Tom McClintock

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 255) to amend certain definitions contained in the Provo River Project Transfer Act for purposes of clarifying certain property descriptions, and for other purposes.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of the measure, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Chaffetz), the author of the measure.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 255, sponsored by the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Chaffetz), allows the Provo River Waters Users Association to own a canal facility that it has operated, maintained, and repaid for decades. This title transfer was the original intent of public law enacted in 2004, and the passage of this bill would remove existing legal barriers in order to fulfill that intent. A companion measure by Senator Hatch passed the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in May. The whole matter comes down to this: the canal was originally an open, earthen canal in a rural setting. The city of Provo grew up around it until, for a variety of reasons, it was decided to enclose the canal, essentially changing it to a pipeline. In order to make it possible for the local water authority to raise non-Federal capital to do so, Congress adopted the Provo River Transfer Act in 2004 to authorize the Bureau of Reclamation to convey title to the association for the canal as if existed when the act was adopted. Now that the enclosure is completed and the time has come to transfer title--as Congress directed nearly a decade ago--the Bureau of Reclamation has opined that by covering the canal, it technically is no longer a canal but rather a piped facility, that it is now different than the facility in existence when Congress ordered the transfer of title. Therefore, it doesn't meet the specifications of the conveyance act. So, in an only in Washington, D.C., moment, we now have this measure before us that changes the facility description in the 2004 act to the ``water conveyance facility historically known as the Provo Reservoir Canal,'' so that the title transfer can proceed. The passage of this bill would amend outdated legal definitions while accelerating repayment to the U.S. Treasury. This legislation continues the positive trend demonstrated by the Natural Resources Committee of economically empowering our communities. The Bureau of Reclamation supports the bill. I am unaware of any opposition, and I urge its adoption. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the bill under consideration.

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1846) to amend the Act establishing the Lower East Side Tenement National Historic Site, and for other purposes.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of this legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers and reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 1846 expands the boundaries of the Lower East Side Tenement Historic Site to include an additional building purchased in 2007. This Manhattan museum is a National Park Service affiliated site, and therefore, it carries no cost to the taxpayers because it's owned and operated by a private foundation. I urge its adoption and reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 2650) to allow the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa in the State of Minnesota to lease or transfer certain land, as amended.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, this legislation would ensure that the Non-Intercourse Act, which limits legal transactions by tribes, does not interfere with the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa tribe's ability to lease, buy, or sell fee land owned by the tribe. The bill also clearly states that it does not authorize the tribe to sell, transfer, lease, convey, or warrant all or any portion of land held in trust by the Federal Government. There is precedent for tribes to seek legislation in Congress to waive the Non-Intercourse Act for transactions of nontrust land because of an overabundance of caution by both tribal and nontribal parties. I would ask for adoption of the bill and reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of the legislation and yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, again, I thank the gentleman for his support of the measure and urge its adoption. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I am now pleased to yield such time as he may consume to my colleague from California, Congressman Paul Cook, the author of this bill.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. H.R. 1241 authorizes the Forest Service to acquire two parcels of land outside the boundary of the Inyo National Forest in exchange for a parcel of national forest land conveyed to the Mammoth Mountain Ski Area. The ski area has been operating its main base under a special-use permit. However, acquiring ownership of that parcel under this legislation would allow the ski area to conduct desperately needed renovations to its facilities. At the same time, the Forest Service would be able to acquire land that it currently leases to operate the facilities outside the boundary of the Inyo National Forest. I urge adoption of this sensible measure authored by Congressman Paul Cook and reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration.

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1241) to facilitate a land exchange involving certain National Forest System lands in the Inyo National Forest, and for other purposes.

