obviously something that is tragic -- you're talking about the shootings. and of the president's thoughts and prayers and hours in general go out to the families of the victims. for specifics about what is happening there, i would refer you to local law enforcement. the fbi is obviously monitoring this, and i would refer you to them on it that in terms of any federal government, federal law enforcement association. but right now, we're obviously watching the events unfold and express our condolences to the families. >> going back to afghanistan for a moment, one of the justifications for the president apologizing, is he pointed out last week, was an attempt to sort of make sure u.s. military members were not put in an additional harm's way. and it seems like that has not been the case.

seems like the violence is continuing. is there any regret or concern about that? >> i think there is concern about the unrest in afghanistan because of it. it does not make the decision as what we did to apologize for the new mexico version mishandling of the quran -- and i did lessen it. as we pointed out, the president's predecessor, president george w. bush, apologized, or my predecessor, apologized on his behalf for the mishandling of the quran in iraq in 2008. there is a responsibility this president has, not just to point out that we have respect for the religious traditions of the afghan people in this case, but to have as his primary concern

the safety and security of american forces and american civilian personnel overseas. anyway, that is why making those statements was so important. >> one more. appearing on msnbc today, the illinois governor expressed concern that oil companies might be engaging in price gouging and said he was reacting to investigate oil companies. is that something that the president would support as well, an investigation in illinois and elsewhere? >> i have not seen those comments. something obviously that the justice department monitors, as was the case last year, as there was a spike in oil. i do not have anything specific from the president or the white house. >> [inaudible] also, how mr. karzai expressed

condolences. did he ever apologized to the united states for the killing of americans? >> i would refer you to the afghan government for statements from the afghan president. i pointed out that president karzai has made very clear and birds to try to ask for calm, which is helpful, as have other senior leaders of the afghan government. the defense minister expressed condolences and apologized to secretary panetta for these this evidence of an involving the two officers at the interior ministry. i am not sure what you mean by the taliban getting off scot- free. what our policy is is to defeat al qaeda come disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al qaeda. to the extent that the taliban is -- we are fighting the taliban, in our effort to disrupt and defeat, and dismantle al qaeda, we're doing it to get the afghan government that it needs to build up its security forces and stabilize its control over the country so

that we can transfer security lead over two afghan security forces. it is also the case that most insurgencies require political settlement. this one does. that is why we support an afghan-lead process of reconciliation with clear conditions that any taliban member that wants to lay down his arms or her arms, laid down his arms, primarily, make clear that they support the afghan constitution, the rights of women and minorities, and renounce any affiliation or support for al qaeda. then there obviously welcome in the reconciliation process. >> two questions. one, do you have an estimate on the number of jobs that the pipeline could create? >> i do not have that, no. >> i know that the process for the northern half is a different because there is an international border. why in the north have not

go as smoothly as the southern half is going? >> thank you for the opportunity to review a little bit of history. as you pointed up, international border. because of that, it requires the state department to review and make a determination about the permit application. secondarily, the process was ongoing, because in the review, concerns or raised about nebraska by a number of stakeholders, including the governor of nebraska, requesting that an alternate route be chosen. those concerns were valid, the administration decided. and therefore, the process was a delayed to allow for the identification of an alternate route. that is where it stood when republicans decided, in order to play political games and maybe try to distract attention from

there, i think, politically unfortunate handling of the extension of the payroll tax cut, to insert an arbitrary deadline. it made it impossible to properly review, by the book, and application that did not yet exist because of the alternate route. if i made clear -- i made clear in a statement not long before i came up to the podium this morning, the president and the administration will review a new submission by trans canada, if that is the mission for an application, if that application is made, without prejudice. we simply hope that the process that that review would be allowed to take place without more political games by republicans. >> [inaudible] >> it will be done absolutely by the book. as it should be. if it is submitted. >> does the administration

signaled transcanada that it was all right to go ahead with the oklahoma part of the pipeline? >> i do not have it here. but the president stated in january that this was something that potentially could go forward if it meets and clears the hurdles that needs to be cleared. this is the same thing. at domestic pipeline. most of the authority involved is local and state. the department of transportation and the army corps of engineers. but most of the permitting is because it does not cross an international border, done by local and state governments. >> so you're not surprised that transcanada is going ahead with that now? >> well, i would not know how to characterize their reaction to the use of the statement i put out welcoming iit, because there is an issue with a glut of domestically produced oil that is held up in cushing.

the state of their refineries are in the gulf. building this pipeline is a very useful to getting that oil to market. >> i have got a couple for you. looking ahead to the dinner with iraq war veterans, there is a group asking for the president to call for national day of action to help veterans. where do we stand on that? what about soldiers who fought in iraq that are fighting now in afghanistan? >> that is a little different from the national day of action to this administration is absolutely committed, and you have heard the president talk about it, first lady and a doctor by been our focus on the effort to connect returning veterans to employment. and we have worked very hard. and through the joining forces ever to do just that. i would refer you to the defense department on the issue of how

to celebrate the end of the iraq war, given that obviously there are ongoing military efforts in afghanistan. >> on an earlier question, not sure i understood. are you saying that the program is compatible or incompatible with the white house's be that muslims are partners? >> what i am also making clear is that, in total contradiction to the story as written, this is a programmer funds available to local entity that then oversees the disbursement to the new york police department. i would sort questions about how those funds are used. thank you very much. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012]

>> the house is expected back in at 6:30 p.m. eastern for a vote on a measure debated earlier today dealing with security at federal buildings and grounds. we will have that live here on c-span. and our road to the white house coverage continues later today with rick santorum. the former pennsylvania senator is campaigning in kalamazoo, michigan ahead of the state's primary tomorrow night. our live coverage picks up this evening at 7:30 p.m. eastern on our companion network, c-span3. >> louisiana governor bobby jindal is gadahn to reveal his proposal for balancing the state budget for the next fiscal year, a budget $900 million in the red. in truth partner, mostly cloudy and 37 degrees at the airport.

you're listening to shreveport exposure's weather station. >> this weekend, "book tv" and "american history to be closed will look at the history of shreveport, louisiana. saturday starting at noon eastern, the union army's failure in louisiana. the red river campaign of 1854. then ehrlick at the over 200,000 books of the john smith nobel collection at the shreveport archives. than a walking tour of shreveport and brochure city. in american history tv on c- span3, sunday at 5:00 p.m. eastern, from barksdale air force base, a look at their role on 9/11 and the history of the b-52 bomber. also visit the founding fathers of recollection at the louisiana state exhibit museum. and the pioneer heritage center, medical treatment and medicine during the civil war. shreveport, louisiana, this

weekend on c-span2 and c-span3. >> the national governors' association met over the weekend. one session focused on the state's efforts to encourage entrepreneurship and job creation. we will hear from the head of the gallup polling operation and eight of the nation's governors. this is 50 minutes. >> ladies and gentlemen, please

>> please take your seats. i had a delegation of your members on the flight coming in. ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats. i call this meeting to order as the nga chair. i would like to take this opportunity to welcome you to the 2012 winter meeting. may i have a motion to adopt the rules of procedure for the meeting? is there a second? thank you. let me explain one thing first before we vote. part of the rules requires that any governor who wants to submit a new policy or resolution for adoption at this meeting will need a three-fourths vote to suspend the rules to do so. please submit any proposal in writing to david of the nga staff by 5:00 p.m. tomorrow, february 25. all in favor of the motion, police say a aye.

all opposed? motion is adopted. governors, our monday session is dedicated to reviewing and adopting new policy statements. we have streamlined our policies and process to more closely align our policy statements with governor's priorities. and i want to say i appreciate the hard work of everyone involved, the governors, staff, the nga staff as we change the direction of how we are establishing our policies. i would like to take a moment to acknowledge some distinguished guests who are here with us today. i want to first recognize our guests from the white house office of intergovernmental affairs. thank you very much for being here. we also are joined today by delegations from canada and the head of the mexican nga. if both of these delegations would stand so that we can recognize you, please.

[applause] thank you very much for being here. for all the tough issues states and territories face today, economic growth is one of the most important issues for us to address. economic growth is key to our success as governors. that is why i chose growing state economies as my chair's initiative. it is designed to provide governors and other state policy makers with better policies to improve the economic environment in their states and more strategies designed to foster business growth. we have put an emphasis on understanding how a small business becomes a fast-growing firm and what policies support that transformation. high-growth businesses are one of the driving forces of the modern global economy. they are the primary source of job creation, prosperity, and

economic competitiveness. in new fast-growing firms often evolves to become large employers. as the governors, we want to help the private sector growth, creating new job opportunities for our citizens. nationwide, firms in their first year of existence at an average of 3 million new jobs per year according to the kauffman foundation. nearly 40% of these new startup firms do not survive the first three years. those that survive, however, prosper and usually create more net jobs than all small start- ups do. the most important firms that survived are called gazelles, high-growth firms that expand employment by 15% or more annually for five consecutive years. such firms make up about 5% to 6% of all businesses, but virtually all new net job

creation. for any successful firm, the challenge is to stay ahead, to go from good to great, and to do it again and again and again by creating new products or by entering new markets. firms that remain entrepreneurialism do exactly that. these firms drive growth and prosperity and global competitiveness. that is why we are opening the 2012 winter meeting with a discussion about economic growth and job creation. my goal for growing state economies is to provide each and every governor with a state profile on to their small business and economic environment and to produce action-oriented reports on policy choices that have been shown it to generate job growth, entrepreneurial activity, and expanded exports. part of growing state economies is four regional economic development summits to provide

governors and other senior economic advisers an opportunity to learn from local entrepreneur is, small business owners, researchers, and other experts on what works to create high growth innovative firms. in october, governor malloy hosted a summit in hartford, connecticut, and governor mark kelda joined us. i never, governor has long hosted a summit in nashville, tennessee and governor barbara and governor allen joined us. last month, we were hosted in seattle. in april, i will be hosting a meeting in omaha, and i encourage as many of you that can to attend. finally, i want to take a moment to think several organizations that have made important contributions to this initiative. bank of the west, generali motors, ntel, the national venture cover coalition, and sanofi-aventis.

