Issues of the Day

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, well, we heard from CBO, the Congressional Budget Office, rather interesting. Got a nice quote. Director Elmendorf announced that, in part of his statement he said, the gloomy, long-term picture is not an argument for rejecting additional spending now to bolster the economic recovery. Indeed, he said, ``Enacting cuts in spending or increases in taxes now would probably slow the recovery.''

If you read the charge for CBO, it's a little bit gray. But when you have an organization that can't seem to get right what the projections are for the costs, when you can't get the costs right for what is requested, as we saw with the health care bill, as we saw with so many things they projected, they have been hundreds of millions, billions, hundreds of billions of dollars off over time, and yet the Director's going to come in and tell us that enacting spending cuts are going--well, they could jeopardize, possibly slow the recovery.

And it's been great to hear my colleagues talk about all the jobs that have been created. We know, for example, in the last month 431,000 jobs, new jobs have been created by this administration. And you really do have to give the administration credit for most of the jobs that were created last month, because when we got the numbers, of the 431,000 jobs, 411,000 of them were census workers. Great news. Unfortunately, those jobs are going to be gone just in a matter of a very few months. So there's 411,000 jobs.

And it's true, President Bush took office after the 2000 census had been completed so he didn't get to create 411,000 jobs in 1 month, as this administration has, for census workers. Unfortunately for him, the economy experienced the most incredible blow at a time coming off the dot-com bubble of the late nineties. The economy was hurting, and then 9/11 happened. And if it had not been for the tax cuts, we would have been surely in the midst of a great depression, perhaps like the 1930s. So the tax cuts helped stimulate the economy, helped get things going in a good way.

The problem is that once the Republicans not only had the House and Senate, like they did from 1995 to 2000, not only did they balance the budget--and the President doesn't do that. The Congress has to do that. But not only did they balance the budget in the Republican Congress, but they also reformed welfare, and for the first time since the beginning of welfare, after a welfare reform that the Congress did, and I think President Clinton vetoed it and then once they had the votes to override the veto the second time he didn't, he went ahead and signed it. Now he's quite proud of it because, out of that welfare reform, the fact is--and I saw this on the chart that was presented back in 2005 at Harvard, of all places.

I got the impression many of them were shocked. But when you looked at single women's income since welfare came into existence, when adjusted for inflation, their income was flatlined over that 30-year period. After welfare reform, they were pushed, basically pushed out of the rut, out of the rutted mess that the Federal Government had created for them and not allowed them out of. The welfare reform actually pushed them toward reaching their God-given potential. And so for the first time since welfare had been created in the 1960s, single women's income, when adjusted for inflation, started going up. And it continued.

But now, after Republicans got both the White House, and House, and Congress, they found out it was kind of fun to spend when you had a President that wouldn't veto anything. And then you had a President that was sending over requests for more money than conservative Republicans really were comfortable with, and they would compromise, and it would still be more money than both should have spent.

There is apparently this giddiness that occurs when one party has the White House, House, and Senate like we have seen the last year-and-a-half. And even in the House and Senate in 2007 and 2008 we saw a great giddiness and just runaway spending like the country had never faced until the last year-and-a-half. And so when I hear about all these great jobs that are being created, more jobs in the last year-and-a-half than were created in the whole 8 years, I think they forgot to say what the President and Vice President always include, created and saved. Because when you say you saved a job, that means it's impossible to ever prove that. And it's impossible to disprove that.

You know, it's like that old story about the guy who says, ``What is your job?'' He says, ``I keep elephants from running in this house.'' He says, ``Well, there aren't any elephants around here.'' ``That's right, I'm doing a great job, aren't I?''

Well, it's the same kind of deal. You know, they've saved, probably can take credit for saving every job in America if they want to, and I am sure at some point they will get to based upon the claims that are being made these days. But it's an interesting time.

And what we've also seen today was the passage of the financial deform bill. I was hoping for reform, but that's not what we got. And I know so many of my colleagues across the aisle have good hearts, good minds, and the best of intentions. But as we saw with TARP, many people on both sides of the aisle, and what we have seen since then, since this President took office, when this President says let's get this bill passed, then they can basically come up with 2,000 pages that only foolish idiots like me would try to read.

