the speaker pro tempore: on this vote the yeas are 415, the nays --

the chair: on this vote the yeas are 420 and the nays were none. the amendment is adopted. the unfinned business is the request for a vorded oat on amendment number 12 printed in part b from the gentleman from louisiana on which further proceedings were postponed on which the ace prevailed by voice vote. the clerk will redesignate the

amendment. the clerk: amendment number 12, printed in part c of house report number 111-506 offered by mr. cao of louisiana. the chair: a recorded vote has been requested. those in support of the request for a vorded -- recorded vote will rise and be counted. a sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. members will record their votes by electronic device. members, this is a five-minute vote. five-minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.]

the chair: on this amendment the ayes were 414, the nays were none and present were one. the amendment is adopted.

the unfinished business is the request for a recorded vote on amendment number 2 by the gentleman from north carolina, mr. miller, on which further proceedings were postponed and on which the ayes prevailed by voice vote. the clerk will redesignate the amendment. the clerk: amendment number 2 printed in house report 111-508 offered by mr. miller of north carolina. the chair: a recorded vote has been requested. all those in favor of taking this vote by the yeas and nays will rise and remain standing until counted. a sufficient number having arisen, the recorded vote is ordered. members will record their votes by electronic device. members, this is a five-minute vote. five-minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.]

the chair: on this amendment the yeas were 418. three nays. the amendment is adopted. the question is on the amendment in the nature of a substitute as amended. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes have it. the amendment is adopted. accordingly, under the rule the committee rises.

the speaker pro tempore: mr. chairman. the chair: mr. speaker, the committee of the whole house on the state of the union has had under consider 5297 and pursuant to house resolution 1436 i report the bill back to the house with an amendment adopted in the committee of the whole. the speaker pro tempore: the chairman on the committee of the whole house on the state of the union reports that the committee has had under consideration the bill h.r. 5297 and pursuant to house resolution 1436 reports the bill back to the house with an amendment adopted in the committee of the whole house. under the rule the previous question is ordered. the question is on adoption of the amendment in the nature of

a substitute as amended. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes have it. the amendment is adopted. the question is on engrossment and third reading of the bill. those in favor, please say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes have it. third reading. the clerk: a bill to create the small business lending fund program to direct the secretary of the treasury to make capital investments in eligiile institutions in order to increase the availability of credit for small businesses, and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. members, please clear the well and clear the aisles. in the back of the chamber,

take your seats on both sides. members, take your seats. take your conversations outside the chambers. and take your seats. plose. -- please. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? >> mr. speaker, i have a motion to recommit at the desk. the speaker pro tempore: is the gentleman opposed to the bill? mr. neugebauer: in its current form, yes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman -- the gentleman qualifies. the clerk will report the motion. the clerk: mr. neugebauer of texas moves to recommit the bill h.r. 5297 to the committee on financial services -- mr. neugebauer: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent that the bill -- the reading of the bill be dispensed with. the speaker pro tempore: is there objection? so ordered. the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. neugebauer: thank you. this motion makes two important

changes to this bill. first, it puts the special inspector general for tarp in charge of the oversight of the new small business lending fund. remember, this fund is tarp 2 or tarp jr., as it's referred to. second, it requires the treasury be certify that the decisions banks receives funds is based on merit and not political situation. this new lending fund follows the model of tarp minus the strong oversight and puts another $30 billion in banks. the motion to recommit would make the special inspector general for tarp -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman will suspend. the gentleman is presenting a motion to recommit. we need order in the house. please take your seats. members, take your seats, and other folks, also, take your seats.

the gentleman from texas. mr. neugebauer: the motion to recommit would make the special inspector general for tarp or sigtarp responsible for oversight. the special inspector general for tarp said i believe it is absolutely critical to protect the taxpayers that the office of sigtarp be able to continue its oversight in the extension of tarp's capital purchase program. accordingly, i write that congress provide sigtarp oversight for the sblf and any resulting legislation. just yesterday, sigtarp announced an indictment in a $1.9 billion fraud case of the failed colonial bank. it involves taxpayer money from tarp due to the efforts of sigtarp, agents working with law enforcement that taxpayers were protected. the underlying legislation puts a -- the deputy of treasury inspector general in charge of

oversight. the treasury inspector general was not among the many agencies and law enforcement that worked on this $1.9 billion fraud involving tarp. sigtarp has considerable experience overseeing a program in which the government purchases preferred stock in banks. if we create a new tarp program that will also purchase shares in banks, why should we not use the same oversight agency that has a proven track record and expertise? failing to take advantage of sigtarp's expertise is an extreme disservice to the taxpayers, exposing them to a greater likelihood of fraud and abuse. is the majority afraid to use this expertise because tarp is part of the title? the taxpayers deserves to be protected when treasury makes investments with their money. unfortunately, we have some examples of tarp investments that have raised serious questions about how the investment decisions were made. one -- when one united bank received tarp funds in 2008, questions came up about whether

the bank's political connections helped its tarp's approval. one united bank lost capital and was under scrutiny by regulator for its lending practices. more recently, more members of congress and others have questioned whether political pressure was involved in the decision by large banks to raise capital for the troubled shore bank in chicago. shore bank has applied for tarp funds in addition to $140 million in assistance from other banks to head off the takeover by the fdic. shore bank also has ties to the obama administration. we do not have all the owns -- answers on how the decisions were made for the banks, but we need to make sure these questions are not raised about other baction. treasury must certify that each decision based on solely economic fundamentals and any any political contributions -- crucials. this type of -- this is the type of decision making that taxpayers always expect and deserve. when there's $33 billion being

put on the line, we need to protect their investment. the underlying bill falls short to do that. the motion to recommit improves taxpayer productions by putting the experience of tarp over this new tarp program and requiring that investment decisions be made on economic fundamentals, not political kecks. if you're going to have tarp ii, why wouldn't you use the same regulator you had for tarp i? i urge my colleagues to stand with the taxpayers and support this motion to recommit. with that i yield back my time. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from massachusetts seek recognition? mr. frank: to oppose the motion. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. frank: mr. speaker, i speak very clear, this is just a preliminary chance to vote no. for reasons that i don't understand, my republican colleagues are opposed to a program in which voluntarily the federal government makes funds available to community banks so that they want to participate,

they can lend it to small businesses. maybe it is the fear that it might succeed and diminish their issues that leads them to oppose it. they have been unable to oppose it outright on its merits so here's what they want to do. they want to say the really the tarp program, but in fact the gentleman from texas said that. he said, if you're going to create a second tarp program, put the tarp inspector in charge. that's true. if you are going to fly to the moon, pack a big lunch. the fact is that we don't create a tarp program. this is classic boot strapping. it's not a tarp program. it's very different than the tarp program in a number of ways. the community banks want to participate in it, they don't want to participate in another tarp program. so to kill it, they are inaccurately characterizing the tarp and then talking about another inspector general. this is not the problem of what the subject is being asked to say. it's to try desperately to get a

little tarp rubbed off on it so they can defeat by that way something they can't defeat on merit. now let me yield a minute to the gentleman from kansas, mr. moore, who is the chair of the oversight subcommittee of our committee, a man with a great reputation for integrity and forcing tax -- enforcing taxpayer rights. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman may not yield loss of time. mr. frank: i just yield. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. moore: thank you, mr. chairman, and to members of this house, i want to say that the bill as written says the inspector general of the department of the treasury shall conduct, supervise and coordinate honest and investigations of the purchase and commitments to purchase of preferred stock and other financial instruments under the program. that is directly from the bill. we should not add sig tarp. i yield back. mr. frank: and the gentleman from texas began with a great surpriseing revelation. a bureaucrat, the inspector

general of tarp wants to expand his authority. i'm surprised that there were not gasps of wonderment in the house. we have an inspector general here. they can do it. and the sig tarp inspector general, because that program is about to go out of existence, decided to expand his authority. but it does say, however, it goes beyond this in one sense. it says that the secretary must certify that e is acting solely on the basis of economic fundamentals and not because of any political consideration. so here's the offer i make with the support of the majority leader. within a few days we will bring a suspension to the floor that will require the secretary to -- we'll go you one better in this effort. and the secretary will be required to certify under oath to the inspector general of the treasury and if member it's want we can have them certify under oath to the government accountability office and if there are other people you want them to certify, too, we'll be

there to do that. but the sole purpose of invoking the inspector general of tarp here, with his cooperation so we continue to have a job, is to discredit the program. if you want this program to go forward, you vote against this, we will come forward with further reinforcement of the oath taking, but, please, if you want to vote no, vote no. i would say to the members, mr. speaker. but don't fall for this main game. this is an effort to -- it's your tarp. no, i'm not. it's the pee-wee herman school of legislating. let's call each other names without dealing with the substance. let's not, when we're dealing with a serious issue of tryinn to get money to community banks to help our smaller businesses, fall for that nonsense. i yield to the gentlewoman. ms. velazquez: mr. chairman, i didn't know that the other side liked tarp so much that you want to keep it going. we have put safeguards,

penalties, restrictions, oversight in place. this is another bureaucratic layer that will hinder the myth of small businesses to access capital. mr. frank: what our friends on the other side have for political reasons is a severe case of tarp separation envy. it's going away, they haven't had their president tell us to do it, they're going to miss it. but we're not going to deal with that in this bill. and kill the bill. i hope the recommittle is defeated -- recommital is defeated. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the previous question is ordered on the motion to recommit. the question is on the motion to recommit. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, the noes have it. the gentleman from texas. mr. neugebauer: mr. speaker, i ask for a record vote on tarp 2.

the speaker pro tempore: a recorded vote is requested. all those in favor of taking this vote by the yeas and nays will rise and remain standing until counted. a sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. members will record their votes by electronic device. pursuant to clause 8 and clause 9 of rule 20, this 15-minute vote on the motion to recommit will be followed by five-minute votes on passage if ordered and motion to suspend the rules on h.j.res. 86. this will be a 15-minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.]

the speaker pro tempore: on this vote the yeas are 180. the nays are 237. the motion is not adopted. the question is on passage of the bill. those in favor say aye, please say aye. those opposed, no. -- those in favor, please say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 being in the affirmative -- mr. westmoreland: mr. speaker, i'd like to ask for a recorded vote. the speaker pro tempore: those in support of the request for a recorded vote will rise and be counted. a sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. members will record their votes by electronic device. this will be a five-minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.]

the speaker pro tempore: on this vote the yeas are 241. the nays are 182. the bill is passed. without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid upon the table. the unfinished business is the question on suspend the rules and passing house resolution -- house joint resolution 86 as amended which the clerk will report by title. the clerk: house joint resolution 86. joint resolution recognizes the 60th anniversary of the outbreak of the korean war and reaffirming the united states-korea alliance. the speaker pro tempore: the question is, will the house suspend the rules and pass the

joint resolution as amended. so many as are in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 of those voting having responded in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the joint resolution is passed, and without objection the motion to reconsider is laid upon the table.

the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. all members remove their conversations from the aisles. the house will be in order. the chair will entertain requests for one-minute speeches. for what purpose does the gentleman from california rise? >> to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. >> -- mr. lungren: once again we have discovered there appears to be some glitch in the majority's effort to bring the so-called disclose act to the floor. and apparently it is over how

many people get exempted from the disclosure rules that otherwise prevail. we have had the n.r.a. exemption which was for organizations that have over a million people who actually existed more than 10 years, people in all 50 states, d.c., and puerto rico. and have less than 15% of their funds from corporations. now we understand they dropped it to half a million. madam speaker, we did not take the oath to the constitution to only uphold part of the constitution. it is time that we stop auctioning off the first amendment and understand that we here are supposed to protect the first amendment not parcel it out, not deny it to some and give it to others. the first amendment is for all americans not just those favored by one party or another. the speaker pro tempore: are

there further one-minute requests? for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? mr. poe: request permission to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. poe: madam speaker, the administration's knee-jerk banning of deepwater drilling for six months is the second disaster in the gulf. the government is intentionally putting companies out of business in the gulf with this unscientific moratorium. 50,000 workers are losing their jobs by government overreaction. the administration is not only purposely putting blue collar workers out of work, the government is sending those jobs to brazil and indonesia. in 2005 there was a b.p. refinery explosion in texas city, texas. 15 people were killed, 180 were injured. the government did not close all the refineries for six months in the united states to investigate the sins of b.p. then. that would have been foolish nonsense and would have destroyed jobs, the economy, and cause the loss of u.s. energy. so investigate the rig explosion. hold b.p. accountable for their conduct, but don't in a moment

of political hysteria stop deep water drilling, wipe out jobs, american companies, and sabotage the u.s. economy. that's just the way it is. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from georgia rise? >> permission to address the house for one minute. revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. >> madam speaker, in georgia's ninth district there is a small town in elagy, known not only as the apple capital of georgia but also home to the mccutcheon pool small business coalition. the community leaders -- the reason is they are committed to creating an environment where small businesses can thrive. however taxation and regulation are stifling small business expansion. throughout my legislative career, i focused my efforts on removing these unnecessary barriers in order to unleash america's entrepreneurial spirit.

as a small business man i know that cutting spending here in washington, eliminating the capital gains tax, and reducing the corporate income tax, along with empowering the private sector is the way to create jobs and get americans back to work. stimulating the economy must come from expanding the private sector, not expanding government as we have seep here today. we have a 16-month track record of failed economic policies and they continue once more here today. we should be encouraging small businesses not penalizing them with higher taxes and more regulation. i hope you'll join me and let's empower the taxpayer and provide tax relief. the speaker pro tempore: further one-minute requests? for what purpose does the gentlelady from texas rise? without objection. ms. jackson lee: thank you madam speaker, very much. everyone knows we are in the grips of trying to overcome the devastation of the gulf and help the people of that region.

