Porter Goss

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I am pleased to yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend, the distinguished gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hall), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for purposes of debate only. Mr. Speaker, this is a fair and straightforward closed rule for a very important piece of legislation. The rule waives all points of order against consideration of the bill and provides that the amendment in the nature of a substitute printed in the Congressional Record shall be considered as adopted. This is largely a noncontroversial bill. As no members of the minority testified differently last night at the Committee on Rules, this rule should receive unanimous support, and I urge support. This reauthorization of the Ryan White CARE Act recognizes the changing demographics of the AIDS epidemic in our country in a way that truly honors the memory of the courageous young boy for which the bill was originally named. Today, there are between 800,000 and 900,000 persons living with HIV in the United States of America with some 40,000 new infections annually. This conference report seeks to shift resources to the most needy areas while preserving the best features of the current programs. The gentleman from Virginia (Chairman Bliley) should be commended for his leadership and attention to this critical public health issue which is of concern to every Member of this body. I am hopeful that the progress made on this authorization will spur funding for another essential program for individuals afflicted with the HIV virus. As my colleagues remember and well know, this House led the way and adopted the Ricky Ray Authorization Act in the last Congress. It authorized $750 million for compassion assistance and recognition to hemophiliacs who contracted AIDS through no fault of their own because of contaminated blood products in the 1980s. Now, the first installment was provided last year, and this year the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Young) of the Committee on Appropriations should be commended for exceeding the President's request in the House version of the Fiscal Year 2001 Labor-HHS appropriation bill for the next installment. As negotiations continue and we near the end of this Congress, I am hopeful that the White House will become fully engaged on the Ricky Ray funding problem and work with leadership and Congress to provide full funding for these victims as soon as humanly possible. The need is great and the time is now. I am confident that, if the White House shows true leadership and demonstrates that this problem is really a top priority for them, we will be able to move further toward full funding this year. Obviously we cannot undo the tragic events of the 1980s, but we can work to provide assistance to these individuals before it is any later. Mr. Speaker, this rule should engender little debate. It is a fair rule for a good bill. I urge its adoption. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 611 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 4392) to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2001 for intelligence and intelligence-related activities of the United States Government, the Community Management Account, and the Central Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability System, and for other purposes, with a Senate amendment thereto, disagree to the Senate amendment, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this rule and the underlying legislation. I thank the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce), my good friend for not only her leadership but yielding me this time. I appreciate very much the observations of the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Moakley), who well understands the plight of our veterans. Mr. Speaker, my home State of Florida has about 1.7 million veterans, that is a lot of veterans, and it serves as home to thousands more during our busy winter season, which is about to start. Given what we are told about the price of heating oil this year, I expect we are going to have an awful lot of visitors to Florida. Given the age and special needs of the population, many of these men and women require extensive medical attention. The lack of timely, quality health care for our veterans has reached a crisis point across our Nation, as the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) has pointed out, but the problem is even more acute in southwest Florida. Sadly, the need far exceeds our resources in southwest Florida, and it is not because we have not been trying. Veterans routinely wait months, sometimes over a year, just to get an appointment for something as simple as vision care or hearing care, and to make matters worse, many are forced to drive hundreds of miles to a VA facility in order to receive the medical attention they require when high-quality private facilities are located right around the corner from their homes. This is sort of an unacceptable way to treat those who have served our country so honorably when we needed them so much. H.R. 5109 begins to address this injustice by establishing a program to allow vets in remote areas to receive care at non-VA facilities at the VA expense. This program would not only relieve the stress of a long drive on an ailing veteran, but it would also introduce more choice into the current VA health system. Veterans in rural areas would finally have a choice between the traditional VA care and the utilization of private medical facilities. Introducing free market values into the VA medical system in my view will likely improve the quality of medical attention received by our Nation's veterans, and they deserve the best. It is time we enable our veterans to have this right to choose, and I think this bill gets us going on that road. It is also about time we treat veterans the same, no matter where they live. They certainly earned that. I think the veterans in southwest Florida should not be discriminated against just because so many of them have found out that southwest Florida is a great place to live and have moved there. Mr. Speaker, it seems to me the facilities ought to follow the veterans. I strongly encourage my colleagues to support the rule, I think it is noncontroversial, and the bill. And I want to congratulate the gentleman from Arizona (Chairman Stump) and all of the other people who have participated in bringing this forward for their leadership and commitment to veterans. When we talked at the testimony at the Committee on Rules last evening, the gentleman from Arizona (Chairman Stump) indicated his clear awareness of this problem and his sympathy for our problems in Fort Myers and for that I am grateful.