Jay Inslee

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. I think you have put your finger right on the nub of the issue. The President says he now, finally, and I suppose this is a small ray of happiness, he now finally recognizes there is a problem of global warming. But he expects volunteerism to solve this problem. Well, I can tell you one thing we all know, you can run a bake sale on volunteerism, and maybe you can run a boy scout troop on volunteerism, but you cannot run a war on global warming on volunteerism. Think about this for a second. Here is what the President proposes. He thinks that he can just send a letter, nicely handwritten, to the CEOs of the oil and gas companies, would you kindly think about not polluting anymore. Well, that would be just about as effective, if he simply tries to run that on a volunteer basis, to just rely on the good graces, and I have nothing against the executives of these companies, they are fine people, but just relying on them to volunteer would be just as effective as relying on consumers to volunteer whether you are going to pay at the pump when you pump gas. Now you can just see the executives with their tin cup and their tithing cup out there trying to collect money from the pump. It doesn't work that way. You have to have some requirement that we both pay for gasoline and you have some measure to require these companies to reduce their pollution. That is a fair statement. It is required. It is the only way we are going to solve this problem. Most importantly, it is the only way we are going to drive investment to companies like A123 Battery and Finavera Renewables which is going to have the first wave-powered buoy off the coast of Oregon in this next year to produce electricity from waves bobbing up and down. So, Mr. Udall, you are correct. We have a responsibility in Congress to create these limits on CO2 pollution. We are going to do that; and, when we do that, we are going to unleash the innovative power that Americans have. The same genius that got us to the moon is going to get us to a clean energy future, and our grandkids will not have to deal with global warming. I would like to yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Baca) on an unrelated subject. Immigration Legislation Pending in the Senate

Mr. INSLEE. The gentleman is entirely correct. Later this year the House will consider what is called a cap-and-trade system. Americans are probably going to hear that term a lot. A cap-and-trade system basically means that we will set a cap, a limit, a total ceiling on the amount of carbon dioxide that will be a pollutant going into the air a year in the United States of America. That is not too much to ask for our grandkids to say we are going to have a total amount of pollution that we put into the air. Now we have done it for sulfur dioxide. We have done it for nitrogen oxide. We have done it for particulates. But there is this giant loophole you can drive a Sherman tank through for carbon dioxide. So it is interesting. We have all these laws that set ceilings for the amount of pollutants that go into the air, but the granddaddy of all, the most dangerous pollutant there is in the world right now, carbon dioxide, there is no limit whatsoever. So Congress owes to ourselves and our grandkids to set some limit, a cap, on the total amount of CO2 that is going into the air. So then the question comes down, how do you allocate who is going to put the pollution in the air? Well, there are a couple of ways to do it. Congress can just hand permits out and we decide. But there is a better way, which is basically a trading system where these permits originally are allocated, but then businesses are allowed to trade them amongst themselves and establish a market for carbon. Europe has done this. I have spent a week looking at how that system worked last week, and I can report that it has been successful to the extent that it has established a cap and a price on carbon. And once you establish a price on carbon, well, what do businesses do? They start figuring out ways to not waste energy and how not to put more pollution into the air. Importantly, this cap-and-trade system is the most economically efficient way to distribute this resource. I got brainwashed by economics when I went to school at the University of Washington. Basically what we learned is that having a trading system, you end up having the most efficient way to find out how to drive economies and efficiencies in your system. So later this year we will be considering a cap-and-trade system. We will set a limit, and it will be the first step in this road to really a clean energy economy. Now I want to note something about a cap-and-trade system, and this is one thing I learned in Europe last week, it is not enough. It is only one tool in the toolbox. This is really important, because next week we will have before us in the Energy Committee a host of issues of ways to drive this clean energy future forward not waiting for this cap-and-trade system, issues like this renewable portfolio standard, where we tell people 15 percent of our electricity comes from clean standards, a green building standard, so that we require new building codes to have energy efficient buildings, a low carbon fuel standard so we use low carbon fuels, a whole host of measures like that. Those are very important. A cap-and-trade system is not enough. In fact, it is interesting, in England, we met with a minister who basically they told us they might have had 15 million tons of savings in carbon dioxide from their cap-and-trade system, but they had 100 million tons savings in carbon dioxide by this combination of measures to have more efficiency in their industries. So next week we will be taking some first steps in the road to a clean energy future that are very, very important, that are going to help these businesses grow.

Mr. INSLEE. I really appreciate Mr. Udall talking about efficiency, because I think we need to look at it as the first fuel. Before you start generating excess energy, if we could figure out how to use it more efficiently and not waste it, that's what I look at as like finding money in the street, it's the first fuel. And Europe has had tremendous success. England has increased their gross domestic product by 70 percent in the last 20 years, but their use of electricity has remained flat. That is a tremendous improvement of efficiency. You don't waste it. But it is not just the English. We have something to brag about here, too. California has increased their gross economic activity by 50 percent in the last 10 years, and their per capita use of electricity has remained flat. They have done it through measures such decoupling utilities with the rate of growth of electricity so utilities now can make money by selling less energy by selling efficiency. And it has been effective. In my city of Seattle, in my neck of the woods, the same thing has happened by doing some of the commonsense things we have talked about. There are some amazing technologies coming in in efficiency. I went and talked to an organization called SIPs, Structural Integrated Panels, last week. They had their national convention. These are panels that are sort of a foam core with a wood fiber sandwich on both sides that are a structural panel you can build a house with so you don't need studs. You build these things, and you can get 20 to 30 percent less heating cost for your home. This is an invention of folks in America, and we can build part of the construction industry by doing that. So I really appreciate your focus on efficiency. I want you to know, you mentioned wind. I remember talking to, in the course of writing this book Mr. Udall referred to, I fell across a story out of Missouri, Mr. Cleaver's State. And there was a quote by this farmer that said something to the effect like, Man, there is nothing better than sitting there watching that turbine go around, and I just count the money every time the blade goes around. Because they get paid by the utility to put the turbine in the field. That's a good way to do it. So I would like to yield to Mr. Cleaver for his observations.

