[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 152 (Tuesday, October 9, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H11376-H11383]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE REPUBLICAN VISION
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions) is recognized
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. SESSIONS. Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for allowing us to be on the
floor this evening to talk about very important issues.
And of course the House of Representatives, in recess right now, is
beginning to prepare for the funeral for our colleague, Jo Ann Davis of
Virginia, who passed away. Today, our colleagues came to the floor one
by one to not only acknowledge the service that Jo Ann Davis gave to
the United States of America, but also in her representation of her
congressional district Jo Ann will be missed. Jo Ann courageously
fought cancer. Jo Ann courageously went back home day after day, week
after week, after serving the United States Congress, making sure that
she talked about those things which she did in her job and her
representation of people from Virginia, but perhaps more importantly,
with the strength and character and courage that Jo Ann, even in the
midst of adversity, brought to this body was an inspiration to
Republicans and Democrats alike. It is with a heavy heart that we all
will miss her, and we say to her family, how much they know they will
miss her, too, and to her constituents, they were well served. Mr.
Speaker, we will miss Jo Ann Davis from Virginia.
Mr. Speaker, tonight I come to the floor of the House of
Representatives to talk about the things which I believe are important
for so many people to understand, not just about what is happening here
in Washington, DC between the two parties, the Republican Party and the
Democrat Party, as we talk about public policy issues that are
demanding on both parties, and certainly our President and the American
people who want to, and do, recognize that America's greatest days lie
in our future, but rather, not just understanding the philosophies
which are talked about here, but they want to know more about them.
What would those policies lead to? And tonight it is my intent, with
several of my Republican colleagues, to talk about the Republican
vision, the Republican vision that would be of a smaller, smarter,
[[Page H11377]]
commonsense government versus the Democrat agenda, which is
ineffective, wasteful and intrusive government.
The Republican Party for so many years has been really the party of
the free enterprise system, the free enterprise system which has made
America the envy of the world, which has made the Republican Party and
this great Nation to not only grow in stature, but to provide dreams,
dreams to Americans and dreams for people around the world.
Mr. Speaker, just in March of this year, the Financial Times out of
London put forth a pretty interesting editorial where they talked about
that the EU, now 25 combined nations of the EU has a GDP that equals
that of the United States of America, or at least where the United
States of America was 25 years ago; meaning that Europe consolidated
all of their resources to the EU, the European Union, to these 25
nations, and when they combine all that they have equal that of the
United States GDP 25 years ago.
What is interesting is that they also look at the amount of spending
that would take place within their medical system and within research
and development in medicine, and both those lag 25 years behind the
United States.
The United States of America has a strong and vibrant system, the
free enterprise system, as a result of not just the United States
Congress and tax cuts and making sure that we have the greatest health
care system in the world, but it comes as a result of what you're going
to hear tonight of a public policy that is ennunciated from a
Republican vision. And certainly, as we look at what has made America
great, you would want to look at, well, why has Europe lagged so far
behind? I mean, after all, Europe could do the exact same things that
America does. They have education. They have wonderful people. They
have innovate ideas and opportunities. I would submit to you it is
because of the public policy. And the public policy that they have in
Europe really has three basic tenets that are entirely different than
the United States has, our free enterprise system. And that was pretty
much ennunciated by what you saw tonight; we're talking about health
care, where it's a State-run program. This is what the Democratic Party
is pushing for their public policy. They want a State-run, single-payer
health care system, just like Europe.
We also see rules and regulations. Europe is completely covered up
with rules and regulations that tell not only employers but also
employees exactly how they will be treated. Forget the free enterprise
system, forget innovativeness, forget the new opportunities that people
might have to bring new products and services. You've got to look up
the union rule book; you've got to find out what you can do.
And lastly, the third tenet that separates the United States of
America from the European model is taxation. Taxes began as a battle
point under Ronald Reagan here in this country. And we recognized that
back under Ronald Reagan, and the President recognized it, that our
taxes were not just too high, they were stifling innovativeness and the
free enterprise system. They were stifling the ability that we had to
grow our free enterprise system in favor of giving the money to the
government, to grow the size of government. And as our President,
Ronald Reagan, said, he hoped that he would change that to where
America once again would be the shining city on the hill. In fact, that
did take place. As we cut taxes, as we became prepared for the future
way back when Ronald Reagan was President to be prepared today, and for
the last few years, for America to propel itself forward.
Mr. Speaker, the Financial Times was right when they said in March
that the European Union could not compete against the United States
economically because of the three tenets that make the EU different,
and that is, high taxes, more rules and regulations, and single-payer
system for health care.
Tonight, you are going to hear members of the Republican Party talk
about how that is virtually exactly what the Democrat Party agenda is
for this great Nation. And tonight you're going to hear Republicans
talk about smaller, smarter, commonsense government whereby we not only
balance budgets, where we have tax reform, where we have health care
that works on behalf of people to where we can maintain the greatest
health care system in the world. We will talk about agriculture; the
gentleman from the great State of Oregon (Mr. Walden) is here to do
that. We will talk about intelligence and homeland security. And
lastly, we intend to talk about education.