And so what they're left with, if you don't try to get through the boring reading is, you get the talking points. So well-meaning people, not believing that anybody would possibly give them talking points that weren't 100 percent accurate, come to the floor, and with the best of intentions, meaning well, read the talking points and say things like this will end the massive bailouts. Bless their hearts. They don't realize if they would read specific provisions of this bill they will find out it does just the opposite.

This financial deform bill that was passed today creates a systemic risk council. Let me tell you how systemic risk should be taken care of. Goldman Sachs gets greedy, runs their cart in a ditch, AIG gets greedy and sells insurance called credit default swaps and they get their cart in a ditch, we have something called bankruptcy. You don't have to liquidate. Gosh, don't do that, because most of the departments at AIG, it sounds

like were quite liquid. They were doing well. Just start splitting it up, selling it off. Then it will never be too big to fail again. But that's not what happened.

We've bailed out Goldman Sachs to the point that since this administration took office and cut all these contracts with Goldman Sachs, they had their highest profit year in the whole history of the country. While the country was hurting, they had record profits. And much of it has to be credited to this government. I am sure people meant well, but that's not the kind of financial reform we need when we got this financial deform bill today.

That financial deform bill today allows and creates this systemic risk council. They are going to get to pick the winners and losers. Washington, of all places, is going to get to decide you are too important to fail, you are too important to fail, you are too important to fail. We're going to pick the winners and losers. I don't like that when that's done from Washington, when Washington says, hey, down in your district, none of us live there, but here's who you need to elect. You know, why don't you let the district, why don't you let the people there in the district decide. Washington gets around to saying this is the business we think is too important to fail. You know, it's insane.

And the health care bill that was passed, the ObamaCare bill, it had all kinds of stuff in there that was going to let the government get their two cents in and take over control of so many aspects, not just the health care. I mean they ordered things for restaurants, and machines, and all kinds of stuff in it. It wasn't about health care. It was about GRE, government running everything. And so that's what this financial bill is about.

And then also we find out today in our Natural Resources hearing, Mr. Salazar, and I know this will be a shock to my former freshman classmate Member of Congress Bobby Jindal, but I am reading from Secretary Salazar's testimony today in our hearing, and I've got to get word to Mr. Jindal, Governor Jindal. He said, and I am quoting, ``Secretary Napolitano, Director Browner, and myself, frankly, we were in the gulf coast probably within--been down there 10 times there in Houston since it started. But we made a call from the command center''--I guess that's in Houston--``to Secretary Gates and to the White House that essentially gave the authorization to the States to move forward with the Coast Guard within a few days after this incident occurred. So it is for me, frankly, surprising that you do not have the governors of these States moving forward with the deployment of these National Guard troops.''

Oh, that's great. With all the failures of this Department of Interior, the Secretary has the nerve to come in and blame the governors of those States that have tried to play by the rules and say, look, we understand your law that you have from Washington, we have to get your permission, so please, how about giving us permission? And then he comes in here today and says, I'm frankly surprised they didn't move forward with their National Guard troops.

Give me a break. What kind of gall does it take to come into a committee, oh, gee, I don't know why the governors didn't do more. I've been to Houston 10 times. How about getting out there where the rubber meets the road? Or even better, when you were sending--when the Secretary, Mr. Speaker, was sending two inspectors to the offshore rigs to inspect, and we find out their only check and balance was to say we'll send them out in pairs. The last two that went out there were a father and son unionized team. And we don't know, the director couldn't tell us in committee, he said that's under investigation. You don't get to see what the investigation is here in Congress, but that's under investigation.

We'll get back to you on that after we've done what we want to do.

I tell you, it's just unbelievable what's gone on. And then we hear, gee, these things that the public is so outraged about, Washington doing, we're probably going to wait until a lame duck session when the public may vote people out that they're mad at because they're wanting to do things, and then they can just pass it because they won't care because they will have already been voted out of office.

I'm telling you, Mr. Speaker, that is the wrong thing to do. It is wrong morally, ethically. It's just wrong. If people get voted out of office because they were thinking about doing something, talking about doing something, they should not come in here and do it after they've been voted out.

And then we have all of this indignation from the northeast about some of the things going on in the gulf, and then low and behold, gosh, news here. I didn't notice it when it came through. Here's an article from February 2, 2010. Coast Guard's been busy and not just with the gulf coast. This was February 2, 2010. ``U.S. Coast Guard officials say they've developed a security plan to allow the safe passage of tankers carrying liquefied natural gas from Yemen through the Port of Boston.''

