Marcy Kaptur

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. First of all, I want to thank the gentleman for his erudite presentation this evening and for the manner in which he has handled the issue. I appreciate what you have proposed on nonproliferation, very underfunded in the accounts, in my opinion, and we look forward to working with you in the months ahead.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, the Obama administration appears to be negotiating the latest job-killing trade deal, as happened under the prior two Bush administrations and the Clinton administration with NAFTA. Our Nation can't employ the nearly 20 million unemployed and underemployed citizens without addressing what is happening to growing imports and lessening exports. Here is a bumper sticker: Out of a Job Yet? Keep Buying Foreign. That was on a car in Michigan as we came back here today. In 2013, America imported--get this--$369 billion in petroleum products alone, $309 billion in automotive vehicles, and $533 billion in consumer goods, which are not completely offset by exports. We are exporting jobs and importing products from other places. Think of the jobs we could create here if we could really live the slogan, ``Made in America.'' For every $1 billion in goods exported, our economy creates 5,000 jobs; but for every $1 billion in goods imported, we lose 9,000 jobs. That is why we have been in the hole for the last 25 years. Our middle class is shrinking. People are struggling out there. They can't make ends meet. We have a budget deficit because we have a trade deficit. America doesn't need any more job-killing trade deals.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to support this bill and provisions therein which underscore that a free, independent, and democratic Ukraine is in the interests of liberty everywhere, most especially the European continent, which largely shares America's constitutional values and respect for the rule of law. The road ahead will not be easy. Ukraine faces enormous challenges in transitioning to a democratic society as Russia eats away at her eastern provinces and now begins to sabotage her internal assets. The incomes of ordinary people in Ukraine have dropped significantly. Consumer inflation for the year is up 16 percent at the same time the Hryvnia has depreciated sharply, forcing private consumption to drop precipitously and further pushing GDP to decline. Life for ordinary citizens has become increasingly unsympathetic. Liberty hangs in the balance. With winter's approach, economic pressures will further mount as Russia restricts gas supplies to Ukraine. This is a time for attention to Ukraine, which holds enormous potential to be the world's breadbasket in this 21st century, if only political conditions are stabilized to allow a better future to be built for all. One powerful dimension of Ukrainian society most often ignored by Ukraine's former leaders and by the world community is Ukraine's village women. Despite all obstacles, they continue to produce nearly half the food that that nation's citizens eat. In village after village, on plots that are small and open pastures, these stalwart women--many of them grandmothers--toil, using simple hand tools, worn out handcarts, wearing old boots, and planting seed and plants whose germ-plasma is nearly worn out. Their timeworn, horse-drawn wagons need tires to navigate the rough back roads. Their dwellings often lack water and indoor plumbing. Life is survival, and it is hard. Empowering Ukraine's women to lighten their load and make their task a bit easier would be one important step our country and world leaders could take to allow Ukraine to transition through these delicate years to a better future. For these reasons, the Appropriations Committee included language in the Defense bill directing the Secretary of Defense to submit a report to the congressional defense committees not later than 60 days after the enactment of this act describing additional assistance that the Department may provide to Ukraine, including out of its surplus warehouses. The goal of our humanitarian efforts is to empower the women of Ukraine, who, despite enormous obstacles, literally hold their families and that nation together. It is to use humanitarian shipments from our country, from government surplus--anywhere in the world we can acquire it--to simply provide items to help them with their food production and preservation. Give to these village women: good seed, buckets, wheelbarrows, gloves, boots, shovels, scythes, hoes, rakes, plastic on rolls, fencing, carts, used tires that will fit their horse-drawn wagons, simple canning equipment for putting up fruits and vegetables, drying equipment, scissors, hand shovels, grass clippers, pruners, loppers, saws, hammers, small hoop houses, hose, rope, and string. And while we are at it, how about some shortwave radios so they can connect to the world beyond their meager circumstances? We anticipate with other provisions in this legislation States with lift capacity, such as Ohio, can arrange Department of Defense humanitarian shipments through their National Guard Partnership for Peace programs to transport the above-mentioned agricultural tools and supplies to the Ukrainian women in their villages through charitable networks in that country. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to recognize this important inclusion in this bill. I thank the chairman of our committee, Mr. Frelinghuysen, the ranking member, Mr. Visclosky, and all freedom-loving people everywhere for understanding the vital consequence of these provisions at this moment of history. I would like to include for the Record an article entitled ``Ukraine Faces Hurdles in Restoring Its Farming Legacy.'' [From the New York Times, May 27, 2014] Ukraine Faces Hurdles in Restoring Its Farming Legacy (By Danny Hakim) Zibolky, Ukraine.--Like many of her neighbors in this old Soviet collective farm, Maria Onysko prefers to be paid in grain instead of cash for the modest plot of land she rents out. ``I have two cows and four pigs, many chickens,'' said Ms. Onysko, 62. ``So we use it for them.'' After the breakup of the Soviet Union, farmland in newly independent Ukraine was divided among villagers, acre by acre, creating a patchwork of agricultural endeavors that are often inefficient or unprofitable. Some land is rented to fruit growers, grain operators or large-scale farming businesses. Some locals work small plots on their own. Some acreage sits fallow, stuck in legal limbo after the owner has died. Ukraine was once the breadbasket of the Soviet Union, known for its rich soil where grain, sunflowers and livestock flourished. But farming production dropped sharply in the chaotic decade after the collapse of communism, and recovery has come in fits and starts. Production is only now returning to peak levels of the 1990s, stymied by the corruption, red tape and inefficiencies that have plagued the broader Ukrainian economy for years and left the villagers living humble existences. Restoring Ukraine's farming legacy will be crucial to the success of the country's newly elected president, the billionaire businessman Petro O. Poroshenko. Such efforts would go a long way toward fixing Ukraine's economy and reducing its dependence on Russia. Agriculture once accounted for nearly 20 percent of the gross domestic product; it is now roughly 10 percent. The potential became clear last year when a strong harvest helped Ukraine avoid a drop in output. ``It was just because of agriculture,'' said Pavlo Sheremeta, Ukraine's minister of economic development. ``Otherwise, it would have been a decline.'' Against the backdrop of the crisis with Russia, Western interests are pressing for change. The European Union is moving forward with a plan to bolster trade by lifting custom duties on Ukrainian agriculture. As part of a deal with the International Monetary Fund for up to $18 billion in loans, the country's government must push through business reforms that would help alleviate the problems with farming and other businesses. The hope is that such initiatives will also bolster the confidence of foreign investors as the crisis abates. Big multinationals have expressed tentative interest in Ukrainian agriculture, but they have largely remained on the sidelines, unwilling to invest in an industry hampered by structural deficiencies and, more recently, the uncertainty with its eastern neighbor. ``If cheap capital comes in along with foreign investment, and you have a good government without roadblocks, Ukraine can close to double its production in the future,'' said Roman Fedorowycz, a Ukrainian-American who returned here years ago and now runs a farming company that grows mainly corn, sunflowers and soybeans. Even small improvements would make a big difference in a highly inefficient industry starved for money. While roughly 70 percent of Ukraine's land is considered suitable for agriculture, it has not been fully cultivated. The country's yield per hectare of grain is about half that of the United States, according to the World Bank. Change won't come easy, given the challenges. Previous governments have tried to restrict what crops farmers grow and when they rotate crops, as well as limiting exports. Some state inspectors lack cars to conduct on-site