Nancy Pelosi

Ms. PELOSI

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, as a representative from California, specifically San Francisco, where the U.N. was born, I rise with particular pride today in support of the Hall amendment. In our community, we have a great appreciation for the United Nations and the work that it does. So I rise today to say let us pay our dues to the U.N.; and, in addition to that, let us give the U.N. its due. It is a great institution. It is capable of helping to solve many problems in the world on a multilateral basis. We have urged the U.N. to put a new leader in and, with U.S. support, that happened; and we still turn our back. I am pleased as a representative of San Francisco to join my colleagues from New York, where the U.N. is domiciled, in praise of the United Nations and its work. And I am very, very pleased to salute the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hall) for his courage and his leadership in bringing this amendment to the floor. Everyone is making a little sacrifice on this issue so that we can have a big payoff for poor people in the world, for protecting the environment, for promoting the rule of law and human rights and peace throughout the world. This debate, to me, seems full of contradictions. On the one hand we are told by our colleagues who oppose the U.N. that their objection to U.N. funding was based on concerns about inefficiencies and bureaucracy at the U.N. Those issues have been addressed. Certainly more needs to be done, but we are in the process of improving that. The U.N. has already implemented significant reforms, and the Hall amendment preserves the package of U.N. reforms in the State Department authorization bill. Another contradiction we hear here is that we need to have more say at the U.N. But by not paying our dues, we will lose our vote in the General Assembly. I cannot believe that this body, this House of Representatives, would even consider allowing such a step to occur. But, unfortunately, we have done that repeatedly in the past, and there is a real possibility that we will vote that way again this year and lose the vote. Passage of the Hall amendment is a step toward ensuring that Congress takes the right path this year, the path to paying our U.N. arrears. Now, another contradiction I hear, the distinguished majority leader came to the floor and over and over and over again he said that we must respect the sanctity, or whatever the word he used, of the authorizing committee, or of the committee process. I think that is an excellent idea, and I think that we should start to do it soon, but we must be consistent. If that was the gentleman's view, I wish he would have stood with us on this floor last week when we did not want the Smith amendment, an authorizing measure, made in order on an appropriations bill to stop the U.N. population funds from going forth without the gag rule. So let us be consistent or else let us not sing as a mantra that we must protect the committee system if we are doing it very selectively. Another contradiction is that the U.S. must not be the policemen of the world, and we must not bear all the burden of peacekeeping and resolving conflict in the world. And yet we are ready to turn our backs here today, hopefully not, on the institution of multilateralism, the most significant instrument that we have at our disposal to solve the world's problems in a multilateral way, and that means with financial resources, intellectual resources, energy, idealism and the rest. It was reported that today our ambassador will be sworn in, will be confirmed on the Senate side, Richard Holbrooke. I do not know if I am allowed to say that, Mr. Chairman. When he is confirmed, and our ambassador goes to the U.N., a position of high honor in our country, the ambassador to the U.N., when he goes there, we want him to be able to serve effectively. We want him to be able to hold his head up high, that we have paid our dues and given our due respect to the United Nations for what it does. So that is why I commend the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hall), because I know it is with considerable sacrifice and compromise that he puts this amendment forward. Everyone is making a little sacrifice. I hope we all can so that we can pass the Hall amendment and hold our heads up high at the U.N.

Ms. PELOSI

Ms. PELOSI. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, many people who follow this bill have heard me say this over and over again, but I want to make the point another time. Every person in America is familiar with President Kennedy's inaugural address when he said, ``My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.'' The very next line in that speech, Mr. Chairman, says, ``To the citizens of the world, ask not what America can do for you but what we can do working together for the freedom of mankind.'' That is a responsibility that we have in this bill. That is why we are disappointed the funding level is so low, but we want to move it forward in the hope that the funding level will be raised so that we can work together with the people of the world for the freedom of mankind.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I want to take a moment to briefly address the final passage of the Foreign Operations bill. The President has issued a veto threat on the bill both for its low funding level and the inclusion of the objectionable Mexico City language. Members when they cast their vote today should do so with the thought that at some future date, they may be asked to sustain a presidential veto. At the present time, I plan to vote ``aye'' to move the bill along, but again advising Members that at a future date if the funding level is not increased and the objectionable language is not removed and the President vetoes the bill that we may be called upon it. The allocation of discretionary resources available in this bill is insufficient to make the investments that our citizens need and expect in implementing our foreign policy. With that thought in mind, I say to Members, it is a free vote, I will be voting ``yes,'' but we may be calling upon you at a future date to sustain a presidential veto. Mr. Chairman, I want to commend the distinguished chairman of the committee. He had too little money to work with, but he allocated it well. I also commend staff: Mark Murray and Carolyn Bartholamew on the Democratic side; and Charlie Flickner, John Shank, Chris Walker, Lori Maes and Nancy Tippins on the Republican side.

