Pete Stark

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. At this time, Mr. Speaker, I'm delighted to yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell).

Mr. STARK. I yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.

Mr. STARK. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. STARK. I yield myself 30 seconds, Mr. Speaker, just to remind the distinguished gentleman from Wisconsin that he and 14 of his colleagues voted for this bill in the Ways and Means Committee last July. I don't mind mixing it up with the health care reform, but it's not. It's the doctor fix.

Mr. STARK. In just a moment, yes. The important thing is that if we move this aside, we're correcting the mistake that was made. Let's forget about who made it. It was there. Now this may not be the end-all correction, but there is no reason that we couldn't come back next year if we find that the formula doesn't work.

Mr. STARK. I will yield myself an additional 30 seconds. If we don't do it and we do the 4-year fix that you, Mike, suggested, or the 3-year, and then it doesn't work, we will have $400 billion to correct. My point is this. If we could remove it for a moment from the discussion on the overall health reform bill--which we can have a spirited discussion on--this is a technical fix which all of your members supported on a bipartisan basis.

Mr. STARK. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.

Mr. STARK. Well, as I say, the gentleman supported it a few months ago. At this point, Mr. Speaker, I'd like to yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from Nevada (Ms. Berkley).

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

Mr. STARK. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. STARK. I yield myself such time as I may consume, Mr. Speaker, to remind my distinguished friend from Louisiana that the American College of Cardiology, the Louisiana Medical Association, and most every medical association in the United States has endorsed the legislation. I reserve the balance of my time. Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. STARK. Mr. Speaker, at this time I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Etheridge). (Mr. ETHERIDGE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. STARK. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee) for a unanimous consent request. (Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. STARK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time. I again encourage my friends on the other side of the aisle to support this fix for the physician reimbursement. It was correct originally in our major health reform bill. The reason it was separated, I would have to admit, was purely political. We had to abide by the President's request that we did not exceed certain costs, and we separated it for that. For those of you who suggest that the Senate may do nothing with this, I'm afraid we have to leave that to the American Medical Association and America's physicians. They will have to pressure the Senate to add this at some point in their deliberations. I think it's beyond us to do that, and my suspicion is that with the more than 150 medical societies around the country, they will be able to importune our friends on the other side of the Capitol. Mr. Speaker, I believe that we will see a format of this bill facing us from the other side. I hope we do. We are talking about postponing any length of time increases, whether it's 4 years and we get $400 billion, whether it's a couple of years and we get $200 billion, there was a mistake made. The distinguished gentleman whom the current ranking member and I know so well is no longer with us. He is probably chuckling up his sleeve at the angst he has caused us. But we recognize the mistake. We did try to fix it. We did try to fix it on a bipartisan basis. I know there are other issues that are tangential to this. I hope we can put these aside today. Take care of the physician fix. Hopefully we've got the formula right. As I said earlier to the distinguished gentleman from Wisconsin, we might not have it perfect, but we have some time in the next year or 2 to make those adjustments. I commit to you that we certainly will, and I hope that you would work with us to help correct it if that comes in the future so we can set this aside. It's a separate debate. We are going to have a long and strenuous debate on health care reform as we go down toward the end of the year and into next year. And I look forward to that. But I would like to see this set aside so that we can see that the physician payment fix, which we all know has been facing us for years, is ended today and that we pass this bill. I thank my friends on the minority side for their kindness in this debate and, Mr. Speaker, I urge passage of the bill.

