Jan Schakowsky

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I was actually baffled to hear that some of my colleagues came to the floor this morning to criticize John Kerry in his capacity as an enlisted soldier and war veteran. John Kerry, the highly decorated hero, recipient of the Silver Star, Bronze Star, three Purple Hearts, Combat Action Ribbon, Navy Presidential Unit Citation, Navy Unit Commendation Ribbon, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal and the Vietnam Campaign Medal, that John Kerry was blasted and accused of being unpatriotic for being critical of the Commander-in-Chief during the Vietnam War. I am baffled that my colleagues would even choose to go there because our current Commander-in-Chief has, what can I say, a less than heroic military career, and the majority of the Americans are more than a little concerned about a President who has sent our soldiers into battle without an exit strategy, without a post-Saddam plan and without body armor.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to the 6 million Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis during the Holocaust. Today in the nation's Capitol, we gather to pay our respects with our Days of Remembrance ceremony. My district, the 9th Congressional District of Illinois, is home to a large number of survivors of the Nazi death camps, and this day holds deep meaning for those individuals and the entire Jewish community. Recent events in the Middle East and around the world underscore the importance of this day. Anti-Semitic and anti-Israel rhetoric and demonstrations continue in numerous countries. And while we respect the right of every person to be heard, the hateful displays throughout the world that are directed at the Jewish people remind us that ``Never Again'' is not a guarantee, but a promise that we must uphold through education, dialogue, and determination. It reminds us that we must continue to strengthen the U.S. commitment to the security of Israel. Moreover, we must redouble our efforts to bring lasting peace to the Middle East. ``Never Again'' also means that we must combat hate and genocide wherever it exists. We must never turn a blind eye to terror or discrimination. We must demand that our government hold those who carry out acts of needless brutality accountable and that it take action to prevent unwarranted human misery. We recently marked the ten year anniversary of the Genocide in Rwanda, a horrific period in recent history. The world, including the United States, allowed for the brutal murder of 800,000 Tutsis in just 100 days of barbaric killings. President Clinton has cited the Rwandan genocide as one of his worst regrets. In my Congressional district last weekend, the Cambodian Association of Illinois held a groundbreaking ceremony for the first Killing Fields Memorial Museum in the United States. While we must honor those who were lost during the Holocaust and other past genocides by carrying on and living honorable and productive lives, the most important thing we can do to honor lives lost in the past is to refuse to repeat the same mistakes today that allowed for those atrocities to occur in the past. Today, as we mark the Holocaust and honor the lives that were lost in the world's worst murder case, and, as we reflect on other past genocides, history appears, shamefully, to be repeating itself. Today, in the Sudan, civilians are being systematically murdered, raped and brutalized by the government and other forces. We will likely witness the loss of hundreds of thousands of innocent lives in the coming weeks if the world stands idly by and does nothing to intervene. Some in this body may feel some comfort in pointing to the fact that a hearing has been held or that they were willing to sign a letter or cosponsor a non-binding resolution expressing concern. Those are important steps to take to put the Congress on record, but unfortunately, they will not save lives. The situation in Sudan is a human rights emergency, one that demands immediate action, not just words from the United States and the international community. ``Never Again'' means making tough decisions to preserve human life. While President Bush has acknowledged the situation in Sudan and has expressed concern, he has not taken action to address it. Phone calls and press statements do not constitute action. Today, I call on President Bush in the name of human dignity and compassion to honor those who were lost in years past while the world watched in silence, to exert true leadership and take action to stop the killing in the Sudan. Each one of us has a responsibility to condemn the senseless killing that is taking place and to demand that our great nation lead the world in bringing the bloodshed to an end.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, in the last press conference, the President was asked if he had made any mistakes and what lessons had he learned. And what the President said was, I wish you had given me this written question ahead of time so I could plan for it. I am sure historians will look back and say, gosh, he could have done it better this way or that way. I am just not sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference with all the pressure of trying to come up with an answer, but it has not yet. So kind of as a public service, a number of us are coming down to the floor to offer, for the President's consideration, a list of some mistakes that he might want to call up so he does not have to fumble around for an answer at the next press conference, if he has another public press conference. One of the things that actually is surprising to me that this mistake happened at all, given what we know now, is the long lead-up to the war in Iraq, that they actually had been planning, and bases were being built, and air space to land was being constructed, was a failure to provide the troops with the protection they needed when they were put into harm's way. It surprises me that that mistake was made. In some cases mistakes have been somewhat corrected, we think; so it would not even hurt the President to mention the fact that as recently as last October, a quarter of our troops in Iraq were lacking in the ceramic-plated body armor that would deflect the bullets that were coming their way. We are told that that has been corrected, although as recently as just a few weeks ago, families are still buying those at about $1,500 a crack for their soldiers just to make sure that they are well equipped. But we know that still the Humvees do not have the proper armor, some of them still do not have the proper armor. A helicopter was shot down that did not have the missile detector that helicopters are supposed to have in order to be fully equipped. I met the aunt of one of the soldiers who died in that last Sunday. She would think that that was a mistake that the President made and something he might want to mention. He could have talked about a mistake making soldiers pay for their travel home when they would come on rest and recreation, R&R. In order to get to their homes once they were landed in the U.S., they were paying their own way. That, I understand, has been corrected. Or we just heard yesterday from the 333rd Military Police Unit in Freeport that was supposed to be coming home this week, that in fact they got redeployed; but all their equipment, their personal foot lockers, had been sent home, and now the families, at their own expense, are shipping the equipment back to their soldiers. They are having to buy all new uniforms. It seems that was a mistake in planning, according to some of the families. Maybe they could have planned better. That is a mistake, and it could be corrected somewhat, at least to reimburse the families that are having to ship back. But it is not just those soldiers that are in harm's way, who are losing their lives now, unfortunately, sadly, horribly, in record numbers in the last little while; but it is the veterans. Again, it is astonishing that this President would not make sure that at the very least those who come home are well taken care of. There was a mistake, and it has been corrected. He could cite that. Our wounded soldiers were being charged for food at the hospitals when they came home. Incredible. Now that has been fixed; they are not being charged for that food. But many were languishing with inadequate care in Army barracks when they came home. Then, right now, this minute, 30,000 veterans are waiting 6 months or longer for appointments at VA hospitals, new increases are proposed in the cost of veterans health care for up to 1 million veterans, and long-term care funding has been slashed. It is really incredible. What the veterans organizations are saying is that actually the amount of money allocated to veterans is millions of dollars short of what it needs to be. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards) actually has a proposal that would add $2.5 billion for veterans health care. The President could acknowledge that it is a mistake to mistreat our veterans, and he could support the bill of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards) to restore that money. He could do something about the fact that he has been refusing to end the survivor benefit penalty. There are a lot of things, a lot of mistakes. We think the President ought to acknowledge some of them and fix them up.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, if and when the President has another prime time press conference, and if the President is asked again to consider the mistakes that he has made, I have a suggestion: he might mention the thousands of soldiers in Iraq who have and are now risking their lives without appropriate body armor and other life-saving equipment. We are finding out now that the President and his advisers and Cabinet were thinking about this war in Iraq for a very long time. And yet here is an AP story from March 26 of this year. It says soldiers headed for Iraq are still buying their own body armor. In many cases their families are buying it for them despite assurances from the military that the gear will be in hand before they are in harm's way. Last October, last October, that is 8 months after the war started, it was reported that nearly one quarter of American troops serving in Iraq did not have ceramic-plated body armor which can stop bullets fired from assault rifles and shrapnel. The military says the shortfall is over and soldiers who do not yet have the armor soon will. ``Nancy Durst,'' I am still quoting from the AP story, ``recently learned that her husband, a soldier with an Army Reserve unit from Maine serving in Iraq, spent 4 months without body armor. She said she would have bought armor for her husband had vests not been cycled into his unit. Even if her husband now has body armor, Durst says she is angry he was without it at any time.'' Her husband also told her that reservists have not been given the same equipment as Active Duty soldiers. ``They are so sick and tired of being treated as second-class soldiers,'' she said. That is from the AP story. No wonder she is mad about it. This armor costs about $1,500. And I hope the President will support legislation that will reimburse the soldiers and families for this expense. Clearly this was a mistake. And so if asked about a mistake, the President could not only say that it was a mistake, but maybe he would like to support H.R. 3615. The gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Larson) has a bill that would reimburse the families for the expense of buying their own body armor. According to the Enlisted Association of the National Guard, as of November 30, 2003, the Army National Guard lacked $11 billion of the $40 billion in military equipment and training it needed to go to war. Among the missing crucial equipment components were nearly 11,000 Humvees, 20,000 radios, 156,000 night vision goggles and 148 Black Hawk helicopters that are required to meet modernization requirements. That seems to me to be a mistake. Our troops were not properly equipped. Currently we are told that every member of the National Guard is being provided with body armor once they are in Iraq, but many of the soldiers are not even given an opportunity to train with the modern equipment before deployment. On November 2, 2003, an Illinois National Guard Chinook helicopter was downed. This helicopter was not equipped with the latest automatic antimissile blocking system. I met the aunt of one of the soldiers who went down in that Chinook, who died because of that accident. I think she would like to tell the President that was a mistake, the cost of life of her nephew. We know that soldiers coming home on R and R were being asked to pay to get to their homes once they came to the United States. Now, that was a mistake. The President could say that that was fixed, but is he going to support legislation introduced by the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ramstad) to reimburse the families for their travel? How about the fact that soldiers, wounded soldiers in the hospital, were being charged every day for their food? Well, we have corrected that, thank goodness, but that is something that the President might think about as a mistake that was clearly made and affected our troops. Now for the latest report that I heard of from my State of Illinois. This was on CBS local news today, I believe. The 333rd Military Police Unit in Freeport, which just had their tour in Iraq extended, may not be adequately supplied for battle. That is because everything they owned was shipped back home. The 333rd is presently sitting on the Kuwaiti border awaiting orders, but they have since surrendered their equipment such as radios and armored vehicles to the troops who replaced them. But now since the 333rd is going to remain in Iraq, they are without any supplies. Even their personal belongings were sent home, including spare uniforms, boots and toiletries. The soldiers only have what they are wearing and are being forced to purchase new uniforms and some equipment out of their own pockets. Military families have been receiving their soldiers' footlockers the past few days and are now frantically repacking boxes and sending all of this gear back at their own expense. This has angered families who did not believe the military thought this redeployment through. Let me just say that the DOD has responded to these families, saying that they are looking into whether they will be reimbursed for sending equipment back. A few mistakes. I will forward this to the President. Maybe he would like to use it at his next press conference.