tv Tonight From Washington CSPAN June 22, 2010 8:00pm-11:00pm EDT
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of sufficient details that congress would need to determine if it was even close to a credible plan. yet, in spite of ourrvery best efforts to obtain more information from nasa, the president's trii to kennedy space center on april 15 only added to the confusion as he laid out more inexpireational and as pierational goals, but provided no clear idea as to how they fit together or how we expect to pay for these new ventures. i have basic concerns about our ability to access and use the international space station after the shuttle is retired. i remain concerned with the gap in u.s. access to space and i want to make sure we can use the enormous research capabilities of the international space station. in examining the president's plan, i still don't see any %% viable way to minimize the gap and provide for exciting research on the international space station. the president's most recent
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decision to send an unmanned, quote, lifeboth, to the spacetation at the cost of $7 billion does nothing to solve this problem and largely duplicates services provided by the russians. we have spent nearly $10 billion onnthe constellation system that has achieved significant milestones and is oo its way, the administration's decision to cancel constellation has further stallee development and jeopardized ouu uudisputed leadership in space and that'' what it's all about. as i said many times before as a member of the space subcommittee, i'm concerned with proposed commercial directionof the space program while we have supported the development of cargo operations, i believe it's prudent we test cargo capabilities before risking the lives of our astronauts on newly developed systems.
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is there a viable market for the carriers with no backup, no information on it and the absence of that data, i fear we might be setting ourselves up for failure if and when the markets don't materialize. anyone can claim to take over commercial crew or take over the space program or the building of the next instruments of investigating space. buzz aldrin who supports commercial crew. i have read his ideas and i'm still looking for concrete data. it's easy to tart these programs and take them over and have the federal government to step in at great loss of time, great loss of international partners, a great loss of contractors, a great loss of employees and great loss of government for additional money to take over. i admire mr. aldrin and would like his suggestions.
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but in examining opinions and examining the options beyond the orbit when we might see the heavy lift system or consider it as a logical destination. we have been told that a new game change in technology development program will provide capabilities for access in the far reaches of spacee but we have very few specifics omission, goals and direction. . we continue to support the constellation program as currently authorized and appropriated by successive congresses. g.a.o. is continuing investigating whether nasa's improperly with holding funds and improperly applying the antideficiency act as a means of slowing constellation work. i believe that congress, and when i say congress i meen both democrats and republicans, congress has been cleared that -- clear that it support the continuation of constellation until it authorizes an alternative program. we no longer can wait for nasa
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to provide justification for its radical changes. time's runnnng out. our space station and those who man them, our many nasa employees, our international partners, our astronauts, await an answer that we can live with and we an lead with. i yield back my time. mr. carter: thank you. mr. hall, we're awfully proud to have him and he has been working a long and hard for any, many years to make sure that eeery time we shoot a human being into outer space we've ad to bring him back. you know, it's easy to develop a space program whether you can say, well, if the guy we shoot out there, if we lose him, it's no big deal, and there's some who develop the space programs this way. but we never developed it that way. and some people with say we're a
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greet dinosaur, this nasa. this great dinosaur comes from the basic premise thht makes --% part of what makes americans great, that every human life is impootant. therrfore you test and retest and retest again and you take another path and you find a new direction until you are assured% of one thing, that that precious human life you put upon that exploding bomb called a rocket, you're capable of putting that human life out into space and bringing it back. bringing he human being back alive.%% and i would argue that we're the only space program that has been a priority -- that that has been a priority. and that's what makes us so much more exceptional than others. is because we've had accidents but they were accidents. but our planned program didn't plan in expendability. we didn't plan for people to be expendable until we learned how to do it.
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we did it and we got through it and we made it work. it's a shame, it's a shame to have that kind of history of a program that has dedicated it self to exploring space and still caring about that one small little glimmer of spark called a human life, but we do it. we have no assurance that this new direction is even going to come close to having thht same basic spirit that created nasa. we are threatening a great human institution. i want to yield some more time to my friend, mr. bishop. mr. bishop: i thank the gentleman froo texas again as both he and mr. hall were very eloquent in pointing out problems that we are facing with the cancellation of nasa. i'd like to take a different -- not cancellation ---of the constellation program by nasa. i'd like to take one small
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detour for here to try to point out once again that the decision by this administration to cancel constellation by nasa was done arbitrarily, capriciously and actually without foresight of what the implications would be and there are unintended conssquences on our military side. for what this administration did not realize is that the people, the industrial base that builds ppthe rockets to send a man to e moon are the same people who build the rockets to shoot down north korean and iranian missiles that are coming at us. and this industrial base is there with the expertise. and if you fire 20,000 to 30,000 of that base, this is not a spigot you can turn on and off. and add them having coming back if indeed y somm miraculous idea you think you need to %% chaage directions and start ovee again. that is what we have found, that
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the impact on nasa has a unique, specific and dangerous impact on the defense of this country. because if we are having a missile defense system, the fact that we are going to fire 25,000 to 30,000 people in this industrial base means that those people will not be working on our missile defense system. the defense authorization act that passed this house and is now over in the senate, in the report language it coocluded that if indeed constellation is canceled, the cost to our military defense, for our missile defense program, will increase 40% to 100%. that the increase cost to anything that is -- any of our tactical missiles, the side %% winder missile, anyyhing that has that propulsion, it will increase the cost for us to build those 40% to 100%. the minute man three costs wwll double, the navy'ssmissile
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program cost will double and it's the time when secretary gates over at deeense has said they want the administration to find roughly $100 billion in cuts for next year's budget. now, did we ever take the time to figure out the implications of this program? not only are we firing 30,000 of our best and brightest, our scientists and engineers, not only are we ceding space to the chineseeand the russians and eventually the indians and the japanese, no longer are we forfeiting the game, no longer are we no longer taking a part, we're putting our missile defense system at risk at the same time. this administration has naively lurched into this program without considering the unintended consequences. and if could also say one thing in conclusion before i yield back to the gentleman from texas, there are three things that the nasa has done in trying to push this program of cutting% constellation that violates the obvious intent of congress.
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number one, congress passed in the omnibus appropriations bill+ language that said the constellation will not bb cut until congress approves those cuts. and nonetheless they first of all deferred the constellation contracts, didn't terminate them, they just deferred them, so the money would not flow. number two, they then moved the constellation manager, didn't fire him, they just moved him to disrupt the program. and number three, in a very novel, unique way, in fact, the spokesman said, well, these are unique circumstances, for the first time ever, ever in the history of nasa, they have said that termination costs, the liability of termination costs must come from existing contracts. nasa has never done that when it terminated a program. when congress told it to terminate a program they always appropriated money for the closing costs. what this means is that the premarket private sector companies that are building
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constellation right now have go% to fund their current contracts, take money out to terminate, which means they fire thhir employees and they turn to their subcontractors and they break those contracts so they fire their employees. this is all a concentrated effort on the -- on the part of nasa and this administration to destroy this program before congress has a chance to finalize our work and say %% whether we want to destroy it or not. i think it's very clear that this congress has never at any time given the indication to nasa that we think constellation should stop. but this is a program being done by the administration in violation of clearly the intent of congress and as the gentleman said maybe even under the specifics of the rule of law of congress to force us intooa -- into where congress does not want to go. this nation should not go. and this is a sad situation. this is sad. this is unprecedented on the pppart of nasa and it is not go
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for the country. i appreciate being able to be a part of this evening tonight because constellation is very, very important to this country. this is our future. we should not lose that. i yield back to the gentleman % from texas and thank you for letting me be a part of this. mr. carter: recap purring -- recapturing my time, as the gentleman was pointtng out something, it just popped into my head, the old civics course that everybody in this country at least used to take ii high school about the three branches of government that were created by our founders. what they did, the laws were written by the congress, the legislative branch, administered and enforced by the executive branch, which is the white house, and interpreted and held to the standards of the constitution by the judicial branch. and as the gentleman pointed out, this connress has never
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taken the position that we were going to trash the constellation. in fact, we wrote specific language that said thht constellation shall remain until congress acts. now, -- but the president is -- without a law or a direction by this congress, has decided to use magic triiks that have never been used before to delay to the point of disaster aad destroy the constellation. now, we just heard today that when judge poe got up here and talked that at least a court of thhs land has pointed out that the closing down of the gulf to offshore drilling was arbitrary and capricious and has granted the extraordinary relief that's very selldom done in the court system by creating an injunction
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against the president of the united states and the white house to both prevent them by one of the whims that they came up with of closing down drilling in the gulf, this court has said, sorry, boys, you can't do that. ok. now we've got a constitution and week of got a congress that has got a provision in a laws that% been passed as the law of this land to be enforced by the executive branch of this government that says that we will not destroy the constellation program until the congress decides to do so. but the president, who i guess didn't take civics in high school, has decided it doesn't really matter whether congress acts or not, he's going to destroy the program. i don't think that's the way it works. i don't thinkkthat's the way it's supposed to work. we are a country -- we like to say this, we recite this in a
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lot of places, we are a country of laws, not of men. it's not what man runs the white house or what man runs some position in this country, it's what the law is. and the law is assed by this congress and by other legislative bodies around the 50 states in this union. oour executive branch is to enforce the laws and uphold them. our judiciary is to remind them when they don't, and as they have dooe as recently as yesterday. what's kind of strange is the carter administration decided to cede the panama canal back, so america would no longer manage the panama canal. it was going to save us money to get rid of the panama canal. it's kind of funny.
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there's a chinese flag in this picture because the chinese manage the panama canal. that's kind of outsourcing american exceptionalism. we built that canal. now we are outsourcing the moon, potentially, to the chinese. under though because ma administration. and we're outssurce -- under the obama administration. we're outsourcing the spault program and the rockets that make this exceptional. this administration has been very critical about outsourcing outside the country of jobs. pointing fingers at lots of people about, you're destroying american jobs by outsourcing, what do you think you're doing with these 20,000 to 30,000 high-paying, technical, the great brain trust of america, you're outsourcing it to the
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chinese, the indians, and the russians. maybe the japanese. why shouldn't we be concerned about this, mr. president? i think that's the question we've got to ask ourselves. and i think we've got to start saying, how much are we willing to say we're no longer exceptional, we're going to outsource everything to somebody else? i believe the american people want to say to us here in congress, hey, wake up. give us a job like you've always given us a job and we as americans will do that job and do it better than anybody else in the world. we always have, we always will. i'm not ready to give up on ourselves. i don't think my colleagues are ready to give up on ourselves and the american people. we are still the exceptional people that put a man on the moon in a decade, like the president of the united states, john f. kennedy said. we're still the people who created the first basically %
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aircraft that you could fly out into outer space, the shuttle program, where we landed right there on a runway like an ordinary airplane, rather than parachuting them inno the ocean like the first programs we did. we have done wonders with nasa. and i hope, and i pray, and i think everybody else hopes and prays that the president will reconsider and allow congress to discuss this and allow congress to make decisions as to whether or not we're going to make these kinds of radical changes to the future of manned exploration of space. and whether, when we do if we %- change, we are protecting human life. all these things are important. all these things are something oh we oughttto be concerned about.
