Charles Boustany

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling), who serves on the President's Fiscal Responsibility Commission.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I remind my friend, the distinguished majority leader of the House, that in the 1990s, during the Clinton administration, there was a great bipartisan effort that led to those balanced budgets because there was a Republican majority.

Mr. BOUSTANY. I will yield.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, in addition to what Mr. Hoyer said about using the unused stimulus funds, Mr. Obey has hailed amendments to the Supplemental Appropriations bill made on July 1 that were paid for by repeatedly cutting unspent projects in the stimulus law. And in the other body, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Mr. Baucus, has suggested the same. And that's what we're saying here. There is a better way to do this, a fiscally responsible way to not only take care of the forgotten man and woman today, but to prevent even more from being forgotten in the future. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise). Mr. Scalise and I have worked together on American competitiveness, trying to achieve energy independence to meet our national security needs and to grow jobs.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, yes, it is an investment, but it is one we can pay for. And that's the sad state that we're in today because we are being refused the ability to even offer those kinds of amendments. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to my friend, a member of the Ways and Means Committee, the gentleman from Nevada (Mr. Heller).

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, just to briefly respond to the previous speaker, we want to look forward. We don't want to look back. We don't want a cynical look to the past; we want a positive vision to the future for the American people, which means we want to go along and promote growth in the economy and do an extension of unemployment benefits in a responsible way by paying for it, eliminating wasteful spending in the stimulus package as the offset. I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Ginny Brown-Waite), a member of the House Ways and Means Committee.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, this is the eighth time this unemployment benefit insurance is extended. I think that, in and of itself, speaks for the failure of the economic policies. Secondly, a massive tax increase in the face of economic uncertainty is only going to hurt economic growth and job creation, and on our side of the aisle, we'll work to find the offset to avoiding these tax increases on the American people. And finally, I just want to point out that private sector growth in the year 2010, the rate of private sector growth has actually been slower than what we saw in the Great Depression. I am pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Linder), the ranking member on one of the subcommittees of Ways and Means.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, my State of Louisiana has faced four hurricanes, a recession, and now an oil spill. And every one of us in this body has faced and looked into the eyes of those who lost their homes and lost their jobs. And every one of us in this body feels deep compassion for those who are in those dire straits. And we all want to help. Republicans want to help those looking for work, we want to help those who are struggling with this current economic slowdown, but we also agree with the American people that new spending must be paid for. This latest unemployment insurance extender bill fails to do what the American people want us to do. Instead, the Democratic approach adds another $34 billion to the already staggering $13 trillion national debt. And that's not because we have a shortage of ineffective, inefficient, wasteful spending that we could cut to offset what's needed to pay for this. We want to do this, but we want to do what the American people want us to do--and that is to pay for it. Republicans have repeatedly called for the cutting of unspent stimulus spending to offset this new stream of spending. The majority leader himself, Mr. Hoyer, said on June 13, there is ``spending fatigue'' across this country and that ``if we have dollars not yet expended in the recovery act'' that they should be redirected for new spending such as this. Mr. Speaker, 18 months ago the administration told the American people that their trillion-dollar stimulus plan would create millions of jobs and keep unemployment below 8 percent. Instead, 2 million jobs more have been lost and unemployment surged to nearly 10 percent. Overall, 47 out of 50 States have lost jobs since the Democrats' February 2009 stimulus bill, including my home State of Louisiana. Instead of supporting this economy and getting Americans back to work, jobs have been lost, our debt continues to spiral out of control, and the only solution we have here, without an ability to amend, without an ability to offer some alternative approach, is to add another $34 billion in new spending without offsetting it. New spending is unnecessary, and Republicans have been calling for this wasted stimulus money to be put to better use by supporting the long-term unemployed. I suggest the best way to create jobs