Blake Farenthold

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 771, introduced by my friend and colleague, the gentleman from south Texas (Mr. Cuellar), would designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 1081 Elbel Road in Schertz, Texas, as the Schertz Veterans Post Office. This bill is cosponsored by the entire Texas delegation, and I'm a proud cosponsor myself, Mr. Speaker. It's altogether fitting and proper that we designate this post office in Schertz to honor those who have sacrificed so much for this Nation--our veterans. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to commend my colleague from Texas for introducing this legislation and also commend him for introducing H.R. 1318, the South Texas Veterans Health Care Expansion Act. I'm a proud original cosponsor of this legislation as well, which is vitally important to the veterans all over south Texas. H.R. 1318 would expand health care for the more than 117,000 veterans who reside in far south Texas. Currently, without adequate medical facilities, many of these veterans are forced to drive over 6 hours to the nearest facility in order to receive needed medical care. This is unacceptable and we can do better. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to report that this legislation passed the House last week as part of the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2012, and it is my hope that the Senate will act swiftly on this measure and that the President will soon sign this important bill into law. The VA estimates nearly 49,000 veterans currently reside in the 27th Congressional District, which I am honored to represent. This makes up much of far south Texas, along with the district Mr. Cuellar and Mr. Hinojosa represent. According to the VA, Texas has an estimated 1.7 million veterans, and there are approximately 22.5 million veterans all across our Nation. To the men and women who have served, thank you for all you have done and for the countless sacrifices that you have made. I am truly grateful for your service and for the hardships you and your families have endured. I am proud to stand in this Chamber and to honor you here today with both bills, that of renaming the post office and our veterans' bill for south Texas. I urge all Members to join me in strong support of H.R. 771. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on the bill under consideration.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 771) to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 1081 Elbel Road in Schertz, Texas, as the ``Schertz Veterans Post Office''.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. I too would like to thank the gentlemen from Texas for their ongoing and continuing support for the veterans. There is not too much that we can do for the men and women who sacrifice time and again for our country. They sacrifice their time; they sacrifice their work; and sadly, in some cases, they are asked to sacrifice their lives. I stand in strong support of this bill, and urge my colleagues to pass H.R. 771, renaming the post office in Schertz, Texas, the Schertz Veterans Post Office. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. I again urge all Members to support passage of S. 349. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the bill under consideration.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1632) to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 5014 Gary Avenue in Lubbock, Texas, as the ``Sergeant Chris Davis Post Office''.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, along with my Texas colleagues, I would like to urge all Members to support passage of H.R. 1632. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to be removed as a cosponsor from H.R. 1380.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Reclaiming my time for just a second, I too am trying to lose weight and would much prefer to work with my doctor and trainer than the USDA. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. I move to strike the last word.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. You know, we in this Congress or Congresses of the past have ceded a lot of our authority to executive agencies. We have given them lots of power to regulate. They are taking over and doing an awful lot. Know Your Farmer--Know Your Food is another example of an agency going beyond what needs to be done and is something I feel they should come back to Congress for. With that, I would like to yield to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx).

Mr. FARENTHOLD. I would like to speak in opposition to this. The ranking member gives a great history lesson on how this comes out. The previous farm bill--passed by primarily Congress controlled by your side of the aisle--created a situation with our cotton subsidies that has caused a problem with Brazil, and we are trying to work it out. My colleagues on this side of the aisle and many of the colleagues on the other side of the aisle are also concerned that this government as a whole, through the regulatory process, picked the regulatory agencies, making it very difficult and unpredictable for businesses by changing the regulatory environment. Our businesses are holding back, not investing, not creating jobs. But we're about to do the same thing ourselves right here with this amendment by yanking the rug out from under our cotton farmers, who have built their businesses, made their plans based on the promise of the last farm bill. You know, I love to save money for this government. I'm none too happy to see this money going to Brazil. But we basically lost a lawsuit and we're having to pay the damages. And we're going to fix it in the regular order without yanking the rug out from under the farmers, who are the backbone of this country, by changing the rules in the middle of the game. Give us until next year to get that farm bill out, and we will address it. Even though it didn't rise to the point of order, this really does rise, in my opinion, to the level of legislating within an appropriations bill. I don't like spending the money. I don't like sending it offshore. But we cannot change the rules in the middle of the game. We cannot move the goalposts for our farmers, many of whom are small, private farmers who have built their future, taken out loans, decided to buy more land, decided to buy more equipment, based all their business decisions on the promise that this government made to them in the last farm bill. And changing the rules at this point is absolutely wrong, and I encourage my friends and my colleagues to vote against this amendment. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Chair, on rollcall No. 395, I intended to vote ``yea.'' After the time to change my vote had expired I noticed my vote had been recorded as ``nay.''