that is why i want to applaud the serious work that was done at the white house to establish the independent framework that i called for two weeks ago to ensure that the impacted communities, restaurants, fishermen, oyster persons, people with small restaurants and large restaurants in the gulf region from florida to texas have the ability to secure the combined of compensation needed now to make their bills. this is not compensation for the injury. as much as it is compensation to survive. for anyone to suggest that this was a shakedown, it is a misinterpretation and distortio% to the american people. what do they want the government to do? to be responsive and make sure that we work on their behalf and to make sure that people whose lights are being turned off can pay their bills.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. ms. jackson lee: good news. we can now get claims and help people. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. further request for one minutes? the chair lays before the house the following personal request. the clerk: leaves of absence requested for ms. moore of wisconsin for today and mr. childers of mississippi for today. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the requests are granted. for what purpose does the gentleman from georgia seek recognition? >> madam 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 the house, revise and extend their remarks, and include therein extraneous material, and -- material. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. graves: mr. moran, june 24, for five minutes. ms. foxx today for five minutes. my good friend from georgia, mr. westmoreland, today for five minutes. mr. poe, june 24, five minutes. and mr. jones on june 24, five

minutes. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. for what purpose does the the gentlewoman from california rise? ms. woolsey: madam 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 the house revise and extend their remarks, and include therein extraneous material. ms. woolsey, california. mr. mcdermott, washington. ms. kaptur, ohio. mr. defazio, oregon. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. under the speaker's announced policy of january 6, 2009, and under a previous order of the house, the following members are recognized for five minutes each. mr. moran from kansas. for what purpose does the gentlewoman from florida rise? ms. ros-lehtinen: to address the house. the speaker pro tempore: without objection.

ms. ros-lehtinen: thank you, mr. speaker, and i'm proud to rise to recognize the many small businesses throughout the nation and especially in my home state of florida and in my area, south florida, that i hope will lead us into the great economic recovery as we have in the past, we shall recover again. small business owners are going to be an essential part of that recovery because small business owners are truly the backbone of our nation's economy employing tens of millions of workers and creating most of them through a new private sector job that are so important for true economic growth. i'd like to take this opportunity to especially recognize two small businesses in my district which definitely represent america's tradition of free enterprise and individual initiative. tricity electric has reaped a well-respected place in both florida and the electrical contracting industry with well over 300 employees. this family firm has been providing electrical design,

installation and service in south florida for three generations, since 1946. the small business' name also played a role in a fascinating rise of small business after world war ii in that it was selected to represent our area's three major cities at that time, miami, coral gables and miami beach. like most small businesses, tricity electric is made up of folks who didn't start at the top, in this case, started in the trenches, digging pipe in hot weather working whatever hours it takes to get the job done. another small business with a long tradition of service in south florida is riverside electric company. this was established in 1922. i love anything older than i am. which is one of the oldest electrical contracting firms in the southeastern united states. another firm with a proud

family tradition, its roots go back to atlanta where the company played a key role in converting the city's streetlights from gas to electric. its founder, eugene m. irvin sr., later moved his family to miami and began riverside electric company. his great grandson, james irvin, is now co-owner of the company along with alexander rodriguez, who started as an apprentice and worked his way up to become a journeyman and maeser electrician. madam speaker -- and master elect -- electrician. madam speaker, these are two companies that provided economic opportunities to diverse groups of people and delivered products and services to a worldwide marketplace. florida's small employers in 2006 represented 99% of the state employers and 44% of its private sector employment. of the even greater significance, however, is that

small businesses created nearly 60% of my state's new jobs in recent years. think of that figure. 60% of the new jobs in the state of florida were created by small businesses. it is my understand and my privilege to recognize today the many dedicated and hardworking employees of small businesses who have done so much over the years to serve their neighbors in so many ways. i thank the speaker or the time, and i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time. ms. woolsey from california. ms. woolsey: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, general petraeus was in washington this week to testify before the house senate and armed services committee. and while his intent was to endorse the july, 2011, afghanistan redeployment date set by the commander in chief, it was not the clear,

unambiguous statement that inspires very much confidence. according to an editorial in "the washington post," today's edition, the general described next july as, and i quote them, the point at which a process begins to transition security tasks to afghanistan forces at a rate to be determined by conditions at the time, unquote. with all due respect, madam speaker, could there be any more qualifers and escape hatches in that sentence? the american people, who have 1,000 fewer fellow citizens and 278 billion fewer dollars than they did when this war began, aren't looking at the beginning of a process. they're looking at an end to this, an end to this miserable war. shouldn't we be at the end or at least in the middle of the process of transig security

tasks to afghanistan forces? shouldn't the beginning of the process have come at some point over the last 8 1/2 years that we've been fighting this war? my concern, madam speaker, is that statements like this one are laying the predicate for an% extension of president obama's deadline, which is exact low the wrong lesson and the wrong approach. the problem is that if you're locked into a certain mindset it will never seem like the right moment to remove our troops from afghanistan because the mission, as currently defined, will never be complete, and conditions on the ground will forever remain bad. but the reason for that is the underlying policy of a military invasion and occupation that is flawed in the first place. so in a twisted paradoxical

way, madam speaker, the more we fail the more we try to succeed with the same misguided approach. and then we just fail some more. that's how you end up with perpetual war. if we had adopted smart security principles and invested in humanitarian rather than a military approach, we would be a lot closer to our goals to a peaceful, stable and secure afghanistan. for my part, madam speaker, and i'm not alone in this belief, the july, 2011, date is not nearly ambitious enough. that's yet one more year in which americans will be asked to sacrifice blood and treasure for a failed counterterrorism strategy that is doing nothing to advance our national security objective. i believe general petraeus is moving in the wrong direction and being cautious where he should be bold. it's time to accelerate the

timetable, not push it back. it's time, madam speaker, to bring our troops home. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back. mr. poe from texas. mr. mcdermott from washington. without objection. mr. mcdermott: madam speaker, we have the highest number of long-term unemployed workers on record. so you think we'd be overwhelmed by bipartisan cooperation for those people who have been out of work for so many months. instead, every single house republican but one voted against the legislation three weeks ago to continue emergency federal unemployment benefits. and now in the other body every republican has refused to support an extension of unemployment benefits, so a growing number of jobless workers are now losing their

benefits. by the end of this week more than 900,000 americans will %- lose their unemployment benefits unless the other body accs. we hear their rumblings over there, but i'll believe it when i see it. by the end of the week the number -- the number will grow to 1.2 million. my colleagues from florida should know an stimated 80,000 floridians will lose their benefits. california, 180,000. ohio, 66,000. georgia, 57,000. and the list goes on and on. the last lifeline for these workers and their families is being severed leaving them adrift with no job, no savings and no support. even some from my own party seem to be saying now is the time to start cutting back on help for unemployment. in fact, it will take about five years of consistent month after month job growth to make up for all the ground we have lost in this recession.

that's how big the jobs hole that unemployment workers are trying to climb out of. you only have to hear it for a few unemployed workers to know how hard they're looking for work and to feel their sheer sense of desperation. they're losing their homes, their health and their faith of the american dream. are we really prepared to just stand by and watch them sink into abject poverty? opponents of helping the unemployment like to talk about budget deficits. of course, they don't seem to care about deficits when it comes to two wars thaa have cost $1 trillion and two tax cuts, mainly for the wealthy, which cost $1.7 trillion, none of that seems to matter. but now the stingy other body says, we might pass this if we can take away $25 a week from all the unemployed. of course, we couldn't take the money from the hedge fund

people. that would be too tough on them. when it comes to helping the unemployed, just say we can't afford it. but i wonder if they have truly considered the real cost of abandoning these families. ending assistance to the unemployed or reduce consumer demand right at the point when the economy is struggling to rebound after the worst recession in 70 years. it would surely increase the number of homes that would not go into foreclosure, and it would drive some individuals permanently out of the labor force if we don't do something. all these outcomes will increase our nation's budget deficit, but even worse, they'll bring about a crippling deficit of hope, hope for the future. helping those who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own is the right thing to do for families, for the economy and ultimately for the federal budget. our failure to get this bill passed has very real and very

immediate consequences. tonight, thousands of people in every corner of this country will suffer because we have chosen to quibble and stone wall instead of act. these -- stonewall instead of act. these benefits help millions of people put bread on the table while they look for work. i sincerely hope the other body will take pity on the unemployed of this country and pass a bill today. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. mr. jones from north carolina. for what purpose does the gentleman from georgia rise? >> to address the house for five minutes. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. westmoreland: madam speaker, i rise today to pay respect to wilton -- milton who passed away. he was a good friend of mine and a good friend to many.

he leaves behind his wife, randi, his loving children, eric and cameron, eric's wife, amy. his extended family included several brothers and sisters who preceded him in death and four brothers and sisters who survived. probably most special to him was his five grandchildren. and a grandchildren, milton and i talked about our grandchildren and what a blessing they were to us. i knew him both personally and professionally. he was born in tennessee and attended tennessee state university. milton enjoyed a career in the electrical industry, which i come from a construction background, and milton and i had many discussions about the condition of our construction industry today. he came to atlanta when he was accepted into an apprenticeship program with the international brotherhood of electrical workers local 613. milton worked hard and had a

successful career. he started grove park electric and went on to dixie electric company. but the highlight of milton's career was uptown electric. he made it into a very successful electrical contracting firm, did a lot of work for delta airlines in the atlanta airport, and i took a trip and visited that site with him probably a couple months before his death. milton also served on several boards. he served as secretary, treasurer, president and chairman for the atlanta electrical contractors association. career and community work are important, however, a man is only as good as the family and friends who support him. fortunately, milton was blessed with a lot of both. he was a loving and devoted husband, father, brother and friend. he was a strong, talented and compassionate man who gave so much to so many folks, and i am proud to speak about him today

on this floor to honor his life and his work. milton, i will miss you, my friend. thank you, madam speaker, and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. ms. kaptur from ohio. mr. burton from indiana. mr. defazio from oregon. . mr. wolf from virginia. ms. foxx from north carolina. under the speaker's announced policy of january 6, 2009, the gentleman from utah, mr. bishop, is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader. mr. bishop: thank you very much, madam speaker. i come to the floor today during the specific time to talk about issues that are taking place on the borders of the united states. the issues i talk about are issues that impact both the northern border and the southern

border as well, but we have had quite a bit of hype in the media lately about things that are taking place on the southern border. so i would like to try to focus my attention primarily on what is happening between the border between the united states and mexico. i also want to try and narrow the focus of the discussion tonight in some particular way. because i'm not talking about everybody who is coming through the border both legally and illegally, i'm talking about certain kinds of bad guys that are doing great harm to this particular country. let me talk about the kinds of me that -- for which we should be vastly concerned. i'm talking about drug cartels and drug runners. the sad fact is that almost all the illegal drugs coming into this country are coming across federal lands at our southern border. i'm talking about hueman traffickers. the sad reality is those who are

hydrogening and -- hijacking and kidnapping people, those who are running prostitution rings, those who are bringing people in here for unspeakable kinds of activities are coming through federal land on our southern borders. if you go down to those lands, you will see the red trees. established where those who are leading innocent individuals will take people across the border, physically abuse them, rape them, and leave an article apparel on a tree as a momento, a reward, a symbol of their success in such a heinous activity. that is happening on federal land along our southern border. and i also want to talk about the potential of terrorists who can come through federal land on our southern border almost without any kinds of inhibitions. not everyone that's coming through the southern border with mexico are from next core or

even latin america. in recent years the border patrol has intercepted people from yemen, pakistan, iraq, somalia, people from most of the countries on our enemy watch list. those types of individuals who for whom we should be suspect are the ones who are being captured and cut and detained. the question is how many are not being captured and caught and detained? we have found discarded apparel, backpacks with old chinese passports that have been modified, that have been cut up, that had been reused. we are not really sure exactly why they were there and for what purpose they have, but we know that those types of individuals are coming across our southern border. please let me try to emphasize, the reason therr should be such concern is because of some of the kinds of people who are illegally entering this country who is sole purpose is not to

find a job or join a family but whose sole purpose is to further the illegal drug trade, whose sole purpose is to further illegal human trafficking, and whose sole purpose could easily be for terroristic reasons. one of the ironies of our situation on the southern border is if you look at this picture of the southern border, the land from san diego over to elpass so, everything that is colored along the southern border, is different kinds of federal land. well over 40% of the southern border is federal land. four million acres of which are in wilderness categories. i want to make a distinction between the southern border from elpass so to san diego because if you go from el paso down to the gulf of mexico, it's slightly different. first of all you will notice from the map there is not a lot of federal lands there and the border patrol has a great deal more latitude and consequently a

great deal more effectiveness on private lands working with private individuals and local law enforcement than they do in the areas where there are federal lands. plus there's a river that makes a difference as well. so i want to concentrate on all of that colored area between san diego and el paso where it is the federal lands that are causing the problem. and they are causing the problem not for an unusual reason i think we can logically understand this. the border patrol is being very, very effective in urban areas. border patrol is also being increasingly effective along the texas border where they are dealing with local law enforcement and private property owners. and that means that if you want to come into this country illegally to do drugs, to human trafficking or terroristic purposes, you try and go through the area that is the easiest. the easiest access to this country has now become federal land along the southern border.

and that means that even though this issue has been with us for many years and many administrations, going back to the reagan years when we were talking about this particular issue, and even though the failings that i will be mentioning in this hour deal with this administration, they also dealt during the bush administration, the clinton administration, and years before that, the only difference, though, is that now the situation is being exacerbated because the success we have in urban areas and on the private sector land means that the bad guys are being funneled more and more into the federal land where it is simply easier access to get into this country. so the problem has always been there. the problem, though, is intensifying. that is why we must look differently at what we are doing. two agencies, actually three agencies are responsible for that southern border. they include those who own the lands which is the department of

interior and the forest service, and those who are charged with patrolling and protecting those lands which is homeland security, specifically the+ border patrol. and my contention to you today is that those three agencies have collectively failed in their responsibility. when a few weeks ago a deputy sheriff from arizona comes to one of those sections of land, which is wilderness designation, which means he no longer is able to stay within his vehicle. because by laws we cannot have a mechanized vehicle in wilderness area, so he has to get out of his car and walk into this wilderness area where he promptly walks into an ambush and is shot. two weeks later in the same area, the same wilderness area where border patrol is not allowed to do their routine type of patrol work, two dead bodies of americans are found in that exact same spot on federal land.