is to stop destroying good-paying jobs that already exist. And let me explain what I mean by that. This is the single most important issue in my home State of Louisiana. The people of Louisiana are facing job loss. In addition to a failed economic policy, a failed stimulus, President Obama's ill- conceived and unwarranted and--in the words of a Federal judge-- arbitrary and capricious ban on offshore drilling is galvanizing residents across the gulf coast like I've never seen before. And the long term implications of this, Mr. Speaker, are real. Real lives are affected by this. Because of this policy, tens of thousands of good-paying jobs along the gulf coast are immediately at risk, and it doesn't have to be this way. But unfortunately, the elites in this administration and the President himself refuse to understand this. Six weeks ago, the Louisiana delegation--the entire delegation, Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate--requested a meeting with the President in writing. And we have not even gotten a response back. Frankly, Mr. Speaker, that's just unacceptable, and it's irresponsible. Already three gulf rigs have left American waters heading to other parts of the world, and the trend is going to continue at an accelerated rate. And once a rig is gone, it could be years before it returns--if it ever returns at all. Each one of these deepwater rigs employs 1,400 workers. You take 1,400 workers and multiply it by six, and those are the immediate support workers. These are jobs that are being lost. And smaller companies that cannot afford to move are simply losing their workers. People are losing their jobs, costing thousands of jobs. I met recently with about 35 companies. These are all small companies affected by this. And there was an African American couple. He got started doing janitorial work. And he worked very hard for years to do this, saved his money and started a small business, an oil service company that he was so proud of. The American dream, by God. He started this company and grew it to 20 workers. And he had accelerating work until this ban on drilling, and now he has no work, and he's seeing his life savings go down the drain. Why? Because of an ill-founded, government-imposed moratorium that makes no sense. These are rig workers and energy engineers, they're plumbers, they're electricians, they're dock workers. They work in the maritime industry. And yet this is the kind of policy we're getting. This ban hurts everybody. We stand united on the gulf coast to support good-paying jobs. This stimulus has failed, and it's time to direct these funds into more beneficial areas to help those who are chronically unemployed. The last time this House acted, Mr. Camp, the ranking member of our Ways and Means Committee, offered a motion to extend these benefits while paying for the spending by using unspent funds from the failed stimulus bill. The House could immediately act on that same type of provision today with the Senate following suit to get these benefits to the long-term unemployed in a way that helps the economy, job creation--instead of hampering job creation even more. That is what we should be doing and what would most help the unemployed get benefits that they need today and the jobs that they need tomorrow. The American people want President Obama and this Congress to spur entrepreneurship and American competitiveness and to create good-paying jobs. Instead, the President and this Congress continue on a path of increasing uncertainty leading to high unemployment and runaway spending. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this bill. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. I will reclaim my time, and I will remind the majority leader that we have the opportunity to go forward now and not cast blame on the past. So I would say that President Obama actually got it right in a statement of administration policy on November 2009 regarding unemployment benefit extensions, which was fully paid for. And here is what he said. I quote, ``Fiscal responsibility is central to the medium-term recovery of the economy and the creation of jobs. The administration therefore supports the fiscally responsible approach to expanding unemployment benefits embodied in the bill.'' All we're saying is there is a better way to do this, and that is to pay for this extension. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I have to respond to my friend from the State of Washington. I would say that I would not have the audacity to speak for the people of Washington, because I haven't had the chance to actually get to know them. I can tell the gentleman that I do know the fishermen, the oystermen, the shrimpers, and those who run boats down in my State of Louisiana. If they were here on the House floor today, they would say, ``Please do not kick us when we're down. Lift this ban on drilling because, if not, it is going to kill our economy.'' These are the same fishermen and oystermen and shrimpers who are losing their jobs. That's why we need sensible policies, Mr. Speaker. We are all for extending the unemployment benefit insurance, but we know we can do it in a responsible way--by paying for it with unspent stimulus money. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. BOUSTANY. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling).