Then it goes on to quote Coast Guard Captain John Healey and to quote Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen, if that rings a bell. He's saying that it could include additional screening of the crew, extra inspections on the ship.

And then it goes on to say: ``One of the top concerns for security officials is making sure no stowaways manage to board the tankers at the port in Yemen,'' where terrorists seem to be going and coming from these days so often, or during the voyage.

``That's really the key here, to ensure that we have a security force on board ship that's checking the ship while it's loading and while it's in Yemeni waters to guarantee that no one who's not authorized gets aboard the ship.''

Because they're saying, see, the contract used to be with countries that were completely friendly who had never sent a terrorist here or a terrorist to be trained in other areas or allowed Yemen to be, or their country to be, a place of safety for terrorists that wanted to destroy our country or from which an attack on one of our U.S. ships happened. We had a contract that had liquefied natural gas from other countries. The fact is if we allowed the gas to be produced from this country, we have over 100 years' worth of natural gas if it were allowed to be produced.

But, no, we're going to risk bringing in a tanker from Yemen. Not just a tanker. This says the contract's for 20 years to bring tankers with natural gas loaded into Boston Harbor. Think about an explosion on that ship. That's what the article points out. You talk about a terrorist attack. Man, we're gonna bring in the bomb from Yemen where the terrorists have been located so often.

And then it turns out people on Capitol Hill have been getting calls that raised a question about it, is this really a good idea. They get a call, look, we're trying to build up Yemen. We're trying to help this country that's supporting our enemies so maybe they'll like us better. Let me tell you, I got a U.N. voting accountability bill. I filed it all three sessions. I'm hopeful we'll get it to the floor. We're going to file for a discharge petition to require it to be brought to the floor.

It's very simple. It says any country--every country is its own sovereign. They can do what it wants. But any country that votes against us in more than half of the contested votes in the U.N., they're just getting no financial assistance from us. As I have been quoted before saying, you don't have to pay people to hate you. They'll hate you for free. So why are we pouring billions and billions of dollars into countries hoping eventually they're going to like us. They're not. You don't buy friendliness.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. GOHMERT. You can't buy friendship. Didn't people learn that on the playground? You can give somebody your sandwich, you can give somebody your lunch money and hope that they leave you alone, but all they do is keep coming back for more sandwiches or more money. You can't buy love and affection because you are looked at as a John, not as a lover. It's tragic, but that's what we're doing: trying to buy love and affection from people that hate us. It doesn't work.

So here we've got this natural gas contract supposedly going on for the next 20 years. And we have over 100 years of natural gas that's already been found

in this country. There's no massive oil spills that come from that.

A wonderful Democrat friend across the aisle did some of his growing up over in Longview, Texas, has a bill to start getting cars, put that incentive out there, get cars on to natural gas. That will be a huge help because we have so much natural gas in this country that it will eliminate so much of our dependence on foreign oil. So Dan's got a good bill.

And yet the answer apparently from this administration is we're going to buy--not use our own natural gas--we're going to buy it from Yemen hoping they'll like us better. Maybe they won't try to blow up our ships and be a safe haven for terrorists who want to blow up our country.

But that's what we're looking at. It isn't good. It's rather tragic.

A lot more I could say about that, but I just could not get over the gall of the Secretary of the Interior to come in here and demean those Governors. But the message should go out to Governors all over the areas potentially affected by the oil spill in the gulf created by British Petroleum, who, if it were in the old days, ought to be horsewhipped, those who are responsible. We'll find out for sure exactly what happened. And when we do--it sounds like we're getting word as to what happened. There were corners being cut right and left.

The safety record of BP compared to the other oil companies was abysmal. But when we find out that they were the best friends that this administration had in the oil business and they were the best friends for our Democrat Senators down the aisle, down the Hall here, we find out that their lobbyists are mostly close friends of this administration and our Democratic friends down the Hall here, they realize heck, they should have had their back covered. They were close enough. They were supporting the climate, actually the global warming bill, now called climate change bill because turns out the planet's not warming. But that's a whole other subject. But is it so hard to understand why they thought their back was covered?

While the Deepwater Horizon rig was sinking in the gulf after the explosion, Senator Kerry was still getting hold of British Petroleum. Some of the articles we found. He was still getting hold of them hoping they'll stay on board with the climate change bill.

