Peter DeFazio

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman who preceded me in the well said it very well. He said he talked about American people getting change back, and that, in fact, is what the Republican tax bill would provide for the vast majority of Americans. He then went on to say: Hello? Should not the wealthy people get back more? They pay more. But guess what? They have already gotten their tax cuts. A study that was just published yesterday and is coming to the attention of the Congress and the American people shows that because of the tax cuts back in the 1970s and the 1980s the wealthiest 1 percent of the American people have already realized an average tax cut of $40,000 a year from their 1977 tax rate, $40,000 a year. That is more than two-thirds of the American people earn for an entire year let alone pay in taxes, and he is saying: Of course those people should get more tax relief. Why should they get more tax relief? Their average tax bill is already greatly reduced from the tax bill that was assessed against those same incomes in this country 20 years ago. But in order to provide that tax relief, guess what? Programs that most American families value whether it is the Veterans Administration which we are debating today on the floor of the House, today and again tomorrow, which, yes, they have made it whole in terms of last year's budget, but guess what? There is not enough money there to cover the aging World War II vets and the care they need and my generation, the Vietnam vets. There is not enough money in that budget. But that money will not be appropriated. They are actually cutting housing. Is America well housed? Does the average young family who wants to have an opportunity to get into what is record-priced housing in the western United States, in my district and elsewhere? Are they getting a little bit of help from the government that they could use to get into that first house? Are other families over housed or well housed in the middle third or so of the incomes in this country? Those programs are being cut. Medicare is being cut. The home health program is a disgrace; the cuts that were put into place 2 years ago, which I voted against, but a majority here and, sadly, a large number of Democrats voted for and the President signed is still going to be dramatically underfunded, and home health care benefits will not be extended to millions of seniors who need them in order to give a tax cut to the wealthiest 1 percent of the American people who have already gotten a very generous tax cut over the last 20 years. Mr. Speaker, the result of all this is that we are seeing an unprecedented concentration of wealth in that 1 percent. More than 40 percent of the wealth in this country, levels not seen since the great depression are owned by 1 percent of the people, and the response of the gentleman from Georgia is: Hello? They should get their taxes cut more so they can accumulate an even bigger portion of the pie while middle-income families have both parents working and still cannot afford to send their kids to college without the kid incurring a huge mountain of debt, while seniors are not able to pay for their prescription drugs and cannot get the home health care they need, while our veterans go unserved. All those things will be reduced so that those people, hello, that top 1 percent who are suffering horribly, and, you know, they are paying only 20 percent less taxes than they paid 20 years ago in this country who are accumulating unprecedented amounts of wealth so they can see yet another tax cut. This is change, chump change for average American workers. For the vast majority of people in this country the Republican tax bill delivers, as the gentleman said, change, chump change, 116 bucks a year for two-thirds of the American workers on average, many of them getting nothing, but $116 on average per year for people earning less than $34,000 a year. But yet, if you earn over $350,000 a year, you will get a $31,800 tax cut, more than most of those other families earn altogether. Do those people, are they suffering? Are they struggling to make ends meet on $350,000 a year? Do they really need that tax cut? Do we have to reduce those programs in order to deliver that tax cut? Do we need such an unfair tax cut? If you want to have a tax cut that is fair, let us reduce the burden of the FICA tax, the Social Security tax. You could do that. You could actually do that and still safeguard Social Security. That would provide tax relief to 96 percent of wage- earning Americans in a bill I have proposed. But guess what? It does not help out those people in the top 1 percent, those earning over $350,000 a year who are paying almost 80 percent of the level of taxes that they paid 20 years ago. They need more tax relief. That is the bottom line in the Republican bill. It is delivering to the people who fund their campaigns, it is delivering to the people who run the corporations that fund their campaigns, and it is delivering, as the gentleman said, chump change to average Americans. Mr. Speaker, we need to reject the Republican tax bill, I am certain the President will veto it, and let us get back to reality here in Washington, get back to our work, fund the veterans programs, fund the housing programs, set up fair priorities and give tax relief to average families who could use a tax break because they are not even keeping up with inflation.