Ron Paul

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Today, the motion to instruct on the comprehensive Iranian sanction bill was passed overwhelmingly, 400-11. Eleven individuals said that this was not a good idea. I was one of those 11, and I would like to explain why I think the sanction bill against the Iranians is very, very dangerous and not well thought out. Sanctions are very serious. Sanctions are literally an act of war. When you prevent certain goods and services going into a country, it's like a blockade. There is no advantage to us to do this. The sanction bill literally says that any country that trades or sends oil into Iran, we will no longer trade with them. So if Russia sends in oil or gasoline or refined products or China does, we are theoretically, under this bill, not to trade with them. Can you think of anything more chaotic than having a trade war with China at this particular time? So often well-intentioned foreign policy procedures backfire. They have unintended consequences and there is too often blowback. Today, unbelievably, we are engaged in so many places in the world and we can't afford it. Our foreign policy costs us a trillion dollars a year to operate. We're in 135 countries. We have over 700 bases throughout the world. We are engaged in military confrontation in Iraq, Afghanistan, in Pakistan. We're bombing in Yemen, as well as having surrogates fighting in Somalia. We're flat-out broke. The policy is driving our enemies into the hands of the Chinese, and here we are looking for another war. It makes no sense whatsoever. The conversation today was nothing more than war propaganda on why we have to get ready to bomb the Iranians. There is no proof, according to our CIA, that they're actually working on a nuclear weapon. I'm sure they would like to. Why not. Everybody around them has it so it would be logical that if they're surrounded and threatened and intimidated with all of the people around them, why wouldn't they want one? Well, of course they do. But others have it. They have never been found in violation of the nonproliferation treaty. Never. And yet Pakistan, India, and Israel, they don't even belong, and they're our friends and we give them money. Pakistan, they have gotten support from us. They have nuclear weapons and they have been known to send nuclear technology to North Korea. So the whole process makes so little sense. The language today was used that, well, we have to go in because of the weapons of mass destruction, they're going to have missiles and they're going to attack us. It's identical to the propaganda promoting in 2002 and 2001 before we attacked Iraq. So this same process is occurring trying to generate all of this excitement about the need to use hostilities. Now, a lot of individuals vote for sanctions that are basically anti- war and they don't like the military option, and they think this is an alternative. I think that is deeply flawed thinking, because sanctions lead to hostilities. And if you commit to the sanctions, you're really committing to the next step. The sanctions of the 1990s and the year 2000, the sanctions on Iraq, eventually led to the hostilities and the war and the invasion. So what did that invasion of Iraq do? Did we find any al Qaeda there? No. We found out that Saddam Hussein wouldn't allow the al Qaeda there. No weapons of mass destruction. We've turned the country upside down. Hundreds of thousands of people injured and killed. We have suffered devastating problems from this. And what has happened? We turned the Government of Iraq over to the Shiites, who are allies of the Iranians. So that whole policy has actually backfired. So now what we're doing to the Iranians is driving them into the pockets of the Chinese. The Chinese are pretty good capitalists these days. They work hard, they produce, they sell us certain goods and services. We pay them, they save their money, and they're starting to invest. So they're investing around the world in natural resources. And what are we doing? All we're doing is trying to take over the world with natural resources so we have control of oil. This is a mercantilistic idea, it's ancient, and it takes you back to almost colonial times. So this, I think, shows that our policies are deeply flawed. I sure would have wished this vote would have come out differently. And I warn, this was a very dangerous vote.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker I rise in opposition to this motion to instruct House conferees on H.R. 2194, the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability and Divestment Act, and I rise in strong opposition again to the underlying bill and to its Senate version as well. I object to this entire push for war on Iran, however it is disguised. Listening to the debate on the floor on this motion and the underlying bill it feels as if we are back in 2002 all over again: the same falsehoods and distortions used to push the United States into a disastrous and unnecessary one trillion dollar war on Iraq are being trotted out again to lead us to what will likely be an even more disastrous and costly war on Iran. The parallels are astonishing. We hear war advocates today on the Floor scare-mongering about reports that in one year Iran will have missiles that can hit the United States. Where have we heard this bombast before? Anyone remember the claims that Iraqi drones were going to fly over the United States and attack us? These ``drones'' ended up being pure propaganda--the UN chief weapons inspector concluded in 2004 that there was no evidence that Saddam Hussein had ever developed unpiloted drones for use on enemy targets. Of course by then the propagandists had gotten their war so the truth did not matter much. We hear war advocates on the floor today arguing that we cannot afford to sit around and wait for Iran to detonate a nuclear weapon. Where have we heard this before? Anyone remember then-Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice's oft-repeated quip about Iraq: that we cannot wait for the smoking gun to appear as a mushroom cloud. We need to see all this for what it is: Propaganda to speed us to war against Iran for the benefit of special interests. Let us remember a few important things. Iran, a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, has never been found in violation of that treaty. Iran is not capable of enriching uranium to the necessary level to manufacture nuclear weapons. According to the entire U.S. Intelligence Community, Iran is not currently working on a nuclear weapons program. These are facts, and to point them out does not make one a supporter or fan of the Iranian regime. Those pushing war on Iran will ignore or distort these facts to serve their agenda, though, so it is important and necessary to point them out. Some of my well-intentioned colleagues may be tempted to vote for sanctions on Iran because they view this as a way to avoid war on Iran. I will ask them whether the sanctions on Iraq satisfied those pushing for war at that time. Or whether the application of ever-stronger sanctions in fact helped war advocates make their case for war on Iraq: as each round of new sanctions failed to ``work''--to change the regime--war became the only remaining regime-change option. This legislation, whether the House or Senate version, will lead us to war on Iran. The sanctions in this bill, and the blockade of Iran necessary to fully enforce them, are in themselves acts of war according to international law. A vote for sanctions on Iran is a vote for war against Iran. I urge my colleagues in the strongest terms to turn back from this unnecessary and counterproductive march to war.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, today I am introducing the End the Mandate Act. This legislation repeals the sections of the recently-passed health reform bill that force all Americans to purchase federally- approved health insurance plans. Forcing every American to obtain health insurance is a blatant violation of the Constitution. Defenders of this provision claim the Congress's constitutional authority to regulate ``interstate commerce'' gives Congress the power to mandate every American obtain a federally- approved health insurance plan. However, as Judge Andrew Napolitano and other distinguished legal scholars and commentators have pointed out, even the broadest definition of ``regulating interstate commerce'' cannot reasonably encompass forcing Americans to engage in commerce by purchasing health insurance. Forcing every American to obtain a congressionally-approved health insurance plan is not just unconstitutional; it is a violation of the basic freedom to make our own decisions regarding how best to meet the health care needs of ourselves and our families. Madam Speaker, the new law requires Americans to have what is defined as ``minimum essential coverage.'' Some people may claim that the requirement to have ``minimal essential coverage'' does not impose an unreasonable burden on Americans. There are two problems with this claim. First, the very imposition of a health insurance mandate, no matter how ``minimal'' violates the principles of individual liberty upon which this country was founded. Second, the mandate is unlikely to remain ``minimal'' for long. The experience of states that allow their legislatures to mandate what benefits health insurance plans must cover has shown that politicizing health insurance inevitably makes health insurance more expensive. As the cost of government-mandated health insurance rises, Congress will likely respond by increasingly subsidizing health insurance for an ever increasing number of Americans. When the cost of government-mandated insurance proves to be an unsustainable burden on individuals, small employers, and the government, Congress will likely impose price controls on medical treatments, and even go so far as to limit what procedures and treatments mandatory insurance will reimburse. Madam Speaker, Congress made a grave error by forcing all Americans to purchase health insurance. The mandate violates fundamental principles of individual liberty, and will lead to further government involvement in health care. I therefore ask all of my colleagues to join me in correcting this mistake by cosponsoring the End the Mandate Act.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, on April 15, 2010, the City of Fulshear, Texas, which is in my congressional district, will host a reception honoring Mayor James Roberts, who is stepping down this year. It is my pleasure to join the people of Fulshear in thanking Mayor Roberts for his years of service. Mayor Roberts was first elected mayor in 1977, shortly after Fulshear was incorporated. James Roberts was a logical choice to serve as Fulshear's first mayor, as his efforts were instrumental in incorporating Fulshear. Mayor Roberts served as Mayor until 1984. In 2006, he returned to the Mayor's office. A graduate of Baylor University, James Roberts has worked as a textbook publisher representative, a world history teacher and a coach. In 1973, he founded J.W. Roberts and Company, a wholesale outlet for industrial hoses, clamps, ducting, fittings and tubings. In addition to building a business, working to incorporate Fulshear, and then serving as mayor, James Roberts has also been involved in a variety of community activities, including 20 years on the Board of the Fort Bend County Library, 2 years on the Lamar Consolidated School Board, nine of which he spent as School Board President. Mayor Roberts has also served as the Deacon of Youth of the Graeber Road Church of Christ. Mayor Roberts is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the American Heart Association. Madam Speaker, I once again wish to express my pleasure in joining the people of Fulshear in thanking James Roberts for his work to incorporate Fulshear, his service as Mayor, and all of his work to better the lives of the people of his community.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, on March 30, 2010 Sweeny Community Hospital will commemorate its forty-fifth anniversary. Located west of the Brazos River in the city of Sweeny in Brazoria County, which is in my Congressional District, Sweeny Community Hospital is a cornerstone of Brazoria County's health care system. Sweeny Community Hospital has always been committed to providing top- notch health care to all who walk through its doors. Sweeny Community Hospital has always worked to grow and improve in order to better meet the health care needs of the people of Brazoria County. Today Sweeny Community Hospital employs approximately 150 people and has locations throughout Brazoria County. Having begun my Ob/Gyn medical practice in Brazoria County shortly after Sweeny Community Hospital opened its doors, I am well aware of the quality of the medical services offered at Sweeny Community Hospital. It is therefore my pleasure to offer my congratulations to Sweeny Community Hospital on its forty-fifth anniversary.