Sherrod Brown

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

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

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, but I reserve the balance of my time. General Leave

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the election of the Democratic Progressive Party's Chen Shui-bian and Annette Lu is truly an historic event with profound and moving implications for Taiwan's people. The race was more than a race between and among candidates. It was a race between the people of Taiwan and the Beijing leadership. Despite Beijing's protests, despite even its threats, this election signified the long-standing commitment of Taiwan to democratic ideals. I would like to extend my congratulations to the people of Taiwan in their success in conducting a free and a fair election. On March 15, only three days before the election, the premier of the People's Republic of China, Zhu Rongji, held a news conference which intensified China's threats of violence if Taiwan were to elect a pro- independence candidate and move away from the People's Republic of China ``one China'' policy. This act was only the latest demonstration of China's attempts to corrupt the Taiwanese democratic process. But as a sign of desire for political change and faith in democracy, the voters of Taiwan overcame any fears of foreign threats and elected a candidate they felt would best lead Taiwan into the 21st century. I applaud President-elect Chen's immediate overtures to improve the situation with China. Already he has invited President Jiang Zemin to visit Taiwan, and he has suggested abolishing Taiwan's ban on direct trade with China. Beijing must now also exercise restraint and start accepting the reality that there are two sovereign countries facing the Taiwan Strait. Mr. Speaker, the U.S. should support the strides Taiwan's new leadership is making toward establishing a peaceful Taiwan and toward making it absolutely clear that the issues between China and Taiwan must be resolved peacefully and must be resolved with the assent of the people of Taiwan. I had the pleasure last April in my office of meeting now President- elect Chen. He is a man of great ability and representative in many ways of modern Taiwan. I am confident his administration will provide the necessary leadership in these difficult and sensitive times for his country. I look forward to working with him, as I am sure all of us in this body do, in improving relations between the United States and the Republic of Taiwan. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam Speaker, I would just like to mention, in response to the comments of my friend, the gentleman from Michigan, that we could take care of these problems of what he calls intrusive government in the Census by allowing sampling, which is what many people on this side of the aisle have suggested, Census sampling, where we find out by taking some 10,000 or 20,000 or 50,000 or whatever number of people and find this information out and extrapolate it to the rest of the country, which every company and every government agency and every political candidate has done for years in terms of polling and all of that. Madam Speaker, our health insurance system fails many Americans, no group more so than individuals age 55 to 64. There are 3.4 million Americans in this age range who are uninsured, the fastest growing segment of the uninsured population. Some of them were blind-sided when their employer terminated retiree health coverage. Others are self- employed or work for firms that do not offer health insurance. Regardless of the reason behind their situation, the prospects of buying individual insurance in the individual market are grim. Only individuals enrolling directly from an employer-sponsored health plan are guaranteed access to private coverage. Companies can and do deny access to self-employed individuals and those whose employer does not offer coverage. Even if an individual is lucky enough to be guaranteed access to a health plan, she is not guaranteed an affordable rate. As a matter of fact, she can bank on being quoted a rate so high it takes her breath away. The purpose of health insurance is to pool risk, not to avoid it. The fact that individuals nearing retirement are priced out of the insurance market underscores how far our system has strayed from that basic tenet. Individuals 55 to 64 have entered a period in their lives when health insurance is particularly important, yet 3 million of them cannot secure coverage in the private health insurance market. If this problem sounds familiar, there is a reason. Before Medicare, 60 percent of Americans 65 and older were uninsured. The public demanded that the Federal government step in when it became clear that insurers would not willingly cover these individuals. Our challenge now is to help individuals 55 to 64. As long as health insurers can pick and choose those whom to enroll and whom to exclude, as long as they are permitted to use medical underwriting, rate increases, and skillful marketing to cream-skim, to weed out those they do not want to insure, as long as insurers can avoid those most in need of health care protection, there will always be significant gaps in our health insurance system. It is one of realities this Nation faces in the absence of universal coverage. Eventually, the public will get tired of weak-kneed politicians and incremental strategies and