It is with great honor tonight that I am joined by a dear colleague
who is from the State of Oregon, the gentleman from Oregon, and I would
yield to him at this time.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. Representative Sessions, I appreciate your
comments tonight about the differences between our parties, Republicans
versus Democrats; but moreover, the vision for this country. Because I
think at the end of the day Americans want us to come together with a
vision that will produce jobs, that will let Americans keep more of
what they earn, that will do something to protect our various resources
and allow us to be competitive internationally.
I heard your comments about our competitiveness versus the European
Union, and I am no economist, but I did spend a little time over there
this spring. And, you know, they're headed down this path of higher
taxes in some countries, and other countries have figured out they
can't compete with higher taxes and they can't compete with very short
work weeks, and they're actually trying to reform to be more like the
United States.
Mr. SESSIONS. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. I would be happy to yield.
Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the gentleman.
You know, an example of this might be the recent election that we saw
in France. And I'm going to let you amplify that, but as we in America
looked at France, and just in the past few years as we looked at a
closed system that they have to where they're not only having to have
people to come through immigration to their country, they are not able
to grow their economy, to be able to bring them into their economy so
that they can be real positives. It's a closed system.
{time} 2030
What we have seen is how the French people changed their government
as a result of that. America still is the big dream. I think the French
understand that.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. I appreciate that. America is a great country
with a great future if we don't allow it to get messed up in these
Halls. We have a great opportunity ahead of us, I believe. I certainly
think when you see what is happening in some European capitals, some
are good things and then there are some questionable things. In some of
these areas they realized their tax rates are much too high. All you
have to do is go back and look at Ireland that went ahead after many
decades of stagnant economy and then did a major tax reform or
reduction and all of a sudden its economy is blossoming. They are
creating jobs. They are attracting companies to locate in Ireland.
I guess that is what troubles me a bit about what I see happening
here in the new Democrat majority is they are looking at how do we
raise taxes, which I don't think is the way to go. I think hardworking
Americans deserve to keep more of what they earn. Certainly that has
been my philosophy and how I have voted here. I think that the outcome
is clear. If you look at when President Kennedy cut the capital gains
tax rate, revenues went up to the Federal Government. Bill Clinton
understood it. He cut capital gains rate. Revenues went up to the
Federal Government. Republicans cut the capital gains rate. Revenues
went up to the Federal Government. The new majority, the Democrats say,
We may just let that expire. We may raise it. We may raise all these
taxes. I think the effect will be very harsh on our economy and
revenues to the Federal Government will probably go down.
Mr. SESSIONS. Exactly what the gentleman is talking about, the newest
word out today in the Wall Street Journal, last week the Bureau of
Labor Statistics released new figures, 110,000 jobs created in
September of this year.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. 110,000 new jobs.
Mr. SESSIONS. September 2007 is the 49th consecutive month of job
growth,
[[Page H11378]]
setting a new record for the longest uninterrupted expansion of the
U.S. labor market. There is more good news. No surprise. We also
learned that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the
Federal deficit came in at $161 billion for the just-completed 2007
year, down significantly from $248 billion the year before, meaning
that we are following exactly what the gentleman from Oregon is talking
about. We are following through to make sure that with these tax cuts
that not only do people have jobs, but the government increases the
amount of revenue it has.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. I am glad you made the point about the
declining deficits and the increasing revenues to the Federal
Government. This Federal Government has never been richer. It has never
had more of our tax dollars than it has today. The issue here is how do
you control spending. I think that Wall Street Journal editorial and
column went on to say today that, Look out, because there are all these
new spending programs being put on the desk.
I met with a group this weekend in my district and I said, You know,
if you smoke, if you drink, if you are born, if you die, if you have
capital gains, dividend income, if you just work, look out because the
taxes on you are most likely going to go up. That is what we see here,
as you know, on the farm bill that recently was approved by this House.
I reluctantly at the end voted against it because it abrogates 55
international tax treaties we have on how our companies and other
international companies are dealt with. Those are treaties we have. And
this House, no notice to anyone here, I think we learned the night
before the vote, suddenly wanted to raise taxes $78 billion and
abrogate all these international treaties America has entered into. Not
renegotiate them. Just blow them apart.
And I don't think that is the way to go. We hear more about this
every day. It is pick on this group or that group or the next group,
set one American against another American and try to leverage one group
and wedge one group and engage in all this political posturing to grow
government.
Mr. SESSIONS. The point that the gentleman from Oregon is making is
so true, and it seems like that we are always in gear for an election.
The fact of the matter is that every 2 years there is an election, but
now, the year before the election, we have engaged in so much bashing
of not only America but really how great America is.
What the gentleman talks about here would also be true with trade,
about how America has found a way to find trading partners all around
the globe to reduce tariffs. And if there is one thing, and the
gentleman knows that I am a big scouter with the Boy Scouts of America.
I teach merit badge classes back home. All of my scouters learn right
off the bat, what is a tariff? And they respond, it is a tax. We are
reducing taxes and allowing countries all around the globe to be able
to compete so that they better their own economic circumstances and end
poverty in their own country. This is part of what that overall plan
is.
Agriculture plays a key role in this.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. A huge role.
