Brad Miller

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers), for bringing this resolution to the floor today. In the last month or two, all of us in the eastern United States have been glued to our television sets watching weather reports as one Atlantic storm after another moved westward from the west coast of Africa across the Atlantic towards the United States. Three storms have made landfall in the United States and done great damage, great property damage and great loss of life. We have learned more and more about storms just from watching the weather reports, watching with fascination the symmetry, the amazing symmetry of the storms, learning about the definition of the eye wall, how that told us whether the storm was strengthening or weakening or maintaining its strength. There has been great damage and great loss of life from these storms. Hurricane Charley, which struck and made landfall in Florida as a category 4 storm, resulted in 31 deaths. Hurricane Frances made landfall in Florida as a category 2 storm but stalled over Florida and just rained and rained and rained with great, great damage. And, most recently, Hurricane Ivan struck the Panhandle of Florida and Alabama as a weak category 4, and then moved upward and caused a total of 49 deaths, including about 10 in my State, in flooding in western North Carolina. These were powerful storms, but we were relatively well prepared for them. The gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers) referred to the great, great savings in life that resulted from the preparation that we had as a result of the work of NOAA, but let me tell my colleagues how much of a difference that made. When we look back early in our history, a much less densely populated country, a nation that was not prepared, had no forewarning when storms struck, let me tell my colleagues the loss of life. In 1893, a storm of unknown intensity struck Louisiana, made landfall in Louisiana. The estimate was that there were 2,000 deaths from that storm. That same year, a storm also of unknown intensity made landfall in South Carolina and Georgia with a loss of life of 1,000 or 2,000. In 1900, a storm that we now estimate to be a category 4 struck without warning Galveston and resulted in an estimated 8,000 to 12,000 deaths. In 1928, a storm struck again with very, very little warning in Florida, and resulted in more than 1,800 deaths. Again, this is a striking contrast. We can thank the people of NOAA, the employees of NOAA for the forecasts and the warnings that we have relied upon to prepare for the storms that have struck the United States this year. It is not an exaggeration to say, because of the work of the employees at NOAA, that there are thousands of Americans alive now who would not have been alive had we not been prepared for these storms, and the way that we have not been prepared for storms before we had that capacity to see storms coming, to know their intensity and to prepare for them. We now see more storms moving towards us. Hurricanes Jeanne and Karl and storms behind them seem to be taking a number as they are in line, moving towards the United States. So this resolution is a modest gesture of appreciation for those employees of NOAA who are working around the clock to monitor the paths of hurricanes, the strength of hurricanes, to make sure that we are ready when those hurricanes reach the United States. So I urge my colleagues to support this resolution. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson).

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, as many other North Carolina Members have in the last few days, I rise to express my hometown pride in the presumptive Vice Presidential nominee of my party, John Edwards. John Edwards has been very, very successful in his life. We used to call that the American Dream. But that is not where he started out. Where he started out and how he got where he is today is important, and he has learned from it. I know that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are very tired of hearing that Senator Edwards is the son of a mill worker, but it is true and it is important. He understands what most folks' lives are like because his life has been the same way. His father worked in the mill, as my father did. His mother worked in the post office. His life has been like the lives of ordinary Americans. He had to depend on public schools to get ahead. Wallace and Bobbi Edwards could never in this world have sent John Edwards to some expensive New England boarding school. He had to go to the public schools. He understands to the depth of his soul the importance of public education for middle- class Americans and the importance of public education in creating opportunities for ordinary Americans.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to be here tonight. I did not think I would be pleased to be here. In my office earlier, I was regretting greatly having agreed last week to come down tonight as I saw the time slip away and as I was, instead of dinner, eating the complimentary North Carolina peanuts that we pass out to our visitors, wondering when, if ever, tonight I would get dinner. Then I heard the speeches of a few minutes ago by the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) and by others on the same topic but from a different perspective, and I felt a new energy and a new enthusiasm for our task tonight, and I would like to address some of the questions that the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) and the others asked about John Edwards. First, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) asked why it was that John Edwards did not have to answer any of the insulting questions that were asked of Dan Quayle when the first President Bush asked him to run as Vice President in 1988, and I think that there is a simple answer to that. The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) said that Dan Quayle had been in Congress for 12 years, John Edwards in the Congress for only six, but John Edwards had not been asked why he was qualified to be President when that question was put very pointedly to Mr. Quayle. The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) said he believed it must be because of the liberal media. I think there is a different explanation. John Edwards is smart. John Edwards is smart. Everyone knows he is smart. Everyone who has spent any time around him knows that. He is plenty smart enough to be Vice President. He is plenty smart enough to be President. Second, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) and all the others said that this is a ticket of two crazy liberals, wild-eyed crazy liberals, out of step with North Carolina or even, they suggested, with Massachusetts, and