Marcy Kaptur

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, let me just thank the chairman very much for his openness to these amendments and for working on this with us to perfect the legislation as it moves through the process. I am very grateful for that and grateful to the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee), and the Committee on Rules. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I want to thank the Committee on Rules. I want to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner) of the Committee on Education and the Workforce and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee), ranking member, for allowing us to move this amendment today, and I want to acknowledge the hard work of Keysha Brooks-Coley on my own staff who has worked so very hard on this amendment and others. This past Friday the Department of Labor reported that unemployment again went up in our country to a level of 8.8 million citizens, of which at least 250,000 are unemployed in the State of Ohio, and the unemployment level is now somewhere around 6 percent of those that we are still counting. Without question people need access to training and to transitional assistance, which this bill offers so much hope to those who are struggling out there, trying to find a good-paying job with good benefits. The amendment I have proposed would strengthen the technical assistance provisions of the underlying bill to allow the Department of Labor where a State does not do it to give help to localities to apply for the program and to administer the program. It would also require that a best practices system be established at the Department of Labor, so if a county in New York wants to learn what a county in Illinois might have done, or vice versa, that that would be available. The amendment would require the Department of Labor to establish a coordinated system so there is no duplication at all. For example, in the technical assistance, it would only be allowed to be provided when the State itself is not doing it. So this amendment was two parts: to better help the localities to apply, and then best practices. I would like to just say for the record, if I could, Mr. Chairman, that we did try to offer another amendment and it was not allowed in order in the Committee on Rules. But I do think it is important with the gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Boehner) and the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), here on the floor, to just state for the record that in a State like Ohio, which ranks at the bottom in terms of drawdowns of these funds, I really hope that as this bill is perfected, as it moves over to the other body and through conference, that some thought might be given to the accounting aspect of our funds, the Federal funds that are sent to the States, and to require quarterly reports, and also to differentiate between allocations to the State and actual expenditures by the State and the local counties. Believe me, its impossible to get this information. We cannot even obtain it for a State like our own from the Department of Labor. We asked the General Accounting Office to become involved in this. Even they have not been able to obtain these numbers. Frankly, I would like to strongly recommend to the committee that if dollars have not been spent by the States that there be a pass-through to the localities, so that our counties that are dealing with unemployed people and people needing training every day would have the flexibility to expend funds that, for whatever reason, seem to be getting lost or stored at the State capital level and never really getting down to those who need to establish contracts for trading with those who are unemployed. Mr. Chairman, although this amendment does not deal with that, I would ask Members for strong consideration of the amendment that does require technical assistance to be given by the Department of Labor if the States are not doing it and also to establish this best-practices opportunity at the Department of Labor, so people can learn across our country, from one State to another, from one county to another, and strongly urge the committee to think about requiring strict accounting of these dollars, with quarterly reports and differentiating between expenditures and allocations, and then, if the State is not spending the money, allowing the locality to receive the pass-through of those funds. I would ask for support of this amendment.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to say in response to the earlier Special Order, if the tax rate programs of the Bush administration as enacted 2 years ago actually produced jobs, then why has America lost nearly 3 million more jobs since that last bill was passed when in fact all those dollars were not invested in America but taken abroad and continue to empty out the manufacturing and agricultural sector of this country? My speech this evening actually has to do with old men's oil wars. I thought it would be important to put on the record the following: Midland, Texas, home to our current President, was drilled dry of oil decades ago. The President's father, who had also been President, had launched Zapata Oil Company to find more oil when Texas ran dry in the Gulf of Mexico and beyond. And then to his son, when the father was President and through his father's friends, was born Harken Energy which the current President headed. Both these firms looked beyond Texas' border for black gold. Both these firms were headed by men who became President of the United States. Harken invested in Bahrain. The President had to divest himself of that before he became our current President; but his father, George 41, still remains a Carlyle Group oil and defense acolyte. Their world view is shaped by oil. Their life has been oil. The politics they pursue is directly entwined with oil. America consumes 25 percent of the world's petroleum, which is a diminishing world resource, yet we only have 2 percent of the world's people. So having drilled America dry for all intents and purposes, the fifties oilmen, I call them, began to rely more heavily on remaining global supplies. The motherlode lies in the Middle East. It is now on these supplies that America has become dangerously reliant. But rather than become energy self-sufficient here at home and create thousands of jobs in this country, America's older leaders have continued to drive America backwards into a dying petroleum age. But Henry Kissinger, age 79, is smiling. For longer than I have been an adult, his vision has been to tie Iraq's oil to Israel and points west. This trade route would secure U.S. vital interests in the Persian Gulf, in oil and Israel. And now America has assured that Iraq is policed by over 100,000 U.S. forces. Donald Rumsfeld, age 70, is smiling, too. He vainly bragged this month he is not known for his diplomacy. The world agreed. In his 1983 visit to Saddam Hussein as Middle East special envoy for the Reagan administration, he was rebuffed when he proposed on behalf of Bechtel Corporation, whose chairman in those days was George Schulz, an oil pipeline that would extend from Iraq through Jordan to Aqaba. Hussein demurred, fearing the pipeline would run too close to Israel. Now Rumsfeld has sat in Abu Gharyb Palace in Baghdad as viceroy Jay Garner receives Bechtel and Halliburton, which Dick Cheney headed. That company now receives noncompetitively bid contracts from this government to secure the oil fields. Not far from northern Iraq lies Baku on the Caspian Sea, an oil bonanza that even Hitler coveted. U.S. forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan make future pipeline defense there so much easier. George Schulz, age 82, is smiling. No longer Chair of Bechtel, he still serves on its board. His Stanford protege Condoleezza Rice, for whom Chevron named an oil tanker, heads the National Security Council. Dick Cheney, 62, is smiling. Halliburton, of which he served as CEO before becoming Vice President, just landed a no-bid contract, $7 billion from the government of the United States paid for by the taxpayers of the United States, to control the oil fields of Iraq. Vice President Cheney already is receiving $180,000 a year from Halliburton in deferred compensation. I want to know if Halliburton plans to make an oil deal with President Karzai in Afghanistan who just happens to have ties to Unocal Oil. Let America embrace the world of the future. Let us move beyond the hydrocarbon age. U.S. addiction to foreign petroleum has cost too many lives and the undemocratic oil kingdoms it has perpetuated are an international disgrace and the primary reason for the rise of terrorism. This world view of the old oil barons should be no more. Let America become energy independent here at home. Let the oil kingdoms democratize. Let us invest that $100 billion-plus we spend to defend foreign oil routes in new technologies here at home: photovoltaics, fuel cells, biofuels, in high speed rail, hydrogen, renewables. Mr. Speaker, it is time for a new generation of Americans to take over the government of the United States.