H5980 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — HOUSE September 13, 2012 

friend so eloquently said, the economic 

strength of the United States that is 

exemplified in every American who is 

working in whatever capacity at all to 

see our economy grow. Because we’re 

the only complete superpower left in 

the world today, the only complete superpower. By virtue of that, I mean 

militarily, economically, and geopolitically. And we have to step up to the 

plate and continue to exercise that 

strong leadership role; and passage of 

permanent normal trade relations, taking this step will go a long way towards doing just that. 

Mr. Speaker, I thank all of my 

friends who participated. And I know, 

as I’ve asked for general leave, others 

who wanted to be here who were unable 

to are going to be joining in submitting 

statements for the RECORD. 

With that, I yield back the balance of 

my time. 

Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to 

underscore the importance of immediate approval legislation to repeal Jackson-Vanik establish U.S. permanent normal trade relations 

with Russia. 

There is demonstrated and widespread bipartisan support for Russian PNTR among our 

colleagues in the House, as well as in the 

Senate. And we cannot and should not wait to 

pass this legislation which will greatly benefit 

American business and their employees as 

they seek entre ́ into the expanding Russian 

market. 

We all share serious concerns with the ongoing human and political rights situation in 

the Russian Federation, but the maintenance 

Jackson-Vanik does nothing to address those 

concerns. 

What it does do is deny the United States 

and our business the ability to fully take advantage of the benefits of Russian accession 

to the WTO both in terms of market access 

and trade enforcement. 

PNTR will provide the United States with important benefits at no cost to us. 

With PNTR, American companies will be 

able to take full advantage of lower Russian 

tariffs, stronger IP protections, and other market-opening concessions that the Russians 

agreed to as part of joining the World Trade 

Organization. 

Last month’s WTO accession promises to 

open that country large and growing consumer 

market to exporters around the world. 

Unfortunately, because we have yet to establish PNTR with Russia, all the members of 

the WTO except the United States are now 

fully benefiting from increased access to the 

growing Russian market, which is the world’s 

9th largest economy. 

Unlike the United States, other countries 

also have the ability to use the WTO’s dispute 

settlement process to help ensure Russia honors its new WTO commitments. This is particularly important in a market such as Russia’s which is relatively new to market capitalism and continues to present serious problems for foreign businesses. 

Anders Aslund and Gary Hufbauer from the 

Peterson Institute for International Economics 

predict that U.S. exports to Russia should 

double within 5 years after accession to the 

WTO. Evidence from countries that joined the 

WTO between 2000 and 2010 suggest this 

statistic to be true, and maybe even a conservative estimation. If Exports to Russia grow 

at the same rate as they did for exports to 

Ukraine and the Baltics, exports could triple, 

approaching $30 billion. This would place Russia among America’s large second tier-markets, such as Australia, India and France. 

Every day we have not passed PNTR is a 

day where we put this opportunity in jeopardy 

by according a competitive advantage to nonAmerican companies doing business in Russia. 

We have the opportunity now to pass bipartisan legislation that advances American economic interests, which should not dither and 

continue to allow the partisan politics of election season to prevent us from grasping that 

opportunity. 

f 

PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS 

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under 

the Speaker’s announced policy of January 5, 2011, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. ELLISON) is recognized for 

60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader. 

Mr. ELLISON. Mr. Speaker, my name 

is KEITH ELLISON. I’m the cochair of 

the Progressive Caucus. Tonight, I 

come before the people on the floor of 

the House of Representatives to discuss 

important issues facing our economy 

and the huge challenges that our Nation is facing, particularly with regard 

to the events that are going to take 

shape right after the election. 

The Progressive Caucus has come together, Mr. Speaker, and thought very 

carefully about what a deal would look 

like and should look like. I want to 

talk about that tonight. I want to go 

into what we call the Deal for All and 

to elaborate on some of the complexities that are facing our country and 

how this is a time where we really need 

to focus on the real core of what is important to make sure that as all these 

fiscal matters come together, the 

United States and the people of America, particularly the working people, 

come out on top and in the right space. 