the U.S. will implement that universal medical coverage. Until then, it makes sense to expand programs that work and to help those in most need of coverage. That is where the Medicare Early Access program comes in. This week the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark), the gentlewoman from Florida (Mrs. Thurman) and I will introduce revised legislation based on last year's Early Access bill. The new version provides tax credits to help more individuals 55 to 64 to buy into Medicare or to purchase COBRA continuation coverage. The mechanisms for providing more individuals age 55 to 64 coverage has not changed. Our bill would enable people 62 to 64 and displaced workers 55 to 64 to pay premiums to buy into Medicare. It would require employers who drop previously promised retiree coverage to allow early retirees with limited alternatives to have access to COBRA continuation coverage until they reach age 65 and, thereby, qualify for Medicare. To make these initiatives more affordable, this legislation would establish tax credits equal to 25 percent of the premium for participants in the Medicare buy-in and individuals eligible for COBRA coverage. Our legislation provides uninsured individuals between 55 and 64 an opportunity to buy into Medicare since the private market surely has failed them. And it restores some measure of fairness to individuals who have paid for employer-sponsored retiree coverage paycheck after paycheck only to have it terminated when they actually need it. Some individuals perceive of Medicare expansion as a backdoor means of establishing universal coverage. Expanding Medicare is not a backdoor means of moving towards universal coverage. I would say we are using the front door. Medicare works. We need universal coverage, and if expanding Medicare will help us put an end to the inefficient, gap- ridden patchwork of private and public health plans we are living in now, then I am all for it. The United States needs universal health coverage. Nothing short of that can assure security, fairness, or economic efficiency. We need a system that does not discriminate against the very individuals that it is supposed to protect. Until we get there, it makes sense to take this step.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam Speaker, should the Medicare program offer prescription drug coverage? What good is insurance if it covers the diagnosis, but not the cure. Of course, Medicare should cover prescription drugs. Why can we not target coverage to just the lowest income seniors? I can think of several reasons why that is a bad idea. First, Medicare endures in this country because every American contributes to it and every American at the age of 65 will benefit from it. A third of all seniors, over 10 million seniors, lack drug coverage; millions more are barely insured; employers are dropping their retiree coverage and private health insurers are cutting back their prescription drug benefits. This is not an isolated or a status problem that can be solved in a piecemeal fashion. It is broad based and it is getting worse. Whether or not Medicare should cover prescription drugs should not even be a real question. If one believes this Nation benefits from helping seniors live in good health and above poverty, then Medicare should cover prescription drugs. But it is expensive to cover prescription drugs. Can our government afford it? We are the wealthiest Nation in the world. Our retirees are collectively responsible for our current prosperity. Their security and their well-being resonate across families, communities, and the Nation. We can afford to, and it is in our interests, to provide seniors health coverage that makes sense, and that means providing prescription drug coverage. But we cannot afford to waste tax dollars that otherwise would be used to bolster Medicare's long term solvency. We need to pay fair prices for prescription drugs. So are the current prices fair? For the sake of argument let us define ``fair'' in this case as necessary to continue a brisk pace of research and development. Maybe prices are fair, maybe drug companies have no choice but to charge such high prices. But I doubt it. Knowing how much drug companies are investing in marketing, knowing what their profit margins are, knowing what their CEOs and top executives are paid, knowing that any reduction in prices can be largely offset by increases in sales volume, I doubt prescription drug prices need to be that high. But even if drug makers could justify their revenue requirements, how could they justify placing such a disproportionate burden on Americans? How can they justify charging Americans two and three and four times what they charge individuals in other industrialized nations. How and why are prescription drugs more expensive here? Because other countries will not tolerate these outrageous prices and because we in this Congress have tolerated them. We do not negotiate prices; we do not demand that drug manufacturers reduce their prices to reflect the federally funded portion of research and development. We do not make use of the collective purchasing power of 38 million seniors to demand fairly-priced drugs. Instead, we nod our heads knowingly when drug manufacturers warn us that any action we take could stifle research and development. Drug prices can come down in the U.S. without stifling that research and development. Take the case of medical devices. The Medicare program