>> representative loretta sanchez was on this morning's washington journal to talk about the threat level in the u.s. after the killing of osama bin laden. >> "washington journal continue" . host: democrats laura sanchez joining us. when issues are services committee and the other is homeland security. t's start with our services and your oversight of people involved in the raid. what's your reaction to the job they did? guest: i had the honor of being the chairwoman for the subcommittee last year. let me just say that they did an awesome job. remember that we have used different special forces in different ways. everybody remembers the black hawk down situation, where things did not work out. these are troops very

specialized, special slls, we really invest in them, they are training all the time. we have them in a lot of places in the world ready to go into action if weeed them to, hopefully, into situations where we can calm down the situation can and make sure democracy is alive and well and that people are doing well. to take this little elite group and to do that, and to marry them with what we have been doing for a long time in 15 years i've been in congress in particular and on our services committee, marry them with the cia and get everybody to work together to go in and able to do this very discreet task and to make it really happen the way it did. kudos to all of them. host: let's move on to the communications in the event by the whole team and the administration. the story has become clear about

the circumstances. do you believe the administration did the best job it could in the communications surrounding this? guest: listen, it is always difficult. we were not there. even at this point, the perceptions from everybody of what went on, everybody wants so much information right away. we are in a 24-hour news cycle. everybody's trying to get information. people are making things u sometimes as we go along slovaks' -- along so that they can fill this appetite for information. we need to try to understand what actually happened during that hour's process of what was going on. not just the decision-making capacity. by the way, i give kudos to president obama for being so strong and forthright in

deciding to go into this in this manner. but, also, for u to talk to those people who were there, to debrief them, and to sort of put together the whole thing. remember the adage of the 10 blind men who are touching a piece of an elepht th and they all think that it is something different depending on where they were touching. when we get the opinions, the perceptions of what was really going on by each of those people involved, we can, hopefully, together if what that elephant looks like. host: i want to ask more questions about this, but we want your calls, comments, questions on two aspects of this. osama bin laden operation itself and the implications for homeland security going forward. our guest is loretta sanchez. the phone numbers are on the screen. also, you can tweet or send us

an e-mail. we will have the information below the pictures. the big story on every newspaper today is the decision by the president yesterday not to release the death photograph. is that the right decision? guest: it is neither here nor there for me. we always get caught up inhe details. people always want the details. the reality is the most important thing for the united states is to figure out what went on, why bin laden was there, what is our relationship with pakistan, what do we do about afghanistan, if anything? this whole situation, this precise, surgical type of situation, i think carter is back to why we have 120,000 conventional troops hanging out in afghanistan if al qaeda is perhaps a dozen people in afghanistan? for me there are so many larger

issues that we should grapple with and try to move forward because it is costing us lives and it is costing us a lot of money in the current situation that we are. so this ability to get osama bin laden and we did that is at the top of the list of how do we begin to phase down what congress approved almost 10 years ago in let's go after him because he did was wrong on 9/11. an photograph, i'd think, is incidental king. host: the president gets kudos from pace that's often critical of him, the wall street journal editorial page.

-- we are beginning to have folks wh undero stand i go through the treasure trove of materials. here's this little item from this morning. are americans more danger because of possible reprisals after the death? guest: there are a lot of groups loosely affiliated with al qaeda.

there are people who just want to do us harm. they might look at this as an opportunity to go after americans. the fact is you have to look at the last 10 years. they have not been successful, terrorists. we have really cut the legs off of al qaeda. we have to acknowledge that, celebrate that, and move forward. no, i don't belie it means we are in any more danger than we were before. in fact, it points to the fact that we are becoming very effective, the fact that we were able to go in and get osama bin laden even when some who or may be helping us supposedly might have known where he was. this was very effective. this is the first piece of puzzle, to figure out what to do with the rest of the war on terror. it's not just a celebration for americans. anybody who believes in true government by the people, any

type of democracy, whatever that might look like, if this is great for nations and peoples around the world. host: when you mentioned people supposed to be helping us, i assume you are referring to the pakistani. guest: yes. this is a house that supposedly was eight times larger than any other home in the neighborhood. the house is closed to the west point of the pakistan people. a lot of retired military and retired isi, like the cia, in this neighborhood. you get this house with 12-18 foot walls and barbed wire and

why would not someone say i wonder who lives there or what is going on there? i believe we have a lot of information. this treasure trove will be important. one last thing that i think is important, there were several options given to our president about what to do. clearly, a very risky oion was to go in as we did. but there will probably not two main reasons that he chose that. thank god he did. the first is that we wanted to confirm to ourselves that we had gotten osama bin laden and we have done that. secondly, this treasure trove, this ability to gather this information so that we can really be much more effective in protecting the world, that is incredibly important. if we had bombed him, as some in the pentagon and other places advocated, we would have lost

thatreasure trove. host: the lead in this story -- let's take telephone calls, beginning with one from florida. mike a democrat. you are on. caller: the democrats quickly turned to independent -- as a

democrat, i am quickly turn intondependence as the day goes on. presentative sanchez, i always see you on c-span debating. i love virtually every word out of your mouth. as far as what is going on now, i need to remind tthe american people. all these people that are supposedly our friendsnd we turn them into our enemies to create the reason to go to war. i will remind everyone, nine months after september 11, al- walaki dined at the white house. so now he is after us and he is basically getting my safety. everyone knows that osama bin laden was a cia operative in the 1980's working against the

mujahedin the last president, president bush, why did not vote for, his father's business partners were bin laden's partners. on september 11, if they were missing at the carlyle group to discuss the actions. if it is a little bit more than fishy. host: a response? guest: in a lot of ways i agree with the things you were same. let me just say that just as afghanistan is important to us, so is pakistan. if to jump on the bandwagon and dismiss that somehow weave no need to have an interaction with pakistan, it is not in the best interest of us as americans.

politically, pakistan is an important country. as a nuclear power perspective, it is important to pay attention to. more importantly, said the main reason why we need to have an engagement with pakistan has is that we do not want it to become an area in which terrorists are training to come after americans, or american soil. it is an important relationship. is it a strong relationship? are they in our corner? absolutely not. just as i would set afghanistan, and some of our partners. if you have heard me, you know i have been critical about where we should be. certainly, disgaging, without any relationship, it would make our life more difficult as we

try to make our future safer. so, i appreciate your comments, and, believe me, i am not a roll over on this. if you know my positions, you know i have been an advocate about what we are doing spending our blood and our treasury in afghanistan, and i appreciate people that think, reid, and rm opinions. it is always great, and never black-and-white. host: another mike in canada. an independent. caller: i had a question with regard to giving upivil liberties in order to be more secure. i have contacted the gsa in response to -- tsa in regard to this question. i understand the need to screen everybody more thoroughly before

they get on the airplane, but what goes to prevent somebody from detonating a bomb while waiting to be reened, or outside of the airport termina it looks like bells and whistles, because it does not really make us more secure. host: do you travel regularly between the united states and canada? caller: i live in the u.s., and travel somewhat frequently. host: there has been an increase in the documentation needed. you now have to use the passport. why has it been like compared to last yr's, traveling? caller: the paperwork is not so much an issue, rather than i am presumed a terrorist, rather than probable cause.

i do not feel like giving up my civil liberties to be more safe. guest: thank you for the question. i am one of those who believes that when we give up our civil liberties, the terrorist has actually won. one of the great things about being an american is the history of civil -- civil liberties. you're looking at somebody who voted against the patriot act. i did not like my mother listening to my phone calls when i was a teenager, so i certainly do not want the government list in. i care about my civil rights, and the civil rights of americans. i have been one of the people that have been placed on the terrorist list at some point. luckily, i was able to get myself off because it was a mistake. i travel the airport all the time. i'm a californian who comes back and forth to washington, d.c.,

every week. we have had incidents. for example, lax, in front of the israeli airline, a shooting happened on the curbside, and people were going to get in line for the process. yes, we have to be vigilant in so many ways. if we cannot capture erything, do everything -- it is too costly. yesterday, we had a mass transit hearing in the homeland security committee and the house ofepresentatives. how do we keep people safe? people get angry when police make you go around and not stop and wait at curbside airports when you are waiting for your wife or somebody to come out. there are so many things we do to limit as much as we can the probability of these things happening. if we cannot do it 100%.

i will tell you this, and maybe this treasure trove will tell us again, that these terrorists are fixated on airports, passengers they love to blow up airplanes. as long as we understand that, we will nd to continue to figure out what is the best way to protect the travelling public. host: "the examiner" looks at the response in a los angeles.

host: one of our viewers the high twitter asks -- guest: again, it is a matter of resources, and giving up civil liberties. the answer is, and i believe, remember, i represent the anaheim area, where we have dizzy -- disneyland the convention center, i have my mighty ducks there -- so, the aner is i represent an area that are any given day has an influx of tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people. so, we worked very closely with local law enforcement because as we saw on 9/11, they are the

ones that have to figure out what is going on on the ground and alert us to things that might be coming. i mentioned that yesterday we have this hearing on public transit in the homeland security committee. one of the things that struck me -- i mean, i was dumbfounded -- that had transit cop for chicago said to us that anything we have done on securing public transit in chicago has been paid by the federal government. not $1 has come from a local level to do that. he said 100% of the security they have for public transit has come from the federal government, and yet if you look at our budget, and what people are advocating, they are doing away with the money we give to a place like chicago to work around securing our public

transit. so, what is it you want? if you want us to bring down the federal deficit, but at the same time, we want people to use their local chicago line, or the subway in new york, and yet if we look across the nation, most of the money is used to sit around how we sort things on public transit, and those are being cut by the -- caught by the republicans. host: the president is in new york today to lay a wreath on ground zero. he did invite george bush. here's what the tabloids look like. host: we're talking with reesentative loretta sanchez of california, who is a member of the armed services committee and homeland security, about some of the implications of the

weekend operation. the next call is ralph, republican. caller: i'm hopingo get an honest answer from a politician, stranger things have hapned. it was any of the information used to get osama bin laden gathered through enhanced interrogation techniques? why are democrats sending grief without giving bin laden miranda rights, or giving him rights to turn himself in or surrender? if you say it is not -- it is for the safety of the soldiers, that is not what you said in the bush years. you said you need to give them their rights, and here, you're of democratic president, shot him without giving him a chance to surrender. how do square with that, how are

you so gleeful, and how you change your viewpoint on that 180 degrees, and not even bother your conscious? guest: that is the question. fino my record, in no i am not so gleeful, and i am one of those democrats that have said we do not need to read miranda rights to people we pick up under the war on terror. you might have to check the record of the person that you are talking to would be the first thing i would say to you. more importantly, the execution, as you called it, of bin laden. there are tw things we know that bin laden said to the world --, i will never be taken alive. when somebody says that to me, that says he is predicting that he will fight. the second thing that he said,

not once, but various times, is that when he would be caught, he would have a strapped bomb on him, and he would take anybody who tried to get him out with him. those are given facts. so, if you are a soldier coming in, in the dark, with chaos going on as these things happen, and you see bin laden there, in row, or whatever it was that he was wearing, and you do not take serious the fact that he said i will have a bomb strapped to me, and i will take out people -- by t way, the congress, in their issue with respect to 9/11 and their affirmation of the war on terror said that heas part of the combat, and when we did that, --

when you're a soldier, in combat, you have a right to shoot in that manner. is not for us to second-guess what is happening there. that is why we have to wait for the fact spad that is why we have to see what everybody says and understand more what is going on. in a time where seconds matter, and minutes matter, i will alys be on the side of my soldiers judgment. host: "the washington post" has a profile of the terrorist hunter. as you look at him, this is what they say. one of theost experienced hunter in the u.s. government had kept it in for the mission two months earlier.

he had overseen weeks of intensive training for a covert operation that could strain the alliance with pakistan if it went awry. the surge was ledy the cia, which eventually appointed to the all wall compound. when president obamaave the authorization to invade the site, cia director leon panetta delegated to the man who had been preparing for this moment for much of his career. g tel i had -- guest:. guest: i have the opportunity to be that committee. if you look at some of the comments i have made, i was not for the conventional troop increase that president obama did in ahanistan.

