[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 15]
[House]
[Pages 20121-20122]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   ANNOUNCING THE AMERICAN PARITY ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, the clean-up efforts along the gulf coast 
are now fully under way. The flood waters of New Orleans are receding, 
and we are shifting our focus from saving lives to restoring lives.
  In the past 2 weeks, Congress has allocated a little over $60 billion 
in disaster relief. It is the right thing to do; yet some here in 
Washington have questioned whether it is money well spent. Others even 
question whether we should rebuild New Orleans at all. And even after 
witnessing the horrors of Katrina's aftermath, some say they want to 
proceed with the tax cut for the wealthiest 1 percent in this country, 
all the while cutting Medicaid, educational programs, and environmental 
programs.
  Ironically, many of these are the same individuals who have vocally 
and unequivocally supported aid and the funding requests for rebuilding 
Iraq. We should be responsible with the people's tax dollars; but we 
cannot have two set of books, two sets of priorities, one for the 
United States and for Iraq.
  Here is what we need to do to begin to restore the lives of the 
people in New Orleans and the rest of the gulf coast:
  These Americans need health care, housing, education, clean water. 
And yet what is the President's budget for this year? A $60 billion cut 
in Medicaid, a $4.3 billion cut in educational programs, a $1.6 billion 
cut to police and firefighters, a $330 million cut to the Army Corps of 
Engineers, a $450 million cut to the Environmental Protection Agency.
  So the very initiatives that we need right now to help New Orleans 
and the rest of the folks on the gulf coast are the ones that the 
President's budget sought to cut back dramatically, and in some cases 
even eliminate entirely.
  At the same time they want to do this, we are spending billions of 
dollars rebuilding Iraq in the very same areas of education, housing, 
health care. Here is a listing of Iraq reconstruction projects 
according to USAID: 2,500 schools have been rehabilitated; 32,000 
teachers and administrators have been trained; over the next year up to 
100,000 additional teachers will receive in-service training; 84 
primary and secondary schools have been established as centers of 
excellence; we are provided universal health care for every

[[Page 20122]]

Iraqi; 110 primary health care centers have been renovated; 10 water 
treatment facilities have been constructed; the Sweet Water Canal 
System was rebuilt, including the repair of breaches and the levee 
system; wetlands are being restored; ports are being rebuilt; and the 
entire transportation program is undergoing a massive renovation and 
construction program. All the while some are questioning whether we 
should do this for New Orleans in our backyard.
  All the while the President's budget called for cuts in these very 
areas that we are now spending, appropriately in some cases, for Iraq.
  Let me be clear, I am not against spending this money to help restore 
the people's lives in Iraq. But we have a budget that was passed with 
opposition from Democrats to cut educational spending, cut Medicaid 
spending, cut health care spending, cut education spending, 
environmental cleanup.
  In the coming weeks, I plan on introducing a piece of legislation to 
ensure that every dollar we spend in helping Iraq restore the 
communities, help restore the lives of the people there we will spend 
here in the United States, because we need to do that for New Orleans, 
we need to do that for the rest of America. But we cannot have two 
priorities, two sets of books, two sets of values, one for Iraq and one 
for the rest of America. Those are the wrong values.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people are the most generous people in the 
word. We can do both. We can build America and Iraq. And it is 
important and imperative that as Americans remain the most generous 
people in the world, that they cannot think that their kids have less 
of a future than other countries around the world.
  We need to ensure that we invest in America, that the roads and the 
bridges and the health care and the education and the environmental 
protection that we have on the laws, that we are investing in those 
areas. If anything, the horrors in the aftermath of Katrina showed us 
that America needs today to stand as one, to be invested in as one, 
that those communities need the same assistance. We cannot pass this 
budget that calls for cutbacks in the Corps of Engineers, cutbacks of 
$60 billion in health care, cutbacks in community health care, all the 
while singing our own praises about the 3,200 schools we are building 
in Iraq, the teachers we are training, the universal health care we are 
providing.
  Again, I will remind you, I am not against providing those. I am 
against the cuts in areas, in the very areas, that we are advocating 
and investing in in Iraq, cuts in those areas for America. This is the 
time when the country looks to its fellow citizens, to the government 
to ensure that they can both restore communities, restore lives, and 
rebuild those communities.
  We need to invest in that area, and like the rest of America, build 
in America and make sure America stands strong going into the future. 
It is high time as we talk about our investment in Iraq, which is now 
close to $350 billion, that that investment in Iraq, that we look here 
at home and say, what do we need to do in the areas of health care, 
education, schools, environmental protection. Because if we build Iraq, 
we have got to ensure that America stands strong.

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