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righh now, we just have to be concerned about why. why this administration is giving up on american exceptionalism and outsourcing our space program to foreign countrres. ill yield whatever time mr. bishop would like to make a comment on that. mr. bishhp: i have only one last insight to give and i appreciate, once again, the gentleman from texas taking this time to point out how significant this issue is, but indeed, the constellation program was the way forward into the future. it was to replace the space shuttle. it went through the science. it is -- it is our future. it's being built by the private sector. yet we are deciding to can sell it with no other goal in mind. we do not have a plan. we donnt have a breasm don't have an idea for what the
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future may bring. there was a study done after the last space shuttle catastrophe that said there are two things that will destroy manned space flight, the mission of manned space flight and nasa. one is not to consider human safety, as the gentleman said, and number two not to have an + organized plan. i have, in a note of irony a flyer that came to our offfces from nasa, that tomorrow in the rayburn foyer, there will be the new era of innovation and discovery, which means there will be an interactive, all-day event highlighting nasa's robust earth and space science portion, cutting edge err naughtics and continued leadership in human flight. i am so grateful there will be an inttractive game that we in congress can play about space flight because if thh decisions of nasa and this administration
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are allowed, there woo't a real manned space flight for us, at least we have a game where we can remember what we used to do and what might have been. i yield back. mr. carter: hat is ironic. one of the things -- reclaiming my time, one of the things you hear from parents is, what am i going to do to get my kids to having their own imagination, not playing somebody else's video game. this sounds to me like somebody else's video game. you remember when we diverted %% satellites from protecting our troops in iraq to over the poles to check on global warming, what i'm hearing from this administration, their plan for nasa is to have low-orbit satellite programs to check on global warming. i forgot, we don't call it global warming anymore, it's called climate change. i apologize. it turns out we may not be warming.
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well, that's a whole other debate. but it seems like all the resources seem to go into -- to go forward -- to go toward desperately trying to prove that. i thank my friend for coming down, mr. bishop we came in this august body together and share a lot of concerns about the future, what we're doing. i'm really happy to to have bob bishop looking attthe scientific side of our world, he's got a great insight into it. i want to thank him for sharing that insight wiih us tonight, i want to thank the speaker for allows us to take this time to talk about something that we are proud of. we in texas have a lot to be proud of. one of the things we we point out that we're proud of is the manned space center in houston, texas. when you look on the texas map
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that tells you the great things to come see in texas we highly recommend people visit the space center. we know great thinged were done by great men and women at that place and continue to be done there. and to drive a stake in the heart of the space program is a tragedy not only for the state of texas buu for the whole united states. i think i can effectively argue, the world. let's not outsource another of our industries. let's not give up on american exceptionalism. let's go back and reconsider the obama administration's desire to trash this prooram and let's go back to putting us on a path with a plan, as mr. bishoo pointed out, to go out and explore those new frontiirs we have left to explore. with that, mr. speaker, i thank you for the time and i yield back the balance of my time.
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the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. under the speaker's announced policy of january 6, 2009, the gentleman from ohio,,mr. ryan, is ecognized as the designee of the majority leader. mr. ryan: thank you, mr. ppeaker. i want to take this opportunity here on the house floor to spend a few minutes talking about some friends of mine who are celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary. i wanted to take a second here to say what good friends they are and what great americans they are and what great people % they are. bill and margie skolaski will be celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary this week and they have been not only tremendous supporters of me, but great people in the community and i want to take this opportunity to wish them a happy anniversary. many, many more years. you've never been to a holiday
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breakfast unless you have been to their house, but i must say there's eggs and queesh and -- ppquiche and sausage and all kinds of different desserrs and there's not a day that goes by that i don't seed margiee+ somewhere that she doesn't want to bake me a cherry pie. i want to thank her for her generosity. she and her husband are two of the sweetest, kindest, nicest people in the community. they represent the things -- they treasure the things people in america needdto spend time thinking about, the importance of family, of community, of church and faith and the importance, quite frankly or after nice piece of pie. they all come together and have been tremendous influencesson my life. i wanted to say thank you and congratulations to all of them and their families as they celebrate this special day.
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i would also like to take this opportunity, mr. peaker to extend a hearty congratulations to theepresident of jungestown state university, dr. david suite and his wife watt, who are both leaving youngstown state university after a long tenure but he and his wife came to youngstown state universityy quite frankly, when it was a sleepy university somewhere in the city of the city of youngstown and came in with a vision for the community, came in with a vision of the university and quite frankly, i think history will judge him as one of the leaders on how a university can have a transformational effect on a community and youngstown state university, the city of youngs stoun, all have been recognized for their partnerships they have created but doctor suite,
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on every account that we would measure his success or failure as a president, has clearly succeeded. enrollment is up 25%. minority enrollment is up. the university has created the first science, technology, engineering, and math college of all the universities in ohio. took youngstown state university and used it as an %% engine for not only economic %% deprothe and research but alsoo for help regular define the city of youngstown and in so many way he is provided lladership for our university and our community. i want to hear, on the floor of the -- i want to, here on the floor of the house of representatives, recognize him and his team, hunter morrison, dr. george mccloud and all the leaders he had in his administration and their ability to take this -- to take this university and transform it and transform our community.
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i want to say thank you, mr. speaker to dr. suite and his wife pat for their passion, their contributionssthat they made to our community and to youngstown state university. we stand on their shoulders as we continue this work. clearly we would not have been here today to make the kind of strides that the university is making doing the kind of research, hosting international energy seminars and forums and really transforming the role of that university. i want to say thank you we clearly wouldn't be in the fogs we are today if it weren't for the leadership of dr. suite and pat suite. also, mr. speaker, we'd like to take this opportunity spend a little time, and i'll be joined by some of my colleagues in the next few minutes, to talk about what has been going on in our %% country economically and really
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what the plan is and what the plan has been for president obama the democratic ongress, and pushing forward an agenda that i think without dispute has taken our country from going off a cliff which is where we were just a couple of years ago a year and a half ago, where the stock market was% at 6,000, plus, where the economy was bleeding 750,000 jobs, almost 00,000 jobs a month. and where there was a complete collapse of the global economic system. because, quite frankly, there has been a debate going on in america that those of us on my side for sure have been losing. the debate since 1980 has been how do we cut taxes for the wealthiest eople in the %-
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country, how do we, therefore, raise the tax burden on the middle class, how do we cut governmnt at every single turn, how do we deregulate and completely ry to remove government out of every aspect of the financial markets and the role of regulating businesses, and quite frankly, our friends on the other side, mr. speaker, won that debate. up until the current president really with a good fight put on by president clinton and he made great strides in his own way. but we've been fighting this system. but over the course of the last couple years we have seen exactly what happens when this philosophy, economic and political philosophy, are implemented. it is milton friedman and the supply side economists and the
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republican party versus the keynesian demand side democrats on our side and our republican friends in the earliest parts of this decade, up until 2006 and then 2008, controlled every %% lever of government, controlled the house, controlled the senate, controlled the white house, implemented their economic policies across the board and in ohio the republicans controlled every statewide office, including the governorship for 16 years and the state legislature for longer, controlled everything and implemented their policies. their energy policy, their foreign policy, theii economic policy, they deregulated wall street,,they continued this path, this role of appointing industry lackees to critical
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oversight positions on wall street, critical oversight positionssin the oil and gas industry, even big donors to oversee fema. and over the course of the last few years we have seen how this philosophy when implemented works. and it works for those multinational corporations, it works for wall street, it works for the oil industry, but quite frankly it doesn't work for anybody else. so we saw when an industry %% lacky's pointed to -- appointed tt head fema, we saw what happened with katrina. you did a good job, broonie, is what came of that. we see when the minerals management agency is littered with industry people, we see that a lot of this -- the
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approvals oo drilling and the lack of preparation for contingency plans for emergencies was nonexistent because our friends on the other side said, we don't need any government, we don't need any regulation of the oil industry, we don't need any regulation of -- we could just put anybody in the fema. and we saw what happened. but really the most significant event has been what happened on wall street. when we completely ignored deregulated wall street. we said, let business police themselves, ignoring decades an% decades and decades of history where we know when unchecked businesses get greedy. it is human nature to get greedy.
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it is human nature not to be connected to what happens three or four moves down the line with the decision that you're making today and so wall street was deregulated, warnings were ignored and we saw the+ worst financial crisis since the great depression hit the united states of america and almost bring down the entire global economy. and so having that philosophy implemented on all acccunts, energy, wall street, globalization, cut taxes for the wealthiest, push the tax bbrden off on the middle class, borrow money and spend money and still cut taxes and run up huge deficits. in fact, the important to note who left the huge deficits. reagan left a $1.4 trillion
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deficit. herbert walker bush, $3 trillion. president bill clinton had -- almost a $6 trillion ssrplus. and george w. bush left us an $11.5 trillion deficit. in this country. with no end in sight. and then not only left%% us tha huge deficct, then we have a situation where the whole economy collapsed. the stock market taaked, banks were going belly-up. unemployment was going through theroof. and then the first january that barack obama took office we were losing almost 800,000 jobs in that month. so, being left with this horrendous mess and the implementation of a philosophy,
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economic and polltical philosophy, that decimates government, runs up huge deficits and here we are left t- deal with it. so we did take some bold stems with the stimulus package, with tarp, which was actually under george w. bush. but we took some bold steps and they all weren't very politically popular in many instances. and we would go home every weekend and have to explain to our constituents about why we %- were doing this stuff. but we are now seeing that the national economy is turning around. we have seen the stock market go up from a little over 6,000 to 10,000-pluu, up to 11,000, back down, week of had some issues with the oil spill, with what's going on in greece, but the stocc market was backkup to
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11,000. we are starting the recovery. we have seen with the issue of jobs, some level of success. in the last week we saw industrial production increased 8.1% during the past 11 months, thh largest 11-month gain since 1997. now, i'm not here to say that this is -- that i'm seeing the world through rose-colored glasses. i'm not here to say that we're even out of the woods yet. but what i am saying is, the policies that we have% implemented have clearly turned the country back into the right direction. it is moving us towards a more secure future for the business
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community and for those people who are out in our community looking for work. unemployment is still too high. we still have work to do with police and fire and helping the states and teachers to ake sure they don't get laid off. but before i kick it to my friend from connecticut, i want to say that you can't help but to look at what has -- where we were and to remember where we were and to say that we have not at least shifted directions and at least changed things to at least move us in a more positive step whhre we can secure the future for our chiidren. where we can secure a good economy for businesses and workers. and that's really what's important here and that's why we pave made some of these very,, very difficult decisions.