i truly believe that a land- based ar, military -- yes, we need some of that, but that is not the wave of the future. actually, if you look at what we were trying to do -- remember, i have been on this committee for 15 years. when we began, when of t things that we wanted to do, and i was critical, but there was the transformation process in the military away from the land- based army sitting in germany, and going away from that, bringing troops back, reach transitioning, is figuring out where the new conflicts would be rejected the soviet union, the middle east, -- the soviet union, the middle eas -- and this entire strike fighter situation, where we are going in

more strategic, and we have gone from investing two billion dollars a year, to almost $10 billion in the time that i have been there. we have more staff. we need a modernization. some of that started when we got into iraq and afghanistan, and some of that was slowed down because the money and the effort has been so focused in these two places. that is one of the reasons i want to see us wind that up so we can concentrate on what our military should look like in the future to protect us and our allies. host: elizabethtown, n.c., david, an independent. caller: i think the whole thing is a hoax. they did not really killed bin laden. if they did, they would have more pictures of him on the

tvnd everything. the things they do and say -- our government has been falsified documents for years. host: so, there would be no convincing you, even if you saw pictures? caller: now. they didn't even get a body. host: thank you, did. let me get one more caller in. marx, a democrat, pennsylvania. caller: he is absolutely right. they got the wrong guy, they did not want to admit it. they brought the body, and deep-6ed, and then this been a began. think about the information that is out there.

host: two skeptics guest: i will tell you this today, -- two skeptics. guest: i will tell you this today, outside and knows that bin laden is dead. we have blown apart their network by getting this guy, and i am very confident that we have, and sometimes you cannot convince some people, but the realit is it was a good day for the united states and the free world. now, we need to moves forward and figure out how we dismantle the rest of the loosely-knit, somemeeld high, and some others [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> republican congressman gohmert on the role of interrogations of guantanamo

guantanamo detainees in the u.s. operation to kill osama bin laden. host: opinion piece in the "wall street journal" by an intelligence analyst for israeli newspaper. he writes, the elimination of an organization's leader tends to paralyze the group in the short-term, but it sometimes results in the rise of an even more dangerous successor. guest: sometimes it's true and sometimes it's not. time will tell. as an old history major and someone who studied military

science and in the army for four years, that could go either way. but in this case, i would humbly submit that when you have a leader who has been as powerful as bin laden has and you take that leader out, you have done a very good thing. host: relations with pakistan. during the break, pakistan warning the united states no more security actions inside its country without their involvement. what is next with our relationship there? guest: if there is a high value target there and let their intelligence people know, the high value target will not be there. and you also have to look at it

from the leaders of pakistan's position. if the people of pakistan thought for a moment that they had given their permission for us to come in, then they would probably be in deep trouble and there might be riots in the street going after them. so, of course, it does them the favor if we do something like that without talking to their leaders first. and if bin laden's replacement ends up being right by the same compound, you have to go in and do the exact same thing and not tell their intelligence sources. but you have to go back to what president bush said, and i think -- and i applaud president obama after 4 and-a-half years of condemning bush for not getting u.n. approval and big alliance working together, he realized to do this, it has to be on your

level. so it was a great moment for the president coming to the realization that the condemnation that he made for 4 1/2 years was wrong and had to do it on his own and we have to do it if it comes up again. host: will it cause you to scrutinize any differently the money the u.s. provides to pakistan? guest: i have an u.n. accountability bill that says anyone who votes against us half the time in the u.n. shouldn't get financial assistance. they are sovereign countries. we don't have to pay people to hate us. they can do it for free. when you look at what has been done with that money, it causes great concern. it won't cause me heightened scrutiny beyond where we are, i have had concerns all this time.

guest: this was an interesting post. guest: gaddafi doesn't recognize other murderous leaders and it makes sense, especially if you're a crazy leader like gaddafi has been, you recognize others that are similar. it doesn't surprise me at all. i didn't realize that, but it

doesn't surprise me. gaddafi knew he was dealing with a guy in bin laden and would come after him as surely as he would get another american. host: email us and tweet us for questions. writing in the "wall street journal," from guantanamo guantanamo guantanamo to abbottobad. guest: we don't know the rules of engagement. normallyr you go in and take out the bad guys. if the president's order to them had been go in and do all you can to take them alive, they would have done that. but those details are unfolding

and we don't have the full story. and in fact, the white house keeps changing the story that we're getting. eventually we'll get the full story and we'll know. perhaps we may have lost valuable intelligence. obviously they said they got a treasure for the computer guys. i would imagine from some of the intelligence that has been publicized now, they got flash drives and figured out how they were communicating. i have not heard in a classified briefing since, but tom clancy does great research for his books and there were indications in the public knowledge there were some that would put messages and photographs and then you send the photograph through the internet and you have the software that takes out everything in the photograph that wasn't messaged. there will be all kinds of information we will be able to glean from that.

do you think bin laden was going to tell us a lot. maybe if he had been waterboarded but since that wasn't going to happen from this administration, i don't know we lost a whole lot. host: what are the one or two questions you would like to have answered around this event? guest: was there an order to kill on sight, don't bring him back alive. we don't want that kind of circus or was the order to do what you can to take him. i'm really curious about that, what was the president's order. i have nothing highest praise for the seals' teams and become friends with some of the members of the seals' teams. my cousin's son just finished seal training and so proud of him. i have got no questions for the seal team. they are the ultimate professionals, but i would be

curious to know what was the order. host: post headline on this story. host: let's go to the phone calls from nebraska, sam on the republican line. sam, are you there? queens new york, this is richie, independent line. caller: i just want to say that the information that they are going to gather is much more important -- host: turn your tv down. that is causing feedback for you. caller: it's much more important because they should work like -- oh. host: i'm going to let you go.

keep your tv down. guest: sounded like he was going to say there was going to be more information from what they got there and that will be true. they will be going through that information for some time. host: we had a tweet and discussion with congresswoman sanchez that the kind of action here should replace boots on the ground that we are currently using in afghanistan. guest: in afghanistan, the more troops you have, sometimes the more you create problems for those gathering up against you. in iraq, though, the surge worked. but it is obvious that afghanistan is entirely different country and so tribal. it is so different from iraq. i have met with some of the

warlords from the northern alliance who we use to take out the taliban originally, i didn't realize until i met with them, we made them disarm after it appeared the taliban was initially defeated. i would love to see us rearm the northern alliance and they would love to see that, too. we have been indirectly negotiating with the taliban and negotiating with pakistan and afghanistan and basically is what they were telling us that they heard, if you let us out next year without big incidents, then you guys can divide this up and the northern alliance that allied with us and defeated the taliban, they know what that means, they and all of their families will be dead. so they would like to be rearmed. i think loretta is right. we could reduce the number of

troops we have, but get back into the role we had originally when the taliban was defeated. let the northern alliance take out their natural enemy, the taliban, for us. they did a lot better job than we have done since we took it back over from them. guest: next call from texas. marty -- mary is a republican there. caller: good morning. mr. gohmert, i am one of your constituents and i'm 80 years old and my husband is 83. we are on social security and medicare. and there is talk all over the place about taking away our medicare and social security. i wanted to know if you are one of them who is going to take it away from us, that's what we are hearing from the democrats. and there was a $500 billion taken out of medicare. and we paid 96 .50, where did

all that money go? >> it's going into the general treasury, just like social security tax money is. we should have had a law that said social security tax monies had to go into the social security trust fund. it never happened. there has never been one dime of real money in the social security trust fund and should have happened and i think it's irresponsible that we never made that happen. as far as taking away your social security and medicare, that is a scare tactic that one party sometimes uses against the other. but i know the republicans are in the majority in the house and we are absolutely committed that if anybody, anyone over 55 will not have their medicare changed, will not have their social security changed. so you don't have to worry about

it. and i hope to see you soon in texas, but don't worry about it. please don't lose any more sleep over it. we're in control in the house and we made it very clear, we aren't going to let that happen and especially to someone who is 80 and 83 like you and your husband. as a former judge, it was called the doctrine of promissories top ell. when promises are made and someone acts in reliance on those promises to their detriment, the original party should be made to keep their promises. the government should be and i believe we will keep our commitments. we will not break those promises though those already on medicare, medicaid or within 10 years of getting there. host: call from maryland, a democrat. caller: i have to praise your

intellectual integrity. you are being very objective. number two -- guest: are you talking about when i spoke with boehner last week and how upset i was with him. caller: you are serving the public the way they should be served. it takes a lot of courage to do that. number two, and this is real. i have been involved in special ops and i'm retired now. as far as this -- let's put it this way, when a redskin defensive player is looking at the dallas cowboys, they know every move and tendency that romo has and if he gets that pass off, you failed. and with mr. bin laden,

left-hand dominant and 6' 3" and of a certain age. for someone who is a special ops person, that is pretty easy to identify. he is moving away from you going to a location that you know nothing about and supposedly running upstairs and who knows what is up there. you are responsible for that team and you have to take prudent action. end of story. and the other thing i want to mention, boots on the ground versus this and that. i have been in special forces, there are two missions, one, direct action, which we saw. number two is to be a force multiplier. so we need also, which we have done, to train some of these other troops in other countries

and you can see an example where we have professionalized those armies. you see what we have done with the egyptian military where we professionalized them and they acted pro professionally and weren't doing what the libyans did. guest: they fall under the control of the muslim brother hood, that professional army we trained in egypt could come back to bite us. host: there has been reporting about yesterday's exchange with the attorney general. i hear the headline.

guest: f.b.i. has been working on this and got valuable information back in 1993 and continued up through the 1990's and then through the next decade, very valuable information gleaned. there was a treasure trove of documents, i believe after a couple were arrested photographing going across the bay bridge and had a subbasement with lots of documentation in it. more documentation has been found, but the bush administration began the prosecution based on all the information had been gleaned for about 15 years. initially there was a hung jury, but they persisted on and got all 108 counts guilty verdicts of all 108 counts against all

five defendants. and the bush administration in 2004 had decided that they weren't going to pursue the unindicted co-con spiritors and there was a motion by some of the unindicted co-conspiritors to have their names stricken. the attorney general in dallas fought that and did a good job and the judge came back and said there's plenty of evidence that has been produced to show that unindicted co-conspiritors. they are joint venturers. so he refused to strike the name from the pleadings and we had word from some people within the

justice department that it was a political decision made not to pursue the remaining unindicted co-conspiritors and that was something we were pursuing with attorney general holder and he seemed to think that the claim, even the question was baseless as to there being political motivation. but when you look at some of the evidence that was produced, one of the unindicted co-con spiritors of north america. deposit slips, money going to fund terrorist activity. there's all kinds of evidence. there are boxes of evidence that haven't even been translated yet and it's interesting if you go to the white house's web site, you can find remarkses recently

by the deputy national security adviser at the all dulles muslim society wherein the first paragraph of those remarks, he thanks the president of the islamic society of north america and he also applauds him for the wonderful prayer that he gave last year at the ceremony at the white house that the president conducted. we have the president of an an unindicted co-con spiritor that they were in involved in funding trim not only -- doing prayers for the ceremony.