Before I dive into that, Mr. Speaker, 

I do want to yield just for a moment to 

talk about the great service of Ambassador Chris Stevens. Ambassador Stevens was a dedicated public servant, 

and he and the individuals who lost 

their lives in Benghazi recently have to 

be remembered for the dedicated service that they lent to our country. It’s 

important to note that Chris Stevens 

loved Libya, loved Libyans; and it’s not 

any accident that Libyans took to the 

streets not to attack America, but 

really Libyans came to the street holding up placards apologizing for the act 

of these terrorists who killed Americans and Libyans when they assaulted 

the consulate in Benghazi, and many of 

them held up placards extolling the 

great virtues of Chris Stevens. And it’s 

important to point out that as Americans are watching these things unfold 

across the Middle East, that the last 

thing Chris Stevens would want would 

be for us to withdraw or pull out of 

Libya. 

This horrible incident that occurred 

in Benghazi was not done by the Libyan people. It was done by terrorists 

who have nothing but contempt for the 

democracy in Libya, which is unfolding; and that is why they would take 

their action against the consulate as 

they did do. But it’s important to note 

that there were about seven Libyans 

who died. The numbers are yet coming 

in. Of course, they’re subject to being 

revised. But there were a number of 

Libyans who lost their lives trying to 

defend that consulate. And I think 

Americans should keep that in mind. 

They also should keep in mind that as 

the outbreak of these protests across 

the Middle East—you have one in 

Yemen, you have them in Libya, you 

have them in Egypt—it is important to 

point out that leaders of these countries have apologized for these things, 

particularly Yemen and Libya. And 

Egypt eventually got there. 

And it’s important to point out that 

Americans should know that this is not 

representative of certainly the will of 

the Libyan people. And there are a lot 

of people across the region who support 

the United States and support a good 

relationship with the United States. 

We should not allow ourselves to be 

confused by these events. I could easily 

see how people could be; but when you 

see dedicated public servants risking 

their lives to build bridges, the last 

thing we want to do is withdraw and 

abandon these relationships that have 

been fought hard for and now have been 

paid for in the blood of our heroes, Ambassador Chris Stevens being one of 

them. 

So I do want to just wrap up this section of my discussion tonight and just 

point out Chris Stevens, a dedicated 

servant of the United States, a dedicated and committed man who has 

gone and offered the ultimate sacrifice 

on behalf of his country to build 

bridges between people and particularly to help build democracy in the 

weak state of Libya, a state that threw 

off a dictator. 

Chris Stevens went there to help the 

people and to help them build a democracy, and he must be remembered for 

his great sacrifice and also that of the 

individuals who lost their lives with 

him, four Americans and several Libyans. And as the names come forward 

and as their names are released, we’ll 

come back to this microphone and 

share the information with the people. 

b 1940 

So now let’s talk about the business 

we’re here to talk about, Madam 

Speaker. Tonight, we’re talking about 

the Progressive Caucus message. The 

Congressional Progressive Caucus is 

the organization in Congress dedicated 

to talking about what’s good for the 

average working American, making 

sure that the average American’s interests are looked out and regarded highly 

as we move forward. 

I want to talk a little bit about the 

Budget For All, and not only the Budget For All, but also the Deal For All. 

I want to get right to the point. Everybody is talking about the fiscal 


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cliff. The sequestration cuts are going 

to come into effect. These are significant cuts both in military and nonmilitary domestic discretionary spending, which will be devastating to important programs like transportation, 

like health care, like research, like 

education. They’ll put significant cuts 

in these important programs, lay off a 

lot of people, perhaps even exacerbating our already too-high unemployment rate. 

But not only that, we see that the 

Bush tax cuts will expire, the payroll 

tax will expire, the so-called doc fix 

will expire, the AMT will expire. 

There’s a number of things coming together, and many people who watch the 

news know that after this election, 

we’re going to see a significant amount 

of activity around how we Members of 

Congress will be able to pull our fiscal 

situation back together in a way that 

hopefully avoids big cuts to important 

programs, hopefully avoids great pain 

that working class people might suffer 

if we don’t come together and come up 

with some deal. 