inspections, so farmers must bring grain to them before shipping. Selling farmland is also forbidden in Ukraine, a legacy of its communist past. So fields remain cut up ``like chessboards,'' said Georgiy Vaydanych, land manager for Agrokultura, a Stockholm-based agricultural company that rents 173,000 acres in many such villages. ``For the moment we have 40,000 active landlords,'' Mr. Vaydanych said. ``Forty thousand!'' Making matters worse, paperwork is costly and many villagers never officially inherit the farmland after their parents die. ``There is uncertainty on how to farm this land, because we have the dead souls in the middle of our fields,'' Mr. Vaydanych said, in a reference to Nikolai Gogol, whose 19th-century classic, ``Dead Souls,'' is required school reading here. Even as the crisis in the east intensifies, life in the agricultural west remains much the same. A dirt road straddling tilled fields leads into this village, with potholes so deep that drivers zigzag past each other. There are horse-drawn carts, roosters crowing, elderly women in kerchiefs and a church painted pale green topped by bulbous spires. Few in this pro-European area of Ukraine are nostalgic for Moscow. Still, Oleg Gusak, head of the village council, said life had not improved. ``When it was a collective, the level of life was better,'' he said, explaining that it was once a larger operation that harvested crops, had livestock and made clothing, furniture and jams. ``People even came from other regions, because we had so much work,'' he said, adding, ``Now, it's not the same.'' Trouble raising capital at reasonable prices makes it difficult to start or expand farms. ``I have to pay up to 12 percent if I borrow in euros,'' said Taras Barshchovsky, an entrepreneur who founded T.B. Fruit, which makes fruit juices and whose rented orchards cover thousands of acres. He has expanded into Poland, where he said he could borrow for less than 3 percent. ``Those who work with Ukrainian banks in hryvnias,'' the national currency, ``they pay up to 20 percent or more. I don't believe you can profit and return money on that percentage,'' he added. And while other former Soviet bloc neighbors like Hungary, Romania and Poland began easing their land sale restrictions after joining the European Union, Ukraine has repeatedly delayed lifting its moratorium, considering the move politically risky in its agrarian society. In 2013, the government of Viktor Yanukovych, the deposed Ukrainian leader, extended the moratorium until 2016, after he expected to stand for re-election. ``I'm afraid if I sell my land in the future my children will say their old grandfather drank away all their money,'' Hrynchyshyn Myroslaw, 62, said as he cleared a willow field near another village. With a laugh, he added: ``It depends how much you will pay me. If there are enough zeros, you can pay me.'' Volodymyr Baran, 43, a tractor mechanic, said he would never sell his six acres: ``The land is our bread.'' Such dynamics deter foreign investment, which has been tepid for years. Despite some interest from China and multinationals, large agricultural enterprises tend to be Ukrainian owned, and recent prominent deals have been less than they seemed. For example, Cargill paid a reported $200 million for a stake in UkrLandFarming, an agricultural holding company. But a Cargill spokeswoman emphasized that the shares were collateral for a loan rather than a long-term investment. The rules make ``it so much more difficult to understand, and to bring in investment,'' said David Sedik, a senior official at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. ``It's not that a foreigner or a company has to buy the land, but it breeds opaqueness in the sector. You need transparent land laws.'' At his office, Mr. Vaydanych pulled out a village map and showed how its 2,500 acres were divvied up among 507 villagers. ``Every field is split, by little, little plots,'' he explained. Being a land manager requires a political touch. Mr. Vaydanych goes from village to village handing out favors, fending off competitors trying to outbid his rental contracts. A village chief, he said, ``may call us and tell us, it's the wintertime, we have a lot of snowfall, so give us a forklift to clean the road. O.K., well, we do that.'' ``He may say this electricity substation is broken so we need urgently to repair it, or he's calling because the water pump at school broke, so we replace it,'' he said. ``That's the commitment that comes with the land.'' ``I wouldn't be surprised by any request,'' Mr. Vaydanych said. ``It is about keeping everyone happy. That's my work.''

Ms. KAPTUR. Thank you so very much for your openness to this, Mr. Chairman. And Mr. Ranking Member, thank you for allotting me the time.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Benjamin F. Marsh, who passed from this life at the age of 87 years. Ben was a respected attorney and longtime solicitor for the City of Maumee, Ohio. A proud patriot, Ben Marsh's life was one of service to others. Born in Sylvania, Ohio, Ben served our nation during World War II as a member of the U.S. Navy. After graduating from Ohio Wesleyan University, he attended George Washington Law School. While at George Washington, Ben worked in federal service for the Atomic Energy Commission. Upon earning his law degree he first went to Columbus, Ohio and then returned to Northwest Ohio to practice law. Early in Ben's law career his services were retained by local government. In 1963 he became the Maumee solicitor. Always committed to public service, Ben decided to run for Congress in 1968, though he was not successful against the incumbent. Ben went on to admirably and ably chair his county party for many years. With a compassionate world view, Ben was named a U.S. Representative to the 1972 general conference of UNESCO. He later served on the U.S. Foreign Claims Settlement Commission. Not one to let retirement end his public service, Ben remained an active and engaged citizen. In 1997 Ben was asked by the State Department to visit Bosnia and Herzegovina to help oversee local elections. He served on the Ohio Elections Commission and was a co- chairman in 2007 of a study committee on Lucas County governance. He also briefly served on the Lucas County Board of Elections. Perhaps Ben's greatest legacy is his family. He and his wife Martha were married for 62 years and together raised a son and daughter. They shared in the joy of their five grandchildren. We know that Ben's family will find comfort in memory and the gift of his life. Ben Marsh was an outstanding citizen, keen intellect, accomplished lawyer, and a devoted patriot at home and abroad. He embodied the meaning of the words ``enlightened citizen.'' His kind nature and sense of humor made him a bridge builder at every level he served. Our community has been bettered by his lifelong dedication to it. Personally, I am grateful for his advice and counsel so selflessly rendered.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, first I wish to dedicate my remarks tonight in memory of our former colleague, James Oberstar, who knew the transportation system of this Nation like the back of his hand. And I know the first thing he would say if he were down here. He would say transportation investment, infrastructure investment is the largest job creator that this Congress and this Nation can provide to the American people. Infrastructure creates jobs. It is the highest form of development we can give to the American people. What are they asking this Congress for? They are asking us for jobs, and they are asking us to fix the roads. Every place I go the public is complaining about potholes because of the bad winter in the part of the country that I represent. We know, where do these jobs come from? The construction industry, the landscape industry, the paving industry, the fencing industry, the stone quarries, the concrete manufacturers. The list is endless. In public transit we are talking about building rail cars to serve a growing population. America isn't declining in population. By 2050 we will have 500 million people in this country, up from 310 million today. So communities across our country are asking for our help. They asked for $9.5 billion in high-priority infrastructure projects just this year, 15 times more than the current funding. So what does the majority do? They cut the current funding by 80 percent, down to $100 million, when the American people are saying--the mayors, the county commissioners, the Governors across this country--help us out. TIGER has proven to be a successful program. It is not stove-piped. It is multimodal. The Vice President, Vice President Biden just visited Cleveland. What did he see? The largest transit point in Ohio, where Amtrak comes right next to the major switching stations for all of the rail cars that serve Cleveland, Ohio. Cleveland is waiting. It is only one of hundreds of places in America that are waiting for this Congress to do what the public wants us to do, and that is build this country forward. Underinvestment will only hurt our people and cost us more in the long run. We know TIGER works. The President recommended doubling the current funding to $1.25 billion, up from 600 to $800 million, to begin to meet the needs of our country. But remember, I said the public