we have a problem. we've got some foxes in the hen house. we find out that the f.b.i. has been getting advice from muslim brotherhood from cair itself. the two people that started cair, all sorts of evidence that they are funding trim, have funded terrorism. and yet they are advising the f.b.i.? it wasn't until 2009, a year after the convictions that the f.b.i. finally issued a letter that they were suspending their close relationship with cair. something has to be done and the attorney general didn't take kindly to my inquiries, but this is a problem that needs to be addressed. we don't need to have

ununindicted co-con spiritors coming into our defense department giving them advice how to deal with the muslim brotherhood and lead prayer at the white house and that's a problem and that's one i get concerned about. host: chicago, fred is up next, republican. caller: good morning, congressman. you made a comment that this full story will come out about this story about osama bin laden. governments always withhold information. we never got the full story on peril harbor or uss liberty, kbd kennedy assassination and this is along the same lining. it's obvious to me that the pakistani government was involved with us with respect to this action. and i don't know why that hasn't

been brought out. guest: don't you acknowledge -- now, both sides have said they have not involved. maybe they were, maybe he they weren't. you recognize how bad it would be for the leaders of pakistan to admit to those people who are out on the street rioting against the united states taking such action. it would be a real problem for them. you do acknowledge that, i'm sure. caller: there is a quid pro quo because that's the reason why the body was done in a muslim burial and all done with the cooperation with the pakistani government. there was something awry, we would be calling for the aid we give to pakistan to be withdrawn. nobody has done anything to withdraw aid from pakistan. guest: i hope we can address that more effectively. but none of us know what the conversations were between the

president, but if i were to put myself as best i could in the president's position and of course i can't ever be president because we won't have a bald president in my lifetime. twation is too important. you have to have hair. but as i put myself in that position of trying to be objective and i was going to notify pakistan since we know they had already warned how value targets before, it would have been at the last minute. and i would have said, we are coming in. and let me tell you, if you do anything to warn them, then you are our enemy and we have to take actions against you, because you are harboring terrorists that have killed americans and so it's up to you, but if you take those actions we will have to go to war with you. and i would have made that clear

so pakistan would not interfere and we can go after our target without them interceding. if that's the message, that is it. i wouldn't have wanted pakistani help. our guys are too good. if you have seen their training. i was in the army, but i have known lots of special forces folks, those guys are so good, i wouldn't want pakistani assistance of any kind. just stay out of the way. host: next caller is jennifer a democrat from kentucky. caller: good morning. how are you today? first thing i want to bring up to you, i don't know if you recall or not back -- it's been a few years back is when bin laden, he would go from different places and take children and he would tell the families they were going to take

them and give them a good education. but when it came down to it, he was teaching these children terrorism. i don't know if you recall that or not, but i do. and also, too, about the picture of him being publicized, i agree with them not showing it for the simple reason it would put our soldiers, jeopardize things, you know, even here in the united states, i believe that. guest: there are pros and cons, as a judge in murder cases, we would have to make a decision go, and i made it many times, will the picture shock people's conscience that it would overcome the probative value and

that's what the administration had to decide. did they consider, weighing all the things, be more prejudicial than they would be helpful or probative. they made the decision it would be more prejudicial. i would lean toward wanting to bring those forward. we have already made people mad that are going to be mad just by killing osama bin laden. i don't think we make that any worse by showing the picture, but i haven't seen the picture, so i don't know. there may be things in there that would create a problem, and if so, they would have made the right decision. host: have you been in any classified briefings this week? guest: i have been in the briefing and everything i have read and heard, nothing to contradict in classified

indicates he did a marvelous job. but obviously, we can't go into anything that was discussed in a classified briefing, but i can tell you, i didn't hear anything in the classified briefing that i hadn't already read in the internet. host: reuters did post photographs of the others in the compound that were killed. those who are interested in seeing it. guest: obviously, they're in pakistan and there is capitalism at work. host: this comment from d.f.w.. guest: i would agree. it would have been nice to have

the body, but here again, they didn't have time to make the decision, hopefully they had thought about it in advance, but she's right. if somebody is buried at sea, it's going to be really tough to have a shrine because you don't know where it's going to be. host: one rebuttal, i agree, but they need documentation to prove his death and not give him an islamic burial. guest: that is a construction taposition by the administration. you can go on-line and read statements by the administration, he was not a true muslim but a treat to muslims, not an islamic leader, because he had so perverted the koran and its teachings, that was the mantra for so long so it is a bit surprising. the viewer is right, bit

confusing to turn around and say, even though we are saying he is not an islamic leader and perverted the koran and its teachings, we are going to treat him like an islamic leader. host: we go to was appointed by governor perry to complete chief justice of the court of appeals in texas before coming to congress. curt, an independent. caller: god bless america. is texas still on fire? guest: it is over two million acres that have been lost to fire. caller: how about gaddafi? did we get him?

guest: doesn't sound like we have, not at this point. have you heard anything, susan? host: no, i have not. guest: you would be seeing scrolling news bulletin here on c-span. host: are you a supporter of our involvement there? guest: not yet. there is no question, gaddafi is a bad guy. he clearly has been responsible by preponderance of the evidence. he is a bad eye. but before you participate and put american treasure and american lives on the line to take out one guy, you really need to know who's going to replace the guy and are those people going to be worse. we don't know that yet. we do know that some of the people that are trying to take him out are part of the al qaeda

, muslim brotherhood. looks like they have a shot of taking over where mubarak left over in egypt. make sure that somebody worse is not about to come in. that is exactly what happened in iran that has got us over 30 years later still having to deal with iran because we got rid of one bad guy, the shah and replaced him with the ayatollah. host: jack, republican from georgia, you are on. caller: mr. louie, how do we feel about being in america this week? guest: i feel like i'm blessed to have been born and live here,

something i didn't deserve to be born here and only thing you and i can do about that, we can't go back and bless those who blessed us by allowing us to be born here. we have to do it for the next generation and that's what i'm scared to death we aren't doing a good job of. caller: i'm a veteran of the 1960's and there has been covert actions forever and there will always be. and without them, you know, -- we were beginning to look like a wimp nation and i'm glad to see we are doing something to try to get the respect back when you have these rules of engagement when our boys have to stand there. guest: you're right. this operation to go in and get bin laden turned out like the fiasco in iran under president

carter, it would have been devastate ink and assisted in the recute recruiting for al qaeda and thank god. host: we are getting tweets saying troops home from afghanistan as soon as possible. do you think there will be more cries from congress about that? guest: there is a lot of talk about that. and i think everybody's in favor of it. what i'm still in favor of is what i have been in favor of doing all along and that is getting weapons back in the hands of the northern alliance. i know karzai is not crazy about that, but he has been totally fair and it is a tribal country. get it back in the control of those who can deal with the taliban and bring our people home, have some advisers there as we're withdrawing, because that is going to be a hotbed and

make sure there are people who want to hurt us. host: redirect the money? guest: you can pull down the money to a great extent. host: there was a piece we showed actually earlier this morning guest: that was one of the ways we were losing the war against terrorism and actually bin laden in one of his statements was pointing it out, that they were able to take a very small amount of money, bring about 9/11 and his hope was they could bankrupt america by how much we were

having to spend to address the little investment they made. host: was it not the strategy with the russians in afghanistan? guest: exactly the strategy and worked with the russians and we don't need to continue to pursue that trap. host: ohio, matt, a democrat. running out of time here, sir. caller: i have one to ask you, we are sending all these billions of dollars overseas to pakistan and afghanistan and they are supporting the people who are against us. well, we are supposed to be going bankrupt, why do we keep borrowing money here to protect us and just say the heck with them countries. quit giving them the money guest: i filed u.n. accountability act. if you want to vote against us and be against all the things we hold dear, that's fine, you are

a sovereign country but we don't have to keep paying you to hate us. they can do it for free. host: last caller from florida, dale. caller: i want to congratulate our military, they are angels and don't get half the credit. and i want to say i highly respect you and your -- a lot of what you say. but on this, on one area, i would like to say, general petraeus has been right on the money and he is a good money and if he says we should keep things calm because of our troops, he most more about what's going on at the time than i think all of us do. and like i say, his judgment is great and i would like to go with his judgment, too. but i respect you in a lot of your beliefs.

i really do. guest: petraeus is one of the greatest generals we have ever produced in this country, but one area that i have a profound disagreement on, i have not heard anything about the koran burning in florida and then the day of rage in afghanistan where innocent people were killed. i think it's atrocious that the koran was burned. i would feel the same way about the bible and the flag. in 2005, there was documentation that one of the goals in the u.s. for the muslim brotherhood is to subvert the first amendment to slia law. we have subverted the first amendment to shria law. i don't want to see that happen. host: thanks for being here. [captions copyright national

cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> c-span's congressional directory, complete guide to the first session of the 112th congress. district maps and committee assignments and information on the white house, supreme court justices and governors. order online. >> c-span's comprehensive resource on congress has new features has made it easier to find information, daily schedules, full list of members, committee hearings, plus video of every house and senate session and progress of bills and votes. take a look at the congressional chronicle. >> house armed services committee chairman buck mckeon spoke about defense spending and said that the obama administration's cuts to defense spending poses a danger to the

nation and general electric plans to continue developing an engine for the joint strike fighter. and that the decision could save the defense department money. >> we are happy to have him with us this morning. so on behalf of the heritage foundation, i welcome all of you. three years ago, we decided to focus our activities every may on the importance of national defense and the armed forces. this is not only, of course, the month of memorial day, but when the defense authorization bills are front and center.

we wanted americans to take the time to think more seriously about what our military forces need to secure our land, lives and liberties for far too long, they have had to do more with less. throughout protect america month, we will share a bright line on this situation for congress and for america. and we do have a jam-packed month. as the calendar we have prepared will show you. i don't know if we have them available, but on the back of it, we have all the activities for the month of may for protect america month. in addition to today, we will host events with donald rumsfeld, general peter pace, senator kelly and representative allen west and others. we are shoing papers on our national defense challenges beginning with one by senator jim talent you will find outside. we posted a new protect america

month page on our web site, so you can find the information, including the activities i just discussed and join the conversation by finding us on facebook and twitter and keeping up with everything at heritage.org/protectamericamonth . just a couple of housekeeping notes, if you would like to ask questions, jot them down on the index cards that we passed out and pass them to the aisles and we will use them also with any questions we get from our web site and we will get to as many questions as we possibly can. and finally at the end, stay seated as the congressman did he parts. now it's my pleasure to welcome back to heritage, congressman mckeon, member of the house of representatives and chairman of the house armed services committee.

i don't think anyone on capitol hill has been more on point and more cogent about the troubling state of our military forces and nor is more any more concerned in funding them. as he wrote in "usa today" right after the president announced his defense cuts, and i quote, there are no consideration of threats, of deterrence, logistics or capabilities or the effect such cuts would have on our three wars, our troops and our national security. chairman mckeon is a much needed voice championing much needed defense at this critical time and knows what america needs and what our soldiers need and it's not sacrificing security to spend for other programs that are spent by the federal government. he has been speaking about this for a very long time, of course, but we would like to note a very

powerful address he gave at heritage last year. the chairman has been fighting the good fight in congress since he arrived in 1992, after serving as the first mayor of santa clarita and served on the house education and work force committee and the subcommittee for 21st century competitiveness. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming congressman buck mckeon at heritage. [applause] >> thank you very much, dr. holmes, and thank you all for your patience. it's unfortunate, but we do get to vote. and we do take that obligation fairly seriously. good to see my former colleague. you are here at the heritage now, right?