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Madam Speaker, I come to the floor with a great sense of pride and admiration to recognize the National Reconnaissance Office, the NRO, for 40 years of outstanding service to our Nation. Since its beginning as a small covert organization on 31 of August 1960 during the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the NRO has developed an unprecedented capability to conduct signals and photographic reconnaissance from space, a capability that to this day remains unmatched by any other nation in the world. Part of the success during the last 4 decades is due to the partnership between American industry and the NRO's highly capable workforce. This workforce, which consists of government civilians and military members of the four services, has consistently delivered new and innovative satellite systems that provide critical intelligence information to our national policymakers and to our military and civilian officials during periods of peace or in crisis or in war. Its record of outstanding technological achievement has rightly earned the NRO the title of Freedom's Sentinel in Space. As one of 13 Members of the intelligence community, the NRO has been very skillfully managed throughout its history by the Secretary of Defense and the director of Central Intelligence. Today the NRO provides systems that push the limits of reconnaissance capability to acquire enhanced images of the Earth and an ever-expanding variety and volume of electromagnetic signals. NRO space systems serve us daily from making it possible to verify arms control treaties to aiding in protecting American lives throughout the world, Americans at home and abroad. For these many important achievements and the promise of continued excellence in space reconnaissance during the years ahead, we heartily congratulate the men and women of the NRO past and present on the occasion of the organizations's 40th anniversary.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that, notwithstanding any adjournment of the House until Wednesday, September 6, 2000, the Speaker, majority leader, and minority leader be authorized to accept resignations and to make appointments authorized by law or by the House.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I offer a preferential motion.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the business in order under the Calendar Wednesday rule be dispensed with on Wednesday, September 6, 2000.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, nobody in the Clinton-Gore administration talks much about the situation in Haiti anymore, even though the situation there is very desperate. I find this regrettable because any reasonable observer will say that the Clinton-Gore policy has failed badly, that there is no democracy in Haiti, and that Haiti's leaders have returned to the old ways of solving problems through violence and intimidation, fear, repression, and even murder. The Haitian parliament has been shuttered since President Preval dissolved it in 1998. A few weeks ago, Haiti held elections that were supposed to have seated a new parliament and provided a road map out of the government crisis that has been going on so long; but Aristide partisans perverted the election process, producing election count results that no international observer is able to certify as legitimate. Haiti's friends around the world have weighed in with concern and condemnation, whether it is the OAS, CARICOM, the U.N., Japan, France, and so forth. But to illustrate what is really going on in Haiti, I want to tell the story of Mr. Leon Manus. Mr. Manus is the president of Haiti's provisional electoral council. That is the body that oversaw the recent balloting. It is a body that is meant to ensure full, fair, free, democratic, transparent elections; but one will not find President Manus in Port-au-Prince or anywhere else in Haiti, for that matter. The fact is that Mr. Manus was chased out of his country in fear of his life and his family's lives. He is here in the United States seeking political asylum. How did this happen? Why did this happen? According to an accurate report in the Los Angeles Times, Mr. Manus' relatives say that Manus was summoned to the presidential palace after the elections, where President Preval and former President Aristide pressured him to certify the recent fraudulent election count as valid, but Mr. Manus steadfastly refused. He would not be a party to corruption, and he left the presidential palace and began what turned out to be a several-day flight in fear of his life that eventually led him to the safety here in the United States of America. I recently had the opportunity to meet with Mr. Manus. I can say he is an absolutely committed man, committed to democracy and to a deep love for his family and his country. I think he wants nothing more than to return to his country and build a true democracy, but he cannot do so as long as the power in Haiti remains usurped by the new dictators there, and these are the very same folks the United States returned to power just a few years ago. Make no mistake about what is going on in Haiti. Certainly factions of the country have been slowly and deliberately silencing their enemies and laying the groundwork for totalitarian rule, which we witnessed