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, we are now 7 weeks into the implementation of ObamaCare. We know that in the first 4 weeks, 106,000 Americans placed health plans in their shopping baskets, although it is not clear how many of them actually purchased plans. Meanwhile, it is estimated that 5.5 million Americans have lost the health insurance that they had, that they liked, and that they were promised that they could keep. The inconvenient truth is that this law has dramatically increased the ranks of the uninsured. Yesterday came word that college students are seeing their low-cost student plans canceled, with replacement costs as much as 1,800 percent higher under ObamaCare. Although the President recently assured the Nation that the cancelations are confined to the individual market, we are now learning that his administration gives a mid-range estimate that two-thirds of the small employer plans and 45 percent of the large employer plans face cancelation as well. Some estimates are as high as 93 million Americans who have employer-sponsored plans will lose their plans next year. And these reports don't account for the millions more who are seeing massive rate increases in their current plans; nor do they account for the millions more who have had their hours cut back to part time or had their wages cut back or have lost their jobs altogether as employers struggle to stay in business while bearing these staggering costs; nor do they account for those who discover that by accepting ObamaCare plans, they are losing their doctors. Walmart now warns that the financial impact of this law on families could materially depress holiday shopping. Mr. Speaker, we are watching nothing less than the wholesale destruction and collapse of the American health care system, which, for all of its flaws, was still the most advanced, accessible, adaptable, and responsive health care system that the world has ever known; and if you doubt that for a second, ask yourself where the world's elites came when they needed first-class medical care. It wasn't to Canada or England or Mexico. It was to the United States. And now we are losing that. There was nothing unforeseen about this fiasco. Republicans have been warning of these outcomes from the very beginning. When we warned that Americans would not be able to keep their health care plans, we were called extremists. When we warned that ObamaCare would result in massive cost increases on consumers, we were called alarmists. When we warned that many Americans would lose their jobs, have their hours cut back, or see salary cuts, we were called racists. When we asked for a 1-year delay in this program to address these issues, we were called demagogues, arsonists, and jihadists. But, now, all of these warnings are coming to pass, and still the Democrats persist in imposing this law on an unwilling Nation. In doing so, great violence is being done to our Constitution. In implementing this takeover of one-sixth of the American economy, the President has repeatedly asserted what can only be described as a doctrine of executive nullification--the authority to ignore the parts of the law that he finds inconvenient or embarrassing and to pick and choose who must obey the law and who need not. He has granted some 1,600 exemptions for well-connected interests-- mainly labor unions. He has excused big businesses from the requirement that they provide health care to their employees, while forcing employees to fend for themselves. He has excused Members of Congress and their staffs from paying the full cost of ObamaCare policies. And last Thursday, he announced that health insurers can ignore the law that requires them to cancel existing policies. Notice that he didn't say that he was going to seek to change the law. He said he would ignore the law for a year. He invited health insurers to do the same, in direct violation of the principle constitutional responsibility of the Presidency to ``take care that the laws be faithfully executed.'' Mr. Speaker, I appeal to my Democratic colleagues to consider the damage that this law is doing, both to the American health care system and to the rule of law itself and, above all, to the families who are struggling to deal with its effects. I ask them to heed the growing pleas of the American people to have their health plans restored to them. I ask them to join Republicans in repealing ObamaCare and to help us replace it with the patient-centered health care system that we have long proposed: reforms that preserve the best of American health care while repairing its flaws.

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, yesterday we heard yet another empty promise from the President that, by fiat, he can delay provisions of law under ObamaCare that have already cost a staggering 5 million Americans their health insurance. Now, notice that he has not changed the law. He has simply said that he will ignore the law, and he invites health insurers to do the same. This is a constitutional abomination. We live in a nation of laws and not of men. The principal constitutional responsibility of the President is to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. If a law is bad, we change that law. We don't ignore it. As a practical matter, the President's announcement has no effect. Since the law hasn't changed, the criminal and civil liability that a health insurer would incur for disobeying it has not changed either. The President has cruelly given people false hope while severely damaging the fundamental concept that separates democracy from despotism, the rule of law.