good move on both your parts. thank you for what you're doing for defense and for holding this series. i don't think there's a better way to open your protect america month than by offering congratulations to the team that took out osama bin laden. to successfully attack an enemy on his home turf, that is not an easy thing to do. their professionalism and courage brings great credit on themselves and the united states of america. ronald reagan was a big fan of soviet jokes. so in that spirit, i would like to honor president reagan and give our british allies a pat on the back. from what i understand, this is a true story. during the cold war, the soviets treated the black sea as their private territorial waters and

the british, who saw the world as their territorial waters, sent a squadron of destroyers into the black sea on a patrol. a russian commander radioed them and said, tell us what you are doing on the black sea. the british replied, about 20 knots. >> in the spirit of that, i would like to borrow an old army phrase, the world is at a time of momentous up-al. for the first time, american dominance is being challenged by credible actors, whether or not we are in a period of decline is to be determined. but i gee with adlai stevenson's wisdom, if the world stumbles,

if we stumble we chose to fall. we have a choice. we can keep leading or start following. but leading from behind is not a practical foreign policy. i commend the president for his leadership on the bin laden operation, but his leadership in other key areas has been scarce. it's my sense that white house defense decisions are putting this great republic on the fast track for decline. the logic has been simply baffling to me, expand our military commitments while cutting the funding for our armed forces. that, ladies and gentlemen, is a recipe for disaster and decline. mr. obama has been called the post-american president. during his tenure, american exceptionalism has been called into question. our role as a stabilizing, unifying force in the world has been doubted. we have flinched from positions

of responsibility as the global order tremors. and i use that term not in a slogan style of political campaigns, but as it exists on the tongues and in the hearts of the oppressed. today the peoples of the middle east are standing up in defiance of tyranny, filled with hope that their nation can change. since our founding america has been the beacon of light for these movements, our military, the torch bearer, new england minutemen defied a monarch, union soldiers freed the enslaved south, g.i.'s liberated europe from a facist tyrant and kept watch over western european democracies while starring down the soviet empire and democracies square off against tyranny, the battleground is all too familiar to us, the middle

east. with our military engaged in three different theaters of combat, it is important that our nation remains guarded and strong. it must be our top priority to field the forces and the hardware necessary to stave off even the most unlikely of contingencies. the arab spring is rot with both prize and peril. the danger to our nation is real. yet during this unpredictable up-al, this momentous shift, the president announced one of the largest cuts to our armed forces in history. let's look at another historical lesson, this year we honored the 20th anniversary of the gulf war. a contingency in the middle east that few had anticipated, blossomed into a multinational effort to protect an innocent

population from a brutal dictator. some of this might sound familiar. at the time, saddam hussein had the fourth largest army in the world. his troops were salty veterans and equipped with the latest soviet-made weapons. saddam promised the mother of all battles, 100 hours after meeting american and allied ground forces, the army was, in the mother of all retreats. the stunning coalition victory in the gulf war was no accident. it was a result of the courage and cunning of our troops, leadership that believed in a strong american role in international affairs and fighting forces that went into combat with the best equipment, the best training and the best leadership in the world. consider the lesson here. throughout the 1980's, our end strength was built around the

threat that never materialized, but when trouble popped up unexpectedly, our forces were strong and well equipped. we ship half a million troops to the persian golf in a matter of a few short months all while keeping our gloves up in western europe. victory was swift and absolute. i liken this to ronald reagan's famous bear in the woods campaign ad. in it, a menacing bear is portrayed as unpredictable and therefore dangerous. the point, and it is a relevant one even today, is that the unpredictability of warfare means our republic must be vigilant and it must be strong. if unpredictability is a threat, we live in dangerous times. technology has empowered individual actors to commit horrific acts of violence. we saw that on september 11. new powers like china are

rising. old powers like russia are rejuvinating. our two oceans are no longer sufficient to protect us. new avenues of commerce and communication like space and cyber space allow determined adversaries to bypass our defenses. the spread of missile technology allows small regimes, previously never a threat to our way of life, to do great harm to our republic. not only has our traditional means of defending ourselves been tossed out the window, the very nature of waging war has evolved so rapidly, there is no way of anticipating how the next major conflict will look. when making your new year's resolutions, those of you in this room, how many of you anticipated that the tue neician government falling or the egypt and government. who predicted there would be a no-fly zone over libya and

innocent civilians gunned down in the streets. we are walking into the future blindly ignoring the lessons of our past. president obama should share my concern about staving off american decline. if he does, they are not reflected in his policies. as we prosecute three tough wars in the middle east and humanitarian relief in japan, as we rely on weapons, weapon systems long past their prime, as we learn about new threats to our life, our daily life, president obama has announced plans to shrink our military that can only be described as historic. 20 major weapons systems have been cut since he took office. more are on the chopping block. we anticipate losing thousands of soldiers and marines. that one really concerns me.

the navy's fleet is almost half of what it was almost 20 years ago. the air force is flying airplanes with an average life of 30 years. with equipment that's falling apart and the war entering its 10th year, the strain on our troops, can only be described as severe. today's military is composed of young men and women who willingly answered their nation's call. they were not coerced into combat. they heard the trumpets blast and they answered. your average soldier is more likely to possess a high school diploma or some level of college education than their civilian counterparts and more likely to come from america's middle class. they have volunteered knowing that america was at war. though these fighting men and women have much to lose, they are willing to risk all for their family, their faith, their friends and yes, their flag. but a decades' worth of conflict

has taken its toll. during the cold war, an american soldier was expected to hold the line against the soviet union. that was it. today, their missions have multiplied. some of our officers and n.c.o.'s and men and women have deployed to iraq or afghanistan five times in the past decade. and a deployment cycle dictates for every year a soldier -- every year we ask a soldier to fight in the middle east, they spend two years with their families. unfortunately, we are still trying to hold up our end of that bargain. i find it disturbing as combat stress takes its toll on the force, the obama administration has announced plans to cut end strength in numbers that must be counted in brigades. i supported president obama's surge into afghanistan and i continue to support his strategy. i refuse to vote for any legislation, however, that will

increase the stresses on our overtasked and overdeployed fighting forces. if the president expands the military missions, he must expand their funding as well. these amazing men and women deserve no less than our full support. aside from the wars, our military is expected to faithfully discharge a number of new, demanding duties. we ask that they guard the seas, protect our computers from hackers, aid in humanitarian relief across the globe, protect our assets in space and deter aggression from rising powers. to ask them to accomplish these tasks with old equipment, with weapons left over from the cold war, while separated from their families every other year is simply disgraceful. a young army cook noted that a well-fed soldier is a happy soldier. i believe that wisdom applies

elsewhere. a well-equipped soldier who knows his family at home is being taken care of is a happy soldier. and i will ensure that our troops carry out their duties, the rug sacks are full and spirits are high. i will cut -- fight any effort by the president to unnecessarily increase the burden on our brave servicemen and women. my remarks are not intended to be all gloom and doom. there is a way forward here. a way to be responsible stewards of the taxpayer's dollar without hallowing out the force. cutting military items wholesale given the challenges i have laid out is irresponsible and dangerous. let's be honest. in $530 billion defense budget, there has to be room for savings. the pentagon is going to need to do some house cleaning. that's just the physical reality

we are facing. but any savings that is identified by the defense department must go back into defense, not to health care, not to social security, not to cowboy poetry, and that's a real one, by the way, and not to any other pet project the administration deems a higher priority than our security. i want to thank the heritage foundation for leading the charge on identifying efficiencies without compromising our security. you provide a valuable and credible voice to a debate that requires seasoned, strategic thinking. this is the heart of our approach to this year's authorization act. we are crafting a smart piece of legislation that focuses on spending taxpayer money wisely without sacrificing military

capabilities and i will give you a few examples. the first is an issue near and dear to the heritage foundation's heart, ballistic missile defense. missile defense is an important part of homeland defense but getting it right means spending our dollars wisely. the president's budget request calls for $800 million over the next two years, a joint american and european missile defense system that has a poor record of performance and will never be deployed. heritage has been a proponent of this joint effort, but the program is broken. here we need to harvest what benefits and savings we can and direct those resources to more urgent priorities, including the ground-based mid defense deployed in alaska and hawaii. the only defense we have to defend our homeland against long-range missile attack.

the defense department has plans to temporarily halt the bradley and abrams tank. the defense industry cannot be turned on and off like a light switch. shutting down production and starting up at a later date costs more. this is a no-brainer. with ground forces heavily deployed in iraq and afghanistan and the threat of i.e.d.'s very real, increasing costs to decrease our fleet is foolish. we plan to fund both these brouks lines in fiscal year 2012. this will spare the pentagon expensive shutdown and startup costs. keep a robust labor force working and provide our troops with modernized arm oured fighting vehicles. there is a great story from world war ii on what our strategic acquisition strategy

be. an aide said there was a vehicle that was sturdy and fast and general marshal said ok, do it. that's a little different than the way we do things now. that vehicle was the jeep. and the army built more than 640,000 of them and we still see them around. we have another important acquisition program coming up, the next generation bomber. the air force and my committee are approaching the development. first, the new bomber will replace the b-1 and b-2 and probably the b-52, so it can be procured in sufficient numbers to meet our strategic needs. second, it focuses on the integration instead of invention, of new technologies. most of this is classified but i can tell you we are building a sturdy, capable platform that will do one thing very well, penetrate enemy air defenses to

deliver a lethal payload. we'll continue to upgade the bomber to fit new missions and new strategic needs but those upgrades will happen overtime to alleviate costs to the taxpayer. there is the general electric engine for the joint strike fighter. i don't want to bore you with the details, so here's the bird's eye view. 2,000 joint strike fighters. to help soften costs, the pentagon originally planned to have two engines built by a g.e. rolls royce team and pratt whitney team who would compete for new production and sustainment contracts. history has demonstrated that these competitions enhance performance and reduce costs. with our future air superiority depending on the joint strike

fighter program, that struck me as smart planning. unfortunately, the pentagon recently decided that a second engine is wasteful and canceled the program. the original engine built by pratt is wrought with cost overruns. the g.e. engine is 80% complete and already performing well. if finished, it could drive down overjall joint strike fighter price tag by billions of dollars. that is significant. i'm curious how protecting a monopoly for a program that will span decades and cost $400 billion is in the best interest of the taxpayer and sounds like penny-wise, pound-foolish strategy that has hounded the pentagon for years. g.e. and rolls royce are knowing about the problem. they decided to be part of the solution. instead of lobbying for the

final 20% needed to finish the engine, the g.e. team has committed the funding the engine for fiscal year 2012 on their own dime. i will accept and support their approach. they believe in their engine and they believe in competition. thanks to their willingness to compromise, we'll bake up a monopoly. potentially harvest billions in savings while fielding a more capable, morrow bus fighter jet all at zero cost to the taxpayer. that sort of acquisition reform from the defense industry should be rewarded and applauded at every opportunity and i thank g.e. and rolls royce for coming to us with a smart, viable solution to a tough problem. with the future of u.s. security on the line, there are two paths we can take. we can adopt president obama's plan to cut $400 billion from the defense budget. this won't dent the deficit and

doesn't address the real federal money pit, entitlements. but it will hit the pentagon and the troops hard. they will lose certain exarktse and the ranks will be thinned. secretary gates recently said after trimming $78 billion from earlier this year that we were approaching the minimum level of defense spending needed to maintain our global commitments. we are projected to fall below that figure by an average of 7% each year for the next 12 years. that's the obama plan. or we can roll up our sleeves and get serious about oversight and reform and can work the defense budget with a southern california pell instead of a sword and securing the blessings for our children and grandchildren if god forbid america does stumble. if we lose our way, historians will ask, was america pushed or did america fall.