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with that i yield to my friend from%% connecticut, mr. murphy. pr. murphy: thank you very much, my friend from ohio, for setting this for us this evening. i think back to when i was making up my mind about running for congress some four, five years ago. and i was in connecticut where i live today, sitting watching a federal government that seemed intent on using the power that it had accumulated here in congress and in the administration to essentially turn over government to their friends. wwether their friends were in the oil industry or their friends were in the health insurance industry or the pharmaceutical industry or the defense contracting industry, whatever it was it seemed as if the reason that some people had run for office, the reason that some people had sought positions in the bush administration was to hand over the reigns of government to corporate
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interests, to people that frankly didn't have the public interest at heart. and i think back to the reasons that i decided to run for congress and that the foundation of it was a real belief hat we had eessentially -- essentially begun to privatize all sectors of the united states economy, the united states government. and the taxpayer dollars were more often being used not to accrue to the public benefit, but to accrue to the benefit of a smmll group of people who happened to hold and wield influence here in washington. and so i think about what would have happened back in january and febbuary of last year, as we were setting the economic strategy toward recovery. i think about what would have happened if the folks who had been running congress and running the administration in prior years nrp charge of this economic recovery -- years were in charge of this economic recovery. i think about the bill we passedd i think about the facc
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that 2/3, excuse%% me, 1/3 of t stimulus bill passed in the winter of last year went to tax cuts. went to tax cuts not for the top 1%, 2%, 3% to income hearners in this nation, not tax cuts for phe fortune 500, but fo tax cuts for individuals, for middle income folks out there, the people that i represent in % connecticut. they're not enormous tax breaks. folks weren't getting thousands of dollars back but they were getting a couple hundred, $300, $400, $500 back in their taxes. small business tax breaks in that stimulus bill, to allow for more incentives for small businesses to expand and iivest in capital, to allow them to maybe take some of their losses a little bit earlier than they might have otherwise been able to do, nord to -- in order to make the books balance foo that one or two really tough years that they needed to survive, an% i think about what would have
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happened if the republicans had issued those stimulus bill. i know the statistics. not to say there weren't people who benefited from that, but i know the average millionaire in my district from the last round of bush tax cuts got $43,000 back. i know that the average income family in new britain, connecticut, got 19 from that tax break. now, i mean, things cost a little bit more in connecticut but that's just about enough money to buy a pep roney pizza in new bripen.%+ that's nothing -- britain. that's nothing. and i know that if the republicans had been writing that stimulus bill that we would have likely seen more of the same. we would have likely seen the economic recovery and the economic stimulus bill that they would have written as an excuse to handdout more tax breaks and more favors to folks that didn't need any more. and so the reason, mr. ryan, that you talk about this recovery as it is in action, the
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reason that we see retail sales picking up, the reason that we see 10% growth in our economy in the last six months is in part because we invested our recovery strategy in the right people. that we invested our recovery strategy in low income and middle income families who need ad lib extra money back on their taxes so they could pay their bills, that they could stop from going into bankruptcy themselves, and maybe they could put a little bit of their money back into the economy. we invested in small businesses because we know 90% of jobs in this recovery or any recovery are going to come from small businesses and we invested in few fur businesses as well. got a company in my business called apollo solar. this is going to to be the next big thing. they're making some really important technology that will allow individual homeowners to put solar panels on their roof, generate a whole bunch of power and then sell it back to the grid for a profit. this is going to be in every home in the nation, we hope, in
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a matter of 10 years to 15 years. and the stimulus bill decided to put money into apollo solar so they cannot only add jobs but they can point the way forward for the futurr of the american economy. money in the pockets of middle class families, money in the bank accounts of small businesses and an opportunity to point this economy forward to the next sweep of jobs that we're going to enjoy in this country in the form of renewable energy jobs. mr. ryan, you're exactly right. i still have unacceptively high levels of unemployment in the places that i represent. i still have way too many that are laid off. and it's no small consolatioo no, consolation at all to them when i or anybody else tries to explain that, you know, jobs are always the lagging indicator and, listen, we got to have big jumps in the production in this country and jumps in retail sales and jumps in orders for
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factories before ll of those employers start adding jobs. but i think peeple are coming to understand that the recovery is on its way. they hear the stories. they hear the stories from main street, as i did in connecticut a couple weeks ago, where almost every retail establishment on main street reported that may, june had been amongst their best retail months in two to three years, the factory after factory think a go to that's reporting for the first time that they've seen orderr make significant upward increases in the past several months, they feel that good news. now, they know that those retail establishments and those factories need to get a couple more months of good news before they start actually addiig jobs back and they know that the first thing you're going to do is take the workers they fur lowed for a day or two every week and put them back full time. but the trend is going in the right direction and i think that it's going in the right direction because the stimulus
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written by the democrats, championed by president obama, put the stimulus in the right place, it gave it to main street, it gave it to middle class families, it gave it to small businesses, which, you know, we're only guessing here, i'm only guessing, but i think that if president bush was still here or the republicans were still in charge of congress that that stimulus and the people and the corporations and the institutions that it invested in would have been a very different set of people and businesses than we see today having been invested in.%% i'd be happy to turn it over to you. i'm happy to see you joining us on the floor this evening. mr. welch: thank you very much. we have to acknowledge something, thoss of us who supported the stimulus as something necessary, those of white house decided to attend to the request by president bush to stabilize the financial system and do something we didn't really want to do but
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felt it was necessary to do, and that is that despite the gross domestic product increasing, despite the positive signs that have been cited by you and mr. ryan, this is still a depression for any american who doesn't have his or her job. when you have 10% unemployment, which i think is the real measure of the strength of this economy, you know we have an economy that continues to struggle. and we have to do a number of things. yes we did have to have a ptimulus. it was focused where it would do the most good. we did have to stabilize the financial system, bbt that's going to add a burden until that is repaid. + but one of the things we have to do is understand what is the proper role of the private sector and what's the proper role of government. this has been an ongoing debate in the united states. people who have been frustrated, that government has gotten it wrong, have come to the conclusion that it can never get it right.
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people who have had faith in the private sector have had a view that they can gever get it wronn. in fact, some of both is the case. unless we have a cop on the %% beat a government that's willing to make rules that give everybody a shot, who play by the rules and work hard and whose goal in doing -- in running a business is to provide good service, provide a good product at a fair price, then we won't have the economy we need. i want to give a couple of examples. the financial crisis buzz brought on by the recklessness, largely, of wall street investment banks. let me give you an exasm. the famous one is goldman sachs. they made a lot f money on subprime mortgages, a lot of money on buying and selling commodities, they went from an investment bank that made most of its money by lending money to businesses, to people who had ideas about how to creete jobs and create companies and
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create wealth they trands form from that to buying and selling derivatives, currencies, and banking money on trading. nothing wrong with that, but it's not banking. it's not putting money into the financial sector. when they had a client a hedge fund billionaire who called up and said, i have an idea. i think that this explosion in real estate valuessis going to collapse, i wanttyou to put together a package of subprime mortgages that you believe will fail that i believv will fail, that i can then sell those and bet against them, goldman sachs said, fine, it's a client, thee're paying money they pay big fees, they had a request, nothing illegal about it. nothing useful about it, but nothing illegal about it. goldman sachs put that package together, helped put that package together, then they turned around and saw this package that was guaranteed, it was designed to fail, literally, designed to%% fail,
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they then went to the roll deeks and called up other -- rolodex and culled up other clients, pension funds, like firemen, police officers, teachers. 4 they said, we have a deal for you. triple-a rated, high yield fund, can't go wrong. they offered a service to one ccmpliant, then they called up the other compliant -- to one client, it was guaranteed to fail, then they called up other clients and told them it would succeed. not guaranteed but they were betting on their reputation. the hedge fund billionaire made another $1 billion. it destroyed wealth.
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what does that do to the american people? legitimately, understandably, it erodes their confidence. 10 my eweview, we have a lot of reasons to be justifiably furious at wall street practices with a, where they strayed from what would be done in main street. ski any one of you in your state of ohio, in your -- i ask any one of ou in your state of ohioo in your state of connecttcut, mr. murphy, or anyone from around the country, can you imagine your local banker saying, -- having one neighbor, saying i want you to design something to fail, and then selling it to another neighbor as something that woulddsucceed. it would never happen. another failure is the government failure. the federal reserve. this explosion in asset values and real estate values and
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subprime mortgages where people who are permiited who had no iicome, no job, no proof of assets, no proof of ability to pay for given loans of $400,000 or $550,000 or $600,000. the regulators had the responsibility to apply the law of financial gravity and not permit that to occur. s that situation where people who point their finger of responsibility at government not standing up their right but those same people can't say that all we should do is dissuade regulation altogether and let the private sector do what it wants because it has led to excess -- destruction of value and a lot of individual people have suffered as a resuut of loss of their hard-earned income. so there's a role and has to be a role for government to be the cop on the beat and to help folks ho are working hard and playing by the rules and trying to reinvest in their community
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to be successful. i would be glad at this time to yield to my friend, mr. boccieri. mr. boccieri: thank you. it's an honor to join my colleagues here on the house floor to talk about what we're doing and how we're putting our country back oo track. we hear from the other side that the greatest tool the government has is to largely unregulate big business, big corporations and provide tax cuts to the wealthiest americans. virtually every problem america faces, that's solution putton the table. now i argue that, look, our philosophy, our broad political philosophy here in the -- here ii this bdy is that the government needs to set the out of bounds markers, need to set the goal posts. let the free market operate in between but be aa good referee. throw the flag when you have big corporations that want to bet on the price of oil going up on wall street. throw the flag when you want to
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bet against people failing to pay their mortgage. failing to pay their mortgage. that's what was happening. that's like betting against america. we don't want to take the stripes off the referee. we want to make sure the playing field is even and fair for all americans. and that's why we're being charged with action. because i think all of us here tonight believe that leadership is not just about position, political position, but it's about action.. leadership is about action. we run for office not just to win lech bus to get things done. we want to put america back to work by investing in ammrica and by investing in our greatest asset, our people. and a lot of talk has been made about the stimulus and the economic recovery. the charts don't lie, folks. when we walked in the job here in the office of the house of representatives just, anaheim my first term, just in may of 2009, what was handed to us
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from the previous administration were two unfunded, undeclared wars that cost $1 trillion. we had an economy that was in free fall. didn't know where we were going to land. exploding deficits from the war and tax cuts for the wealthiest americans. we had unregulated greed on wall street, banking system in chaos, it required swift action not just a political position %- but swift action. in may of 2009, we have lost 345,000 jobs. pne year later, after some of the economic policies we put many place -- put in place here in the congress we turned that + 180 degrees and actually had a net job gain of 431,000 jobs by may of 2010. so the facts don't lie. another thing that really disturbb me about our friends on the other side of the aisle is the whole notion that democrats are not tough on deficits that is comppetely
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false when you look at this chart right here. this chart right here shows that deficits have been handed on by the last three republican presidents. we look at president reagan a $1.4 trillion deficit left to the american taxpayer. we look at george bush, president bush, we see that he left a $3.5 trillion deficit. and that didn't begin to turn until president clinton turned those deficits into a $5.6 trillion surplus. what was left to us when we came in the door in the 111th congress was nearly a $12 trillion deficit. by two undeclared, unfunded wars two. tax cuts to the wealthiest americans who could fford to pppay and pay their fair hare and a prescription drug plan that left huge holes, doughnut holes for ur eniors who couldn't afford to pay for prescription drugs. these are the facts.
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like joe friday used to say,le on the facts, please, ma'am. right now, we're trying to set the facts straight. my colleagues are appropriate in pointing out these efficiencies -- these deficiencies in the arguments by our colleagues on the other side. mr. murphy: -- mr. ryan: i represent a district that is sttong in manufacturing. we've seen in the last couple of months a couple of point decrease in the unemployment rate. + still way too high. but this stimulus plan is coming down the pike, it is helped in so many different ways in so many different road projects, train structure projects.. + y got $100 million in title one money for our schools ppeventing tens if not hundreds of teachersing with laid off.