Ms. PELOSI. I yield to the gentleman from New York, chairman of the authorizing committee.

Ms. PELOSI

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me. Mr. Speaker, today we vote on legislation to block OSHA from protecting America's working men and women from workplace injuries and illnesses caused by ergonomic-related issues. My colleagues have the figures, but they bear repeating. Each year more than 2 million workers suffer these injures, more than 640,000 workers lose time at work, and each year this costs the economy $15 to $20 billion in worker compensation, an overall $60 billion, all things considered. I oppose this legislation and support workplace protection for American workers. What is ergonomics? What is that word? What does it mean? Ergonomics and what are ergonomic-related injuries? Ergonomics is the science of adapting the workplace to the physical needs of the workers such as giving telephone headsets to telephone operators to avoid cradling the phone to reduce neck and shoulder pain, a work place that is poorly adapted to workers' causes, ergonomics injuries. One type of injury, repetitive motion injuries frequently mentioned here, is caused when a worker repeats a specific motion hundreds or thousands of times. For example, secretaries and office workers who type all day at their computer keyboards often suffer wrist and arm injuries. Similarly, America's poultry workers who cut up and sliced up the chicken parts for our meals repeat the same cutting and slicing motion hundreds of time an hour each day as they cut up thousands of chickens for our meals. The cumulative stress of these repetitive motions cause secretaries, poultry workers, and other workers to suffer health problems. But I want to get personal about this, Mr. Speaker. I want to talk about one particular poultry worker. Betty Yvonne Green. Betty worked as a chicken fillet puller for seven years. Her job required her to use her thumbs to separate the fillet from the bone, cut the tips off the fillet with scissors and then place the product in a tub. Betty performed this task 16 to 17 times a minute for 2\1/2\ hours straight without a break. In 1984, Betty began to feel pain in her right arm and reported it to her supervisor, the directors of personnel and the plant manager. They all told her there was nothing wrong and she would have to live with this problem. Management felt her pain did not warrant medical assistance, and nothing was to be done until Betty went to her personal physician. Betty's doctor found that both her rotator cuffs had been torn and required surgery. She went back to work after both surgeries, but was unable to continue to do her fillet job. She worked some light duty, but to no avail. Betty was terminated by the company for what they said was excessive absenteeism. She was denied unemployment and only received workers compensation after retaining an attorney. On behalf of Betty Yvonne Green and many, many workers throughout this country who deserve our respect, in fact deserve our protection, I urge our colleagues to vote no on this so-called Workplace Preservation Act. Indeed it should be called the Workplace Persecution Act because that is exactly what it does to the American worker. We can study this thing to death. Of course we are always open to more science, but we have to also know when we have enough science to proceed and learn many more ways that we can do better in the workplace, but not to deny, not to deny what has been fully documented by NIOSH, which has been fully documented by the National Academy of Sciences as a relationship between repetitive motion and ergonomic disease. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no.''

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I thank the distinguished ranking member for yielding me this time and for his leadership on this issue, as well as the ranking member on the subcommittee of jurisdiction, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Owens). Mr. Chairman, I think it is quite ironic that many people have said in the course of this year that this century began with violence in the Balkans and it is ending with violence in the Balkans. So too with this issue. This century began with the muckrakers, with Ida Tarbell and Upton Sinclair pointing out dangers in the workplace for American workers. They showed the exploitation of the worker. And here we are at the end of the century, much enlightened, much improved, but not completely. And ironically, the new information technology age has presented new and additional challenges. As more people work on keyboards and look at screens, it presents more possibilities for ergonomic disease. So let us not ignore the history of it. We look with great embarrassment at what happened at the beginning of the century. We know so much more now. We owe it to the American worker to do better. But I do not ask my colleagues to take my word for it. In saying this, I am joining the major national occupational and safety health groups, which believe that existing science supports the need for an ergonomics standard and oppose H.R. 987. The American Public Health Association, the American Nurses Association, the American Association of Occupational Health Nurses, the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, representing over 2.7 million safety and health professionals, have documented the need for and support an ergonomics safety standard to protect workers from workplace injuries. The American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine is America's largest occupational medicine society concerned with workforce health, and they have said and I quote, ``There is adequate scientific foundation for OSHA to proceed with a proposal and, therefore, no reason for OSHA to delay the rulemaking process.'' The American Public Health Association's national women's groups, according to Women Work, the National Network for Women's Employment, all urge a ``no'' vote on this resolution. I urge my colleagues to join them.

