Jim McDermott

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, this is Iraq Week in the House of Representatives, called by the Republican majority in hopes that they can stop the bleeding, not on the ground in Iraq, but in the opinion polls in this country. They want to capitalize on the success of the U.S. military last week and define progress in Iraq all over again. Over the last 3 years, the definition of progress by the Republican majority has been as elusive as the President's plan for Iraq. Still, later this week after lots of Republican speech making, the majority leader will force-feed the American people a new resolution telling them what to think about the Iraq war. In the fine print is a desperate effort by the Republicans to cling to power in the November election. That is what this week is all about. Republican leaders hope to commandeer the news cycle and convince the American people that Republicans deserve to stay despite their record on Iraq. In other words, Iraq Week is a staged Republican campaign event. The resolution the Republicans will force through the House of Representatives on Friday will have nothing to do with increasing the safety of our Nation or the security of our soldiers on the ground in Iraq. It is about the security of the Republican grip on power. The Republicans fear the American people have answered Newt Gingrich's question. Do you remember it? ``Had enough?'' Well, they have. Poll after poll says the American people indeed have had enough of Republican power. The American people always have accepted sacrifice when it comes to defending the Nation. But one thing they have never accepted is being misled by their leaders. The American people have heard enough to know the trust they placed in the President over his justification to invade Iraq was misplaced. The American people have seen enough to know this administration and the Republican Congress have no plan except to keep declaring progress. The words, however, pale compared to the images they see on TV every day. Enough facts have emerged for the American people to know that Iraq has become a grim lesson we learned a long time ago in Vietnam. But instead of transferring responsibility, the President declares the tide has turned, U.S. troops will stay in Iraq, and there will be difficult days ahead. That is a Presidential declaration that more American soldiers will die, more American soldiers will suffer grave physical injuries, more American soldiers will be exposed to depleted uranium, and more American soldiers will return home traumatized by post-traumatic stress disorder. This is today's reality, and the truth is there is no end in sight. And you will not hear that from the President. Earlier this year, U.S. military commanders talked about significant force reductions by the end of the year. They have stopped talking about it. That is because the reality on the ground in Iraq defies the Republican spin. But the spinning goes on. Yesterday at Camp Neocon, that is what they used to call Camp David, the President called together the administration in a new effort to define progress. It was a campaign meeting meant to manage the news the American people receive about Iraq. Today, the President made a surprise visit to Iraq, not unlike landing on an aircraft carrier to declare mission accomplished. It wasn't then and it isn't now. Soon, the Republican leaders will tell the American people what to think, without the information on which to make an informed decision. Here is something they do not want to talk about: the U.S. is building Fortress Iraq, a $600 million embassy, the biggest in the world. What lurks ahead for the United States is another grim and painful lesson we learned a long time ago. The administration would like to divert your attention while it orders the military to pour concrete runways and bunkers across Iraq. Tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers are going to be stationed in Iraq indefinitely. These bases will be called something else for the American people, but they will still be targets for the insurgents. Not everyone has access to enterprise journalism being produced by the mainstream news organizations. So in the interest of promoting a resolution of truth about Iraq, I will enter into the Record two recent news articles. The first is from the Los Angeles Times entitled: ``Give the Defense Department an F.'' ``A Roadblock to Unity in Iraq'' was published in the Salt Lake City Tribune. Read them. Make up your own mind. The definition of progress in Iraq is not a Republican resolution force-fed to the Congress, as they would have you believe. The definition of progress is bringing our soldiers home, all of them, in significant numbers every month from this moment on until they are out of harm's way and we are out of the war that we should never have been in in the first place. [From the Los Angeles Times, June 3, 2006] Give the Defense Department an F (By Anthony H. Cordesman) If the United States is to win in Iraq, it needs an honest and objective picture of what is happening there. The media and outside experts can provide pieces of this picture, but only the U.S. government has the resources and access to information to offer a comprehensive overview. But the quarterly report to Congress issued May 30 by the Department of Defense, ``Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq,'' like the weekly reports the State Department issues on Iraq, is profoundly flawed. It does more than simply spin the situation to provide false assurances to lawmakers and the public. It makes basic analytical and statistical mistakes, fails to define key terms, provides undefined and unverifiable survey information and deals with key issues by omission. It deserves an overall grade of F. The report provides a fundamentally false picture of the political situation in Iraq and of the difficulties ahead. It does not prepare Congress or the American people for the years of effort that will be needed even under ``best-case'' conditions nor for the risk of far more serious forms of civil conflict. Some of its political reporting is simply incompetent. For example, the report repeatedly states that 77% of the Iraqi population voted in the December 2005 election. Given that the CIA estimates that almost 40% of the population is 14 or younger, there is no conceivable way that 77% of the population could have voted. The report says 12.2 million voters turned out. The CIA estimates Iraq's population is 26.8 million. This means roughly 46% of the population voted. The far more serious problem, however, is the spin the report puts on the entire Iraqi political process. Political participation surely rose. But that wasn't because of acceptance of the new government or an embrace of a democratic political process; it reflected a steady sharpening of sectarian divisions, as Sunnis tried to make up for their decision to boycott earlier elections. The report touts a ``true unity government with broad-based buy-in from major electoral lists and all of Iraq's communities.'' But its own data tell a different story. The one largely secular party won only 9% of parliament. The sectarian Shiite party, the United Iraqi Alliance, got 47%. The equally sectarian Sunni Iraqi Accordance Front got 16%, and the Kurdish Coalition got 19%. That hardly adds up to ``unity.'' The five-month delay in forming a government after the elections, the failure to appoint ministers of defense or interior and the fact that former Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari relinquished his post only after strong pressure from the United States and from Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani are signs that progress is likely to be slow in the future as well. Sectarian conflict has become almost as serious a threat as the insurgency. It is scarcely reassuring to be told by the Defense Department that the February attack on the Golden Mosque in Samarra marked a defeat for the insurgents and Islamic extremists because it did not instantly lead to all-out civil war. It is hard to think of a worse definition of victory. The economic section of the report contains useful data and reflects some real progress in the Iraqi financial sector. However, its analysis is flawed to the point of being actively misleading. No meaningful assessment is provided of the successes and failures of the U.S. aid effort, and no mention is made of the massive corruption and mismanagement of U.S. aid discovered by the special inspector general for Iraqi reconstruction. Nor is there meaningful analysis of oil developments, budget and revenue problems or future needs for aid. More than $30 billion in U.S. funds and nearly $35 billion in Iraqi money is involved, yet there is a serious risk that the Bush administration will do more than omit the inspector general's report. In fact, some State Department officials and Republicans in Congress are trying to put the inspector general out of business. The report's handling of the key issue of Iraqi unemployment is symptomatic of the victory of spin over content. The report quotes vague national figures of 18% unemployment and states that other estimates range between 25% and 40%. By saying that unemployment and poverty ``remain concerns'' but that there are ``substantial difficulties in measuring them accurately,'' it glosses over one of the most destabilizing aspects of Iraq. It ignores the failure of the aid program to create real jobs, especially for young men in areas of high crime and insurgency. Unemployment is not a casual macroeconomic factoid; it is central to bringing stability and security and to defeating the insurgency. The Defense Department's reporting on the Iraqi police forces simply cannot be trusted. Death squads rampage in police uniforms, but there is only passing mention of staff problems, corruption, sectarian tensions or horrific prison abuses. There is no meaningful analysis of problems so severe that the U.S. has called for a ``year of the police'' and Iraq's new prime minister, Nouri Maliki, is considering reorganizing the entire force. The United States is making real progress in some aspects of building the Iraqi regular military. Yet there is still a tendency to promise too much, too soon, to understate the risk and the threat, and to disguise the fact that the U.S. must be ready to support Iraq at least through 2008 and probably through 2010. The U.S. cannot afford to repeat the mistakes it made in Vietnam. Among them was dangerous self-delusion. The strategy President Bush is pursuing in Iraq is high risk. If it is to have any chance of success, it will require bipartisan persistence and sustained American effort. This requires trust, and trust cannot be built without integrity. That means credible reporting. The American people and Congress need an honest portrayal of what is happening, not halftruths by omission and spin.