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we got grants for fire and cop,% 20-something cops on the beat bauds of -- because of the grant in the city of akron. if we weren't putting money into roads and bridges and infrastructure, if we weren't making sure there was state support for our schools and education funds, we would have lost thousands of teachers, police, fire and construction % workers who would have never went back to work. now we're not saaing we've got all the answers and we've got a corner on the marketplace of success but we clearly, because years and years and years of economic philosophy prior to 1980 said when the government goes -- when the economy is in a big downturn someone has to step up to fill the hole to prime the pump. ww have a general motors faaility in ohio that put on a third shift. all their suppliers are going to benefit from that. if the republicans were in
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charge that whole company would have been sold out piecemeal. we used $20 million in stimulus money that leveraged $650 million for a french company to expand 350 jobs, 500 construction jobs. this is all happening because we had a stimulus biil. and i don't blame anybody in this chamber, mr. boccieri, for not believing me that the stimulus package has had some success. but how about bill gates? would anybody believv bill gates when he said the incredible measures, drovery act and tarp, needed to be take ton make sure there wasn't a collapse, both in terms of stabilizing the financial system and priming the pump of the economy beccuse it had been slowed down so much. now, we're%seeing the benefits that those things have been done. that's bill gates sayinn it.%- you can go right down the list, warren buffett and others who have said the stimulus package
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has worked. and my concern, quite frankly is that we've got to do more before this -- before we get gleetly out of this ethe woods on this economy. look at the job you were ins. look at the deficit numbers. and i want to make one final statement here, because mr. boccieri brought it up about pppeficits. you grow your way out of deficits. if you don't have people working, you're not going to reduce the deficit. you can't cut your way out of some of this stuff. you've got to grow your way. what we have is a pro-growth agenda. . investing in infrastructure and energy, get people working again. if we want to see the deficits go down, we have to get people back to work. and that's what this whole agendd has been about and it's
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working. you look at what president bush left us with and look at where we are at now, as jobs go up, %% the deficit projections go down. i yield to my friend. mr. murphy: the fact that facts don't lie, here it is. this chart isn't rigid but telling it like it is. you are looking at this chart, the last year of the bush administration, the first year of the obama administration. the trend is unmistakeable. and the bush administration ground to a halt, the economy went into the tank, where in jannary of 2009, the last month of the bush administration and ppfirst month of the obama administration, this economy lost nearly 800,000 jobs. as mr. welch were sworn in for our second term. but the trend coming out of janice just as unmistakeable. every month, almost without
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question, more jobs being lost where in the last three months we have added jobs. we have added 700,000 jobs in the last two months. that is way too many people out of work.%% we still have miles to go. but you want to talk about what policies didn't work and what policies have worked. well, the numbers don't lie. i want to add one more thing to the table. we can talk about the jobs that have been created through the stimulus bill and saved through the policies of this administration, but there are other maybe nnt as well covered, ju just as important -- but just as important successes. last week on page four, five or six of your local papers, you %- might have noticed a story that the chinese governmenn has announced that it is going to dramatically change the way it runs its currency, that it is going to allow its curreecy to
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float in a way it has never before. that is something that democrats in this congress, led by mr. ryan, have been working on for a long time. the chinese have been manipulating their currency so that on day one they can underprice american manufacturers, sometimes by 30%, 40%, 50% just on the basis of how they manipulate the value of their currency. we have lost millionn of manufacturing jobs in this country and much of it has gone to china. much of that is because of the funny business going on with their currency. they can get away with it under the bush administration because they asked no questions when it camm to trade policies. they rushed into trade agreements asking little questions when we sat across the table from our trade partners asking them to change their trade policies so they couldn't
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unfairly underbid american labor, american manufacturers. they can't get away with that. the chinese can't get away with that with a democratic congress. we aren't going to give a free pppass to china, to india and o european partners to allow them to subsidize their industries with government dollars to manipulate their currencies or to run rough showed over labor and environmental policies so as to underprice and outbid american manufacturers. the chinese saw the writing on the wall.. they have a long way to go to get this thing right, but the fact that they figured out they can no longer manipulate their curreecy to unfairly compete with american manufacturers show that a new sheriff is in town. mr. boccieri says there is a new referee and the whole world understands that. when the referee is holddng domestic corporations
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accountable for their actions, that's a good thing. when the referee is on the international playing field ready to hold our trading partners accountable for their unfair trading practices that is transformtive as well. so the story how we get from january, 2009, when we were at a disastrous point in our economy where today we are heading in the right direction, has a lot of stories. it's about job creation and stimulus bill and also starting to stick up for american manufacturing, which we are finally doing in this congress. pr. welch: when you are talking about the whine east wuan, it is removed from people on main street but has a real impact on american manufacturing. i'm among many who believe that for america to have strong long-term economic growth, we have to revive, ot abandon, manufacturing.
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and in the stimulus, there were commitments to do it in the energy sector. if we are a confident nation, we aren't going to pretend that the energy policy that we have now, relying on a 19th century fuel, where we have to send almost $900 billion of our money abroad to bring oil in, that if we take on the challenge of the new energy economy, we can create jobs. in the stimulus, nothing worked, including for anybody who is out of work. but there are solid, straightforward examples of how it did make a difference for many people and i want to talk about barry, vermont, a small, haad-working very proud town with the tradition of working in the granite quarteries and have- been losing jobs to chinese imports. but we have a company that is a small company that has been there for years and having a hard time staying ahead wwth the
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collapse in the economy. their product, something that was used in tasers, but the engineers there developed a product that could be used in electric vehicles. and that's all part of what we want in our new energy economy. they have an immense amount of interest in this and getting interest from car manufacturers and had to decide whether to build a plant or expand their plant in vermont or do it in china to take advantage of the lower labor rates. and these folks wanted to stay, but the law of economics means they have to be able to sustain themselvvs. they were within two days of going ahead and making a commitment to develop this plant of china when the stimulus bill was passed and had in there the opportunity for companies to apply to get energy grants. they applied and they put their decision to move to china on hold. they got the grant.
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several million dollars.. and only a few months ago, the republican governor of vermont and the democratic congressman from vermont joined the people from sprague at a groundbreaking where they were opening up the construction of a brand new factory with great jobs for the people of barry, vermont. it's real and took governmental involvement and that's an investment that's going to come back with taxpayer revenues, but real strength in that community where they will have a great new factory with new jobs developing a product that will haveeripple effects across vermont. i yield to mr. boccieri.%- mr. boccieri: i thank the ppgentleman for talking about h we can get our economy back on track and put america back to work. we are beginning to see the signs of economic recovery. 10 successive months of manufacturing growth has led to an upturn in manufacturing and our output in ohio and many
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midwestern states. we're seeing the housing sector improve. the housing sector of the economy is very important to our economy because every recession since the great depression, the housing sector has led us out any downturns in the economy we ever had. if you think about whht goes into building a new home, steel, wood, carpeting and drapes, third car garage, the appliances, there is a lot of economic output, especially with those household products like washers and dryers and the like. so we are beginning to see upturn in the economy because of that. look, we lost a lot oo jobs, millions of jobs under previous economic take us a economic policies and will take us a while to grow back the economy and get back to the confidence that we all share that we are in a stronggr positiin, but we're on the right track. we're on the right track.
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and according to folks who study the economy daily like "fortune" magazine, said the economy has made a sharp u-turn and better days for american businesses and workers are around the cornnr. "newsweek" said america is coming back stronger, better and faster than nearly anyone had expected, in fact, better than our international rivals. recovery came quickly because the public and private sectors reacted with great speed. from the far left to the far right, economists are saying we had to do something, we had to do something. and there is only three tools that the american government has to jum-start or kick the economy, manage the interest rates with the federal reserve. interest rates are near record lows, zero percent in some cases. we saw the other policy is to utilize tax policy. largest tax break in american
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history to small businesses and american middle-class families. "usa today" said that tax bills are the lowest since 1950 since tax policies that were enacted through the stimulus and other measures that helped that in%% 2009. the other policy is inject huge amounts of capital in the marketplace. it's the right policy to help the factory workers that were struggling to meet their payments and their bills and put bread on their table, helping them with an unemployment check or cobra assiitance to carry their health care insurance from month to month while looking foo jobs. that was the right investment i1 jobs. that was the right investment in 2009. that was an investment in the american people with job training and worker skilled training, investing in our work force. those are tangible things that we can take and that's why we are getting reports like this. we see some positive job gain s
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in the 16th congressional district. 35,000 jobs will be created, manufacturer distributing medical products. nationwide insurance, 600 jobs in ohio and many in my congressional district. rolls royce that makes fuel cells,, that will add to our electric vehicles. they just announced a new fuel cell research headquarters from singapore to ohio. i know i will be working with my colleague in the 177h district working on research and development and retain nearly 90 jobs in my congressional district. we see a.b.s. company, a national science foundation grant, a company in worcester, ohio, they have this grant to do
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leading-edge research and helping further development of creating high-tech jo1 helping further development of creating high-tech jobs here in the 16th congressional district. and barbasol added dozens of jobs in ashland county in my district. these are real signs of how some of the pplicies that we have enacted are pell pping to grow our economy. the leadership is about action, not just taking a political position. just say no crowd here in washington is not lending itself to the recovery of our country. we need their help. we need their help and need all americans working together to put our country back on track. we need the republicans' help to put the country back on track. we have seen tough times beeore but we always pulled together as a nation and made it through our toughest timee. mr. murphy: you mentioned we need republicans here and there is support for the democratic
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policies and obama's policies. let me add two quotes that you mentioned. the first from the assistant treasury secretary under george bush. this is one of bush's top economic strategists who said their economic policies, including the stimulus have helped to move the economy. frr mark zandi, chief economist from moody's, a chief economist feels like the light switch went on in businesses this spring. when you take it all together, the response to the recession was massive, unprecedented and ultimately successful. you have a broad spectrum of agreement, mr. boccieri from the economists who say the policies that have put us on the right track. mr. altmire.
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mr. altmire: i want to reiterate in the district that i represent just across mr. ryan's and mr. boccieri's districts, the similar experiences that are happening in pennsylvaniaaas well and we had a choice to make in 2009 when we as members of this house had to make a decision as to what to do when we were looking off the cliff into the aayss with an economy that was on the verge of collapse in a verr literal sense. we could have done nothing or more of the same. those were two of our options and there were people on the other side of the aisle who wanted to take that approach, to continue to pursue the policies ttat led us to being in that position in the firsttplace, but we chose not to do that. we chose to take action in a very forceful and present proactive way. and now, a year and a half
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laterr where are we? it's fair to ask, what's been the benefit of this? this was a huge bill. this was a monumental vote and a vote that many of us took with the knowledge that there were things in the bill that we could support. there were a lot of things we knew moving forward were going to have a tremendous impact on the nation and our districts. and as we have seen rom some of the charts, a year and a half later, we have seen an incredible difference in our economy, both as a nation and in our districts. six of the last seven months, we have had positive job growth and yes, we are at the time, in the decade, once a decade, where yo% hire census workers to go out and folks on the other side will say those numbers are inflated and there are census numbers included in that. but private sector job growth has gone up over that same period of time by the hundreds of thousands in the previous two months, and we expect the strong
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number again for the month of june. and also at the end of june, we will have our fourth straight quarter, a full year of positive g.d.p. growth and this is to be compared with where we were at the beginning of 2009 when we had negative six g.d.p. nu had negative six g.d.p. number. and by the end of 2009, the end of that very same caleedar year, the very year that we passed the recovery act, we had plus six g.d.p. growth, almost plus-six. and largest calendar year increase in almost 30 years in the gross domestic product rom negative six to nearly plus-six. . we saw jobs going down, until we passed that stimuluss package, until today, six of the past seven months, positive job growth, five months in a
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row positive job growth, we expect that to continue. the stock market bottomed out almost the time the recovery began to take effect. in the district i represent in western pennsylvania, as in the ohio districts and i presume mr. murphy's district of crth as well, we have a legacy of manufacturing and we have a lot of folk whors doing better todaa than they were a year ago. the gentleman from ohio, mr. boccieri, hist -- listed the company. we have some, i have elwood forge and elwood quality steel, both doing better this year than last year, not only because the companies are doing better but because as a country is doing better. that's what it means when manufacturers see an increase in orders. we're stimlutting -- stimulating our economy and growing and moving again. that's the first thing that turns around is that manufacturing sector and in western pennsylvania, we're
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seeing that impact very directly. we've seen it in some of the infrastructure projects in all our districts across the country to have something of lasting significance that's going to be there in the days after -- decades after we recover. is everything in the economy where we want it to be? no, of course not. it hasn't fully recovered, we're not out of the woods yet, we're not coopletely out of the hole it took us decades to dig but we're getting better. again. g.d.p. growth is strong. stock market has recovered to some extent, jobs are much better and we're mmving in the right direction. that would not have happened were it not for the actions that this congress took. i yield to the gentleman from ohio. mr. ryan: i think it's important again to reiterate, %% these are two separate philosophies. we did nnt have one vote in the house of representatives from the republican side, they, in many instances continued to
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argue for cutting taxes for the top 1%. hopefully that will trickle down to the middle class, hopefully that will trickle down to manufacturing and we saw from the 1980's on, people took that money and they invested it in china. manufacturing in mexico. in china. in other places. and what we're saying is, reinvest back in the united states, transportation, energy, infrastructure, rebuild the country, a pro-growth agenda from democrats, cutting taxes for businesses, cutting taxes for the middle class and jump starting the economy. making sure that we have fair regulation, referees on the field and making sure we don't let corporations run the country, whether it's wall street, the financial market, or whether it's the oil industry saying approve this permit even though i don't have a plan in case we have a catastrophe, let it all go. we're the corporations we run the show.
