Sherrod Brown

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Michigan for his leadership on trade issues, and I want to echo the words of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Jackson) in his opposition to H.R. 4103. H.R. 4103 represents another lost opportunity in terms of international trade, in terms of our dealings with Africa. We have failed Africa in this body on aid issues, we have failed Africa in this body on trade issues. This lost opportunity of H.R. 4103 is embodied in the fact that we could have lifted up standards for African workers and for American workers and for our trade agreements and trade relations. But what is embodied in H.R. 4103 runs through our entire trade policy. The gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Jackson) talked about loss of sovereignty in the developing world; that we have through various kinds of programs for all kinds of trade adjustments, all kinds of other issues, what has run through our programs is loss of sovereignty, the push to privatization in these countries. He mentioned privatization of their water system, that we have come in through structural adjustment and other programs, forcing cutting of health benefits, cutting of education benefits. We have lost opportunity in H.R. 4103 to allow and encourage and push in allowing unionization, allowing the ability to bargain collectively and to organize in the developing world. Instead, we are, as the gentleman said, engaging in a corporate race to the bottom. We have done that with the North American Free Trade Agreement, we have done it with our trade agreements with Singapore and Chile. We did it 4 years ago with the first round of AGOA. We are doing it again today. Instead, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Jackson) introduced 4 years ago what would be a prototype on trade agreements, to lift up standards, to encourage unionization, to have international labor organization standards, to have environmental standards, to have food safety standards, to guarantee sovereignty, to move away from the kinds of privatization and undercutting sovereignty that we have too often done through structural adjustment and other methods in the developing world. This H.R. 4103, the acceleration of AGOA, only hurts the developing world, only hurts U.S. workers. Ultimately it helps in the corporate race to the bottom, it helps add to corporate coffers, corporate profits. It does nothing for workers in Africa or in the United States.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. The gentlewoman from Illinois' (Ms. Schakowsky) statement about the President when he could not think of any mistakes that he made, several of us came to the House floor and talked about that a couple of nights, and not so much to be critical of the President, but to sort of think about mistakes this administration has made, because as you learn when you are a child you cannot really learn very much until you acknowledge the mistakes you make and then you correct them. The President still has not come forward on Iraq, on this issue we talked about, on the prescription drug bill when they said it cost $400 billion over 10 years and then it later came out it was $534 billion and they knew that but the did not tell the American public and they threatened someone's jobs if he told the media or told the Congress. I think if we are going to move ahead, if we are going to solve this Nation's economic problems, the President, it would be so much better if he would say, hey, this was a mistake. Ronald Reagan did that. Ronald Reagan, when he was going a certain course in driving up the budget deficit, at a couple points he made a change and he did some different things and the country was probably better off for it. This is really the first President in our lifetimes that I think has not been able to acknowledge a mistake and change course. I do not want him to go around doing mea culpa, mea culpa, but I do want him to acknowledge a mistake and do a correct and change course. He really has failed to do that. Again, his answer to every economic problem no matter what the situation is more tax cuts to the wealthy and trickle down economics and more trade agreements. His answer to every situation remains unchanged and he will not change the direction of failed policies. That to me, it is not personal to George Bush, but it just makes me wonder the character and the motive sometimes, but not even so much that it is the judgment of the very stubborn people in the White House that think they have the answer because it fits their ideology and they will not change that direction when it is clear their economic policies have failed. It is clear their environmental policies, their health care policies, as the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky) said, a million more people are uninsured every single year in this country since President Bush took office. Clearly these policies are not working. Would they not want to change these policies and go in a different direction?

