Peter DeFazio

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Congress has failed to authorize the ongoing war in Kosovo but the House and Senate Republican leaders are happy enough to see the President's $7 billion request for emergency funding and raise him $8 billion. That is right. $15 billion of so-called emergency funding, every penny of which will come from the Social Security trust funds. $15 billion in pork and special interest waivers under the guise of a military emergency in Kosovo. Something stinks. I guess that is why this bill includes $2.2 million for sewers in Salt Lake City for the Olympics. That is an emergency. And a mining giveaway in Washington State. Waiver of environmental laws. That is an emergency under this bill. Special breaks for oil and gas producers who just raised the price of gas 50 cents a gallon. That is an emergency. $3.7 million for the page dorm. $3 million for reindeer ranchers. $23 million for fishers in Alaska. Hundreds of thousands for Democratic and Republican leaders. These are not emergencies. Say no to this legislation.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida for yielding me this time. I congratulate the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Upton) on this motion to instruct. It is a good start to begin to strip out some of the extraordinary special interest riders that have been piggybacked on an ostensible emergency spending bill. Now I have got to depart from the majority of my colleagues here in that I voted against the entire package. The money for the military should come out of the Pentagon. The money for other purposes should come out of the appropriate budgets. We should not be spending the Social Security Trust Fund, which is what we are dipping into here, which both the Republican leaders and the President promised to safeguard for these purposes. But absent that, even worse than the fact that we went from $7 billion to $11 billion, and all these other things were larded into the bill, even worse, we have an attack on the environment in this legislation. The 1872 mining law is not enough of a giveaway? Multinational mining companies acquire land in the western United States worth billions of dollars for $2.50 an acre with not a penny in royalties to the Federal taxpayers. That is running government like a business? But that is not bad enough. We cannot reform that law here. We know that. There is a majority that supports the continued giveaways. But this bill goes even further. It waives provisions that have ridiculous, inadequate, antiquated law so that an open pit mine, heap leach mining, can go forward in Washington State. Cut off the top of a mountain and for every 16,000 tons of ore, one dumps cyanide on it, which it tends to get into the water table, and one gets an ounce of gold. This is prospecting, modern times. But that requires a waiver, and the waiver is in this bill. What does that have to do with emergencies? What does is it have to do with Kosovo? Nothing. It has to do with the fact that Senators can do whatever they want behind closed doors and try and muscle the House and intimidate the President into signing the bill. I certainly know that President Clinton will stand strong against these environmental riders as he has stood so steadfast in the past against similar riders. I urge him to veto this bill if we are not successful in our efforts today.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, this is what the public knows about the total aggregate budget of our intelligence agencies. We are told somehow this figure needs to be kept secret. What solace would U.S. enemies or potential enemies abroad take from knowing that we lavish more money on our intelligence agencies than the entire gross national product of their countries and many of our other enemies combined around the world? None. They would probably be scared to death to think of the amount of money we are spending. It is kept secret for a reason. It is kept secret because of the extraordinary waste and incompetence. We had some discussion just now about the lack of human intelligence. They are right. They are lavishing so many billions on geegaws and satellites and things that bring down so much data that is never, ever to be analyzed because there are not humans there to analyze it. They do not have people. They do not have agents. They are wasting tens of millions, hundreds of millions, billions of dollars annually on these things instead of investing in agents and intelligence. A much smaller, more effective post-cold war, post-gadgetry type intelligence service could serve our Nation well. The failings have been well documented, but I want to go into this most extraordinary recent failing for a moment. These are maps which I obtained through the Congressional Research Service, whose budget for an annual basis is equivalent to about one day's spending of our intelligence services. They were able to provide the maps. They provided two maps, in fact, where the Chinese embassy used to be and where the Chinese embassy is now. It is about four miles apart. The gentleman before me really puzzled me because he said we targeted an empty lot. We have already admitted we targeted a building and blew it up. We did not target an empty lot. And it just happened to be the Chinese embassy. Maybe they did not have access to the same database as CRS even though CRS has a budget a tiny fraction of