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we're reining that back in, trying to jump start small businesses with the fund we provided last week, $30 billion to loan $300 billion for community banks. get the local banks loaning money again and stop relying on these globalized bank whorr in ii to make a profit and have -- who are in it to make a profit and have no tie to the community. i yield to the gentleman from nnw york. mr. tonko: you talk about th contrast between the party in control now and the house, with clean energy, think of all those strategies compared to kate toring big oil, big banks, wall street, making certain the biggest amongst russ taken care of. i contrast that with all the work being done in my district in the 21st congressional
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district in new york, it's always had a spirit f pioneer, it's in our d.n.a. we have within the confines of that district, an energy revolution of sorts, it's the birth place of electricity. we're continuing on with a global center for renewable energy as g.e.: nano science in the district, the semiconductor energy, superconductive cable, talking about advanced battery manufacturing. when we looked at the recovery act, how the president banted to bring us into the new age, allow for transitioning, a transformation of the energy economy, that's what this is all about. what we have had expressed in this recovery act are opportunities to grow new opportunities with advanced battery manufacturing. the battery looked at by g.e. not only provides a concept of an alternative generrtion not only for generation of electricity, not only for
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powering heavy vehicles, but also it's there for energy sorage so that with the transmit tant energy of renewables that transmit nature, thh opportunity to provideefor storage there creates all new opportunities. the battery is the linchpin. the same is true of superconductive cable. you can transmit far more electrons compared to traditional cables, where new opportunities are being developed to create lighter blades, more power per dollar invested. all of this is what holds great promise for our my, for jobs, for small business innovation, for the emerging technologies. that's what this investment is all about. finally you see a commitment to small business, to the pioneer spirit to the invention and creative genius that's always been part of the american culture and so i'm really proud of the efforts we're making to grow back this economy to grow
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back the investment in basic research and r&d. that's what this is about with the recovery act. people are looking at this contrast, representative ryan, they're looking at the slow, steady progress, the climb upward from what was a precipitous drop in that left-handed side of the formation, the precipitous drop in jobs, in the growth in unemployment, the lack of investment, the household income lost, now has taken a sharp u turn as and we see the road to recovery the progress because of the wisdom of the types of investmenn made in the recovery act propoeted by -- promoted by the white house and supported by speaker pelosi here. mr. ryan: i totally agree with the gentleman. you have tax cuts for miss, you have $30 billion for community banks to loan out up to $300 billion, you have tax cuts for individuals, you have the extension of unemployment benefits and health care
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through cobba, you have infrastructure projects, billions of dollars, billions of dollars for pell grant, so people can go to school. we've take then banks out of the student loan business so people get a better deal when they take out a loan to go to school. as you said, we're taking $1 billion a day that's leaving this country to go to oil producing countries and driving that back into the united states, the kind of technology you have, the kind of nuclear ttchnology and production that mr. altmire has in western pennsylvania, fuel cells in mr. boccieri's district and fuel cells in my district, all of the above in mr. murphy'' district. >> the -- mr. tonko: the policies of the past gave us the disaster in the gulf, the policy of the present give us opportunity. mr. ryan: mr. murphy would you like to wrap up? we have about a minute left.
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mr. murphy: listen, when it comes town to it, of all the %% things that drive the recovery and this economy, it's people spending again. and the fact is, we'll go back to where we started at the heart of our economic recovery legislation is putting power in the hands of average, +everyda working class families that's what drive this is economic recovery and that's what the democrats have invested in. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the ordering of this oh five-minute special order in favor of the gentleman from texas, mr. gohmert is vacated. under the speaker's announced spoifl january 6, 2009, -- announced policy of january 6, 2009, he chair recognizes the
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gentleman from texas, mr. gohmert, for 60 minutes. mr. gohmert: thank you, mr. speaker. it's always an honor to be here and to be speaking on the floor. there are so many who have served this country so honorably and well and have done the same thing. i never lose sight of that fact. it's a little discouraging at times. it's interesting to hear the stimulus is working because that's what george w. bush was doing and as i recall in 2006, the republicans lost the majority because democrats convinced them thaa t was the wrong thing to do and you know what? the democrats were right. they appropriately warned the majority because as they said, we should not be deficit spending. you're killing the country,
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killing the country, and they won the majority in 2006 because they were right. we should nnt have been deficit spending like that. but that went on. so it's interesting to hear just four short years later thattit turns out that what president bush was doing and was encouraging being done is actually the good thing, but i still tend to go back and think% that those of us on the republiccn side that agreed that we needed to get out from under the deficit spending, that we needed to get spending under control, the compassion and spending money to deficit level is not the same thing. it's -- the federal government, like a parent, just throwing money at their kids, thinking that's going to make them happy
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and everybody will be loving and caring but i happen to agree with my friend, jim dobson who knows a lot about raising children he says you show me a child whose parent never said no, and i'll show you one messed up kid. more and more we keep seeing people run to washington, give us money, give us money. let's don't deficit spend, but give us money. it's got to stop. it's got to stop. when the democrats promised they would stop the deficit spending if they were given the majority in november of 2006, they diagnosed the problem correctly. but then they didn't use the treatment they promised when they took over the majority and so it's interesting, i went back and found an article in speeches from early 2007 where
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we were talking about how well the economy was going at that point, and it's amazing from the time that those who ppomised to stop the deficit spending and yet instead dramatically increased the deficit spending, it's amazing to see how the economy took a nosedive once the democrats took the majority. i didn't plan to come talk about the stimulus this evening but i've heard from enough people who have been begging, please, stop the deficit spending, when the federal government runs up such an enormous deficit, they suck up all the capital in the country and the world and the businnsses that would like to hire people can't keep their lines of credit open anymore. you've got this administration's regulators
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telling banks, now you better not keep extending that line of credit to that business because even though they're still hiring people, seem to be doing well and have never missed a payment, we're concerned that maybe someday they will and you don't want your bank to be under the scrutiny that we'll put on it if you keep extending lines of credit to this company. . they can't borrow money or grow their business. if you aren't growing, you are usually dying. and so it's just interesting. i did not expect four yearss after i heard my friends across on the other side of the aisle yelling and fussing about $200 billion deficit in one year, just outrageous, unconscionable.
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you're right, we shouldn't be deficit spending. i really expect them to stop. and this year, it's expected we'll have a $1.6 trillion deficit by the federal ggvernment, in one year. who would have ever dreamed that the same people who said just short years ago thatt $160 billion deficit was reppub billion deficit was republic hence i believe and now saying -- reprehensible, 10 times of that much. then last month, we got good news, 431,000 new jobs created last month. that was great news. 411,000 of the 431,000 jobs were
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temporary census workers. not sure that's quiteers. not sure that's quite as good a news as we originally thought.%% so we have an administration and majority who are ecstatic thinking that the emperor has regal clothes on and the economy is doing great and the stimuluu is working so very well because we cceated 411,000 jobs last month for temporary census workers. that emperor has no clothes on. it's not a great economy. now, it should be. it's trying to be. it's trying to come back. but as the private sector tries to do better, boom, we hit them with a health care bill that is
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going to cost so much more money than ever before. telling businesses you have over 50 employees, then you are going to get hammered with a tax. so we are hearing people say, we had 56. we had to let people go. we can't be over that cap. we have people being let go because the health care costs are now going to be so much in the added taxes are hidden. yoo have people that are selling homes and there are going to be added taxes for them..%% this was supposed to be a health care bill that helped the working poor and yet when i was at a jobs fair in marshall, texas, a few weeks ago, i had one gentleman tell me, look, we are given entry-level jobs but are given really good health
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insurance. once the full extent of this health care bill kicks in, he won't be able to do that anymore. he will have to go on medicaid. ppif you make 133% of the pover level or less under that wonderful bill, you get forced into medicaid even if you have an employer willing to provide you health care. if you are above 133% of the poverty level and you can't afford to have the insurance policy that's dictated by this zeus of a congress and resident then guess what? you are going to pay extra income tax. you can't afford the health insurance, you get an extra income tax. good news all thh way around. i did want to address something that causes me a great deal of concern, all of this actually
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is, but it hit me as i was seeing more information about the 9/11 con spiritors. and i -- con spiritors and i use that term because they filed documents saying hey were. and this article i saw on sunday , the headline from "politico" said chances dim for swift 9/11 decision. it starts off on 6/20/10. attorney general eric holder on the decision to hold the trial for alleged 9/11 plotter was
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weeks away, quote, unquote, and they expect the obama administration to punt the decision until after the november mid-term elections when the controversial plan could be less damage to the political mort tunes of endangered democrats and might face less resistance on capitol hill. holder's -- holder explicitly denied thattthe mid-terms had anything to do with the timing but said discussions were ongoing. the white house had no comment. so the article goes on and discusses in quite some length about the 9/11 trial and the problems and figuring out what
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to do about it. and then while i was looking % this weekend, i saw some great news. this is from the "new york times" and this is exactly quoting from the "new york times" article, five charged in the 9/11 attacks seek to plead guilty. so they're going to plead guilty. great news in guantanamo bay, cuba. the five detainees charged with coordinating the september 11 attacks told a military judge on monday that they wanted to confess in full and a move that seemed to challenge the government to put them to death. well, that's great news, because we have this article on sunday saying the attorney general and this administration can't decide what to do about the trials great news, they're going to
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plead guilty. another quote from the article said at the start what has been listed as routine proceedings said they had written a statement from the five men charged or dated that they stop filing legal motions and %% announce our confessions to plead in full. great news. they're agreeing to plead guilty to confess everything. awesome news. awesome news. the date of this "new york times"' story was decemmer 9, 2008. the 9/11 plotters agreed to plead guilty to the atrocities regarding 9/11.
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ttey were not going to file any more pleadings. they were throwing in the towel. they were ready to be sentenced to death. and if you go back and look at this article, mr. speaker, it talks about how they're ready to accept martyrdom. isn't that something. they told the military judge they wanted to confess in full and ready to be put to death for their crimes. isn't that something snr and so they planned to stop filing legal motions and will plead in full. a strange thing happened on the way to the five 9/11 charged con expire ators the 9/11
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atrocities. this adminiitration took office a month after that story and said you know what? basically, in essence, you guys don't plead guilty. we want to bring this to new york and create a circus out of it put manhattan in great danger and probably cost them, one estimate was $100 million they don't have. trying to figure out how to come up for their budget right now. up, they will bring them to new york. they were ready for the big show. and now we're told that there will probably won't be a
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decision until after the november elections. they were ready to plead guilty. and now they have to wait two years because this administration wanted to jump in and make a circus out of justice . you don't do that. it's not justice when ou attempt to make a circus out of it. and i yield to my courtroom. i would allow one camera, remain in place. could not be moved and the moment i saw one juror look over at the camera, the camera was out. everybody knew the rules. had to be approved camera so all networks pulled from one camera- and the first one to file a motion to bring the camera, use the camera, were the ones that got to put the camera in there
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and everyone else pulled footage from those, because when you're talking about justice, when you're talking about court proceedings, you cannot talk about making a big show out of the trial. it's no longer justice, it's now a circus. and in the meantime, we have over 3,000 people who lost their lives in the 9/11 attacks. who see justice going away yet one more time. heartbreaking. heartbreaking. guys are ready to plead guilty as announced in this article. december 9, 2008 in the "new york times" and now we're talking two years later before you even think about, figure out
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what we're going to do. they were ready to plead guilty but for this administration's meddling with the third branch. and for those who think that te congress does not have the authority to create military commissions, i unnerstand their ignorance. there is a lot of it out there. but that's been going on for years. under the constitution, this body has the authority to creat+ ucmj, long before i was here, of course. buttthey did. and that's why the bush administration tried to create a military commission without coming through congress. that's not the president's job but the congress's job under the constitution. so when the congress came back
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in 2006, created the military commissions act, it was pertainly upheld because it was appropriate. and of course, in that bill, it peferred to those who were at war with america as enemy combatants, a term that's bben around for at least 70 years. that got hanged last year. we had an amendment to the military commission aat of 2006, the term enemy combatant has been changed officially in the act that president obama signed -- he didn't want%to offend these poor military combatants and they are now referred to under the billlas underprivileged alien enemy beligerants. that's where we are with regard
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to the /11 attackers, the 9/11 plotters. and if you go back and read the pleading filed by muhammad ann the four others charged that should have pled guilty in january f 2009 but for the intervention by the executive branch through the department of justice and white house, but for the meddling, these guys may well have already been put to death since that's what they were willing to accept and i just know that they have a very rude awakening awaiting them in the next life. but, unfortunately, that will not be experienced by them for some time to come. really tragic. .