was asking for $9.5 billion. TIGER has provided already $3.5 billion for 270 critical infrastructure projects across 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. In prior years, we know that transit and rail passenger projects have received only about one quarter of TIGER funds available, and there is typically no other predictable dedicated funding source for this type of project. Without TIGER, and a few other Federal programs, mass transit and the shape of our Nation's highway system and rail system would be so much worse. Americans increasingly look to this Congress and say, what are they worth? This is one of the places where we should be worth something for the American people. So we rise tonight to say this is really a misguided decision. We need to take funds from elsewhere. We send funds all over the world. We are building dams in Afghanistan. Who is going to take care of it after we leave? Hundreds of millions of dollars in other places, and yet our own people are having to go get their cars realigned and buy new suspension systems because they are having to ride through all these potholes all over the country. We ought to do our job. We ought to find a way to fund this program and repair this country from one end to the other. I ask myself: If we had to build the Hoover Dam again, would this feckless Congress have the guts to do it? So we have a problem like TIGER that, coast to coast, works. Where's the majority? Out to lunch. No wonder the public doesn't have respect for the Congress of the United States. We are not at one with where the public is. The mayors are begging us. Our county commissioners are begging us. Our Governors are begging us. Our transit systems are saying measure up, Congress. Wake up. Wake up. I rise in strong support of restoring the funding and, frankly, funding at the level that the President has proposed, $1.25 billion. But even that is only about one-seventh of what the country has asked for, so it is severely underfunded for the needs of the Nation. We know it is the best job creator. We know it has a proven record, and we know the American people want it. What more do we need to know? I can just hear Jim Oberstar talking to me now. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate the people of Ukraine on conducting free and fair elections that the world watched closely. As a beloved friend of mine from Ukraine wrote me: These elections were amazing. People were standing in long lines with the purpose to vote. And we did it. We do hope that we will start to live in a new way. Ukrainians deserve much better in life and in leaders. Thank you. With a nearly 60 percent turnout, and despite the fearful invasion by Russia of Ukraine's eastern provinces, the election proceeded on schedule and without major disruption. This is a living testament to the future and the hopes the Ukrainian people invested in their new government. The people of our region send heartfelt congratulations to the incoming Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. A successful businessman in his own Nation, he now holds a historic opportunity to lead Ukraine to write a new era of stability, prosperity, and democratic reform. It will be a major undertaking. May the hopes of the Ukrainian people for a better life be realized in our time. Ukraine can rise to be one of the greatest nations on the European continent. Her time is now.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition and honor of all veterans on this Memorial Day, celebrated on Monday. In gratitude of all freedom lovers who made our freedom and our ability to stand on this floor today as a free people possible--in particular the 400,000 men and women who gave their lives and the 16.5 million men and women who served during World War II. This Memorial Day is particularly poignant as it is the 10th anniversary of the dedication of the World War II Memorial on the Mall. And on June 6th, we commemorate the 70th anniversary of the invasion of 150,000 Allied troops' landing on the heavily-fortified coastline of Normandy, France--D-Day. On this year of anniversaries, as we think about the importance of this Memorial's place in American history, let us remember the significance of what these greatest Americans, this greatest generation of Americans, did for the freedom of humankind. When we dedicated the memorial in 2004, more than four million of the 16 million American veterans of World War II were still alive. Today, fewer than a million remain. We lose more than 500 of them every day. And ten years from now, at the 20th anniversary ceremony, only 80,000, roughly, will survive. At the memorial, what Abraham Lincoln called ``the mystic chords of memory'' are played with grandeur and grace. And that is what the memorial is all about. It was built to preserve a memory-- The memory of gallantry and devotion, of honor and sacrifice, of dedication to a cause bigger than oneself. The memory of a generation of ordinary Americans who did something extraordinary--answering duty's call, saving democracy, and then modestly returning to their communities and their families, to work in the factory, to work on the farm . . . or simply to carry the mail. The World War II Memorial will be there long after the World War II veterans are gone. While they are still with us, take the opportunity to let them know that a grateful nation will always pay tribute to their courageous service and they will always be remembered as heroes. Mr. Speaker, let us not forget the valor, fidelity, and sacrifice of all World War II participants, and those who served in the conflicts that followed.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Chair, I rise today to offer an amendment to shift $7 million in funding from the NASA space operations account to NASA's space technology mission. I strongly support and urge my colleagues to support this amendment. I strongly support the improvements to the overall NASA budget, but I am concerned that we are missing a critical opportunity in the space technology account. The space technology mission supports game-changing research and development that enhances our current missions and expands the opportunity for future missions. For example, at NASA Glenn in Ohio, space technology research supports the Solar Electric Propulsion project, developing critical energy technologies to enable cost-effective trips to Mars and across the inner solar system to enrich a variety of next-generation journeys and to do so more energy effectively and efficiently. This transformative work advances not only our space exploration program, but our economy and our national well-being, with spin-off benefits to advanced manufacturing, our commercial energy sector, defense, automotive, and commercial aviation industries and countless other applications. The Space Technology Mission Directorate's focus on partnerships and strategic integration promotes technology transfer and commercialization within private sector companies, sprouting new businesses and the important jobs that accompany the future. This exciting work challenges our brightest minds, including many of our young people, to excel and create a pipeline of innovation driving our economy into the future. I understand limitations of the constrained budget we are working with and want to thank Ranking Member Fattah and our esteemed chairman, Frank Wolf, to better fund NASA's Space Technology Program and other critical research and development efforts. My amendment merely shifts $7 million in funding to the space technology account from the space operations account. It is a small but important step in the right direction, and space operations has been given quite a substantial increase. In addition, my amendment would actually reduce outlays by $2 million for fiscal year 2015. So I think it is a win-win-win on all fronts. I look forward to continuing to work with the chairman and the ranking member and our colleagues as the bill moves forward in the Senate and further address the needs of this important program. I would urge support of the Kaptur amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. KAPTUR. I thank the chairman so very much. This is my moment also to add my voice to the other Members here who have celebrated and expressed gratitude to Chairman Wolf for his years of service to the people of the United States and this great Republic. I don't think I will ever hear the word ``Darfur'' and not see Frank Wolf's face in my mind's eye. I don't think that I will ever read articles that deal with child hunger, wherever it might exist, in some of the most forgotten places on Earth, and not think of Frank Wolf. I will always remember, sir, your gentlemanly manner, your great passion. I will always recall the work that you have done to stand up for those who speak for liberty in places, forgotten corners in China, for religious leaders who have been suppressed around the world. And what a great patriot you are and a gentleman who can work across the aisle and whose word is always gold. I thank you very, very much for your support on this amendment. We wish you Godspeed in the years ahead. I know all my colleagues join me in wishing you well and thank you for your exemplary service. I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. KAPTUR. Will the gentleman yield?