I just wish they would get their story straight. John Kerry and John Edwards are the Huck Finns of American politics because they got to attend their own political funeral. In December of last year and early January, they appeared to be politically dead. Their campaigns were not going anywhere. The former governor of Vermont, Howard Dean, appeared to be walking away with the Democratic nomination. A respected political reporter here, Stuart Rothenberg, wrote a column that said, ``It ain't over till it's over, but it's over.'' Howard Dean was assumed to be the nominee. So all the right-wing commentators began talking about how the Democrats were going to nominate a crazy liberal in Howard Dean; and, to establish that contrast, they said the Democrats were rejecting sensible, thoughtful, moderate candidates like John Kerry and John Edwards. Things did not go according to their script, and now the ticket is John Kerry and John Edwards, and those same thoughtful, sensible, moderate folks that just a few months ago they were praising, they now are tarring with the same brush that they tarred Howard Dean. Also, they need to get their story straight because just last week, in the hours immediately after John Kerry had announced that he had asked John Edwards to run on the ticket with him, the first response from the Bush-Cheney campaign was a 26-page e-mail that outlined all of these differences, all these differences between Kerry and Edwards, they just had nothing in common, and it just showed how flagrantly political John Kerry was to have asked someone with whom he agreed so little to run as Vice President with him. Very quickly they abandoned that. Now they say they are just alike. There is absolutely no balance to this ticket; they are exactly alike. The same voting record. They are two peas in a left-wing pod. Again, their story would have a little more credibility if they would stick with it for just a little while. In fact, both John Edwards and John Kerry are moderate in the best sense, not in some voting record and how they have reacted in the last 2 years to take-it-or-leave-it propositions, bills that have not been put to them to vote ``yes'' or ``no,'' bills that have not been compromised an iota. That is not the test of their moderation. It is their willingness to compromise, to try to find common ground, to try to find sensible solutions, to listen to everyone involved in the political debate, to listen respectfully, to respect their views and concerns, and to listen carefully because they might actually learn something. Would that not be refreshing to have in a President and Vice President? I was also startled to hear our colleagues on the other side of the aisle say that John Edwards and John Kerry were out of touch and criticized them so sternly for being wealthy, for being rich. This is a party that treats the richest folks like rock stars. They are almost embarrassing in their fawning over rich folks. And the richer the folks are, the more fawning they are, the more unctuous they are around them. But that is not the point. The point is not the success John Edwards has had. Yes, John Edwards has been very, very successful. We used to call that the American Dream. The point is where he started out and what he learned from that. John Edwards, and I know they are tired of hearing the story of his being the son of a mill worker, but it is true and it is important. He understands what most folks' lives are like because that is the kind of life he lived. His father worked in the mill, his mother worked in the post office, as my father worked in the post office. John Edwards' life was like most Americans' lives. He had to depend on the public schools to get ahead, to have opportunities for him. Wallace and Bobbi Edwards, John Edwards' parents, could not have sent John Edwards to some expensive New England boarding school. He had to go to the public schools. And John Edwards understands to the depth of his soul the importance of public education for middle-class Americans, the importance of public education in creating opportunities for ordinary Americans. John Edwards never got into any school on anything but his own merit. He never got into any college, he did not get into law school because of who his daddy was. He got in because he earned his way. He has earned his way his entire life. He has never had anything given to him, and he will understand the lives of ordinary Americans because of that. They have talked about his role as a trial lawyer and the money that he made and how that now puts him out of touch. I can tell you what a trial lawyer does. The suggestion that he handled frivolous cases and made a fortune off that is ridiculous. He took the cases that had merit. He took the cases where people had been harmed because someone had not done what they should have done. John Edwards had to explain to juries how people who had suffered a terrible injury, how their lives had changed. He had to explain what their life was like before the injury, what their hopes were, what their aspirations, what they wanted their future to be like; and then he had to explain to the jury how that had changed and what their life was like after the terrible injury that they had suffered. And he had to explain the lives of many different people from many different walks of life. I can tell you this, before you explain something to a jury, you have to understand it yourself. He was past master at understanding intellectually and at the pit of his stomach what peoples' lives were like, the lives they led and how their lives changed. And that would be a wonderful asset to have as a President or as a Vice President. Finally, I want to address the lack of experience, the issue that they raise. That was, of course, part of the Dan Quayle debate as well. I was very startled to hear the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) describe that John Edwards had had less than 10 years of, his phrase was, public service, which I take to mean years in a political office. It was just 10 years ago that the members of the majority party campaigned for term limits. They characterized public service as career politicians. Now, 10 years later, they say that 6 years in political office is entirely too little experience, too little time in public life. I think that the debate tonight of the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) reminds us all how out of touch the majority party has become in 10 years and how if we want to have leadership in touch with the lives of ordinary Americans we need to change our leadership.