[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 13]
[House]
[Pages 18633-18640]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  2245
                       30-SOMETHING WORKING GROUP

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Altmire). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, it's an honor to address the House. 
And I hope the Members of the House had a great 4th of July break as we 
celebrate another birthday of this great country. And the great thing 
about it is you're allowed to say what you want to say and feel what 
you want to feel and express yourself in any way that you would like 
to.
  Mr. Speaker, as you know, the 30-Something Working Group, we come to 
the floor to share with not only the Members of Congress, but also with 
the American people, the importance of good policymaking, and also 
making sure that we're factual in what we say and what we do here.
  It was quite interesting. I was sitting here reading my notes from 
the information that we pulled together to come to the floor. We're 
going to talk about Iraq tonight, but I'm going to talk a little bit 
about SCHIP because we spent a lot of time and many hours on this floor 
fixing what the Republican Congress left for dead, really. We had to 
come in, the Democratic majority, with the leadership of Speaker  Nancy 
Pelosi, and save the SCHIP program in many States.
  A number of Republican Governors wrote that were in a crisis mode of

[[Page 18634]]

their program being shut down in the State of Florida, health care for 
children. In Washington, many people talk about SCHIP. I'm so glad to 
have the chairman here of the subcommittee that deals with this 
particular issue. And it goes to show you, here on the Democratic side 
we have great responsibility when it comes down to fixing and cleaning 
up the mess that was left from the 109th Congress and the Republican-
controlled Congress and special interests got what they wanted.
  I think it's also important to note that a supermajority of 
Republicans voted against the continuing resolution to be able to save 
the SCHIP program in many States to provide health care for children. 
And now we're going through the policy move that we have to take to be 
able to make sure that SCHIP is here for every child and to make sure 
that they have the kind of health care that they deserve.
  So I'm so glad Mr. Pallone from the Garden State is here because he 
is the chairman that's dealing with this very issue. I'm a member of 
the Ways and Means Committee that is also going to be having a 
discussion on this issue. And I can tell you, as we start to move forth 
and uncovering and unearthing some of the injustices that have taken 
place in the past, and we have Governors on our side, we have children 
advocates on our side, we have those that believe in true health care 
on our side in saying that this is not a last-day-at-school kind of 
syndrome that we see the President and others going through. And I 
think something is about to happen that is really great and is going to 
secure and make sure the children have the kind of health care they 
deserve.
  Mr. Pallone, I would be more than happy to yield to you at this time 
because I know without notes that you can talk about this because you 
and your staff have been working on this issue and members of your 
committee have been working on this issue.
  Mr. PALLONE. I want to thank my colleague from Florida, first of all, 
for being here tonight and for being here for so many nights for so 
many years now. I know they call them the ``30-Something,'' but it's 
several years now that you've been doing this on a regular basis, and 
drawing attention to what the Democrats are doing, and of course when 
we were in the minority, pointing out the contrasts between ourselves 
and the Republican majority.
  I don't want to give a course in history here tonight, but I have to 
take issue with what my colleagues from Tennessee and Georgia just said 
with regard to the children's health initiative.
  First of all, I think it's really important, and I know you say this 
all the time, that we're not here as ideologues. I'm not here because 
I'm a liberal or a conservative or because I want a government-run 
program or a privately run program. As far as I'm concerned, if 
everybody could get health care under some kind of privately run 
insurance program and it was all affordable and we could cover 
everybody, that would be fine with me. The only reason that the SCHIP 
or the children's health program was set up about 10 years ago, and I 
was there and I was part of it at the time, and it was done on a 
bipartisan basis, Republicans and Democrats supported it, was because 
we realized that there were more and more children in this country that 
were going without health care.
  And we did not set up an entitlement. I heard my colleagues from 
Tennessee and Georgia on the Republican side repeatedly refer to this 
as an entitlement program. It is not an entitlement program. It is a 
program that simply gives money in a block grant. I mean, nothing could 
be less of an entitlement than a block grant, to States like Georgia 
and Tennessee that they match to try to cover children that don't have 
health insurance.
  Now, let me stress this is for parents who work who have children. We 
have a Medicaid program for people who are very low income. But what we 
found 10 years ago, and again, on a bipartisan basis, just as many 
Republicans as Democrats, what we found 10 years ago was there are a 
lot of people who work for a living, but they don't get health 
insurance on the job and they cannot afford to go out in the individual 
market privately and buy it. I mean, that could cost you $12,000-
$15,000 a year if you have to go out for a family of four and buy 
health insurance. If you're making 20, 30, $40,000 a year, you can't 
afford to pay $12,000-$15,000 a year for health insurance for yourself 
and your children.
  So the Federal Government decided, let's give some money to the 
States. They will match it, and they can help cover these children of 
working parents whose income is a little too high so they don't qualify 
for Medicaid, but they can't get health care on the job because their 
employer doesn't offer it, and they can't afford to go out and buy it 
on the individual market.
  Now, what is wrong with that? There is nothing wrong with that. I 
cannot understand how anyone on the other side of the aisle, including 
my two Republican colleagues that just spoke, would come out and say 
that we don't want kids to have health insurance. I mean, what are they 
talking about? There is no alternative for these people other than to 
go to the emergency room or the hospital. They can't get it on their 
job. They can't afford to buy it privately on the individual market. 
They have no alternative. And that is simply all we offer to do.
  And now my colleagues on the Republican side are talking about 
entitlements, raising socialism. I mean, this is not an ideological 
issue. This is just a practical way of trying to deal with a problem.
  Now, let me tell you something. You already made reference, my 
colleague, to the fact that some States this year ran out of money to 
pay for this children's health initiative very earlier, and the State 
that came here crying first was the State of Georgia.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, if you would yield for a second.
  You know, I was sitting here. And the great thing about being a 
Member of Congress, and I thank the people from the 17th Congressional 
District in Florida for sending me here, it's almost like, coach, get 
me the ball. I wanted to say, will the gentleman yield? Because it's 
interesting that Georgia was on their knees with hands clasped saying, 
please help us. Children are about to run out of health care insurance, 
and we're about to have a crisis. And it was the leadership of this 
Congress, the Democratic Congress, that brought about that kind of 
change. That's why people wake up at 7 a.m. in the morning to go vote 
for representation.
  So now we're down to politics, Mr. Speaker. And it's very 
unfortunate, politics is playing a role in the lives of our children, 
grandchildren, nieces and nephews that need health care. And this is 
for working folks. These are for folks who punch in and punch out every 
day, individuals that are struggling every day that are hoping that the 
government will stand for them.
  So, Mr. Chairman, continue. I yield back. But I'm just saying if 
Florida was in the situation, I couldn't come down here to the floor 
and start knocking something that this Congress ran to the savior. And 
what we had to do, Mr. Chairman, was to couple it with a number of 
other things to get it to pass for the President not to veto it. And 
we're going to talk about that a little later, but I think that's very, 
very important.
  I yield back, sir.
  Mr. PALLONE. Well, I just want to follow up on what you said. You 
know, this money that we give to States to help cover these kids in the 
last few years has run out very early for a lot of States. And, again, 
it was the gentleman from Georgia's own State, it was State 
representatives, Secretary of Health and Human Services, whatever they 
call that person in the State, came down here in February. And they 
were over in the Speaker's office, and I was asked to come. And there 
were Republicans and Democratic Congressmen in that room. Now, I can't 
say for sure that the gentleman who spoke tonight was there, but there 
were other Republicans. He may have been, but I don't want to say for 
sure because I don't remember. But there definitely were Republican 
Congressmen from the State of Georgia in that room over in the 
Speaker's office, along with Democrats. And they said, you've got to 
pass