theirs, but they certainly did have a map. They could have accessed the Yugoslav web site. Maybe they thought it was disinformation, but they have a web site for tourists, and on the web site they have the new address of the Chinese embassy which my staff pulled down from the World Wide Web. Certainly, they have 486 computers and modems at these intelligence agencies. Or maybe we do not allow them to have those because we have wasted so much money on these extraordinary spy systems flying around up there in space that provide very little benefit to us. The funny thing to me is, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, as soon as we have an extraordinary failing of our intelligence agencies, say this proves the case for more money. Many of the same people stand up in the floor of this House and say the education system of the United States is failing our children. Do they say that needs more money? I think it needs more money for smaller class size. No, they say it needs to be reformed, dismantled, reorganized, vouchered, everything but more money for education. But when it comes to the failings of our intelligence services, the only answer, the answer every time is more money, more money, more money, more billions. Why? Why not apply that same critical viewpoint, that same scrutiny to these agencies? Why not reveal the budget to the light of day? There is nothing in the Constitution that provides for hiding this budget. It is not a national security issue. It is a national waste and incompetence issue that is being kept from the American people. It is being kept from Members of Congress. Yes, I could go upstairs and read all that stuff. That is great. But the minute I came to the floor of the House I could not talk about it. I would be crippled to talk about the waste. If I actually had facts about the waste, I could not use them. If I had the actual aggregate number, I could not use it. So we have to come here and have this absurd debate every year because we are covering up an incompetent number of bureaucracies and disasters, and we have a bunch of people who are on a little committee who go into a room and exert some light degree of scrutiny and are even stonewalled at times by the agencies. It is time for a major overhaul of these intelligence services because of the major failings, from the most recent failings here at the Chinese embassy back to being unable to predict the collapse of the Soviet Union, the invasion of Kuwait, the explosion of nuclear weapons by India, failing after failing after failing. There is no other part of the government where Congress would take it, lay down and say, ``Here is more money. Waste it.''

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, on the other side they are talking about lower taxes. That means saving money. On the other side they are talking about dumping more money into the intelligence services, who already have a $30 billion a year budget. Sometimes this place reminds me of Alice in Wonderland. Think of a parallel. When our kids fail the achievement tests, what do they say, more money for education? They say, no, we need to reorganize, we need to overhaul, we need to revitalize, we need vouchers, we need change. Now, when the CIA fails in its most basic mission on a multibillion dollar budget, they say they need more money. Guess what? Here is the information they needed. Where did I get it? This came from the Congressional Research Service. It is publicly available. Maps of Belgrade on line. Here is the embassy. That is where it has been for 5 years. Here is where it used to be 5 years ago. Well, maybe they did not know the current address. They could have gone to the web site, which is put up by the City of Belgrade and the government of Yugoslavia, which has the address. They could have got a phone book, but they probably do not have anybody who can read Serbian. I guess that is why they need more money. Maybe they need more money to go down to the bookstore and pay $19.95 for a Michelin map. They do not need more money. They need to spend it better, they need to be reorganized, and some people need to be fired.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, today we are here talking about $12.9 billion of supposed emergency funding. That is $12.9 billion from the Social Security Trust Funds. Let us make that clear. That is where this money is coming from, the so-called surplus. The surplus is intended and the tax is raised for the purposes of Social Security. Now, if this were a dire and absolute emergency and there were no alternatives and it was essential to the American people, it might make some sense. This amendment would make things, in fact, worse, because at the core of this amendment is the way to resolve this problem. The Pentagon should reprogram other funds to pay for this crisis. In a conversation with a senior White House official yesterday, I said, what is the crisis the end of this month that you are telling us about that you need, the President is asking for $7 billion, for this war? The crisis is the Pentagon might have to reprogram funds. They might have to take money from the seven C-130Js that was stuffed into an authorization and appropriation last year for the Speaker of the House that the Pentagon did not want and does not need. They might have to take money from their $30 billion of appropriated unobligated funds. They might have to fix their computer