Mr. SESSIONS. The American is a farmer making sure that not only what
we produce in this country that we get that opportunity for it, but
making sure the rest of the world has that same opportunity. So this is
where these trade bills which are languishing right now in the House of
Representatives, the clock has already started. Please let everyone
know back home if you can, the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden), that
we need to continue these trade bills to make sure that American
agriculture and our manufacturing pushes our products overseas and we
take their products which helps not only these countries but also all
of humanity.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. As the gentleman well knows, the trade bills
that are pending open their markets to our goods, because our markets
are all already open to their goods. This is about American
manufacturers, American agriculture being able to sell what we make or
raise here into other markets in a fair way.
I met with a wheat marketing group on Friday morning in my district
in the town of Moro, Sherman County. And wheat there, they had just
sold a barge full of U.S. soft white wheat from the Northwest for $11 a
bushel. I stutter because it is a record amount, $11 a bushel. Why?
Well, there are droughts in Australia and elsewhere, enormous demand
for this product on the world market. Where they have suffered year
after year when there have been gluts on the market, in this year,
world economy, effects of agriculture around the globe, international
trade policy being open, they are going to get up to $11 for their
wheat. Now the market has come down a little bit, $300 for barley right
now. These are tremendous prices that will help American farmers
because it needs to be sold to countries overseas that are consuming it
in enormous amounts.
So we benefit from trade if these agreements are fair, if they are
negotiated properly, and if they are enforced correctly. Now, let me
give you an example in my part of the world that is really troubling
and that this Congress needs to do something about, and that is the
issue of illegal logging. It ties into the whole issue of the
environment and how I think Republicans want to take care of the
environment that we have especially in our forests. There is an
enormous amount of illegal logging going on overseas to satisfy the
wood demand that we have right here in the United States and elsewhere.
But we are the big importers in many cases.
According to the G-8 illegal logging dialogue which happened in
Berlin in June of this year, 40 percent of illegally cut timber is
attributable to imports to the G-8 countries, and United States is
responsible for a quarter of those imports. Now, what is going on
around the world I don't think most Americans are aware of. I wasn't.
The Washington Post did a terrific story on it. I have now read other
studies. Brazil, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Russia appeared to supply,
but not necessarily from all their own forests, a great majority of
this illegal timber. There may be logs on the books that say, Don't cut
here. But that doesn't stop rogue provinces and illegal operators from
doing that. Why does that matter? Because here in the United States,
this Congress and this government has clamped down on our domestic
production of timber off our forested lands, especially in the West, 80
percent reduction since 1990. Meanwhile, wild fires ravage America's
forests.
I tell you, Congressman Sessions, if Theodore Roosevelt were alive
today, he created these forest reserves in 1905, he would be rolling
over in his grave to watch how mismanaged they are. We had over 8
million acres go up in fire this year, nearly a record. We are on track
for a record each of these last few years. It costs the taxpayers of
America $1.2 billion so far and we are not done with the fire season,
so far to extinguish these blazes.
Mr. SESSIONS. Tonight we are talking about the Republican vision
versus the Democrat agenda. Smaller, smarter, commonsense government
versus ineffective, wasteful, intrusive government. Forestry may be one
of those issues that would fit right in here.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. It absolutely is one of those issues. When
Republicans were in control of this assembly, and I am sorry to sound
partisan on this, but it is just the way it is in the clash of
philosophies on this particular issue, while we had some bipartisan
help, I chaired the Forestry Subcommittee in the House Resources
Committee. We held hearing after hearing after hearing on these issues.
We marked up and passed legislation, some of which made it all the way
into law, some of which was bipartisan and passed this assembly.
But unfortunately, today, the Speaker of the House, the majority
leader of the House, the Democratic caucus chair, the Natural Resources
Committee chair and the Rules Committee chairwoman all voted against,
for example, the Healthy Forest Restoration Act, which did become law,
which allowed some thinning of our forest, not as much as I would like
to see but helped streamline it. The whole leadership of this Democrat
Congress voted against that in the House. So it makes it almost
impossible to go to the next step to help stop these wild fires from
ravaging our forests, to get to commonsense management of our timber.
I want to show an example here of a fire that occurred in my
district. This
[[Page H11379]]
is the example of the Eggley fire. The Eggley fire burned about 140,000
acres of America's grasslands and forest lands out in Harney County,
140,000 acres. Do you see the devastation? These two children are the
grandchildren of the county judge there, a Democrat, Steve Grasty, and
they are standing there as a stark example of the future that they are
now inheriting. Some of this area burned before. Some of this area has
been basically made off limits. We think you ought to go in there and
remove the burned dead trees while they still have value and restart a
new forest sooner. We had legislation that passed the Republican House
last year, it was bipartisan, that would have gotten that going.
Unfortunately, the Senate never picked it up.
Mr. SESSIONS. So the opportunity to go in and clear, the opportunity
to allow this burned timber to be harvested would mean that bugs and
all the things which might find a way to eat this timber or weaken it,
rather than clearing it and getting started again, is in the process of
decay, not health at this time.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. I will tell you what is worse. We have a lot of
cattle ranchers out there who have permits to graze on some of this
ground. Because of the intensity of this fire, it may be one year or
two before the grasses come back and they will be allowed to graze.