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Tennessee for yielding me this time, and I agree that this is a bill with disappointingly modest ambitions, but one that we must support today. Many Members have talked about manufacturing job losses in the country. In North Carolina, it is 150,000 manufacturing jobs in the last 3 years. It has cut into the backbone of the traditional basis of the North Carolina economy. There have been textile industry jobs, tobacco jobs, furniture jobs, the jobs that North Carolinians have depended on to support themselves and their families. I have talked to a lot of workers who have lost their jobs. They are very realistic. They do not ask how are we are going to bring those jobs back. They know those jobs are gone forever. The employers have not simply cut a shift, they have closed the factory. It is padlocked and the equipment sold. The employees have either gone overseas or they are just flat out of business. Their question, instead, is where are the new jobs going to come from and what are we doing to bring new jobs here? And my answer is: We are not doing nearly enough. We are not doing nearly enough. They know that service sector jobs will be no answer. We cannot prosper as a service economy. We cannot simply cut each other's hair or sell each other insurance or give each other golf lessons. We have to make things. The heart and soul of our economy is manufacturing. It is the basis upon which our economy exists. It is the basis of our prosperity and we are not doing nearly enough to protect it. Let me tell you what the Manufacturing Extension Partnership has done in our State. In 2002, there was an independent Federal survey of the MEP program, which is called the Industrial Extension Service in North Carolina. As a result of the help, the service, the advice that the Industrial Extension Services gave to some 367 employers that year, they achieved $85.6 million in savings as a result of the efficiencies they were able to achieve. As a result of that, North Carolina was able to save 1,119 jobs and create 193 new ones. Mr. Chairman, the Industrial Extension Service, the Manufacturing Extension Partnership, is something we should be doing better by, not cutting.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to welcome our guest chaplain, Lester Burleson. I am proud to represent Reverend Burleson in this Chamber. Reverend Burleson is the youth minister at Wake Forest Baptist Church in Wake Forest, North Carolina, a very important congregation in my home county. Before arriving at that position, he served 8 years as pastor of Wake Union Baptist Church in Wake Forest, North Carolina, where he saw his ministry grow from a working congregation of about 38 to 150 folks regularly attending Sunday worship services. Reverend Burleson's ministry has also taken him into the world of sport. As chapel coordinator for the Anshultz Entertainment Group in North America and Europe, he has helped many pro athletes grow in their faith. He also serves as the director of the chapel program for the Carolina Hurricanes, our local NHL team. Just as Reverend Burleson has served his parish and his ministry with great distinction, he has also served our country with great distinction. As a 10-year Army reservist, Reverend Burleson served as commander of the 139th Tactical Operations Center. During Operation Desert Storm, he was elevated to company commander and served 10 months of active duty. His wife, Pamela, and children, Mandy and Matthew, are watching today proudly. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Reverend Burleson for his distinguished service, and I am honored to welcome Reverend Burleson to the House floor today.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in support of this legislation to designate the Roxboro, NC Postal Service facility as the Oscar Scott Woody Post Office. Oscar Scott Woody, a native of Roxboro, North Carolina, was a sea post clerk aboard the Titanic. Woody worked 15 years as a railroad mail clerk, spending most of the time on trains running between Washington and Greensboro, North Carolina. He was selected in 1910 to join the sea post service. The Titanic was not only the largest and most luxurious ocean liner of her time, she was also a Royal Mail Steamer. With five sea post clerks, the Titanic set sail for New York with over six million pieces of mail on board. The clerks worked throughout the voyage, sorting mail in the ship's state-of-the-art mailroom. Sea post clerks were highly skilled and respected postal workers who sorted, canceled, and re-distributed the mail in transit. Regarded as the best of the best, these men typically sorted over 60,000 letters a day, making few, if any, errors in the process. Their hard work and efficiency allowed the mail to be delivered immediately or forwarded directly to other destinations at the end of a voyage. Mail was considered precious cargo and sea post clerks were expected to protect it at any cost. On the evening of April 14, 1912, the sea post clerks took a break to celebrate Mr. Woody's forty-fourth birthday. During their celebration, the Titanic hit an iceberg. They returned to find the mail storage room, located in the forward hold that the iceberg had breeched, flooding with water. The clerks desperately tried to save 200 sacks of registered mail by dragging them to the upper decks. Oscar Scott Woody was last seen alive at work, sloshing through the waist high freezing water to save the mail. None of the mail clerks survived. Oscar Scott Woody's body was recovered a week later and buried at sea. An exhibit at the Person County Museum of History in North Carolina notes Oscar Scott Woody's place in history. Governor Mike Easley proclaimed November 24, 2003 as ``Oscar Scott Woody Day'' in North Carolina. Recognition of Woody's heroic efforts is long overdue. It is certainly fitting to name a North Carolina Post Office after a North Carolinian who gave his life upholding his duties to the U.S. Postal Service. Not only does this legislation recognize a postal hero, it serves as a recognition of the contributions made by postal workers and sea post clerks throughout our nation's history. Mr. Woody certainly displayed the qualities with which North Carolinians take pride. This account was published by the Roxboro Courier on April 24, 1912: ``Mr. Woody stuck by his post and went down with hundreds of brave men, who scorned to take the places by the law of the sea and of Tar Heel chivalry [that] went to women first . . . More than one North Carolinian today, when it was learned that the dead mail-clerk hailed from down home, expressed their satisfaction that North Carolina courage had not been found wanting in that fearful test.'' On May 1, 1912, an article about Mr. Woody in the same paper was published under the headline, ``Died like a North Carolinian.'' Loyal to the last, Mr. Woody was a true Tar Heel. He stuck by his post like his heels were covered in tar and did his job on that frightful night, choosing duty over his life. On his birthday, he never wavered from his duty, and for that all Tar Heels take pride. I hope all my colleagues will join me in honoring a man who truly gave his life for his work by naming the Roxboro postal facility the Oscar Scott Woody Post Office.