The administration, of course, would not want to jump on their big oil company friends. Their support in the elections, it was so helpful. Their support for, like, even the gas hike, the gas tax hike that is being proposed. Some of the things nobody else in the industry would support it would seem. BP was their buddy.

So it makes sense that the administration wouldn't immediately want to jump on BP. They're hoping that BP wasn't lying to them, that they will get this thing under control and it will be all right. Then they come through here and push through their global warming bill and get that done, the crap-and-trade bill that is going to create, as former chairman of Energy and Commerce, former Chairman DINGELL, had indicated this is not only a tax, it is a great big tax, which apparently may have had something to do with him losing his chairmanship

Anyway, let's think about what we're doing because it has dramatic effects across the country.

Of course, we know we are also telling Israel not to--or apparently this administration has been telling Israel, Just lay off. Let them build the illegal Palestinian settlements. Don't try to defend yourself. Get ready to give away more land. We are putting on all this pressure. Don't defend yourself even though Iran is developing--now we know--enough uranium for two bombs. Of course, one would be enough to wipe out much of Israel, but don't defend yourself. We're putting all that pressure on them. That doesn't make sense.

Why would we do that to our best ally in the Middle East, to one of the best friends this country could have in the whole world, to one of the few--maybe sometimes the only one--that truly stands up with us like 95 percent of the time in the U.N. more than most anybody else? Yet we're turning our backs on them, and we're telling them not to protect their own country. Don't stand for what is going to help Israel stand? Why would they do that?

Then we start seeing things that help it make sense, like with this sign. Now, down in Arizona, it turns out we've got a wilderness area down in Arizona that the park police can go in but not with any mechanized vehicles or mechanical equipment that is motorized. Also, the Border Patrol can't go there. The only people who can go there with impunity are people illegally going through, and that is why this warning sign says: Active drug and human smuggling area.

It is like the city that spends more to put up a sign that says there is a bump in the road than it would cost them just to fix the bump. Don't put up a sign. Fix the problem. This is the United States. Why are we just saying, Hey, look. Here is a sign. There is active drug and human smuggling in this area. They are coming through with mechanized vehicles and with all kinds of motorized things they may be using. They are violent. It says visitors may encounter armed criminals and smuggling vehicles traveling at high rates of speed. That is because only the illegals can come through here using vehicles, because we don't let the Border Patrol in there with vehicles, and we know law enforcement gets shot.

Then it starts to make sense. Oh, okay. We're just trying to avoid being hypocrites as a nation. We are telling Israel not to defend itself, to let people overrun them and to let those rockets fly constantly. Don't bother to check the ships that come in, the flotillas that come into the Gaza Strip. Just let the rockets keep flying. We are able to say that without being hypocrites because that's what we're doing. We're not protecting ourselves.

We say, Look, Israel. Get over it. We are letting ourselves be overrun. We're letting people come in illegally armed. We've let them take over part of the United States and we're not doing anything about it, so we're not being hypocritical when we say, Don't protect yourself, Israel. We're doing the same thing, see?

That will make Israel feel better to know that we are not protecting ourselves. We have just turned over part of the United States of America to armed criminals who are illegally in this country.

The truth is neither one of those is a good idea. The truth is Israel should defend itself. They should be able to stop the rockets that are attacking them from coming into areas. They should be able to stop illegal settlements. They should be able to do all of the things that are necessary for a nation to protect and preserve its national integrity.

We lost a Senator this week. My time is running short, so I want to get through as much of this incredible speech as I can. I want it understood this was a speech given by Senator Robert Byrd, in 1962, after the Supreme Court decision to eliminate prayer in schools. This is from the official record. As time will permit, I will read Senator Robert Byrd's speech from 1962.

You know, one of the things I love about America is, for the most part, it is a very forgiving country. A man who had been part of the Ku Klux Klan later was repentant. He was very sorry for being part of that organization, and he changed his ways and was completely embraced by his colleagues. This is Senator Byrd's speech from 1962:

``Mr. President, Thomas Jefferson expressed the will of the American majority in 1776 when he included in the Declaration of Independence the statement that `all men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'

``Little could Mr. Jefferson suspect, when penned that line, that the time would come when the Nation's highest court would rule that a nondenominational prayer to the Creator, if offered by schoolchildren in the public schools of America during class periods, is unconstitutional.

