Tom Osborne

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 660) supporting the goals and ideals of National Mentoring Month.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I urge support of H. Res. 660. I want to thank Mr. Davis of Illinois for his support. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Res. 660.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might consume. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today in honor of National Mentoring Month, which actually was celebrated in January, but we were not here in January, so we are doing it a month late. I would like to honor the contributions of the thousands of mentors and mentoring programs across the country that work so hard to provide young people with support and assistance. And I would like to make a personal reference here, Mr. Speaker, in that I spent most of my previous career, 36 years, working with young people, and I saw many changes during that period of time, certainly great changes in the family. The out-of-wedlock birth rate was 5 percent in 1960; today it is about 35 percent. So a huge increase. And at the time that I first started my coaching career, the number of children living with both biological parents was 90 percent. Today it is roughly 50 percent. And we currently have 22 million fatherless children in the United States today. And I worked with many young people who were without fathers, and I saw the devastation that this lack of a father caused in their lives. I also witnessed many cultural changes during that 36-year period. We have become the most violent Nation in the developed countries for young people, currently lead the world among developed nations in suicide and homicide rates. Certainly drug and alcohol abuse has increased dramatically. And, of course, gang activity, many people are aware of the increase there. And also some of the influences of the media have not all been that positive. Some of the television, some of the movies, some of the Internet activities, some video games certainly have been somewhat pernicious and not been helpful to our young people. So if we look at history, we realize that most great civilizations decline and fall due to internal factors, not external consequences. And so if we look at Rome, to some degree the British Empire, Soviet Union, we see some of those things occurring. And I think it is important that we not be caught off guard here in the United States. It is difficult to legislate or mandate solutions to some of the problems that I have outlined briefly here, but I would like to remind the fact that mentoring does work. An adult who has no vested interest in a young person, who is not a parent, not a grandparent not a teacher, no one who is paid to come and spend time with that child, makes a tremendous impact on that child's life if they simply care enough to show up and spend time, because it indicates to that young person that they are worth something, that they are worthwhile. And so we see some dramatic changes. My wife and I have been involved with a mentoring program which currently mentors 2,900 young people, mostly in the State of Nebraska. We have done some research through Gallup, the polling company, and they have found that absenteeism, in a good mentoring program, is reduced by 80 percent, absenteeism from school. We find that discipline referrals go down by about 70 percent, grades improve by 40 percent, and also pregnancy rates go down significantly. Substance abuse is decreased by 40 to 50 percent. Gang activity is reduced substantially. And some things improve and increase. Graduation rates go up. And personal hygiene and personal relationships with parents and peers also tends to improve. So a mentor is someone who cares. And we have so many young people in our country today who simply do not have an adult in their life that they can count on, somebody that cares about them unequivocally and will always be there for them. A mentor is also someone who affirms, who says, I believe in you, I see some talent, I see some possibility. A mentor is someone who provides a vision of what might be possible. So mentoring is critical. Mentoring does work. And Congress has responded. We had an amendment to No Child Left Behind called Mentoring For Success, which I was able to introduce. In the last 5 years we have provided $184 million of support for mentoring programs around the country. This is supported, of course, by Chairman Boehner. Another mentoring program was funded to the tune of $168 million, and this is for children of prisoners. It was through HHS and supported by the President. And currently it costs about $500 per mentoring match, and so we reach undoubtedly 600,000, 700,000 children through these programs. Mentoring is cost-effective. It costs $500 to mentor a child. It costs $25,000 to $30,000 to lock someone up in prison. And the average meth addict will cost the State that it resides in roughly $47,500 if they are addicted to meth because of crimes committed and other abuses. So at the present time, Mr. Speaker, it is estimated that we need roughly 18 million mentors in the United States, children who badly need somebody in their life. We currently are able to supply roughly 3 million, so we are 15 million short. And what we have done in Congress is helped; certainly been a step in the right direction. So I am pleased that we can at least acknowledge what has been done, and National Mentoring Month has certainly increased awareness and shown the importance of mentoring and the need for more mentors across the country. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, this last month, former Congresswoman Virginia Smith died in Sun City, Arizona, at the age of 94. She served the Third District of Nebraska for 16 years through eight terms. It is a very large district. It covers 80 percent of the State of Nebraska, with 69 counties and 64,000 square miles. She and her husband, Haven, drove county to county, city to city, weekend after weekend; and there was no one who was more faithful in covering that area and being loyal and faithful to her constituents than Virginia Smith. She served on the Appropriations Committee for several years and was responsible for an animal research center in Clay Center, Nebraska, which really is of worldwide renown. She was tenacious, she was aggressive, and she was very strong in constituent services. Nebraska was very well served by Virginia Smith, and she will be greatly missed.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding. I will be brief. I realize that this is simply an extension of the Second Higher Education Act, but I would like to make a couple of points here. This act authorizes Pell grants and student loan programs, which are so important to so many students to continue their education. As part of the reauthorization package that moved through the Education and Workforce Committee this year, I was pleased to offer an amendment that would allow the Secretary of Education to award Pell grants on a year- round basis. We think this is very important because this would allow students to be eligible for Pell grants during summer enrollment. The reason this is important is that we are going to see a rather dramatic increase in college enrollment in coming years. In over 36 years on the college campus, I saw some rather significant changes in the time that it took for people to graduate from college. When I started on the college campus in the 1960s, most people graduated in 4 years, 4\1/2\ years; and now a 5\1/2\- to 6-year graduation timetable is very, very common. As a result, with increasing enrollment and also this extended time period, we are putting greater and greater stress on the facilities in colleges and universities. Therefore, we feel that allowing students Pell grants during the summer which will allow them to go to school year-round and maybe approximate a 4-year to 4\1/2\-year graduation time would be very important. I look forward to seeing a reauthorization of the Higher Education Act signed into law in 2006. However, for now we must extend the existing authorization, and therefore I support H.R. 4525. I thank Chairman Boehner for bringing this legislation forward. I urge my colleagues to support passage of H.R. 4525 today.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Madam Speaker, the Iraqis voted today, and it is estimated that approximately 10 million of 15 eligible voters did vote. Women voted in record numbers. The Sunnis participated in large numbers for the first time. The vote completes the political process in Iraq. Last January, they elected an assembly to draft a constitution. In August, the constitution was completed. In October, the constitution was approved by a large margin, about 70 percent of the voters. Now a new government is elected, and this was all done today with relatively little violence as the Iraqis went to the polls. There is some other news that I think is positive as well: School attendance in Iraq is up by as much as 80 percent; 774 schools have been built or renovated; 36,000 teachers have been trained; and 142 health care facilities have been built or are under construction. Nearly all young Iraqis have been vaccinated for the first time. Satellite dishes, newspapers, TV stations and small businesses are developing and springing up, and 211,000 Iraqi troops have been trained and equipped. Still, there are many who say that there is no progress in Iraq, and I would like to reflect on some comments from a young soldier from Nebraska that I met in a recent trip to the Middle East who said this. He said it is important that we finish the job there and not pull out prematurely because, if we do leave early, three things will happen. Number one, thousands of Iraqis will die, and we have promised them we would not abandon them, and so we will break a promise. Secondly, we will encourage more terrorism worldwide and in the U.S. as well. It would inform the terrorists that terrorism does work. And lastly, 2,000-plus soldiers would have died in vain. I think this is an important point to consider. As I have talked to parents of soldiers who have died, this is something that they do not want to have happen. There was a letter distributed today by Congressman Jeff Miller from Bud Clay, and it was written to President Bush upon the death of his son, Staff Sergeant Daniel Clay in Iraq. This is what Mr. Clay wrote to President Bush, and I quote, he said, ``We and many others are praying for you to see this through. As Lincoln said, `that these might not have died in vain.' '' Included in the letter from Mr. Clay was a letter from his son, and this letter was written if he should happen to be killed in combat, and it was written to his family. And this is what Daniel Clay said. He said, what we have done in Iraq is worth any sacrifice. Why? Because it was our duty. That sounds simple, but all of us have a duty. Duty is defined as a God-given task. Without duty, life is worthless. It holds no type of fulfillment. The simple fact that our bodies are built for work has to lead us to the conclusion that God who made us put us together to do His work. And then he goes on, finally he says, I know what honor is. It is not a word to be thrown around. It has been an honor to protect and serve all of you, meaning his family. I faced death with the secure knowledge that you would not have to. This is as close to Christ-likeness as I can be. That emulation is where all honor lives. I thank you for making it worthwhile.

Mr. OSBORNE. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time of the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton).

