K. Conaway

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Mr. Chairman, thank you for accepting the amendment.

Mr. CONAWAY. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. CONAWAY. I thank the Chair. I appreciate that, and I will endeavor to not use all the 5 minutes.

Mr. CONAWAY. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mr. CONAWAY. I did. I just want to get this on record. I did take yes for an answer. The importance of financial statement auditing is important. It needs to be a priority. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. CONAWAY. Thank you very much. Let me briefly explain what it does because on the surface, it looks like it's just an in-and-out with no real issue. I will be quick. The issue allows me to talk about financial management, internal controls, and clean audits at the Department of Defense. This is, as it should be, a high priority that is reflected in the priorities set by the Secretary of Defense himself. It's not really up to the Appropriations Committee to find these funds. These funds ought to come out of hide. It's important they do that. Yesterday or the day before, the Secretary announced a $60 billion savings search for the Department of Defense. He can't find that money without good internal controls. The authorization committee has said this is now a priority. We've accelerated the movement by 4 years, the point at which the Department of Defense needs to have clean, audited financial statements. Sarbanes-Oxley made that function of internal control a high priority when it was passed. Businesses had to do what was referred to as section 404 reviews. It was difficult, it was painful, and it was expensive. But almost every one of those publicly held companies will tell you today that after they put those new controls in place, that they are better. Their financial statements are better. Their decisions based on financial information are better. The same thing would apply to the Department of Defense if they would make this a priority. It has to be a priority for the Secretary of Defense, the appropriations committee and the authorization committee.

Mr. CONAWAY. Yes, sir, I will.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Mr. Speaker, there is no one on our side of the aisle who would argue that we have necessary reforms for this medical health care system that we all enjoy and we are mostly all alive because of. The comments to the contrary that this is totally broken, totally unworkable, as you know, are hyperbole, simply done to try to set a riot, I suspect. 4.7 million jobs are estimated to be lost by this health care plan. That is a big number. But four or five of those jobs are at a long-term health care plan company in Llano, Texas. Steven Lange sent me an e-mail that says if he is required to put this 8 percent tax on his business, because it is a low-margin business, because he gets Medicare reimbursement for 90 percent of his revenues, he will be unable to pass that 8 percent increase for the cost of doing business along to his major customer, i.e., the Federal taxpayer. Because of that, he will have to cut his employee base. His employees take care of the most vulnerable, frail, and least capable people in our society, folks at the end of life, and cutting the service to them should be not something that we ought to do. Physicians in the group say ``first do no harm.'' I would argue that this health care plan ought to do the same thing.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 3293--Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010. In the Department of Education, Higher Education (includes FIPSE) account, an earmark for the Midland Independent School District, Midland, TX for teacher training was included on my behalf. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Midland Independent School District (ISD), located at 615 W. Missouri Ave., Midland, TX 79701. Funding for this project will be used for Texas Mathworks. Texas Mathworks is a center for mathematics education formed by Texas State University System to develop model programs and self-sustaining learning communities that engage Texas K-12 students in doing mathematics at a high level. Funding in Fiscal Year 2010 will be used to recruit and train six-to-eight teacher leaders from Midland Consolidated ISD at Mathworks training sites. Training includes observing a camp in the morning and then learning how to teach their own camp in the afternoon. Teachers will conduct their own Math Camp, assisted and mentored by the master teachers. Students will attend the junior summer math camps. During the academic year, the master teachers will pilot Part I of the curriculum, mentored and assisted by a full- time mathematics Peer Coach. These teachers will become part of a professional Math Inquiry Group. The Peer Coach will work closely with the faculty mentor to observe all teachers in their classrooms, give input and