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this resolution. I thank the gentleman from Ohio for bringing this issue up. It is late. This war started 9 years ago. It's about time we talked about it. It was said earlier on it is hard to quit a war, and we shouldn't be quitting. I will tell you what the real problem is, it is too easy to start a war. It is too easy to get involved. And that is our problem. The founders of this country tried very hard to prevent this kind of a dilemma that we are in now; getting involved in no-win wars and nobody knowing exactly who the enemy is. The war was started and justified by quoting and using the war powers resolution written in 1973. That was written after the fiasco of Vietnam to try to prevent the problem of slipping into war. Yet that resolution in itself was unconstitutional because it literally legalized war for 90 days without Congressional approval. It did exactly the opposite. So here we are, the 90-day permission for war at that time now is close to 9 years. I am afraid that this is too little, hopefully not too late for us to do something about this. Are we going to do it for 10 more years? How long are we going to stay? And the enemy is said to be the Taliban. Well, the Taliban, they certainly don't like us, and we don't like them. And the more we kill, the more Taliban we get. But I want to quote the first line of the resolution passed back in 2001, explaining the purpose for giving the President the power, which was an illegal transfer of power to the President to pursue war at will. It said, ``To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the recent attacks launched against the United States.'' The Taliban didn't launch an attack against the United States. The Government of Afghanistan didn't launch it. The best evidence is that of those 20 individuals who participated in the 9/11 attacks, two of them might have passed through Afghanistan. A lot of the planning was done in Germany and Spain, and the training was done here in the United States. Oh, yes, the image is that they all conspired, a small group of people with bin Laden, and made this decision. Right now the evidence is not there to prove that. But certainly bin Laden was very sympathetic, loved it, and wanted to take credit for it. One of the reasons why he wanted to take credit was that it would do three things he wanted: First, it would enhance his recruitment efforts for al Qaeda and his attacks against western powers who have become overly involved in control of the Middle East and have had a plan for 20 years to remake the Middle East. He also said that the consequence of 9/11 will be that we will bog the American people down in a no-win war and demoralize the people. There is still a lot of moral support, but there is a lot of people in this country now that the country is totally bankrupt and we are spending trillions of dollars on these useless wars that people will become demoralized, because history shows that all empires end because they expand too far and they bankrupt the country, just as the Soviet system came down. And that is what bin Laden was hoping for. He also said that the dollars spent will bankrupt this country. And we are bankrupt. And yet there is no hesitation to quit spending one cent overseas by this Congress. We built a huge embassy in Baghdad, we built an embassy in Kabul, billion-dollar embassies, fortresses, and it's all unnecessary. Nobody is really concerned. If people were concerned about the disastrous effect of debt on this country, we would change our foreign policy and we would be safer for it. We are not safer because of our foreign policy. It is a policy of intervention that has been going on for a long time, and it will eventually end. This war is an illegal war. This war is an immoral war. This war is an unconstitutional war. And the least you could say is it is illegitimate. There is no real purpose in this. The Taliban did not attack us on 9/11. You know, after we went into Afghanistan, immediately the concerns were shifted to remaking the Middle East. We went into Iraq, using 9/11 as a justification. It was nothing more than an excuse. Most Americans, the majority of Americans still believe that Saddam Hussein had something to do with 9/11. And I imagine most Americans believe the Taliban had something to do with 9/11. It is not true. We need to change our foreign policy and come back to our senses and defend this country and not pretend to be the policeman of the world.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to congratulate the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (UTMB) for being approved for full membership in the Texas Medical Center, the world's largest medical complex. Texas Medical Center President and CEO Richard E. Wainerdi said of the decision to include UTMB in the Texas Medical Center, ``We are proud to have The University of Texas Medical Branch join the Texas Medical Center as its 49th member institution. As a member of the Texas Medical Center, UTMB will be collaborating more closely with other member institutions and this relationship will further increase the combined level of expertise that will be a material benefit to citizens throughout Texas and beyond.'' Working closely with UTMB as I do, I am not surprised that it has been asked to join the University of Texas Medical Center. The people of UTMB are consistently working to improve the lives and health of Texans and all Americans. UTMB is one of the major centers of medical research in Texas and in the nation. UTMB features a multidisciplinary environment that enables scientists and clinicians to work on projects that often have immediate application to patient care. Among UTMB's areas of strength are neuroscience; pain management and stroke treatment; gastrointestinal health; environmental health and asthma; infectious diseases; vaccine development; cancer; molecular medicine; aging; and diabetes. Among its numerous activities, UTMB hosts summer science programs for middle school, high school, and undergraduate students to help encourage and develop the research workforce of tomorrow. While UTMB's research program is impressive, many Texans primarily think of UTMB as a leading provider of quality health care. This is because UTMB offers services ranging from primary to specialized diagnostic care. Particularly impressive is UTMB's pioneering telemedicine programs. In conclusion, Madam Speaker, I congratulate the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston for being asked to join the University of Texas Medical Center. I also extend my gratitude, on behalf of all the people of my district, for all that the people of UTMB are doing in both the field of medical research and in delivering quality health care to the people of Texas.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, I would like to enter into the Record the following letter from Professor Robert D. Auerbach, a professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. This letter provides additional information regarding remarks I made at yesterday's Financial Services Committee Humphrey-Hawkins hearing, remarks which Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke categorized as ``bizarre.'' Thank You Congressman Ron Paul for Bringing These Important Facts to the Public's Attention I thank Congressman Ron Paul for bringing to the public's attention the Federal Reserve coverup of the source of the Watergate burglars' source of funding and the defective audit by the Federal Reserve of the bank that transferred $5.5 billion from the U.S. government to Saddam Hussein in the 1980s. Congressman Paul directed these comments to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke at the House Financial Services Hearing February 24, 2010. I question Chairman Bernanke's dismissive response. BERNANKE: ``Well, Congressman, these specific allegations you've made I think are absolutely bizarre, and I have absolutely no knowledge of anything remotely like what you just described.'' The evidence Congressman Ron Paul mentioned is well documented in my recent book, Deception and Abuse at the Fed (University of Texas Press: 2008). The head of the Federal Reserve bureaucracy should become familiar with its dismal practices. First, consider the Fed's coverup of the source of the $6,300 in hundred dollar bills found on the Watergate burglars when they were arrested at approximately 2:30 A.M. on June 17, 1972 after they had broken into the Watergate offices of the Democratic Party. Five days after the break- in, June 22, 1972, at a board of directors' meeting of officials at the Philadelphia Fed Bank, it was recorded in the minutes [shown on page 23 of my book] that false or misleading information had been provided to a reporter from the Washington Post about the $6,300. Bob Woodward told me he thought he was the Washington Post reporter who had made the phone inquiry. The reporter ``had called to verify a rumor that these bills were stolen from this Bank'' according to the Philadelphia Fed minutes. The Philadelphia Fed Bank had informed the Board on June 20 that the notes were ``shipped from the Reserve Bank to Girard Trust Company in Philadelphia on April 3, 1972.'' The Washington Post was incorrectly informed of ``thefts but told they involved old bills that were ready for destruction.'' The Federal Reserve under the chairmanship of Author Burns not only kept the Fed from getting entangled in the Watergate coverup, which the Fed's actions had assisted, it allowed false statements about bills the Fed knew were issued by the Philadelphia Fed Bank to stand uncorrected. Blocking information from the Senate and House Banking Committees [letters shown in my book, Chapter 2] and issuing false information during a perilous government crisis imposed huge costs on the public that had insufficient information to hold the Fed officials accountable for what they had withheld from the Congress. Had the deception been discovered the Fed chairmen following Burns may have been forced to rapidly implement some real transparency to restore the Fed's credibility. That would have reduced or eliminated many of the deceptions, and corrupt practices that are described in my book. The second subject brought up by Congressman Ron Paul is the exposure of faulty examinations of the Federal Reserve of a foreign bank in Atlanta, Georgia through which $5.5 billion was sent to Saddam Hussein that a Federal Judge found to be part of United States active support for Iraq in the 1980s. On November 9, 1993, several federal marshals brought a prisoner, Christopher Drogoul, into my office at the Rayburn House Office Building of the U.S. House of Representatives. The marshals removed the manacles. Drogoul took off his jump suit and changed into a shirt, tie, and business suit. He immediately looked like the manager of the Atlanta agency with domestic headquarters in New York City of Banca Nazionale. Drogoul had come to testify about a ``scheme prosecutors said he masterminded that funneled $5.5 billion in loans to Iraq's Hussein through BNL's Atlanta operation. Some of the loans allegedly were used to build up Iraq's military and nuclear arsenals in the years preceding the first Gulf War.''' Drogoul's `` `off book' BNL-Atlanta funding to Iraq began in 1986 as financing for products under Department of Agriculture programs.' '' The loans allegedly had been authorized by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Since Drogoul told the committee he was merely a tool in an ambitious scheme by the United States, Italy, Britain and Germany to secretly arm Iraq in their 1980-88 war, the testimony was politically contentious and unproven. He was sentenced in November 1993 to 37 months in prison and he had already served 20 months awaiting his sentencing hearing. U.S. District Judge Ernest Tidwell found that the United States had actively supported Iraq in the 1980s by providing it with government-guaranteed loans even though it wasn't creditworthy. The judge said such policies ``clearly facilitated criminal conduct.'' Gonzalez was drawn to Drogoul's answer about the Fed examiner who had visited his Atlanta operation. Gonzalez said that: ``At the November 9, 1993 Banking Committee hearing I asked Christopher Drogoul, the convicted official of the Banca Nazionale Del Lavoro agency branch in Atlanta, Georgia, how the Federal Reserve Bank examiners could miss billions of dollars of illegal loans, most of which ended up in the hands of Hussein. Mr. Drogoul stated: The task of the Fed [bank examiner] was simply to confirm that the State of Georgia audit revealed no major problems. And thus, their audit of BNL usually consisted of a one or two-day review of the state of Georgia's preliminary results, followed by a cup of espresso in the manager's office.'' Gonzalez was appalled at the of lack of effective examination of a little storefront bank and also appalled by the gifts exchanged by officers of the New York Federal Reserve and the regulated banks in New York City where the main U.S. office of BNL was located. A description of what followed is in my book. The Fed voted in 1995 to destroy the source transcripts of its policy making committee that had been sent to National Archives and Records Administration. Chairman Alan Greenspan had the committee vote on this destruction, telling the members: ``I am not going to record these votes because we do not have to. There is no legal requirement.'' (p. 104 in my book.) Greenspan thus removed any fingerprints on this act of record destruction. Donald Kohn, who is now Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors at the Federal Reserve, answered some questions I had sent to Chairman Greenspan about this destruction. Kohn replied in a letter on November 1, 2001 to me at the University of Texas that they had destroyed the source records for 1994, 1995 and 1996, they did not believe it to be illegal and there was no plan to end this practice. That is one reason why the Federal Reserve audit supported by Congressman Ron Paul is needed. The Fed must stop destroying its records.