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Madam Speaker, the crippling reach of methamphetamine abuse has become the Nation's leading drug problem today, and this is according to a survey by 500 sheriffs departments in 45 States. It is cheap to buy. It is easy to make. It is available everywhere. It is highly addictive. Oftentimes it is addictive after just one use. So it is currently replacing cocaine and heroin in many parts of the country. It leads to increased crime, child abuse, increases in the jail population. In many parts of the country, almost 40 to 50 percent of the jail population is due to methamphetamine abuse. However, the main problem anymore is not the mom-and-pop meth lab out in the countryside. It is the superlabs. Right now 60 to 85 percent of the meth in the United States is coming from superlabs in Mexico, and this is really hard to trace. It is hard to get at. The one thing that is needed to make methamphetamine is pseudoephedrine or ephedrine, and this is manufactured in only six or seven locations around the world: Czechoslovakia, Germany, China, southeast Asia and so on. This bill would make it more difficult for meth manufacturers to obtain the pseudoephedrine necessary for producing the drug in these superlabs. H.R. 3199 includes language the House passed earlier as part of the Foreign Operations authorization bill. It identifies and publicizes the five countries which have the highest rate of diversion of pseudoephedrine to manufacturers of meth. We can get the invoices from these manufacturers. The Department of State could then use its existing authority to reduce or eliminate U.S. foreign aid to those countries which are most contributing to the meth problem. This is one thing that gets people's attention, when you take their foreign aid away, because they are producing meth that is being used in these superlabs. It is a good bill. It gets to the source of the problem. I want to thank Chairman Sensenbrenner and particularly Chairman Souder for their hard work on this bill, and I urge support of the underlying legislation.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I also would like to congratulate Mr. Dingell. Mr. Dingell lockers next to me in the House gym, and I see him occasionally, and I appreciate the fact that he gets down there on occasion, and we get a chance to talk. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Japanese border was opened to U.S. beef trade. This was good news. This border had been closed since December 2003. In 2003, we exported $1.4 billion in beef to Japan. Since that time, the border has been closed, and we have lost over $3 billion in trade. Regaining the market is not going to be easy. Australia has filled much of the void that was created by this ban on U.S. beef. We also must restore confidence in U.S. beef in Japan. I think roughly two-thirds of the Japanese public are saying that they are not sure that they want to eat beef from the United States. And of course, we have a very safe supply. We also must ship beef from cows 20 months of age or younger, and to verify that age is going to be difficult because we do not have an animal ID program which is critical for this country. So we hope that this trade can be restored rather quickly. Over the last year or two, much of the focus on trade issues, particularly in regard to agriculture, has been in regard to the Canadian border and also Japan. But as far as I am concerned, Mr. Speaker, the major issue regarding agricultural trade is not Japan. It is not Canada. It is being played out to some degree this week in WTO talks in China. The major players in these talks in regard to agriculture are the United States and the European Union. This brings me to a discussion of comparison of these two trading powers. On the chart here, we see the comparison. The economy of the United States is $11.7 trillion a year. The European Union is $9.4 trillion. So they are very comparable economies. Well, the largest two in the world. The import tariffs on European Union goods coming into the United States are roughly 12 percent. In contrast, our goods going into the European Union are being tariffed at 30 percent, more than double. This is hard to understand when you look at the comparison of the economies. The agriculture trade deficit of the United States right now is a minus $6.3 billion to the European Union although we have a slight trade surplus with the overall trade worldwide. This has been a major problem for us. Of course, those tariff differences have been a major issue. Export subsidies: These are subsidies that are given to promote exports. You see that the European Union is providing roughly $3 billion in export subsidies; the United States, $31 million in subsidies. So it is about a 100 to 1 ratio with the European Union providing $100 for every $1 that we are providing in export subsidies. Farm subsidy per acre: This is an interesting statistic. The United States subsidizes our farmers $38 an acre, and the European Union subsidizes their agriculture $295 an acre, almost six times as much as we do. One other interesting statistic of comparison is that we have had two cases of BSE or mad cow disease in the United States, just two. In the European Union, they have had 189,000 cases of BSE in the last 15 years. Last year alone, in 2004, they had 756 cases of BSE where we have had two in the last 3 years in North America. So you would think that we would have a tremendous opportunity to trade beef with the European Union, and yet that has not happened. What has happened is the European Union has not allowed U.S. exports of beef into the European Union at all for the last several years because we use some hormones with our beef. They have used this as a tactic to keep our beef out even though the WTO has declared our beef perfectly safe. So we have had practically no trade with them in this regard. We also have had genetically modified crops such as corn and soybeans which have been excluded, again for final sanitary reasons which, again, defy logic. They have also shut out our pork and our poultry. Mr. Speaker, we do not think these issues will be resolved in this current round of trade talks that are occurring now in Hong Kong, but eventually, they must be addressed if there is going to be some equity in world trade. And if the WTO is going to move forward, we absolutely have to have some equanimity in the relations we have with the European Union, and we think that these trade issues need to be resolved.