[[Page 18635]]

an emergency supplemental bill to give us more money for SCHIP because 
we're going to run out of our yearly allotment on March 1; two months 
into the year. So they said, please, do something. Well, what we did is 
we attached that to the emergency supplemental bill. Some people know 
that as the Iraq supplemental, but it really covered a lot of different 
things.
  And as you say, we put $750 million just to cover Georgia and other 
States to the end of this year. And you know how difficult it was. The 
President threatened to veto it three or four times. We finally got it 
passed. And every month I would get calls or letters from the Georgia 
delegation saying, when are you going to pass this money because we're 
going to have to tell these kids that they don't have any health 
insurance.
  So I don't understand how they come down here on the Republican side 
and complain about this program that they helped start, that their 
State is asking for money. Most of the people in that room from the 
State of Georgia were Republican, not Democrats, okay. And we're just 
practically saying, okay, look, we don't want to have to run out of 
this money every year because obviously this program is growing because 
the number of uninsured kids, again, from working families, keeps 
getting bigger every year. It's up to something like nine million 
children nationally that don't have any health insurance. Okay. And 
what we're saying is, let's come up with a larger pot of money over the 
next 5 years to pay for these kids so that, there is about six million 
of those nine million that are eligible for the children's health SCHIP 
program right now, eligible under the current law. There is about 6.7 
that are covered, there are another 6 million that are eligible under 
the current law that President Bush and the Republicans have been 
supporting for the last 10 years, and there just isn't enough money to 
cover them.
  So all we're saying is, let's take some money, in this case over 5 
years it would cost about maybe $50 billion to cover these kids that 
are already eligible for this SCHIP program.
  Now, how in the world the Democratic initiative to simply pay for 
kids that are already eligible for this program that's already on the 
books becomes socialism or entitlements or some kind of radical 
procedure here. For the life of me, I simply do not understand. I mean, 
there is nothing here that's new. There is nothing new here.
  I yield back to the gentleman.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Chairman, you said $5 billion over the next 
5 years?
  Mr. PALLONE. We're talking about $50 billion over the next 5 years, 
about $10 billion more per year, to cover the rest of the kids that are 
currently eligible for this program.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. That's $50 billion.
  Mr. PALLONE. Right. And we're not talking about anything new here.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Over the next 5 years.
  Mr. PALLONE. Right, additional money.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Well, let me tell you, per year in Iraq we spend 
$120 billion.
  Mr. PALLONE. Exactly. And where do these kids go? They have no place 
to go. The only place they go is if they get sick or they need 
attention, they have to go to the hospital emergency room. And what 
kind of a way is that to operate a health care system where you have to 
take your kid to the hospital emergency room because they can't see a 
doctor on a regular basis.
  Now, one of them said community health centers. I'm all for community 
health centers. I think it would be wonderful if every town in the 
country had a community health center and you could go there and get 
free care, but that's not the reality. In my district, we have maybe 
three or four of these community health centers. I represent about 
650,000 people, and we have maybe three or four of these federally 
sponsored community health centers. There is no way in the world that 
these parents that take their kids, all who are uninsured, to these 
community health centers. There is absolutely no way that that's going 
to happen.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Imagine the line. Imagine a rural county. 
Imagine an urban county that I represent, everyone kind of diving into 
one or two locations to make it all happen. Why should we inconvenience 
those that are counting on their government to respond, especially on 
behalf of our children.
  I'm glad you came down here tonight to have you here, the person that 
has the gavel in their hand, heard testimony from the States. I know 
you know what I'm saying. This is what you're doing and this is why 
we're here. And Americans voted for a new direction, and we're heading 
in that new direction. There are those that are Members of Congress 
that don't want to move in that new direction. And, Mr. Speaker, like I 
said, the great thing about our country is that we can disagree and you 
can voice your opinion and other ideas, but I think it's important also 
for the American people to get fact and not fiction. And that's what 
we're here about, and that's what it's all about.
  You are always welcome, Mr. Chairman, to come down. I am a part of 
the ``something'' part of the 30-something. So you can join, and that 
caucus is growing. And the good thing about what we do here on the 
floor from those new Members of Congress, we call them ``majority 
makers,'' to those that have been here as long as you have been here, 
to see this process go full circle, 360 degrees, to be able to come to 
the floor at 11-something at night, to be able to set the record 
straight I think is important not only for Members of Congress, but 
also for the Congressional Record and for those individuals that are 
listening to the statements that are being made here on the floor that 
know better.