They are having now today, literally today, with the price of hay being
what it is and the demand, they are having to liquidate their herds.
Some of them may go completely out of business all because these lands
aren't being properly managed.
Now, for our friends who are concerned about global warming and
greenhouse gas emissions, I serve on the Select Committee on Energy
Independence and Climate Change. A fire that burns as intensely or more
so than this one probably emits 100 tons of greenhouse gas emission for
every acre, 100 tons per acre. This burned 140,000 acres. A good,
green, healthy-growing forest like a lot of them we have in the
Northwest will sequester between 4 and 6 tons of carbon per acre. So
wouldn't you think that this Congress would be focusing on doing better
management on our forests? And yet the subcommittee that I used to
chair has now been compressed in with the National Parks, Forests and
Public Lands Subcommittee into one, has held one hearing in 9\1/2\
months on this issue. They have marked up no legislation dealing with
this issue. Nothing is happening of consequence, except taxpayers are
spending $1.2 billion to fight these blazes. The future these kids are
looking at is a long way off. I like my forests green and healthy, not
black. But some of the groups out there who appeal even thinning in
these areas issued a statement recently that said burned forests are
healthy forests.
Now, I suppose in the enormous scope of time, they grow back. We know
that. But I don't think burned forests are the policy that Americans
want us to have when it comes to their forests. It doesn't work well
for habitat, for water quality and watersheds.
Meanwhile, I'll bet we don't cut a stick of this, or very little of
it. Instead, because this will get litigated because we won't change
the law here which is what needs to happen, even though you and I would
do it and you have been helpful in these efforts, instead we will
proudly go to the local store and get our furniture made in China from
illegally harvested wood from countries that have no environmental laws
where the forests are extraordinarily important around the equator to
sequester carbon.
{time} 2045
I don't understand the ineffective, wasteful vision of the other
side, when I believe no land manager in America would allow this to
occur and wouldn't go in right afterward. Counties don't do it. Private
foresters don't allow this to occur. They get in right away. I have
been out on sites, and they get in right away, clean it up. Our State
of Oregon has a very progressive Forest Practices Act. But they don't
wait. They don't wait a year. It will be a year before they are done
writing their plan, and then it will be subject to appeal and
litigation, most likely for another year.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I remember when the fires at Yellowstone
were taking place, and I remember seeing how many of our friends who
were environmentalists said, let it burn, let it burn, and yet I
remember seeing the carnage that took place with wildlife and the
millions of animals who not only lost their home but then would be
thrust out in the cold as a result of the huge fire, when in fact I had
learned from my being an Eagle Scout, and the gentleman from Oregon is
an Eagle Scout, we learned in our forestry merit badges that healthy
forests are those where you can come in and clear out those things that
were from years of use, and come and clean the forest, and you could
come and take sections so that you made sure that any fire did not
destroy the whole thing. They would come and cut the forest and work
with Mother Nature and then replant.
Mr. Speaker, in the last 5 or 6 years, and you can look at any
National Geographic or perhaps the Discovery Channel and see where the
people, the companies that grow trees, they have healthy forests. I
think the healthiest forests are where private people and private
companies own the trees, as opposed to the government, because the
government has a policy of ineffective, wasteful and intrusive
government in managing our forests.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. The other thing we learned as Scouts, and, like
you say, we are both Eagle Scouts, what has always stuck with me when
it comes to how we manage our resources was a very simple line: ``Leave
your campsite better than you found it.'' That, I think, is a great
guiding principle for those of us in this body, not only for natural
resource policy, but for this country, to leave it better than you
found it.
Mr. Speaker, let me just suggest that we burned more than 8 million
acres this year, and 5.7 million acres, which is our new average that
we are burning every year in this country, is an area larger than the
entire State of New Jersey. We throw these big numbers around in
Washington, the bureaucrats do it all the time, and we do it from time
to time. Think about every year you're burning an area of your national
forest and grasslands and other areas larger than the size of the State
of New Jersey.
Let me tell you what just happened in my district of eastern Oregon.
I have 70,000 square miles of terrific eastern Oregon. Three of the
last mills have been put either on indefinite closure or closure in
very remote areas where they are surrounded by overstocked forests that
need all this work, and they are some of the last, if not the last
mills in these communities, and 198 people in those three communities
have lost their jobs. That is 2.6 percent of nonfarm payroll.
Now the State's economists, the certified smart economic folks, said,
I wonder what that impact of those 198 jobs would be if it was spread
over 2.6 percent of nonfarm payroll over the Portland metropolitan
area. So a standard city in America, what do you think that would be?
It would be the loss of 26,400 jobs.
So all across the rural West in small communities where the mills
close, there's barely a yawn or a whimper in this Congress about what
is happening, and yet the prior forest service chiefs and the current
one will tell you our country and our forests and our ability to manage
those forests cannot be sustained if we lose the infrastructure to do
the management.
That is precisely what is happening today, for a lot of reasons, some
of it market conditions, but part of the market conditions is an 80
percent reduction in the timber harvest on Federal land, an inability
to go in and even clean up after a fire in less than 2 years on Federal
land.