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, on March 4th, the Galveston Chamber of Commerce will hold its 164th annual meeting. Established by the Ninth Congress of the Republic of Texas in 1845, making it the oldest chamber of commerce in Texas, the Galveston Chamber of Commerce works to promote and advocate for the business community of Galveston. At the March 4th meeting, the Galveston Chamber of Commerce will honor 32 Galveston businesses who have served the Galveston Community for 100 years or longer. The Port of Galveston, which has been in operation since 1825, is the oldest business in the community. It is truly a remarkable achievement that these 32 businesses kept their doors open through several hurricanes, tropical storms, recessions, and the Great Depression. I certainly agree with Gina Spagnola, president of the Galveston Chamber of Commerce, who said ``Our business community is the lifeblood of our community, and we must continue to welcome, appreciate, encourage, support and protect them.'' Madam Speaker, it is a tremendous pleasure to join my friends at the Galveston Chamber of Commerce in saluting these businesses for their years of service to the people of Galveston. I am truly honored to serve as their representative and hope all my colleagues all join me in congratulating these outstanding businesses. I have attached a list of the names of the businesses that will be honored on March 4 and the date that the companies were established. Del Papa Distributing Company, 1910; Moody National Bank, 1907; American National Insurance Company, 1905; Biehl & Company, 1905; Rosenberg Library, 1904; Malloy & Son Funeral Home, 1902; Fred Hartel Company, 1900; Galveston Country Club, 1898; the Grand 1894 Opera House, 1894; and Stewart Title, 1893. Galveston Insurance Associates, 1892; University of Texas Medical Branch, 1891; Galveston Independent School District, 1884; AT&T, 1878; The Children's Center, Inc., 1878; Mt. Olive Missionary Baptist Church, 1876; Frost Bank, 1874; Grace Episcopal Church, 1868; J. Levy & Termini Funeral Home, 1868; Galveston County Medical Society, 1865; and Texas Gas Service, 1856. Ott Monument Works, 1854; First Evangelical Lutheran Church, 1850; Mills Shirley LLP, 1846; Galveston Chamber of Commerce, 1845; Gal-Tex Pilots Service Corporation, 1845; Galveston County Daily News, 1842; Trinity Episcopal Church, 1841; First Baptist Church, 1840; Moody Memorial First United Methodist Church, 1838; City of Galveston, 1837; Port of Galveston, 1825.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. What have we allowed ourselves to become? Are we no longer a Nation of laws? Have we become instead a Nation of men who make secret arrests? Are secret prisons now simply another tool of Federal Government law enforcement? Is secret rendition of individuals now permitted, out of misplaced fear? Have we decided that the writ of habeas corpus is not worth defending? Is torture now an acceptable tool for making us safe? Unfortunately, the single answer to all of these questions from the leaders of our country and to many of our citizens appears to be ``yes''. And now we are told that assassination of foreigners as well as American citizens is legitimate and necessary to provide security for our people. It is my firm opinion that nothing could be further from the truth. Secret arrests, secret renditions, torture, and assassinations are illegal under both domestic and international law. These activities should be anathema to the citizens of a constitutional Republic. The real threat doesn't arise from our failure to torture. Rather, desensitizing our Nation to the willful neglect and sacrifice of our civil liberties, fought and died for over the centuries, is the threat. The concept of habeas corpus existed even before King John of England was forced in 1215 by his rebellious barons to sign the Magna Carta. This basic principle and expression of individual liberty, which has survived 800 years, greatly influenced the writing of our Constitution and our common law heritage. Today we hardly hear a whimper, either from the American people or a stone silent U.S. Government as our cherished liberties are eradicated. Instead, we have a government that deliberately orchestrates needless fear and makes people insecure enough to ignore the reality of their lost liberties. The latest outrage is the current administration's acknowledgment that we now have a policy that permits assassination not only of foreign suspects, but of American citizens as well. Of course the CIA has used secret assassinations in a limited fashion for decades, despite international, domestic, and moral law. When done secretly, as in the past, our government at least recognized that assassination was illegal and wrong. Frighteningly and astonishingly, however, the policy is now explicit. National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair, in open testimony before the House Intelligence Committee on February 3 of this year, acknowledged that American citizens can indeed be assassinated at our government's discretion. The U.S. Government attempted to assassinate Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen without even charging him with a crime. We are told this evidence is secret, that he does not deserve any constitutional rights, and that some unknown individual in the administration has the authority to declare him a threat, and therefore a legitimate target for assassination. Yes, I know, he is probably a very bad person. Yes, I know that only a few Americans are on the assassination hit list. Yes, I know that artificially generated fear makes a large number of Americans inclined to applaud this effort which supposedly will make us safe. But if this becomes standard operating procedure and a permanent precedent is established, let me assure you that this abuse of the law will spread. It's time for Congress and the American people to wake up to the realities of the dangers we face. We must remember, as Members of Congress, that we have taken an oath to protect and defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic. It should not be that difficult to distinguish the difference between the danger posed by the underwear bomber and the danger posed by a government that endorses secret prisons, torture, and assassinating American citizens.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, February 28th marks the 170th anniversary of the Avenue L Missionary Baptist Church in Galveston, Texas. The Avenue L Missionary Baptist Church will commemorate this anniversary with a series of events through this month, including a grand parade and old fashioned picnic on February 20th. One of the oldest black churches in Texas, Avenue L Baptist is the mother church of African-American worship in the entire state of Texas. Texas Avenue L Baptist began as the Colored Baptist Church, a congregation organized by Reverend James Hutchinson to serve Galveston's slave population. In 1855, First Baptist trustees Gail Borden, Jr., John S. Sydnor, and Reverend Huckins purchased land from the Galveston City Company for use by the congregation of Colored Baptist's successor, the African Baptist Church. After the Civil War, the property was formally deeded to the African Baptist Church, who where reorganized under Reverend Israel S. Campbell as the First Regular Missionary Baptist Church in 1867. The church adopted the name Avenue L Missionary Baptist in 1903. In 1916, construction of the present brick church building commenced. Many fund-raising activities where undertaken by the people of Galveston to raise the funds for the church. The new structure included art glass windowpanes, a furnace to supply steam heat, and a baptizing pool. A pipe organ was installed in 1921. Reverend H.M. Williams spoke for all of his congregants when he said ``Our Church is a most beautiful one.'' Today, almost ninety years later, Avenue L Missionary Baptist remains a most beautiful church. In 1973 work began on renovations, including the additions of air- conditioning, and central heating. In 1977, the Church's stained glass windows where refurbished and covered with a protective shield. Reverend R.E. McKeen, who served as pastor of Avenue L Missionary Baptist, during the renovation also began broadcasting sermons on local radio. Among the prominent pastors who have served at Avenue L Missionary Baptist Church are Reverend H.M. Williams, who served as moderator of the Lincoln District Baptist Association and led the rebuilding of the church after the hurricane of 1900 and the Reverend G.L. Price who served as President of the National Baptist Convention of American and the Mary Allen College. Reverend Andrew Walker Berry, who served as Pastor from 1985 to 1990 was a noted composer and prolific writer of prospectuses and pamphlets. Reverend Berry also has over 100 gospel songs published through his company ``Musico.'' The Avenue L Missionary Baptists Church remains a pillar of the Galveston Community. Every Sunday hundreds gather in the church for services. In addition, Avenue L Missionary serves the Galveston community with a variety of missionaries including the Young Adult Christian League, the Logos Bible Class, Mid-week prayer and Bible study, the General Mission, Jr. Melodic Messengers, and the Young Adult Ushers. I am pleased to congratulate the Avenue L Missionary Baptist on its 140th anniversary, and wish for its continued success in serving the people of Galveston.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, I rise in reluctant opposition to this resolution. Certainly I am moved by the horrific destruction in Haiti and would without hesitation express condolences to those who have suffered and continue to suffer. As a medical doctor, I have through my career worked to alleviate the pain and suffering of others. Unfortunately, however, this resolution does not simply express our condolences, but rather it commits the U.S. government ``to begin the reconstruction of Haiti'' and affirms that ``the recovery and long-term needs of Haiti will require a sustained commitment by the United States. . . .'' I do not believe that a resolution expressing our deep regret and sorrow over this tragedy should be used to commit the United States to a ``long-term'' occupation of Haiti during which time the U.S. government will provide for the reconstruction of that country. I am concerned over the possibility of an open-ended U.S. military occupation of Haiti and this legislation does nothing to alleviate my concerns. On the contrary, when this resolution refers to the need for a long-term U.S. plan for Haiti, I see a return to the failed attempts by the Clinton and Bush Administrations to establish Haiti as an American protectorate. Already we are seeing many argue that this kind of humanitarian mission is a perfect fit for the U.S. military. I do not agree. Certainly I would support and encourage the efforts of the American people to help the people of Haiti at this tragic time. I believe that the American people are very generous on their own and fear that a U.S. government commitment to reconstruct Haiti may actually discourage private contributions. Mr. Speaker, already we see private U.S. citizens and corporations raising millions of dollars for relief and reconstruction of Haiti. I do not believe the U.S. government should get in the way of these laudable efforts. I do express my condolences but I unfortunately must urge my colleagues to vote against this resolution committing the United States government to rebuild Haiti.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, I oppose H. Res. 1003, designating January 10, 2010 through January 16, 2010 as National Influenza Vaccination Week. While I believe the American people should be made aware of infectious diseases and common sense preventative measures, I am concerned that this resolution continues the hysterical reaction from government officials to the swine flu outbreak. As a physician, I have yet to see any evidence that justifies the current level of alarm. Influenza typically kills around 36,000 people every year in this country and hospitalizes a couple hundred thousand. In the almost a year since swine flu made its first appearance in the U.S., there have been only a handful of confirmed deaths attributable to this strain, and most of those sickened have or will fully recover. Every death is tragic, but I see no reason to deal with this flu outbreak any differently than we typically deal with any other flu season. Instead, the federal government has responded with invasive screening at airports, closing down schools and sporting events, and causing general panic. There have also been discussions of mandating that certain populations be forced to receive the swine flu vaccine. I would remind my colleagues that during the 1976 outbreak of swine flu only 1 America died from the flu, but mandatory vaccinations killed at least 25 before the program was abandoned. Madam Speaker, the panicked reaction to swine flu outbreak demonstrates why the Federal Government should not become involved in health care. Instead, decisions as to how best to deal with infectious disease should be left to local communities, health care providers, and, most importantly of all, individual citizens. Patients should always have the right to make their own decision about whether or not to receive a vaccine after getting full information on both the risks and the benefits of vaccines from their health care provider.