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate the opportunity to come here to speak about women's History Month and thank the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia for providing all of us with this opportunity this evening. They do not call it ``history'' for nothing. In general, the history of our Nation and our world has been about ``his'' story, about men's story. And it is not surprising, as men have written history books and have been considered the leaders that books are written about. And this is not meant in any way as an anti-male statement, just a fact that most of history is about the leadership of men in our world. I wanted to just share tonight a study that was done very recently by the Center for the American Woman and Politics, about why it is that more women do not run for political office. The premise is that study after study has shown that when women run, women win in the same numbers that men do. And, yet, if you look at this wonderful body, our august House of Representatives, we are about 14 percent women. And the same is true of the United States Senate. And so the question really is why do we not appear in greater numbers and why do more women not run since they have equal opportunity to win? So they did this study and what they did is they created what they called an eligibility pool, 1,000 men and 1,000 women who were from the fields that produced most candidates, business, education, and law. And by definition, the thousand women and thousand men were equally qualified. These were people who were at mid- or upper-career level. They asked them a number of questions to determine the differences between them. One of the differences that was really disturbing and chilling to me was that when asked about their own qualifications, the women in the study were twice as likely as the men to say about themselves that they were not qualified to run for office. Now, as I said, by definition these men and women were equally qualified. And perhaps even more disturbing, that sense of being not qualified in twice the numbers as men ran across generations. The younger women were as likely to declare themselves not qualified as older women. So clearly we have a challenge before us. What do we do to these qualified women to make them feel that they are not so? But there was a hopeful part of that study. What it said was that the one factor that was in some ways the most responsible for someone making the decision to run for office was being asked to run for office, someone making the suggestion. And they divided those who make the suggestion into formal actors and informal actors. So, in other words, if someone is asked by a formal actor, that being an elected official, a party official or a political activist, to run for office, they are likely to think of themselves as candidates or potential candidates. So to me that said, as a woman who is interested in getting more women involved in leadership positions, what we need to do is to encourage women, encourage young women and women older than that to run for office, to put that seed in their head and create really an old girl's network, if you will, that will bring women along to think of themselves as candidates. We also need to, in this 21st century, explore what are those situations, what is the socialization process that ends up with women not feeling as qualified to run for office. These were women who rated the activities involved in being a candidate as being something they were even more willing to do than men; and yet when it came to that final question, do you see yourself as qualified to run for office, twice as many women as men in this pool said they were not qualified. So this is a challenge to us, to men and women alike. If we want to have the kind of diversity, if we want to have the benefit of women's leadership, then we are going to have to build in the systems that do that and the support networks that will encourage women so that we have the kind of equality as we move forward in this century. So I wanted to share the outcome of this wonderful study. It is the Center for the American Woman and Politics. They are at Rutgers University. They are part of the Eagleton Institute, and over the years they have provided us with very useful information in moving forward to include more women in our political universe. So I thank my colleague from the District of Columbia for focusing on this important issue and for allowing me to participate tonight.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman so much for yielding. Madam Speaker, I stand here today with such a pride in joining true patriots who are coming to the floor tonight under the leadership of the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the distinguished chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus (Mr. Cummings), and my colleague the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), who has really been a conscience for all of us, that we have to ask the questions. We stand here as people who love our country. We love our country so much that we fought to be here to represent over 600,000 people, to represent the views of ordinary Americans, and we are here tonight because we are concerned that our country is losing its credibility and its moral leadership around the world; and that our democracy is in jeopardy right now, because democracy depends on the truth. It depends on the light of day. It depends on discussions being held out in the open, so that people can make up their own minds, so the facts, the real facts, get laid on the table. And to question, yes, even to question the President of the United States, Madam Speaker, about things that have been said, and the Vice President of the United States. No one in this great democracy is beyond being questioned, and that is the duty of Americans, not just of Members of Congress, but of citizens of the United States, of the media, of the press, to find out the truth. Madam Speaker, for over 6 months this administration has been fighting tooth and nail against all of the facts being laid out in public before this commission investigating 9/11 and what happened. It is not just the 3,000-plus people that died that day, and it is not just the 570, 580 or 590-plus people now that have died in Iraq and their families that are suffering, presumably because we were fighting terrorism, and some of us question the rationale for that war. But all Americans deserve to know the truth, and this administration over the last 6 months has battled against the commission over access to documents and witnesses. The panel has issued two subpoenas to the Federal Government for aviation and military records, and twice had to threaten to do the same for access to presidential briefing materials. The panel fought the White House over an extension of its statutory deadline for issuing a report which was originally set for May 27 in order to really do its job. There has been pressure on this commission not to explore fully and readily exactly what happened on 9/11. Now, fortunately, under tremendous pressure right now, we are going to hear more information, under oath, from the National Security Advisor, who has found it fit to speak on every single broadcast and radio station and television program about this. But now under oath she will appear. I think this is a wise decision, and I am glad that it is going to happen. But I want to talk for a minute about one of the strategies that is used to silence people who would ask those kinds of questions, who would come up with information that the administration does not like, that runs counter to the administration's version of the truth. I am not saying that the other versions are always true or more correct, but what I am saying is that anyone who dares to stand up and say something different is slimed by this administration. Let me give you some examples of the ways in which the integrity, the competence, the motives and even the patriotism of those who raise questions is attacked. The Medicare actuary who came up with the numbers that said that this Medicare bill that passed in the middle of the night, after arm- twisting and holding the record open for 3-plus hours, the actuary who came up with dollar figures that said it really was going to cost about $140 billion more than the administration said, was warned that he would be fired if he told key lawmakers about a series of Bush administration cost estimates that would have torpedoed, or could have, any Congressional passage of this White House-backed Medicare prescription drug plan. Richard S. Foster, the Chief Actuary for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, told colleagues last June that he would be fired if he revealed the numbers relating to higher estimates to lawmakers. This is a person who was supposed to give us the truth. That is his job. He is supposed to come up with the facts. For doing so, he was told he would be fired. Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill, 3 days after Paul O'Neill criticized the Bush administration's Iraq policy, the administration, quoting from an Associated Press story, ``began an investigation into whether any laws or regulations had been violated by O'Neill.'' The probe came despite O'Neill having specifically ``cleared all of the documents with the Treasury General Counsel's Office.'' Of course, the problem ended by fully absolving O'Neill. But, right away, rather than answering the charges that were raised, the administration went after the man and tried to undercut his credibility. White House Adviser Larry Lindsey was fired when he told a newspaper that an Iraq war could cost $200 billion. General Anthony Zinni, fired, a retired Marine general who was Bush's Middle East mediator. He had the audacity to anger the White House when he told a public policy forum in October that ``Bush had far more pressing policies than Iraq and suggested there could be a prolonged, difficult aftermath to the war. He was not reappointed as Mideast envoy.'' The source, and that is a quote, was the Associated Press in July of 2003. Even troops fighting in Iraq were threatened for telling the truth about combat in Iraq. After soldiers in Iraq raised questions about the Bush administration's deceptive WMD comments, General John Abizaid said no soldiers ``are free to say anything disparaging about the Secretary of Defense, or the President of the United States. Whatever action may be taken, whether it is a verbal reprimand or something more stringent, is up to the commanders on the scene.'' The source, ABC News. No, we are not even going to let those who are putting their lives on the line publicly raise questions. The CIA was blamed for telling the truth about bogus Iraq nuclear claims. Despite the CIA having made advance objections to the White House about false Iraq nuclear claims, ``President Bush and his National Security Advisor yesterday placed full responsibility on the Central Intelligence Agency for the inclusion in this year's State of the Union Address of questionable allegations that Iraq's Saddam Hussein was trying to buy nuclear weapons.'' So much for taking personal responsibility for words that come out of one's own mouth. Let us blame someone else. And then, of course, there is Richard Clarke. But even before I get to him, the Secretary of Commerce the other day, in talking about people who are concerned about losing their jobs, because jobs are being exported overseas, said that basically this kind of outsourcing is really a good thing for the economy. ``People who are out of work because of outsourcing, who said, no, they think maybe we ought to try and keep jobs at home, he called them economic isolationists, and he said economic isolationists wave the flag of surrender, rather than the American flag.'' That is a quote. So, in other words, people who are out of work because their jobs have gone overseas and have the audacity to complain about our policies that do that are said to wave the flag of surrender and not the American flag. What does that mean? They are not patriots? These people, whose children every day go to school and say the pledge to the flag while dad or mom is looking for a job?

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Chairman, I rise today against the Republican budget and for the Democratic and CBC alternative budgets. The members on the other side of the aisle describe their budget as one that ``recognizes the fundamental obligations of the Federal Government.'' It does no such thing. In fact, it is nothing short of a political document that turns a blind eye to our obligations. The House Republican budget is indefensible. House Republicans followed the lead of President Bush and passed a budget that goes after the poor, the homeless, and the elderly. Republicans value more tax cuts for the rich over meeting the needs of senior citizens, working families, the unemployed and the majority of Americans. Medicaid and Section 8 vouchers are slashed so they can pay for missile defense, subsidies to Halliburton and tax cuts for the wealthy. The Republican budget cuts and underfunds programs that have been proven to strengthen our country and provide opportunities for the future. The so-called ``education President's'' own No Child Left Behind is underfunded by $8.8 billion. While college costs have skyrocketed, the GOP budget keeps the Pell Grant maximum at the same level it was three years ago. There is no money for the Family Opportunity Act, which would provide health insurance for disabled children. It tells my committee, Energy and Commerce, to make $2.2 billion in Medicaid cuts over the next five years, jeopardizing health and long term care for 52 million Americans. Section 8, low-income heating assistance of LIHEAP, child care assistance--programs that help people pay the bills and keep roofs over their head in tough times like these--are cut by $3.7 billion. We could see 250,000 people lose affordable housing this year under the GOP budget. Veterans' health care is underfunded again, this time by $1.3 billion below what the Republican Chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee recommended. Over the next five years, the Republican budget will cut these and other domestic programs by $36.9 billion. At a time when so many families are worried about jobs, health care, and education, this budget puts their future on the chopping block. Parents cannot afford to send their children to college. Seniors cannot afford their housing, heating bills or medicine. Veterans have to wait for months to see a physician at the VA. Teachers still have to buy their own school supplies. Democrats offered a clear alternative to the destructive plan Republicans pushed through Congress. We will continue to fight for a fair budget that will fund America's true priorities.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. My colleague across the aisle from Texas is feeling really proud of himself, because he thinks he found a Medicare cut in the Democratic alternative. Excuse me, we are talking about $800 million more for Medicare over the next 5 years. So he is just flat wrong, but there are a lot of things wrong in this budget. It is true that when we talk about, well, it is just 1 percent, it is just a little bit here or there, we are talking about a $2 billion cut in Medicaid. What is that about? Medicaid? We are talking about the poorest of Americans, many of whom, by the way, are working 7 days a week or 5 days a week trying to earn a living and still do not have benefits. Their children are doing without. Yes, it is true, we are talking about senior citizens in nursing homes. Medicaid pays for two out of three residents in nursing homes, one out of ten residents in assisted living facilities in addition to home-based and community-based care. We are talking about 52 million children, disabled persons, persons living with AIDS, parents, senior citizens who rely on Medicaid. Is this what fiscal discipline is really about? Is this what we want to cut in this budget? The Blue Dog budget, the Black Caucus budget and our Democratic alternative leave Medicaid intact because that is what government is supposed to do, help people when they need health care.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Chairman, I rise against the Republican budget because it cuts funding for women's business centers, among many other essential and effective programs.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, this resolution, never opened for committee discussion and now closed to amendments, is perhaps a consistent way to mark the anniversary of an unnecessary war that was built on misleading statements, dangerous disregard for the facts, and dangerous policies. To a person, we believe that our military men and women have done a remarkable job in very difficult conditions, conditions like traveling in tactical vehicles that do not have steel armor, leaving them dangerously vulnerable to grenades, small arms, and roadside bombs. Soldiers in Iraq are hanging flack vests and even plywood on their Humvees in desperate attempts at protection, army officials are quoted as saying, and the casualties mount week by week. Republicans who choose to slime the records of opponents of this resolution would be better to turn the mirror on themselves. Many of us will be supporting a Democratic budget resolution that will back up our rhetoric with the resources needed to provide equipment, compensation, military housing, child tax credits for military families, and other necessities that are missing in the Republican budget proposal. Let us put our money where our mouth is.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Madam Speaker, there is a president in the western hemisphere who was chosen in what many voters believe is a flawed 2000 election. Many people in his country and around the world believe that this president misled his people into a violent conflict in which many lives were lost. Revelations of corruption including falsifying documents, financial mismanagement, gross overcharging by well- connected corporations, kickbacks to politically allied organizations continue to accumulate. What is the proper response of the people of that country who no longer wish to be led by that president? Because it is a democracy, the answer is clear: vote him out at the next election. I speak of President George W. Bush, not President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti. Those of us who do not support President Bush will work to remove and replace him in the November 2 election. That is the way we do it in our democracy. In a democracy, one does not take up arms against an elected President. We do not threaten his life nor is he forced out of the country nor are convicted murderers and drug dealers and armed thugs welcomed in to do the dirty work. In a democracy, one goes from elected President to elected President and not coup d'etat to coup d'etat. So this is a very, very sad time for those of us who believe in democracy. The Bush administration had the choice of defending the democratically-elected government in Haiti or supporting its overthrow. It chose the latter. Jean-Bertrand Aristide was the first democratically-elected President of Haiti, his successor due to be chosen in the next presidential election in 2005. Over the last several weeks, an armed insurrection was organized by former death squad leaders, convicted murderers and drug dealers. They used terrorist tactics to take over police stations and then cities which were protected by only a very small government police force. The New York Times describes these so-called rebels: ``The public face of the rebel army is the smile of Mr. Guy Phillipe. He is suspected by both Haitian and United States officials of cocaine trafficking. Mr. Phillipe has few democratic credentials. In 2001 he stood accused of planning a coup. Government said he masterminded a raid on the Presidential palace that left seven dead. He is joined in this rebellion by Louis Jodel Chamblain, the convicted assassin from FRAPH.'' The New York Times described FRAPH as ``an instrument of terror wielded by the military junta that overthrew Haiti's embattled Jean- Bertrand Aristide in 1991. It killed thousands over the next 3 years.'' Rather than coming to the defense of the democratically-elected government of Haiti, the Bush administration joined with the anti- democratic forces in the country to call for the President's ouster. The administration, our administration, the Bush administration has consistently supported a small, elite group in Haiti whose principal economic interests is working with multinational corporations to exploit Haiti's vast pool of cheap labor. It is not a pretty history. Last weekend, the United States and the international community met with President Aristide, at which time he agreed to a power-sharing proposal made by CARICOM and supported by the United States and France. He agreed but the opposition refused. Colin Powell extended the deadline, but the opposition stood by its insistence that Aristide step down, essentially dead or alive. So, in the end, the Bush administration sided with the murderers, with the terrorists. While it is unclear exactly what happened early Sunday morning, the message from the U.S. to President Aristide was crystal clear, the United States will not protect you from being cleared by the assassins that are on your doorstep. So President Aristide has gone. People are dead. The brutal former dictator Duvalier is on TV saying he wants to come back. Guy Phillipe wants to reinstate the brutal army. Chaos reigns in Haiti. Where do we go from here? Clearly, we need to be part of this international force to establish security, but it would be shameful if we do not look back and figure out how we got into this mess, that is, to have a full investigation of every taxpayer dollar that was spent in Haiti and find out whether it was involved in the destabilization of Haiti. We have to assure the security of the Aristides so that they can go to a country where they can be safe, and we have to help the refugees. We need that full investigation, and we will be pushing for it, starting tomorrow.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. It is actually insulting and certainly annoying that there is some sort of accusation that those of us who think that the substitute is preferable do not care about women and do not care about the babies that they are carrying. As a mother, as a grandmother of four children, we have to recognize this bill for what it is. If we want to go after protecting pregnant women, we ought to go after protecting pregnant women, not about threatening to take away their right to choose, which this is a thinly veiled effort to do because we are trying to create a special status of human being, of a fetus, of an unborn child. While I kind of admire the strategy, it does not get to the heart of this issue. The proponents say we have to have this bill to protect pregnant women from violence, but the truth is this bill does not even address crimes committed against the woman at all, it only addresses the new crime created in this bill, which is a crime against a zygote, an embryo, a fetus. Furthermore, this bill would not even apply to the tragic Laci Peterson, as we understand the facts of the case, and as is true in the vast majority of domestic violence cases. Those crimes are covered by State law and not Federal law. H.R. 1997 only touches on few and rare instances when pregnant women could be harmed by someone committing a Federal crime. The undisputed aim of this bill is to move forward a calculated antichoice agenda in which embryos and fetuses are codified into law as humans with all of the human rights afforded people in our society. This would bring us one step closer to overturning Roe v. Wade and taking away a woman's constitutional right to choose. Instead, if we truly care about protecting pregnant women from violence and creating stiffer penalties for those who harm pregnant women, we should pass the substitute to this bill, known as the Motherhood Protection Act. The substitute recognizes that the pregnant woman is a victim when she is assaulted, instead of making the fetus distinct and separate from the woman, which anybody who is pregnant or has been pregnant knows is really not when you are carrying that child. The substitute classifies assault against her and assault on her pregnancy as two crimes, both crimes against the woman. Unlike H.R. 1997, the substitute gets to the heart of the matter: protecting pregnant women from violence. I urge my colleagues to vote no on H.R. 1997 and yes on the substitute amendment.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) for allowing me to share my thoughts on this. I wanted to begin with something that may seem a little bit off point. I just returned from the White House meeting along with the Congressional Black Caucus that was kind enough to let me come along, in a meeting with Secretary of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice and the President, and we were talking about the crisis in Haiti right now. And one of the reasons now given for our going to Iraq was to liberate Iraq, to bring democracy to Iraq. And we stand here right now at a moment when violence and thugs and M-16s are moving toward the palace of the democratically elected President of Haiti, Mr. Aristide, and there seems to be a reluctance for the United States now to get involved in saving a democracy. Whatever one thinks of Mr. Aristide, some of us do not like some of the things the President does, or we are talking about the Vice President tonight, but we are going to wait until November, until there is another election. We are not even so sure about the last election. They talk about some irregularities in the Haitian election in 2000. We think there were some here, too, but we do not do anything. And I got to thinking that what if there was some oil in Haiti? Maybe there would be a little more interest on the part of the United States in really doing something. Our hope is that the President understands, and I know he understands, but that in the light of there being an imminent bloodbath in Haiti, that the United States takes some action. It would be pretty ironic if we were trying to bring democracy to Iraq and yet we let democracy crumble in Haiti. Let me get back to the point. I have been watching these ads on television that Halliburton has been putting on. They are pretty glossy ads, and they show soldiers, handsome young men and women, getting meals that Halliburton says that it is providing to our soldiers; and says that Halliburton has been doing all this great work, and I am sure that over the years they can proudly point to some of their accomplishments. But they are bragging about meals right now, and what we have found out now is that, yes, they provide meals, but they have also been charging for three times as many meals as were actually served in a major Army facility in Kuwait, that American taxpayers are paying millions and millions of dollars to Halliburton for meals that simply never got served. Whoops, a little mistake. Or is it just a mistake? Maybe the gentleman has referred to it already, and he can stop me if he has, but the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) has been doing a wonderful job in calling for investigations of these overspendings on behalf of the American taxpayers. We should not be paying 1 cent more than we need to be spending, particularly in a war that, in my view, we should not have been involved in in the first place. But there we are, and Halliburton is there, too. So he, along with the distinguished gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), sent a letter on February 12 to the Director of the Defense Contract Audit Agency asking them to look into some of the problems based on information that was provided to them by whistleblowers. It is not always so easy to be a whistleblower, to stand up and risk one's job and sometimes risk all kinds of retribution to tell what is really going on. Halliburton deserves scrutiny. They were awarded in 2001 a global logistics contract worth about $3.7 billion, 90 percent of this total value for work in Iraq, and here is what these whistleblowers are saying that Halliburton is doing: that they are engaging in these improper practices, telling employees that price does not matter. This is from the letter: ``High-level Halliburton officials frequently told employees that the high prices charged by vendors were not a problem because the U.S. Government would reimburse Halliburton's costs and then pay Halliburton an additional fee. One whistleblower said that a Halliburton motto was `Don't worry about price. It's cost-plus,' '' which means they not only get their costs, but, on top of that, some profit. So do not worry about it. ``Wasteful spending: Ordinary vehicles were leased for $7,500 a month. Higher prices than necessary were paid for furniture and cellular phone service. Poor quality mobile homes were purchased and accepted even though much better units were available. Under Halliburton's cost-plus contract, all of these wasteful expenditures were passed on to the taxpayer. The company even sought to order embroidered towels at a cost of $7.50 each when ordinarily towels would have cost about one-third of the price.'' Those of us who are involved in decorating our homes, maybe once in a while we are going to splurge on an embroidered towel. I do not think that we need to do that when we are trying to be cost-effective in a war in Iraq and have a little money left over to help some people at home. ``Avoiding competition among vendors: Halliburton's objective was to keep as many purchase orders as possible below $2,500 in value . . .'' Because they are being frugal? No. The letter goes on to say: `` . . . so its buyers could avoid the requirement to solicit quotes from more than one vendor. Instead of having multiple vendors submit competitive quotes for needed materials and selecting the lowest quote, Halliburton frequently sought only one quote from a single vendor.'' ``Inviting unjustifiably high quotes: It was routine for Halliburton buyers to copy a requisition, hand it to a single Kuwaiti vendor, and tell the vendor to submit any quote below $2,500 the next day. The focus was not on obtaining a reasonable price.'' And there is a lot more in this letter, but in the summary here, it says, ``Relying on an inadequate list of preferred vendors: Halliburton's supervisors provided buyers with a list of preferred Kuwaiti vendors. Many of the preferred firms were unreliable or charged `outrageous' prices. Supervisors did not encourage buyers to identify alternative vendors and, in some cases, wanted to use a higher-priced vendor on the preferred list rather than a new, cheaper vendor. ``According to the whistleblowers, improved business practices would yield significant savings.'' And they talk about ``Mr. Bunting,'' one of the whistleblowers, ``estimated that competition could reduce costs by up to 15 percent. The former procurement supervisor explained that when he obtained three quotes instead of just one, he typically saved up to 30 percent.'' So we are paying top dollar, unnecessarily high prices. And just what is this company and its relationship to the Vice President? Because that is what we are talking about here today. The integrity of this administration is in question. And when Mr. Cheney says in 2000, July of 2000, before the election, said, ``What I will have to do, assuming we are successful in the election, is divest myself, sell any remaining shares that I have in the company,'' the fact is a congressional report found that Mr. Cheney still owns more than 433,000 Halliburton stock options, including 100,000 shares at $54.50 per share, 33,333 shares at $28.00, and 300,000 shares at $39.50. That is from CNN in September of 2003. Then he says in January of this year, ``I severed my ties with Halliburton when I became a candidate for Vice President in August of 2000.'' I do not know what ``severed'' means. I clearly do not understand the meaning of the word ``severed,'' because, to me, this is a pretty good and lucrative tie. ``Along with 433,000 stock options,'' and this is a quote from CNN, ``Cheney still receives about $150,000 a year'' from Halliburton. I would like people I may have severed ties from to have that kind of deal. Severed to me means no, I do not get any money, but that is clearly not the definition of the word to Mr. Cheney. So I think, look, there are just so many questions here, and I do not know if this issue would even come up so much if we could count on this company spending taxpayer dollars in the way that they should be spent. But it is not one issue, it is not two issues, it is time after time after time. Every time the light is shined on what Halliburton has done, we find taxpayer dollars that are being wasted there. We cannot afford to do that. The Vice President of the United States should take some responsibility for that. It is a company he was CEO of. This is a company he continues to gain benefits from, and I think it really does raise a matter of where does the buck stop, where is the responsibility and the accountability, and, fundamentally, it raises questions of integrity, of ethics. So I appreciate the gentleman letting me raise the issues.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Exactly. So, yes, you can keep your Medicare, but you may not get the same benefits; your premium may go sky high because the HMOs are skimming off the healthiest and the wealthiest. And, yes, you can have your Medicare, but it is going to cost so much more. Again, at the most generous, it is an incomplete answer and, really and truly, a deceptive answer. Seniors have to watch for that. And then, ``Will I save on my medicines?'' And the announcer says, ``You can save with your Medicare discount drug cards this June and save more with new prescription drug coverage in 2006.'' Do my colleagues know what? Many seniors already have a prescription drug card. Actually, they may have a few prescription drug cards. But under this new plan, they are only going to be allowed one Medicare discount card, which may not even provide all the medicines that they need. The ad is misleading because seniors are led to believe that all of their medicines are going to be covered. It means that seniors will have to pay in order to get the discount card. It is not free. The ad does not mention that drugs that may be covered when you get the discount card could be dropped, leaving you with no savings, or you may end up in the middle of the year needing another medication you did not know about that is not on the card. This is a bad deal, and this ad is telling seniors, in a glowing ad, it is a nice ad, is it not? I mean, it is pretty. It is pretty. I mean, it is so wrong. The ad is so wrong. But the fact that the seniors are actually paying for this ad that gives a false picture of their Medicare, which they love and they want to know the truth about, is nothing short of, I do not know if technically so but, in my mind, criminal.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, at the end of the day, I really put my faith in the senior citizens of this country. I have the pleasure of being the executive director of the Illinois State Council of Senior Citizens working on issues like this; and if I know the seniors, they will sit down, put pencil to paper, and figure out exactly what this bill does or does not do for them. They will know that this campaign is a sham and a scam; and if the other side of the aisle thinks that this is going to carry the day during the elections, I think the senior citizens of this country are going to prove them wrong.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to reinforce the point that the Republicans never really liked Medicare, but that continues to this day in spades. When we heard one of the leaders on the other side of the aisle, one of the chief negotiators on this bill, or authors of this bill say, To those who say this will end Medicare as we know it, I say, I certainly hope so. So seniors have to understand who is driving the legislation and where their disrespect for Medicare really lies.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, this is a full media branding operation. I am sure all of the Madison Avenue guys are in there figuring out, how many impressions does it take? Who reads their mail? How many people watch television? Oh, yes, it is a very slick ad in time for the election.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. The worst part of this deception is that it is going after senior citizens who count on prescription drugs day in and day out to extend and enhance and perhaps save their lives, and it is telling them things like, the ad itself, where a senior says, ``So how is Medicare changing?'' And the answer, ``It is the same Medicare you have always counted on, plus more benefits, like prescription drug coverage.'' If I am a senior and I am watching this, I am thinking, here it is, what I have been waiting for, a prescription drug benefit. The first thing they are going to find out is, no, forget it, there is going to be nothing for 2 years except for, and we will talk about that later, this card. So there is not going to be any Medicare prescription drug plan of any sort for a couple of years. Then when they really find out the details, some of them are going to find out, ``If I join this plan, I am going to spend more on my Medicare.'' Millions of seniors would spend more if they signed up. So when they say it is the same Medicare you always counted on, plus more benefits like prescription drug coverage, it is not true. It is simply not true. The most generous thing we can say about it is that it is certainly not the full story and, for many seniors, simply not true. Then it says, ``Can I keep Medicare just how it is?'' And that is a question that seniors are asking. They love their Medicare, for good reason. They can count on it, they can take it to the hospital, they can make sure that they can go see their doctor. They know their Medicare, and they love it. ``Can I keep Medicare just how it is?'' they ask on the ad. They say, ``You can always keep your same Medicare coverage.'' The thing they do not say is how much you may have to pay for it.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for his leadership on this and for this evening to bring to the attention of our House of Representatives just how really bad this media campaign is and how cynical it really is. I heard the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown) talking about the windfall that will come to the pharmaceutical industry because of the passage of this bill, something like $140 billion in additional windfall profits. But I do not know even in their wildest imaginations if they realized the taxpayers were also going to fund the media campaign to sell the plan that will bring them the $140 billion. So we are talking about a neat little $22 million ad campaign that is beginning. I am sure maybe you talked about some of these things earlier, but you were just talking, too, about the political nature that we feel is involved in this ad campaign, that the timing has much more to do with an election in November than it does with really educating and informing seniors about the reality of this legislation and what it is going to mean to them. Fortunately, the seniors are smarter than I think some people on the other side of the aisle may think. However, to add to the political connection, some of us wrote a letter to Dara Corrigan, the Acting Principal Deputy Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services, and in that letter we were requesting an investigation of this ad campaign. Let me bring it to your attention. The letter in part says, ``It has also come to our attention that a media firm currently working for the President's reelection campaign has been hired to purchase the $9.5 million worth of television ad time for this new commercial. National Media, Inc., stands to make a windfall from this campaign. This is the same company that has been repeatedly hired for ad campaigns primarily funded by the Republican Party and by the drug industry. National Media, Inc., has done ad campaigns for Citizens for Better Medicare, a drug industry front group that has spent tens of millions of dollars on ads attacking lawmakers interested in lowering the cost of prescription drugs.'' Now, we just passed a new campaign finance reform law that actually makes certain kinds of interlocking consultants and ad producers, et cetera, actually illegal. I do not know if this is legal or not legal. We want the investigation to proceed forward, but it certainly smells bad when you have the Federal Government, with taxpayer dollars, taxpayer dollars, millions, hundreds of millions of Americans putting money into an ad campaign. I have seen it. I do not know if you have. It has been in the media market in the Chicago area. I saw it on television here in the D.C. area. That ad campaign is promoted by the very same people who are working for the President's reelection campaign. To me, that is a smoking gun.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to speak out in opposition to H.R. 3030, a bill to reauthorize and amend the Community Service Block Grant program. While I strongly support the social services and organizations that these grants help support, this bill does not correct current law, which explicitly allows religious organizations that receive federal funds from the Community Service Block Grant Act to discriminate in their hiring. Instead, I support the amendment offered by my colleagues, Representatives Lynn Woolsey, George Miller, and others, which would prohibit discrimination in hiring based on religion. Americans share a fundamental value that we must never discriminate on the basis of religion. Unlike other ideologies, our Constitution specifically protects religion in the first amendment of the Bill of Rights. Yet, H.R. 3030 says federal funds can, in fact, be used to discriminate against someone who may not share the same religion as that practiced by the organization receiving funds. We must not allow our taxpayer dollars to support discrimination. The fact is that religious organizations have been providing secular social services, such as Meals on Wheels, adult literacy programs, homeless shelters and job-training programs, to people in this country for decades. And, in cases where federal funds are involved, these religious organizations have willingly done so without discriminating in their hiring. We must not go down a road where discrimination of any kind is allowed with federal money. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on H.R. 3030 and ``yes'' on amendments that prohibit religious discrimination.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Exactly.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. This is taxpayer advertising: $9.5 million on television; $3.1 million for newspaper, radio and Internet; and a mailing to 40 million seniors and persons with disabilities, all at taxpayers' expense to explain why this lousy bill is, in fact, good for them.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, the words that we want to come out of their mouths is that there will not be any more waivers, and that seeking a job in the private sector, particularly with an industry that you are now regulating in a sense or making decisions about, is not right. It is not right. It smells. People know that. They do not like it. This is why the public loses faith in government, and that is why I feel so strongly about it.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. If I can go on for just a minute, when President Bush ran for office, he said our first priority will be to restore honor and dignity to the White House. But when you look at President Bush's top official in charge of Medicare getting issued a waiver to pursue employment in the health care industry while he continues to serve as administrator of Medicare, how can we call that honor and dignity? This confirms the worst of what people think about the way government is run. When this first happened, I along with our colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark), wrote a letter to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tommy Thompson. A part of the letter says, ``For 7 months Members of Congress who relied on Mr. Scully for information were kept in the dark about the fact that he was actively engaged in looking for employment with firms that have significant interests in the issues at stake. Financial conflicts of interest are designed to assure Members of Congress, entities with interests pending before CMS, and the public that Federal executive branch employees are independent and unbiased in their behavior. While we strongly believe that this waiver should never have been granted, at a bare minimum knowledge of it would have been valuable to us in weighing the advice provided by Mr. Scully.'' This is just shameful. I think in order to restore the confidence that the American public should have in Members of Congress that we are operating in the public interest, in their interest, that when we come up with a bill, it is because it is going to help them get their prescription drugs, then we cannot allow this kind of behavior to continue. No waiver should be granted. An advertising campaign, paid for by the taxpayers, should not be allowed. If the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) takes this job with PhRMA, for 1 year he will not be able to lobby Members of Congress and staffers, but he can still lobby the executive branch, the people that are writing all the regulations that have to do with implementing this particular piece of legislation that he crafted behind a locked door. I think that this notion of restoring honor and dignity to the White House, that is an important goal; but that goal has been undercut and betrayed by this administration and the conduct by the chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. This is correct. Quoting from the article: ``Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson played the commercial Tuesday for reporters. Four actors who portray Medicare beneficiaries ask how the law is changing Medicare. `Can I keep my Medicare just how it is?' one asks. The announcer replies, `Yes, you can always keep your same Medicare coverage.' At the end of the ad, another senior says, `So my Medicare isn't different, it's just more?' The announcer, `Right.' ``Several Democratic Senators already have criticized as propaganda a two-page flyer that HHS plans to make the basis of a letter to be sent later this month to the 40 million older and disabled Americans who are enrolled in Medicare. Asked whether he had consulted those Democrats about the accuracy of the ad, Thompson said, `It's accurate.' ''