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, I have come to the floor this evening with Mr. Cleaver of Missouri, and perhaps others will join us, with a message of optimism in the face of a great challenge that our country faces. And we have faced many challenges, but one of the more pressing for ourselves and our grandchildren is the issue of global warming, this concern that our increased carbon dioxide and other gasses is going to result in significant climactic shifts. And the science, of course, has been very disturbing recently about this threat. But we have come to talk about a message of optimism that our country ought to have in our ability to solve this problem. And it is a large problem. It is perhaps certainly more global than we have ever had outside of war. But we today want to talk about why we believe America is ready to face that challenge, why we believe America is capable of succeeding in beating global warming, and why we believe the effort to defeat global warming will ultimately benefit the United States economy by allowing us to lead the world in new clean energy technologies. And I would like to, in preface to our comments today, just set the stage about what the challenge is and why we believe the solution is one that Americans are fully capable of obtaining. First, the challenge. The challenge, of course, is that we have created a condition where we may double the concentration of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere by about 2050, twice as high as carbon dioxide has ever been since before pre-industrial times. And, of course, all of the scientists in the world agree that carbon dioxide is a global warming gas, and it does stand to reason that if you double the amount of this global warming gas, you could have problems in your climate. And, unfortunately, the evidence has become more and more disturbing. Just last week, the Goddard Space Science Department at NASA came out with a new report authored by lead author James Hansen that said, ``If global emissions of carbon dioxide continue to rise at the rate of the past decade, this research shows that there will be disastrous effects, including the increasingly rapid sea level rise, increased frequency of droughts and floods, and increased stress on wildlife and plants due to rapidly shifting climate zones.'' This is not a quote from some fellow living in a tepee. This is NASA. The agency that sent an American to the moon has been looking at what is happening right here at home on Earth and has concluded that, indeed, we have trouble; and what is very disturbing is that the most recent science has been more disturbing. We were briefed by Dr. John Schellenhuller, who is the lead scientist in Europe on this subject, last week, who told us about the increasing melt in the Arctic that has increased in severity, about the melting tundra. The rate of the melt of the tundra is melting much more rapidly than was anticipated even a year ago; and, of course, that can release methane gas, which is even 16 times worse for global warming than even carbon dioxide. My local scientists at the University of Washington in Seattle have confirmed these findings. So, basically, we have got an issue that we have got to deal with. And right now there really is a race going on in the world of tipping points. These scientists have told us that we are approaching tipping points where the climate can tip into regimes where we would have uncontrollable global warming and that that could happen in as short as shortly after the next decade. But we have another tipping point which we believe we are about to cross over here in Congress, and that is a tipping point where the U.S. Congress will tip from sort of an approach of the ostrich, where we had our head in the sand, to tip over to the approach of the American eagle, where we will have a new vision about a new clean energy technological future for this country. So we are here tonight to say that that new approach of optimism is one that will prevail starting next Wednesday when the Energy Subcommittee in the U.S. Congress will start discussions about a new clean energy future for this country. I will be introducing a bill in about a week called the New Apollo Energy Act, which will come forth with a whole suite of ideas about how to adopt new clean energy solutions. And, of course, we call it the New Apollo Energy Act because we think what Kennedy believed about America, which was that we were the greatest innovation country in the world, is something that we have got going for us. So we should use our technological genius just like we did when we went to the moon. So before I yield to Mr. Cleaver, I want to talk about why I have optimism about our ability to skin this cat, why I believe we can dramatically reduce our carbon dioxide emissions and dramatically tell our grandchildren that we are going to use our know-how to solve this problem. And the reason I am confident about this is that in the last year I have been doing a rather intensive review of the technology that we hope to bring to bear on this subject and I have been getting to know the Americans really across the country who tonight are inventing new technological solutions so we can move forward on clean energy. I just want to mention a few of them. First, there is a company in Massachusetts called the A123 Battery Company. I love the number. A123 Battery Company. And they have developed a lithium ion battery which is so powerful that basically in the size of about two or three shoe boxes you could put it in your car, which they are prepared to do this fall, and turn your hybrid car into a plug-in hybrid car. And I drove one actually, a converted plug-in hybrid that I drove around the capital a few weeks ago. This battery is so powerful that you will be able to plug in your car, drive it for 20 to 40 miles just on electricity, no gasoline. Then after 40 miles you use gasoline and you will get over 150 miles a gallon on either your ethanol, eventually, once it is a flex-fuel, plug-in hybrid, or your gasoline. Now, that is a heck of a deal for Americans for your first 40 miles to have zero carbon dioxide coming out your tailpipe. A123 Battery Company. The second company called Nanosolar. Nanosolar is a new company in California that has developed a photovoltaic cell, a solar cell, which uses nanotechnology to dramatically decrease the manufacturing costs and the costs of solar energy. And they are going to make a solar cell that is 1/50 as thick as the current silicone-based solar cells. It is called thin cell technology. A third company, Ausra Company, a former Australian company that has been moved to the United States that has breakthrough technology on solar thermal where you use parabolic mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays to heat gas to 1,100 degrees and turn a turbine, again, dramatically potentially reducing the cost of solar energy. So I wanted to first start our discussion with the context of great Americans doing great things in energy, and here are three companies moving forward. And to continue this discussion, I want to yield to Mr. Cleaver, who has been a great leader on these energy issues fresh in Congress. I would like to yield to him for his perspective on our ability to move forward in global warming and clean energy.

Mr. INSLEE. Will the gentleman yield for a moment?