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, this evening I would like to include in the Record an excellent editorial from the Toronto Star written by the editorial page's editor emeritus, Haroon Siddiqui. The focus of this article is looking at the United States and our role in the Middle East and Central Asia. Though I cannot read the entire editorial tonight, I thought it had some excellent observations that are important for the American people to hear. It is often helpful to have a country from the outside looking at us, rather than us looking out at the world. Mr. Siddiqui writes that a superpower like the United States would find it somewhat easy to defeat an incidental power like Iraq, but to do so not only for its publicly stated reasons, fighting terrorism, liberating Iraq and triggering a domino effect of democratization of the Middle East. But, he observes, the real American agenda is now only becoming clearer. The conquest of Iraq, he says, is enabling a new Pax Americana, the exertion of American power. That goes well beyond control of oil, though that surely remains a central enterprise. He points out that America is pulling out of traditional bases of allies like Saudi Arabia and Turkey, and probably doing so because of the rising conservative backlash in those countries to our very presence. He mentions that U.S. relations with Egypt have been placed upon the back burner; Egypt, of course, being the most populace Islamic and Arab country. It is no accident that the three nations, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt, are the region's most populous, but that America's newest partners are some of the most thinly populated, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and the United Arab Emirates, all as well tightly controlled monarchies. People are a problem for America, he observes in the Arab and Muslim world. They are bristling with anti-Americanism, principally over the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, which remains unresolved. He points out that the pullout just announced by the Bush administration of 10,000 U.S. troops from a Saudi air base was long overdue, but it so embarrassed the ruling House of Saud, which had to place it very far away from public view at a remote base in the desert. I would point out in a way I was very disappointed that the Bush administration announced this current withdrawal so quickly, because Osama bin Laden has been given a victory. Osama bin Laden on 9-11 said to us that he wanted the infidels out of Saudi Arabia, and, among others, he was referring to U.S. troops based on Saudi soil. Why did we have to give him that victory? I think that helps to ripen terrorism globally. The article goes on to say that the kingdom with the world's largest oil reserves, Saudi Arabia, and the highest output, will lose clout as America now controls the second largest reserves in the world in Iraq. And he states that America now has a vise grip on the region with 14 new post-9-11 bases, from eastern Europe, through Iraq, the Persian Gulf, Pakistan and Afghanistan, to the two Central Asian republics of Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. The singular feature of all those new allies, he says, is that they are weak states. Most are undemocratic, if not repressive. So America is replicating its failed model of using unrepresentative regimes to suppress people, but doing it on new turf. He says this short-term gain, therefore, of victory in Iraq may come at the expense of long- term pain and rising terrorism, as he sees America determined to install its own puppet regime in Baghdad with the majority Shiites being shunted aside. He then comments on the Bush administration quietly cozying up to a most notorious terrorist group, the leftist Mujahideen-e-Khalq in Iraq, and he questions why would the Bush administration even want to do that, a terrorist group that killed Americans when we were having difficulties in Iran. Taken together, he says, these American moves bear an uncanny resemblance to the British colonial enterprise of nearly a century ago which is still being paid by the people there. As America confronts this new world in the Middle East and Central Asia, it is worth reading Mr. Siddiqui's very perceptive comments.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I have never met New York's Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, but on behalf of the citizens of Ohio, I want to thank him. The people of New York should be very proud of their Attorney General, Mr. Spitzer, for he is bringing to justice the robber barons of Wall Street who stole the money in our 401(k)s, who lied to our shareholders about the worth of various investments, who issued fraudulent reports about the value of stocks, and frankly destroyed a great deal of the confidence of our people in our so-called free markets. In fact, some might say they have been a free-for-all market. Some might say what these Wall Street fellows have done is a big heist, a big heist right out of people's pocketbooks and a big heist right out of people's dividends. Because of work that he did, and our Securities and Exchange Commission following behind, the regulators found fault with every single investment banking firm on Wall Street. I want to include in the Record much of what they said: ``Analysts wittingly duped investors to curry favor with certain corporate clients. Investment houses received secret payments from companies they gave strong recommendations to buy. And for top executives whose companies were clients, stock underwriters offered special access to hot initial public offerings.'' It really is staggering, when we think about the recession that we are in, about the malfunctioning of our own stock markets which lie at the heart of this free enterprise system that has been hijacked time and again. It started with Enron. Then we saw WorldCom. Then it was Tyco. Now it is every single money manager on Wall Street that has your money. So far, they have been fined as follows: $400 million is to be paid by Citigroup; $200 million each by Credit Suisse and Merrill Lynch, which included an earlier Merrill settlement of $100 million in fines; $100 million in fines by Goldman Sachs; $80 million in fines by Bear Stearns; $80 million by JP Morgan; and fines of the same amount to Lehman and to UBS Warburg; $32.5 million in fines by Piper Jaffray. These are names we see advertised in our newspapers. They have got enough money to buy ads all over the country, yet they take your hard- earned money and they gamble it away. I have to ask myself as a Member of Congress, I am not going to trust those folks with the Social Security funds of this country. Do not tell me to put our people's hard-earned dollars in that stock market that you cannot trust from one day to the next, and do not ask this Member of Congress to vote for a Bush administration tax scheme that rewards some of the same fellows that just ran away with our money in our own equity market. Why was not anybody watching? Why did it take so long? Now, they tell you anything to get your money. That is what Mr. Spitzer found. And they did tell you anything to get your money. The news articles really say everything. What jumps off the page in the documents is the Wall Street firms' utter, utter disregard for the individual investor in pursuit of their own personal benefit. These are institutions that are supposed to be working for us, and they all, not one, not two, all, the major firms on Wall Street failed the American people. One investor told a colleague he was trying to make the company look good with his questions. A few moments later he said, ``We got paid for it, and I am going to Cancun tomorrow because of what I did.'' That is someone that took your money. Here is somebody, Sanford Weill, Citigroup's chairman. He persuaded an analyst to change a rating. This is not some guy in the back closet. This is the head of the largest investment banking firm in this country. What are they doing up there? What is the matter with them? You know how many people in my district have lost their retirement savings in the 401(k) plans alone? These are the highest paid people in our country that the Bush administration is about to open up the Treasury for. They do not deserve a dime. They ought to pay more of it back to us for what they have done. Mr. Speaker, I congratulate Attorney General Elliott Spitzer of New York. He is a hero in my book. Mr. Speaker, I include the three newspaper articles for the Record. [From the New York Times, Apr. 29, 2003] Ten Wall St. Firms Settle With U.S. in Analyst Inquiry: Agree to Pay $1.4 Billion (By Stephen Labaton) Washington, Apr. 28.--Prosecutors announced a settlement today with the nation's biggest investment firms that bars the heads of the largest bank from talking to his analysts, details a far greater range of conflicts of interest than previously disclosed, and leaves the industry exposed both to further regulation and costly litigation. The $1.4 billion settlement by 10 firms and 2 well-known stock analysts reached tentatively last December but completed in the last few days, resolved accusations that the firms lured millions of investors to buy billions of dollars worth of shares in companies they knew were troubled and which ultimately either collapsed or sharply declined. The Securities and Exchange Commission, state prosecutors and market regulators accused three firms in particular-- Citigroup's Salomon Smith Barney, Merrill Lynch, and Credit Suisse First Boston--of fraud. But the thousands of pages of internal e-mail messages and other evidence that regulators made public today painted a picture up and down Wall Street of an industry rife with conflicts of interest during the height of the Internet and telecommunications bubble that burst three years ago. At firm after firm, according to prosecutors, analysts wittingly duped investors to curry favor who corporate clients. Investment houses received secret payments from companies they gave strong recommendations to buy. And for top executives whose companies were clients, stock underwriters offered special access to hot initial public offerings. ``These cases reflect a sad chapter in the history of American business--a chapter in which those who reaped enormous benefits based on the trust of investors profoundly betrayed that