for over 400,000 jobs to be created each month for us over a period of several years in order to accommodate for the growth in population as well as to return us to that kind of high -- of low unemployment. . we have a lot of work to do, madam speaker, i know the gentleman knows that. i think it's fair to say that in fact, we need to create 434,000 jobs per month for two years to make up for the job losses we have experienced that is going to take some significant commitment on the part of this congress to stop the government spending and have lower taxes on small business. as the gentleman knows, his constituents, just like mine, everyone i talk to knows someone out of work. it is high time for us to focus on small business and that is

to provide the tax relief for small business and to stop the government programs of spending. and i would hope that the gentleman can commit to trying to change the route we have taken to finally begin to grow this economy again. with that, madam speaker, i would ask the gentleman -- mr. hoyer: before the gentleman asks another question, would you yield so i can comment on the comments the gentleman made? mr. cantor: sure. mr. hoyer: the gentleman indicates we want to stop spending. every economist from his side of the aisle and our side of the aisle said if we didn't spend last year we would not have grown the economy. chairman ben bernanke, appointed by president bush, and secretary paulsen, said you better spend or you'll go into a depression.

generally speaking, the gentleman wants to return to the policies of the bush administration. the bush administration, of course, was the worst job performing administration since herbert hoover. i know the gentleman knows that because those statistics are pretty clear, created 19,400 per month you talk about 400-something odd thousand jobs, i agree we need to create that level if we're going to get the jobs your economic program lost. 19,400 jobs, you need 100,000 to stay even. that was the average over 96 months of the policies that were pursued during the bush administration that my friend supported. very frankly, you will remember, during the clinton administration, an economic program that your party didn't support, to a person, everyone voted against it, we created 216,000 jobs per month. now there's no secret as to where those jobs were lost. if you create 10% of the numb of jobs you need to stay even,

you're going to go behind and we have a real deficit. the c.b.o. says the program was adopted, that your party opposed, created two million new jobs or retained jobs in our economy. over the last five months, we've had a net positive growth in jobs. we grew 162,000 jobs last month. the gentleman is absolutely correct, not nearly enough. but much wet better than the 797,000 jobs lost in the last month of the bush administration or the average 726,000 jobs lost in the last three months of the bush administration. we now have -- we're in the pluses. we're starting to grow. we need to do more much, much more. that's why i responded to the gentleman when he asked me what we're going to do we're going to continue to focus on bringing jobs back to america and to our people.

i yield back. mr. cantor: i thank the gentleman. madam speaker, i would say this. always the gentleman likes to talk about the prior administration, and i would just like to point out that during the prior administration, the last two years of that, his party was in control of congress and certainly if we look at the numbers, did contribute to some of the problem that -- mr. hoyer: would the gentleman yield on that issue? mr. cantor: i'm not ready to yield yet, madam speaker. i would say there's plenty of blame to go around. but what we're trying to do is learn from mistakes that have taken place and go forward in a constructive manner. it's my sense that this nation is at a crossroads. we have serious challenges facing this country and last thursday was congress' deadline for passing a budget. and it is my strong belief that we must act and the gentleman indicates that we are going to act, but because of the

critical nature of the challenges that we face, madam speaker, i believe that we've got three reasons to act swiftly and properly in passing a budget because it is at the heart of the lack of confidence of what the american people feel toward this body and if we can rebuild that confidence somehow, we can see a return to growth in this economy so people can get back to work. first, madam speaker, since 1974 budget act passed, the house has never failed to pass a budget resolution. american families and small businesses are not given the luxury of avoiding a budget somehow because maybe it's too difficult. and neither should we. and the gentleman in his own words has said before that it is difficult to pass budgets in election years because they -- the budgets -- reflect what the

fiscal status is. again, madam speaker, i point out never since the passage of the budget act in 1974, has this house failed to pass a budget resolution. secondly, madam speaker, as to the urgency for this body to act in this critical time. c.b.o. director doug elmendorf recently remarked the nation's fiscal past is unsustainable. without a more aggressive approach to spending than the president took, in his budget proposal, the debt will rise from currently 53% of g.d.p. to 90% of g.d.p. at the end of the decade. we all know, madam speaker, that is unacceptable. finally, i say to the gentleman, madam speaker, the president in his remarks consistently refers to pending tax increases as the expiration

of the bush tax cut. madam speaker, i'd say the american people believe that erasing a tax cut is a tax increase. this congress has a responsibility to the people that we represent to inform them, the families, the small businesses, of its intention on whether we're going toin crease taxes on the small business -- whether we're going to increase taxes on the small businesses. i ask the gentleman if he could give us some sense of when we can expect the body to act on a budget? i yield. mr. hoyer: i hope that we act on a budget certainly before this end of this work period. i think it's important to pass the budget. i've said that. i'm working toward that end. mr. cantor: i thank the gentleman for that and for his

commitment to ensure that we right the ship, so to speak and stop the spending. mr. hoyer: will the gentleman yield on that in mr. cantor: i yield. mr. hoyer: the gentleman would like to pretend the bush administration didn't exist. he doesn't like to look back, doesn't like history, doesn't like to learn from our mistakes. he doesn't outline the mistakes the bush administration made or he made in supporting those policies but presumably he believes they existed which led to such a disastrous performance of our economy, the turning of a $5.6 billion surplus that the bush administration inherited which allowed it to do some of the things they did without paying for them, unfortunately they left a $5 trillion deficit to this administration. they left a deep, deep, deep hole we've been trying to dig out without much help, frankly, from your side of the aisle, i

will tell my friend. we are getting out of that hole. almost every indicator indicates that, including the growth of jobs, not nearly to where people are feeling it. we need to make sure we continue to create jobs and create an economy that is working much better than it worked during the bush administration. the gentleman mentions we were in charge of congress in 2007. yes, in 2006, the american public said we don't like the policies the bush administration, the republicans in congress are put suing. we want a change. we did change. but the gentleman well knows that no veto of president bush was overwritten to change the economic policies you were pursuing, period. we couldn't do that. we couldn't do it until such time as january of 2009 occurred. when it occurred, unfortunately, and tragically for the american people and the millions, eight million, to be -- eight million plus to be

exact who lost their jobs a financial system that was suffering from egregious regulatory neglect and had as a result put many, many taxpayers, millions of taxpayers, to the responsibility of trying to stabilize the ship of state. now we've done that and the good news is, that money is being paid back. and the good news is that in terms of the bill that you and i both supported but 2/3 of your party did not, we did stabilize, at the request of the bush administration, the financial community. so when the gentleman says that we need to grow jobs, we do. but very frankly, if the gentleman is proposing the same policies that were pursued for eight years under the bush administration, then that won't get it and didn't get it and that's bhy it's important to learn, not to place blame, but to learn as i said the other

day, from those failures. and not repeat them. to invest in the growth of our economy. mr. cantor: i thank the gentleman, madam speaker. i say that if he is so intent on comparing the budgets and the outlook under the bush administration to this one, i would say this. if we compare the 2011 budget of president bush and president obama, president bush's outlook and budget for this year was $2.9 trillion. the 2011 budget of this president is $3.6 trillion. we could simply cut the deficit by 50% if we just lived within president bush's 2011 budget. and madam speaker, i would say to the gentleman if you cut out all the emergency spending caused by the recession -- mr. hoyer: will the gentleman yield? mr. cantor: i'll yield in a minute if you cut out the

emergency spending caused by the recession and looked at discretionary spending, since congress votes on that every year, president obama will increase discretionary spend big $319 billion over president bush's budget for 2011. so, madam speaker, i would say, again, we've got to do better. the american people are waiting for this body to step up in a responsible way to stop the spending, which brings on the need for yet even more debts, which ultimately will lead to higher taxes, despite what the gentleman said, there's been enough tax relief and get back to a fiscal path that makes sense so we can see small business grow again. i yield. mr. hoyer: first of all, the gentleman does this often. i never said there had been enough tax relief. but you -- which you just said i said.

nobody heard me say that. mr. cantor: i thought the gentleman had said there's been so much tax relief under the current administration that it teems -- that it seems that all we need to do is keep spending. mr. hoyer: i think you anticipated what the facts are, as you know, i didn't say that. but you anticipated it. 95% of the american public, 95% of the american working people, got a tax cut, as you recall, in the legislation that you voted against. $288 billion in tax relief. that went into the pockets of americans, helped them get through some very, very tough times, which we inherited, did not create, which we inherited and moving forward. now with respect to the tax cuts, or tax increases that you referred to earlier, they're going into effect because of a policy i voted against but you voted -- i think you voted for, you were here in 2001 and 2003.

why did you do that? you talked about budgeting you did it because you couldn't conform to your budget requirements. what ewe simply did is you did the artifice, with all due respect to say, they'll expire in 2010. what is projected to happen in 2010 is a direct result of the budget and the policy that you promoted and voted for, i tell my friend. mr. cantor: i say to my friend again if he's so intent on comparing the two, let's go back to the bush budget, which would allow us to cut the deficit by 50%. if he's so intent on saying how bad things were. let's stop the spending. but i would say to the gentleman, as far as tax relief is concerned, that tax relief, to 95% of the public, 25% of the tax relief went to entities and individuals that don't even pay taxes. now, in the minds of most persons, -- of most americans, that's not a tax cut, that's a handout. that's why we've got to start

getting back to basics, madam speaker, and insist that the kinds of things that we do here are actually constructive to job creation. because that's what we need to be about. we can go through the litany of things in this president's budget and what the majority has done over the last -- over its term in office this session, to demonstrate taxes have gone up significantly over this period. it is time to stop taxing, stop spending, and stop borrowing. so madam speaker, i thank the gentleman -- mr. hoyer: will the gentleman yields on that? mr. cantor: i yield. mr. hoyer: when you say taxes have gone up in this speared, what period are you referring to? mr. cantor: this year, this year madam speaker, taxes have increased $670 billion, $316 billion comes at the expense of the middle class. mr. hoyer: and what were those taxes.

mr. cantor: madam speaker, if you look at the health care -- mr. hoyer: the health care bill has not gone into effect. mr. cantor: the health care bill that has just passed as long -- as long as this economy and the players in this economy understand that, actions are being taken now to facilitate adopting to a very high tax environment. now, if the gentleman wants to join us, if he want to join us in sending a signal to the public that we're not going to continue business as usual, then let's step up, send the signal. we're not going to allow taxes to increase any further, and that starts with differenting from the -- differing from the president's budget which calls for $2 trillion in tax hikes over the next 10 years. so i say to the gentleman, you can say all year long that you have sat here and provided enough middle-class tax relief. it's just not true. the public doesn't understand

that. the public sees washington spending money in unprecedented ways and having to borrow to pay for that and ultimately people understand that it is about raising their taxes, taking home -- reducing their take-home pay to pay for that. mr. hoyer: will the gentleman yield? mr. cantor: i yield. mr. hoyer: the gentleman perhaps believes if he says it enough that i said there's been enough tax relief maybe people will believe it. i have never said that on this floor or any other place. so i wish the gentleman would stop mischaracterizing what i say. now, very frankly, what i have said is the policies were pursued were not working demonstrablely when we took over the presidency of the united states and could change policy which we did. we changed policy consistently with frankly what senator mccain said ought to be done during the course of the

election. not the same way but we had to invest in our economy. mark zamby, senator mccain's economic advisor, along with others, said we need to do what we did. now, the gentleman voted against it. but it has, i tell you, worked demonstrablely. two million new jobs, according to c.b.o. -- not new jobs -- retained or created. in fact, over two million jobs. 162,000 jobs created last month. not enough. he is correct. but to ignore the fact that we are making some progress, i don't know whether you saw larry kudrow, he said, stop talking down the economy. stop saying things aren't getting better because the psychology of the economy is very important. in fact, whether it's the stock market indication going up, they have confidence, whether it's the growth in our economy from a 6.4% decline in the economy we took over from the

bush administration to now a 5.6% growth, that figure doesn't mean anything to anybody unless they get jobs. i understand that. we need to get jobs. what it does mean, however, with the economy growing that jobs will follow, and that's important. so please don't put words in my mouth. we need to cut taxes for the american public. in fact as you know, i want to remark on something that you said. ronald reagan was a sport of the -- supporter of the earned income tax credit. why was he a supporter of the earned income tax credit? because he wanted to make sure people got food for their family, buy some clothes for their kids to go to school, pay their mortgage payment was an important thing to action. that's the difference, frankly, between the two parties. we don't believe it was a handout. it was a handup in a very difficult economy. we said, and they don't pay taxes.

why don't they pay taxes, i ask my friend rhetorically? the reason they don't pay taxes is because they're not making enough money to pay taxes under your tax program, i would suggest to you. you did that. we supported it. they didn't pay taxes but what we said is they've got to live. their kids have to eat. they have to get by. and to the extent that they have some assistance in doing so and spend that money as every economist will tell you, and you know this to be the case, it will help the economy grow. yes, we help those people as well. maybe you think that was simply a happenedout and we shouldn't have done it -- handout and we shouldn't have done it but we did. mr. cantor: reclaiming my time, madam speaker. this is where politics kick in. for anyone to sit here and say that republicans don't care about people, that's just not true, and he knows it. it's a definitional question. if the gentleman differs with my characterization, it's not handout, it's a handup, ok.

but what we are talking about was tax relief. it was not a tax cut. if you don't pay taxes you can't get a tax cut. but what i'd say to the gentleman is this -- times are different right now, madam speaker. the american public understands the crossroads this country is at. that we are on a path to fiscal ruin, and the gentleman likes to continue to defend the stimulus bill as having been a success. well, i'd say to the speaker -- say, madam speaker, to the gentleman, no one, not very many people in america thinks the stimulus bill was a success at generating jobs. and that's just almost a unanimous fact among most americans. so if we know that, why would we continue to advocate the same policies? and instead, madam speaker, i'd say again, i hope the gentleman would join us in advocating tax cuts for small businesses so

that we can grow jobs in this economy. the gentleman did ask what tax cuts -- what tax hikes occurred over the last -- over this session and during the gentleman's party's majority rule? we know that there was a $65 billion tax increase on tobacco products. there was almost $7 billion tax increase under the stimulus law repealing guidance allowing certain pairs to claim losses of a corporation. there was an almost $23 billion of surtaxes extended for the federal unemployment program. and there was also, madam speaker, as the gentleman knows, a delay of rules reducing double taxation of american foreign nationals to the tune of almost $6 billion. those are the tax hikes that have occurred in addition to

the overwhelming billions and billions of dollars inside the health care bill. so, madam speaker, it is not accurate for the gentleman to represent that, number one, this congress has not raised taxes on the middle class. we know differently. and number two, to sit here and hide behind the notion that there aren't going to be tax increases at the end of this year and the fact that that realization is not impacting job growth or the lack thereof, now, that's not being completely accurate, madam speaker. and i'd say to the gentleman times are different now. it is time for us to own up to the obligations that we face as a country and work together to try and put this country back onto a growth path. mr. hoyer: will my friend yield one more time? mr. cantor: i yield. mr. hoyer: it is a new time. we're paying our bills.

now, we had to borrow a lot of money because we were in a very deep hole, and everybody said if you didn't, all economists, marty feldstein said you need to put more money back in the economy. we didn't have any money. you have a $5.6 trillion surplus. we had a deficit. we didn't have any money. your administration spent it all. you didn't pay for your tax cuts. very nice to give tax cuts, but if you don't pay for them and they create deficits, then who's going to pay for them? our children. and that's what happened. we went to war. one was absolutely essential. we went to another war that some say was a choice. that is in iraq. we somewhat abandoned afghanistan. we went to iraq and we didn't succeed in afghanistan. well, we didn't pay for either one of those wars. who were you expecting to pay for those wars? our children. you adopted a drug prescription

program which frankly we made better in the health care bill. we made seniors more secure in getting their prescription drugs, but you didn't pay for it. your economy that you left us, very frankly, is responsible for 38% of that deficit to which you referred. 90%-plus of the deficits that confront this country is the direct result of the policies pursued during the last administration. just as when roosevelt inherited from the hoover administration a very substantial downturn. it took him time to turn this economy around. turn that economy around. so i say to my friend, we are prepared to work together, but we're not prepared to pretend when you say times are different, they are different. they are very different. the difference between a $5.6 trillion surplus and a $5 trillion deficit.

the bush administration inherited and our inheritance. it's made it tough on us, tough on the american people. and we're trying to get out of this. i think we are. and, again, i repeat to my friend. larry kudlow gave you very good advice. very conservative guy on television. i know him. we appear on his program. he urged those of you on the conservative side of the ledger, don't deny the fact. that's what larry said. don't deny the progress that has been made because if you deny it and people believe that denial they won't think things are getting better and they won't act accordingly and that's not going to be good for our economy. it won't be good for our country. so i caution my friend so when things are positive, have the ability to say, yes, we've made some positive progress from where we were before this administration came into office. i yield back. mr. cantor: i thank the gentleman. and in trying to close this

colloquy, madam speaker, i would say the gentleman knows good and well that when we had a positive job growth report last month i was the first one to speak out and acknowledge the fact that, yes, growing jobs is a good thing. we got a long way to go. the gentleman admits that we are at a different time now, and he points to the deficits and he points to the fact that the old administration he allegedly didn't pay its bills and perhaps we in the majority spent too much. ok, fine, but it doesn't give this majority and this congress and this administration any better or more license to bankrupt this country to continue on the spending path and that is my point. we are at a crossroads, madam speaker, i would tell to the gentleman. we have tremendous challenges before us. and as the american people know, if we don't stop the reckless policies of this town,

it may very well lead to the fact that our kids and their kids will not enjoy the same freedoms and opportunities that we do. so i continue to tell the gentleman we stand ready to work with him to try and address this extremely critical time in our nation. mr. hoyer: if the gentleman will yield? i simply say i agree with the gentleman and i agree with the gentleman and certainly want to join together in this effort. and the gentleman will observe that's why we have adopted -- readopted statutory pay-go. we think that will constrain spending. that's why we created a commission to look at spending and make recommendations to get a handle on the spending in this country and bring our deficit in line as it was in the 1990's. and that is why the president has submitted a budget that freezes discretionary spending at last year's levels. so we agree with you that we need to move in that direction and in fact we are. i thank the gentleman.

mr. cantor: and in closing, madam speaker, i'd say that in order to get a handle on spending, just stop, and that is why we shouldn't allow for discussion of hiking taxes. it allows this body, this fellow government to have yet even more of the taxpayer dollars to decide how to spend. it's time for us to stop and practice fiscal discipline and get this economy back on track, and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. mr. hoyer: madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from maryland. mr. hoyer: madam speaker, i ask unanimous consent that when the house adjourns today ited a jurp to meet at 12:30 p.m. on monday next for morning hour debate. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. the chair will entertain requests for one-minute speeches. for what purpose does the gentlelady from ohio rise? >> i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute please. the speaker pro tempore: without objection.