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, Iraq's final general election will be held a week from tomorrow, December 15. Iraqis have paid a great price to get to this point. 30 years under Saddam Hussein, the last 2\1/2\ years, thousands of Iraqi have died in a conflict. The United States has paid a great price. Over 2,000 of our finest soldiers have been killed, many more have been wounded, billions of dollars have been spent, some have said this is a quagmire, some have compared it to Vietnam. And yet, I think it is appropriate to mention at this time that progress has been made. Now I will mention several areas in which considerable progress has been made. First of all, in the area of education, 774 schools have been built or renovated since the conflict began. We see an 80 percent increase in attendance in schools in Iraq. Most of these increases are due to young women who have never attended school previously. We have had 36,000 teachers trained in Iraq since the conflict began. In the area of health care, 17 hospitals either have been built or are currently under construction. 142 health clinics are under construction today or have been completed. And 3.2 million children under the age of 5 have been vaccinated. This is roughly 97 to 98 percent of that population. As far as the economy is concerned, we see many small business starting to spring up. Cell phones, satellite dishes, newspapers, television stations are apparent at every turn. And there are 1 million more automobiles today in Iraq than prior to the conflict. So the economy is not perfect, but it is getting better. As far as the government, we have mentioned many times that the constitution, of course, has been written out, approved October 15 by more than 70 percent of the people. The Sunnis voted in large numbers. And now the election is December 15. As far as the plan to get out of Iraq, the exit strategy, we often hear that there is no plan. The plan has been very clear from almost day one to train and equip 270,000 Iraqis. To date we are at 211,000 Iraqis trained and equipped. There are many areas of Iraq that are totally under Iraqi control with no U.S. forces present or even as back-ups. This is something that oft times is not reported. So this is a critical time. We often hear people say, well, the Iraqis want us to leave. I think that is true. They would like to see us out of there. But if you ask them, they will tell you, not yet. Not at this point. Not at this turning point. So I think that we have all of this discussion now going on about our pulling out. And this discussion to the effect that we are losing, that we cannot win. These comments go world-wide, and they are made by policy makers, often here in Washington. And they certainly carry weight in the Middle East. And I would like to make an observation from the world of athletics, something I know a little bit about. There are some principles of competition that I think apply, not just to athletics, but to military conflict as well. And I would say, first of all, number 1, never tell your team that you cannot win. You would not tell them that before the game, you would not tell them at half time, you would not tell them in the fourth quarter that they cannot win and that they are not winning, because there is such a thing as self-fulfilling prophecy. This is something that no coach would do, nobody who is responsible would do this to people that you care about, to people that you want to win, it is something that simply would not be done. And the soldiers that we talked to, I have been to Iraq three times. I talked to them. They do not believe they we are losing. They think that we can win. They think this is very winnable. They see accomplishment. And the reason that we have so many soldiers reenlisting to go back over there for a second and third tour is because they see the accomplishment. They would not do this if they thought they were losing. A second principle is never give encouragement and reason for optimism to an opponent. This is something you would never do in an athletic contest. So as the game goes along, and as you enter the fourth quarter, what you do is you carry yourself as though you are winning. You do not show fatigue. You do not show injury. And so you do not give encouragement. You do not allow people to believe that somehow they are going to wear you down. And so this is something that I think is critical that we carry that understanding. And so if we pull out prematurely, much as a Captain from Nebraska told me when I was in the Middle East, he said this. Number 1, if we pull out early, those killed and wounded will have sacrificed in vain. That is very true. What do we tell their families? How do you go and address a mother or father who have lost a solider, when we have really quit? Secondly, large numbers of Iraqis will die and we will have broken a promise. We told them we would not pull out. This is a promise we made. And then thirdly, we will certainly encourage terrorism everywhere. Anytime terrorists feel that they are winning, or that their methods are effective, all you do is encourage more terrorism worldwide, and the United States will become a bigger target. So as I have talked to many Iraqi women, and I am the co-chair of the Iraqi Women's Caucus, what they will tell you consistently is this, we now have hope. We now see a future. Iraqis truly believe that things are getting better. They think that things will be better 6 months, a year from now. And I hope that the American people will have the same feeling, the same confidence, the same optimism, because this is something that we cannot afford to lose.