trust,'' said William H. Donaldson, the new chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. ``The cases also represent an important new chapter in our ongoing efforts to restore investors' faith and confidence in the fairness and integrity of our markets.'' In a reflection of regulators' concerns about the prospect for conflicts of interest at Citigroup, Wall Street's biggest bank, the settlement bars its chairman and chief executive, Sanford I. Weill, from communicating with his firm's stock analysts about the companies they cover, unless a lawyer is present. But the regulators found fault with every major bank on Wall Street. In addition to the three firms accused of fraud, five others--Bear Stearns, Goldman, Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Piper Jaffray and UBS Warburg--were accused of making unwarranted or exaggerated claims about the companies they analyzed. UBS Warburg and Piper Jaffray, were accused of receiving payments for research without disclosing such payments. And Salomon Smith Barney and First Boston were accused of currying favor with their corporate clients by selling hot stock offerings to senior executives, who then could turn around and sell the shares for virtually guaranteed profits. The two banks agreed to end that practice, known as spinning. In settling the cases, the firms neither admitted nor denied the allegations, following the standard practice in resolving such disputes with the commission. In monetary terms, the $1.4 billion in fines, restitution and other payments equals nearly 7 percent of the industry's profits last year, which was Wall Street's worst year since 1995. Of that sum, $387.5 million will go to repaying investors who file claims with the government. But armed with the regulators' findings, lawyers are sure to seek many times that total in private litigation. The firms also agreed to abide by what officials said were significant new ethics rules and to build barriers between investment bankers and stock analysts in hopes of relieving analysts from the business pressures that many succumbed to during the 1990's. For example, the compensation of analysts is to be based on the quality of their research, not their contribution to the firm's investment banking business. As part of the agreement, two analysts whose fortunes rose with the markets, Jack B. Grubman of Salomon Smith Barney and Henry Blodget of Merrill Lynch, agreed to lifetime bans from the industry, along with significant fines. The singling out of Mr. Weill stemmed in part from his efforts to try to influence Mr. Grubman to change his view of AT&T--a Citigroup client that had Mr. Weill on its board--to positive from negative. He and Citigroup's other senior officers--whose contacts with the banks' research analysts are also restricted under the settlement--were the only Wall Street executives to agree specifically to such a prohibition. Any top Wall Street executive directly involved in investment banking, however, would be barred from discussions with his company's analysts under the terms of the agreements. For all the anticipation of today's announcement, the voluminous record of complaints and damaging evidence left many unresolved questions for both investors and the securities industry. Foremost among those was what long-term impact the settlement will have on the culture of Wall Street, the integrity of stock analysis and the confidence of investors. Concerned that the settlement might not be far reaching enough--and might also have unintended consequences-- officials at the S.E.C. are considering the adoption of a new set of regulations governing stock analysts. ``It's critically important that we now step back and thoroughly examine the issues,'' said Harvey Goldschmid, one of the commissioners. Wondering whether the settlement might discourage research for smaller markets, he added, ``No research is certainly better than skewed research, but honest research would be even better.'' Critics who fear that the settlement falls short of protecting investors said that they welcomed further efforts by regulators. ``What they have imposed is a solution where they will try to regulate behavior, ethics and business practices,'' said Scott Cleland, the chief executive of Precursor Group and a member of a coalition of small research firms without ties to investment banks that have been seeking broader changes. ``What they didn't do is address the conflict at its source-- the commingling of trading, research and banking commissions.'' ``The analogy is that if this were an operating room, they disinfected everything but the scalpel,'' Mr. Cleland said. ``The scalpel is left dirty.'' While providing $375.5 million in restitution that can be sought by investors, the cases leave unresolved how much investors might ultimately recoup after relying on the analysts to make what turned out to have been calamitous investments. Federal and state officials said today that one aim of the settlement was to shake out enough strong evidence to assist shareholders in private lawsuits and arbitration efforts. ``This is very much the beginning,'' said New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, whose early inquiry into conflicts on Wall Street prompted federal and market regulators to begin focusing on the issue--and who supporters say might try to ride his success in the case to the governor's office in Albany. ``One of our objectives was to put information into the marketplace to permit investors on their own to seek relief.'' Wall Street executives acknowledged that the findings of the regulators would probably draw more lawsuits against their firms. ``It's sort of like throwing a party and inviting a lot of people in, isn't it?'' E. Stanley O'Neal, Merrill's chief executive, said at the firm's annual shareholders meeting in Plainsboro, N.J. Government officials also emphasized today that the settlements did not preclude them from further investigation--pointedly noting, for example, that they were examining whether any top executives at the investment firms had failed to adequately supervise the analysts. ``Just wait,'' said Stephen M. Cutler, the head of enforcement at the commission and a leading architect of the agreement. In addition to the restitution, the firms also agreed to pay $487.5 million in penalties, $432.5 million to fund independent research, and $80 million for investor education. Mr. Blodget agreed to pay $4 million and Mr. Grubman $15 million to settle the charges against them. The fines, restitution and other penalties were divided as follows: $400 million will be paid by Citigroup; $200 million each by Credit Suisse and Merrill Lynch (which includes an earlier Merrill settlement of $100 million); $125 million by Morgan Stanley; $110 million by Goldman Sachs; $80 million each by Bear Stearns, J.P. Morgan, Lehman and UBS Warburg; and $32.5 million by Piper Jaffray. One of the final issues that had been negotiated involved which companies would bear the brunt of the penalties and how much might be covered by insurance policies and deductible from the firms' taxes. Under tax law, none of the $487.5 million in penalties is deductible, and the firms agreed not to seek reimbursement under their insurance policies. Prosecutors also inserted a clause in the settlement that might make it harder for the firms to try to deduct any of the $512.5 million in independent research and investor education.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a very special constituent, United States District Court Magistrate Judge Vernelis K. Armstrong, on the occasion of her receipt of the Ohio Women's Bar Association's Justice Alice Robie Resnick Award of Distinction. This award is the OWBA's highest award for professional excellence and is bestowed annually on a deserving attorney who exhibits leadership in the areas of advancing the status and interests of women and in improving the legal profession in the state of Ohio. It gives me great pleasure to wish Judge Armstrong my warmest congratulations on this truly special occasion. The Honorable Vernelis K. Armstrong is a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of Ohio, assigned to the Western Division in Toledo. She has served as a United States District Court Magistrate since she was appointed to the Federal bench in September of 1994. Judge Armstrong is a 1956 graduate of Wayne State University, and also received her law degree from Wayne State University Law School in 1960. Prior to her appointment as a Federal Magistrate, Judge Armstrong served as an Assistant United States Attorney in Toledo for fifteen years, primarily handling civil litigation matters. Judge Armstrong has been a member of the Ohio Women's Bar Association since 1993. She is currently a member of the Toledo Bar Association Round Table, the Minorities in the Profession and Federal Court Committees. In the past, she served as Secretary for the Board of Trustees for the Toledo Bar Association, on the Bankruptcy Committee, as liaison to the Bankruptcy and Minorities in the Legal Profession Committees and on the Pro Bono Advisory Board. Judge Armstrong's past recognitions and awards include receiving the Arabella Mansfield Award by the Toledo Women's Bar Association in 1988, the Excellence in Law Award by the Black American Law Students' Association (BALSA) in 1989 and 1997, the Milestones Award by the Young Women's Christian Association in 1997, and in 1999 she was the recipient of the Athena Award by the Chamber of Commerce. The OWBA was initially formed in 1991 and is the only statewide bar association within Ohio solely dedicated toward advancing the interests of women attorneys while encouraging networking and the creation of a statewide mentor program for women attorneys. On May 1, 2003, Ohio Supreme Court Justice Alice Robie Resnick will be presenting Judge Armstrong with the Ohio Women's Bar Association's Justice Alice Robie Resnick Award of Distinction at its Annual Meeting in Cleveland, Ohio. It gives me great pleasure to rise today, Mr. Speaker, and join the OWBA in congratulating Magistrate Judge Vernelis Armstrong and wishing her continued success.