Ms. KAPTUR. I just want to thank the ranking member who had such a broad range, Ranking Member Fattah, certainly in the space science arena, but also in urban development, energy, and so many other facets of what we do as a committee and as a country. I want to thank you very much for being able to work in a collegial way on this amendment. We thank you very much for remaining true to your commitment to true science.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce a House Resolution Calling for Free and Fair Elections in Ukraine. Ukraine will hold a presidential election this Sunday, May 25, 2014, with the goal of once again reinforcing a democratic legitimacy within the country. On February 22, 2014, the Ukrainian Parliament voted to remove Victor Yanukovych from the post of President of Ukraine. This election to replace the former president is planned amidst political upheaval that has included violent street protests, Russia's invasion and illegitimate annexation of Crimea, and Russian instigated separatist rebellions throughout the eastern portions of the country. The prospects this presidential election hold cannot be overstated. It is a decisive marker for a fresh start for Ukraine. Free and fair elections are fundamental for regaining economic and political stability throughout the nation. The importance of free and fair elections is not lost on the American people. With this resolution we are reaffirming the commitment of the United States' support of the expression of freedom, human rights, civil liberties, and the rule of law in Ukraine, embodied through elections that are free and fair. Further, we condemn the interference of foreign agitators in pre-election activities and behavior that could adversely impact voter participation during polling. In the remaining days prior to the election, the focus of the international community will remain on supporting the preparations and ensuring the Ukrainian people understand they are supported in these democratic efforts. Promoting access and participation in free and fair democratic processes must be a priority for America. I encourage my colleagues to support these ideals through this resolution. No nation across our world suffered more or endured more in the last century's bloody European wars than did Ukraine. Freedom loving people hold a moral obligation to right the wrongs of the past in the present for Ukraine through these historic elections. May they occur peaceably as thousands of election monitors from across our globe travel to Ukraine to assure that nation a better future. This weekend in our own Nation, as Memorial Day commemorations ensue, including the 10th Anniversary ceremony here in Washington, D.C. of the dedication of the World War II Memorial, in which I will gratefully participate, let us remember those whose sacrifices made our freedoms possible. And let us pray for those who dream of opportunities America is blessed to enjoy, like the people of Ukraine who have yet known full freedom and whose moment is now.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Morrison R. Waite High School in my District. The school will be celebrating its 100th Anniversary on May 10th, 2014. High upon the east banks of the Maumee River, on a bluff overlooking the very heart of Toledo's downtown, stands historic Waite High School. Established in 1914, Waite High School is an important anchor in the community and has been a proud tradition on Toledo's East Side since its doors first opened a century ago. Named after Supreme Court Justice Morrison R. Waite who had practiced law in Toledo, Waite High School has lived up to the reputation and success of its namesake. Students achieve academic success, with many going on to post-secondary education or vocational options. Waite High School has nurtured many of our community leaders including current Toledo Public Schools Superintendent Romules Durant, Toledo's ``Mr. Music'' Samuel Szor, Toledo Public School teacher Lucy Weaver, former Mayor Michael J. Damas who was the first Arab-American mayor elected in the U.S., Judge Joseph Flores, and Judge Robert C. Pollex to name but a few. In 1982, Waite High School began recognizing its Distinguished Alumni and has since honored 122 individuals for their accomplishments. Of these, forty have been educators. From its beginning, Waite High School taught its students to achieve and to lead. Indeed, our community has been the richer for their efforts. The high school got its nickname, the Indians, from Toledo fire department members on the East Side of Toledo. The fire department used to break up into two teams, East and West, for an annual running and fire truck pulling competition. The East Side fire department members used the nickname ``Indians'' in the annual competition. As the only Toledo Public School on the East Side, Waite High School decided to adopt the name. The school experienced success early on in athletics earning national titles for football in 1924 and 1932. The football team played games from Maine to California. Waite has won more than thirty City League sport titles, with dozens of athletes named to All- City teams. The rich athletic tradition continues today. Waite High School's dedication goes beyond academic achievements and athletic prowess. The school boasts over thirty clubs and organizations. It is host to three of the largest blood drives in Northwest Ohio. The importance of giving back to the community has always been a tradition at Waite. Its students are in the 80th year of providing holiday baskets for East and South Toledo families. At the end of May, the school will hold its 97th annual Memorial Day program honoring our community's veterans. For a century, Waite High School has sat nobly on the banks of the East Side of Toledo's Maumee River. Its proud heritage and sterling traditions have held true since its opening day one hundred years ago. As it looks forward to the next century contributing toward our successful future through the education of new generations, we take a moment to reflect on its past glories. I am pleased to join our entire community in celebrating the 100th anniversary of Morrison R. Waite High School, a beacon of learning on Toledo's East Side. Onward!

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the National Fair Housing Alliance and the Toledo Fair Housing Center filed a Federal housing discrimination complaint with the Department of Housing and Urban Development against Safeguard Properties headquartered in Ohio. Safeguard is the Nation's largest privately held mortgage field services property preservations company. Their business model involves maintaining and marketing bank owned, foreclosed homes (REO properties). The National Fair Housing Alliance and its member organizations have recently gathered evidence that shows that companies like Safeguard are neglecting and failing to maintain foreclosed homes in minority and low income neighborhoods. In Toledo, Dayton, Baton Rouge, New Orleans and Memphis, Safeguard has failed to prevent blight from entering into the neighborhoods that are most venerable in our country. In an Office of the Inspector General report they were named as one of the preservation companies that would provide inaccurate information and would manipulate photos of foreclosed properties that it managed in their reports to Fannie Mae. We cannot allow these big corporations to continue taking advantage of the American people. I would encourage more States and representatives to investigate situations like this and send a message to these companies that we will not sit back and allow them to profit off of the suffering of the American people any more.