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I remember roughly 4 years ago after 9/11 what the feeling was in this Chamber. Everyone was united. We had a common purpose. And it was truly a great time to be here. The other night we went out and rolled around in the mud together for a little bit, and we were united. We had a common purpose. We wanted to have a great team. As I listen to what is going on here tonight, I am really concerned about the acrimony and the general tenor of the discussion. I realize that there is plenty of blame to be laid at everyone's feet. I with many others am concerned about what the American public perceives and what our troops perceive in regard to this discussion tonight. We can do better. We are better than this.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Chairman, I thank Chairman Stearns for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, I speak in support of H.R. 1065, the United States Boxing Commission Act. When we think about boxing, we often think about Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney, Joe Louis, Max Schmaeling, Muhammad Ali, Sonny Liston. These are all high-profile fights, a lot of press coverage, pretty well attended by trainers and doctors, a lot of money involved. But what we do not see is the low profile, the seamy side of boxing, the mismatches, the dishonesty, the lack of medical attention, sometimes the brain damage, the low pay, the high number of people who leave the sport with absolutely no financial resources and many times in pretty poor shape physically. So sometimes this part of boxing has been called the ``red light district'' of professional sports. And I would have to say from my knowledge of it, somewhat limited, I would agree that that is an apt title. Professional boxing, as has been mentioned, is the only major U.S. sport that does not have a centralized association or league to establish and enforce uniform rules and practices. In football we have the National Football League; basketball, the National Basketball Association; Major League Baseball; National Collegiate Athletic Association; U.S. Olympic Committee. So people say, why did boxing not do this? Why would this not be something that would be natural? And the reason is there is a lot more organization in those other sports. NCAA is composed of member institutions. The Olympic Committee has a variety of supporting organizations. Boxing is almost something that one would have to say has total anarchy, and it is spread all over the place. Some of these club fights, obviously, are very low-budget items; and it is almost impossible to get any kind of organization involved. I have spent most of my life working with young athletes, and some of these athletes came from backgrounds similar to that of most prizefighters. There is a lot of poverty. There is sometimes very little family support, sometimes poor schools, sometimes gang influence. But with somebody to care and supervise and nurture, many will come out of that environment and do reasonably well. But they need a little bit of guidance. They need a little bit of help. But I would say the exploitation is more often the norm than a good outcome. So years of corruption and abuse in boxing would indicate that no effective regulation would come from within the sport. We have asked the question, why do they not just take care of it themselves? But how long are we going to wait? We have had years and years and years of this sport, going back to the 1700s, and we have seen no regulatory body emerge. How many people have to die? How many people have to have their brains scrambled? And how many matches do we have to have with no medical attention before we do something about it? We would not do something like this with animals. We are very much against cockfighting and other kinds of contests, and we regulate, and we make some of those illegal as well. So H.R. 1065 provides a uniform Federal standard to regulate business practices and safety issues within the boxing world. This is something whose time has come. It establishes the United States Boxing Commission which oversees all boxing matches in the U.S. This is a good bill. It is a needed bill. I would really like to see the States do this. But States, again, in many cases, have abdicated their responsibility. They are all over the place. What goes in one State does not go in another. Again, the medical supervision is the main thing that I am interested in, and the injury factor and the fact that we are not having adequate supervision. I urge support of this bill. I realize it does add some government responsibility. Generally, as a Republican, I do not like to see those things, but when health and safety is involved, I think we need to intervene.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 856) to establish a Federal Youth Development Council to improve the administration and coordination of Federal programs serving youth, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous information on H.R. 856.