Gene Taylor

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Madam Chairman, again, I appreciate, number one, both the majority and the minority giving me the opportunity to bring this amendment up tonight. To the point that the chairman raised, I have served on the authorizing committee for about 16 years now. In the span of that 16 years, I don't ever recall a request from our colleagues on appropriation to pass language to either force or encourage the commissaries to be self-insured. And I think I am pretty keen on this issue and I am pretty confident in saying we have never received a request from your committee to do that. So now that the President is willing to make this commissary whole, that obviously the need is there, that it was indeed an act of God, that it is authorized, I find it strange that at this time Keesler Air Force base and AAFES would be punished for not fulfilling a request that they never got. On the other hand, I think we could fulfill requirements of the President's request, fulfill what is best for AAFES, fulfill what is best for the airmen, for the retirees and the active duty personnel. The people who flew the missions into the hurricane shop at this commissary. People who fly missions in Iraq shop at this commissary. It is a part of their compensation that was promised. It is a part of the compensation that has been denied. Anyone who has visited Mississippi gulf coast knows that the shopping opportunities in the private sector have been greatly diminished as a result of the storm. So you can't say just go out in town, because in the case of Waveland, Mississippi, in the case of Bay St. Louis Mississippi, Long Beach, Mississippi, Pass Christian, Mississippi, those stores are no longer there. So for all of those reasons, I would encourage my colleagues to put back the money that the President has asked for. Madam Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Madam Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, let me first start by thanking my good friend Roscoe Bartlett for his tremendous help this year. The bill authorizes five ships, more than the administration asked for, unfortunately not as many as I would like to build, but very, very great help of the gentleman from Maryland on the part of adding an LHA(R) for the Marine Corps to the ship; getting the next generation destroyer, the DDX, started; and adding a Virginia Class submarine to the fleet. Again at five ships, if you figure the typical 30-year life of a ship, we are cruising toward a 150-ship Navy. That is entirely too small, despite Navy projections that they think they can get the fleet up to about 313 by 2013. But again these are important steps in the right direction. I want to commend the gentleman from Maryland for his help in making that happen. There are a lot of people who have a lot of things they want to say. I want to yield what remains of my time to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Marshall).

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Last night, about 12,000 Mississippians went to bed in somebody else's house or in their carport or in their car or in their tent. They are waiting on a FEMA trailer. I did not promise them a FEMA trailer. The President of the United States did. He has not fulfilled that promise yet. It is over 102 days past the storm. As we speak, there are tens of thousands of Mississippians, average Joes, who are about to lose their house. See, they lived outside the flood plain. They had wind insurance, and a storm of magnitude that has not occurred in 300 years either destroyed or flooded their homes. Now they have no home. They have a mortgage to pay, and their insurance company, which contributes heavily to the folks over there, says you are not getting a dime because that was water and not wind, but they will use any excuse they can. I have introduced legislation to try to help those folks, and it is expensive. It is going to cost about $5 billion to help those folks hang on to their homes and hang on to their mortgage; and in 102 days we have not had a hearing or a vote on it. But if you are a member of the political contributor class, the guys who write the big checks to the RNC, guys who write a big check to a Congressman here, Senator there, we have got a vote on your tax cut that does not even expire for 3 years. You want to know what this House's priorities are? It is not with the average Joes. It is with the political contributor class. You call them what you want. You can call them rich, but we all know it comes down to who writes the checks. By the way, the guy on Coleman Avenue whose house washed away, he does not write big checks. So maybe that is why you do not listen to him. It has been 102 days, and you have done nothing. There is no talk of doing anything. There are 12,000 Mississippians waiting on a FEMA trailer. So what do you bring to the floor? Is it hurricane relief? Is it something to help the average Joes? It is a tax break for the wealthiest 1 percent of America who, by the way, write the big checks to the political parties. Tell me your priorities are not screwed up, because I am going to tell you they are.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I want to remind the gentleman that when your house is washed away, your job is washed away. You are not looking for a tax break. You are looking for your fellow Americans to help you out while your kids are serving in the Mississippi National Guard over in Iraq. You have not done that for 102 days.