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, there are two major stories in the news. There is one that we see daily, and that is the story of the war in Iraq. The other story we hear little about, and that is the economic war right here at home. Last month the Pentagon announced we will be sending another 100,000 troops to Iraq, and our hearts are with them. They are putting their lives at risk for us. They deserve our support. But last week the Associated Press reported that an even greater number of people, 108,000, lost their jobs, as U.S. companies dealt with the battered economy right here at home. These Americans also work every day to support the ideals of our Nation and the work ethic. They deserve our support. It is also ironic to note that prior to the Pentagon's recent deployment, there were already 300,000 troops in the vicinity of Iraq. In February, according to the Associated Press, businesses here at home shed almost as many jobs, 357,000 more than previously reported; and yet this morning, President Bush announced his opposition to the unemployment extension that we attempted to get here today in the budget resolution, calling it ``objectionable'' in the statement of administration policy. We are hearing lots of plans about aid to flow to the Iraqi people, including food and medicine. This is aid that must be provided. But while the United States Army also takes on the role of humanitarian assistance in a military zone, the Salvation Army here at home is facing a swelling need for services and a downturn in donations that have led to an unprecedented lack of food for people in our own economic war zone. The Salvation Army in my own hometown has seen a 42 percent increase in requests for assistance just this year. At the start of the fiscal year last October, our Women, Infants and Children food program reported the highest level of participants ever; and nationally we have the highest number of participants in the last 5 years. Just since January 2001, America has lost nearly 2 million more jobs. In Toledo, my hometown, military spouses are showing up at the Women, Infants and Children feeding offices because their husbands have been called up for active duty, cutting the income of families by drastic amounts. The Cleveland Plain Dealer last month told us, at a pantry in Columbus's west side, a 67-year-old retiree gets groceries to help feed a daughter and a granddaughter who moved in with him last year. He remembers relatives telling of bread lines during the Great Depression. He never imagined he would see himself in one, let alone wait in one. There is no doubt that the United States is the freest and most bountiful Nation on earth. That is why people want to come here. But do we not owe as much to hardworking Americans as we do to war-torn Iraqis? Do we not need to build our economic might here at home as much as our military might abroad? Do we not need to plan as much for our economic-torn economy as much as we do the Iraqi war-torn economy? Do we not need a coalition of allies with labor and management for job creation and economic improvement as much as we need a coalition of military forces in the Gulf? If we can provide money to airlines who are claiming they are being hurt by the war, should we not also provide an additional 26 weeks of unemployment benefits to airline workers who are the real victims of the slowdown? Military war, of necessity, is receiving most of our attention of late, but how about the enemy within? The economic war here at home? It seems to me that the weapons of war may be more visible when they are used, but the damage of an economic war is just as real for individuals and families and communities that are suffering here at home. Our State is over $4 billion in debt. Our mayor, he is broke. It just seems to me that our news ought to talk a little bit about what is happening here at home. Mr. Speaker, it is time the second war that we are in on our home soil gets equal attention in the media.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, Lucas County, Ohio will celebrate Public Health Week April 7-13, 2003. I am pleased to recognize the efforts of the Toledo-Lucas County Health Department and its Public Health Planning Committee in its efforts to promote health education for the citizenry of our region. The Toledo-Lucas County Health Department provides a wide array of services, including immunizations, AIDS/HIV counseling and testing, specialty health clinics, wellness programs, outreach, and advocacy. It is the local agency responsible for ensuring safe water and air, environmental services, food protection, animal control, and health assessments of the people in Lucas County. Its staff, administration, and volunteers are committed to public service, and deeply dedicated to the promotion of public health and wellness. Celebrated in 46 states, Public Health Week is a coordinated effort to utilize the resources of the systems of public health to educate people about a wide array of issues. This year's effort focuses on weight and obesity. With two-thirds of adults overweight, and the number of overweight children tripling in twenty years, Public Health Week 2003 urges Americans to ``shape up their future.''

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. I rise in strong support of this essential bill for military operations, homeland security, and foreign assistance, and I want to thank the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Young) and the ranking member, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), for their hard work, especially on the gentleman from Wisconsin's anniversary of service in this Congress today. After three decades of service, we need that intelligence, especially now in this critical time in world history. I want to focus my remarks particularly on health care for those who are putting their lives on the line in America's cause as we stand here to provide the resources for them to do that, and that is especially those in our Guard and Reserve. Those in the Guard and Reserve are not tangential to this operation. In many units they comprise over half of these on the ground. I think we have to recognize with the change in our force structure that we have to provide the kind of benefits to these Guard and Reserve forces that they deserve. In this bill, with the leadership of the gentleman from California (Mr. Lewis) and the ranking member, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), we have made an improvement in health care coverage for our Guard and Reserve forces. After 30 days of active duty call-up, they are eligible for TRICARE and their families are eligible for that health insurance. So it is an improvement over past situations. But as we move forward this year, I would hope we would recognize the changes that have occurred in our force structure and provide 365-day- a-year optional health care coverage for members of the Guard and Reserve upon their return home. Because, truly, one-third to one-half of members of the Guard and Reserve have no health insurance. They do not work for companies that provide health insurance. And for those with insurance, the current system is a patchwork. It creates a lot of family turbulence as they are called up to active duty and then they find their insurance plan switching to another, and so forth. And I can tell you when they come home, many of them will fall off their benefits. The Veterans Administration has told us they will only care for those in active duty from the Guard and Reserve for 2 years after they come home, and they will not care for their families. So we have a situation here that has a lot of inequities. I would just ask the chairman and ask the chairman of the Subcommittee on Defense of the Committee on Appropriations and the ranking member, that as strongly as we support this bill and the improvements for family coverage for those in our Guard and Reserve, that when they do return home, that in further bills that will come before us in the appropriations process and in the authorizing bill for the Department of Defense for 2004, that we provide optional TRICARE coverage for those in the Guard and Reserve and their families, 365 days a year. Let us give them that option. I ask my colleagues to support this important measure as essential under current circumstances but far from perfect in times of adequate support for our veterans and our homeland security.