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 856, the Federal Youth Coordination Act. I am very pleased that the House of Representatives will have the opportunity to consider this important legislation. I have long advocated for a stronger emphasis at the Federal level on youth development programming because I believe our Nation's future is linked to a healthy, educated, morally sound next generation. The genesis of this bill is in the report of the White House Task Force on Disadvantaged Youth. Although the final report was issued several years ago, I believe that the task force report and its thoughtful analysis and recommendations should be implemented. This legislation does that. Although the executive branch is charged with implementing youth programs, Congress creates many of these programs and funds them. We need to know that our efforts are producing the best results for our young people. The White House Task Force on Disadvantaged Youth noted a number of facts about America's young people and the programs that serve them: First, the National Academy of Sciences estimates that one-quarter of adolescents in this country, almost 10 million teens, are at serious risk of not achieving productive adulthood. Number two, most young people will grow up just fine without government involvement, but the most vulnerable young people may be missed by programs designed to help them. And, worse, the programs we think will help them the most may not at all. There is a serious lack of rigorous evaluation of Federal youth efforts at the present time. Number three, a large number of youth-serving programs are targeting many youth subgroups. These services and target populations often overlap, creating unnecessary duplication and multiple programs that are ofttimes not necessary. Number four, the current Federal response to youth failure is convoluted and complex and is a perfect example of what the GAO has called ``mission fragmentation.'' The GAO recommends that programs with similar goals, target populations, and services be coordinated, consolidated, or streamlined to ensure that goals are consistent. The White House Task Force identified a number of goals and changes that would help to better coordinate the hundreds of programs across 12 Federal departments that serve youth. The three largest youth-serving agencies are the Department of Health and Human Services, Justice, and Education. To support these efforts, in February of this year, I, along with my colleagues, Mr. Hoekstra, Mr. Ford, and Mr. Payne, introduced H.R. 856, the Federal Youth Coordination Act, which was crafted to help implement many of the recommendations of the White House Task Force on Disadvantaged Youth. The Federal Youth Coordination Act creates the Federal Youth Development Council to evaluate, coordinate, and improve Federal youth- serving programs and hold Federal agencies accountable for achieving results. The purpose of this bipartisan legislation is to maximize the return on Federal investment in young people, not to eliminate programs that work. America's young people deserve high-quality, effective, and meaningful youth development programs. Our Nation's taxpayers deserve their tax dollars to be spent on high-quality, effective, and meaningful youth development programs as well. Among the Council's duties will be: to ensure communication among agencies administering programs designed to serve youth. Many of these programs are not allowed by statute to even communicate with each other, and this is a mistake. To recommend objectives and quantifiable 5-year goals for Federal youth programs. Many of these programs do not have any measurable quantifiable goals at all. To make recommendations as to how to better facilitate coordination and consultation. To improve efficiency in programs, identify target populations of youth who are disproportionately at risk and assist agencies in focusing additional resources on them. To assist agencies in coordinating and collaborating on youth programs. And to conduct research and evaluation programs, solicit input and recommendations from outside groups. In addition, the Council may provide technical assistance to a State at the request of a State to support State-funded councils for coordinating State youth efforts. The Council will also be charged with issuing a report to Congress so that Congress and the authorizing and appropriations committees can use the information in future decisions. This additional information will lead to a more cohesive, efficient, and effective Federal youth policy that our young people deserve. Further, while the Council is chaired by the Department of Health and Human Services, its charge is to coordinate across the full range of Federal departments with a focus on the needs of youth, not on the needs of bureaucracy. This legislation was developed with the assistance of a number of organizations and has been endorsed by over 250 organizations. I want to thank all of these organizations for their grassroots support, which helped propel this legislation. Among these organizations has been the National Collaboration for Youth, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Campfire USA, Volunteers of America, YMCA of the USA, Forum for Youth Investment, Youth Service America, Volunteers of America, and America's Promise--the Alliance for Youth. I want to thank all of the cosponsors of the legislation as well as the chairman of the Education and Workforce Committee, John Boehner, and the chairman of the Subcommittee on Select Education, Pat Tiberi. Their support has been critical. I would also like to thank the staff who worked on this legislation, particularly Erin Duncan from my staff, Whitney Rhoades of the Education and Workforce Committee, Krisann Pearce and Jo-Marie St. Martin, also of the Education and Workforce Committee, as well as Brady Young of the Legislative Counsel's Office. I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this important effort toward creating more cohesive and meaningful positive youth development programs by passing H.R. 856. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner), the chairman of the Committee on Education and the Workforce.