federal land. you look over at the prince family where through a wildlife refuge once again because it has an endangered species on it, border patrol is prohibited from going into that area, unfortunately the murderer of rob was not prohibited from entering this country through that wildlife refuge. he confronted a rancher whose family goes back to the 1907 in arizona, in that particular ranch, this is an elderly gentleman on a motorized vehicle on his own land. he did not have the opportunity of facing the issue of whether to fight or flee because he didn't have the capacity to do either. he just had surgery on his back. he just had a hip replacement. was scheduled for another hip replacement. he basically was impossible. in years past when a rancher confronted drug cartels, drug runners, the human traffickers, they would usually flea. but for whatever reason -- flee. but for whatever reason, this is

becoming more constant, for whatever reason the drug cartel decides to stay there and they killed rob and his dog. then he fled with a very outof the way route to going back through the exact wilderness refuge from which he entered into this country. sorry, this is an example of where we are failing. a mexican rancher brutally murdered, bound in duct tape, was thrown into the organ pipe national monument, not on the u.s. side, back in november. to this day nobody has actually issued any kind of press release to allow anyone to know that is happening. and the sad part is the examples i'm giving you right now are not isolated. we have had several members of our border patrol who have been murdered in this exact same area. more and more individuals, both americans and of mexican extraction, are being assaulted, murdered, raped, and robbed in this particular area.

and it is all happening on federal land. so the question one has to simply ask is, why? why would this indeed be the situation in which we find ourselves? one of the problems that this congress needs to address, because only this congress has the ability to address it, is some of the internal conflicts between different federal agencies. if you have the interior department and forest service who owns the land, they have certain laws that we in congress have widely passed on how they must manage their land. homeland security, though, is responsible for border protection. they have other requirements and laws and not always do those laws fit together easily. in fact sometimes they are in conflict. it would be very simple to say, common sense would tell you just to sit down and work out the issue. unfortunately, we are dealing with the federal government. where common sense is not necessarily a high priority. indeed, some of the land managers working under the department of interior as well

as the forest service almost are doing their work as if they had blinders on. dedicated to the task at hand and the legal requirement they have to consider the value and protection of the land as their highest priority, and dedicated to fulfilling that legal requirement, they are sometimes oblivious to the real world that is around them. they forget that there is other missions that have to be there. so sometimes it is more important to protect 22 prong horn goats on this land than it is to consider definitely more than 22 young men and women in america who are obviously subject to the suffering and the pain that comes from the use of illegal drugs which are coming through that exact same territory. it is almost as if we have had attitude within the department of interior and forest service that because those are their lands they will allow the border patrol to go in there under

certain circumstances. yet at the same time we have had the criticisms filed with us that allowing the border patrol to go in there and monitor these lands and protect the border from this country sometimes takes up to six months just to get the permits to run the programs they need to do. we were told the other day well, this is changing. we are working together better. but now we are coming together as homeland security and interior department and forest service, we work those out. no longer does it take six months to get the permits of the activities to take place. we are now doing those within 30 days, sometimes 60 days, occasionally a bit longer. here is the question. we are talking about securing this border. drug car tells does not wait 90 case from the entrance into the country before they continue on. they are not waiting for the bureaucratic wheel to spin so slowly in this country to get together and work together to

solve this particular problem. and until we can come up with a new way of doing these issues, it will continue. we had a meeting with these three groups again the other day in which they were proud a communication tower essential for the border patrol to do their work in guarding the access and monitoring the access into this country was not allowed to be put in the site the border patrol wanted because that would have been on wilderness designation and once again because of the laws we have passed you may not put any new structure on a wilderness designation. so they were very proud, they were very proud that they had after several months of negotiations conducted a deal to move the power to an area that was acceptable to homeland security and acceptable to the interior department. that sounds great that they did the deal. with one small caveat. the tower doesn't work in that area. there is now by everyone's

admission a three-mile hole in the coverage. which means in this effort to try to monitor what is coming in and out of american territory, there is now a three-mile black spot where no one will ever know what is coming in and coming out, and i'm sorry that's causing the problem. it is not unusual for the drug cartels who are very sophisticated to understand this concept. and therefore with this three-mile hole that becomes the primary route of entrance. and the only reason that that three-mile hole exists is because to obey our laws an to have first of all the concept of protecting the land upper most you didn't put the tower where the tower would work. you put it in alternative site. perhaps years ago when only a few people were coming over occasionally, perhaps years ago when only people who were there coming over to try and get jobs

to milk cows or change sheets, occasionally that would not have been a problem. but as i have said, we are no longer talking about that group, those kinds of people coming in. we are now talking about effective, organized drug cartels having running battles with themselves as well as mexican authorities on that side, and they are the ones who are now in increasing number coming through those black holes on the federal land that we have simply created because we have not taken the blinders off to look at the overall picture. . it is human traffickers who have coming over in increasing numbers that -- in areas that we are not being regularly patrolled. and terrorists coming into this country through areas that no longer have any kind of security simply because we're giving precedence to land concept to wilderness or endangered species and that takes precedence over securing

or border and protecting the citizens of this country. now, people shake their heads in amazement and say, that's silly, that violates common sense. the only thing to say to those citizens who say that is, you're right, it is silly and it does violate common sense and that's why this congress needs to do something about it because we have the ability to take all three agencies and make them see the large picture, the overall goal and not simply what their narrow focuses may be in their job requirements or their job vision. a question was made on whether the border patrol can do routine patrols along our southern border without dropping a beat. the representative from the national park service and department of interior said, of course not. only under certain circumstances. only when there is evidence of incursion would they be allowed to go into these areas because that's when they need to. well, once again, if we are now

inviting people to use these areas because we're stopping them other places, so now they're coming on federal land, one of the things we need to do is make it much more difficult for someone to come into this area illegal and that means you need to have border patrols doing routine patrol. i think in the back of everyone's mind if we start thinking about what the border patrol could or should be doing as we envision it, personally, we would obviously see a bunch of people in a motorized vehicle checking for signs of incursion and making sure that those who want to come into this country are having a second thought and saying maybe there is a better route that is not across federal lands. so the first question one should ask is, why not, why aren't they allowed to be in there? for indeed if the bottom line means our border patrol is not allowed to go on federal lands to do their job, we are creating our own problem.

initially if you were here last week or two weeks ago the president announced a new initiative to send 1,200 national guardsmen down to the border. i'm encouraged for his commitment to do something about that. but once again one has to ask, if the border patrol are not allowed to go onto federal lands, the national guard won't be able to go onto federal lands. and i don't care how many people you send down there, if they are not allowed to do their job, if they don't have the access so they can do the patrolling, it doesn't make a sirches. that's silly. -- make a difference. that's silly. it's not going to work. and that's the concept that somehow some way we ought to recognize, we ought to figure out. there's also one other issue that goes along with that that should be a special concern to this congress, madam speaker, in the way we operate here. because one of the audits we

have congress appropriating moneys to agencies of government who are then extorting that money from other agencies of money. for the border patrol to do their work one of the things and conditions that is put upon them by the department of interior is they have to pay mitt combation fees. which means this congress without knowing the details appropriates money to homeland security for the border patrol who will then have to pay that money to the department of interior for mitigation fees or to buy other lands to compensate. this congress has no control over that process. that's wrong. this congress has no say over that process and that is wrong. and the idea of transferring money from one group to another without the oversight of congress is wrong. it is illogical. it should not happen. when he homeland security budget is brought to this

floor, i as a member of congress do not have the ability to come in here and transfer some of that money from homeland security over to the interior budget. but the agencies are doing it. and they're doing it without reporting it to congress, without understanding what congress is about. those agencies by one extorting money from the other have the ability to do something that members of congress cannot and i'm sorry, madam speaker, this is illogical. and i'm sorry that we are going to authorize up to $50 million in this year's budget to give to homeland security so they can get -- send it over to the interior department or the forest service at the interior department and forest service without ever checking on why we're doing it. the money all comes from the same pot, and it should be congress' decision on where that money is spent and how that money is spent. it should not be matter of internal negotiations between the haves and have nots within different agencies. and that is a practice that has

been going on in this administration and the prior administration and the prior administration beyond that. the difference so is that today's dollar amount is so much more significant and the issue, and the issue is much more significant. some of the news agencies made a major brouhaha yesterday by reporting a new sign that has been put up by the department interior. i believe this is on the buenos aries national refuge. and what it says to americans coming down to this american spot for wildlife species and recreational opportunities is clear. it tells americans, danger, there is a warning. travel is not recommend. because the american land owned

by the federal government in which they would be entering is active drug and human smuggling activity. and the b.l.m. encourages them to use public lands north of interstate 8. how many other places in the united states do you have the united states government putting on signs telling americans not to enter into american territory because it is too dangerous for americans to go into american territory, that drug cartels from foreign nations have taken over control of this territory and you enter at your own risk? unfortunately, this is not unusual. it's that this sign went up this last week. for years, both the interior department and the forest %% service have been recommending to people not to travel in these areas. and if you do you go at your own risk. 95% of the oregon pipe national monument and 90% of that wilderness area is controlled

by mexican drug cartels and americans can't go without armed escort. we were told and warned another area is a dangerous area, don't stop along the roads, continue on driving. try not to get out of your car and continue on foot in those particular areas. these are areas well within the border of the united states. and sadly this is not atypical. going back to the year 2006 -- once again, darche administration, but in 2006 the department of interior issued a report by -- which was never released to the public. but in it it indicated that in the year before, 2005, there were at least five murders, two rapes, 39 armed robberies and they are estimating somewhere between 200,000 and 300,000 illegal incursions on this piece of property. now, i want you to know those

are the only ones that the federal government investigated. anything that was reported to local government -- to local law enforcement was not included in those figures. now, because this has now been spun out in the national media and because the sheriff in pino county simply said there are areas in his jurisdiction that are out of control, and that area that is out of his control where he cannot provide protection are all federal lands that are owned by the department of interior and the forest service where he nor the local law enforcement nor the border patrol have the ability to do what they need to do to try and control that particular area. a memo today, media trying to put this in some kind of perspective. what they said is don't take this out of perspective. it's only a maul area of the land that is closed to americans.

-- it is only a small area of land that is closed to americans. in fact, they put out this sign which is somewhat blurred but they simply said -- this is the buenos aries national wildlife refuge. they're only closing this portion down here. that's the portion of america that no americans can go into because it's too dangerous for americans to go down there. they also then said that the amount of violence that takes place here annually is decreasing so we should be heartened. i think there should be another question that should be asked. how as a policy for this congress or this administration, how much of america's lands should we accept as uninhabitable for americans? how much -- what percentage of american property should we just say, ok, foreign entities, foreign substance groups, drug cartels, you can have 5% of our land as yours, we just won't bother you in that, maybe 10%,

2%? what percent is acceptable to say that america could turn over our control of american lands to cartels and groups from outside this country and it's acceptable? how many murders are acceptable before we're happy? is five murders too many? if we only have three murders a year happening on federal land, is that enough to satisfy what we are doing? the bottom line is quite simple. what we have been doing is failing. and we have to do something different. we have to do something different. part of it is to use common sense and say the border patrol should be allowed to go where the border patrol needs to go. i have here a picture of one of our federal lands, once again, in arizona, where you see traffic barricades. these traffic barricades, nicely put here, are cool except the goal of these traffic barricades is to prohibit the border patrol from

going into federal land that has wilderness categories and wilderness designations. this is not to stop the bad guys from coming in. this is to stop our guys from coming in. at oregon pipe national monument, these things look like a normandy barriers, used to be our border between the united states and mexico. this used to be put in there to stop mexican cars from coming into the united states. well, we have a different wall there now that is much more effective so we don't need those. so instead, the public land manager in this particular area took these barricades and put them inside his territory, once again, not to stop foreigners from coming in, but to stop the border patrol from going in. somehow we have to realize that what we need to do is to allow the border patrol to have routine access, routine patrol and not stop them from going into these territories. now, once again, we have met

with them and said we are working these things out. everything's going to be fine. in fact, some of the gates we are putting up have locks on them and we're giving the border patrol keys to the locks. they could push those gates. however, local security -- the local law enforcement doesn't have a key to those locks. if a deputy sheriff in one of those counties is chasing a bad guy into that area they are prohibited from that pursuit. somehow we've just got to get common sense back into the situation because what we are talking about simply, simply does not work. and there's an irony into this. the sole purpose of trying to stop the border patrol from securing our borders is because the fear that they may cause damage to the environment. that a motorized border patrol truck could actually screw up the land or chase away an animal or do something else. so, therefore, we are prohibiting them from doing

that except for some extraneous and unusual circumstance. but the irony is the bad guys, the drug cartels, the human traffickers, potential terrorists, they're not inhibited by any of that. so they go into that area and they don't care what kind of environmental damage they do. madam speaker, you have probably seen these pictures before. this is a picture of federal land. this is wilderness land where americans are not supposed to go, no motorized vehicle is supposed to go, no wheeled vehicle is supposed to go, only on foot, backpacks or on horseback. that's for us. unfortunately, the drug cartel and the human traffickers come in here and they leave all their stuff behind as they change clothes so they can get

picked up along the highway and then go further inside the united states illegally. this is what's left behind. this is what the landscape looks like in these areas that we're trying to save for their environmental purpose. the irony is we are failing, we are failing because the people that need to be kept out are not being kept out and the people who could solve the problem are. one of the unique finds we found is that once again the border patrol, trying to come up with some pocket change and pocket money for their activities, are going to these areas and this cacti that was cut down is an endangered species which means it is illegal to cut it down. they didn't care. they cut it down anyway. it is placed across a road, the purpose of which is to stop an american traveler in this federal territory because they can't go over the cactus. once they get to that spot, they are then armed -- they are then

robbed with armed gunmen. the irony once again is if the federal government were to go in there and pick up this cactus and move it off the road, that's a felony. that's illegal under our wilderness act. sometimes once again we have to come up with other areas of what to do. we have placed water towers within federal territory in an effort to try and make sure that those illegal visitors coming in here who happen to run out of water will not die. that's a humanitarian effort. however, what is so bizarre is, border patrol can't go anywhere near those water towers for fear of running off illegal aliens that may need the water. look, we have done this kind of stuff, once again, going back, through several administrations. but the cost is higher now, the issues are higher now, the danger is higher now. we can no longer afford to continue on with that particular pattern. i would also warn you that right now, as we speak, in a national