>> this week, the s.e.c. alleged that goldman sachs committed fraud. but there's growing evidence it could be excluded from any criminal case, thousands i invite my colleagues to join me and several dozen other members in signing on to a letter to attorney general holder asking him to investigate goldman sachs and other related cases to ferret out and fight fraud in our financial system. legal maneuvering to thwart justice should not be allowed for those who have harmed our republic so maliciously. in addition, i urge my colleagues to sign on to h.r. 3995, which enhances the f.b.i.'s s.e.c.'s and others' abilities to investigate and prosecute fraud and other financial crime. those who committed financial crimes must be brought to justice.

our letter an h.r. 3995 lead exactly in that direction. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentlelady from florida rise? >> to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. ms. ros-lehtinen: i rise today to recognize april as autism awareness month and call for research into to leading developmental disorder. it affects more children every day and is becoming exceptionally prevalent in our society. the number of american families who must learn to cope with autism is growing every day. an estimated one in 110 children boorn in the united states are now diagnosed with autism. we must invest in the research that will allow us to better understand and treat this serious disorder for individuals already live with autism and those children who will be diagnosed this year, we must make this our priority.

autism's hold on our families, our children, and our country must be broken. i look forward to the day when children diagnosed with this developmental disorder can live full and healthy lives. i thank the speaker for the time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from the northern mariana islands rise? mr. sablan: to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. sablan: madam speaker ernesto guerrero is a teenager in the northern mariana islands is a teenager who despite his own problems has found a way to help other children. angel has used his -- was dige nosed with a brain tumor and used his experience to help other.

he found the way that time passed more comfortably because of the play room there but he knew that kids back home at the commonwealth health center in the northern mariana islands had no play room so ain yell partnered with hawaii represent arive and retail pacific, a nonprofit organization, and together they organized toys and books to make a play center at the commn wealth hospital he took the adversity of his own life and turned it into a benefit for others. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from florida rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. >> madam speaker, florida's unemployment reached a record of 4.3% and in some areas, it's as high as 15%. my constituents continue to ask me, where are the jobs? many claim the layoffs are

driving up the unemployment rate but the real culprit is the lack of jobs being createded in the private sector. american who was been jobless for over a year will continue down that road if new jobs simply do not exist and i'm not talking about temporary government jobs. congress must work to stop spending and create a favorable environment for businesses to save money and invest by cutting taxes and incentivize banks to start lending again. increasing the federal government's control over the free market and spending money we do not have is not the answer. americans have made that clear. that is why today, i co-sponsor the economic freedom act this bill will lower job-killing taxes on businesses and rein in excessive government spending. this is the type of solution americans deserve. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from new york rise? >> i ask unanimous consent to

address the house for one minute and revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized. >> thank you, mr. speaker, i rise today to celebrate the 90th anniversary of russo's bar and grill in amsterdam, new york. it was opened in 1920 as a moe haubling grocery store. after the repeal of prohibition he turned it into a tavern and pool hall he passed it on to his children. pat and lou. it was then passed to its current owners. russo's is about family, a gathering place, old american ideals, an immigrant's dream and a successful small business. perhaps that's why even then-candidate hillary clinton recognized the important of russo's, making a campaign stop there in her successful 2000

run for a united states senate seat. nearly a century ago, pat russo planted a seed that germinated and grew into what we have today, fine food, a gathering place for local community meetings and events. russo's has the recipe for success, tasty success for 90 years. mr. speaker, i yield back the rest of my time. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? >> mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized. mr. smith: during president george w. bush's first term, the national media gave extensive coverage to the bush administration's relationship with enron. "the new york times" wrote, their dies are broad and deep and go back many years. "time" magazine reported on bush's enron problem. the chicago tribune headline

read, bush urged to be open about enron. eight years later by comparison, national coverage of the obama relation to goldman sachs is scarce. the s.e.c. filed suit against goldman sachs, charging it misled investors who participated in a mortgage securities deal designed to fail. goldman sachs employees gave president obama over $1 million in campaign contributions. nearly seven times as much as president bush received from enron workers. according to numbers on open secrets -- opensecrets.org as reported by the "washington examiner." the "examiner" also reported that several current and former members of the obama administration have close ties to goldman sachs. the national media should give americans the fact not just the double tan zards. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentlelady from texas rise? >> to address the house for one minute.

the speaker pro tempore: without objection. ms. jackson lee: thank you very much, mr. speaker. i agree with my friends on the other side of the aisle, we must create johns and we are working intensely to do that. we created 22 million plus jobs and in the obama administration we are increasing or holding or not losing jobs and increasing jobs. i hope my colleagues will join me in arguing two points, one, we must invest in the private sector, and the banking sector must help. and two, we must not lose teachers. we must begin to work on the idea of saving the nation's teachers. stand up for your job because you're standing up for the education of our children. who can afford to lose the best and the brightest. we lose that when we begin to lay off teachers. we should end any thoughts about laying off america's

teachers, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: gentlelady yields. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized. mr. barton: i spent this weekend talking to people in my districts about the economy and jobs which is on the minds of the american people and many of them said, congressman, we would be spending money and expanding our business but congress is creating such an uncertainty that we don't know what to do. they're still trying to figure out how this health care bill will impact them and if congress will pass a cap and trade bill that will raise the cost of energy, they're hearing congress talk about v.a.t. taxes, gasoline taxes and they see congress spending and borrowing money i it doesn't

have running up record deficits. they say, congressman, we're uncertain about the future in this country. when i go clubs and meetings, i ask people in the audience to raise their hands if they're live ought a better life than their parents. everybody's hand raises. when i ask how many people think that their children and grandchildren will live better than they are today, their hands are down. we cut spending, cut taxes and get the american people back to work. the speaker pro tempore: the chair lays before the house the following personal requests. the clerk: leave of absence requested for ms. mccollum of minnesota for today until noon. the speaker pro tempore: without objection the request is granted. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? mr. poe: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent that today following legislative business and any special orders heretofore entered into, the following members may be permitted to address this house, revise and extend their

remarks and include therein extraneous material. mr. moran for march -- april 29, myself, mr. poe, for april 29, mr. jones for april 29, dr. paul for today and mr. burton for april 26, 27, 28, and 29. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from tennessee rise? >> i ask unanimous consent that today following legislative business and any special orders heretofore entered into, the following members may be permitted to address the house for five minutes, revise and extend their remarks and include thereon extraneous material. mr. caves of tennessee. mr. janikowski of illinois, mr. altmire of pennsylvania, mr. davis of illinois, mr. -- ms. woolsey of california, ms. kaptur of ohio, mr. defazio of oregon, ms. -- mr. sablan of

northern mariana, and ms. norton of d.c. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. under the speaker's announced policy of january 26, 2009 -- of january 6, 2009, and under a previous order of the house, the following members are recognized for five minutes each. mr. davis of tennessee. >> mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. davis: our region is known for its natural beauty, rivers, streams, rolling hills, farms, fields and forests all come together to create the rich tappestry of the region. just as the beauty of the land contributes to the character of the place i'm proud to call home, so does the remarkable beauty of the people, the teachers, statesmen, war heroes and artists of the region are the vehicle that was carried

our most cherished traditions of the ages. out of these great men and women, there's one many particular i'm proud to call my friend. never one to shrink from a challenge, he's always been ready and willing to dedicate his time and resources to the service of others. mr. speaker, i rise today to honor millard vononing lee, an accomplished tennessean, who has dedicated his life to public community service, whether through his law practice, his service to the general assembly or his fight to improve education, he's been a staunch advocate for the interests of tennesseans. though it would be impossible to qualify and quantify the total impact that his work has had on our communities, countless lives have been enriched because of his faith and his friendship. a lifelong resident of oakland county in the foothills of the cumberland plateau he graduated

in 1947, attending tennessee technological university and graduated from cumberland law school in 1951. almost immediately after entering his -- earning his law degree, he began his general law practice in livingston, tennessee, which he continued until 1971. during that time, he was elected to four years in the general assembly and one term in the state's constitutional convention. he has had numerous positions in tennessee government, including county attorney and served as our state insurance commissioner. millard has always fought to improve education throughout tennessee. he serves on the tennessee board of regents and through his financial support helped create the science, technology, engineering and math center at tennessee technological university to bring a world class research center into the heart of tennessee. in his hometown of livingston, he was instrumental in coordinating local officials and private investors to

construct the public library that bears his name. he alsoest tash -- established the oakley firth national bank foundation which provides scholarships for financially challenged high school seniors in oakland county. he also helped build a campus for a community college which serves students across the umer cumberland area. i'm proud to be one of his friends and join them in wishing millard success in his future endeavors. mr. speaker, i yield back my time. the speaker pro tempore: mr. moran of kansas. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? >> i wish to control mr. moran's time. claim his time. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. poe: mr. speaker, plr rules and procedures for coming into the united states legally. you have to sign the guest book

at the port of entry so we know who you are. we have the right to know why someone wants to visit our country, and we have the right to tell them when it's time for them to go home. but right now america's hardworking taxpayers foot the bill for everyone who sneaks across our borders unabated. american taxpayers are expected to pay for the world's problems. we have enough problems of our own right here. let me mention some of our border issues and some of those issues that we have on the texas-mexico border. criminal aliens are part of that problem. there is a crime wave taking place in our border regions. there are 14 texas counties that border mexico, and recently i called the 14 county sheriffs and asked them this question -- how many people do you have in your county jail that are foreign nationals charged with crimes other than immigration violations? like misdemeanors and felony offenses. and they told me that 37% of the people in border county

jails in texas are foreign nationals charged with those crimes. these are not rich counties. these are poor counties, and yet they're expected to take the brunt of the crime problem on the border. they don't have the money to prosecute or even house these individuals. you see, mexico's problems have become our problems. further, the violence in mexico has escalated. just yesterday a holiday inn in monthry, mexico, was attacked by narcoterrorists. the asexual assault was done by 50 gunmen to block streets and slow down police response. at least three people were kidnapped in the attack by the drug cartels. violence in our southern border with mexico has escalated as well. and it not only effects good mexican nationals on the southern -- on the northern part of mexico but americans on the southern border as well. murders, kidnappings, old west shootouts, mexican military helicopter intrusions into the

united states and reports of criminal cartels cloning border patrol vehicles to smuggle drugs have all occurred. an arizona rancher was murdered on the border recently at his ranch. a california border agent was assassinated just a few months ago. in el paso, texas, our border patrol agents are reportedly being targeted by the azteca hitmen. those outlaws help and protect shipments for the juarez drug cartel. arizona has just passed a new law giving local law enforcement the ability to check immigration status and detain those in the united states illegally. the bill also puts an end to sanctuary cities in arizona. it requires law enforcement agents to make a reasonable effort to determine a person's legal status if there is reasonable expectation they're in the united states illegally. arizona and other states are desperate so they are trying to do the job that washington will not do. this bill is waiting for the governor's signature in arizona and most arizona citizens

support this law. border states have been asking for help for securing the border in this escalating vyleps for years. states have -- violence for years. states have to protect their citizens because the federal government refuses to act to adequately secure the border. it is the primary purpose of the federal government to keep american citizens safe. when the federal government refuses to act, the border states are left to deal with the problem on their own. governor rick perry in texas has been asking for national guard troops for over a year, but the department of homeland security has ignored these requests. there seems to be blissful silence in d.c. about the border war. why do we wait for more tragedy before more boots are put on the ground? our law enforcement agents need help. doesn't washington know the border has become a war zone? national guard troops should be deployed to the border immediately to protect us from the narcoterrorists. border patrol and local sheriffs in texas and other states are outmanned, outgunned and outfinanced. the united states guards the

borders of other nations, but yet we refuse to guard our own border. why do we do that? mr. speaker, we fail to act at our own peril. and that's just the way it is. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentlelady from illinois rise? >> i seek unanimous consent to address the house for five minutes. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. the gentlelady is recognized for five minutes. ms. schakowsky: thank you, mr. speaker. i rise to mark the 25th anniversary of an extraordinary organization, the aids foundation of chicago. the aids foundation is not just an illinois treasure, it's recognized across the nation as a leader in the hiv-aids policy and service. the aids foundation was founded in 1985 at the height of the hiv-aids epidemic when an aids diagnosis was a death sentence. h.i.v. has been identified to -- has been identified two

years earlier but effective treatment was still not available. many of us watched helplessly as friends and loved ones passed away. a.f.c. was founded by friends of mine, dr. renthro, judy carter. the fight against hiv-aids and improve the lives of people affected by the epidemic. thanks to a.f.c.'s role as a force for change, lives have been saved and lives have been changed. a.f.c. helped turn the tide of the epidemic in illinois and across the country. by working with community organizations to develop and improve hiv-aids services, funding and coordinating prevention, care and advocacy and acting as a champion for effective, compassionate hiv-aids policies. in its position as the hub of the hiv-aids services in chicago, a.f.c. has worked with its partner agencies to help people living with or affected

by hiv-aids with the care, housing and prevention services to keep hiv-aids -- h.i.v. infection from being the death sentence it once was through its advocacy efforts. a.f.c. has given a voice to those who would otherwise go unheard, empowering those living with the disease to be their own advocates, holding those of us in power accountable and keeping the human face of the epidemic fresh in our eyes and close to our hearts. many of the lifesaving programs established by this body have been implemented on the ground by a.f.c. and its community partners. again and again, a.f.c. has been a dedicatesed steward for its resources. in coordinate nating aids prevention and case management and supportive housing programs has been repeatedly recognized as national models. from the west side of chicago to west africa, a.f.c. has part nerd with community organizations to support vital

prevention, education and care programs that would otherwise go unfunded. these activities reflect the true scope of the hiv-aids epidemic, running the gamut from the local and state level to the national and international stage. because of the richness of these links, a.f.c. is uniquely positioned to build coalitions and grassroots networks to effect change. the countless campaigns has empowered those communities impacted by the epidemic to directly engage their elected officials and demand the life-saving services that they need. as a member of congress, i rely on a.f.c. to provide me with policy advice and is important to describe the on-the-ground needs and the needs that must be a-- and the concerns that must be addressed. i want to congratulate the president and c.e.o., board

chair and their staff and volunteers for their leadership and dedication in the fight against hiv-aids. thanks to your hard work over the last 25 years we now know that this is a fight in which one day we will be victorious. and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the chair will receive a message. the messenger: mr. speaker, a message from the senate. the secretary: mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: madam secretary. the secretary: i have been directed by the senate to inform the house that the senate has passed s. 3244, an act to provide the members of congress shall not receive a cost-of-living adjustment pay during fiscal year 2011 in which the concurrence of the house is requested. the speaker pro tempore: mr. jones of north carolina. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? >> i ask unanimous consent that i take my five minutes at this time. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for

five minutes. >> i thank you, mr. speaker. today, the motion to instruct on the comprehensive iranian sanction bill was passed unanimously 400-11. i was one of the 11, and i'd like to explain why i think the sanction bill against the iranians is very, very dangerous and not well thought out. sanctions are very serious. sanctions are literally an act of war. when you prevent certain good and services going to a country it's like a blockade. there's no advantage to us to do this. the sanctions literally says that any country that trades or sends oil into iran we will no longer trade with them. so if russia sends in oil or gasoline or refine products or china does, we are theoretically under this bill not to trade with them.