guidance and collect data required by the external evaluator. In the Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA)--Health Facilities and Services account, an earmark for the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC), Lubbock, TX for facilities and equipment was included on my behalf. The entity to receive funding for this project is the TTUHSC, located at 3601 4th Street, Lubbock, Texas. Funds would be used at the Laura W. Bush Institute for Women's Health--Odessa, TX Campus. The mission of the Laura W. Bush Institute for Women's Health is to cultivate and advance multi-disciplinary science in women's health and to promote the well-being of women through research, education, and community outreach. This initiative will provide resources for tissue banks at TTUHSC dedicated to women's health and research into gender differences in health. This project will accomplish the following: (1) Create a women's health tissue bank on the TTUHSC campuses in Amarillo, El Paso, and Odessa to receive, store, and distribute a full range of biological specimens, such as whole organs, tissues, cells, and DNA. (2) Develop protocol to establish an organized repository of characterized tissues for collection and maintenance useful for a wide range of women's health research studies. (3) Collaborate with the Research Institutional Review Board to assist in the development of standards in methodology, management, and education regarding tissue bank specimens. (4) Develop a priority hierarchy for tissue distribution to assist researchers in fulfilling the purpose of taking research from the laboratory to the patient. (5) Create a reporting standard and method for researchers describing the purpose, process, and evaluation of the tissues used in laboratory research. (6) Improve the knowledge and breadth of research in the field of women's health and gender differences in health. In the Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) account, an earmark for Texas Tech University Health Science Center (TTUHSC), Lubbock, TX for the West Texas Center for Influenza Research, Education and Treatment was included on my behalf. The entity to receive funding for this project is the TTUHSC, located at 3601 4th Street, Lubbock, Texas. Funds would be used at the Odessa, TX Campus. The West Texas Center for Influenza Research, Education and Treatment at the TTUHSC would provide a model of care of the influenza patient using a large network of primary care physicians from around West Texas. It would also develop an infrastructure for clinical research and the study of new drugs and therapies. The Center would provide education to patients and families in order to limit the spread of disease. It would further establish a clinical approach to pandemic influenza should such an epidemic occur.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 3288, Transportation, HUD and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2010. I hereby certify that to the best of my knowledge the requests (1) are not directed to an entity or program that will be named after a sitting Member of Congress; (2) are not intended to be used by an entity to secure funds for other entities unless the use of funding is consistent with the specified purpose of the earmark; and (3) meets or exceeds all statutory requirements for matching funds where applicable. I further certify that should this request be included in the bill, I will place a statement in the Congressional Record justifying the use of federal taxpayer funds. I certify that this project does not have a direct and foreseeable effect on the financial interests of my spouse or me. South Orient Rail Line Rehabilitation in San Angelo, TX--The South Orient Rail line connects Ft. Worth, Texas, to the deep water port in Topolobampo, Mexico, on the Pacific Coast. This funding will be used to repair railroad crossings that are found in poor or worse condition to improve rail safety, speed and allow the transport of new wind turbines and towers in San Angelo, TX. The project is of the highest priority to San Angelo and the city is ready and willing to contribute to the line for speed and safety and sees the potential in future commercial growth with new freight transit from the deep water port in Mexico and Chihuahua City. I am requesting funding in the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations bill in fiscal year 2010. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Texas Department of Transportation, 125 East 11th Street, Austin, TX 78701--Committee amount: $1 million. Concho Valley Multi-Modal Terminal in San Angelo, TX--The funding will be used for construction of a multi-modal terminal that will house customer service centers, administrative offices and development space for the Concho Valley Transit District. The Texas Department of Transportation has awarded a multi-year $1.5 million grant to support future development and the project received. This project has been authorized by SAFETEA-LU. I am requesting funding in the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations bill in fiscal year 2010. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Texas Department of Transportation, 125 East 11th Street, Austin, TX 78701--Committee amount: $250,000.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 2997--Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010. A request to Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSRESS), Special Research Grants Account, to the Animal Fiber Research Program. This funding would assist in the ongoing Wool Research Program. This program is a partnership between the Texas Agriculture Experiment Station in San Angelo, TX, New Mexico State University and Montana State University. This program helps enhance the quality and quantity of wool and mohair produced in this country. In addition, significant efforts are being made to work with small ruminants as a means to control invasive brush which is a major issue in many parts of Texas degrading rangelands and taking precious water. The project is located at 7887, U.S. Highway 87N, San Angelo, Texas, 76901. A request to Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSRESS), Special Research Grants Account to continue partial funding of the state-of-the-art multidisciplinary research approach at the International Cotton Center at Texas Tech University. The International Cotton Center conducts cotton research programs for cotton production systems and provides market and policy analysis for natural fibers (cotton, wool, and mohair) in an effort to increase profitability and maintain viability of all segments of the U.S. cotton industry in an increasingly competitive and volatile international market. The project research would be centrally located at Texas Tech University, located at 2500 Broadway, Lubbock, Texas 79409. A request to Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSRESS), Special Research Grants Account, to continue partial funding for the Center for Food Industry Excellence at Texas Tech University. The Center for Food Industry Excellence is a federal and state supported program that conducts systematic development and evaluations of production, processing and preparation methods of food products to achieve a safer and more nutritious food supply. The project research would be centrally located at Texas Tech University, located at 2500 Broadway, Lubbock, Texas 79409.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Mr. Speaker, I hear a recurring theme about jobs: Where are they? Who has them? Who doesn't have one? In a different life, I participate at a needs assessment in a community that I lived in that went through a process of looking at what needs were in families, in neighborhoods, and in the community. Once we distilled that list down to the top 10 needs for this particular community in Midland, Texas, if you looked at them, out of all 10 of those, nine of those needs would have been positively impacted by a job. You cannot overstate the importance of jobs in the private sector, because when you have jobs in the private sector, individuals are better, families are better, communities are better, and this Nation, as a whole, is better. I can tell you where the jobs aren't. Here is a list of 53 new boards, commissions, and bureaucracies that are created under the health care plan that is percolating its way through this system. That plan will cost 4.7 million private sector jobs, but it will do a good job of creating additional bureaucrat jobs that don't create wealth and don't improve the overall economy of this country. Mr. Speaker, where are those private sector jobs?

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. For the much-maligned North American Free Trade Agreement, most of the time you hear people criticize it, but they do it based on old data based off of misconceptions, and when you begin to lay out the facts to them, particularly from the States who--some of the most inflammatory comments that I heard on this floor about NAFTA come from Members from Ohio. And that's a pretty startling fact that we will have to confront them with perhaps the next time that they bring that up. I would like to move back to Colombia because I think, given free trade agreements that are the most ripe for execution and for completion, Colombia would certainly be in that category. My colleague mentioned it had been 967 days that that bill has languished in our system. Let me point out that, over 925 of those days, we're under the leadership of Speaker Pelosi. So it has been the Speaker who has stood in the way of reducing tariffs by $2.1 billion, that my colleague mentioned earlier; insisting that the 35 percent tariff on automobiles remain in place; the 10 percent tariff on cotton remain in place; and the 10 percent on computers and other things made in the United States remain in place.