forest there is hour in wildfire. most of the wildfires that are taking place on federal land in the southern border area are not accidental wildfires, they are started by the bad guys, the drug cartels and the human traffickers, for two reasons. either they will start the wildfire as a diversion to take federal forces to the fire so they can go the othhr way, or, much more practically, if they're in deep trouble, they'll start a fire to get somebody to come and rescue them. most of the fiies are started that way. we have one now which is called the horseshoe fire. estimates are $10 million that it will cost the taxpayers to fight this fire caused by illegal aliens trying to come in this country, not for jobs or for family, but to do harm. illegal trafficking, drugs and, once again, potential terrorism. that's what we need to deal with. that is the issue that's at hand. there is one last concept with

this. arizona passed a law dealing with illegal immigrants. it as been highly controversial. the merits are the rationale of arizona's laws notwithstanding, i have no intention of talking about whether i think it's a good or bad law, it is insignificant. what is a reality is that the law was produced because of the anger, the angst and the anxiety that is caused by the funneling of thousands and thousands of drug dealers and human traffickers into the state of arizona because we have done such a good job, we're now funneling them through those federal lands. the federal government's action caused that law. and i would think it would be wise before this federal government decides to go to arizona and tell arizona what they should or should not do internally with their laws for the federal government to realize we are cautioning the problem. and for the federal government -- causing the problem and for

the federal government to go down there on federal lands and say it is a federal responsibility, the federal government will stand up, the federal government will ensure ttat we have control over this territory, the federal government will stop the worst possible invasion of this country by the people who are trying to do harm. mainly, once again, the drug traffickers, the human traffickers and the potential terrorists. that's what the 10th amendment is about, that's the concept of federalism. we're causing the problem and we're criticizing the local government who is trying to react to it. the local government wouldn't need to do that form of reaction if we simply did our job first. once again, look at the map. that's the territory. everything that's colored. that's an open invitation for people to come into this country because it is so easy. and that's the problem. and because it's been exacerbated, because it's happening to greater extent, because the damage is worse than ever before, and because the potential harm to this country is so great, this congress has

to step up and decide that we will get these entities together and we will establish what the standards are. the standards should be very simple. that not one inch of the united states property should be given over to a cartel and americans should never be told not to go into parts of this country because the too dangerous for americans. we should come up and establish a policy that the border patrol will have open and complete % access and no other agency, especially interior forest service, will tell the border patrol what their job is and how they will do it. and that there will be continuous and routine patrols of our border until such time as the drug cartels realize that it is no longer easy to come to this country that way and they will find some other route, that's obvious. but this is our responsibility, our land, and that we clearly are failing and that the problem is getting worse every day is our fault and our responsibility and we must take control

definitely on that. i hope this country recognizes what we're talking about. but more important, i hope this coogress recognizes what we're talking about. i will say, i think this congress has. the language in house bill 5016 which would solve this problem was passed in this body overwhelmingly on a bipartisan vote on a motion to recommit. the bill to which it was voted and attached is waiting over in the senate with very little likelihood of being moved. senator coburn in the senate on the appropriations bill attached similar language that would help solve this problem to an appropriations bill. it pass -- was passed by a voice vote in the senate. and then before it came to final passage over here, in conference committee, the language was removed. both bodies of this congress have said what they believe should take place. and common sense from americans tells us what should take place. now is the time of us to realize

we cannot -- we can no longer simply ignore this situation and it's our fault what we have been doing -- our fault. what we have been doing does not work. we need a better approach. we need to make commonsense situations, we need to have our land manager see the higher picture of what is important for this entire country. and we need to do it now. because the situation gets worse every day, eeery day we wait. madam speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back.

the speaker pro tempore: 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, madam speaker. madam speaker, i appreciate very much the privilege to be recognized, to address you here on the floor of the house of representatives, in this great deliberative body that we have. i appreciate the gentleman from utah who so eloquently spoke in the previous period of time and i have a number of things on my mind that i came here to impart to you, madam speaker, and anyone that would like to overhear our conversation. maybe this would be a good day to solve a lot of the problems that we have before us and just generally address this situation. i may have to refer once in a while back to the history of the world to make a reference point so we can understand what we're

doing now. this is an america that's been built upon the foundation of a good number of things. the pillars of american exceptionalism. now, some of these are pretty simple. they're in the bill of rights, freedom of speech, religion, press, freedom to petition, the freedom to assemble and petition our government for grievances, all in the first amendment there. property rights that are clearly defined in the fifth amendment, freedom from double jeopardy and then we have a whole series of other rights. but, a couple of thix that we don't talk about -- things that we don't talk about very much in this country and that is, if would you go to the uscis stack of flash cards -- flashcards, and these are glossies about 2 1/2 inches by about five, like a deck of them, and when we have illegal immigrants that come to the united states that are studying so that they can pass the citizenship test and receive

their naturalization to become an american citizen, they study the flashcards very much like students study the flashcards in, say, math. two plus two is four, three plus three is six. i won't go on any further so i don't make a math error. but these cards that test the applicants for american citizenship have a series of questions on them and an answer on the other side. there will be questions such as, who is the father of our country? you snap it over and the other side of that card says, george washington. you need o know that if you're going to be a citizen of the united states of america. who emancipated the slaves? flip the card over, abraham lincoln. next question -- actually, this is question number 11, what is the economic system of the united states? free enterprise capitalism is on the other side of that card. i don't think it's arguable, i don't think it's refutable.

but neither do i believe that the administration believes what i have just said. i don't think they've endorsed the free enterprise capitalism. i don't think they've been active in it. a small, small percentage of this administration has signed the front of the paycheck and handed that payroll check over to one of their employees. i'm one of the people who has done so. i have started a business and created jobs and i have met payroll for over 1,440 consecutive weeks. you learn some things doing that, madam speaker. you understand and appreciate the free enterprise system. we know why people take risk. people go so to work so they can make some money. they punch in and punch out and they get their paycheck and the benefits package that comes with that job because they want to feed their family, they want to have some walking around money, they want to save up for the future, they want to have the flexibility to go and get some living in, doing some things that cost a little money.

these are -- this is taking advantage of the liberties and freedoms that we have here in the united states, that's getting a job and going to work. that's contributing generallyy to the free enterprise system -- generally to the free enterprise system. but when an entrepreneur comes up with an idea to start a business or buy an existing business, maybe transform that business into something different, a vehicle for them, that really launches our free enterprise system and we have seen success models of that across the thiftry of america, across the -- history of america, across the united states of america. we want to think of the carneigies, for example, back in another era. or jpmorgan in another era, or we can be thinking also of some of the rockefeller or in today's world -- rockefellers or in today's world we can think of bill gates, the founder of microsoft and apple. yes, they made a lot of money.

and there's not one dime of it that i begrudge them because their creativity and their discipline, their attitude, their hard work, yes, but their smart hard work has done a rot or -- for all of us. our lives are far better today because we had creative people who injected ideas in and stimulated this economy. and bill gates and steve jobs being two of them, there are many more out there in the dot-com industry. there are also failures out there. and if you define failure by starting a business and watching it go broke, although i think that many times there are lessons learn the that that are built upon and those failures become successes. but my point is, madam speaker, is that we are a nation that has embraced free enterprise capitalism, it should not be arguable here in the united states, we should not have a knee jerk reaction that we should go toward a government takeover of the private sector

in order to solve a temporary economic problem. our default mechanism should be to free enterprise, to freedom. and we have to let some entities fail if we're going to allow our economy and our nation to succeed. that's the risk. you have to once in a while let the child fall off of the bicycle because when they get up, they'll be a lot better at it. and you have to once in a while let people achieve and be rewarded for their successes to the fullest extent because that's what inspires more entrepreneurship, more challenges and more success. and when you think of the united states of america, and this is the historical lesson now and it goes back, i mean, we look at 1776 as our year, fourth of july, 1776, as our year. think of that time, what was going on in that period of history, what was going on in the culture of western civilization. well, let's see. not only did the 13 original

colonies declare their independence from great britain, from the king, but that was the year that adam smith published his great work called "wealth of nations." my book, i believe, is 1,057 pages long and you can read through it carefully and learn what it's like to make pins and nails and how to utilize the division of labor to get more efficiency and everybody benefits. adam smith had the industrial revolution figured out in 1776, before the dawn, just at the beginning of the first signs of the dawn of the industrial revolution. we had here in the united states the freent prize capitalism. -- free enterprise capitalism. a nation of small farmers were free to succeed or fail on their own merits or demerits. and we know that some of our earlier presidents had real

difficulty with their finances. thomas jefferson among them. george washington had some of those struggles as well. there are others that had difficulty with their finances. it wasn't something they were handed something that didn't require them to be a manager. their management of their finances and the production of their operations had a lot to do with their successes or failures. 1776 adam smith touched the nerve and educated the marketplace of western civilization and they fwan to embrace the -- began to embracc the idea of free enterprise capitalism. the idea of the invisible hand managing our economy rather than -- rather than the king ordering it to be done or in a later century, the next century, karl marx calling it come out of central demand top down. adam smith's vision was if you

only have one loaf of bread, one brand of bread on the shelf and you have a set price for that loaf of bread you can take the price up well above what it's worth, people are -- if they are going to eat bread they have to pay more than what it would be costing if there's competition. as soon as company a has competed against compaay b, what can you use to get a market share? well, you can bake a loaf of bread that you sell a little cheaper, you can bake a loaf of bread that's a little better loaf of bread, but you can package it up a little better nicer and provide it a little fresher. that's some of the things, cheaper, better advertising, service packaging and maybe a little fresher. and when you do that if you can undersell -- if you sell at a lower price a better quality product the invisible hand would come into that grocery store and instead of paying $1 for a loaf of bread, by that 95

cent loaf of bread that's better than the $1 loaf of bread. company b at 95 cents is outselling company a who is selling their bread for del 1. so what happens? the quality of bread for company a goes up, the freshness goes up, the price goes on and this competition goes on day by day constantly, transaction by transaction, the invisible hand making the selection of a brand of a loaf of bread, a gallon of milk, a can of beans, or a t-shirt or a pair of sneakers or a car on the lot or a plane ticket on the internet or any transaction that you can think of that a consumer would use if there's competition out there and the calculus of the consumer would select market shares and set the prices and provide for the production, directions and the

availability of products because free enterprise capitalism reacts. they have to compete so they react to market demands. that's just a few minutes to explain what that is. and i'd like to have that time in the oval office to explain this, also, to the person that sits behind that desk. because i've seen a lot of signs that tell me that there isn't a deep natural conviction that supports f%ee enterprise. and this includes the nationalization of three large investment banks, a.i.g., the insurance company, fannie mae, freddie mac, general motors, chrysler, the entire student loan program in america and now the takeover of our own bodies, our skin and everything inside it called obamacare. and then in the speech about how to deal with the gulf oil spill which is a disaster and a

tragedy that i don't think we can point our finger at an individual who is to blame at this point. we haven't found out yet what caused it. but in that speech the president raised the issue that he'd like to move forward on cap and trade or cap and tax. now, if you -- and we have a financial reform bill that is in conference right now that's being hammered out. now, i'll have these up again, and i take this, madam speaker, to a percentage so that we have an understanding of how much of the private sector of this economy has been swallowed up by decisions made beginning in the bush administration, all of those decisions supported wholly by candidate then and now president obama. three large investment banks, a.i.g., fannie mae, freddie mac, general motors, chrysler, now that totals to 1/3 of the private sector activity as described as professor boyle at arizona state university some

months ago. and when you add to that 17.5% of our economy, which is underneath the now ownership, management, control of this administration called obamacare. now we're up to 51%. remember 33 and 18, 51%. the financial services package ppwhich looks like it's very difficult to block and most likely to end up on the president's desk, as much as i'd reich to stand in its way, -- as much as i'd like to stand in its way, is another 15% of our economy. now we're up to 66% of our economy swallowed up if the financial package gets to the president's desk. behind that cap and trade or cap and tax, a tax on everything that moves in america. it takes energy to move anything. it takes energy for me to raise my hand. so many calories burned up for

a push-up. i suppose somebody knows that number, madam speaker. but some say that cap and trade is about 8% of our economy. i think it's larger. i think it grows into being larger. it may well start out at 8%. so 66% that we're at now in the total and we add 8% to cap and trade, if the president is successful in what he would like to do, we will have seen 74% of the private sector economy swallowed up and being under the ownership, management or control of the federal government. 74% of our economy. that leaves 26% of the economy left over. the engine of our economic growth is free enterprise capitalism. this little simple thing that you can't pass a test to be naturalized as an american citizen without at least the risk of that being one of the questions on your test. we want everybody in america to

know enterprise capitalism is our economic system that we have here in the united states. but our treat enterprise capitalism is swallowed up. the margin left is 26% if this falls in the way that the president is driving it, and we're going to expect that 26% to provide the taxes and the growth and the economic foundation to support all of this government on the other side. meanwhile, we're watching irresponsible spending out of this congress to the tune of trillions of dollars. well, let me just say that i believe i could pull out at the top of my head $2.34 trillion in irresponsible spending that's taken place in just about the last year and a half or a little bit more. and that would be wrapped up in the $700 billion in tarp spending, the $787 billion in the economic stimulus plan, which 6% of americans worked

out for the positive. 96% of americans think it didn't work. would be better off if we hadn't done it. there are other components out there with the fed rolling out funds that rounds it up to $2.34 trillion. and i listen to and submitted to debate after debate that came out of this side of the aisle over the last several years of democrats and many of them self-profess blue dog democrats that say we have to have pay-go rules. we're going to be pay-go. we are going to pay as we go. if we have to increase spending in one area we have to go find someplace to pay for it by decreasing spending in another area. that's a philosophy that i agree with and i endorse. in fact, i'd go a little further than that if there's a way to do it. but the blue have essentially dropped out of sight. they may be fighting behind the scenes because what we're finding out is this speaker has

not -- is not going to bring a budget to the floor of this congress. since we had budget rules that began in 1974, this congress has always passed a budget, always brought a budget to the floor. as difficult as it is to pass it, it is a framework, a spending constraint that at least you can point to the line items in that budget and argue that on a appropriations bill that spends beyond that breaks our budget. but if you don't have a budget any kind of irresponsible spending works just as good. and that's what's going on. there's not -- there's not a conscience, there's not a challenge, there's not a means to try to figure out how to get us back to a balanced budget. there is no path to do that. in fact, the president has driven this. he's essentially -- he's advocated for trillions of dollars of spending. he has signed trillions of dollars of spending. he's said that in order to grow out of this -- to solve our economic problem we need people spending money.