program which has ordered $41 billion of unneeded parts, many of which are obsolete and still being ordered by Hal the computer down there at the Pentagon. Yet we are saying we are here in a crisis and they need more money so they can keep doing things the way they have been doing them in the past, which is to waste money. Certainly I support a pay raise for the troops, but it should not be on an emergency basis. It should come in the regular order of things, and it should not come out of the Social Security Trust Fund. We should not set the young people in our military against the senior citizens and the future senior citizens of this country by spending those funds on a pay raise for people in the military today. It should come out of the general fund of the Treasury. It should come out of the Pentagon budget in the next year. So we should not further restrict the Pentagon from reprogramming. In fact, we should require that the Pentagon reprogram all of the funds for this activity from that $30 billion of unspent funds from programs that they themselves have said they do not want. Let us stick it to a few Members of Congress who have gotten their pork in past bills and getting their pork in this bill and take that money back and spend it on something the Pentagon really needs that supports the troops in the field. I rise in opposition to H.R. 1664, making emergency supplementary appropriations for military operations in Kosovo. The Department of Defense (DOD) has over $30 billion in unobligated and unspent funds that it could reprogram for the Kosovo military operations. It does not need an additional $6 billion. I further oppose this bill because it includes $7 billion in unneeded additional funding for the DOD that has nothing to do with the Kosovo operation. Last year Congress provided an additional $8 billion in the Omnibus Appropriations bill for the DOD under the guise of military readiness. Most of that funding didn't do anything for military readiness. It was more about campaign readiness. For example, is a study about military uses for caffeinated gum crucial to the readiness of our military? If the DOD needs funding for Kosovo, it should reprogram some of the unneeded funding from that bill. Or perhaps the DOD should look a little harder for the $17 billion that it has lost over the past decade. The Pentagon simply cannot account for $17 billion. It has nothing to show for it, not even an overpriced screwdriver. or perhaps the Pentagon should reprogram the funding for the 7 unrequested C-130Js that Congress provided last year. This bill contains $7 billion that the President did not request for the Kosovo operations. For example, it contains $1.34 billion for spare parts that was not requested by the President. This is outrageous since the General Accounting Office found that the DOD maintains over $41 billion in obsolete parts. How did that happen? The computer that orders spare parts can't communicate with the computer that knows what spare parts are currently on the shelf. The DOD doesn't need more money for spare parts. It needs to fix the system that orders the parts. If Congress keeps giving the DOD more money to cover up a broken system, the DOD will never fix it and billions more will be wasted. The DOD does not suffer from a lack of aggregate funding. It suffers from a lack of discipline necessary to function effectively in the post Cold War era. The DOD has over $30 billion in unobligated funding that it could reprogram. But the DOD refuses to make changes and cut unneeded programs. Congress could force the Pentagon to critically examine its spending and cut the waste by refusing to blindly throw good money after bad. Congress could take the first step towards fiscal discipline at the Pentagon by denying additional funding for the Kosovo mission. It is simply outrageous that the Pentagon cannot function effectively with a $280 billion year budget. The Pentagon claims it is prepared to fight two major theaters at once. Yet every time we actually use the military, taxpayers are forced to give the Pentagon more money. It's time to stop wasting billions of tax dollars and force the Pentagon to be more responsible with our money.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I am proud to introduce legislation today to help combat the growing problem of youth violence in America. I began this effort last year in response to the needs identified following shooting at Thurston High School, in my hometown of Springfield, Oregon. This legislation is designed to prevent youths from turning to violence by providing adequate crisis intervention and support services and to limit opportunities for troubled kids to obtain firearms. Politicians talk a lot about helping kids, but when it comes to putting money on the table, programs that invest in our children continue to go underfunded. We must do better, or we will continue to see tragedies like those in Littleton, Springfield, Jonesboro, Edinboro, West Paducah, and Pearl. My package will boost funding for prevention and intervention programs that have a proven track record for helping at- risk kids and families in crisis. Following the Thurston shootings, community leaders, educators, law enforcement and medical professionals as well as Thurston students and their families worked to develop an action plan identifying several grant programs that address specific needs in our communities. However, to