Marsha Blackburn

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I object.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I object.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I object.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I object.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, in March, the Homeland Security Committee unanimously approved a bill to authorize funding for the Department of Homeland Security for the coming year. It wasn't a perfect bill, but it was one the committee accepted. Now the liberal leadership plans to strip the most critical provisions in the legislation. These are not controversial points that should make my colleagues on the other side of the aisle uncomfortable. Unless, of course, the Democrats do not agree with an increased emphasis on immigration enforcement at the ports or secure biometric identification for aliens captured at sea or critical funding to protect America's food supply. But, as we've all seen since the Democrats took over in January, we know that is the case. But it actually gets worse. The liberal leadership voted against allowing noncontroversial amendments to increase information sharing between DHS and cops on the beat, allowing DHS to investigate Social Security fraud at the workplace, and increased fines of employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens. Mr. Speaker, this bill makes a mockery of the democratic process, does nothing extra to secure our borders and will, unfortunately, probably make our Nation less safer. Welcome to Homeland Security, Democrat style.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. One of the things that is so disappointing to me, having as many veterans and as many military families and members of the military as I have in my district, one of the things that is disappointing to me is they may want to do this over and over and over and delay the funding that gets to those troops. One of the things that it always brings to mind, if you don't want to get the money to them and you don't want to get it to them in a timely manner, and you want to push benchmarks on our troops, then you have to be able to answer some questions. You've got to answer the question: What is going to happen if we leave?

Mrs. BLACKBURN. We know. And what we have to do is be certain that we meet our obligation to our men and women in uniform and that we send a message to every terrorist that is breathing on the face of the earth that we will not stop.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. What is going to happen if we leave Iraq? What are the Iraqi people going to do if we leave Iraq? What is going to happen in the Middle East? Somebody asked me earlier today, asked me, how many more people have to die? I said that is the question to ask the terrorists: How many more people have to die? But what we do know is that we cannot let down our guard. We do have to continue to fight. We have to realize terror and the war on terror is a new enemy. They do not have a headquarters. They do not show allegiance to a country. They do not wear a uniform. They are an illusive enemy. Right now they are saying the central battle front is Iraq. September 11, 2001, we know where that central battle front was.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. That is right. It is so unfortunate. What we need is a clean bill that allows a good debate over how we are moving forward in Iraq. I think it has been striking to see the Senate confirm and give a vote of support for General David Petraeus who is commanding our efforts in Iraq, a very scholarly general. He truly is a leader for our men and women and for the Iraqis. He has great respect from them. But then to turnaround and say we are going to second guess or Monday morning quarterback your decisions and we are not going to give the funding and we are not going to give it in a timely manner. As the gentleman from Georgia was so eloquently stating earlier, there comes a time when you have to look at it and talk about what their intent is, and if they even trust the troops, if they even trust the commanders in the field to have the flexibility that they need to respond. Certainly today we have seen and have noted the demise of al-Masri who is the head of al-Qaeda in Iraq. Now I know that it is probably a subject that the majority doesn't want to talk about, that al-Masri was killed in Iraq, had been found there and had been working there. So it leads one to ask the question: What was he doing in Iraq? Why was he in Iraq? And why was it that he met his death in Iraq? Well, the answer to that question is he was there because he and the other terrorists and the other terrorist groups all tell us the central front of the global war on terror is in Iraq. This is where they are fighting it.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, indeed, we see that. The message that it sends, actions do speak louder than words. We heard that as children growing up, ``your actions are going to say more about your intent than the words that you speak.'' And we know that. The message that it is sending by the actions is one that does not serve us well, in my opinion. It is one that causes our intent to be called into question, because we know what the enemy would do with us if they were given the chance. We have to realize that we have to be vigilant and we cannot let down our guard, not for a minute, not for an hour, not for a day. We have to continue to work to defeat this enemy. So many of my constituents have called about the bill. I brought a copy of the bill today to the floor with me, and here it is. It is I think 93 pages when we printed the whole thing out. It is not that difficult to read. I can even read parts of it without my reading glasses, the print is big enough, and I like that. It makes it a little bit easier to focus on. For constituents who are watching tonight and want to follow along through the debate with us, I would encourage them, go to thomas.loc.gov. That is all you have to enter in your search engine. When you get in thomas.loc.gov to query the site, enter ``H.R. 1591.'' That is the number on this bill. I do encourage individuals to go in and pull this down so they can see what is contained in here. Now some of the comments that I have had, and you mentioned this earlier, our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, the Democrat majority, ran railing against pork spending. From so many of our families I have heard: How in the world could they have drafted a bill that had money for all of these different interests? It sounds like a grocery list when you talk about beef and cheese and dairy products and spinach and shrimp. And when you look at the intent or what we have come to believe that they want to do, which was not put it through PAYGO rules, not put it through regular order, but slide it in here because they felt this was something Members couldn't refuse to vote for. How unfair to our troops and our military families, to put this on their back and saddle them with this $24 billion worth of pork barrel spending. It is not what they said they were going to do; and quite frankly, I don't think that is the kind of change that the American people wanted to see.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Yes, and I appreciate the gentleman yielding. Yes, indeed, we hear this regularly, not only from our Guardsmen, but we also hear it from those that are on active duty, that are moving forward and readying for another deployment. They talk about how they work to make ends meet, and they talk about how deeply it hurt the ongoing progress of developing different equipment and protocols as funding was cut through the nineties. I think another thing that we have to remember, and this has been highlighted by a couple of my constituents who are so wonderful and love keeping up with the issue, is we have to remember on September 11, 2001, we were not under a George Bush budget. We were still under the last Clinton budget. The focus was shifting for that budget that was going into place on the first of October in 2001. Actually, Mr. Speaker, I think everybody realizes that prior to September 11, this Nation had responded to acts of terrorism as civil disobedience. September 11, all of that changed and we called it what it is, and that is a war. Because no one can deny, and I do think it is foolhardy to stand and say, oh, there is no such thing as a global war on terror. Everybody knows there is, because they know we have a very dedicated, very focused enemy. You can listen to their own words. They want to annihilate us and end our way of life. I think it would not be wise for us to let that go unattended. We are right to respond with diligence and tenacity and focus to make certain that we defeat the radical Islamic jihadists who want to tear our Nation and our communities apart by the very fabric that holds them together.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Georgia so very much. I appreciate his diligence on the issue. Mr. Speaker, as we have been through this issue and with our troops, I have got a letter with me tonight that I received from one of our men and women that is in Baghdad who is thanking me for the support and thanking so many Members of the House for their support in standing with them and their families and supporting our troops. I think it is so interesting how they have viewed this and kind of the filter they view this issue of our troop funding from. As I read that letter and as I have been home over the weekend and talked to so many of my National Guard families, talked to so many of the military families that call Tennessee's Seventh District home, one of the things that has been mentioned repeatedly is, ``Marsha, I hope that people in Washington look at this debate and that they take a little bit of a historical view to this and focus on what should be some lessons learned.'' Because there are lots of lessons learned, or should be lots of lessons learned in this, Mr. Speaker. One of the ones that was highlighted for me by one of my constituents is that we have to realize when you go back and you look at the decade of the nineties and look at the view that then President Clinton took of the military, saying, well, the wall has come down. Well, we have survived these threats. Well, let's reduce funding to the military. Well, let's reduce funding on intelligence. Let's put it into domestic programs, social service programs. Then the unintended consequence, I am sure he would say, is when you look at what happens when you have to go back through that rebuilding process. When you hear from those in our intelligence agencies and in the FBI and the CIA that say, my goodness, it takes 5 years for us to develop an asset in these countries. When you hear from our men and women in uniform about the importance of maintenance, maintenance on those posts, maintenance on that equipment, R&D and how that should have been continued. When they point to equipment and artillery that didn't get developed. We have to look at that as a lesson learned and realize, yes, indeed, you do get peace through strength, and you maintain it by being certain that you are ever-vigilant and that you are always making certain we fulfill the constitutional duty to provide for the common defense. There are lessons learned, and I hope that this body does take it seriously, and I hope that our friends across the aisle will join us and say let's be fair to our military, to those families and to those troops, because for the debate that has taken place, for the rhetoric that has been spewed, for some of the statements that have been made, there are many of them that can look at this and say they are not being fair to us and they are not being fair to the job that we would do.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam Speaker, you know, nobody likes war. I don't like it. My constituents from Fort Campbell that are fighting this war, they don't like it. But they understand it. And we all know there are some things worth fighting for. Freedom is one of those things. Freedom is one of those things. Listen to this from British historian John Stuart Mill. He said back in the 1800s, ``War is an ugly thing, not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.'' People that don't care, that is what is worse. Using our troops as a political tool during a time of war is not wrong. It is ugly. It is downright ugly. It is wrong, and it jeopardizes our national security. Just yesterday, Iraq's Ambassador to the U.S. said American troops are critical to the success of that. Today we stand and recognize the demise of al Masri, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq. Tenacity. Focus. That is what yields results. Our men and women are getting results. It should be the first priority. We should all be reading this bill. We should recognize war is ugly. Veto the bill, Mr. President.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam Speaker, the liberal leadership of this Congress has put themselves and the lives of our military members, our soldiers in the field, in a very difficult position. When they passed the supplemental spending bill earlier this month for the global war on terror, they only did it by loading it up with pork. It sounds like a grocery list. They have got money for spinach, for beef, for fish and for peanuts. Billions of dollars of pork. They made their Members an offer that they couldn't refuse. They claim to support our military, but in this bill they tie the hands of that same military by instituting a timetable for withdrawal and taking the power for running the war away from the commanders in the field. The majority leader, Harry Reid, didn't help when he said he thinks the war is lost. American citizens need to ask themselves the question: What would happen, what would happen, if we were to walk away? It is the same question our Speaker, who obviously isn't going to meet with our commanding general, also needs to ask. Let's respect the soldiers in the field by doing our job and passing a clean budget.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California for yielding. It has been so interesting to listen to the debate this evening. I am reminded of my school teacher grandmother and an admonition that she would regularly give us to us, which was ``Your actions speak louder than your words.'' And she would remind us of this time and time and time again. And, Mr. Speaker, I can tell you, quite frankly, I think that what we are seeing is the actions of a majority who are doing their best to ensure, to ensure, that our men and women in uniform do not have the funding that they need. I represent a lot of these military men and women, and I have heard from them. I am hearing from a lot of the military men and women and their families, and they feel like the modified withdrawal dates in this legislative disaster are nothing more than a vote of no confidence for our troops. They feel that this legislation will embolden our enemies and send a message to the rest of the world that they believe that they are more qualified to prosecute a war than the men and women we are sending to the frontlines. That is something, Mr. Speaker, that they do disagree with. Our military leadership deserves the opportunity to fight this war with the funding and the support that they need to accomplish their goals. They deserve the ability and the opportunity to win. Yet the leadership in this House continues to try their best to micromanage the war and our troops without the funding that they need. Despite what the majority leader in the other body and his supporters in the House believe, this war is not lost. Yet this dead-on-arrival supplemental bill will only exacerbate the problem and put our troops in harm's way. I think that we should show our respect for the men and women in uniform by respecting the job they do. We should do our job: Send the funding to the troops.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from South Carolina and my colleague from Tennessee for his work on the resolution, and I thank Mr. Andrews for his kind remarks. And, yes, we think the Scarlet Knights as we honored them last week did a wonderful job. But I will have to tell you, Mr. Speaker, we were so thrilled with our Tennessee Lady Vols, and we did like that score of 59-46. We thought that was very good. We liked the fact that our Lady Vols captured their seventh title in 20 years, and it was the first NCAA championship since they won three straight titles, as my colleague from Knoxville mentioned, there in 1996, 1997, 1998. He mentioned also their coach, Pat Head Summitt, and mentioned that she is the NCAA's all-time winningest coach, male or female. She is given to leadership and she is given to mentoring and role modeling. That is why she has totaled up 947 victories, and she is still counting because she is still out there. And we accept that challenge from those at Rutgers. We know they are coming back next year, but so are we, and we know that Coach Summitt is going to be out there. And, again, we expect that they will dominate not only the SEC but the NCAA. And, as always, the Lady Vols accomplished their goal with the dignity befitting one of college basketball's most celebrated programs. Yet their on-the-court exploits pale in comparison to the fact that the Lady Vols continue to set a standard for Division I college sports in the classroom. Coach Summitt and her staff demand the best, and that attitude is reflected in the championship team's 3.0 grade point average, and the program's remarkable graduate rate that has spurred every student who has completed her eligibility at the university to either graduate or continue working toward requirements for graduation. Basketball excellence deserves our applause, but a commitment to academic excellence and the pursuit of a young student athlete's college degree and their leadership and professional development deserves our celebration. I do congratulate the Lady Vols, Coach Summitt, and the entire University of Tennessee family for their tremendous achievements.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam Speaker, the liberal leadership of this Congress put the lives of our soldiers in the field in a very difficult, very difficult position. When they passed the supplemental bill earlier this month, they loaded it up with pork. Actually, the bill sounds more like a shopping list. There is money for spinach and for fish and for peanut storage. A lot of pork, and it is something that does not do a service to our military. But what the leadership did was to make an offer that couldn't be refused to a lot of Members. They claim to support the military, but in the bill what they are doing is tying the hands of the military by inserting a timetable for withdrawal and taking the power away from the commanders in the field. Majority Senate leader Harry Reid didn't help when he considered that the war was lost. That is the message that he is sending to our troops and to the terrorists alike, that everybody ought to give up. American citizens need to ask themselves, is defeat an option? What would happen if we were to leave? What we need to do is let the soldiers do their jobs, us do ours, pass a clean bill, and send it to the President.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I think what we see here is so important, and what you've just said speaks to the issue. Because a budget should reflect not the priorities of the government, but the priorities of the people. And what we have seen in the budget that our friends across the aisle brought that eliminated the tax reductions, that increased the taxes, that adds to that, knowing that people are overtaxed, knowing that government is overspent, is the fact that all of these automatic increases, mandatory spending growth, not addressing entitlement reforms that are needed, but allowing that to be put on autopilot, and increase and increase and making that spending permanent while you make the tax reductions temporary.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I would gladly yield.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. If the gentleman will yield?

Mrs. BLACKBURN. The gentleman is exactly right. That is why we have to look at that budget document on this tax day and say, they laid the marker down. They showed us what their priorities are. Their priorities are a bigger government and higher taxes on the American people. I would invite all of them to join us, join us in reducing taxes. Join us in making these tax reductions permanent. Join us in making sales tax deductibility permanent. Join us in being certain that middle-class Americans get first right of refusal on their paycheck, that it is not the Federal Government that gets first right of refusal on that paycheck. Before those deductions are taken out, let's be certain that the American people have the opportunity to sit down at that kitchen table and decide how they are going to spend those hard- earned dollars, because it is their work. You know, American families, individuals in my district in Tennessee, we talked a lot about taxes as we went through this district work period. I had one of my constituents stand up in one of our meetings and he said, Marsha, I've got sweat equity in my paycheck; I've got a lot of sweat equity in my paycheck when I get it. And it just galls me every time I see a little bit more of that paycheck going to Washington, D.C. for programs that don't work. He talked about the spinach farmers and the fisheries and the peanut storage people and Katrina relief and all these things that were the waste; and the additions and the add-ons and the pork barrel spending that got put into the bill that would have funded our military. On this tax day, as people are going to the mailboxes tonight, they know that they are not undertaxed, they are overtaxed. They know that government is not underspent, it is overspent. And they know that the Democrats laid down a marker. They made a choice when they did this budget. That budget choice was, do you want to stand with the American families and let them have first right of refusal on that paycheck, or do you want to give first right of refusal to the bureaucrats and the liberal elites in Washington, D.C.? And they made their choice.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I will yield.

Mrs. BLACKBURN. I thank the gentleman from Georgia. Madam Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to be on the floor tonight and talk a little bit about what the hold-on-to-your-wallet Congress is doing to Americans as we come to this tax day. You know, we circle April 15 on the calendar every year. I tell you, everybody knows that. They look forward to that day with dread. And I have said so many times I think the only thing good that happens that day is my nephew, Chip Wedgeworth, has a birthday every year on April 15. So that is the highlight of our April 15. I think the reason that Americans look at April 15 with that sense of dread is because they know, our constituents know, that we are overtaxed. They know that the government is overspent. It is plain and simple to them. They know that the government does not have a revenue problem, they've got a spending problem. And they never take the time to go through the disciplines that are necessary to reduce what the Federal Government spends. Those are things that American men and women who are working know. They know that government is overspent; they know that they are overtaxed. They know that the government doesn't have a revenue problem, that it has a spending problem. And Americans do mark this date on the calendar. They resent what it stands for. I thank the gentleman from Georgia for what he is doing on this issue. Madam Speaker, it is so nice to be on this floor and be joined by my colleagues who are real people, who live real lives, as the gentleman from Tennessee was talking about his business; people that understand what it takes to start a business, to run a business, to maintain a business. They are not part of the liberal elite. They are part of real people, this wonderful American middle class that makes this Nation run. You know, I think another thing that kind of gets to people as they are sitting there trying to get those taxes in the mail tonight and figure these forms out, these thousands upon thousands upon thousands of pages of the tax form, you know, I had one of my constituents in a town hall meeting say he couldn't read the Tax Code, it was bigger than the King James version of the Bible and he has never been able to get through the Bible, and so he definitely couldn't get through the Tax Code. That is how big and unwieldy this thing has become. But they look at this and they know that what we've got is a bureaucracy that is out of control. It is unresponsive; it is out of control. And the liberal elites who have created this bureaucracy think they are smarter than everybody else. They think that they know what should be happening for and to the rest of the country. And you know, I am right in there with them, don't like that very much. I think that our constituents all know, too, that just as we are talking about, they know that they are overtaxed and government is overspent. They know that government is never going to get enough of their money. And my colleague from Tennessee mentioned sales tax deductibility. Madam Speaker, I think it is just really so very sad that this Congress chose to let those tax deductions expire, which in effect will enact the largest tax increase in history on the American people, all to put more into the coffers of a government so that the liberal elites get their hands on it and they spend it. There again, the people know that they are overtaxed and they know government is overspent. As we talk about what is before us today, I think that it is important. I was looking at one of the gentleman's posters that he has down there about mandatory spending growth. Isn't it amazing that we see this mandatory spending growth? The budget that our colleagues across the aisle, the Democrats, have chosen to pass makes our tax reductions temporary, makes tax relief for all of our families temporary, and makes spending permanent.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam Speaker, it is a privilege to rise today to honor G. Patrick Maxwell, M.D., FACS and thank him for his contributions to the practice of plastic surgery and his service to others. Dr. Maxwell's talents as a pioneering plastic surgeon are world renowned. Dr. Maxwell received both his undergraduate and M.D. from Vanderbilt University and completed residencies in general surgery and plastic surgery at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Dr. Maxwell has published over 100 scientific articles, and lectured and performed live surgical demonstrations in over 20 countries world-wide. In 2005, Dr. Maxwell was awarded the Presidential Award from the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. This award acknowledged his ``excellence as an educator and innovator bringing art and science to a new level for the specialty.'' Additionally Maxwell has received virtually every accolade awarded to an American plastic surgeon. These awards include the Robert H. Ivy Society Award, the James Barrett Brown Award and Maxwell is a three time recipient of the Walter Scott Brown Award. Dr. Maxwell continues to be an innovator in his field and has ten U.S. patents for medical devices. Dr. Maxwell has been instrumental in revolutionizing developments in reconstruction for survivors of breast cancer. Maxwell's contributions are not limited to the field of plastic surgery. In addition, Maxwell is the co-founder of the Tennesse-Kentucky chapter of Operation Smile, past president of the Nashville Chapter of the American Cancer Society, a founder and board member of the Aspen Center for Integrative Medicine and co-founder and Executive EVP Diversified Specialty Institute. Madam Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in thanking Dr. Maxwell for his extraordinary contributions to plastic surgery and for the profoundly positive impact he has on our community.

Mrs. BLACKBURN

Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, today the tax man cometh, and the tax man taketh away on this very day. The American people circle this on our calendar. We look forward to it with dread because we know that this is the day that the money goes in to feed an inefficient and ineffective, many times, Federal Government. The current Congress has voted for tax increases at every single turn. They voted for more spending while eliminating tax reductions for middle-class American families. They are getting rid of the deductions that have helped jump start the economy. The simple truth is that liberals want to take more money out of your pocket and put it into the Federal Government. In my State, my fellow Tennesseans can expect to pay more than $2,600 per year in coming years, thanks to the hold-on-to-your-wallet Congress that is in action today. My colleagues and I at the Republican Study Committee have recently proposed a taxpayer bill of rights that protects the taxpayer. It includes: 1. The right to have a Federal Government that does not grow beyond their ability to pay for it. 2. The right to receive back each dollar that they entrust to the Government for their retirement. 3. The right to expect the Government to balance the budget without having their taxes raised. 4. And the right to have a right to a simple, fair tax code that they can understand.