and he is a key kneesian economist on steroids. this is a guy that didn't see it adam smith's way. john maynard was the economist who believed you could take federal money, the greenbacks cash and put it into the hands of -- put it in the hands of the american people and they would take it out and spend it and that would stimulate the economy and you could grow out of n economic crisis just by simply spending government money. well, i've always thought that was a ridiculous proposal. i think you have to produce things that have value and market them for a competitive price and build your efficiencies. i believe this is an economy that's built on production, not on consumption. and if that's all it was we could embrace john maynard ka nmbs e's -- kane's idea who actually spoke about solving the economic problem in the united states. this way. kane said, i want to find an

abandon coal mine. i can solve all of the unemployment. he said, i can solve all of the unemployment in america. i just go to an abandoned coal mine and drill a whole series of holes into the ground in that abandoned coal mine and i would put american dollars, cash money, down the hole, fill the holes up with cass and fill the coal mine up with garbage. garbage. fill the coal mine up with garbage and then just turn america's entrepreneurs loose. and they would go to work digging up that money through that garbage. that would give them jobs. that would keep them busy and they would go out and spend it. that was kane's. and it may have been tongue in cheek in all fairness. i hope it was tongue in cheek. it reflects cainsian economic theory. and -- kenesian economic theory. and the president told us a

year ago, february 10, that %- franklin delano roosevelt lost his nerve and didn't spend enough money. if he spent enough money, he would have, according to the president, spent our way out of the great depression and we wouldn't have to way for world war ii to come along to be the largest stimulus plan ever. it's pretty close to verbatim. this f.d.r. lost his nerve in spending. today's president has not lost his nerve. he has spent money way beyond any previous president. i think the accumulative total in all is more debt and deficit of all the presidents going back to george washington. i expect its true. i think i should have to verify it before i tell you i know it's true. but it's a huge debt that's been run up by this president and this pelosi congress in the house and the reid senate down

that hallway without regard to how we ever get back from it. and the argument was that we needed to get money spent into the economy, the stimulus plan. remember? $787 billion rolled up over $800 billion in reality. now they're coming back and to stimulate the economy some more. but the president said a year and a half ago, spend money, spend money, spend money. that's what will help the economy. people are hanging onto their dollars because they don't have confidence you got to spend money. some months later the president said, no, now we're going to

have to be careful. we can't spend. we are going to haveeto be frugal as if we could one time borrowing a lot of money and giving it to people and we are going to simulate the economy and when you shift gears -- it seems to be what's going on with the economic strategy of the white house. so now we have these multiple trillions of dollars, the interest of which right now consumes 10% of our budget, the interest on these deficits that are projected today under the proposals of the president by the year 2020, 10 years from now, will not be 10%, they'll be 20% of our overall budget. now, can we understand what this means? when we start tapping into that, it's the pie chart we're talking about here, a 10% slice is our % interest today. a 20% slice becomes the interest in 2020 and if the interest rates go up and double, you'll see an economic decline that's brought about because of higher

interest rates and you'll see a bigger chunk right away. if interest rates double today, our 10% slice would be at least 20% and that could happen in a matter of a few months, weeks or months. so this is serious business. passing this debt along to our children. we need to figure out how to recover from where we are today. all of this can't be put back, some of it can. many of the things that have been passed and signed into law need to be repealed, right down to their roots, and many of the things, much of the money that's been spent, it's gone, we can't get it back, but we're going to have to figure out how to service the debt. that means, pay the interest and pay the principle down and pay the principle off. this nation shouldn't be carrying debt. debt that meets or exceeds that that we see in countries like greece or spain or ireland or italy. the european union threatens to collapse under the financial stress that they have because

they have loaned money -- it's almost like they're sitting at a poker table playing for chipping that are writing each our i.o.u.'s around the table. at some time you have to pay fo- the drinks and the food that's coming along. those chickens are coming home to roost in europe. we don't need to be there in america. we're a different kind of people. we have a unique vitality in our character, in our soul. one of the things that is part of that vitality is that we've skimmed the cream off of the crop of every civilization in the world. everybody that were immigrants to the united states, they didn't get people who were sitting out there on the porch that didn't go to work. these were the entrepreneurs, the creative ones, the ones that had a dream, that were frustrated because they had the shackles of a dictator that kept them from using freedom to grow

their own lifetime success. can you imagine if you couldn't worship freely, if you couldn't go out and get a job, if you couldn't start a business, if you couldn't even put money in a bank and trust that you could go get it when you needed it? if you couldn't trust the rule of law, if you had to think that there was a different form of justice for one person because they were connected better with government than another person, wouldn't you look at america, even though they advertised the streets are paved with gold, some of them didn't realize that that was figuretive, not literal. some of them came here to find out our streets aren't pavinged with gold. but in a way they are, madam speaker. they're paved with gold because we have the rule and law and you can pretty much count on the law treating you the same regardless of who you are, what you look like or what your particular net worth might be. or who you're connected to. lady justice is blind. if you remember, they're

standing there with her hands out holding the scales of justice, weighing the justice with a blind fold on. in this country, lady justice is blind, the rule of law has to apply and we must defend and uphold the rule of law. got to give everybody an opportunity to compete in the marketplace for a job or start a business and we need to hold them accountable. need to hold them accountable to produce and earn and carry their own weight. and we've drifted over into a society now where, my grandmother came here over a century ago by now, she arrived where they rewarded smart, hard work and people could succeed without penalty. in fact, when she walked across the floor of the great hall at ellis island she would have been one of those arriving immigrants where they took a little hook and peeled her eyelids back to lock and see -- look and see if those white spots were in there to indicate an eye disease. they looked people over and checked them to see if they were

good physical spess mens. if they had a limp or a bad arm or they were obviously pregnant, they put them back on the ship and sent them back to europe. this isn't steve king that is telling you these narratives except that these came directly from the park officer at ellis island, the day that she did the tour for us. about 2% of those that arrived at ellis island got back on the ship and they were sent back to their home country because they didn't meet our standards. and even when they met our standards, there wasn't a welfare program for them. they either needed to have some family or friends to get them started or it was simply, you have to survive on your own. go out and get a job, go to work, start a business, offer yourself to do anything, weight tables -- wait tables, sweep the floorr, sweep out the sewers, grab a hammer or whatever it might be, and go to work and help build america and they did. we got the dreamer, we got the

passionate ones, we got the smart ones that could understand what america was and is and is to become yet, beyond this point where we are today. and that vitality and that vigor that beat in the hearts of the willing immigrants that came here legally is a great big reason for american exceptionalism. it's almost unwritten, it's almost unspoken about, but it is a characteristic that is an essential component in american exceptionalism. coupled with free enterprise capitalism and the rule of law and religious freedom and a moral society that is built on judeo-christian values. yes, that's our history and our culture and our heritage. it's our modern reality, too, perhaps to a smaller degree, but the core of the quarter of who we are -- character of who we are is based on our religious faith. so we have a rule of law and a people that respect god's law so you don't need as much -- as many law enforcement officers.

but we can use our labor to produce more that has value because we pay fewer people to put on a badge and a gun and go try to control folks that are not willing to abide by the law. another one of the reasons why america has been rizz -- has risen up, another one of the reasons why we've been more successful. so the vigor that we are in america is being challenged today. 200 years ago you had free enterprise capitalism. you had these freedoms. and, by the way, it was the dawn of the industrial revolution and we had the transfer of the age of enlightenment that arrived here in the new world at the daunl of the industrial revolution -- dawn of the industrial revolution and from the greeks we got the age of reason which flowed through europe. it had to go over to ireland where the irish could save civilization by being the scribes that actually copied and preserved the classics that came from greek and roman literature, so we know something about the

greek and the romans because the irish monks and scribes made sure that they gathered all of that data and reproduced it, copied it over and stored and saved it. during the dark ages when nothing happened. madam speaker, i sometimes tease my family on the irish side of the family, which actually seems to be my wife and my side, i ask, what is it that the irish are so proud about? what is good about being irish? why is it that on st. patrick's day everybody's irish? and they didn't have very many good answers for me. so i would tease them a little bit and i'd say, i know what they did. i know what the irish did that was unique, that no one else did. a people that, according to fraud, -- freud, couldn't be psycho analyzed, but the irish did something nobody else did. they were the only ones on the globe to record history during the dark ages when nothing happened. now, that diminishes the contribution.

the contribution is great because we received through their contribution of being the monks and scribes and collecting that data and reproducing it and storing it and saving it from the barbarians who burned the books and burned the writings when they could, they saved the knowledge base that came out of greek and roman civilization. and that knowledge base is rooted back in out of the greeks as the age of reason. the foundations for our science and our technology today. the their um, the hypotheses, the axiom. the list of those greek foundational thoughts were socrates and play theow and aristotle and others, sat around in the square and analyzed and used the version of knowledge that they had to test each other's ability to be logical and to be able to reason. that foundation of reasoning was preserved by the irish and as they deployed back across europe

with that message, they actually taught western civilization how to think again. how to think beyond our emotions and our reactions and how to take empirical data and crunch that data and turn it into something that could follow a logical thought and we could act and react according to actual facts rather than the -- seemed like an odd thing for the irish to contribute, to overcome emotions and use reason. and they did. and thanks again to the irish scribes, the roman rule of law, roman law had spread over most of western europe, it spread through great britain, through england, and it spread into ireland, even though the irish had been conquered a number of times, it never really changed their character very much, but they helped preserve roman law which was re-established in england to old english common law. the common law that we use today to evaluate and in the case law

that's being decided by our courts across this land is rooted back in old english common law which is rooted back to roman law. it arrived here in the new world with the english speaking side of the age of enlightenment. and i also have to couple with that these foundations for american greatness, madam speaker, two more very profound things that took place. the birth of christ where his teachings transformed the civilized world as we knew it then. and we know that faith and those core values are in our culture and our civilization today. and the catholic church might not have been the roman and eastern orthodox, but the roman catholic church it is today might not be what it is today if it had not been for the protestant reformation from martin luther, who taught us the

protestant worth ethic and the catholics went with that well. so i couple the age of reason with the roman law and passed that over to ireland and spread it back across all of europe, all of western europe, excuse me, and we have the age of enlightenment which began in france, but the sister to it was the english speaking side of it in england where free enterprise capitalism emerged and came to this country at the dawn of the industrial revolution, arriving in a country that had low or no taxation, no regulation, unlimited natural resources as far as they could comprehend them at the time, and a continent to settle from sea to shining sea and a vision of manifest destiny for this country. and look what's been accomplished in this giant petri dish of freedom and liberty with the components in that giant petri dish that i've talked about. we have become the unchallenged greatest nation in the world,

with a vigor and a vitality and a character all our own. there's something unique about being in america. we need to understand that it's not something to apologize for. we have an extra blessing here and that comes about because of the things that i've talked about and others that i haven't mentioned yet tonight. we have an extra blessing. an extra vigor and there's something about us, maybe there's a little bit of an american attitude. you know, i don't know, maybe muhammad ali that said, if you can do it, it ain't bragging. we should be more in our character in the things we do, we should also have confidence and i have a constituent that just passed away who is a man of high values and faith and character, world war ii veteran, and i got to know him well. i interviewed him on his world war ii experience in a video that i believe we have now stored over at the archives in

the library of congress. but he served in germany and world war ii for the united states army. and at the end of the invasion of berlin he was there in the american sector where he was taken captive by the russians. the russians put him and three others into their russian prisoner of war camp, american soldiers. and they had to eat, they had to peel the poe day toys for the russian soldiers and then they got to eat the dirty potato peelings while the potatoes went to the russian soldiers. i'm surprised it didn't all go to vodka. but there were stories there that told me how poorly he was treated but i asked him, tell me the circumstances by which you were taken captive. and he said, well, the war was over, the german soldiers were gone, we were walking down the street in berlin and the russians came and picked us up and arrested us, he and three others. as he told the story, he said that the russians claimed that

there were women in one of the adjacent houses and no soldier was to go near the women. well, that wouldn't be the history of the russian soldier or the american for that matter, but that was the pretens for picking them up and he pointed out that they were all in civilian clothes and i said, how did the russians know you were american enough to pull you over and arrest you? now, i thought he might say, because of our clothes, i thought he was going to say uniform, actually, but his answer was really interesting, it was, well, they knew us by our walk. they knew american soldiers, even from a distance, because of the way we walked, the way we carry ourselves. when you think about that, you know, if you see a shadow of a bird hopping out on the combrass you know a robin hops differently than some other kind of a bird. you see their gait. you know. you think that human beings would have a similar gait. americans have a distinct gait

of how we handle ourselves and especially during that period of time when america had complete confidence in everything that we were doing. and so there's something unique about being an american. and we need to keep this, this precious gift that we have. we got to do our work, we have to take our responsibility, we have to bring this country away from the well fair state that we have become -- welfare state that we have become. we have to apply the law equally to everyone regardless to race, ethnicity and national origin or any other privilege that there might be. the o.j. version of justice as we see it, if you juxtapose the criminal case versus the civil -- i think most of america knows the facts that happened. there appeared to me to be a different version of justice for o.j. simpson in a criminal case than he might have gotten if he didn't have the money. or the note right and the fame -- notority and the fame as