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Mr. MILLER of North Carolina asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I also rise in support of H.R. 3389. Since 1987, the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Awards have recognized excellence for quality in management. The Baldrige Awards quickly became America's highest honor for excellence and performance, and the benefits of the award exceeded any expectation. To recognize excellence, the Department of Commerce first had to decide what excellence in management was and then how to achieve it. That required that businesses see their performance through the eyes of their customers and their employees. The criteria for excellence that developed as a result have transformed American business and the businesses that have competed for the awards, including the businesses that have not won the award, have achieved higher productivity, greater customer satisfaction, better employee relations, increased market share and improved profitability. The awards have made quality a national priority and have disseminated nationally the best practices for achieving it. A recent study of the Baldrige Awards by Professor Albert Link of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, one of my district's outstanding academic institutions, and by Professor John Scott of Dartmouth College, a college in New England, estimated the benefits of the award and the competition for the award at $24.65 billion. That is an astounding sum. The Baldrige Awards now have five categories: Manufacturing, service, small business, and, since 1999, health care and education. But many other organizations cannot participate: Not-for-profit, service organizations, government agencies at the Federal, State and local level, independent sector organizations, such as human services, religious, cultural or trade and professional organizations, and private quasi-public organizations created by legislative authority, such as public utilities, cooperatives, mutual insurance companies and credit unions. These organizations represent a significant part of the American economy, but they are now unable to benefit from the assessment and the feedback that are a vital part of the Baldrige Awards and the award process. Let me say a special word about government agencies. The gentlewoman from Pennsylvania and I may disagree about what government should do, but there should be no disagreement about how government should do it. There should be no disagreement how government should be managed. Government agencies should be managed as well as the best managed private businesses. Managers in government must respect the people they serve and they must respect the taxpayers who pay for what they do. Managers in government should be consumed with achieving excellence in performance and in achieving efficiency. I fervently hope that government agencies will focus on what constitutes excellence and how to achieve it, and that we will save billions as a result, just as private businesses have saved billions, as a result of competing for the Baldrige Awards. In my district in North Carolina, there are many important organizations that are left out of the Baldrige experience. Let me tell you about just a couple of them. Our State Treasurer's Office and Department of Revenue have made great strides in applying sound management quality practices by increasing accuracy and by cutting telephone hold times, freeing my State's citizens from voice mail jail. Likewise, our crime control and public safety agencies are demonstrating the value of a systematic quality and performance excellence approach grounded in Baldrige criteria. The North Carolina State Highway Patrol, a recipient of our State Quality Award, has achieved important improvements in all of its key performance effectiveness measures. The Commander of the Highway Patrol, Chief R. W. Holden, said that our State Baldrige-based award process allowed us to direct our self-improvement efforts to the most effective areas of our organization. The Carolina Blood Services Region of the American Red Cross is another State Quality Award winner that has achieved stellar results. These public agencies are demonstrating excellence in management every day. The keys to their continued improvement are the ability to be recognized for their good work and the ability to measure their performance against proven standards in order to become even better. These worthy organizations affect our daily lives and our communities' well-being, and, like so many other not-for-profit service organizations, they cannot benefit from the Baldrige Award process today. It is time to remedy this, and this bill proposes that the Baldrige Awards be opened up to allow participation by not-for-profit organizations, including government agencies. Support for this proposed expansion is widespread. The Foundation for the Malcolm Baldrige Award, the Baldrige Board of Overseers, the Secretary of Commerce and the President have endorsed expansion to include not-for-profit service organizations. The Baldrige National Quality Program is a public-private partnership. It is managed by the National Institute for Standards and Technologies, NIST, an agency of the Commerce Department, and is supported by the private sector Baldrige Foundation. These organizations raise funds to support Baldrige's many activities so that the Federal investment in this program is leveraged many times over, not only by this private sector funding, but also by the efforts of hundreds of largely private sector volunteers and voluntary sector organizations, such as the American Red Cross. I would be very proud to tell the folks in North Carolina, in the North Carolina Treasurer's Office, in the State Patrol and in the Blood Bank, that they too will be eligible to receive the recognition that goes with the Baldrige Awards, and to share their best practices with other organizations across the country. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I also want to acknowledge the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania's (Ms. Hart) work and thank her for working so well on this and for her leadership on this issue. After hearing the strongly partisan 1-minutes this morning, I am very glad we found some common ground between the parties. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Gordon).