Ms. PELOSI

Ms. PELOSI. I thank the distinguished chairman for his generosity in yielding all the time to me. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the very distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), the ranking member on the authorizing committee.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, who has the right to close?

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I rise in very strong opposition to the Paul amendment, and it is not even reluctantly. It is with grave disappointment, frankly, that this amendment is even being proposed, though I respect the gentleman's right to do so, and I respect the gentleman. If this Paul amendment would be enacted, it would cause deaths and suffering for millions of women and children. I say that without any fear of contradiction. Of course, we all want to reduce the number of abortions performed throughout the world, and the best way to do that is to promote family planning. It seems hard to believe that the gentleman would stand up and say he does not know why it is in our national interests that we improve the plight of children, poor children and families throughout the world by allowing them the opportunity to make decisions for themselves about the timing and the number of children that a family would have, or that the impact that this has on women, alleviating poverty, raising the literacy rate, and, again, giving more empowerment to women by having them control their own destinies. The issue of population, certainly we understand that our world's resources are finite. I think that most would agree that it is in our interests as well as the interests of every person living on this Earth that we husband our resources very carefully, and that includes curbing uncontrolled population growth. I say that as one who does not support any forced measures in that end, but voluntary efforts to that end. This amendment would close the most effective avenue to preventing abortions. The gentleman says that well, if we spend this money, then the organizations that use this money but also perform abortions have this underwriting, or the money is fungible, and, therefore, we are supporting abortions. I think the gentleman knows full well that no funds may be used for abortion procedures. That is the law of the land. We reiterate it every time we have a discussion on this subject. If you are going to apply fungibility, you would have to apply it to everything we do here. I do not know why all of a sudden when it comes to international family planning, fungibility becomes a principle, but when we are dealing with the defense bill or any other appropriations, we never say that giving money for this, that or the other purpose helps that country underwrite some practices that we might not approve of. The amendment would end a more than 30-year-old program recognized as one of the most successful components of U.S. foreign assistance. Tens of millions of couples, Mr. Chairman, in the developing world are using family planning as a direct result of this program, and the average number of children per family has declined more than one-third since the 1960's. Three out of four Americans surveyed in 1995 wanted to increase or maintain spending on family planning for poor countries. I was, this year, in India and saw what happened in those states where there was effective family planning as opposed to what was the plight of the people in areas where the women did not have access to this family planning information. So I believe that this amendment would be contrary to the interests and values of the vast majority of the people in the world, and certainly, speaking in our own terms, of the American people. In February 1997, both the House and the Senate showed their commitment to the USAID International Family Planning Program by voting for the early release of funds specifically for this program. We had to have a vote at that time. Mr. Chairman, I see some of my colleagues on their feet, and I am pleased to yield to the distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Gilman), chairman of the authorizing committee, the Committee on International Relations.