opposed to the civil case. i believe there was justice in at least one of them. we want these foundations, the ill pillars of american exceptionalism built up again because america is not done. we have not reached the apex of our flight. even though we may have had malaise two speech a couple nights ago, that's not the american spirit. we don't apologize for who we are, nor do we back up from people who challenge us. we look down at the gulf of mexico and we see an environmental disaster, a mess down there that is a tragedy. it's a tragedy, especially, for the people who live in that gulf area and anyplace where that oil might drift. boy, do we all feel gadly, especially those in louisiana and beyond. but something went wrong in a 5,000 feet below the surface of

the ocean and 18,000 feet below that that caused that well to blow out and the spill that's coming now will be stopped one day. i looked going into last weekend and they were down to 13,800 feet with their relief well that if they hit the column right they will be able to shut off the leakage in that well. they're drilling day and night. there's no question about that. i expect they're drilling two holes smumently with a discovery enterprise, the drill ship that's sitting there to drill the relief wells that they're doing. they'll get it shut off. there's a lot of oil out there on the surface and a lot of it has drifted onto the marsh lands and into the beaches. we will get it cleaned up. i don't know how long it will take nor what it will look like, but i do know this, in 1979 there was a massive spill of an oil well blowout down off the yucatan peninsula. and that -- and that well spilled about 3 1/3 million gallons of oil. now, as of a few days ago, the

calculus was about 1 1/4 gallons of oil had come down off the gulf. now we're seeing numbers well beyond that and no one knows who to believe, whether it's b.p. or the government or somebody that's looking at those numbers. but i can tell you this, it's been a decade or two snce people have worried about going down to the yucatan peninsula because of that oil leak. they've gotten it cleaned up. the impact has been minimized dramatically. we will get louisiana cleaned up. we'll get our coast cleaned up. we'll look back on this time. what i'm interested in is stop the leak and, yes, clean up the mess. and i want to bring every ship in here that can go out there and set up a sweep system. and i don't see any reason for the president not to suspend the jones act and go around and do a mia copea to america and bring in every ship we can to recover as much oil as possible off the surface of the ocean rather than having to vacuum it

up out of the wetlands and clean it and take it out of the sand on our beaches. we need to get it while it's on the surface of the water and that means surround the oil slick and start herding that back in. if you remember the comedy routine that emmett kelly, the circus clown did, where he went out and many of us have seen the movie, where he went out, they didn't know what his show was going to be or what he was going to be but he walked out into the spotlight under the big top at the circus and took a broom and began to sweep the edge of the spotlight in. and the person running the spotlight figured out what was going on, put it over the light way on top of the big top and began to shrink that light as -- up on the inside where it was emitted, shrunk it in as to emmett kelly swept it in. he was able to sweep it under the rug and eliminate it. that's what we need to do with

this oil spill. we need to fake that oillspill and start on the outside and start bringing that together and bring enough rigs that we can get it done and recover the oil that can be recovered from the surface and take it off of the surface of the ocean. if it takes -- if we don't have every ship there doing that that we can do now we need this bring them. and the jones act stands in the way, and tte white house, of course, they're going to be protective so they're less than -- i think there needs to be a powerful call of the president of the united states to waive the jones act. so we need some things to do to fix up america and free enterprise and lower taxes and lower regulations and more inspiration for people to have an opportunity to go out and earn, save and invest and succeed. people held accountable for their actions and people rewarded for the things they do go and punished for the things they do bad. that's the america we need to

be in. but today we're in a welfare state, and it is a fact, and this was a report that was done by robert recollecter of the hair tam foundation. he -- recter of the heritage foundation. they could have been legal, illegal, natural born or naturalized but headed by high school dropout, they weet on average drawdown $32,000 for public benefits. a family of four headed by a high school dropout. they would pay an average of $9,000 a year in taxes. and the difference, i remember, $22,449 a year is the net cost to the taxpayer for a household headed by a high school dropout because their skill levels, no matter how hard they work, can't earn enough money to sustain themselves in this society. this is the society that we built. we have poured in millions of

people into this country illegally that have suppressed the wages of the lower skilled so that the high school dropout can't find a place to punch the clock to earn enough money so they don't have to go on some type of public assistance. there will be food stamps there, there will be rent subsidy, there will be heat subsidy. there will be 69 other federal programs. and we thought we reformed welfare here in the mid 1990's. it only brought things to a plateau. and then the welfare spending started to grow again, so we are a dependency society. and the president of the united states and the members of his party know full well that expappeding they class -- expanding the class in america expands the political base and they are expanding the dependency class in america so they have a stronger political foundation so they can stay in power, the elitists can stay in power. well, i happen to have a good friend on the floor of the

house right now who is anything but an elitist unless there happens to be some kind of company that would be smart people, well educated, judges from texas that will stand and fight, naturally born, that's been referbished by education and life experiences and hopefully a little bit by the friendship of mine that i offer as much time as may be consumed by the gentleman from texas, judge gohmert. mr. gohmert: i thank my friend from iowa so much and in fact have some dear friends and actually have them here present . but one my wife and i taught in sunday school 20 years or so ago, she's with her mom. and anyway, she was saying she really enjoyed steve king special orders, and so i thought i might pass that on. i also heard my friend mention

the jones act and how president bush was able to suspend it. it's interesting when you put things in perspective how sometimes they appear different. back at the time that hurricane katrina hit, some people thought he waited too long, but he suspended -- hurricane katrina hit on august 29, 2005. on september 1, september 1 president bush suspended the jones act so foreign ships could come in and help. they helped put people up. they helped bring things that people could use, to help clean up, but katrina on august 29, september 1 he suspended it through september 19. and i know there are some who say, well, it probably takes a lot of things.

actually, it has to be signed off on by customs and border protection, department of energy and the maritime administration. but guess what, those are all white house appointments, so it's just getting people that work for him to sign on. that's no big deal. and then to actually suspend the jones act and apparently they offer within a few days of the disaster the big blowout to -- for the netherlands to bring in equipment and dredge up and set up and create barrier islands and this administration said no thank you. not only did not suspend the jones act but said no thank you. we don't want you coming over here. and the truth is the jones act would be so easy to suspend. and back during these past months it's so easy to suspend, all you'd have to do is make one phone call, get your staff

have d.o.e., customs and border and maritime to sign off and then they could bring it to you and have it right over on the golf course so when you finish off on the ninth green putting and sign off on the jones act before you tee off on the 10th. in the meantime, if that would have been done early on when the netherlands and england and others volunteered, it would have meant the saving of the likelyhoods of thousands upon thousands of -- livelihoods of thousands upon thousands of people on the gulf coast. it would have meant the saving of wildlife on the marshes where oil is getting up in there. it would have been terrific and a tremendous help had they been willing to just tell the unions, look, we know you don't want the jones act suspended. it won't be for long, but we're talking about saving countless lives of wildlife in the area

as well as the livelihoods of so many. and i don't know if my friend from iowa had heard, but i read here on the floor an article regarding british petroleum's relationship with the global warming bill. and it makes sense why they would have waited so long to jump on b.p. and get mad at them and say we got the foot on their neck and that stuff because it turns out that b.p. was the one big oil company that was signed on to all the global warming stuff. i'm sorry. i say global warming but we know that since apparently the planet started cooling they changed the name and said please call it climate change because it doesn't push global warming bills when it turns out that the planet is cooling as

south africa found out this week with the snow down there. but, anyway, it turns out that on april 22, senator john kerry, democrat from massachusetts, was on the phone with allies in his push for climate legislation and told them he was rolling out the bill that very day with three oil companies, including british petroleum. they were supporting him on his climate change, global warming bill, and they were supporting the white house, and so, of course, they were reluctant to jump on the oil company that was being such a big help to them. but what we found is once they saw that the united states was angry and that this was going to be nothing but trouble, well, they were willing to throw their friends under the bus and put their boot on their throat and wanting to kick some rear ends. and we had a meeting today in

our natural resources committee and we had the new acting director of minerals management service. we had the new acting inspector general of department of interior, and i was asking that, you know, since we had hearings a few years ago on why the price adjustment language was pulled out of the offshore leases in 1998 and 1999, this was a few years ago, prior inspector general, the inspector general said, well, we can't get to the bottom of why the price adjustment language was pulled out, but clearly at the time it had cost our country hundreds of millions, and i'm informed now it's billions and billions of dollars now that should have gone as revenue from the offshore rigs but has gone into the pockets of some of the big

oil companies that executed those leases in 1998, 1999, and it turns out that the inspector general said, but i haven't been able to question the two people with the most information because they could probably explain this because they're no longer with the government. i said, they're not with the government. why can't you call them? well, they're not with the government. well, when you're talking about hundreds and millions and now billions of dollars you would think that they would want to know their version of what happened because if there's billions and billions of dollars that have gone to big oil, that should have gone in our federal treasury because it should have been royalty if these people had not pulled that language out of those leases, then you would figure somebody would want to know if they got something in return for that. what made you pull that language? because at best we could tell from the hearing a few years ago, it appeared they were given language -- look, the

language is not in here on price adjustment. don't you want that in there? and they never talked to them. they weren't with the government anymore. turns out one of the two had gone to work for a company, perhaps you've heard of them, british petroleum, went there in 2001 when the clinton administration left and now -- served in different positions. one as director of shipping doctor or director of british petroleum shipping limited in london, vice president for british petroleum north america and l.a. -- in l.a. and also one other position with b.p. before she came back. i canned the acting inspector general, now that we have found out that she's back with the interior department, now we know you surely have asked her why that language was pulled out. what did she say? oh, i didn't know she was part

of any of that what struck me, and call my cynical, but she came back to -- we found the press release from interior june of 2009, how ironic. that's 10 years after the 1998-1999 leases, during the clinton administration, had that language pulled out. 10 years later, she comes out from british petroleum and goes to work for the interior department for minerals management. really interesting. 10 years that always rings a bell. oh, yeah, unless it's murder, the statute of limitations is normally a maximum of 10 years. so that's probably good news. if there was anything that went wrong back there that was done that shouldn't have been done, 10 years, just answer the question. you know. why did you pull that language out? before you went to work for

british petroleum and helped big oil company make so much money? so anyway, that's a matter of concern, continues to be a matter of concern. i did ask the acting director of m.m.s., since we know that the only entity within minerals management that is allowed to be unionized is the offshore inspectors, i asked, now we know you're dividing m.m.s. up into three groups, three parts. the prior director indicated that she didn't know if they might ought to unionize or not, didn't really know. so i asked the new acting director. he didn't know that may happen. now there's only one little part of m.m.s. that's unionized, the offshore inspectors. now they may unionize all of those and they'll have three different agencies to do it with. that was interesting to find out today. when i asked if he thought it was a good idea that a father and son team were the last two

inspectors to go out to deep water horizon before the blowout he said he didn't see anything wrong with it being a father and son. this is your check and balance. this is what we were told, ensured that both inspectors are doing their job because ethey know the other is watching them and will report them if they don't do their job and he didn't have a problem with that being father and son,+ didn't see that was a problem. folks, i'm telling you --, mr. speaker, when the hodes of the agencies don't see the father and son as a problem being the last two inspectors to go to deep water horizon and they are their own checks and balances to make sure the inspections are properly done, we've got a problem. it's not british petroleum. they're one problem, they need to be dealt with, and should be, because we've already seen the administration now willing to throw their good friends under the bus, but then we need

-- we do need to clean up the cozy relationship that the president has talked about and that he helped create in minerals management service. i yield to my friend from iowa. mr. king: i thank the gentleman from texas. i am standing here thinking, i started down this subject matter and -- a statement i needed to make was this. i'm look forward to the interception of the whole in the re-- of the hole and the ref leaf -- relief wells that are being dealed that were down to 14,000 feet going back to last weekend, so i assume they're a i proaching their goal. but it's very difficult to thread the needle from four miles away. but when they do get it done and get the relief wells drilled and sealing it off, doing what they did in 1979, when they had the huge oil spill when they had the blowout in the well on the yucatan

peninsula, when they hut that off, i expect -- and i haven't had a conversation with anybody in b.p. or anybody more knowledgeable than we, i expect we'll be able to go down with robotics, cut the casing off and recover the blowout preventer. if we can bring that up to the surface and test that b.o.p., we'll be able to have a more effective theory on what went wrong. that's what i'm interested in, more than anything else. i want the well shut off, i want it cleaned up, but i want to know what went wrong. and the president has frozen and issued an order to stop all drilling offshore for six months. even if we find out what went wrong and find out it was human error, mechanical error, they still seem to be determined that they're going to crush the economy in that part of the country. the economic damage of oil

drifting to shore is a heavy load, economically and environmentally. it takes a long time to recover. also, the economic damage of shutting off all those jobs that are supported by the drilling is a painful thing to watch that kind of judgment from the president of the united states. mr. speaker, i acknowledge we must have run out of time. for that cause, i will be happy to yield back the balance of whatever is not left. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields. pursuant to clause 12a of rule 1, the house will stand in recess.