today. These people are not interested in democracy. They are not interested in helping their people find a better life, and they desperately need one in Haiti. They are only interested in preserving their own power; and as all of this has gone on, the Clinton and Gore administration has been inept and in denial. Time and time again they have passed up opportunity to make clear to the Haitian leadership what it means to practice democracy, to build democratic institutions. I cannot fathom why they continue to defend the situation in Haiti or aid and abet the activities of the Aristide crowd. They are not Democrats. Given this total failure, Congress must act to help stop the move toward dictatorship in Haiti. In this year's foreign operations bill, the House voted to prohibit any aid to the government of Haiti with a few exceptions such as counterdrug assistance and humanitarian food aid for the people and medicine for the sick. This is a good first step, but there is plenty more to be done. Another good and logical step would be for the United States to revoke visas issued to corrupt Haitian government officials who are credibly alleged to be involved in narcotics trafficking, money laundering, and other crimes. Haiti's leaders have turned their backs on democracy and, saddest of all, have turned their backs on their own people. The Clinton administration has fumbled U.S. policy toward Haiti at a cost of billions to the American taxpayer and immeasurable suffering to the Haitian people. Mr. Speaker, I challenge the Clinton-Gore administration to publicly admit their failure in Haiti, and I invite them to join in a policy that supports democracy rather than Aristide and his cronies.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize an outstanding American who has faithfully served our country for the past 32 years, General John A. Gordon. General Gordon, who retired from the Air Force earlier this month, was awarded two commendations this morning in a ceremony at the George Bush Center for Intelligence. George Tenet, Director of Central Intelligence, awarded him the National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medal; and General Michael Ryan, Air Force Chief of Staff, awarded him the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal. John Gordon's Air Force career began in 1968, and his early assignments were in the highly scientific areas of weapons research, development and acquisition. He went on to serve as a long-range planner at the Strategic Air Command. He was then assigned as a politico-military affairs officer at the Department of State. He returned to the real Air Force as commander of the 90th Strategic Missile Wing. General Gordon also served our country as a staff officer with the National Security Council and in several senior Department of Defense planning and policy-making positions. Joining the intelligence community late in his career, General Gordon was first appointed as associate director of Central Intelligence for Military Support back in 1996. Following that assignment, he was named Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, the second-highest ranking intelligence officer in the United States, a position he held with great distinction from October of 1997 through June of this year. His tenure came at a time when the intelligence community was rebuilding in response to new threats to the United States national security that have emerged since the end of the Cold War, things we know as transnational threats, terrorism, weapons proliferation, weapons of mass destruction proliferation, illegal arms sales, narcotics, those types of things. As DDCI, General Gordon worked closely with Congress and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence to improve U.S. intelligence capability and to safeguard sensitive national security information. General Gordon brought a singular sense of purpose to the Deputy Director's job that was highly valued by those inside and outside the intelligence community. I would like to point out, despite the fact that he does not have a background in intelligence, John Gordon would have made a great case officer. Last year he took time to sit down with a group of high school students from my district, some of the top students in southwest Florida. After he spoke to them, several were ready to sign up for a career in the U.S. intelligence community; and this comes in an era where many gifted students are leaving school early to earn a fortune in a new digital economy. I think General Gordon has another career out there as a recruiter for Intelligence if he wants it. From this gentleman's perspective, it was a pleasure to work with General Gordon while he wore the uniform of the United States Air Force. I am sure he will bring the same diligence and professionalism and integrity to his first civilian job as the Under Secretary of Energy for Nuclear Security and the first administrator for the National Nuclear Security Administration. As we all know, our nuclear secrets and weapons abilities will be more secure, and needs to be more secure in places like Los Alamos, with John Gordon as their steward. We look forward to his taking up the reins. On behalf of the members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I would like to thank General John Gordon for his continuing service to our Nation. I wish John and his wife, Marilyn, and their daughter, Jennifer, all the best for their future. I offer sincere gratitude for the family sacrifices I know have been made to allow General Gordon to commit so much time and energy to distinguish himself in critical 7-day-a-week, 24-hour-a-day top-level jobs that he has done so well. That is a great contribution to our country. It deserves to be recognized.