                              {time}  2300

  Mr. PALLONE. I appreciate it, and I know you want to get back to the 
Iraq war, as I think you should. I want to thank you again, and just 
say in conclusion from my part of this tonight, what I really don't 
like is trying to make this into an ideological debate.
  When I hear my colleagues on the Republican side, instead of being 
practical and looking at what is going to accomplish something, to 
start making it ideological and talk about entitlements and socialism 
and the whole thing, we don't need that. We don't need that rhetoric 
here. We as Democrats are trying to accomplish things in a practical 
way, without ideology, without right or left and all this jargon that 
we are hearing from the other side.
  I just hope that it doesn't continue, because otherwise I am going to 
come down here every night and talk about why practically speaking the 
children's health initiative is a good program.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. If the gentleman would yield, just to make 
one last point on this, and I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for 
coming down, before I came here, I was the chairman of the Public 
Health Committee in the Connecticut State Legislature. What we figured 
out over time, because we were a State that submitted waivers to the 
Federal Government to expand our children's healthcare program, so we 
actually ended up with one of the more generous SCHIP programs in the 
country. We had more kids as a percentage of children who were eligible 
for children's healthcare, sponsored and subsidized by the State and 
Federal Government, than most other States, and what we found was that 
was actually reducing the cost of healthcare over time.
  I got to listen to a little bit of the rhetoric on the other side of 
the aisle earlier, and they act as if we have existing today a fiscally 
responsible system of healthcare. We don't. We have the most expensive 
healthcare system in the world.
  You may have covered this earlier before I got on to the floor. But 
we have the most expensive healthcare system in the world for outcomes 
that are lucky if they rival those of countries that spend 50 percent 
less on their healthcare, 16 percent of GDP in this country compared to 
10 or 11 percent in other countries that insure everybody and get 
basically the same or better outcomes.

[[Page 18636]]