can you think of anything more chaotic than having a trade war with china at this particular time? so often well-intentioned foreign policy procedures backfire. they have unintended consequences and there is too often blowback. today unbelievably we are engaged in so many places in the world and we can't afford it. our foreign policy costs us $1 trillion a year to operate. we're in 135 countries. we have over 700 bases throughout the world. we are engaged in military confrontation in iraq, afghanistan, pakistan. we're bombing in yemen and as well as having surrogates fighting in somalia. we're flat out broke. the policy is driving our enemies into the hands of the chinese and here we are looking for another war. it makes no -- no sense whatsoever. the conversation today was

nothing more than war nothing more than war propaganda on why we have to get ready to bomb the iranians. there is no proof, according to our c.i.a., that they're actually working on a nuclear weapon. now, i'm sure they would like to. why not? everybody around them have it so it would be logical if they're surrounded and are threatened and intimidated with all the -- all the people around them, why wouldn't they want one? well, of course they do. but others have it. they have never been found in violation of the nonproliferation treaty. never. and yet pakistan, india and israel, they don't even belong and they are our friends and we give them money. pakistan, they get support from us. they have nuclear weapons, and they have been known to send nuclear technology to north korea. so the whole process makes so little sense. the language today was used at -- well, we have to go in

because of the weapons of mass destruction, they're going to have missiles and they are going to attack us. it's identical to the propaganda promoting in 2002, in 2001 before we attacked iraq. so the same process is occurring. try to generate all this excitement about the need to use hostilities. now, a lot of individuals vote for sanctions that are basically anti-war and they don't like the military option and they think this is an alternative. i think it is deeply flawed thinking because sanctions lead to hostilities, and if you commit to the sanctions, you're really committing to the next step. the sanctions of the 1990's and the year 2000, the sanctions on iraq eventually led to the hostilities and the war and invasion. so what did that invasion of iraq do? did we find any al qaeda there? no, we found out that saddam

hussein wouldn't allow the al qaeda there. no weapons of mass destruction. we've turned the country upside down, hundreds of thousands of people injured and killed. we have suffered devastating problems from this, and what has happened? we turned a government of iraq over to the shiites who are allies with the iranians. so that whole policy has actually backfired. so now what we're doing to the iranians is driving them into the pockets of the chinese. the chinese are pretty good capitalists these days. they work hard, they produce and give us goods and services and they are starting to invest around the world in natural resources. and what are we doing? all we're doing is trying to take over the world with natural resources so we have control of oil. this is a mercantileistic idea. it's ancient and it takes you back to almost colonial times.

so this, i think, shows that our policies are deeply flawed. i sure wish this vote would have come out differently and i warn this is a very different vote. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. . mr. altmire from pennsylvania. without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized. ms. norton: mr. speaker, this week the historic vote to give the 600,000 residents of the district of columbia here in the nation's capital voting representation in the house was due on the floor and had to be pulled down only for now. i come to thank the majority of members of congress of this house who have voted for the right of the people of the district to have a vote on this floor, especially the 22 republicans and the 219 democrats who gave the d.c. house voting rights act a straight up vote in 2007 when it

passed, 241-177. i thank speaker pelosi and mr. hoyer for their infatigable and unfailing support to the very end. i thank majority leader harry reid for allowing a historic first time vote for the bill where it passed in the senate. i thank chairman john conyers for his unyielding support of d.c. voting rights. i thank former representative tom davis, whose idea it was to pair democratic d.c. with republican utah, the most perfect example of a bipartisan bill ever to hit this floor where each side benefits equally. i thank d.c. voters, and the coalition they put together. who were steadfast and creative throughout this process.

the senate for the first time in fact enacted the bill but it had a gun amendment that took down the district's gun safety laws. yet the district's gun safety laws have been held to be constitutional now by the courts. nevertheless, when the bill came here to the house, i sought a clean vote, almost got it, thank the house for being willing to put the d.c. house voting rights bill on a must-pass bill. the senate did not agree. so i spent months trying to negotiate a compromise that would have at least have left at least some of d.c.'s gun laws intact. but finally and reluctantly agreed to the same amendment that passed the senate to in fact alter district's gun laws, but i had a set of strategy for returning the district its public safety laws. however we were hit over the top with a new and revised gun

amendment that gun forces sprung on us that was worse than anything we could imagine. ultimately people would have been alawed -- allowed to carry guns in the nation's capital. the city could not prohibit guns in its own public buildings, owners of commercial property could not allow guns in their own property from those who rent or lease. we expect the gun forces to return. we are ready for them. for the sake of post-9/11 washington and hometown d.c., they must not succeed in overturning the public safety gun laws of the nation's capital. i promise you this, we will redouble our efforts to finally give the american citizens who pay taxes at a rate of second per capita in the united states, the citizens who live in your own capital, the vote in congress they have sought for

two centuries, and that every american who believes in the founding principles of the framers in our country know must have. let's do it and let's do it this year. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time. mr. davis of illinois. for what purpose does the gentleman from northern mariana islands rise? mr. sablan: to address the house. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. sablan: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, i rise to congratulate the shareholders, management, and employees of a very special family-owned business in the northern mariana islands as they celebrate their company's 60th anniversary. jolten enterprises ink, -- inc., began filling beer and soft drinks to soldiers and sailers

in saipan right after world war ii. they gradually grew their quintessential mom and pop operation into a multimillion dollar corporation. today encompasses not only retail shopping outlets but also wholesale, shipping, car dealership and auto service, hotel, real estate, construction, and material supply, hardware, insurance, bakery, and deli businesses. they have hundreds of employees, including many that have been a part of the company for decades. it is difficult to imagein 60 -- imagine 60 years ago. the war had destroyed virtually all the fiscal infrastructure. so for newlyweds take the great

entrepreneurial leap of faith and open a corner grocery store was a significant step not only in their own lives but the reconstruction of the island economy. they sacrificed much and worked hours to build their small business. they were lucky enough to have a government job, but it was constantly networking, plan, and carefully executing a variety of adaptations and expansions to grow the business. dada supervised the store during the day, balancing the books, while caring for and the couple's growing family. the four daughters, annie, patricia, francis, and priscilla began their own education in business at an early age right there in the store. their parents were tough but carrying out -- teaching other children to work and work hard

to get what they wanted. they learned that discipline was key to success and as each of the children grew, they took on their own increasingly important roles. jolten passed on in 1993, didi in 2008. but their six children continue to run the many businesses their parents began. and the children shared their parents' values with their own children. so the lessons they imparted continue to be practiced by a third generation of entrepreneurs. as retold by the children and grandchildren, one of the most important of this lessons was that to a large degree the company's success is a result of the teamwork of the company's loyal and dedicated managers and employees. in that spirit, owners, managers, employees, we salute them all. hand in hand may they continue to prosper in the next decade guided by the vision and spirit of the company's founding couple

. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. mr. posey from florida. ms. woolsey of california. mr. burton from indiana. ms. kaptur from ohio. mr. forbes from virginia. mr. defazio from oregon. under the speaker's announced policy of january 6, 2009, the gentleman from texas, mr. burgess, is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader. mr. burgess: i thank the speaker for the recognition. i thank the minority leader for allowing me to speak this afternoon during the leadership hour. it is always a significant event to be asked to speak during the leadership hour and certainly appreciate the confidence shown

in me by the leadership. this afternoon i thought we would talk a little more about the health care bill passed by this house last month because it is an important subject and one that continues to cause problems across the country. almost any place you go people want to ask you questions about why did you do this bill and what does it mean for me and what can i expect going forward? mr. speaker, i know i need to confine my comments to the chair and i will do so, but if i were to be able to speak to people directly, i would encourage them to look at a health care policy website that my office maintains, it's called the congressional health care caucus, healthcaucus.org. on this website chronicles many of the debates and discussions that occurred over the last 14 or 15 months encapsulating the genesis of this health care bill that was passed last month. and really with the passage of

the bill the health care issue does not go away. we simply move into the second part of what is going to be the health care discussion because, after all, even as we speak, just down the hill at the department of health and human services, they are busily working and hiring people, people who are going to be writing rules, writing regulations, and really dictating the policies that will direct health care in this country not just through election day, not just through election day 2012, but literally through the lives of the next three generations of americans. so this is an important concept and people do need to pay attention as the rules are written over at the department of health and human services, there will be periods open for comment on that public rule making process, and people need to visit websites a such as healthcaucus.org or the health and human services website to familiarize themselves with the

rules as they are being written. if you get the mental picture of some central planner moving data points around on a big map or graph, that's probably the right mental image to have right now with where we are with this health care bill. let's talk just a little bit about how we got to where we did with the passage of the bill. wreck politician after the -- recognition after the presidential election of 2008 that health care was going to be a big part of the legislative agenda for the president's first term. there was no question about that. and as we worked our way through the year last year, concepts such as cost and coverage started creeping into almost every story that was written about health care. because it was after senator kennedy's committee over in the senate that health, education, lib labor, and pensions committee released a congressional budget office score on the bill that they were working on which showed a cost

significantly north of $1 trillion over 10 years and coverage numbers of above 13 million additional people being covered that people said, my goodness. this costs a lot. we don't get nearly the coverage that we thought we did. almost every other health care proposal that came forward after that was subject to that same congressional budget office scrutiny and scoring and as a consequence you kind of got an idea of the parameters being set. and those parameters were that the bill had to be scored at costing under $1 trillion and the bill had to score as covering an additional 30 million people. those were the things, those were the points on the graph that had to be satisfied at the end of the discussion. so if it were a question of covering everyone who makes under 150% of the federal poverty level under medicaid, as was the directive from the bill that was passed in the house, if that made the final number too

high, then you do what they did in the senate and said we are only going to cover people up to 133% of the federal poverty level with medicaid, and use that money that's not spent on covering people with medicaid at higher income levels we'll use that for something else. there was all sorts of jockeying for position that occurred over the months during the debate last year. we passed a bill out of committee, july 31, last summer, the bill was actually supposed to be passed out of committee much earlier and was supposed to come to the floor and we were supposed to pass the bill on the floor of the house before we went home for the august recess. but because the speaker of the house decided to take up a climate change bill in june and force the passage of that bill right at the end of june before we went home for the fourth of july recess, thereby causing many members to feel some anxiety from their constituents back home over what they had

done with this large energy tax that the house just passed, many members of congress were reluctant to move with rapidity on the health care bill because they were feeling the pushback from the energy bill that they wondered if maybe we didn't pass this a little too quickly and maybe we should have read the bill and studied and understood what the bill did before we voted on it. so the month of july was a kind of a give and take really most of the discussion was on the democratic side of the aisle, it did not involve republicans, but it was moderate democrats who were concerned about the passage of this bill too quickly. ultimately the bill did pass in committee, all the moderate democrats on my committee voted in favor of it, and ultimately it passed. but it didn't pass until the house had already adjourned for the august recess on july 31. as a consequence, the bill did not come back to the house floor until after the august recess. and most of us know what happened during august. there was a significant amount

of anxiety exhibited across the country where people would show up at their members of congress or their senator's town hall meeting during the summer and voice their, either their support or their rejection of the concept of the health care bill that was being discussed in the house and senate, and the feeling was almost unformly negative against what was being passed at least on the floor of the house. . the situation that occurred after the summer town halls, i thought, i thought we would come back and perhaps with a renewed spirit of bipartisanship that we could not do something this large when it was against the will of the american people. i thought we'd come back and hit the pause button or the reset button or maybe the rewind button and go back to committee and rework this bill. but that was not to be. the president, of course, came and spoke to giant session of congress here in the middle of september speaking right from

the podium behind me and talked about how they were going to go forward with their vision of health care reform. and it didn't really matter what people said over august. america must have been in some sort of state because they didn't really mean what they were saying when they said they did not like this bill that we were going. we, congress, were going to give them. we, the president, were going to give them. so the consequence in december after the house passed -- the house did come back and pass the bill early in november. the bill had grown from 1,000 pages at the end of july to 2,000 pages by early november. it was interesting that the bill had grown in the number of pages because all of the amendments that were made in order during the committee process were all mysteriously stripped from the bill before it came back to the floor. but the bill was much larger. the bill came to the floor, passed by a very narrow vote and, again, the polling done the day of that vote showed that only about a quarter of americans actually supported the work we were doing.

about another 30% to 40% felt that we were doing the wrong thing and another small but significant percentage said you shouldn't even be doing this right now because your focus should be on creating jobs and the american economy. but we passed the bill. what happened next was really something the likes of which i have never seen before in my short tenure here in congress. between thanksgiving and christmas the senate wrote and produced and passed a health care bill. now, both senate committees, the education and labor and financial committee had worked on a different bill throughout the course of the bill but then they worked on an entirely different bill between thanksgiving and christmas eve and the ultimate passage of the bill. the bill, interestingly enough, had a house number. it was h.r. 3590. it had a house number because it was a bill the house of

representatives had passed earlier in the year. it wasn't a health care bill when we passed it, but we did pass it on the floor of this house. it was a housing bill, not a health care bill, but that bill was picked up over in the senate, amended so all the housing language was removed and the health care language was inserted. but it wasn't a question of let's get the best possible health care policy and put it in this bill. it was more a question of what will it take to get your vote and we'll put that in the bill. that process was so unseemly, the last part of december, people were engaged even though they were concerned about the goings on with their lives and the end-of-the-year activities but they were concerned about votes being bought and sold and people actually coming to a conclusion to vote yes for the bill because they had gotten some special deal contained within the bill. that process was so flawed that even though the senate achieved that 60-vote margin on

christmas eve the ill will exhibited by the american people continued for the weeks after that. now, the bill did pass on christmas eve. it was passed early in the day to get senators out of town ahead of a snowstorm. and as a consequence, the bill itself was not ready for primetime. and no one, i really believe this, no one in the senate ever thought that would be the final product. this was again simply a placeholder to get the senators out of town before christmas and be able to say that they had passed a health care reform bill before the end of the year. everyone thought we'll come back to a christmas committee orwell' come back to some type of -- or we'll come back to some type of arrangement. maybe it won't be a formal conference committee because we don't want to include republicans but we'll still work on getting some of the rough edges knocked off and include some of the

house-passed principles as well. unfortunately for america, that never happened, because what happened in the second tuesday of november an election held way, way up in the state of massachusetts where a republican was elected, senator, in a seat that had been held by a democrat for literally generations and that happened because of the appearance of passing this bill before christmas eve appeared so awkward, appeared so unseemly that it looked as if people were buying votes for the bill. the american people pushed bark, and even in massachusetts that was too much to take, and senator scott brown was elected. as a consequence of that, it was apparently felt by leadership in the house and the senate that a conference committee was not a good idea, and there would not be the support for this bill on either the floor of the house or the senate if they were to bring it back requiring the 60-vote margin in the senate and, of course, a simple majority in the house.