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, to follow on the words of Mr. Frank from Massachusetts, I would like to say that we all know that a good offense is the best defense. That is true in any sport, whether it is wrestling or football or basketball. But I would commend the Speaker and my colleagues to the words of Christ. In Matthew 7:3, He says, ``Why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye,'' the press, the FBI, whoever. ``Hypocrite, first cast out the beam in thine own eye and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote in thy brother's eye''. Madam Speaker, we have a very unbalanced set of perceptions in this House. If it goes favorable toward us, we think it is wonderful, and we proclaim it. But if it happens to be unpleasant to us, suddenly, we cannot seem to find enough words to castigate it. This is a House in which the people expect us to be just and even-handed. That is what they expect from us. That is what they should get.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, we can improve the lives of abused and neglected children in this Nation. One of the powers that we have, the Federal Child Welfare Program, is a lifeline we don't use enough, in my view. We know as legislators that the system needs reform. We saw it around Katrina very much as youngsters were spread across the country and fell between the cracks in a whole variety of situations. We know as parents that the vulnerable want and need only what our own children want and need, to be loved, cherished and protected. Today we have an opportunity to extend our hand as caring adults and take hold of vulnerable children, and we should take it. H.R. 5403, proposed by Mr. DeLay of Texas, takes a step in the right direction. It has been here before, I have supported it before, and I am proud to do that again today. As the ranking member of the Human Resources Subcommittee, I believe children come first, and there is no such thing as a political divide if we can better protect and nurture vulnerable children in America. I stand here to support my Republican colleague, Mr. DeLay, and urge the House to unanimously pass this legislation. Specifically, this bill strives to safely speed the placement of children in foster care or adoptive homes across State lines when this is considered an appropriate thing to do. This is very important, because today there are a number of barriers that prevent the timely placement of children in homes across State lines. We are a very mobile population, and laws that used to seem to make sense really do not today, and that is why we need this bill. They include an overly long time to conduct home studies to ensure the safety of children, obtaining criminal background checks on prospective foster care and adoptive parents, inadequate State resources and often a low priority assigned to interstate placement of foster and adoptive children. It is the latter that is really the problem. This bill creates meaningful incentives for States to address these barriers, and I urge my colleagues to support this initiative. It is meaningful legislation. This is not symbolic. It has some real power to change things. But it is more than that. By passing this bill, we recognize the heroic efforts of countless Americans across this country, foster parents and the caseworkers who deal with them and the many others who strive to help kids who are in need. By passing this legislation, we also rightly honor the leadership in fighting for vulnerable children by Mr. Tom DeLay. He has made a difference, and it is no surprise that he keeps fighting to protect and defend children. All too often, we are the light of hope for abused and neglected children. Today, let us curse the darkness by passing this bill.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, it is not very often that Jim McDermott rises to support this President, but that is precisely what I am doing now. The President does not want his hands tied by the passage of H.R. 4681. I couldn't agree more. H.R. 4681, the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act of 2006, will not make Israel safer, will not meet the urgent humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people, and will not give our diplomats the tools they need to help find a path to peace in the Mideast. For all of these reasons, I oppose it, and I urge my colleagues to reconsider. I believe in diplomacy as a means to correct injustice around the world. I believe gifted diplomats can accomplish as much with words and deeds as the military can with guns and soldiers. There is no question that the United States must take all appropriate steps to ensure that terrorists like Hamas are denied access to our financial aid. Not a penny should go to those who do not renounce terrorism. Hamas is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent Israelis before coming to power. Since then, they have neither renounced the use of violence nor recognized Israel. This is unacceptable. By all means, we must deny Hamas dollars that would buy hatred, but we must remember that Hamas and the Palestinian people are not one and the same. Even as we deny any and all assistance to Hamas, we must not hurt those Palestinians who are working for peace. If we fail to support them, I have no doubt that Israel will pay the ultimate price: more instability in the West Bank and Gaza, more desperation, and more terrorism. America's leadership is on the line in the Middle East, and more instability is something we need to avoid at all cost. We still have 130,000 American soldiers in harm's way in Iraq; we can't afford to make any more poor choices related to that region. But, that's exactly what we will do if we pass this bill. It doesn't make sense for the United States to limit political and economic aid to moderates, like Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. He and others have met our government's requirements by recognizing Israel, renouncing violence and terrorism against Israel, and accepting all previously signed Israeli-Palestinian agreements. What happens if we turn our back on leaders trying to heal a millennium of hate? And what can we expect if we turn our backs on the real and growing humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people? It doesn't make sense to put restrictions on funding the NGOs that provide the Palestinian people with hospitals and schools. As a medical doctor, I am gravely concerned about the fate of millions of innocent Palestinians who rely on international aid for food, health care, and for developing their economy and businesses. Recent news reports say that international sanctions are preventing hospitals in Gaza from providing dialysis machines for patients, and they may not be able to supply immunizations to children. The World Health Organization sees a ``rapid decline of the public health system . . . towards a possible collapse.'' If left untreated, these conditions will nurture a breeding ground for more hatred, more violence, and more terrorism. This bill will only increase the restrictions on aid to the Palestinians and that will make the already dire situation even worse. As a doctor I took an oath to heal. As a nation, we took an oath to lead. Allowing innocent Palestinians to go hungry, while denying them medical treatment cannot possibly correct injustice, or lead to peace. If passed, this bill will be seen as anti-Palestinian, and the resulting chaos and animosity can only threaten the relative calm that Israel has enjoyed for the past year and a half. This bill does not help Israel. Many of the Israeli leaders I've spoken to, think this bill goes too far by punishing all Palestinians, not just Hamas. They understand that a radicalized population will show more support for Hamas, not less. During a recent trip to Israel and the Palestinian territories, I saw how both sides deeply yearn for peace. And I saw firsthand how they need the United States to do all it can to help them make peace. The Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act will make this task enormously difficult. The harsh restrictions, and cutting off contacts with moderate Palestinians, will severely complicate our ability to assume an active role in helping both sides resolve the conflict. If we cannot engage with moderates, and those trying to develop the Palestinian economy and build civil society, we forfeit our ability to nurture and strengthen the positive elements in Palestine. We need a bill that allows us the utmost flexibility to help moderate Palestinians, to quickly get economic and humanitarian aid to places that need it, like hospitals and health clinics, and helps prevent the resumption of terrorism. This bill does not meet these criteria. We need to isolate and weaken Hamas, and hopefully their tenure at the head of the PA will be a short one. But if we cannot distinguish between Hamas and the majority of the Palestinian people, we cannot possibly expect to have a role in creating what comes next. Israelis and Palestinians realize that in the end, their fates are tied. When Palestinians' lives get worse, so do those of Israelis. It's time to help the majorities on both sides reach their mutual goal--a peaceful two-state solution--rather than standing in the way by punishing one side. Give our State Department an opportunity to nurture peace, or we will surely have to ask our military to counter more terrorism. Vote against H.R. 4681.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I had an unavoidable conflict on the afternoon of May 19, 2006, and was not able to vote. Had I been able, I would have voted ``aye'' on rollcall votes Nos. 175 and 176.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take claim the time of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel).