Mr. INSLEE. That is an important point. I think the good news we can share with Americans is that there are a lot less people in this Congress than there used to be who believe it is a hoax, and that is, in part, because they have read the science. People are seeing it with their own eyes. Now they are hearing from their constituents, frankly, and they are hearing from their own scientists. I just want to read this NASA report that just came out last week, and it talked about the urgency. Mr. Cleaver, you said, we don't have a lot of time to deal with this; we don't have 50 years to deal with this. This report said that basically there are two ways we can go. We can go the business as usual approach, or we can have a second approach, an alternative approach to reduce our CO2. Basically this report said that with another decade of business as usual, it becomes impractical to achieve the alternative scenario because of the energy infrastructure that would be in place. This was a quote from Mr. Hansen of NASA, basically meaning we have about 10 years to change course here a little bit to have more essential efficiencies, to have more clean energy, to put our minds together to figure out how to have a cleaner energy future. So we don't have the luxury of a lot of time. But again I want to come back to this idea of optimism, why I am optimistic about it. Mr. Cleaver mentioned Mr. Carnahan started a wind turbine farm that is doing great. They are earning farmers a lot of money. They are earning construction crews a lot of money to build these things. They are generating revenues in Missouri. This is happening all over the country, that tremendous growth, 15, 20 percent growth a year in this wind turbine wind energy. I want to tell one little story that I think is typical of what we are going to see in America. A fellow in Seattle, Washington, named John Plaza who is an airline pilot. He was a good airline pilot, but he sort of got tired of reading books while he was flying back and forth. That is what they do in the cockpits, a dirty little secret we can share. He decided he wanted to do something entrepreneurial. He started looking around for an idea that he could advance to create a new, value-added business, and he started to think about energy. He started thinking, is there a way that I could sort of develop a clean energy resource and make some money as well? He started to focus on biodiesel. So this fellow, who was not an engineer, not a chemical engineer, not a mechanical engineer, didn't have an MBA, he literally went home and started to tinker in his home about how to make biodiesel out of various vegetable products. He hit on a way to make biodiesel that he thought was as good or better than anybody else. He went out and raised a few dollars, rented a little tiny room in an old warehouse and bought the old beer vats from the Rainier brewery in Seattle, Washington. The Rainier brewery used to be the iconic beer in Seattle, Washington. He bought the old vats they used to brew beer in and he started to brew up biodiesel. John Plaza is now CEO or CFO of a company in Grace Harbor, Washington, that is going to be the largest biodiesel plant probably in the world, or at least in the Western Hemisphere. They are under construction. They are going to be open for business some time next year, over a million gallons a year. This is a product that reduces carbon dioxide, uses products we make, either canola seed or perhaps palm oilseed or perhaps soybean oilseed they are starting to bring in. But the point is, here is an American success story of a fellow with an idea who wanted to find a way to maximize clean energy. We just need a way in Congress to help drive investment to those new clean energy sources. I want to mention one thing about how Congress can help people like John Plaza to develop these new businesses. One of the things we can do is next Wednesday we will be hopefully passing what is called a low carbon fuel standard. A low carbon fuel standard will basically say that the fuels we burn in America every 5 years will get 3 percent cleaner when it comes to carbon dioxide. And when we pass that low carbon fuel standard, it will create an incentive for investment to go to these businesses to develop these new higher, cleaner forms of biofuels. You know we are using corn ethanol right now, but it is really just sort of the first generation. I liken it to the Wright brothers Flyer of aviation. It is just the first craft we can get in the air. But we need cellulosic ethanol and advanced forms of biodiesel that will produce a lot more product per acre and a lot more CO2 savings, and we believe we can do this. So here is one thing Congress can do, and I know there are many others. I yield to the gentleman from New Mexico.

Mr. INSLEE. We are hopeful. I actually gave a speech in response to Prime Minister Tony Blair last week in Berlin. I was asked to present sort of an American response to the Prime Minister's ideas about global warming. One of the things he talked about is what the Europeans have learned is that we need some action, some policies to drive investment into these clean energy technologies that can produce the clean energy to avoid the kind of problems you are describing in Greenland. And of course the President is right now in Germany today at the G8 Summit. We are hopeful, although probably not that optimistic, that the President would propound some ideas where we will guarantee our grandchildren that we are going to reduce our CO2 emissions. Now, one way or another, Congress needs to do that, because we've got an obligation to American grandkids to do it. I want to just note a couple of things. It's not just Greenland that is experiencing it. It's the good ole U.S. of A. I got to know some people in Alaska in a little town called Shishmaref that sits on the Arctic Ocean. That is the first city in America that is having to be relocated due to global warming because they live right on the coastline, and the tundra that supports their houses is melting, and the seas are encroaching, and it has actually eaten some of their houses already. They are actually going to have to move their entire city. They've already voted to do it. They are going to move it 13 miles inland to a little place called Fish Camp. It will be the first American city to have to relocate its first victim of global warming. That's a sad day when you think Americans already have to relocate their cities. So this is not something that's 50 years in the future. It's here today. Now, we have experienced off the coast of Washington and Oregon the same issues you've talked about, about new species of fish coming in. And our ranchers down in the western United States are having unprecedented drought they are having to deal with. This is something Americans are suffering today. And that is why, starting next Wednesday, we hope to have an aggressive congressional response to help these clean air technologies move forward. So I appreciate your observations of Greenland. I wonder if I could maybe yield to Mr. Udall, who has joined us here this evening, who has been a leader and certainly has a long tradition in his particular family in leading environmental issues. Mr. Udall.