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then we see not only the interference with the 9/11 plotters and the white house and the department of justice to -- and i don't know, maybe the name should be changed from department of juutice to department of procrastinated justice. because it should have happened by now but for this group. then we see in the gulf coast, seeing what continues to go on, video every second reminding us of that. the more we hear the more disconcerting it gets. we heard one of the all-time experts on global warming finally admit early this year that, well, actually, there's no evidence of the planet warming since 1995, and in the
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last few years it's been cooling, yes, the middle ages were a lot warmer in the northern hemisphere than it is here now, of course, i'm sure it's easy to remember from history the middle ages, the noo sir, all those folks, -- the norse, all those folk, they had high-powered automobiles creating global warming back in those days. but apparently, it was such a wonderful thing to this administration and to our friends across the aisle that british petroleum was onboard with global warming and they were going to -- they were going to make a lot of money in the carbon credit business, they were excited about it and they were the big oil advocate teamed up with the democrats in the senate and thee-- with this
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administration and so people wondered why this administration didn't come out much more quickly and condemn british petroleum. they were still hoping they were going to salvage their crap and trade bill. but they lso knew if their big ally, british petroleum, was not on board, then it might be more difficult to convince others that it was going to be such a good thing for the energy business. so they really didn't want, apparently they didn't want to condemn british petroleem too roundly, too quick, because they were still hoping to salvage a passage of the crap and trade bill and they really, at the time, thought they needed their ally, their very, very close ally, british petroleum and there was an article indicates that in fact senator kerry, on april 22, when the deep water ho horizon
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blew, that senator kerry was commmnicating with british petroleum about trying to get that global warming bill passed. things got put on hold, obviously, after that explosion took place. and yet still over 60 days later, the jones act has not been suspended, so the netherlands could come in as they had offered to come in. they have got some amazing machinery that would help with the separation that could build island barriers, save so much of the pristine beaches, and stilll the jones act suspension. obviously that was a bill to give protectionism to unions and certainly unions did not want to see that bill suspended but for all the criticism of president bush, within three days of hurricane katrina
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occurring, august 29 was when it occurred, septtmber 1 is when president bush had suupended signinged or -- ssgned an order suspending the jones act so that foreign vessels could come in and assist us in our time of need after hurricane katrina. over of days later this administration still has not done it. so i hear all the talk about we're doing absolutely everything we can, how about putting a signature on a suspension of the jones act. just do it 19 days like president bush did and you'll be able to have all this outside assistance come in. one of the things i've seen and this has been hard for me over the years, when somebody wants to come help me after i've had some family tragedy or something, i just don't like to accept -- i don't want anybody
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to put themselves out, but what we find out is, you have done something for somebody else, it blesses their heaat hen they get to do something nice for you. and you know, we have done some very nice things for so many countries as reflected in the ceeeteries all over europe and american soldiers that were been buried around the world, where they gave their lives, not so we could be an imperialist nation, because if we were, french would be speaking english, the netherlands would be speaking english, germany would be speaking english. but that was never our goal. japan would be speaking english. that was never our goal. it was a goal to bring liberty and freedom, bring the very gift that we have in this country to others.
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such a wonderful inheritance. the problem is, they were endowed by our creator with certain inalienable righhs, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. like any inheritance, any gift if you don't fight for it, then mean, evil people women take it away. so the jones act has not been suspended. and we have a fund that was created with british petroleum said we were going to dd it anyway and it sure sounds like from what we've been hearing, british petroleum deserves to pay a great deal more than that , but one of the great things the founders did was create ppthree branches of government. soothat when responsible party has done something wrong, you don't have the congress or the
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president come in and say, here's your fine, here's your fee, this is what you've got to pay. we don't have that. we have hearings and trials in court. and if you want to avoid having a long, drawn out trial process, then you can come in and work out a settlement agreement. and some companies have found out, after they've done wrong and harmed people, that they % actually end up better off creating a fund on their own, something that is acceptable to others so that they can be compensated for the harm that's been done without protracted litigation. that's all a very noble thing. having a fund supplied by british petroleum, that's a very good thing. but when you take it out of
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context of the three branches of government and that this is more a judiciary issue and you allow either the legislative or the executive branch to just say, here's what you owe. put up the money and we'll appoint our pet person here to dictate who gets what. then you've broken down the constitution. that's not supposed to happen. because the same president and attorney generallwho sit down with somebody at the very time that they are investigating criminal charges and they made a big deal in the media about investigating criminal charges, they said by the way, we're investigating you, it goes without saying, they said it all in the media, we're
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investigating you for criminal charges. we think you need to put this money up. the same executive branch that can dictate creating a fund like that, no matter how willing the health care bill is to put up the fund that same executive branch can say, by the way, why don't you just take the blame for everything. why don't you just take the blame for everything. let's don't even get into what the government may have done wrong, what the administration didn't do, what the department of interior didn't o, what our minerals management service didn't do, or the fact that we just made a big splash june of 2009 about a deputy assistant secretary coming into this department who worked ffr
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british petroleum ever since she left the clinton adminissration, january of 2001, and never mind that she -- didn't say why the language was cut out of the offshore leaaes that made, i thought it was hundreds of millions, but now apparent last tl billions of dollars for an employer, big oil, but it costs the federal treasury billions of dollars that went to big oil. let's avoid all that discussion about the cozy relationship between this administration's regulators and british pppetroleum. let's avoid all of that and you just take all the responsibility. there's a reason that an executive branch is not supposed to do that.
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it opens the door to abuse. in fact, the federal -- there are federal laws, ust like i'm familiar with state laws in texas, that say basically it's a crime far prosecutor in texas to call in a defendant and say, ppi'm not -- i will not indict you or i'll drop the indictment if you will put x number of dollars into aafund that i dictate. that's a crime. you can't do that. there's a reason that we have three branches of government. i heard someone ask once of the brilliant justice toon anyone scalia, don't you thiik the reason we've had more liberty in this country than any other
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country in the world is because of our bill of rights? and justice scalia, he's so brilliant yet so forthright he said no, and i'm sure my answwe will not do justice to his bu my recollection, basically, no. the soviets had a much better bill of rights than we have. then it hit me, i remember, i studied the soviets' bill of rights and they did. it was a great bill of rights. he said, no, the reason you've got more liberty in america is because the founders did not trust governmmnt. so they wanted to make it as hard as they could for government to pass any laws, to force anybody into anything, you set up three branches as the founders so that you couldn't just quickly pass a law. even if you did, you have an
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executive branch that is elected outside of congress so it's not like a prime minister where we eeect one of our own in here to be the leader, similar to a presiddnt, we've got an executive branch. and that's not enough. we set up a judicial branch that's appointed in the federal system so that all of these things would help create gridlock. today we hear people say, i'm tired of gridlock. the founders thought it was the best thing, the pest gift they could give is a way to -- the best gift they could give is way to clog up the government so they wouldn't rush in and make laws unless they were absolutely necessary. we've gotten away from that. it's gotten too easy, as we saw when the republicans in 2001 hhd the white house, the senate, spending started like
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it had before. compassion was equated to giving away money. whereas if you go back to 1995 when republicans took congress as a majority, finally, we started having a balanced budget because this body creates the budget and the senate hopefully agrees, and then you've got a way to control spending. . it's amazing to me that president clinton taking credit for a balanced budget. he didn't do it. the congress did. and in some cases, he was brought n kicking and screaming, but the republican congress balanced the budget. it wasn't until they got giddy by their own party and the white house that the brakes came off
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and spending increased so we had $200 billion in deficit in one year and that was so outrageous until this last year when it was over $1 trillion and this year as much as $1.6 trillion in one year. it's unbelievable and irresponsible. and now we read today in the paper that majority leader is saying they're givinggup all hope of passing a budget, too politically difficult. and as we heard one of the democratic leaders say in 2006 before they won the majority, if you can't provide a budget, you can't govern. a lot of truth in that. so we need to get away from the
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executive branch being the congress, being the executive branch and the jish branch. we saw that with the auto task force. thhs created the bankruptcy laws. bankruptcy is provided for in the constitution. wasn't really created until the early 1800's where the courts were created. and it was set up because the founders believed that apparently nobody, no business or body shouud ever be too big too fail because if you're failing, you can go through bankruutcy. and in fact, if you're too big to fail, it is absolutely essential that you go through
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bankruptcy and re-organ downsize so you won't put this country through that type of risk again because you are too big to fail and that's what we have seen with goldman sachs. they got even bigger. they should have been allowed to fail previously. well, there's a brilliant man and i didn't vote for barack obama in 2008, but i should have would vermont voted for thomas soul. his article says a lot. his editorial says here and just been posted this week. he says, building up the nazi
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ppmovement in 1920's, and i'm quoting. leading up to his taking power in the 1930's, he sought to activate, but did not normally pay much attention to politics. such people were a valuable edition to his political base since they were susceptible and had far less basis for questioning his assumptions or his conclusions. the idiots was coined to describe nonsupport is. and this is in an article. we do have wishful idiots who are heard to say, what we really need is for the president to be a dictator for a little while.
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back to quoting, the democracy needs informed citizens if it is to survive. in our times, american democracy is being dismannedlee+d piece b piece by our very eyes by the current strays in washington and few people seem to be concerned. president's poll umbers are going down because increasing numbers of people disagree with particular policies of his. but the damage being done to the fundamental structure of this nation goes far beyond particular counterproductive policies. just where in the constitution of the united states does it say that the president has the authority to extract sums of money from the private enterprise and distribute it ass he sees fit to whomever he deems worthy of compensation. no where. and yet that's precisely what is
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happening. and he goes on -- and i tell you, here's a reason we have to rely on the justice system because if we didn't have that branch of government that could be the final arbiter of disagreements between groups there could be people like me who have seen the damage rushing through the cheaper way to drill , seen the damage, the loss of lives, those whose lives are still in jeopardy because of the grave injuries, the damage to the environment. and i just drove from new orleans to panama city and there is anticipation of doom and gloom in so many places that those people -- the beaches are beautiful from panama city, through alabama through -- well,
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missiisippi. they're beautiful. but people aren't showing up at the beeches. they can at least come and enjoy them, but b.p. is doing an unconscionable thing. if we didn't have a justice system. if we back to the days of when israel once was and i was the judge, the tendency would be to -- for people to get horse whipped. but there is a reason we don't have a judicial dictatorship so one man can't say you ill be horse chipped. and there are good friends in the administration and inn+ the majority they thought they could do whatever they wanted and the president, senator kerry, the majority, especially in the
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senate, they took care of them. they didn't think if they did something this outrageous they would be thrown out of the bus. but we should not have one branch that does that kind of dictation. it's not good. it's not good at all. and then we have the problem with israel being accosted by its enemies and we are siding with the wrong people.%% i had a teacher who tookup with the bullies and she she sided with them who were bigger than the rest of us. and i'll never forget fifth grade, one of those guys took my brand new football i got for christmas and i went to get it back and my knows was bloodied
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but now, i don't run from a fight. and when the teacher was told by other students i wws trying to get my nose to stop bleeding and came into the boys' rest room and marched me in front of the class and said this is what happens when the little boys try to play with the big boys. well, that's kind of what's going on here. we have bullies trying to bully israel and we're siding with the wrong guys. we will have a price to play if this continues. israel has great value for human rights like we do in this country. if they were not in the middle east, we would spend trillions of dollars trying to protect ourselves in that area from the
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things that are growing right now with nothing more than a thank you. and yet, the u.s. voted to force them to disclose their nuclear weaponry, if any. you don't do that to friends. that's what hez a/k/a ya and isaiah told him it will be a a taken away. you don't show your enemies a defense because they will find - way to overcome them. i was just downstairs having supper with sean alexander who played football with allbama and was m.v.p. in seattle super bool, a reat guy, great guy, but he mentioned four veres of
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scripture and he said 30. . 19 and i'm quoting from the most quoted book. the first 150 years oftentimes our legislators were afraid to file a bill without having a scripture basis to back it up bbt sean quoted from the bible. i call heaven and earth to witness against you today that i set before you life and death the blessing and the curse so choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants and love your god by holding fast to him because this is your life and the length of your days that you may live in the land and give to him.