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Chairman, the President has signed into law a bill that guarantees a massive tax increase for the middle class. They just do not know it yet. Make no mistake. The President's tax giveaway to the rich will be paid for by the middle class for generations to come. In fact, Americans living overseas are already reeling from the President's fuzzy math. It is the largest single tax increase in 30 years for these Americans. I will enter into the Record a story published on Tuesday in the International Herald Tribune entitled ``Americans Abroad Outraged Over Tax Changes.'' Not only does the President's giveaway hurt Americans living and working overseas, his tax giveaway will actually encourage companies to hire executives in other countries because the new law is so onerous for Americans. The President declared ``Mission Accomplished,'' but the words ring as hollow now as they did on that aircraft carrier when he declared an end to major hostilities in Iraq on May 1, 2003, almost 3 years ago. What the President signed yesterday is a massive $70 billion tax giveaway. Americans earning $1 million a year will enjoy an average $41,000 windfall every single year through 2010. The President handed out $16 to the average middle class family. There is no money to pay for this presidential giveaway, just as there is no money to pay for the President's Iraq War. He keeps signing credit card slips for the U.S., but what kind of credit limit does he actually have? The Washington Post called it the ``Day of Reckoning for the next President in and Congress. I will enter into the Record a May 4 story. The story of the ``Day of Reckoning'' is January 1, 2011. Let me read a paragraph out of the Post story: ``At that moment politicians will face a choice: Either allow taxes to rise suddenly and sharply on everyone who pays income taxes, is married, has children, holds stocks and bonds, or expects a large inheritance, or impose mounting budget deficits on the government far into the future.'' I urge you to read the rest of that story, which will be in the Record. This is not voodoo economics; this is black magic. The President and the Republican majority have made the surplus disappear. They have replaced a Nation enjoying strong financial security with a country insecurely surviving on a growing addiction to massive foreign debt. They are transferring the wealth of our Nation to the very rich and leaving the bill for the reckless plundering of the Treasury to the middle class, and they made sure the pain will not begin until the President leaves office. Two generations ago when income tax rates exceeded 70 percent, economists could argue that a tax cut could fuel economic growth. But that logic is as scarce today as gasoline at $1 a gallon. To independently confirm this point, I turn to none other than the very conservative Cato Institute. Here is what they said in the Los Angeles Times story on May 14, which I will put into the Record: In the story the Cato Institute shows that since 1981 for every dollar in tax cuts, the government spending increased by 15 cents. So they kept going. They gave away $1 and they spent $1.15. The President and his surrogates are pretending otherwise. The bills are piling up and so is the debt on the American middle class, until we stop. But the Republicans did the opposite. They rammed through a reckless budget bill yesterday. This much we know: The Republican budget is all gain and no pain for big oil. The Republican budget is all riches for the rich and rags for the rest. The President and the Republicans are hurting the poor, the disadvantaged, the vulnerable kids, the seniors, and the middle class. And the Republicans are passing on a legacy of debt, not to their children but to their grandchildren. When the President signed the latest tax giveaway, he gave those earning $1 million a year, earning $1 million a year, an extra $41,000. That is the average salary of the middle class in this country. For doing nothing. He just simply gave it to them. They will not work a single day for it. Meanwhile, the House Republican budget will add another $254 billion to the deficit to pay for that. They are going to borrow from the Chinese to give it to the rich. So the debt ceiling had to be raised again yesterday. Buried in the bill for the fifth time under Mr. Bush, we have raised the debt ceiling. Their spending is so out of control, they do not know how to stop. But that is not the half of it. In 2007 the rich will receive even more funding. There is no end to their spending. The only way is to take them out in November. By 2010, the Republican giveaway will cost as much as all of the funding for the Departments of Education, Veterans Affairs, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, State, and Energy. And, median family income in America is down. Under this President, the tallest mountain in the world is no longer Mt. Everest; it's Mount U.S. Deficit. The rich are sitting on top with Republicans. Rock slides are crashing down on the rest of us. And the landslide is coming. This mountain of debt will collapse on the American people. That's the record of a Republican President and Republican majority who have defined themselves as the party of one percent, representing only those with a seven figure income or above. [From the Los Angeles Times, May 14, 2006] Bankrupted by Voodoo Economics (By Jonathan Chait) If you remember the 2000 election, you probably remember President Bush's warning about why we needed to cut taxes: if we did not return the surplus to the taxpayers, Washington would spend it. Well, we all know what happened next. Bush returned the surplus to taxpayers--and Washington spent the money anyway. Conservatives have a number of analogies to explain why tax cuts will lead to spending restraint: Cut your child's allowance. Starve the beast. But the analogies are all wrong. The child has a credit card. The beast has a private meat locker. Washington can spend whatever it wants, regardless of how much it taxes. The right has been congenitally unable or unwilling to grasp this lesson. Last week, though, there was a faint glimmer of recognition. William Niskanen, chairman of the fervently anti-government Cato Institute, did a calculation showing that, since 1981, every $1 in tax cuts tends to produce 15 cents of extra spending. Likewise, every $1 of tax hikes tends to reduce spending by 15 cents. The notion that tax cuts cause spending to dry up, or that tax hikes encourage more spending, is not just wrong, it's completely backward. Now, Niskanen is not the first policy wonk to discover this correlation. Four years ago, Richard Kogan of the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities discovered the same thing. I wrote about it in the New Republic--and nobody paid any attention. But Niskanen's finding is getting some attention. Moderate libertarian Jonathan Rauch wrote about it in the Atlantic, and a Washington Post columnist picked it up from there. You'd think conservatives would pay some attention to a study that empirically demolishes one of the central underpinnings of their domestic policy. Indeed, my fellow columnist, Jonah Goldberg, wrote on National Review's blog last Monday that ``conservatives are going to have to respond to Jonathan Rauch's argument in the new Atlantic.'' Of course, no response ensued. Indeed, the next day, National Review was on its merry way, editorializing for more tax cuts, as if Niskanen's study didn't exist. The curious thing is why conservatives persist in supporting a strategy that is demonstrably counterproductive to their stated goal of shrinking government. The answer can be found in the same entry by Goldberg. He proceeded to write: ``There are others better qualified to deal with the economic issues. But if tax increases can be demonstrated to shrink government in some significant way, I'm certainly open to them.'' Indeed, there is plentiful evidence that tax hikes can slow spending. There is a sizable chunk of the Democratic Party that is willing to inflict pain on their constituents in the form of spending cuts as long as the rich bear some of the burden in the form of higher taxes. In 1982, 1983, 1990 and 1993, Democrats in large numbers voted for budgets that ratcheted back spending and raised taxes. In 1995, many Democrats offered