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. It's almost like a fog has been lifted over America. We sought to capture or kill Osama bin Laden for 10 years; and just recently, that was accomplished. And it's almost as if the sun is a little bit brighter and the can-do American spirit has been revived, that same spirit that took us to the Moon, that same spirit that has led us to victory in the past. Our intelligence community is key to that success, as is our military. It is absolutely imperative that we support and back the intelligence community that provides us the knowledge and information that not only helps us win wars but, more importantly, keeps us out of war. Knowledge is power. What we know about beforehand gives us the opportunity to stop conflicts before they happen. We are also in an era of a tight budget now. We are looking at an authorization bill that increases and provides adequate oversight to our intelligence to make sure those resources are being spent wisely and are being spent in the defense of this Nation, in the furtherance of our interests, and in the furtherance of freedom.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. If you don't mind, Judge. I wanted to reiterate what you were saying. You know, demonizing the speculators isn't the way to do it. The speculators are the users. They're the airlines. If you want to double what your vacation is going to cost, you take away the airline's ability to hedge their fuel prices, and you know what, if you want to stick it to the speculators, let's open the spigot and those guys betting on higher prices, they are in trouble. They're going to lose some money on that. So I just wanted to definitely reiterate that fact. And, you know, if you take a look at what this Nation's policy is today on the oil and gas industry, if you were trying to concoct a way to run up gasoline prices, you probably couldn't come up with a better way to do it than we're doing now. It is like we are intentionally trying to raise oil prices. We're limiting production. We're making production more expensive. We're using a regulatory agency to make it more difficult to drill. We're not leasing any of our land. If somebody had come to my office and said, Blake, how can we make gasoline more expensive, I'd list out exactly what the executive branch and the Federal agencies, the regulatory agencies are doing. I can't think of a way to run the prices up that they haven't. If, as we're hearing, the President's goal is to get prices down, the eighth grade is the answer. Increase the supply. That's all it takes. And it's easy to increase the supply. Sure, we can't flip a switch and do it overnight; but in a matter of months, as we open up Federal lands for leasing, as we open the gulf, as we get the permitting process under control, those prices will turn around, and they will go down. Helping the oil and gas industry lower prices does not mean we abandon alternative energy. All of the above is the answer. I think some people on the other side of this aisle and in other offices in this town believe that it's either/or. Let's strangle the oil and gas companies so our friends in the alternative energy can thrive. It's not like that. The energy demands of a modern world are such that all-of-the-above is a correct answer. wind, solar, safe nuclear, and a strong reliance on natural gas that is in the ground in supplies just 5 years ago we couldn't have imagined with the breakthroughs in technology for producing shale gas, coal. There's no one answer. Every watt of electricity, every BTU, everything we do lowers the cost and raises the standard of living of everybody here and abroad. I am sick and tired of less, less, less, either/or. This is the United States of America. This is the 21st century. Yes, we can, we can have it all, and we start at the pump. Thank you, Judge.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. I was a child.