this cross-section a private sector support illustrates just how important our work in growing state economies is. we have support from companies engaged in advanced manufacturing to cutting it information technology to those who can finance entrepreneurs. i also want to thank the kauffman foundation for their financial and intellectual support. we're pleased to have this a broad support, because it is indicative of our work that we need a partnership with the business community and others who are committed to job creation, prosperity, and economic competitiveness. now, to kick this off, it is my pleasure to introduce a good friend, a gallup chairman and ceo, james clifton, who says "what everyone in the world wants is a good job." in his latest book, he describes how this undeniable

fact will affect all leadership decisions as country's wage war to produce the best jobs. since 1988, jim has served as ceo of gallup, a leader in organizational consulting and public opinion research. his most recent innovation, the gallup world pole, is designed to give the world 6 billion pesetas since the voice in virtually all key global issues. under his leadership, gallup has expanded from a predominantly u.s.-based company to a worldwide organization with 40 offices in 30 countries and regions. jim is also the creator of the gallup path, the metric-based economic model that establishes the linkage among human nature in the workplace, customer engagement, and business outcomes. this model is used in performance management systems in more than 500 companies

worldwide. please welcome gallup chairman and ceo james clifton. [applause] cravaack >> thank you very much, governor heineman. it is a highlight for me to be here, and a thank you for your partnership. by the way, i do not know if you know this and not, i was born and raised in nebraska. but i live here in washington, d.c. i have an office in new york. i go back and forth. there is a story that follows a nebraskan on the east coast. maybe you have heard it. it is not a joke. it is a story. nebraska was planned oklahoma years ago, and we used at these big drag out games to the game was in lincoln. the abc announcer interviewed one of our running backs. i will not say his name. he was sitting there and had his

nebraska football helmet, pure white. nothing is done except one big n. i do not know what she has this question to the but she said to him, if the n on your helmet did not stand for nebraska, what might it stand for? he thought he really wanted to get it right, and he finally said, i would have to say knowledge. [laughter] that one follows you everywhere you go. [laughter] i just changed some things that perfectly fit what i saw in the program. i changed them, so now i do not know if the speech is going to work perfectly. i kind of wish i had not changed them, but i did. then me hang some thoughts on you that we found from our polling, and maybe they will give you some ideas for the really important discussions you're going to have. i have had kind of the same job

my whole life. dr. gallup found in our country, a famous eye when -- iowan. he was more of an academic that he was a businessman. he had a thing. he was real interested in democracy. he had a line where he said if democracy is about the will of the people, somebody should go find out what that will is. it is important to politicians. he did not say go voted that will. he just said that you should know what that will is. because if you do not know what that will is when you're making strategy is for your state and the u.s.a., if you have the wrong premises, the more you leave, the worse to make the plays. his point was, let's write that will down. here is something that you need to know for the conference. if you said -- so he started this thing 75 years ago. if you said to me, over those 75 years, what is the single most profound poll you have ever

seen? i will tell you. dr. gallup called it the great american dream. he always wanted to write that down. but the great american dream has been peace for decades. maybe that is coming out of civil war and world war i and the world war ii. then he came to have a family. pray to god that you want. freedom. a bunch of stuff like that. that has been in the will of america. here is what you need to know though. almost nobody knows this. it will sound a subtle when i tell it to you. it is just changed. the new wealth of america is to have a good job. -- the new will of america is to have a good job. it is huge sociological shifts to the changes everything. one thing that changes is when you get married, you wait longer or you do not get married at all. it changes how many kids you have. or maybe you do not have any at all.

here is a big one. it changes migration patterns. we have been walking for about 200,000 years, falling herds are agriculture, now we want because of a place that we think we can get a good job. here is in the board 1. it changes who we vote for. more than ever. it also changes to allow for all the people here and corporations, we were just talking about this, it changes how you manage your workplace. because now in job is personal, and it defines your relationship with your country, with your state, with your neighborhood, with your family, and also with big you. they say, is that new? it is all new. if you want to know what it used to be like, if you see a yankees baseball game and bay bridge hits and has a funny rented a look in the crowd. those are salary men. sorry, ladies, but at that time, it was all salary men.

they all have those black suits on. they all look exactly the same. they had those same hats on. and a black tie. it looks to me like they're all smoking pale mail cigarettes, too. but the whole yankee stadium are the same people. but that is back when the job was not personal. those were salaried people. so that is what you need to know. right now, gallup tracks nightly in employment. we shall about 20% unemployment. you had underemployed, too. if i go over and mow dave's lawn and you pick me $20 and i were to one hour -- i am not unemployed. did you know that? maybe i am and engineer and bridges were one hour a week. i am not unemployed. it gallops says to me, are you unemployed, i say, hell yes, yes are unemployed. so the real unemployment number

is about 20%. this is what is deadly about it. when we ask the 20%, do you have hope to get a job, 60% of them say i do not have any hope to get a job. it would not have mattered to salaried men. they do not care. it was not personal. but now it wipes you out, and you experience something that i am going to call hopelessness. every new state of mind here in the united states. that gets you a 18 million people. what i know about 80 million people from my business is that means every single one of us in this room is one debris away from somebody who is hopelessly out of work. so if you ask yourself, why is america in the current state of mind? it could be the relationship we have with those 18 million. that is what this is real important. the reason that there is a book called "the coming jobs were,"

their 7 billion people in the face of the earth and 5 billion adults. so we have a sample across 160 countries. that gets to 98% of the world's population. we said, what are you up to in your country? i will speed this up. the great american dream is not the will of the whole world. the whole world wants a good job. and a good job, we define, is 30 + hours per week and a paycheck and consistent work. so that is just a good job. when we ask the world, the adults, how many wish they had that, 3 billion of them say that is the most important thing in the world to me, to have a good job. here is the problem. there's only 1.2 billion good jobs available right now. so we have a global shortfall of summer between 1 billion -- 1.5

billion and 1.8 billion jobs. the problem that you see with jobs going to china or wherever they are, all of that is going to grow multiple times bigger. so as americans, when we think about our future, about where the jobs are going to become a it is not just china build the whole world will be crushing for them. we have been watching this in the middle east with our tracking there. it looks like the arab spring to you, maybe it is islamic winter. how about that is just a jobs war? in egypt, they voted for the brotherhood. the brotherhood came in and made a great big move into leadership. guess why they voted for the brother said. you think because they want sharia law. that is not what they told us. they think the brotherhood is if you don't understand what the will is, you may call the wrong decisions and assumptions and you make the middle east worst because that is not what they are going for.

it is everywhere. that is the point. i was watching -- you know these numbers now -- this country's gdp is about $15 trillion. the chinese gdp is about $5 trillion we have about three times the gdp that china does. when you ask on the gallup poll to the country who has a bigger economy, they say china's. i don't know why. if china had a bigger gdp than we do right now, this would be a colossal bust. this would be a huge mass. it is kind of a mess right now. i went through and took a bunch of economists and said where will the u.s. economy be in 30

years? they said it will go from 15-30. we will have $30 trillion of new incoming stuff. where will china be? between 60-$80 trillion. the white bus out. -- they wipe us out. we are on track where they will be the leader of the free world and economics are more important than military. they will have plenty of money for military. the problem is the economic might the u.s. has had over the years has been incredible. another good question is what will the gdp of the whole world be? we will go from a current $60 trillion where we are now -- the united states as 25% of all whole world's gdp which is colossal.

there is only 300 million of us. it will go from 60 to 200. it means $140 trip -- it means 140 trillion new stuff will be coming in. there'll be $140 trillion of sales, stocks, money, customers, and jobs in the next 30 years. we've got to get a disproportionate share of it or our relationship with the rest of the world changes more than you can ever imagine. the way it looks now is the chinese, whether you do 8.5% or 10%, that's what comes out to. unless something big happens that is coming to a theater near us and that was one of the reasons why the gallup poll put this stuff together. you are quiet and depressed.

that is why we did that research. i will try to say something hopeful here. i was watching tv a little over 30 years ago and there was a panel of economists, i just turned 60, i lived through this. the panel of economists, i will never forget watching this, shocked me. they all sat there left and right leaning, good americans, and they said that japan and germany were going to overtake our economy in the next 30 years. that is right now. they say because of superior manufacturing, japan would go to first and germany would go to second and the united states would go to third. they said japan would be at about five and germany would be about 4 and the united states now, would be 3.5 or 3.8.

can you imagine? it as deja vu all over again. remember what happened -- nobody saw it coming. the people of low america, our own economists said it was over. we went clear up to $15 trillion. i don't know why. why did anybody not write about this? what ever happened there is what we need back here again. somebody needs to write that down and say how can we do that. what happened was, we just had an unbelievable run of innovation and an entrepreneurship. if he won a big number, add the stubs over 20 years over the projection, you see what i mean, over the regression line, that equals $100 trillion.

now you finally have a big number. that is how much money we had over those 30 years by outperforming where we were supposed to be. that is also how we had 25% of the total gdp of the whole world. i want to hit on a couple of these points. i don't mean to make them sound reckless but i think it is important for the good of the order here. i think we're making a very big mistake getting all of our money on innovation. consider that. we have pushed all the big multi-colored chips on to that one phenomenon of innovation.

what if you are wrong? what if we are wrong? i notice the president just packed $150 billion into innovation. i did not say a line for entrepreneurship. what if we got it exactly backwards? i worked on this research with no special interest groups. innovation has no value whatsoever until there is a customer standing next to it. there is not a person in this town that knows that. when we are trying to create jobs and we keep piling more and more on innovation, look what they saudis are doing. they are building cities of innovation. the most valuable part of it is the business model and the doctor per nor that can't fire it. -- entrepreneur that can fire

it. this is such an unbelievable story -- the internet probably saved this country in that great big run. there are some other things but that is a huge part of it. there is an inventor in washington right now walking around, he built to that. -- he built that over at darpa. he is a friend of mine and he told me this story. he had done. a guy came walking over and he had heard about it any asked to see it. vin got back is to fly across fiber optics. he has -- he has his own internet and a guy came from the u.s. senate and looked at and he said that could be a helluva thing, let's throw it out into commerce. vin cerf said to that u.s. senator, fine with me but i

don't see what value businesses will have with this. it was a conversation about the internet. by the way, the u.s. senator was al gore. i don't even know him. he should have gotten a nobel prize for that one. that internet just sat there until it went out into commerce and ought to ignore is got ahold -- entrepreneurs got ahold of it and probably most of the $100 trillion came out of just that moment. otherwise, all that in obeisance it's there. maybe we would still be spending more money on innovation. a woman invited me to give a talk at the cabinet of sciences. she said i need you here in an hour and half. did somebody canceled? what you want me for?