to cut spending and balance the budget. But Newt Gingrich and the Republicans quashed that move by insisting on huge tax cuts too. The insistence on tax cuts tends to weaken fiscal restraint all around. Having tended to the rich with tax cuts, Bush had to buy off enough voters with spending hikes to win reelection. Most conversatives are like Goldberg--they want to shrink spending. But most conservatives, also like Goldberg, tend to think that ``others are better qualified'' to make those decisions. Conservative option outlets tend to subcontract out their economic thinking to a handful of polemicists, and virtually all of them are committee advocates of supply-side economics. They're theologically committed to tax cuts and don't really care about spending cuts. They studiously ignore any evidence that weakens their case--which is to say, most of the evidence. So, basically, you have a handful of supply-siders leading the rest of the conservatives around by the nose. The conservatives could cut a deal with the Democrats to tighten spending and taxes, but the anti-tax nuts are the ones who set policy for the movement. It's funny. Almost all the conservatives, including Goldberg, are furious at Bush for raising spending. But it hasn't occurred to them to question the dogma of the voodoo economists who led them into this mess in the first place.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, May is Foster Care Appreciation Month, when the Nation honors those who open their hearts and homes to America's most vulnerable children. These are children who cannot live at home because it isn't safe. How ironic and out of touch that the Republican majority should choose May to bring out a budget that neglects America's neglected children by obliterating the funding for the Social Services Block Grant program. This program funds America's response to the SOS of neglected children who need us to protect them. The Republicans have other priorities: Giving the rich more money. The Republicans believe a safe house for a child is a mansion for the rich, so they will cut $500 million out of these programs which help the poor in order to give away millions to the rich. There is no home, no heart and no shame in this Republican budget. They take care of the top 1 percent. They cannot give enough to those people at the top. They cannot borrow enough to give to those people at the top. And they forget about everybody else, including the foster children. That is the American way for the Republicans. I offered an amendment to change this. They turned it down. Vote ``no'' on this budget.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the do-nothing Congress is in session today to enact a sham budget. Let me explain why I say that. There is a provision in that budget which raises the debt limit. Now, if you are balancing the budget, why are you implying you are going to go out and borrow more money? If one of your children said, ``Well, Dad, I am making $40,000 this year, but my wife and I have decided to take $100,000 in a home equity loan so we can pay for whatever we want,'' you would tell your son or your daughter that was fiscally irresponsible. What the Republicans are doing is borrowing more than $300 billion from the Chinese, the Japanese, and anybody else who will give us money, and they are giving it in a tax cut to the people earning $1 million a year. They are going to get over $100,000 back from the borrowing. That is what this budget really does. It is a sham. It doesn't balance anything, and it should be rejected, both by the Congress and the people on election day in November.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Chairman, I rise to protect and defend the U.S. soldiers who protect and defend us. I urge the House to pass my amendment calling for a comprehensive study on possible health effects on soldiers from exposure to depleted uranium. I am a medical doctor. Like every doctor, I took an oath to use all my knowledge and skill to heal the sick. I was trained to listen to the patient and to use science, not conjecture, to make a diagnosis. I have been listening to soldiers, and I am greatly troubled. We need to do a study on the effects of depleted uranium. My amendment includes a comprehensive study of the effects on our soldiers from exposure to DU, and also includes the children of our soldiers born after exposure. I recognize there have been a number of studies done on this exposure, but they do not answer all the questions. There has been no comprehensive study of cancer rates in relationship to DU exposure in gulf war veterans. The VA has a volunteer medical DU follow-up program that has been tracking about 60 veterans who signed themselves up for the study. These veterans were all friendly fire victims who have DU imbedded in their body, and I am heartened that the VA has been keeping track of them. But 60 veterans is not enough to catch cancers that have a rate of one in 1,000. This sample is not large enough to be statistically reliable. There are about 900 gulf war veterans who have had level one or level two exposure to DU. We should be studying all of them and keeping track of all their health. There has been no comprehensive study of the Gulf War Syndrome in relation to exposure to DU. No definitive cause has been established for Gulf War Syndrome. Presently, between 150,000 and 200,000 soldiers who served in Gulf War I could have Gulf War Syndrome. We need to study the possible relationship between depleted uranium and Gulf War Syndrome. Any link between these two or other negative health effects has not been conclusively established or refuted. I urge my colleagues on both sides to stand with me and protect and defend the soldiers whom we send out to protect and defend us. For me, this is a personal, not a political, quest. My professional life turned from medicine to politics after my service in the United States Navy during the 1960s when I treated combat soldiers returning from Vietnam. Back then, the Pentagon denied that Agent Orange posed any threat to soldiers who were exposed. Decades later, the truth began to emerge. Agent Orange harmed our soldiers; it made thousands sick and some died. During all those years of denial, we stood by and did nothing while our soldiers suffered, and for me there can be no more Agent Orange. We have to think of that in terms of this DU. If DU poses no danger, we need to prove it statistically and with independent, scientific studies. If DU harms our soldiers, we all need to know it and act quickly, as any doctor would, to use all of our power to heal the sick. We owe our soldiers a full measure of the truth, wherever that leads us. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to pass this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, May is Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, and I rise to proudly recognize and honor over 78,000 Asian Pacific Americans who live in my 7th Congressional District in Washington State. They are the largest minority group in my district, embracing over 13 percent of the population. They are Japanese, Asian Indian, Korean, Chinese, Filipino, Cambodian, Laotian, Hmong, Vietnamese, Pacific Islanders, as well as other Asian American cultures. Their contributions have helped to make Seattle a richly textured weave of cultures and people. We all benefit as a result. Beginning in the late 19th century, Asian Americans immigrated to the United States to work hard and make a better life for themselves and their families. Many faced prejudice, racial injustice, and discrimination, but these new immigrants believed in America, and they made our Nation stronger by fighting for American values like equality. As our Nation again debates the importance and role of immigration in the early 21st Century, we should consider the contributions that Asian-Americans have made, and continue to make, to our Nation, becoming leaders in public and social service, business and industry. In Seattle, I am proud to have introduced the legislation that renamed a United States Courthouse as the William Kenzo Nakamura United States Courthouse in honor of a Japanese American who was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his courage under fire in World War II. Mr. Nakamura made the ultimate sacrifice in service to the country he loved, an honor made more poignant