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from New York for the generous grant of time to discuss this important amendment. I come to the debate equipped with two reference sources, the first being Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. ``Emergency: an unforeseen combination of circumstances or the resulting state that calls for immediate action.'' Now, it is plausible to believe that we cannot anticipate everything in the budget and that emergencies do happen beyond our control, and we should figure out a way of dealing with them. The question is, is the census, is the dicentennial enumeration of the people of the United States an unanticipated emergency that could not be foreseen? Well, Thomas Jefferson 210 years ago could have told Congress that in the year 2000 they were going to need money for the census because it was required that it be done every 10 years as long as the Nation should stand, and the Nation still stands. So this is by no means an emergency in terms of unanticipated budget needs. Budget gimmicks were not quite enough. The rosy scenario, assuming that things would continue as well as they had for the last 10 years, for the next 10, that was not quite enough. The quiet proposal and winking and nodding about real cuts of 30 percent in all domestic spending, even that was not quite enough to get to the point where we could have tax cuts and not declare emergencies to make room for the tax cuts. That is what this is all about. Social Security is going to be hit and hit and hit and hit again with so-called emergency spending which does not count. We are taking the money. We are spending it. We are replacing it with IOUs in the Social Security Trust Fund. We are ripping the lock off the lockbox, but it does not count. Do not pay any attention. Look the other way. It is not an emergency. This is not an emergency. This is spending the Social Security trust funds for the census, something that could have been anticipated. We should support the gentleman's amendment. Get honest about this budget.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, ``emergency,'' an unforeseen combination of circumstances or the resulting state that calls for immediate action. Today the House of Representatives, under Republican leadership, will declare an emergency, $4.5 billion for the decennial census. Since that is required in Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution, Thomas Jefferson could have predicted that we would have to do a census next year, but not the Republican leadership. No. This is the second of at least three emergencies they are going to declare this year: The war in Kosovo, with a whole lot of things added in; the drought, a real emergency; and now, the census; more than $27 billion. The emergency is, they want to deny the reality of the budget. That reality is, we now have a deficit looming next year and for years to come because of faulty assumptions and emergency spending and other needs of the government. The emperor has no clothes, and the Republicans have no surplus to spend on tax cuts for the wealthy. But they continue to deny that reality with shenanigans like emergency spending for routine, constitutionally-required government duties. It is a very bad joke.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for the generous grant of time. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the bill. Where in this bill do we target or state explicitly that what we are doing is going after underage purchasers of wine over the Internet or microbrew over the Internet? This is a very broad bill. The target is much larger than underaged drinking and access to alcohol. They are still going to go down to the concern and give the guy an extra couple of bucks who is a bad guy to go into the store and buy the stuff. They are not going to do it over the Internet and buy an expensive case of wine. That is not what we are after here. We are trying to close down the small wineries and breweries.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Madam Speaker, there is legislation contained in this bill before us that is protected by the rule, legislating on an appropriations bill. This legislation that pertains to the Bonneville Power Administration is very, very problematic, and in fact, is contradicted by language in the manager's report. But, of course, we know the language in the manager's report does not hold sway over legislative provisions contained within the bill protected by the rule, riders on the bill. There are two provisions that are aimed at Bonneville Power Administration and other Federal power marketing agencies that are damaging and very ill-informed. One is incredibly broad, and it would repeal legislation Congress passed by a large majority in the 1992 Energy Policy Act. It allowed the Bonneville Power Administration to directly fund operations and maintenance at hydroelectric facilities operated by the Army Corps and the Bureau of Reclamation in the Pacific Northwest. For years, we had a horrendous backlog and horrendous inefficiency. But then this amendment passed. In fact, now unlike other Federal power marketing agencies and systems around the country, we are pretty much up to date, and it is working very efficiently and effectively, both for the Federal taxpayers and for the region. Why would this bill repeal that? It is some sort of strange flat- earth view of competition that does not exist and cannot effectively deal with the problem and did not before we had a change in the statute. Secondly, the bill would prevent Bonneville Power Administration and other PMAs from cooperating with the utility customers to properly maintain the regional transmission grades. Here we are worried about system reliability across the country which carries both public and private power, and we are going to undermine that in this bill. That is not a good move for the West or even the Southeast in terms of the Tennessee Valley Authority and other PMAs. It is very damaging. In fact, it is so damaging that I will have to vote against the entire bill, and I would urge other