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, we cannot, we should not, and we must not give President George Bush a blank check to squander the lives of our children and the dollars of our constituents in Iraq. We should not give him a blank check today, we should not give him a blank check next week, and we should not give him a blank check ever. The days of giving him a blank check to make repeated incompetent decisions in Iraq must be stopped and they should be stopped today by voting ``no'' on this supplemental. And the inspiration for doing that should come from our proud men who are serving in Iraq. I heard a story a few weeks ago about a fellow who had his buddy shot by a sniper, he was being shot up by automatic weapons fire, and his buddy ran out into the field of fire to rescue his friend. We should look at our duty today as rescuing our children, brothers, sisters, husbands and wives in Iraq. And if we take hostile political fire in doing so, so be it. That tiny act of standing up to George Bush does not end up in the same league of courage of those who are serving in Iraq who take real hostile fire, that need to be rescued from the incompetence of the executive branch of the United States Government. And it is solely the power of the U.S. Congress to do that. The people who established this institution had a very wise knowledge. They knew someday there could be a President who might make bad decisions on occasion, who might make bad decisions in the course of a war, and that is why in article I, section 8, they vested in the U.S. Congress the power of the purse to be used in exactly these circumstances, to rein in a rogue President who cannot seem to understand the reality on the ground in Iraq and has a hallucinatory policy that is exposing our children to harm. This power in section 8, the power of the purse, is one that is designed by the framers of democracy for exactly these circumstances. And the reason the framers put the power of the purse to rein in a rogue President is because they understood that this is the institution closer to the American people. This is the People's House. And I know there's a lot of problems that none of us are geniuses on in Iraq, but there is one thing we know: In difficult times in America, there is one will, one sense of absolute genius that all of us should follow, and that is the will of the American people, the joint, commonsense consensus. From the cornfields of the Midwest to the coastlines, there is a common consensus that we need a change in policy in Iraq, and the only way we will get it, the only way that common sense of the American people will be followed is to vote ``no'' on this today. We can be united in understanding that. And when we do so, we will follow the Congresses of the past who on at least five occasions have used the constitutional power of the purse to insist on a change. And I will say this. In the Constitution, this organization here is given the power to declare war. And we also have the power to end a war. Presidents do not have the authority to fight wars in perpetuity. There is no way that Congress would ever give that authority. And today using the power of the purse, a constitutional tool, we should stand up for the will of the American people and fulfill our rescue mission for our sons and daughters in Iraq and vote ``no'' on this supplemental bill.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to remove from H.R. 2060 the name of Nathan Deal as a cosponsor. His name was inadvertently added as a cosponsor to the bill I had sponsored.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, we have had the right to be disappointed in the President's abject refusal to do anything to give us auto efficiency and clean autos for years. And now we still have the right to be disappointed even though he has been ordered to do so by the United States Supreme Court. We sort of heard this sort of semi ``maybe I'll think about it'' approach the other day. We need some bold action when it comes to new technology, including in our automobile sector; and we know we can get that. We know we can have efficient automobiles, and we know we can deal with global warming. I've got to tell you, I just cannot understand why some folks here want to embrace ignorance on global warming. They point out that we didn't know about global warming in 1970. We didn't know about the Internet either, but I don't know why you shouldn't use it. We've learned some things from 1970. We've learned that the planet is warming. We've learned that CO2 is responsible. We've learned that it's coming from our industries. And we've learned that if we have the Federal law followed, we will have energy efficiency and a clean energy economy in the future of this country.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, I rise today to introduce legislation that will close the polar bear loophole and prohibit U.S. citizens from bringing sport hunted polar bear trophies from Canada into the United States. I call on my colleagues to support the Polar Bear Protection Act, which if passed, will help conserve and protect one of the most beloved American icon species by discouraging U.S. citizens from contributing to their decline through sport hunting. The Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 established a moratorium on the importation of marine mammals and marine mammal products, including the importation of all sport hunted marine mammals such as seals, walruses and polar bears. But in 1994, Congress enacted an exemption to this ban and allowed American sport hunters to bring home polar bear trophies from Canada for their personal use. There is no other such exemption in the Marine Mammal Protection Act. This exemption has had the effect of increasing Canadian polar bear deaths by U.S. sport hunters. In 1994 the polar bears' survival was not known to be at risk. Today, we know their future is precarious. Polar bear populations are facing threats previously unprecedented in the history in the Arctic. The polar bear is dependent on sea ice for survival--it relies on the ice for hunting, breeding and rearing its young. Yet as a result of climate change, Arctic sea ice is receding at a rate even a non-scientist can observe, rapidly enough for polar bears to feel the impacts. An unknown number of these magnificent creatures--which can swim at least 50 miles--have drowned and are starving. Populations are changing their distribution, bringing them closer to human villages and exposing them to greater risk of negative interactions with people as they desperately search for food. Leading scientists project that the Arctic may be completely free of sea ice in the summer as early as 2040. This has disastrous implications for polar bears. In July 2005, the World Conservation Union (IUCN) Polar Bear Specialist Group (PBSG) released its quadrennial report, which reviewed the status of polar bears. Although the world population estimate remains at 21,500-25,000, in fact many populations are ``data deficient,'' due to the difficulties of studying this species in its remote, harsh habitat. At least some populations are declining and more may be. The IUCN PBSG concluded that the species should be upgraded from ``a species of least concern'' to ``vulnerable,'' based on the ``likelihood of an overall decline in the size of the total population of more than 30 percent within the next 35 to 50 years.'' It further concluded that the principal cause of this decline is global warming, with pollution an additional negative influence. For the first time, they expressed a need for caution when determining hunting quotas. The U.S. Department of the Interior has confirmed that warming temperatures and the receding of sea ice in the Arctic pose a threat to polar bears and has concluded that polar bears could be endangered within 45 years. Based on the threats posed to polar bears, the Interior Department proposed that polar bears be listed under the Endangered Species Act as ``threatened'' on December 27, 2006. As many of you know, I actively have supported the listing of polar bears on the Endangered Species List. I feel strongly that such a listing is vital to the bears' survival. I also feel strongly that sport hunting at this time is an additional unnecessary burden that these beleaguered bears can ill afford. More than half of the world's polar bears are in Canada and most of these are in the territory of Nunavut. In 2005, Nunavut increased its polar bear hunt quotas by almost 30 percent without scientific basis, despite documented declines in some populations and the increased threats to polar bears from the effects of climate change. The increase was based on anecdotal accounts that more bears were seen near villages; however, this increase in sightings likely was the result of hungry bears being drawn to village dumps than an actual increase in bear numbers. As a result, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has expressed concerns with this increase in quotas. Indeed, I am concerned that the money generated by American trophy hunters in Nunavut was a motivating factor in this quota increase. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also acknowledges that at least five polar bear populations, of which four are hunted, have poor and/or inadequate information on population statistics. It admits that four populations are possibly being over-harvested, posing conservation challenges for the bear. Some of my colleagues here today may have supported the polar bear trophy importation exemption in 1994. I recognize that the landscape was different then, when many polar bear populations appeared sound. However, circumstances have dramatically changed. Seventeen years ago it was inconceivable to think that we could envision a world without these magnificent animals. Now, in 2007, we are learning that polar bear extinction could become a reality. While long-term action clearly is required to address the significant environmental factors negatively affecting polar bear survival, immediate action can and must be taken to control direct human-caused mortality, including addressing the harmful effects of U.S. trophy hunting. I hope you all agree that contributing to the mortality of these bears from unnecessary sport hunting is no longer justified. We need to eliminate the exemption that allows the importation of polar bear trophies into the United States. The Polar Bear Protection Act will further polar bear conservation at a time when these animals need it most. I urge my colleagues to join me by supporting this legislation, and I hope that the Natural Resources Committee will hold hearings on polar-bear conservation and this bill.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Who are the real experts on the question of whether the lack of a timeline actually fuels the insurgency, the lack of a timeline actually making the violence worse? One of them is named Muhammad al-Dini. He is an elected member of the Iraqi parliament. He was here yesterday, and I met with him. He told me that a majority, 144 members, of the elected Iraqi parliament 2 days ago signed a petition that basically said that the lack of a timeline is fueling attacks against our troops. The lack of a timeline is fueling this insurgency. The lack of a timeline is playing into the hands of al Qaeda. And the reason he told us this is that it allows them to go out and recruit and say, Look, America is going to be here forever. And they recruit people that go out and attack us. The other thing he told us is that the Maliki government is using our taxpayer dollars to run sectarian militias that go out and attack Americans. He urged us to adopt a timeline. An elected official in the parliament of the state of Iraq; now there is an expert. It amazes me that people who have been wrong on Iraq for 4 years come down and lecture us, lecture us about whether a timeline is going to work or not. I think it might be handy in Congress to have a penalty box. If you have been wrong for 4 years on the right strategy in Iraq, maybe you should to go into the penalty box for a while and allow the people who were against this war from the beginning to have a say on what we do in Iraq. What we are saying is, a lack of a timeline hurts. We need to bleed the insurgency of the fuel they use, and the fuel they use is the lack of a timeline. One more thing, I read this headline: ``Bush Told War is Harming the GOP.'' I don't care about the GOP or the parties. The GOP members went and told the President this is hurting the GOP. It doesn't matter who is getting hurt politically here. I will tell you what matters: Our sons and daughters are being killed in Iraq. I hope some of my GOP colleagues, the next time they go to the White House, I hope they say, we don't care about the GOP or the DEM; we care about the Army and the Navy and the soldiers who are being killed in Iraq, and let's get a timetable and get us out of there.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, in the aftermath of the terrible tragedy at Virginia Tech, as people try to make sense of this senseless act, we must remember to find strength in community. Last week, I spoke to Korean-American leaders in my district who expressed their deepest sympathies to all those affected by this tragedy--the same sense of sorrow shared by all Americans. I expressed my hope that the Korean- American community would not be targeted in any way, in the aftermath of this situation. I am proud that so far this fear hasn't materialized, but I rise today to remind Americans not to place blame on this or any other group. Korean Americans should feel no communal sense of guilt or responsibility for this act. Their own pride in their achievements and contributions to American society should remain undiminished. Rather, we all should keep the victims, their families and the Virginia Tech community in our thoughts and prayers at this difficult time. We can do this by supporting efforts like that of Washington State Senator Paull Shin, who has been working with local Korean Americans to start a fund for the victims' families. We also should work together to make sure that college campuses across our Nation retain their openness and continue to be bastions of hope and opportunity.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, on March 2, 2007, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB), a three member panel affiliated with the Library of Congress, issued a decision that changed royalty expenses for commercial and noncommercial webcasters and will likely end Internet radio as we know it today. According to the decision, which is retroactive beginning January 1, 2006 and commences through December 31, 2010, commercial and noncommercial webcasters would be subject to an increase in royalty rates from $.08 in 2006 per performance to $.19 per performance in 2010. The new royalty rates amount to a 300 percent increase for the biggest webcasters and up to 1200 percent for small webcasters. For most web casters the royalties will exceed their gross revenues and bankrupt them. The CRB has refused to reconsider its decision so the higher royalties--including retroactive royalties back to January 2006--are due May 15, 2007. My fear is that these new rates will decimate Internet radio and 70 million Americans that listen to Internet radio every month will no longer have access to this music service. For these reasons, I have introduced the Internet Radio Equality Act which provides royalty parity for Internet radio providers. The bill vacates the CRB's March 2nd decision and changes the royalty rate- setting standard that applies to commercial Internet radio royalty arbitrations so that it is the same standard that applies to satellite radio, cable radio, jukeboxes, and record companies (when they are licensees of songwriters). The bill also sets a transition rate through 2010 that is the same royalty rate that satellite radio services pay (7.5 percent of revenue). Finally, the bill expands the Copyright Act's Section 118 musical work license for noncommercial broadcasters like National Public Radio to enable those broadcasters to also perform sound recordings over Internet radio at royalty rates designed for noncommercial entities. I believe strongly that it is the responsibility of Congress to promote media diversity in all areas including web-based broadcasting and to ensure affordable consumer access to Internet media.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of our time.

Mr. INSLEE. My fellow Members, we know that small businesses have been leaders in job creation and are the dynamic growth center for the American economy, and now they are poised to become the leaders in our green building revolution. We know that we have challenges on energy security, we know we have challenges to deal with on global warming, and we know that small businesses have challenges to receive capital to help in their programs to make their businesses more efficient, less costly for energy consumption, and less emitting of greenhouse gases. Our amendment would create the ability of the SBA to provide capital to our small businesses across the country to do thousands of things that they want to start doing, items like putting additional energy- efficient equipment into their businesses, building green roofs that can prevent energy loss, installation of renewable energy sources like photovoltaic cells and energy equipment heating and cooling systems. The list is endless. I would like to think of a little small business called the Snoqualmie Ice Cream Company, which is some of the best ice cream in the world, but they used an SBA loan essentially to put impervious concrete and build a green roof, which helped their business operations and helped the environment to boot. So we would propose that we expand the SBA purposes to allow our small businessmen and women to be on the cutting edge of green building and green businesses across the country. This will help them move a step forward to use their dynamic leadership. Mr. Chairman, I yield to Ms. Velazquez.