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. This is about whether we're going to pay for this or not. Consider that this is the eighth time this Congress is going to extend these benefits. The eighth time. That's an indication that the current economic policy of this administration and this Congress is a failure. I mentioned earlier the fact of the matter is we have a choice. We can do this in a fiscally responsible way, or we can choose to run up additional debt on our children and grandchildren to the tune of $34 billion between now and November. Again, I think the President, President Obama, got it right in the statement of administration policy in November 2009 when the unemployment benefit extension was actually paid for. Again, I'm going to quote what he said: ``Fiscal responsibility is central to the medium-term of the economy and the creation of jobs. The administration therefore supports the fiscally responsible approach to expanding unemployment benefits embodied in the bill.'' Now, if fiscal responsibility helps the economy and job creation, then the fiscal irresponsibility of this bill before us will hurt the economy and job creation. And I think the American people have spoken. They want us to do this, but they want us to pay for it. Let's do the right thing and actually pay for the spending we approve and help our economy grow, help job creation. As the administration said, a fiscally responsible approach is what's needed. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. I yield the gentlewoman an additional 20 seconds.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I have no further Members wishing to speak on this issue, and I am prepared to yield back my time. I look forward to working with my colleague on the Ways and Means Committee in this effort to hopefully change this regime's behavior. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I join my colleague and friend on the Ways and Means Committee in strong support of H.J. Res. 83, which would continue the imposition of sanctions against the repressive regime in Burma for another year. The purpose of imposing sanctions against Burma is to promote democracy, develop a respect for human rights, and improve living conditions for the Burmese people. Unfortunately, the ruling junta is still dedicated to working against, not toward those objectives. For that reason, I am in favor of continuing our practice of extending import sanctions against Burma for another year. Burma's regime is one of the world's most repressive. And it continues to oppress democratic movements and humanitarian efforts. In reading the State Department's human rights report on Burma, I am appalled at the extent and scale of grave human rights violations. According to the State Department, this repugnant regime, in which military officers wield the ultimate authority at every level of government, routinely continues to abridge the right of citizens to change their government and commits to other severe human rights abuses. Specifically, government security forces allowed custodial deaths to occur, and committed extrajudicial killings, disappearances, rape, and torture. The regime detains civic activists indefinitely and without charge, and engages in harassment, abuse, and detention of human rights and pro-democracy activists. Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi is still being falsely detained by the regime. And as of March 2010, the regime held an estimated 2,100 political prisoners. The army attacks ethnic minority villages. Violence and societal discrimination against women, recruitment of child soldiers, and trafficking in persons have continued. The regime also severely restricts freedom of assembly, expression, association, movement, and religion. In addition, I am very concerned that the regime has taken steps that seem to guarantee that the elections that will be held in Burma later this year will not, in the words of the State Department, be transparent, inclusive, or credible. And I am still disappointed that there has not been additional multilateral pressure against this regime. I strongly urge the administration to put more pressure on our trading partners and the United Nations to put the leaders of this regime and its cronies under targeted economic pressure that denies them access to personal wealth and sources of revenue. I call on the United Nations, Burma's Southeast Asian neighbors in ASEAN, and the People's Republic of China to step up engagement considerably. I am pleased that this Congress amplified our sanctions 2 years ago to eliminate trade in jewelry containing Burmese rubies and jadeite, even if the jewelry was made in and exported from a third country. The expansion was designed to bring about multilateral pressure on the regime through the United Nations and World Trade Organization, similar to successful legislation on conflict diamonds. We are still in the process of assessing the effectiveness of that law. The General Accountability Office reported to us several months ago on the effectiveness of the expanded sanctions, and we are considering its recommendations for improving the administration of the program and assuring that legitimate trade in these stones is not constrained. I must be clear that I generally view import sanctions with great skepticism. However, if there is a right way to impose sanctions, I think these Burma sanctions are crafted to maximize their ability to effect change. For example, they require the administration to issue annual reports on Burma that include whether U.S. national security, economic, and foreign policy interests are being served so we can make an informed decision. Perhaps the most critical aspect of the Burma sanctions program is that they require us to redirect our attention every summer to the question of whether these sanctions should be continued. They are not self-executing. We here in Congress must consider this issue and vote to continue them on an annual basis. I continue to believe that our greatest hope for effecting real change in Burma is multilateralism. The whole world, particularly China and the ASEAN countries, must put economic pressure on this regime. I support this resolution because it increases our chances to bring about this multilateral effect. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I agree with my ranking member's remarks here. The gentleman from New Jersey made a very compelling emotional argument. We all agree that we have to do something. But the American people want us to pay for this. They have been speaking very loudly and very clearly. They're tired of the fiscal irresponsibility. Now our friends across the aisle here predicted that their trillion- dollar stimulus would create 3.7 million jobs. Since then, what have we seen? Let's look at the record. Debt has grown by $2 trillion and nearly 3 million jobs have been lost, with unemployment hovering just under 10 percent. I think if our friends across the aisle would take the time and talk to the job creators in this country--the small business owners, the entrepreneurs--what they would find is that these tax-borrow-spend policies are creating tremendous uncertainty for the job creators-- small business owners across this country. And these policies are leading to more unemployment and more debt. Look at what the administration is advocating--a job-killing moratorium on exploration for oil in the deep water. This is going to kill potentially a couple hundred thousand jobs on the gulf coast. We need to get back to some real debate on these issues here. Now what does this bill do? It's $34 billion to extend the unemployment benefits. But it's not paid for. The American people want these policies paid for. And there's no reason why this couldn't have come to the floor with the opportunity for us to amend it and to have a real debate over some of the merits of this amendment of how we can pay for this. It's just not right. More debt, more uncertainty, more unemployment, higher taxes. The American people deserve better.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the previous question and the rule because American families continue to struggle with rising health care costs. Recently, the Congressional Budget Office and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services reported that health care costs for families and for services will rise even higher due to this massive new health care law. Today's YouCut vote helps to stop one of the major problems with the new health care law, and it could save taxpayers across this country between $5 billion and $10 billion. Under the new health care law, the IRS will be in charge of verifying that every American taxpayer has obtained government-approved, acceptable health coverage for every month of the year. In other words, if the IRS determines that a taxpayer lacks government-approved health insurance for even a single month, then the IRS can have the power to withhold tax refunds. This is an unprecedented new role for the IRS-- one that injects the IRS even farther into the personal lives of American families. So today's YouCut vote would prevent the IRS from hiring thousands of examiners and auditors required to implement this new individual mandate. As a former heart surgeon, I know we can do better and I know we can agree on many commonsense approaches to cutting health care costs for families and for seniors. We have many proposals to do this which are not part of this health care law. But I'll tell you this: An individual mandate enforced by the IRS is not one of them. I urge my colleagues to oppose this rule and vote against this rule. Join me and cut $5 billion to $10 billion from the IRS while preventing yet another mandate on health care from the Federal Government.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to applaud the Federal District Court ruling yesterday overturning the administration's job-killing moratorium on American energy production in the deep water of the Gulf of Mexico. This moratorium on drilling will ship thousands of good- paying jobs overseas. It will also make us more dependent on foreign oil. And finally, it's contrary to and in fact distorts the recommendations by a panel of independent scientists and engineers that the administration put together. It distorts their whole view that this industry-wide moratorium will in fact hurt safety by pushing the most experienced workers overseas and actually shipping all of our most advanced drilling rig technology overseas. It will hurt safety. I urge the administration to back down from this ill-conceived, job- killing, arbitrary moratorium on American energy production.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, last week, the nonpartisan Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services released an actuarial report that shows that the President's new health care law will increase health care costs over and above what was expected; premiums for families and small businesses will rise beyond what was expected; and access to a physician will suffer for many, many Americans. They also showed that the $500 billion in indiscriminate cuts to Medicare to pay for a new entitlement is a very deep cut that will hurt access to care for many of our seniors. Half of all seniors in the Medicare Advantage program will lose their current coverage. I have 140,000 seniors in my State of Louisiana who depend on Medicare Advantage in rural areas for access to a doctor. They're going to lose that kind of coverage that gives them that valued access to the physician of their choice. This bill, this law, fails to lower costs. It creates red tape and bureaucracy, and it really does nothing to enhance quality for most Americans.