is the largest purchaser of medical devices in the U.S. Medicare pays discounted prices for medical devices and yet new devices are developed every day. The government funds 40 percent of the R&D in the United States. Sources other than drug companies fund another 10 percent of drug research and development. Drug companies receive huge tax breaks, drug makers pay an effective rate 10 percentage points lower than the average for all major industries. Drug profits are 5 percent higher than any other industry. In 1998, the CEO of Bristol-Meyers-Squibb was paid $146 million in salary and benefits. Obviously, a fast way to make money is to charge inflated prices for prescription drugs. It works beautifully for the drug companies, but it does not make it right. So what do we do about high drug prices? The drug industry says the best way is to make prescription drugs affordable for seniors by enrolling all 38 million in private health insurance plans. That clearly has not worked as we have seen the price of health insurance go up and up and up. We have other options. I have introduced legislation that would give drug manufacturers a choice. They could either disclose their true costs and work with us to bring the prices down, or they could license their patents to generic drug companies and let the free market, using good old-fashioned competition, bring prices to a more reasonable level. The gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) has introduced legislation that would permit seniors to purchase drugs at discounted prices. The gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Sanders) and the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Berry) have introduced legislation that would permit us to import drugs when they are priced less expensively in other countries. So I ask again, should Medicare provide prescription drug coverage for seniors? The answer is yes. Will it be expensive? The answer is yes. Is there some way we can make it less expensive? The answer is a resounding yes. Now, will this Congress add a drug benefit to Medicare this year? I do not know the answer to that. We may not get a chance to vote, or the majority of the Republican leadership may go with yet another stopgap measure rather than taking a logical step in updating the Medicare benefits package.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, China has done it again. Yesterday, Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji threatened violence against Taiwan because it is holding free elections. He said to the people of Taiwan, ``Do not act with impulse at this juncture. Otherwise, I am afraid you will not get another opportunity to regret.'' This Chinese dictatorship condones forced abortions, engages in religious persecution against Christians and Muslims and Buddhists, has institutionalized slave labor and child labor. Even attempting to form an independent labor union in China is an offense punishable by death. Mr. Speaker, Congress has been promised over and over that free market capitalism will create a more democratic and less hostile China. Yet, after 10 years of U.S. engagement with China, that nation remains a nation ruled by an authoritarian government with a violent aversion to human rights and a hostility to environment and labor standards. What makes anyone think the next 10 years will be different? There are more corporate jets at Reagan National Airport during congressional debate on China every year than at any time during the year. A WTO deal for China is more about gaining access to a billion workers than it is a billion consumers. Vote no on permanent NTR.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam Speaker, remember when we were children, in some cases 30, 40, 50 years ago, tuberculosis clinics were closing in virtually every community in America. I remember growing up in Mansfield, Ohio, in the 1950s and 1960s; and I remember that tuberculosis clinic was closed there because Americans realized that tuberculosis was not really much of a problem in the United States of the 1960s or 1970s or 1980s. People are surprised in this country, Members of Congress are surprised, citizens are surprised, to learn that tuberculosis in 1999 killed 2 million people around the world. It killed more people in 1999 around the world than in any year in history. Tuberculosis is one of the greatest infectious disease killers of adults worldwide, killing someone every 15 seconds. It is the biggest killer of young women around the world. It is the biggest killer of people with HIV/AIDS. Of the deaths from AIDS in Africa, literally one-third of those deaths actually are from tuberculosis. The World Health Organization estimates that one-third of the world's population of the 6 billion people in the world, some 2 billion are infected with the bacteria that causes tuberculosis, including an estimated 10 to 15 million people in the United States. In India, 1,300 people a day in India, 1,300 people a day die from tuberculosis. An estimated 8 million people around the world develop active TB each year. It is spreading as a result of inadequate treatment, and it is a disease that knows no national borders; and it is becoming more and more of a problem in the United States. The threat that TB poses for Americans derives, one, from the global spread of tuberculosis and, second, from the emergence and spread of strains of tuberculosis that are multidrug resistant. In the U.S., TB treatment is normally only about $2,000 per patient in the United States and in developing countries as little as $15 or $20 or no more than $100 per patient, regular, sort of standard tuberculosis. The costs can go up to as much as $250,000 a patient to treat multidrug resistant tuberculosis, and the treatment is much less likely to be successful. Multidrug-resistant TB kills more than half those infected even in the United States and other industrialized nations. Madam Speaker, the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella), Republican from Maryland, and I are bipartisanly sponsoring legislation which will authorize an appropriation of $100 million to U.S. Agency for International Development, USAID, for the purpose of diagnosing and treating TB in high-incidents countries. The director general of the World Health Organization, Secretary General Gro Brundtland, said that tuberculosis is not a medical problem, it is a political problem. We know how to take care of people with tuberculosis. We know how to treat tuberculosis. The question is the political will to do it, the resources available to do it. Tuberculosis experts estimate that it will cost an additional $1 billion each year worldwide to control this disease. The great majority of funds are used for the direct implementation of DOTS Tuberculosis Control Program, DOTS stands for directly observed treatment, where a person infected with TB must take medication every day for up to 6 months, and, if they stop taking it, then even when they stop coughing up blood or stop showing symptoms of TB, their multi-drug-resistant TB can come back. That is why it is simple to treat, but difficult to make sure that people take their medicine every day. The medicine is there. The will needs to be there, the outreach workers need to be available, whether it is in the United States or India or Nigeria or wherever across the world. Resources under our legislation will be used primarily in those countries having the highest incidence of tuberculosis. It is a problem worldwide that we as a wealthy country have a moral obligation to deal with. It is a problem worldwide that we have a practical reason to deal with, because tuberculosis, with more tourism, travel, with more business development, with more trade, with more airplanes, tuberculosis has come into our country in greater and greater incidence, unless we in fact try to deal with tuberculosis internationally. That is why we already have bipartisan support for the legislation that the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella) and I are working on. That is why I ask other Members to join us in cosponsoring this legislation which I will be introducing next week. March 24 is International Tuberculosis Day. We will be introducing the bill next week, the week of March 24, and ask other Members to cosponsor it.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object, I yield to the gentleman from New York to explain the bill.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, further reserving the right to object, I rise in strong support of this resolution which was introduced by my colleague on the Committee on International Relations and chairman of the Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) and congratulate him on his good work. Most Americans, and, for that matter, most Members of Congress probably had not heard of Falun Gong until last summer when the Chinese dictatorship banned and started throwing thousands of people in jail for practicing it. It is hardly surprising people that Chinese is systematically arresting, torturing and even killing its own citizens for wanting to practice their faith, which is what Falun Gong is. This is the same gang of dictators, after all, that persecutes Christians, Muslims and Buddhists and winks at forced abortions. But even though this latest purge is completely in character, it is a perfect illustration why we need to radically alter our relations with that dictatorship. Because when Beijing decided to make practicing Falun Gong a capital offense, which is exactly what the rubber-stamp Chinese congress did before the visit to Beijing of our trade representative Charlene Barshefsky, we are seeing that life in the People's Republic is not much different from 10 years ago when the People's Liberation Army turned its tanks and machine guns on the people in Tiananmen Square who wanted nothing less than the very same political liberty that lets us stand here tonight and debate this resolution. As I speak there are thousands of men and women in China who are being beaten and killed for choosing to believe in ideals we take for granted in this country, whether it is our faith in God, our right to vote or simply wanting to belong to Falun Gong. As we consider, Mr. Speaker, permanent NTR next year to China, let us remember what the Communist Chinese are doing to the Falun Gong. Mr. Speaker, further reserving the right to object. I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Further reserving the right to object, I yield to the gentleman from Nebraska.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, this Congress owes a debt of gratitude to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Lazio) and to the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman). Thanks largely to their efforts, we have an opportunity to do something right. I wish I could say that more often. We owe a debt of gratitude especially to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) under whose leadership proponents of this legislation managed to defend repeated attempts to emasculate it. Finally, we owe a debt of gratitude to President Clinton. The President and his exceptional health team have demonstrated their commitment to the goals of this bill in a number of ways, lending their assistance again and again as this arduous process moved forward. The idea behind the bill is simple. If individuals want to work, let us help them work. For many disabled individuals, the ability to work hinges on reliable health care. Yet, under current law, work means losing access to that care. By providing continued access to Medicare and Medicaid, the Work Incentives Improvement Act enables individuals to leave the disability roles and go back to work. H.R. 1180 taps into the tremendous human potential that all of us have and takes us closer to a time where equal opportunity for disabled people is no longer an objective, it is a fact. Nothing is perfect. This bill could have been much closer to that ideal if the Republican leadership had not co-opted it with a self- serving moratorium on the organ allocation bill. And there is a user fee provision that may reduce the number of attorneys willing to represent disabled clients. It is not a particularly well thought out provision. But overall, Mr. Speaker, the bill is a victory for the disabled and a much needed reminder that American values are, in fact, intact. I ask for support of the bill.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object, I yield to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Bliley) for an explanation of his unanimous consent request.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, further reserving my right to object, with that explanation, I want to associate myself with the remarks of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Bliley) to let my colleagues know that I support the adoption of S. 580. I am particularly pleased because one of the key provisions in this bill is the Graduate Medical Education Funding for children's hospitals. They will receive actual dollars in fiscal year 2000 if this authorization is enacted. We have worked in a bipartisan manner in this bill, and I am glad to see its inclusion. HCPR is needed to study key health care issues as we go into the next century. These issues include access, cost, quality, and equity in virtually all aspects of the health care system. The true bipartisanship exhibited by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Bliley), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis), his staff, the Senate, particularly the efforts of Senators Jeffords, Frist, Kennedy, and their staff, especially the efforts of Ellie Dehoney in my office. Mr. Speaker, I recommend that this bill be adopted by unanimous consent in the House of Representatives.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this resolution because it does exactly what we should be doing here in Congress. We should be encouraging and supporting nations that have made the choice to become democracies. That is something we do not do enough here in Washington. I think we need to start rewarding countries like India and Taiwan that give their people the right to live under the rule of law. Last month, India had an election that saw over 350 million people choose to show up at the polls to select a new government, easily the largest election in world history. Think about that. A country of nearly 1 billion people with a middle class of 300 million, with more Muslims than any other country in the world except for Indonesia. A country that just 50 years ago was still a colony of England and before that had been ruled by the same feudal system for thousands of years. It is pretty clear that if this country of one billion people can overcome its problems and elect a government that serves the people's needs, then our State Department, our U.S. Trade Representative's Office and the Republicans in this Congress should quit lavishing all their attention on the People's Republic of China and start working with our sister democracy in India to bring stability to South and to East Asia. Before closing, Mr. Speaker, I would like to note last week when the Committee on International Relations unanimously approved this resolution, we also overwhelmingly approved a resolution condemning the military coup in Pakistan and calling for the immediate restoration of democratic rule in that country. The Republican leadership deliberately prevented this resolution from coming to the floor which sends the wrong message to would-be dictators around the world, whether they are in Nigeria or Pakistan or North Korea. Instead, we need to support and encourage the development of democratic institutions. While I urge my colleagues to support this resolution, I hope the Republican leadership will condemn the ouster of Pakistan's elected government by yet another military dictatorship.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, let me make sure I understand this. While he was in Istanbul yesterday, President Clinton called on Turkey to correct its human rights abuses so it could be admitted into the European Union. Yet at the same time that our President was admonishing Turkey, our U.S. Trade Representative was in Beijing signing a trade deal that could one day give the People's Republic of China membership in the World Trade Organization. Are we to infer that the Kurds in Turkey count for more than Tibetans in China or that Greek Cypriots count for more than Chinese Christians or that the European Union is a more exclusive and principled organization than the World Trade Organization? Or, this could not be it, could it? Are American corporations more involved with bigger investments and have more at stake in China than they are in Turkey? Does that explain why Time Warner's CEO recently gave Chinese President Jiang Zemin a bust of Abraham Lincoln? Earlier this year we fought a war for human rights in Kosovo. Today we will not raise a tariff for human rights in China.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, many of us have come to this floor of the House of Representatives today and on previous days for 5 minutes and 1 minutes in various speeches to talk about asking that the United States not support accession for China to the World Trade Organization. We are instead insisting that labor standards and environmental standards be applied to our trading partners, the same kind of environmental standards and labor standards that we follow in this country. If that makes us isolationists, as my friend, the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Bereuter) suggested earlier, then so be it. But the fact is that those of us that believe in the right kinds of labor standards and the right kinds of environmental standards around the world want to lift people up around the world, not continue this downward spiral on food safety and labor standard and environmental standards that our trading policy seems to move us towards. Republican leadership last week wrote a letter to the administration demanding that our USTR, U.S. trade rep bureaucrats, do not include labor standards in any of the discussions at the World Trade Organization. The Republican leadership of the Committee on Ways and Means is insisting that the U.S. trade rep ensure that developing countries require that we protect property rights but not human rights, not labor standards, not environmental rights. At the same time, Mr. Speaker, Trade Ambassador Charlene Barshefsky, an unelected official who never seems to miss an opportunity to publicly diminish the importance of labor rights, was supposed to meet with some of us here in the House last night and explain whether or not the administration really plans to push for stronger worker environmental rights in Seattle. What happened? Did we have a chance to talk about how Huffy Bicycle has closed its last American plant because it cannot compete with cheap imports from China, a place where trying to form an independent trade union will get one thrown in prison or even killed? Did we have a chance to talk about some of the maquilladora factories in Mexico which dump their pollution into the same water that their workers have to drink? Did we get a chance to talk about why armed guards will not permit independent monitors into the garment factories in El Salvador which ship millions of dollars worth of merchandise here every year? No, we did not, and that is because Ambassador Barshefsky and a score of other American trade bureaucrats were heading off to the People's Republic of China to try to secure a last minute deal to get China into the World Trade Organization. As we speak, U.S. trade bureaucrats are busy coddling the same gang of dictators that are busy arresting, torturing and even killing Chinese people that practice Falun Gong, which as far as I can tell is the same thing as torturing and killing Christians and Muslims and any other group of people that have spiritual beliefs in that country. So instead of having a real dialogue on whether the Seattle ministerial will have any discussion about human rights, worker rights, human rights, instead of having a chance to hear exactly what is going to happen in Seattle, the administration wants to commit this country to a policy that will continue to hurt workers, a policy that continues the human rights abuses, child labor, slave labor, forced abortions, persecution of Christians and Muslims and Falun Gong and all kinds of religious minorities in China that will continue to allow that kind of policy to happen in China. We can bet the farm on it. If the People's Republic of China accedes to the World Trade Organization, if this country's government supports China accession to the World Trade Organization, that is the last we will ever hear about human rights. Do we really think a totalitarian government that performs forced abortions is ever going to protect labor rights? Do we believe that a totalitarian government which kills thousands of its own people in slave labor camps and then sells their organs is ever going to let the WTO implement any sort of framework to protect the rights of workers? Mr. Speaker, we should stand strong against the accession of China to the WTO.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Engel).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Baldacci). (Mr. BALDACCI asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how much time remains for each of us.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\3/4\ minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey).

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), ranking member of the Committee on Commerce. (Mr. DINGELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks, and include extraneous material.)