she said it was the people that had our best laboratories. she wanted me to tell them that an invasion was overrated. -- innovation was overrated. these of the people that run the best laboratories in the world. i said to them how many of you have inventions that are ready to go and just need to be commercialized? every hand went up. >> one guy said i have an invention better than the internet. it needs entrepreneur were shipped. we must -- an entrepreneurship. we might have an oversupply of innovation -- of invention, but we of not put the same science to the entrepreneur that we have to innovation. here,tching my clock governor. i just want to make one more

point for you to consider. what the united states is the best in the world that is intellectual development. you hear about bad schools. the top schools are incredible. the top 30 schools, 20 are in the united states. we are masters of intellectual development. if you put 1000 kids in front of educational psychologists they can rank them 1 through 1000 with their iq, sat score, and everyone would agree, we really know iq. that is how we will find someone. they cast out. you give them a scholarship. it is so intentional but once they graduate they go on. see how we do that?

no one has mastered intellectual development like the united states of america i do not know what -- america. i do not know what the example is. the hammer and nail? if you are a hammer, you think everything is the mail? if you said there are these 1000 kids, let's line them up by their ability to enterprise. the united states of america fails. we have no idea. it is even an argument. we do not even know who the buses carry if we could do that, you might rise up and -- do -- who the best is. if we could do that, you might rise up and change everything. here are two ideas, and he will have some questions. this morning, 6 million ceo's

got up. 6 million between one employee and 100, between 100 and 500 there is only 80,000, and between 500 and 1000, then there are only 100,000. we really are a nation of small businesses. when the small businesses get up, not one of them is thinking about how they can hire an employee. you are seeing the president. make sure you tell him that. no one is trying to hire an employee. they are trying to cut them. if you hire one person, it is like a merger.

you have to talk to your bank, your spouse, and everything else, but what everyone is talking about is how they can create customer. this is really important. of the 6 million, 75% are not even trying to grow. you just have to know that or you will make mistakes in your engineering. what they doing in that business? if they do it only for the reason of freedom. they are like coyotes. they can not be domesticated. they never will be. that is the way they are. they are not trying to grow. if you put engineering systems in, policies in, all the ways they can grow, 75% into not know what you're talking about.

they are doing it because nobody can tell them what to do. if you get into what they are thinking about, they are like from outer space. only 25% of them are trying to become facebook and groupon. that is 1.5 million small businesses, but those are the ones we have to put engineering in place and support because they could burst. there is about $3 trillion of gdp in there. they could burst up to three times, five times. that is the sweet spot in all of this. the last one is we did a survey of fifth through 12th graders. it is hard to get a national random. we asked if they would invent something that changes the world, so 45% of them said they

would do that. the other one about starting their own business is about 45%, to. -- 45%, tool . there is plenty of hope. that is where you will get start-ups. the second place we have to be is right there. here is the negative, when we ask them if they are in an internship, only 5% of them said they are. if we not done up to 20%, 25%, or even 50%, i think we would take over the world. i'm quick to stop right now. thank you very much for having me. [applause] >> jim clifton has given us plenty to think about, and he has also agreed to take questions. so, go right ahead. >> first of all, let me say the newest governor has arrived.

the governor of mississippi. welcome. you get the first question. >> i enjoyed that. tell me what the biggest impediment is to these lone wolves, these entrepreneur orders, because i love these guys. -- and entrepreneur -- these entrepreneurs, and what slows them down? if you just move that out of the way, i will take off? >> that is a deadly question. that is a debate. i called some of them myself. you sound like you know a lot of them. there in a completely different space and the rest of the country. when you ask them what the

biggest burden is, the state regulations. -- they say regulations. it is not banks. if anybody tells you, because there are surveys around, and they tend to be listed samples -- just trust me. when we say what regulations, the two drove down our environment and health care. -- drill downs our environment and health care. it is the image that crushes them. i looked at them as turtles. they have their heads in their shells. what will get them out? i mean that positively. turtles can move freely fast. >> in mississippi, they will bite you, too. [laughter] >> you and i have always had trouble getting loans. 20% is the right number.

it should not be 0. you should be arguing with these guys anyway. regulations, but also the image. i will not say the name, but a group of guys said we're going to give a rebate of $4,000 if they will hire somebody, then they start thinking is that more rules for me? it makes a turtle draw their head back. then we say why don't we have every company hire one employee? 6 million people are not going to hire one employee. so little guy in jackson, mississippi, is going to hire one, and ge is going to hire one and lay off 33,000 people? don't bring that up because it makes the turtle pull their head in even more. >> thank you.

>> along the same line of what has been mentioned with regulations, when you talk about 6 million ceo's were not trying to expand their businesses, i expected there out there trying to be profitable. that is the motivation. that this house a free market system works. as you are profitable, you have the opportunity to expand your business and hire more people. profitability happens in many different ways. to me, it is not only the regulation, but the uncertainty of the marketplace. estimates are that we have a couple trillion dollars of capital on the sidelines. that is because of uncertainty, regulations, we do not know what the future is going to bring. for the entrepreneur who has a great idea, they need capital. when you commercialize, how do you you have capital to flow towards helping them to commercialize a great idea, whatever that might be in a

free market system? my question would be how do we get capital flow into the marketplace to energize the entrepreneur and help them to expand existing businesses with new ideas? >> remember, of the 6 million, only 25% of them really want to grow. when we asked them if they have the capital necessary to grow, they say they do. you have another group, in that 75%, they are having trouble, would like to have money, and banks are not lending to them. they go broke. it is important that you segment those populations. one of the most amazing experience i've done in my career we are doing in nebraska, and we found 500 small businesses and we put a guide to 10 of them, and we have

about five things we do to them. you also have a relationship outside of those tools. you talk about their strategies. they are always do it a lot of things wrong. they spend too much time with their worst customers, rather than their best. we put our best tools in. it is mentoring, advising, that is really what they want. what they wish they could have consultants like a big companies have, kind of like bain capital or somebody. we have tried to create that. by the way, to do it well, you need to have the university of nebraska help. you cannot have some lowly state department do it. it is kind of like magic pulling it off. dave told me he was a very

popular governor. that is what he told me. [laughter] >> people in that 25%, there are some real hot shots, and they want to be part of something exciting. dade shows up, i show up, did ceo shows up, the president of the university -- dave shows up, i shall walk, the ceo shows up, the president of the university shows up budget i show up, the ceo shows up, -- i'm sure, the ceo shows up, the president of the university shows up. that is what they want. not capital. >> we probably beat nebraska that year. [laughter] i was intrigued by the businesses, your survey about

the ceo's wanting to expand. i recently did a survey in oklahoma, and we are relatively small, 3.8 million people, and we surveyed our businesses, asking about tax structure, workforce, education, are you planning to add more jobs, and we found that over 60% of businesses that responded said they were going to add jobs, which was interesting according to your statistic. the other thing bettas a little different is that we actually have -- that is a little different in my state is we have employers that can not find the workers in oklahoma, so we started a program called okjobsmatch.com. to match employers with employees that are out there in the work force looking for jobs. it is interesting, nationally,

it is different than what i am seeing. it goes back to the last question of creating the certainty in the marketplace as opposed to the uncertainty we see nationally. as governors, would you recommend we can do to further create certainty in our state and what we need to do nationally with the uncertainty in the marketplace? >> by the way, if you want to do 9% unemployment, or 20% unemployment, you are right -- the variations in this country of performance are unbelievable. omaha, neb., has unemployment of around 4.9%. gdp is growing. if you look at austin, texas, and albany, new york, i'd like comparing those two -- both big states, capital cities, and no ports, and know nothing, but for some reason austin, texas, has created unbelievable energy.

albany can not. the only thing you can point to his local leadership teams where they get together and make some kind of strategy. i was looking in national. i do not know if they have that much gdp or not. they may get into a healthcare center. there are enormous differences. the best thing we can do is the 1.5 small businesses, by the way, the same number of soldiers we have, if we work as hard to develop them as we did our military, and i love the military, by the way, but if we got as good as dead science, i think that is our best chance to -- at that science, i think that is our best chance to come up. i am a capitalist. the kids coming out of high

school may to be in a state of mind of free enterprise or we will not have the focus that we need. those are the big places to work -- to focus on. get some engineering for them. dave and i can tell you about our experiment. get a metric. gallup gave it as a gift to the country. if you go on a gallup.com, your schools can plug in how much innovation energy, on to print your energy, and how many are in internships. -- entrepreneur energy and how much -- how many students are in your internships. it is too low. >> let's say we solve the issue on been teaching folks how to be an entrepreneur, -- that we

solve the issue of regulation. have governments that and found ways to make it easier to do business -- have found ways to make it easier to do business. in small communities, unemployment is that 13%, and in some areas it is like 9%. the question i have, it is a two-part question. you need a customer. it ultimately comes to meeting a customer. -- needing a customer. let's say this territory or county figures that out. do you then take from the other county, or the other state and prosper and blossom? you alluded to the issue of

globalization, where america is at 25% now, but if you look at all of the experts, intent, 20, 30 years, -- in 10, 20, 30 years, we are a small piece of the pie. if we are driven by small business, how you get more customers, and it is not just the customer from albany or oklahoma. how do you get that small business entrepreneur who does not have much regulation to other customers in this global economy? >> i understand your question. one reason we have to slow down is we are not selling fast enough to each other. we need more competition, but you are right, that will not take us up to the gdp numbers we need to continue the relationship we have with the rest of the world. we do need competition.

we could get another 7% out of that. the big answer is export. you see the future through apple, groupon, cars, and other things, but if we do not export, none of this works. those little guys are doing a pretty good job. within that 25% group, those numbers add up pretty fast. you are spot on. it doesn't work. we cannot sell enough stock to each other to get the numbers we need. -- stuff to each other to get the numbers we need. >> any final questions? the governor of hawaii. >> yes. you indicated that among

-- and you indicated that among the responses, you said you drill down a little bit on the element that can afford and one of them was health care. the provision of health care, financing health care, i presume, is what you mean by that, the costs. that has very little to do, or nothing to do with regulation s such. it has everything to do with how we provide health care. what is the assumption about healthcare? you mentioned the united states military. if we had training, investment, as someone who was involved for two decades of the armed services committee before i took this job, i will tell you i have some experience and how you provide health care. it is national, international, that is to say universal health care. what is happening at least where my collective bargaining is concerned in the state of hawaii is that the provision of

health care and its cost is the single most difficult challenge to me. it is not state spending. it is the cost running away. it is the spending chasing the cost. until we come to grips with the question of health care and get rid of the political rhetoric, we are not going to be able to deal with whether it's called regulation or anything else. we have to come with grips with the question of the provision of health care and the exploding costs are rounded before it will have some of the flexibility with -- around it before it will have some of the flexibility with regard to education are -- and some of the things around it. >> by the way, when respondents say health care, something to keep in mind is also the image

of regulations might be more than the actual regulations. it could be the 6 million turtles saying more regulations, but they cannot really pin them down. you are right. everything i am talking about this morning addresses -- i will call of the offense. we cannot cut our way out of the. if falling gdp does not bounce back up, -- if our gdp does not bounce back up, the defense is health care. it is growing. if you add that it is $10 trillion, three times bigger than the sub-prime dell compared the tsunami from health care is just unbelievable. -- sub-prime. the tsunami from health care is just unbelievable.