  So what we found in Connecticut was as we expanded the reach of our 
SCHIP program and got more kids eligible and enrolled, we were actually 
cutting the cost of care for those kids because, guess what? 
Preventative care, as I am sure has been said on the Floor, is much 
less expensive, much more fiscally responsible than crisis care, when 
these kids show up in the emergency room with much more complicating, 
debilitating illnesses that require much more expensive care.
  So, for my money, investing in children's healthcare insurance is the 
right thing for taxpayer dollars. We certainly know it is the humane 
thing to do, it is the moral thing to do, to insure children who have 
no healthcare through no fault of their own. But it is certainly the 
right thing to do if we are going to be responsible stewards of 
taxpayer dollars.
  If I were sent here, as the folks on the other side of the aisle 
believe they have been, to be stewards of taxpayer dollars, I would be 
investing in preventative healthcare every single day I was here, and 
that is what the SCHIP program does.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Murphy, I just want to thank you, definitely 
fresh out of the State legislature, for coming to this floor. I served 
in the legislature myself, and I can tell you that in Florida we enjoy 
the Federal assistance that is there.
  Some folks, Mr. Speaker, speak of Medicare as socialized medicine. If 
you try to do away with Medicare right now and have new and great ideas 
that would limit access to clinics and what have you, I think you would 
have an uprising in this country as we look at providing better 
healthcare.
  If I can, we came to the floor tonight, and I have my Iraq notebook 
with me, and I want to thank not only staff but the Democratic 
leadership for taking a forward lean, as we have done since we have 
been here in the control of the House, and the American people provided 
us with an opportunity to lead, to move this country in a new 
direction, and also move this issue of Iraq in a new direction. I just 
want to talk a little bit about the numbers, and I want this to sink 
in, because I want Members to know exactly what we are doing.
  We have to create and we have to be about a major paradigm shift, I 
would say slash ``new direction,'' as it relates to Iraq. We know that 
the President has executive authority and he can veto. We know that the 
legislature, and when we say legislature, I started talking about 
States, I started talking about legislature, I would say the Congress, 
the legislative branch of government has the responsibility of policy 
and making sure that we pass legislation that will be helpful.
  During the 4th of July break, which was a wonderful thing, you have 
an opportunity to go back to your districts and you have an opportunity 
to go to places where you can learn more, I actually went to Norfolk, 
Virginia, to the Naval facility there and spoke to a number of sailors 
and some marines and others that have been deployed before. I was there 
on a destroyer and also a submarine and also an amphibious vessel that 
moved marines into a forward area and had an opportunity to talk to a 
number of individuals over that weekend.
  I left with the impression, Mr. Murphy, of them saying, if you want 
to help the troops, then stand up for us in the Congress and making 
sure we bring some sense to what we are doing.
  Now, some of the bloodiest weekends in Iraq took place during the 4th 
of July break, and a number of Iraqis have lost their lives and they 
have a number of civil war conflicts that are going on there. Also a 
number of marines, soldiers and others, even civilians, lost their 
lives.
  I think it is important as we look at this and we go through a 
forward lean, I just want to capture this moment from the Congressional 
Research Service, Mr. Speaker, the nonpartisan Congressional Research 
Service, which is a nonpartisan organization within the Congress. These 
are individuals that are Ph.D.'s and those that count the numbers and 
really give the Americans an objective view of what the real picture 
is.
  Let's talk about cost here for a minute. You heard Mr. Pallone, the 
Chair of a subcommittee dealing with the children's health program, say 
over 5 years it would take $50 billion to be able to provide healthcare 
for children. Let's look at these numbers.
  Per year in Iraq, and this is the chart that I have here, $120 
billion a year. I am going to even further break that down to $10 
billion a month and change. These are not my numbers. This is the 
Congressional Research Service numbers. Per week, $2.3 billion a week 
in Iraq. $2.3 billion. This is just Iraq. We are not talking about 
Afghanistan. Per day, $329 million and change. I am not even giving you 
the change. Per hour, $13 million. That is every hour in Iraq, $13 
million.
  Think about what we can do here domestically. I am talking to the 
mayors of our cities and our towns. I am talking to commissioners that 
would like to resolve some issues and want some sort of Federal 
assistance in doing that. I am talking to the citizen that is wondering 
why something is shut down in their community for a lack of funding.
  Per minute, $228,000. That is per minute. $228,000. That is more than 
many Americans make in 5 years, Mr. Murphy, a minute. That is what is 
happening in Iraq right now. Per second, $3,816. Some may say $4,000 a 
second.
  You look at the Forbes' richest, most wealthy Americans, they are not 
even doing that. You have companies that wish they could make $3,816 a 
second. This makes Oprah, her income, look very small. This makes some 
of the new people that are there, the President or the used-to-be 
chairman of Microsoft, look very small when you look at these numbers. 
But you have to look at this issue for what it is. These are the 
dollars that we are spending.
  Now, who is standing in front of us and making new policy changes 
here? I think it is important, and I think we are going to have a gut 
check here, and I want to make sure that Americans know exactly and the 
Members know. Because many Members, they go back home and they say, I 
did not quite understand that. I am sorry. It went over my head. I 
didn't understand what happened, when a constituent may walk up to 
them.
  This week in the House we will have an opportunity to reaffirm our 
support and move this Iraq debate in a new direction. Responsible 
redeployment of our troops. We talk about responsible redeployment. We 
are talking about a bill that Chairman Ike Skelton is going to bring to 
this floor tomorrow, or sometime this week, where Democrats and 
Republicans will have an opportunity on the record to vote once again 
as it relates to redeployment.
  The Responsible Redeployment Act, H.R. 2956. It requires the 
responsible redeployment of U.S. troops beginning within 120 days of 
enacting and ending by April 1st, 2008. I think it is important that 
everyone understands that a supermajority, 70 percent, a supermajority 
of Americans believe that we should be out of Iraq.
  It requires the President to publicly justify the post-deployment 
missions for the U.S. military in Iraq with a minimum number of troops 
necessary to carry out those missions. This is not saying that we are 
going to take all of the troops out of Iraq, but what it is saying is 
those troops that are in harm's way, doing the door-to-door, doing all 
of these things in the middle of a civil war that Iraqi troops should 
be responsible for, there are a number of people that are saying, you 
know, they are not quite ready.
  But, meanwhile, back at the ranch, I know every Sunday on CNN they 
have a report talking about what happened in Iraq that week. I think I 
have seen too many flag-draped coffins. I think I have talked to too 
many spouses and family members that are saying, what are you going to 
do and how are you going to do it and how are you going to stand up?
  Chairman Ike Skelton is beyond this. He is what one may say is an 
individual that solely has the troops in his heart and in his mind. And 
this will be a product of not only him, but many Members of Congress. 
So Members will get an opportunity to vote.
  Now, Mr. Murphy, before I yield to you, I think it is important that 
we

[[Page 18637]]

show who is standing in the schoolhouse door here. I would ask for not 
only the Members, but also the American people to go to the White House 
website if you want some information.
  Members of the Republican minority, thanks to the American people, on 
March 29 of 2007, stood with the President after we moved the bill 
through this Congress that would move the policy as it relates to Iraq 
in a new direction. It would bring more accountability as it relates to 
profiteering, more accountability as it relates to how our troops are 
being deployed based on what the President says that he thinks is 
right. It is bringing democracy to it.
  When we passed that bill, it passed both the House and Senate, I can 
say that the Democratic majority voted in the affirmative with a few 
Republicans, and it went to the White House. And before that bill could 
be carried to the White House, the President said that he would veto 
it.
  I want you to take a look at this picture here, because I think it is 
very very important. Pictures speak 1,000 words. You have all 
Republicans, the minority, that are standing behind the President 
saying stand with the President and we will not allow the President to 
be overridden, for there to be an override of his veto.
  I think it is important for us to pay very close attention to it, 
because my message to those that were on the steps of the White House, 
who met with the President, who had some sort of discussion with the 
President, that have said ``we are going to make sure that the 
President's will is not overridden,'' well, I want to ask, how many 
times will the Republican minority go down and stand with the President 
in front of the will of the American people?
  That is going to happen this week, Mr. Speaker, and I am glad that 
Speaker  Nancy Pelosi has said we are willing to take the fight on 
behalf of the American people to the executive branch and to those 
Members of Congress who believe that we should be ``staying the 
course'' or continuing to do the same thing expecting different 
results.
  There are a lot of things that are going on in Iraq that are not in 
the control of the American Congress and executive branch and those 
that they elected to represent them here in Washington, DC. But what we 
do have control over as it relates to the policy and as it relates to 
the will of the American people and the troops. One person said if you 
want to help the troops, get us out of Iraq. If you want to help the 
troops.
  Mr. Ryan and I in the 108th and 109th Congress heard all kinds of 
speeches here on this floor, Mr. Murphy, Members saying ``I support the 
troops.'' ``No, I support the troops more than you.'' ``No, let me take 
my shirt. Let me show you a tattoo I have on my shoulder saying I 
support the troops.''
  That is not what it is about. It is about policy. It is about manning 
up and womaning up and leadering up and standing up on behalf of these 
men and women that are in harm's way.