by the fact that William and his family were forcibly relocated to a federal internment camp at the beginning of the war. Today, we proudly celebrate Asian Pacific American culture and heritage, from the Vietnamese Tet in Seattle Lunar New Year celebration to other local cultural festivals. We also honor Asian Pacific Americans by preserving the ethnic heritage of our citizens. Places like the Wing Luke Asian Museum, the Seattle Asian Art Museum, the Filipino American National Historical Society, and Densho: The Japanese American Legacy Project keep us in touch with the roots of our neighbors. Our pride in and recognition of many Asian American role models has earned Washington State a global awareness. Just last month Chinese President Hu Jintao chose Seattle for his inaugural visit to the United States as head of state, touring a Boeing plant and Microsoft headquarters and noting the ``good cooperative relations'' between China and Washington State. One out of every four jobs in Washington State is directly tied to international trade, and we have a strong and growing trading relationship with the Asia Pacific region. This relationship has been established, expanded, and nurtured largely through cultural awareness first developed in the region by Asian-American immigrants. We all benefit from the contributions Asian Pacific Americans make to our community and country. Asian Pacific American Heritage Month is a celebration of the American spirit. We are a nation of immigrants, and by honoring Asian Pacific Americans, we honor all cultures.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the Medicare prescription drug benefit plan is doing a bad job, and it is doing a worse job of helping those who need the help most. I was down in the lunchroom in the Longworth Building, and one of the cashiers stopped me and said can you explain to me how this works? She said, I figured out what it is going to cost me to join, and I can save more money by going to Costco. My drugs will cost less in Costco. If you added it all up, I am going to be better off staying out of the program and buying my drugs at Costco. Now, this program was faulty in its inception, and of the millions of people on Medicare who still haven't signed up, 85 percent of them are poor enough to qualify for the low income subsidy. When this bill was in the Ways and Means Committee, we offered the opportunity to the chairman to sign up these poor people at the beginning, automatically, because they are low income. We know what their income is. They are not going to get rich all of a sudden. But, no, we are going to let them flop around out there trying to figure out this complicated program. Now, how could we have let it happen? Well, haven't the Republicans been telling us that the Medicare drug benefit was intended to help those most in need, those eligible for low income subsidy? They turned down, the author of this turned down tonight Mr. Stark's offer to rewrite this thing and get all these people in. But that is not what really went on here. Just encouraging people or threatening or, as the gentleman from the Energy and Commerce Committee says, keeping the pressure on old people is not sufficient. That is not humane public policy. You ought to be ashamed of saying something like that. We want to pressure. My mother is 96 years old. I don't need you pressuring my mother on this drug plan if she can't figure it out. Now the low income beneficiaries are twice as likely to have health problems, mental problems or live in a nursing home. Many have difficulty with English. You can't just stand out here and say, hey, folks, sign up, sign up. They can't figure out what to do. You have made it so complicated so that they wouldn't sign up. That is what you did. You wanted the ones who were most needy to be unable to figure out how the plan would work so they could be left out. Now, just to show what a warm heart you have, you slap a 7 percent penalty on them for the rest of their life. You say to them, if you don't sign up by the 15th of May, you can't sign up for 6 months, and it is going to cost you 1 percent a month for every month you don't sign up. That kind of loving treatment is, in my view, exactly what this program does not need. It is a mess, this is a bad resolution. We will all probably, you know, vote for it. But when you let the drug companies write the bill, it was never meant to work for ordinary people. The program needs time to find these people and help them. Blindly adhering to the May 15th deadline, just five days away, dramatically penalizes many seniors who have not signed up. This program has been a mess from the start. If Republicans are serious about helping seniors, we must extend the deadline for enrolling, remove the penalties for not signing up, and streamline the procedures, so that our most distinguished citizens can actually understand this. Just because Republicans let big drug companies help write the legislation doesn't mean we are helpless to take action. Republicans were wrong about the real cost of this program. Now they are wrong when they say they want to help seniors. An artificial deadline won't help seniors. A real prescription drug benefit will.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, it is not very often that Jim McDermott rises to support this President, but that is precisely what I am doing now. The President does not want his hands tied by H.R. 4681. I completely agree. It was taken off the calendar today, and it ought to stay off the calendar. H.R. 4681, the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act of 2006, will not make Israel safer, will not meet the urgent humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people, and will not give our diplomats the tools they need to help find a path to peace in the Mideast. For all of these reasons, I oppose it, and I urge my colleagues to reconsider. I believe in diplomacy as a means to correct injustice around the world. I believe gifted diplomats can accomplish as much with words and deeds as the military can with guns and soldiers. There is no question that the United States must take all appropriate steps to ensure that terrorists like Hamas are denied access to our financial aid. Hamas is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent Israelis before coming to power. Since then, they have neither renounced violence nor recognized Israel. This is unacceptable. By all means, we must deny Hamas dollars that would buy hatred, but we must remember that Hamas and the Palestinian people are not one and the same. Even as we deny any and all assistance to Hamas, we must not hurt those Palestinians who are working for peace. If we fail to support them, I have no doubt that Israel will pay the ultimate price: more instability in the West Bank and Gaza, more desperation, and more terrorism. America's leadership is on the line in the Middle East, and more instability is something we need to avoid. We still have 130,000 American soldiers in harm's way in Iraq; we can't afford to make any more poor choices related to that region. But, that's what we will do if we pass this bill. It doesn't make sense for the United States to limit political and economic aid to moderates, like Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. He and others have met our requirements by recognizing Israel, renouncing violence and terrorism against Israel, and accepting all previously signed Israeli-Palestinian agreements. What happens if we turn our back on leaders trying to heal a millennium of hate? And what can we expect if we turn our backs on the real and growing humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people? It doesn't make sense to put restrictions on funding the NGOs that provide the Palestinian people with hospitals and schools. As a medical doctor, I am gravely concerned about the fate of millions of innocent Palestinians who rely on international aid for food, health care, and for developing their economy and businesses. Recent news reports say that international sanctions are preventing hospitals in Gaza from providing dialysis machines for patients, and they may not be able to supply immunizations to children. The World Health Organization sees a ``rapid decline of the public health system . . . towards a possible collapse.'' This bill will only make the already dire situation