western Members to do the same. Finally, there is a provision that forces BPA to discontinue an important infrastructure development. BPA is installing a fiberoptic network on its transmission towers to improve its communication and its dispatch of power. It is good business. They need to do it. At virtually no incremental cost, they could provide excess capacity to remote rural communities who will never see in this century or even in the next century for 20 or 30 years a private provider stringing fiberoptics to their communities. BPA owns 80 percent of the transmission. It does not, by policy, allow other people to access or hang things on its transmission. They are the only alternative out there. In some, again, misguided attempt to bring about competition that does not exist, and if it did exist, I would not be up here on that particular issue and prohibit them from using their excess capacity at no incremental cost to provide services to those communities. These are ill-intentioned. They are not overcome by the manager's language. I urge colleagues to vote against the entire bill unless these are fixed.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, there is no surplus in this year's budget. We are still running a deficit. On top of it, we have got a $5.6-trillion debt, $17,000 for every American from the tiniest baby to the oldest senior citizen in a nursing home. But here we are after midnight talking about a $1-trillion dollar tax cut. Now, this is based on this future and possibly allusive surplus. That is based on a probably rosy economic scenario. We have done this mistake before. Are we going to do it again? Now, it is also, and listen up, it is predicated upon further cuts in veterans' health care, further cuts in education and student loans, cuts in Medicare, and it puts Social Security at risk. Yet the Republicans say it is their money, they earned it, and we should give it back. Well, who is ``they''? That is the key question. Who is the ``they'' to whom we are giving the money back? Let us look at that. Well, ``they'' happens to be the top one percent of income earners in this country. The people earning a minimum of $300,000 a year and up, they are going to get a $54,000 tax cut on average. That is where those wonderful high numbers come out. Those people, well, they are going to have to get a Brinks truck to handle theirs. Now, they do not have to worry about veterans' health care. They are not very worried about student loans. Their kids are not eligible. They are not worried about cuts in Medicare, and they do not care about Social Security. Now, the families who have to make up for the cuts in veterans' health care and in student loans and in Medicare and are worried about Social Security, that is 80 percent of the taxpaying Americans. Every family that earns $63,000 a year or less, what will they get? They will get $310 on average, 90 cents a day. Now, can we replace those benefits with that? No.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. The issue here is not the Exchange Stabilization Fund as set up by President Roosevelt. I believe there is broad agreement among Members of the House and others about the value of that fund to defend the American dollar and to intervene in currency stabilization around the world which would have a dramatic impact on our dollar or on the American economy. The issue is should unsecured loans to foreign nations, most of the time being made to bail out extraordinary speculation, sometimes by U.S., sometimes by U.S. multinational, and sometimes by foreign interests, be made in excess of $1 billion of our taxpayers' money by a Cabinet member, with or without the consent of the President of the United States and without any consultation or consent of the elected representatives of the people? Now, I think most people would have to raise a question about that. We are not talking about the reasons for which the fund was established, which was to shore up or defend the dollars against attacks. We are not talking about currency stabilization generally. We are talking about unsecured loans to foreign governments, foreign interests, to bail out failed speculative activities. Now, some have gone to the floor to talk about the great success of bailing out these failed speculative activities. Guess what? If we do not have market discipline, if we bail out the speculators every time their 50 and 100 percent loans go sour, and give them back their capital after they have already gained it two or three times over in interest, then they will go out and do it again and again and again. And now they are doing it with the support of U.S. taxpayers' money and at the risk of U.S. taxpayers' money. Oh, yes, the speculation has worked out pretty well so far, as far as we know, since the fund is not fully accountable. In fact, in the past, and we have heard accounts of that earlier this evening, the fund was used to buy rugs and special trips and all sorts of things. Yes, it was cleaned up a number of years ago. But, still, it is not fully accountable to the American people. No full accounting is rendered. And it continues in these activities. Now, I think we as the elected representatives of the people have got to question. Maybe $1 billion is the right figure. Maybe we should let them do $2 billion. I do not know. I do not know exactly what it is. But I can say that before we extend a loan without security of taxpayers' dollars, which is not in direct defense of the interests of the United States of America, of our economy, of our currency, of our people, of our taxpayers, of our workers, yes, maybe in defense of a few bankers who made some really stupid loans at extraordinary rates of interest, then we have to question whether it should continue in that