I was just out on the GW fire, not named for me, even though it's my
initials, GW fire outside of Black Butte Ranch, Sisters, Oregon. It
burned, I think, 7,000 acres, something like that, or 8,000. Where the
forest service had done thinning, the fire dropped to the ground and
they put it out. That is part of what we were trying to accomplish with
our Healthy Forest Restoration Act that President Bush signed into law,
that we as Republicans wrote, with bipartisan help.
The thinning project, where it dropped to the ground, the trees are
all green around it, was held up by environmentalists for let's say 5
years in
[[Page H11380]]
litigation, 2001 until, I think, 2006, and finally the forest service
prevailed and they worked the sale. They thinned out this overstock
stand, and a fire hit it and it went out, and the trees are still
green.
Mr. Speaker, I think that what Americans want is for us to manage, to
be good stewards of this land and this resource. To do what is
happening today without reform is ineffective, it's wasteful, it's
intrusive. Today, 45 percent of the forest service budget goes to
fighting fire. It used to be 15. That is 45 percent goes to fighting
fire. A nearly like amount goes to paperwork to process the various
activities they do, rather than on the ground, doing what they are
trained to do. We tie them up in court, in litigation, in all this
process and all this stuff.
We have got to fix this problem, and if we do, when we passed the
Forest Emergency Recovery and Research Act in the House last year by a
big bipartisan margin, it would have generated, I think, $140 million
over 10 years to the Federal Treasury in net new revenues. It would
have helped pay for cleanup and restoration effort.
We can do these things, but this leadership today, they voted against
it, from the Speaker on down. They put people in charge of the
committees who were opposed to us every step of the way.
So I would tell my colleague from Texas, elections have consequences,
and the changes are being played out today as more and more
firefighters are called upon to put out these blazes, as cattle
ranchers in eastern Oregon and around the West are driven off their
allotments, having to liquidate their herds or trying to get disaster
help in, when it doesn't have to be that way. It doesn't have to be
that way.
We can work smarter, we can fix these problems, and in so doing, we
can improve the environment. Do you think this is great habitat for
anything other than bugs and woodpeckers, which need habitat; I'm not
downplaying that. We have seen case after case. In Colorado, the Hayman
fire. After that enormous fire, the Denver watershed was deluged with
mud and dead animal debris and dead fish as the runoff occurred. We are
always going to have fire. We need to be smart on how we manage our
forests so we can manage our fires. Get it back in balance with nature.
Mr. Speaker, this Congress has held one hearing, taken no legislative
action, zero, zip, zilch, let it burn, don't fix it afterwards, and we
will just get our imported wood from illegal logging and furniture from
China. It doesn't make sense. It needs to change.
Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the gentleman from Oregon, who not only has
persuasively brought forth arguments that he sees in his home State of
Oregon, but also who amplified the Republican vision, smaller, smarter,
commonsense government, almost something you can find in a Scout
handbook, or a merit badge, versus the Democrat agenda, which is
ineffective, wasteful, intrusive government, allowing not only for
thousands of people to lose their job, but mismanagement of the natural
resources that has been given to this great country that Lewis & Clark
found out so much about, that we tout as not only the Teddy Roosevelt
answer to the way America would be, but also how we are going to bring
her on in the future.
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Oregon not only for
his time, for his dedication, but also for the things which he believes
in.
I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. Mr. Speaker, I want to make one other comment.
You're going to see a lot of discussion in this Congress about what to
do about global warming. I serve on both the Energy and Commerce
Committee and the Energy and Air Quality Committee and the Select
Committee on Global Climate Change, and I want to do what is right for
the environment. But there are going to be competing viewpoints. The
two philosophies are going to collide here.
There are some on the Democrat leadership side who think a carbon tax
is where America should go, a .50 cent a gallon increase in taxes on
your gasoline. That is their vision. It's $50 a ton carbon emissions
from power plants, higher taxes, higher fees on ratepayers in America
or drivers in America. I don't think it has to be that way, by the way.
I think there are ways we can invest in research and development and
get new technologies and incent Americans to do the right thing, not
punish them with higher taxes, because Europe is kind of going that
direction. They are looking at a cap and trade model in Germany. They
rolled it out 5 years and the price of electricity in Germany went up
25 percent. They miscalculated. Guess who got the bill? The ratepayers
did. Now they are going to try and change that. They think they have
got a little different thing worked out.
But I would rather invest in research, development in new
technologies for new fuels. I was out at the dedication of an ethanol
plant in my district. If we can ever get to cellulosic, we can use
woody biomass and we can use things like algae to scrub carbon out and
to produce fuel. It is amazing what lurks out there on the horizon. But
we don't have to punish ratepayers, I don't think, at least. And yet,
you watch, that is what is coming.
Think back to Jimmy Carter in the seventies. He put on his sweater,
sat by the fireplace in the White House. The sweater thing may be
there, but you aren't going to get to have a fire. You're just going to
shiver in the cold because you won't be able to afford your electricity
or your power because they are going to drive up the costs so high that
people are going to say ``I can't afford it.'' And then they will race
back here to get more money from the government to help bring down the
cost of heating.