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he also quoted from matthew 5. 24 no one can serve two masters or he will hold to one or despise the other. you cannot serve god. you know, these days, some constituents get pulled away because they are torn. they'd like to serve the tremendous power in this country, torn between constituent service and power. and then in some cases we see here george sorros has made more money than anybody in this country because of british petroleum and all that has happened there and of course this country apparently gave $2
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billion to explore the deep exploration and make hundreds of millions for mr. sorros. i'm happy for anybody to make lots of money but sometimes people are torn between their constituent service or being part of a powerful team. people often gotten to move their vote. %% i was told that before i got here, one of the hardest things% is not when people come to you and say you are going to vote this way beeause most in this body are stubborn enough but get you to say come on, we thought yyu were a team player. we want you on our team. we want you as one of the good guys on the team and want you up on the team player thing. and so good people in this body in the senate, even in the judiciary apparently when they allowed the auto task force
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taking due process in -- or taking without due process by % our constitution, turned bankruptcy upside down, they commenced the judiciary to look the other way and let the constitution and bankruptcy laws be turned upside down. there are people who want to be part of the ttam, you know, and forget the constitution. and when that happens, we break down that so many have fought and died for to give us this gift. and when i hear my colleagues in the prior hour talking about how well the stimulus is going, i keep coming back and in the book "liberty and tyranny," the textbook is so good, he quotes the secretary of the treasury under franklin d. roosevelt in 1939 said morgenthau was testifying and actually, he wrote this, he said we have
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tried spending money. we have spent more money than we have ever spent before and now after eight years, we have an unemployment rate thattis just as high today as it was when we started and we have an enormous debt to boot. human nature has not changed much since the 1930's. when the government starts spending money, then ultimately you're going to have a choice, keep borrowing or printing and then ultimately you get into the position that the soviet union was in, you can't print it in or can't spend it enough so you have to go up and announce we are bankrupt as a nation and out of business. . and it brings me back, oh, and by the way, one other thing i want to mention, and this happens when you refuse to enforce the laws.
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we have a president ho decided he's going to impose a drilling monitorum and so the judiciary came in, considered the constitution, considered the act, reviewed all the executions for imposing it, said, this is arbitrary and capricious. you can't do this. there's no basii for doing a moratorium of all of these. you want to go after b.p.? he said -- he didn't say this, i'm saying this, you want to go after b.p. and make sure they're not cutting corners on other rigs because we know they cut them, sure looks like they cut them at least on deepwater horizon? that's one thing. but it on all the rigs -- but to do it on all the rigs, when there were violations for b.p. and in the saae period exxon and shell had one, there's a reason why you could justify doing that with b.p. rigs. but not all of them. so the judge struck it down. and here already today secretary of interior says he's appealing
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it. apparently he likes the idea of having one branch of government running everything. big mistake. and then, not only that, a lot of folks may not know, mr. speaker, but there is, as i understand it, under federal law, the right of the border patrol to come in to private land owners' land, up to 25 miles from the border, anywhere, any of our borders, to enforce our border. everywhere around the border they have that right. up to 25 miles, to come into private property. they if they need to enforce our border. lo and behold, there is one place they can't and that's on federally owned property like the national park in arizona. where apparently by 32 miles of border with mexico that's a park that has now been announced to
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be closed to american citizens because there are too many illegals going across that land and tearing it up and some have gotten violent and killed even border patrol, even law enforcement people in that area. we can go on private property to protect our border but we can't go on federal land? that's outrageous. and rob bishop has a bill to deal with that and so do i and rob has really done great research on this, has really been a leader in the area of bringing this stuff out. we got to do something. that is outrageous. we need defense and we need to give a 25-mile, at least, area for the border patrol to patrol and say, that's not going to be national park wilderness area because our border means too much. we got people wanting to come in here and destroy our way of life. but i see my time has got be
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shorter now. a lot of things i want to cover. there are so many people who do not understand, mr. speaker, where we came from and why there needs to be a firm foundation under this country.%% president harry truman, sooe may recall he was a democrat, he said this, the fundamental basis of this nation's laws was to give moses -- was given to moses on the mount. the fundamental basis of our bill of rights comes from the teachings we get from isiah and st. paul. i don't think we emphasize that enough these days, if we don't pave a proper fundamental moral background we will finally epup with a totalitarian government that doesn't believe in rights for anybody except the state. boy, was he prophetic. james madison, credit for writing the most in the
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constitution, he said this, 1825,,the belief in a god all powerful wise and good is so essential to the moral order of the world and to the happiness of man that arguments which enforce it cannot be drawn from too many sources, nor adopted with too much slisstude for the different characters and capacities to be impressed with. franklin d. roosevelt said, the skeptics and the cynics of washington's day did not beliive that ordinary men and women had the capacity for freedom and self-government. they said that liberty and equality were dreams that could not come true. you know they were like the people who of could haved at the 10 commandments because people were in the habit of breaking 10 or more of them. patrick henry said this, bad men
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cannot make good citizens, it is impossible that a nation of infidels and idol ters should be a nation of free men. it is when a people forget goo that tyrants forged their chains. so much, so much truth n our heritage. hm. i'll just conclude with this, thomas jefferson's own words, god who gave us life gave us liberty and can the liberties of the nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis and conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of god, that they are not to be violated but with his wrath? indeed -- i tremble for my
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country when i reflect that god is just and is justice cannot sleep forever. this government is not god and the only protection from those who think they might begin to be is the enforcement of the three branches of government and their separate powers and we've got to get back to that. to save this nation. with that, mr. speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back.%% the chair recognizes the gentleman from texas for a motion. mr. gohmert: mr. speaker, at this time i move that we do now hereby adjourn. the speaker pro tempore: the question is on the motion to adjourn. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes have it. the motion is agreed to. accordingly the house stands adjourned until 10:00 a.m. tomorrow.
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adjourned until 10:00 a.m. strip. in 2007 the state department designated a terrorist organization, forcibly seized contrrl of gaza. hamas continued to refuse isra's right to exist and perpetuated terrorist attacks launching countless rockets from gaza into israel. hamas calls for the elimination of israel. and jews from islamic holy lands. no hamas leader publicly expressed a willingness to disarm or stop attacks on israel or israelis. israel, like very other country
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in the world, has a right to defend itselwith a sworn enemy on its border, israel must protecter citizens against pontial attacks every single day. under the blockade, israel directs ships to tte port of ashtat where they are inspected for arms or other dangerous úúems before israel allows off loading and assists in the delivery of legitimate goods to gaza. we know israel's concerns about arms transfer to gaza are legitimate because both weapons and raw materials are smuggled into gaza through tunnels ffom the sinai and egypt. thousands of rockets and mortars have been fired from gaza into &&rael over the last decade. just last week israel has shown signs of compromise, announcing its intentions to ease the blockade, allow more civilian &-ods and humanitarian aid to enter the palestinian territory
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by land, including construction materials for civilian projects. it is important to note that hamas has made no such compromises and continues to maintain its vehement and violent stance gainst israel's existenc hamas also continues to endanger gazaivilian population by using hospitals, schools, mosques and residential neighborhoods as command and operation centers or as weapons storage facilities. while hamas claims to be the popular representatives of the palestians in gaza, their actions show that they hardly care for the plight of the averagg gazan as their deprive their own people of democracy, civil rights and freedom. the best way to ameliorate that and to fix the broader current crisis and to prevention future onns is an israeli-palestinian
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peace and the creation of an independent palestinian state that lives side by side with israel, providing security and economic stability for the palestinians and the israe people. today it is israel who continues to acknowledge the necessa framework for any peace agreement. israel as shown willingness for direct negotiations. the palestinians continue to >> president obama has ordered general stanley mcchrystal to the white house on wednesday to discuss a magazine article in which the general and some of his staff made derogatory remarks about addinistration officials, including the president. in a few moments robert gibbs tells eporters that general mcchrystal future will be announced after tomorrow's meeting. after that, reaction from senator john kerry, chairman of
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the four relations committee, followed by the state department briefing that focused on the comments by an article in "rolling stone" magazine. in a few minutes, president obama's comments about the meeting tomorrow afternoon. now, robert gibbs at the white house. >> has the president spoken to the general about this yet? >> he president has not spoken with general mcchrystal. i think you'll know that general mcchrystal is on his way back to washington and will take part in tomorrow's planned afghanistan meeting in the situation room. as the secretary's statement said, he was recall the back to washington to speak to pentagon officials and the president
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about the remarks made in the article. >> what about the president's personal reaction? >> the fisa to sayythat our combat commander does not usually participate in these meetings from washington. the president has asked for him to come back to explain those remarks and that is what he is on his way to do. >> in the story they are quoted as ripping on the president's, the vice ppesident, etc. how can the president leave the job with someone who offers that much insubordination? does he plan to fire them? >> let me say ttat there are 90,000 brave men and women in afghanistan. what we owe hem is nothing our best efforts to get a new
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strategy in the country. that is the present focus. that should be everyone's focus. that was worked out in longow,%- confrontation last fall and last winter. the president went around to many of the people in the situation room, asking them if they agreed with the strategy and asked for their commitment. again, that is what we know the men and women who are fighting over there. again, the president will speak with general mcchrystal about his comments and we will have more to say after that meeting. >> is mcchrystal's jobs saved? >> we will have more to say
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after that meeting. >> [inaudible] >> i would obviously say that peter has served alongside and withhn a valuable economic team that has faced the greatest economic crisis than any president has faced since the great depression. did he is an enormous task. peter has been instrumental in, for instance, this year's plan to freeze and non-security discretionary spending for three years. he has decided to leave before we get into the creation of the next budget. he haa been here for two
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budgets and we are looking for a replacement. >> will there be any other departures? >> i know of no other departures. obviously we're looking at a number of talented caadidates. the remarks in the story aser critical and as insubordination? >> i think the president is looking forward to speaking with the general about these remarks. >> can you characterize the president's reaction at all? "obama clearly did not know anything when they first met." disappointed? >> you will have his undivided attention tomorrow. >> did the president dispute the characterization? >> the president looks forward to speaking with him tomorrow
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about what is in that article. every member of this team, from the commanding general to anyone that works from this building, throuuhout the pentagon, we owe it to those people to implement the right policy. without a doubt, general mcchrystal has made an enormous mistake. a mistake that he will get a chance to talk about an answer tomorrow to both officials in the pentagon. >> does the president still have confidence that the general can run this war? >> we should wait and see what the outcome will be. >> why has the general not talk to the president yet?