vein. For 2 years this amendment stood. Were there any international crises during that time to which the United States could not respond? No. There are other tools. We can go to the World Bank, which basically is an arm of the U.S. Treasury, or the International Monetary Fund, another arm of the U.S. Treasury. At least, though, it would be diluted by other countries' money and other taxpayers' from other countries' money. It was not directly funds allocated from our taxpayers to foreign governments. Interventions took place during those 2 years that this amendment was in effect to bail out speculators. Now, if we think it should be the policy of the United States to bail out speculators so all their investments are always guaranteed, then we should vote against this amendment. That will be a fine day for some people, but not for the American people. Not a proud day for me as a representative of the American people. And I urge my colleagues to think long and hard and remember this amendment was in effect for 2 years and none of these horrible things happened, because other tools are available that do not put our taxpayers' dollars at risk.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman's position, but he has used the word ``parks'' at least 50 times. This does not apply to the parks, and it does not apply to developed areas on the Forest Service or BLM.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeFAZIO. Just in response to the gentleman's comments, Secretary Lyons came to me last year and asked me to forego the amendment, saying he understood their problems and he would fix the program. Yesterday, he showed up in my office again, said he understood there were problems and he will fix the program. Now today he has called and said he understands there are problems and he wants to fix the program. I think if perhaps he meets with the chairman, who controls his budget and his salary, ultimately, and that of all his employees, and the ranking member, maybe this time he will deliver. But I have to tell my colleagues, I am put out by the fact that this is a year later and it has not happened. And, also, I have to say that I have concerns that go beyond that to the concerns of the committee in terms of how these funds are being spent. And Mr. Lyons admits there is no authorization or control process beyond the local forest. I think that goes to the grave concerns.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, just in reflection, on my forest, perhaps we have raised in this bill the amount of money that the committee has appropriated for recreation above what the President asked for, but obviously the President did not ask for an adequate amount, and the budget overall is reduced. In fact, I am finding, on a number of my forests, it happens that the collections are basically keeping them even. They were reducing recreation and other needs elsewhere. But to go beyond that, I remember that the gentleman last year approached me after this vote and said we would work together to authorize a program where we would have a universal single pass so we would not have this mish mash, and we have not done that. It still has not happened. I had one forest that had two passes for one forest. They have gone to one pass for that forest this year, but it does not have reciprocity with the other forests. I mean, this is insane. I asked the supervisor of one of my forests last Friday, I said, ``If I buy your pass, can I use it on the next-door forest?'' He said, ``No, you cannot.'' Then he called back on Monday and said, ``No, I was wrong. You can.'' I mean, it is so confusing. Average people cannot figure it out.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I have had Mr. Lyons in my office last year and this year telling me he was going to rationalize the program and take care of the accountability problems and the proliferation of passes. Nothing has happened. I would appreciate it if something would happen. But I would further urge that if the committee is going to travel that they travel to my district and perhaps hold a hearing on the issue in my district and hear of some of the concerns and problems or meet in the district of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden), from whom you will hear later. Because I think the committee will hear a little different story, perhaps because we have so many forests in our State and the proliferation is a problem. Finally, if it is so popular, and I am not sure of those polling numbers, I suggest that perhaps I should offer my other amendment, which is to turn it into a voluntary system and turn do away with the enforcement. The Forest Service could save money on the enforcement, and perhaps the gentleman from Ohio would look favorably upon that amendment.

Mr. DeFAZIO. No. If the gentleman will continue to yield, those are all different passes. There is no transferability.

Mr. DeFAZIO. If the gentleman will continue to yield, the annual pass is $25 for that forest, but it is $25 for the other forest 20 miles that way, and it is $25 for the other forest 60 miles that way, and it is a different charge for the park, which is 40 miles that way, and then the BLM is looking at doing it also. So it starts running into a lot of money.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I say to the gentleman, just remember, this amendment does not affect parks.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeFAZIO. I thank the gentleman for that. I hope it becomes permanent or we extract a royalty in the future. I thank the gentleman for his clarification.

Mr. DeFAZIO. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio. (On request of Mr. Regula, and by unanimous consent, Mr. DeFazio was allowed to proceed for 1 additional minute.)