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Guam (Ms. Bordallo) and the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Renzi) for allocating time so that I might speak on behalf of H.R. 289, which would expand the boundaries, as they have said, of two national wildlife refuges along the north coast, the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge in Ohio and the Lower Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge in Michigan. Obviously, we are one of the few American flyways that remain. The bill that is before us today is identical to a measure that passed by unanimous consent here on the House floor late in the 107th Congress. But because of inaction by the other body it was unable to be sent to the President for signature. I would like to thank the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Gilchrest) and the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), chairman and ranking member of the Fisheries Subcommittee, for their assistance, and also chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Resources, the gentleman from California (Mr. Pombo) and the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall), for their efforts as well. We deeply appreciate the support they have given on a bipartisan basis throughout. This bill is modeled on the legislation of the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) to create the Lower Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge. Obviously, our region is right next to Canada, and it builds on the remarkable success of that effort. Let me emphasize that this bill facilitates only voluntary actions. Voluntary cooperation is the byword. Our bill explicitly prohibits any forced takings. It does not force any private landowner or the Federal Government to do anything that both parties are not willing to do. What it does do is create a mechanism and a boundary, again drawing upon the success of the Lower Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge, to foster cooperation and teamwork to promote conservation and the national wildlife refuge system. The bill facilitates a process by which our U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service can either purchase land or accept donations of land and conservation easements from willing parties, corporations, nonprofit organizations and individuals. That is well under way in the lower Detroit as I speak. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, which is a part of this, was created in 1961 originally when local conservation and hunting clubs donated pristine Lake Erie marshland to the Federal Government and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The bill enjoys broad and deep support in northern Ohio along the north coast from conservation groups, wildlife groups, and as the gentleman from Arizona mentioned Ducks Unlimited, and local governments. It is supported by the State of Ohio and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Mr. Speaker, this year we are celebrating as a Nation the 100th anniversary of the national wildlife refuge system that was created by the vision of President Theodore Roosevelt. During this centennial year, obviously the north coast is very grateful to be included. H.R. 289 will help us raise the profile of the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, the Lake Erie marshlands and also the Lake Erie islands so that more Americans and people from throughout the world can enjoy their natural splendor. The refuge now attracts over 130,000 visitors a year, hunters, fishermen, photographers, birders, hikers, artists and schoolchildren. We expect that number to increase dramatically. I might say as a result of our recognition of our dependence on our natural system, when we first began work in this region of our country, we had but two or three nesting pairs of eagles that were left in our region of the country. That is now up over 84 nesting pairs of eagles. We expect those numbers to increase in ensuing years as well. We see the natural wonders of the Lake Erie marshlands as an economic boon to our north coast region through ecotourism, which is expanding. We want families to enjoy the roller coasters at Cedar Point in Sandusky and then drive a few miles west to see the bald eagles at the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge. We want tourists to enjoy some of the greatest fishing on Earth. I would like to say that I represent the bathtub of the Great Lakes. We have more fish and more swimmers than any other part of the region, or anyplace in the world, in the central and western basins of Lake Erie and also some of the greatest bird watching in the world as well. H.R. 289 will help us build on this momentum, not only for Ottawa but also for the Lower Detroit International Wildlife Refuge. I want to personally express my deep gratitude to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), seniority number one here in the House, for his leadership for our entire region. Mr. Speaker, I urge the Members to vote ``yes'' on H.R. 289.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Helen Hutt, joining us in our gallery, a distinguished citizen from Ohio. When Helen first began her service to the American Red Cross, Calvin Coolidge was President of the United States, a first-class stamp cost 2 cents, and the first Academy Awards were presented. That was 1928. Since that time, Helen has touched countless lives through her 75 years of service to the American Red Cross. Helen began her involvement with the Red Cross in 1928 when she became certified to teach swimming lessons. During World War II, she worked in the South Pacific as a ``Doughnut Dolly,'' serving GIs coffee and doughnuts. In the 1950s and 1960s, she organized a ``Learn to Swim'' program for Port Clinton children and the blind. Helen worked as a local Disaster Relief Volunteer during the 1970s, and then volunteered at Magruder Hospital recruiting blood donors and sharing expertise with the Ottawa County Advisory Board. She is still an active volunteer for the Ottawa County district office of the Red Cross. Throughout her years of volunteerism, Helen has received numerous honors, including the Volunteer of the Year Award for the Ottawa County District, and the highest local award for the Red Cross that it ever bestows, the Clara Barton Volunteer Leadership Award. Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that this incredible American now is over 90 years of age and she will be receiving her 75-year volunteer pin at the National Red Cross Headquarters here in Washington, D.C., I ask my colleagues to join me in congratulating this magnificent American. Congratulations. We are so very, very proud of you, Helen Hutt.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the resolution and stand 1,000 percent behind our brave and selfless men and women in uniform. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the resolution. At this decisive moment in history, all Americans stand 1000 percent behind our brave and selfless men and women in uniform. I have no doubt America will achieve a military victory in Iraq. The road after that will be long, and require sustained commitment along with the support of our allies. No one can predict fully the course of world events as this war begins, so we must draw our strength from one another. This is a time for reflection, and kindness to one another. I extend deepest respect to all the people of our community country who have open discussed and not shirked from their responsibilities as free citizens in addressing how best to defeat rising terrorism around the world. Your voices will shape a wiser course for the future. May the God that creates and sustains us all protect the world's children for a general of peace to come.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, Women's History Month is celebrated during the month of March in the United States and around the world. Last week Members of Congress participated in Domestic Violence Awareness Week on Capitol Hill in partnership with Lifetime Television to raise awareness of the issues surrounding domestic violence, and address possible solutions. Domestic Violence is one of the most critical public health issues facing women and children today, and its impact is felt by every member of our society. Domestic Violence is not just a women's issue. Domestic Violence touches the lives of men, women and children--affecting the entire family structure in our country. I would like to take the time this month to honor the domestic violence shelters in my district--the 9th District of Ohio for the services they provide daily to individuals coping with domestic violence. The YWCA Battered Women's Shelter in Toledo, OH, the Family House in Toledo, OH, the Safe Harbour Domestic Violence Shelter in Sandusky, OH, and Ottawa County Transitional Housing in Port Clinton, OH. All four of the mentioned organizations serve women and children on the front lines. The staff members of the shelters are the individuals that hear the stories, and provide services to people in need. The statistics are real, and the issue of domestic violence must be kept at the forefront of domestic policy debates locally and nationally. The YWCA Battered Women's Shelter in Toledo serves the area of Lucas County and offers emergency short-term housing and counseling for battered women and their children. The Family House in Toledo serves Lucas County and is a short-term emergency shelter for homeless families, offering supportive services through a family case manager. Ottawa County Transitional Housing in Port Clinton is a long term homeless shelter for women and children. The shelter serves people in Erie and Ottawa counties offering supportive services to families. I sincerely thank all of the individuals that work for these important organizations, serving our community, and the people of the 9th District of Ohio daily. Onward.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the achievements of women in community development. Women are key leaders in building quality, affordable housing and they are revitalizing their communities in the United States as well as internationally. The central role of women in any effective community development strategy, whether the goal is economic development, housing, education or health, has been well documented. The National Network of Women in Community Development, in partnership with women community development leaders from across the country are working to bring a collective voice to foster new policies and improve existing ones, which are more responsive to the housing and community development needs of women and children. On the occasion of the 20th Anniversary of the McAuley Institute, the only national nonprofit community development intermediary that focuses its resources on the housing and related needs of women and their families, I would like to recognize the vital role that women-led development organizations have played in creating housing across the country and in the restoration of communities.