                              {time}  2315

  These are real families. We have to treat this issue as it relates to 
redeployment of troops in Iraq as though our children or our nephew or 
our cousin or our husband or wife, what have you, are in harm's way as 
we speak. Those that have a dot.mil address behind their e-mail address 
that are e-mailing us and are asking us to be leaders, I am glad that 
this House is moving in the direction, and the Senate is moving in the 
direction, and I commend those Senators that have come to the side of 
the American people saying enough is enough. The President can burn all 
kind of Federal jet fuel and fly throughout the country. He was in 
Cleveland talking about what we need to do. Enough is enough. The 
bottom line is that folks have to come to grips that this is a 
democracy.
  The White House is under some sort of impression, I want to say 
impression. They believe if they were to come out at a press 
conference, if the President were to say the rain doesn't fall from the 
sky, it comes up from the ground to the sky, they believe many 
Americans would actually look outside to see if that is true. We know 
what is right and what is wrong. What is wrong is the fact that we can 
no longer stand idly by and let this happen.
  The Democratic Congress has tried to make this happen. We need 
Republican support. We need the American people to call their 
Republican representative and say enough with this partisan stuff, 
let's move for our young men and women in harm's way.
  I yield to Mr. Ryan.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. The bottom line is that this is not just us, or the 
Democrats or the American people. Mr. Meek, Mr. Murphy, these are the 
soldiers who are coming back.
  I don't know what your personal experiences have been, but the 
soldiers in my district who have come back, and I meet them for a cup 
of coffee at the coffee shop and they talk off the record, they say, 
Get us out because this is insane. It is ridiculous. The only thing we 
all hear from the soldiers who say I want to go back, they say they 
want to go back because their buddies are over there. They are not 
going back because there is some great cause that the President has 
outlined for them. They are so far beyond that. They go back because 
their buddies are there, and God bless them. Those are the kind of 
buddies that we all want.
  I think it is important that that picture that you showed, Mr. Meek, 
and what the minority party is trying to do here by not giving us 
enough votes to override a Presidential veto in the House and in the 
Senate is they are complicit in following President George W. Bush's 
foreign policy that has taken this country right off the cliff. Mr. 
Meek, Mr. Murphy, Mr. Speaker, $600 billion, thousands of lives lost, 
innocent people in Iraq getting bombed.
  And here's the bottom line that I think the country needs to know and 
completely understand. This President has made the country less safe. 
There are more terrorists today that are gunning at the United States 
than ever before. Even pre-9/11, and now al Qaeda is coming out and 
saying we are stronger than we have ever been. We are as strong as we 
were on 9/11.
  We have thousands and thousands of more terrorists who want a gun to 
come at the United States. There are sleeper cells I am sure in the 
United States, but when we try to pass a Homeland Security bill that 
funds 3,000 more Border Patrol agents, that puts the proper equipment 
and the proper technology on the borders to make sure that when the 
cargo is coming into the ports that those are checked, that our first 
responders have the proper equipment that they need, the Republican 
minority basically filibustered in the House and tried to stop that 
from happening.
  So what we are saying here is that if we don't quickly rectify this 
problem and start making investments that we can go after Osama bin 
Laden and al Qaeda instead of this mess that we are in in Iraq, then we 
are more vulnerable as a country. And if something happens in this 
country, it lays right at the footsteps of the White House because we 
have been fighting this war. It has been ridiculous. The whole concept 
has been ridiculous. George Herbert Walker Bush said it was crazy to go 
into Iraq. This has not made any sense since the beginning. And now we 
are wasting $600 billion fighting a war in some country that we don't 
know a whole lot about instead of focusing that money on making sure 
that we get Osama bin Laden, making sure that we destroy al Qaeda. 
That's the war.
  And so if al Qaeda hits the United States of America, it is because 
George Bush led us into a war in a country that didn't have any al 
Qaeda members in it.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Ryan, the bottom line is that the President, 
and we have to talk about the student loan issue that he talked about 
earlier today, and I think it is important that we talk about that 
because again we had Members here talking about SCHIP and we were all 
once representatives in our States on the legislative end on the State 
level. But I think it is important for us to, and where is my red chart 
to talk about the debt.