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. That is a mistake that neither the Pentagon or the President has acknowledged, even though we know dozens if not more men and women were killed because they did not have body armor, because the Humvees were not up-armored with the kind of protection that we know how to put on and failed to do. No one in the administration, in the Pentagon was punished for that failure, no one was reprimanded, no one lost their job. Yet dozens of young American men and women died because of it.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friends for joining me. It is the duty of us, as we talk about the middle class ways, and it is our duty to offer what we would do positively with what we have talked about in the past with Crane-Rangel and looking at these trade agreements again and extending unemployment compensation and doing the right things and changing the economic policy into the right direction in this country. I thank my friends, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland), the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), and the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Jones) for joining us.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, they want Medicare they can depend on, they want decent public education, they want affordable prescription drugs, they want a fair tax system that does not give tax breaks to the wealthy and leave them wanting for pennies, if that; they want fair treatment. They want fair treatment.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus). I know you really want to listen to one more speech because you have not heard enough speeches since you have been here. It is a pleasure to be here. I particularly thank the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee) for their good work; to Wren, to all of your supervisors, your new supervisor, Joy Malleen, and to all of you especially for your public service at a very young age. The gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee) says this is an almost 200- year tradition of pages working in the greatest legislative body in the world, and this is an achievement you can look back on. It is an achievement especially because if you are like Omar Halabi in my district, if you are like most people here, I think, it was not by accident you ended up here. You are obviously achievers at home. Many of you went through a competitive process to get here. You obviously have shown self-discipline; you are self-starters. You already have the kinds of values and the kind of work ethic that will get you ahead as you go off to college, and you go off in to the military and you go off into the workforce. I have watched Omar from Brecksville, Ohio, in my district and watched some others of you and talked to you, for some of you it is a semester, for others as Omar got to re-up as they say. I have gotten to see the personal growth and the kind of growing into the whole idea of public service. My short remarks, I will just say that I hope when you go home, I heard the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) talking about young people not registering to vote in very high numbers. I hope you will go home, those of you that are 18 now or soon will be 18 or have plenty of friends that are 18, that you make it your mission to register your friends to vote, to get involved, whichever side you want to be on in the Presidential race this year, whichever side you want to be on on any number of political campaigns at home in community service and encourage people, as President Theodore Roosevelt, my favorite Republican said, ``Get in the arena. That is where you really make a difference.'' You have already been in the arena by working in this legislative body, by serving the Congress, by serving your country. You can accelerate that and go home and build on that and really be in the arena every day, back at school, back in the workplace, in the military, at home doing what you already know how to do. You have the leadership skills. You have the interpersonal skills. I hope that you will share those skills with people all over the 50 States of this country and get into the arena and do it. Congratulations to all of you.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, President Bush came to northeast Ohio, Youngstown, last week to try to defend an economic program that simply is not working in any of the Great Lakes industrial States. Ohio has lost one out of six manufacturing jobs since President Bush took office. We have lost almost 200 jobs every single day of the Bush administration. His answer to that is more tax cuts for the rich, hoping they trickle down and create some sort of economic activity, and more trade agreements like NAFTA that continue to ship jobs overseas. Those policies are not working. What we should be doing is extending unemployment benefits to the 50,000 Ohio workers who have lost their benefits. We should reexamine these trade agreements. We should pass the bipartisan Crane-Rangel bill which gives companies incentives to manufacture in the United States, rather than giving tax breaks to the largest companies in the country which continue to outsource and continue to ship jobs overseas. That policy is not working. We need a new direction in Ohio and across the country.