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, before this war starts, we should recognize that the Bush administration foreign policy toward the Middle East and central Asia is leading America down a dangerous, dark alley globally. It is isolating America in the world even further. Even before the Bush administration took office, America had a growing problem there related to the unresolved Arab-Palestinian conflict as well as our addiction to the import of Middle East oil from which the profits prop up repressive regimes. This chart shows the dramatic increase in deaths among U.S. diplomats in service to our country overseas. Most of them are in the Middle East and central Asia and most in the Middle East. It is very interesting. Here were the Beirut bombings in 1983 at our embassy, the Kenya bombings. This chart does not include now the millions of people that have been affected and the thousands of Americans here at home who lost their lives on 9-11, as well as diplomats like Lawrence Foley who recently was assassinated in Jordan or the soldiers who recently lost their lives in Kuwait. In 2 years, Bush's programs have reduced America's standing in the world, plummeting even more than before. The conduct of the Bush administration foreign policy is costing America friends across the world. Even our oldest and staunchest allies in the cause of freedom are turning away from us. Our neighbors, Canada and Mexico, are increasingly at odds with this administration's foreign policy goals. The Bush administration cannot buy the loyalty of the people of Turkey. We offered billions of dollars in grants and loans, and we sold out more textile workers in North and South Carolina by saying the Turkish textiles could be used in U.S. military uniforms to lure their support, but the Turkish parliament has refused to be a rubber stamp for the government and rejected the request to allow U.S. troops to use Turkey as a staging base. Why? It is not Colin Powell's fault necessarily. We should look at the fact that about 95 percent of the people of Turkey oppose this administration's war with Iraq. Henry Luce called the 20th century the American Century, but USA Today says the 21st century might be known as the anti-American century. USA Today this week had a huge article talking about how Americans traveling abroad are now being treated. One traveler told USA Today he carries a lighter emblazoned with an American flag. On recent overseas trips, he says he had been turned down when he offered someone a light and they see the flag on his lighter. In Britain, 67 percent of the public opposes a war against Iraq without specific backing from the United Nations Security Council. Americans are being told by USA Today, do not patronize U.S. franchise restaurants abroad. In Germany, 86 percent of the people are opposed to a military attack against Iraq; and in Russia, at least 91 percent of the people oppose a war against Iraq. It is widely recognized that support for the United States has never been lower in South Korea. Around the world, public opinion has shifted against this country. A former national security adviser's brigadier general said in the New York Times yesterday, America's standing in the world has never been lower since 1945. We are losing the battles for the hearts and minds of the people of the world. For a White House that follows polling results as closely as the Bush White House, these numbers are staggering. The problem is not President Chirac of France or Chancellor Schroeder of Germany. These have been America's most historic and dependable democratic allies. The problem is that the Bush administration has simply failed to convince the people of the world that a preemptive strike against Iraq is justified. Meanwhile, here at home, energy prices are going up. Gasoline is over $2 a gallon in California and rising across America, and the last four recessions have been caused by rising oil prices. Just be smart enough to connect the dots. It is time for the United States to put all that money that we are spending abroad right here at home to create energy independence, and it is time for us to get back to the bargaining table with Israel and the Palestinian authorities to put peace in that region and every single bit of energy that we have toward that end. Today, we had a magnificent outpouring of support against the war from the poet laureates of America, and I choose to read one of the 13,000 poems that they presented to us by Mr. Stanley Kunitz, a 97- year-old poet from New York City, who said, ``When they shall paint our sockets gray and light us like a stinking fuse, remember that we once could say, yesterday we had a world to lose.''

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation with mixed feelings, because the need for environmental remediation along the border is extraordinary; and I wish to express my deepest respect for my colleagues, the gentlewoman from Illinois (Mrs. Biggert), the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Bereuter), the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gonzalez), the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa), and those who have worked to bring this matter to the floor. I rise in opposition because I really do not believe this should come to us under a suspension. I think that the issues concerning us all out of NAFTA, and NADBank in particular, deserve the full engagement of this Congress. And I think Members should pay attention to this legislation that was brought up very quickly and out of a single committee, a committee on which I do not serve, and this is my only way of informing the membership of issues at stake relating to NADBank and adjustment to NAFTA. As an appropriator in this Congress, I have to express the view that NADBank in and of itself deserves a very, very close look by Congress because if we look back to NADBank's establishment, it had a very curious beginning. It existed only as a side agreement that was tacked on to the original NAFTA trade agreement that was passed by a narrow margin here in Congress in 1993. NADBank was sort of an afterthought. I can remember the gentleman from California who helped negotiate it, but it never had a separate debate in this Congress. Its functions, its operations have never been separately debated here, and now we are asking for amendments to something we have never had a full debate on in this Congress. NADBank's shortcomings are vast, and it operates in a most unusual and atypical fashion, outside the normal jurisdictions of our Committee on Appropriations. The gentlewoman from Illinois (Mrs. Biggert) mentioned it has a half a billion dollars of capitalization. Some of it came from the general revenues of the United States, the people of our country, and the remainder from the people of Mexico; but even though it has a half a billion dollars of capitalization, it comes in the form of several pieces that wash through various appropriations subcommittees. It has no real home. Some might say its jurisdiction is segmented. Others might say it truly is haphazard and hard to get your arms around. The American people deserve better. Indeed, NADBank operationally as a bank is a moving target, looking for a home in the Federal Government. It technically resides in the Department of Treasury. Yet its loan and grant authorities float mysteriously between the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Small Business Administration, and a growing role for the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, which all manage to somehow, in ways unknown to Congress, subsidize the activities of NADBank. What we do not know about NADBank far surpasses what, in fact, any individual Member of Congress might know. I know that Members who live along the border have a horrible environmental problem that they are dealing with. I have seen the cesspools being created by industrial production and agricultural production with no funds for environmental remediation. We tried to build environmental provisions into the original NAFTA. They were rejected. They were rejected and now, with the billions of dollars of commerce occurring across the border, who is being asked to pay for the environmental remediation? Not the companies creating the damage, but the taxpayers of the United States of America. This is a chart showing the trade deficit with Mexico. Before NAFTA's signing, we had a positive balance with Mexico, both ways. Since NAFTA's passage, every single year we have moved as a Nation into deeper and deeper trade deficit with the nation of Mexico, as well as Canada. We have lost over three million jobs in this country due to NAFTA; and the people of Mexico have had their wages cut in half, and now 250 million jobs in northern Mexico and those maquiladoras are moving to China where the wages are even cheaper. We ought to revisit NAFTA. It is 10 years since its passage and millions and millions of people are being harmed. Indeed, the most harmed, in my opinion, are the peasants coming off the ejido system in Mexico who have no voice and no representation, and they deserve it in this highest Chamber of our government. NADBank should realistically deal with these adjustments and it does not. We should not just have a suspension bill that deals with two or three small provisions. We should deal with the