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I also want to thank the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Gordon), who is now the ranking member of the Committee on Science for his work on this and for his support as well as his kind words just a few minutes ago.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in honor of Black History Month and to take this opportunity to honor the African American citizens whom I represent. Our state is home to a rich tradition of African American leaders whose educational, economic and political achievements have enriched North Carolina and our Nation. Hard work and perseverance are traditions of the African American community. During a time when hatred and bigotry triumphed over our Nation's loving and generous spirit, African American leaders worked diligently to ensure and enhance the quality of life for future generations of both blacks and whites. Particularly important to our quality of life in North Carolina has been the African American community's persistent commitment to education. This is demonstrated in the work of acclaimed educator Dr. Charlotte Hawkins Brown who founded the Alice Freeman Palmer Memorial Institute. Founded in 1902, the Institute served as an African American preparatory school in Guilford County until 1971. This commitment remains strong among those who are seated at the helm of Historically Black Colleges and Universities in the 13th and neighboring Congressional Districts. Dr. Dianne Boardley Suber of St. Augustine's College and Dr. James Renick of North Carolina A&T State University are leaders of thriving higher education institutions. Both serve on the President's Board of Advisors on HBCUs. These leaders, along with Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole of Bennett College for Women are extraordinary examples of those who continue the legacy of producing young scholars who will contribute to the progress of our state and nation. Evidence of this progress is apparent in the accomplishments of two graduates from NC A&T, former Chief Justice Henry Frye, the first African American appointed to the Supreme Court of North Carolina, as well as Dr. Ronald Erwin McNair, Physicist and Astronaut who lost his life in the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster in January 1986. The contributions of the African American community in North Carolina are also demonstrated in the unique furniture designs and skills of artisan Thomas Day of Caswell County whose work continues to influence the industry. Recently a good friend of mine, John Wesley Winters, Sr. passed away. Mr. Winters was a leader in North Carolina, his contributions as a businessman, civil rights leader and political leader leaves a powerful legacy. Many African American families own their own homes in Raleigh because of Mr. Winters' work. My District includes the Civil Rights Museum in Greensboro, North Carolina. Four brave young men, Joseph McNeil, Franklin McCain, David L. Richmond and Ezell Blair, Jr. (now known as Jibreel Khazan) took a firm stand by sitting down at a ``white only'' Woolworth lunch counter. This new museum helps us reflect every day on how their strength and determination, even in the face of threats, jolted a burgeoning civil rights movement that forever changed the American cultural landscape. We are a better Nation, we are better human beings, because of their courage. Black History Month reminds us of these and other achievements. We will never forget the important contributions that African Americans have made and will continue to our Nation.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, the public schools are where we deliver on the promise of equality of opportunity. Today I rise to honor a man who has been delivering on that promise throughout his 29 years of service to Wake County public schools. Bill McNeal has served Wake County kids in every capacity--as a social studies teacher, a principal, and a county administrator. After 3 years at the helm of our school system, folks back home knew we were lucky to have him as our school superintendent. Now our secret is out. This week the American Association of School Administrators named Bill McNeal the National Superintendent of the Year. Superintendent Bill McNeal has proven that even the loftiest ambitions can be met with hard work, boundless determination, and strong leadership. A key author of Wake County's ambitious Goal 2003 program, he has delivered results. In 1998, 75.4 percent of Wake's third graders were testing at or above grade level in math. In 2003, 93.5 percent achieved the mark. Wake's fourth and fifth graders fared even better, with 95 percent achieving at or above grade level scores. Last year, Wake's high school students averaged a 1067 SAT score, the highest average ever in the school district. Even more remarkable has been Bill McNeal's campaign to narrow the achievement gap for Wake's diverse and ever expanding student population. The achievement gap in math for students on free or reduced lunch shrank from 35 percent in 1998 to 16 percent in 2003 and in reading shrank from 35 percent in 1998 to 21 percent in 2003--all while student performance has increased across the board. Not one to sit back and enjoy these successes, Bill McNeal recently implemented the Goal 2008 program to continue to push ahead. He has outlined a blueprint to increase student achievement across the district's elementary, middle, and high schools over the next 5 years. His goal is to have 95 percent of all students in grades 3 through 12 at or above grade level by 2008. Mr. Speaker, we are honored by Bill McNeal's service to our kids and our community, and I look forward to working with him and our dedicated administrators, teachers, and parents to deliver on the promise of equality of opportunity.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, mutual funds are how America's middle class saves. It is how young couples save for their first home. It is how middle class families save for their children's education, for their children's college, and for retirement. It is how the middle class families save for a rainy day, to provide against life's harsh uncertainties. It is infuriating that some mutual fund managers have taken advantage of those families. It is even more infuriating that they have such disrespect for the middle class families who trusted them with their life savings. They seem to see America's middle class as rubes or hicks, not as the very people who make this Nation work. This legislation is a beginning, and I am pleased that no one today has described it as the end. But I certainly hope that when the Senate considers the regulation of the mutual fund industry next year they will pause to consider other reform proposals which others today have spoken of. The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Kanjorski) has already spoken of such proposals, and I know that the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel) will in just a moment. I certainly hope that we will urge that the Senate consider measures to assure that the welfare of the funds' investors, not the funds' managers, is the guiding principle to how the funds are governed. The funds need truly independent directors who know the industry, will ask tough questions, and will exercise independent judgment, not just go along with the funds' managers. We should consider requiring that there be a single lead independent director, focused responsibility with the authority to hire outside experts, to call meetings of the board, and to place items on the board's agenda. Finally, we should require a clear fiduciary duty by the managers of the fund to the investors in the fund. Mr. Speaker, there may be reasons to address the same concerns in different ways or, perhaps, even to leave well enough alone. But as long as some funds are not governed for the benefit of the investors, we will likely be dealing with one new fund management practice after another, each designed to separate the middle class from more and more of its life savings. I will vote for this bill today; but I hope the Senate, with the luxury of time next year, will look closely to make sure that we have done enough to protect America's middle class. They work hard for the money they have earned, and they deserve better.