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, today marks the 100th day since Hurricane Katrina came ashore in south Mississippi. Since that time, we have had a mixture of incredible support from the people of this Nation; but also, quite frankly, there have been a lot of promises made by the President of the United States that have yet to be fulfilled. In 100 days since the storm, numerous regrets by me, Senator Lott, Mr. Pickering and others to try to help those people who found themselves in the horrible situation of having a home that never flooded, or a piece of land that had never flooded since the Europeans settled in Mississippi in 1699, who thought they were properly covered by having wind insurance, who thought they had taken adequate precautions to secure their home in the event of a storm, who found that their homes had flooded. And now for 100 days, I, Senator Lott, Mr. Pickering and others have asked to try to do something to help those people. After all, every aid package the President talks about talks about tax breaks for the fat cats. Well, the fat cats are going to do just fine after the storm. They always do. They have got the money; they know how to invest it; they know how to make more money. They do not need tax breaks. The people who need help in south Mississippi are the average-Joe homeowners: the kid who coaches the Little League team, the guy or lady who sings in the choir, who find themselves now at the end of 90 days that their mortgage is due, they have lost their job, their house has been either destroyed or horribly damaged and they are looking for help from their Nation. This is an extremely patriotic part of the country, and an extremely high percentage of those people have served in the Armed Forces or are presently serving, and all they are asking from you, Mr. President, is a little bit of consideration. After 100 days, we had taken care of the people of New York after 9/ 11. After 100 days, we had taken care of the people of San Francisco. Tonight in south Mississippi, people will crawl into two and three-man tents because 12,000 families are still waiting for a FEMA trailer. The company you gave the contract to, Bechtel Incorporated, has donated tens of thousands of dollars to your campaign and to the Republican majority. You are obviously friends. I think you can pick up the phone to the Bechtel family and ask them to finish the job. After 100 days, only two-thirds of the people who have asked for a trailer since their home has been destroyed have received one. I did not promise those folks a trailer. You did, Mr. President. After 100 days, it has turned cold. A shower with a garden hose in August feels pretty good; a shower with a garden hose when it is 33 degrees outside is a pretty crummy experience. The contracts for debris removal were let on a per-cubic-yard basis. Therefore, the people who did that had an incentive to work quickly because the more they did the more they got paid. The contracts to deliver FEMA trailers was paid by the month. If you pay anyone to do something by the hour as opposed to the job, it is human nature they are going to do it slower. The people of south Mississippi have waited long. Mr. Speaker, it is time to call your friends at Bechtel and tell them to finish the job. Folks had to live in a pup tent for Thanksgiving and their patience has worn thin. Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, I remember when the promise was made that you could cut taxes, increase spending, and pay down the debt. I thought that was a bunch of malarkey at the time, and it has turned out to be $2.4 trillion wrong. But to come to south Mississippi and to promise the people in south Mississippi that you are going to get them a trailer, and not fulfill that promise or drag your feet on that promise, that is something people see every day. It is something I see every time I go home, and that is every weekend. Mr. President, it is time for you and the people at Bechtel to do the job: to deliver the trailers that are sitting in places like Hope, Arkansas, where there are thousands of trailers sitting on the runway. Or Purvis, Mississippi, where there are over 1,200 trailers sitting on the ground, or the staging area in De Lisle or the staging area in Hancock County. They are not doing anyone any good sitting in the staging areas. If you have to void the contract with Bechtel, by all means do so. If the Bechtel family has any respect for their good family name, I am asking them as a Member of Congress representing south Mississippi to replace the management you have in south Mississippi and get the job done because the people of south Mississippi and the people of this Nation who are paying for this deserve better.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, as I speak, one of the greatest legal scams in American history is being perpetrated on the people of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, honest Americans who purchased insurance policies to protect their families in time of a hurricane. They paid their premiums for decades. They are being told one by one ``we are not going to pay your claim.'' See, in a typical insurance policy known as a ``wind policy,'' you would think it would protect you from the 140- to 160-knot breezes of Hurricane Katrina; but somehow buried in that policy is small language that says they are not going to pay for wind-driven water. Now, for most of us, you would think of wind-driven water as maybe the water driven under the stoop of your door in a rain storm, or if you have an older house like I had, under the windows, maybe get some curtains wet or the sheet rock under that window. So if the wind blew a tree into your house, you could file a claim. If the wind blew a car into your house, you could file a claim. But if the wind generates a 30-foot wall of water, well, then the American insurance industry en mass is telling those people in Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and the Alabama gulf coast, You're out of luck. We took your money. You're a chump. Our Nation has a flood insurance policy separate from that where the credibility of this Nation is at stake. I have already told you what I have thought the private sector is doing to my people. But this is us. We also collected people's money in good faith that when there was a flood of their homes that would be paid. We had an unprecedented natural disaster. Now, two things can happen. We can go the way of the private sector which is doing everything they can to scam my constituents, and please use that word, or we can honor our claims. Because a person or a nation is only as good as its word. Our Nation gave our word that we would pay these claims if substantiated. Those claims have been substantiated. Let us set a precedent that hopefully the insurance industry will follow and pay our claims. I want to commend Chairman Oxley. I want to commend Ranking Member Frank for bringing this to the floor in a timely manner. I very much want to commend the other body for plussing this up so that we can fulfill our obligation as a Nation for those people who had flood insurance policies, that we will pay those claims in a timely manner. At the same time I want to go on record as saying that I think there ought to be a national registry of child molesters and, at the moment, insurance industry executives because I think Americans ought to know if they live near one.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, in south Mississippi tonight, the people who have electricity, who might be at a VFW hall or a parish church hall, who are living in two- and three-man igloo tents waiting for Congress to do something, have absolutely got to think this place has lost their minds. The same Congress that voted to give the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans tax breaks every time. Every time. Without a tax break. Out of the goodness of their hearts, no? To help their big contributors. Who is kidding who? The same America that are spending 4 to $6 billion a month in Iraq where, by the way, 4,000 Mississippians are fighting tonight, 15 have already come home dead, a dozen more have been to Walter Reed, who never asked the Iraqis for an offset are suddenly saying in the name of the poor folks in Mississippi who lost their houses, poor folks in New Orleans whose houses were flooded, we can't do this unless we have to hurt some other Americans to help some Americans? Suddenly after taking care of those who had the most, we have got to hurt the least. To help the folks in Mississippi? Folks, this is insane. I have sat here. I remember the vote. May 9, 2001. I remember a President who said he could cut taxes, increase spending and pay down the debt. We are $2.4 trillion deeper in debt than that night. I did not vote for that. Almost all of you did. I did not vote to tell the folks who make hundreds of millions of dollars a year, you deserve a tax break. You did. I voted for offsets for the war in Iraq because, yes, we went to war. My goodness, kids from Mississippi are dying there. I have got a kid who lost both legs volunteering in my office to answer the phone to help folks who were hurt in Katrina. Mississippi has paid their dues. Why should they have to pay their dues twice? This is an emergency. The one time you borrow money is when you go to war and for an emergency. And so, now you have to have an offset? Don't tell me you are being fiscally responsible. I sat here for 5 years and watched you take a budget surplus and run it into $2.5 trillion of new debt. So let's put these things in perspective. Yes, I was told the Iraqis have weapons of mass destruction and they are getting ready to use them. Yes, I was told that you could cut taxes, increase spending and balance the budget. But this is the cruelest lie of all, that the only way you can help the people who have lost everything is by hurting somebody else.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I would like to remind the gentleman that this Congress closed the naval station at Roosevelt Roads without a BRAC.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I have come to the same conclusion as the great gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hobson). I have just probably been at it longer. Article I, section 8 of the Constitution gives Congress the responsibility to provide for the national defense. It does not make us generals; it does not make us admirals. We do not tell admirals how to sink ships; we do not tell generals how to takes hills. We do, hopefully, provide sound business decisions for them. The whole concept of BRAC is taking that decision-making process away from the people who begged for the job and were given the job by the citizens and delegating it to some other people. I did not run for Congress to delegate my responsibilities. I take them very seriously. The service Secretaries would come before our committee, for years they have come before our committee and said, We have too many bases. Every single service Secretary. The gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie) and I would respond to the service Secretaries, Name one base that you want to close. Just one. The same service Secretaries who said they wanted to cancel the Crusader, who said they wanted to cancel the Arsenal ship, who wanted to cancel the Joint Strike Fighter, the same guys who have no hesitation on canceling things and making tough decisions, never named one base that they wanted to close. We followed that up with a very simple question: In the three previous rounds of BRAC, can you name one weapons system that you have bought with those savings? Can you name one additional benefit that you have given to the troops? Can you name one good thing that came out of this? Never once could they answer that question. You see, BRAC saves no money. What people miss in all of this is that when a base is closed, the local communities then come to Congress, as they should, and say, Look, you have just put all my folks out of work. We at least want the property back. And in every instance Congress has given that property back to the locals, so there is no savings of selling off the property. As a matter of fact, it gets worse, because our Nation has to live by the same laws as everyone else. If an individual pollutes a piece of property, they have to clean it up before they can sell it. To date, our Nation has spent $15 billion cleaning up properties before we gave them away. The gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hobson) makes an excellent point: every time you lose a base, you lose a capability. The worst of Hurricane Katrina hit my congressional district. I was very fortunate to be friends with Admiral Mullen, the Chief of Naval Operations. I was very fortunate to be friends with General Steven Bloom, the head of the National Guard Bureau. In my frantic calls to them in the aftermath of the storm begging for their help, their first response was, Where can I put my people? Name a barracks, name an airfield, name a place where I can put my people so they can help the people of Mississippi. Every time you lose a base, you lose a place to put those people in the event weather, whether it is a tsunami in the Pacific, a hurricane in Mississippi, a flood or earthquake on the west coast, a flood in the Midwest, you lose a capability to help the American people. We are at war. Goodness gracious, we have 140,000 Americans fighting and dying in Iraq. We have another 20,000-plus in Afghanistan. Did anyone see these wars coming? The truth of the matter is, in my time in Congress we have had a war in Panama that no one saw coming, we have had two wars in Iraq that we really did not see coming, we had a war in Bosnia that no one saw coming. So when you close a base, you close it forever and you lose that capability to respond to future contingencies. Above all, when some new weapons system comes along, you lose a place to deploy it. Right now our Nation is buying 30,000 acres in North Carolina, and some people in North Carolina think it is a great idea and some people think it is a terrible idea. We are spending a heck of a lot of your money buying land in North Carolina so we can build a base to land F-18s, the newest version of the F-18, when they come off the carriers. Then we have to buy the land and build a runway. And everyone who has served knows it does not end with the runway. You have to have a fire station, barracks for the enlisted, barracks for the single guys, family housing for the married folks, you have to have commissaries, you have to have fun things for the guys to do when they are off duty, because we are trying to attract young people like you to come serve our country. All of these things cost money, and we are going to build all these things in North Carolina at great expense to the public. With you we already had all those things. We had all those things that we are getting ready to buy and build in North Carolina in Jacksonville, Florida. It was called Cecil Field. It had a 10,000-foot runway and three 8,000-foot runways. It had an excellent quality of life, and it was all paid for by the American taxpayer, and a previous round of BRAC closed that. So, please, proponents of this, tell me how we are saving the taxpayers money, how we are making the Nation more secure, and, above all, if the service Secretaries cannot name a single base that they think is worthy of closing, why are we going to close so many bases in one fell swoop? We were elected to follow the Constitution. The Constitution clearly gives Congress the responsibility to provide for the Army and the Navy. Let us do our job and let us not hide behind some commission to do our work for us. I urge Members to vote against the recommendations of this commission.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Madam Speaker, I want to thank the members of the Committee on Ways and Means for bringing this to the floor. As you know, south Mississippi, south Louisiana suffered a catastrophe of biblical proportions; and there is really no other way to describe it. A 30-foot wall of water hit south Mississippi, resulting in the breaking of the floodgates in New Orleans. Whole communities, the city of Waveland, it is pretty fair to say no longer exists. The city of Bay Saint Louis, probably 80 percent of the people in that town lost their homes. In portions of Harrison County, in Pass Christian and Biloxi, there are entire blocks leveled, with one person not able to distinguish the parts of furniture from his house with the parts of furniture from another. I consider myself a deficit hawk. I have voted against almost every tax bill that came to this floor because I did not want to see the deficit go up by the $2 trillion it has. This is different. I felt that those bills took care of the wealthiest Americans. I think this bill takes care of the neediest Americans. It is truly a step in the right direction when we have so much to do. One of the fights that the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. McCrery) and all of us from the affected area will have is to help those people who could never have conceived they would flood with their insurance needs. They had wind insurance. They are now being told it did not cover a flood, and places that had never flooded in recorded history of the Europeans coming to America flooded. They are being left out in the cold. We have to find a way to help them. There is going to be, based on the Florida experience, a number, probably in the tens of thousands of people, who will be told by FEMA that their house has been 51 percent destroyed and, by regulation, it has to be bulldozed. And then it is complicated by, I am told, based on the Florida experience, the insurance companies who will go to them and say FEMA says there is only 51 percent destruction, so we are only going to give you 51 percent of what you thought your premium was. So if you had a $100,000 house, it is bulldozed; but you only get $51,000 in payment. We have to fix that. We cannot let that happen again. There are too many hard-working people who are looking to Congress for leadership. I do not say this often, because I did vote for the war in Iraq and I share in the responsibility for every one of those Americans who were wounded there and everyone who died there, but on a daily basis we hire Iraqis to clean the streets, just to give them something to do and give them a chance at life. On a daily basis we are fixing sewer lines in Iraq. On a daily basis we are building schools in Iraq. We need to do for our fellow Americans what we so willingly do for the Iraqi people. So I thank the committee for this great step in the right direction. It is such a, quite frankly, small step on such a monumental journey that we have to take; but it is at least a step in the right direction, and thank you for doing it.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Madam Speaker, I recently heard the gentleman who represents Hollywood speaking about how it is somehow fair that the only Member of this body that I know of who was there on Ground Zero, who rode with the National Guard to distribute food because FEMA so thoroughly screwed up, who realizes that if it were not for the United States military doing FEMA's job for them, people would have starved to death, people would have died of dehydration, hospitals would not have gotten needed medical supplies, that I will not be allowed to subpoena witnesses. So as a Member of this body who was elected by as good a margin as anyone else here, I do object that I could not ask for a witness, that I could not subpoena a witness to deliver the message that needs to be delivered about the lessons learned in Mississippi. We do not need to make the same mistakes when the next hurricane hits. The bottom line is FEMA did make horrible mistakes that came very close to costing people their lives. FEMA could have avoided millions of dollars in unnecessary aerial replenishment of people that we could get trucks to, because they insisted on one point of delivery in a county where very few people still had cars that were running and those that had cars that ran could not get gasoline. FEMA could have sent thousands of people on their way to their families in other parts of the State, but did not bring gasoline in for them. There are a number of mistakes that we never need to make again as a Nation. And I would hope that I would have the opportunity to subpoena some of the people that need to speak on this. It does not need to be Bush-bashing; it does not need to be anybody-bashing. It needs to be an honest account of what happened. But how can we do that when one of the people that was at Ground Zero cannot ask questions of witnesses, cannot subpoena witnesses? Is that really fair? Does that really get to the solution of the problem? I do not think so. I think our Nation works best when we work together, and a 9/11-type commission composed of whoever needs to be subpoenaed is what we need to do. At the end of the day, I am going to vote for a commission no matter how bad, because something is better than nothing; but the American people deserve for us to do it right.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Madam Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Madam Speaker, given the gentleman's desire to see that we get to the bottom of this, given that the gentleman is elected by a majority of the people from California, and given that I am elected by a majority of people in the most affected area, does the gentleman not think it would be fair that I would have the same right, as someone from the affected area, to subpoena witnesses as the gentleman from the west coast of this country would have?

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, due to a family medical emergency, I missed rollcall votes 308 through 325, which took place on Friday, Monday, and Tuesday--June 24, 27, and 28, 2005, respectively. Had I been present, I would have voted as follows: Rollcall votes--308 (Price of Georgia Amendment): ``nay''; 309 (George Miller of California Amendment): ``yea''; 310 (Brown of Ohio Amendment): ``nay''; 311 (Filner of California Amendment): ``yea''; 312 (King of Iowa Amendment): ``yea''; 313 (Hefley of Colorado Amendment): ``yea''; 314 (Hinchey of New York Amendment): ``nay''; 315 (Hayworth of Arizona Amendment No. 14): ``nay''; 316 (Van Hollen of Maryland Amendment): ``yea''; 317 (Paul of Texas Amendment): ``yea''; 318 (DeLauro of Connecticut Amendment): ``nay''; 319 (Hinchey of New York Amendment for DeFazio of Oregon): ``yea''; 320 (Motion to Recommit H.R. 3010): ``yea''; 321 (Passage of H.R. 3010): ``nay''; 322 (Motion to Suspend the Rules and Agree, as Amended, H. Res. 199): ``yea''; 323 (Motion to Suspend the Rules and Agree, H. Con. Res. 155): ``yea''; 324 (Motion to Suspend the Rules and Pass, as Amended, H.R. 458): ``yea''; and 325 (Ordering the Previous Question, H. Res. 341): ``nay.'' Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to enter this personal explanation into the Record at the appropriate location.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, due to a family medical emergency, I am departing Washington, DC, at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, June 24th. As a result, I will miss votes on the amendments to and final passage on H.R. 3010, the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2006. Upon my return to Washington, I will submit a statement indicating how I would have voted had I been present.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the 100th anniversary of St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church located in Long Beach, Mississippi. In early 1905, Bishop Thomas Heslin of the Natchez Diocese directed the order of St. Vincent de Paul, known as Vincentians, to build a church and religious retreat to fill the needs of the parishioners of Long Beach, Mississippi City, Perkinston and Wiggins. Forty acres of land were acquired on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, and the church was consecrated as St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church on July 15, 1905. As the City of Long Beach grew, so did the mission of the church. In 1915, St. Thomas was designated a parish church by Bishop John Gunn with Father Joseph Hagar serving as the new parish's first pastor. September 3, 1922 marked the first day of school for students of St. Thomas Elementary School, staffed by the Daughters of Charity. August 17, 1969 marked a tragic day for all of South Mississippi when the Gulf Coast was struck by Hurricane Camille, a category 5 storm and the strongest hurricane to strike the United States in the 20th century. Camille destroyed the original 1905 St. Thomas Church and most other church associated buildings. As the region slowly recovered the church was rebuilt. Bishop Joseph Brunini dedicated the new St. Thomas Church on August 20, 1972. The Vincentians ceded the parish to the Diocese of Biloxi in the summer of 1993, and Father Louis Lohan was named pastor of the congregation. The church's most recent major addition was the Parish Life Center, which was dedicated in November 2002. So it is my great honor to congratulate the people of St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church on their 100th anniversary.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute and to recognize the outstanding service of Lieutenant Colonel Joseph W. Corrigan, who retires this July after twenty-three years of selfless and dedicated service while working for the United States Army, the Army Corps of Engineers, and Army Legislative Liaison. Lieutenant Colonel Corrigan is a decorated Iraqi Freedom combat veteran who has not only demonstrated his courage in a hostile fire zone but his fervent compassion for people suppressed by years of tyranny and his untiring love of Country as he dedicated over twenty years of voluntary service to our Nation. Lieutenant Colonel Corrigan began his career as a United States Military Academy graduate, Class of 1982, and was immediately selected to lead our Nation's Sons and Daughters, an honor he accepted with great pride. During his superb career he has met the call of our Nation in both positions of leadership and staff while both he and his family endured the hardships of deployments and separation. As a testament to his professionalism, in 2002 he was awarded the Pace Award as the Department of the Army Staff Officer of the Year. Recently, Lieutenant Colonel Corrigan proudly served the citizens of our great State of Mississippi in his capacity as the Deputy Director, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers--Mobile Engineer District where he managed all the Corps of Engineer programs for five Southeastern States as well as Central and South America. Lieutenant Colonel Corrigan has spent a major portion of his career with Army Legislative Liaison providing both the Army and Congress with valuable professional insights and advice that have had a direct and positive impact on transforming the Army to meet the current and future requirements of a Nation at War. Mr. Speaker, as Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Corrigan leaves twenty- three years of Military Service to our Country, I offer not only congratulations on his accomplishments but heartfelt thanks for his selfless service to our great Nation and a wish for his continued success.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, what we are talking about today is a fairly simple thing. The text of the original bill is to give the 50 States the legal authority to, on a state-by-state basis, prevent the desecration of the flag, a symbol of our country. There is something a heck of a lot more serious going on than the desecration of the flag: it is the desecration of our Nation. In the last 4 years alone, the national debt has increased by $2.1 trillion. We have taken money out of the Social Security trust fund, $632 billion out of that trust fund, and used it to run the country, leaving nothing there but an IOU. Money has been taken out of the Federal Employees Retirement System, now a total of $614 billion. Mr. Speaker, if any business in America had taken that money out of the employees' trust fund----

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, the point of order is, why would we take the time to protect the symbol of our country if we will not take the time to protect the financial future of our country as well? That is my point.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, what is the procedure to appeal the ruling of the Chair? I would like the ability to speak to that, please.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I am appealing the ruling of the Chair, and I would like to speak to that point.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, is that debatable?

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding under the rule passed by the Committee on Rules that the minority is guaranteed a motion to recommit.