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Chairman, I thank the Chairwoman and Ranking Member for their this issue. I rise today to support my amendment to the Small Business Lending Improvements Act (H.R. 1332) which would add an eligibility area to Section 504 loans. My amendment will ensure that American entrepreneurs have the opportunity to start, build and, grow green small businesses by adding a sustainable design or low-impact design to the public policy goals of this lending program. This common-sense amendment would decrease long-term operating costs for small business owners, stimulate green building technologies, create a better work environment for employees and reduce carbon emissions in the United States. Buildings account for one-third of carbon emissions per year. It is important that we help small business owners make sustainable choices that they might not otherwise make due to cost, or simply due to the fact that some of these technologies are new. My amendment will help SBA expand their financing structure to help businesses use sustainable building standards, such as LEED certified, which have a minimal impact on our environment. Currently, SBA loans can help a company upgrade to required standards, but very few Small Business Loans have helped owners choose green building standards. Furthermore, green buildings benefit workers. Case studies show examples of 2 to 16 percent increase in productivity in among employees who work in buildings that incorporate sustainable building design. Sustainable design and green building practices are easy and available. An excellent example of how this can be done, and why green technologies help small businesses and the community, is the Snoqualmie Gourmet Ice Cream factory in Maltby, Wash. I recently toured this factory, which is Snohomish County's first sustainable commercial project, owned by Barry Bettinger. Barry used Small Business Administration (SBA) loans for low impact development strategies. With assistance from the Sustainable Development Task Force, he used technologies to cut his lighting costs by 50 percent, reduce his water usage by 40 percent and reduce energy for cooling fans by 75 percent. I hope that the SBA and experts in sustainable design such as the National Institute of Building Sciences will work together to develop meaningful standards in this eligibility area of sustainable design. Congress has a huge opportunity here to further improve the small business lending program to meet goals of reducing energy consumption in this country. Thank you for supporting this amendment.

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, we here highly resolve that starting today we will no longer allow President Bush to make an infinite number of mistakes with an infinite number of our sons and daughters. We know one thing, the President believes he has done a heck of a job in Iraq; the American people disagree. The people who are now doing our bidding in Iraq proudly are standing up for democracy, and we want some democracy here. We know that there is a difficult road to hoe in Iraq, but we know there should be an infinite wisdom in one source in America, and that is the American people. There is no sovereignty, there is no king, there is no person who always does a heck of a job. When push comes to shove, we have got to listen to the American people, and the American people have spoken to us loudly. They have said it is time for the Iraqi leadership to quit fiddling around and form a government. And they know, as we do, as the retired generals who have come out full force and said that the American people are right, we cannot expect our service personnel to solve the political problem in Iraq. And now, 13 months have gone by since supposedly they formed this constitution and they were going to solve this problem of what to do with their oil, and they still haven't got an agreement. They are still fiddling around while our sons and daughters die. Now, the troops and the generals understand that there is a message being sent by this resolution, and the message is to Maliki and the rest of the Iraqi leadership: You have got to stop fiddling around and form a government, and you have got to reach an agreement about oil. And until you do, there is going to be civil strife, civil war and Americans driving in the middle of that. This is a message to them: Solve this problem.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, today, in honor of Earth Day, I introduced a resolution that would support the only nationally-recognized day dedicated to recycling. Every November since 1997, millions of Americans have become better informed about recycling and buying recycled products as a result of events held in honor of America Recycles Day. Last year, events were held in communities in every state. In my home state of Washington, 12 communities are planning events to commemorate this important day in 2007 in cooperation with counties, elementary schools, businesses and local troops. Recycling creates 1.1 million U.S. jobs, $236 billion in gross annual sales and $37 billion in annual payrolls. Recycling also saves energy, prevents air and water pollution, reduces the need for new landfills and combustors, reduces our dependence on foreign oil, reduces the need for extraction of certain natural resources, and can stimulate the development of greener technologies. Over the past 10 years, many new markets for recycled products have been created. For example, plastic containers can be remanufactured into other plastic containers, fleece, carpet, car parts, strapping, stuffing, bottles, pipe, lawn and garden products, injection molded products, and plastic lumber. Yet, as markets for recycled products have increased, recycling rates for certain recyclable household products, like plastic and aluminum containers, has decreased or stayed the same, and curbsid pickup programs have decreased in communities. There remains a significant opportunity to increase recycling in the United States and I believe that the activities of America Recycles Day provide one way to achieve this end. It is time for Congress to support this important day and effort. I urge my colleagues to take up this important resolution and pass this bill before America Recycles Day on November 15th.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, I rise today to urge the Natural Resources Committee to take action on the bipartisan Bristol Bay Protection Act, which I introduced today with my colleagues, Congressman Wayne Gilchrest and Congressman Maurice Hinchey. The Bristol Bay Protection Act will renew long-standing, bipartisan protection for this economically, culturally, and ecologically important marine ecosystem through a Congressional prohibition on oil and gas development in the waters of Alaska's North Aleutian Basin. When Congress returns from the district work period we plan to introduce the Bristol Bay Protection Act. The Exxon Valdez oil tanker spill, which fouled more than 1,200 miles of pristine Alaskan shoreline and caused billions of dollars in economic damage, moved the Congress and President George H. Bush to place the North Aleutian Basin Planning Area (which includes Bristol Bay) under moratoria from oil and gas development in 1990. In 1998, President Clinton later followed up with an extension of this moratorium on pre-leasing and leasing activities in the same waters until 2012. This past January, President Bush removed the long-standing executive ban on offshore drilling in Bristol Bay, opening the way for leases the Federal Minerals Management Service (MMS) has proposed in 2010 and 2012. Alaska's Bristol Bay and the southeastern Bering Sea encompass one of the most productive marine ecosystems in the world. These sub-arctic waters support important commercial fisheries, representing more than 40 percent of the Nation's annual seafood catch. The area targeted for oil and gas leasing overlaps with important habitat and fishing grounds for pollock, cod, red king crab, halibut and salmon--fisheries which generate more than $2 billion dollars annually. These fisheries support fishermen and fishing families throughout Alaska