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, this week America's seniors and disabled Americans can use the new prescription drug discount card created by last year's Republican Medicare law. This card program has not exactly been met with a resounding ``yes.'' Nation-wide fewer than 500,000 seniors out of 40 million actively chose to enroll in the card. A little surprise when seniors in Ohio and throughout the country have found it confusing, have found it overwhelming, have found it way, way too bureaucratic, and have found it unreliable. Under traditional Medicare, all of your benefits are available through one Medicare card that looks like this. But under the new program, seniors have to choose from a whole deck of cards. This card may be a discount for Fosamax. This card may be a discount for Zoloft. This card may be a discount for Vioxx. This card may be a discount for Lipitor. This card might be a 12 percent discount. This card might be a 16 percent discount. This card might be a 19 percent discount. But even with that confusion, Mr. Speaker, it gets worse because one card might cover your blood pressure medicine but not your heart medicine; the discounts published in the brochure you read, the 12 percent, the 14 percent, the 16 percent, the discounts you might read could be out of date by the time you get to the drug store. In other words, under this Rube Goldberg kind of plan, you pick one of these, in Ohio, 53 cards, you pick one of these cards, you pay $30, you are stuck with that card the whole year. Yet, the card maker, the card seller can change the discount, can change the drugs that are covered anytime during that 52 weeks. Mr. Speaker, that is not Medicare. This is Medicare. It is simple. It is reliable. It is universal. The new program is having such problems that even one of its most widely accepted provisions is having trouble signing people up. The new law provides annual subsidies of up to $600, a good idea, on drug purchases for some, unfortunately too limited, number of low-income seniors. But even that provision did not reach its target audience. Secretary Tommy Thompson says he is somewhat concerned that low-income seniors are not signing up. A lot of us are concerned in this House that they are not signing up. The gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark), the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland), the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), and I have introduced a bill that would automatically enroll all seniors in the new low-income subsidies program. Like Medicare itself, our proposal is simple; it is universal and reliable. Unfortunately, because it violates the Republican privatization way of doing things, they do not want to do it. So instead of actually fixing the problem by saying all seniors who are eligible get the $600 automatically, the Bush administration's going to spend another $4 million to advertise to try to encourage people to sign up. They have already spent up to $80 million to tell seniors that this program is a good idea overall. Now they want to spend another $4 million doing something that we ought to do to reach out to those seniors that need the drug benefit. Earlier last year when the HHS auditors said the Republican bill would cost $134 billion more than the White House said, the White House suppressed the estimate and gagged the auditor. When the initial reaction from seniors was less than enthusiastic, the Bush administration announced plans to spend, as I said earlier, $80 million of our taxpayer dollars to educate seniors on why this bill is not really this bad after all. When news coverage of the program was not favorable enough, the Bush administration was undaunted. They just rolled out their own news stories, at taxpayers' expense, complete with fake anchor, phony interviewer, bogus reporter. It is not about substance; it is about image. I think we can show that we can do better. House Republican leadership should pass the Dingell bill this week. It would begin to enroll those people who are eligible for the $600 drug benefit, those lower-income seniors. We could pass it and get it over to the other body in plenty of time to have it on President Bush's desk by next week. I would love that to happen. The choice, Mr. Speaker, again should be do we want one Medicare card that can give good drug discounts using the 40 million beneficiaries to negotiate a 40, 50, 60 percent discount for all seniors on this one card, or do we want to issue this privatized kind of Medicare with 53 cards, with 53 different plans, sold by private insurance, too confusing, too bureaucratic, and, frankly, a benefit that is barely worth it?

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time of the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, today is the first day America's seniors and disabled Americans can use the new prescription drug discount cards created by last year's Republican Medicare law. The discount card program has not exactly been a smashing success. Nationwide, less than half a million seniors actually chose to enroll in the drug discount card program out of 40 million. Little surprise, really, since seniors in my State of Ohio and throughout the country have found it confusing, have found it overwhelmingly bureaucratic, and have found it unreliable. With good reason. Under traditional Medicare, all benefits are accessible through just one card, but under this Rube-Goldberg, new Republican program, seniors have to choose literally from a whole deck of cards. In my State, there are as many as 53 different cards available. One might cover blood pressure medicines but not heart medicine. Another might cover arthritis medicine but not diabetes medicine. Worse yet, the card costs $30, and it must be kept for a whole year, but the discounts published in the brochure given out might be out of date even before an individual gets to the drugstore. The Republican bill lets the drug companies change coverage and discounts as often as once a week without notifying the cardholder, who, as I say, has to keep the card for 12 months. That is not Medicare. Medicare, real traditional Medicare is simple, reliable and universal, not this confusing privatized Medicare that the Republicans have foisted on the