develop new initiatives using these grants, or to expand existing programs, an increase in overall funding is essential. This package would provide this much needed funding for services to foster strong and healthy children, families and communities. The causes of youth violence are extremely complex and there is no panacea. This package doesn't include everything communities may need, but it certainly addresses some of the key concerns our community has identified. Youth Violence Prevention Act: Increases funding for early childhood intervention programs such as Head Start. Increases funding for juvenile justice delinquency prevention programs including court schools. Increases funding for child abuse prevention programs focusing on community-based family preservation and crisis intervention programs. Expands the National Guard's successful Youth Challenge program for troubled high school dropouts. Provides incentive grants for states to implement a 72-hour hold for juveniles caught with a firearm on school grounds. Authorizes expansion of the instant criminal background check system so a person who sells a firearm but is not a licensed dealer can check to see if a prospective purchaser is eligible to purchase a firearm. Provides for a tax credit of up to $250 for the purchase of safe storage devices for firearms. Requires manufacturers to provide trigger locks for all purchases of new firearms. Requires safe storage of firearms.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Madam Chairman, I thank the esteemed ranking member for yielding me time and I would like to congratulate the chairman of the subcommittee and the ranking member, as well as the full committee chairman and ranking member on what I consider to be an excellent Water Resources Development Act piece of legislation. This bill is vital in three major areas for my State and for many States across the Union. It contains investment in appropriate projects that are vital to the economic infrastructure and the competitiveness of the United States in the international economy. In particular, we have provided for an authorization, should all of the environmental reviews be adequately completed by the Corps of Engineers, for the Columbia River. It is vital if the port of Portland is to compete in the Asia Rim, that they be able to accommodate the new larger class of ships. It is vital in a number of other areas. The environment. Certainly we can say this is probably the most important piece of environmental legislation to pass this Congress. It contains money for a number of projects in my district: Amazon Creek; Springfield Millrace; going to look at nonstructural flood control alternatives for the Willamette River; Skinner Butte Park environmental restoration right in the heart of the largest city of my district; and, finally, it is good for salmon. It contains a large investment in a long overdue Willamette River temperature control project that I have been working on for almost a decade here in Congress. It is a large project, $65 million, but it will correct problems created by the Federal Government when those dams were constructed, which are destroying salmon runs in the McKenzie and Willamette Rivers. All in all, this is an excellent piece of legislation. It is good for the economy, good for the environment, and good for water resources across the United States.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me. We in Congress are in a position we should never be in. We are confronted with a failed law, failed leadership and a military action that failed to meet its initially stated objectives. Here we are, finally having a belated and truncated debate because of the War Powers Act, but a War Powers Act which is totally defective, and for 8 years I have been introducing legislation to fix the War Powers Act. We need to reclaim our constitutional authority and require prior authorization before Presidents engage in wars or warlike activities using our armed forces. This is not unique to President Clinton. President Reagan, President Bush went down the same path, as did Presidents before them and as they will continue to do until this body has the guts to change the law and require that not a penny be spent except in defense of our country against immediate attack or armed forces overseas or as a citizen without the authority of Congress in a war or warlike action. We have a failed congressional leadership. They were engaged in duck- and-cover and get everybody out of town before the bombing began. They did not allow us to have a debate. Even with the defective law, we could have had a vigorous debate here, and if we had that debate, I believe we could have had a better policy. Did not everybody know that it rained in that area at this time of year? Did not our intelligence forces perhaps know that bombing and removal of the OSCE observers would lead to increased, accelerated ethnic cleansing and slaughter? And what if, what if Slobodan was not going to come to the bargaining table after a few bombs fell? Those questions were not asked by this Congress, and they were not answered by this administration, and now we are in the midst of a failed policy. I believe we need to go forward from here with productive ideas, but this debate is not going to allow us to talk about productive ideas. What about the idea of a temporary cease-fire, working with our allies to try and force productive negotiations? What about having enough time to talk about this issue? It is not allowed under this absurd rule.