[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 194 (Friday, December 16, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E2299]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




CONFERENCE REPORT ON H.R. 1540, NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR 
                            FISCAL YEAR 2011

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                               speech of

                          HON. EARL BLUMENAUER

                               of oregon

                    in the house of representatives

                      Wednesday, December 14, 2011

  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, today I voted against the National 
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 (NDAA). While nothing is 
more important than providing the resources needed to keep America and 
our men and women in uniform safe, this authorization spends too much 
and is a missed opportunity for much needed reform.
  First, however, I would like to thank Chairman McKeon and Ranking 
Member Smith of the House Armed Services Committee for including 
elements of all three of my amendments in this final conference bill. 
One amendment lifts the veil on classified immunity for defense 
contractors, a practice that exposed 36 of our Oregon National 
Guardsmen to toxic chemicals in Iraq. The other two will help protect 
our troops on the battlefield and save billions of dollars through 
energy efficiency initiatives. Their inclusion, however, does not 
offset the overall authorization which fails to reflect America's 
priorities or our national security realities.
  It is deeply unfortunate that this legislation includes the appalling 
detention provisions and that the bill continues to tie the President's 
hands by restricting his ability to transfer detainees to the United 
States for trial in Federal Court are appalling. Preventing the 
administration from closing Guantanamo only serves to bolster Al Qaeda 
and erode America's security. There is no excuse--even in the name of 
fighting terrorism--for undermining our ideals. Beyond the practical 
security considerations, terrorism is an assault on those ideals and we 
should not further erode them in response to that threat.
  One thing that most of the Occupy Wall Street and majority of the Tea 
Party advocates agree upon is that the United States is on an 
unsustainable path.
  The economy is still floundering. We are losing the competition with 
other countries in the international arena when it comes to rebuilding 
and renewing America's infrastructure and making advances in education. 
Even our health care system, improved by the Affordable Care Act, still 
falls short of the systems in use by most of our major European 
competitors.
  These glaring examples of un-sustainability for our infrastructure, 
our education system and our health care system are all troubling. None 
of this, however, compares with the un-sustainability of our massive 
defense and security spending. U.S. defense spending is bloated and not 
strategically oriented. We cannot continue to spend almost as much as 
the rest of the world--friend and foe alike--combined. We spend 6 times 
as much on defense as China, and 12 times that of Russia. Our Navy is 
larger than the next 13 navies combined.
  People who are at the front deserve our best in terms of equipment, 
and they and their families need to be well-cared for, not just in the 
field, but when they come home. Our armed forces are stressed and 
continue to be hobbled by the reckless actions in Iraq and further 
challenged by the war in Afghanistan, and need to come home. We 
continue to spend in Afghanistan with no clear plan for withdrawal.
  Today we have a reauthorization of the defense bill that fails to lay 
the foundation for the dramatic changes that are needed. Scaling back 
our open-ended spending commitments, nuclear weapons systems that we 
spend more on today than during the Cold War and are far more out of 
proportion to what we will ever need or use, patterns of deployment, 
for example, with our Navy, all cry out for reform. Long overdue 
elements to deal with cost effectiveness and the environmental 
footprint, energy costs at $400 a gallon for fuel at the frontlines in 
Afghanistan, and tens of billions of dollars lost to inefficient air 
conditioning are missing.
  The greatest threat to our future is losing control of our ability to 
make tough decisions that will enable us to sustain our military and, 
more importantly, to sustain the economy. In short, the NDAA ignores 
the big picture.
  We should reject this blueprint and begin the process now of right-
sizing the military, trimming our burdensome nuclear stockpiles and 
unnecessary programs, eliminating costly weapons programs, ending our 
misguided mission in Afghanistan, and moving away from a Cold War model 
of deployment with U.S. military bases all over Europe.
  We have the most powerful military in the world and will by far even 
if we invest substantially less. Our problem is that the American 
public is being ill-served by government. We're not investing in our 
future, and our economy will not be able to sustain this ever-
increasing military commitment, to say nothing of the demands of 
investing in our communities and our people, especially the young. This 
is another missed opportunity to set down a marker for real change, and 
to lead responsibly.

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