Mr. CONAWAY. Well, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me, and those are some pretty startling facts. I'm a CPA and I tend to work better with facts than I do with hyperbole and make things up and guesses and wishes. Those facts are pretty startling when it comes to the----

Mr. CONAWAY. Well, I thank my friend for yielding. I was startled last week when I saw a headline attributed to a comment that our United States Trade Representative Ron Kirk made that trade still or was a high priority with the White House. High rhetoric but no action. I've not seen any pressure from the White House on the Speaker to tell the Speaker that we have a great friend in Colombia, we have an ally, a stalwart ally in President Uribe, and we need to quit thumbing our nose at him, quit treating him like a redheaded stepchild, and begin to treat him as the friend and ally we know him to be by recognizing the importance of this free trade agreement, and getting it passed, getting it signed and getting it implemented into law. The only reason I can see so far, remaining reason, is our trade unions' opposition to this particular trade agreement. I'm not sure why they picked out Colombia because, in the grand scheme of things, Colombia's overall economy doesn't threaten any particular business in the United States. But the remaining issue is with our trade unions. It's been my experience that Colombia has addressed almost every single one of the issues with respect to union organizers that was the pushback. They've decreased the violence significantly. They've agreed to ILO standards. As my colleague Mrs. Biggert mentioned earlier, they've agreed to an Office of the High Commission from the U.N. on human rights. All those things have been agreed to so there's no rational reason to continue to maintain the 35 percent trade barrier on automobiles. There's no rational reason to maintain the 10 to 15 percent trade barrier on movies and DVDs. There's no rational reason to maintain the 10 percent tariff on cotton. And finally, there's no rational reason to maintain the 10 percent tariff on computers. That hurts American businesses. My colleague mentioned a while ago that our trade unions don't understand that when we make things in the United States and sell them overseas that creates jobs. I would respectfully disagree. They are bright, smart people. It's counterintuitive why they would be against creating jobs in America so that we could build stuff and sell it overseas, but I think they full well understand the mechanics of how that works. So I would encourage my colleagues to continue to push on the Colombia Free Trade Agreement. Colombia is the strongest democracy in South America, and at a time when there's unrest in Honduras, unrest in Venezuela, unrest in Bolivia and throughout that region, we need a strong ally in that country. We need to put our actions where our mouth is, in effect, and put this agreement in place so that we can quit insulting our good friend President Uribe by refusing to bring this up. I appreciate the gentleman for the time.

Mr. CONAWAY. Well, it's interesting that between the unions and the Federal taxpayers, we own General Motors, and so a General Motors car made in the United States bears a 35 percent tariff if you try to sell it in Colombia. So you add 35 percent to the cost of that car, and it competes with a car say made in Korea or other places that don't have that tariff, and then we don't compete well on a cost basis. So those are American manufacturing jobs. They speak to you on behalf of the American taxpayers and the unions for a change, which I don't normally speak to, if we're going to prosper General Motors, why not do something that drops the tariff, makes us more competitive for the taxpayer-made automobiles to be sold in Colombia? As you mentioned earlier, Colombia's continued with the unilateral trade agreements that they're doing that continue to disadvantage American businesses that compete with businesses from those countries that Colombia----

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 3170--Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010. In the Army Corps of Engineers Operations and Maintenance account, an earmark to complete a study in the Lower Colorado River Basin of Texas was included on behalf of the President and me. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Lower Colorado River Authority. LCRA Headquarters are located at 3700 Lake Austin Boulevard, Austin, Texas, 78703. The funding would be used to complete the draft interim feasibility studies for the highland lakes. The study area is bounded by the Guadalupe, Lavaca, and Colorado-Lavaca river basins on the west, and the Brazos and Brazos-Colorado basins on the east. This study is investigating water resource problems, needs, and opportunities to determine whether improvements for flood risk management, ecosystem restoration and protection, water quality, water supply and allied purposes have a Federal interest. In the Army Corps of Engineers Operations and Maintenance account, an earmark for Hords Creek Lake, Texas was included on behalf of the President and me. The entity to receive funding for this project is Army Corps of Engineers Fort Worth District. The District offices are located at 819 Taylor Street, Ft. Worth, Texas, 76102. The project is in Coleman County about 13 miles west of the city of Coleman, Texas. The funding would be used to for operations and routine maintenance. In the Army