[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 32 (Monday, March 21, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
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[Congressional Record: March 21, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]


                              {time}  2050
 
                    IMPORTANT ISSUES FACING AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Peterson). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of February 11, 1994, the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] 
is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I certainly appreciate the opportunity to 
address the House tonight on a number of important issues that are 
facing the country today, that of defense, that of health care, that of 
the family and taxes and crime, and so forth.
  I am going to start out by yielding the floor to the gentleman from 
Utah [Mr. Hansen].
  Mr. HANSEN. I appreciate my friend from Georgia yielding the floor to 
me.
  (Mr. HANSEN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. HANSEN. Mr. Speaker, it has been interesting as we go through the 
downsizing of the military, we all realize that this is a necessary 
thing to do. But the question comes down to how far do we go?
  We are going through a base closing. We have done a 1991 and 1993. We 
are looking at a 1995. We are finding out the Pentagon does not have 
the money to come up with the promises they made as far as defense 
conversion, as far as cleaning up the toxic wastes, all of the 
economies of the area. I do not see that money coming about as we first 
anticipated it would. We have a big backlog.
  Having sat for 6 years on the Restoration Environment Panel of the 
Committee on Armed Services, I do not think there is enough money in 
the whole defense budget to take care of the toxic wastes we see in the 
various bases, but we are looking at those things. We know every time 
there is a debate on the floor, people stand up and say the cold war is 
over. Why are we spending all this money on defense?
  If I may, Mr. Speaker, I would like to talk for just a moment on the 
history of what has happened in this country of America where we are 
all Pollyannas and want to believe the very best. We want to believe 
that all is well. Peace on Earth, goodwill toward men. No more problems 
for any of us.
  Unfortunately, that is not what history tells us. Those who choose 
not to learn from history seem to relive it. That has been the case of 
the United States of America.
  During the First World War, my father was in that one. He flew 
Jennies down in Texas at Kelly Field, that fine old airplane that many 
of us look back on and those of us who have been pilots enjoyed that 
very much. I remember my dad talking about how euphoric they were when 
the war ended, the war to end all wars, bring the doughboys home. It is 
all done. We have nothing more to worry about.
  Then in a few short years, just a little over 20 years, here came the 
Second World War, and the United States was not ready to get into it, 
because after the First World War, we went too far too fast. We wanted 
to believe this Pollyanna thing that all is well. There is nothing more 
to worry about. Things are OK in the world today. We have brought the 
boys home. There is nothing more.
  In the Second World War, probably one of the bitterest wars ever 
fought on the face of the Earth, look at all the people we lost, both 
in the Pacific and in Europe. Look at the terrible things of war that 
were created. Following that, again, the same euphoria seemed to 
permeate the people of America, all is well. There is nothing more to 
worry about.
  I still remember my father saying to me, you were too young for the 
Second World War, you will be too old for the next one. Again we 
disarmed too far and too fast and found ourselves after winning that 
one at a point where a man by the name of Kim Sung from North Korea 
said to a man by the name of Stalin from Moscow that I can push the 
people off that peninsula in 3 weeks and the United States will not 
respond.
  However, he read that one wrong, as we all know, and we did respond, 
and the Korean War started. I am a Korean War veteran myself. We got 
through that one. Then Vietnam, that terribly unpopular war.
  After each one of those, what does the United States do? We disarm 
too far, too fast. And a few little ones like Panama, Grenada, Libya, 
and then the Persian Gulf, which was probably a textbook war, if there 
can be such a thing.
  Now we find ourselves in the position of doing it again. I have the 
greatest respect for people like Chairman Dellums and Chairman Sam 
Nunn. But as I look at what we are doing now, we find ourselves, first 
we were looking at the force structure that Dick Chaney, Colin Powell, 
and George Bush worked on, which was basically a 25-percent reduction 
in military. Now under the Clinton administration we are seeing closer 
to a 40-percent reduction in military, which I personally am worried 
about, and I feel we find ourselves maybe in the same position.
  I know the Director of the CIA, Mr. Jim Woolsey, has made a very 
interesting statement. He said the Soviet Union was like a great big 
dragon out in the jungle. And that dragon has now split apart and now 
we have 50 poisonous snakes.
  Think about it. We do not have to be too bright to figure out there 
are poisonous snakes in various areas. You can read Jane's, the defense 
magazine, and know what is happening in Libya as far as biological and 
chemical, know what is happening in Iran and Iraq. We know what is 
happening in North Korea, and many areas. These 50 slithering poisonous 
snakes are all over.
  Yet, at the same time, we are disarming the military so rapidly that 
do not we ever learn from history? Didn't we learn what happened? The 
First World War, the Second World War, Korea, Vietnam, one after 
another? Are we going to put the people of America in jeopardy again by 
disarming this Nation too far and too fast?
  Will we ever learn from our great first President, George Washington, 
who made the statement, ``The best way to keep the peace is be prepared 
for war,'' not overly prepared, but adequately prepared, that we can 
handle any contingency that may happen.
  I submit to the American public that we are not there and we are 
going too far and we will rue the day we do that, just as we did at the 
First World War, the Second World War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, 
and you name it. Let us be cautious as Members of Congress who are 
making these policy decisions. Let us be cautious that we do not disarm 
this military to the point we can't bring it back.
  Do you realize how fast we could build P-51's, DC-3's, B-17's, and B-
24's. Well, you can't do it now. There is no way we can build like we 
did during those times. Now we will have just what we have got, and 
those 50 poisonous snakes worry me, Mr. Speaker, and they should worry 
the American public. We should be very cautious and very prudent as we 
start this builddown and not go as fast as we have in the past.
  I thank my friend from Georgia for yielding to me.
  Mr. KINGSTON. I thank the gentleman from Utah.
  I wanted to touch base on two of the things you pointed out. I have 
read during the course of this year ``The Last Line,'' part II, by 
William Manchester, which is a biography of Winston Churchill, and the 
book actually took place from about 1920 to 1939.
  During that period of time, of course, Churchill fell from grace in 
the English Parliament. Really he was one of the most hated men in 
England during that period of time. What he was hated about was he kept 
saying we are not preparing, we are disarming too fast and meanwhile, 
Germany, yes, Germany of all places, is rearming, and they are 
building, and they are getting prepared for a war. They are going to be 
a world power.
  Nobody believed him. History shows Churchill was ridiculed, laughed 
at, and scorned. Yet, he stood steadfast, and because of those beliefs, 
he was able to become Prime Minister and lead England successfully 
through World War II. But he was out there crying in the wilderness 
alone.
  Mr HANSEN. If the gentleman will yield, it is interesting to me you 
would bring that up, because that is another classic example in world 
history. When Chamberlain the Prime Minister of England, talked to 
Hitler about whether or not they were going to Czechoslovakia, and 
Chamberlain came back and told the English people all is well, we have 
it worked out, he was cheered all over England.
  But a voice of reason and understanding, Winston Churchill, stood up 
and was booed off the House floor, the House of Parliament. And yet in 
a short time, did Hitler live up to what he said he would do? Surely 
not. He walked right into Czechoslovakia, and the next thing we knew we 
were in it up to our ears. That man that had the courage to be the 
voice of reason when everyone wanted to believe differently, stood up, 
took the flak that he had to take, and later, as you pointed out so 
ably, became the Prime Minister of England and was the man who gave the 
inspiration to all of the world when he talked about we will fight in 
the streets, we will do all this type of thing.
  Churchill was an amazing individual. In fact, in his last talk that 
he ever gave to Parliament, he stood before them and all he said is 
never give up. Never, never give up.
  I cannot say it the way he would say it, of course, but that is a 
good thing for all Americans to look at also as we look at the roots 
that we have from England.
  And I am interested in what you said about him, because he was one 
great leader, and probably someone we should all emulate and should 
think about it and cautiously think about it as we, here as Members of 
Congress, who are studying the policies, setting the money for what is 
going to happen with the defense of America, should never forget those 
great lessons of history from people such as him.
  Mr. KINGSTON. I think the gentleman is correct. I have heard it said 
many times that while the United States cannot afford to be the 
policeman of the world, if there is to be one, let it be the United 
States, because we have always been a peace loving nation and have 
never used our military power to invade other countries, as history 
shows many other countries do when they have that advantage.
  The gentleman from California is here and has great knowledge and 
expertise on military topics. If I could yield to him.