even worse. As a doctor I took an oath to heal. As a nation, we took an oath to lead. Allowing innocent Palestinians to go hungry, while denying them medical treatment cannot possibly correct injustice, or lead to peace. Passing this bill will be seen as anti-Palestinian, and the resulting chaos and animosity can only threaten the relative calm that Israel has seen in recent months. Many of the Israeli leaders I've spoken to, think this bill goes too far by punishing all Palestinians, not just Hamas. They understand that a radicalized population will show more support for Hamas, not less. During a recent trip to Israel and the Palestinian territories, I saw how both sides deeply yearn for peace. And I saw firsthand how they need the United States to do all it can to help them make peace. The Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act will make this task enormously difficult. The harsh restrictions, and cutting off contacts with moderate Palestinians, will severely complicate our ability to assume an active role in helping both sides resolve the conflict. If we cannot engage with moderates, and those trying to develop the Palestinian economy and build civil society, we forfeit our ability to nurture and strengthen the positive elements in Palestine. The President and State Department must have the utmost flexibility to help moderate Palestinians, to quickly get economic and humanitarian aid to places that need it, like hospitals and health clinics, and helps prevent the resumption of terrorism. We need to isolate and weaken Hamas, and hopefully their tenure at the head of the PA will be a short one. But if we cannot distinguish between Hamas and the majority of the Palestinian people, we cannot possibly expect to have a role in creating what comes next. Israelis and Palestinians realize that in the end, their fates are tied. It's time to help the majorities on both sides reach their mutual goal--a peaceful two-state solution--rather than standing in the way by punishing one side. While the bill has been pulled from the calendar, that's only temporary. I urge the majority to leave it off the table indefinitely. Give our State Department an opportunity to nurture peace, or we will surely have to ask our military to counter more terrorism.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, some people say this is a do-nothing Congress. They are wrong. This is the rubber-stamp Congress. Every Member of the Republican side is right now looking through his office for where is his rubber stamp, because this is one of the days when they come over here and rubber-stamp the President's tax cuts. The 13th page of the New York Times today carries the fact that the tax cut for the top 10 percent, 82 percent of the $69 billion goes to the top 10 percent. Now, that is not do-nothing, that is just forgetting the other 90 percent in this country. And when a decent period has passed by, they are going to come out here and raise the debt limit again. That is in the paper today as well. They raised it in March, and they have given so much away and dug us so deep in debt that they are going to be out here doing it again. There is nothing in what we will do today that is useful for anybody who is at the middle class or below. This is all for the top 10 percent. That is all these people are for. The time is coming for change in November.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the Republican rubber-stamp Congress is in session. Republicans are going to rubber stamp the last act of the budget. The first act was in December when the Republicans took from the poor, the disadvantaged and the foster kids, the people on food stamps and students trying to get a student loan. The Republicans emptied one Christmas stocking, but they thought it would be unseemly to immediately give it to the rich right in front of the poor. So they waited and they waited and they waited, and finally, today, they think the people have forgotten and gone to sleep. So they are going to give it to the rich. The party of 1 percent is going to get a reward. The millionaires are going to get a windfall for which they did nothing except attend fund- raisers. Every millionaire will get a windfall of $41,000. The average American makes exactly that during a year. He will get $16. Millionaires, $41,000; ordinary people, $16. Those are real numbers, no matter what they say, and that means it is reward the rich, ignore the poor. That is the Republican rubber stamp of the President's views on the world. They say it will increase savings. The savings rate in this country is zero. In fact, it is less than zero. Ninety-nine percent of the people in this country are not better off, only the 1 percent who get the rubber stamp today; and the rest of America is forced to choose between filling the gas tank and putting food in the refrigerator. Now, they all brought their rubber stamps today, but what they have not told you, and I will enter into the Record at this point the article from The Washington Post from May 9. [From washingtonpost.com, May 9, 2006] Another Possible Bump to the Debt Ceiling (By Jonathan Weisman and Shailagh Murray) A $2.7 trillion budget plan pending before the House would raise the federal debt ceiling to nearly $10 trillion, less than two months after Congress last raised the federal government's borrowing limit. The provision--buried on page 121 of the 151-page budget blueprint--serves as a backdrop to congressional action this week. House leaders hope to try once again to pass a budget plan for fiscal 2007, a month after a revolt by House Republican moderates and Appropriations Committee members forced leaders to pull the plan. Leaders also hope to pass a package of tax-cut extensions that would cost the Treasury $70 billion over the next five years. They would then turn Thursday to a $513 billion defense policy bill that would block President Bush's request to raise health-care fees and co-payments for service members and their families. In recent days, Congress has received some good news on the budget front. A surge of tax revenues this spring, sparked by economic growth, prompted the Congressional Budget Office last Thursday to revise its 2006 deficit forecast from around $370 billion to as low as $300 billion. But the federal debt keeps climbing because of continued deficit spending and the government's insatiable borrowing from the Social Security trust fund. With passage of the budget, the House will have raised the federal borrowing limit by an additional $653 billion, to $9.62 trillion. It would be the fifth debt- ceiling increase in recent years, after boosts of $450 billion in 2002, a record $984 billion in 2003, $800 billion in 2004 and $653 billion in March. When Bush took office, the statutory borrowing limit stood at $5.95 trillion. Democrats will harp on those statistics not only in the budget debate but also when the House takes up tax legislation expected to finally emerge from House-Senate negotiations today. The legislation would extend for two years the deep cuts to tax rates on dividends and capital gains that Congress approved in 2003. It would also slow for one year the expansion of the alternative minimum tax, a parallel income tax system designed to hit affluent but increasingly pinching the middle class. Although the debate will be rancorous, the tax measure is expected to pass by a comfortable margin. The budget vote will be closer. House leaders had to pull the budget plan from the floor in April, after moderate Republicans balked at planned cuts to health and education programs and appropriators objected to limits on home district pet projects--known as earmarks--and a provision that would limit emergency spending for natural disasters to about $14 3 billion a year. Appropriators have come on board, Appropriations Committee spokesman John Scofield said. GOP leaders and committee chairman Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.) tried to win moderate support last week by cutting $4 billion from the president's defense spending request and adding that money to labor, health and education programs. But some moderates are still holding out. ``I expect they do not have the votes right now,'' said Rep. Michael N. Castle (R-Del.), a leader of the balking moderates. ``Could they get the votes by the end of the week? I'd give it a 50-50 chance.''

