Peter Deutsch

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, there is an expression that most of us have heard: ``If it walks like a duck and it sounds like a duck and it quacks like a duck and it smells like a duck, then it is probably a duck.'' But we might want to change that in this Chamber to say that ``Maybe it is Newt Gingrich.'' My, my, my--a special tax break for Rupert Murdoch, $63 million, and then blaming it on Senator Moseley-Braun. All of us might think so, but no one in America believes it. Mr. Speaker, Mr. Gingrich, no one in American believes that it was Senator Mosley-Braun. You know it was you. You know what was involved. It would not have happened without you, and it is wrong. It is business as usual in this Chamber, and it is wrong. I urge the President to veto this legislation. He needs to veto it. It is not what the American people want. It is the absolute wrong way we ought to be conducting ourselves in this Chamber.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this amendment. This amendment clarifies what the committee tried to do in terms of making sure that a renter of a product is not automatically liable in that situation, and I urge the adoption of the amendment.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a former member of this body, the Honorable Dante Fascell. For over 40 years, Dante Fascell represented the people of south Florida in both the State legislature and the U.S. Congress. Very few Americans can claim to have had as distinguished a record of service to their country as Dante Fascell. Born in New York in 1917, his family relocated to Florida when he was 8 years old. He earned his law degree from the University of Miami in 1938, and then served his country with honor in WWII from 1941-46. After leaving the Army, he returned to the private practice of law until he was elected to the Florida State Legislature in 1951. Three years later, he was elected to the U.S. Congress in 1954, where he served with honor until his retirement in 1992. Dante Fascell came to Congress when virtually all of south Florida was one congressional district. Perhaps no other man has had a greater impact on the face of today's south Florida. He authored the bill that made the Florida Keys a national marine sanctuary, as well as barring offshore drilling there. In 1990, Mr. Fascell enacted legislation that created the prestigious North-South Center at the University of Miami, to foster understanding and better relations within our hemisphere. As chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, he was a tireless advocate for Radio Marti and the National Endowment for Democracy, both of which promoted the ideas of democracy around the world. He also co- authored the War Powers Resolution of 1973 which required the President to consult with Congress before initiating any military action against a foreign power. Dante Fascell continues to be active in these issues today, currently serving on the board of trustees of the North-South Center and with a number of other activities and organizations in the Miami area.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Dr. Joel Frankel for his outstanding contributions to his community and his profession. The Concordia Chapter of the City of Hope, National Medical Center, and the Beckman Research Institute have chosen to present their annual Spirit of Life Humanitarian Award to Dr. Frankel for his over 25 years of outstanding commitment to the people of Broward County, and to the science of medicine. Dr. Frankel was born and raised in Israel. Following service in the Israeli Army, he moved to New York City to pursue higher education. He graduated magna cum laude from Adelphi University, and went on to study medicine at the State University of New York. Following his graduation from medical school, he spent 5 years at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami Beach, where he became board certified in both internal medicine and pulmonary diseases. For the last 15 years he has practiced pulmonary medicine in west Broward County, and is on the staff of several area hospitals. He is chief of staff of Sunrise Rehab Hospital, and is a member of the board of trustees. Although he thrived within the medical establishment, he is also an innovator. Dr. Frankel is a founder and chairman of the board of the Florida Institute of Health. FIH is a rapidly growing multispecialty group practice that began in 1993 and currently is composed of 50 physicians and serves approximately 70,000 patients. Dr. Frankel and his wife Ellen have been married for 27 years, and they have 2 children, Michael, 21; and Stacy, 17. Dr. Frankel's contributions to his community make him eminently worthy of the award being bestowed upon him. City of Hope, one of America's foremost medical and research centers, is dedicated to patient care, education, and research in leukemia and other cancers, diseases of the heart, lung, blood, and basic studies in genetics, the neuroscience, diabetes, and AIDS. I salute Dr. Frankel and the City of Hope for their exemplary public service.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to ask that my colleagues in the House join me in commemorating the 97th anniversary of the destruction of the battleship U.S.S. Maine in Havana Harbor, Cuba, on this day, February 15, 1898. Today in the city of Key West, FL, a prominent group of citizens has gathered to announce the formation of the U.S.S. Battleship Maine Centennial Commission. They are meeting at the historic Key West Custom House where on the second floor a naval court of inquiry convened by President William McKinley met to hear testimony from all the survivors, officers and crew, of the U.S.S. Maine, on several occasions in March 1898. The centennial commission, under the sponsorship of the Key West Art & Historical Society, and Richard Warren, chairman, City Commissioner Joseph Pais, vice chair, and Radm. Ret. Nick Gee, vice chair, wish to call to the attention of all Americans the importance of commemorating the 100th anniversary of this tragic event that destroyed the proud battleship, that killed 260 crew and officers out of 350, and that propelled this great Nation into a war with Spain to the cry of ``Remember the Maine.'' This war, the Spanish-American War, that ``splendid little war,'' would lead to the freedom of the Philippines. Puerto Rico, Guam, and the island of Cuba. Today in Key West, this group of citizens prepares to honor the men of the Maine who died without the ability to defend themselves in Havana Harbor on February 15, 1898. They will honor that great steel battleship that had celebrated Christmas of 1897 in Key West Harbor and been ready to sail forth to Cuba on January 24, 1898, to assist, if necessary, Americans in the city on Havana, Cuba. These citizens will proudly remember the Maine and all of the great naval vessels that have visited the port of Key West and the near waters. Today they will recall the great Cuban patriots that gathered in Key West throughout the 1890's in the long struggle to cast off the yoke of Spanish tyranny that had laid waste to Cuba. Key West will remember those days in which journalists, war correspondents, Members of Congress, and military leaders strode to the dusty streets following the story that war always unfolds. These were people like Frederic Remington, Robley D. Evans, Stephen Crane, Randolph Hearst, Richard Harding Davis, Admirals Sampson and Schley, and Clara Barton of the Red Cross. Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter have, thus far, joined me as honorary members of the U.S.S. Maine Centennial Commission. During the next several months the commission will be seeking members from throughout the United States, the great State of Florida, and that little bit of paradise called Key West. I call on all of us here assembled to join Key West and the centennial commission in recognizing their proud efforts. And, together, let us all remember that battleship U.S.S. Maine and her crew.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that my name be removed as a cosponsor of the bill H.R. 555.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Chairman, during rollcall vote No. 112 on H.R. 667 I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present I would have voted ``no.'' amendment offered by mr. riggs