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, others have spoken tonight on specific issues before Congress that affect our Nation's veterans. I rise to say how proud I am of the men and women now serving in our Nation's Armed Forces in Iraq. Mr. Speaker, as you know, I spent 3 days last week in Iraq as part of a Congressional delegation. I ate lunch and supper with our soldiers in Bagdad on Friday. Sunday morning I attended a worship service with our soldiers in Kirkuk. That day, I had lunch with our soldiers in Kirkuk and supper with our soldiers in Tikrit. They slept on cots. They used port-a-johns, but their spirits were high and their dedication undimmed. Our delegation stopped briefly in Germany on the way home. We visited soldiers at a military hospital in Landstuhl. Our military escorts told us what to expect. Regardless of the pain they were in, regardless of how their lives would be changed by their injuries, the patients we had talked to were soldiers, and when they spoke with us, they would soldier up. I spoke with men who had grievous injuries. I heard not one word of complaint. I visited several of the soldiers who were on the Chinook helicopter that was shot down Sunday near Falujah. The medical personnel told us that it would help to encourage them to talk about what had happened. I will spare you the details of the injuries they suffered and that they saw their buddies suffer. The gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Case) and I asked them what message they would have us deliver, what they wanted us to tell the folks back home. They said to tell folks back home to support our soldiers when they got home. And one told me to tell the soldiers in his unit that he loved them. Another young man was wounded when his convoy was ambushed. They were ambushed with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire. A grenade landed near him and caused a traumatic amputation of his arm. A buddy applied a tourniquet and two of his buddies commandeered an Iraqi truck and evacuated him from the fire fight. In the truck he said two prayers. The first is that he would live to be a father, that he would help his children with their homework, that he would take them to ball games, that he would watch them grow up. The second prayer was that the eight soldiers who remained behind would survive. And they all did. The young man had lost his arm, but he was grateful that the Lord had answered his prayers. My visit to our soldiers in Iraq and in the hospital in Landstuhl reminded me of the duty our men and women in uniform feel in defending our Nation and of the sacrifices they are making in answering that call. The benefits our Nation provides, our Nation's veterans are well- earned. They are the least we can do for those who defended our freedom at the risk of their lives. Mr. Speaker, as a Member of Congress, I will do all that I can to honor our Nation's debt to those men and women.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I have noticed in reviewing the Congressional Record of my remarks earlier that the otherwise very talented people who transcribe do seem to have limited southern proficiency, which I think you would appreciate. This is the second time, Mr. Speaker, that I have stayed up well past my bedtime to speak on the floor on a motion to instruct conferees on the child tax credit. I cannot recall having stayed up this late this often since I was in college, and it is not because I believe that insomniacs in my district watch C-SPAN. I am staying up tonight, as I stayed up last week, because I think it is important that we adopt a child tax credit. The gentlewoman from Connecticut spoke a few minutes ago about people being prevailed upon, not voting their instincts. I was very reluctant to vote against the bill, even the bill that came before us, the $82 billion bill. I certainly knew that we could not afford it. We are digging a deep deficit hole that is going to drag down our economy for the foreseeable future and is going to destroy our ability to do the things that really will help working- and middle-class families, like providing a decent education, like reforming our health care system which is just not working for most families and is not working for American business, like making sure that Social Security and the Medicare system are solvent, particularly when my generation starts to retire. But of all the tax cuts that this House has passed, the only one that helped working- and middle-class families was this one. That is why it is the only one that I really wanted to vote for, and now we know it is the only one that the majority did not really mean. They did not really mean this tax cut when they voted for it. They put the price tag of $82 billion on it to sabotage the tax credit, to make sure it would not really pass. They knew the Senate would not go along. They knew that they would simply dog it when it came time to confer and try to work out a compromise, they would not agree to any kind of compromise, and this would simply die. And they tell the working- and middle-class families who would benefit from the child tax credit that they had voted for it, but somehow nothing had happened. In fact, the conference committee, as I understand it, has never even met, has yet to meet. The gentleman from Missouri has spoken eloquently of the need for this tax credit; but he should talk to his own party's leaders because they have said publicly, for attribution, on the record, that this is not a priority for them. As the gentlewoman from Connecticut pointed out earlier, the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal said that they intentionally made the price tag as big as it was to sabotage it, to kill it, and to make sure that it would not really pass. And certainly if there is one publication in the country that knows the real intentions of the Republican leadership of this House, it is the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal. It is hard to imagine that any writer for the editorial board, for the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal, does not have Tom DeLay and Bill Thomas on their speed dial. They know exactly what the leadership of this House intended by the package that came before the House and by the vote. It was intended to kill the bill. It was a stunningly cynical maneuver. Anyone who has ever watched a hospital show, a doctor show, knows what code blue is. They know what it is for a patient to code. But many hospitals have, or have had in the past, what they call privately light code blue. That is when their patient is in their final illness. There is a decision not to resuscitate the patient, not to take extraordinary efforts to keep the patient alive. The patient has agreed to that, the patient's family understands that, but for the peace of mind of the patient's family when the time comes, they still rush around, they still look frantic, they just do not do anything extraordinary to resuscitate the patient. They let nature take its course, and, for whatever reason, the patient's family feels a little better about it rather than simply thinking that their loved one is being allowed to die. We have seen code blue. We have seen the extraordinary efforts that the leadership of this House goes through to pass the tax cuts that they really mean, the ones they intend to happen, they want to happen, the ones that help the investor class rather than the middle class. The inheritance tax, I am sorry, which you call the death tax, or the cut on the taxes on dividend income, we have seen the extraordinary effort, the rushing around, the moving of heaven and Earth to get those passed. But not this. Not this. This has been at most light code blue. There has been a little bit of activity, a vote on the floor; but it is very clear that they have not meant this. They have not even met. The conference committee has not even met. This is the tax credit that should happen. This is a tax cut that should happen, that will help working- and middle-class families. Let us hope that working- and middle-class families, the ones who would benefit from the child tax credit, will see the difference between how the majority acts when they want to pass a tax cut and how they act when they do not.