Corps of Engineers Operations and Maintenance account, an earmark for the O.C. Fisher Dam and Lake, Texas was included on behalf of the President and me. The entity to receive funding for this project is Army Corps of Engineers Fort Worth District. The District offices are located at 819 Taylor Street, Ft. Worth, Texas, 76102. The project is located in Tom Green County, on the North Concho River, near the City of San Angelo, Texas. The funding would be used to for operations and routine maintenance. In the Army Corps of Engineers Operations and Maintenance account, an earmark for Proctor Lake, Texas was included on behalf of the President and me. The entity to receive funding for this project is Army Corps of Engineers Fort Worth District. The District offices are located at 819 Taylor Street, Ft. Worth, Texas, 76102. The project is in Comanche County on the Leon River, about eight miles northeast of the city of Comanche, Texas. The funding would be used to for operations and routine maintenance.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. I thank the gentlelady from North Carolina. It's interesting that the debate is about the bill and not the rule itself. My colleagues on the other side continue to fail to defend their idea that we ought to have a closed rule in this process and that the amendments that would make this bill better are somehow trivial and shouldn't be debated on this floor. One of those amendments that I offered would have actually had an impact on the spending. My colleague from California talked about the opportunity to reduce spending in these bills. The theater, or the fiction that is associated with this process, Mr. Speaker, is that we will walk through some amendments later on to reduce spending in this bill. Should those pass, should 218 of us say we disagree with the hard work that the Appropriations Committee has done and want to reduce that spending, as we did with the $200,000 bicycle program recently at the end of June, that money still gets spent, Mr. Speaker. That money goes into the slush fund that allows the chairman of the Appropriations Committee to spend it in conference on deals that he wants to do, on rewards that he wants to make available to folks who have toed the line on the other side of the aisle. The amendment that I would have proposed would have said that if 218 of us come to this floor and disagree with a particular provision in the bill that the Appropriations Committee has done, that money wouldn't get spent; that money would actually reduce the deficit. My colleagues on the other side are frightful of that issue because they're afraid, like on the $200,000 with the bicycle program, that the will of this Congress may be that we disagree with the appropriations process. The Appropriations Committee does yeoman's work. They have a hard job to do in ferreting out priorities on spending. It's a job that I do not aspire to, but they should just get one bite at that apple. And my amendment would have simply said, Appropriations Committee, do the best work you can, bring that product to this floor, then allow the 435 of us, the rest of us who aren't on the Appropriations Committee, to have our say, to have the debate, to have the conversation about whether or not something is valid. And then if 218 of us disagree with the priorities that the appropriations process has set on this Ag spending, then that money simply would not be spent, they will not get a second bite at that apple. But the Rules Committee, in their infinite wisdom, has said no, that's too complicated, that's too hard for this body to consider. And so, Mr. Speaker, as a result of that, I urge my colleagues to vote against this rule because it is flawed on its face.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information regarding authorizations I requested and were included as part of H.R. 2647, National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2010. A request for the Marksmanship Skills Trainer. The funding would be used for procuring a portable self contained system that allows for multiple scenarios from training to combat skills. This is a multiple user system allowing for high output during times of training constraints. The trainers will be stationed at the various Texas Army National Guard facilities allowing for maximum use for the soldiers. The system allows for ongoing marksmanship training in a simulated environment without the expenditure of ammunition or need to travel to a weapons range. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Texas National Guard, 2200 West 35th Street, Austin, TX 78763. A request for the Mobile Firing Range. The mobile firing range is a self contained range that allows for the firing of pistol and rifle systems for the Texas National Guard. Currently there is no opportunity to fire weapons for training or qualification without traveling to a certified range on a military installation. The Texas Army National Guard currently does not have access to any indoor ranges that can be used to fire the M16/M4 which is the current armament for 90% of the soldiers within the Texas Army National Guard. The Mobile Firing Range will allow soldiers to train with their assigned weapons at home station. This system is a training and force multiplier due to the negation of travel and lodging, and staging needed when conducting this training on a military facility. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Texas National Guard, 2200 West 35th Street, Austin, TX 78763. A request for the Visual Door Gunner Trainer (VDGT). The funding would be used for procuring a VDGT device that provides door gunnery and crew coordination training for UH-60 Blackhawk crewmembers. The VDGT also incorporates precision gunnery training to improve target engagement skills. This system is mobile and can be moved between Texas Army National Guard aviation facilities that have UH-60s. The system enables crews to train without leaving home station or flying additional hours. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Texas National Guard, 2200 West 35th Street, Austin, TX 78763. A request for the Field Deployable Hologram Production System. The funding would be used for completing development of a compact production unit that produces 3D holographic imagery for mission planning and intelligence purposes for U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The U.S. Army requests a self-contained, field-deployable EHI production system to accelerate imagery delivery to combat forces. The goal is a more efficient, cost effective production system that provides the deployed war fighter needed planning and intelligence capabilities on a much faster basis. The entity to receive funding for this project is Zebra Imaging, Inc, 9801 Metric Blvd, Austin, TX 78758. A request for the Compact Pulsed Power Initiative. The funding would be used for the development of explosive- or battery-operated, compact, high-power radiation sources and associated antenna systems capable of destroying electronics used for radars, communications, computer, or remote detonation devices, and others that can disable car engines. The information gained from this research will be significant in furthering our nation's defense capabilities especially in the area of disabling and destroying IEDs. The research for this project will be conducted by Texas Tech University, 2500 Broadway (mail stop 3121), TX 79409. A request for the Modular Shoot House. The funding would be used for procuring a self contained combat scenario system for team training in a safe 360 degree ballistic, combat simulated environment. The Modular Shoot House (MSH) will be placed on Texas Army National Guard training facilities as determined by training needs of the geographic regions in the state. New combat training tasks will be exercised using the MSH by multiple units who have building clearing as part of their mission essential tasks. There is currently no Texas Army National Guard controlled MSH. The addition of this system will greatly enhance training and readiness prior to unit deployment. The entity to receive funding for this project is the Texas National Guard, 2200 West 35th Street, Austin, TX 78763. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information for publication in the Congressional Record regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 2997-Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010. A request to Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSRESS), Special Research Grants Account, to the Animal Fiber Research Program. This funding would assist in the ongoing Wool Research Program. This program is a partnership between the Texas Agriculture Experiment Station in San Angelo, TX, New Mexico State University and Montana State University. This program helps enhance the quality and quantity of wool and mohair produced in this country. In addition, significant efforts are being made to work with small ruminants as a means to control invasive brush which is a major issue in many parts of Texas degrading rangelands and taking precious water. The project is located at 7887, U.S. Highway 87N, San Angelo, Texas, 76901. A request to Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSRESS), Special Research Grants Account to continue partial funding of the state of the art multidisciplinary research approach at the International Cotton Center at Texas Tech University. The International Cotton Center conducts cotton research programs for cotton production systems and provides market and policy analysis for natural fibers (cotton, wool, and mohair) in an effort to increase profitability and maintain viability of all segments of the U.S. cotton industry in an increasingly competitive and volatile international market. The project research would be centrally located at Texas Tech University, located at 2500 Broadway, Lubbock, Texas 79409. A request to Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSRESS), Special Research Grants Account, to continue partial funding for the Center for Food Industry Excellence at Texas Tech University. The Center for Food Industry Excellence is a federal and state supported program that conducts systematic development and evaluations of production, processing and preparation methods of food products to achieve a safer and more nutritious food supply. The project research would be centrally located at Texas Tech University, located at 2500 Broadway, Lubbock, Texas 79409.