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, as we start the new year 2010, the establishment politicians, economists and Wall Street are trying to convince themselves that we have turned the corner and economic growth has once again begun. The predictions that conditions are getting back to normal come from those who never saw the crisis coming and don't have the vaguest notion what caused it. Some of them concede that it could be a jobless recovery. That will establish a new definition for a recovery. Official unemployment is at 10 percent but even the government knows that if everyone is counted, including those individuals that are too discouraged to even be looking for work, the unemployment rate is 17 percent. Free-market economists claim the actual unemployment rate is closer to 22 percent. There's reason to believe that the correction is just barely started and has a long way to run. If the financial bubble came from excess credit created by the Federal Reserve, doubling the money supply can hardly be a solution. It wouldn't make much sense for a doctor taking care of a very sick patient from severe infection to deliberately give the patient another infection. Yet that's what the PhD doctors are doing to our very sick economy. It can't work. It will make the economy much sicker. If our leaders don't wake up soon, the economy will be brought to its knees. Great danger lies ahead. In foreign policy, it's always crucial that the motives of those who would do us harm are understood. Denial of the truth and accepting more politically palatable excuses will guarantee that threats to our safety will continue as we pursue a seriously flawed involvement overseas. It's the same in economic policy. If there's denial or ignorance of the real cause of financial bubbles and the inevitable corrections that must follow, the economy cannot be reenergized. We should have learned the lesson from the Depression of the 1930s that it was a predictable result from the Federal Reserves orchestrated excesses of the 1920s. Instead, the new-born Keynesian economists who took charge made certain that the correction would not be a one or two year affair as were the previous corrections in our history. The aggressive intervention by Hoover and Roosevelt, the Republicans and the Democrats, turned a short recession into the Great Depression, which lasted until the end of World War II. The real tragedy was that the interpretation of the 1930s institutionalized bad economic theories. Unfortunately, and erroneously, the Depression was blamed on the gold standard, free markets and a lack of regulations. Though monetary policy was analyzed, its importance was 100 percent misinterpreted. The low interest rates and excess credit of the 1920s, driven by Federal Reserve policy, was not considered a factor in producing the stock market bubble and the mal-investment. Instead, the 1930s analysts and even later analysis by Milton Freidman and the monetarists, along with academic ``scholars'' like Bernanke, came to an opposite conclusion: the Fed was at fault but only because it was too tight, arguing that massive monetary inflation was the only answer to the slumping economy. And now we are witnessing a grand experiment by the very person who for years claimed special knowledge regarding the Depression. Chairman Bernanke is in the midst of trying to solve the problem of massive monetary inflation and excessively low interest rates instituted by his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, by implementing even more inflation at historic rates. The sad part is the answer to his very risky experiment with the wealth of our country and the health of our economy will take years to analyze. The conclusions will be just as flawed as they were in the aftermath of the Great Depression by an intellectual and political community that had totally rejected commodity money and the principle of free market with the current understanding in Washington. One hope, though, is that free-market thinking and Austrian economic theories will have greater influence in the next decade or two, since their influence is now on a dramatic upswing. But there are a lot of hurdles to overcome. In the 1930s, in an effort to find the true cause of the crisis, Congress ordered an official investigation. It became known as the ``Pecora Investigation'' named after Ferdinand Pecora, the aggressive chief council of the hearings. It received a lot of public attention and brought about many major changes but, tragically, every conclusion made and new policies implemented caused the depression to worsen and legitimized bad economic theories that continue to haunt us to this day. The Federal Reserve was not blamed except for not printing enough money fast enough. Artificially low interest rates and mal-investment, the main source of the grossly distorted economy and bubble of the 1920s were exonerated. Not enough regulations were blamed, thus the Glass-Stiegall Act and the Securities Act of 1933 were passed and deepened the depression. Separating commercial and investment banking and the newly created SEC were to have solved all future problems--as long as the Fed was free from any restraint in its money creation operation to serve big-government spenders and members of the banking cartel. Since the flaws in the monetary and economic system were not corrected but made worse after the Depression, it was to be expected that periodic booms and busts would persist. The longer these cycles could be papered over with new money and credit, the greater would be the distortions and debt that would one day have to undergo a major correction. That correction is now in its early stages. Since the dollar was the reserve currency of the world and totally fiat since 1971, without any linkage to gold, the financial bubble became worldwide. This bubble that burst in 2008 was the largest in history. During the formation of the bubble, the U.S. as the issuer of the world currency received undeserved benefits. We essentially became the counterfeiter of the world and no one called us on it. Even today, the trust in the dollar that persists has buffeted the pain of the correction for us. This unique setup was a prime cause for our balance of payment deficits and the huge foreign debt we owe--the largest in the history of the world. The discord in the world financial system is telling us that it's time for us to pay for our profligate spending and massive foreign indebtedness. We have lived, as a nation, far beyond our means and the message is, for the foreseeable future, that we will be forced to live beneath our means as this debt is paid. The inflation optimists are excited about current signs of economic growth and have even announced the end of the recession. It is conceivable that a reprieve can be achieved and the penalty that our economy must endure delayed. A reprieve must not be confused with a pardon; one is a temporary delay, the other an exemption. The payback for our excesses is certain to come. Massively increasing debt and monetary inflation can slow the crash and change some government statistics encouraging the optimists. But real job growth and return of prosperity will remain elusive. The odds of us once again becoming an exporter of manufactured goods, like steel, cars, and textiles, are remote. Ironically, a reprieve may well restore some confidence and motivate some spending and investment. But instead of restoring long-term growth, it may well act perversely by precipitating price inflation and higher interest rates. Since today's interest rates are artificially set, much of our investing is unproductively misdirected. Current enthusiasm in the stock market is once again a reflection of the message that low interest rates send. Thus too, the government's stimulus package has helped to sustain the bond bubble, which in time must be deflated in order to get back to sound economic growth. All of this activity poses a threat to the dollar. Governments are very powerful, and when in partnership with the monetary authorities that can inflate the currency at will, big government thrives. Welfare demands and senseless wars can be financed for long period of time through inflation, as long as trust in the currency lasts. Trust, though ultimately controlled by facts, can be misleading, since currency values can gain benefit from a country that has a strong military and wealth and a reasonably healthy economy. Eventually, markets and reality overwhelm, and illusions about a currency's worth become a reality. Today, reality is setting in and the first of three major events has begun. The worldwide financial system, built on a foundation of paper, has received the shock waves of an impending collapse. The wild speculation and the derivatives market, the stock market bubble, the insurmountable debt--public and private--and the massive mal-investments have been shattered. The only solution so far offered worldwide, but led by the United States has been to ``print money'' faster, keep interest rates low at practically zero percent, and remove all stops for controlling deficits. These are the very policies that caused the disequilibrium, and doing more of the same, but only faster, can hardly help our economy. The addiction to easy credit and deficit defies a wise political solution. Politicians are incapable of delivering the message of frugality, common sense, and sound money. We can expect that the course we are on to continue and accelerate, since the first event, the collapse of the financial system, is still in its early stage. The housing crisis is far from over; the commercial property crisis has not yet gotten much attention, and the financial obligations of the government are growing exponentially. And none of this forces the slightest pause in the expanding of welfare growth. The number of regulations, which are indeed a tax, are exploding though the market was already suffering from regulatory excesses. There's a consensus in Washington that ``wise'' regulations can compensate for all the mistakes made by the Federal Reserve, the Executive Branch, and Congress. This fallacy has been around a long time and will be difficult to overcome. The pessimism of the middle class continues to get worse despite the prognostication of Wall Street and the Administration. Most Americans know that the standard of living and real wages have not gone up for the past 10 years. If you're not a shrewd stock trader and instead invested in stocks 10 years ago and held on, in real terms you would have lost 20 percent of your savings. The middle class is poorer also because house prices have crashed and many have lost their homes. On top of this, all we hear about is the trillions of dollars of debt and entitlement obligations that have been racked up for future taxpayers to pay. When it is revealed that the insider friends of the Fed and Congress get billions of dollars in bailout at the expense of the middle class, it's no wonder the people are taking to the streets and directing their hostilities toward both Republicans and Democrats in Washington. Many would agree it's well-earned anger and properly directed. This anger and frustration will certainly grow as the consequences of the collapse of the financial system become more severe. The concerted effort to prevent the correction the market demands, guarantees a prolonged agonizing crisis. Every effort to reverse the tide will depend on spending, higher deficits, increased taxes and money creation. This effort is now providing another grand bubble: the dollar/bond bubble. The next event will be a dollar crisis. A full-blown dollar crisis will be worse than our current financial crisis. The extent of a dollar crisis depends on whether or not the Washington politicians wake up and change their ways--a dubious hope. More likely, the insanity will continue until some not yet known event will undermine the confidence of the dollar worldwide. Signs of less desire by foreigners to hold our dollars are already present. I'm certain our Treasury and Federal Reserve are pulling out all stops to prevent a massive run on the dollar. At present the ``orderly'' retreat from the dollar is working. But it won't last. China is quite active in investing in national resources around the world, and including in Iran. While we live in the dark ages and believe only our military presence and military threats can protect our access to oil, China is actually spending some of their savings investing in their future access to energy and other precious metals and minerals. But the orderly retreat from the dollar won't last forever. Since 1973, shortly after the breakdown of the Bretton Woods Agreement, the dollar has lost 32 percent of its value against a Federal Reserve