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner) for his support and comments and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa) for his support, as well, and the support of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis). I have enjoyed working with these gentlemen on this project and the staff. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for those kind words. I guess I would like to reciprocate by saying that I have worked with a great many people in the House and no one has been more responsive and more interested in matters dealing with law enforcement and children than the chairman. So we really appreciate it. I am sorry that Wisconsin got beat, but everybody has got to lose sometime. Of course, Barry Alvarez is a good friend of mine, too. I rise in support of the conference report, and I would like to particularly thank Chairman Wolf for restoring some of the Byrne grant funds. As many people know, Byrne grant funds were zeroed out in the President's budget. It was a tremendous effort to get any money back in there for Byrne grants. And for those who do not know, Byrne grants basically support local law enforcement as we attack the methamphetamine problem. The gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Wamp) talked about meth a little bit earlier, and I would like to just take a second to show people graphically what has happened in regard to this problem. In 1990 there were two States, California and Texas, that each had more than 20 methamphetamine labs. The rest of the country was relatively free of this problem. Then we look at what is present in 2004, and we see the spread of methamphetamine from west to east, just a few States in the northeast that are preserved to some degree from meth, and that will soon change, I am certain. In most of these counties in most of these States in the western and the central part of the United States, more than half of the jail cells are now occupied by meth addicts or people who have had meth-related crimes. I would say more than half of the child deaths, child assaults, foster care cases in these regions are due to methamphetamine abuse. So we really appreciate the restoration of these funds. It is not what everybody would like, but it is certainly going to keep these law enforcement people going for a period of time. Also, this conference report provides funds to clean up toxic material from meth labs, which is much needed. Above all, it encourages the Drug Enforcement Agency to establish a methamphetamine task force. Currently, we do not feel that the DEA has a comprehensive plan to attack the problem of methamphetamine, which is really covering the whole country and is certainly becoming more and more of a problem on the east coast. So this part of the bill is excellent. I appreciate the chairman's work. I would like to thank him one more time for his efforts.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Madam Speaker, in roughly 1 month, general elections will be held in Iraq. I would like to comment on my perceptions as to what I have seen as I visited there on three different occasions and talked to many of our soldiers. Soldiers often comment on the fact that there are really two wars, apparently, going on in Iraq. There is a war that they see on CNN, and they watch cable television regularly. Then there is the war that they are actually fighting. Apparently, in their minds, at least, there is some discrepancy between the two versions. They have asked me to come back on occasion and talk about what they see happening over there. First of all, in the area of education, 746 schools have been renovated, and these projects have all been completed; 36,000 teachers have been trained since the war started; attendance in the schools is up by 80 percent, and most of these increases are young women, who are attending school for the first time. In the area of health care, 17 new hospitals have been built; 3.2 million children under the age of 5 have been vaccinated for the first time, 97 percent of all children have been vaccinated; 700,000 pregnant women have been vaccinated; and 142 new clinics are currently under construction or have been completed. It is certainly not perfect, but it is an improvement. As far as the economy is concerned, many small businesses and entrepreneurial activities are springing up. As you fly over Baghdad at tree-top level, you see satellite dishes on practically every building. They were not there under Saddam. Newspapers are springing up. Many news outlets that were not there are present today. There are 1 million more automobiles in Iraq today than under Saddam, and Iraqi income, of course, has increased as well. As far as a political process, as many people know, the elections for a constitutional assembly were held last January, and the turnout exceeded expectations. The constitution was written in August. The constitution was approved about 2 weeks ago, October 15, with a 78 percent approval rating. A new government will be elected December 15, and the Sunnis have been kind of a wild card here. They boycotted in large numbers the first election, and it appears that they will participate fully in the December 15 elections. As far as an exit strategy, you often hear that there is none. Yet at the present time 210,000 Iraqi security forces have been trained and equipped as of this date. The goal is 270,000 total, so we are more than three-fourths of the way toward our goal. There is no shortage of recruits. Every time they put out a call, more people volunteer than they have room for in the Iraqi army. Some areas of Iraq are totally controlled at the present time by Iraqis with no American backup. The intent is to draw down U.S. troops as Iraqis are prepared to control their own destiny. That is the exit strategy. We are moving in that direction. It is certainly not done yet, and we will be there for some time. The next few weeks will be violent before the elections. It will be a very difficult time. Some agree and some disagree that we should have gone into Iraq, but we are there, and this is an irrefutable fact. The observation from a soldier in Kuwait is something I would like to pass on at this time. He said this: We pull out and we pull out prematurely, three things are going to happen. Number one, every soldier who died or was wounded will have been sacrificed in vain. Currently the morale of our troops is generally very good. They do not want to leave prematurely. Many of them have reenlisted. Secondly, if we pull out early, Iraqis will die in large numbers. Tens of thousands and possibly hundreds of thousands will die. We will have broken a promise, and this is what happened after the first Gulf War. We cannot let the Iraqi people down at this point. Thirdly, if we pull out prematurely, at this point terrorists will be encouraged worldwide. They will be shown that terrorism does work. The U.S. will become an even bigger target, and our population will be under a greater threat. This is a difficult and a dangerous process. Nothing is certain at this point. It is difficult, but many positive things have happened. I think it is important that the American people be aware of these issues.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, due to obligations in my district, I was unable to vote on the Conference Report on H.R. 3057, the Foreign Operations, Export Financing and Related Programs Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2006. However, had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on the Conference Report on H.R. 3057.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 4128, the Private Property Rights Protection Act. The Supreme Court decision of Kelo v. City of New London is one of the most unpopular decisions ever rendered. I believe more than 90 percent of United States citizens oppose this ruling, and it may be that the other 10 percent do not fully understand it. So it has been certainly roundly denounced. The Court states that ``any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private property.'' So if one party has a project that will yield more tax revenue than is currently provided by a piece of property, that property may be taken. This gives local governments broad powers. This creates great concern in the Agriculture Committee, as has already been noticed. Farm and ranch land can be taken very easily because a golf course, a shopping mall, an amusement park can easily be classified as being more important as far as economic development than agricultural land. Nonprofits, such as churches, Salvation Army, Goodwill Industries, shelters, are very vulnerable. They generate little or no tax revenue. So almost any project can supersede them in this regard. Small businesses are very vulnerable. I had a farmer athlete who played for me who had worked very hard to develop a small business in an old building, a restaurant, and a new hotel was coming into the area. The local city council was thinking about shutting him down, destroying the building, building a new hotel, which would be economic development. And this person was essentially very vulnerable. His whole life savings, his whole investment was going to be gone. So this bill would prevent that. H.R. 4128 prevents States and local governments from receiving Federal economic development funds if they abuse their powers of eminent domain. These are important protections. I would like to thank Chairman Goodlatte, Chairman Sensenbrenner, and others who have worked so hard on this bill; and certainly I urge adoption of it.