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the House Republican standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 2847, Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010. This legislation passed in the House of Representatives on June 18, 2009. In the Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs account, an earmark for Emergency Communications Equipment for the City of Midland was included on my behalf. The entity to receive funding for this project is the City of Midland, located at 300 North Lorraine, Midland, Texas 79702. Funding for this project will be used to upgrade backup equipment for Midland's emergency communications system, which is used by the city's police, firefighters and other first responders. In the past, not all first responder groups in Midland could communicate with each other due to differences in their systems. An advantage of Midland's new, upgraded communications system is interoperability, enabling police and other first responders to communicate directly. The backup equipment must be upgraded so that it will properly take effect should the main system fail during an emergency. In the Office of Justice Assistance, Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grants Program account, an earmark for the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training (ALERRT) Program, at the Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas (San Angelo Police Department in partnership with ALERRT) was included on my behalf. The entity to receive funding for this project is the ALERRT Program at Texas State University-San Marcos, located at 601 University Drive, San Marcos, Texas 78666. ALERRT was established by Texas State University to provide first responders with the tactics they will need to effectively respond to active shooter situations. ALERRT enables officers that have successfully completed a special ``Train-the-Trainer'' course to train fellow officers at their home agencies, providing an efficient and cost-effective manner to increase the number of officers with these life-saving skills. Continued funding for ALERRT in FY10 will enable the program to train more patrol officers, including San Angelo Police Department, help establish the program as a national training system; further build train-the-trainer capacity; enhance retention of learned skills by former students; provide valuable research and evaluation to improve first responder abilities; and provide investigative training and support for evolving threats. In addition to providing ALERRT to the more than 400 entities requesting it, FY10 funding and beyond will be integral to sustain and build capacity for a nation-wide effort to standardize a level of preparedness among the more than 650,000 peace officers employed by law enforcement agencies across the United States.

Mr. CONAWAY

Mr. CONAWAY. Well, I struggle with that, obviously.

Mr. CONAWAY. These are American consumers, American jobs and American families that our good colleague from east Texas has been talking about. If you look at what other nations have done--and I am never one to say, Well, if so-and-so is doing it, we ought to do it too. But if you can learn from their example and apply it to your own circumstance, then there may be some value there. Australia, there's an editorial in today's Wall Street Journal that recounts Australia's struggle with this issue. Their Prime Minister, much like our President, ran last year on a platform that he and Obama would, together, cure this issue. To get it through their House of Representatives, he had to delay the implementation of it under their legislation until 2011. So this urgency thing that you've been hearing about--that if we don't do something soon that life will end as we know it--apparently has softened a little bit under the new terms since the world's getting cooler instead of warmer. But the story went on to say that they would not get it through the senate in Australia. New Zealand right after last year, right after the new government took over, suspended their cap-and-tax program within weeks of its initial implementation because they didn't believe it was correct. Poland's leadership is now saying that we are skeptical on the science. The Czech Republic has folks saying, We are skeptical. There are scientists in this country that are beginning to say-- politically correct now--to challenge this science associated with this because prior to this if you did it, you were called a Neanderthal, a knuckle dragger. One of our colleagues today called us ``Flat Earth People.'' You know, those kinds of things. But now it's beginning to be a little more politically correct to be able to say, hey, the scientists never settle on any issue, certainly not something as unknown as this is going on. So the science is beginning to push back on them. And one final thing for my colleague who mentioned the 20 percent refinery. There was an article in Bloomberg today, talking about how major oil companies intend to cope with this bill, and they intend to cope by reducing their emphasis on refining. No more investment. They will shut them in. They would rather buy the oil, produce the oil overseas, refine it overseas and import refined products to this country to sell as opposed to buying it. What we would prefer to do is produce the crude oil from the U.S., and refine it in U.S. refineries. Those are all U.S. jobs. But companies will adapt to this. They will figure out how to make this deal work, and it will be at the expense of the American economy and American jobs and American families who will be punished with this legislation. So I appreciate my colleague leading the fight tonight, giving us this opportunity to talk to each other and the Speaker about what's going on because this is--as I mentioned earlier this afternoon, there is an old movie that was entitled, ``Bad Day at Black Rock.'' Folks, this was a bad day at Black Rock for this country. With that, I yield back.

Mr. CONAWAY. Sure.