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, among the duties of a Member of Congress, there is nothing more serious than the issues of war and peace; committing the wealth and the might of our Nation, putting the members of our armed forces in harm's way. Before we went to war with Iraq, we debated around the clock. Every Member of this body who so wished was allowed to come to the floor and debate and discuss the issues of conscience and war and peace. Today promises a pathetic, pale and perverted version of that grand debate. Four contradictory resolutions, 1 hour each. Vote on a declaration of war, 13 seconds per Member of Congress, if it is equally apportioned. Vote on immediate withdrawal, 13 seconds per Member. Is the press of business on this body so heavy that we cannot allocate more time, or are the leaders on the other side afraid of a full and fair debate? Yesterday, the House adjourned at 4:30 in the afternoon. Tonight, after exhausting ourselves in this debate, we will leave at 7 p.m. What is more important to the other side, fund-raisers, or issues of war and peace fully and fairly debated? Fair debate? No amendments will be allowed from the floor of the House of Representatives. And, we are only having this debate today because of the War Powers Act and its expedited procedures. They have to have a debate, although they are trying to pervert it in different ways, but after today, no further votes will be allowed. This is an outrageous abdication of our duties as Members of Congress. Vote ``no'' on this rule.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, today I voted to require the President to obtain congressional approval before deploying ground troops in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY). The framers of the Constitution clearly intended that the power to initiate war, whether declared or undeclared, should reside in the legislative branch of government. The power to lead the nation without congressional authority into a costly overseas military adventure is a power the Constitution explicitly denies the President of the United States. The Administration's policy in FRY is extremely short sighted and is a clear example of why the Administration should have come to Congress before committing U.S. troops to the NATO airstrikes. A congressional debate would have forced the Administration to define every aspect of NATO's Balkan policy. Congress should have been given the chance to ask the tough questions that still linger after weeks of bombing. Instead, NATO and the Administration are defining and defending their policy as they go along. The result has been a tenuous military coalition with a mission constantly questioned. This has emboldened Milosevic to escalate his genocidal campaign and strengthened his power in Serbia. A completely unified NATO force backed by a well-defined long term Balkan policy before executing any military operations might have made Milosevic a willing participant in peace negotiations. The congressional leadership has presented Congress with a lot of bad choices today as well. It is unfortunate that Congress is falling into the trap that the Administration has set for it. Before the NATO airstrikes began, the Clinton Administration wanted us to believe that the only options available were to bomb or do nothing. Now Congress wants us to believe that the only options are to continue the severely flawed military operations or withdraw our troops and do nothing. Unilateral withdrawal of U.S. forces from the military operations at this time would cause the collapse of NATO and be tantamount to a victory for Slobodan Milosevic. While I support the efforts of my colleagues today to begin asserting their Constitutional duty to authorize military actions, I question the timing. Debating whether or not to withdraw our troops while they are engaged in a military action, is extremely irresponsible. There is a way to assert our Constitutional duty without undermining the safety of our troops. I have introduced legislation for the last 8 years to require Congress to authorize military actions before U.S. troops are placed in hostilities. The continuing religious and ethnic strife in the Balkans is unlikely to be resolved by offensive military actions. Milosevic has more than demonstrated his willingness to sacrifice the lives of his own people to retain his power. There is another option. The U.S. and NATO should call for a cease fire contingent upon a pull back of Serbian forces and the beginning of real negotiations including Russia and the United Nations. The Rambouillet agreements were fatally flawed and designed to fail. It's time to go back to the drawing board and negotiate enforceable peace between Milosevic and the Kosovar Albanians.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I am deeply saddened by the tragedy at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. It brings back emotions my hometown experienced last year when a group of students at Thurston High School were shot by a fellow student. Last week's violent rampage was an incomprehensible and devastating act and I know my community joins me in sending our thoughts and prayers to the victims and their families in Colorado. We can't legislate all solutions, but we can take prudent steps to help prevent similar acts in the future. As we learned in Springfield, the changes needed to prevent similar tragedies are going to require an enduring commitment from each and every one of us. Preventing youth violence depends on our ability to support children and families. Each of us needs to look for ways to do more to help our neighbors and communities. In small ways and large, we can all help keep our children and families safe.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Let us just really go to the point here. This is special interest legislation. It has a name. It is the ``foreign corporate freeloader special interest tax loophole big contributor protection act.'' It is simply cloaked in helping average American families. But what they want to do is lock in place an incredibly unfair and complex tax system which favors the privileged and the wealthy. A few examples: The Government Accounting Office says, over the last 6-year period they have numbers for 70 percent of the large foreign corporations operating in the United States that avoided all U.S. taxes despite their profits. They want to lock that system in place. They want to lock that system in place. The Intel Corporation got a ruling that a large part of their income should be treated as income in Japan for tax purposes. Unfortunately, the United States of America has a treaty with Japan which says it has to be treated as American income. So guess what? The Intel Corporation paid no tax. They did not pay tax on that income. Now, would not average Americans like to have that kind of a break, that kind of a loophole? They want to lock that unfair system in place. And most recently it has come to light that the cruise ship industry operating in America, 95 percent of their passengers are American, is paying no income tax in this country because they are registered in countries like Liberia, where theoretically they would pay taxes if there was a government and if they levied taxes, but there is not and they do not. The Republicans want to lock that system in place with this two- thirds requirement under the cynical guise of giving suffering average Americans relief. They are in the majority. Why do they not pass legislation to give relief to average Americans? Why do they not take up a bill today, tomorrow, every day and send it to the President? They are not doing that. This is special-interest legislation, plain and simple. This is just unbelievably cynical, my friends, unbelievably cynical. Average Americans are suffering under this system. They are paying more than their fair share, while foreign corporations, huge U.S. corporations, and immensely profitable, privately held businesses, like the cruise ship industry, pay not a dime for the services they use in this country. And with this two-thirds requirement, that would never change. And beyond that, I guess I have got to wonder, since they are in the majority, who are they protecting us against? Are they protecting us against themselves? They control the House of Representatives. They will never bring a bill to the House to raise taxes on these special interests. But they want to be sure that they lock those loopholes, those special protections, those privileges in place for all time for their big campaign contributors. Vote ``no'' on this cynical amendment.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. The question before the House is how do we safeguard Social Security, increase military spending, cut taxes for the wealthy, and balance the budget without devastating cuts in everything else that is important to many Americans, from veterans' programs to education to law enforcement? The answer is we do not, and we cannot honestly. On the Republican side they have revived with gusto the magic asterisks of the Reagan years, which are so-called undistributed cuts, meaning we do not know what to do, we are punting, and we will figure it out later, but there will probably be a whole bunch more cuts or we will not deliver on these promises. One or the other has got to give. Unfortunately, the other budget alternatives before us also come up short in those areas. I tried to offer a progressive budget alternative that was balanced, did not offer tax cuts to the wealthy, protected those programs important to Americans, with modest reductions in the military, and it was not allowed. It was an honest budget and it was not allowed. It did not have any magic asterisks that say we do not have the slightest idea how we are going to do this, we will just put something in that says we will figure out how to cut later. This is a dishonest budget with a dishonest debate without a progressive alternative.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I am pretty sure of next week before a recess. But, again, just pointing to this week, votes were done by 2:30 on Tuesday. Clearly, the House could have gone in at 4 o'clock in the afternoon and been done by 6:30 on Tuesday and accommodated Members from the West Coast. Then on Wednesday, we reversed the entire schedule and did not vote until after 3:00 because of a parade for people on the East Coast. I mean, some of us might have liked to go to Saint Patrick's Day parades on the West Coast, but the gentleman would have had to give us 2 days to do it. In any case, I do not see great sensitivity in last week's schedule. I hope, after we come back from the recess, they can do a little better by West Coast Members.