[[Page 18638]]

  We just had Mr. Pallone as the chairman of the subcommittee down 
here, and we have a proposal talking about $50 billion over the next 5 
years. Let me say real quick, per year it is $120 billion in Iraq and 
climbing. I say that to a mayor or to a Governor, I would like to have 
my hands on $120 billion that the Federal commitment has made.
  Mr. Ryan, it is not the President, that is all too easy. The 
President is in his last leg of a swim meet here. He has the last day 
of school kind of syndrome. All of us know what the last day or last 
week of school felt like. I am about to leave the institution, and I 
don't have to worry about what is happening.
  But guess what, it is not the last day of school for the American 
people and those that are in harm's way. We have a responsibility to 
stand for them. I am not going to just leave the President. I am going 
to say that those individuals on the Republican side of the aisle, not 
all of them, but a majority of them, are willing to stand with the 
President that ran this record debt up that we have now. A $1.19 
trillion debt and climbing, done by the Republican majority in the 
108th and 109th Congress and beyond, of rubber stamping what the 
President has done.
  We all live the same kind of lives. We all understand our 
responsibility up here. But I tell you, to be able to move in a new 
direction in Iraq, it is going to take more than just Democratic 
majority Members, especially in the Senate, to be able to bring some 
real sense to this new direction in Iraq. The real issue is that there 
is a choice to be made.
  Mr. Ryan, some of the Members on the Republican side used to laugh at 
us when we were on the floor. I see them in the hall and they are like, 
``You all are funny. Do you really believe people are going to follow 
what you all are talking about if you are given the opportunity to 
lead?''
  Well, guess what, how do you like us now? People believe. Democrats, 
Republicans, Independents. And you know something, some people who 
voted for the first time in their lives who had given up on the 
political system, and I will be doggone if their vote goes in vain. I 
am telling you right now, we need Republican Members of this Congress 
to vote on behalf of our troops.
  Want to help the troops? Vote for redeployment. You want to help the 
troops, vote for antiprofiteering legislation. You want to help the 
troops, when Mr. Murtha comes to this floor with an appropriations bill 
that is going to bring major sense as it relates to the appropriations 
in this war, then support that if you want to support the troops.
  Mr. Ryan, I am going to yield to Mr. Murphy by saying this: As of 
July 11, today, the deaths in Iraq as it relates to U.S. military 
personnel, and this is not even counting those clandestine agents that 
are out there, those civilian folks, 3,609. That is as of 10 a.m. this 
morning.
  Total number of wounded in action, returned to duty, 14,681.
  Number of wounded that did not return to duty, 12,014 and climbing.
  I want to say this is real. This is above and beyond Democrat-
Republican politics, Independent politics, whatever the case may be. We 
are moving in the direction of redeployment of our troops and a new 
policy. The President can stand in the schoolhouse door all he wants 
to, but the bottom line is he is empowered by the Republican minority 
that are saying that we are not going to allow you to have enough votes 
to be able to override what the President is saying. That is where it 
comes down to it.
  I can tell you, like I shared with some of my colleagues, you 
continue to follow the President on the old way, and I guarantee you, 
just like I said in the 108th Congress and 109th Congress, and I don't 
have a whole lot of say in what goes on in some of these districts 
because people have their own heart and mind. They read and they see. 
They see the people that are not coming back. People are being 
deployed.
  They are not glad they are going. They are crying when people are 
going. Will I see my husband? Will I see my father again? What are we 
doing? What does this mean? We are in the middle of a civil war; what 
does that mean? Will my husband or wife be knocking down some door as 
we speak here on this floor, having Iraqis huddle in the middle of a 
room on a security mission that is necessary because the Iraqi 
government is not doing it, and those individuals will never forget 
that. And they are not doing it just because they feel like doing it; 
they are doing it because it is the mission. We support them in that 
mission, but the bottom line is we have to have a new attitude and new 
direction.
  There are Iraqi troops that should be doing those house checks and 
taking that responsibility, and an Iraqi parliament that should be 
coming to work every day to make sure that they do what they do. It 
shouldn't be our people, and people know it. So the bottom line is, 
when you are in a place where you don't understand exactly where you 
should be, fall on the side of commonsense. That is all that I am 
saying.
  Mr. Murphy.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Thank you.
  We know because we have talked to these families. When they are 
crying about their loved ones injured in the field of battle or, God 
forbid, have not come back, there is also a sense from military 
families that their despair is because they realize they are the only 
ones that are being asked to sacrifice for this war.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. What happened to the coalition, Mr. Murphy?
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. The coalition of the willing is no more, 
Mr. Meek. What is left are the military family, and their friends and 
families have been asked to shoulder almost the entire burden of this 
war.
  When we talk about where we are going to spend the taxpayer dollars, 
you have to talk about what we are getting for that investment.
  You gave the statistics on the casualties since the beginning of the 
war, but it is even more terrifying when you talk about what has 
happened simply since the surge has begun: 593 soldiers have died since 
January 10; 3,500 have been wounded; 1,600 wounded so badly they cannot 
return to battle. We are talking about 13,000 Iraqi civilians and 
members of the military police who have been killed or wounded since 
the surge took place.
  So you have to ask what we are getting for this investment. It has 
gone from $8 billion a month to $10 billion a month since the surge has 
gone into effect. What we have gotten is an Iraqi political institution 
or Iraqi political infrastructure which is even less willing to take 
responsibility for its own actions, even less able to take control of 
their own country.
  It was reported in the Associated Press of the President's report on 
progress in Iraq that the Iraqi government has not ``met any of its 
targets for political, economic and other reform.'' Has not met any of 
the targets we have given them for economic, political reform.
  Parliament is going home for the summer. There is a parliament where 
the biggest Sunni group has pulled out. You have an inability for the 
Iraqis to deal with their own shop. As someone said, right now the 
Iraqis are paying wholesale for their politics because we are 
subsidizing every decision that is being made there. It is time they 
start paying retail for their political decisions, and that is only 
going to happen when they have a sense of when the crutch is going to 
be taken away from them.
  So, Mr. Meek and Mr. Ryan, I think to myself when we talk about how 
we are going to spend money, whether we are going to spend $120 billion 
a year in Iraq or whether we are going to spend $40 or $50 billion on 
children's health care insurance, and I think, as Mr. Ryan said, that 
$120 billion investment is getting more and more Americans killed every 
day and is making this country less safe and less safe every day, and 
is making it less and less likely that the Iraqis will ever be able to 
take control of their country.