the target is way out ahead of a lot of people. -- target is getting way out ahead of a lot of people. it is about the same as their profit. 300,000 times 8000 is about $300 million. so, health care has gotten to the same place. remember the joke warren buffett made about how general motors was really a healthcare company that happens to sell cars? what he meant was the only survive to provide health care. that is pretty much the way of our businesses are right now. i had better end. thank you very much. [applause] >> the house is in recess after debating one bill dealing with security federal grounds. the members will be back at 6:30 p.m. eastern.

michigan and arizona hold their presidential primaries tomorrow night. later this evening, rick santorum live from kalamazoo, christian -- kalamazoo, mich., speaking at heritage christian academy. that is live at 7:30 p.m. on c- span3. and we will talk with roger lowenstein on "washington journal" about his audra call -- his article, "is inacio worth $189,000 per hour?" he will take your phone calls at 9:00 a.m. eastern. >> you can charge your iphone, cell phones, all of that stuff directly. what you are seeing here is an area that has 165 million wells, each of which can sequence a

small piece of dna. of the technology itself is using two kamras, one that looks out, and one that looks at the high. we know exactly what the purchase -- what the person is interested in that they are seeing. >> a look at the newest and technology and latest innovations coming out of the industry. at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. >> the defense department said today that it has no plans to change strategy in afghanistan. two pentagon officials spoke to reporters about the protests and violence there.

>> i will open with a few remarks about afghanistan, and i'm pleased to be joined by my colleague by video link from kabul. the mishandling of materials, including the holy ground, political leaders including the president, the secretary of defense, and the security force in afghanistan move quickly and forcefully to express apologies for this incident. and both american and afghan leaders have let -- have met with muslim religious leaders over the past several days to elicit support in conveying that message. tragically, many in afghanistan have been killed or wounded as a result of the violence there. extremists have killed four americans, including two officers within the conference of the afghan interior ministry. -- within the confines of the afghan interior ministry. these are tough losses, and they

demonstrated challenges that we experienced during the course of this campaign. but let me be clear, first, secretary panetta and chairman dempsey are fully committed to our strategy in afghanistan. they believe we have achieved significant progress in reversing the taliban's momentum and in developing the afghan security forces. and they believe the fundamentals of our strategy remain sound. second, we will not let recent events allow us to lose sight of the progress we are making toward our broader objectives, including our core goal of defeating al qaeda and its terrorist allies, and denying it the ability to maintain a safe haven in afghanistan. third, we are on wavering in our commitment to achieving the transition to afghan security lead along the time line agreed to at lisbon.

fourth, we join president karzai and other senior afghan leaders who have called for calm in an end to violent protest. fifth, we appreciate the steps president karzai is taking to quell violence in the country, and we commend a hard work and sacrifice of the afghan security forces who have suffered casualties attempting to quell the violence. we respect the right of all afghans to peaceful protest. but further bloodshed serves dinner -- serves neither the coalition, nor the afghan people, who are themselves falling victim to violence. finally, our relationship with our afghan partners remains strong. we continue to strengthen the mutual trust between isaf and the government of afghanistan, as well as afghan forces and civilians. every day, our forces together

with our afghan partners face a brutal enemy. there are now about 330,000 afghan security forces defending their own country, and they are partnering with isaf forces in well over 90% of operations. together they fight in very difficult situations, building trust and mutual respect, despite recent incidents as. -- recent incidents. we know that the coalition of as get -- the coalition and afghan forces will be tested throughout the campaign. anyone who believes they can weaken our resolve through these attacks is severely mistaken. let me repeat that. anyone who believes they can weaken our resolve through these cowardly attacks is severely mistaken. our coalition will emerge from these challenges far stronger,

and as determined as ever to provide security for the afghan people. there is much at stake in afghanistan. our commitment to our mission and our strategy will not waver. with that, i will be happy to take your questions, unless capt. kirby from kabul has further comments. >> no, thanks, george. i thought you cover them very well and i'm ready for questions. >> with respect to general allan removing advisers from the ministry, what must need to change before they go back into that partnership? i think he said the fundamentals of the strategy remains down. what are the fundamentals and where are the partnerships and

trusts that you referred to? is he going to proceed with a strategy without any reconsideration? >> when it comes to the particulars of ensuring that there is the appropriate security for isaf personnel and others, that is something we work on together. the fundamental strategy does remain sound. we continue to fight alongside our afghanistan and -- our afghan and isaf partners. the mission continues and will continue to do that. if we work alongside thousands of afghans every single day to ensure a better future for the afghan people. nothing that has happened over the past week will deter us from that goal. it we are making progress -- we are making progress and have put the enemy on its heels in many parts of the country. that does not mean there is not work to be done. there is. but let's not let the events of the last week steer us away from the reality that we have made to

mcginn progress in the country. let me turn it over to -- have made weekend the progress in the country. let me turn it over to john. he may have additional comments. >> thanks, george. general allan has made it clear that the advisers will go back into the ministries when he is ready for them to go back. he has not put a deadline or tie line on that he is in discussions -- or a time line on that. he is in discussions every day with the ministry of the interior and the ministry of the defense to get to that point. i would not want to go into any specifics on that because you obviously want to preserve a little bit of your force protection measures. but suffice it to say, he is not ready right now to have the advisers go back. but this is temporary. he made this very clear yesterday in meetings, that he

wants the work to go on. advisers are still in contact with their counterparts in the ministry via phone and e-mail. the contact is still there, the work is still continuing. it is just that they are not physically at the ministry building >> is isaf -- at the ministry building. >> is isaf taking any additional measures as far as partnering as a safety measure? how can isaf personnel be confident that they are not vulnerable to attack to the very -- by the very people they are mentoring? >> kupchan? >> a great question, but -- >> john? >> a great question, but what we have talked about these incidences in the past, these are challenges that we are dealing with all the time. i would tell you that each of

the regional commanders, general allan certainly urge them to be vigilant, but he also made it clear that operations continue. we just wrapped up an operation today, a three or four day operation, partnered with rc southwest. over 900 afghan security troops were partnered with this operation, nearly half the total truth the participated. it was what we call a spoiling mission. they wanted to get ahead of any spring offensive by the enemy down south. they did a tremendous work together. it was a very successful mission. it's over 200 pounds of homemade explosives were captured. weretraploid, 29 ied's taken. they inspected over 5000 vehicles along highway one through two districts down there.

that is just one example. but the work continues, as george said, throughout the country. the partnership continues. the growth and development and the training of afghan security forces has not been aunt -- not been impacted. clearly, everybody will be a lot more vigilant right now. it is appropriate to do. but the mission itself continues. >> capt. kirby, please give us your best assessment of what is happening on the ground right now how widespread are these protest? how often are they happening? how dangerous is the atmosphere? and what additional steps, if any, can you tell us about to protect general troops and american civilians? >> right now, all that has been done in kabul -- nothing has changed over the last couple of days.

the advisers are not in the ministries. movement here is restricted. especially anything outside the green zone. obviously, i would be less than honest if i did not say that things are tense in kabul. they certainly are. but i will tell you that it is getting calmwer here. -- it is getting calmer here. on saturday, we had many protests and a great majority were violent. and yesterday, only nine protests, and they were not throughout the country. there were four in the east, four in the north, and only one out west. and today, only two -- 3 protests, and only two were about the koran dispute. only one was violent. there has been a call by religious leaders, certainly by

president karzai and other government officials, for calm and peaceful protests. we are starting to see an effort toward restraint. >> capt. kirby, could you give us a status update of the investigation into, as george put it the other day, the murders of the two officers in the interior ministry. why hasn't the perpetrator been caught? and why haven't the afghans even said publicly that this was an afghan that carried this out? >> i will not speak for what the afghan ministries are saying or not saying or why. that is something they should talk to. this just happened, as you know, so the investigation is just now on -- under way. the afghans are also investigating it as well. we are working together with them on that. the killer fled and there is an

active search to find him. i would be loath to go into any more detail than that. believe me, craig, what happened today as everybody's attention here, and sharp focus. it is a sharp tragedy. again, our hearts and prayers go out to the families of the two that were killed. but to the larger point, and george said this very well, as tragic as that was and a shock to the system here, certainly to isaf personnel here in kabul, everybody wants to continue the mission and get back to work. that is what we are focused on. >> can you tell us where things stand with the review of the entire afghan strategy? we heard this summer that you had asked general allan to do the poster strategy. this morning, i think the post

or the times said that everybody was getting, together this week to look things over at nato. where do we stand now? when will we get the report that we are waiting for? and how has everything that has gone on this last week change any of the planning? >> we are taking the long view on this, in terms of the troupe drawdowns between now and 2014. we are still having those discussions inside the u.s. government, and of course, we will consult with our isaf partners. the important thing we need to do is sustain the progress that we have made. the fundamentals of the strategy remains sound. we are not going to let the events of the past week, which are regrettable and unfortunate and tragic, influence the long horizon view that we are taking with respect to our partnership

with afghanistan and our enduring work there. barbara? >> to go back to bob's original question, is, in fact, trust between the u.s. side and the afghan side strained right now and where is it strange? can you trust them? >> john, feel free to comment on this as well and i will also offer my perspective. when we learned last week of the incident involving the secret tests -- sacred texts, including the koran, we took steps to apologize to the afghan government. and our officers were killed over the weekend, afghan officials apologize to the secretary and to others for this incident and pledged to take immediate steps to curtail violence in the country and to do what they can to protect isaf personnel. the measure of trust in a

relationship like this, and it is a very strong relationship, a strong partnership with the government of afghanistan -- when something like this happens, when we have tragic events, how quickly do we respond? we have taken responsibility for what we have done over the past week. the afghans have taken responsibility as well. i think that is a key measure of trust. we're going to continue to work together in ways that further the partnership. i think that is the essential ingredient. john, you have anything to add? >> know, george, i think that's right. if you look at it, trust and confidence are the keys to coalition warfare. there are going to be issues. there is going to be some tension. there are going to be some disagreements. and as we have seen, they're going to be these dreadful,

regrettable, lethal incidents. but i can tell you at the leadership level, everybody here is focused on maintaining that trust and confidence and continuing to work together. we are maintaining daily contact between general allen and his counterparts in the afghan government. >> do you think the karzai government did enough to stop the violence in the early days, them or one? and number two, sitting here today, could leon panetta walked into the ministry in kabul and be saved? without extra protection. we understand he travels with extra protection. could he walked into either of those buildings right now? >> we have talked with the problem -- with the afghan officials about the problem of violence throughout the country. >> [unintelligible]

did they do enough in the initial outbreak of violence? >> we are confident in our partners in the days after the kurram incident. we believe they did not want to see the kind of violence that has spread throughout the country. we believe they are committed to curtailing violence. they have pledged that to the secretary and to others. we look forward to seeing violence abate in the coming days. john, do you have anything to add? >> know, george, nothing to add. -- no, george, nothing to add. >> i want to go back to the incident of the ministry of the interior on saturday. are you 100% sure that the

shooting inside the ministry is related to the correne issue -- the koran issue? and my second question, the you think that some senior afghan officers could be involved in this incident? >> the answer to both your questions, quite honestly, is we do not know. the we do not know what the motivation was behind the murders. and we do not know all the facts surrounding how this individual got into this space, and frankly, was able to get out as quickly and easily as he did, apparently. that is what investigators are working to right now, and we do not have that level of detail. >> can you update us on the

status of the investigation into the karan burning itself? has anyone been pace on leave -- been placed on leave? we were told last week that there would be preliminary results within 24 hours, and we have not heard much about that. and what was the decision making about recalling he got -- recalling advisers from them ministries in kabul and are around kabul, and not in the rest of the country? why is that distinction made? why you think advisers around the country are safer than those in kabul? >> john, do you want to take that question? >> yeah, sure. on the status investigation, it is ongoing. it is not yet complete. i would be loath to get into a specific deadline here, but i can tell you that they're

working very hard on this. i am not aware of any body being put on leave or anything like that as a result of this. the work is going on. they are working very hard at it, because general allen did want this done right the, but expeditiously. that is where we are. i just do not have a better feel for it than that. on the other question, this was such a very specific act, clearly against two men who were advisers inside a ministry, and based on what we knew at the time and in the hours after, the most prudent thing to do -- general allen made this decision very quickly -- to get everyone back inside the isaf compound. we did not have any indication

that the threat was anywhere other than in kabul. and i said this earlier, he also made it clear to all of the regional commander out there that they also needed to take whatever appropriate force protection measures that they felt were needed, based on the conditions on the ground where they were. and without getting into the details of what each one did or did not do, i can tell you that they took the guidance to heart. >> could you tell us if those force protection measures included separating armed afghan security forces from the u.s. and isaf forces in any of the outlying areas? and also, could you give us an update on this food tampering business at the forward operating base this morning? was there intentional intend to poison u.s. forces there?

-- was their intent to poison u.s. forces there? >> as i said, we just concluded a very successful partner operation. and we are still out there in very kinetic operations with afghan partners. i would not want to speak for each rc commander in terms of what they did or did not do. but training and partnership continues today. on the other issue, the legend food poisoning, week -- the l'oeil did food poisoning, we are investigating this right now. -- the alleged food poisoning, we are investigating this right now. i can tell you that an employee at and that -- at a dining facility had some reason to believe there was food tampering. he reported it and they immediately close the facility

and brought in a team to examine the food. they did find high levels of chlorine in the coffee and on some fruit. what we do not know right now -- and again, this is why the team is looking into it -- we do not know if this was a deliberate act to poison, or just perhaps using more clorox in the cleaning than they should have. we just do not know right now. >> and do any of the commanders, particularly at the upper levels considering the events of last week, consider u.s. forces in the field fighting side by side with armed afghans at greater risk today than they were a week ago? >> again, i would not want to speak for operational commanders

that i have not spoken to. and i am here in kabul and not out with them. what i can tell you is that all of the rc commanders are continuing operations every day. and the process is not just field operations. it is the process of transition and training. as of this morning, they all outlined their ongoing efforts. the work continues. certainly, everybody is a little bit more vigilant, and they have taken whatever force protection measures they deem appropriate, but not to the degree -- at least, not that i have seen -- to the effect that id -- to the place that it affects the mission or the strategy. >> we have this incident of the last week. we have the border castillo's with pakistan.

understanding that you are still focused on the taliban, the relationship -- we have the border still closed with pakistan. understanding that you are still focused on the taliban, the relationship has begun to change. >> you can see this after the house. the house is coming in to vote on it measure earlier today. to accompany -- the clerk: report to accompany house resolution. to prohibit the department of education from overreaching into academic affairs and program eligibility under title 4 of the higher education act of 1965. the speaker pro tempore: referred to the house calendar and ordered printed. pusuant to clause 8 of rule 20, the unfinished business is the vote on the motion of the gentleman from texas, mr. smith torque suspend the rules and concur in the senate amendment to h.r. 347 on which the yeas and nays were ordered. the clerk will report the title of the bill.

the clerk: h.r. 347, an act to correct and simplify the drafting of section 1752, relating to restricted buildings or grounds of title 18, united states code. the speaker pro tempore: the question is, will the house suspend the rules and concur in the senate amendment? members will record their votes by electronic device. this is a 15-minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.]

the speaker pro tempore: on this vote, the yeas are 387, the nays are 3. 2/3 being in the affirmative --

the speaker pro tempore: have all members voted. any member wish to change their vote. on this vote, the yeas are 388, the nays are 3, 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the senate amendment is agreed to. and without objection, the the motion to reconsider is laid on the table. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. please take your conversations off the floor.

the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from indiana seek recognition? >> mr. speaker -- the hoist is not in order. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the gentleman from indiana is recognized. >> i would like to if i could

get everybody's attention, ask for a moment of silence. we just lost a former member of congress, katie hall from gary, indiana, and after that, mr. speaker, if you would be so kind, we would like to have a moment or two to make some comments about ms. hall. i request that the house have a moment of silence in remembrance of katie hall. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the house will be in order. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from indiana is recognized. mr. burton: thank you, mr. speaker. let me start off real quickly before i yield to my colleague from gary, indiana and say katie hall, who was a member of this body, died just this last few

days from an unknown illness and was 73 years old and came from humble beginnings in mississippi. grew up on her father's cotton farm and was a teacher foy more than 30 years. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. members, please take your conversations off the floor. the gentleman may proceed. mr. burton: she was a very fine teacher and she moved in 1962 to gary, indiana, where she became a very good friend of richard hatcher of the mayor. and when a good friend of mine died, mr. hatcher, mayor hatcher appointed her as the nominee on the democrat party to succeed him. she also served in the indiana senate. i served with her there.

she was a very fine person. >> the house is not in order. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is correct. the house will be in order. take your conversations off the floor. the gentleman from indiana may proceed. mr. burton: during her time in the congress, she was one of the key sponsors in 1983 of the national holiday in remembrance of dr. martin luther king and credited for playing a key role in getting that bill passed after it stalled in the house for 14 years. she was a great lady, great congresswoman and will be missed and we want to send our deepest sympathy to our family and friends. and i yield to my colleague, the senior member from gary, indiana. >> i appreciate the gentleman for yielding and appreciate the

indulgence of the chair. i appreciate the gentleman for yielding and asking for the moment of silence. mr. visclosky: mr. speaker, could we ask the folks over there to be silent for a few minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the house will be in order. members, please take your conversations off the floor. the gentleman from indiana may proceed. mr. visclosky: i appreciate it. i would express my appreciation for the dean of our delegation, for asking for the moment of silence. mr. burton rightfully pointed out the sponsorship of the legislation that dr. king's holiday and also point out to my holiday that mrs. hall served in

the indiana house as well as the indiana senate and following her service in the united states congress, also served as clerk for the city of gary for five years from 1988 to 2003. she does leave a granddaughter, two daughters and a husband. my sympathies and all of us go out to the family as well. i also think that mrs. hall would probably want to be remembered for her role as an educator and those who taught young people in the gary school system. she aserved her family and those who she represented and served her country and again our sympathies go to the family and i appreciate the respect shown by the gentleman from indiana. mr. burton: i would be happy to yield to my colleague from indianapolis. >> mr. speaker, i would like to take a moment and join my colleagues to honor the life of former congresswoman katie hall,

who passed last week at the age of 73. i met her as a young man. in fact i had the chance to spend some time with her in the early 1980's in san francisco during the democratic national convention. she made a name, not only as a strong advocate and leader in the state of indiana but as an educator. she knew that america's children were suffering and she supported alternative education, mr. speaker. she understood that children had different needs and made sure she was an advocate of different educational models to meet those needs. my sympathies go out to her family and friends mourning her passing and indiana politics will not be the same. and i yield back. mr. burton: she will be

mr. burton: thank you, once again our sympathy goes to her loved ones, we yield back the balance of our time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the chair is prepared to entertain one-minute requests. for what purpose does the gentleman from virginia rise? >> mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. >> mr. speaker, on thursday, february 23, virginia and our nation lost a true hero. sergeant t.j. conrad was killed in action in the nangahar province in afghanistan in the rioting there. he was 22 years old, a husband, a father, a son, and a brother. outgoing, determined, and a man of true grit. sergeant conrad truly personified the army's old

slogan, be all you can be. born in new port news and raised in the county, he grew up attend make son's cove elementary, northside middle school and northside high school. mr. griffith: he was an outstanding wrestler and helped lead his team to the blue ridge title in the regular season and the tournament as a senior in high school. i wish to extend my prayers and our prayers and condolences, his infant son bentley, his parents, his relatives and his friends. his father stated he will be remembered for his great sense of humor, his smile, his kind heart and his ability to brighten anyone's day. we grieve toe the loss of our warrior -- we grieve the loss of

our warrior brother but honor sergeant conrad for his sacrifice, his commitment to duty, honor and country. he gave his all in service for the sake of our safety, our freedom, and our liberty. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. for what purpose does the gentleman from minnesota rise? >> ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. >> mr. speaker, i rise today to congratulate the min tonka -- the minnetonka girls high school hockey team for winning their second consecutive championship. after winning last year's championship in a nail-biting game, the skippers this year defeated the raiders 3-0678 the first score came early in the first period by defender holly carn and deanna followed up with a goal late in the third period

and there was a third goal by junior laura berman who scored the final goal. mr. paulsen: this victory could not have happened if not for the outstanding goal tending who blocked 23 shots in the shutout. i want to congratulate all the girls on the skippers hobblingkey team as well as their coaches. i also want to thank and recognize their hard work, training, perseverance and commitment because it really paid off. we're proud of the student athletes and so is our entire community. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. for what purpose does the gentlelady from texas rise? >> to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. ms. jackson lee: i serve on the homeland security committee and have the privilege of serving on the committee dealing with foreign affairs here in the house. i rise today to, as usual, offer our deepest sympathy for all of our soldiers that have fallen in battle but i'm particularly outraged at the incident that

our -- that is occurring around the unfortunate burning of the koran which our president appropriately extended his apology, as we would if someone -- we would want if someone had burned bibles. but it is outrageous for our soldiers to be in harm's way, for them to lose their life. it is time for the after began national security force it is stand upened be -- security forces to stand up and be security forces. it is time for president karzai to indicate he will not be driven out by the taliban and not allow the taliban to take hold of the afghan people. this is a tragic and horrible situation none of us would have wanted to occur but we cannot stand for our soldiers to be in the eye of the storm and being shot for something they did not do, intentionally or individually. so i would ask that our soldiers be taken out of harm's way around any afghan national security forces that we cannot vet and ensure that they are intending to do the right thing. we need to hear from president

karzai in a way that denounce this is horrible action and we must stand up to the taliban and have a transition out of afghanistan where the afghan national security forces are protecting their people and they're allowed, in essence, to have a nation that protects women and children and families and has the adherence to the law that requires human decency. with that, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: are there further one-minute requests? if not, the chair lays before the house the following personal request. the clerk: leaves of absence requested for mr. bilbray of california for today, mr. culberson of texas for today, and mr. jesse jackson of illinois for today. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the requests are granted.

>> under the speaker's announced policy of january 5, 2011, the gentleman from arkansas, mr. griffith, is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader. mr. griffith: thank you, mr. speaker. i came here to the floor tonight to talk with some of my colleagues and the american people about what i believe is the most pressing issue facing our country. a lot of us have been home working in our districts over the last week, seeing our constituents, speaking at local rotary clubs. mr. griffin: visiting with constituents in the office and around the district. and it is clear to me that the top priority for the american people over the last year remains the same, and that is, jobs.

people back home are encouraged and are optimistic about the future but they need some signs that jobs are increetsing here in the united states. jobs remain the number one issue. since i got here a little over a year ago with some of my freshman colleagues, a lot of us have made jobs our sole focus. there are a lot of different things we can do to encourage job creation. my focus has been on the private sector. private sector job creation in my view is the way that we get our economy going again. not through government stimulus.

we've tried that. to the tune of about $1 trillion, almost. it has not done what the president promised. seems to me the best approach is to create an environment here in this country where the private sector can flourish. where people want to take risks, where they want to invest and compete with other countries. so how do we do that? there are a variety of ways. that's why we're here tonight torque talk about some of these. i'm joined by some of my colleagues and i think that they would agree that one of the ways we can encourage the private sector to grow and create jobs is through tax reform. fundamental tax reform.

another way is regulatory reform. job creators around my district tell me what a lot of us know and that is that not regulation, but overregulation, not regulation, but excessive regulation is a tax on businesses. it's a tax on job creators. so we need tax reform. we need regulatory reform. thirdly, we need to further pursue our energy resources here in the united states. we need to construct, for example, the keystone x.l. pipeline that the president first delayed and then denied. so thirdly, we need to further

explore our energy resources. fourthly, we need to live within our means. as a government. that means dealing with our spending problem. our spending addiction. our debt. our trillion-plus dollar deficits. so if you were to ask me, what's your plan? what would you do? what are you trying to do? what have you been fighting for for a year, over a year, try to encourage the private sector to grow jobs in this country? i would say tax reform, regulatory reform, increased energy exploration and development here in the united states, and making the federal

government live within our means. those four things, if we can address them, in bold ways, we can change the course of this country's fiscal situation and the economy and ultimately grow this economy and create jobs. i'm going to turn now and yield to the gentleman from virginia, if you'd like to comment on some of this. >> thank you, congressman griffin. i do, and i agree with what you had to say and whole heartedly support your concepts and where we need to be moving this country. let me say to each and every one of you that the american worker is second to none in this world. second to none. mr. griffith: when you look at our workers, they are the most innovative workers in the world and they are the hardest workers in the world. statistics, different reports, continue to show us this point. we will never compete with the

chinese and other countries on wages, nor do we want to. but our advantage, our advantage, congressman griffin, is that we have the ability to use our energy resources in a way that we can create jobs and we can fight for american jobs by having affordable energy. that's our trump card. and for some reason, those in the administration want to tie our hands behind our backs and not allow our businesses to use our trump card to keep jobs in the united states and bring jobs back and that is that we have great energy resources in this country. you know, the president was recently in florida and he mockingly described republican plans on energy and getting gas prices down, he said, step one is drill. step two is drill. step three is drill. well, you know, the president is just wrong. we have a true all-of-the-above

policy. and i like to describe it this way. it is drill. that's step one. step two, dig. step three, discover. step four, deregulate. let me explain a little bit. drill is easy. we have vast, untapped resources in oil and we have huge resources in natural gas. if we're allowed to drill for natural gas and for oil, we can turn around a lot of the things that are happening in this country. let's talk about gas prices because that affects jobs. listen, some of this has to do with looking at the world market and if we signaled immediately that we were ready to start using our resources, the prices would come down because those people who are speculating that oil is not going to be available in the future and -- not in the distant future but also two or three years from now would realize the giant in the world of energy was awakened from its

slumber and ready to go on the march for jobs. . so the it's important that we look at drilling. i don't think we should be mocking it. dig. obviously we have a lot of coal resources in this country. my district has a lot of coal, it also has natural gas. we are number one in the world in coal resources. everybody else in the world is using the coal, we are the ones who refuse to use it. as i said before, we have our hands tied behind our backs. well, ladies and gentlemen, i have to tell you something. we have to have reasonable regulations but we've got to untie our hands and be ready to use our coal. the chinese are now buying our coal to make -- to use our coal to make the products, the goods that we used to make in this country. and guess what? a lot of times folks say, we don't want to use coal because it has pollution tanned creates problems -- and it creates problems but a nasa study has shown us that if we have the chinese using our coal to make the products we use to make, they get those money for those products, their people have the

jobs and guess what happens to the pollutants in the air? it takes roughly 10 days to get from the middle of the gobi desert to the eastern shore of my beloved virginia. just 10 days. we know that a significant portion of the mercury in our air is coming from foreign sources. not our plants, but foreign sources. mr. griffin:ky inject something there? mr. griffith: i yield back. mr. griffin: i think it's a great point. and a lot of times some of us think about this country and pollution here. but i think that what i hear you saying, it's a very, very good point, is that this is one world and we in this country, through the processes and the regulatory structure that we have, we burn coal cleaner, we

are a better steward of the earth when it comes to using some of these traditional energy sources. so what i hear you saying is, i think it makes a lot of sense. if you believe that coal will not be used if we do not use it here, then that's not exactly accurate. somebody's going to burn it. the question is, do we do a better job with some of these traditional energy sources, do we do a better job than other countries that will burn it if we don't? the chinese can burn the same coal yet regulate it in a way

where they do a lot more damage to the environment. and that brings me actually to the keystone pipeline. the president first delayed it, then he denied it. so that the extreme environmentalists would be happy with him. but if you apply what you're talking about, it seems to me we would rather refine -- we would rather be refining the oil sands from canada in this country, instead of the alternative that canada's talked about which is shipping it to china for refining. why? because we refine cleaner, we refine safer, we do a better job. those oil sands are going to be refined. the issue is not, if we don't refine them no one will.

the fact is they will be refined. the issue is, do we refine them or do the chinese refine them? and i think what you're saying, and i wholeheardedly agree, we do a better job here. mr. griffith: absolutely. mr. griffin: i yield back. mr. griffith: i would have have to say, we do a much better job here and it's almost like, i can remember when i was much younger, liberals always said to conservatives, well, you all act like the united states is the only country in the world and we have to look at the whole world. now the liberals are looking at it and saying, well, the united states is the only country in the world, we have to only look at the united states and we don't look at the big picture and i thinked in a vernltly, even with good intentions -- i think inadvertently, even with good intentions, there are greater pollution risks with us using our energy -- pollution risks with us not using our energy with that being said,

let's look at how that impacts on jobs. not only do we get the pollution, but we don't get the jobs. we don't get the money. and you talked about, you know, living within our means and so forth. let's just take a look at my district, american electric power is the biggest power producer in my district. there are others. they have estimated with new regulations energy costs are going to go up 10% to 15% as they spend an additional $6 billion to $8 billion. 10% to 15% on hardworking american families is tough. but when you look at the job component, when you look at that job component, that means it's going to cost more in my district to make potato chips. it's going to cost more in my district to work the family farm. it's going to cost more in my district to make furniture. it's going to cost more in my district to make paper products. that's just -- i've just touched on the surface. every single retail establishment, every single business has to use electricity.

but when you raise the cost of manufacturing goods or using electricity to manufacture goods by 10% to 15% over the course of the next few years, you're making us less competitive in the world and we lose more jobs and we have more people who are unemployed and more people who aren't able to go out and buy products which then means more people lose their jobs because they're not selling those fords down at the ford place, they're not selling washing machines and tv's and all the products that are out there and we lose even more jobs because of the failure to recognize that the regulations are killing our jobs and our jobs are going elsewhere. and i have to say, getting back to what i call the four d's, i'm not saying we don't look at all of the above. the president was in florida, he said, we only want to drill, drill, drill. he was talking about algae. well, i'm not one of those people who's going to criticize the president for looking at algae. i think algae actually has a positive future.

but it's a positive future that is probably 15 to 50 years away. 15 to 50 years. we need energy now. we need affordable energy now. we need jobs now. and to be looking at something, i think it's absolutely right, that's the discover part of those four d's. we need to encourage discovery. but one of the ways tone courage discovery is to de-- ways to encourage discovery is to deregulate. it's interesting how folks want to do all these things and then they come up with regulations and they find out that the new startup companies often times have difficulty -- oftentimes have difficulty creating the new alternative energies because they run into other regulations that prohibit them from going forward. so i think we need to make sure we look at drill, dig, discovery. looking at those alternatives, finding more ways that we can be efficient and finding new alternative energies and then let's not regulate our industries out of existence. which is where we're headed at this point. when you do that, we continue to

lose jobs, we continue to have a flat economy. look, i don't think saying, you know, we're down on the unemployment -- on the -- the unemployment situation has gotten better but we're still at 8%. i don't think that's anything to celebrate. i think it's better but it's not something that you go out and say, we've solved our problems. and i believe that we have not solved our problems at this point. we're workingen to and that's good -- we're working on it and that's good. the economy in this country, because of our hardworking americans, because they're innovative and because they work harder than anybody else, is not just going to roll over and day by at the same time it could be doing so much better and we need to maintain that we're the number one economic power in the world and the way to do that is to keep our jobs, by keeping our energy and our energy sources and our energy costs at a reasonable level so that we can in fact compete with the low-wage countries of the world. we don't want the low wages but to do so, to make sure that we can still compete, we have to keep our energy affordable. mr. griffin: will the gentleman yield?