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, with the tragic shooting at Fort Hood this past week, our country has once again been ravaged by the convergence of mental instability and gun rampages. As President Obama did today, let us honor those lost to this terrible tragedy--Sergeant First Class Danny Ferguson, Sergeant Timothy Owens, and soldier Carlos Lazaney--and continue to pray for the injured as they recover, as well as all those in uniform who serve our Nation. As this is now the second shooting at Fort Hood in recent years, Americans and we, in Congress, must again ask ourselves: Isn't it time for a national conversation on untreated mental illness? As a member of the Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, we must use this moment to support early diagnosis, as well as pathbreaking neurological research, building on the President's BRAIN Initiative. We must probe the undiscovered functions of the human mind and human performance. Advanced research and treatment will benefit both our deserving veterans and all Americans who struggle with the unknown reaches of the unquiet mind. Again, I lend my support to honor the heroes lost at Fort Hood, and I implore my colleagues to make certain this latest tragedy is, indeed, the last tragedy. Let us measure up to this worthy challenge.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, last week, the Senate acted forcefully by passing legislation to renew emergency unemployment insurance. I would encourage this House to follow that example so we may provide a vital lifeline to over 2 million Americans to provide for their families. These are hardworking Americans who are out there every day looking for employment or receiving education to be better prepared to reenter the workforce. In Ohio, 75,200 unemployed workers need these extended benefits they earned. As our economy continues recovering from the greatest recession in modern history, let us give them what they earned. We must avoid making this a partisan issue. Workers in both Democratic and Republican districts desperately need this critical lifeline. The House must act today. Let the Speaker bring the Senate bill up for a vote here so the House can finally pass legislation. Let us do what is sensible and allow these Americans to keep our economic recovery going by not falling into the ranks of poverty themselves. These hardworking Americans have earned their benefits. [From The New York Times, Aug. 30, 2012] Majority of New Jobs Pay Low Wages, Study Finds (By Catherine Rampell) While a majority of jobs lost during the downturn were in the middle range of wages, a majority of those added during the recovery have been low paying, according to a new report from the National Employment Law Project. The disappearance of midwage, midskill jobs is part of a longer-term trend that some refer to as a hollowing out of the work force, though it has probably been accelerated by government layoffs. ``The overarching message here is we don't just have a jobs deficit; we have a `good jobs' deficit,'' said Annette Bernhardt, the report's author and a policy co-director at the National Employment Law Project, a liberal research and advocacy group. The report looked at 366 occupations tracked by the Labor Department and clumped them into three equal groups by wage, with each representing a third of American employment in 2008. The middle third--occupations in fields like construction, manufacturing and information, with median hourly wages of $13.84 to $21.13--accounted for 60 percent of job losses from the beginning of 2008 to early 2010. The job market has turned around since then, but those fields have represented only 22 percent of total job growth. Higher-wage occupations--those with a median wage of $21.14 to $54.55--represented 19 percent of job losses when employment was falling, and 20 percent of job gains when employment began growing again. Lower-wage occupations, with median hourly wages of $7.69 to $13.83, accounted for 21 percent of job losses during the retraction. Since employment started expanding, they have accounted for 58 percent of all job growth. The occupations with the fastest growth were retail sales (at a median wage of $10.97 an hour) and food preparation workers ($9.04 an hour). Each category has grown by more than 300,000 workers since June 2009. Some of these new, lower-paying jobs are being taken by people just entering the labor force, like recent high school and college graduates. Many, though, are being filled by older workers who lost more lucrative jobs in the recession and were forced to take something to scrape by. ``I think I've been very resilient and resistant and optimistic, up until very recently,'' said Ellen Pinney, 56, who was dismissed from a $75,000-a-year job in which she managed procurement and supply for an electronics company in March 2008. Since then, she has cobbled together a series of temporary jobs in retail and home health care and worked as a part-time receptionist for a beauty salon. She is now working as an unpaid intern for a construction company, putting together bids and business plans for green energy projects, and has moved in with her 86-year-old father in Forked River, N.J. ``I really can't bear it anymore,'' she said, noting that her applications to places like PetSmart and Target had gone unanswered. ``From every standpoint--my independence, my sense of purposefulness, my self-esteem, my life planning-- this is just not what I was planning.'' As Ms. Pinney's experience shows, low-wage jobs have not been growing especially quickly in this recovery; they account for such a big share of job growth mostly because midwage job growth has been so slow. Over the last few decades, the number of midwage, midskill jobs has stagnated or declined as employers chose to automate routine tasks or to move them offshore. Job growth has been concentrated in positions that tend to fall into two categories: manual work that must be done in person, like styling hair or serving food, which usually pays relatively little; and more creative, design-oriented work like engineering or surgery, which often pays quite well. Since 2001, employment has grown 8.7 percent in lower-wage occupations and 6.6 percent in high-wage ones. Over that period, midwage occupation employment has fallen by 7.3 percent. This ``polarization'' of skills and wages has been documented meticulously by David H. Autor, an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A recent study found that this polarization accelerated in the last three recessions, particularly the last one, as financial pressures forced companies to reorganize more quickly. ``This is not just a nice, smooth process,'' said Henry E. Siu, an economics professor at the University of British Columbia, who helped write the recent study about polarization and the business cycle. ``A lot of these jobs were suddenly wiped out during recession and are not coming back.'' On top of private sector revamps, state and local governments have been shedding workers in recent years. Those jobs lost in the public sector have been primarily in mid and higher-wage positions, according to Ms. Bernhardt's analysis. ``Whenever you look at data like these, there is this tendency to get overwhelmed, that there are these inevitable, big macro forces causing this polarization and we can't do anything about them. In fact, we can,'' Ms. Bernhardt said. She called for more funds for states to stem losses in the public sector and federal infrastructure projects to employ idled construction workers. Both proposals have faced resistance from Republicans in Congress.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, a threat to liberty anywhere is a threat to liberty everywhere. Freedom's bell rings now for nations around our world to choose between the fledgling democracy of Ukraine or the dictatorship of Russia. As the Russian bear eats its way through Ukraine's easternmost regions with abandon, the scene seems almost surreal as the world waits while Putin's pushes his illegal aggregation further. The questions for freedom loving nations are: Who defines freedom's edge for Ukraine? Surely, not Russia. Where does the edge of defiance stop? And who will push the bear back in its cage? Aggressor Putin says he will send Russian peacekeeping forces to the nation he has just invaded illegally. That would be a line for ``Saturday Night Live'' if it were not so real. When the Budapest Accords were signed in 1994 and Ukraine voluntarily gave up the third-largest cache of nuclear weapons on Earth, it was left defenseless, but was promised by our government, the United Kingdom, and Russia to respect the independence, sovereignty, and existing borders of Ukraine. So let me ask our government, the United Kingdom, and Russia: Do words mean anything, or were they merely artful conveniences at the time? Now, let me ask NATO nations: Where is the edge of liberty you will defend?