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I have been supportive of this type of legislation. I have voted for it when I was in the State legislature. I have been supportive since I have been in Congress. What is in front of us right now, though, is specifically the Towns amendment, and what it deals with in terms of interstate pollution. Mr. Chairman, as has been pointed out previously, for Members here who are from upwind States or upriver States, it is not quite the same type of intensity that it has in States like Florida. Florida in many ways is the ultimate downriver state. As far as I am aware, we have no rivers that flow into other States. We are the repository of downstream pollution from other States, whether it be Georgia or Alabama or Mississippi. In a State like Florida, and in a district like my own, which is the downstream end of the downstream State representing the south end, the tip of the State, Florida Bay and the Everglades area, where it is the downstream end of the downstream State, we have very little control over what occurs upstream. Specifically, again, Mr. Chairman, if we focus on what this amendment is about, in parts of this country like Florida, without this amendment passing a very well-intentioned bill and a very good bill will have some exceptionally bad results. Just as we see progress being made, particularly again, in my State, in my district in Florida Bay, some of that progress, and the law is changing on it, and the regulations are changing on a yearly basis, some of that progress will clearly be a detriment. There are other areas in the country that have similar concerns. There are other areas in the country that have similar concerns, and what I would hope is that Members on the other side of the aisle who are in communities and in districts and in States that have these unique type problems focus on their district concerns more than their leadership concerns in the vote when it comes up this afternoon.

Mr. DEUTSCH

Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I rise to voice my support for S. 2, the Congressional compliance bill, and the conference report which passed the House on January 17, 1995. As the record shows, I voted in support of this measure twice: Once on August 10, 1994 at the close of the 103d Congress (H.R. 4822); and again on January 4, 1995, when the House of Representatives passed this measure in the 104th Congress. Accordingly, had I not been unavoidably detained in travel, I would have voted ``yea'' on the vote for S. 2.