American public. The new program is having such problems that even one of its most widely accepted provisions is having trouble signing people up. The new law provides annual subsidies of up to $600 on drug purchases for some low-income seniors. But that provision is not reaching its targeted audience. Secretary Thompson says he is somewhat concerned that low- income seniors are not signing up. A lot of us here in the House are concerned, too; and we have offered a solution. The gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark), the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), and I have introduced a bill that will automatically enroll all eligible seniors in the new law's low-income subsidies program. Like Medicare itself, our proposal is simple, it is universal, and it is reliable. But instead of actually fixing the program as they could, fixing the problem, the Bush administration has decided to spend more tax dollars on advertising. The Republican Medicare bill has always been more about image than substance. This bill written by and for the drug companies, written by and for the insurance companies, this Medicare privatization bill written by and for the HMOs has made America's seniors even more confused, and it simply is not working. When HHS auditors said the Republican bill would cost $134 billion more than the White House said, the Bush administration suppressed the estimate and gagged the auditor. When the initial reaction from seniors was less than enthusiastic, the Bush administration announced plans to spend $80 million of taxpayer dollars to educate America's seniors on why the bill is not really as bad as seniors think it is. When news coverage of the program was not favorable enough, the Bush administration, undaunted, spent more money on advertising. They rolled out their own news stories complete with fake anchor, phony interview and bogus reporter. It is not about substance; it is about image. Let us do it right. The House Republican leadership should take up the Dingell bill this week which will help low-income seniors get access to the $600 benefit. They should take up the Dingell bill this week, we could pass it and get it over to the other body in plenty of time to have it on the President's desk by next week. Just once, instead of our government always coming down on the side of the drug industry and on the side of the insurance companies, some of the President's biggest contributors, instead of the government always coming down on the side of the drug companies and the insurance companies and the HMOs, Congress just this once could do the right thing.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, President Bush came to northeast Ohio to Youngstown last week again to try to defend his economic program and argue that it is working for Ohio. Ohio, since President Bush took office, has lost one out of six manufacturing jobs and has lost 165,000 manufacturing jobs overall. In fact, during the Bush administration, there have been 200 jobs lost in Ohio every single day of the Bush administration. The President's answer: more tax cuts for the wealthy, hoping some of it will trickle down to the Ohio community that is not working, and more trade agreements, like NAFTA, that continue to ship jobs overseas. Mr. Speaker, the answer is not the failed Bush economic policies, but instead, the Crane-Rangel bill, which will give incentives to those Ohio and American companies that do their manufacturing in this country instead of giving big companies incentives to ship jobs overseas.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the time of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, about a year ago, April 24, 2003, President Bush came to Canton, Ohio, to address workers at the Timken Company, a company which makes ball bearings and other metal products. The President chose his visit to Timken to showcase his economic policy. During his speech, the President told Timken workers: ``Here at Timken last year, productivity rose 10 percent. Which means that America can compete with any nation in the world because we got the finest workers in the world.'' President Bush told the Timken workers that if his tax plans were enacted ``more than a million new jobs will be created by the end of 2004.'' He then went on to say, ``That's what the whole purpose of our economic package is, to create the conditions for job growth so people can find work.'' One million jobs created by 2004. He was so confident of this that he mentioned it twice during his speech. Last week the Timken management announced the company will close its Canton plant, eliminating 1,300 more Ohio manufacturing jobs. Third- and fourth-generation workers at this plant who helped build this company now face unemployment. Timken is closing its Canton plants, three of them, while building another facility in China. Like a host of other predictions and promises delivered by President Bush, the record just has not matched the rhetoric. The Bush economic record of the last 4 years, ship jobs overseas, give tax cuts to large corporations, help corporations reap big profits, lay off American workers. It happened at Timken. It has happened at plant after plant after plant in my State and all over the country. In my State alone, we have lost one out of six manufacturing jobs since President Bush took office. One hundred eighty thousand manufacturing workers have lost their jobs. That comes out to about 200 Ohioans a day who have been thrown out of work since George Bush took his oath of office. The recent modest job creation numbers are welcome that we are seeing in some places around the country but too many of those jobs are low- paid service jobs, too many of these jobs are seasonal work, too few of them have health and pension benefits. The