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, by the government's own numbers, for every American who has found health coverage under ObamaCare since it rolled out, some 50 Americans have lost their health insurance on the individual market, but that doesn't account for the many millions more who are losing employer insurance or are losing wages as a direct result of the Democrats' ObamaCare fiasco. One such family is the Howard Asbury family in Mariposa, California. Mr. Asbury writes: I am a retired union carpenter, and I am covered under the union's retiree health plan. When I retired, my wife went to work in the billing department for an ambulance company. Yesterday, she was informed by the owner that he was dropping all health care coverage and cutting all employees below supervisor to part-time. We will be able to enroll her and our two children under my retirement health plan through my union, although this does not address the loss of income. So now we have to pay for her coverage and the children on $440 less income. Mr. Speaker, my office is being flooded by such complaints. I have to believe that our colleagues across the aisle are hearing the same things. Why aren't they listening?

Mr. McCLINTOCK

Mr. McCLINTOCK. Madam Speaker, this summer the biggest fire in the history of the Sierra Nevada Mountains burned 400 square miles of forest land. The fire left behind an unprecedented swath of environmental devastation that threatens the loss of not only the affected forest land for generations but sets events in motion that could threaten the surrounding forests for many years to come. The fire also left behind as much as a billion board feet of dead timber on Federal land that could be sold to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, money that could then be used to replant and restore the devastated forests. In addition, processing that timber would help to revive the economy of the stricken region. But time is already running out. Within a year, the value of the timber rapidly declines as the wood is devoured by insects and rot. That's the problem: cumbersome environmental reviews and the litigation that inevitably follows will run out the clock on this valuable asset until it becomes worthless. Indeed, it becomes worse than worthless--it becomes hazardous. Bark and wood-boring beetles are already moving in to feast on the dead and dying timber, and a population explosion of pestilence can be expected if those dead trees remain. The beetles won't confine themselves to the fire areas, posing a mortal threat to the surrounding forests in the years ahead. By the time the normal bureaucratic reviews and lawsuits have run their course, what was once forest land will have already begun converting to brush land, and by the following year, reforestation will become infinitely more difficult and expensive. Within 2 years, several feet of brush will have built up, and the smaller trees will begin toppling on this tinder. It is not possible to build a more perfect fire stack than that. Intense, second-generation fires will take advantage of this fuel, sterilizing the soil, eroding the landscape, fouling the watersheds, and threatening the surrounding forest for many years to come. Without timely salvage and reforestation, we know the fate of the Sierras because we have seen the result of benign neglect after previous fires. The trees don't come back for many generations. Instead, thick brush takes over the land that was once shaded by towering forests. The brush quickly overwhelms any seedlings struggling to make a start. It replaces the diverse ecosystems supported by the forests with scrub brush. For this reason, I have introduced H.R. 3188, which waives the time- consuming environmental review process and prevents the endless litigation that always follows. It authorizes Federal forest managers, following well-established environmental protocols for salvage, to sell the dead timber and to supervise its careful removal while there is still time. The hundreds of millions of dollars raised can then be directed toward replanting the region before layers of brush choke off any chance of forest regrowth for generations to come. It is modeled on legislation authored by Democratic Senator Tom Daschle for salvaging dead and dying trees in the Black Hills National Forest, a measure credited with speeding the preservation and recovery of that forest. This legislation has spawned lurid tales from the activist left of uncontrolled logging in the Sierras. Nothing could be further from the truth. This legislation vests full control of the salvage plans with Federal forest managers, not the logging companies. It leaves Federal foresters in charge of enforcing salvage plans that fully protect the environment. The left wants a policy of benign neglect: let a quarter-million acres of destroyed timber rot in place, surrender the ravaged land to beetles, and watch contentedly as the forest ecosystem is replaced by scrub land. Yes, without human intervention the forests will eventually return, but not in the lifetimes of ourselves, our children, or our children's children. If we want to stop the loss of this forest land and if we want to control the beetle infestation before it explodes out of control, the dead timber has to come out soon. If we take it out now, we can generate the funds necessary to suppress brush buildup, plant new seedlings, and restore these forests for the use and enjoyment of our children. If we wait for the normal bureaucratic reviews and delays, we will have lost these forests to the next several generations. That is a choice. Congress must make that choice now, or nature will make that choice for us.