basket of currencies. But that doesn't tell the real story, since that is a measurement against all other currencies, and they are fiat currencies as well. This gave the dollar an artificial benefit from its position of power in great wealth and military prowess. The dollar in relationship to gold, however, is down 97 percent since 1971, and 82 percent as measured by the CPI. The dollar, mismanaged by the Fed, has not been a benefit to the savers who sought to responsibly take care of themselves. They've been cheated by a rotten system and are just beginning to understand exactly how the Federal Reserve has been responsible for the swindle. It is impossible to predict the time when confidence will be lost, but it can come quickly. Resorting to buying other paper currencies will not be of much help. When the dollar crashes, most likely the purchasing power of all currencies--since all countries hold dollars as a reserve--will go down as well. This means that dollars and other currencies will go into buying consumer items, precious metals and other physical properties. Consumer prices will soar, as well as interest rates. The central bank will lose control; and the more they inflate, the worse the confidence becomes. The interest rates will respond to these efforts by rising sharply. If the Fed tries to reverse the run on the dollar, interest rates will also soar, and the pain on the American citizens will be of such proportion that political chaos will result. Either scenario leads to political and social chaos--the third event, and the most dangerous. With no ability of the federal government to fund its commitments, international or domestic, major changes will occur in our system. The social unrest will elicit cries for government to exert unusual force to head off a complete breakdown of law and order. The ultimate trap will be set for a system of government claiming to protect a free society. If more power and police authority are not given to the federal government, it will be argued that only anarchy will result. If more government policing power is given, it will mean a lethal threat to civil liberties. Already we have permitted the notion that a single person, the Attorney General or President, can decide who is an ``enemy combatant'', thus denying that individual the right to habeas corpus, permitting indefinite detentions without charges made. This attitude toward civil liberties has changed significantly since the fear built around 9/11. Yes, I know declaring one an ``enemy combatant'' is reserved for the radical Muslims engaged in terrorism against the United States. To be reassured by this reasoning is quite dangerous and naive. Logic should not lead us to equate suspects with terrorists, and include American citizens, and yet this has already been set by precedent. Under difficult circumstances, our political leaders will not be hesitant to use these powers to maintain order. Tragically, the people may even demand it. We are rapidly moving toward a dangerous time in our history. Society as we know it is vulnerable to political and social chaos. This impending crisis comes as a consequence of our flawed foreign and domestic economic policies, a silly notion about money, ignorance about Central Banking, ignoring the onerous power and mischief of our out-of-control intelligence agencies, our unsustainable welfare state, and a willingness to sacrifice privacy and civil liberties in an attempt to achieve safety and security from an inept government. Dangerous times indeed! What can be done about it? Must we wait for the inevitable and expect to restore our liberties in a street fight against the overwhelming power of the state? Not a good option! The only way that we can prevent blood from running in the streets is to offer a better idea of the proper role of government in a society that desires first and foremost--liberty. And that is impossible without a firm commitment by our thought leaders to the ideas of freedom, the source of all creative energy and prosperity. An all-powerful state is the threat to that ideal. The prevailing attitude of the people--as it once was in early America--must be that of liberty and self reliance, rather than the nanny state and dependency relying on government force to mold all private choices. If this is understood, a smooth--although not painless--transition to a free society is achievable. Ignoring this option will be very destructive to everything that is dear to the hearts of most Americans. What is it that we must do? We must immediately embark on: Balance the budget by reducing spending; Change our foreign policy to that of non-intervention; A full audit and more supervision of the Federal Reserve leading to abolishing the Federal Reserve; Legalize competition to the Federal Reserve with competing currencies; Regain respect for civil liberties and privacy while reigning in the CIA; Wean ourselves off the dependence of wealth transfers by government; Abolish crony capitalism--no subsidies, no bailouts, no regulatory or tax privileges to protect the powerful elite especially the military industrial complex; and Eliminate the income tax, inheritance tax and taxes on savings and dividends. None of this can happen without the restoration of Congress to its dominant position of the three Branches of Government as was originally intended by the Constitution. The Executive and Judicial must be reined in, and Congress must assert its prerogatives over all legislation curtailing all unconstitutional agendae through budgetary controls. Signs abound that angry Americans are now more ready than ever before for a change in direction that is indeed real. If this program were improvised--even suddenly and dramatically--the adjustment, though significant and to a degree somewhat painful, would be much shorter and of minor consequence compared to the chaos and poverty that will result if we refuse to change our gluttonous appetite for a free lunch.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, I rise at this time to talk about a piece of legislation that I have recently introduced. That legislation is H.R. 4248. It is called the Free Competition in Currency Act. I believe long term this is a piece of legislation that will play an important role in the monetary reform that will be a necessity if we continue to do what we have been doing with our economy and our financial system. We are in the middle of a financial crisis today. Some people think we have turned a corner, but, quite frankly, I do not believe that has occurred. Recently, though, we have just had the opening bells of an inquiry into what the cause of the crisis has been. It is the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission. It is a take-off of the Pecora Commission that was established in the 1930s to figure out why the crash occurred then. Of course, that commission met and talked to people. They tried to figure out what was the matter. And from my viewpoint, they came down with all of the wrong conclusions. They said that the Federal Reserve was involved, that the Federal Reserve didn't print enough money fast enough and they didn't have a big enough bailout package and they needed a lot more regulation. So they did all of those things for the first time in our history, under the two administrations, the Hoover and the Roosevelt administrations, and they prolonged the Depression. They took a 1-year depression/recession and turned it into a 15-year depression. So I believe what we are going through right now is the same old song and dance. We are doing the same thing again. We have this new inquiry, and the members of the commission are people who didn't see it coming, didn't explain it, and didn't anticipate it. And the people who are coming before the commission, as far as I can see so far, had no anticipation or are acting surprised that the crisis came and that there was a bubble. So I can hardly see any good results coming from this. My position over the many years has been that the Federal Reserve is a dangerous organization because it creates the bubble. Our country would be better off with a strong central bank like the Federal Reserve. I argue from a moral, economic, and a constitutional viewpoint that it has no right to exist and it is very dangerous to us. I am very pleased, though, that one of the pieces of legislation I introduced, H.R. 1207, to audit the Federal Reserve, has met with a large amount of support. We have 316 cosponsors of that bill, and I think that is a major step in the right direction, looking to the Federal Reserve for the cause of our problem: the easy money system, the easy credit, the fixing of interest rates too low. Now, the reason I am addressing this is because I believe the correction has a long way to run and that eventually we will have to have monetary reform. Now, in spite of my position being that we don't need the Federal Reserve, I am not in favor of closing the Federal Reserve down in one day or two. But I do believe the monetary system will close down this government and the monetary system and the Federal Reserve and a lot of other things if we continue on our profligate ways of spending and borrowing and inflating the currency and regulating the currency, and this will get much worse until we have a total collapse of the system. So my bill, what it does is it introduces competition, competition in currencies. The Federal Reserve system and the dollar standard is run by a cartel, a monopoly. They don't allow competition because they know that they can't compete. Just as we have competition in the post office with FedEx and UPS, I think that the Federal Reserve deserves a little competition. The public school system has competition with private schools and it has competition with home schooling. There is no reason in the world that we can't enforce the Constitution, legalize the Constitution and say that we can have competitions in currencies, but there are three major things that we must do to do that, and the bill does this. We repeal legal tender laws and remove the monopoly control of the Federal Reserve. We legalize private mints so mints can mint coins, and they will be controlled by fraud laws and anticounterfeit laws. Today, our government commits fraud and counterfeit by printing money at will. If a private organization did that, they would be imprisoned for the fraud they are causing. But the other important reform that would have to occur for money to circulate and compete against the monopoly control of the Federal Reserve would be to take taxes off money. The Constitution says only gold and silver can be money, only that can be legal tender, so you can't tax it and allow it to be competitive. So these things could occur, and if nobody wanted to use it they wouldn't have to and everybody could be happy with the Federal Reserve. But if the conditions get so chaotic and the people are looking for an alternative, they can go and start operating in another currency. So this to me could provide a smooth transition. It would not be chaotic. It would be legalized in the Constitution. It would be good, sound economics; and, eventually, the most important thing it would do, it would restrain the spending of this Congress, because as long as you have a Federal Reserve over there willing to print up the money any time we spend more money that we don't have and we can't borrow, then the Federal Reserve will accommodate us. Therefore, I argue the case for competition in currency and strictly limit it in government.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, Reverend Charles L. Allen. Sr., Pastor of the Greater Mount Nebo Missionary Baptist Church, is retiring after thirty-two years of dedicated service. I am pleased to join his parishioners in thanking Reverend Allen for his devoted service to his church and community. Reverend Allen has served in many capacities throughout his years in the ministry. Among the many positions Reverend Allen has held are President of the Puritan District Congress of Texas and advisor to the City Wide Ushers Association. Reverend Allen also taught Moody Bible College courses to his parishioners and other interested members of the community. Reverend Allen served in the United States Army from 1952 until 1954. Under Reverend Allen's leadership, Greater Mount Nebo experienced a tremendous increase in membership. Reverend Allen helped ensure Greater Mount Nebo had sufficient resources to construct a new edifice and retire the church's mortgage. Reverend Allen also helped his congregation, and the entire community, by organizing a variety of education courses. Reverend Allen's parishioners benefited not just from his teachings, but from his personal example. Reverend Allen treats everyone who crosses his path with integrity and compassion. The vitality and warmth exhibited by this spiritual and dedicated leader has earned him the respect and admiration of those individuals who have been privileged to know and work with him. In conclusion, Madam Speaker, I am pleased to join the congregation of Greater Mount Nebo Missionary Baptist Church in thanking Reverend Charles L. Allen, Sr., for all he has done to better the lives of his parishioners.