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I rise to say a few words about William Russell Mote. Mr. Mote passed away a few days ago after a long and productive life, as Members heard my colleague, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Miller), announce from this podium a few minutes ago. I suppose not every American may know the Mote name, but surely they have been affected by his life and his generosity. William Mote contributed measurably to our understanding of the oceans and the fishes and other life in the oceans, helping us to learn how to be good stewards, taking care of these natural resources. Mr. Mote's accomplishments are very many, but I think his most notable one from my perspective was the establishment and the sustainment, the very generous sustainment, of the world-recognized Mote Marine Research Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida. Prior to redistricting in 1990 in Florida, I used to represent Sarasota and the Mote Marine Lab where it is. I can tell Members that today it is one of the premier marine laboratories in the world, an opinion that is quickly seconded by experts in this field, I would add. Mote Marine is a very busy, very professional, and very accomplished institution, just like its founder. While Mr. Mote has passed on, all of us are going to continue to benefit enormously from his life and the Mote Marine Laboratory, which continues on. We are in his debt for that. I would like to pass along to the many members of the Mote Marine laboratory community and their families my sincere condolences from myself and my wife, Mariel, and of course from other friends from southwest Florida which I now represent who understand the Mote Marine Laboratory and knew Mr. Mote well. We appreciate greatly the legacy that he leaves us of awareness about the oceans and how fragile they are, and that the fishes and the critters and mammals in that ocean do need stewardship, now that mankind has made such a strong imprint on our globe; the educational efforts that are being made at Mote Marine to share knowledge with people who need that knowledge and want that knowledge to push forward into the horizons of the unknown in our oceans; and of course, the research that is done there in so many areas. I have memories myself going back when I was a city councilman in the city of Sanibel trying to deal with the scourge of red tide, which is something that occasionally visits the Florida beaches. It is a very unpleasant thing, with dead fish and a bad smell, and it is bad for tourism, but it obviously says that something is wrong with the environment. We tried to understand that. That was my first meeting with Mr. Mote, going to his laboratory and saying, can you help me understand red tide? Is there something we can do about that? That pursuit still goes on. That was back some 20 or 25 years ago, I think. Bill Mote was a hands-on activist. He got very enthusiastically involved. He had a wonderful, charming way about going into a project. He was very pleasant. He was very knowledgeable. He was very eager to share whatever knowledge he had and pass it along. He certainly raised awareness about sharks. I think most of us are familiar with the movie, but the facts about sharks, what they really are, how they live, what goes on with shark populations in the world, we owe a huge debt to the Mote Marine laboratory and the work that has been done there. Dolphins, I remember going to Mote Marine to get assistance in writing legislation for dolphin protection. There is such a thing as dolphin captive program legislation now to protect our dolphin inventories, because they were being exploited at one point. Manatee rescue operations, an endangered species in Florida. Those who have seen manatees know in what perilous shape they are and how wonderful they are, what great creatures, and the work that has been done there to try and make sure that we will continue to have manatees on this globe. All of these kinds of things are wonderful parts of the natural resource that Bill Mote found and fell in love with and decided that he would do something about. I would suggest that Bill Mote met the test that most of us would like to meet. He left life a little better on this planet for the work that he did. I think that is his best and most wonderful legacy.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I am privileged to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling), chairman of the Committee on Education and the Workforce. (Mr. GOODLING asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Moakley), my colleague and friend, pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate on this subject only. Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 555 provides for House consideration of H.R. 4118, The Russian-American Trust Cooperation Act. The modified closed rule provides 1 hour of general debate, equally divided between the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on International Relations. In addition, the rule makes in order a minority substitute and one motion to recommit, with or without instructions; in other words, 2 bites at the apple. I am aware of no Members who sought to offer amendments to the bill. Indeed, the only amendment offered during committee consideration that I know of has been actually incorporated into the bill. Recognizing the time constraints in the floor calendar during this time of year and the relative simplicity of this bill, this is a fair and balanced rule, in my view, and I urge its support. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 4118 is relatively straightforward as a piece of legislation, but it is enormously important from a national security perspective. Let me explain. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 4118 prohibits the U.S. Government from restructuring or rescheduling any of Russia's debt with the United States until the President certifies that the Russian government has ceased operating its intelligence eavesdropping facility which happens to be located nearby in Lourdes, Cuba. I know that many Members have passionate feelings about Cuba; but to me, this has little to do with U.S. policy towards Cuba; it has everything to do with protecting American citizens and our national security. It is absolutely inconceivable to me, and I think to most Americans, that the United States would provide aid and loans to Russia at a time when, according to press reports, the Russian government pays Cuba hundreds of millions of dollars a year to operate a facility it uses to eavesdrop on the United States and on our business and what is going on here. For years now, the defense and intelligence community has been pointing out the danger posed by the Lourdes' listening facility. Relying solely on open-source information and press reporting, and I want to reiterate that point, all of this is based on open-source and media reports, the site at Lourdes is of concern for the following reasons: first, the Russian government allegedly pays up to $300 million each year in rent to the Cuban government for the facility. Second, the Russian government has reportedly invested over $3 billion, that is B, billion, for the operation and modernization of this huge intelligence base. Third, the Russian government, following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990, has apparently significantly stepped up its intelligence collection activities against the United States from its Lourdes base, and this is, of course, before the currently elected president of Russia, Mr. Putin, was elected and it is well known that Mr. Putin comes out of the intelligence community as a former KGBer; and I do not know what his view is on the subject of Lourdes, and I suspect it is time we find out. Reportedly in recent years, Russian intelligence agencies have funded major facility and equipment upgrades and enhancements at the Lourdes site. Finally, the experts familiar with the Lourdes facility, including Russian defectors and former U.S. Government officials, assert that the Lourdes site is being used by the Russian government to collect personal information about American citizens and proprietary information about U.S. corporations. Clearly, this capability offers the means to conduct cyberwarfare against the United States and its people. That is something most Americans understand and do not want to have happen. Given the obvious national security implications, I am deeply puzzled by the Clinton-Gore administration's adamant opposition to this bill. It seems we have a very clear case where the Russians, with the assistance from Cuba, are engaged in activity in direct conflict with U.S. national security. Through the leadership of the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gilman), the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Ros-Lehtinen) and others, we have found a way to apply real pressure to Russia to cease its activities at Lourdes. Yet, I understand the Clinton-Gore administration is opposed. I would submit that their opposition to this bill is an example in a very long list that makes the Clinton-Gore administration's disdain for security policy appear again one more time before us, inexplicable as it is. The Clinton-Gore administration, and in particular, Vice President Gore, who spearheaded administration policy toward Russia through the Gore-Chernomyrdin Commission, has repeatedly claimed that it had achieved a special relationship of trust with Russian, referring to them as partners. I want to quote from the minority views that accompany this bill, because it contains truly amazing statements from the Clinton and Gore administration and its allies in Congress. The minority suggest that ``the extent to which Lourdes may target U.S. individual or corporate communications is uncertain.'' We know it is there. We are just not really sure how much they are listening to or what they are getting, I guess is what that means. Further, the minority suggests that allowing the Russians to eavesdrop on the United States to the Lourdes facility is a way of ``guaranteeing a certain level of political trust between Russia and the United States. These statements remind me of many times that President Clinton has told the American people that our children could sleep peacefully at night because there were no nuclear missiles pointed at the United States. That is a very nice sentiment, it is a great statement and I wish it were true, but it is not. It gives the American people a false sense of security. I think likewise the many press reports and the testimony by the Russian defectors and the others contradict the reassurances in the minority reports that the Lourdes site is nothing to be concerned about. I think it is something to be definitely concerned about. I think the American people deserve better than those kinds of assurances, which cannot be backed up. I encourage my colleagues to support this bill. I think that the Republican government needs to understand and be made accountable that it has to honor its financial obligations, and that the Lourdes site must be shut down if it hopes to truly build a relationship of real trust between our two peoples. Finally, I encourage my colleagues to send a very strong signal to the Clinton-Gore administration that the American people will no longer stand for their culture of disdain for security, whether it is the State Department laptops, bugging at the State Department, Los Alamos, or the many things we have been reading about. It is clear that lack of good security has been a hallmark of this administration from day one, and it is not acceptable. It is expensive, it is painful, and it is affecting our national security in a negative way. I encourage my colleagues to support this fair rule and the underlying bill. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to advise the gentleman from Massachusetts, through the Chair, that we have no requests for further speakers. I am going to make a brief closing remark after the gentleman yields back.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would point out that this bill asks Russia to stop renting the facility, and have it shut down that way. So we are dealing and focusing on Russia, not on Cuba in this bill. Mr. Speaker, I yield 6 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Florida (Mr. Diaz-Balart), my colleague and a member of the Committee on Rules.