Mr. Speaker, it doesn't have to be that way. We ought to have
incentives, not punishment. There are ways to get this done. There is a
great story in the Wall Street Journal today about big national
companies that are beginning to ask about carbon footprint of their
suppliers, and Americans are beginning to say maybe you ought to put a
fluorescent light bulb in. If you put it in five of your most used
lights, you can save an enormous amount of energy. It's a good thing
for your bottom line, and it reduces carbon. Keep your air up in your
tires, you reduce carbon emissions and you increase your gas mileage.
These are things Americans will do because we want a good, healthy
environment. But do you want to have a 20 percent increase in your
electricity bill this winter? Do you want 50 cents more on top of a
gallon of gas? And who gets the money? The Federal Government. You
could have a trillion dollars that way in a heartbeat and it will all
be hidden; it will be phased in, come out of your power bills, you will
never know it happened. And the big spenders around here are just
licking their chops.
I don't think it has to be that way. I think we can have smaller,
smarter commonsense government that uses market principles and incent
the people to do the right thing, not ineffective, wasteful and
intrusive government that just costs taxpayers more and more and more.
Mr. SESSIONS. I want to thank the gentleman from Oregon. There's only
one thing you didn't mention, and that's the BTU tax that many of the
new leaders of the United States Congress today, the new Democrat
majority, right there with the BTU tax. They're back. What they are
really saying is pretty simple: Don't use this electricity; sit in the
dark. Don't go create something that is good or better, don't find a
way to have less emissions; go and tax things.
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for being here today. We
have been joined also tonight by the gentleman, who is a dear friend of
mine from Iowa, Mr. King. We are talking tonight, Mr. King, about the
Republican agenda, smaller, smarter, commonsense government, versus the
Democrat agenda, which is ineffective, wasteful and intrusive
government. And perhaps the thing which I identify most, and
particularly when I see you, is to talk about taxes and how important
tax reform has been.
Mr. Speaker, it has been said a long time ago that the Republican
party is here as the bull dogs for the taxpayer, to make sure that
efficiency occurs, to make sure that the original mission statement of
what a program might be for, to balance a budget is important. I don't
know if the gentleman heard or not, but the Bureau of Labor Statistics
released new job figures of 110,000 net
[[Page H11381]]
new jobs in September. September 2007 is the 49th consecutive month of
job growth, setting a new record for the longest uninterrupted
expansion of the U.S. labor market.
{time} 2100
Since August of 2003, our economy has created more than 8.1 million
jobs and today has the lowest unemployment that sits at 4.7 percent.
There is more good news. You see, if you have a country that produces
great dreams for people and they can go make things happen, like jobs,
we also learned last week that the nonpartisan CBO, Congressional
Budget Office, said the Federal deficit came in at $161 billion for the
just-completed fiscal year, down from $248 billion the year before. I
think we are headed in the right direction. I yield to the gentleman
from Iowa.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for
organizing this Special Order this evening and pulling together a lot
of the thought process regarding the Republican vision versus the
Democrat agenda.
Looking at the 40 consecutive months of job growth, I would take us
back to why we didn't have job growth before this began in August 2003.
I would like to frame this for when the Bush Presidency came in in
January 2001. That was in the middle of the bursting of the dot-com
bubble. We had an economy that was really a false economy. It was a
speculation on the ability to store and transfer information more
efficiently than ever before, but it had not been corrected for.
Well, the dot-com bubble was in the middle of bursting in January
2001. By September 11, 2001, the financial center was attacked, America
was attacked and the Pentagon was attacked and they had the plane that
crashed in Pennsylvania. This was another attack on our finances. This
was a double-whammy cloud that came over the very new Bush
administration.
So we came forward with two rounds of tax cuts. We asked for $545
billion worth of tax cuts over that span of time. We got a pretty good
chunk of that. In two rounds, those tax cuts have been what produced
this thriving economy that shows a stock market that sets new highs,
and also this job growth of 49 consecutive months of job growth.
Mr. SESSIONS. As I recall, we spent at least one or two of those
elections talking about how the stock market was down and how people
had lost their savings and their pensions were in trouble, and how all
of these terrible things were happening, cataclysmic events.
Then along came a market-based idea which we had known and understood
not just from watching President Kennedy who cut capital gains and
President Reagan to talk about you cut taxes you get more money because
of invasion, isn't it true what this brave Republican Congress did is
they cut taxes because they wanted to spur the American economy for
people to have jobs and be competitive with the world, and so families
would have an opportunity to keep more of what they made rather than
giving it to the government.
Mr. KING of Iowa. What the gentleman says is exactly true. Believing
in the free market system and allowing people to keep more of what they
earn, allowing them to make those decisions, that was entirely the
philosophy behind the tax cuts. It has proven to be true throughout all
these years, and it continues to grow this economy in the face of some
very poor messages coming out of this Congress. Thankfully, not much of
what has been attempted on the other side has been accomplished.
I think a strong market indicates that Wall Street doesn't believe
that the Democrats are going to accomplish very many of the things they
would like to do.
To go back to the tax component, and I don't know how I overlooked
the corporate corruption which was also a component, Enron, Global
Crossing, some of those things, the accounting things that were going
on. I recall some people made a lot of money out of Global Crossing.
Some went to jail; some didn't. Some are supporting Presidential
campaigns. We ought to take a look at those folks and how that worked.