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. The chairman states that the main purpose of this bill is to prevent the Iranians from getting a nuclear weapon. That isn't even as powerful a statement as was made that enticed us into the Iraq war. There was the claim that they already had them. But now, this is a pretense, and yet here we are taking these drastic steps. My main reason for opposing this bill is that I think it's detrimental to our national security. There's no other reason. It doesn't serve our interests. So I am absolutely opposed to it. In the late 1930s and the early 1940s the American people did not want to go into war, but there were some that were maneuvering us into war, and they used the argument that you needed an event. So, in June of 1941, sanctions were put against Japan, incidentally and ironically, to prohibit oil products from going into Japan. Within 6 months there was the bombing of Pearl Harbor. And there is now talk, there's been talk in the media, and we've heard about it, we need to bomb Iran. And that's what the people hear. The sanctions are a use of force. This is just not modest. This is very serious. And the way this is written, it literally could end up with a blockade. It could be trying to punish our friends and cut off trade, and this cannot help us in any way. We would like to help the dissidents. We'd like to encourage them to overthrow their government. But hardly should we have our CIA, with U.S. funded programs, going in there with a policy of regime change. They know these kind of things happen. We've been involved in this business in Iran since 1953. And it doesn't serve us well. It backfires on us, comes back to haunt us. One of the goals explicitly expressed by al Qaeda and their leaders has been they would like to draw us into the Middle East because it would cost us a lot of money and it could hurt us financially. And the second reason they want us over there is to get us bogged down in an endless war. And for the last decade, that is what we've been doing. We are bogged down to the point where it's very discouraging to the American people, very frustrating, no signs of victory, no signs of peace. But we're bogged down. These were the precise goals of the al Qaeda leadership. And also, one of the purposes of enticing us over there and being involved is to give a greater incentive to recruit those individuals who become violent against us. And this has been unbelievably successful. So we've been involved in Iraq. We've been involved in Afghanistan. We're bombing Pakistan and almost, this is like another bonus for those who want us to be attacked, is that we're over there and just fomenting this anger and hatred toward us. That is why I believe this is not in our best interest. It actually hurts us. Once we say that we're going to do something like using force and prevent vital products from going in, it means that we've given up on diplomacy. Diplomacy's out the window. And they're not capable of attacking us. You know, this idea that they are on the verge of a bomb, you know, our CIA said they haven't been working on it since 2003. And the other thing is, if you want to give them incentive to have a bomb, just keep pestering like this, just intimidate them. Provoke it. This is provocative. They might have a greater incentive than ever. They can't even make enough gasoline for themselves. I mean, they are not a threat. They don't have an army worth anything. They don't have a navy. They don't have an air force. They don't have intercontinental ballistic missiles. So it is not a threat to our national security. I see the threat to our national security with this type of policy which could come and backfire and hurt us. I want to read number 5 in the bill, that particular item, because it makes my case, rather than making the case for those who want these sanctions. I think this literally makes my case. Number 5 says, on October 7, 2008, then-Senator Obama stated Iran right now imports gasoline, even though it's an oil producer, because its oil infrastructure has broken down. If we can prevent them from importing the gasoline that they need and the refined petroleum products, that starts changing their cost-benefit analysis, that starts putting the squeeze on them. The squeeze on whom? On the people. This will unify the dissent. This will unify the Iranian people against us. If we want to encourage true dissent and overthrow that government, which is more spontaneous and honest, I would say this is doing exactly the opposite.

Mr. PAUL. I thank the gentleman. If the gentleman from California didn't like my analogy about how we were maneuvered into war in World War II, I think it might be much more appropriate to compare it to the sanctions on Iraq. There were those in the 1990s that wanted us to go to war with Iraq. We were looking for an excuse, and we put strong sanctions, continued flying over their country and bombing. Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of kids died because of those sanctions, and eventually they got their war. We ended up in the war. Anybody who believes that taking gasoline away from the common person in Iran is going to motivate them to get rid of their Ayatollah--it's the Ayatollah that carries the power--that's not going to happen. It just does exactly the opposite. So this is why I believe this is a much greater threat to our national security. It does not help us. It doesn't achieve the goals that are set out. For instance, we now commonly say that the Iranians have no right to enrich. Well, they signed a nonproliferation treaty, and they have not ever been told that they are making a bomb. And what we are saying in this bill is that they can't enrich anymore. So in a way, you're violating international law by saying they can't enrich, period. So that is just looking for trouble. Now, what else this bill will do: It is going to push the support of the Iranians in another direction. It's going to push them towards India, China, and Russia, and these countries have special associations with Iran. So we are going to separate us. We will be isolated from that, and they are going to have a much closer alliance with these countries. That will not serve our interests. It's going to serve the interest of one country mostly, and that's China. China acts only almost like capitalists. They take our dollars they have earned from us and they are spending the dollars over there. They would like to buy the oil, refine the oil, and drill the oil. But here, we assume that we have to do it through force, through sanctions, threats, intimidation, and secret maneuvers to overthrow their regime. It just doesn't work. It sounds good. It sounds easy, but it does backfire on us. You get too many unintended consequences. And besides, our national security does not depend on what we do in the Middle East. Our national security is threatened by this. We are overstretched. We're broke. And this is part of the strategy, as I mentioned before. Our archenemies in that region want to bankrupt us. They want to stir up hatred toward us, and they want to bog us down. And they're achieving what their goals are.

Mr. PAUL. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I talked to somebody today that will be voting for these, but admitted that they won't work and it is mere symbolism. So already they don't think these will do much good, even those who will vote for it. They're impossible to enforce, is one reason, and it will create a black market. And these particular sanctions are most difficult to enforce just because of the nature of the way it's written. One must understand a little bit about the pressures put on this country to act in a defensive way. They happen to be surrounded by a lot of nuclear bombs. And they don't have a history, the Iranians. As bad as they are for their leadership and how bad their regime is, they're not expansionists territorially. I mean, how many years has it been since they invaded another country for the purpose of taking over another country? It is just not in recent history at all. But the countries around them, India--India has nuclear weapons, China has nuclear weapons, Pakistan, Israel, the United States. I mean, they're all around them, so I'm sure they feel like a cornered rat. What I see here is propaganda, propaganda to build fear into people, to prepare the people for what is likely to come, just as we did in the 1990s, fear that there were weapons of mass destruction, but this one is, well, someday they might get a weapon of mass destruction. Unfortunately, I am just really concerned that this is going to lead to hostilities because this is the initiation. The fear is building up. Too often in this country we talk of peace at the same time that we pursue war. We pursue war, and we use these efforts to push our policies on others. And quite frankly, we don't have any more money to pursue this policy, whether it's used by the militarism or even to try to buy friends by giving them a lot of money. It just doesn't work. I urge a ``no'' vote on this resolution in the interest of United States security. Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a few more points as to why I oppose this new round of sanctions on Iran, which is another significant step toward a U.S. war on that country. I find it shocking that legislation this serious and consequential is brought up in such a cavalier manner. Suspending the normal rules of the House to pass legislation is a process generally reserved for ``non-controversial'' business such as the naming of post offices. Are we to believe that this House takes matters of war and peace as lightly as naming post offices? This legislation seeks to bar from doing business in the United States any foreign entity that sells refined petroleum to Iran or otherwise enhances Iran's ability to import refined petroleum such as financing, brokering, underwriting, or providing ships for such. Such sanctions also apply to any entity that provides goods or services that enhance Iran's ability to maintain or expand its domestic production of refined petroleum. This casts the sanctions net worldwide, with enormous international economic implications. Recently, the Financial Times reported that, ``[i]n recent months, Chinese companies have greatly expanded their presence in Iran's oil sector. In the coming months, Sinopec, the state-owned Chinese oil company, is scheduled to complete the expansion of the Tabriz and Shazand refineries--adding 3.3 million gallons of gasoline per day.'' Are we to conclude, with this in mind, that China or its major state- owned corporations will be forbidden by this legislation from doing business with the United States? What of our other trading partners who currently do business in Iran's petroleum sector or insure those who do so? Has anyone seen an estimate of how this sanctions act will affect the US economy if it is actually enforced? As we have learned with U.S. sanctions on Iraq, and indeed with U.S. sanctions on Cuba and elsewhere, it is citizens rather than governments who suffer most. The purpose of these sanctions is to change the regime in Iran, but past practice has demonstrated time and again that sanctions only strengthen regimes they target and marginalize any opposition. As would be the case were we in the U.S. targeted for regime change by a foreign government, people in Iran will tend to put aside political and other differences to oppose that threatening external force. Thus this legislation will likely serve to strengthen the popularity of the current Iranian government. Any opposition continuing to function in Iran would be seen as operating in concert with the foreign entity seeking to overthrow the regime. This legislation seeks to bring Iran in line with international demands regarding its nuclear materials enrichment programs, but what is ironic is that Section 2 of H.R. 2194 itself violates the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to which both the United States and Iran are signatories. This section states that ``[i]t shall be the policy of the United States . . . to prevent Iran from achieving the capability to make nuclear weapons, including by supporting international diplomatic efforts to halt Iran's uranium enrichment program.'' Article V of the NPT states clearly that, ``[n]othing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and in conformity with articles I and II of this Treaty.'' As Iran has never been found in violation of the NPT--has never been found to have diverted nuclear materials for non-peaceful purposes--this legislation seeking to deny Iran the right to enrichment even for peaceful purposes itself violates the NPT. Mr. Speaker, I am concerned that many of my colleagues opposing war on Iran will vote in favor of this legislation, seeing it as a step short of war to bring Iran into line with U.S. demands. I would remind them that sanctions and the blockades that are required to enforce them are themselves acts of war according to international law. I urge my colleagues to reject this saber-rattling but ultimately counterproductive legislation.