and the Pacific northwest. Bristol Bay sockeye salmon runs, the largest on earth, are the lifeblood of many remote, Native villages in southwestern Alaska. Subsistence and commercial harvest of salmon resources are the economic mainstay of these culturally-unique communities. The region's coastal wetlands, lagoons and sheltered bays serve as migratory hubs, staging areas and wintering grounds for millions of waterfowl and shorebirds. The southeastern Bering Sea is also home to a number of marine mammal species--many of which are threatened or endangered--including sea otters, Steller sea lions, fur seals, humpback whales and the North Pacific right whale. As a testament to the region's ecological importance, five National Wildlife Refuges and eight Alaska state protected areas have been established here. The U.S. cannot drill our way to energy security. The risks posed by offshore oil and gas development to the renewable resources of Bristol Bay and the thousands of people in Alaska and along the west coast whose livelihoods depend upon their continued health are simply too great. The bipartisan Bristol Bay Protection Act restores protections to the people, wildlife and habitats in the North Aleutian Basin Planning Area. It is my hope that the Committee acts swiftly to protect this pristine area.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Madam Speaker, there will be under-utilized wireless spectrum in the gaps or ``white spaces'' between TV broadcast channels when the transition from analog to digital television is complete. These white spaces could provide broadband access to millions of Americans and enable a wide range of innovative wireless devices and services which cannot be utilized in other frequencies. White spaces spectrum must remain unlicensed because the availability of this ``Swiss cheese'' pattern of spectrum nationally makes licensing it impractical. An unlicensed regime would also lead to a more efficient use of the frequencies. Unlicensed white spaces devices will avoid harmful interference with all incumbents. Cognitive radio uses spectrum sensing technology to identify and avoid occupied TV channels. This method has been approved by the Defense Department for unlicensed devices that share spectrum with military radar. This unlicensed spectrum can be used for wireless broadband, public safety communications, and numerous at-home and business devices. For the reasons listed above I have introduced the Wireless Innovation Act, H.R. 1597, which mandates that white spaces be used nonexclusively for unlicensed fixed or portable devices while mandating that incumbent licensees be protected from harmful interference. This legislation would provide interference protection to full power television, low power television, wireless microphones, and all other incumbent users of this spectrum. The bill also requires that the FCC permit use of unlicensed devices not later than February 18, 2009.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, today I rise as a cosponsor of H.R. 886, the Wild Sky Wilderness Act of 2007 to commend the House for taking long overdue action on legislation to designate the Wild Sky Wilderness. Today's approval of this well-drawn, meritorious environmental legislation is long overdue. I want to thank Congressman Rick Larsen and Senator Patty Murray for their tireless persistence on behalf of their constituents as well as Chairman Rahall for his long standing support for the Wild Sky and for bringing this bill to the floor. As a Member of the House Natural Resources Committee, I have been supportive of Congressman Larsen's attempts to designate this area as wilderness and was continually frustrated at the failure of the previous Chairmen of that Committee to move this legislation and disappointed at the reasons given for inaction. Those arguments were without merit. One of the benefits of working on this legislation was learning of the steadfast support from my constituents, the new Wild Sky Wilderness will be a popular and well-loved addition to my state's heritage of protected wild landscapes. It is overwhelmingly supported by my constituents, who live nearby. Indeed, the new Wild Sky Wilderness is within easy access of the people in the entire Puget Sound region. This wilderness area, which is located in Snohomish County, enjoys enthusiastic support from the county council as well as our elected county executive. It also has the support of an overwhelming number of local elected leaders throughout the county, Democrats and Republicans alike, as well as a long list of local Snohomish County business owners. Over the years that the Wild Sky Wilderness has been before Congress it has earned enthusiastic editorial support from the local newspaper, the Everett Herald, as well as the major newspapers in Seattle and across the state. I want to emphasize to my colleagues that in my State this is as popular and non-controversial a proposal as it could possibly be. I am pleased to mention the support this legislation enjoys from the Administration, including the Agriculture Under Secretary, who in response to my questioning said that the President will sign this bill into law. On top of its stunning wild character, the 106,577-acre Wild Sky Wilderness is particularly noteworthy because it embraces lower elevation lands than most of the existing Federal wilderness areas in our State. As a result, the new wilderness will afford statutory protection to headwaters streams and watersheds vital to the survival and restoration of healthy runs of salmon and steelhead in the Skykomish River, for which the area is named. Passage of this legislation contributes to the important goal of protecting a greater diversity of biological communities in our National Wilderness Preservation System--including deep, forested valleys as well as towering, ice-clad mountain peaks. This lower elevation wilderness land will provide greater opportunities for year- round recreational adventures for Washington State residents. During the congressional consideration of this wilderness proposal, our committee has dealt with a question that all too easily can mislead those who are not familiar with the 1964 Wilderness Act and of the consistent approach Congress has followed over four decades now in applying the protection of that historic conservation law to additional portions of our Federal lands. As Congress acts on wilderness proposals such as this Wild Sky Wilderness legislation, it is important that we take care to follow the legislative history of the Wilderness Act of 1964, which was a bipartisan product of our committee, and the precedents consistently laid down over the subsequent more than four decades as Congress has enacted more than 130 laws under both Democratic and Republican leadership that have designated new wilderness areas across our country. It is clear that the Wilderness Act reserves to Congress alone the decision as to what Federal lands are ``suitable'' for designation as wilderness. Subsection 2(a) of the Wilderness Act specifies that ``. . . no Federal lands shall be designated as `wilderness areas' except as provided for in this Act or by a subsequent Act.'' Subsection 3(c) further specifies that the President may make recommendations, but that ``A recommendation of the President for designation as wilderness shall become effective only if so provided by an Act of Congress.'' Despite this full history of Congressional action, some tried to question the inclusion of certain lands in the Wild Sky Wilderness because these lands showed fading evidence of past logging, old roads, and similar evidence of human use and impact. This objection, sometimes referred to as the ``purity theory'' of wilderness, is not based on an accurate understanding of the Wilderness Act and the intent of those who enacted it. The new Wild Sky Wilderness includes some evidence of past human uses and impacts, including evidence of logging, old logging roads and logging railroad grades, and some culverts installed along those roads and railroad grades. In this way, it is no different than many wilderness areas Congress has previously designated as wilderness. During a debate here