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Is the Wall Street Journal out to lunch in saying that that was intentionally made as rich as it was so that nothing at all would pass? I do not expect that they have the gentleman on their speed dial the way they have Bill Thomas and Tom DeLay.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. I celebrate the power of shame.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. The problem with that is that we know that the Senate is not going to do it. There are several problems with that. The first is we simply know the Senate is not going to do it. I wanted to vote for that entire tax package. I wanted to make it permanent. I wanted to extend it down for the people who had been left out, shamefully. It was shameful to leave them out before. I wanted to extend it down the income scale to reach them. I wanted to extend it up. I think that the folks who would have gotten the expanded child tax credit slightly higher up the income scale are still the middle class. It is usually two working parents, working hard, trying to make a life for themselves and for their families. I would like for them to have gotten it. If I could write the tax laws, I would like for working- and middle-class families to get this tax cut and for it to be permanent. But I also know, one, we are digging a massive hole. We are digging a hole that may take a generation to dig out of. It is going to be a drag on the economy. It is going to eventually certainly, not just eventually, probably already affecting interest rates, and it is going to destroy our Nation's ability to deal with the challenges that we will face, the challenges of education. We are cutting back on basic research; we are losing out economically to the rest of the world. We are in a desperate competition.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, how does the gentleman from Missouri account for the public statements by Tom DeLay that this is not a priority for him and embracing the Senate position ``ain't going to happen,'' the public statement by Bill Thomas that this is not a priority for them, the editorial in the Wall Street Journal that this was intentionally made rich so that no tax credit bill would pass at all, and how does he explain the fact that the conference committee has yet to meet?

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, when the House passed an $82 billion child tax credit bill a few weeks ago, I was a problem child among the Democrats. I wanted to vote for the bill. I wanted to give the tax credit to the working families who were left out by the House before. And to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley), I wanted to extend it. I wanted to make it permanent for all the families who got that child tax credit. I knew we could not afford it, but we cannot afford any of tax cuts we have passed this year. And of all the tax cuts passed by this House, only the child tax credit really helped the middle class. I want to give the middle class some tax relief; and if we are going to dig a deeper and deeper deficit hole, why not let a couple of the shovelfuls help the middle class? I ultimately voted against the bill because I knew that what the middle class, what working families would have to do without would hurt middle class and working families far more than the tax credit would help them, like funding for education, the health care reform we so desperately need, a solvent Medicare and Social Security system and on and on. But I was very puzzled at the time by the explanation I heard from others who had been in Washington longer than I had for why the leaders of this House were passing, actually passing so generous a tax relief package for the middle class when nothing else done by this House this year has helped the middle class at all. I heard that they really were sabotaging the child tax credit by making the price so great that they knew the Senate would not go along; and when the Senate did not go along, they would just run out the clock rather than compromise and the working families would not really get tax relief. By voting against the tax credit bill, the argument went, we supported a compromise with the Senate that would make it possible to pass a tax credit right away and give immediate help to middle-class families. I am new here, but I thought I had fallen through the looking glass. The Republicans voting for the tax credit were actually against it. The Democrats voting against it were actually for it. Only in Washington, I thought does yes mean no and no mean yes. We have seen the Republican leadership move Heaven and Earth to pass tax cuts that they really want. The inheritance tax, oh, I am sorry, the death tax; the tax on dividend income. They did not get everything they wanted. They did not get an outright repeal of the dividend income tax, but they compromised and they got something because they were very intent upon getting tax relief for the investor class. But tax relief for the middle class, not so much. In a sense that bill passed a few weeks ago. We have seen absolutely no objection. We have not seen any effort to find a compromise and provide real relief. The leadership of this House has not budged, and they have been openly nonchalant about the need to pass this bill. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the majority leader, said that of the Senate bill or agree to the provision of the Senate bill, ``Ain't gonna happen.'' And he said, ``There's a lot of other things that are more important than that.'' The chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, the gentleman from California (Mr. Thomas), said, ``There are worse things than it not happening,'' the child tax credit bill. And the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Bell) mentioned a few minutes ago, the Wall Street Journal, the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal, certainly a publication that knows very intimately the real motivations of the Republican leadership of this House, the private thoughts of the leaders of this House, they said, ``Mr. DeLay and others in the House deliberately made their bill richer than the Senate version because they knew the Senate conferees would walk away and pass nothing instead.'' I very much want to hear the gentleman from Florida's (Mr. Foley) explanation of these public statements by your party's leaders because they stand in stark contrast to what you have said tonight on the floor of this House for why the House should not adopt this motion to instruct. Now, the earlier vote on the child tax credit was a little hard to understand. Yes meant no; no meant yes. But this motion is pretty easy to understand, and you can understand it without the assistance of magic mushrooms. If you really want to give tax relief to working families, vote yes. And if you just want to play cynical political games at the expense of working families, vote no. Mr. Speaker, I will vote yes.