the speaker of the house at one point was asked could they just pick up and pass the senate bill in the house and get it down to the president for his signature, and the statement then right after the massachusetts election was that the speaker did not believe she had 100 votes on the floor of the house for the senate bill. but it was significant that the senate bill had a house bill number. it was significant that the senate bill, although now it was a health care bill, had passed the house previously because under the rules of congress if that bill would come back to the house of representatives with the question asked, will the house now agree to the amendment made in the senate on h.r. 3590, and if that answer was yes by a simple majority then the bill is passed and it goes down to the white house for a signature. well, ultimately that is exactly what happened, and during the remainder of the month of january, all of the month of february and much of the month of march, the same

process occurred over here where members of congress on the democratic side of the aisle were encouraged, threatened to change their vote, change their mind and vote for this health care bill. well, it passed. it passed and was signed into law. it required a significantly sized fix it bill to be passed in a week because the bill was so flawed it could not stand on its own. indeed, there have been multiple things that have been brought to people's attention since that time about problems that existed with the bill, and i rather suspect we are going to continue to find those problems occurring over and over and over again in the next several months. my opinion, this bill should be repealed and we should actually go back and do what the american people really were asking us to do when they showed up at those town halls in large numbers in the month of august. they did not want us to turn the entire system on its head in order to help the people

that legitimately needed to help. yes, we need to provide assistance for people that have pre-existing conditions. don't take away what is working for 60% to 65% to 68% of the american people. that is in the polls taken since that time. the system needed reform. the system did not need to be changed from top to bottom. and yet over the next eight years that is exactly what we will see, a system that none of us will recognize by the end of 2014, 2016, 2018, pick your point on the time line. currently my state, the state of texas, attorney general greg abbott, is pursuing a court case and joined with several other states to do so to argue

before the supreme court that the bill we passed is unconstitutional. the bill is -- proponents of the bill, people who think the bill was proper and is constitutional argue that under the commerce clause of the constitution that this bill will be held to be constitutional by the supreme court even though the concept of universal health care is discussed nowhere in the constitution. the problem with the commerce clause is we are now for the first time requiring a citizen of the united states merely as a condition of being a citizen of the united states to buy a good or service or product that they may not want, need or feel they're able to afford. and this is the first time the commerce clause hat been invoked to protect the commerce that was -- clause that has been invoked to protect the commerce. now they're going to argue that before the supreme court. one of the shortcomings of the senate bill, one of the things that was not properly thought through, was a provision called

a severability clause in the bill. we had a severability clause in the bill that was passed in november, but no such severability clause was in the senate bill, perhaps in their haste to get something done before that snowstorm on christmas eve, they simply forgot about it. but what a severability clause would do, we may overstep our bounds in the eyes of the court and a court may strike down a provision in the bill but it allows the rest of the bill to stay and be enforced. without a severability clause this is now up to the discretion of the court. the court could if it agreed that the commerce clause could not be invoked to pass this bill strike down the entire bill or they might use the discretion of the court to only strike down a portion of the bill that they deemed unconstitutional. that drama has yet to play out and likely it will during the summer months or fall and we'll have to see what occurs with that. but i do support attorney general greg abbott in texas

and many attorneys general across america who are actively pursuing this course against this bill. what would repeal look like? could congress repeal a bill that had passed and been signed into law by the president? the answer is yes, and there is actually precedence for that. in 1989 some people will remember the name dan, chairman of the ways and means committee , democratic chairman from the state of illinois coincidently and passed the catastrophic health care act. this was a catastrophic health care act for senior citizens. the bill was actually passed in a bipartisan fashion in both the house and the senate, was thought that people wanted this but in fact it's one of the problems that you have when you get out in front of the american people and give them things they don't necessarily want that actually cost them money. and what happened with the catastrophic care act was the pushback was so intense and so immediate that when congress came back into session they

quickly decided that perhaps the world could live without the catastrophic care act and they repealed it. now, this bill was passed in the final months of the ronald reagan administration. it was signed by president reagan. the appeal was signed by president george herbert walker bush, but the concept of repeal of a bad health care entitlement law is one that certainly has been exercised within the lifetimes of many of us who are serving in this body today. since the passage of this bill in march, support across the country has diminished, opposition has increased, and, again, that is likely to continue as the bill becomes more and more unpopular as people dig into it and look into the provisions of the bill. and one of the other things that is working against the concept of this bill was the absolutely poisonous process that led to its -- led to its -- led to its passage and its

signing. you know, back in may or june of last year, six stakeholders met down at the white house to talk about health care reform. now, there's nothing wrong with that. that's perfectly proper that perhaps the people who represent the doctors, the hospitals, the drug manufacturers, the device manufacturers, america's health insurance and representatives from the service employee international union met down at the white house to talk about health care reform. in a very well-publicized photo op that was then occurred after those meetings, the president came out before the cameras and said that he had agreement from the six parties that were in those meetings that they would save $2 trillion over the next 10 years in the delivery of health care. well, i simply asked for the notes of those meetings, the agreements that were agreed to in those meetings so that we as the legislative body could

evaluate that as we were working on the legislation, the actual law or the bill that would become law here in the house of representatives. and i sent letters to the white house in september. i was rebuffed with any sort of information. ultimately in december i filed what's called a resolution of inquiry with my committee, the committee of energy and commerce. this resolution of inquiry was brought up before the committee, interestingly, the same day that the president delivered the state of the union address in january. the resolution of inquiry was not going to pass because obviously on a party line if democrats are in charge then they can strike down almost anything they want. but the chairman of my committee consented to allow me to request of the white house six of the 11 things that we had asked for in the resolution. some of the information is right and proper and should come to the gentleman from texas should he request that information.

so we rerequested the information and essentially all we received from the white house is copies of press releases and copies of webpages that were reproduced for us, but nothing regarding anything that was written down, nothing regarding any arrangements that were made, any deals that were made, nothing regarding any email exchanges that occurred resulting in the savings of $2 trillion. now, i will admit to sometimes being relatively naive, but it seems to me if you're going to agree to a $2 trillion deal, someone is at least on the back of an envelope somewhere going to kind of keep a tally of what those numbers are. someone is going to write something down, but the white house would have us believe that, no, there hasn't been nothing written down. is it significant? i submit that it is. there were several points that came up during the debate of the bill during the house and the senate where an amendment would be offered and the discussion then would suddenly end with, well, that wasn't part of the deal.

. senator mccain had an amendment about drug reimportation. i don't agree with drug reimportation, i agree that's a bad idea. but i do think senator mccain should have had the ability to submit his amendment, debate his amendment, and have it pass or fail on the merits of the amendment. in no way should he have not been allowed to offer that amendment because of a secret deal made down at the white house with the drug manufacturers. but that's exactly what happened. he was stopped from offering the amendment by his committee chairman saying that's not part of the deal that we have. another area where the hospitals were going to be taxed as part of the pay-for in the bill. they said, wait, that wasn't part of our deal. well, the deal may be fine, the deal may be proper, but we as legislators should at least be privy to those decision that is were made down at the white house. we should at least have the information about what was agreed to and on whose behalf those agreements were made.

we never got that information. and to this day i still await some response from the white house. significantly during the presidential campaign when he was a candidate, president obama said, and i'm quoting here, and that's what i'll do, bringing all parties together. not negotiating behind closed doors but bringing all parties together and broadcasting those negotiations on c-span so that the american people can see what the choices are because part of what we have to do is enlist the american people in this process, close quote. i couldn't agree more. yeah, you got to enlist the american people when you're doing something this broad and this sweeping, but they never bothered to do that. yes, you do need to open those meetings up, c-span can sometimes be a trifle boring when you watch us for too long at a time, but it's important. it's the window to the world that people have on the legislative process. so when the president made that

pledge no less than eight times during the campaign, it struck a chord with people, it resonated with the people. i would like to see where if my representative is involved in those meetings where does he stand? the president would make his point. does the representative stand on the side of the drug company or the people? does the senator stand with the insurance companies or does he stand with america's patients? important concepts to know. unfortunately we have not yet had the ability to know what those deals were. i got to believe that this is such an important point that people got this when it was offered to them that, look, we'll make it an open and transparent process, you can watch it on television if you don't get too bored, but it will be your choice. i think people picked up on that notion. and honestly this is one of those, yeah, people can say things during a campaign that they actually can't deliver after the election's over. that happens all the time. i understand that. but this is a read my lips

moment. this is a read my lips no new taxes moment. the president promised all these negotiations would be up for purview, covered on c-span, and you would be able to watch and you would be able to make the decision as to whether this process was a good one or bad one. again unfortunately to date that has not happened. i do hope that the white house does at some point get us that information. one of the things that i heard over and over again during the summer during the town halls is that really and truly if you are going to hold prices down, you are going to have to do something in the realm of liability reform. i understand this because in my home state of texas we, in fact, have passed significant liability reform back in 2003. and that has made texas now one of the more favored places to practice medicine. there have been doctors who have fled other parts of the country and moved to texas. in fact, one of the bigger criticisms in texas right now is that it takes a texas state

board of medical examiner's too long to process an application because their backlog is so significant. but it is a far cry from where we were in 2002 when we were, in fact, labeled as one of the states in crisis in the medical liability crisis. now, during the eight years since that bill passed as a state bill, texas has licensed over 15,000 new physicians. and it is important texas is a big state and there's lots of open area in texas. since the passage of that law back in 2003, 125 texas counties have added at least one high-risk specialist. that's like half the counties in texas. 224 counties in texas. that's over half the counties in texas that have added one

high-risk specialist. my home county of denton county being one of those. we heard stories in 2002, 2003 all over the state of people who were closing their medical practice, radiologists, doctors who take care of the sickest of the sick, pregnant moms with the significantest of the sick newborn babies. they simply could not get liability insurance because their risk was too great. their risk was too high. they were leaving the state. the state paid for their education, the state supported school. state supported them to bring their residency training, but the state could not offer them a place to practice because they could not afford liability ream -- premiums in the state. since that bill has passed 125 texas counties have added at least one high-risk specialist. again texas is a big state.

not hard to believe that, especially in some of the less populated areas in west texas, that a person might live many, many miles from a physician. but since the passage of this law, now 99.7% of texans live within 20 miles of a physician. that is a staggering success story with the number of doctors who have moved into the state and are practicing, yes, some are practicing in urban areas, but many are practicing in rural areas. rural areas that previously did not have an emergency room doctor, did not have an object sta trishian. and now they -- object sta trishian. now they do. when we talked about this health care bill we talked about access to insurance but really when you need health care, you're not so much interested in insurance policy, you are more interested do you have a doctor there to see you when you're sick. 82 texas counties have seen a net gain in emergency medical

physicians. including 29 counties that are partially medically underserved. 33 rural counties have seen a net gain in e.r. doctors, including 26 counties that previously had none. 26 counties that previously did not have an emergency room doctor now have one in the state of texas. such has been the effect of medical liability reform. my field of obstetrics, texas saw a net loss of 14 abat the trishans -- object sta trishians. . you can deal with that loss. but since the state passed the law, they have experienced a net gain of 192 object sta trishians -- obstetratians. that's a big deal when you have a family member in labor looking for a place to have your baby. it is important to that the care there when you need it.

12 rural texas counties have added an orthopedic surgeon, including seven that previously had none. again that's a significant fact, particularly in areas of rural texas where the drive might be quite long if you're dealing with an injured loved one and trying to find orthopedic care. charity care rendered by texas hospitals has increased by 24%. resulting in almost $600 million in free care to texas patients since the passage that have liability reform law in 2003. and texas physicians have saved almost $600 million in liability insurance premiums, a significant savings that has allowed more doctors to stay in practice. the texas law has been so successful that i introduced legislation into congress that was modeled after the texas law. it's h.r. 1468, the medical justice act. i offered this in the form of an amendment when we marked up our

health care bill in the house energy and commerce committee last summer. it was rejected first on a tent -- technicality and then along a party-line vote. if we are going to ask our doctors to be our partners in this brave new world of health care we have constructed, the very least we can do is to give them some stability in their practice and that stability would be in the form of some relief from the problems they face with medical liability. another problem that's faced by our nation's doctors and is one of the reasons why we are very likely to face a significant doctor shortage, and again in spite of the fact that we passed a health insurance bill, if we do not have doctors to see those patients, then it's not going to do much good that we pass that bill. you know, a sweeping health care reform bill kind of would have been the ideal time to talk about things like physician work force and how we train doctors and how we pay for that

training, but we chose to omit most of that thinking from this bill. another problem that we face in almost recurring basis here in congress is the fact that medicare by formula ratchets down reimbursement to physicians year over year over year. in fact this year the number was to go down over 20%. last week we passed a very small bill that extended that deadline to the end of may. so doctors got a little bit of a reprieve and patients got a little bit of continued access to their physicians, but i will have to tell you as a practicing physician, that is a significant event when -- of major payer like medicare comes in and says, we are going to be paying you 20% less next month for the work that you do for us. it is a difficult problem to fix. it is an expensive problem to fix. but it is one that just simply must be done.

not just because it's the right thing for doctors, but if we do not have doctors who commit to stay in practice and take care of our medicare patients, then patient access is going to be a critical problem. we will all stand up here and talk about how we want our patients, our medicare patients to have only the best and quality care, but it's very, very difficult to guarantee them quality care when we can't even assure them of a doctor at the other end of the phone line when they need one. now, in the health care bill that we passed, primary care physicians do get a little boost in payments for medicaid, but there are -- that is short-lived and there's still going to be significant disparities between payments of primary care and specialty care. medicare and medicaid rates for primary care services will increase for primary care, but only for a very short period of time. and we are very famous in congress tore doing this. we'll say we are going to take care of you. we are going to actually pay you what you think you're worth for

the next 18 or 20 or 24 months. these things are called funding cliffs. sure enough there's a big funding cliff in the health care bill that was passed. and doctors will face falling off that funding cliff in now a little less than two years' time. fixing the medicare payment formula, fixing the so-called s.g.r. formula is going to be a tough lift. the house did pass a bill. last fall. unfortunately it was a bill that had already been rejected by the senate so i'm not sure why we brought it up and voted on it on the house side. we did. it was a bad bill. it didn't fix the problem, but it was the only opportunity to pass a medicare fix or s.g.r. fix or doc fix during the california year 2009. i voted in favor of it even though the bill itself was a dreadful product and surely we can do a much better job.

now, i have a s.g.r. reform bill, h.r. 3693, ensuring the future physician work force act, and i would encourage members of congress to look at that. this is going to come back again and again and again. we passed a short-term extension. we now have solidified physician payment through the month of may. but beginning june 1 or 6 or someday early in june that 20% funding cliff still is out there and we are going to have to take care of that. i rather suspect this being an election year we are not going to do anything large to fix this problem. we should, but i do rather suspect we will do something that punts it down the road until after the next election. it's a shame. it's a shame because when we are doing something as big as the fundamental health care reform that we did, it seems like this is the kind of problem, this is exactly the type of problem that you would like to take care of. because, again, what do we hear from our folks when we go home

and talk to them about health care? i'll tell you what, congressman, one of my biggest problems is trying to find a doctor who will take medicare. if a senior changes locations, if they move from one town to the next, if they leave the town when -- if they leave their town when they retire and move to be closer to their grandchildren, they are very likely going to experience a difficulty and delay in finding a doctor who is taking new medicare patients. it has become so cumbersome because of what we in the united states congress do to physicians year in and year out. it has become so cumbersome to find physicians will take new medicare mashents that -- patients it has become a critical access issue for our seniors. . let me talk briefly because it is important. one of the mistakes that was made in the bill, one of the problems that emerged after the bill was passed and signed, and most people in the country are not going to shed too many tears about this but many

members of congress lost their health care after the passage of this bill. members of congress will now be required to buy their insurance through the insurance exchange just as every other american will be required to do beginning in the year 2014. the exchanges are not going to be set up until 2014, but members of congress, as of the signing of this bill, are required to buy their health insurance through the exchange so we're now asked to buy insurance in a nonexistent exchange and that is going to make it difficult. our staff do fall into the same category, so i am getting many questions from staff saying, well, they're still taking a health insurance premium out of my paycheck but am i insured or not? there is things that needs to be cleaned up. again, most americans are not going to shed too many tears about members of congress being confused about their health insurance congress. they will say, well, welcome to my world. interestingly enough, the people who wrote this bill, and

that would be committee staff, administration, staff from the white house, leadership staff, the people who actually wrote this bill -- certainly no republican was involved in writing this bill. most democrats were not involved in writing this bill. in fact, i would submit to you house democrats, especially, were excluded from this process. so who writes a bill like this? well, it is tenured and long-term committee staff, leadership staff. yeah, the white house was down here big time while the bill was being hammered out during the latter part of december and early january. all of those people who wrote the bill are exempt from that. so there is one little simple fix-it bill, h.r. 4951, that would also require committee staff, leadership staff, members of the administration, political appointees at the federal agencies to also be covered under the exchange the same as members of congress. now, again, the problem is that

we're required to be covered under the exchange. the exchange is not up and running until 2014, so it remains to be seen how that will work out, but the irony of congress voting itself out of health insurance because they didn't understand the bill that came over from the senate on christmas eve is just simply too important to ignore. one of the last things that i do want to cover this afternoon , yesterday my committee, the committee on energy and commerce, subcommittee on oversight and investigations, was going to have a hearing on america's business that had released information that they were going to change their earnings projections because of issues that occurred after the passage of the health care bill. so you see here, and this actually should be a minus sign in front of all these numbers. companies like at&t was going

to have to write down $1 billion in changes as a result of us passing the health care bill. well, when these companies have these press releases because of what the health care bill had done. john deere was going to have to write down $150 million. 3-m, again that should be negative $90 million. when that occurred, my chairman, mr. waxman, said they need to come before our committee and be held accountable why they would release this type of information on a day that was otherwise a great national joy when the president was signing the health care bill. well, the companies responded that they were simply performing under requirements like the securities and

exchange commission. their earnings were going to be affected by the passage of this bill and they were required to restate earnings based upon that information, and maybe they didn't need to release it on that particular day but certainly that information needed to be made public and indeed many of these same companies had contacted members of the committee staff and let them know this in advance of actually releasing the information. now, interestingly enough, when it came to light that the heads of these companies stated, well, we're just simply doing what you told us we had to do under the rules provided by the securities and exchange commission, the committee decided to postpone indefinitely that hearing. but it was troubling. it was troubling because here we have a rather significant subcommittee in the united states house of representatives, a rather significant subcommittee that can issue subpoenas if it wants. it does take testimony under oath.

this is generally not an exercise that a company c.e.o. will look forward to with great relish to come before our committee and have to answer questions. and some of us saw that as actually an intimidation tactic. don't you dare complain about what we have done with this health care bill or we can make your life miserable if you do. now, health care costs are going to take a toll on united states profits, corporate profits, according to estimates by benefits consulting firm, towers watson. medtronic warned that it could result in 1,000 workers being laid off. it was estimated that there would be thousands of layoffs and thousands of consumer costs. if you came out against this bill, if you dare to speak up against this bill, the message was loud and clear to corporate

america. we're going to call you in, we're going to question you under oath, we are likely to embarrass you in a public forum, so don't you dare complain. but one of the things i heard over and over again from large and small firms back home is this health care bill will have a profound, a significant and a dill tare yuss effect on just simply conducting a business. more than one small business in my community has come back to me and said, as i run the numbers, as i look at what happens to me through the year 2014 and the requirements that will be upon me, it is very likely that my bottom line will go negative and stay negative as far as i can see unless i don't expand or i don't hire. in fact, the succinct message that the united states congress has sent to small and medium-sized businesses across the country in every state of the union is, don't hire right now.

don't hire right now until you know what's going to be required of you, mr. and mrs. employer. we are likely going to change the way your business works. again, in a very profound and significant way. now, i also sit on the committee of the joint economic committee, which is a senate and house committee. the first friday morning of every month, whether we're voting on the floor of the house or not, we need to be in town to receive a report from the department of labor. and that report is the earnings report -- i'm sorry -- the employment report for the preceding month. it comes out the first friday of every month. usually those numbers are released about 8:30 in the morning and our committee convenes at 9:00 or 9:30 to hear from the head of the department of labor as to what the employment statistics look like. i joined that committee in january of 2009. we have never had, never had in the 15 months that i have been on the committee a good news report. in fact, one of my constituents

back home said i'm bringing such bad luck to the committee that maybe i ought to consider some other assignment. but the fact remains is if we keep doing things in congress, in the house and the senate, in the legislative branch, if we keep doing things that sends a loud message to a small business, medium-sized business, don't hire right now, we're not going to see the type of employment recovery that we all feel that the economy is capable of. look, whether you believe in bailouts or stimulus or not, everyone knows that the united states economy is too vibrant not to recover. there is almost no way that the united states congress or the white house, regardless of who occupies these chairs or who's down at the other end of pennsylvania avenue, there's almost no way that the congress or the white house can keep the american economy indefinitely suppressed. but we can really lengthen the pain, and that's one of the things we're doing right now. the uncertainty we've created

with health care costs, the uncertainty we've created with energy costs, the uncertainty that we're creating with this financial services bill that is now being argued over in the senate, small business, medium-sized businesses are looking at what's going on in washington right now and are saying, i need help but i don't think so. i will pay overtime or ratchet back. and yet every person who runs for office -- and you can take this to the bank -- every person that runs for office will stand up on a stump or chair and give a speech to a chamber or rotary club back home and say small business is the engine that drives our economy. and that's exactly true. if i have one small business at home that might be looking at picking up one or two additional people but says, you know, right now is not the time and i'm not going to do that, ok, that's one or two jobs. could that make an effect on the larger economy? you bet. you bet. when you take that one or two job growth that's not occurring

in that business and extrapolate it across the broader community with businesses of that side, that's a significant effect on the growth of jobs and the economy. and yet, and yet it is the unemployment numbers that are really the depressive part of what's happening in the economy right now. yeah, wall street might look a great deal better than it did last year. maybe the gross domestic output may look better than it did last year but the numbers of unemployed, the numbers of long-term unemployed, the numbers of young people unemployed, those numbers are what people are having to deal with every day. that's either them or their friends and neighbors and that's what they see every day. and until we address the problems with employment, no one in this country is going to believe that we really have the appropriate handle on the economy or the economic direction of the country. again, i believe the economy will recover in spite of the

united states congress, in spite of the white house. it almost always does, but we can certainly make that recovery much more difficult and much more painful and perhaps suppress it longer than it would be otherwise suppressed by our activities here in the house of representatives. well, suffice it to say, as we wrap this up, i believe this health care bill to be a fiscal disaster. it is going to increase the deficit. i don't care what anyone else says. it's $582 billion over the first 10 years and likely as not over the second 10 years those numbers even become more startling. you look at how the bill is constructed. you got 10 years of taxes paid for six years of benefits. is it any great surprise that the next decade, which is 10 years of taxes and 10 years of benefits that that deficit is not likely to increase? we also have a problem that the bill double counts social security payroll tax revenues. a budgetary gimmick that made the bottom line number look

great. again, remember the parameters we were working with. you have to have the top number less than $1 trillion. you have to have the people over 30 million people. move those pieces on the chess board how you want, but those are the parameters you have to work with. and if you double count the social security taxes if you double count the money from the medicare cuts, of course your bottom line is going to look better. and we did the class act. most people are not aware of it. it's thought of as a long-term care supplemental insurance, but the reality is it's a three-card monty for a $50 a month cost, a beneficiary may receive $50 a day in additional long-term care cost for a long-term care hospital. well, most of us knows that $50 will not cover a stay in the

long-term care hospital. most of us know that the numbers in that equation doesn't work up. but what happens is that you have so many people just joining the program at the front end during the first years you actually run a surplus, but then you get to the outyears and you run a significant deficit. and the class act literally was a financial manipulation that was introduced at the last minute not to provide people long-term care insurance. if we really wanted to do something with long-term care insurance we'd make it tax deductible, we'd make it a tax credit, we could make it you could pay for it out of your health savings account. if we wanted people to get long-term care insurance we could do it. the class act wasn't it. the class act was some fancy bookkeeping, some manipulation of the books, collect a lot of premiums upfront. you don't start paying benefits for several years. so that will score the cost of -- a revenue raiser during the first 10 years of this -- of this budgetary cycle, but in the out years it does nothing but explode the budget.

again, in my home state of texas, it's estimated that this bill is going to cost the state of texas almost $25 billion in additional funding for medicare , medicaid and additionally there's going to be cuts to the safety net hospitals, the so-called disproportionate share cuts. in 2011, dugmakers face an annual fee, and people say well, they make too much money anyway, hit them with a $2.5 billion charge in 2011. but think about it for a minute. that $2.5 billion, where is that ogoing to come from in the pharmaceutical manufacturing world? is it going to come from the c.e.o. salary? is it going to come from the lobbyists' salary? i think you know the answer. those dollars will come from increased costs to the end user, the patient, you and me. in 2011, medical device

manufacturers are going to be charged an additional fee, up $2 billion. again, that's not to be paid by the c.e.o. of one of these boston companies. that money will be paid by the patient who receives that defibrillator that artificial hip, that vein filter for preventing blood clots. those are the people who will be paying that fee, not the companies themselves. there's a health insurance provider fee, $2 billion in 2011, it goes up from then. that's not going to be taken from the c.e.o.'s salary of the private insurance companies, whether they're for profit or not for property. that money is coming out of the rate payers' hide. there's going to be a tax on wages to increase to 2.35%. in 2013, a new tax on unearned income on dividends and

interest. in 2014, an excise tax is placed on class 2 and class 3 medical devices. class 1 devices like band-aids and tongue depressors, they're not, but class 2 devices, like syringe and needle, those are going to be taxed, your doctor's office. in your doctor's office they can't charge you the $2 -- the 2.9% tax on the syringe because that's a contractual amount between the insurance company, the patient and the doctor. that's difficult for a doctor's office to pass that charge along. doctors will bear the brunt of that. hospitals, too, are likely to bear the brunt of it since your arrangements are contractual, they're unlikely to be able to pass that cost along. types of medical -- other types of medical devices, type ii devices, interestingly enough, i'd like to say everything from lasers to leeches will be taxed

in your doctor's office. employers will more than 50 employees must pay a fine up to $3,000 if employees receive tax credits to purchase insurance. that's where a lot of small and medium-sized business is concerned. and the arbitrary placement of those numbers, why is it 50 employees, why not 55? why not 45? simply because they had to pick a number and start somewhere. so if there's a small business back home that has 48 employees but they've got so much work as the economy recovers that maybe they'd be fixing to add five jobs, they're not going to do it. let's stay under 50 employees, our life will be easier under this health care bill. at least let's wait and see what's going to happen. what's up next? let me say it again. i favor repeal of this bill, rip it out, root and branch. get it gone then come back and fix the things people told us they wanted fixed. what we are going to see next,

just down the street at the department of health and human services, another federal agency, the office of personnel management, they're writing the rules and regulations to dictate how this 27 pages of legislation, how it now turns into the rules and regulations that govern what happens to your doctor's office, your hospital, and essentially dictates what happens in your life when you intersect with the american health care system. this will take some time. this is not something that's going to occur overnight. right now the hiring is in process. maybe the administration can say we're adding a bunch of new jobs over at the department of health and human services and i.r.s. but most of us would just as soon the i.r.s. agents weren't hired. they're generally not there to make our lives go smoother and easier. office of personnel management, that's an interesting phenomenon. many people will recall that when the senate passed their health care bill, senator

lieberman said, i won't vote far health care thail bill that has a public option within it. and yet we have a bill that in fact does have a public option. it's not called a public option, straight up, but it is a public option, sure enough. states are required to set up state exchanges. people will be required to buy their insurance in the exchange. some will have those costs subsidized, some will not. what if a state does not set up an exchange. can the federal government force it to set up an exchange? no. the federal government will set up an exchange for those states where no state exchange exists. within that national exchange, under the law, it's required there be one insurance company that's a for-profit company and one that's a not for profit. these insurance companies if no company signs up to do this duty, that exercise has been taken over by the office of personnel management. a nonprofit insurance company administered by the office of

personnel management begins to look a lot like what was discussed last july and august as the public option. in fact, it will be a defabbling toe public option within a short period of time. those who oppose the bill and said i couldn't support a bill that had a public option but now that a public option is out of it, i'm ok, i can support the bill, guess what they got a public option. let me say, this is not a bipartisan bill. the opposition to this bill was bipartisan. you had almost 40 democrats and every republican who said we don't want this bill. interestingly enough, part of the story that's yet to be told is the effect of this bill on what happens early in november, later this year. in "usa today," the newspaper that comes out nationally, earlier this week, there was an article about the number of physicians who have filed and are running races for congress.

it will be unprecedented numbers. i think the number of republican doctors who have filed for congressional races is just a little over 30, 3 . there are many more waiting in the wings. some states have much later primaries that number will likely go higher. not every doctor will win their primary, not every doctor will win their congressional race. i think it's safe to say, the next congress, the 112th congress, when it convenes next january, is likely to have -- likely to have more physicians in the congress than any time in the previous hundred years. this bill has had a profound effect on how americans think about their health care and how they think about their relationship with their government. it's a government that's bigger, better -- is a government that's bigger, better for the people, or worse? and people are having that discussion around the dinner table that never would have thought about it in years past.

now it's become an important issue. this next november will be a sentinel time in american politics and american governance going forward. it will dictate whether this bill continues to exist and exert control over people's lives, continues to take money out of the lives of productive citizens, or whether this bill is turned back and then the congress gets down to the serious work of correcting the problems that people told us they wanted us to correct and we ignored them consistently through the fall and through the winter. i think it says something that the opinions of congress right now are in the low double digits. any doctor is willing to run for congress, i can tell you this from personal experience, doctors enjoy a high approval rating. you go to congress, it goes into the low teens. it's a significant step to run for congress for physicians, yet doctors across the country are willing to give up their peace of mind and livelihood to

come to the aid of their country in its hour of need. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. under the speaker's announced policy of january 6, 2009, the chair recognizes the gentleman from iowa, mr. king for 60 minutes. mr. king: thank you, mr. speaker. i appreciate being recognized to address you here on the floor of the house. i remind you, mr. speaker, these deliberations here represent the most deliberative body in the world and that's the argument that we've made for years and even though it's not as deliberative as it was before speaker pelosi took the gavel we still have some discussion time down here. we still have special orders and 60 minutes and alternating hours between democrats and republicans, when both sides do show up for those alternating hours. tonight that's not the case. this is a wrapup and the finish of the week, mr. speaker. many have gone to the airport

and caught a plane and gone home to their district or wherever they might go. but i don't think enough has been said yet this week, it's been a relatively short week, not a particularly trying or testing week with anything that stands out here of significant accomplishment. i'm watching still as policy moves in america. the policy that has been shoehorned through this house of representatives and become the law of the land has caused the american people to fill up my town hall meetings. we were not here on monday we didn't gavel in -- we gaveled in on tuesday and the first vote were sometime about 6:30 on tuesday evening. so the work week is tuesday evening for two or three vote we call it naming post offices, that was the level of the significance of the suspension calendar. then some debate on wednesday and some committee activity. today is thursday, it's been low-key, last votes took place maybe two hours ago, something

like that our work week is all day wednesday, finishing the night on tuesday and early part of the day on thursday and then going -- a lot of people going home, mr. speaker. that's ok with me because i don't support the agenda that's being driven here out of the speaker's office. i don't support the process that's been developed. i do support constitution, liberty, freedom, fiscal responsibility, limited government and i support the people that have been coming here to petition the government for redress of grievances. that's a constitutional right that we all have and i've seen tens of thousands come here to say don't take away my freedom, don't take away my liberty. let me have the right to manage the health care of my own body, for example. and the people across this country that have said over and over again that the fiscal irresponsibility was the profligate spending going on

for the last three years in this congress, plus, is more than they can abide. my town hall meetings on tuesday, excuse me, on monday of this week, one in council bluffs, one in hsu city, we're not -- one in sioux city. they were not jam packed as they were back in august when people believed they had a chance to put the brakes on what is now known and the president refers to as obamacare that packed the town halls in my district and all over the state of -- all over the united states of america. hundreds of thousands of americans who came in to express they didn't want the government to take over management of our health care. i have never seen an issue that brought this much intensity and this many people out and still, and still, the leadership in this congress was determined to

shoe horn a bill through here and that happened maybe three weeks ago or a little more, early in the wee hours of a monday morning, just a little after midnight, as i recall, the final vote was, on a sunday night. the speaker could not have allowed the members of congress to go home, let alone for an easter break period of time, because she knew that if the democrats in this congress went home to listen to their constituents, that their congressional offices would be jammed full of people that were there to petition their members of congress for redress of the grievance of a government takeover of health care. and they would have filled the streets by the tens and hundreds of thousands, they would have demonstrated a con -- at congressional offices, filled any town hall meet, there would have been an outpouring of rejection of that policy like this country has never seen. so the speaker kept her own democrat members here on the

hill and insulated from their own constituents, even to the extent that as the phone lines were either jammed or shut down, i don't know which, but the last three days, i couldn't call my own office. and i know there weren't that many people calling my office. they were busy calling the offices of democrats who were determined to vote for obamacare. but i couldn't get through because the switchboard was jammed, at least the last three days here in the house, while you had members that couldn't even be heard -- their constituents could not call them they couldn't get through to send them a fax, yes they can send an email presumably we don't know if those went on an automatic dump or if there was an answer. only their constituents can know that we know there was a difficulty verifying if the senate, during their period of time, that this was an important issue, up until christmas eve if the senate members were answering their telephones. but here, they couldn't get through to call my office, i

couldn't call my own office from my cell phone and my own staff i had to communicate with around the hill, we had to call on our own cell lines to each other's cell phones and that's not such a particularly great handicap, but on top of that, mr. speaker, the cell phones were jammed, the signal was so jammed with so many calls that we couldn't connect either by cell phones -- even by cell phones sometimes for hours. that's an awful lot of rejection focusing itself on an issue here that america had the opportunity to debate since last july. all the way into nearly april. that's what's happened with obamacare. and now after the bill was passed -- and i would remind you, mr. speaker, that if we'd had the bill go to the senate for a vote and then to the house for a vote in order to qualify it to go to the president's desk for signature that turns it into the law of the land, obamacare could not

have passed this congress on the day that it was messaged to the president because the votes didn't exist and the united states senate -- in the united states senate to support the bill. the folks who voted to represent themselves in massachusetts, in particular, scott brown was elected by the liberal people in massachusetts to block obamacare. and there he was following through on his word to do that except it was circumvented and they used a recisions policy that it never been used in a piece of policy like that before, to enable that to happen and a promise from the president of the united states that he would sign an executive order that he would have the people in america believe that the president of the united states can sign an executive order that can amend a bill that the congress just passed. that's the executive order that deals with the stupak amendment which was designed to shut off

federal funding for abortion that might be enabled by obamacare. now, think about what this means. here we have a constitution that sets up the structure. article 1, section 1 says all legislative powers will be vested in a congress of the united states. comprising of the house of representatives and the united states senate. it even prescribes that all spending will start in the house, not in the senate. but this is an authorization bill, not an appropriations bill, so obamacare could have started in the senate or in the house. well, we got a senate version that was taken up by the house. but the constitution establishes that the -- that all legislative powers are vested here in the house and senate. the house and senate collectively. we are the legislative branch of government. and the president of the united states who wrote the book, the audacity of hope, had the audacity to offer to bart stupak that he could sign an

executive order that would effectively amend bart stupak's pro-life language into the legislation that was here on the floor of the house at the time. message from the senate. now, a man that taught constitutional laws as an adjunct profession at the university of chicago would believe his sfleck tif order can effectively amend legislation that -- executive order can effectively amend legislation. if the president can amend legislation by executive order, then can't the president also just write the legislation by executive order and do what he will without having to consult congress? that would be two branches of government instead of three branches of government. maybe the president would argue there's something congress can do like he can't like appropriate money, for example. well, that would be a very narrow role and that would be turning us back on the constitutional responsibility