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Thank you very much, Judge. I grew up in the oil and gas industry. My great grandfather, Rand Morgan, came to Corpus Christi after the Great Depression and was one of the pioneers in the oil and gas industry in the Saxet field by the Corpus Christi International Airport. We've been a farming ranch and an oil and gas family since before I was born, since before my father was born, and since before my grandmother was born. Rand Morgan was actually my great grandfather. And we can tell you as landowners, as outdoorsmen, as hunters, and as fishermen, the oil and gas industry is a clean industry. The men and women who work in the oil and gas industry are committed to the environment. The landowners whose land is used for domestic oil and gas production are committed to making sure the oil and gas companies do a good job and keep their land in great shape. You talk about offshore, too. Corpus Christi is the home to some of the largest fabricators of offshore oil and gas equipment in the world. Port of Brownsville has several industries building and refurbishing offshore oil and gas. And our fishermen love the offshore oil and gas rigs. They're artificial reefs. They're where you go to fish--not fishing for sport, but fishing for the fish you're going to take home and fry and eat. They're clean and they're great for the environment. And we had a horrible accident with the BP well. Our beaches in some parts of the country suffered with some contamination. I think it's the second time I remember that happening in my lifetime. The first time it happened, there was a blowout of a well in the Gulf of Mexico operated by the state-run oil and gas company of Mexico. Not a whole lot happened with that one. We had tar balls coming up on the beaches of Corpus Christi. It was an annoyance, but we took some wipes and you wiped your feet off after you got off the beach so you didn't get it on the carpet or your cars. But what we've done now as a result of the BP blowout is we've shut down the oil and gas industry--the American oil and gas industry in the Gulf of Mexico while the Chinese, the Brazilians, and the Mexicans continue to drill in the Gulf of Mexico. And there's not a thing in the world we can do to stop them or regulate how they do it. Instead, we're penalizing our oil and gas companies in the United States. We're decreasing production that's available to fuel our cars, to power our electrical generating plants, and to create the hundreds of products that rely on oil and gas. Our focus is wrong. We should be looking at ways to increase production and increase safety and increase our ability to respond in the event there is another accident. We need to be training the Coast Guard. We need to be training our industry personnel. We need to be developing the technology to contain it and to protect our beaches from oil and gas spills that may happen as a result of the activities of any country in the world. We have the opportunity to be the technological leaders in this and get our domestic oil and gas industry back on track and get the price of gasoline back down to reasonable levels. We're getting to $4 and $5 a gallon of gasoline. That doesn't just ruin your summer vacation. It starts to ruin your life. You can cut down on driving, you can take the bus, you can take public transportation. But those avocados Judge Carter was talking about, they can't. They have got to get to your grocery store in a truck. Every good or service that you use or buy is affected by the price of oil and gas. It's going to run the price of everything up. We have got to get this under control, and we have got to exploit our domestic energy sources. I agree with Judge Carter, Texas is the leader in wind farms. It's a beautiful sight as I drive down Ocean Drive in Corpus Christi, looking across the bay at the windmills across over by Sinton, Taft, and Portland. That's the future. But you can't put a windmill on a car. You have got to have oil and gas to run your cars. Now, we can get into a discussion about we probably need to be focused on getting cars working on natural gas as a more cost-effective way to do it. We've got a great abundance of natural gas, but we have got to get rid of the moratorium--the de facto moratorium that is crippling the oil and gas industry in the Gulf of Mexico. It's running prices up. It's costing us jobs in Texas. I want to talk just for a second, if you don't mind, Judge Carter, about the portrayal of the oil and gas industry as being an evil industry. It's real easy to talk about these big corporations, big oil and gas producers like Exxon and BP. I have got two things to say about that. First of all, I imagine if you have got a retirement plan or pension, you're an owner of one of these oil and gas companies. Your pension plan, your mutual fund, they're all investors in these companies. But that being said, really the bulk of the oil and gas are produced by small businesses, by independent operators who are one, two, three, five, 10, 20-man operations that take a chance, go out there and explore and drill. And every time they find a prospect, they go out there and raise some money. They put their money on the line. And they are on the line. If they drill a dry hole, they're going to have to struggle to get their next paycheck. But this is the entrepreneurial spirit that built America. These men and women are not evil. They are our neighbors. They're concerned about the environment. They're concerned about this country. And they want the price of gasoline that you put in your car to be reasonable. They're not profit gouging. We can show charts about how the price of gas is going up and why it's going up, but it's not that hard a question to look at. If you took a middle school government class and you studied economics and finance, you learned about something called supply and demand. And supply, especially in this country, is down because we can't drill and produce offshore. We can't drill and produce in massive areas of land that's controlled by the Federal Government. And we've got a regulatory scheme that's looking at making new technologies to produce energy that's more expensive and possibly illegal. So the supply is down. Then you look across the globe at our competitors--China, India, Korea. All of these countries are seeing newfound wealth. The old movies where the Chinese would ride around on bicycles, that's not the way it is in Beijing anymore. The Chinese are driving cars. Their factories are using oil and gas, and they're competing in the international market for that oil and gas. Our national security, our economic security, and our very freedom lies in exploring, finding, and producing our domestic energy resources. That's the way we're going to keep America free. That's the way we're going to keep the costs of our goods and services down. And that's the way we're going to keep the price of gasoline in check. Thank you, Judge.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. To balance our budget, we have got to do more than just cut spending. We've got to cut excessive government regulation that keeps businesses from growing, expanding and hiring more people. We have got to get rid of the culture of ``no'' that infects our regulatory agencies like a cancer. A small business from south Texas that knows firsthand the detrimental impact of shortsighted and excessive regulation is Zarsky Lumber Company with its 135 employees. They survived the Great Depression and this economic downturn, and they now face another big threat--the EPA and its job-killing rules. Another large business is considering locating a new plant in China instead of south Texas to avoid oppressive regulations. Our government has become too big and Federal regulations too onerous. In a recent meeting with a Federal agency, I asked how long their permitting process took. They told me between 3 and 7 years. How do regulators sleep at night knowing that every day they delay is a day someone doesn't get a job they need to support their families? Our job is to help create jobs. And we create jobs by getting the government out of the way. Cutting redtape is just as important as cutting spending to get our financial house in order.

Mr. FARENTHOLD

Mr. FARENTHOLD. Thank you very much. I rise in support of this amendment as well. With off-the-shelf available technology, this type of mapping can be done at little or no cost, increasing safety to aviation, especially those involved in rural aviation like crop dusters and the like.