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina

Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, 4 months ago as a brand- new Member of this House, I stood with two of my Democratic colleagues from North Carolina at the Employment Security Commission office in Raleigh. And together we called on Congress to extend unemployment benefits for an additional 26 weeks. At that time there were more than 37,000 workers who had already exhausted their unemployment benefits in North Carolina and nationally a million workers were without benefits, out of a job, out of money and because of the inaction of this House, out of luck. Despite my plea and the plea of other Democrats to extend the benefits through a compromise plan that the Senate passed unanimously, the House leadership allowed the benefits to expire and allowed 1 million Americans and their families to go without benefits. And there was never an explanation for why this House could not trouble itself to act quickly, to act in time to give that extension. A few days later this House did act and extended benefits. It was not 26 weeks. It was 13. Again, no explanation for why we could not act in time. Here we are again. With a deadline quickly approaching, the Republican leadership is again doing nothing to extend those benefits. On May 31, just a couple of weeks, this House will let unemployment benefits expire again; but this time the impact will be far greater. Now there are 2.1 million workers who will be left without unemployment benefits. Twice as many in January, twice as many mothers and fathers, twice as many breadwinners, twice as many out-of-luck Americans. The economy has lost more than half a million additional jobs since January. Since the recession began 2 years ago, the economy has lost 2.7 million jobs in the private sector. The persistence of job loss at this 2-year mark in this recession is the worst since the Great Depression. The unemployment rate is now 6 percent, and there are 8.8 million unemployed Americans. But again House Republicans are doing nothing to protect out-of-work Americans and their families. The Republican leadership has found the time to do plenty for America's richest. The Republicans rammed the President's tax bill through last week. If you listen to the Republicans speak in favor of that bill, you would have thought you flipped from C-SPAN to the History Channel. You would have thought you had gone back in time and you were seeing House debates during the Great Depression or the Works Progress Administration or the Civilian Conservation Corps, because every Republican spoke entirely of creation of jobs. Only in passing and only occasionally were Republicans speaking for the bill mentioned that what the bill did was eliminate dividends, the taxation on individuals of dividend, dividend income. As the gentleman pointed out just a short while ago, we have heard strained arguments before for how tax cuts solve a wide variety of problems. The Republicans say that tax cuts to the rich are the solution for everything from urban sprawl to tooth decay. Last week it was the creation of jobs and economic stimulus. But the proposed economic stimulus bill, or the bill described last week as an economic stimulus bill, does little, precious little, to stimulate the economy. They said that we need to cut taxes on the richest Americans so that we can create what economists call the wealth effect; that the richest Americans need to feel so secure in their financial circumstances that they then will not feel inclined to save the money, but they will spend it; and that will stimulate the economy. The unemployed may not feel rich, may not feel wealthy from getting an extension of their unemployment benefits, but believe me, they will spend it. I call it the got-to-pay-the-bills effect. They will spend the money. They will spend it on their rent. They will spend it on food. They will spend it on health care costs. They will spend the money. Do not worry. I do not favor, Mr. Speaker, an indefinite extension of unemployment benefits, but I do not believe, as apparently the majority in this Chamber do believe, that the majority of those who would be helped by the extension of unemployment benefits would prefer not to be working. If my colleagues think the unemployed are not looking for jobs because unemployment benefits allows them a tax-paid holiday, I invite my colleagues to come with me to Rockingham County. I would like to introduce them to unemployed textile workers who do not know when they will again find a job. They do not where to look for a job. I would like to see my colleagues say to their face that we need to light a fire under them so they will look for a job, and then, unless we end their unemployment benefits, they will not look, they will not go and find a job to support themselves and for their families. I am proud to be here with many of my colleagues today, the first- term members on the Democratic side, calling for an extension of those benefits.