that is vested in the united states congress. and we should always reject the idea that a president can sign an executive order that has an effect on changing the legislation that the congress has passed. in fact, i may be the number one most author tif voice in the united states congress on this -- authoritative voice in the united states congress on this subject matter. in the state level we had then our governor, tom vilsack, filed an executive order. he was the fresh governor. maybe a little bit fresher than the president has been in this period of time. i think it was in the first couple three months of his office. governor vilsack signed executive order number 7 and i looked at it and said he violated the separation of powers and legislated by executive order. when i raised an objection of course it was refused and denied. the executive office didn't

respond to legislative office. we filed a case called king vs. vilsack. this is now our secretary of agriculture vilsack whom we had a good exchange in the ag committee i think just yesterday. but in this issue we disagreed. he agreed that he could amend the code of iowa by executive order and i believe the legislative powers are vested within the legislative branch of government. and most of our state constitutions, including iowa, are modeled off of our federal constitution. so they take an oath to uphold the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of, fill in the blank. for me it's iowa. that oath is an oath that you can only take to uphold the constitution as it reads, as you understand it, as it was understood to mean at the time of the ratification of the constitution itself or the

subsequent amendments. there isn't any other alternative. none of us can take an oath to uphold the constitution as it will be amended by, what, the president's executive order or even a decision of the united states supreme court? now, i put that list at 10 now as the 10 last people that should be allowed to amend the constitution of the united states. that should be the nine supreme court justices and the president of the united states. those 10 are the last people on the planet that should be engaged in seeking to amend the constitution. the constitution sets up the framework for us to amend it when we don't like the results. we are required to adhere to it and live by it. and for a president of the united states to sign an executive order that has companies that deal, that supposedly buys half a dozen -- excuse me -- a full dozen, not a baker's dozen but a full dozen votes to support obamacare here and the president would exchange an executive order that was

designed to assure the stupak dozen that wouldn't be federal funding of abortion because his executive order would alter the language and the meaning of the bill. the smallest and tiniest of fig leafs was offered to congressman stupak. that executive order no one takes seriously today. it was simply a tool of utility to put the votes together, to force this obamacare off the floor of the house and send it to the president for his signature, which he did, and now obamacare is the law of the land. i was, i believe, mr. speaker, the last member of congress to leave the house of representatives and leave the capitol that night. it took me perhaps an hour to wind myself down and come to a point where i thought i could leave this place where such a cataclysmic offense to the constitution, our freedom and our liberty had taken place in such a shameful fashion. a shameful fashion includes the antics in the united states senate where they cut deal

after deal after deal, including the cornhusker kickback. yes, i know, there is a successful effort made to peel the cornhusker kickback. it leaves in the florida gator aid and several other deals cooked up in the senate so they could produce enough votes temporarily to push that bill through on christmas eve and then, of course, we had the massachusetts election which changed the dynamics over there. here deal after deal was made, and one day i hope to hold hearings in the united states congress to find out what actually went on behind those closed doors and i believe the american people have the right to learn what happened beheend those closed doors. i want to hold hearings and investigations and bring people under oath and stand them up and take that oath and testify before congressional hearings, what were you offered by rahm emanuel? what were you offered by the president of the united states? if you're aarp and your job is

to represent the senior citizens that are your members, i want the representatives of aarp to come in and tell us, what the offer you could sell insurance to our members so good and so high that you decided to sell out your own members? what was it that fciu got? what was it that the big farmer got? what happened to the 165 million dollars that they promised they would commit in an ad campaign in order to sell obamacare to america so that big farmer could have a larger market that was mandated by the federal government? what were the deals that were made? we need to know that. if we can drag c.e.o.'s of private american corporations before the united states congress and if henry waxman can threaten to -- well, yesterday was the day he was going to do it and he canceled it. i think he thought better of it. i think if henry waxman can bring c.e.o.'s before the united states congress and allege they're making too much

money or he wants to see into their books and records or if ed markey, the subcommittee chairman can hand a letter to dave sokowitz an intimidating letter, a man that testified against cap and tax, can be intimidated with the threat of the chairman of an important energy and commerce subcommittee, that the request of that chairman to -- to investigate the company that he represents, witness intimidation plain and simple, straight upfront, it's documented, it's in public documents now, along with the other activities that had to do with the president of the united states now nearly a year ago firing the c.e.o. of general motors. just simply fired the c.e.o. of general motors. didn't try to take his fingerprints off. didn't imply it was a decision that came about some other way. didn't try to hide it. he proudly accepted the -- some

will call it credit. i'll call it blame -- for reaching across the line between the public and the private sector and firing the c.e.o. of general motors and deciding who would be the new c.e.o. of general motors. he sent his car czar to do those deals. he replaced and named all by two members of general motors and wasn't quite engaged in chrysler but some of the activities took place. and the white house, and when it's the white house it's the president of the united states, mr. speaker, dictated to the bankruptcy court exactly the terms that he -- merged from the bankruptcy courts in general motors and chrysler. that situation is appalling and breathtaking when you think of the nationalization that's taken place. and, mr. speaker, when you look at the beginning of this is at the end of the bush administration, henry paulson, secretary of the treasury, came here to the capitol september 19, 2008, and asked for $700

billion in bailout money that he would deal out the way he saw fit in an attempt to stop what he believed was a potential or maybe an impending meltdown of the world's credit that he thought could occur, come all crashing down, he couldn't guarantee if it was a fix. he said if he give me new ideas it won't be as good as my own. in about october of 2008, and then another $350 billion that was approved by a congress that was elected later and by a president who was elected later and that was president barack obama who supported and approved all of the tarp funding, all of the nationalization beginnings that he followed through on the balance of that of the takeovers of three large investment banks. a.i.g., the large insurance company, to the tune of $180 billion. fannie mae, freddie mac, culminated by executive order

right before christmas of last year and hardly made the news. you know, if we went in and see what happened late friday night after the news cycle and the press goes off to their golf game or home to their family, we would find all kinds of -- i mentioned earlier -- cataclysmic things that happened friday night. i'd like to amend something here to the power in congress. give me -- give me the right to veto and put back in place anything that happened after, say, 2:00 on a friday before the press comes to work at around 9:00 on a monday morning. let me go back and fix those things that happened. we would have a lot better country today that woopt have reverted but friday night, this is when the president posed those moves because that's when it's the lowest news cycle and that's what happened. but three large investment banks taken over by the federal government by president barack

obama. a.i.g. and the banks bailed out. barack obama approved or enacted that. the takeover of fannie mae and freddie mac that the chairman of the financial services committee pledged he would never vote to support or bail out, and i remember the date that i heard that, the first time most clearly was october 26, 2005, right over there from that microphone when barney frank said i won't vote to bail out fannie or freddie mac. don't count on me to cothat. well, we might -- don't count on me to do that. well, we've had a relentless defense of fannie mae and freddie mac's irresponsible practices going through many years prior to 2005. but i stood here on this floor and engaged in that process and the amendments that came to put capital requirements and regulatory requirements on fannie mae and freddie mac were shot down and voted down and

fought against, the most aggressive opposition came directly from the democrats who were in the minority at the time but fannie and freddie had worked the lobby and had a broader bipartisan support than they might have otherwise had. so three large investment banks nationalized. a.i.g. nationalized. fannie mae, frede nationalized. and now -- freddie mac nationalized. and now you and i share the liability of $5.5 trillion in contingent liability of fannie and freddie. and before i go over the car companies' nationalization, i might remind you overhearing this dialogue that of all of the financial reform that has wall street under the focus and under the spotlight and under the magnifying glass, all of the tactics being used and the president going back up to wall street to give his speech today, of all of that, the president didn't mention fannie mae or freddie mac.

there's nothing in the financial reform bill that reforms fran lee -- fannie mae or freddie mac. what's in the reform bill is a slush fund to let the administration decide which businesses are too big to be allowed to fail and go in and implement a takeover of the private sector. what are the criteria? the judgment of the executive branch. yes, there are guidelines but not many constraints. it gives them the power and authority to look over every credit transaction in america. every credit transaction in america. presumably that means that if you're in a small, rural area, you used to go in and pick up grocery items and buy some gas, they'd put it on your tab and you'd come pay that at a later day. someone mentioned if you go into a furniture store and they have a special on ma dresses -- mattresses, so you can buy the

mattress and come pay for it 30 days later, nothing down, that's a credit transaction the federal government would look in on and have to approve. it would give them the ability to look in on your credit card, mr. speaker. not necessarily take it out of your pocket but electronically look in on those credit records that would give the federal government the authority to examine everybody's transactions. credit card transactions, debit card transactions, presumably if you have credit involved with your bank accounts to look at those loans in the bank accounts, maybe tech knick -- technically not your checking account because yost at credit account but the federal government going that far and that deep and having that authority, let alone looking into wall street transactions that take place, the investment banking transactions, all the components that come along that have to do with higher finance and the subprime, i'll say the

mortgage transactions that take place and to track them all the way through. some of this is good. looking at high finance and being able to track that and be able to identify is primarily a good thing, as long as that oppressive thumb of the federal government doesn't go in the middle of our back down to individuals in this fashion and as long as we don't leave it to the discretionary judgment of the federal government on which businesses are too big to be allowed to fail. if the federal government can come in and take over three large investment banks and a.i.g. and fannie mae and freddie mac and if we have a president of the united states who seems to be following through on the playbook that's on the website of the democratic socialists of america, dsausa.org, mr. speaker, i hope everybody is paying attention to that or you can google democratic socialists of america and hit the button, there will be a website that website changes a

little bit each time i speak from -- about the dsausa.org but on the website, i saved all those pages, you can run but you can't hide. things never die in cyberspace, mr. speaker. but on their website, is now or has been, the language that starts out with this. it says, we are socialists. we are not communists. which doesn't give me a lot of comfort. there's a marginal difference. communists want to nationalize everything, they want to own all real property, they want to take over everybody's house, all real estate and they want to tell everybody where they have to work, what they'll pay for goods and what they'll be paid for the work they're told to do. that's more the pure form of communism. from each according to his ability, to each according to his need. but that's like the socialists. they want to share the wealth. that's what the president told joe the plumber.

that's the mission statement of acorn. share the wealth. the exact language comes out of the mission state oment of acorn. the funding streams are a little different but they are co-mingled and often they are trading shirts with each other, whether it's a purple sciu shirts than acorn. a the risk of digressing, i would point out that even though acorn announced that on april fools' day they'd be shutting down acorn national, i carry this acorn around in think pocket every day to remind me that they have not gone away. it actually may have been an april fools' joke on us that acorn was going to shut down acorn national. now it's the same people, the same face the same boards of director, a little mixing and matching, changing the names, changing the titles, funding streams have been slunk

significantly, thanks to hannah and james and think work that went on behind that, but the same structure is many place, the same people, the same problems. it reminds me of what happened after the wall went down on november 9, 1989, and it appeared to be the end of the cold war, the soviet union thereafter imploded, about a little more than a year after that, the soviet union was wound down. there were those who got together to celebrate the end of the cold war. it was a celebration. a 45-year cold war looked like it came to an end. but it didn't convince the communists that they had lost it philosophically. they didn't believe our free enterprise capitalism and our vigor that comes from being american was what defeated them. they thought they needed more managers that were more pure in their ideology. even though they had to scatter

from the light they went back and reformed new alliance ps and allegiances and they come back at us again and again and again. even more insidious and harder to find and harder to identify, but philosophical enemies of the liberty and freedom of the united states and western civilization they remain, acorn remains an entity out there that has spent millions of dollars undermining the integrity of the legitimate ballot system here in the united states of america. they produced and admitted to over 400,000 false or fraudulent voter registration forms. and they argue it didn't result in a single fraudulent vote chfment is completely, i think, a specious argument, why would you spend millions to produce false or fraudulent voter registration if you didn't think it was going to result in a favorable result for you in the bat lot -- ballot box?

even though there were major problems with acorn in ohio if that election would have been closer and we would have scrutinized it more closely, we would have found out more about what could have been happening in the ballot box in places like ohio, minnesota, when we go to court, who wins in the end in the close elections, and what if -- what if all those false or fraudulent voter registrations had been kicked out at the beginning and no one had walked in, that doesn't mean the ones that are discovered were all those that actually happened. i have to believe that the voter registration list was significantly corrupted in all of the states where acorn was carrying out this practice and a significantly corrupted voter registration list opens things up for more and more corruption this united states of america, built upon the foundation of our constitution itself, that constitution one might think is

the framework for law and it's what we have to preserve if we're going to be a healthy and viable country. and i agree. but the very foundation underneath the constitution itself are these legitimate elections? when elections are delegitimized -- delegit mittized, the foundation falls because the foundation for the democracy is legitimate elections and the people's confidence in those legit malt elections as well. acorn went right at the very component of america that's essential, that is, not that we just have clean, legitimate elections, we must do that if we're going to uphold our constitution, but we also have to have the american people that believe we've conducted ourselves in a legitimate fashion, that their vote was

not undermined by an illegitimate vote. that's the acorn side of this. acorn, by the way, another place that i want to do the investigations, the other side of the great election divide, and hold hearings in this congress and subpoena witnesses and go in and investigate them completely, i believe many of those investigative lines when we follow the money will lead to the white house itself, mechanic. so we have financial reform that's up in front of us. we have acorn that has dispersed itself to some degree, reforming under the same managers, the same faces and some of the same funding streams. i have raised the issue of how obamacare was pushed through this congress and how it takes over another chunk of private sector and i'll summarize and add up the three large investment banks taken over by the federal government, a.i.g., the insurance company taken

over by the federal government, fannie mae and freddie mac taken over by the federal government, and now general motors and chrysler taken over. $787 tarp funding, $787 at the tail end of that, we have 6% of the american population that believes the stimulus package actually worked and stimulated jobs. well, the data shows the exact opposite. unemployment went up, not down, while that was going on. the promise was we wouldn't see unemployment go over 8% you should the stimulus package. what really happened was unemployment went to 10% and it's hanging in that zone, 9.7% unemployment. the vision of borrowing money from the chinese and saudis and pouring it into project here's in america, extending jobbers in public sector, creating government jobs and calling creation of government jobs economic development, i don't think we've had a president

that believed that in the history of america until we get to here. this point in our history. i don't even believe franklin delano roosevelt, the great keynesian economist that he was and embraced john maynard canse's -- canse's philosophy, not to -- keynes' philosophy, not to the ex-tense keynes would have liked to him, and even though we did a lot of make-work projects across the country, the evidence of that is still out there, but our president said to us, a little more than a year ago, that he believed that franklin delano roosevelt lost his nerve and he should have spent a lot more money in the 1930's, if he had done is so that would have brought about a recovery instead of waiting for world war ii to come along to become, and i quote, well, i better not quote that but the general language, world war ii came along, it was the greatest

economic stimulus plan ever. that's close to a quote. and i know i've got the philosophy exactly right. and i don't actually disagree with that statement about the stimulus plan or the second world war happened to be. i would argue we didn't recover from the great fregs in the second world war, even. when the stock market crashed in october of 1929 and as it spiraled downwards and it hiccupped its way up and down and we went through the vast spending era of the great depression and we saw unemployment go up. and then come back down and go up again. when we got to world war ii, december 7, 1941, we were still in the depression. unemployment was a number that was approaching 20% for part of that time. we had 25% unemployment, i think, at the peak, and we got into the second world war, we began to manufacturer everything as fast as we could. a lot of women that had not worked before went to work. rosie the riveters, my mother

among them who tied parachute knotts in omaha was what she did, all day every day. tied knotts in parachutes. god bless her, she turned 90 years old yesterday, i honor my mother with all the love i have. she did her part of the war effort, as my father did, his 2 1/2 years in the south pacific. but the economy didn't recover in the second world war back to where it was. it wasn't the second world war that was the complete recovery package that one would think the president, according to his words, would be the recovery. i would just look at, what are the indexes? some of the indexes would be what the stock market looked like and when did it get back to where it was in october of 1929? one might think that franklin delano roosevelt's new deal and his keynesian spending was what brought us out of that, that's what my history people taught me my teachers taught me that. i went back and looked at the records that wasn't the case. we still had high unemployment

and we still had low and stagnant growth and some reduction of growth in the 1930's. what we saw during world war ii was unemployment rates went way down because we needed everybody to do the work. we saw unemployment rates go to the lowest they've been in history at 1.2%. that's almost unheard of today but unemployment was 1.%. 25% to a high, ratcheted down, 15%, 10%, down to 1.2%, near the end of world war 2. still we did not recover from the great depression from the 1929 stock market crash, wasn't world war ii, it wasn't even the korean war. in fact, franklin delano roosevelt had been dead for nine years before the stock market, the dow jones industrial average, came back to where it was in october of 1929, that happened in 1954, mr. speaker. and so one can't i think