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, I rise today to mark the Katyn Annual Remembrance at the National Katyn Memorial in Baltimore, Maryland. This Sunday, April 6, Polish Americans and other liberty lovers will gather at the National Katyn Memorial after a remembrance Mass is said at the Holy Rosary Church in honor of the victims of the Katyn massacre. In 1940, the Soviet secret police were directed by dictator Joseph Stalin to systematically murder over 22,000 of Poland's most important leaders, including military officers, religious leaders, educators, and intellectuals, in and around the Katyn Forest in Russia. In 1951, a U.S. House of Representatives select committee was tasked with conducting an investigation into the Katyn genocide, and it concluded that the Soviets were responsible for this mass murder. In 2010, after decades of denial and despite protests from its Communist members, the Russian Parliament approved a statement that ultimately acknowledged Stalin's complete responsibility in perpetrating these heinous crimes. While we honor the memory of the Polish victims of Katyn at this time every year, it is especially important this year as Eastern Europe, Crimea, and Ukraine once again face the illegal aggression of their territorial sovereignty from Russia and its leader. Let the world of nations continue to work in conjunction with the Polish government and with victims' families to uncover the complete truth of what happened at the Katyn Forest and nearby killing fields. Our world holds a moral obligation to honor the victims and to reveal the whole truth to enlighten future generations. Madam Speaker, history must record fully these mass crimes against humanity, and it must heal the fissures of tyranny to prevent such grave atrocities into the future.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, I thank Congressman Murphy for yielding. You are such a refreshing, brilliant, positive Member of this House, and I thank the people of your State for sending you here. I thank you for all the citizens you are fighting for to bring new energy and to bring new vision to our country. Thank you so very much. Madam Speaker, I entitle my remarks this evening ``The World of Nations Holds a Moral Obligation''--and underline ``moral obligation''--``to Ukraine.'' Seventy years after World War II, let us provide some historical context in which to view Russia's illegal invasion of Crimea and potentially other nations. Scholars, historians, and diplomats still are piecing together the annals of the horrific slaughter and political oppression of the past century that has plagued the region we call Central and Eastern Europe. The full truth of what happened remains to be told as far too much was locked behind the Iron Curtain. Masterful books like ``Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin'' by Dr. Timothy Snyder of Yale begin to present the unfathomable dimension of the horror. If there is any place on the Earth the world community of nations owes a moral obligation and should seek to pull forward, it is Ukraine. The suffering and death endured by millions of innocent people inside Ukraine and nations in her immediate environs had no equal any place on Earth. There, the crushing of human life and human spirit were so diabolical and of such gigantic proportion, it is hard for us as human beings to wrap our minds around it. With clarity, let us recall that American soldiers who liberated Europe during World War II never ventured far enough eastward into Soviet-held territory to witness the grip of that tyranny; thus, the West still holds some naivete about the depths of depravity to which millions of innocent civilian people--mothers, fathers, children, grandparents--fell victim. George Will quotes Dr. Snyder in a recent piece titled, ``Russia's brutality with Ukraine is nothing new.'' During the 1933 Stalinist- forced famine--here is a quote from the book ``Bloodlands.'' Boys from another school pulled out the severed head of a classmate while fishing in a pond. His whole family had died. Had they eaten him first? Or had he survived the deaths of his parents only to be killed by a cannibal? No one knew; but such questions were commonplace for the children of Ukraine in 1933. Yet cannibalism was sometimes a victimless crime. Some mothers and fathers killed their children and ate them. But other parents asked their children to make use of their own bodies if they passed away. More than one Ukrainian child had to tell a brother or sister: ``Mother says we should eat her if she dies.'' Additionally: In January 1933, Stalin, writes Snyder, sealed Ukraine's borders so peasants could not escape and sealed the cities so peasants could not go there to beg. By spring, more than 10,000 Ukrainians were dying each day, more than the 6,000 Jews who perished daily in Auschwitz at the peak of extermination in the spring of 1944. Snyder is judicious about estimates of Ukrainian deaths from hunger and related diseases, settling on an educated guess of approximately 3.3 million from 1932 to 1933. He says that when ``the Soviet census of 1937 found 8 million fewer people than projected,'' many of the missing being victims of starvation in Ukraine and elsewhere, and the children that those adults did not have, Stalin ``had the responsible demographers executed.'' Ukraine was hell on Earth. With the able assistance of Ukrainian Museum and Archives in Cleveland, Ohio, and its incredible resident scholar Andrew Fedynsky, let us take a look back before we look forward. Beginning with the year 1933, as millions of Ukrainians were dying of starvation at the hands of their own government in its forced famine genocide, that terror has gone down in history as the Holodomor, murder by famine; yet few in America or anywhere noted them, even fewer spoke out, to condemn the extinction as American and other western companies were working with the Soviet Government to realize its 20th century industrialization campaign glorified recently at the Sochi Olympics. Soviet industrialization was paid for by the sale of grain brutally seized from peasants--or Kulaks--who paid dearly for Soviet progress--so- called progress--with their lives by the millions. Much of the U.S. media at the time either ignored the catastrophe or actually collaborated with Stalin to cover up that genocide. For this contortion of truth, The New York Times reporter Walter Duranty was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, one of the worst instances of the denial of truth in the history of journalism. During this fateful period, the United States chose to recognize the Soviet Bolshevik Government. It was not until 50 years later, through legislation I introduced as a first-term Member of Congress in 1983 in this House, that Congress authored the creation of the Commission on the Ukraine Famine to finally acknowledge and recognize the extinction of millions of innocent lives in Ukraine. That ink remains wet on the pages of history. But to return to the World War II years, by 1938, when Nazi Germany forcibly annexed Austria, in what was termed the Anschluss, too many in the West took at face value Adolph Hitler's assurances that he was merely reuniting German-speaking people. That same year, Nazi Germany proceeded to annex Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland, as the West negotiated what was called ``Peace in Our Time,'' accepting Hitler's assurances that this was the extent of his ambitions. When his militarized Wehrmacht took over the rest of Czechoslovakia, there was no security response from the West, only petulant words. Then came 1939, when Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union jointly invaded neighboring Poland in September of that year. Verbally, France and Britain condemned the aggression, but then did nothing. It was only after Hitler turned against his Soviet ally in 1941 and invaded France that the West took the threat seriously. By that time, hundreds of thousands had already been killed. Millions more would die as Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia divided Poland, killing 20 percent of its people, a higher percentage than any other nation engaged in World War II, and began the outsized carnage that carved up Europe between their dictatorships. By 1944, in a valiant fight to the death struggle, the Polish Home Army, the Armia Krajowa, rose up in a 63-day heroic battle to liberate Warsaw from Nazi occupation. Across the Vistula River, the nearby Red Army refused to join the struggle and instead stood by as Poland's hopelessly outnumbered warriors died. This June in Poland will mark the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising. Then, in 1945, immediately after the end of World War II, the United States, France, and Germany withdrew their recognition of the long- suffering Polish Government in exile, which had been established after the Nazi-Soviet invasion in September 1939. The West opted in favor of recognizing the Soviet-imposed government that would forcibly rule half of Europe until the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, after which began a disassembly of that brutal system of Soviet human domination. And I might add, it was Poland and her spies that broke the Nazi code, and yet this is what the governments of the West did to Poland. At the end of World War II, in 1945, at the Yalta Conference, ironically held in Crimea, the heads of governments of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union, headed by Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin, met for the purpose of determining Europe's postwar configuration. Their fateful agreement cordoned off and consigned Central Europe to the yoke of oppression for half a century more, subjugating millions. How many tens of thousands more died within the confines of the Soviet Union? Only God knows. In furtherance of repressive rule, between 