i want to comment a little bit on the all-of-the-above strategy that you're talking about. i am an advocate for an all of the above th energy strategy -- all-of-the-above energy strategy. we've heard the president mention that. but we here in the house have been advocating for that. i have since i got here. that includes alternate energy sources, renewable energy sources, biodiesel, wind, solar. i'm for those things. but i'm also for the traditional energy sources and in addition nuclear. we have a clean, safe nuclear energy plant, power plant in arkansas that we count on to provide safe, affordable energy. we also have coal plants. other sorts of energy sources.

we make in my district, we make the wind mill blades that go on these massive wind mills. we also have well-spun tubular in our -- in high district in the second congressional district of arkansas. and they've recently been in the news because there's been a lot of uncertainty about their future as a result of the president killing the keystone pipeline or denying the permit. the happy news that i have to report is that well spun is doing some diversifying. they did have to lay some people off after the keystone pipeline was delayed. but they're doing some diversifying so they can make some other sorts of pipe and they're actually going to expand. i'm hoping that once we get, and i believe we will ultimately win the battle on the keystone pipeline, once we get the keystone pipeline in full swing, the construction in full swing,

nen that -- then that will further help them. so i'm for all of the above. but i know that in my lifetime we're still going to be using a lot of these traditional energy sources. it's not a either-or. we can continue to pursue wind and continue to pursue solar and continue to pursue biodiesel and alternate energies. renewable energy sources. but at the same time pursue the traditional sources. particularly natural gas. natural gas is abundant. and best of all it's american. and in my case it's arkansan. got a lot of natural gas in my district and other districts in arkansas. it is abundant and it is cheap and where ethanol can increase the wear on a traditional

karenin, natural gas can extend the life -- car engine, natural gas can extend the life of that engine. i want to turn the conversation over to my friend from the third district of arkansas, congressman steve womack. he's got a lot of natural gas in his district as well. before i do, i just want to recap. we have jobs as our main goal. and there are pillars under that goal of jobs. and those pillars are tax reform , regulatory reform, further energy exploration and getting our spending under control so that we deal with our debt and we live within our means. those are four pillars. they're not separate from job creation, they are crit cam -- they are a critical part of encouraging private sector job creation and giving certainty to job creators.

now i'd like to yield to my friend from arkansas, steve womack. mr. womack: i thank the gentleman and i do appreciate his leadership in this discussion about job creation in america. i've said many, many times that if there is an elixir out there to fix the problems, the challenges facing our country today, it's job creation. and what the gentleman from arkansas has been articulating in the last several minutes has been a very good discussion about the four things, and i couldn't agree more, the four things that are part and parcel to our country, creating jobs -- country creating jobs and putting itself on a different fiscal path. and he's talked about overregulation, he's talked about the threat of higher taxes and the need for comprehensive tax reform in our nation. he's talked about the need for a solid energy policy that allows our country to access its own

resources, american energy resources to solve america's energy challenges. and of course he's talked about the deficits and the debt. now, if you kind of look at the plight that we're in today so far as job creation, greater than 8% unemployment, sustained unemployment over 8%, and when you look at the fact that people are out here scrambling to find work, meaningful jobs, they want to be productive, they want to contribute to american exceptionalism, and the way do you that is not by taking a welfare check -- you do that is not by taking a welfare check, it's by taking a paycheck. if you're looking at this plight today like you would a pending storm, it's a dark, dark cloud of uncertainty that hangs over the job creators and i submit to you that the reason so many people who are sitting on trillions of dollars of cash, that would like to get into the

game and create jobs, expand the american economy, that the reason they're not doing it is because they have a difficult time computing their input costs. . they don't know how energy is going to affect their ability to create jobs. they don't know how the next regulation, the next rule that's going to come down from washington is going to impact their ability to earn a profit. they're not confident, as evidenced by the downgrade we had last year by the s&p, they're not confident that this congress, these people who gather in this chamber every day, are capable of making the decisions, having the courage to make the decisions to put america on a different fiscal path. it's a dash -- it's a dark, dark cloud of uncertainty. i don't blame them for sitting on the sideline right now. but there's a lot of cash to get in the game if we do some of the right things. the gentleman -- the gentlemen

who have spoken tonight have spoken about regulation. that's not why i came to the floor tonight, not what i wanted to talk about primarily but i came from a meeting right before votes today that talked about an issue totally unrelated to my district, unrelated to most of america. but it's out in california and late they are week, we're going to vote on h.r. 1837, the sacramento-san joaquin valley water reliability act. when i heard my colleague from california talking passionately about this issue as he's done a number of times from the well of this house, back in 2009, federal regulations, federal regulations to protect a three-inch fish, the delta smelt, led to the deliberate diversion of over 300 billion gallons of water away from the san joaquin valley and their farmers, cost thousands of farmworkers their jobs, inflicted up to 40% unemployment

in certain communities and fallowed hundreds of thousands of acres of fertile farmland. those are real people. those were real jobs. and because of federal regulations in this -- and this desire on the part of this congress, this federal government, i should say torque protect a three-inch fish, we turned our back on american workers and in so doing, we affected millions of people nationwide because when you affect the fertile farmlands of california the way we have by diverting this water, you have indeed taken a step toward increasing the price of food. the bill that we will consider later this week is a comprehensive solution that would restore water deliveries that have been cut off due to federal regulations and environmental lawsuits and the plethora of things facing the california farmers. mr. griffin: will the gentleman

yield? mr. womack: i'd be happy to. mr. griffin: i agree with what the gentleman is saying, and correct me if i'm wrong, what you're saying is not regulation, the issue is excessive regulation. the issue is overregulation. i've got a 2-year-old and a 4-year-old. i love them dearly and hate to get on that plane when i have to come up here from arkansas and have to leave them back at the house. and i want them to have clean air and clean water. so i don't know anyone, the folks here tonight included, who are against all regulation. regulation, used properly, protects us, kids, etc. this is not about whether to regulate or not. this is about excessive

regulation. overregulation. regulation -- regulations -- regulatory process that does not consider cost benefit -- that does not consider impact on jobs. that does not employ common sense, washington regulators that don't speak with folks impacted on the ground. that don't -- well-intentioned though they may be, that don't look at the impact and potential impact of their overregulation. that's what i hear. -- hear from my colleagues. i agree whole heartedly. i think that is a critical distinction to point out because we always hear folks saying, you just want no regulation. that's a false choice. that's a straw man. that's not anyone's argument.

that i've heard. the issue is one of overregulation. excessive regulation. i yield back to the gentleman. mr. womack: let me take it a step further, i can relate to what the gentleman is talking about, relate it back to my home district. i think the gentleman would agree that over the last several years, in arkansas, there's been a phenomenal rate of growth in the northwest part of our state. the area that i happen to represent, the great third district of arkansas. it's known for its incredible growth over the last several years. now it is home to some pretty well-known companies, companies like wal-mart and j.b. hunt trucking and tyson foods. and if you look at northwest arkansas, there's really no compelling reason why prior to the establishment of those major companies that northwest arkansas would be an area where

you would have this unprecedented growth. but because of the entrepreneurial spirit and drive of guys like sam walton and don tyson and j.b. hunt and i could go down another list of people that have provided jobs and expanded, created and expanded businesses and made a meaningful impact on the greater mid south and the entire nation, but for their entrepreneurial spirit, northwest arkansas would be kind of an average area. no great infrastructure until recently there. no real compelling reason why it would be anything special. but we're fighting an issue in the greater northwest arkansas area that could indeed impact our ability to continue to grow and i'm talking about e.p.a.'s desire, insatiable appetite torque put a total maximum daily load, a t.d.m.l., if you will,

on the watershed that flows into oklahoma because of a standard, a loading standard imposed on northwest arkansas by our neighboring state that many say is not even achieveable. so all of the great development and job creation and the elevated quality of life is in jeopardy. the future is in jeopardy as a result of a federal agency imposing on the region a standard that may or may not even be able to be achieved. i bring that up for this reason. back when i was the mayor of a city in northwest arkansas, i challenged e.p.a. to give us the science, to show us exactly how they can calculate that this standard is -- has been impacted by the farmers and ranchers of northwest arkansas and those that manage the point sources of pollution, the municipalities. i happen to be the mayor who

presided over one of those. as i understand it, the science was a collection of data from about 20 streams somewhere in america, not known to us, and they took, i think, the 75th percentile of the average phosphorous loading into those streams. i doubt seriously that they used streams and rivers that were similar to what we were dealing with in northwest arkansas. i bring up this subject only because we're talking about job creation tonight. and our ability to continue to expand the economy in northwest arkansas is dependent on our ability to have a good, clean water supply and be able to treat our wastewater and be able to discharge it properly and sufficiently to be able to create growth. but i'm afraid one day we'll look up and because of these standards imposed on us by the federal bureaucracy, this overregulation we've talked

about, we're not going to have an opportunity to grow because we're going to be into moratoriums into growth and development in our area as a result of the unfair standards. but that's a whole other story. i came tonight to talk with my colleague about tax reform. as we've indicated, the threat of higher taxes, or the tax structure as we now know it, is in my strongest opinion one of the great barriers to job creation. you know, just the other day, in this very chamber, the president of the united states stood on the dais and talked to the congress about the need for comprehensive tax reform. his proposal to reform the corporate tax code, i was pleased to see the president showing some leadership in that regard and i look forward to working with the administration and my colleagues in the house and senate to do something that in my strong opinion is long overdue. i, along with many of my colleagues agree on the need for corporate tax reform. the u.s. has one of the highest