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 555 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, it is my great honor to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gilman), the distinguished chairman of the House Committee on International Relations. (Mr. GILMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I simply would put it this way. If we had an aircraft carrier parked off any part of the United States that was bristling with antennas and flying a foreign flag, people would want to know what was going on. When there was evidence that that aircraft carrier was being used to obtain information that we regard as private information, our personal communications, our telephone calls, so forth, I know most Americans would want the United States Government to take action. That is not a far cry from the situation we are looking at. The largest intelligence gathering facility is, in fact, at Lourdes, Cuba; and there is no doubt it is being used. Russians are having a hard time making ends meet. Yet they are still willing to put $300 million a year, or something thereabouts, into renting this facility; so presumably, they are getting at least that much back in their dividend, and that is undoubtedly at our expense. It is worth noting that this weekend we are going to be renegotiating the debt. The Russians are going to be asking us one more time, could we do them a favor. I do not think most Americans want us to be paying our tax dollars to the Russians to spy on us, to take our secrets. That is what this bill seeks to stop. My colleagues can remember the uproar we had just last week here when the Xinhua news agency for the People's Republic of China proposed to build a building that had line-of-sight capability on the United States Pentagon, the seat of the defense operations. There was huge uproar. That has been stopped because of the concern of spying. Well, if we are able to stop something that simple, certainly we ought to make an effort to stop something as meaningful as what is going on at Lourdes. Nobody wants Big Brother reading their mail or looking over their shoulder or spying at them especially when Big Brother is not American; and, as all Americans know, we do not spy on ourselves in this country. So if we are being spied on, it is by somebody else, and we should stop it. Mr. Speaker, I urge the support of the rule. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution. The previous question was ordered.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a privilege to yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Ros-Lehtinen), the chairman of the Subcommittee on International Economic Policy and Trade.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate very much the distinguished gentleman from Georgia, the honorable John Lewis, the dean of the delegation, and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) and the other members of the Georgia delegation, affording us this time to speak about Senator Paul Coverdell. The Rules of the House do not permit us to refer to the other body or Members of the other body, and we seldom do speak about them. This is exceptional, because Paul Coverdell was really an exceptional person. I think he did touch our lives. Certainly those of us who live in Florida who have to fly through Atlanta understand very well the meaning of having the Atlanta airport there. What I wanted to talk a little bit about today is the loss to Nancy and his family, to the State of Georgia, and to our country. I think it is pretty much of an incalculable loss, and it is obviously very painful if we have listened to the speakers who have gone before. We are going to miss Paul Coverdell deeply, and we are going to miss him for a very long time to come, not only as a person, but for the skills he brought to the art and science of crafting legislation and people persuasion here in these hallowed halls of the United States Congress. To me, he had several distinctive hallmarks. They were honor and decency, things that count for a lot here. And effectiveness and accomplishment, of course, the way we are measured. Those of us who were privileged to work with him knew of this literally unrelenting energy. He was a man who could tire out the most hard working of us. He certainly had the intellect to challenge us as well. We all admired his ability, as we have heard testimony to, to find common sense solutions that seemed to work for all sides in a given debate. Those are wonderful people skills. As the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Bishop) said in his testimony on the floor, that unquestioning integrity was also another Paul Coverdell trademark. That is very high praise. I well recall his commitment to fighting the war on drugs, just one of the many things he did here, and to his finding a way to get the money to pay for fighting the war on drugs, which is the harder part. His contribution to that was characteristically second to none; and more importantly, he was successful. And that success is now being employed on the front lines in Colombia and in other meaningful ways, and that will affect America as well and those who are concerned about the scourge of drugs on our youth and on our quality of life in this country. So, Mr. Speaker, I would like to say for my wife and myself and other neighbors in the neighboring State of Florida, we send our condolences, our keen sympathy, and our love to Nancy and the people of Georgia. Paul Coverdell was a man who gave so much. He was taken too soon.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, the election has been, by all observation, a total sham. The OAS has come back and said this is not even a pretense of democracy. There is no transparency. The final blow for me, and I have been giving them the benefit of the doubt for a long time, as the gentleman knows, hoping against hope that things will get better, but when I spoke with Mr. Manus, that was the end of it. It is over.