my challenge to you is to ensure that question never has to be asked and never has to be answered. the heritage foundation has sounded the trumpets blast on smarter defense spending. continue your good work. continue to offer your sage advice to congress. let's work together to ensure president reagan's shining city on the hill burns bright for future generations. 20 years ago, our nation liberated kuwait and won the cold war. america appeared invulnerable and tyrants trembled. a decade's worth of peace followed. let us stand up and be strong again and let us meet the security challenges of the 21st century with the determination and resolve that has littered our history with the remains of dictators and let this republic stand tall once more, to protect our liberty, to preserve our

prosperity and to pledge to the world that america will always lead. so that america will always be free. thank you. [applause] >> in your view to adequately fund our troops in fiscal year 2012 and beyond, in terms of the budget. >> i don't have a specific number. i do know that as i said, we have cut 20 programs in the last couple of years. some of those maybe should have been cut. i would have hoped that, for instance, the expeditionary fighting vehicle, we have been

working on that for 20 years, why did we wake up one morning and decide we couldn't afford it. i would hope we do a better job of planning ahead and buying to fit our needs rather than working on something for years knowing that we can't afford it. we had the navy in a hearing recently and they were talking about the future ballistic missile submarine that has 24 missile tubes and they were happy that they were able to report that by cutting four of those missile tubes, they could save $1 billion. the costs of the submarine is still not affordable and not going to be in our budget. i guess my solution was well, see if we can cut four. how about if we cut 24 or what if we just cut out the submarine? i mean, how far do we need to cut without knowing what our real needs are? my problem is that i think our

budget has been driven by financial needs rather than by our defense needs. i think we need to find out what the mission of the military is, what do we really expect them to do and then fund it accordingly. >> the second question is from -- actually two questions from inside the air force, but the second one was on the second fighter engine, which i think you answered. the other is do you have any details on the $400 billion that president obama wants to make and how much of that will actually be pentagon money? >> no. all i know is the president gave a speech and said we want to cut $400 billion out of defense. now, the secretary, a year ago, asked the services to cut $100 billion, find efficiencies within their services that totalled up to $100 billion and

said you will be able to keep this for things you need more. they later came back and said, you will be able to keep 70 of it and use $28 billion to pay for must-need things that you have. and when he presented that to us, he added that he had found another $78 billion we could cut over the next four years that would result in cutting the army in the fifth army, the army and marines by 47,000 people. and he went on to say at that time, this is a as far as we can go. any future cuts would have to come out of manpower and the president after that gave the speech for cutting another $400 billion. i just think we are on this downward trend, cutting without -- that's a great question because why do you come up with a number without first saying what is the need, what are we going to expect our military to

do, what are our defense needs. that's why i say it is driven by the dollar rather than the ultimate need by what our defense should be performing. >> next question is on the same theme, pretty much stated a different way, a number of people are arguing that now that the wars in iraq, the war in iraq is winding down and with the expectation that it could wind down in afghanistan as well, given the fact that the president has said there is a troop timetable for withdrawal, there are people talking about another peace dividend, same thing after the cold war and going back, sometimes references to the vietnam war, this is a time for our major drawdown, peace dividend, spend it on social issues and things like that. i think i know what you are going to say, but could you address that argument? >> nobody wants peace more than i do.

given a choice, we would want a nice, calm, peaceful world. but i have lived long enough that at the end of world war ii, we sent all the troops home. few years later, korea, we lost a lot of people needlessly because they weren't prepared and didn't have the equipment, training and leadership and lost a lot of people needlessly and then vietnam. and after each of these, we run our military down. president obama made a very courageous decision the other night to go after osama bin laden. i'm sure in his mind he probably remembered when carter sent our forces out to rescue some hostages and the helicopters couldn't fly. we have come a long way since then, but we have started hallowing out the military. i have seen it after every conflict and war we have had. first time we are cutting back

the military during the war. what was the question? >> peace dividend. >> ok. that's a wonderful thing and i think everybody understands that if you're not fighting a war in iraq, if you aren't fighting a war in afghanistan, if you are not providing a no-fly zone in libya, there should be money saved, i agree. but people should understand after a decade of fighting in iraq and afghanistan, we have chewed up a lot of equipment and there is no money in the budget for reset. and we look at probably $100 billion to do that, to get them back to the point where their equipment is capable to move forward again. so, i think that that needs to be considered. and then i think we can talk about a peace dividend. i don't think, though, that we should -- our military -- i carry around a little thing in

my pocket here that i think is important to know. when i came to congress, we had 76 army brigades and now we have 45. that is less than 20 years ago. we had 82 fighter squadrons and now have 39. we had 360 navy ships and now 154. grant it, the ships we have now are better than the ones we had 20 years ago, but a lot of them are the same ones and numbers do count. we have 19 ships right now in japan, 18,000 people helping in that effort over there. it's important, but if that's part of the military mission, then that ought to be figured in in our defense budget. so -- >> you mentioned the failed mission under president carter. we have a question here, whether or not there is any evidence that you know of that the helicopter accident in the raid

in pakistan had anything to do with the overuse or lack of training? is there any evidence that this had anything to do with -- >> no. no. they trained very well for this mission and the equipment that they have now is very good. there was -- i don't think this is classified, but when the helicopter came in, the wall surrounding the compound was very high and pitch black and waited until it was totally dark so they would have had the best chance of success. the back of the helicopter hit the wall. the second problem was there was about a 15-degree difference. they had the helicopter fully loaded and the difference in temperature has to do -- depends -- the lift of the helicopter

depends on the temperature. and when they came into hover so they could fast-rope down, they couldn't hold the hover and that is what happened. it was not a mechanical failure and not a problem by the pilot. just a little miscalculation on the temperature. we couldn't know all of those details. >> i think we have time for maybe two more. which of the 2012 presidential front runners had defense spending as a priority. in the republican party. >> that would be trump and [laughter] >> romney had 51 and trump had 49. we have so many candidates that are out there.

i haven't spoken to all of them. i don't even know all of them and there may be more coming tomorrow. but i do know -- i spoke to mitt romney and he was exactly in line with the things i have said here today. so i know he feels strongly about rebuilding america and he's very, very strong on not apologizing to the world for america. >> last question. during the debate on the new star treaty, there were a number of people arguing that we needed to modernize our nuclear forces as part of that treaty, and that was pretty much the ongoing consensus for people who voted for it. could you tell us what you can about the progress in terms of what the congress is going to provide for funding for nuclear

funding after the new star treaty? >> i think senator kyl is the lead voice in the senate and fighting for that modernization. in the house our subcommittee chairman of strategic forces is mike turner and he is the one that leads the effort on missile defense and does an outstanding job and i know he has put money in this year's markup to buildup our missile defense. and i think you ought to have him come here and talk. he's great and he could give you everything on missile defense. he's our expert. >> mr. chairman, thank you very much. i know you have to get back to some meetings and more votes. thank you very much for coming. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute]

>> thank you very much for coming today. we are having to use this room for press availability. i hope you don't consider me rude but to ask you to get out of this room as quickly as possible. but thank you for coming today. >> the house passed a bill today to increase the number of offshore drilling leases. here's part of the debate. just over an hour. >> gasoline is now about a cent and-a-half nationally from $4 a gallon. by comparison, the price was $1.84 when president obama was sworn into office. in my home district in central

washington last week, i heard from farmers, the foundation of our region's economy who are finding it harder and harder to pay these high energy prices and i have no doubt that my colleagues from other parts of the country have heard similar stories from their constituents. the pain being felt today has been exacerbated by the actions of this administration. this administration who for the past two years has repeatedly blocked, hindered and raised the cost to access to our american energy resources. the house natural resources recently passed h.r. 1229, 1230 and 1231 with bipartisan support which reversed specific actions taken by the obama administration to block offshore energy production the of. they will create jobs and will lower energy prices. these are the first of an array of bills that will be introduced by our committee as part of the

american energy initiative that will focus on expanding renewable energy, onshore production, hydro power, coal, critical minerals and address offshore revenue sharing and other needed reforms. today we are debating h.r. 1230. this bill requires the secretary of the interior to conduct oil and natural gas lease sales in gulf of mexico and offshore virginia that had been delayed or canceled by this administration. the virginia lease sale for example, was scheduled to happen this year. but due to the obama administration actions, the earliest this leas sale could occur is now, 2017. this bill will create thousands of jobs and according to c.b.o. rkts it will generate $40 million in new revenue to the federal government over the next 10 years. i will note that very soon after

this bill passed out of the committee with bipartisan support, the obama administration announced it would move forward on one gulf lease sale. prior to this sudden action, the obama administration was on course to make 2011, the first year since 1958, since 1958 that the federal government would not have held an offshore lease sale. squeezing one conveniently leas sale does not undue the obama administration's record of blocking and delaying american energy production. this bill that we are considering today is necessary to hold their feet to the fire and to ensure that these lease sales move forward. americans understand the pain inflicted by rising gasoline prices, but yet we continue to hear the same excuses on why we shouldn't act. and let me give you several examples. my colleagues across the aisle

will say that expanding drilling will do nothing to lower gasoline prices. the truth is, and this is the important part, it will send a strong signal to the world markets that the u.s. is serious about producing our own resources and bringing more production, american production online. furthermore, this argument has been used by opponents to american energy production for decades. we can no longer delay and prevent access to our own american resources. my colleagues will also propose increasing taxes on american energy production. let me repeat that, mr. chairman. they will also propose increasing taxes on american energy production. i have to ask, when has raising taxes lowered the price of anything? and of course, the answer to that is never. and it won't happen with energy. whether it's raising -- taxing

american energy producers or imposing a cap and trade energy tax, the democrats' plan will further increase the price at the pump and ultimately cost jobs. we are also likely to hear my colleagues reiterate use it or lose it myth, claiming there are acres of nonproducing leases. mr. chairman, in reality, use it or lose it is already the law of the land. the moment a company pays for and receives a lease, the clock starts ticking. leases have a time line. if action doesn't occur on that lease, the lease is lost, according to the lease. in addition, and this is important, too, only about a third of the leases contain oil or natural gas. one thing we can't do, sometimes you think we are very powerful, but one thing we can't do is mandate production where there is no oil or natural gas.

and finally, my colleagues will undoubtedly attempt to claim that these bills ignore the need to ensure safety in offshore drilling. nobody has forgotten the tragic deepwater horizon accident and i hear that from my members of the gulf and i heard that when i was at hearing two weeks ago. however, we must not forget the fact, the economic threat of high gasoline prices has to our economy and our need to move forward. the administration has slowly started to issue deep water permits in the gulf of mexico which is knowing that it can be done safely and responsibly. yet my colleagues act as if nothing has changed at all as far as safety reform. but by doing so, they are completely ignoring reality and the actions of their own

administration. they are ignoring the fact that regulations have been enhanced and strengthened and standards have increased and new technologies have been developed, tested and deployed. and i might add, mr. chairman, we heard this at the hearing at the hearing i alluded to in louisiana two weeks ago. h.r. 1229 that we'll debate next week will improve safety by making reforms to current law. number one, it requires that the secretary issue a permit to drill, and two, requires that the secretary conduct safety review, neither of those provisions are in current law today. in 2008, the last time gasoline prices reached $4 a gallon, congress stepped up to the challenge and took bold action to end decade's long ban on new offshore drilling. although this administration has effectively re-imposed that ban, the american people are once again calling on congress to

actment. congress can show the american people that we have heard their concerns and taking action. i urge my colleagues to vote in favor of the bill and that will create american jobs, lower gasoline prices and strengthen energy independence and with that, i reserve. >> the gentleman reserves his time. the gentleman from massachusetts. >> i yield myself as much time as i may consume. >> the gentleman is recognized. >> one year ago today, we were two weeks into the bp oil spill in the gulf of mexico. we were two weeks into what would ultimately become the worst environmental disaster in our nation's history, with more than four million barrels of oil spilling into the golf and since that disaster, we have learned many things about the safety of offshore drilling. we learned that the blowout preventer that the industry touted is fail-safe, could in fact, be sure to fail if an

actual blowout was under way. the only technology that the oil industry has been relying upon in the ent of a spill was a xerox machine. other response plans were so similar to evaluate wall russes from the gulf of mexico even though they had not called the golf home in years and they were dead ringers and they contained the same name and phone number of the long deceased expert. they had nor the resources or the ability. the response included an attempt to shoot golf balls and bits of rubber into the well when we were told that the industry was relying on the most sophisticated technologies, we assumed they met technologies developed by m.i.t. and not the p.g.a. and we learned from an independent bp spill commission that the root causes of the disaster were systemic through

the entire oil and gas industry. and yet, here wer debating legislation that would do nothing to improve the safety of offshore drilling and could make drilling it exposed as the absurdities of teaming this in the week of the deepwater horizon. it is 2007.