legitimately argue that the world war ii stimulus plan even brought us out of it. we increased our production. it stabilized our economy. the unemployment part got better. but the growth and equities that had to deal with the dow jones industrial average didn't get back until 1954. franklin delano roosevelt had been dead nine years before the stock market got to where it was when it crashed in 1929. this was a long, long, long, painful recovery that america went through. now, we went through not just the great depression in the 1930's looking for recovery. we went through the second world war looking for recovery. we went through the korean war and finally limped our way back. and i'll submit, mr. speaker, that a big reason for that is when you overleverage a country or company you have to pay in

service to debt. that means you have to pay interest on the borrowed money, and by the way, that borrowed money was from americans instead of the chinese and saudis now. the war bonds had to be paid off as well. and so that has to come out of the tax revenue that's coming in. the tax revenue that comes in comes from not government. it comes from the private sector. the private sector has to have -- to be viable. there has to be profitability there in order to attract capital investment. capital investment necessarily increases -- wise capital investment increases our productivity. increased productivity increases our gross domestic product which allows us to buy, sell, trade, make, gain, produce more goods, sell more goods, cash in at the cash register more. the factory of the retail. and when that happens this private sector economic growth then pays its share of taxes

and in the end it's the people in america that pays the taxes, not the corporations, not the businesses and it's certainly not the government. so what we have going on here now is government has swallowed up with those eight huge entities that i talked about, three large investment banks, a.i.g., fannie mae, freddie mac, general motors and chrysler, those eight entities that are swallowed up by the federal government represent, according to an economics professor at the university of arizona as far back as last august, 1/3 of the private sector activity in the united states swallowed up by those eight huge entities nationalized and taken over by the federal government. and behind that came, what, obamacare sexualowing up another 18% of our -- is 33%? you're nodding. i appreciate that. 33%. 33% plus 18% is 51% of our

economy. dictated the terms of its business contracts every bit of health care in america will be, according to this term of obamacare signed into law a couple weeks ago or three, will be directed by the federal government. and some people -- let me say some people without the largest of minds are arguing that because we still have a surviving private sector health insurance industry that the health care in america hasn't been nationalized. i will challenge them, mr. speaker, point to me, point for me to a sector or a component or an activity within health care in america that is not slated to be changed, altered or directed by obamacare. there isn't a single health insurance policy in america that the president can tell anyone, you get to keep that policy, that it isn't going to

increase the premiums dramatically or perhaps reduce them marginally. that's going to happen. the premiums changed for everybody in america unless there's something that sits exactly on the dividing line. young people will pay a lot more in premiums because they are a lower risk. we went from a 7-1 community rating that's out there now which means the lowest premium compared to the highest premium are 7-1 which means that we have a young, healthy person paying $100 on a similar policy an older person that may not be completely healthy could be paying $700 a month on a similar policy or even an identical policy. now, this has been pulled back to a 3-1 community rating which means now that that -- just say we have two people, they're both insured. the youth at $100 a month. the older person, say my age, who is at greater risk, at $700 a month, that's $800 between the two of us. now, when you go to a 3-1

community rating, that means there can't be much disparity so you dial that thing back down. so if you can charge -- you charge the young person then $200 and the older person $600 a month, now we're back to $800 again but the $800 comes $200 at the young person at doubling their premium and reduction in the older person at $700 down to $600, now you have the $800 that comes together for that mom premium of the two insured. that's how that works. so health insurance premiums change because they change the rules for everybody and they'll have to be approved by the health choices administration czar or whom ever that happens to be that has -- whomever that happens to be that has that title. everybody's health insurance changes in america, and this government effectively cancels every policy subject to the approval of the new rules that

will be written that aren't written yet. nobody knows where they are. the health insurance underwriters are pulling their hair out trying to figure out what happens and how do they do business. the federal government's dictating completely every health insurance policy in america. can we find a health care provider that doesn't have their way of doing business altered by this bill? certainly the funding stream that comes in is altered. there's half a trillion dollar cut in medicare. for our senior citizens. $523.5 billion, over half a trillion dollars cut out of medicare reimbursement rates. i represent the most seniored congressional district in america. iowa has the highest percentage of his population over 85 than any of the states. we are the second with those over the age of 65. out of the 99 counties in iowa,

10 of the most 12 seniored counties in iowa, and i hear the president say there's waste, fraud and abuse in medicare so we're going to slash half a trillion dollars out of there to pay for obamacare. half a trillion dollars. and has the president pointed his finger to a single bit of waste, fraud and abuse that's in medicare that he would fix? he promises that's what he'll do, but if you can't identify or won't identify it or if he's holding the access to that information hostage to the passage of his obamacare bill. he's got the bill. he's signed it. it's now the law of the land. now, it's time for the president of the united states to turn over all of those magic cards to show us where is the waste, fraud and abuse in medicare. i don't say it doesn't happen. i hear those cases too. but what's the solution to fix it, and do we really have to pass a bill in order to have legitimate clean government? if there's corruption, let's go find it.

let's go root it out, root and branch, pull it out and let's legitimize all of medicare in the country. but we don't need to be going there arguing if there's half a trillion dollars worth of waste, fraud and abuse, how do you arrive at that number if you haven't found the waste, fraud and abuse yet? so i am going to ell -- tell you seniors will be penalized and we'll be borrowing more from the chinese. because i am going to go here on the congressional record, april 22, april 22, 2010, to say that we will not see a half a trillion dollars in cuts in medicare. they were never sincere about that. that's only a number that they needed to reach so they could argue that obamacare doesn't cost over $1 trillion over 10 years. remember the argument now became c.b.o. scored this at $132 trillion in savings over 10 years. that would be $13.2 -- 132

billion with a b in savings over 10 years. that's $13.2 billion per year, 10-year budget window that we're talking about. that's not loose change to american taxpayers but to the overall budget. it's very marginal as to whether it's a savings or whether it's an increase in spending. but that includes and is predicated upon the cut to the spending which is a punishment to our seniors of $523.3 billion. it's also predicated on a tax increase of $569.2 billion. and is predicated upon the avoidance of the doctors fix, which is in the range of $360 billion. all of that distorts this to the tune of about $1.4 trillion with an honest accounting would get added back into this

obamacare bill. so you take $1.4 trillion in costs that are distorted and you subtract $132 billion from that and you're down in the neighborhood of let's just say $1.27 -- i'll get that number right. subject $132 billion from the $1.4 trillion. now you're down with $1.27 trillion in increased costs. i have to refresh you, mr. speaker, because i'm wondering if any democrats would be able to pass this test. couple little questions about a little history. why did we go no obamacare in the first place? what was the argument from the beginning? what happened during the campaign that presumably gave the president of the united states a mandate to impose obamacare on america? and i remember this discussion, but i suspect that madam speaker pelosi chooses not to

remember this. barack obama, then senator and candidate obama said we are spending too much money on health care. we got to solve the problem with spending too much money on health care. and so he argued that the solution for that apparently is spend a lot more on health care. now, that doesn't pass the first little bit of third grade logic test. i could go to my granddaughter who is now 5 and had her first little loose tooth over the weekend and say to her, if we're spending too much money, does it -- does it solve the problem if we spend more money sm and she would give me that quizzical look saying, how could you say something so irrational, grandpa? that's the argument that came. it's a matter of fact and record and public record. we're spending too much money. we have to solve that problem and low and behold obamacare

spends a lot more money. and somehow they still argue of spending too much money. second thing is we have not enough competition in the insurance company. not enough choices. we have 1,300 insurance -- health insurance companies in america or we did until a month ago when obamacare was signed into the law of the land. 1,300 health insurance companies. 100,000 possible policy varieties, and the president wants another one. i didn't get that. he got the exchange. and the exchange will decide who are the winners and who are the losers and they will write the mandates for every single policy in america. and let's say if you don't cover contraception, then there's going to be a requirement to cover contraception. if you don't cover viagra, there will be a requirement to cover viagra. if your policy doesn't cover mental health, there will be a

requirement to cover mental health. mandate after mandate. when we only have a couple of those prior to obamacare will come down raining on the federal government. and it makes a mandate for five or six insurance mandates and every mandates increases the cost of the premium and takes away our liberty and takes away our freedom. all these things bad that i talked about i don't -- it doesn't pale in comparison to the part that knocks up my inards more than anything else and that's this, since 1973, the people on generally the left side of the aisle in america have made the argument with regard to roe vs. wade and dole vs. bolton and abortion in america, the people on the other side have argued long and hard that the federal government has no business telling a person what they can and can't do with their body. that's the argument. so they argue that the federal

government can't regulate nor diminish nor make it more restrictive for a woman who seeks an abortion to get that abortion. because the not our business what a woman dozen with her body -- does with her body ycht men and women make that argument. over and over again they made that argument. and now the same people, mr. speaker, are making the argument and have made the argument and the president has signed it into the law of the land, now that the federal government has not no business telling a woman what she can or can't do with her body but instead the same people are arguing that the federal government has every right to tell everybody in america what they can or can't do with their body. the president of the united states, with the iron fist of the leadership within the house and the senate and the compolicity of a bear majority of the members of the house has imposed and nationalized our

very body, the most sovereign thing that we have is our own personal self, our skin and what's inside our skin, the management of that has been taken over by the federal government. now they tell all of us, you should buy a health insurance policy and if you can't afford it we're going to tax somebody else and send you a refundable tax credit and you, by golly, are going to pay for that policy. and if you're working and making enough money and you don't have a policy, if you happen to be working for a business who has less than 50 employees, then we're going to fine you a percentage of your income and the i.r.s. is going to come in and do the audits, first electronically and then personally, to impose that health insurance policy on you and it won't be the one you can buy last month, it will be the one you can buy next year or the year after, after they write the new rule. the federal government's nationalization of our bodies. so, they've nationalized eight huge entities, 1/3 of the

private sector activity, and another 18% of our economy, the health care, and nationalized and taken over the most sovereign thing we have, our skin and what's inside our skin. and taken away our ability as individual free people that exercise the rights that come from god, clearly identified by the founding fathers and delineated in the declaration of independence, which is the foundation for the constitution, the sovereignty of man, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and by the way, mr. speaker, i would point out that you and everyone in this congress and those who aspire to come to this congress should know that the founding fathers understood that those rights are prioritized rights, life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. not just a grab bag of rights that they pulled out of the sky or randomly put into a package, but set therein an order of

priority, a priority that the thing most paramount is our life, our life, the management of our lives as well. and that liberty as a secondary right that's subordinate to the right of life and the pursuit of happiness was not pursuit of happiness as it's envisioned in the minds of a lot of people today. pursuit of happiness subordinated to liberty and to life. so that no one in their pursuit of happiness and by the way pursuit of happiness meant to our founding fathers more the greek understanding which means per suit of truth, pursuit of knowledge, pursuit of perfectionble body and mind. that's what pursuit of happiness was understood to mean when the declaration of independence was signed and they pledged their lives, their fortune and their sacred honor. pursuant of happiness was the pursuit of truth and pursuit of purity and so that pursuit of happiness, though, is still sboord nat and cannot in anyone's per suit of happiness can they infringe upon the liberty of another.

because our liberty, our liberties are established in the bill of rights, for example, now. we understand them more clearly. and they are also enshrined in title 7 of the civil rights act. shall not discriminate against people based on race, cede, color ethnicity, now and a lot of times with agent and -- age and disability, those are real rights. they are the rights that are protected and the rights to freedom of speech, religion, the press, right to keep and bear arms, the right to property, the right to be protected against double jeopardy, to be judged by a jury of our peers, all of that, those are all rights. these rights are our liberties. our liberties that are guaranteed to us cannot be taken over by someone else and their pursuit of their happiness. they have to honor and respect that as our liberties are always subordinated to the right of life being the most paramount

right. these things all taken away by obamacare, the right to life itself because it puts people in line to take the health care that the federal government prescribes and it's unconstitutional and in a lot of ways, at least four ways. first, there's nothing there in the enumerated powers that grants this congress or the president of the united states to join together and impose a product on us that's either produced or approved by the federal government, never in the history of this country has that ever happened. that's a constitutional violation. there's nothing in a commerce clause that allows such a broad definition that people who would not engage in commerce whatsoever would have to buy a product produced or approved by the federal government. that's a violation of the equal protection clause for the reasons that i've said. louisiana purchase, florida gator aid and so on. it's a violation of the 9th and 10th amendments, the states'

rights components of this as well. i encourage the attorneys general to move forward with their lawsuits. i'm working for repeal of 100% of obamacare, pull it out, root and branch, i don't want one d.n.a. vestige of it left behind. let's get it out, let's pull it out all the way, mr. speaker, so there's none of it left. then we can start putting the components in place as individual stand-alone bills so the american people can clearly see that their voice is being heard in this united states congress and we could do, we must do it and we can do it in a reasonable time frame, we can put the -- put a discharge petition down here on the floor now, for signatures of these members of congress, second thing we can do is seek to get that vote on the floor. the senate's doing the same thing. and when we have -- the other side of the election, we can shut off funding for the implementation of obamacare, we can do that 2011 and 2012, we can elect a new president, we will -- who will sign the repeal

on his first order of business january 20, 2013, and then we start the reform process. that's where we need to go, mr. speaker, and for those who think that it can't be done, it can't be accomplished, i have a survey on my website that asks the question, do you believe that it's more likely that obamacare will be repealed than the cubs will win the world series this year and the last number i saw, 58% believed it's more likely to repeal obamacare and 42% thought it was more likely the cubs would win the world series. they went to spring training, they're playing ball, we're going to play ball all the way to 2013 and beyond. we're going to get this job done, mr. speaker. 100% repeal of obamacare, it must be to preserve the liberty americans had last month that they deserve every month through the lives of our children and grandchildren with that, mr. speaker, i would express my gratitude for your indulgence and your attention and especially for that little nod of the head and i'd yield back the balance of my time.

oh, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: does the gentleman have a motion to adjourn? mr. king: madam speaker, i move the house do now adjourn. the speaker pro tempore: the question is on the motion to adjourn. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes have it. the motion is agreed to. accordingly the house stands adjourned until 12:30 p.m. on monday next for morning hour monday next for morning hour debate.

health class president -- >> president obama presented a speech in new york city. from cooper union college in new

york, this is about 25 minutes. >> thank you. thank you very much. [applause] thank you. thank you very much. everybody, please have a seat. thank you very much. it is good to be back. it is good to be back in new york. it is great to be back in the great hall in cooper union. we have some special guests that i want to acknowledge. gov. david paterson is here. [applause] attorney general andrew cuomo. [applause]

state comptroller thomas to nepali is here. [applause] the mayor of new york city, michael bloomberg. [applause] and all the citywide elected officials, thank you for being here. it is great to be back in cooper and union where generation of leaders and citizens have come to defend their ideas and contest their differences. it is also great to be back in lower manhattan. it is just a few blocks from wall street. [laughter] it really is good to be back. [laughter]

because wall street is the heart of our financial sector. since i last spoke here to years ago, our country has been through it tellable -- a terrible trial. 8 million people have lost their jobs. kalb's ridiculous small businesses have had to close their doors. -- countless small businesses have had to close their doors. trillions of dollars in savings have been lost. as a nation, we were forced to take unprecedented steps to rescue the financial system and the broader economy. as a result of the decisions we made, some of which were very unpopular, we are seeing hopeful signs. a little more than one year ago, we were losing an average of 760,000 jobs each month.

today, america it is adding jobs again. one year ago, the economy was shrinking rapidly. today, the economy is growing. in fact, we have seen the fastest turnaround in growth in nearly three decades. but you hear it -- but you're here and i am here because we have more work to do. we cannot be satisfied until the millions of our neighbors who are looking for work can find a job and wages are growing at a meaningful pace. we may be able to claim a technical recovery, but we will not have truly recovered. even as we seek to revive its economy, it is incumbent on us to rebuild it stronger than before. we don't want to economy that has the same weaknesses that led to this crisis. that means of addressing some of

the underlying problems that led to this turmoil and devastation in the first place. one of the most significant contributors to this recession was a financial crisis as dire as any we have known in generations, at least since the 1930's. that crisis was born out of a failure of responsibility, from wall street, all the way to washington, that brought down some of the world's biggest financial forms and almost brought us into a great depression. it was the failure of responsibility that i talked about here in new york city two years ago, before the worst of the crisis had unfolded. this was back in 2007. i take no satisfaction in knowing that my comments that have largely been borne out by the events that have followed. but i repeat what i had said that because it is essential

that we learn the lessons from this crisis so that we do not do them ourselves to repeat. make no mistake, that is exactly what will happen if we allow this moment to pass. that is an outcome that is tha unacceptable to me and is unacceptable to you, the american people. [cheers and applause] as i said on the staged two years ago, i believe in the power of the free market. i believe that a strong financial sector that helps people to raise capital and get loans and invest their savings. that is part of what has made america what it is. but a free market was never meant to be a free license to take whatever you can get however you can get it. that is what happened to often in the years leading to the crisis.