fundamentals of this agreement and the giant holes that are in it. In the United States, in a State like my own--and here is a current chart of this showing our unemployment--the dark green covers counties in our State with the highest rates of unemployment. One of the five top States in the Union to lose jobs because of NAFTA, most recently Dixon Ticondaroga Pencil and Crayon Company in Sandusky, Ohio, and also Phillips Electronics, in Ottawa, Ohio, over 2000 more jobs have relocated to Mexico. We know a lot about NAFTA and its impact, and yet we look at the NADBank regulations and which counties have they helped with all the job loss in Ohio? Well, they picked one here and they picked one here and they picked one here to try to give a minimal amount of assistance. But there is no regularity, frankly no real help. NAFTA's NADBank has no regularity with which it deals with the huge job loss that these trade deficits represent. The bill that is before us expands the area of eligibility for NADBank, as my colleagues rightly wish to do, by about 200 additional kilometers down into Mexico. But it does absolutely nothing to provide support to the thousands of communities across our Nation that have also lost jobs to Mexico. My problem is NADBank's reach is not great enough. In fact, the part of the bank with the least staff and support, called CAIP, C-A-I-P, the Community Adjustment and Investment Program, has just experienced the resignation of its director and the Bush Administration has proposed no funding for future grants. As an appropriator, I want to help the NADBank for all of America. NADBank will not let me help it, and this debate will not let me find an appropriate way in which to pay for the adjustment that is so essential not just in Ohio but in California, in Tennessee, Oregon, south Florida and so many other places that have lost jobs because of NAFTA. So the problem with NADBank is not the limited area of Mexico where more of our tax dollars will be used to remediate environmental disasters, because NAFTA is silent on the environment, but the fact that NADBank's reach is too limited. It ought to reach to places like Detroit and Sandusky, Ohio, and east Tennessee's and South Carolina's textile belts, in south Florida, in Galesburg, Illinois, where Maytag just announced it is shutting down and moving to Mexico, and south Chicago's loss of Brach's candy and Buffalo, New York, with the loss of Trico corporation. Indeed, NADBank in the last 2 fiscal years has issued only six direct loans: three in the border area, two in North Carolina, and one in Virginia. Imagine, six loans and thousands of lost companies in this country and millions of lost jobs after 10 years. NADBank has far too little to show for its existence. With half a billion dollars, what has it been doing? So I would say to my colleagues who have absolutely wholesome and extraordinarily important concerns here today in trying to extend NAFTA's environmental provisions through NADBank to cover a larger proportion of Mexico's to our border countries problems, look at the fundamentals. I think the administration wants to piecemeal with this suspension bill and find ways to try to fix an agreement that fundamentally needs a broader look. I would urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this suspension bill today in order that we can have that broader debate. We need so many adjustments in NADBank and NAFTA. First, we need an agricultural adjustment provision. Part of the illegal immigration coming into our country is because there are no agricultural provisions under NAFTA, and NADBank is absolutely unrealistic in the manner in which it deals with the exodus in the Mexican countryside. NAFTA is a huge continental disaster for them. Indeed, people's lives are being lost every day because we choose to ignore their pain. Let us be voices for the most powerless people on this continent. We need a continental labor registration system for agricultural labor. It is wrong what happened to those 14 people in that truck in Omaha dying because they were brought up here as bonded workers. We need a continental solution to that travesty. In terms of the environment, why should the taxpayers of our country be asked to pay for the damage these corporations are doing? The corporations involved in this border trade, they ought to pay, because they are the ones creating the mess. We have done the very same kind of program here in our own country to let those responsible pay for the environmental damage that they are doing. In terms of NADBank, to help our communities readjust whether they are Illinois, whether they are Ohio, whether they are California, let us look at a NADBank that can function to meet the reality of the job loss across this Nation and harm across our continent. Today we are being asked with this suspension to just take the tail on the dog. I am asking the Congress to embrace the dog. This is my only opportunity to do it. On the 10th anniversary of NAFTA, can we not finally be adults and recognize the continental situation that we, as elected officials at the highest levels of our government, have a responsibility to remediate? It is time. It is time. I realize that the bill that is before us technically is much more narrowly cast, but it is our only vehicle. Give a few more weeks, a few more opportunities for Members to weigh in. I think we could create a measure that truly, on NAFTA's 10th anniversary, would help our continent deal with the pain and suffering of workers in our Nation and continent. And by the way, the Department of Labor has made the decision not to count the workers in our country who are losing their jobs because of NAFTA today. That has now been stopped. What kind of a system is this? What kind of government is this? We have a responsibility to displaced workers to certify their communities for eligibility for programs like NADBank we must know where those jobs are being lost. So many pieces of this continental puzzle need to be put together in a tidy package. We are not presented with that package today. So I would just for the purposes of colloquy end my formal remarks now, in the event some of my colleagues, such as the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gonzalez) or the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa) or the gentleman from California (Mr. Filner) wish to comment at this point. This is just an awfully important question for our continent. We are the people who can make life better. It is our time. It is our watch. We ought to make it better for people who do not have voice in this Chamber. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate very much appreciate the gentleman yielding just for a question. It is my understanding that the Community Adjustment and Investment Fund, CAF, which is within NADBank, is basically zeroed out in this proposal, which means that it will have no money. And this is the portion of the bank that deals with loans and grants to the nonborder regions. Could someone please clarify for me whether my understanding is correct? And I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Filner).

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Filner), who is such an expert on this.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I thank my colleagues, particularly those along the border, for engaging in this debate today. I would just like to place on the Record information from the Community Adjustment and Investment Program headed in San Antonio, Texas, from NADBank that says Congress has zeroed out future funding for the Community Adjustment and Investment Program. The Bush budget contains no money, no appropriated dollars for the program to help in the nonborder areas of the United States. I would beg my colleagues who are supporting this, please look beyond just the border and even for the border, recognize who is making the pollution and who should pay for it. But please do not disenfranchise communities across our country that are losing jobs. I will end with this story. One of the companies that has just left my district in Sandusky, Ohio, Dixon Ticonderoga, one of the workers just committed suicide. The head of that company called me and said, Congresswoman, we're going to leave you a building, an empty hulk. I said, well, sir, all I've got is NADBank. So I called NADBank about 2 weeks ago and I said, they're leaving us an empty hulk. What can we do with a loan or grant program to create something, some type of economic activity inside that building? And the answer was, We have no funds. So we are talking here about only one square on a very large board. I urge my colleagues to please withdraw this bill today. Let us work together and put language in there that helps all of the United States and all of North America, all of North America that has been so badly harmed by NAFTA, including agricultural adjustment provisions, so that no Mexican worker will die in this country because there is not a labor registration system across this continent that gives them the dignity of a work card where they cannot be bonded and sold by those coyotes all across this continent. There are huge problems that NADBank could be the vehicle to solve. Please vote ``no,'' or withdraw this bill today in order that we bring something back to this Congress that can help us perfect an agreement that is badly flawed.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I would like to claim time in opposition, please.