Ms. PELOSI. I yield to the gentleman from Alabama.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. In doing so, I want to correct the record. Those of us who were asking for raising tariffs on products coming from China were not interested in cutting off trade with China. What we were doing is to say, let us have the same reciprocity between our two countries as we would expect from other countries. But then to use that and say it is all right to give a $70 billion trade surplus to the regime so they can strengthen their hold on the people of China but we should take out our concerns with China on the Ex-Im Bank I think is very inappropriate. That is why I oppose it. The Ex-Im Bank does not subsidize the Chinese government. The Ex-Im Bank subsidizes U.S. manufacturers selling into countries, including China. The Paul amendment would not allow the Export-Import Bank to assume any new business. This would mean that all of the Ex-Im's resources would be used to liquidate existing transactions. In other words, Ex-Im would slowly, gradually shut down. I agree with the gentleman that we must subject the Ex-Im, OPIC, and all of these institutions to harsh scrutiny. Are they performing the task that is their established purpose, to promote U.S. exports? The Ex-Im Bank, I think, from the scrutiny we subjected to in our committee does that. The gentleman's amendment is ill-advised. The same would apply to OPIC, which, by the way, does not operate in China. So I urge our colleagues to oppose this amendment for many more reasons than I have time to go into.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson- Lee) I commend for bringing the plight of Tibet to the attention once again of our colleagues. The gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan), our distinguished chairman, has been most cooperative on this issue of Tibet. It is a priority for many of us on the committee. And, of course, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gilman), chairman of the authorizing committee, has been a champion on the Tibet issue for a long time. But as the gentleman from Alabama said, the funds are in the bill already because this is a priority. The plight of the people of Tibet challenges the conscience of the world and by and large the world ignores their plight. Our bill does not, and the more attention we can call, the better. Mr. Chairman, even though this may not be able to be received by the full House this evening, nonetheless, the bright light that the gentlewoman focuses on Tibet once again is appreciated and will contribute to freedom there one day.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, the gentleman's position on this is well-known.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, I know that the distinguished chairman of our committee will be calling for a point of order on this sense of the Congress motion, but I did want to take a half a moment to join her in commending our former colleague here, Mickey Leland. When the gentlewoman mentioned that it is 10 years, it seems impossible, but indeed it was 1989. I was with my family in Cairo when we got the bad news. We were all going to join Mickey in Nairobi when he left Ethiopia. Of course, he invited everyone to go to Ethiopia with him. Fortunately for everyone else, he did not have a large enough plane for everyone. Maybe if he had a larger plane, he would still with be us. Every day I remember him, because his picture is on the wall of my office, holding a baby, that beautiful picture of Mickey Leland. He was there, not helping countries, but helping people. I am particularly pleased that the gentlewoman at least has us focused on peace in that region because that is what we should be working toward. Once again, I commend the gentlewoman for calling the Congress' attention to this important region of the world.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I wish to associate myself with my colleagues' remarks, and I look forward to working with them to press upon the administration the concerns that were expressed here by the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Stearns) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich), and I commend them for their leadership on this issue.

Ms. PELOSI. Reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman. We need to make those contributions to the Man and the Biosphere program. Everything else is fully funded. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the amendment. I commend the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller) for his leadership on this issue.

Ms. PELOSI. I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I will defend the committee position in opposing reluctantly the distinguished gentleman from Colorado's amendment to our bill. Mr. Chairman, I think it is important to note that the House Committee on Appropriations mark for the IO&P account is $167 million, which is $25 million below the administration's request. An additional reduction of $2 million to this account would further erode our ability to gain international cooperation in protecting the environment and natural resources. A $2 million reduction to the IO&P account exceeds our voluntary contribution to the Man and the Biosphere program, $355,000, and the World Heritage Fund, $450,000. As a result, this amendment would force reductions in other worthwhile scientific and educational activities, such as the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission and the International Council of Scientific Unions at a time when we look toward science to increase our understanding of global environmental problems.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for being so generous in yielding. I support both of the gentlemen. I think they are both right. I think that the Hastings amendment is one that is an important one, and the recognition that he seeks to present to the flower industry of Colombia is important. But our colleague from California (Mr. Farr) is also right. I do not think that that recognition does damage to the flower industry in the U.S.; the free market does. But we must be sensitive to those needs because we have a wonderful flower industry in our country. But that does not negate the facts that the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings) presents. I thank him for his leadership on this, especially at this sensitive time in Colombia's future. My colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr), has been a champion on that score. He has been a friend of Colombia and is sensitive to the concerns that are there, too. So, hopefully, we will be able to find a way to recognize and also recognize our own industries here, as well.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I thank the distinguished gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to yield my time to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Ackerman), and that he be allowed to control said time.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to yield the 7\1/2\ minutes that has been yielded to me to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Menendez) and that he be allowed to control that time.

Ms. PELOSI

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, in the interest of time, and under the way the 5-minute rule works, that is, people come and it is not divided on each side of the issue, which is the way the 5-minute rule works, the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Callahan) and I have worked very hard to try to bring something that was honed down, with minimal controversy, to the floor. Clearly, the House must work its will, and it is doing so, largely with authorizing issues, I might add, I mean debates that have been carried over from the authorizing committee; and that is completely appropriate. But recognizing all that we have been through today, I ask unanimous consent that each side of the amendment have 10 minutes, and then we take the vote and proceed with the other votes this evening.