Mr. STARK. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. STARK. I thank the gentleman for yielding only to suggest that being nice doesn't seem to get you much around here. This motion makes a mockery of the debate. My friends on the other side simply propose the same old same old. They can't even tell us or the American people how this will affect doctors or military families or others. It is legislating in the dark. The distinguished minority whip voted in committee enthusiastically for the bill that is before us, now seems to have forgotten and changed his mind. It is a continuation of the Republican history of mismanagement of Medicare and dishonest budget gimmicks, and I urge its opposition.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Mr. Speaker, today's vote will be the most important of our careers. History will mark which side we're on: providing quality, affordable coverage for all Americans, or the status quo. I would remind my friend from Wisconsin that former Senator Bob Dole voted against Medicare, and that vote has haunted him ever since. It probably prevented him from becoming President. Since my first election, I have worked to see that government serves our people. My top priority for 37 years has been to provide quality, affordable health care for all. I wish we had done it sooner, but at my age, you learn to take what you can when you can get it. The bill is not the bill that many of us would have created on our own. That is the legislative process. The compromise before us today is the right thing to do for the American people. The bill guarantees health coverage to 96 percent of Americans. It's fully paid for. People who like their coverage indeed can keep it. It reforms health insurance regulation and requires shared responsibility by individuals, businesses, and government. It assures that health care is affordable for lower- and middle-income families. It fills the Medicare prescription drug doughnut hole, and it provides free preventive services in Medicare. It has the support of consumers, doctors, nurses, senior citizens, children, people with disabilities, farmers, and small business owners--organizations that represent virtually every segment. In my district, like every other district, Republican or Democrat, I've got 67,000 uninsured people who will be helped; 8,000 people with preexisting conditions; 14,000 businesses will get tax credits; 8,300 seniors will have the doughnut holes filled. And every district in the country has similar numbers. I defy you to go home and tell those people you voted to deny them quality, affordable health care. I am proud to have helped author this legislation. I encourage each of my colleagues to join me in voting ``yes.'' I can assure you, these guys aren't going to have to pay for it in the future. Announcement By the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. STARK. I thank the chairman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, the Republican substitute is not a substitute on health reform. It substitutes gifts to the wealthy insurance companies for morality and dignity. Their bill spends $61 billion over the next decade, and what would the American public get for that investment? It would get 5 million more uninsured people than we have in America today. That's not a conservative solution. It's no solution at all. Our legislation expands coverage to 36 million more Americans, reforms the insurance market to end abusive practices, provides financial assistance to lower-income and middle-income families, creates a public health insurance option that will make health insurance companies compete on quality, provides security for our seniors, and protects our children's futures by not adding one dime to the deficit. A vote for the Republican substitute is nothing more than a vote for transferring money to wealthy insurance companies. Vote ``no'' on the Republican substitute and ``yes'' to provide affordable, quality health care for all Americans.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman from California, the Honorable John Garamendi, be permitted to take the oath of office today. His certificate of election has not arrived, but there is no contest and no question has been raised with regard to his election.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Madam Speaker, as Dean of the California delegation, it is my pleasure to introduce the newest addition to our delegation, John Garamendi. He and his wife, Patti, began their years of public service as Peace Corps volunteers in Ethiopia. Since then, John has spent over 27 years serving the people of California in the State Assembly, as Insurance Commissioner, and as Lieutenant Governor, and he helped preserve our Nation's parks and wildlife as President Clinton's Deputy Secretary of the Interior. As we prepare to enact health care reform, John will lend an effective voice to that effort. As California's Insurance Commissioner, he learned the problems families face when trying to buy health coverage. He is an expert on insurance regulation, and his perspective will be of great value. Please join me in welcoming John Garamendi, his wife Patti, their six children, and nine grandchildren to our congressional family. I would like at this time to yield to the distinguished ranking Republican, Congressman Dreier.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. STARK. I associate myself with the remarks of the distinguished chairman and urge adoption.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Friends of Children With Special Needs (FCSN), a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing support, friendship, and life skills training to developmentally disabled individuals and their families. Formed in 1996, FCSN is based in Fremont, California. FCSN offers special needs children an accepting, educational, and fun environment. The organization provides resources and information for families with special needs children and advocates for full-inclusion educational systems that allow special needs children to interact with their peers. FCSN also educates family members, friends, and students to promote better understanding of developmental disabilities. The organization assists thousands of special needs individuals each year. In 2006, FCSN opened the Dream Center in Fremont, California, which now serves over 250 children and adults with autism, Down's syndrome, and cerebral palsy. In May 2008, FCSN began offering programs in San Jose to support the South Bay community. There are plans to transform the South Bay Center into another fully operative Dream Center in 2010. These centers allow FCSN to provide additional services, such as job training, therapeutic modalities and day programs. FCSN's mission is to ``help children with special needs and their families find hope, love, respect, and support through integrated community involvement.'' I applaud everyone who has come together to support the continuing success of Friends of Children With Special Needs as they strive to meet these goals.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Madam Speaker, I rise to congratulate and honor Thomas J. Orloff on his recent retirement as district attorney of Alameda County. A third generation resident of Alameda County, his 15 years as district attorney capped an extraordinary career of 40 years of service as a prosecutor on behalf of the people of both Alameda County and California. Mr. Orloff joined the Alameda County District Attorney's office in 1970 after graduating from the University of California's Boalt Hall School of Law. He distinguished himself as a trial lawyer, prosecuting many high profile cases including leaders of the Black Panthers and the notorious BGF prison gang. In addition to his trial prosecutions, Mr. Orloff served in many supervisory and administrative capacities including 5 years as the chief assistant district attorney. Tom Orloff was elected district attorney, without opposition, in June 1994 and has been re-elected in June 1998, June 2002, and in June 2006, all unopposed. During his tenure, he established special units to emphasize prosecutions of domestic violence, stalking, gang violence, real estate fraud, and abuse of the elderly while expanding ongoing efforts to combat public assistance fraud, sexual assault and consumer and environmental crimes. Unlike most elected district attorneys, Tom recently personally tried and obtained the conviction of a street gang member who murdered San Leandro police officer Dan Niemi. In addition to his work in Alameda County, Tom has given his time to the California and national prosecutors associations, serving as president and on the board of directors of the California District Attorney's Association and as a member of the board of directors of the National District Attorney's Association. Among many legal honors, he has been selected as a Fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers. Active in Alameda County as well, Tom has for many years served on the board and as treasurer of the One Hundred Club which provides financial support to the survivors of Alameda County police officers and firefighters who are killed in the line of duty and on the advisory board of the Boys and Girls Club of Oakland. Most importantly, I would like to commend Tom Orloff on his stewardship of the finest prosecutor's office in the country. Every day, since taking office in January 1995 Tom sat down behind the same desk Earl Warren used when he served as Alameda County District Attorney from 1925-1939. He proudly displayed on his office wall a framed indictment signed by both Warren and another Thomas Orloff, Tom's grandfather, then the foreman of the Alameda County grand jury. As only the fifth Alameda County District Attorney since Warren, Tom has guided a prosecutor's office that has seen remarkable stability and has been characterized by its innovation, creativity, and remarkable commitment to the highest ethical standards. Prosecutors are the only lawyers who are ethically bound to serve two masters. The public prosecutor, as Justice Sutherland put it in his United States Supreme Court opinion: ``is the representative not of an ordinary party to a controversy, but of a sovereignty whose obligation to govern impartially is as compelling as its obligation to govern at all; and whose interest, therefore, in a criminal prosecution is not that it shall win a case, but that justice shall be done. As such, he is in a peculiar and very definite sense the servant of the law, the twofold aim of which is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer. He may prosecute with earnestness and vigor--indeed, he should do so. But, while he may strike hard blows, he is not at liberty to strike foul ones. It is as much his duty to refrain from improper methods calculated to produce a wrongful conviction as it is to use every legitimate means to bring about a just one.'' (Berger v. United States (1935) 295 U.S. 78, 88.) Like Earl Warren and the four others who separate them, Tom Orloff has demonstrated a profound, personal commitment to the ethical administration of justice. More than anything else, this commitment, on the part of the elected district attorney, to ethics in criminal prosecution sets the Alameda County District Attorney's office apart from the rest. I know that Tom, while proud of his many personal accomplishments, takes his greatest pride and satisfaction in the office of the Alameda County District Attorney. In public life we are all too often confronted with many whose sole purpose in seeking or attaining public office often seems to be self-aggrandizement. Tom is that rare public servant who truly has served the public and who has put the interest of his office ahead of his own. Tom has demonstrated courage and independence in making many hard and occasionally unpopular choices during his tenure as district attorney, authorizing the prosecution several years ago of several officers of the Oakland Police Department, known as the ``Riders'' who were accused of a variety of crimes including robbing, kidnapping and framing street-level drug dealers. Most recently, Tom filed murder charges against a Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer who shot and killed a BART passenger. The shooting was videotaped and received a very high level of publicity. This is reportedly the first murder charge lodged against an on-duty police officer in California history. It should come as no surprise to learn that Tom Orloff has long led the way in hiring women and minority lawyers. Under his watch, and due to his personal commitment, the Alameda County District Attorney's office is now one of the most diverse prosecutor's offices in the country--a special challenge considering the debt most minority law school graduates carry and the small salaries starting prosecutors earn. One of Tom's former colleagues wrote, many years before she became an associate justice of the California Supreme Court, ``If our nation of laws is to remain both strong and free, we must have system of criminal justice in which every citizen can have confidence. The weight of maintaining this confidence falls on the shoulders of those lawyers who walk into court to represent the People. It is, as it should be, the highest calling of an American advocate.'' (Carol Corrigan, On Prosecutorial Ethics (1986) 13 Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly 537.) I have known Tom Orloff for many years. In the time he has served as Alameda County's district attorney he has given me the highest confidence that the administration of criminal justice in Alameda County was in the most capable hands possible. To me, he epitomized the prosecutor who always sought justice first. In determining whether to initiate criminal charges he always made what he felt was the right decision, not the popular decision. In the trial courtroom, he fought hard and he fought fair. More importantly, he instilled that ethic in all of his prosecutors. As a result, I share with the citizens of Alameda County an enduring and deeply felt confidence in the work of our criminal justice system. I wish Tom and his wife Pam a long, healthy and productive retirement.

Mr. STARK

Mr. STARK. Madam Speaker, I rise today to introduce legislation that will open up thousands of good homes to foster children. On any given day, there are approximately 500,000 children in the child welfare system. Over 125,000 of these abused and neglected children are waiting to be adopted. There is an acute shortage, however, of adoptive and foster parents. The result is that many children, particularly minority and special needs children, languish in foster care without permanent homes. The severe developmental, emotional, and educational costs to children raised in foster care are well documented. The 25,000 youth who never find a permanent family and ``age out'' of the system each year are more likely than nearly any other group to become homeless, incarcerated, or suffer with mental illness or substance abuse. Despite the shortage of adoptive and foster parents and the terrible consequences of long stays in the child welfare system, some states have enacted discriminatory bans prohibiting children from being placed with qualified parents due to the parent's marital status or sexual orientation. Currently, over 65,000 adopted children and 14,000 foster children are living with a gay or lesbian parent. Studies suggest that upward of 2 million gay and lesbian individuals are interested in adopting or fostering a child. Yet, statewide discriminatory bans and the practices of individual adoption agencies have resulted in fewer children being placed in safe and permanent homes. Congress invests over $8 billion in the child welfare system each year and we should not accept policies that use Federal funds to enact barriers to adoption and close the door to thousands of potential homes. Multiple studies have found that adopted and foster children raised by gay and lesbian parents fare just as well as their peers being raised by heterosexual parents. When considering a potential placement for a child, the only criteria should be what is in the child's best interest and whether the prospective parents can provide a safe and nurturing home. Bigotry should play no part in this decision. That is why I am introducing the ``Every Child Deserves a Family Act.'' This legislation would simply prohibit any entity that receives Federal child welfare funds from denying or delaying adoption or foster care placements based solely on the prospective parent's marital status or sexual orientation. States and child welfare agencies that fail to end discriminatory practices would face financial penalties. This is the same approach that put an end to race discrimination in adoption and foster care placements. Abused and neglected children in our child welfare system are some of the most vulnerable members of our society. We cannot allow divisive politics to further harm these children by shrinking the number of prospective adoptive and foster parents. I urge all of my colleagues to join me in saying yes to children and no to bigotry by cosponsoring the ``Every Child Deserves a Family Act'' and working with me to make it law.