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the distinguished gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Chairman, I obviously heard this debate and ran over here. I very much am opposed to the amendment. There is no pretense democracy anymore in Haiti. It is not a democratic country. I have recently had the opportunity to talk to Mr. Manus, who was the head of the election committee there. He was chased out of the country under threat of death under assassination by mob violence, a most brutal and terrifying prospect. And certainly he has come to our country seeking asylum as a result. There is no judicial department that is working there. There is no real legislative branch. We are stuck with a situation in Haiti where we have committed billions of dollars and made the situation worse because we have backed the wrong people. It is a tragic situation. To make it worse by adding more American taxpayers' dollars to the situation to promote a non-democratic form of government in a friendly neighboring country to me is an unconscionable act, and I surely hope we are not going to do that.

Mr. GOSS

Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hall), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only. Mr. Speaker, this is a fair and appropriately structured rule for debate on this matter. We have made six amendments in order on a bipartisan basis. These amendments cover a full range of topics concerned with the underlying bill. The Committee on Rules has clearly erred on the side of inclusion to ensure a full, yet I believe efficient debate on this very important subject, which has caught the attention of Members. We are here today because doctors have become disillusioned with some aspects of our modern healthcare delivery system. They rightly assert that some HMOs are interfering too much in the doctor-patient relationship undermining their ability to effectively do their job. Their complaints are understandable, and they do need to be addressed. H.R. 1304 seeks to level the playing field between insurers and doctors. While HMOs should not be able to dictate to physicians because of their size, it is equally wrong for doctors to collude and force the hand of insurers and employers. If we get it wrong, the end result could be higher health care prices and more uninsured Americans without improving patient quality of care which concerns all of us. Those are the things we need to avoid, so we have to get it right. We have to find the correct balance, and this rule fairly provides for meaningful debate on how to proceed. H.R. 1304 is a simple, straightforward bill. It proposes to give doctors and other health care professionals a limited exemption from antitrust laws when bargaining with health plans conferring on them the same rights afforded to unions operated under the National Labor Relations Act. But based on testimony from some colleagues, there may be a hitch, unlike traditional unions, these doctor cartels, as they are called, would exist without any real regulatory oversight. Doctors could refuse to negotiate in good faith and even engage in selective boycotts. Obviously, this is a problem that needs a remedy. We all know that Congress does have a role in curtailing HMO abuse. I am very proud to be one of many House Members and Senators who have been serving on the conference, working on a bipartisan basis, to finalize the details of the Patient's Bill of Rights. But while we still have some work to do on it, it is no secret that we are pretty well agreed to the need for an independent, binding review process where doctors' decisions will be evaluated by other physicians. In other words, meaningful and appropriate oversight. We also understand that HMOs should be held accountable when they interfere in the doctor-patient relationship and harm occurs. But as encouraged as I am by this, I have reservations about H.R. 1304. It appears to be a necessary, simple solution to a tough problem, but as a wide range of experts have stated from the Congressional Budget Office to the Federal Trade Commission, the costs could outweigh any potential benefits. In fact, the CBO's projection put the cost at well over $3 billion over 10 years, not an insignificant amount of money, even around here; and that is worrisome to me. I am hopeful that my colleagues will support this rule so that we can get on with deliberation of these and other issues and weigh the potential costs and benefits. That is, after all, why we are here and what a deliberative body does. America's doctors and patients do deserve relief from bad HMOs. Indeed, Congress is addressing HMO reform in a tough and serious manner; I am a firsthand witness to that. The gentleman from California (Mr. Campbell) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) and some others urge that H.R. 1304 is the right direction we should pursue as part of congressional consideration. As our colleagues, they deserve respect for bringing this forward, and I urge a yes vote on this fair rule and look forward to a fair exchange on the underlying bill after everybody has the chance to hear all sides. However, we do not get that chance if we do not approve this rule.