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I had intended to stay out of this debate but it has dragged on and I feel it merits some additional points be made. I serve on the authorizing committee. I authored a number of amendments the last time we tried to modernize and amend the 1872 mining law. This is an antiquated law which begs for change. In fact I think the committee, even though they are attempting to basically erode some provisions of the law here, recognizes that by continuing the moratorium on patents. Let us just understand what is ultimately at stake here. It is the ability of someone operating a mine for which if they have patented it they pay the government, and the taxpayers, $2.50 an acre. No royalties, no other fees are involved. $2.50 an acre. Many times these mines can return tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars on a relatively small number of acres. It is a very, very lucrative enterprise. Now, enter heap leach mining. It requires a lot more Federal land, a lot greater number of acres to extract a small amount of gold through the process of heaping up the land and dosing it with cyanide. Now, they say because we are having to extract from many, many more acres of land, which we paid $2.50 an acre for and make bigger and bigger piles, we need more places to process the ore and more acres of public land, for which they will pay $2.50 an acre if they patent it. Now, I just want to relate this to the debate we are going to have in a few moments over the issue of recreation fees and since the gentleman from Massachusetts did not bring Grandma, who he often brings up in these issues, into this, I want to bring Grandma in. He always talk about Grandma and the kids going out to the forest and doing this and doing that. Let us just envision Grandma today. She drives up to the national forest, she drives her car to the end of the road and wants to take the grandkids for a little hike to see the wildflowers. Guess what? There is a little metal box there that says you have got to pay $3 to park your car. And she does. Her car occupies maybe 200 square feet. She has got to pay three bucks to park the car. The mining company wants to park wastes forever for $2.50 an acre. Now, Grannie would be better off if she filed a claim and got a patent and paid $2.50 for an acre, she could open a parking lot and other people could park there, she could charge them a buck and a half, they would save a buck and a half, and everybody would come out ahead. This is absurd. Because we are not asking people to pay their fair share, we are now sticking it to the little guy, and the fair share is an industry that makes hundreds of millions, billions of dollars a year, many of them foreign-owned and operated, operating on lands in the western United States, paying not a penny in royalties to the Federal Government and getting the land for $2.50 an acre. This law must be reformed. If by adopting this amendment we squeeze a little bit and it hurts a little bit and we get a rational debate in the committee of jurisdiction on which I serve and we then finally, finally bring this law into the 20th century and finally begin to protect the taxpayers and the environmental interests, this will be a very meritorious and historic moment.

Mr. DeFAZIO. I yield to the gentleman from Vermont.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I respect the comments of the gentleman who preceded me in the well, but I would like to make a rejoinder on behalf of the States and on behalf of this program which provides vital services for low-income Americans to meet their heating and cooling needs in the different parts of the country. One point I would make first would be it is fine to say many States are running a surplus, but are they running a surplus because they have met all their needs and obligations or are they running a surplus because of cuts in programs that serve many of these same people? That is one point. The second point is, have we done away with all of the unfunded mandates? There are so many things that the Federal Government requires of our States which do not have Federal dollars attached, and now we are going to impose essentially here a new mandate by saying if they want to participate in this program they have to put up 25 percent of the money. That, I think, is very problematic. It is particularly problematic logistically for many States. My State legislature is about to adjourn, having completed the budget. They do not know about this. They have not anticipated it. So I guess next winter, unless we have an emergency session of the legislature to come up with more money in order to meet this match, Oregonians will not get this low-income weatherization assistance. States are also, of course, by law, most States are required to have balanced budgets. They have had balanced budgets for decades. That is why, in fact, I was a very early person on this side to support a balanced budget amendment for the United States. And we are headed towards a balanced budget, supposedly a theoretical surplus here. So what are we doing? Why are we gouging the States now? Why are we hitting at the little people and the low-income weatherization? This is something that is going to cause a lot of disruptions in the next year. Yes, some States could probably accommodate it. Many will not be able to logistically. Many may not be able to financially. I really believe that this is an ill-intentioned amendment. It has not come from the authorizing committee. It is being proposed by the Committee on Appropriations. And if this is meritorious, it should go back to the Committee on Commerce and they should have a discussion in making changes in the authorization for this program.

Mr. DeFAZIO. If the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Roemer) will continue to yield, that is amendment No. 2. We are doing No. 1.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?