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, I rise to introduce the Free Competition in Currency Act of 2009. Currency, or money, is what allows civilization to flourish. In the absence of money, barter is the name of the game; if the farmer needs shoes, he must trade his eggs and milk to the cobbler and hope that the cobbler needs eggs and milk. Money makes the transaction process far easier. Rather than having to search for someone with reciprocal wants, the farmer can exchange his milk and eggs for an agreed-upon medium of exchange with which he can then purchase shoes. This medium of exchange should satisfy certain properties: it should be durable, that is to say, it does not wear out easily; it should be portable, that is, easily carried; it should be divisible into units usable for everyday transactions; it should be recognizable and uniform, so that one unit of money has the same properties as every other unit; it should be scarce, in the economic sense, so that the extant supply does not satisfy the wants of everyone demanding it; it should be stable, so that the value of its purchasing power does not fluctuate wildly; and it should be reproducible, so that enough units of money can be created to satisfy the needs of exchange. Over millennia of human history, gold and silver have been the two metals that have most often satisfied these conditions, survived the market process, and gained the trust of billions of people. Gold and silver are difficult to counterfeit, a property which ensures they will always be accepted in commerce. It is precisely for this reason that gold and silver are anathema to governments. A supply of gold and silver that is limited in supply by nature cannot be inflated, and thus serves as a check on the growth of government. Without the ability to inflate the currency, governments find themselves constrained in their actions, unable to carry on wars of aggression or to appease their overtaxed citizens with bread and circuses. At this country's founding, there was no government controlled national currency. While the Constitution established the congressional power of minting coins, it was not until 1792 that the U.S. Mint was formally established. In the meantime, Americans made do with foreign silver and gold coins. Even after the Mint's operations got underway, foreign coins continued to circulate within the United States, and did so for several decades. On the desk in my office I have a sign that says: ``Don't steal--the government hates competition.'' Indeed, any power a government arrogates to itself, it is loathe to give back to the people. Just as we have gone from a constitutionally instituted national defense consisting of a limited army and navy bolstered by militias and letters of marque and reprisal, we have moved from a system of competing currencies to a government-instituted banking cartel that monopolizes the issuance of currency. In order to reintroduce a system of competing currencies, there are three steps that must be taken to produce a legal climate favorable to competition. The first step consists of eliminating legal tender laws. Article I Section 10 of the Constitution forbids the States from making anything but gold and silver a legal tender in payment of debts. States are not required to enact legal tender laws, but should they choose to, the only acceptable legal tender is gold and silver, the two precious metals that individuals throughout history and across cultures have used as currency. However, there is nothing in the Constitution that grants the Congress the power to enact legal tender laws. We, the Congress, have the power to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, but not to declare a legal tender. Yet, there is a section of U.S. Code, 31 U.S.C. 5103, that purports to establish U.S. coins and currency, including Federal Reserve notes, as legal tender. Historically, legal tender laws have been used by governments to force their citizens to accept debased and devalued currency. Gresham's Law describes this phenomenon, which can be summed up in one phrase: bad money drives out good money. An emperor, a king, or a dictator might mint coins with half an ounce of gold and force merchants, under pain of death, to accept them as though they contained one ounce of gold. Each ounce of the king's gold could now be minted into two coins instead of one, so the king now had twice as much ``money'' to spend on building castles and raising armies. As these legally overvalued coins circulated, the coins containing the full ounce of gold would be pulled out of circulation and hoarded. We saw this same phenomenon happen in the mid-1960s when the U.S. government began to mint subsidiary coinage out of copper and nickel rather than silver. The copper and nickel coins were legally overvalued, the silver coins undervalued in relation, and silver coins vanished from circulation. These actions also give rise to the most pernicious effects of inflation. Most of the merchants and peasants who received this devalued currency felt the full effects of inflation, the rise in prices and the lowered standard of living, before they received any of the new currency. By the time they received the new currency, prices had long since doubled, and the new currency they received would give them no benefit. In the absence of legal tender laws, Gresham's Law no longer holds. If people are free to reject debased currency, and instead demand sound money, sound money will gradually return to use in society. Merchants would have been free to reject the king's coin and accept only coins containing full metal weight. The second step to reestablishing competing currencies is to eliminate laws that prohibit the operation of private mints. One private enterprise which attempted to popularize the use of precious metal coins was Liberty Services, the creators of the Liberty Dollar. Evidently the government felt threatened, as Liberty Dollars had all their precious metal coins seized by the FBI and Secret Service in November of 2007. Of course, not all of these coins were owned by Liberty Services, as many were held in trust as backing for silver and gold certificates which Liberty Services issued. None of this matters, of course, to the government, which hates competition. The responsibility to protect contracts is of no interest to the government. The sections of U.S. Code which Liberty Services is accused of violating are erroneously considered to be anti-counterfeiting statutes, when in fact their purpose was to shut down private mints that had been operating in California. California was awash in gold in the aftermath of the 1849 gold rush, yet had no U.S. Mint to mint coinage. There was not enough foreign coinage circulating in California either, so private mints stepped into the breech to provide their own coins. As was to become the case in other industries during the Progressive era, the private mints were eventually accused of circulating debased (substandard) coinage, and with the supposed aim of providing government-sanctioned regulation and a government guarantee of purity, the 1864 Coinage Act was passed, which banned private mints from producing their own coins for circulation as currency. The final step to ensuring competing currencies is to eliminate capital gains and sales taxes on gold and silver coins. Under current federal law, coins are considered collectibles, and are liable for capital gains taxes. Short-term capital gains rates are at income tax levels, up to 35 percent, while long-term capital gains taxes are assessed at the collectibles rate of 28 percent. Furthermore, these taxes actually tax monetary debasement. As the dollar weakens, the nominal dollar value of gold increases. The purchasing power of gold may remain relatively constant, but as the nominal dollar value increases, the Federal Government considers this an increase in wealth, and taxes accordingly. Thus, the more the dollar is debased, the more capital gains taxes must be paid on holdings of gold and other metals. Just as pernicious are the sales and use taxes which are assessed on gold and silver at the state level in many States. Imagine having to pay sales tax at the bank every time you change a $10 bill for a roll of quarters to do laundry. Inflation is a pernicious tax on the value of money, but even the official numbers, which are massaged downwards, are only on the order of 4 percent per year. Sales taxes in many states can take away 8 percent or more on every single transaction in which consumers wish to convert their Federal Reserve Notes into gold or silver. In conclusion, Madam Speaker, allowing for competing currencies will allow market participants to choose a currency that suits their needs, rather than the needs of the government. The prospect of American citizens turning away from the dollar towards alternate currencies will provide the necessary impetus to the U.S. Government to regain control of the dollar and halt its downward spiral. Restoring soundness to the dollar will remove the government's ability and incentive to inflate the currency, and keep us from launching unconstitutional wars that burden our economy to excess. With a sound currency, everyone is better off, not just those who control the monetary system. I urge my colleagues to consider the redevelopment of a system of competing currencies and cosponsor the Free Competition in Currency Act.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Certainly, in the last 24 hours, we've had a lot of discussion about Afghanistan and whether or not we should send more troops. As a matter of fact, that debate has been going on for a long time. The whole debate about Afghanistan is something that makes me think that we are bogged down, considering the fact that it has been going on for 8 years. This is not new for us. This is more or less the rule rather than the exception, and I believe this comes about because of the way we go to war. In the last 60-some years, we have never had a declaration of war, but we have been involved in plenty. We've been involved in Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, and the Iraq War, and now Afghanistan, and it looks like it's going to be Pakistan as well. So I think the reason we get here is because we don't declare war and we slip into war, and then it becomes political. There are two sides. There is one side of the argument that says, Let's just come home. And the other side says, Fight it all out. And people say, No, you can't be an extremist on this. You have to have a balance. And the balance is chaotic. There's no way of measuring victory, and nobody wants to give up, claiming it would be humiliating to give up. But just think of the tragedy of Vietnam, all those years and all those deaths and all that money spent. Eventually we left, and South Vietnam is now a unified country, but we still have troops in Korea, in Europe, and in Japan. And we are bankrupt. So some day we are going to have to wake up and look at the type of foreign policy that the Founders advised us to have, and that is nonintervention: don't get involved in the internal affairs of other nations, have free and open trade and accept friendship with other countries who offer it, and that we shouldn't be the policemen of the world and we shouldn't be telling other people what to do. We cannot be the policemen of the world and pay for all those bills because we are literally bankrupt. In thinking about the dilemma that we have, I think back, even back in the 1960s when I was an Air Force flight surgeon for 5 years, and that was the first time I heard the term ``quagmire.'' And thinking about that for many, many years, that's all I can think about right now is to evaluate what we have. There are a few phrases that have been around for a long time, and I believe they more or less describe what is happening here. Quagmire. Certainly that is what we are doing. We are digging a hole for ourselves. ``Perpetual war for perpetual peace.'' We have all heard that term, and it sounds like we are in perpetual war. ``War is the health of the state.'' We all know the government size and sacrifice of civil liberties always occurs much more so in the midst of a war. A book was written many years ago by one of the most, if not the most decorated soldier we ever had, Smedley Butler. He wrote a book called ``War is a Racket.'' And I have come to this belief that war literally is a racket for the people who push these wars, whether it's the military industrial complex or the special interests and the various factions, but it's never, it's never for the people. Today it is said that we're over there to protect our national security to go into Afghanistan. Well, it's down to 100 al Qaedas in Afghanistan, and, quite frankly, the Afghan Government had nothing to do--they said they harbored the al Qaeda, and that is true, but do you think those 19 guys needed to do pushups in Afghanistan to come over here and do what they did? The real planning wasn't in Afghanistan. It was in Spain. It was in Germany. Where was the real training? The real training was in Florida. The training was in Florida, and the FBI had evidence at the time that they were being trained, and it's totally ignored. And yet we are concentrating, we are still back to 9/11, fear of nuclear war. We have to go in, scare the people. Yet what is the motivation for individuals to become radical against us, whether it's in the Taliban or al Qaeda? There is one single factor that is the most influential in motivating somebody to commit suicide terrorism against anybody or us, and that is occupation by a foreign nation. And now, where have we occupied? We have occupied Iraq and Afghanistan. We are bombing Pakistan. But not only the literal occupation, but also, we have this threat on Pakistan. So I would say it's time for us to reassess ourselves and look at a noninterventionist foreign policy.