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with the general not be the first person who would pick up the phone and he would apologize directly to them up >> general mcchrystal has not called the president, the president has not called general mcchrystal. the president asked the general mcchrystal, and they will get an opportunity to talk about this article face-to-face sometime tomorrow. >> does the president not want to hear from him right now? >> they are having that >> will they be alone in that meeting? >> i do not have a timeline for that meeting yet. >> the this agreement is not over policy, according to the article, but moreover the personalities in impact policy. does the president make a distinction as opposed to beeng
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on the same page with policy? >> i will say this, i think that the president believes, most believe, that personality differences aside, we are here to implement a new strategy, put together over theecourse of three months and 12 meetings in the situation room. it is our job to implement that strategy. the president does not believe that personalities, whenever your disagreements are or were, strategy to get afghanistan right. the president talked throughout the campaign and throughout the time that we created this strategy in the sstuation room
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that the war effort in afghanistan has been under resource for years. now there are on the order of four times the number of troops in afghanistan. or there will e, i should say, coming into the country on a pace laid out. it is incumbent upon anyone differences. there are disagreements here in the white house. in every foreign capital throughout the world. it is of -- an incumbent upon those in the policy-making world to set aside the differences and implement the decisions that the commander-in-chief has made in conjunction with both military and civilian officials. >> is removing the general from his position an option? >> again, i will not prejudge the meeting.
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>> with the president not know ahead of time that is an option he is considering? >> i would say that all options are on the table. >> last year there were a series of options -- meetings going on in the situation rome, with is not be a firing offense? >> again, i think that the magnitude and grave nature of the mistake here are profound. the president took everyone to task less " let -- last year for, as you said, coming out of those meetings. saying that there's a reason they are not had in starbucks. they are in the situation room.
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he takes this seriously because we have life-and-death decisions being made to put people in harm's way. we owe ii to those men and women, some of whom are serving their third or fourth tour in afghanistan or iraq, we owe them our very best. >> if mcchrystal were of so vital, would this be such a the decision? >> i think that our efforts in afghanistan are bigger than one person. i think that there is a strategy that was born out of discussions on the military in civilian side. we said this about iraq and afghanistan. there is not a military solution to this problem.
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in marginaa. this in our efforts if a government structure cannot be created to secure it, ou cannot transfer. this is bigger than anyone on the military or civilian side. >> how would you describe the president's reaction? was he surprised? >> i gave him the article last night. and he was angry. >> [inaudible] >> angry. you would know it if you saw it. >> as mcchrystal offered a resignation? >> not that i am aware of. again, he issnot with -- he has not met with the pressdent. not that i am aware of..
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>> pulling a general off of the battlefield in a war, is that not tantamount to expectations? >> i will nottprejudge exhortations. >> what is the purpose for calling him here? >> to see what in the world he is thinking. >> is there a certain aspect of this serving as a shaming function? >> this goes far eyond the president, let's be clear about that. will have the manifest for you, there are other people involved. we have a diplomatic corps that is sending civilians in to create a government structure i was speaking of. as i said, we have men and women in all levels of the military involved.
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discussions that have, i assume, general mcchrystal will be having them with more than just the commander in chief. >> [inaudible] >> spoke clearly to that. >> what bothers the president most about what e read? >> that we are distracted from what the president considers to be an enormously vital mission for our country and armed forces. we are at an important time in seeking to make progress in a country that we have been in for a number of years. we have dedicated, as i said, more men and women to this
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effort than have ever been dedicated before. and we have got a lot of work to do. our focus should be on that work and on implementing the policy, creating a security and governance of the environment that allows our good men and >> when the walter reed scandal broke in the washington post, secretary gates fired the people involved. when live nuclear weapons were actively put on an air force base, secretary gates fired the people involved. why would you want to have general mcchrystal in the white house and not have this handled by the secretary? who has shown himself willing? >> this is a decision that will
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be made by the commander-in- phief. as i said a moment ago, this is an enormously important message and this is an enormously important time. i think that the president believes that the general should havv an opportunity to discuss with him. >> one more thing on that. general mcchrystal already had his woodshed moment wiih the president. how many times can this man be taken to the woodshed by the commander-in-chief? >> we will know more about that tomorrow. >> robert, you have spoken a couple of times about what is owed to the people serving over there. what should people put in harm's way of their commander taking
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these shots at the commander-in- chief, the vice-prrsident, general jones, ambassador-barry and others? >> i think that anyone that read that article understands, as the secretary talked about, what an enormous mistake this was, given the fact that mothers and fathers all over this country are sending their childrennhalf way across the world to participate in this. they need to know that the structure where they are sending capable and mature in
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people who are the targets of this criticism will be around a table. will each one had a chance to call him to task? >> you all may know more about calls that he has already made on this to different members not. it is hard to speak about what the interaction would be like for that meeting since it has not happened. >> you said the parenns of soldiers need to be sure that the command structure in afghanistan is capable and mature enough -- did i hear you correctly? so you're questioning whether or nnt general mcchrystal is capable and mature enough foo the job the has -- he has? q and you had my quote right. >> you said he was angry. but i was wondering in the larger sense, was the president's anger more having to do with the comments about respect for the command --
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respect for the chain oo command? i don't know that i could focus like a laser on particular aspect. i think we're probably read the article and you could guess there are a number of pointssin which anger might be your reaction. maj. -p>> does it matter to the president that general mcchrystal has apologized and is making these other calls to try to remedy the situation? >> sure. >> in what way will it affect the president's decision as to how this strategy can go forward? >> obviously the president will get an opportunity with -- to speak with other members on the team about confidence in the structure that they have. and again, i'd just do not want to prejudge theepresident's conversation. that is not fair to the president, and it is certainly not fair to general mcchrystal. >> but the president has taken note of that and it will factor
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into his consideration? >> absolutely. >> does it matter to the presideet that president karzai today through a spokesman said that he would like to can you to work with general mcchrystal in the theater and that is the operations and can are and elsewhere go forward? >> is important that president karzai have confidence in the entire team. and i think many people enjoy, at a number of different levels on that team, good relationships with president karzai. >> so what would not be inaccurate for us to assume that from the president's perspective, general mcchrystal 's capability and maturity are now open to question? >> i think there are open questions based on actions that reported in that article that the president seeks to speak to general mcchrystal about.
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>> one of the underlying themes of the article, separate from general mcchrystal's more controversial comments, is the frustration that rank-and-file soldiers have with the rules of engagement and the frustration -pof deallng with the realitiesf trying to prosecute the counterinsurgency strategy on the ground on a day-to-day basis. separating mcchrystal from that analysis and that theme in the article, how concerned is the president about that, that rank- aad-file soldiers find themselves -- if they are being accurately represented in this article -- trapped by limiting and constricting rules of engagement? >> i have not spoken with either the president or the team on that aspect of the article. i would simply surmise it is something that -- has been and will be discussed in the past and in the future. i will say that we know what
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civilian casualties do to the mission. we know what happens. and you have seen general mcchrystal, could seen ambassador eikenberry, you've seen others -- you have seen the president speak about the anguish of knowing that innocent civilians have been killed in these battles. and again, we know the effect that it has on the population, which already believe -- which does not believe that the insurgency has their best interest in mind. so i will say that great care has been taken -- and use otten marjah -- great care is being cut -- and you saw it in marja
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-- great care is being taken in prosecuting a war that does not population sympathy towards those we are trying to defeat. >> does the presidenttat all feel betrayed since mcchrystal is there because the president decided he would be there and largely backed mcchrystal's recommendations for the counterinsurgency strategy? >> i would simply sum it up as i have before in saying that over+ the course of many weeks a strategy was defined, refined, and develop, and that each member of the team pledged to implement and agreed with that strategy. that is what we want anybody from the ambassador to the combat -- the combatant commander, to anyone else involved in this to ocus on and focus on alone. >> after the review last year, one of the things you all
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stressed is unity of purpose and consensus that you all had reached going forward. given both the general's comments, but also the sort of sense of dissension and agreement that the article for trade among various players, are you convinced that that kind of consensus still exists? >> i can only take the word of those that sat in the oval office as the president went around person to person. >> bout was a lot of months ago. >> i understand, it just happened to be at a fairly pivotal moment at the point in which the president lays out a decision for straaegy and asks those involved, do you agree with my decision and do you pledge to implement it? look, i am not speaking out of school to say that there are disagreements in this building probably every hour of every day about what to do and when.
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>> if you could tell us about more of those on a regular basis. >> but it is the president's job to make those decisions and is our job to implement them -- not phree litigate them, but to move forward based on what the president has decided. >> that was many months ago, the times have changed. is there a concern that something needs to happpn to make sure that the folks that are now pursuing this are still on that same page? >> i have -- the president gets in his presidential daily briefings, in weekly memos from the combatant commanders, from the ambassadors, and weekly meetings with the secretary of state and the secretary of
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defense, and no one has walked into any of those meetings, and no one has written in any memo that they disagree with the decision that agreed with -- that they agreed with late last year. >> the briefing that he got with karzai and the senior officials today, i take it mcchrystal had already departeddand was not part of that meeting? >> that's correct. this was a regular -- this was a regularly scheduled svts with president karzai. >> when you described the president, and giving the article and he got angry, had he read the whole -- were you with him when he read the whole article? or was it based on your highlights? >> he hhd heard something. i do not remember him -- about tte existence of this article. i walked the article over to the residence last evening. he came back to the oval office on a couple of occasions. i was not in the room when he
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read the article. i'll go here and then i will come here, don't worry. >> whom did he talk to last nine other than you about this? who did he call or e-mail? >> obviously general jones, the chief of staff and many members of the national security team. judy has he talked to or heard from many of the leaders of the nato countries? >> the only call the we have done today is with president karzaa. >> you said that general mcchrystal had not called the president and the president has would he have expected general mcchrystal to try to call him by now? >> no, again, i think given the fact that we haveerequested he come back for a meeting, let's ssy a meeting in lieu of a call, how about that?
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>> briefly on the svts call, did the subject of mcchrystal come up? >> i believe president karzai -- i've seen certainly the comments from his spokesperson. i don't know if that separately came up as part of the svts, but i can certainly check. >> robert, thank you very much. you said the president was angry and that you would know it when you see it. the problem is we have never seen it. can you elaborate a bit more. >> are you lucky? can you elaborate? >> i am not going to elaborate. >> just to clarify, you doo't believe mcchrystal was in on the karzai briefing? >> he was not in on the svts. he was either preparing for or on a plane back here. >> if you have not had this big meeting tomorrow, with the president have called him back annway? >> yes.
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>> will he meet with the president privately in the oval officc separately? >> that is my understandingg i do not have time for that. my assumption and i did not have a full conversation with scheduling right before i came out here, but the distinct impression i was given was that that would be at some point tomorrow. >> that portion of the white house briefing focused on remarks by general mcchrystal and "rolling stone" critical of the administration. senator john kerry reacted to the article before hearing before the senate armed services committee. >> the hearing will come to order. i want to take a minnte as we start to respond to remarks made by general mcchrystal and his staff and a magazine article.
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i had a conversation with general mcchrystal about half an hour ago.. i emphasized to him that i think obviously those are comments that he is going to have to deal with with the vice-president and the security staff. i have enormous respect for general mcchrystal. this is a critical moment in afghanistan, and as far as i am concerned personally, the top priority is our mission in afghanistan and our ability to proceed forward confidently. it will be up to the president of the united states as commander-in-chief to make the decision as to whether or not he and his national security staff will be able to do that. my impression is that all of us would be best served by backing off and staying cool and call,
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and not sort of succumbing to the normal washington twitter about this for the next 24 hhurs. we have troops on the front lines. we have a major mission that we're in the middle of, and the prioritiee are best serveddby letting the president and his top general have their conversation and make a decision how we proceed forward. >> p.j. crowley says general stanley mcchrystal has apologized to call eikenberry for his negative comments. this is five minutes. >> richard holbrooke is and kabul today. he had meetings with u.s. and afghan officials as part is his regular travels in the region
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