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, tonight I wish to express my profound gratitude toward President Jacques Chirac and toward the French Parliament for their enduring alliance with our country and with NATO. I would also like to offer my respect to French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villipin. The civilized world cannot know yet the best method for stemming the growing terrorism that is engendered by the revolutionary fervor found in the Middle East and Central Asia, but I am certain of one thing: We will not succeed without our historic and valuable allies in Europe. They are priceless. War must be the last resort, only after tough and thorough inspections performed by U.N. agents have been exhausted. I would like to speak of relations between the Governments of France and the United States and between the citizens of our countries. Our friendship is important and historic and dates from the days when General Marquis de Lafayette helped us win our own revolution for independence. Our very capital city, the city of Washington, was designed by a Frenchman, Pierre L'Enfant, and was modeled after Paris. The words of the French Revolution, ``liberty, equality, fraternity,'' remain true today, and in our Congress they are truly carved for all time. Just this week, I opened a medal for our Uncle Stanley Rogowski, who had fought in Normandy. Three Bronze stars. Bloodied for 3 years across the northern plains of France. As I visited the cemeteries there, I thought about the close alliance between the American people and the people of France and the struggle for freedom over tyranny in the 20th century. U.S. President and U.S. Ambassador to France Thomas Jefferson wrote, ``I do not believe war the most certain means of enforcing principles. Those peaceable coercions which are in the power of every nation, if undertaken in concert and in time of peace, are more likely to produce the desired effect.'' He wrote that in 1801. He loved France. He traveled there, he learned much, and he helped weave that into the fabric of American life in our earliest years. As Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa urged from a continent torn by terrorism in Sudan, in the Ivory Coast, in Egypt, in Nigeria, ``Peace. Peace. Peace. Shouldn't America listen to the rest of the world?,'' he said. ``Give the inspectors time.'' Note what is happening throughout the world. The largest antiwar turnouts in U.S. history. In London, 750,000 citizens marched against the war, that city's largest demonstration ever. In Rome, 1 million people. In Spain, millions marched in Madrid and Barcelona. In Berlin, half a million. People marching in nations whose homelands have been ripped apart by past wars and who are victims of terrorism as well. Surely they know the price of suffering. Imagine the message these demonstrations are sending across the caves of terrorism. America is being isolated in world opinion. This is neither wise nor politically sustainable for our Nation to go it alone. The war on terrorism can only be won with a broad and committed international coalition starting with America's most historic allies. In this new struggle of righteousness, moral force is more important than bombs. The war on terrorism is actually a political insurgency halfway around the world, first against the corrupt regimes in the world of Islam, much like a civil war. Lacking any experience with democracy, desperate and politically motivated masses grasp Islam as a metaphor for political change and reform. The United States should not become the beleaguered referee caught between warring factions who also happen to sit atop the world's largest oil wells on which we have become dependent. Rather, America must unhook ourselves from that oil addiction; and as important, America must work with a broad international coalition to support the forces of popular reform and rising hopes for a better and more just way of life. In some of the most undemocratic places in the world, in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan, two-thirds of the population is younger than 20, uneducated and often hungry. A major international commitment to feeding hungry children while educating them would serve the world much more durably in the years ahead. In embracing the future, America must hold to its deepest ideals in this sea of political discontent and ally with rising aspirations of the dispossessed and forgotten. America should not, as happened in Iran, be caught on the wrong side of an unsustainable dictatorship or propping up weak regimes. Only broad and committed international coalitions can triumph in this struggle. Of three facts we are certain: we need our friends; America cannot win this battle alone; and only with justice will peace come.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, tonight I wish to place on the record my deepening concerns about America's global alliances. A few weeks ago, it was with shock and dismay that I observed our President purposely fail to extend congratulations to German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on his reelection. The President's behavior was inappropriate and damaging. Germany has stood as our Nation's most cooperative ally for over 50 years as our nations rebuilt Europe, weathered the Cold War and linked our economies with shared democratic values and a rule of law. NATO has stood as the bulwark against the most awful forms of tyranny and repression. NATO is not the ``Old Europe,'' in Secretary Rumsfeld's poorly chosen words. It is the democratic, dependable Europe that has withstood the test of time. It is the modern Europe that has always stood at America's side. I have been blessed to live through an era when President John F. Kennedy stood at the Brandenburg Gate, when Berlin was a divided city between the forces of freedom and repression, to proclaim for freedom- loving people everywhere, ``Ich bin ein Berliner.'' For the vast majority of Americans of this post-World War II period, we express to the German people and their government profound gratitude for your alliance with America, your sister Republic. Never before in my 20 years in Congress have I felt compelled to place a call to the German Embassy to offer my congratulations to the German Chancellor, as well as the congratulations of all Americans of goodwill to the Chancellor. Indeed, it is no secret that Germany has dispatched its own peacekeeping forces to Afghanistan to help secure the first bloody tranche of peace, a most dangerous and difficult assignment. So, tonight, I want again to formally thank the Chancellor, the members of the Bundestag, and the German people for their resolve and enduring friendship with America. I thank the Bundestag, as well, for their ongoing exchange with our Congress. Despite reckless White House rhetoric, Germany's ties to America are deep and growing. Then this past month, we witnessed the Bush administration publicly humiliate France. France too has suffered and suffers as a result of terrorism. They know a great deal about terrorism. Mr. Speaker, let me remind the American people how essential France was to the establishment of our own independent Nation. During the Revolutionary War, the French forces allied with our Continental revolutionaries, and they were indispensable to our victory over the British crown. French General Marquis de Lafayette was dispatched by General George Washington to rout out the British forces. About 5,500 French soldiers, led by Lieutenant Jean Rochambeau, drove the British from New York; and ultimately, the French and American forces were victorious at Yorktown. Mr. Speaker, 5,500 French troops in those days was a huge commitment by the nation of France. Our Republic owes much to France and the people of France, and I wish to thank them tonight in their own words. Donc, ce soir je voudrais exprimer mon gratitude profonde envers le President Chirac et envers le parlement francais de leur alliance durable avec notre pays et avec l'OTAN. Je voudrais aussi offrir de respect au ministre de l'Etranger de la France, Dominique de Villipin-- je ne veux absolument pas le chatier. Le monde civilise ne peut pas encore savoir la meilleure methode pour endiguer le terrorisme grandissant qui est engendre par la ferveur revolutionnaire trouvee au Moyen-Orient et a l'Asie Centrale. Mais je suis certaine d'une chose: nous ne reussirons pas sans nos allies historiques et valables en l'Europe--ni face a leur opposition. La guerre doit etre la derniere ressource, apres que les inspections raisonnables executees par les agents de l'ONU auront epuise. Je veu parler des rapports entre les gouvernements de la France et des Etats-Unis et entre les citoyens de nos pays. Notre amitie est importante et historique, et date des jours ou le general Lafayette nous aidait pendant notre guerre de l'independance. Meme notre capitale, la ville de Washington, a ete dessine par un francais, Pierre L'Enfant, et a pris modele sur la ville de Paris. Les mots de la revolution francaise--liberte, egalite, fraternite--restent vrais aujourd'hui et dans notre congres, ils sont vraiment graves pour toujours. (English translation of the above statement is as follows:) Our friendship is important and historic, and dates from the days when General Lafayette helped us during our war for independence. Even our capital, the city of Washington, was designed by a Frenchman, Pierre L'Enfant, and was modeled after Paris. The words of the French revolution--liberty, equality, brotherhood--remain true today and in our Congress, they are truly carved for all time. U.S. President and U.S. ambassador to France, Thomas Jefferson wrote, ``I do not believe war the most certain means of enforcing principles. Those peaceable coercions which are in the power of every nation, if undertaken in concert and in time of peace, are more likely to produce the desired effect.''--Thomas Jefferson to Robert Livingston, 1801. Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore