulus money. we weren't spending fast enough was our problem. i would remind -- of course, mr. speaker, the comments need to be directed to the speaker's chair, none of us, no republican voted in favor of that stimulus bill last february. mr. akin: just reclaiming my time for a moment. in a way that's a little bit unusual down here. there is usually a few democrats that will vote different from their party or a few republicans. in this case, on this great big porkulous, every single republican voted no. mr. burgess: absolutely correct. mr. akin: doesn't pass the smell

test. mr. burgess: it's not what i came to washington, d.c. to do. what i wanted to share with the house tonight, "the dallas morning news" runs a column every sunday by dave scott burns. he was quoting an economist in austin economist, laci hunt. er ving fisher saw it first. the man who may have been the greatest american economist wote the theory about the great depression in 1933. excess debt controls all of the economic variables. he went on to say, think about it for a minute. it's a very powerful statement. excess debt controls all of the economic variables. what does that mean? that means we cannot control the unemployment rate. that means we cannot control almost everything is out of our grasp because of the massive amount of debt that we have

accumulated. a and on monday the president said he wanted to accelerate the price of spending because we weren't getting the money out the door fast enough. let me reiterate, excess debt controls every other economic variable. it was true in 1933 and i suspect the true is today. i think every member on the floor here tonight has recognized that at one time or another. and the time point, the only thing that will allow recovery is the passage of time. unfortunately, congress is not in control of that. and time will pass at a set rate, regardless of what we think that it will or won't do. he goes on to say, -- mr. akin: i want to get what you're saying. you're saying there's a relationship between this tremendous level of debt that

we're building and the unemployment numbers? in other words, when you have a whole lot more debt, the unemployment is going to be -- particularly debt with spending, because spending is causing the debt, you are going to have bad trouble with unemployment. is that what this economist is saying? mr. burgess: we are in a period of prolonged underperformance and will essentially be a loss for decades. we will recover, but the operative factor will be time and not actions. most people don't want to hear that. excess debt controls almost every other economic aspect. you cannot spend your way out of this problem. the unemployment went up. the correct response is not to shove more money out the door. the correct response is do what you can to get control of that spending and begin to erode the debt, begin to put the debt on a

glide path to reduction and that's where the recovery will come and that will take time. there is no other way around that. i thank the gentleman for yielding. i think this is a wonderful discussion that you've had tonight. i thank you for bringing this to the attention of the american people. mr. akin: i appreciate the doctor from texas bringing some wisdom here and economic common sense. and most people know that these things are connected. if you spend a whole lot, eventually you will go into debt and debt will influence things. what happens is -- i'm an engineer by training, not a medical doctor, but like drawing a vacuum economically in the economy. so the small businesses we are hearing about like out in wyoming, the small businesses, they don't have the money to invest to drill a well. so the main engine of job creation dries up. what you're doing up -- the

government is becoming so oppressive and expansive and in everything it is trying to do. as we heard eloquently expressed from the gentlelady from minnesota, the story about what happens when the federal government starts to get into the business of running car things. i'm picturing there is going to be someone listening to our discussion tonight that is a cartoonist and they will think about the automobile that will be designed by the u.s. congress and they will have what the engine and wheels look like. there is a youtube being created along those lines. it's not a pretty picture to have the federal government running our business and our private sector and that's been the genius of our country. and we are blurring it badly and will cause a lot of trouble. do we have a doctor from georgia that wants to join us here?

i'm going to run back to my good friend, congressman king from iowa. please join us. mr. king: a couple of points that linger in my mind. one is to add to the point that the gentleman from georgia and missouri were making about spain and i concur, it was for every green job created, it cost .2 jobs, but also each of those green jobs cost $770,000 to generate that job. a massive cost in capital. i want to throw another point into this in a brief way, the cap and trade component of this legislation that's impending to be driven through this house floor the month of june, we have experienced that. when speaker pelosi was elected, she declared this capitol complex would be carbon neutral and ordered the generating plant

that provides the electricity that illuminates this room would be changed over from coal generation to natural gas under this idea that natural gas isn't a hydro carbon that can't be upheld by an engineer, but in any case, double the cost of the electricity and still found out we weren't carbon neutral but still emitting co-2 into the atmosphere. and so, when on the board of trade and purchased $89,000 carbon credits, the very central commidity that is going to be presented on the floor of this house, $89,000 to offset the co-2 emissions so we can light this capitol complex. some of that money went to farmers in south dakota. didn't change their behavior. and some of that money also went to a coal-fired generating plant

in iowa that had received a government grant to burn switch grass. i went over to look at that. they got a check. that's how cap and trade will work in the united states of america. we can't get it right in congress, we aren't going to get it right in missouri. mr. akin: i think we have three or four minutes left. i'm going to yield to my good friend, congresswoman bachmann from minnesota. mrs. bachmann: we were watching "titanic" and i listened to dr. burgess about the debt and the debt load. once thebt load. once the ice gash came on the side of the titanic, we think of the united states. nothing could possibly sink the united states. we will always be a superpower. the one thing that has kept us a superpower has been freedom,

free market economies. we are in the process of watching the deconstruction of free market economies before our very eyes. as the ice ripped that hole in the titanic, water started being taken on and the engineer brought the blueprint of the titanic, water came into the first chamber, the second and the third. by the time it filled up so many chambers, it was over. the ship -- it was impossible to save that ship. that, i think, mr. akin is what you have been bringing before this body this evening, you have been showing to the american people that at a certain point when we have such excess levels of spending that in turn leads to excessive levels of taxation, that in turn leads us to excess levels of borrowing that at a certain point we wonder what the tipping point will be if the

united states will not be able to recover. we do have an alternative. we have a positive alternative that next quarter we could already see growth in our economy. but this plan that president obama has put forward is the kind of plan that we could watch last night -- last weekend on tnt in the movie "titanic." if we follow that plan that president obama has put before us, we know what that plan will be and we know people wig go down. mr. akin: i thank the great guests we have had tonight. i think you for this symposium on freedom and the need to have the federal government restrained to its proper limits. thank you very much, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: under the speaker's announced policy of january 6, 2009, the chair recognizes the gentleman from georgia, mr. gingrey, for 60 minutes.

mr. gingrey: for the next hour, i'm going to be joined by a number of my colleagues on the republican side of the aisle. and most of them are members of the g.o.p. dtors' caucus and we are going to spend time talking about health care reform. certainly that is the number one thing that's on our plate as we go through these next six weeks leading up to the august recess and of course as the president has outlined his desire to have a health reform bill on his desk for signature sometime in mid-october of this year. whether or not that can be done remains to be seen. and there are a lot of thoughts out there as to how to approach

this. but we feel that it's very important as physician members, i think there is something like 339 years of clinical experience combined in this g.o.p. doctors' caucus, about 15 of us health care professionals who have actually practiced in the field, if you will, most of us involved just in clinical medicine, what i like to refer to as meat and potatoes medicine, not research at some heyak democratic institution, but actually seeing patients every day in the office, in the operating room and delivery room. so i think we have a perspective that we would like to share with members on both sides of the aisle. early in the evening, madam early in the evening, madam speaker, we heard from the 30-