But I would like to take this back to a philosophy that I would ask
the American people to think about, that is, Ronald Reagan once said:
what you tax, you get less of. He also said what you subsidize you get
more of. But what you tax, you get less of. And so the Federal
Government, in its, I'll say lack of wisdom, places a tax on all
productivity in America. And Uncle Sam has the first lien on all
productivity in America. That is our Federal income tax, personal,
corporate, capital gains, the tax on your pension, the alternative
minimum tax, the whole list of all of the Federal taxes, Social
Security tax is another one. That list of taxes is taxes on
productivity. Interest income, dividend income, all are measures of our
productivity. The Federal Government has the first lien on those taxes.
What I want to do, what a lot of us in this Congress want to do is
adopt a national sales tax, a national consumption tax, H.R. 25, the
FAIR Tax. I will say this: everything good that anyone's tax proposal
does in this Congress, it does all of them in one package. That is not
just my opinion. That is the opinion of a lot of economists and some
very highly placed, respectable people.
But to put that in place, we have to take the tax off of production
and put it on consumption. We will have far more production. The
estimates of some of the top economists go from a growth in our economy
of maybe 8 to 9 percent up to 33, 35 percent growth in our economy. But
nobody thinks there will be less growth; we think there will be more
growth.
But changing the dynamic way we tax, no tax on production, earn all
you want to earn, save all you want to save and produce all you want to
produce, there is a reward for that because then you get to decide when
you pay taxes, and that will be when you consume.
Another thing that is an important component of this, and Alexander
Tyler once said that when a democracy realizes, and I will argue we are
a constitutional Republic, but he referenced a democracy, when people
realize they can vote themselves benefits from the public treasury, on
that day a democracy ceases to exist.
We have a number, maybe 44 percent, of Americans don't pay any income
tax. That number has been growing. It is 2 or 3 or 4 years old, so I am
going to suppose that number is bigger and maybe it is over 50 percent.
If half of the people realize they can push their Congressmen and go to
the polls and elect people that will vote them benefits out of the
public treasury, then soon we are in a situation where that half of the
people don't want to work. They don't want to produce any more. So they
sit back. They were in the safety net that was created by the nanny
state, and now that safety net has been cranked up to the elevation of
a hammock, and there they sit, not producing, just sitting not being
productive individuals in this society.
Mr. SESSIONS. And aren't we in that circumstance as we speak now with
the SCHIP, which is children's health care, where this new Democrat
majority has brought forth a bill that, among other things, more than
half of the people who would be new to this SCHIP bill would be people
who are already on insurance, who already have private insurance, and
yet they are demanding, no, no, we have to add them to the government
side.
What we are looking at here is a $6 billion program that Republicans
invented because we believe in helping children because we know if you
take care of children, immunize them and do things when they are
children, then when they are adults, they not only do better in school
they grow up and are healthier.
We are taking this from a $6 billion program a year to a $13 billion
program. And to fund it, it would require, under the Democrat majority
plan, 20 million new smokers to pay for the darn program. Is that what
you are talking about where you all of a sudden shift from people who
figure out you can get the government to pay for everything, a
government-run health care program?
Mr. KING of Iowa. That is exactly what I am talking about. People
decide they want to be dependent on the taxpayers. They think it is
cheaper for them to let somebody else pay for those services. This is a
perfect example.
[[Page H11382]]
I was in the Iowa senate when we shaped the SCHIP policy and
supported it at 200 percent of poverty. There are waivers in there, and
I can speak specifically to Iowa's numbers. They vary across the
country depending on the waivers and what the States have decided to
do.
I think it was New Jersey that said no matter what the President
says, they are going to grant SCHIP benefits to 450 percent of poverty.
In Iowa right now it is 200 percent of poverty, and there are 20
percent that are waivers. So a family of four making $51,625 a year
qualifies. That is mom, dad and two kids. The kids qualify for
federally funded health insurance programs making that kind of money.
The bill passed off the House, this Pelosi-led Congress, was 400
percent of poverty. That meant that same family of four in Iowa that
qualifies at $51,625 would qualify at over $103,000. Well, in the
Senate it got negotiated down to 300 percent of poverty. So in my State
that is still over $77,000 for a family of four.
So you have to decide. There will be 2.1 million kids that I will say
will be bribed off their own private health insurance by Federal tax
dollars. They will say: go on the Federal plan.
They will never be able to do that one again because there will be
such a high percentage of the kids that you can never reach into that
universe. I don't know if there will be any kids on privately funded
health insurance if this SCHIP bill passes. That percentage goes up
well over 80 percent of the kids that will be on federally funded
health insurance, and there will be companies that are providing health
insurance for their employees and the family, and they will take a look
at this and decide I am paying them less than $83,000, which is a
commonly used number, so why don't we just offer health insurance to
the employee and their spouse or significant other, as the case may be,
and just say we don't provide it for children because the Federal
Government does.
This bill takes us to the tipping point where it slides over the
other side. It is the cornerstone for socialized medicine. It closes
the gap, just a technicality to pick up the remaining percentage of
kids that would be on private insurance.
By the way, here in this Chamber, September 22, 1993, President
Clinton spoke to a joint session on health care. He laid out a lot of
this plan which we know now was Hillary's plan, and she began her
hearings and her secret meetings after that, Harry and Louise shut that
down, along with Phil Gramm and a good number of other people who
believe in freedom and private health care.