men and women at Timken, the men and women who build things in America, want to know where they are going to find the good-paying jobs to send their kids to school, to feed their families and to pay their mortgages. The Timken Corporation, however, is doing just fine. Three weeks before announcing the Canton plant closure, Timken boasted in a press release of its record quarterly sales of $1.1 billion for the first 3 months of this year. They also added that earnings per share were up 63 percent over earnings per share 1 year ago. In a speech to Timken workers, the President bragged that worker productivity, productivity of these workers for the previous year, was up 10 percent. So we have worker productivity up 10 percent, we have corporate profits going up significantly, we have sales setting records, yet Timken laid off hundreds of workers, 1,300 workers, and closed down three plants. Last spring, the President when he visited Timken was also visiting Tim Timken, the chairman of this company. Mr. Timken is a Ranger, meaning he raised more than $200,000 for the Bush campaign in 2000. Mr. Timken also raised soon after that 2003 visit another $600,000 for an event for the 2004 campaign. In other words, President Bush's economic policies have worked just fine for Mr. Timken and his family but the Bush economic program has failed the families of 1,300 Timken workers. We can do better for America's workers. First of all we can extend unemployment benefits to 1 million Americans in this country who have lost jobs, who are looking for work, who have not found work and whose benefits have expired. Fifty thousand of those workers live in Ohio. Second, Congress can pass the bipartisan Crane-Rangel bill which instead of rewarding those companies that go overseas and do their manufacturing as the Timken company is doing, instead of rewarding them we give tax breaks, we give tax incentives, we reward those companies that stay in the United States and manufacture. If 100 percent of your manufacturing is in the U.S., you get 100 percent of the benefits. If 10 percent of your manufacturing is in the U.S. and 90 percent is in China and Mexico and Indonesia, you only get 10 percent of the benefits. The third thing we need to do is quit using our Tax Code to send our jobs overseas. Too many workers have seen their tax dollars go to subsidize their companies who go overseas and cost American jobs. Something has got to change.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, it has happened again. The Timken Company of Canton, Ohio, owned by one of the President's biggest fund-raisers, a place where the President a year ago said his tax cut policies were working, look at the prosperity of this company, the Timken Corporation closed its doors in Canton, Ohio, laying off 1,300 people. The Bush economic record in Ohio: One out of six manufacturing jobs has disappeared, 177,000 manufacturing jobs in the State are gone, 200 jobs a day have been lost since President Bush took office. The Timken Company sent out a press release 3 weeks ago, bragging about its quarterly sales of $1.1 billion, saying it set some kind of record. The Bush administration economic record over the last 4 years has been to ship jobs overseas, give tax cuts to large corporations; those large corporations have huge profits, then they lay off American workers. It is the same old story. This economic policy is not working for my State of Ohio. It is not working for manufacturing. It is not working for working Americans. It is not working for our communities.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, it is time for Congress to act on legislation to permit prescription drug importation. Drug companies are the most profitable businesses in America. The drug companies earn profit margins of over 18 percent. That is three times the average of Fortune 500 firms. These companies are huge multinational juggernauts. In 2001, the 10 biggest U.S. drug companies reported profits of $37 billion. That is more than the Federal Government spends each year on VA health care. It is more than the entire U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development budget. It is a full billion dollars more than the combined gross domestic product of Lebanon, Panama, and Yemen. That is not total revenue of the drug company; that is its profits. So how is it the drug companies are able to do so well, even as other manufacturers and companies around this country are having trouble in many cases with staying afloat? By gouging American consumers, that is how. Drug companies routinely charge American consumers, two, three, four, five, sometimes even ten times what they charge their customers in Canada and other wealthy countries. Medicine sold in Canada is the same safe, effective medicine, same manufacturer, same packaging, same drug, the same ones that our constituents buy at a neighborhood grocery store or drugstore in Elyria, Ohio, but it costs a fraction of the price. Price data collected last fall by the Alliance for Retired Americans tells the story. Drugmakers charged Americans $89 for Celebrex, an arthritis medicine; Canadians paid $44. The drug industry charged Americans $108 for the cholesterol medicine Lipitor, which happens to be made in Ireland; Canadians paid $61 for Lipitor. Drug companies charged American women $246 for Tamoxifen, the breast cancer drug; Canadian women paid $44. Our constituents paid 500 percent more for cancer medicine than Canadians paid, same manufacturer, same drug, same dosage. In fact, U.S. taxpayers helped develop that drug. But because the U.S. Government allows drug companies to charge any price they want for essential medicine, that is why these drugs cost so much more. The best response would be for the American Government to stand up to the drug industry, but