Mr. CONAWAY. I thank the gentleman. I appreciate that. These are troubling times, and this bill is awfully troubling. The science that surrounds this climate change issue, everybody gets an opinion about it; but there's only a certain set of facts that we ought to deal with. One of those facts is, if you would equate the Earth's atmosphere to a football stadium with 10,000 people in the stadium--to you guys from Texas, in Indiana we play a lot of football there. So there are 10,000 people in the stands. About 7,600 of those people are wearing jerseys that say ``nitrogen'' on the front; and about 2,100 or so have jerseys that say ``oxygen'' on them; and about 100 of them, or so, would say ``argon.'' The remaining 100 or so jerseys in that stadium are referred to as trace elements. Among those trace elements are four jerseys--up from three 150 years ago--four jerseys that say ``CO2.'' So the catastrophic disaster of biblical proportions that is being predicted by the zealots and the religious folks on this climate change thing argue that the addition of one more jersey that says CO2 on it to that stadium of 10,000 drives the change that they're talking about. Now I'm skeptical. I get to be that way because everybody gets their own opinion. That's a fact. You get to interpret that fact however you want to. But the truth of the matter is, that's what they're asking us to believe. If you look at the 21 models that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change used to predict this disaster, and they start in the year 2000, and you plot them on a graph over time, and they start out with a bracket, you've got the worst-case scenario on the top, the best-case scenario on the bottom, and then all those in the middle. They start at a relatively narrow band, and they go out over time. They begin to spread a little bit. Then they get out a certain number of years, and they go straight up, big slash. It kind of looks like a hockey stick at that point. Right there is where Earth ends as we know it, life ends as we know it, under their scenario. So you've got that graph plotted over time, starting in 2000. If you had plotted Earth's actual temperature for the last 9 years on that exact same graph, it's below the best-case scenario, and it's falling away from the path that their predictions are on. Now, I've got a lot more experience in financial projections than I do climate change projections, but the concepts are the same. Whatever your time frame on your projection, the most accurate period is the near term. In other words, you should be able to get the close-in years right, so to speak. So what these climate signs are saying is, their 21 models couldn't get it right in the first 9 years. Now what they've not been able to explain is there's some sort of a self-correcting mechanism in their scheme that somewhere out here, it brings them back in line with what's going on, and it marries it back up. So if your predictions don't get it right in the first 9 years, should we trust those predictions? The other question you have to ask yourself is, Did you come up with the model before you came up with the answer? Or did you come up with the answer, and then you derive a model to get there? I can't answer that question. Now these models look incredibly accurate because they are fraught with algebraic equations and all kinds of high math and calculus and trigonometry and all this kind of stuff that I'm sure you have built into these things. They look very great, and they look very intellectual. But they are predictions. They are guesses. They start with a series of assumptions. And if you take them back in time--I don't know that if you put it back in time and put the really out numbers in there and ran them forward that they'd get it even better. So the models themselves are not working, and that's what's driving the change in terminology from global warming to climate change, man-made, by the way. If you look at the quotes from our President, who is one of these aficionados, one of these people who has drunk the Kool-Aid, so to speak--this is a quote from Senator Obama who was then trying to convince us that he should be President of the United States. Apparently he convinced about 53 percent of us that that was a good idea. I guess he must have been really tired that day, talking to the editorial board because he got very straightforward and didn't mince his words too well. He probably wishes he had these ones back. But he said, ``Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.'' Well, to those of us from west Texas, that would mean that if I am paying $2 for something today, then to skyrocket means that I am going to be paying $7, $8, $9 for it at some point in the future. So it increased costs on the skyrocket thing. And there's a ellipse here of where he goes on to talk about coal- fired powered plants and the coal industry having to be retrofitted and fixed and brought into the 21st century, so to speak, and the costs associated with those, that will cost money. And they, the energy producers, will pass that money on to consumers. Now you and I are the consumers. Anybody who pays for the turning on of a lightbulb is a consumer in this regard.