>> also, resolution of the order that would provide the government a way to unwind. we will now turn up the sound of the live coverage on c-span. >> we recognize the legitimate process of bankruptcy.

sometimes, enterprises have been liquidated and other times they have been reorganized and given a fresh start. at all times, creditors and debtors have been able to rest assured they would not receive fair treatment. the winners and losers have been given by the constant law. the bankruptcy system has allowed our economy to be the greatest the world has ever seen. investors have seen the economic security, have flocked to us as a result, and we have prospered. other nations, by contrast, have uncertainty in their roles. they have bell out their favorite few -- have bailed out their favorite few and a sacrifice to the others. corruption has flourished. as we respond, we are presented with a choice. we can reject our corporate culture of bailouts and in its

place return to a tradition of the rule of law and the bankruptcy courts. alternatively, we can cement in place bailouts with barrett and tendon cost, backroom deals, and corruption as the preferred tolls of our system. the first path, the path of prosperity is the way we should choose. the legislation before us projects that path and commits us permanently to government- administered bailout because of its sponsored claim that the fear of bankruptcy causes financial crisis. it was the market paused panic over lehman brothers that brought us to the brink of financial meltdown. the truth is at the market did not panic over lehman brothers' bankruptcy. after they became insolvent, the market recovered within a matter of days. what caused the market to panic was the wild ride of a consistent government bailout as the economy teetered on the edge in 2008. when it became plain from the

federal government's ad hoc decision making that they had no clear plan to stabilize our economy, investors did what on certain investors do, they headed for the hills. our economy was nearly paralyzed as a result. the amendment offered today would restore of the use of our bankruptcy system and reform it to work better for all financial institutions. that would make clear to the nation and the world that we remain a people committed to the rule all locked into divisions within our constitution. it will reassure investors. unlike the legislation amends, it will not commit us to the cycle of ad hoc government bailouts that brought us the last crisis. it will take us away from the politicize the economy that has increasing and unsustainable debt and lead us into decline. i urge my colleagues to choose the path of prosperity and it reject the decline by supporting this amendment and i yelled back. >> the gentlewoman from

california. >> thank you, mr. chair. i am strongly in support of reinstating the fund to provide for the orderly liquidation. this is one of those issues where i cannot understand why the opposition insisted on finding the house for bailouts. it does not make good sense. the nonpartisan website labels the bailout charge as an out and out falsehood. perhaps this issue was explained it this way. it is my understanding the industry has been lobbying hard because they simply do not want to front the money to cover their own systemically risky activities. in fact, many have pointed out that this is the industry's number one priority. the orderly dissolution funded the house bill provided for an assessment on large firms which

would merely ensure the fdic has the necessary resources and, at the moment of receivership, the fdic would submit a plan for bankruptcy liquidation by the management, wipe out shareholders, handle losses to creditors, and sell off the assets of the firm. the orderly dissolution fund would only be used for a shutdown, not keep it afloat. does the exact opposite of what happened in this most recent crisis by preventing american taxpayers for palin for the bailout. under thh senate bill, the fdic would have the ability to liquidate large firms and reduce their credit line from the treasury department to cover any cost. any losses the fdic and counters would supposedly -- encounters with supposedly be recovered as the sell-off assets of the failed firm. why my friends on the opposite side of the aisle insisted on

holding up this bill and the senate until the pre-fund was is a bailout by the dissolution by a line of credit from the treasury is not is also a mystery. again, i hope we preserve the of pre-fond of the house bill and i stand strongly on the side of consumer advocates on this issue. >> i would think, mr. chairman, the goal at the end of the day would be to make sure that those who willingly extend credit to large firms, to systemically significant firms, at the end of the day, that they be the ones that pay for the bankruptcy of that firm or the collapse of that firm. the reason this is important, and i hope everybody agrees, the idea should be to end this too big to fail concept. the goal should be to do

something about the presumption that exists in the market that because it would be so disruptive to the market, because it would hamper financial markets, that there are firms that are automatically going to be rescued by the government. as a result, here is the problem -- market participants believe that the creditors from those firms are going to enjoy very real advantages over other creditors. therefore, the interest, the cost of credit, the loans are made at such a low rate that the result is these very large institutions, these very large firms are subsidized in their leverage. and they are subsidized in their risk taking. it distorts incentives and away that contributed to the last collapsed and could contribute to the next one. so republicans have put together

an alternative that i think it's to that objective we have of willingly extending credit, basically having the cost of this fall on those who willingly extend that credit, and not on the taxpayer. basically, the republican substitute enhances the bankruptcy code for financial institutions. it limits the cascading spread of risk and panic through the financial system and get it assures more orderly wind out of financial restitutions. the substitute that republicans are offering permits federal regulators with relevant expertise to provide assistance in bankruptcy proceedings to efficiently and quickly won down insolvent financial institutions. it also prohibits federal regulators from injecting new money into failing financial restitution or using funds to pay off the creditors of a failing financial institution,

and that it incorporates the existing transparent and well understood procedures of chapter 11 and chapter seven of the bankruptcy code. the core of bankruptcy is the automatic stay which prevents creditors from seizing assets of a failing firm and thus permit an orderly unwinding of a firm. unlike the proposed resolution of the 40, bankruptcy does not tax a failed firms -- resolution of the board, bankruptcy does not tax a failed firms, it does not force them to pay off the firm's creditors. the most important aspect is it allows an orderly way out in which we do not compound the moral hazard problem in which we have seen a larger and larger percentage of our financial institutions basically find their way into a government guarantee. the worry i have is that as every decade goes by and as the

government guarantees grow in size and scope, the moral hazard grows with it. this last failure convinces me that unless we really prohibit these bailouts in the future, developed a different alternative through a bankruptcy procedure, as this substitute does, we are going to further feed, further compound the moral hazard and lead to the day when is going to be too much that we are even going to be able -- >> does the gentleman yield? >> the cost to the economy. >> in this bankruptcy, where is the debtor and financial financing? where would they get financing? >> the point is that by knowing going in that the creditors are going to take this amount of loss, the reality is that the market will adjust for this and not extend the type of credit

and over-leveraging that right now causes us to confront this question. >> the gentleman from new york, mr. meeks. >> that me just state this is not a bailout fund. i think i heard the gentleman from illinois say this may be a burial fund. to call this a bailout fund is like claiming that actually using one's burial insurance is going to be a positive outcome, something a person would look forward to. i don't know what my colleagues on the republican side of the senate were there at on this, but burial insurance does not force a moral hazard. i hear people talking about moral hazard of the time. having burial insurance does not mean one will take greater risks to go skydiving or dry faster down winding roads,

knowing that the funeral service, casket, and burial plot will be paid for. does not make that any more compelling, at least not for a normal person. knowing there is a system in place to guarantee that a financial institution that takes risked a cannot manage will be liquidated and that the shareholders will be wiped out, that the creditors will take a distant back seat to the funeral fund and the american tax payer, and that the employees of the firm were not only lose their bonuses but are frankly likely to use their jobs -- lose their jobs does not encourage more hazard. risk-taking or whatever nonsense people may claim that it does. it makes the likelihood of losing a very real -- losing big very real for those who unable to reckless risk-taking. not including the burial find it -- find how they may choose

to plug it. we are proposing that the players pay for that clean up that may follow. not only that, but by making assessment proportionate to actual risk, we are ensuring that those who pose the greatest risk are therefore more likely to. the greatest crisis. -- are likely to contribute the greatest crisis. the fund after the fact means that taxpayers have to pony up alone in the mist of crises in hopes that the industry will pay them back on the crises subsides. as we saw in the crises we are now recovering from, imposing a levy on financial firms when they are under the greatest financial strain is unrealistic. funding after the fact actually

promotes risk-taking. what kind of system are we promoting if the biggest risk takers now know they will not have to pitch in for the cleanup because they will be out of business and run off with the profits from the good days, all those who are more prudent and survive the crisis are left holding the tab for their wild neighbors? a basic sense of fairness would lead to even a child to understand that this is not right. making the good kids clean up the mess of the wild kids is not fair in school and is not fair on wall street either. the inclusion of a pre funded burial fund has a major budget impact and sound fiscal policy for those who want to see the deficit brought under control. taxpayers can rest at ease knowing they will only be called on to lend money to the fund during the deepest crisis and not any time a financial firm runs into trouble for excessive risk-taking. the fund insures the industry

itself is at the front of the line to pay for its own crises. additional language democrats added to the bill of surest taxpayers they will get paid back first as a failing financial institution is liquidated. shareholders will be wiped out and creditors who helped finance the reckless behavior will get whatever is left, only after taxpayers have been paid back. the funeral fund has been replenished. far from a bailout, my friends, the system being put in place by democrats will enforce a discipline that exists in our nation's community banks, who fall under the fdic jurisdiction, but has never existed for the most risky financial firms, and that is why it is supported by miss sheila bair from the fdic and a very strong language in a letter that was sent to us. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i rise in support of the gentle lady from west virginia's

amendment. i have lived in the world of real bankruptcy and a real risk. i know the difference between money that you get and trust and money that is infested, either by stockholders or by vendors. i think one of the challenges we have here today is we are continually muddying what is a bank and what is a financial institution. after all, not in the years i've visited chrysler factories around the world, i never saw them as a bank, not once. in the years that i was a vendor for general motors and their quality-control people came in to inspect me, i never once had a banking conversation with general motors and specter. they wanted to know about product. they never offered to finance me as they took 60-90 days to pay. the fact is we have a muddied it the difference. the fdic exist for good reason.

confidence by people of our trusted members of the bank. they provide their money as depositors, not stockholders. we, if we go forward with this amendment, are simply creating a situation and where little by little the bankruptcy laws is whittled down into who gets government money available. ultimately, the fund is not limited to the fund they build up. we're finding that in the gulf coast as we speak. it is the full faith of the american people, if necessary. i would ask all of you to look at this again. if you cannot accept the amendment as it is, strongly consider what is wrong with it. and only serves to say there are entities that go into bankruptcy and are entities the fdic handles and handles well. the fdic has been charged and

the member institutions understand their charge is to protect the depositors, not the stockholders, not the creditors, not the guy who does the windows, not the landlord, not any of those people. and yet, for hundreds of years, we have had a bankruptcy court system, a separate bankruptcy court system, we have modernized it and dealt with it. even the german has for a long talk -- even the chairman has for a long time looked at bankruptcy law. if we have to allow bankruptcy law to reach across into some way related to systemic risk of institutions which are not properly registered fdic members, i welcome that as a member of the judiciary. but please understand that the republicans want to preserve the fdic for depositors. without this, you are simply creating systemic risk companies that don't have fdic-

insured depositors, and yet they're being treated that way. as so many people before me the served on the financial services committee articulate, other differences, you are missing the apples and oranges. i strongly suggest you reconsider your potential opposition to the amendment, accept the amendment, give further refinement either here or and the judiciary. we certainly can expand bankruptcy law and modernize it to allow for funds, but not o strip away ordinary bankruptcy protection, which mr. smith has already spoken on, is critical. financial services was never intended to preempt the history of successful bankruptcy, and i think a successful bankruptcy because they provide the maximum protection to the creditor, while giving the stockholder the opportunity not to be wiped out. for everyone of us who has invested in stocks or has a pension plan that invests in

stock, we are not creditors. we want stockholders to be given consideration, in order of consideration. i would ask you to reconsider the gentle lady's amendment, but to do just do that, and i yelled back. am i oppose the subsequent amendment. i want to commend representative it could be air is out on the house cost pre fund. they said while we hope this authority will never be used, it will empower regulators to first use a company's assets to shut down a failing institution. firing corporate executives and wiping out shareholders and protect taxpayer dollars by using money from the financial industry paying through a profound risk-based assessment. i strongly am in favor of the pre funded approach, and i

yelled back my time. >> further debate? the gentleman from texas. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i looked at the amendment as an incredibly important amendment because it goes to the heart of the debate. the debate really today is about bailouts versus bankruptcy. is that simple. bailouts ultimately equal tax payer money. bailouts equal a political economy. bailouts equal moral hazard. bailouts equal to big to fail. a bankruptcy is no tax payer money. bankruptcy is no political economy. bankruptcy is no moral hazard. bankruptcy is predictability. bankruptcy is fairness, and combining the two will help preserve jobs in an economy that

desperately needs jobs. under the bailout regime, and i don't care what you call it, whether you funded at halftime or after the fact, before the fact, ultimately, why do you have a bailout fund if your not going to bail somebody out? maybe it is not the equity holderr. maybe it is the counterparties. i don't know who it is, but again, paraphrasing a line from the old kevin costner movie, "field of dreams," if you build it, they will come. the house wants to recreate the $50 billion pre-fund. i hear what i think the gentleman from new york called it a burial fund. i have heard the chairman and the past speak about death panels. i am not sure insomuch as a death penalty as a resurrection panel. that is certainly what it was in the case of chrysler and gm.

i know somebody will say, technically, no a bankruptcy judge blessed it. i concede the point. but when the government shows up with a $60 billion of taxpayer money and all the sudden creditors decide, well, i guess i would rather have part of $60 billion, i feel fairly confident the taxpayer was not represented in that proceeding. what happens is all of a sudden we have new chrysler and new gm, and oh, by the way, the united auto worker pension fund it, and unsecured creditor, gets forty-three cents on the dollar and senior secured creditors got twenty-nine cents on the dollar. since everybody manage to get taxpayer money, i am sure they were all too happy to sign on the dotted line. yes, i suppose all chrysler and gm were put to death, but all the sudden we had a miraculous resurrection. i don't even see the word "new"

on the side of the building. the only thing that changed is the taxpayer is $60 billion poorer. or maybe we have the case of aig, which is more akin to the film, "weekend at bernie's," or they prop up the dead guy. i suppose if you have taxpayer money, you could prop them up quite a time. that is the case with aig. i have heard the chairman say we cannot have any more aig's. i am not sure if that is the case. what i see under this particular authority is although perhaps the fed cannot created, the ftse has almost unlimited borrowing authority -- the fdic has almost unlimited borrowing authority and the ability to pick and choose among creditors and the ability to make them whole. it is that not all aig case? where it deutsche bank and ubs, where they were somehow all made

whole? as counterparties? with u.s. taxpayer money? again, what i see here is a resurrection panel and "weekend at bernie's." i see aig and chrysler and gm. that is the difference. comes down between bailouts and bankruptcy. it is quite simple. this is at the heart of the debate. i know someone to ridicule it and use sarcasm, but this is what the debate is about. this and the previous one. the democratic majority believes that there are institutions that are too big to fail. they believe that those institutions all tamale must be bailed out. we do not believe that and we believe that moral hazard creates the too big to fail and we need to market discipline, and for failing wall street firms, the answer is no taxpayer bailout.