Republican leadership and President Bush have already rejected that common-sense policy. In fact, the Medicare prescription drug bill, written by the drug companies for the drug companies, and enacted last year and signed by the President, explicitly prohibits the Federal Government from negotiating on behalf of American consumers for fair prices for prescription drugs. Think about that. Forty million Medicare beneficiaries ought to be able to get a get a great price because of the number of people that Medicare represents. Yet the Congress has prohibited negotiated prices. Since this Congress, the Republican leadership, will not allow the government to stand up to the drug industry, we should at least allow our constituents to benefit from the tough stance taken by other nations. A bipartisan majority in this House on this, both sides of the aisle, solidly supported legislation last year that would give our constituents access to prescription drugs imported from Canada and other nations. That vote was a declaration of independence from the powerful drug lobby and a real step forward for our constituents. Two big drugstore chains in America have announced their support for importation of safe, effective drugs and affordable medicine. They see the tough choices that their customers in this country make every day. We should heed that call. Four States have already established drug importation Web sites, five local governments have set up importation programs, 20 additional States are considering importation as a way to respond to their constituents. These public officials, Democrats and Republicans alike, are doing what they can because Republican leadership in this body and President Bush have failed to act, and continue to do the bidding of the drug companies. Seniors in Ohio and throughout the country continue to go to Canada for a better deal on prescription drugs. They know a full deck of discount cards does not offer a discount comparable to the fair prices charged to our neighbor country to the north. Their continued grass- roots fight against the drug companies is a cry for help. We should answer that call. This Congress should send to the President's desk a responsible, bipartisan drug importation bill before the Fourth of July recess. The President should wean himself of drug company money and influence and sign that bill. America needs a declaration of independence from the drug companies. Let us get it to the President's desk before July 4.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I thank my friend, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland), for his comments, and I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would add that there are 50,000 Ohioans alone who have seen their unemployment benefits expire in the last 6 months, 1 million Americans. These are people looking for a job, playing by the rules, but cannot find a job. The President said the economy is growing. We heard our friend from Iowa and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) saying things are great, jobs are coming back, the economy is great. Well, 50,000 Ohioans cannot get their unemployment benefits.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I yield to my friend from Ohio.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, just before I wrap up, this is all very puzzling. I understand why President Bush is hostile to good environmental policy, because environmentalists do not vote for him. He does not seem to care. I understand that President Bush pushes legislation that kind of restricts the rights of minorities because minorities do not vote for him. I understand why he is hostile to organized labor because he does not get many labor union votes from steelworkers or auto workers or food and commercial workers. But I do not understand why he is so hostile to veterans. That really puzzles me because a lot of veterans voted for President Bush. They liked the fact that his father was a decorated veteran. They liked the fact that he served this country through the National Guard honorably and fully, at least before the news broke they thought he did, and they voted for him because they thought he was sort of a stand-up tough guy and would stand up for American interests. It astounds me that this President would change our policy and military doctrine, would attack Afghanistan, attack Iraq, make noises about Iran and other places such as North Korea, but when the veterans come home, not treat them any better than he treats them. The only answer I can figure is, he is so wedded and focused on his tax policy, on cutting taxes for the very wealthy, saving literally over a trillion dollars in taxes for the richest 1 percent, that everybody else suffers, veterans suffer, school kids get shortchanged, seniors through the Medicare program get shortchanged, environmental enforcement gets shortchanged, food safety enforcement, research for the NIH get shortchanged; and that is the only explanation I can come up with. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), and I look forward to the comments of the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight with my two friends, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) from Niles in northeast Ohio and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) from a district that runs from Portsmouth, along south from the Ohio River, up east including parts of Mahoning County near Youngstown. We will talk about the treatment of veterans in this country and the problems that we have seen, and the strength of the veterans administration, the good things it has done but how it really has fallen short, a Federal agency that has done remarkably good work for so many, but fallen woefully short in the last couple of years. I want to continue the theme that the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) mentioned, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott), others, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) earlier this week, Are you better off today than you were 4 years ago? And I think this theme particularly is reinforced when asking about veterans. Are veterans in this country today better off today than they were 4 years ago? And I think we will see as the evening goes on in the next 30, 40, 50 minutes or an hour, how the veterans really have been shortchanged by this administration, how the Veterans Administration does not work as well as it did. Our benefits to veterans are not nearly as adequate, never really generous, as they used to be. I want to talk about that, whether veterans are better off today than they were 4 years ago. As I said, I am joined by the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland). Last week Secretary Principi and President Bush announced that they would close three Veterans Administration hospitals in the United States: one in Mississippi; one in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area; and one in Brecksville, Ohio in northeast Ohio. The Ohio facility serves 48,000 veterans in our region of northeast Ohio. I find it ironic and a little sorrowful that as we head into Memorial Day next week, as we prepare to dedicate the World War II memorial, that the President and Secretary Principi and his administration announce plans to close VA hospitals. Prior to Secretary Principi's announcement, I, along with the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) sent a letter to the Secretary asking him not to close the Brecksville hospital. Our letter echoed the sentiment of more than 5,000 veterans who signed petitions; it echoed the sentiment of several thousand more who came to rallies and meetings and wrote us letters and made phone calls to us saying this VA hospital in Brecksville, one of the best in the country, treating homeless veterans, a model for the country in treating veterans with mental illness, protesting that this hospital be closed. I met with hundreds of local veterans who voiced their opposition, as has the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) and as has the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan). Instead of listening to the men and women who served this Nation, the administration is foisting upon American veterans a plan that will force them to travel further and wait longer for health services they depend on. In the case of Brecksville, they are closing a facility with a leading reputation for mental health services, and for the last 43 years Brecksville has pioneered innovative, nationally recognized programs and services for homeless vets and veterans with mental illnesses. Since 1971, Brecksville has offered inpatient mental health services, including acute substance abuse treatment and acute and long-term psychiatric care, to veterans from all 50 States. We are creating new veterans. The irony of closing these three hospitals, the irony of cutting veterans benefits, health and education benefits, which has happened in this House of Representatives on this floor and with this President, the irony of doing that, the irony of closing these hospitals that lead up to Memorial Day is every day we are creating more veterans in this country as soldiers return from Iraq, sometimes with scars, emotional scars, physical scars, mental scars, where they really do need treatment. Approximately one-third of the adult homeless population served their country in the armed services. On any given day, as many as a quarter million male and female veterans are living on the streets or in shelters, and perhaps twice as many experience homelessness at some point during the course of the year. For many homeless and mentally ill veterans who struggle with local public transportation, closing Brecksville will double, even triple, the number of miles they will be forced to travel. The administration made big promises to American veterans. George Bush can hardly go anywhere without singing the praises of our men and women in uniform, even though, as the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) has pointed out many times on the floor, they sing their praises but do not provide them with safe drinking water, did not provide our soldiers with body armor, do not outfit our Humvees with metal plate armor underneath the Humvees and on the door of the Humvees, so that they are much more dangerous. There is hardly a day goes by that the President does not in one of his fund-raising speeches around the country, which are almost daily, that he does not, the President, sing the praises of our veterans. At the same time, this administration has cut veterans benefits, cut education and health care benefits, raised the price of prescription drugs, and now, strike three, is closing these three hospitals which are serving hundreds of thousands of veterans. When I think about a veteran in my district who originally was paying a relatively small copayment per drug per month, that copayment has tripled, and now the administration wants to double that copayment again. It is just amazing to me the President of the United States would do that in a time of war. It is especially amazing when you look at the price of drugs in Canada, the price of drugs in France, in Germany and around the world, how much less drugs cost in those countries. In fact, every once in a while I have taken, over the last 6 years, busloads of seniors to Canada to buy less expensive drugs, but how can you look a veteran in the eye and say, Hey, you ought to go to Canada and buy your prescription drugs? How can you tell a veteran he or she should go to Canada and buy their prescription drugs because they are