it is completed in april of 2007. it is the most likely site of an offshore drill. it is predicted to occur. it is 4,600 barrels of oil. it led to more than 4 million barrels spilling into the gulf. they concluded that the total volume of oil that would be spilled as of the next 40 years. d be roughly 47,000 barrels of oil, that is less than what was spilled in the deep water horizon in one day. m.m.s. concluded in 2007 a worse case scenario, only 19 to 31 miles of gulf coastline would be

impacted by a spill. the deep water horizon disaster resulted in oil reaching over 950 miles of gulf coastline. and m.m.s. determined that a deep water blowout would not present a cleanup problem because the oil would rise in the water column, surfacing almost directly over the source location, but in fact the oil spewing from the ocean floor remained an enormous subsurface plumes that spread across the gulf. the obama administration is already moving forward to hold these lease sales in the gulf later this year and early next year. and they are going to be more responsible. even the congressional budget office analysis of h.r. 1230 concludes, c.b.o. estimates that implementing the bill would have no significant impact on proceeds from lease sales in the gulf of mexico because the proposed schedule is similar to the plan included in the d.o.e.'s budget for 2011. so really all the majority is accomplishing with this

legislation is ensuring that we don't do any new environmental review of the impacts of these lease sales. instead of actually reviewing the lessons of the b.p. spill, the majority wants to lessen the environmental review. and in addition, this legislation would force the department to move forward with a lease off of the coast of virginia within one year. well, i have very bad news for the majority. the overwhelming majority of the area that would comprise this lease sale would infringe on critical training areas for the u.s. navy, the department of defense concluded that 78% of the area offered in the virginia lease sale would occur where military operations would be impeded by drilling structuring and related activities. moreover, much of the remaining area is comprised of a major shipping channel. this bill is really a solution in search of a problem. the bottom line is that the oil production is at its highest

level in nearly a decade, and natural gas production is at record levels. we should instead be debating legislation that would protect the lives and the livelihoods of the people in the gulf and that could actually help consumers at the pump this summer. so at that point i would like to reserve the balance of my time, mr. chairman. the chair: the gentleman's time is reserved. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: mr. chairman, i yield 1 1/2 minutes to the gentleman from virginia, mr. goodlatte. the chair: the gentleman from virginia is recognized for 90 steckeds. mr. goodlatte: i rise to engage the chairman in a colloquy. mr. chairman, as you know i am committed to ensuring that revenue sharing of the benefits of o.c.s. development are returned to those coastal states where drilling is occurring or may occur, like virginia. can you share with me and other members of this body whether this will be addressed by the committee? i yield to the chairman. mr. hastings: i thank the gentleman for yielding. the answer is we will be a focus and a priority. when i first introduced the bill before us today i stated these are only the first steps in this

congress' efforts to increase american energy production. the committee will continue to move on an array of bills that will introduced in advance as part of the american energy initiative. coming soon will be the bills focus on expanding offshore production, on shore production, critical minerals and revenue sharing. today only a few select states receive revenue sharing from o.c.s. activities. this committee will be working to reform those revenues to ensure there is a fair treatment to all states that produce oil and gas in the o.c.s. revenue sharing will be a priority and action will be forthcoming. i yield back. mr. goodlatte: i thank the chairman for his comments. i commend him for this legislation and i thank him. mr. hastings: i yield 1 1/2 minutes to the distinguished chairman of the energy and commerce committee, the gentleman from michigan, mr. upton. the chair: the gentleman from michigan is recognized for 90 seconds. mr. upton: thank you, mr. chairman. mr. speaker, most americans understand the concept of supply

and demand and in fact a third of our oil now comes from the gulf. department of energy information agency tells us that last year's production in the gulf was 20% less than projected in 2007. and in 2012, we are going to be getting a half a million barrels a day decline in production from 2010. what happens when the production goes down an the demand goes up? the price goes up, way up. add to that the uncertainty and unrest in the middle east, and there is no surprise that we have gas prices at $4 and $5 in this country and who knows where they are headed. this legislation, we pass it today, get it enacted, helps turn the key to unlocking the door on domestic energy production. this is not -- this legislation is not about new lease sales, it's simply catches up with the leases already approved. let's pass it. i yield my time back to the

chairman. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the ranking member of the subcommittee, the gentleman from new jersey, mr. holt. the chair: the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for two minutes. mr. holt: mr. chairman, i thank my friend from massachusetts. i rise in strong opposition to h.r. 1230. this is the first in the republican amnesia acts that ignores what happened last year in the gulf of mexico. it would force the department of the interior to rush into holding new leases in the gulf of mexico and off the coast of virginia, not far from new jersey, i might add, even though congress has not enacted a single piece of legislation to improve the safety of offshore drilling. the president's spill commission reported that offshore drilling in u.s. waters is four times more deadly than drilling elsewhere in the world, even for the same companies. clearly there's a safety problem that must be addressed.

and i must emphasize because they have talked about it again and again, they are talking about high oil prices, high prices at the pump. we feel it. everybody in america feels it. do they address it? no, they do not address gasoline prices. it actually accelerates the handouts to big oil. this legislation does. and in addition to being silent on safety concerns, this prohibits any further environmental review in the gulf based on the lessons learned in the deep water horizon last year. that tragedy exposed the woefully inadequate ways in which the environmental reviews had been done in the gulf of mexico. need i remind the speaker or the majority that there are no walruses to protect in the gulf of mexico? as you heard from mr. markey, that's the level of quality in the environmental review that they want to apply from here on out. the analysis assumes the blowout

preventers were capable of preventing blowouts. we now know, we have learned, they are not. the post spill investigations have clearly demonstrated the assumptions of the environmental review are not sufficient. i will offer an amendment shortly to drop the language that would deem this environmental review to be adequate. despite the poor and safety environmental record accumulated in the gulf, h.r. 1230 recklessly puts the atlantic coast -- the chair: the gentleman is recognized for an additional half minute. mr. holt: h.r. 1230 recklessly puts the atlantic coast at risk of experiencing an oil spill such as what we have seen before. that's why i call this the amnesia act. there are two more bills we will be seeing here on the floor that are similar. this is not in the interest of the u.s. consumer. it is not in the interest of fishermen. it is not in the interest of coastal residents.

this is not in the interest of america. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: thank you, mr. chairman. mr. chairman, i am pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from colorado, the chairman of the subcommittee dealing with this legislation. the chair: the gentleman from colorado is recognized for two minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. this bill is the first step for republicans to bring a new energy policy to this country, the american energy initiative. mr. lamborn: look at this chart. it says it all. under barack obama an had -- and his regulators, the average price of gasoline in this country has gone up from $1.84 a gallon when he took office, to just under $4. under his watch, gasoline has more than doubled. we need more supply and everyone agrees it should be our own energy not foreign. under the law of supply and demand, which my friends across the aisle have not found a way to repeal, more supply means lower prices. in addition, the thousands of

more jobs for americans and billions of revenue dollars for the treasury. h.r. 1230 requires that four promising lease sale areas, three in the gulf and one off virginia, must be opened up for production. no more stonewalling by this administration and extreme environmentalists. after the spill came out of my subcommittee and the full natural resources committee, this administration belatedly said it would start acting on one of these four lease areas. if the only way we can get action is to shame them into it, republicans will do so. if the administration still refuses, we will do our best to force action by changing the law. this bill is the first step to get gasoline prices down. the american people deserve no less. thank you, mr. chairman. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from oregon, mr. defazio.

the chair: the gentleman oregon is recognized for two minutes. mr. defazio: we are headed toward 425, $4.50 a gallon by memorial day. the usual memorial company run-up when the driving season starts of the the rushing dreams of american family, small business, and our economic recovery. hey, the profits are up. it's good. republicans say it's just supply and demand. it's simple. so if we add a small increment to future domestic supply, five or 10 years from now, that will bring down the price. no, it won't. remember, it's a world price commodity. in fact, supply is up. u.s. has 12.6 million more barrels in storage than the five-year average. demand, it's down. americans can't afford the price and the economy is depressed. libyan lost production been made up by the saudis. every gallon of that has been made up. what's really going on?

it's market manipulation, price gouging, profiteering, and speculation, but the republicans won't take on their benefactors from big oil and wall street. even goldman sachs says that $20 of a barrel is excessive speculation, $20 a barrel. that's 60 cents a gallon. we can stop that tomorrow. put a tax on speculators, or in college the commodities future trading -- encourage the commodities future trading commission to try to block what you are doing. on the nigh next -- nymex exchange, 45% of the trades in one day were driven by computers, they traded twice the world's daily oil consumption by computer in one day, driving up the price, and the republicans said, it's supply and demand. it's not supply and demand. it's market manipulation, it's price gouging, it's speculation. do something about it.

those tools are before us. if you want to have a debate about future supply and future domestic supply from natural gas or offshoring drilling or biodiesel or whatever, let as have that debate. you want to get people relief this year, save our economic recovery, save american families, take on wall street, take on big oil, take on the speculators. or, i guess you are afraid they won't contribute to the next campaign. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from washington. . mr. hastings: i'm pleased to yield one minute to the gentleman from california, mr. mcclintock. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. -- the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcclintock: the majority of the american people an the majority of this house recognize it is long past time to put american energy and independence and prosperity first. by opening up these resources we assure energy abundance for the next generation, we begin to ares the rues now increase in prices at the pump, we

assure productive, high-paying jobs, not only for the thousands of american workers directly employed in the industry, but for many times more. the employed in support and spinoff jobs. we ensure billions of dollars of oil royalties paid directly into this nation's treasury at a time when the treasury is empty. we assure that our growing reliance on foreign sources is reversed. to those who were clamoring for more tax revenues, this is the healthy way to get them, by removing the impediments that have prevented a prosperous and expanding economy. it is prosperity and prosperity alone that creates tax revenues. with this measure we begin to change the policies that have produced the pathetic and self-inflicted spectacles. mr. hastings: i yield the gentleman 15 seconds. mr. mcclintock p: of the most oil-rich nation in the world importing its energy.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from virginia, mr. moran. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. moran: we know our constituents are paying too much at the pump. but we also know where that money is going. almost $30 billion just in the last three months went to the top three oil companies, exxon, shell, and b.p. remember b.p.? over $7 billion just this quarter. and in fact that's after the american taxpayer, which we say we're so concerned about, shelled out $5 billion in subsidies to the oil and gas company. that's revenue of about $100 billion on an annual basis, more than that. that's where the money is going. and within that profit, not revenue, profit we're talking about, what do they do with it? 90% of it is for stock buy

pbacks and dividends to enrich the executives and the shareholders. and to spend on tv advertising to convince the american public they're spending on just the opposite. 10%. 10% is going for drilling. now what this legislation would do is to bring us back to a period of even weaker regulation than we had before the gulf oil spill. imagine it just happened, 200 million if gallons of oil spilled into the gulf coast waters and now we want to repeal that, and we want to open up off the shore of virginia with thousands and thousands of jobs are dependent upon the naval operations offshore, which would not be able to be conducted. if we go ahead and drill on these properties. plus the remaining 22% is devoted to shipping lanes for

two of our busiest commercial ports, hampton roads and baltimore. do we want to lose those jobs and the jobs in tourism, virginia beach. we should be about creating jobs, not jeopardizing jobs, defeat this bill. the chair: the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: i would note the two democrat senators from virginia and the governor of the state are in favor of this legislation. with that, mr. chairman, i'm more than happy to yield one minute to the gentleman from ohio, mr. johnson. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. johnson: i rise today in strong support of the restoring american offshore leasing now act. last night, i had a telephone town hall with hundreds of anymy constituents. the overwhelming concern was the high price of gas. seniors, students, working families and small businesses want to know what we're doing to help lower fuel costs.