corporate tax structures in the world, second only to japan. this discourages job growth and job creation in the united states. it's time to broaden the base. time to get the government out of the business of picking winners and losers. time to eliminate special interest loopholes and it's time to lower the corporate tax rate once and for all. but corporate tax reform is not the only piece of the puzzle. there are many other pieces. if we're going to grow the economy and give our job creators the certainty they need to invest, we also should look at the individual rates, not just the corporate rates but the individual structure as well. there's an opportunity to simplify the individual tax code. in december of 010, according to the compendium of tax expenditures prepared by the research service we all use, there were more than 00 tax expenditures in the form of exclusions, exemptions, credits,

rates and deferrals. we need to re-evaluate every single one of these expenditures. there many other venn bits of comprehensive tax reforms. for example, more than 90% of the treasury's budget goes to the i.r.s. if we simplify the tax code and make it easier to follow and enforce, the i.r.s. doesn't need the resources it currently needs. what's more, i.r.s. reported, and i think these numbers were back in 2006, hundreds of billions, i think somewhere just short of $400 billion of what we call a tax gap. again, simplification of the tax code makes it easier to follow and enforce and we can significantly narrow that gap. i thank my colleagues from beth sides of the aisle who have looking forward to working on comprehensive tax reform. i believe in my heart that it is as my colleague from arkansas has indicated, it's one of four

things, four basic things, four basic issues, facing america today, that can help put our job creators back into the business of doing what they do best. and that is having ideas, incubating those ideas. making those ideas come to reality. taking the necessary risks. having access to the capital to help support those businesses. to expand those businesses by hiring people. by growing things, by making things. as my friend from virginia said a moment ago, we have proven that the american worker is the most productive worker in the world and that's what we need to do. i believe that corporate tax reform, ending this excessive overregulatory environment that we're in, to access american energy solutions torque solve america's energy challenges, and once and for all, doing something about the

extraordinary deficits, four straight trillion-plus dollar deficits facing america, and nearly trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see. based on the current glide path. to do those things necessary to get our deficit under control, to begin to whittle town that debt and save future generations the burdens we have in an almost immoral way put on their shoulders. i yield back my time and thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight. mr. griffin: i thank my friend from the third district of arkansas and appreciate his comments here tonight. i'd like to continue talking a little bit about tax reform, since representative womack was talking about some aspects of the president's proposal. i think most of us around here are certainly excited that the president has even start

discussing fundamental tax reform. unfortunately, i think that the president's proposal has a lot of aspects that would be burdensome to the businesses and the job creators that he purports to be trying to help and so i don't think that it has much chance in the house or the senate and i think he knew that when he proposed it. but at least he's having that conversation, that's a start. that's a start. we talked about, whether you're talking about tax reform, energy exploration, regulatory reform, or common sense budgeting, making the federal government live within its means, all of those relate to jobs. they all are directly related to

encouraging private sector job creation. . and we've been working on a highway bill recently. infrastructure is a critical part of this equation. that's part of the spending our money wisely under the budgeting side of things. because we need a strong infrastructure so that we can compete with other countries, continue to have economic development in this country. so that's a critical part of it. but with regard to the president's tax plan, it raises taxes, at least $1 for every $1 in tax cuts that he provides to simplify the corporate tax code. it creates a whole new category of taxes for our country --

companies that do -- for our companies that do business overseas. and most glaringly it doesn't do anything to address individual tax rates. the tax rates that you pay at home, i pay. and why is that important for job creation? well, for a number of reasons. first of all, the code we have now is complex. doesn't always reward hard work. in fact, sometimes it punishes it. but one of the real specific reasons why we must deal with the individual tax rates to grow jobs is because many businesses pay their taxes, particularly l.l.c.'s, soul propriorer toships -- sole companies, mom

and pop businesses all around the country in arkansas and in my district. they pay their taxes using the individual income tax brackets. so, you can't just address the corporate tax code, although the president's corporate tax quote reform, has a lot of tax hikes in it, it will make our businesses, our job creators in this country less competitive, but you can't just reform the tax code by dealing with corporate tax reform. you've got to look at individual tax reform. corporate tax reform. across the board. you have to make it simpler, fairer and flatter. some of the terms that we've talked about, we've certainly advocated for that in our budget last year and we're going to do that again this year. it's critical not only for job

creation by larger businesses but by small businesses, mom and pop businesses. so tax reform is a critical part of what we need to do to get jobs going. as i've talked about earlyier, some of my colleagues talked about, there are a number of reforms that we have been pursuing for over a year now that relate directly to private sector job creation. as i indicated earlier, it's tax reform. it's regulatory reform. it's more energy development. it's living within our means. individually these issues may not have jobs in the title, but they are the columns, the supports that hold up the private sector job building, if

you will. and i want to say a couple of things about the regulatory issue because i've just introduced a bill, h.r. 4078, regulatory freeze for jobs act. again, as lot of us said, i'm not -- as a lot of us said, i'm not antiregulation. i'm knot do not you know -- i don't know anyone who is against regulations across the board. what i'm against is the federal government failing to apply common sense when regulating. what i'm against are excessive regulations, overly burdensome regulations. i'll give you an example. i had a jobs conference down in my district in little rock, at the clinton presidential library

, we had a jobs conference, we invited a number of job creators . seems to me, if you want know what to do to create -- if you want to know what to do to create private sector jobs, would you ask someone who had created them. folks from the private sector, experts on this issue, we invited them in, said, hey, what's the biggest obstacle to job creation? we had democrats, we had republicans both. and we asked them just point blank. and the number one answer was regulatory uncertainty. what does that mean? well, it means that folks have money that they might want to invest but they hold on title tight to that money because they're no -- on tight to that money because they're not quite sure what's going to happen. they're not sure whether we're

going to get our debt under control or not. they're not sure how much obamacare, the president's health care law, is going to cost them. they're not sure whether the regulations that they've heard proposed by the e.p.a. has potentially being proposed, they're not sure whether or not those are going to be implemented. there's uncertainty everywhere. i had someone say to me the other night, there's always uncertainty. yeah, there's always uncertainty. if you're a farm there's uncertainty whether there's going to be enough rain for the crops that year. there's always going to be some uncertainty in live because we don't have -- life because we don't have crystal balls. i get. that but what we don't want is a federal government -- i get that. but what we don't want is a federal government that needlessly creates additional uncertainty. sometimes we say, i had enough problems before this came along. that's what we're talking about. you got enough to deal with

naturally. you've got enough uncertainty as it is. you don't need the federal government creating more uncertainty. if you talk to community banks who have been impacted by the president's dodd frank law -- dodd-frank law, they have a lot uncertainty. having to hire new folks to comply with the law. what are the new regulations going to be? don't know yet. just know they're coming. don't know what they're going to be yet. just know they're coming. just know they're going to be burdensome. same with the health care law. here's a quote from, actually a well-known democrat businessman, commissioner on the arkansas highway commission, appointed by our democrat governor in arkansas, former chairman of the arkansas economic development commission. he said at my jobs conference, quote, every project i look at now i've got to wonder if i'm going to get to build it because

are the regulations going to stop me? i've got to admit that i pass on over 50% of the projects i'd like to do because of the burden. the hurdle of the regulations, end quote. now, president -- the president recently said in his state of the union address, that he's approved fewer regulations in the first three years of his presidency than his republican predecessor did in his. well, the president said that sitting right here on the floor of the house during the state of the union, this year. so i think it deserves some attention. well, is that true? if you just look at the numbers, it's true. if you just look at the number of regulations. but if you look at the number of what are called major

regulations and the burden that it puts, the cost of the regulations, what this president has done far exceeds what we've seen before. the previous administration issued an average of 63 major regulations per year. this administration has issued an average of 88, an increase of 40%. under president bush the office of information and regulatory affairs reviewed an average of 77 economically significant regulations biannually. these are the ones that really impact business. we're not talking about a minor regulation here or there. we're talking about the ones that really impact job creators. under president bush, his office of regulatory affairs reviewed about 77 every two years. under this president it's 125.

not quite doubled, but not far from it. if the administration maintains its current pace, it would add nearly 1 -- $150 billion be a auto -- annually in new regulatory cost over eight years. i'm going to yield to my friend from virginia, but before i do, i just want to mention that i have proposed a regulatory freeze for jobs act, h.r. 4078. because what it would do, it would basically freeze the introduction and progression of major regulations, those having an impact of $100 billion or more. it would freeze those with exceptions for emergencies, health issues, what have you. there are exceptions in the bill. but it would freeze them until our unemployment rate gets down to 6% to. show that we're getting our --

6%. to show that we're getting our footing. because what the regulatory environment is doing tower job creaters are stifling their abilities to create jobs. i'm going to yield now to my colleague from georgia. mr. griffith: i thank you so much. i stuck around because i wanted to hear more about your regulatory for -- regulatory freeze for jobs act. it's the way and the direction that we ought to be going. because i'm willing to bet that those regulations that have been approved are probably, if you looked at the inches of regulations, it might only be one reg but i'd be willing to bet that this administration beats the bush administration on inches of regulation by a mile. that being said, i have to also say that, you know, i go out and i talk to not only the rotary clubs and other civic organizations, but i like talking to high school students because what we do here in washington will be a far greater impact on their lives than what we do on our own lives. it's our children. you indicated you have young children. i have an 11-year-old, a

6-year-old and a 4-year-old. i'm concerned about them. but the high school students get it. when i start talking about the regulations, and you talk about, what would you do if you were a factory that was faced having to pay binn big fines because you -- pay big fines because you couldn't comply, not because you didn't want to, but because you couldn't comply with an e.p.a. regulation, what happens to those jobs? you know what they say? i don't have to teach them this. they already know it. those jobs go somewhere else. usually to china. and they know and we talk about the money issue, and you've talked about that and you're absolutely right. they know that if we create a regulatory environment that's con deuce to have creation of jobs, not no regulations, but conducive to creating jobs, that we end up with more jobs. you end up with more jobs, you have more taxpayers, you have more taxpayers, you have more taxes and guess what? just like in our households, if you have more money coming in, it's a whole lot easier to pay your bills going out. and so when we talk about living within our means, we can live within our means at a higher

level, if we just have the ability for the american entrepreneurial spirit and the american entrepreneurial -- entrepreneur to go out and take the normal risks that are associated with any business enterprise, and create the jobs, the jobs that over the last centuries we as americans have worked hard to create and in a mere 200 years created the greatest economic system, the greatest economic country ever seen on this planet. and i have to say, it comes back, you talk about the dodd-frank in banks. the regulating -- community banks in particular. i come from a very rural district compared to a lot of the others and, you know, the community banks are the heart and soul of those communities and yet they are afraid to lend money to people they know are going to stay there and fight to keep those jobs and to fight for their communities. but they're hesitant to lend the money because they don't know money because they don't know what the regulatory scheme is