                              {time}  2330

  That's a terrible investment. That's a bad investment. When I think 
about $50 billion in children's health care, by

[[Page 18639]]

doing the right thing, the moral thing for kids, and at the same time, 
probably making our health care system more affordable and less costly 
in the end, because we're hooking kids up with preventative health 
care, that's a great investment. That's a worthwhile investment.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. We're slingshotting the kids then for 5 months.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. At some point, we've got to talk about 
what results we're getting for our money, and if you can turn around 
even a portion of the money that we're using over there to make this 
country less safe, turn it around and college age, children's health 
care, I mean meat and potatoes things that matter to middle-class 
families, those are the investments that I came to Congress to work on. 
Those are the investments that millions of Americans around this 
country sent a new class of Democrats here to work on, and if we can 
get some Republicans to stand up with us this week, as we have seen 
happening in the Senate over the last week and a half, we'll start to 
make good on those promises.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Well, $50 million for children's health care or 5 
months more in Iraq, let the American people make that decision. Poll 
that, get the focus group out and figure that one out, where the 
American people are going to be. They're going to be with the 
leadership. They're going to be with the Speaker. They're going to be 
with the majority leader in the Senate. They're going to be for making 
these investments.
  And I just love, Mr. Speaker, how our Republican counterparts went 
way back to 1992, they went into the deep parts of the Republican 
library, the CATO Institute and everywhere else, and they pulled out 
the 1992 talking points, and they've dusted them off and everything's 
socialism and union bosses. And it's typical of why they're not in 
power.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I guess I wonder whether the water is 
different in the Republican cloakroom down here than it is in the 
Senate cloakroom, because what we've seen in the last couple of weeks, 
and I've got a list here of all of the people who have changed their 
opinion on the war in the last several weeks and all the quotes from 
Republicans in the United States Capitol regarding their new opinion of 
this war, which is that we should set a date for withdrawal, and it is 
Senate Republican after Senate Republican after Senate Republican after 
Senate Republican, Dick Lugar, George Voinovich, Pete Domenici, Lamar 
Alexander, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins.
  What's missing from that list, for some reason, are members of the 
Republican minority here in the House. This is the body that's supposed 
to actually be more responsive to the American people, not less 
responsive. So I haven't been here long enough to understand what the 
difference is, but some Republicans are waking up to the notion that 
it's time for a change. It just hasn't happened here yet.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. That's the God's honest truth of where we are. The 
force of the American people broke through in the election, but it is 
yet to penetrate the ideology of the Republican leadership and the 
Republicans in the House, many of them, and everything is coming down 
to priorities. It's all coming down to priorities.
  And when Mr. Murphy and Mr. Pallone and yourself are talking about 
making this investment in the children's health care, poor kids getting 
health care, our friends on the other side are so void of any ideas on 
how to make America competitive in the 21st century that they have got 
to scream socialism, and I urge all of our colleagues, Mr. Speaker, to 
go back to the 1930s and 1940s and 1950s and 1960s. The only argument 
our friends on the extreme right have is socialism.
  We're talking about a bill that passed out of the Appropriations 
Committee with bipartisan support. The Members who are coming down here 
are extremists. They are the extreme neoconservatives who have 
implemented their policy over the last 6 years and have run this 
country domestically into the ground, have run our foreign policy into 
the ground, and now all they have is names to call us.
  Well, go out, and when these millions of kids have health care, go to 
them and say, you know what, you really shouldn't get that health care 
because it's socialism, okay? When you go to college and you have an 
extra 700 bucks in a Pell grant or over the next few years it will be 
an increase of over $1,000 by 2011, from $4,050 to over $5,000, go to 
that college family, the parents that are struggling to pay for that, 
and let our friends on the other side say we have no business helping 
you with college; that's not the role of government, Mr. Speaker, 
that's socialism. And when we cut student interest rates from 6.8 
percent to 3.4 percent, I urge all of our friends on the other side, go 
to all the millions of families across this country and say we don't 
want to do that, that's socialism; let the free market work.
  These banks have been sucking off the government for years. We didn't 
raise taxes to do this. All we did was say the banks aren't going to 
make a big profit on the student loans. We're going to give it to the 
kids and give them a nice 3.4 percent rate so they can go get an 
education and go get a job and go create wealth and go start a business 
and hire people that are going to pay taxes to keep tax rates low for 
everybody.
  They're void of ideas, and this is the best investment. I mean, this 
is great. We get to go, over the course of the next year, and campaign 
on this? This is good stuff.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. The thing about it and the thing about what we 
work on and what we meet on, and after we leave the floor I need to 
talk to you even further about this issue, because, Mr. Speaker, the 
President was on the road and saying, well, I'm going to veto the 
interest rate cut that the Democratic Congress passed because it 
doesn't help enough needy kids that are presently in college.
  Well, this is the same President who said we're going to be treated 
as liberators when we were in Iraq.
  This is the same President that has said that investing in big oil 
will be able to assist us to be energy independent when big oil made 
nothing but profits after the White House meeting.
  This is the same President that said he was going to treat anyone in 
the White House that outed an CIA agent in a way that they should be 
treated, and then later let that person off the hook through his 
executive power.
  This is the same President that has said that we need to send an 
escalation of troops to Iraq and we'll see a safer Iraq; that we've 
seen otherwise, some 500-plus men and women in uniform that have lost 
their lives since that surge.
  This is the same President that goes on and on and on talking about 
how he's going to increase Pell Grants when he hasn't done that.
  This is the same President that said that 9/11, that we are going to 
implement this Department of Homeland Security and said there was no 
need to pass all of the 9/11 recommendations. That still hasn't made it 
to his desk yet, that we want to get passed, that this Democratic 
Congress passed.
  This is the same President that told folks to go shopping after 9/11 
when he had the opportunity to move this country in a new direction, 
bring us together, help our economy, and the Americans were ready to do 
what they needed to do.
  And this is the same President saying I'm going to veto a bill that's 
going to cut student loan rates not only for students, I will go 
further as a parent to say, for parents and grandparents that are 
helping children that are now coming out of college that are more in 
debt now than ever because the Federal Government is not there for 
them. If we're not there for them, then the State government can't be 
there for them because they have to cut, and guess where the first 
place is they go. They go to students and cut back.
  So I'm about full right now of the American spirit and say that I 
hope that our leadership here in the House, with the President, you 
spoke of politics saying it's a great thing to run on.