they want us to stop being dependent on foreign energy and start really developing america's resources today -- resources. today we're doing that. unfortunately, our colleagues across the isle -- the aisle believe raising taxes on oil companies will lower the price of gas. this defies both logic and common sense. not only would raising tacks ensure job losses in america but it would result in the increase of america's dependence on foreign sources of oil. raising taxes on american energy companies would give a competitive advantage to the russians, the chinese and opec countries that are operating without anti-growth and anti- self-sufficient energy policies. mr. speaker, my constituents in southeastern and eastern ohio understand the negative impacts these proposed tax increases -- mr. hastings: i yield 15

seconds to the gentleman. mr. johnson: that these proposed increases would have on gas prices and they oppose these efforts. i strongly urge my colleagues to support this bill and i yield back my time. the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the gentlelady from santa barbara, california. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized. mrs. capps: h r. 1230 is a collection of bad ideas. it's -- it mandates the administration offer new lease sales even though they're -- they say they're not prepared to oversee them. they act as if the worst oil spill in history never happened and it pushes billions of dollars into already overstuffed industry coffers. the only thing it adds up to is

a false promise. the republican majority is hoping to delude the public that this rush to new offshore drilling will provide a quick fix to oil prices but the harsh reality is we will never control oil supply or gas prices through drilling. we don't have the supply. we have the ability to control prices by lowering our consumption. that's what we're starting to do. for example, the e.i.a.'s latest report says we're lowering oil usage thanks in part to the president's fuel saving standards. we will be in yol of our energy future by making car cars that go further on a gallon of gas. if in 10 or 20 years oil and gas are still the focus of our energy debate, then we have miserably failed. we will have followed the path that george w. bush and dick cheney charted an we've seen

where that leads. high gas prices and billions in oil company profits. it's about time we break free from our addiction to oil. so i urge a no vote on this misleading bill that accelerates new dirty an dangerous drilling. i yield back the plan of my time. the chair: the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: thank you, mr. chairman. can i inquire how much time on both sides? the chair: the gentleman from washington has 15 3/4 minutes, and the gentleman from massachusetts has 16 minutes remaining. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: i'm pleased to yield one minute to the gentleman from new mexico, mr. pearce. the chair: the gentleman is recognize. mr. pearce: i'm pleased to rise in support of h.r. 1230 to restart american jobs. the current five-year lease plan would have aloud for the sale of four leases off the coast of virginia and three in the gulf of mexico. the president and his agencies are continuing to block these sales. it's time to stop that blocking.

we're talking about jobs, the nation is faced with 8% to 9% continuing unemployment. the jobs offshore are good, high-paying jobs, $400 a day, $50,000 a year. recently the president had strong rhetoric to georgetown university, saying he's going to increase oil and gas production in america, yet the administration's actions are moving us the opposite direction. tax increases kill jobs, that's an economic truth. our friends across the aisle want to kill american jobs by raising taxes at a time when unemployment is too high, when we're dependent on too much foreign oil. in a speech last month at georgetown, president obama said the fact of the matter is that for quite some time, america is going to be still dependent on oil an making its economy work. we're exploring and assessing new frontiers for oil and gas developments from alaska to the

south and mid atlantic states. in this bill we are giving the president the bill he is saying he's going to implement. now let him sign it. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the gentleman vermont, mr. rush. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. rush: i thank the gentleman. imagine what we could do for the american consumer at the pump if we stop lobbing rhetorical grenades back and forth and decided to focus on the concrete things it is within our power to do today that would lower the price at the pump. there's three things. one, why are we giving tax breaks to oil companies? you do have to wonder, $1 trillion in profits, nothing wrong with that, but do they need to reach into the pockets of the american consumer and get $40 billion on top of that? that's number one.

number two, have the futures market be about protecting the consumer, not enriching the hedge fund wall street speculator. it is astonishing what's going on and it's so bad that even goldman sachs acknowledges that at least $27 on the price of $110 barrel of oil is about speculation. why in the world do we allow that? because every time you and i go to the pump, our constituents go to the pump, they're paying for wall street and they're paying for tax breaks to oil companies. the third thing we can do is we can do it short-term and that's going to the strategic petroleum reserve. two republicans presidents and one democratic president have done that with great effect, lowering the price 33%, 19%, and 9%. it gives immediate relief to the consumer at the pump. we can do this together. if we the agenda is about doing something fb your constituents an mine and not just having

this political food fight. end speculation, end the tax breaks and foe into that asset belonging to all of us, the strategic petroleum reserve and bring prices down immediately. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: i'm pleased to yield one minute to the gentleman from south carolina, mr. duncan, a member of the natural resources committee. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. duncan: thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, mr. chairman, for your leadership on this issue. our friends across the aisle want us to use this debate to demagogue this issue and demonize oil producers. this administration's policy of drill there not here, has led us to what we face today. they have fueled overseas oil producers by shutting of domestic exploration. now today we hear the other party tell us that raising taxes on american energy

production will somehow make prices go down. this is insane. mr. chairman, as any economist can tell you. we need to end the de facto moratorium on the gulf of mexico permit we need to reopen the west to exploration, we need to open up anwr for exploration, we need to allow american entrepreneurs to do the work of the free market and get this economy moving again this bill will begin the possess of releasing the potential of american nrnl this means tens of thousands of american jobs producing american energy for american households an businesses. i urge us to pass this bill and put americans back to work producing american energy. god bless america and i yield back. the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield myself three minutes. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. markey: this is the wrong debate to be having here today. the republicans are debating more drilling without more

safety. even though the b.p. spill commission that examined what wept wrong last year concluded there is a systemic failure in our country to deal with the safety issues that confront the offshore drilling industry. in fact, they concluded that there are four times greater fay talities -- fatalities in drilling off-the-shores of europe than the united states. four times more fatalities. we should be number one in drilling, but we should be number one in safety as well. what the republicans are doing here today is they are saying that they believe in all of the above, but the truth is, that with this bill they are saying once again it is really an agenda of oil above all. they have nothing out here on renewable energy resources, wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, plug-in hybrids,, all electric vehicles. none is part of that debate. they go back to the same old

agenda of oil above all. do we need, do we need to give more to the oil industry? $10 billion in profits for exxonmobil in january, february, and march? $10 billion they made. shell, $8 billion. b.p. $7 billion. chevron, $6 billion. conoco phillips, $3 billion. shouldn't we talk a little bit about safety as we are talking about new drilling off our shore line? no, that's not the republican agenda. should we be talking about taking away the tax breaks from the oil industry? the $40 billion which the american taxpayer gives to the oil industry. do we really need to have the oil industry in the consumer's pocket at the gas pump and then in their other pocket as taxpayers to give even more money to exxonmobil? that's what the republicans should bring out here for a debate. they do not do that. on the new york mercantile exchange, that's where they

trade for oil prices. that's now 45% of the trading. on the commodities futures trading floor of the new york mercantile exchange. what do the republicans do to deal with the fact that it has turned into a crude oil casino? where gambling is going on, as the speculators of our country anti-world look at saudi arabia, look at libya as the price of oil sprokets, goldman sachs concludes that $20 a barrel of the increase in the price of oil just comes from the speculation from the gambling that's going on and the nymex. you might as well put las vegas over the new york mercantile exchange. it is a crude oil casino, ladies and gentlemen. what do the republicans do? they have slashed the budget for the commodities futures trading commission who are the cops on the beat. they are saying we need fewer cops to police these speculators. they slash the wind and solar

budget by 70% in their budget that just passed last month. i yield myself an additional 30 seconds. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. markey: i thank you. this is their agenda. nothing on safety. nothing on wind and solar. nothing on corraling the speculators. and what do they say? what they say is, they are going to in fact go into the medicare budget of grandma and grandpa and cut their program and then put an oil rig on top of it to suck out the money. like a pipeline out of the pockets of grandma or grandpa and put it into the profits of the oil industry by more tax breaks for them, even as they report the greatest profits in the history of any company in the history of the world. ladies and gentlemen, vote no on this legislation. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: mr. speaker, i yield myself two minutes. the chair: the gentleman is recognized tore two minutes. mr. hastings: sometimes i am absolutely baffled by the

rhetoric that i hear here. let me remind my colleagues that 2 1/2 years ago in 2008 when gasoline prices went to $4 a gallon, we republicans came in to the house even though we weren't in session and talked about the potential resources that we have in this country to make america self-sufficient. and american people got it. they got it and they said, you know, we ought to utilize those resources. they said we should drill. we should drill in the outer continental shelf, and we should drill on shore. the american people get it. and yet the rhetoric we hear here is entirely different from the economic issues that are facing us. here's the whole point. when america ended the moratoria on offshore drilling, the prices went down. it's never been explained by the other side, but it's pretty darn

obvious. when you send a signal to the markets you are serious about becoming less dependent on foreign energy, the markets responded. and they responded 2 1/2 years ago and they will respond the same way. but all we hear from this side is you have to have a bogeyman, everybody's against us. baloney. the market is what drives this -- the price of oil and it's in our best interest in this country to become less dependent on foreign energy, and that's what these three bills do. i reserve my time, mr. chairman. the chair: the gentleman from new jersey. mr. holt: i'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from new york, mr. tonko. the chair: the gentleman from new york is recognized for two minutes. mr. tonko: i thank the gentleman for yielding. let there be no doubt, americans that are worried about the price of gasoline, it's recent spike has once again put us on notice. this bill that relieves regulation provides the wrong

tools. america knows we can do better. we cannot afford to mindlessly give billions of dollars to big oil companies while they make record profits. in the short-term, we must ensure that speculators and wall street quit playing games with the price of oil. and finally, we must provide motorists with fueling options at the pump. it is unconscionable we would give $4 billion of taxpayer money to big oil companies this year alone while they are on track to make nearly $100 billion in profits in 2011. with prices this high, does big oil really need even more money? taxpayers know they don't. and taxpayers are hit twice with taxes on gasoline, once at the pump and once on tax day. this must end. we can help consumers at the pump by going after wall street speculators that drive up the cost of oil. we can increase mileage standards and it's reasonable that they could reach 60 miles per hour gallon by the year -- miles per gallon by 2025. and consumers can choose the

lowest alternate. high gas prices are painful. they are painful to seniors living on a fixed income, and painful to small businesses. and the big oil subsidies accompanying them are paying for our nation's economy as it recovers from the bush recession. let's end these big oil give aways to some of the most profitable companies in the world and provide drivers with alternatives. creating clean energy jobs of the future. i'd like to thank the gentleman for his leadership on this issue and for yielding. mr. speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: thank you, mr. chairman. i'm pleased to yield one minute to the gentleman from michigan, mr. benishek, a valuable member of the house natural resources committee. the chair: the gentleman from michigan is recognized for one minute. mr. benishek: mr. chairman, this morning a gallon of gasoline in my hometown of iron river, michigan, was $4.29. and unfortunately most people

are plagued with the fact they know that the prices are going to go up further in the next few weeks. i believe that we in congress know there is no silver bullet that's going to lower prices at the pump. however we have a responsibility here to craft policy and pass legislation that will increase the supply of crude oil which we will be -- which will be produced here at home. as members of congress, it's our duty to take these actions to help lessen the pain of these prices on our families. in michigan and throughout the country. mr. speaker, mr. chairman, we need to find a long-term solution to high fuel prices, and i believe that our full day markup we have on committee last month was the first step. i believe that passing this bill today will be the next step. we have many further steps to take. i yield my time. thank you. the chair: the gentleman's time

has expired. the gentleman from new jersey. mr. holt: mr. chairman, i'd like for us to hear now from mr. sarbanes of maryland, one of the most thoughtful members of the natural resources committee. the chair: for how long? mr. holt: two minutes. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. sarbanes: i thank the gentleman for yielding. i oppose the legislation that would really open in a wholesale fashion a very sense fifth areas to offshore drilling. we have to take a lot of care when it comes to doing this offshore drilling. i don't think that this bill exercises that care. during the committee's consideration of the bill, i put forward an amendment that would strike that section of the bill that authorizes drilling off the coast of virginia. i did this because of my concern about the potential impact of a spill on the chesapeake bay, which, of course, is a treasure for marylanders and all those who live in the chesapeake bay watershed. that chesapeake bay is really the soul of my state of maryland.