some -- let me be clear, not all -- but some on wall street forgot that every dollar traded or leveraged as a family looking for a house or trying to pay for education or opening a business or saving for retirement. what happened on wall street has real consequences across the country, across our economy. i have also spoken before about the need to build a new foundation for economic growth in the 21st century. given the importance of the financial sector, wall street reform is an absolutely essential part of the foundation. without it, and our house will continue to sit on shifting sands. we could be the level to future crises. that is why i feel so strongly -- we could be vulnerable to future crises. but his wife also strongly to ensure accountability on wall

street and to protect consumers on main street. [applause] here's the good news. a comprehensive plan to lead -- plan to achieve these goals has already been presented to the house of representatives. a senate version is currently being debated, drawing on ideas from democrats and republicans. both bills represent significant improvement on the broad rules that we have today. despite the furious effort on industry lobbyists to shape this legislation -- i am sure some of these lobbyists work for you in the private sector. they are doing what they're paid to do. but i am here today, specifically, to speak

specifically to the titans of industry. i want you to join us in this effort. [cheers and applause] i am here because i believe that these reforms are, in the end, not only in the best interest of our country, but in the best interest of the financial sector. i am here to explain what reform will look like and why it matters. first, the bill being considered in the senate will create what we did not have before -- a way to protect the financial system and the broader economy and american taxpayers in the event that a large financial firm begins to fail. how can we respond in a way that does not force taxpayers to pick up the tab?

in an ordinary local bank, when it up -- when it approaches insolvency, we have an orderly process through the fdic that insures that depositors are protected, maintains confidence in the banking system, and it works. customers and the taxpayers are protected and owners and management lose their equity. but we do not have that kind of process designed to contain the failure of a lehman brothers or any of the largest and most interconnected firms in our country. that is why, when this crisis began, companies employing tens of thousands of people and holding billions of dollars in assets had to hurry and had discussions in the middle of the night. we had to deploy taxpayer dollars. much of that money has now been

paid back. my administration has proposed a fee be paid by large financial firms to recover all of the money, every dime, because the american people should never have been put in that position in the first place. [applause] this is why we need a system to shut these firms down with the least amount of collateral damage to innocent people and innocent businesses. from the start, i have insisted that the financial industry, not taxpayers, shoulder the cost in the event that a large financial companies should fall. the goal is to make certain that taxpayers are never again on the hook because a firm is deemed too big to fail. there is a legitimate debate taking place about how best to ensure taxpayers are held harmless in this process.

that is a legitimate debate. i encourage that debate. what is not legitimate is to suggest that somehow the legislation being proposed is going to encourage future taxpayer bailouts, as some have tried. that makes for a good sound bite, but it is not actually accurate. is not true. in fact, the system as it stands -- [applause] the system as it stands is what led to the series of costly taxpayer bailouts and it is only with a reform that we can avoid a similar outcome in the future. in other words, a vote for reform is a vote to put a stop to taxpayer bailouts. that is the true spirit and a story. [applause] -- and that is the truth. and the story. [applause] and no one should be fooled in this debate.

of the bill would also enact what is known as the local rule -- as the boat puller -- as the voelker rule. [applause] this will run only safeguard our system against crises. this will also make our system stronger and more competitive by instilling confidence here at home and across the globe. markets depend on that. part of what led to the turmoil in the past two years is that, in the absence of clear rules and sound practice, people did not trust that our system as one that was safe to invest or lead. as we have seen, -- invest or lend. as we have seen, that has for all of us.

so that is the first thing. no. 2, reform would bring new transparency to many financial markets. as you know, of part of what led to this crisis or firms like aig and others who were making huge and risky bets using derivatives and other complicated financial instruments in ways that the fight accountability or even common sense. in fact, many practices were so opaque, so confusing kelso complex, that the people inside the firm's -- so confusing, so complex, that the people inside the firms did not understand them. they were not fully aware of the massive debts that were being place. that is what led warren buffett

to call derivatives as financial weapons of mass destruction. that is what he called them. that is why reform will rein in access and ensure that these kinds of -- ran in excess and ensure that these kinds of practices see the day of light -- the light of day. there are a lot of companies who use these instruments to illegitimate and. -- legitimate and. a business might hedge against rising -- legitimate end. a business might hedge against rising fuel costs. they can rein in a decent price. that is the way markets are supposed to work. the problem is that these markets operated in the shadows

of our economy, invisible to the regulators and invisible to the public. these practices were rampant. rick'sks approved dangerously -- risks accrued dangerously. i was encouraged to see a republican senator join democrats this week on this issue. [applause] that is a good sign. with that action, we will continue to see what highly leveraged and loosely and murderemonitored gambling in our system.

third, this legislation would enacted the strongest protection devore. this financial crisis was not just the result of decisions made on wall street. it was also a result of decisions made at kitchen tables across america. while it is true that many americans to own financial obligations that they knew or should have known that they could have not afforded, many were duped. many were hurt by conditions in the fine print.

millions of people have now lost their homes. tens of millions more have lost value in their homes. just about every sector of our economy has felt the pain, whether you are behaving driveways in arizona or selling houses in ohio for your dream home repairs in california or you're using your home equity to started small business in florida. that is why we need to give consumers more protection and more power in our financial system. this is a lot about stifling competition were stifling innovation. it is the opposite. with a dedicated agency setting ground rules and looking out for very people in our financial system, we will impart consumers with clear and concise and affirmation when they're making financial decisions. instead of competing to offer confusing products, companies will compete to the old fashion way, by offering better products. that will mean more choices for consumers, more opportunities

for businesses, and more stability in our financial system. unless you're a business model depends on bilking people, there is little to fear from these new rules. [applause] #4, this is the last component. these wall street reforms will give shareholders new power in the financial system. they will get what we call "a say on pay," a voice on the bonuses given to top executives. there will have authority to determine who manages the company in which they have placed their savings.

americans cannot be read anybody for success when that success is earned. -- americans do not begrudge anybody for success when that success is earned. exorbitant bonuses while taking government money of $7. -- government money zero fanoffl of us. it led to a situation where folks with the most to lose, stock and pe the least to say in the process. that has to change.

[applause] let me close by saying this. i have laid out the set of wall street reforms. these are reforms that will put an end to taxpayer bailout, that will bring complex financial dealings out of the status, that will protect consumers, and it will give shareholders more power. we also need more reform in washington. [applause] the debate over these changes is a perfect example. we have seen battalions of financial industry lobbyists descending on capitol hill, firms spending millions to influence the outcome of this debate. we have seen misleading arguments and attacks that are designed not to improve the bill

but to weaken or to kill it. we have seen a bipartisan process buckle under the weight of these withering forces. that is even as we offered a proposal to target the root problem that led to the turmoil in our financial sector and in our entire economy. we have seen business as usual in washington. but i believe that we can and must put this kind of cynical politics aside. we have to put an end to it. that is why i am here today. [applause] that is why i am here today. for those of you who are in the financial sector, let me say this. we will not always see eye to eye. we will not always agree. but that does not mean that we have to choose between two extremes. we do not have to choose between

markets that are unfettered by even modest protections against crisis or markets that are stymied by it onerous rules that separates -- that's a press enterprise and innovation. -- that's suppress -- that suppress enterprise and innovation. managing that tension is what has allowed our country to keep up with a changing world. we make sure that we not tip one

way or the other. this debate can be contentious. it can be heated. but, in the end, it serves only to make our country strong. it has allowed us to adapt and to strive. i read a report that fairly illustrates this. "through the great banking houses of manhattan last week ran while live alarm. big backers stared at one another in a year and astonishment -- big banker stard at one another in a surprise and astonishment. icthat was in a "time magazine"n

1933. [laughter] [applause] the system that caused so much consternation, so much concern, was the federal deposit insurance corp., also known as the fdic. it is an institution that has successfully ensured the deposits of generations of america. in the end, our system only works, our markets are only a free when there are basic safeguards that prevent abuse, that check excesses, and that insure that it is profitable to play these system. that is how we will ensure that

our economy worse for consumers, that it works for investors, and that it works for financial institutions -- in other words, that it works for all of us. that is why we're working so hard to get this passed. this is a central lesson not only of this crisis but of our history. what i said when i spoke here two years ago, ultimately, there is no divide between main street and wall street. we will rise and we will fall together as a nation. [applause] that is why i urge all of you to join me in. i urge all of you to join me. for those of you in the financial industry, i urge you to join me not only because it is the interest of your industry, but also because it is in the interest of your country. thank you so much.

[applause] god bless you and god bless the united states of america. [applause] thank you. >> today, the senate budget committee finished marking up the budget could they began with a proposal to end of the troubled asset relief program. then there was the provision for the iraq and afghanistan war spending. >> i want to welcome staff and members back to the market. i did understand that senator gregg has some questions that he would like to pose.

you're free to go with your man meant, sir. >> thank you, mr. chairman. -- with your amendment, sir. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> the first amendment is to deal with the top program, which was sischeduled to expire. ÷senator graham meant -- senator gregg made an eloquent argument. the talk program avoided the financial meltdown around the world. it was supposed to expire in december 2009.

this amendment removes the budget authority. i hope we can pass this amendment. the problem now is that tarp has taken on a life and flavor that no one had envisioned. if you had told me that it was going to be used to bail out car companies, i would not have voted for it. the reason i avoid it -- i voted for it was because i thought it was when to avoid a financial meltdown. these $44 billion have ceased to serve their purpose and it is becoming a slush fund. the authorization needs to expire. we are well past the time it should have expired. it took as a long time to do

away with the spanish-american war phone tax and i do not want tarp to be around for another 100 years. it is not needed. >> i thank the senator for his evaluation. tarp ends on october 3 of 2010. that is three days into the fiscal year. based on the cbo projection, we assume that $148 billion of the tarp funds will not be used and will not add to the debt. i think all of us were very reluctant to approve tarp funding. but it was done on a bipartisan basis. it was to avert a global financial collapse.

we now know that the latest projections from cbo, the original $700 billion, will not cost us anywhere near that amount. the latest analysis is that the $700 billion will cost us $109 billion. that is the most recent credit score. already, $181 billion has been paid back. we just had the news this week that general motors has paid back all of their loans. we still have to recoup the equity investment. i was interested to see that the chairman of gm say he believes that they will be able to sell stock and the united states will recoup all of its money. i hope that is the case. the administration is not that optimistic that we will recoup all of the money.

but we also know that, in terms of the money invested in banks, the latest estimate, we will actually make $7 billion on the money put out to banks. many of the banks have already repaid. of course, we acquired warrants on these banks in addition to loans that were extended. so the estimate is now that we will actually make a profit of $7 billion. the president has put forth a proposal for a fee to ensure that all of the money is recovered from the industry. that is so that we would not even be out of the $109 billion. i would reluctantly oppose this amendment. the secretary of the treasury

has asked that we not in it -- we not and did it before october 4. >> -- we not end it before october 4. >> i share your optimism. but there were $44 billion in this fund that is obligated. we're trying to make sure that these $44 billion get spent on things -- do not get spent on things that had not been envisioned when we voted for tarp. i think it would be fiscally prudent to take it off the table. >> all right, that is certainly fair, senator gregg. -- senator gramm. >> we do not needed anymore.

your statement is absolutely accurate. it has worked out for the taxpayer fairly well, relative to the money that was put out to the banks, not so much for the automobiles, not so much for aig, but the banks were making money on it. there's no reason to continue this program and to carry it into the next budget cycle. we should terminate its. in itandend it. >> is there any other debate? >> first of all, i support the amendment as it is presented. something that seems to have escaped the people that voted

for tarp is the fact that the banks that received target money -- tarp money made billions and billions of dollars with that money. billions -- i don't think that was the intent of tarp. at least on the committee that i am on, tarp helped summon finance. it was supposed to extract toxic assets out of the banking system. it was never supposed to be used for the purposes of that have been explained here more than

once. i would hope that this amendment would be considered. i would urge everyone to vote for it. thank you. >> thank you. senator gramm, can i get your attention for a moment? >> yes, sir. >> let me make sure that i and a stand -- that i understand the full implication of your amendment. please take a moment and take me through what your intention is. >> yes. it is pretty simple. it is-standing that there is $44 billion that were supposed to -- itqou'derstanding that there is 44 buildings that were supposed to be in the tarp program that are on obligated.

the banks are in good shape. who would get the $44 billion? none of us appreciated the money be used to bailout car companies. again, i voted for tarp believing that the financial system was melting down. next thing you know, we are bailing out car companies, which was a different purpose than what i intended. if this $44 billion is not taken off the table, my fear is that he will be spent on tangential issues that cannot go to the heart of the matter. the program did work when it comes to banking and we're well on our way to get some stability. we have a lot of needs in this country. the $44 billion is hanging out there in thin air and it disturbs me. i think we should take it off the table and put it to some other noble purpose rather than having it potentially is used in

a way that -- potentially misused in a way that tarp was never intended. >> here is the question that i have. thihere is the thing that i am trying to reconcile in my mind. we have $148 billion that cbo says will never be used, ok? and the number that you have here, as i read it, is $22 billion. is that the difference we're talking about here?

>> the amendment says that there is $44 billion in the tarp loan authority and that cbo says will be used by october 3, but has not been used so far. the subsidy rate on that remaining loan authority is 60%. >> all right. >> [unintelligible] >> let me just circle back. i get it now. thank you for that explanation. >> you're welcome. i am glad i was able to help. [laughter] >> is jim on your staff, too? i personally believe that it is appropriate that we take off the table tarp money that will not be used.

i have an issue with the calculation here. my understanding from the treasury is that this money will be used, but there will then be $148 billion that will not be used. before we end this mark up, i hope we will be able to address that spirit is really a larger number. i don't think we should interfere with obligations that have already been made. that is what treasury tells us is the case with this money. >> what is it obligated to do? what are they going to spend it on? >> i do not know. what they have told us is that this is money they anticipate will go out. i do not know if that is some long-term arrangement. >> that is not our understanding of these dollars.

our distending of these dollars is that they are a key. >> -- they are a kkitty. it is in case they want to fund an additional program. >> might understanding of that is that this is correct. it has been set aside, but it has not been spent. i personally believe that the larger number, the $140 billion that cbo told us will not be used, we do need to find a fence before the end of this mark up. we need to make sure that that money goes to pay down the deficit. any tarp money that remains is to go back and pay down the deficit. end tarpon it came back -- we

insisted that that -- and tarp money that came back, we insisted that. it is the law. >> this money should be taken, too. >> this is a pretty good rule for washington. they did not know what they were going to do with the money. they're going to spend it if they keep it. let's take it away before they spend it. if they do not have it spent by monday, i do not think they know what they will do with it. let's just take it off the table. >> i am sympathetic with the notion of making sure that those moneys are taken off the table if not used for tarp purposes.

i have reservations about this particular amendment. but, hopefully, we will be able to take off the table the $148 billion that is out there that will not be used. >> [inaudible] >> senator feingold has an amendment as well? all right. why not do this? ok. let's go to senator feingold. >> we are now in the ninth year of the war in afghanistan and their eighth year in the war in iraq. to date, we have spent $1

trillion on these wars. it is an astounding figure. every single penny of those costs have been added to our budget deficits. with a pay for absolutely none of it. we expect to be spending hundreds of billions of dollars more on these wars. unless we change the way we budget, all of that will be added to our deficits, too. this resolution includes additional spending for the current fiscal year. it also includes $50 billion for a place holder for 2012. altogether, this budget resolution anticipates $300 billion in additional costs. and that will be far less than will be needed.

cbo projects $270 billion more than the $300 billion already provides. 2pvsimply disclosing anticipated cost in a budget proposal does not constitute the same as paying for these costs. i think we need a more comprehensive global strategy to enhance our national security. al qaeda is not a two-country franchise, but a nimble, global threat. if we're going to continue to pay for these wars, my amendment requires that we pay for those costs rather than continue to add them to the budget deficit. it requires that we enact

policies now that ensure deficit neutrality for any additional spending on the wars. additional funding could still be provided as an emergency appropriation, but i would hope that that would not happen. these two wars do not meet our definition of an emergency. spending on them as somehow unforeseen. in a year, the war in afghanistan will be starting its second decade and iraq is not that far behind. this strikes a reasonable balance in the need to get our fiscal house in order. >> there are certain members

that will be unhappy with what i am going to save. i think -- going to say. i think is important to assert that it is an emergency that haa war has been ongoing for years. it is anticipated. can we predict with precision? no, we cannot. do we know that we're going to be spending hundreds of billions of dollars? yes, we do. i believe that it is important to send the message that we're not just going to put this on the debt, that we are going to pay for it.

i would say that senator feingold has come up with irresponsible way to do that. he does not expect the expenditure to be covered in one year, but to do it over time in what i think is responsible and fiscally prudent. i thank the senator for his amendment. i plan to support it. is there the debate on the amendment? senator sessions. >> we are in the war not of our choosing, but because we were attacked. we have had a long and vigorous national debate about it. most of us, overwhelmingly, have supported this activity.

we are any huge deficits and there is no likelihood that we will construct a plan that will get us to balance the budget in the short term. but we can certainly take steps to go in that direction. i think are appropriate responses to maintain a focus on reducing our deficit, reducing the cost of war and to the emergency supplemental we have used. i think that would be the best approach. i really think that this would be