cheap? Under this administration, a third of America's veterans have unprocessed claims, and 130,000 veterans are waiting for appeals decisions. New enrollment fees and increased costs of prescription drugs will cost veterans $2 billion over the next 5 years. This administration is opposed to the renewal of imminent danger pay for families of active duty soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. Think of that. The administration and the Secretary of the VA sing the praise of American soldiers, and then oppose giving those soldiers a little extra money when they are in the face of danger in Iraq and Afghanistan. We are spending $1.5 billion a week in Iraq turning our young men and women into veterans. We ought to be able to ensure when they come home that they receive the best health care. Our veterans deserve better. It begs the question earlier, are veterans better off than they were 4 years ago? I think when you look at what this administration has done with soldiers and with veterans, it is a decided no. I yield to my friend from Ohio (Mr. Strickland).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I received a letter in the mail from a young friend. ``Dear Congressman Brown: ``I'm happy to be writing to you. ``I have an issue I think is important. I don't want the FDR dime to be changed to the Reagan dime because FDR has a real story. The story is when FDR tried to find a cure for polio, he asked children and grown-ups all over the United States to send dimes to the White House. By the end of the year, they had collected more than $1,000 in dimes. ``There would be no particular reason to have Mr. Reagan on the dime, but there is a reason that FDR should be on the dime. It is almost like having a monument to FDR in your pocket. ``I think another very important issue is health care. I believe we should have a national health care system. If people don't have health care and they get sick, they could die. If I get a very bad disease, I might get very good antibiotics and live. I would get those antibiotics because I have health care. But other people couldn't get antibiotics if they didn't have health care and couldn't afford them. ``Thank you for letting me write to you.'' It is signed Alex Friedman. ``P.S. I am an 8-year-old in the third grade.''

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the bill, but more specifically I want to speak in support of the Waxman-Tierney amendment. The amendment should garner the support of every Member of this body, because this body authorizes and funds the activities of CDC, of EPA, of FDA and every other Federal agency. We have an oversight role, and under our watch, science is being subverted to promote political and ideological goals. Advisory goals are being stripped of scientific experts and seeded with industry representatives and ideologues. Reports are being censored and data is being manipulated to promote the administration's political and ideological objectives. This is a dangerous, dangerous precedent. This did not happen with President Bush, Sr., it did not happen with President Clinton, it did not happen with President Reagan, it did not happen with Republican or Democratic Presidents the way that it is happening today under this very politicized, very partisan, very ideologically driven White House. The Federal Government has no business hiding from the facts, much less suppressing them. That means the Federal Government should not turn over science, real science, to ideology, to industry representatives, to corporate interests. In February of this year, 20 Nobel Laureates and dozens of other leading U.S. scientists issued an unprecedented statement of concern about the misuse of science by the Bush administration. This is not a Democrat on the House floor saying this, this is 20 Nobel Prize-winning scientists and dozens of other leading scientists. ``When scientific knowledge has been found to be in conflict with the political goals, the Bush administration has manipulated the process through which science enters into its decisions.'' These are Nobel Laureates and other scientists talking. ``This has been done in the Bush administration by placing people who are professionally unqualified or who have clear conflicts of interest in official posts and on scientific advisory committees, by disbanding existing advisory committees, by censoring and suppressing reports by the government's own scientists, and by simply not seeking independent scientific advice.'' That is from 20 Nobel Laureates, not from a bunch of Democrats complaining about it. To prove the point that these are not our words, the Director of the National Bureau of Standards in the Nixon administration, another Republican who played it straight, did not have this ideologically driven agenda, Dr. Lewis Branscomb of the Nixon administration, said, ``I am not aware that President Nixon ever hand-picked ideologues to serve on advisory committees or dismissed from advisory committees well-qualified people if he didn't like their views. I don't think we have had this kind of cynicism that we see today with respect to objective scientific advice since I have been watching government, which is quite a long time.'' The Bush administration is manufacturing reality to fit its beliefs, and then they have the nerve, they have the gall, to call it sound science. That is not science, it is censorship. This Nation cannot afford it, this body should not abide it. I urge my colleagues to pass this amendment. Regardless of our political affiliation, we should not be afraid of the truth, nor should we permit its subversion.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, I yield my time to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney) and ask unanimous consent that he be permitted to control the time.