[[Page 18640]]

I always said this whole Iraq issue, if we see more and more pictures 
like this, Republican leadership leading their caucus down to the White 
House saying we stand with the President and making sure that the 
Congress doesn't override his original thoughts or what he feels should 
be, the White House is not to be used as the Republican National 
Committee instrument or the Republican Congressional Campaign 
Committee. This is about the American people and what we do.
  So, the President, this is his last day of school. This is the last 
month of school. He's about to move on. He's about to become a private 
citizen. Those of us that are in Congress, if the American people that 
allow us to come back after 2008, will be here to govern this country, 
and guess what, this is not the last day of school for Americans.
  So, when we talk about cutting student loan rates in half and the 
President starts using all kinds of, I start to go back to the big oil 
argument. What, did the banks have a special meeting at the White 
House, saying we can't allow this to happen; you got to stand in the 
schoolhouse door; and will they be able to motivate these Members to go 
back to the White House and say we stand with the President? How many 
times?
  So, Mr. Speaker, I know that the bold leadership we have here in the 
House, if he vetoes this bill, which I don't want him to do, I hope he 
signs it, and we're able to provide the assistance to these individuals 
that are in all of our districts, Republican and Democrats. This is not 
for Democratic kids. This is for all kids, for all families, for all 
working people. If he does it, I hope that within the hour that he does 
it that we have something here on this floor, and we'll separate the 
Members from the followers here on both sides of the aisle.
  And when we passed this bill, I know you brought this issue up, but 
when we passed this bill, there was 143 Republicans that voted against 
it, just enough to withstand. One, one over to be able to hold off a 
presidential override. That's a gut check there, Mr. Speaker. I wonder 
how many of those 143 are going to be with the President in not 
allowing American families to have a cut in financial aid.
  I want their constituents to pay very close attention on whose side 
you're on. Are you on the bank's side or are you on the American people 
side?
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Can I make a point because I think this is so 
important. There's not been a tax increase here. This is not where the 
President can say, I'm going to veto this bill because the Democrats 
increased taxes on someone.
  What we did is we shifted this money that was going to the banks and 
allowed them to charge students 6.8 percent. It was basically corporate 
welfare, and we're saying that that same amount of money that went to 
them is going to go to more students for cheaper loans, less interest 
rates, 3.4 percent instead of 6.8 percent, just a shift in the money, 
shift in priorities.
  So what the President's basically saying is I would rather have the 
banks make the profit than expand student loans to more kids and more 
parents. Now, that's just reading the facts. Ignore our rhetoric.
  Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. To go deeper than that, let's explain 
exactly what the deal is. Let's delve one layer deeper into this, 
explain exactly what the deal is for banks here.
  We already guarantee all of these loans for the banks. That's a great 
deal. You tell me that I'm going to lend money to somebody and if they 
don't pay it back, somebody else is going to pay me back? Well, guess 
what, I'll probably make that loan.
  But then what we did on top of it, on top of it was we gave them a 
cut of the loan, too. You know what we figured out? They're still going 
to make the loans even if you don't give them a cut of the loan. 
They're guaranteed loans. They're essentially guaranteed loans. That's 
just commonsense.
  And so as Mr. Ryan said, this becomes sort of a socialist welfare 
program for just a different set of people, people that are doing 
pretty well already. So, to me, this is just commonsense. So to a lot 
of people it's commonsense.
  When we go back in our districts, we're hearing a lot of people 
talking about Iraq. People are behind the Democrats' plan to reorder 
our priorities there and start going after the real bad guys, but there 
are a lot of people struggling just with getting by every day and every 
week, and there are a lot of young parents who are raising young kids 
and looking at college costs, thinking to themselves how on earth am I 
going to do this.
  And to think that one of the things that stands in their way is a 
system now that subsidizes some pretty well-off banks, at the expense 
of those parents and their kids, is ludicrous. I mean, frankly, I could 
probably sit there, even coming from a pretty fiscally conservative 
State like Connecticut, I could probably sit here and justify bringing 
in new revenue somehow in order to increase money for student aid. I 
think I could sell people back in Connecticut, and say, listen, we've 
got to put a little more into the pot and we're going take care of 
students who need help, I mean truly meritorious students.
  We don't even have to do that here. We don't even have to make that 
argument. All we have to do is say listen, we've just got to shift 
moneys from the haves to the have-nots. That's the brilliance of this 
program.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. I know that we're running out of time, and I 
think Mr. Ryan is going to move us to a few more minutes here.

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