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke does not want us to know any the details of the Fed's secret operations. This position is not surprising and has been typical of all central bank chairmen. Bernanke's stated goal is ``to design a system of financial oversight that will provide a robust framework for preventing future crises.'' During its 96 years of existence, the Federal Reserve has played havoc with our economy and brought great suffering to millions through unemployment and price escalation. And it has achieved what only a central bank can: A steady depreciation of our currency. Today's dollar is now worth 4 cents, compared to the dollar entrusted to the Federal Reserve in 1913. Ninety-six years should have been plenty of time for the Fed to come up with a plan for preventing economic crises. Since the Fed is the source of all economic downturns, it's impossible for any central banker to regulate in such a manner to prevent the problems that are predictable consequences of his own monetary management. The Federal Reserve fixes interest rates at levels inevitably lower than those demanded by the market. This manipulation is a form of price control through credit expansion, and is the ultimate cause of business cycles and so many of our economic problems, generating the mal-investment, excessive debt, stock, bond, commodity, and housing bubbles. The Federal Reserve's monetary inflation, indeed, does push the CPI upward, but concentrating on the government's reports of the CPI and the PPI is nothing more than the distraction from the other harm done by the Federal Reserve's effort at central economic planning through secret monetary policy operations. Real inflation, the expansion of our money supply, is greatly undercounted by these indices. In response to our latest financial crisis, the Federal Reserve turned on its printing press and literally doubled the monetary base. This staggering creation of dollars has yet to be reflected in many consumer prices, but will ultimately hit the middle class and poor with a cruel devaluation of their savings and real earnings. The Fed has clearly failed on its mandate to maintain full employment and price stability. It's time to find out what's going on. Instead of assuming responsibility for the Fed's role in the crisis, Bernanke brags about, ``arresting'' the crisis. I would suggest to Mr. Bernanke that it's too early to brag. Bernanke decries any effort to gain transparency of the Fed's actions to find out just who gets bailed out and who is left to fail. Instead, he proposes giving even more power to the Fed to regulate the entire financial system. What he does not recognize--nor does he want to admit--is that he is talking about symptoms while ignoring the source of the crisis: the Federal Reserve itself. More regulations will never compensate for all the distortion and excesses caused by monetary inflation and artificially low interest rates. Regulation distracts from the real cause while further interfering with the market forces, thus guaranteeing that the recession will become much deeper and prolonged. Chairman Bernanke's argument for Fed secrecy is a red herring. It serves to distract so the special interests that benefit from the Fed policy never become known to the public. Who can possibly buy this argument that this secrecy is required to protect the people from political influence? My bill, H.R. 1207, has nothing to do with interference with monetary policy. This was explicitly stated in the amendment voted on in the Financial Services Committee. Bernanke's argument for protecting the independence of the Fed is his argument for protecting the secrecy of the Fed. Chairman Bernanke concludes that ``America needs a strong''-- think cartel--``nonpolitical''--think Goldman Sachs--``and independent''--think secret--``central bank with the tools to promote financial stability, in the midst of a horrendous financial crisis, and to help steer our economy to recovery without inflation.'' This belief is a dream that one day will become a nightmare for all Americans unless we come to our senses, stop our wild spending, runaway deficits, printing press money, massive bureaucratic regulations, and our unnecessary world empire. A crucial step towards fixing these problems will be transparency of the Federal Reserve.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, Monday, November 23, in Port Lavaca, Texas, IBC Bank and HJM Elementary School will co-host the Shark Town Micro Community Grand Opening. Shark Town Micro Community is an innovative education program that gives HJM Elementary students the opportunity to learn ``real world'' business and financial skills. I am pleased to extend my best wishes to the people of IBC Bank, HJM Elementary, and all the businesses, educators, and, especially, students participating in this program. The Shark Town Micro Community is a small community within the school run by the students. The HJM Elementary student council serves as the Shark Town council, and the student council president serves as the mayor of Shark Town. HJM Elementary students named the community after their school's mascot, a shark. Students may choose to work at any of a variety of business, including an IBC Bank, Wal-Mart, and HEB grocery store. Students can also work at Shark Town's branch of the IRS, student workers have to pay taxes, one of Shark Town's utility companies, the post office, the local newspaper, the safety patrol, or the recycling center. Students may also train to be future teachers. Local Port Lavaca businesses sponsor their Shark Town counterparts. The businesses provide their Shark Town counterparts with signs, badges, and shirts for their employees. Local businesses also provide funds for the Shark Town companies. Employees of the local businesses also periodically visit the school to offer assistance to their counterpart businesses. Students receive salaries based on their jobs and their work performance. In order to participate in Shark Town, students must submit job applications and be interviewed. Payment is in the form of ``sand dollars.'' Students may use their sand dollars to pay their taxes and utility bills as well as to shop at Shark Town's stores. Madam Speaker, the Shark Town Micro Community program represents an innovative means of providing students with a unique opportunity to learn about how businesses operate as well as develop work and financial management habits that will serve them well throughout their lives. It is my pleasure to again congratulate all those participating in the Shark Town Micro Community project.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I want to express my appreciation for your getting this Special Order on this very important subject. Of course, a lot of people in this country are asking, What should we do about Afghanistan? It's a pretty important question. It might be one of the most important questions that we are asking right now. And yet nobody seems to have an answer. I think the difficulty in finding an answer comes sometimes from not having fully understood why we got there. I just can't imagine this debate that's going on within our government today, the executive branch, the legislative branch, and with the people--can you imagine this going on during World War II? How many troops should we have? What is our exit strategy? Who is our enemy? How are we going to impose democracy? It's so far removed from what a traditional responsibility is of our government, which is to provide national security. Now they have practically run out of excuses for why we are over in Afghanistan. The only one that is left that they seem to cling to is that we are there for national security; we want to fight the bad guys over there because we don't want to fight them over here. I will talk a little about that later; but, quite frankly, I think that's a fallacious argument and actually makes things a lot worse. It just bewilders me about how we get trapped into these situations. I happen to believe that it's because we get ourselves involved too carelessly, too easily and we don't follow the Constitution, because under the Constitution, you're supposed to declare the war, know who your enemy is, and know when you can declare victory and bring the troops home. And we did that up until and through World War II. But since then, that hasn't been the case. I recall a book I read in the 1980s written by Barbara Tuchman. She wrote a book called the ``March of Folly,'' and she went back as far as Troy, all the way up through Vietnam and took very special interest in countries where they were almost obsessed or possessed with a policy, even though it was not in their interest, and the foolishness and the inability to change course. She died in 1989, but I keep thinking that if she had lived, she would probably write a history of our recent years, another ``march of folly.'' Just think of what has happened since the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet system collapsed. It didn't take us long. Did we have any peace dividends? No. There were arguments for more military spending, we had more responsibility, we had to go and police the world. So it wasn't long after that, what were we doing? We were involved in the Persian Gulf war. And then, following that, we had decades of bombing in Iraq which didn't please the Arabs and the Muslims of the world and certainly the Iraqis, but it had nothing to do with national security. And then, of course, we continued and accelerated our support of the various puppet governments in the Middle East. In doing so, we actually went to the part of not only supporting the governments, but we started putting troops on their land. And when we had an air base in Saudi Arabia, that was rather offensive. If you understand the people over there, this is a violation of a deeply held religious view. It is considered their holy land; and foreigners, especially military foreigners, are seen as infidels. So if you're looking for a fight or a problem, just put troops on their land. But also, as a result of the policy that we have had in the Middle East, we have been perceived as being anti-Palestinian. This has not set well either. Since that time, of course, we haven't backed off one bit. We had the Persian Gulf war, and then we had 9/11. We know that 9/11 changed everything. We had 15 individuals from Saudi Arabia, a few from Yemen and a few from Egypt, but, aha, this is an excuse that we have got to get the bad guys. So where are the bad guys? Well, Iraq, of course. Of course, they figured, well, we can't quite do that, let's go into Afghanistan. Of course, not one single Afghani did anything to us. They said, oh, no, the al Qaeda visited there. But I just can't quite accept the fact that the individuals that were flying those airplanes got their training by going to these training camps in Afghanistan doing push-ups and being tough and strong. What did they do? Where was the planning? The planning was done in Spain and they were accepted there in legal bases. They were done in Germany; they were accepted there. As a matter of fact, they even came to this country with legal visas. And they were accepted by the countries. And, no, no, we said, it's the Taliban; it's the people of Afghanistan, never questioning the fact that a few years back, back in 1989 when the Soviets were wrecking the place, we were allied with the people who were friends of Osama bin Laden, and we were over there trying to support him. So he then was a freedom fighter. And the hypocrisy of all this and the schizophrenia of it all, they were on again and off again. No wonder we get ourselves into these difficulties. And it doesn't seem to ever lead up. The one assessment that was made after Vietnam, and I think you can apply it here, is how do we get in and why do we get bogged down? And two individuals that were talking about this, East and West, Vietnam and the United States, they sort of came to the conclusion that we, the Americans, overestimated the ominous power of our military, we could conquer anybody and everybody. And we underestimated the tenacity of people who are defending their homeland, sort of like we were defending our homeland in the Revolutionary War, and the invaders and the occupiers were the Red Coats. There's a big difference, and you can overcome all kinds of obstacles; but we have never seemed to have learned that. And unless we do, I don't think we can solve our problems. Indeed, we have to realize that we are not the policemen of the world. We cannot nation-build. And Presidential candidates on both sides generally tell the people that's what they want, and the people say, keep our fingers crossed, hope it's true. But then, once again, our policies continue down the road, and we never seem to have the energy to back off of this. I emphasize, once again, that I think we could keep our eye on the target, emphasize what we should be doing if we went to war a lot more cautiously, if we have an enemy that we have to fight in our national defense and then there is a declaration of war.

Mr. PAUL. I will yield.