it's a national treasure. in so many ways. the virginia lees parcel, 220, and it is a lease parcel which the republicans would like to put back into play with their bill, when you look at it about 78% of that parcel, you have to immediately take off the table, because it would occur in areas where military operations would be impeded. i want to thank my colleague, gerry connolly, from virginia, for putting forward an amendment on this bill which would shift the burden say the department of defense has to affirmatively conclude that you will not impede these kinds of military operations in order to drill. so you take that out of the equation, then you take another chunk of it out because you need to keep commercial shipping lanes opened, what you're left with is about 10% of the parcel that you could actually drill on. what you could get from that would overwhelm supply the demand of the country for one

day. so you would be putting at risk this valuable, sensitive chesapeake bay and all the surrounding areas for getting one day's worth of energy production. that just doesn't make sense. i think it undermines the bill on a wholesale basis. it shows that this is not put forth in a way that is sensible. for that reason i oppose the legislation. i yield back my time. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: mr. chairman, i am pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from virginia, another valuable member of the natural resources committee, mr. wittman. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. wittman:thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to thank the chairman also, for his leadership and work on making sure we address the energy needs of this nation. virginia has the opportunity to develop offshore energy in an environmentally friendly and responsible manner. like any industrial or commercial activity, energy production has its risks, however those risks have been

significantly mitigated and offshore energy production can be conducted in a safe and responsible manner. unfortunately, the administration has halted any further oil and gas development in the atlantic ocean. our economy continues to struggle and any further increase in energy prices will exacerbate that struggle. we are now working to regain our footing, as unemployment hovers at 9%, with the unrest in the middle east and north africa, those issues continue to threaten this nation's energy security. failure to properly and promptly address our energy needs could negatively impact the u.s. economy and stall any recovery, and continue to affect national security. energy production offshore of the commonwealth could create thousands of jobs and generate much needed revenue to reduce the deficit. the department of interior has

calculated virginia could produce 500 million barrels of oil and 2.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, natural gas being one of the most economically viable and environmentally friendly sources of fossil fuels. a recent study by i.c.f. international concluded that offshore energy production in virginia could create 1,888 new jobs and generate 19.5 billion in federal, state, and local revenues. i can tell you in virginia as we struggle to find dollars to clean up the chesapeake bay, struggle to find dollars for transportation, that those dollars are much needed. virginia can lead the nation in improving our energy security and reducing our reliance on foreign oil, and to do that we must reinstate the planned offshore oil and natural gas lease sale. with that i urge my colleagues to support this measure. thank you, mr. chairman. i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from

massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from virginia,. mr. connolly. the chair: the gentleman from virginia is recognized for two minutes. mr. connolly: thank you. i thank you, mr. chairman. mr. chairman, you know, i hate to say it, but what we are hearing here on the floor of the house of representatives in defense of this legislation is snake oil. somehow the commuters, the hard-pressed commuters and consumers of gasoline in this country are supposed to believe that if today we unleash all possibility of oil drilling, gas drilling offshore, continental united states, we are going to be producing barrels of oil. false. we are going to reduce the price of oil today equally false. in fact, there's plenty of evidence that the market that drives oil is relatively an

elastic. we heard earlier today on the floor of this house, driving is down. demand is down. supply is up. but so are prices. in fact, if you look at this chart, there's an erie -- eerie, correlation between oil profits and the spike in the price of gasoline charged to our hard-pressed consumers in the united states. . the other side wants you to believe with a smoke screen that somehow their tax subsidies being cheaged or lifted would in fact further increase the price of oil. they have low tacks, low royalties, they have record profits, how has that worked out for the average driver in america? this is produced record gasoline prices. the republican policy that will be enshrined today in this legislation have produced these profits and those costs for the

average consumer in america. it is wrong and to argue otherwise is selling snake oil. i urge the defeat of this legislation on behalf of the consumers of america and i yield back to the distinguished ranking member. the chair: the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: i reserve my time. the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from washington state, mr. inslee. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. inslee: we should oppose this bill not because it is too strong but because it is too weak. americans do need relief from $4 a gallon gasoline and they are not going to get it from this bill either in the short-term or the long-term. the reason they won't get relief in the short-term is we're not drilling in the right places. we need to drill speculators, not just wells. even goldman sachs recognizes

that a significant portion of this huge spike in prices is due to rampant speculation in the market. but this bill doesn't do a single thing about that short-term reason for this short-term price, we need to drill speculators not just wells. but secondly, in the long-term, this bill does not give us what we need. my friends across the aisle told us they were going to give us an all of the above energy strategy. they haven't given us an all of the above strategy. they have just given us an all of the below strategy. because the only thing they are thinking about are these archaic technologies of drilling holes in the ground. we use 25% of the world's oil. we only have 3% of the world's oil supply. even if we drill in yellowstone national park. the dinosaurs just didn't die

underneath our feet. we need new supplies of energy of electricity, biofuels from targeted genetics in seattle, advanced form of algae biofuels from south fire energy and general atomics and other companies. we need new sources of energy not just below our feet but above our feet and in our minds where we get the intellectual capital to get these -- to invent these technologies. that's an all of the above strategy. let's get real short-term relief. defeat this bill and get a real energy policy for this country. the chair: the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: i'm going to reserve my time. the chair: the gentleman from washington reserves his time. the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: can you please tell me how much time is remaining in the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts has 3 1/2 minutes remain, the gentleman from the state of washington has 10 minutes remaining. mr. markey: i would ask the

gentleman from washington state to please -- mr. hastings: i have a speaker coming to the floor right now. at this time i'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from arizona, mr. flake. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. flake: i thank the gentleman for yielding, i won't take the full two minutes. i've been listening to this discussion, when you see graphics with an oil rig sucking money out of social security or medicare or whatever that was, you know you've gone beyond the realm of what is logical for a debate or the real facts about what this legislation does. the bottom line is it will make it easier for us to become more energy independent. not completely energy independent. it can't go that far. but it will make us more independent than we were before. it'll create an environment where jobs can be created by the private sector.

it will help over time lower the price of gasoline because it will create more supply in the end. that's what it does. it doesn't put a big oil rig on the top of medicare and suck money from our seniors. come on. this is just a measure to help the situation, to make it better. we've blocked off too many areas to oil drilling and we not exploited our own supply enough to help breng down price and to help consumers out there everywhere. so that's all this does. i commend the gentleman for bringing it forward. i urge support for it and i yield back the mans of my time. the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i yield one minute to the gentleman from new jersey, mr. holt. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. holt: i thank my friend,

mr. markey. this is about big oil handouts, pure and simple. there are no lessons learned, no lessonned applied with regard -- lessons applied with regard to safety or the environment. if these companies were energy companies, as they lake to say, they would invest more in producing sustainable, clean energy. alternatives. in the long run, we all know it, we've got to face the facts, we've got to break our addiction ooil. and if the majority, the authors of this legislation, really wanted to help the motorist the consumers, they would address speculation, they would enthe speculation. they would end the tax giveaway. they would use the strategic oil reserve to short circuit speculation. the oil companies are not energy companies. they are fleecing machines. the greatest profits of any corporation in history and you heard me say a few minutes ago that the biggest of them,

exxon, had an effective tax rate of about .4%. this will not help the consumer. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: can i inquire of my freppeds -- if my fend from massachusetts is prepared to close. mr. markey: i am prepared to close. mr. hastings: hold on just one second there, i have one gentleman who wants to speak. i'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from louisiana, mr. landry. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. landry: i ran down here to thank my colleagues for doing what the american people have been asking them to do and to start the process of stopping to kick the energy problem can in this country down the road.

finally, we're going to take the steps necessary to put people back to work and to start america down a path of affordable domestic energy. now, they say that we're robbing grandma and grandpa. grandma and grandpa hold stock in those nrnl companies. down in louisiana, grandma and grandpa's grandsons and grandchildren work in an industry that provides that energy. right now, they don't have a job. they're being laid off or they're being stonet brazil or africa or the middle east to drill for oil out there. while we have spent over $1 trillion of taxpayer money

funding the department of energy to wean us off of foreign oil. i just rise to say thank you, mr. chairman, thank you to my colleagues who have come today in support of this amendment, and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: i would defer to the chairman of the committee, if he is the concluding speaker on his side, i'm prepared to close on my side. mr. hastings: at this time, i am the concluding speaker so i reserve my time. the chair: the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. markey: would the chairman -- the chair: the gentleman has 2 1/2 minutes. mr. markey: i yield myself the remaining time. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. markey: so here's where we are. the republicans take over. the republicans say they're ready to put together a plan for our country. it's one year after the b.p. catastrophe in the gulf of

mexico, the worst environmental disaster in our nation's history. last year, the republicans blocked passage of any safety legislation that would lerp the lessons of what happened in the gulf of mexico. the b.p. spill commission has come back. they say fatalities on u.s. rigs are four times higher than those on european rigs. we should be number one in drilling and we should be number one in safety. the plups refuse to deal with the endemic, systemic problems with safety identified in the american oil tri-. the oil tri-is now garnering the largest profits any corporations in the world have ever been able to enjoy. but the republicans refuse to bring out here legislation which will take away their tax breaks. they don't need to have tax breaks to do something they're doing anyway. it's like subsidizing a fish to swim or a bird to fly. we don't have to give them taxpayers' money.

the ryan budget slashes benefits for grandma and grandpa, then takes that money and gives it away in tax breaks to millionaires and to the oil industry. do we really need to tell grandma we're cutting back on her medical benefits and taking her must be -- her money and giving it in tax breaks to the biggest companies in america? and finally we should be talking about the stra teemic petroleum reserve. it was used by both president bushes, it was used by president clinton, it does work. the new york mercantile exchange is where oil futures are traded. it is a casino of crude oil right now. on one day two months ago, 45% of all the computer generated trades were in the oil industry. it was twice the value of all the oil in the world. that's what we need to do, to

deal with those speculators and the way to do it is to deploy the strategic petroleum reserve, deploy it now, send the fear of losing fortunes into the hearts of those speculators and you'll see the price of oil drop like a rock. that's what we need to do. that's what consumers need as they head into the memorial diday weekend. that's what people are wondering what is going to happen to our economy. 10 of the last 11 recessions in our economy are -- in our country are tied to the price of oil. 10 of the last 11 recessions. but what we saw in 1990, president bush won the war in iraq in 1990 an 1991, but because he never deployed the strategic petroleum reserve until it was too late, a mini recession and president clinton was able to defeat him. let's learn this lesson about the price of oil. ignore this agenda of the

republican party. the chair: the gentleman from washington. mr. hastings: mr. speaker, how much time? the chair: the gentleman has seven minutes. mr. hastings: i yield myself the balance of me time. -- of my time. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. hastings: this is an interesting debate, there's been a will the of rhetoric thrown around, some that opportunity apply whatsoever to the bill before us today. h.r. 1230 simply tells this administration that to go through with the lease sales already authorized by a previous administration, in other words, all these lease sales had gone through whatever process they had to go through, three of them were in the gulf of mexico, one on the coast of virming. we are simply saying, let's send a signal to the international markets that america is serious about becoming less dependent on foreign oil and we to that by saying, this administration

should go through with these lease sales. which i might add, mr. chairman, we have heard about the loss of revenue from the other side of the aisle, these lease sales themselves would provide the general fund with $40 million other the next 10 years. so this is a very -- what we're doing, which is ironic, we're telling this administration to do something, it should be doing by law anyway. that's what this is. i urge my colleagues to vote on this bill. we can have other discussion on the other bills in ensuing days. as far as the discussion talking about big oil, i don't know how many --ic probably count the number of colleagues on the other side of the aisle that didn't say something about big oil rather than those that did. but what is interesting, you would be led to believe that the only big oil in the world apparently are american companies. i would suggest that is entirely not true.

in fact, when you talk about big oil, mr. chairman, really who you should be focusing on is opec. because crude oil is an international product, a global product, no question about that. and yet opec controls 45% of the market. it is a cartel, mr. chairman, there is no question about that. and we all know simple economics if there's a cartel on any commodity on any commodity the way that you break the cartel is by increasing the supply. and that's what the combination of these three bills do, simply send a signal to the markets -- and i've said this over and over -- that we are serious about utilizing the resources that we have. now it's been said several of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle said the united states doesn't have any resources. well, nothing can be further from the truth because if you

look at government data on what the potential resources are in the outer tenl shelf, and i am going to -- outer continental shelf, and i am going to say onshore, the potential resources for oil equivalent per barrel is in excess when you combine o.c.s. and onshore, the potential resources are in excess of two trillion barrels of oil. that far exceeds what one of my colleagues earlier, dr. fleming from louisiana, said. it far exceeds what they have in saudi arabia. in fact, in other opec nations. now, this rhetoric of trying to blame somebody when the issue really is something as basic as it is something consumers could utilize. utilize.