But Clinton came back and said if we can't get this done in one shot,
we are going to do this incrementally. And the next step for full,
federally funded coverage for children in America is to go and lower
Medicare from 65 down to 55. If we do that, the people in the middle,
SCHIP is covering some kids up to age 25 today. So the people in the
middle ages, 25 to 55, they are the ones paying for their own and they
would be paying for everybody else's.
Mr. SESSIONS. My guess is they would call that the doughnut hole
then.
Mr. KING of Iowa. That is the group of volatile people that will
realize they are paying for everybody else's health care, and they are
paying for their own. They will say, put me on it, too, I'm paying for
it anyway, and then we will have a Canadian plan. That is what I see
coming.
Mr. SESSIONS. Where would the Canadians go if America has a single
payer, Hillary-style health care plan? Where would the Canadians go
when they need real medicine?
Mr. KING of Iowa. I would think they would be worried about that
right now. Their Prime Minister came to the United States for melanoma
surgery. There are entire companies that have been spawned in Canada
who are in the business of setting up the transportation and the access
to U.S. health care for the people that are very sick or maybe die in
line in Canada that can come down to the United States.
One of the good insurance programs that you can get up there is being
able to have your heart surgery taken care of by flying you from Ottawa
or Montreal or Quebec down to Houston for heart surgery. That is the
Canadian package. There is no place to go if we don't have an American
plan.
And by the way, the research and development, the innovation, the
things that make us the best in the world in health care, disappear too
because the profit incentive is taken out. Then we get mediocre along
with the rest of the world. That ends up reducing our quality of life,
and it costs American lives.
{time} 2115
Mr. SESSIONS. The gentleman, as he makes the point about how
important it is that we have a market-based, free enterprise system
health care, is so true.
If you look at America and leukemia versus Europe, America's survival
rate is 50 percent; Europe's is 35 percent. Prostate cancer, America's
survival rate is 81.2 percent; France, 61.7; England, 44.3 percent.
My gosh, it just tells you that what America has is not only the
greatest health care system in the world, and one that is of envy, but
one that produces results. And of course it is more expensive, and of
course it costs money, but if the free enterprise system would support
this because we don't tax the ability that people have to buy their
health care, which is what the Democrat party mandate is, that you've
got to tax people that don't belong in a corporation, then what it
means is that you've got a bunch of people that can't afford it.
So that's another point that comes back to your tax element about
health care. You should not have to pay after-tax money on health care.
It should all be pre-tax, but the Democrats insist that, if you don't
work for a corporation, you should not get this opportunity because
it's not something that you negotiated with with a labor contract.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I do have a bill that I've introduced in this
Congress, whose number has escaped me, that provides full deductibility
for health insurance purchased by individuals, and that's been slow in
the coming. It's been lagging. It's rooted back in wage and price
controls of World War II. When they froze those wages and prices, then
employers figured out that if they couldn't give a raise, they could
give a benefit. So health insurance became the benefit that got added
on because wage dollars couldn't go up.
When that happened, we built a foundation of employer-based health
insurance in this country, and now it becomes the politics of holding
on to that employer base. That's why there's not the flexibility that
we need to have there.
But an entrepreneur, an individual that starts up a business, a ma
and pa store, they have to pay some of the highest premiums because
they don't get into a group plan, and they can deduct 100 percent of
the health insurance for their employees but not for themselves.
There's something really wrong with that. That needs to be fixed. I
would take this thing on over to a lot more freedom, and whenever you
give up tax dollars, some of them provide you security like through the
military, through those services that can't be provided any other way.
Transportation is one of them. But at some point, as you peel out the
tax dollars and hand them over into that hand of Uncle Sam, they
represent your freedom that you're granting over there to the Federal
Government. The Federal Government then decides who's going to be able
to exercise their freedom at your expense.
I want to feed my share of this and hold up my end of this freedom,
but I don't want those dollars to go to discourage people from holding
up their end of this load. That's the difference between Republicans
and Democrats.
We're all sociologists here in this chamber. We're here trying to
figure out how do people react towards certain stimuli or lack of
stimuli, raising taxes, raising regulations, imposing criminal
penalties and prison sentences. Everything in between, across the
spectrum are all things that we should be analyzing and having some
understanding of how people will react.
But we understand the motive for earn, save and invest, and we are
philanthropists. We give at church. We give to charities. All of us in
this country do, more on our side than the other side statistically,
but if you let people keep their own money, they'll also understand a
good place to put it out of the goodness of their heart.
[[Page H11383]]
Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the gentleman not only for being here this
evening but a chance to join the gentleman from Oregon and, of course,
Texan here.
Mr. Speaker, tonight we've had an opportunity to talk about the
Republican vision and how important the Republican vision is for a
smaller, smarter, common sense government, versus a Democrat agenda,
ineffective, wasteful and intrusive government.
I want to thank my colleagues for being here this evening. Mr.
Speaker, we appreciate your time. We know that the people of the good
State of Tennessee have sent you here to do the people's work, and
that's what we're here to do, same also, for good public policy.
____________________