                              {time}  2100

  Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to my friend from 
Utah, who is one of the leaders on the Armed Services Committee, 
because what you have said needs to be said at townhalls throughout 
this Nation. Instead of the news media focusing on some of the juicier 
aspects of Government and politics, they need to be looking very 
seriously at what we are doing with our defense apparatus, this 
dismantlement we are going through, and address it.
  Let me take some of the statements that you have made and talk a 
little bit about some specific things.
  First, the threat has changed. I think we all concur in that. The 
former Soviet Union is now broken down into States. The problem is that 
the four States of Belarus and Kazakhstan and Ukraine and Russia that 
came out of the Soviet Union, those four States at least retained 
nuclear weapons. And it is at times the ownership of the pink slip of 
those nuclear weapons is somewhat in doubt, and the political 
leadership is a very fragile political leadership in those four States. 
I think that those nations are understanding now, I think they have 
always known instinctively, but they are understanding now that the 
ownership of those nuclear weapons gives them prestige and gives them 
leverage.
  In looking at the Nunn-Lugar moneys, the moneys that we have 
appropriated in Congress to dismantle some of those nuclear weapons, we 
notice that the schedules are dragging and dragging and dragging. We 
keep asking in Armed Services, when are they going to dismantle the 
nuclear weapons aimed at us? The answer is, sometime in the future. But 
we tend to have a few problems with moving this process down the line.
  I think the delay is caused by the fact that these nations understand 
there is a certain prestige attached to these weapons. I think it is 
going to be a long time before they are dismantled. But beyond the 
Soviet threat, we have North Korea obtaining nuclear capability. We 
understand that. We also understand that there is very little we can do 
about it, according to our experts who say we cannot make a clean 
scalpel-like attack, surgical strike on the nuclear apparatus, the 
nuclear development apparatus of North Korea, like the Israelis made on 
the Iraqi nuclear reactor, because they have underground facilities. It 
is very complex. It is difficult to tell exactly what is going on and 
where. And our intelligence apparatus has not penetrated the Korean 
peninsula well, everyone understands that. And so we have problems with 
stopping this development.
  When you are dealing with the brutal leadership of North Korea, we 
have discovered that the fine print and the excellent, eloquent 
statements of our diplomats have little effect on their military 
machine and on their nuclear development operation.
  So you have nuclear weapons being acquired by an instable regime that 
is dependent on the personalities of a few people.
  In the South China Sea, you have Communist China now claiming a great 
deal of territories, understanding that there is some wealth in the 
South China Sea, moving into the South China Sea with strength, 
building warship bases and warplane bases in the Sea.
  In the Balkans, of course, we have the situation that most Americans 
who watch CNN are aware of. The Balkans continue to explode. And in the 
Middle East we have a continuing, dangerous situation. And overlaying 
all of these threats around the world, we have now a stampede among the 
Western nations to proliferate high technology, what is known as dual-
use technology. That is machinery and technology that can be used on 
the domestic side to make plant and equipment for domestic 
manufacturing operations but also be used on the military side to build 
the military machines that at some point may meet young Americans on 
the battlefield and kill them. That is militarily critical technology, 
and I am reminded that when we found the skull furnaces that had been 
shipped by the United States to Saddam Hussein before the Iraq 
conflict, and we looked up the documentation that came out of our 
Department of Commerce, they had stamped on that documentation for 
these skull furnaces, which were used by Hussein in his nuclear weapons 
development program, very critical parts, they had stamped on those 
documents that they were going to be used by the Iraqi people to make 
prostheses for amputees.

  Of course, our Department of Commerce bought that particular 
explanation. The point is that even with that illustration, the United 
States is the most conservative Nation of all the nations in the 
Western democracies with respect to shipping high technology to our 
potential adversaries.
  We now have a stampede, a flood by Great Britain, by France, Germany, 
Japan, by many others to sell military critical technology, technology 
that is equivalent to selling Winchesters to the hostiles, to our 
adversaries. It is no longer just a thin hemorrhage around the world. 
It is a flood of technology.
  So overlaying all these threats that we have in Korea, with respect 
to China, with respect to the former Soviet States, with respect to the 
Middle East, and with respect to what I guess you would call the usual 
suspects, Libya, Iraq, and others, you have overlaid on this 
proliferation of killing technology that is currently at flood stage.
  We have a very dangerous world. And against this threat, the Clinton 
administration is reducing national security by $127 billion. This was 
last year's baseline, $127 billion below what George Bush cut out of 
defense of $50 billion. So this is $177 billion below what we figured 
in 1990, we would need for national defense.
  We have cut our fighter forces 50 percent. We have cut our bomber 
forces by 33 percent in just a few months. We are now reducing our 600-
ship Navy. It was almost 600 ships a few years ago. It is a little bit 
above 300, massive reductions taking place right now.
  We are cashiering 600 young people a week out of the military, taking 
the uniform off these people, putting them back in the private sector 
and praying that the world is going to be stable.
  I think, to the gentleman from Utah and my good friend my Georgia, I 
think we are approaching what George Marshall described, after World 
War II, when somebody said, what do you think about the demobilization, 
General? He said, ``This is not a demobilization; it is a rout.''
  Of course, we know that shortly after that rout took place in the 
most powerful army in the history of the world, the United States 
military was down to such a level that when we were challenged in 
Korea, we were unable for many months to meet the challenge,
  Mr. KINGSTON. I wanted to relate a old hunting story. We were talking 
about selling technologies to our suspected enemies.
  There is a great and illustrative joke, the story of a hunter who was 
out hunting when it was cold. He found a frozen snake, and he took the 
snake home with him. And he heated the snake up by the fireplace and 
gave him a little water, fed him a mouse. And the snake, sure enough, 
revived and got alive again.

  Then one day the man was moving the snake's water dish and the snake 
bit him. And the hunter said, I do not understand this. I took you in. 
You were fed. You were frozen. I thawed you out. I fed you, gave you 
water. The snake shrugged and says, you knew I was a snake.
  I think that is what we forget in America. Often we think that we can 
kill our enemies with kindness when, in fact, you cannot reform people 
who do not want to be your ally. Yet time and time again, we do sell 
furnaces or other sort of technology to the people who will be after 
our very own citizens in one form or the other one day.
  Mr. HUNTER. I think my friend is right. He has made a wonderful 
illustration with this story.
  My only problem with that story is, I think it is very difficult for 
me to imagine how a snake shrugs.
  Mr. KINGSTON. You people in California do not have very big snakes. 
We will get you to Georgia sometime.
  Mr. HUNTER. You have those broad-shouldered snakes in Georgia.
  Let me bring out one other thing that I think is important for us to 
remember. That is, as Leo Thorsness, who was a POW for many years in 
North Vietnam and a Medal of Honor winner, said, he said in areas of 
national defense, if you are going to make a mistake in budgeting, err 
on the side of strength.
  And what I think the American people were so grateful for during 
Desert Storm was when Colin Powell said, we are going to destroy the 
Iraqi Army, the fourth largest military in the world, with overwhelming 
force.
  So we met that military with overwhelming force, and we took around 
100 casualties, that is KIA, killed in action, 100 casualties.
  Somebody was comparing that to the number of people who were killed 
in drive-by shootings in Washington, DC, during the same period of 
time. I think there were more people killed by drive-by shootings in 
the drug wars in Washington, DC, than were killed during Desert Shield 
and Desert Storm on the battlefield in Iraq.
  The reason we were able to prosecute that war and cut off Saddam 
Hussein before he cut the oil lifeline that the West depends on, the 
reason we were able to do that was because we had overwhelming 
strength. This was not an even match.

                              {time}  2110

  In technology and in quantity and in quality of systems, we had 
overwhelming strength.
  We are now cutting back to where our analysts are coming in, like 
those from the General Accounting Office and the Budget Office, who 
told us the other day in the Committee on Armed Services, ``We think we 
can win these wars on what we are going to have.'' I asked him, ``Did 
you take into account casualties?'' ``No, we did not take into account 
casualties.''
  I just want to give two situations and ask you to compare them. At 
Antietam, just a few miles from here, where Robert E. Lee invaded the 
North during the early part of the Civil War, went across the Potomac 
and took on McClellan's army at Antietam Creek, the battle forces of 
the South and the North, considering the geographical proximity or the 
geographical location that Lee set up in, were fairly, fairly even. 
There was rough parity. The North had more people but the South had a 
geographical--because they sat up on a ridge near Antietam Creek, they 
had the edge in terrain and topography, and they were set up in a 
fairly strong position when the North struck them.
  Because both sides were evenly matched, it was a fierce, grinding 
struggle. In a matter of about 10 hours, 33,000 Americans were either 
killed or wounded. The cornfield, if you go to Antietam Creek and you 
stand there and you let the ranger brief you on that battle, and you 
are standing there at the headquarters of Antietam battlefield, he will 
show you where the cornfield was, the famous cornfield which was taken 
and retaken by both sides, until it had switched possession six times. 
At the end of that carnage, you could walk all the way across the 
cornfield on bodies.
  We took 33,000 casualties, North and South, in that battle, because 
there was an evenness of forces; because there was not overwhelming 
superiority on one side or another.
  Compare that with our fight in Desert Storm, where we beat the 
fourth-largest army in the world and took about 100 men killed in 
action. The facts are that having overwhelming force is much better for 
your young men and women in uniform, because it protects them, it 
allows them to get the job done quickly without taking massive 
casualties, and it does not turn your operation into a long, grinding 
battle that wears you down and results in body bag after body bag being 
shipped home.
  Mr. HANSEN. Will the gentleman yield on that?
  Mr. HUNTER. I am happy to yield to the gentleman from Utah.
  Mr. HANSEN. I think my friend from California has brought up a very 
interesting point, talking about the Civil War in the United States of 
America.
  As we go back and look at the history of that, it was a grisly, mean, 
dirty, bloody affair, and we lost literally thousands and thousands of 
our people.
  Now we look at the thing today, as we talked about, the kind of wars 
we could look at. The gentleman brought up the idea of weapon 
proliferation, talking about ethnic, religious wars, problems we have 
probably not faced at other times, and the gentleman has used a good 
example which I appreciate the gentleman used, what happened in Iraq.
  At this point, the big, fourth-largest military might on the face of 
the Earth moved into Kuwait. It was a war of aggression, much like 
during the Second World War, when Hitler's Germany moved into 
Czechoslovakia, France, Scandinavian countries.
  At that point people wanted to push them out. It was the 
anticipation, get them out of our country. They have occupied something 
that is not theirs.
  It is interesting the gentleman brings up the Civil War, a different 
kind of war. In Vietnam, what did we have on our hands? We had a civil 
war on our hands. When you talk to people who were Vietnam veterans, 
they did not know who was wearing the white hat, who was the right 
person, a very difficult type of war to get in. Korea was another civil 
war. Ours was a civil war. The history of civil wars is that they are 
very tough to win.
  Now as we look at what we may face now, these are not easy wars, and 
I'm not saying the Persian Gulf was easy, but we knew those people did 
not have their hearts in it. Look how they surrendered.
  Look at the problems with Bosnia and these areas. Look at some of the 
problems that could come up. What you have alluded to is another one of 
these tough wars to fight, much more, even with the overwhelming odds 
because they had people fighting for God, country, and mother, so to 
speak. It is not one of those things where they are mercenaries.
  There is another point that I believe even requires a higher degree 
of training, a higher degree of preparedness, than having the 
technology and the overwhelming odds that we have. It is a sin almost 
in my mind to see the technology that we have perpetuated in America, 
which has been the leading edge of why we have been ahead and in my 
opinion why the cold war ended, is the technology of America. To see 
that taken apart and eroded is to me one of the biggest mistakes we are 
seeing in America at this particular time.

  Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman will yield, I think one of the things 
we are saying is that yes, it is efficient to swat a fly with a 
sledgehammer when you are talking about saving lives. That is how the 
American military has been successful throughout the years.
  Mr. Speaker, we have a couple of other things we wanted to talk 
about, but I don't want to cut the gentleman short, but just encourage 
him to maybe sum up.
  Mr. HUNTER. I thank the gentleman from Georgia, and I thank him for 
letting my friend from Utah and I talk a little bit on his time in this 
special order.
  Let me just finish by saying this, Mr. Speaker. The airlift that we 
have undertaken over Bosnia has now been carried on longer than the 
Berlin airlift. This is another aspect of military operations and 
military requirements in this so-called peaceful period. We have now 
carried that airlift on longer than the Berlin airlift.
  Our military operations over Iraq have now been carried on longer and 
we have had more military operations over Iraq, aircraft operations, 
than we had during the Iraq war, so the so-called period of peace 
following the war has been more stressful on our air wings than the war 
itself.
  At the same time, Mr. Speaker, we have gone down in President 
Clinton's defense budget, we are cutting down on the number of new 
aircraft that we procure to the point where if we compare what we did 
in the 1980's, when we had in naval air, for example, we had about 
5,500 aircraft, and that includes fixed-wing aircraft, fighters, attack 
planes, bombers, and it includes helicopters.
  We replaced those aircraft with replacement budgets each year of in 
excess of 300 aircraft, or roughly about 18 to 1. That means for every 
18 aircraft we had in our inventory, whether on the decks of our 
carriers or in our air bases, for every 18 aircraft in inventory we 
would buy at least 1 new aircraft every year.
  We have cut back so far on replacing those aircraft, on replenishment 
inventories, that we are only going to replace this year at the ratio 
of about 1 to 100, so we are replacing them at five times lower rates 
than what we were replacing them during the 1980's. That means we are 
aging our naval air force.
  That means that instead of replacing those 1965 Chevys with new 
models, we are going to go ahead and get along with the 1965 Chevys for 
a few years longer. That means that when we have that conflict that the 
gentleman from Utah [Mr. Hansen] talked about, and it might be a civil 
war, it might be something along the lines of Desert Storm, it could be 
an ethnic problem, but when we have to meet that conflict, we are going 
to have much older aircraft than the modern aircraft that we were able 
to prosecute Desert Storm with.
  Mr. HANSEN. I thank the gentleman from Georgia for allowing us to use 
a little of his time and be a voice in the wilderness in what some of 
us feel very strongly about.
  Mr. KINGSTON. I appreciate the gentleman's leadership in defense 
matters.
  I wanted to touch on some health care topics, and particularly, Mr. 
Speaker, I wanted to talk about the impact of health care on small 
businesses and the family. I think it is so important that we talk 
about the family more.
  We had this great debate today on school prayer. I was glad to be 
here for that. It is very important. I was glad it was a healthy debate 
on school prayer. The central theme behind that debate was, will this 
make life better for our students and our families, and will we be 
getting back to maybe some better values as a country?
  I think one of the things that we need to do in America is assess our 
tax system as respects the family. A statistic that I fell across the 
other day has just shocked me. That is that in the 1950's, the average 
American family paid, as part of their income, 2 percent taxes in 
Federal income tax, so part of the average family income, 2 percent 
went to Federal income taxes. Today that same average family pays 24 
percent.
  During that period of time, Mr. Speaker, the family time spent with 
each other has actually decreased about 37 percent. Now I'm not sure 
how that statistic actually has been studied, but I think the fact is 
that everyone we talk to is busy: The mom works, the dad works, they 
are rushing around here and there, they are trying to catch planes and 
go on trips and so forth.
  And yet, is our quality of life any better than it used to be, are we 
spending more time with our children? No. If we do not spend more time 
with them, we do not impart our values and I am afraid if this health 
care plan passes with its $400 billion price tag that it will just be 
one more massive tax on the middle class who cannot afford it anymore.
  I am very concerned that in the health care debate we are forgetting 
the tax formula as it hits the middle class, because if we look at it 
statistically, Mr. Speaker, the folks who have the traditional families 
as much as Hollywood and some of our pseudointellectual think-tank 
types hate to admit it, the traditional families have the fewer 
dropouts, the fewer drug problems, the fewer DUI's for their children. 
We need to do anything we can to promote and encourage that traditional 
family unit, and I think making the tax system more friendly toward 
them will keep families together.
  I am going to also say this is not unique to the middle class. If you 
look at what we are doing for the folks in the lower social and 
economic levels particularly those who are on welfare, we are 
absolutely murdering them. We do not even let the dad get near the 
house because if we do we cut off all of the benefits, push them off 
the economic cliff and they cannot survive.
  The gentleman from California [Mr. Hunter].
  Mr. HUNTER. I know the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Taylor], 
has some important comments on this so I will not take long. But the 
one statement the gentleman just made about the so-called Great Society 
and the progeny of the Great Society which are all of these programs 
that are supposed to help people are something I have often reflected 
on because as a young lawyer in San Diego County I remember going to 
the presiding courtroom of the superior court and the municipal court 
and watching fathers be sent out for trial, for criminal trial on the 
basis that they had been caught by a neighbor or seen by a neighbor 
slipping back into their own house. And that was a function of this, 
the great welfare system that was a function of this, the great welfare 
system that was built initially under Lyndon Johnson, that said that 
people got more money if the father was not around, and as a result of 
that, you had families that purposely stayed apart or gave the image of 
staying apart, the impression of staying apart so they could receive 
more money. It was human nature to do everything you could possibly do 
once you have been seduced by the great welfare system from Washington 
to accommodate that welfare system. You do everything possible to get 
the most money possible.
  So as a result, instead of Lyndon Johnson's pride and joy, the Great 
Society welfare programs, bringing families together, they ended up 
splitting families apart because they gave them an economic incentive 
for the father to be gone and ultimately the father would be, if he was 
caught slipping back into his own house to see his own wife and 
children, he would be criminally prosecuted. And I have wondered often 
how many families were broken up permanently because they made that 
initial separation on the basis that they could get more sugar from 
Uncle Sam, more money from Uncle Sam if they would just split up. The 
gentleman is right on point when he mentioned that fact.
  Mr. KINGSTON. I will give the gentleman a statistic that has been 
proven. Ninety-two percent of the children on AFDC or basically welfare 
do not have a father at home. Listen to this: 35 percent of the 
children in Washington, DC, are on AFDC, 28 percent in New York City, 
24 percent in Chicago, 19\1/2\ percent in Los Angeles, and the national 
average is 13 percent. And that is because our tax policies and our 
benefit policies have attacked the family, and particularly in these 
cases the family in the lower socioeconomic levels.
  There is a bill pending right now which I am a cosponsor of, which is 
a rent control bill that actually allows the father to move back into 
the housing project and does not kick the family out, because we have 
got to rebuild the family before we can get folks off welfare, and this 
is an issue which is bipartisan. And I am proud to say that there is so 
much agreement between the Democrats and Republicans on it, to me there 
is no reason why this should be back burner stuff. We should be 
debating this and moving this through the Congress before recess, 
because it is that important to the security of our Nation. But there 
is so much bipartisan agreement on it.
  I know the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Taylor], wants to say a 
word and I am happy to yield to him.
  Mr. TAYLOR of North Carolina. I appreciate the gentleman from Georgia 
having this special order and giving time. I was interested in his 
comments about small business and how the health care bill, the Clinton 
health care program will impact small business. I think most of us 
recognize that mandates that will be placed on small business, if that 
legislation passes, will kill a lot of small businesses. About 95 
percent of the jobs in my district are tied to small business, and we 
feel that, in fact I have had business after business tell me they 
cannot sustain that kind of cost.
  Now I know Mrs. Clinton said we cannot afford to be concerned about 
these under capitalized small businesses. I think that is the way she 
put it. But we have to recognize that everything from Apple Computer to 
Coca Cola started in someone's back yard or in their garage and became 
a small business. That idea was developed. As it proved to be an idea 
that served people, it grew into a large business, and that is how most 
large businesses become large, they start as small businesses, are 
allowed to grow and become successful and then provide more and more 
jobs and more and more benefits as they are able to do that. There are 
few businesses that start as major businesses, few companies in this 
country start this way.
  I know the President has been in Detroit with the job summit worrying 
about creating more jobs and strengthening the economy. That was the 
base of his whole campaign. It is a worthwhile goal that many of us 
want to work toward. But, he has lost his compass in that direction. It 
is the Government that is creating the problem for small business. I 
cannot tell you the hours and hours I spend and the horror stories I 
hear of the Government, the onerous hand of Government and the damage 
it is doing to our small businesses, going far beyond the basic public 
health and safety protection, going far beyond the basic consumer 
protection. It reaches out, Government does, to be more and more 
intrusive until the point that it kills the patient altogether.
  Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman will yield, what we are hearing from 
our small businesses in the first district of Georgia, if they have to 
pay 80 percent of the health care for their employees they will 
eliminate jobs starting with the part-timer, and the lower wage, which 
in my opinion are the people who need the work the most and need to 
have that opportunity, and they will raise their prices and when you 
draw that back one more time what will it do with the family. It will 
probably eliminate more, it will reduce the number of jobs available to 
the second wage earner and when you go to the grocery store, the 
restaurant, the dry cleaners, wherever, your goods and services that 
you purchase will be more.
  Mr. TAYLOR of North Carolina. Yes. How will we have served the people 
in this country is they lose their job? Then they will have neither 
health care nor a job. And I do not see how we move people ahead with 
that kind of draconian action.
  Mr. HUNTER. If the gentleman will yield on that point. The gentleman 
is one of our experts as a successful businessman, one of the real 
experts on the cause and effect of Government policies on business. And 
you know I have two cents' worth from California. The liberal 
leadership in the legislature in the State of California decided that 
they were going to do a wonderful thing for working people in 
California, and that was to put into place the most expansive, all 
encompassing Workmen's Compensation program on the face of the earth. I 
am talking about a Workmen's Compensation program that allows you to 
sue for stress and has very lenient guidelines in proving stress.
  Well let us look at what happened with that Workmen's Compensation 
program. It passed. This was supposed to help the workers. Liberals 
around the world celebrated when this thing passed and as a result of 
that you had a steady exodus of businesses leaving the State of 
California, going not just to Mexico, but to Arizona, Nevada, Texas, 
all other States which are considered to be business-friendly, and it 
is my understanding that now if you rent a U-Haul going back to 
California, instead of leaving California, you can get a very good 
deal, because no businesses are coming in. And I have talked to 
colleagues who serve in this Chamber, who have said to me, ``Duncan, we 
hate to say it, but we are on another raid in California; you have so 
many businesses out there to whom government has dealt a killing blow 
that they cannot wait to come to our States and we are going out with 
our chambers of commerce, our city fathers and we are going to go bring 
your businesses to our States. So here is an example of the welfare 
state attitude, the liberals in Congress doing something that they 
thought was good for workers, and in doing so, they deprived the 
workers of their most precious possession, their job.''

                              {time}  2130

  Mr. KINGSTON. I want to speak on the State of California and this 
whole issue of really mandates on employers, because that is what we 
are talking about. It is not the 80/20 split. It is just one more 
mandate, more Government intrusion.
  But there was a great movie several years ago called Billy Jack, and 
I have got to tell you my anecdote, but one of the lines was that Billy 
Jack came up to one of the bad guys and said, ``You know what, 
Duncan,'' and I am going to pick on you, ``I am going to put my right 
foot on your right cheek, and you know something else,'' he said, 
``No,'' he said, ``there is nothing you can do about it.'' I will say 
this, having studied the fact that you all passed that work comp 
allowing stress, the fact that you have a 700-percent increase in 
claims and that your permitting process when businesses want to add on, 
sometimes they have to go through 25 local agencies and 35 State 
agencies and seeing what they have to go through, to raid California 
right now as an outsider, it is fruit like California oranges is ready 
to pick, because your business climate, in my opinion, has been ruined 
by Government taking fish out of the water to keep them from drowning.
  Mr. HUNTER. The gentleman is exactly right.
  Just one last thing with respect to regulations put together by 
Government, we had one company, a great aerospace company that tried, 
it took 3 years for them to get a permit to increase their factory size 
in San Diego County. They went to Arkadelphia, AR, and they got a 
permit to build a 500,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in 3 
weeks. What they could not get in their own hometown in 3 years they 
were able to get in 3 weeks in another State. That is the story of big 
Government ruining California.
  Mr. TAYLOR of North Carolina. You were mentioning California. We are 
happy to accept in North Carolina those companies that leave.
  Mr. HUNTER. Let us not get too quick to take all of our businesses. 
We are going to come back. We are going to elect Republicans and they 
are going to slash regulations and bring businesses back to California.
  Mr. TAYLOR of North Carolina. The problem is we in this body 
nationally are creating those same problems for every State in the 
Union.
  Of course, in my district, I see companies going to Mexico for that 
reason. We lost Ball Manufacturing. It said, ``We are going to Mexico. 
We are making it a lot cheaper.'' We had Eaton Corp. that announced 
much the same thing. We may lose a portion of our Gruber Manufacturing 
for the same thing. We are creating more joblessness because of these 
regulations.
  It is not just the disparity in wages. Our workers can outproduce and 
take up that slack of the difference in wages, but the businesses 
themselves, nor the workers, can make up the difference for these 
onerous regulations that keep piling on and piling on. There is no way 
they can make up that difference in cost.
  So we are losing outside the country.
  I want to cite just two or three areas just to tell people what we 
are talking about rather than just talking in generalities.
  Let us talk about the Superfund sites. Now, that is up for renewal in 
this legislature, in this Congress, this year. It may go over to the 
next Congress, but it is up this year to be renewed. It should have 
been named the Lawyers' Relief Act, because the study over the last 15 
years shows that of the sites that were listed as critical sites to be 
cleaned up, only about 20 percent have been cleaned up. There are still 
80 percent of the sites that were there 15 years ago.

  It also showed that almost 80 percent of the funds went for lawyers' 
fees, did not go toward what folks would be talking about cleaning up 
actual chemical spills or other problems. It went for litigation, and 
it went into a fund, or it went into lawyers, whether they were 
defending, whether they were prosecuting. It was strictly a legal 
mechanism.
  In the legislation itself which totally overlooks the ex post facto 
law, in my district I can tell you a story of a situation some 25 years 
ago. We all know batteries were being tossed in the creek or on the 
side of the road for people to get rid of them. We did not have a 
collection process. Some of the local service stations and the 
recycling salvage dealers there decided, let us collect these things up 
and send them away to be recycled. That takes them out of the creeks, 
that takes them out of the public for any damage they would do. They 
did it. They would urge people to bring old batteries to their service 
stations and they would come by and pick them up.
  This was the best environmental move at that time. There was no law 
against it at that time. They would ship them to central sites, and 
that central site would break them down and salvage the components of 
the batteries that could be reused.
  In the early 1980's after Superfund passed, they said, ``You know, 
the contents of these batteries may create spills.'' Now, there is not 
a great deal of scientific evidence that this is a deadly site. It 
could pollute in certain circumstances. And so these areas that were 
used as breakdown points for those batteries were declared Superfund 
sites.
  Now, the stations and the recycling centers in my district stopped 
when the law said this might be a problem.
  Twenty-five years later now in my district one of the central sites, 
the gentleman who the site was declared a Superfund site, they first 
said it is an $80 million Superfund site, and so they allowed him to 
plead to a $15,000 fine if he would list the names of all the people 
that had sent in batteries over the last 25 years.
  Now small dealers, small salvage companies have fines on them 
anywhere from $200 to a million and a quarter dollars for doing what 
was legal at the time they did it, for doing what was best for the 
environment at the time they did it and totally disregarding the ex 
post factor protections in our Constitution, and these people are now 
facing, small family companies, small businesses, are facing total ruin 
for doing what was best at the time and totally legal at the time.
  Now, when Government can reach out and do that, think of the chilling 
effect it puts on any business to make any positive move or to try to 
do anything in the area of business.
  In the area of pesticides, we had in the late 1950's a bill passed in 
this Congress, and I think it was 1957, called the Delaney clause. It 
said that any technical amount of a carcinogen found on a fruit would 
render that fruit out of the market. It would have to be destroyed and 
could not be sold in the market.
  At that time the detection had large amounts of pesticides were all 
that could be detected, and you could not detect small amounts. Today 
you can detect up to 1 quadrillionth of an amount.
  There is more of the same chemical in the skin of the fruit than 
there is pesticide that might be detected on the fruit. And yet now we 
have the Delaney clause holding up in my district, and it happens to be 
a fungicide, there is a question whether or not it is a carcinogen, but 
without the use of it, our Red Delicious apple trees are dying, 60 
percent of the crop.

  Most of our small farmers will be wiped out unless something is done. 
The FDA and the EPA, sitting in my office, both say this is not a 
public health and safety question. They recognize there is more danger, 
if there is danger at all, in the skin of the fruit than there is on 
the pesticide. And yet this onerous bureaucratic regulation is there 
now going to destroy thousands of our farmers and take out of 
circulation a very valuable commodity, I think, for the American 
people, if you follow the old adage that an apple a day keeps the 
doctor away. We are not going to be having many Red Delicious coming 
out if we do not do something about the Delaney clause.
  Here again, it is one of a long list of ways that we have piled on 
regulations. It seems to operate along the candy theory. You know, if a 
piece of candy is good, a pound will be better, and a ton will be 
wonderful. We all know that a piece may be good, a pound will make you 
sick, and a ton will kill you, and that is what happens with the 
regulations. Jefferson said that Government is best that governs least, 
not that it does not govern at all.
  There are needs in our product safety and our food laws and other 
areas for certain regulations, but as they continue to spread and 
become counterproductive, it kills our small businesses, and that is 
what is happening.
  I think both of you gentlemen are on a piece of legislation that we 
have that would require regulations that are promulgated after a bill 
is passed to come back to Congress for those regulations to be approved 
by the Congress before they go out to the public.
  We had 70,000 pages of those regulations come out of this body last 
year that small business is now having to live under and having to try 
to survive under, and I cannot imagine that anyone in this body, nor 
anyone with a small business, nor anyone else out there, knows what 
those 70,000 pages of regulations say.
  I was on the plane coming in this morning, and two lawyers were going 
to the regulators today, because they said the regulators did not even 
know; that the numbers of regulations had so surpassed them they did 
not even know what the regulations were anymore, and here lawyers were 
having to go down, and they will be sitting there talking about what is 
coming out in such abundance that they cannot be kept up with.
  Mr. KINGSTON. On the subject of regulation and Government overkill, I 
understand right now the average family pays about $4,000 a year more 
in all total goods and services purchased simply because of the 
additional cost of regulation, anywhere from, you know, filling out 
forms to putting in new guardrails on machinery. Some of it is good. 
Some of it is simply overkill and bureaucracy.
  One of the things in the health care bill that people need to know 
about in this 1,342-page document is that if you have a friend who is a 
physician and you go straight to that physician because, say, they are 
in the same Sunday school class or kindergarten, you know the 
physician, and you say, ``Tell me, Johnny has got a little sore throat. 
What can you do about it?

                              {time}  2140

  And right now this situation happens all over America. The physician 
says, ``Look, here is a prescription. Go get it,'' or, ``I have some 
stuff in my office. Have him take 2 or 3 of these and it will be 
okay.'' Now, that becomes a Federal law under this new health care 
program. That leaves you subject to a fine of up to $10,000. That is an 
example of more regulation, more Government coming into your life and 
destroying, once again, the family because the bureaucracy is now in 
the formula. The bureaucracy has now entered this kindergarten, and the 
bureaucracy is standing between little Johnny and that friendly doctor.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California.
  Mr. HUNTER. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia 
[Mr. Kingston] for having this special order and talking about this 
threat. I think the health care bill that is before us represents a 
struggle between Government and freedom. I hope Government does not win 
this struggle, because I think that the health care bill is going to 
produce more $300 ashtrays--remember the $300 ashtray that the Defense 
Department produced; and the $600 hammer--they are going to produce 
more of those, more $300 health care ashtrays and hammers than the 
Defense Department ever thought of. We will end up with high-priced 
medicine. We will end up with very high-priced medicine. I think we 
will end up a lot like the Canadians. The Canadian system was 
ballyhooed for months in this Chamber by many Members of the House. 
They have kind of quieted down now because over December the biggest 
hospital in Ontario had to shut down because they ran out of money. I 
think that is the trademark of socialist system, they find out in the 
end people who do not care, Government bureaucrats, will never be able 
to produce systems as efficiently as people who do care, free 
individuals.
  Mr. TAYLOR of North Carolina. In a health care forum I had a nurse 
from Canada stand up and testify as to how horrible the system was, how 
that she could not stand the fact that they could not take care of 
patients, could not apply medicine as she had been taught, they did not 
have the resources to do it. They had to watch people wait and die, in 
my cases, because of the rash nature of that system.
  The gentleman said it--I think both the gentleman from California 
[Mr. Hunter] and from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] have hit the right thing. 
The McDermott, the Clinton, the Cooper bill, are all bills that believe 
that more Government, more of your tax money, more regulations, will do 
for health care a better system that what we have and an improved 
system in the world. On the other hand, there are those of us who 
recognize that there are problems in our health care system.

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