``The June 25 Supreme Court decision is sufficiently appalling to disturb the God-fearing people of America and to make us all reflect upon the extraordinary nature of the times. For what, indeed, can we expect to happen next if this is to be the way things are going? Following the French Revolution, the atheist revolutionists hired a chorus girl to enter a church as the `Goddess of Reason' and thereby defile the name of the Almighty. Following the Russian Revolution, the Bolshevik Government established a giant museum, dedicated to the promotion of atheistic beliefs.''

I've been in that museum. I was sick to the point of nauseam, but back to Robert Byrd's speech.

``The American people were shocked by both moves. So it was in those days. But what about today? Can it be that we, too, are ready now to embrace the foul conception of atheism?

``It is hard to believe, but, then, what are the facts of the matter? Are we not in consequence of the Supreme Court ruling on schoolroom prayer, actually limited in teaching our children the value of God? And is this not, in fact, a first step on the road to promoting atheistic belief?''

As I turn the page of Mr. Byrd's speech on the

Senate floor, let me parenthetically note that Robert Byrd's Christian beliefs are what caused him to disavow his membership and to ask forgiveness for his membership to the KKK. It went to the heart and soul of the man, and that is why he came to the floor in 1962 and gave this speech. Continuing on:

``In reading through the Court decision on school prayer, I am astonished by the empty arguments set forth by the majority as opposed to the lucid opinion recorded by Mr. Justice Potter Stewart, the lone dissenter. In answering the arguments of the majority, Justice Stewart did not see fit to engage in debate over matters of ancient history. As he put it:

`` `What is relevant to the issue here is not the history of an established church in 16th century England or in 18th century America but the history of the religious traditions of our people, reflected in countless practices of the institutions and officials of our government.'

``To that, I would say, `Amen.'

``So this, indeed, the crux of the issue--the religious traditions of our people.

``Wherever one may go in this great national city, he is constantly reminded of the strong spiritual awareness of our forefathers who wrote the Federal Constitution, who built the schools and churches, who hewed the forests, dredged the rivers and the harbors, fought the savages, and created a republic.

``In no other place in the United States are there so many and such varied official evidences of deep and abiding faith in God on the part of government as there are in Washington.

``Let us speak briefly on some of the reminders in Washington that reaffirm the proposition that our country is founded on religious principles. The continuance of freedom depends on our restoring the same spiritual consciousness to the mainstream of American life today that made possible these monuments and tributes of the past.

``A visitor entering Washington by train sees the words of Christ prominently inscribed above the main arch leading into Union Station. Here at the very entrance to the seat of the Government of the United States are the words: `The truth shall make you free.' John 8:32.

``Nearby is another inscription cut into enduring stone, the words from the Eighth Psalm of the Old Testament: `Thou hast put all things under his feet.'

``A third inscription reiterates the spiritual theme: `Let all the end thou aimest at be thy country's, thy God's and truth's.'

``All three inscriptions acknowledge the dependence of our Republic upon the guiding hand of Almighty God.

``On Capitol Hill.

``Throughout the majestic Capital City, similar inscriptions testify to the religious faith of our forefathers. In the capital, we find prominently displayed for all of us to see the quotation from the Book of Proverbs, 4:7:

`` `Wisdom is the principal thing: Therefore, get wisdom, and with all thy getting, get understanding.'

``The visitor to the Library of Congress may see a quotation from the Old Testament which reminds each American of his responsibility to his Maker. It reads, `What doth the Lord require of thee but to do justify and love mercy and to walk humbly with God?' Micah 6:8.

``Another scriptural quotation prominently displayed in the lawmakers' library preserves the Psalmist acknowledgment that all nature reflects the order and beauty of the Creator.

`` `The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork.' Psalms 19:1.

``Underneath the statue of history in the Library of Congress are Tennyson's prophetic lines:

`` `One God, one law, one element, and one far-off divine event to which the whole creation moves.'

``Additional proof that American national life is God-centered comes from this Library of Congress inscription: `The light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth not.' John 1:5.

``On the east hall of the second floor of the Library of Congress, an anonymous inscription assures all Americans that they do not work alone--`for a web begun, God sends thread.' ''

I realize that my time is expiring at this moment. There is much, much more in this wonderful speech by the now late Senator Robert Byrd, and I will not stop in future sessions here on the floor until I have finished this wonderful speech by Robert Byrd.

Though, for tonight, since I believe in playing by the rules, the rules require me to yield back. I do now yield back the balance of my time.

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