1945 and 1948, the Soviets forcibly imposed puppet regimes across their captive nations like Poland, absorbed them into their empire, and repeated this pattern in nearly a dozen other Central and Eastern European countries through military occupation, government censorship, mass arrests, and rigged elections as an Iron Curtain separated the free world and the subjugated. That was the world that I and millions of liberty-loving people grew up in. In 1956, the Hungarian people became the first to bravely rise up to cast off the boot of communism and assert their human rights. The Soviet Union dispatched armed tanks, brutally invaded, and imposed mass arrests and executions. You can still see the shots in the buildings inside of Budapest when you travel there. You can see the marks of what those tanks did. Roman Catholic Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty was forced to take protective refuge in the U.S. Embassy, where he remained for 15 years in Budapest as a global symbol of noble defiance against Soviet repression and a distant hope that life could change for the better. The ugly pattern of national theft repeated in 1968 when the Czechs and Slovaks moved to restore freedom in their country. The Soviets invaded again with mass arrests and reimposed their brutal rule. Starting in 1959, throughout this era of forced nationhood, U.S. and Western support for shortwave Radio Free Europe broadcasts across these captured nations gave hope to the people of Central and Eastern Europe, held as prisoners in their own lands. When, a decade later, in 1978, Roman Catholic Cardinal Karl Wojtyla of Poland was elected Pope, he became the first non-Italian Pontiff from Central Europe, taking the name John Paul II. His incredible life story in building a religious alternative to the communist dictatorship in his homeland reawakened the worldwide effort to defeat Soviet communism. An enlivened Solidarity movement that had begun during the 1950s in Poland through courageous labor activists spread to Lithuania's Sajudis and Ukraine's Helsinki Monitoring Group. America's AFL-CIO, along with united bipartisan support of our government, our Atlantic allies in NATO, and the American public who understood liberty's struggle hung in the balance, remained firm as the cold war tested our resolve. In 1986, the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl, Ukraine, exposed the incompetence and bankruptcy of the Soviet system as the Soviet Government ordered hundreds of unprotected workers into that radioactive zone, consigning them to certain death. The work of a few brave activists from that horror evolved into a citizen's movement that matured into a forum for popular expression. By 1989, as the Soviet economy finally collapsed, propelled by its ill-fated decision to wage war in Afghanistan, the Berlin Wall dividing East and West came crashing down as students from Europe danced on the wall, and we could see Central and East European nations one at a time begin to regain their independent, sovereignty, and chance--chance--for freedom. Then in 1991, 46 years after the end of World War II, the Soviet Union itself collapsed. And in its Ukrainian Republic, more than 90 percent of Ukrainians voted to become an independent nation, including over half of the people in Crimea. In an act of complete demilitarization in 1994, independent Ukraine gave up the third largest nuclear arsenal in the world. Inasmuch as these weapons were intended to be used against the United States and other Western countries, this gesture immeasurably enhanced American security and world peace. In return, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Russia provided assurances for Ukraine's independence, its territorial integrity, its freedom and economic viability contained in the operative document known as the Budapest Memorandum. For two decades, the people of Ukraine, digging out of deep repression, have fought to build forward a nation that can govern, feed, and educate its people. They surely dream of becoming the great nation of which they are fully capable, a borderland nation reaching in all directions, west and east and south and north. Ukraine's potential is unlimited. She is already the third largest exporter of grain on the face of the Earth. But in this new century, the same country of Ukraine found itself in a timeless struggle to elect honorable public officials that would treat people with dignity. Those who assumed power too often stole from the people. Others like President Victor Yushchenko were poisoned as he tried to transition Ukraine to a modern state. Other leaders were imprisoned. And the latest kleptocratic government, just deposed, stole billions from its own nation, threatening economic growth and democratic progress. As negotiations to include Ukraine in an economic trade union with Europe were nearly complete last year, the now-deposed, disgraced President Viktor Yanukovych rejected the agreement, triggering mass demonstrations across the nation. The only power the people there have is to stand up and speak out for themselves. So, in 2013 and this year, we saw hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians begin demonstrating when their government, reacting to Russian economic and political coercion, reneged on its commitment to sign the Association Agreement with Europe. I say to the American people, if you had lived the lives of their great-grandparents, their grandparents, their parents, would you have had the courage to stand in the Euromaidan, would you have had the courage to stand there against the Berkut, against the police that had weapons and you had nothing, nothing but your voice? The peaceful Euromaidan movement was shattered by government-led violence, scores of deaths and injuries, the ultimate impeachment of a corrupt President who fled his post and his country when mass killings made it impossible for him to stay. His kleptocratic thievery from his own people disgraced him and his administration for all the world to see. Under Ukraine's constitution, Ukraine's legislative branch, their Rada, their congress, passed succession legislation to elect a new President, a new Prime Minister, and a speaker on an interim basis until free elections can be held this May 25, not long from now. With Ukraine's eastern region of Crimea now invaded illegally by Russian aggressors, with its sovereignty and territorial integrity violated, and with Crimea forcibly annexed by Russia through a phony election, one must ask why the Atlantic Alliance and NATO, for two decades, left Ukraine largely undefended without a military security umbrella. What is liberty worth? Have too many people become too middle class to understand the principle of liberty? She stands atop the dome of this Capitol, the Statue of Freedom. It is more than a statue. It is how we live. It is what we stand for. It is why the world respects us. Is Ukraine to be a nation perpetually stuck in a time warp of history repeating itself? How many more have to die? Do the Budapest Accords mean nothing? Do the words mean nothing on the pages on which they are written? This past week, this House distinguished itself by passing two measures relating to Ukraine that place our Nation squarely in liberty's corner at this time of testing. Make no mistake; this is a time of testing. Yet the United Nations, our world's institution charged with assigning peacekeeping forces to troubled hotspots, seems frozen due to the power of Russia's veto inside the Security Council. Can our world community of nations muster the will to meet this latest threat to liberty? The question is: Can a dictatorship acting unilaterally overrule the aspirations for liberty? American and international commitments have to mean what they say. History shows us that ignoring the word and substance of those precious documents leads to ever greater challenges ending with potential catastrophe. But international agreements aside, it is a moral obligation of our world community of nations to stand with Ukraine based alone on her tragically brutal history to which her people were subjected over the last century. No people on Earth, no place on Earth suffered more. So I say to the world community of nations and liberty lovers everywhere: Where do you stand? Where do you stand diplomatically, economically, politicly, and militarily? I say to the world community of nations and liberty lovers everywhere: Where do you stand? A new diplomatic and security architecture is needed to strengthen Ukraine's precarious situation. Her people long for liberty. They have sung to the world, yet they remain undefended against the worst aggression since the fall of the communist empire. Ukraine--her people--have earned her right for a better day. It is not only in Ukraine's interest, it is in our interest. It is in the interest of what we stand for as the oldest democratic republic on the face of the Earth, yet one of her youngest nations. William Faulkner's writings remind us: The past is never dead. It is not even past. So I say to those who are listening this evening that Russia's brutality with Ukraine is nothing new. The question for us is: What do we stand for? What does this country stand for? What can our leadership provide to the world community of nations to give this great country of Ukraine, whose potential is unlimited, the chance for liberty in this new millennium? May God bless America, and may God bless those who understand the price of liberty. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time. [From the Washington Post, Mar. 17, 2014] Russia's Brutality With Ukraine Is Nothing New (By George F. Will) ``Boys from another school pulled out the severed head of a classmate while fishing in a pond. His whole family had died. Had they eaten him first? Or had he survived the deaths of his parents only to be killed by a cannibal? No one knew; but such questions were commonplace for the children of Ukraine in 1933. . . . Yet cannibalism was, sometimes, a victimless crime. Some mothers and fathers killed their children and ate them. . . . But other parents asked their children to make use of their own bodies if they passed away. More than one Ukrainian child had to tell a brother or sister: `Mother says that we should eat her if she dies.' '' --Timothy Snyder, ``Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin'' (2010) While Vladimir Putin, Stalin's spawn, ponders what to do with what remains of Ukraine, remember: Nine years before the January 1942 Wannsee Conference, at which the Nazis embarked on industrialized genocide, Stalin deliberately inflicted genocidal starvation on Ukraine. To fathom the tangled forces, including powerful ones of memory, at work in that singularly tormented place, begin with Timothy Snyder's stunning book. Secretary of State John Kerry has called Russia's invasion of Ukraine ``a 19th- century act in the 21st century.'' Snyder reminds us that ``Europeans deliberately starved Europeans in horrific numbers in the middle of the 20th century.'' Here is Snyder's distillation of a Welsh journalist's description of a Ukrainian city: ``People appeared at 2 o'clock in the morning to queue in front of shops that did not open until 7. On an average day 40,000 people would wait for bread. Those in line were so desperate to keep their places that they would cling to the belts of those immediately in front of them . . . . The waiting lasted all day, and sometimes for two. . . . Somewhere in line a woman would wail, and the moaning would echo up and down the line, so that the whole group of thousands sounded like a single animal with an elemental fear.'' This, which occurred about as close to Paris as Washington is to Denver, was an engineered famine, the intended result of Stalin's decision that agriculture should be collectivized and the ``kulaks''--prosperous farmers--should be ``liquidated as a class.'' In January 1933, Stalin, writes Snyder, sealed Ukraine's borders so peasants could not escape and sealed the cities so peasants could not go there to beg. By spring, more than 10,000 Ukrainians were dying each day, more than the 6,000 Jews who perished daily in Auschwitz at the peak of extermination in the spring of 1944. Soon many Ukrainian children resembled ``embryos out of alcohol bottles'' (Arthur Koestler's description) and there were, in Snyder's words, ``roving bands of cannibals'': ``In the villages smoke coming from a cottage chimney was a suspicious sign, since it tended to mean that cannibals were eating a kill or that families were roasting one of their members.'' Snyder, a Yale historian, is judicious about estimates of Ukrainian deaths from hunger and related diseases, settling on an educated guess of approximately 3.3 million, in 1932- 33. He says that when ``the Soviet census of 1937 found 8 million fewer people than projected,'' many of the missing being victims of starvation in Ukraine and elsewhere (and the children they did not have), Stalin ``had the responsible demographers executed.'' Putin, who was socialized in the Soviet-era KGB apparatus of oppression, aspires to reverse the Soviet Union's collapse, which he considers ``the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century.'' Herewith a final description from Snyder of the consequences of the Soviet system, the passing of which Putin so regrets: ``One spring morning, amidst the piles of dead peasants at the Kharkiv market, an infant suckled the breast of its mother, whose face was a lifeless gray. Passersby had seen this before . . . that precise scene, the tiny mouth, the last drops of milk, the cold nipple. The Ukrainians had a term for this. They said to themselves, quietly, as they passed: `These are the buds of the socialist spring.' '' U.S. policymakers, having allowed their wishes to father their thoughts, find Putin incomprehensible. He is a barbarian but not a monster, and hence no Stalin. But he has been coarsened, in ways difficult for civilized people to understand, by certain continuities, institutional and emotional, with an almost unimaginably vicious past. And as Ukraine, a bubbling stew of tensions and hatreds, struggles with its identity and aspirations, Americans should warily remember William Faulkner's aphorism: ``The past is never dead. It's not even past.''

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Metropolitan Philip Saliba, who led the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Church in North America for nearly 50 years and who passed from this life on March 19, 2014. Metropolitan Philip was the longest-serving bishop in any branch of Orthodoxy in the United States and leaves behind a tremendous legacy of service to the Orthodox Christian community. Metropolitan Philip began leading Antiochian Orthodoxy in 1996 and frequently visited St. George Antiochian Orthodox Cathedral in Toledo and St. Elias Antiochian Church in Sylvania. His leadership will be greatly missed, as he played a key role in inspiring unity among Orthodox churches during his tenure. His compelling vision for unity was noted by The Toledo Blade, where he was quoted as saying: ``As long as we are fragmented and known by Antiochians and Greeks and Serbians and Bulgarians and Russians, we will have no impact as a church on this country''. His eminence is remembered fondly for his personal warmth and compassion and has been described by his parishioners as a ``visionary''. One of the metropolitan's many accomplishments includes the founding of a church camp, Antioch Village, in Bolivar, Pennsylvania, which flourished under his direction. Indeed, he was lauded for this achievement, and for his other successful endeavors in expanding the reach of the church. A staunch advocate for inclusion, Metropolitan Phillip welcomed converts without connections to the church's Middle Eastern roots and expanded the role of women in the church. He insisted on the creation of a women's organization and appointed women to the archdiocese's board. The metropolitan also urged the church to modernize in other capacities, by using English during liturgies and by beginning a clergy retirement program. Under his purview, the number of parishes in the diocese quadrupled in size--a true testament to the significant impact of his leadership. Indeed, his imprint on the Orthodox Christian community will live on, as will his memory. To his brothers Nassif and Najib Saliba, and all those whose lives he touched, we offer our heartfelt sympathy. We hope that they draw comfort in the days ahead and in the memories of this extraordinary man and the gift of his life.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to the life of Leonard J. Wasserman of Oregon, Ohio, who passed from this life on Monday, March 10, 2014. Len Wasserman was an indefatigable and socially minded leader on many fronts, dedicating his life to the service of his country and his local community. After graduating from Olney High School in 1944, Len served as a Sergeant in the U.S. Army during WWII. Following his service, he returned to Oregon, Ohio, to work as an engineer for Pure-Union oil, then as a chief engineer for Little Sisters of the Poor. In addition to his work as an engineer, he also enjoyed farming and continued pursuing this passion until his retirement in 2000. In the city of Oregon, he has made an immeasurable impact through his active role in the community. He served the city in various capacities, ranging from Councilman, Mayor, member of T.M.O.C.O.G, and past chairman of the Safety Commission and the Oregon Growth Commission. Len also remained politically active throughout his life, through his involvement in the Oregon Democratic Club. He served as past president and was a lifetime member 45+ years precinct committeeman. He was also a life member of the St. Ignatius Church, serving the church in a variety of roles. Len was a member and past president of the Holy Name Society, church lector, Eucharistic minister, member and past president of St. Vincent DePaul Society, church councilman, usher, and past president of the church credit union. In addition to his involvement with the church, Len was also a member of the Christ Dunberger American Legion Post 537, where he served as chaplain and member of the color guard, V.F.W. 9816, life member of O.C.A.W. 346, Old News Boys, Eagles 2562, Swiss Club, G.A.F. Society, and the G.B.U. Len Wasserman leaves to cherish his life and legacy his loving wife Wilma Wasserman, their children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and extended family and friends. May we join them in honoring the life and service of an exceptional man.

Ms. KAPTUR

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the esteemed ranking member of New York (Mr. Engel), a dear friend, for yielding time in support of the Ukraine Support Act, H.R. 4278, and for his leadership from the time we traveled to Ukraine together well over a decade ago; and to Congressman Royce, the chairman of the committee, to reaffirm America's strong support for liberty and the people of Ukraine at this really critical time in world history and the history of Central and Eastern Europe. The assistance that is contemplated here is in the form of a loan guarantee and will aid Ukraine's efforts to recover its own missing assets to pay the money back. Ukraine is fully capable of earning its way forward. It is already the third largest grain exporter in the world, so this is nothing that can't be repaid. In addition, the bill authorizes $10 million for international broadcasting to Ukraine. I can guarantee you--I did an interview with Voice of America about a week ago--I received emails from people in Ukraine. They are waiting to hear the song of liberty. Let us sing it loudly by passing this legislation quickly on a bipartisan basis and stand for freedom when it matters most.