Peter DeFazio

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. The premise of taxpayer support for the auto companies was twofold--preserve our productive capacity and maximize job retention. Well, the plan has kind of gone off track here. The resolution of Chrysler, losing tens of thousands of jobs through the unnecessary closure of dealerships, and now Chrysler is going to close their most productive, modern engine plant in the world and build one in Mexico? How is that in the taxpayers' interest? The leadership of the financier from Wall Street, Mr. Rattner, needs to be brought under control here. GM's now on deck. The Obama administration has to reconsider their approach. Don't endorse the closure of thousands of dealerships. Don't support the export of our productive capacity. It is rumored that GM wants to manufacture their cars in China. Preserving a corporate shell while losing productive manufacturing capacity and tens of thousands of jobs is not in the taxpayer interest and should not receive the endorsement of the Obama administration nor this Congress.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Well, after doubling the national debt under the failed leadership of George Bush, the Republicans unveiled their budget alternative yesterday, very appropriately on April 1, April Fool's Day. Now, there's a pretense that they're going to restore fiscal stability through budget gimmicks, the spending freeze, no matter how great the need, bridges falling down, veterans need services, to educate our kids, budget's frozen. Well, it's frozen, sort of. There is another part that's not. After the smoke and mirrors are put up, their real agenda comes through, which is more tax cuts for the wealthy. Here's the amazing thing. They're going to eliminate all taxes on capital gains so people who invest for a living don't have to pay taxes. We have had that argument before. But think of it, it's so beautiful. The hedge fund managers, who averaged $260 million each a year last year creating toxic assets that are destroying our economy, claim that their income is carried interest, which is capital gains. So the hedge fund managers who put our economy in the tank will contribute zero, zero dollars, under the Republican budget alternative to helping repair the damage in America. Good work, guys. April fools.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DeFAZIO. I believe I have the right to close. Does he have further speakers?

Mr. DeFAZIO. Okay. Well, then I yield myself the balance of my time. The gentleman refers to the board of directors. He's apparently not particularly conversant with how those elections are set up so that it is extraordinarily difficult to nominate and/or replace anyone on boards of directors the way most corporate governance is set up. You know, it's amazing to me that somehow those who have a direct interest, Americans who own the stock, they should just sell their stock. Well, maybe their stock's worth half what it was last year because of crumby management, and he says, well, just sell your stock because they lost half your money and let the CEO still get an exorbitant salary. Come on, is that a good decision? No. The other alternative would be to actually allow the owners, in what I think is a fairly well-accepted form of government in the United States of America, those people to actually vote in a meaningful and binding way, as opposed to an advisory way, to a board of directors who are all first cousins, who all serve on each other's boards, and all feather each other's nests and all compensate themselves very well. Come on, we all know how this works. If you want to just stick up for the current system, then stop this sort of bifurcated argument, oh, the Democrats are really bad because they didn't do this earlier, and it was in another bill that could have been or should have been but we don't want to do it now, and we don't want to do it in a meaningful way. That's where the Republicans are coming down here, and I find it to be a most disingenuous argument. With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DeFAZIO. I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. DeFAZIO. I rise in support of the bill, and I'm very favorable to the say-on-pay provision. I'm going to propose that we actually add to that provision, but first, I've been a bit bemused by the debate today and listening from my office to hear from the Republican side that they're saying, well, it's the Democrats' fault that there aren't more meaningful restrictions, but we're against these meaningful restrictions. So I'm going to give them a chance here to maybe be a little more consistent because I'm going to offer a free-market approach to enhancing protections for stockholders and taxpayers against excessive corporate executive remuneration. It's a free-market approach, and it's also a democratic approach because it would allow the owners of the company, the stockholders, to cast not just an advisory vote but a binding vote on corporate compensation. Now, I know we're going to hear concerns about this, and perhaps again they will be extraordinarily inconsistent on their side of the aisle, bemoaning the fact that we didn't do this earlier but not wanting to do it now in a more meaningful way. But the issue here is very real. The growth in corporate compensation has been extraordinary. We've gone from a 40:1 ratio to the average worker 25 years ago to nearly 400:1 in many cases now, and Americans are justifiably outraged, and they're particularly outraged when it's sometimes now their taxpayer money which is going to support these lavish lifestyles. We have examples of some corporations that have recently gone to binding votes. NBIA after a rather disastrous year has gone there. You can expect that their stockholders are going to be a little cranky about the corporate compensation. Carl Icahn supports this provision. And the Netherlands has adopted this. In the Netherlands, the way it works is it's prospective. The next year's salary package has to be approved by the stockholders in a vote. Now, the bill does refer, the provision regarding say-on-pay, to the SEC, and I would leave that intact so it would be up to the SEC to figure out how this might work. Perhaps there's already an egregious pay package in effect and voting against a prospective package wouldn't even get at the underlying--I can understand that some people would say that this needs a little work, but I trust the SEC to get there. With that, I yield to the chairman.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Well, the Republicans are at it again. It would be funny if we weren't in such dire financial straits as the government is, thanks to a number of years of Republican rule. During the Bush era, George Bush inherited a balanced budget, he inherited projections of a surplus for years to come, and paying down the debt of the United States substantially. Well, he went to work busily, and using restrictive legislative rules the Republicans passed massive tax cuts favoring the wealthiest of us. Those with estates over $5 million, those who earn over $250,000 a year got huge largess from the Republican Party. Now, in a time of surplus, it didn't hurt too much. But then, George Bush launched an unnecessary war in Iraq and decided to pay for it off the books; i.e., he did not score it in the budget, and just every year declared it as an emergency as much as it might cost. So far, close to $700 billion has been spent on George Bush's war in Iraq. Of course George Bush's tax cuts and his off-the-books spending and a massive expansion of government under total Republican rule, took us from a time of surplus to a time of massive deficits. George Bush set record after record with deficits during his Presidency, and he managed in 8 short years to double the debt that it had taken us more than 200 years to accumulate as a Nation. And the Republicans were all for it. But now they would have us believe that their born-again fiscal conservatives, with a 19-page document with no specifics--and guess what it contains, this is how we are going to balance the budget, folks--more tax cuts for rich people. Oh, what a surprise. That will solve everything. They do have this cockamamie theory, and it is that if we give all of the money to the rich people, the rich people will go out and invest that money. When they invest that money, the little people will get jobs, and the little people will pay taxes because the rich people shouldn't. That is their budget, plain and simple. Eliminate the estate tax. That would mean that if Bill Gates died tomorrow, and God forbid, I hope he is healthy and he won't, but if he did, the unrealized capital gains of his stock would then become nontaxable. No taxes would have ever been paid on that stock, passed on to his kids. If his kids invest it for a living under the Republican plan, they would earn capital gains and under their plan investors don't pay taxes. So you can have multi-generations of people accumulating more and more wealth who haven't paid a penny in taxes. But don't worry, the Republicans tell us, they will invest that money in America and put the little people to work. Well, no, maybe they will invest that money in China where labor is cheaper, or Mexico where labor is cheaper, or who knows where. Who knows how they will waste it. Who knows what new, speculative instruments they will come up with. Their so-called alternative would be funny if it wasn't so serious. But this is deadly serious. President Obama is trying to dig us out of an incredibly deep hole and a very difficult time in the American economy. The radical deregulation of the Bush years and all of that wealth creation on Wall Street, which has now tanked, many people's pensions and their 401(k)s, it is killing jobs, we are trying to fix that, and we are trying to re- instill a sense of fiscal responsibility here in Washington, DC. It will not be easy. And particularly it won't be easy if the Republicans continue to play the clown on their side of the aisle and say eliminating taxes for rich people will solve all of the problems confronting the American people. Maybe it will provide them health care; I'm not sure how that works. Maybe it will help educate their kids in public schools; I don't quite get that part. Maybe it will rebuild our infrastructure; hmm, it won't do that, either. But it will make the rich richer, and that's all they are about.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. We have been told this would be the most transparent administration in history. And in many areas, they are infinitely better than the Bush administration. Their single greatest failing comes in the area that, unfortunately, is foremost with most Americans today, which is the economy and the bailouts on Wall Street. Treasury Secretary Geithner has now proposed a new plan. It is a pretty good deal. Taxpayers will put up 95 cents of every $1, investors will put up, well, between 5 and 7 cents. And it is called a nonrecourse loan; that is, these speculators will put down 5 cents on the dollar to bet on certain packages of so-called toxic assets from the banks, buying them from the banks, and they will share evenly in the profits with the American taxpayers, except the American taxpayers put up 95 cents, and the speculators put up a nickel. It is certain to perpetuate what has been going on on Wall Street, which is making a few people very rich and impoverishing average Americans, and this time through the tax system and putting taxpayers on the hook. The program is reported, according to the Washington Times, to have been designed by two prominent Wall Street firms, Blackstone, a secretive private equity group, and a company called Pimco, both of whom apparently have very large positions in these so-called ``toxic assets.'' It is reported by the Washington Times that they suggested this to some of their insider buddies in the administration, and the insider buddies presented this to Secretary Geithner, who has been floundering around trying to put details to his program, and now he has found them. So Wall Street has written the details. Also, according to the Times, Pimco and Blackstone are not only in line to be able to wash some of their toxic assets and to gamble mostly with taxpayers' money on other people's toxic assets, but they are going to be hired by the government to manage the program. What a beautiful sort of circular little system this is. We need some accountability and transparency. We need a commission akin to the commission named after the collapse in the Great Depression to investigate every aspect of what has gotten us to this point, who has been involved, what laws have been broken, with subpoena power so that some of these people can enjoy, instead of Federal handouts, they can enjoy Federal hospitality in a maximum security prison somewhere. Plain and simply, I believe the American people are being taken to the cleaners yet again with this particular plan. What is wrong with actually taking AIG and winding it down? It is a so-called ``zombie.'' We are told in vague terms ``it is too big to fail.'' When I asked Secretary Geithner, just about 10 days ago, I read in the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Secretary, that, in fact, we are shoveling money in the front door of AIG because it is too big to fail, the taxpayers are on the hook for over $150 billion to AIG, and now we are 80 percent owners, and they are still paying bonuses to the people who created the problem, and apparently they are shoveling money out the back door to some of the firms who are getting money in the front door, most notably Goldman Sachs. Goldman Sachs has been getting direct infusions of cash from the Federal Government, and now they are going to be made 100 percent whole on their bets with AIG. They were gambling with AIG, betting against other people's securities with these so-called ``credit default swaps.'' So instead of saying, ``tough, we will give you back your bet, but we are not going to give you 100 percent of the amount you were betting on,'' they are getting 100 percent of the amount they were betting on, and meanwhile we are subsidizing them on both ends here through this black box that is called ``AIG'' that is too big to fail, that, gee, it is just way too complicated to explain to you why it is too big to fail and why we couldn't unwind this zombie corporation in an orderly way. Had we done that last fall or earlier this year, then we wouldn't have had to pay the bonuses because it would have been clear the company was bankrupt, and it could have been taken care of and unwound in a much more orderly way. But we are not being given the information about why it is too big to fail and why this is the way to do it. And when I asked Secretary Geithner, is it true we are giving money to AIG that then they are giving to Goldman Sachs for bad bets they made? I asked if there was something call a ``naked credit default swap?'' He said, ``oh, don't believe everything you read in the Wall Street Journal. It is not true.'' The Treasury has revealed that what I read in the Wall Street Journal was indeed true. These same huge firms that are benefiting from a direct bailout from the government are also getting a second-level indirect bailout on their bad bet. And some of these firms are foreign banks. We are not only bailing out the likes of Goldman Sachs. We are bailing out Deutsche Bank and other foreign interests. This is outrageous. We need a full investigation, an explanation of what has gone on and what is going on. We need to take legal steps to prosecute any of those who broke the laws. And we also have to have stiff new regulatory reforms to make sure this doesn't happen again. And none of that is happening, sad to say.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Well, today was 6 months overdue here in the House. Last fall, when President George Bush and Secretary Henry--``Hank,'' as people like to call him--Paulson--just a regular guy from Wall Street who earned $750 million in 1 year before he left Wall Street to come here and be Secretary of the Treasury, protecting Main Street interests under the Bush administration--panics the Congress, said the world was on the verge of collapse, and submitted, on a Friday evening, a three-page bill asking that we appropriate $700 billion and give it to Henry ``Hank'' Paulson and let him spend it however he deemed fit. Unfortunately, Congress didn't really improve too much on that original draft. Congress got stampeded. I didn't. I voted against it. And for one glorious moment, one night, one day, we stunned the world by stopping that bill here in the House and saying there are not enough protections for American taxpayers in this bill. There's no guarantee we'll get paid back. There's no real restraint on how Henry ``Hank'' Paulson of Wall Street is going to spend the money. We fear it will go to bonuses, it will go to waste, it will go to his buddies on Wall Street and he'll use it to penalize his enemies on Wall Street. And that's exactly what happened. And here we are now, at least $350 billion later of that $700 billion. It's estimated, by one group that does weekly estimates, we've lost about a third of the money. The American taxpayers are being told they'll have to pay that back over the next 30 years. In the meantime, many of these companies and these lords are rewarding themselves with bonuses. We're told, well, these are certifiably smart people. I mean, how can these firms continue to exist without them? Well, the firms like AIG don't exist anymore except for the largesse from the American taxpayer. They bankrupted their companies. How could anybody think they deserve a performance bonus or a retention bonus of any sort? What they need is a bonus push out the door. And that should have happened a long time ago. And I've got to say the Obama administration is trying. A big hole was dug here. They are trying to make some sense out of what Bush and Paulson did. But I am not impressed by our Treasury Secretary, Mr. Geithner, and I think that President Obama should rethink whether or not he is the man for the job at this time. When did Secretary Geithner know about these bonuses that were coming due at AIG? He was head of the New York Fed. He was very involved in bailing out AIG through the Federal Reserve last fall. Did he just find out or has he known? And did he neglect to tell the President, did he neglect to tell the Congress that these bonuses were pending? I don't know for sure. But we need to have that question answered. Geithner was hired because he said, well, Wall Street's comfortable with him. I'll tell you what. I'd like a Secretary of the Treasury who Wall Street doesn't like because that person is protecting Main Street Americans and the taxpayers of this country instead of coddling these fat, overpaid people on Wall Street who have bankrupted their own companies and are trying to bankrupt America and have caused nationally and worldwide an economic collapse. These certifiably smart people. So today we began to correct the mistakes that were made here last fall under pressure from Bush and Paulson. But people need to be brought to account. We need to hire the 1,100 agents that the FBI has been asking for for 4 years to fill out their financial fraud and crimes unit. We need to hire those 1,100 people and maybe give some of these people who today are getting bonuses Federal hospitality in the future, a little uniform and a nice warm place to sit behind bars. We need those investigators. We need that budget. We need to thoroughly review everything that's gone on. And we really need to question the leadership of Secretary Geithner in these matters.

Mr. DeFAZIO

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

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Well, we just heard from the Republican side of the aisle that they are ready to make the tough fiscal choices. Unfortunately, they are about 8 years and $5 trillion short with their newfound fiscal conservatism. Remember, George Bush inherited a surplus. What was the answer to the surplus? Tax cuts. Then we had the attacks of 9/11. What was the answer to that? Tax cuts. Then we had the misbegotten war in Iraq. What was the answer to that? Tax cuts. A war fought on borrowed money and tax cuts. And then we had the bank collapse and the recession growing into a depression. And what was the answer of George Bush? Tax cuts. And what is the answer of the Republicans today? Tax cuts. For them to say they are for fiscal responsibility and honest budgeting after those 8 years is laughable. The Obama administration is going to give it straight to the American people tonight. They have made a hash out of it, and we are going to try to fix it, but it is going to take some time.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today on a motion offered pursuant to this order, it adjourn to meet 10 a.m. on Tuesday, February 17, 2009, unless it sooner has received a message from the Senate transmitting its concurrence in House Concurrent Resolution 47, in which case the House shall stand adjourned pursuant to that concurrent resolution.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. There has been a lot of talk in Washington, D.C. over the last few years about the bridge to nowhere in the last highway bill, an anomaly from a lot of good investment that was in that bill. But what we have with the passage of this bill today are a lot of tax cuts to nowhere. I never met a tax cut that could build a bridge or that could rebuild 160,000 bridges in our National Highway System that need rebuilding. They are crumbling or falling or they are functionally obsolete. I never met a tax cut that could even fill in a pothole. I never met a tax cut that could build a school. I went to elementary school in a new post-World War II school. It is still there today, serving future generations of kids. That was money borrowed and money well spent. Money borrowed for tax cuts, ephemeral tax cuts--very small tax cuts--for the average family are not going to rebuild our economy, put us on the path to prosperity and put people back to work. Three Republican Senators insisted on a lot more tax cuts. They hijacked the bill because of the arcane, obsolete and, in fact, discretionary rules of the Senate. It did not need to be that way. Let's just look at a couple of things they cut. We had an amendment here on the floor of the House to add $3 billion back to transit. That would have provided for thousands of jobs. Twelve thousand buses are obsolete. There are backlogs of orders for buses sitting on the shelf. There are options that are not funded. That would have put American workers to work in building the buses, and it would have put American workers to work by driving the buses, taking Americans to work and to school. $3 billion was cut from there to make room for tax cuts. There was money cut from highways to go to tax cuts. All of the money to build schools was cut from the bill for tax cuts. The list goes on and on and on. We could have done so much more to rebuild our infrastructure with this bill. We could have done so much more to help our kids get a good education and get safe and new schools and facilities, but they went out the door to tax cuts. Now, there was one tax cut, actually, that would have helped a business in my district that employs 1,300 people. That tax cut was taken out of the bill. The CEO called me yesterday, saying, ``We'll probably be closing our doors because we're not going to be getting that tax relief.'' Then there is money to help the States with the deficit and with the school budgets--that's great--except it cannot be spent until July. My schools are in crisis now. They're talking about lopping a month off of the school year, and we are being told we cannot spend that money now, that you'll need it for next year. Well, we're in the last 3 months of a 9-month year. That means our cuts are going to be twice as big as they would need to be on an annual basis. We need to have access to that money now, but we won't have access to that money now under this bill. This bill ultimately is a lost opportunity, and I fear that, when it comes time to do further investments, the borrowing well may have run dry. Who is going to lend us this $800 billion to spend on these sorts of things like tax cuts? They might lend us money to build a bridge because they know it makes us more productive, and it puts people to work, and it provides returns. They might lend us money for other substantial things. They might lend us money for education, but they're going to lend us money so we can cut taxes. If they'll lend it to us, we're probably going to borrow it from China or from Japan. We'll think there are not going to be any consequences, and we'll think that maybe we can go back to the well again later when we want to meet real needs and when we want to make real investments. I fear that the well will have run dry. So I voted ``no'' today, and I am proud of that vote.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. If the Republicans hadn't run the economy into a ditch and if they had a credible alternative, maybe we'd listen to them. Tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts--tell me about a tax cut that ever built a public school. Tell me about a tax cut that ever educated a child at a public school. Tell me about a tax cut that built a bridge. We've got tax cuts to nowhere. They just want to carry on about bridges to nowhere. We've got 160,000 bridges in this country on the national highway system that are falling down. They're functionally obsolete or they are structurally deficient. A tax cut will not fix a single one of them. I guess maybe after they give the rich people all their money back, we can take up a collection for public schools, a collection to educate our kids. Maybe they'll be generous. Maybe they will even build us some bridges. I don't think so. The Republicans don't have a credible alternative. Unfortunately, this bill also has too much tax cuts in it because of Republican insistence, particularly from the Senate side. We have lost so many jobs and potential jobs in this bill because of tax cuts. Now, let's look at infrastructure spending. In this bill, $29 billion to modernize roads and bridges, rebuild roads and bridges. That creates 835,000 jobs. $18 billion for clean water environmental restoration projects, 375,000 jobs. That's $47 billion--that's 6 percent of the bill, nowhere near enough--is going to create 1.2 million jobs. That means 35 percent of the jobs in this bill come out of 6 percent of the bill, and none of them come out of the tax cuts they're talking about on that side of the aisle. Infrastructure spending was cut to make room for tax cuts. Mass transit was cut to make room for tax cuts. Two of the largest transit districts in Oregon, they're suffering the same thing as transit districts across the country. They have too many passengers so they're going to have to cut service. Americans are turning to transit to avoid high gas prices. They're turning to transit as an effective alternative and a good way to get to work, and the service is going to go away. There's no transit district in the world, not a one, that makes money, but the Republicans say, oh, we can't afford to support those transit districts; let's give the money back to people. Well, what are they going to do? How are they going to get to work? There's a lot of people who don't have an alternative. And then the making work paid tax cut, which is in this bill, is down to eight bucks a week per person. Now, I can just see, you know, someone of the generation that gets that $8, there's a lot of people in my district could use eight bucks a week, they sure could, but they don't think it's going to put America back to work. They don't think it's going to turn this economy around. They don't think that's going to give us a better future. It can help them with some essentials. It can help their kids with some essentials, but they would rather see the money invested to put other people to work in good jobs and rebuild this country and give us a better future. Eight bucks a week. I can just see, you know, 20 years from today when our kids and grandkids are still paying for the money we borrowed to give some people $8 a week back will say, Grandpa, what did you spend that eight bucks a week on because I'm paying taxes to pay that money back. Grandpa probably won't remember where the eight bucks a week went. The education cuts, to make room for tax cuts, which can mean some of the school districts in my State have to chop 20 days off the year, 20 days. Now, tax cuts aren't going to help those kids get their education. They're not going to keep those schools open. School construction, remodernization, out. Had to make room for tax cuts. Now, why are we making all this room for tax cuts when none of the Republicans are supporting the bill? Because there's three Republicans in the Senate who are writing this policy. They're more powerful than the President of the United States and the Congress combined apparently because the Senate is so dysfunctional, and they're writing the bill and they want the tax cuts. They're delivering tax cuts for these guys, and they're sticking it to the American people in terms of a meaningful jobs creation stimulus package. Veterans took a big cut. Everybody loves to come to the floor and wrap themselves in the flag and talk about how much they support our troops. You can measure it in this bill. Veterans and our servicemembers were cut in their housing and other services to make room for tax cuts. Tax cuts are not the answer. I personally think we should start over, reject the tax cut mantle from that side of the aisle, and invest the money in rebuilding this country. If we're going to borrow the money, it should provide benefits for years to come, not a transient benefit and not a tax cut.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Madam Speaker, James Richard Klonoski died on January 30, 2009, at the age of 83. It is impossible to summarize his life in a few words, but I offer this tribute. Jim was a man of sound convictions who valued and respected opposing views. He was keenly interested and engaged in politics. He was a teacher who invited his students to explore the world and challenged them to think. He understood that good teaching is full of ideas and committed himself to 40 years of excellence at the University of Oregon. He was a generous mentor and a leader who helped shape Oregon politics and politicians. Jim Klonoski believed in the future. A host of public officials in Oregon will tell you they were inspired by Professor Klonoski to hope for and to work like hell for change. His son, Jake, noted the historic inauguration of President Barack Obama was a joyous family celebration of his father's unshakable faith in a better future. Jim Klonoski's family was the center of his universe. His life was infused with love and admiration for his wife and children. His students were frequently amused and sometimes amazed by stories about the children. He was equally devoted to his wife of 30 years, Ann Aiken, and Judge Aiken was a frequent guest in his political science classes. No tribute to Jim is complete without mention of baseball. He was a fan and a fanatic. Legions of local baseball families remember Jim as a fixture at his sons' games, and area umpires no doubt recall the many tips he offered them in hopes of improving their officiating skills. There is a Japanese proverb that says ``Better than a thousand days of diligent study is one day with a great teacher.'' All of us privileged to have had our day with Jim Klonoski are grieving his unexpected death.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. I have concerns about the new plan by Treasury Secretary Geithner. Now, he is not explicitly asking the Congress for more TARP money. In fact, the Senate already gave him $350 billion more of TARP money, but they are tapping the Federal Reserve, in addition to that $350 billion, for hundreds of billions of dollars for his new plan. As the New York Times says, ``For all of its boldness, the plan largely repeats the Bush administration's approach of deferring to many of the same companies and executives who peddled risky loans and investments at the heart of the crisis.'' That's right. The people who have gotten us into this and who have enriched themselves are the people who are going to protect the taxpayers and who are going to get us out of this. I don't believe that. Some of the most glaring deficiencies of his plan are the so-called restraints on the obscene executive compensations. They are a pale shadow of what they could be. There was one good provision in TARP that almost everybody missed. It said that, if Congress passes a law, all of the past TARP agreements--all of them--will have to be brought in compliance of that law. We could get back the money they paid out in bonuses if we pass a law to do that. I would suggest Mr. Geithner should ask, but if he will not ask, we should still pass the law and begin to make taxpayers whole. Beyond that, instead of tapping the taxpayers and borrowing money, the other tremendous failure is to put in place a mechanism to pay for this in the names of the American taxpayers in this generation and in the two generations to come. A modest imposition of a transfer tax--something we had from 1917, it was doubled during the Great Depression and only expired in the sixties--a transfer tax of up to one-quarter of 1 percent, something the British have on the London Exchange, would raise about $150 billion a year. Wall Street--those scions of ``lift yourselves up by the bootstraps; we are capitalist types''--could pay for their own bailout. Now, there are a couple of things wrong with the proposal. One is it would hurt some speculators. Of course, people seem to think there is some value in speculators because some of them trade on one-tenth of 1 percent or less margin 100 or 1,000 times a day. It wouldn't hurt people whose 401(k)s have already been decimated. In fact, it would stabilize the markets, and it wouldn't put the taxpayers on the hook. It would be Wall Street on the hook. Now, I don't know what is wrong with that. I don't think Main Street America thinks there is anything wrong with that, but somehow, downtown at the Treasury, Mr. Geithner and, obviously, Wall Street think that's wrong. So let's protect the taxpayers. Let's raise the money from Wall Street, itself, and let's put in meaningful and punitive restrictions on executive compensation, and if they want to go work somewhere else, good luck to them. Mr. Geithner said, ``Oh, they'll all go work for foreign banks.'' Good. Maybe they'll ruin the foreign banks, too, and that will give us a competitive advantage in the future when we grow our small- and medium-sized banks that didn't gamble like these jerks on Wall Street.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Last week the Congressional Oversight Panel of the so- called TARP program, the bank bailout program, announced that George Bush and his buddy, Henry ``Hank'' Paulson from Wall Street but who, for a little while stood in as Secretary of the Treasury, paid $254 billion for $167 billion worth of assets in the name of the American taxpayer. They lost 34 cents on every dollar. Now, how is it that Henry ``Hank'' Paulson came out of Wall Street with $700 million? He was so smart, but somehow, as Secretary of the Treasury, he couldn't get full value for the dollar for the American taxpayer? We want our money back. It's time to impose a tiny transfer tax on all securities exchanges and derivatives on Wall Street to pay back the taxpayers for the still unfolding scandal. We want our money back.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. The needs are great. There are many projects on the shelf. We heard from the President's hometown, the head of the Transit Authority, $500 million on the shelf. Bus options. Ready to go. They need the money. Critical repairs. Ready to go. Engineering work done. They just need the money. Under the original proposal of this bill, they would have only got less than half that. Now we get them closer to the $500 million. We are still not there. This is a good start. And if there's any transit director or any airport director or any Department of Transportation head or Governor across the country who can't find worthwhile investments to put people to work for these projects, given our transportation infrastructure deficits, then they will be looking for a job in the near future because that money will go to another State, another transit district, another airport that can spend it productively and put people to work and meet America's transportation infrastructure needs.

Mr. DeFAZIO. I thank the gentleman. We have had the greatest 1-year increase in transit ridership in 50 years. Americans are loving their transit systems to death. Yet, there is $160 billion deferred maintenance on these systems. 12,000 buses have passed their useful life; they are patched together, they are limping along, they are maintenance heavy, they are dirty. They need to be replaced. There are 10,000 options for new buses, buses made in America. They can't be executed because our transit systems don't have the money. If we pass this amendment, thousands of those new fuel efficient, cleaner buses will be purchased, putting Americans to work in the bus manufacturing and all through the supply chain, in addition to helping people get to work in a more fuel efficient and more comfortable way. I urge support of the amendment.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. I thank the gentleman. For 8 long years our Republican colleagues stood shoulder-to-shoulder with George Bush as our country accelerated its slide toward a third world infrastructure. The collapse of the bridge in Minnesota is perhaps the signal moment of the Bush administration. What did they do before and what have they done after for our infrastructure? Nothing. They didn't believe in investing in our public infrastructure. Tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts. Tax cuts never built a single highway. Tax cuts never built a transit system. Tax cuts never replaced a bridge. Tax cuts are not the answer to all of America's problems. We need to invest in our public infrastructure in this country. The most solid core point of this bill is what we are debating right now, more than $40 billion of investment in the future of America putting our highways and our bridges back in good repair, rebuilding our transit systems, beginning to provide new capacity, to get people more efficiently to work, to avoid the costs of congestion, the costs of the deficient services we suffer. These are jobs. I heard someone, some bizarre Republican stand up earlier and say something about the difference between work and jobs. This is work that puts Americans to work, and it's jobs, and it rebuilds our country. I don't quite get what point that person was making. And it's not a tax cut. It's real investment. I can justify borrowing money to build a bridge or a transit system that will serve the next two or three or four or five generations of Americans a lot more than I can justify a tax cut which is gone tomorrow and did nothing to rebuild our future. They lack vision. In this we will buy American products. ``Buy American'' is the theme of transportation policy in this country. We will buy buses made in America. We will even start buying street cars for the first time made in America.

Mr. DeFAZIO. We are going to rebuild our bridges made with steel in America, concrete sourced in America, labor of American workers. This is the core of this bill. It's not enough, in my opinion, and I have made that clear and made some angry by saying that, as has the chairman. But it is a good, solid down payment and a solid core for an American recovery with these investments. Stop talking just about one-note tax cuts. They didn't work for George Bush. They are not going to work today. We need to begin real investment and rebuilding our future, transportation infrastructure. This is the core of this bill.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Madam Speaker, today's headlines are pretty grim about job losses across America. The Bush legacy lives on. George Bush has made a horrible hash out of this economy with his trickle-down economics favoring those at the top, with his deregulatory policies, dismantling those things which protect consumers, people's 401(k)s and their investments from fraud and abuse, and with his unnecessary war. President Obama sees and realizes the pain across America and wants to take positive steps to put people back to work and get this economy back on course. That is the good news. The bad news is that I don't believe the President is well-served by a number of his economic advisers. Some of them do not now, nor have they ever believed, that rebuilding the foundations of our economy with investment in infrastructure, putting millions to work, increasing the wealth of the country, making us more efficient and competitive in the international economy, delivering our goods more fuel effectively, getting people out of congestion in their cars and getting them to work more efficiently, they don't think those are good investments. They say that is not what we want. They want tax cuts. They want other spending that is more immediate. We do not need another consumer-driven, borrowed-money--because all this money is borrowed--bubble for this economy. We need to get back to basics. We need to rebuild our foundations. Unfortunately, this bill dedicates about 6 percent, 6 percent of $825 billion, to our transportation infrastructure. In contrast, the Chinese are spending, over the next 2 years, $600 billion on their transportation infrastructure to make their country more fuel efficient, to make their country more competitive. And we in the United States can only come up with $40 billion for transportation infrastructure? They say that it can't be spent quickly enough. That is not true. The list of deferred maintenance in projects is long. The known need far exceeds that short-term outlook, just for this year's deficiency in investment. We could spend much more, we could spend it more productively, and we could put millions of Americans back to work. For every $1 billion we spend on transportation infrastructure, by the most conservative of estimates, you get a six times multiplier effect in the economy and you put 28,000 to 30,000 people to work. For a dollar in tax cuts, you get back, depending on whether or not people spend them or use it to replenish their depleted savings, very, very little stimulative effect. The Bush tax cuts, $160 billion borrowed last spring, gave us a whole one-quarter of one percent bounce in one quarter for the economy. $160 billion borrowed, an obligation for the next 30 years for our kids and grandkids, and that is what we got? No, we need more substantial investment. There a lot of talk about ``shovel-ready.'' There is a lot of talk about infrastructure. We need to deliver on those promises, and thus far this legislation that is being proposed falls short. I don't fault my colleagues here. It is coming from the Senate. It is coming from downtown. But we can do better. We are the people's House, the House of Representatives. We don't need to have $275 billion in tax cuts and we don't need to take those dictates from somewhere else, and particularly the President's advisers when they are wrong. I know the President's heart is in the right place. I am hoping we can do a better bill.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. Madam Speaker, I congratulate the President-elect on being in touch with the American people in understanding the pain on Wall Street, of job losses, of foreclosures, and of the sense of urgency. I share the sense of urgency he brings to this issue and the idea that we need a significant new investment--stimulus, whatever you want to call it--in America to turn things around. That's the good news. The bad news is I don't believe he is well served by his economic advisers. These are your typical pointy-headed, academic economists who think that what we need is to return to a speculative, consumer-driven society, not a wealth-oriented, production-driven society with a strong foundation. They want instant gratification with five times as much in tax cuts as investment in infrastructure in this country, a country with a $1.6 trillion infrastructure deficit--a crumbling water system, sewer systems, roads, bridges. One hundred sixty thousand bridges in this country on the National Highway System, let alone the local, are structurally deficient or are functionally obsolete. Our transit systems are operating with obsolescent or obsolete equipment. Now, the investments in these areas aren't all shovel-ready. They're going to drop this shovel-ready 60 days, going to be done in 18 months. We are in deep trouble in this country, and rebuilding the foundation and the underpinnings of this economy is going to be critical toward a long-term recovery effort. When you invest in these things, you put people to work. These are much better than tax cuts. Now, you don't have to take it from me. Yes, he has his economic advisers--Mr. Summers and others--but I would rather take advice from Paul Krugman, who just got the Nobel Prize for Economics. He says, ``And bear in mind that even a project that delivers its main punch in, say, 2011 can provide significant economic support in earlier years. If Mr. Obama drops the `jump-start' metaphor, if he accepts the reality that we need a multi-year program rather than a short burst of activity, he can create a lot more jobs through government investment even in the near term.'' He goes on to say, ``So my advice to the Obama team is to scrap the business tax cuts and, more important, to deal with the threat of doing too little by doing more, and the way to do more is to stop talking about jump-starts and look more broadly at the possibilities for government investment.'' How about a national high-speed rail network? That would take decades. It would cost hundreds of billions of dollars, but it would build a future for America. The emergencies would be built here. The cars would be built here. The tracks would be built here. It's so much more fuel-efficient than our current modes of transportation. How about our existing transit system--the 12,000 obsolete buses or the need for new streetcar systems? These projects, yes, can't be going in 60 or in 90 days. Well, a few of them actually can. In fact, we have a list on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee from both local and State and national groups that totals a couple hundred billion dollars. Yet Mr. Summers poo-poos the idea that there is an adequate amount of investment that can be begun and made in the short term, and he'd rather send it out in checks of about $8 per pay period to Americans. I don't think the people I represent believe that, if they get an extra $8 take home that that's building a strong, new foundation, giving them confidence in the future of this economy, and I certainly don't believe that banks should be able to recapture taxes they paid in the past because they've speculated themselves to the verge of insolvency, taking money from the taxpayers that they won't tell us how they've billed. Now they want to get a look-back on their taxes. That's not going to put one single person to work. It might give some CEO yet another bonus, but it's not going to put anybody to work. Let's have a much more realistic, concrete, if you will, investment in America's future rather than more of the same. The huge amount of tax cuts in this proposal sound a little bit too much like the George Bush trickle-down economy. It's time for a new direction to rebuild the foundations of this country, and I urge the President-elect to bring in his economic advisers for a little chat and, perhaps, to reorient their thinking.

Mr. DeFAZIO

Mr. DeFAZIO. After 8 years of disastrous Bush-led trickle-down deregulation, anything-goes economic policies, our economy is in a shambles. Unemployment, foreclosures, they're skyrocketing. We need to rebuild the foundations of our economy, putting Americans back to work and putting our economy on a path to recovery. I congratulate the President-elect with his sense of urgency. Shovel- ready infrastructure projects, he's put that on everybody's mind. That's excellent, tremendous public support. Unfortunately, the package is a little short on infrastructure and shovel-ready, and very long on tax cuts, the same policies that failed us during the Bush years. Five times as much for tax cuts. Will $8 a pay period additional in their take-home put Americans back to work? It's good for Americans. They're suffering. But will that rebuild our economy, put people back to work? Will a look back for the banks so they can get tax benefits, they can reclaim taxes they paid in the past, while taking TARP money and not telling us what they do with it, will that put Americans back to work? We need more investment in infrastructure and less emphasis on the tax cuts.