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, it is awfully cold in Washington, D.C. these days, and the arrival of spring is not going to change the frigid temperature beginning to grip the Nation's Capital. No matter how much we stand in the bright sunlight, Washington, D.C. is fast becoming a cold, cold place under this President and administration. The Big Chill is on and it is becoming an ice age for the ``People's- Right-to-Know.'' The New York Times and The Washington Post recently won Pulitzer Prizes for breaking through the administration's secrecy to inform the American people about secret prisons and secret wiretapping. In response, the administration wants journalism stopped. It just gets in the way of the administration telling people only what they want them to know. Maintaining this veil of secrecy is so important that the administration directed the Attorney General to see if he might invoke the 1917 Espionage Act as a way to make the first amendment disappear. By controlling what you know, they hope to control what you think. It is the solution to their Iraq dilemma. You don't have to mislead the people, as the President did, if the people simply don't know anything at all. That is what this assault on free speech is all about. I seek permission to enter into the Record an editorial promoted by the Washington Times by Nat Hentoff entitled ``Chilling Free Speech.'' The President and his administration are doing everything possible to impose censorship. They know that secrecy is the fastest, most effective way to silence dissent. If the American people know what they are doing, the American people could make them accountable for what they are doing. But there is no accountability for their actions, so they hide them under a blanket of secrecy. The President cried ``shameful'' that the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalism had reunited the American people with the truth about secret prisons and secret wiretapping ordered by the President and his administration. In other words, the truth made it out into the open, and that was not part of their plan. The only way to account for it was to attack those responsible for telling us. It is the centerpiece of the Republican playbook. Attack anyone who disagrees. I know those tactics firsthand. But the cracks are beginning to show in the Republican wall of silent acquiescence. A rubber stamp is still being used in this Congress by the Republicans, but many of my colleagues, my Republican colleagues, know that their mandatory vote at the discretion of the President is not in the best interest of the American people, and the people are beginning to listen to other voices, when they can hear them above the clatter of the Republican noise machine. Here is the proof. David Wise in the Los Angeles Times recently wrote an article entitled, ``Secrecy's Shadow Falls on Washington.'' I ask permission to enter this article in the Record. To help the American people understand how pervasive secrecy in the administration is, let me read a short excerpt from Mr. Wise's article, quote, ``The National Archives and Records Administration have been embarrassed by the revelation that at least 55,000 documents formerly available to researchers have been withdrawn and reclassified under secret agreements with the military and the CIA. The deals were so secretive that the documents simply disappeared from the shelves.'' That is the end of the quote. At least temporarily the head of the National Archives has suspended the disappearance of American history. It doesn't mean the threat has passed; it just means someone is fighting to keep America free. We have two choices, the free flow of information or the outright control of information. America is strong because of the protections within the free flow of information. It is guaranteed by the first amendment. But the President and his majority want to tell you what to think through the outright control of the information. Geoffrey Stone, author and law professor at the University of Chicago wrote an article in the New York Times the other day called, ``Scared of Scoops.'' Again, I ask to enter it in the Record. As the writer points out, the administration's primary tactic is intimidation. When in doubt, they try to make you afraid. When unpopular, they try to make you afraid. When they are losing their hold on power because of their record, they tend to make you afraid. The only reason you know this President has no energy policy for America is because he can't hide the price of gasoline at the pumps. He would make it a secret if he could. Don't be surprised if the President tries to classify the price of gasoline as a national security matter. That is his method of accountability to the American people. None. In a Nation where free speech is the last defense against absolute power, they don't want you to know because the more you know, the worse they look. [From the Washington Times, May 8, 2006.] Chilling Free Speech (By Nat Hentoff) Beyond the firing of CIA officer Mary O. McCarthy for leaking classified information to the press is a much larger story of the administration's increasing investigation of other such press leaks as a possible prelude to an American version of Britain's stringent Official Secrets Act. In February, CIA Director Porter Goss told the Senate Intelligence Committee of the need for a grand jury investigation including reporters who receive these leaks. The charge against Miss McCarthy, which she denies, is that she was a source of highly classified information for Dana Priest's report in The Washington Post on CIA secret prisons in Eastern Europe. Miss Priest, a 2006 winner of a Pulitzer award for the story, has been writing about the CIA's ``black sites'' since late 2002; and Sen. Pat Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, continually refuses to authorize an investigation of the CIA's violations of American and international laws in its prisons wholly hidden from our rule of law. Miss Priest is already subject to a Justice Department investigation, as are New York Times reporters James Risen and Eric Lichtblau for their disclosure of the president's secret approval of the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance of Americans. (Those reporters have also received Pulitzers this year, despite the president's characterization of their reporting as ``shameful.'') The administration's position has been clearly stated by FBI spokesman Bill Carter (The Washington Post, April 19): ``Under the law, no private person (including journalists) may possess classified documents that were illegally provided to them. These documents remain the property of the government.'' The law Mr. Carter cited is this administration's expansion of the Espionage Act of 1917, which is now before the courts in a case that can greatly diminish the First Amendment rights of the press--and the right of Americans to receive information about such lawless government practices as the CIA's secret interrogation centers and the president's violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in unleashing the National Security Agency. This espionage case--United States of America v. Lawrence Anthony Franklin, Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman--is the first in which the federal government is charging violations of the Espionage Act by American citizens--who are not government officials--for being involved in what until now have been regarded as First Amendment-protected activities engaged in by hundreds of American journalists. Messrs. Rosen and Weissman, former staff members of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)--who have since been fired--are accused of receiving classified information from Defense Department analyst Franklin regarding U.S. government Middle East and terrorism strategy. Messrs. Rosen and Weissman are charged with then providing that classified information to an Israeli diplomat--and a journalist. Government official Franklin has pleaded guilty and been sentenced to prison. But defense attorneys for Rosen and Weissman declare: ``Never (until now) has a lobbyist, reporter or any other nongovernment employee been charged . . . for receiving oral information the government alleges to be national-defense material as part of that (accused) person's normal First Amendment-protected activities.'' In an amicus brief to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press (with which I am affiliated) says: ``These charges potentially eviscerate the primary function of journalism--to gather and publicize information of public concern--particularly where the most valuable information to the public is information that the government wants to conceal'' so that the public cannot ``participate in and serve as a check on the government.'' (That's why the First Amendment's freedom of the press was added to the Constitution in 1791.) But the judge now hearing this espionage case, T.S. Ellis III, already said in March: ``Persons who come into unauthorized possession of classified information must abide by the law. That applies to academics, lawyers, journalists, professors, whatever.'' Recently, the judge appears to be backing off. However he decides, and it's uncertain, Steven Aftergood-- head of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists--says: ``To make a crime of the kind of conversations Rosen and Weissman had with Franklin over lunch would not be surprising in the People's Republic of China. But it's utterly foreign to the American political system.'' (This censorship of the press was cut out of the Espionage Act of 1917.) If the Supreme Court agrees with the Bush administration on this case, we will, as Mr. Aftergood says, have to build many more jails--and disarm the First Amendment.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to speak out of turn.