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

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I would like to direct a question to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Lazio). Last week, I observed the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Bonior) rise and ask the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Armey) if it would be possible to delay votes on Tuesday to accommodate West Coast members. If I leave my district at 6:00 in the morning, I can barely make it here by 5:00 in the evening. That is common to many people who live on the West Coast. I realize the gentleman can walk to his district in that time period. This is a problem. It is a real problem. So I scheduled to come in on Monday afternoon. My plane was canceled. So I took the first plane out on Tuesday morning. I find, when I get here at 4:30 that the House concluded business at 2:30 in the afternoon, and I missed the votes, as did some other people from the West Coast. I saw the gentlewoman from Wyoming (Mrs. Cubin) from not even quite the west coat on the plane on Tuesday also. I would hope that the majority will consider this schedule in the future. I would further note, and no one should take offense at this, because even though my name is DeFazio, my mother is an O'Shea, and I come from the O'Sheas and Crowleys, I note that, on Wednesday, the House of Representatives delayed all votes until after 3 o'clock this afternoon because there was a Saint Patrick's Day parade in New York. Now for some reason, we can delay all the proceedings of the House of Representatives until after 3 o'clock in the afternoon for a joyous occasion, a parade, but for regular business and accommodating the schedules of West Coast Members, who constitute a significant minority of this body, they apparently can do nothing. Mr. Speaker, I would just ask the gentleman if there is any consideration going to be given on that side to putting those votes, the two or three votes that were done by 2:30 in the afternoon later in the day on Tuesday?

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman from New Jersey yield further?

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I brought with me a potential terrorist weapon of mass destruction delivery device. It might be classified. Close your eyes. Here it is. A briefcase like this was brought into a hearing by a biological weapons expert in the Rayburn Building, full of aerosol canisters, capable of deploying anthrax, killing everybody on Capitol Hill, many people in Washington, through security 2 weeks ago. There are other probable terrorist or rogue state delivery devices. If it is a nuclear threat, it will probably be a truck coming across the Mexican border, maybe like the two tons of cocaine that come across every day in trucks. Or it might be a ratty old freighter that is registered anonymously in a Third World country like Panama under a flag of convenience that steams into New York Harbor with a stolen hydrogen bomb. The question is: Will the future leader of the rogue state assure the annihilation of his or her people for all time by launching a single or even a dozen or two dozen missiles at the United States of America? Within 30 seconds, we know where the missile came from, and they are targeted within 3 minutes by the most massive nuclear force on earth. They will be destroyed. That is the power of our proven defense, the ability to withstand the attack of any aggressor and respond with awesome force. It worked against the Soviet Union for 30 years with thousands of hydrogen bombs. It certainly will deter the pathetic tiny unproven arsenals of North Korea and other rogue states. Do not waste billions on fantasy protection. Vote no.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentleman from California (Ms. Sanchez).

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green).

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DeFAZIO. We would be happy to accept the gentleman's amendment. We have no problem.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Likewise on our side, Mr. Chairman. We have no reservations.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will yield, we support the amendment. We do not want to see the Coast Guard trying to perform this difficult and dangerous mission with equipment that is not suitable. This is the right equipment for this mission. We are supportive of the amendment.

