he had spent time in the gulag. some of his first designs that he did on aviation where we're from the gulag. was eventually released from prison and was no longer an enemy of the soviet people in fact he became his country's protect and made chief designer of a ballistic missile called item number one. even lost his identity and was now a top secret somebody working on a top secret. get a mind when they went to germany they started to study german. technology. was first so long an able to perform his job ended up diving deeper into the work he loved so much. made a faithful replica of the feet on stalin's orders although it was successfully launched realized that the rocket was not good enough he was sure he could make an even better one and he did it was called the king. of. the soviet union and the united states with a neck and neck in the construction of long range missiles but that changed in one nine hundred fifty seven in the midst of the cold. case became the space race. on the morning of october fifth hundr

its millions who disappeared into the gulag. >> do you agree with the 50 million figure? >> i don't think anybody knows and i'll tell you why i'm havering and avoiding an answer to an exact number. there are lots of ways of killing people. you can put them up against a wall and shoot them. you can put them into the gulag and starve them, but you can also forcibly resettle them in inhospitable regions of the country. you can ruin the agriculture and deprive even the free citizenry of all of the nutrition that they need. you can so mangle your foreign policy as to do a deal with adolf hitler and ill prepare your country for war in 1941 so that you have to evacuate territory where the germans then enter and kill even more people. in this respect then, the number could be even higher than the one that you just mentioned. >> let's go to the end of his life. lenin buried there in the tomb in red square. stalin's ashes there. trotsky in mexico. but go to the end of his -- what was the end of stalin's life like? >> stalin was exhausted by his involvement in the second world war.

he's been in the gulags of the castros for decades, due to his work inside that enslaved island. dr. bisette is the mandela of cuba. today is his 49th birthday. i wish him god speed and freedom and freedom for cuba. to the press i ask, how long do the heroes of cuba have to suffer before you acknowledge their existence? i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman has yielded back. for what purpose does the gentleman from tennessee rise? >> to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for one minute. >> thank you, madam speaker. it's been interesting listening to the discussions this morning and this afternoon. mr. cohen: social security is 75 years old. it came about because of franklin roosevelt, a great democratic president and a democratic congress evolving out of a depression caused by republican herbert hoover and now 75 years later we look at a situation where another republican president, a hoover george bush caused another financial crisis and the republicans talk about privatizing social secur

the cuban people and demand the release of every single political prisoner in cuban -- in the cuban gulags. until every single one is released we cannot stop speaking. we will continue to stand with the political prisoners. thank you. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentlelady from nevada rise? without objection. ms. titus: mr. speaker, for 75 years older americans have relied on the guaranteed benefit that social security provides. this monthly check provides the safety net from poverty and is a key component to a dignified retirement after a lifetime of work. seniors contributed to social security. they earned it. they deserve it. they depend on it. yet as we celebrate 75 years of this outstanding program, it's once again under attack by republicans who want to dismantle the system and spend trillions of dollars in a risky privatize scheme that gambles senior sentence' savings in the stoket market while lining the pockets of wall street. does that sound familiar? it should. republicans tried to do the same thing under the bush administ

similarly these giants in the cause of freedom recounted how their lives in the gulag improved when the west and president reagan championed their cause and challenged the lies at the foundation of the soviet system. it seem this is administration, the obama administration, has forgotten the lessons of history to the detriment of china's young democrats. in their annual freedom of the world report, the n.g.o. freedom house documented a litany of abuses perpetrated by the chinese government and then made the following observation. while these acts of repression are disturbing so is the absence of protests from the democratic world, when the soviet union arrested a dissident for suppressed religious expression, it drew widespread condemnation by figures raising from heads of state to trade union leaders, as well as by human rights organizations and prominent humanitarians. china's current actions, by contrast, elist little more than a boilerplate -- elicit little more than a boilerplate criticism and just as often provoke no response whatsoever. elsewhere in asia we see an administration

at the same time the obama administration recognizes that there are about 5,000 cubans held in the gulags of that nation for the charge of dangerousness. those are 5,000 additional political prisoners that languish in prison. we got to remember who the castro regime, who they are. this week alone they blame the united states for sinking the south korean ship that killed 46 sailors earlier this year. they blamed the united states. this is the same regime that holds an american hostage, mr. allen gross a. jewish american contractor providing humanitarian aid to cuban jews within that island and nation. this is the same regime that last month fidel castro himself compared israel to nazi germany. and yet some want to give concessions to that regime. some want to help that regime with billions of dollars. let's demand elections and freedom for the cuban people. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentlelady from ohio rise? without objection, so ordered. >> thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, today i rise to call on my colleagues and particularl