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the Special Order time of the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Jones).

Mr. OSBORNE

Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, yesterday a subcommittee of the Japanese Food Safety Commission, on Prions, which deals primarily with BSE, or mad cow disease, voted to pursue a course designed to open Japan's borders to U.S. beef. This is something that the beef industry has been waiting for for about 1 year, 1\1/2\ years now. And the full committee will vote tomorrow on opening trade with the United States, and then this will begin a 4-week comment period, after which it is assumed that borders will open. So we are hoping that by the end of the year we will see U.S. beef going to Japan. This is certainly important for our beef industry because Japan was buying at one time roughly $1.7 billion of U.S. beef annually. So it is a huge portion of our beef trade. Getting the border open has been surprisingly difficult, however. We had two cases of BSE in North America that shut off trade with Japan. Japan has had numerous cases of BSE in recent years. Our current testing system would detect one BSE-positive cow out of 10 million healthy cows with a 99 percent probability. So the odds of a BSE cow getting through our present system is practically nil. So it is a very reliable system. Contrast this with the scenario currently going on with the European Union. In 2004, last year, there were 756 cases of BSE in the European Union, 756, whereas in all of North America there have been no more than four or five cases in the last 3 years. There have been 189,102 cases of BSE in Europe since BSE was first found several years ago. So it has been a huge amount of trouble that they have had. Yet the United States has experienced practically no exports of our beef to Europe. One would think with that scenario that we would have had a tremendous export opportunity. The European Union has blocked U.S. beef in violation of WTO rules, also has blocked our pork, our poultry, and genetically modified crops. So the European Union, certainly, has not been a good trading partner; and they have, as I mentioned, violated WTO rules in doing so. The net agriculture trade deficit between the United States and the European Union was a minus $5 billion last year; so we have taken a big hit in this area. Current trade talks with the European Union are very important, and we have an excellent trade ambassador, Rob Portman, who is doing a great job and we have great confidence in him, but currently we have an offer on the table which is one by which we would reduce our amber box, our farm subsidies, by 60 percent, from $19 billion to roughly $7.5 billion. We have asked the European Union to reduce their trade subsidies by 83 percent, from $80 billion down to $15 billion. The EU has countered with an offer to reduce their export subsidies and also their farm subsidies to 39 percent, which is certainly not a very satisfactory counteroffer. As a result, we are somewhat concerned about their response to this whole situation. It seems that tariffs certainly need to be equalized between the U.S. and the European Union. Currently, our tariffs on goods going into the European Union are roughly 30 percent. Their goods coming into the United States are roughly 12 percent. So here these two large trading partners, with economies of somewhere in the $9 trillion to $11 trillion range, still have a great dichotomy in terms of the actual tariffs that are being charged against the U.S. versus the EU. The important thing to realize is if these trade agreements are formalized and if they do come into being, this will certainly change the nature and structure of our current farm bill. A note of caution here, Mr. Speaker. Brazil is waiting there and seeing what is going to happen. Their land is roughly 10 percent of our land value. Their labor costs are about 5 percent of our value. So if we reduce our farm programs, they are going to be a formidable competitor. We certainly think our farmers can compete with anyone in the world; but when the playing field is that unequal, it can be a problem. So it is really important that we realize that trade agreements are tremendous if they are honored and if the playing field is equal, but they can be huge liabilities if one side honors the agreements and the other does not. So far with the European Union that has been pretty much the situation. So in Congress we need to look at the next WTO round very carefully.