on the House floor in 1969, Representative Morris K. Udall, the former chairman of our committee and himself one of the architects of the Wilderness Act, explained this practical approach intended by the authors of the Wilderness Act to the House: It would be nice to have our national wilderness system absolutely pure and completely free of any sign of the hand of man. But the fact is that we are getting a late start in this business of preserving America's wilderness. Logging has occurred; wood roads have been opened and later abandoned; cabins have been built which in time have decayed and fallen down; in the interest of public health and safety and to protect the natural resources there may sometimes be lookout towers and patrol cabins. All of these are imperfections within the wilderness. Yet how often is man able to create or to establish anything which is truly perfect? Very, very rarely--if ever. [Congressional Record, September 24, 1969] Mr. Speaker, these remarks by Rep. Udall perfectly explicate the practical approach that Congress has always followed as we choose lands for protection in our National Wilderness Preservation System. He went on to further explain that: Congress has declared it is our national policy to preserve America's wilderness resource. Whether some prior existing imperfection--something less than absolutely purity--is to be accepted into the national wilderness system should be determined by whether its inclusion will significantly contribute to the implementation of this national policy of wilderness preservation or whether its omission will significantly obstruct this policy. [Congressional Record, September 24, 1969] In keeping with the practical approach he has so cogently summarized, I want to emphasize that some of the low elevation lands within the Wild Sky Wilderness show evidence of past human use and impacts. We have made a careful judgment that inclusion of these lands is important to serve the overall purpose of wilderness protection. As chairman Udall would have put it, every acre in the proposed Wild Sky Wilderness exhibits ``substantially all the value of wilderness.'' We should preserve it. I would also like to take a moment to pay tribute to Ms. Karen Fant, who devoted her life to preserving wilderness and wildlife in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest. She spent four decades organizing for conservation, working for groups including the Alaska Coalition, Sierra Club, Olympic Park Associates, Wild Sky Working Group, Washington Wilderness Coalition, and Save Our Wild Salmon Coalition. Her activism spanned many years, crossed state lines, and extended as far as Chongqing, China, where she dedicated herself to developing a strategy to address environmental degradation in Asia as a board member of the Seattle-Chongqing Sister City Association. Karen was instrumental in passing the 1984 Washington State Wilderness Act, which sets aside over one million acres of new wilderness. She also initiated the efforts to preserve Wild Sky. I cannot imagine a better way to honor Karen's conservation legacy than for my colleagues to join me in supporting H.R. 886, the Wild Sky Wilderness Act of 2007. Passage of this legislation is the perfect tribute to Karen's legacy.

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, this is wilderness the way wilderness is supposed to be done. I want to compliment Congressman Larsen and Senator Patty Murray for their efforts to shepherd and to fine-tune this bill. If anyone wants to see how to do a wilderness bill, come see how this one is done to take into consideration all of the local comments to pare this down to where we have the muscle and bone in this wilderness right now. Boy, is it the right place to do it. I have a picture here of Gunn and Merchant peaks looking north from Baring Peak. I climbed Baring Peak, that is really just a little scramble, a couple of summers ago. What is so amazing about the Wild Sky Wilderness, it is both wild, and it is in the sky. It is only about 55 minutes from downtown Seattle. About 2 million people can drive to this incredible Wild Sky Wilderness in about an hour, and it is a hidden gem. What you can say is that we have a new hidden gem that has been protected in the State of Washington to join the other jewels in the crown of our wilderness and our National Park System in the State of Washington, and we invite people to come out and see it. And if you come, what you will see is a very virgin country very close to an urban area. Millions of people drive by these mountains on Highway 2 and don't even realize how wild this country is right to their left as they are going east towards eastern Washington. There are hardly even any marked trails in there. So if you want wild close to an urban area, come to the Wild Sky Wilderness. It is a very, very wonderful place to go. But there is a second reason I want to point out why this wilderness is so important. The day I went up to the Baring Peak, I just happened to meet a father and two of his sons he was taking for a hike. He told me this is one of the earliest hikes going into Baring Lake. And if you could see the smile on this dad and the sort of interesting looks on these two kids, you know what wilderness is about, because today when we establish the Wild Sky Wilderness, we are giving a gift to these kids and their kids and their grandkids. So these kids could be in the same position as dad has been, sometime, to have a wilderness to take their kids and their grandkids to, and they will have the same smile on their faces 100 years from now as this family did that summer day up on Baring Peak. I want to thank the people who have been involved in this, Mike Towns specifically, a fellow who has been working on this for over 10 years. He is a teacher in Redmond, Washington. I know he will have a big smile on his face today, too. This is a great day for the continuation of wilderness in the State of Washington. It is just south of the Jackson Wilderness Area. It is a tradition that Congressman Larsen has followed and Senator Jackson, and a proud tradition of wilderness in the State of Washington. Congratulations.

Mr. INSLEE

Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, this bill could not be more timely. As I was walking across the street in front of the Supreme Court, I saw the inscription chiseled in the marble of the Supreme Court. It says, ``Equal justice under law.'' But we have witnessed now in the last few weeks the unpeeling of a scandal where the executive branch fired eight well-performing U.S. Attorneys because they would not do the political dirty work of the White House. And it is apparent now, as much as it has ever been, that we have to have a check and balance on the executive branch with Senate confirmation. I want to know why this is so viscerally important. In my district in western Washington, we had a gentleman named John McKay who was doing, by all rights, a good job as a U.S. Attorney for western Washington. But then there was this contentious election out there for Governor in 2004, and a bunch of Republicans were leaning on him to start a grand jury investigation alleging voter fraud because the vote came out in favor of the Democrat. He refused to do so because he said he didn't see any evidence of voter fraud. A little later what happens is he goes to the White House for a meeting about a prospective judgeship, and what do they ask him about? They say: How come Republicans are mad at you, at the White House. And he knows what they are mad about, is because they wouldn't go after this case where there was no evidence of voter fraud. It was apparent they were leaning on him; and, when he did not collapse, he was fired. Now, this is a situation where it is clear that we need Senate confirmation. And, by the way, I have written a letter to the President today saying the President should reinstate that U.S. Attorney while this matter is investigated. This thing smells like a mackerel in the moonlight, and it needs to be resolved. Until it is resolved, Congress is going to be investigating; and to prevent this from happening again, we need to be sure we have Senate confirmation.