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, America lost one of its best and brightest intellects and public servants in recent days with the death of John Kenneth Galbraith. To say that Professor Galbraith understood economics is like saying Albert Einstein was good at arithmetic. Ken Galbraith pioneered economic theories that transcended numbers, products, and nations, because he added people into the equation. He recognized and helped the whole world understand that market forces alone could not be anonymous engines of economic activity. There was more at stake--people, and more to consider--policy, in a nation's economic growth and development. If you stop and think about it, every parent has told a child at one time or another that there are consequences to their actions; John Kenneth Galbraith helped nations understand that there are consequences to economic actions. Mr. Galbraith's impact on modern economic theory can be seen in the books he authored including The Affluent Society and New Industrial State. In all, his astonishing contributions as a world-renowned economist and professor span more than five decades. But, there is so much more to his life and contributions to the American people. John Kenneth Galbraith served his country as a Presidential advisor and ambassador to India. He helped FDR implement the New Deal, serving in his administration. He also served President John F. Kennedy, among others. Mr. Galbraith walked among giants, because he too was a giant--in intellect, heart, and commitment to his country. If ever there was a single individual who embodied the positive change he wanted to see, it was John Kenneth Galbraith. I was privileged to know him in my role as President of ADA, Americans for Democratic Action. When liberal activists gathered in January 1947 at the Willard Hotel to form Americans for Democratic Action, Ken was there to inspire and to lead. He never stopped doing either. From the beginning, Professor Galbraith was ADA's guiding light--both philosophically and as a pragmatic politician. As its president, he led ADA during the Vietnam War to take a stand and become the first national organization to oppose the last fatally flawed war this country waged. His participation in ADA continued as an ADA national board member, national convention speaker and author of the pithy Galbraithian letters, some of which were private and many of which attracted members to this organization which he held so dear. I received a personal note from him just recently. John Kenneth Galbraith was that kind of person; he never stopped thinking, and feeling, and interacting, even as his own health was failing. Just a few weeks ago, as he lay bedridden, he met with an ADA board member to discuss ways to further the goals and objectives of the organization. John Kenneth Galbraith was nothing short of astonishing and his loss to us and to the world is enormous. His legacy will be sustained by the countless people he inspired, through his sons--including Jamie, who serves on ADA's national board-- and through the Galbraith Fellows, who will continue to work in the public service in his memory. To say that John Kenneth Galbraith will be sorely missed is an understatement of the highest order. What I am proud to say is that I knew this great American, and this institution can honor his memory by ensuring that his voice resonates throughout America for all time.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, we heard a lot of talk out here a little earlier about honesty in motions on the floor. I want to report that there has been some honesty not in the floor but to the press by the majority leader. The majority leader has finally run up the white flag. The Republicans have capitulated; they have given up. Today's Roll Call says, the majority leader says we will be here until Christmas. Now, that is from someone who is in charge of the House that has not passed the tax reconciliation bill from the last budget that started on October 1, 2005. That is 7 months ago. And the Republicans can't run a two-car funeral. They can pass the cuts, but they can't deal with the tax bill. If you look on the list that they offer for the next session next week, possible legislation, the Tax Reconciliation Act. Every year starts the same here. January 1, we have until April 15 to pass a budget. Then the Budget chairman goes over there, and he did it again this year, and they had this big hoo-haw and they have all kinds and they flap their arms, but they haven't passed a budget. The law says the budget has to be in place by April 15. Well, we are about 3 weeks past that now, and if you look in the orders for next week, there it is: possible legislation, possible budget resolution. This country is running without a budget. The Republicans do not want a budget because they don't want people to really know what this is costing. Well, what about the hole that they are digging for the American people and their children and their grandchildren? In the 6 years that the Republicans have been in charge of this House, we have raised the debt limit $3 trillion. These are fiscal conservatives. You know, they are very careful with nickels and dimes. They are spending like they had all the money in the world and they never had to think about paying their credit card. Well, obviously they don't intend to pay with their credit card because they can't put the tax reconciliation bill, together which is how you pay for the credit card. No, they are going to pass it on to their children and their kids. Now, if the average citizen in this country had a credit card and said, ``You know, I am just going to spend on this credit card and spend on it, and I am never going to pay on it. What I am going to do is, when I die, I am going to will it to my son or my daughter, or my grandchildren,'' we would think they were the most irresponsible human beings imaginable. And yet that is what the majority leader is admitting for his party by saying we are not going to get done, we are going to have to wait until after the election. Now, what you don't read between these lines is: If we win the election, we will have to come back and do something, because there will be a Presidential election coming in 2 years. Or, if we don't win the election and the Democrats are in charge, it is their problem. The majority leader is admitting on behalf of all his conferees they have no plan to run this country in a systematic way. The bill that is going to come up possibly next week, the tax reconciliation bill from October 1, 2005, has in it major tax breaks. Twice this week, once by me and once by Mr. Larson of Connecticut, we tried to take back $5 billion of those tax breaks away from the oil companies. The Republicans said, oh, no, no, we can't take any money away from oil companies. The country will come apart, I guess. The profits of oil companies in the last 2 years and certainly in the last 6 months have been astronomical. They have really been obscene. Gasoline in my district, you can't find it right now for under $3.25, and it is easy to find it for $3.40, and yet the people on the other side say we have got to keep letting the gasoline companies, big oil, make as much money as possible at the expense of the ordinary person. The Republicans ought to get out their rubber stamp and do what the President wants, because that is the only hope they have got.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the time of the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I sometimes wonder when I am out here on the floor whether anybody ever listens to anybody. The distinguished gentleman from Texas who opposes this motion acts like some kind of wild-eyed liberal. Left-wing bunch of environmentalists come up with this idea all by themselves. This came out of the Senate, I would tell my distinguished colleague. This came out of the Republican Senate. This is an idea that sprang from conservative Republican minds who understand that there is some reason to think that the oil companies have enough. Now, as Yogi Berra used to say, ``It's deja vu all over again.'' We are running the same script tonight as we ran about a week ago. A week ago, the Republicans voted down my motion to stop the oil companies from legally cooking their books to avoid paying their fair share of Federal taxes. My distinguished colleague from Connecticut comes tonight with his motion. The price tag for the oil industry is $5 billion, not by raising taxes, just by closing loopholes. But they would rather keep the money, inflate their profits and earn more money for buying bonds to finance our Federal deficit and charge the American people more at the pumps. Now, for Big Oil, too much is not enough. That is all fine and good with this Republican leadership in the House, but it is not right with many of my Republican colleagues who know it. In fact, last week a handful of them were brave enough to vote with the Democrats and voted in favor of this motion. Now here we are, and we are going to give you a second chance. Do we pave a road with gold for Big Oil? Do we allow them to continue to cook their books, to keep $5 billion that rightfully belongs to the American people? Even the Senate Republicans cannot buy that. My goodness, guys, come on. Even the Senate Republicans. But, of course, the House Republicans are different. Your gas tank is empty. Your wallet may be empty. Your credit card debt may be rising with gas prices, but the party of 1 percent, which is really what the Republican Party is, does not care. Because Big Oil is part of the 1 percent of America that the House Republicans reward. They are going to pay for it by taking it out of the hides of 99 percent of the rest of America, the middle class. I join gladly with my esteemed colleague from Connecticut to ask the House Republicans to act on the Senate Republican proposal which we support. They offered to buy you a tank of gas. That is what the leader in the other body said: we are going to give you a $100 rebate. Even industry turned that down. What good is it giving people two tanks of gas? That is simply not enough. The American people deserve more than a Republican handout. They deserve a prescription to end America's addiction to oil. And in the weeks since the Republicans first voted down this motion, the price of gasoline has risen again. You cannot seem to get the message. There is no surprise here. Net income of oil companies has nearly tripled since 2002, and the margins for oil refining have risen 700 percent. The answer to date from this administration and House Republicans is to give them all they want, and they want it all. The American people are becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of Big Oil, and the House Republicans are going along for the ride. But with the enthusiastic report of the President, House Republicans are showing what their energy strategy really looks like. It is not about extracting oil. It is about extracting every dime from the American people for the oil companies. They are drilling in your wallet, and a gusher of consumer debt is paving a road of gold for Big Oil. That is the solution for our energy price for the party of 1 percent: supersize the price of a gallon of gasoline and let Big Oil get fat on the profits. Their idea of energy independence is to dig deeper into your wallet. Democrats believe it is time to govern for the 99 percent of Americans that the Republicans have simply forgotten. It is time to stop Big Oil from cooking its books and frying the American people in the process. It is time we supersize renewable resources like wind and solar. It is time energy independence became a national policy, not a national advertising campaign by Big Oil paid for by the American people. We can start now. We can pass this motion to instruct. We need to restore rational fiscal policy. The $5 billion would give us some money to do some of that and not endorse reckless financial tax holidays for Big Oil. When Republicans talk about shared sacrifice, they have to prove they mean more than offering up the American people on the altar of corporate greed. I urge all my colleagues to support the Larson motion. Just because the Democrats have the right policy on this issue does not mean the Republicans have to vote against it. You can vote with us once in a while. You will not die, nothing terrible will happen to you, and the American people will win. I urge adoption of this motion.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlemen from New York (Mr. Higgins).

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from South Dakota (Ms. Herseth).