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Madam Speaker, the United States is on an unsustainable path right now, an unsustainable course with massive debt, trillion dollar deficits going into the out-years, unemployment approaching 10 percent, and this administration, since January of 2009, has enacted $670 billion in gross tax increases with more tax increases planned by this administration and the Democratic leadership of Congress. It's no wonder we have high unemployment and uncertainty all throughout this country with regard to the business climate. So what can we do? How can we correct this course? How can we restore American competitiveness for the 21st century? Well, I think there are three things we can do. First, let's cut wasteful, massive government spending. Let's give the American public confidence that we can get our fiscal house in order. Let's send a signal to the bond markets and to our foreign allies and competitors that we can act responsibly. Let's lay out a path for entitlement reform, which is causing severe strain on the Federal budget and leading to this deficit spending. Just laying out a corrective path will send a positive signal. Secondly, we can lower the corporate tax rate to make U.S. companies more competitive globally with regard to our trading competitors. Let's unleash American innovation. Let's get the American companies out there creating jobs again by lowering the tax rate for our corporations. Right now we have the second highest corporate tax rate in the world among industrialized countries. This makes us less competitive. This also means that companies that want to come to the United States and invest to create jobs here also have a high tax burden. So, therefore, if we want to create jobs, let's make this country competitive for investment coming in and for our companies going out to do investment. That's how we will restore job growth in this country. Also, one of the things we need to do with regard to tax policy is to make sure that we don't doubly tax our companies who are trying to compete against foreign competitors abroad because our companies competing all over the globe also create American jobs. If we doubly tax ours on top of having the second highest corporate tax rate in the world, well, it's no wonder we're not seeing the kind of job growth that is necessary. We're not going to see U.S. companies and the U.S. be competitive in this global market. And finally, the third thing: let's promote exports. Exports create jobs, good high-paying jobs. Now, the President has announced that his goal, his stated goal during the State of the Union, was to double exports by the U.S. over the next 5 years. Well, let's look at a little bit of history here for a moment. It took us 10 years previously to double exports. It required the completion of a round of negotiations at the WTO. It took implementation of NAFTA and 10 free trade agreements to be implemented to double exports. This administration has offered none of that so far. We have, currently, three free trade agreements pending that have been negotiated in good faith, and yet this administration and this Democratic Congress has failed to implement these free trade agreements. These are a win for the United States because those countries are already bringing goods into our country; we just have barriers in exporting to theirs. Why not lift those barriers? Implementing these free trade agreements will create good high-paying U.S. jobs. These three countries--Colombia, Panama, and South Korea--are markets that are ready for U.S. goods and services. So all we have to do is implement these agreements which have been negotiated in good faith. By failure to do this, what we're doing is sending a signal to our competitors and to other countries that the United States does not negotiate in good faith. That's a poor signal to send if we want to be competitive in this global market. Meanwhile, those three countries I just mentioned, Colombia, Panama-- let's just take Colombia, for instance. The European Union and Canada are both in the stages of implementing free trade agreements with Colombia. And what's happened? We've seen U.S. exports of agriculture products plummet just over the past year. At the same time, the European Union and Canada have also increased their exports to fill that gap. We are losing out. We are losing out on being able to export to Colombia simply because we won't keep our good faith negotiation and implement this agreement. The President has announced a national export initiative, but yet there have been no substantive steps to move this forward. Why not implement a small business initiative to help our small businesses export to Colombia? That's an immediate way to create jobs.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, our country is on an unsustainable path with trillion-dollar deficits annually, continued massive government spending, and an atmosphere of uncertainty as President Obama and congressional Democrats have enacted $760 million in gross new tax increases since 2009, with more tax increases planned. It's no wonder that unemployment remains stubbornly high and economic growth is sluggish. These policies are a threat to U.S. competitiveness. We need a commonsense policy to promote growth. We need to cut government spending and adhere to a balanced budget. We need to increase U.S. exports by implementing the three free trade agreements that we've already negotiated. That way, we show that America keeps its commitments. And we need to lower the corporate tax rate so that our U.S. companies can compete against foreign competitors. These are commonsense policies that will lead to U.S. competitiveness, job growth, and economic growth.

Mr. BOUSTANY

Mr. BOUSTANY. Mr. Speaker, I now yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Roskam), a distinguished member of the Ways and Means Committee.