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, this is very important legislation for this body. As the chairman of the full committee has pointed out, it is supported strongly in a bipartisan manner. That is because almost all of the Members of this Congress and certainly the Members of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure share a common concern in the Coast Guard's activities and giving them adequate resources to fulfill the burdens that we put on them. The chairman has already gone on at some length, but I think it should be restated just so people remember, the Coast Guard does everything from local boating safety courses to search and rescue. If one is in trouble out on the water, they are the ones who respond. Sometimes in very hazardous situations, sometimes to loss of life to members of the Coast Guard, they are attempting to save mariners in distress. They safeguard our borders by watching for smugglers and people attempting both to enter the country illegally or to enter drugs and other substances illegally into our country. They are our first line of protection for our coastal resources and the environment. That leads me to some comments that are very close to home for me. The Coast Guard has been involved now for more than a month in the wreck of the New Carrisa which went aground in stormy weather outside the largest port in my district, very close to the mouth of the harbor. The Coast Guard is still working on its own internal investigation and summary of the events that led up to this tragedy. I think there will be much to be learned from that critical review, perhaps some further changes in authority for the Coast Guard, changes of law regarding insurance of these freighters and other ships. Today a freighter carries as much oil, these larger freighters, as did a small tanker 20, 25 years ago. They often carry more fuel than they need to accomplish their mission, as did this ship in this case, for ballast. So the potential for oil spill no longer just extends to tankers and tanker safety, but now the potential for catastrophic oil spills extends to large freighters. Yet, they do not have the same insurance requirements that we put on tankers, nor do they have the same hull safety requirements we put on tankers; and those are critical issues that we will need to look at in the future to safeguard our precious coastal resources here in the United States. I am very pleased that this bill, with unanimous vote in the committee, and hopefully a similar vote here on the floor of the House, includes some modest initial amendments for changes in the law that I have proposed as I became educated as to what happens when a foreign ship is headed towards the United States. And in this case, had these provisions of law which are in this bill today by my amendment been in effect, we might not have had the New Carrisa tragedy on the coast of Oregon; we might not have despoiled our precious coastal waters. The Coast Guard, under this bill, will now be notified 24 hours in advance before a ship crosses into our 12-mile territorial limit. The Coast Guard will have the authority to hold a ship at that 12-mile limit if they have questions about the safety of the ship, the competence of its crew, or other extraordinary circumstances are intervening that could jeopardize safety. In this case, the New Carrisa was on a list the Coast Guard keeps called the ``Watch List''. The ``Watch List'' is composed of ships that are known to the Coast Guard to have problems or to be registered in countries that are known to abide or to basically not fully enforce, rigorously enforce, international maritime rules. Panama, in this case. Liberia and other countries are also in question. This ship was on the ``Watch List'', and it would have been boarded once it reached the harbor. Unfortunately, it never reached the harbor because it went aground, I believe due to the misconduct of the captain, and it caused an ongoing and unfolding tragedy on the Oregon coast. This could happen anywhere in the United States of America. Under my legislation, the Coast Guard would be able to hold a ship on the ``Watch List'', ask them a number of questions about the condition of the vessel, the crew, etcetera, out at 12 miles. And if the Coast Guard was concerned about their capabilities or conduct or their navigational capabilities, they could require a pilot be put on board. They could require other actions be followed by that ship once it has entered into our territorial waters. In this case they may have well have told the ship to hold off out 12 miles, where it was safer, because there was a huge storm brewing and the pilot could not get out to them. These are tools that the Coast Guard, I believe, will be able to prudently employ and, hopefully, avoid this happening again in Oregon or anywhere else in the United States. There may well be other measures we need to take, and next week, when we hold a hearing to review the oil spill liability legislation on the 10-year anniversary of the Exxon Valdez tragedy, I believe we will see a path to other changes in law that are necessary. Beyond that, the money in this bill is a good amount of money. Personally, if I had license, I would give the Coast Guard more money to conduct their mission. I believe that, in fact, they are operating in a very frugal manner, particularly compared to the other uniformed services, and they are spending our taxpayer dollars wisely and in a way that most all Americans are grateful on a daily basis. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.