if there is fraud, the answer is criminal prosecution. but the bailouts have to stop. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> the representative from ohio. >> thank you, i appreciate your leedership on that issue and this issue and also that of rep goodyear is. i oppose the amendment. my republican colleagues are all for bankruptcy reform. let's ask where they were when we were trying to get bankruptcy reform to help our beleaguered constituents who were facing record foreclosures and our neighborhoods were being hurt all over our country, especially in the hardest-hit states. they stopped us from reforming the bankruptcy code with a cramdown that allow them to get the protection of the bankruptcy court and protect their homes. protection that is available to those who want to protect a second home, but not the house they live in with their families and they may have had

trouble from that. from health problems or losing their jobs. but now we are offered bankruptcy reform. what we're talking about here, though, is insuring against disaster. we're talking about an important measure to rein in wall street by establishing a tried and true mechanism to liquidate so-called too big to fail firms and a controlled, orderly manner. it would reduce risk to the system and avoid the near panic of 2008 when failure of lehman brothers and aig and others threaten the whole economy and the same hard-working taxpayers saw their tax dollars go to prop them up. since 1934, the ftse has used such a fund, paid for by banks, -- the fdic has used such a fund, paid for by banks. our nation's committee banks

have done quite for some time that if they fail, there is no second act. there is no fund. there will be liquidated, the management and directors tossed out, and shareholders accountable. that is how we restore market discipline. that is how we stopped taxpayer bailouts. just like bp and the oil industry should set aside enough money to clean up their mess, so should wall street. some say we can let them fail, that anybody who buys that is not even about what would really happen -- is naive about what would really happen. we need to buy the insurance now and have the banks pay for to make sure that that approach, the approach that brought us aig and bear stearns and big ppice tags for the taxpayer, does not happen again. rep it could be harassed -- rep

proposal will protect the american tax payers. i yelled back. -- i yelled back. >> under the house offer, the federal government would assess financial restitutions up front to set up a bailout fund. if you look on page 13 of the house offer, if the house is realistic, it will admit that even though it is creating an enormous bailout fund, it will not be big enough. it would barely cover the $145- plus billion that fannie mae and freddie mac cost. if you look at page 18 of the house offer, it allows for taxpayers to be the backup of the bailout of the fund runs out of money. after the bailout fund, the fdic

will tap its line of credit, with the treasury to follow up and finish up the bailout. but experience shows that amount will not be enough. taxpayers will be left holding the bag for the cost of future bailouts. as long as the government is in the business of bailing out institutions, too big to fail, no amount of taxpayer money will ever be enough. the way to protect the american people is to end bailouts once and for all and use the bankruptcy as central to the solution. it will give certainty to the marketplace and discourage risky practices, eliminate taxpayer liability that the house offer will do, and not have political interference. with that, i would like to yield the rest of my time to the gentle lady from west virginia. am i like to thank the gentlewoman. in summary on this amendment that i offered, i offered this

amendment in committee. we have considered it before, very similar. i just want to make that distinction. also, to the gentleman from illinois, who talks about the timeliness of bankruptcy as opposed to the idea that the resolution authority and the fund they set up -- i think the bankruptcy we are, the enhanced bankruptcy we are creating here, i would acknowledge, the title is an issue. by creating a new portion of bankruptcy that is specifically aimed at these kinds of institutions, we could take this into account and address that issue. the other thing i like to say, and i will not use the "b" word, i will use taxpayer funds. in both bills, senate and house, the treasury is used as a backstop in one form or another to provide funding for these institutions as they are failing. the other thing i like to say from the gentleman from michigan who ask the question about the

reliability, this would provide for prompt, orderly stays in the case of debtor liability. that is addressed, maybe not in a manner that u.s. the question, but in some form or fashion, recognize the problem. the gentleman from pennsylvania also mentioned the proposal they put forward represents a soft landing for these institutions. i don't know, when i heard that, i thought, what are we providing a soft landing for these institutions? i think they got a pretty soft landing, and a harsh way to this taxpayers, to the pension funds, to anybody who has stopped in these institutions and trust that they are not engaging in risky behavior is engaged in, i think the discipline, the legal parameters, and the certainty of an enhanced bankruptcy that would create this bill -- would be created in this bill is the kind of landing a systemically they see the way forward, it is.

definite, defined, legal terms, it is within bankruptcy court, and i think that would give them, the ancestors of these institutions, the corporate structure -- the investors of these institutions, the corporate structure, and the creditors of these institutions the certainty that if they invest in these institutions or do business with them, if for some reason things go wrong, the end game is not a resolution of 40 out there that nobody has defined or used -- is not a resolution authority out there that nobody has defined or used. >> the gentleman from michigan? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i have been listening to the debate go forward, and i am the new guy here. i have heard a lot of rhetoric on both sides. i have heard how simple it is, and i am fairly simple, too, and

the right way to go in the wrong way to go. what i like to look at is who was ford, who is again something? i like to look at the numbers, cut through the chase, and look at the numbers from the cbo. first, who was for and against? the whole idea of the bond -- of the fund, which i have heard of as a bailout fund, over and over here is a bailout fund, the people who are against this fund, and they're saying it is their number-one priority to kill, are the big wall street banks. the big wall street banks, the lobbyist for those banks are saying do not have this fund because we're going to have to pay for our misdeeds, we're going to have to pay for taking excessive risk. we want the taxpayers to do it. that is why they are opposing this. this is not a bailout fund. this is makkng the banks accountable for paying for their misdeeds, plain and simple. that is the key to it. >> will the gentleman yield?

>> i will not. did the cbs cordis as costing the attack -- why did the cbo rate is as costing the taxpayers? the senate version, which had a $50 billion fund, was actually scored as it was not a tank cost to the taxpayer at all and would put money into the system. that is not a bailout from the taxpayers. that means the banks are paying for it. that is what the lobbyists have descended on wall street, on capitol hill like locusts to stop this because they did not to pay for their misdeeds. i have heard about having bankruptcy, let's use bankruptcy to take care of it. guess what, we had the bankruptcy code before hand. i was not in congress at the time, but it was a heck of a mass at almost the entire economy almost started to one wind. i asked about debtor in

possession financing. you need resources to that, and was no good financing around anywhere because all the credit markets had frozen. there was not anybody to put that in, and did not have an orderly process. what it did was basically bring our economy to the brink. let's cut through all of the rhetoric. the wall street banks do not want this fund. they did not like this resolution because there will be the ones put oo the hook. if we did not put this fund in, there's a cost from the cbo score of $20 billion, at all. wall street should cost taxpayers any more. >> the gentleman yielded back his time. there will be no further republican members able to speak. >> mr. chairman? >> i'm sorry, i was misinformed. i was misinformed, i apologize. >> i am often overlooked, i

understand. >> not often enough [laughter] the gentleman is recognized. >> your just hoping there was not another groucho line. i will start where i conclude, which is to and the bailout of failed firms, you do so by allowing failed firms to fail and not bail them out. the legislation that is before us will perpetuate the problems that we have had over the last year-and-a-half, in which we have bailed out firms that have made excessively port risk, born on the shoulders of the american taxpayers. when i walked into the room before, mr. gutierrez was talking about a process to address the situation quickly and suggested that bankruptcy could not do so. i think he made passing reference to the lehman

situation. let me remind the gentleman how quickly that process transpired. it was on septemberr15, 2008, lehman first filed chapter 11. within one week of the filing, lehman sold its core business, over $1 billion in assets, to barclays, and generated cash proceeds to pay creditors. the september 22, within a week, a holding company purchased lehman and asia- pacific region. next month, through november, they took advantage of the bankruptcy code to reject or sam stern on expired contracts and leases, shedding debt. while not all creditors were paid in full, they were paid fairly according to the well- developed priority scheme enacted by congress and not by an ad hoc system that we would hereby create. back on september 15, a first filed.

previously, if you think back, six months earlier, they were trying to attempt to sell some of their business to forgo bankruptcy, trying to sell to parklawn and bank of america, a deal that would be a lot like the bear stearns situation, but there were not able to do so. why? because the government was acting in an ad hoc manner. business was not certain which way the fed would go on this, with a bail them out or not. for that reason, they were not able to secure financing and the bankruptcy occurred. at the bottom line is the problems we have had over the last year were the uncertainties created by this administration and more specifically this fed. the legislation before us setting up this bailout fund will perpetuate that uncertainty. the chairman says, for example, in the last debate, there is no list as far as which institutions are going to be covered by this. let's take the chairman at his word, apathetic, but it

hypothetically, there is no list. if i'm a potential creditor would like to loan to a company going forward and there is no such list, i can only guess whether this particular company i may be a creditor to will fall into this category, in which case i will be under the benefit of the bailout, or they could fall into another category of going into the bankruptcy code. that uncertainty is what led to the lehman situation, and that a surrogate will be perpetuated under this bill. you are creating more uncertainty as to how i will be covered. at the end of the day, because of that uncertainty, some creditors will be treated better, it will be treated in a situation where the money comes from the taxpayer or for the bailout fund, it will be a disadvantage to someone. i think i am paraphrasing, comparing to kids, we don't want the good kids to have to pay for the actions of the bad kids. that is exactly what you would

have occurred here, even with the fund that occurs initially, because the good kids are the ones who are actually bailing out the bad kid. i will close on this, this is not an ideological or political argument. look at what some other people said about this. fed chairman jeffrey leiter said, with regard to this proposal, he is criticizing this legislation for not doing enough to prevent future bailouts of financial firms. in other words, that would occur under this, bailouts would continue to occur under this. furthermore, the federal bank of philadelphia fed president said the change to the bankruptcy code creates the authority to wind down firms. a bankruptcy court with scheduled procedures and institutions would be better " than a bank regulator to dismantle large institutions without bailouts.

>> the gentleman's tiie has expired. >> thank you. >> the gentleman from north carolina. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i actually favor either the senate or house approach more than i favor the amendment, because the amendment really does not do any thing to address the problem. i was amazed that my friend, who just rewwote the history on the lehman bankruptcy, almost as bad as rewriting the history on fannie and freddie -- >> would the gentleman yield? >> yes, sir. am i just gave the particular dates. could you tell me which dates or wrong?

>> well, what you ignored is the severe impact on the taxpayer and on the economy, which is what we're trying to avoid. the women folks may have come out pretty well, but it was -- the lehman brothers spokesman have come out. well, this was about the taxpayers, not about the folks who got paid. >> with the gentleman yield? >> i was not going to get involved in this, but i favor the house approach, obviously, over the senate approach, because i don't think it makes sense after the fact to be putting together money. but even if we adopt the senate approach, it is better than the amendment, from my perspective. time.l yield the balance of my >> thank you very much. appreciate that. first of all, look, we have an approach. this is a conference committee. the senate has an approach, the

house has an approach. we have to discuss how to pay for this. the senate says we will wait for them and allow the fdic to borrow up to $150 billion. we say let all of the institutions, all of the too big to fail and all the systemically risky or significant, that are $50 billion or more, pay into the fund. they pay into the fund, no tax payer money. they keep saying they will resurrect them. we're in this bill -- where in this bill? i wishhthey would spend more time reading the bill and watching movies. if they read the bill, bill find there is no conservatorship, none whatsoever. you must dissolve the institution. they keep talking about, well, it will help the financial institution. this is not about helping the financial institution. this is about maintaining a system, the financial system, our credit system, equity

system, but the system we all rely on, the capitalist system of the united states of america. that is what we are here about today, the system as a whole, which think has been very good for all of us. what we have to think about is who is going to pay for it? of the taxpayer is going to pay for it? because $20 billion, if we'd do it the senate way, that is what the cbo says, i don't know about you, but i will tell you something, $36 billion per year is just the bonuses on wall street. we will have to make a decision, if we do not create this fund, and we will have to find out $20 billion. where do we take it away from? a nutritional program, flapjacks up for the guys and women in afghanistan? where do we take the money from, education? i say they sip fewer martinis, have a few less rolls-royces and

houses on the beach and pay for the fund. the logic to this is imus will go back to my district tomorrow, get pulled over by -- the logic to this is i might as well go back to my district markham get pulled over, is the car registered? yes, it is. when they ask me for insurance i will tell them, but i have not had an accident yet. it when i have an accident, officer, i will buy insurance. of course i will asked all the people from allstate and state farm to pay for my accident. this allows people to act cannot be responsible for their action by contributing to a fund that dissolves the riskiest of them. otherwise, what i think we are saying here is, you know something, next time somebody buys a homeowner's policy, maybe the kids at should hide it matches because daddy must want to burn down the house. maybe next time somebody buys car insurance, hide the key is

because obviously wants to crash it. no,,we ask people to be responsible and pay into the fund and the riskier conduct and behavior, the more you pay. >> i recognize minutes. i believe there are no republican members who want to speak? when we are debating fannie mae and freddie mac, i guess i feel i am being accused of being a shape shifter. sometimes i am accused of being tom delayyin drag, except he was the one in drag when he did the dance show. what i am told is the failure of the republican party when they controlled the house and senate and presidency to pass any legislation restricting fannie mae and freddie mac was my fault because i had the secret power over their leadership. the gentleman from california said republicans had difficulty reaching consensus because of us

nasty democrats. i wish i knew i had the power when i had because i would have been able to stop more. now i am being confused with george bush. i did not bail out any institutions until george bush did it first and came to us. bear stearns was done by the federal reserve system, without any congressional input. aig was done by the federal reserve without any federal government input. we were asked about tarp -- i think my colleague. -- i think my colleague. i did not have the responsibility for the past. many of us cooperate with tarp, although i regret it would not get conditions on it. then the gentleman from texas says we want bailout. apparently, the more inaccurate the statement, repetition will overcome the and accuracy.

this bill says quite the opposite. there is to issues. one is if there is a failure, should we do anything about it other than bankruptcy? that is legitimate debate. there is no debate about this bill. the institution itself does not survive, does not continue, and that is where they are confusing them. we are very clear the institution is out of business. there werr some ambiguity about it, which they debated and house bankert the code, and we will have a motion that will clean that up and remove any suggestion to will be conservative ship and it could continue. so the language is overwhelmingly clear that nothing can happen until there is a dissolution of the institution. did someone ask me to yield? yes? >> the question i have, if there is no bailout, where does the $150 billion go? >> i thank you for making my

point. the confusion is between the fate of the institution and whether or not there are consequences of the institution that have to be dealt with. here again, the members on the other side do not follow through with the fdic and did not seem to be up to grasp this. the ftse has two roles. they pay off depositors with federal government money that was collected through the fdic, paid in by the bank, and they then deal with some of the other consequences of that. they did not automatically put everything else into bankruptcy. the institution dies. there is no bailout of the institution. there is no to big to fail. the institution fails. where we differ is, do you simply say it goes into bankruptcy, and that is it, which caused a great deal of crisis with lehman brothers, or do we say, as the fdic does,