You’ve heard a lot of discussion 

about a grand bargain. But if we do any 

deal, the core values of the deal, we 

need to say first and upfront what this 

deal must include. 

The first thing this deal must include, and I’ll start with this poster 

here, Madam Speaker, is protection for 

America’s social safety net. Let me 

start with a quote from President Roosevelt where he says: ‘‘Every man, 

woman, and child is a partner.’’ In 2012, 

these words come to life when we see 

that more than 58 million people rely 

on Medicaid. That’s a lot of people, 

Madam Speaker; 48 million rely on 

Medicare; more than 61 million rely on 

Social Security. 

So with the idea in mind that everybody is included, everybody counts, everybody is contemplated in our American life, it’s important to point out 

that as we move forward with this Deal 

For All, or any deal that we might 

have, that it’s important to maintain 

the social safety net, particularly in 

very difficult economic times. If you 

slice Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, you are going to literally be 

harming the interests of millions and 

millions of Americans. Therefore, a 

key feature of any deal will be preservation of benefits for the people who 

need them most—Medicare, Medicaid, 

Social Security. 

Madam Speaker, the next slide, the 

next poster here is a poster that talks 

about how we need to move our Nation’s military towards the ability to 

deal with 21st-century threats. That 

will mean that we need to do some 

changes, some adjustments; and Cold 

War-era weapons systems are just not 

what this particular moment calls for. 

So the second feature of the Deal For 

All will be that the military, which has 

seen its budget literally double since 

2001, will have to share and do some 

paring down, but not just paring down, 

literally advancing. But some of these 

old Cold War-era weapons systems and 

some of these things that are fit for 

dealing with the Soviet Union just 

aren’t necessary any more. They’re expensive, cost a lot of money, and they 

don’t help us meet the threats we’re 

facing right now. 

So the second feature of the Deal For 

All would be moving our military to a 

position where it’s dealing with 21stcentury threats, not simply maintaining old expensive programs that we 

don’t really need. 

The third feature of the Deal For All 

would be that we would ask Americans 

who have been well-to-do Americans, 

people who have benefited tremendously under the Bush tax cuts, to do a 

little more. Now, I know my friends in 

the Republican caucus and some conservatives often say that taxes, why 

would you want to punish somebody 

for being successful. Well, we think 

that America has done so much for so 

many that to help pay a little bit more 

to this country that you love is not a 

punishment. In fact, it’s actually something that we would expect people to 

do. And there’s a lot of very well-to-do 

people who agree with that point of 

view. 

We actually have a piece of an idea 

called the Buffett rule because a very 

rich man says that, hey, a rich man 

like Warren Buffett should not be paying a lower tax rate than his secretary, 

which he does. 

So Americans of various economic 

classes agree taxes are not a punishment. They are the cost of funding a 

civilized society; and if we’re going to 

meet the budget challenges facing our 

Nation, we’re going to have to get 

some revenue, and it might well come 

from the people who have benefited so 

much under the Bush-era tax cuts. 

Then, finally, but perhaps most importantly, Madam Speaker, we need to 

get Americans to work. This is a key 

feature of what any Deal For All must 

include. 

So tonight, we’re talking about the 

Deal For All, and we’re talking about 

the fiscal cliff, and we’re talking about 

what any fair agreement would have to 

include. This is not bargaining chips, 

Madam Speaker. All four of these 

things are key. In order to have a safe, 

sound budget fix or grand bargain, 

we’re going to have to have something 

to get Americans back to work, and 

we’re talking about an infrastructure 

bank, a longer-term transportation 

bill, various things I’m going to talk 

about tonight. 

But putting Americans back to work, 

asking the military to share in the 

cuts, and to revamp our military for a 

21st-century world. 

Three, asking the top 2 percent to 

pay a little bit more by allowing the 

Bush-era tax cuts to expire for the top 

echelon. It would only mean that the 

top rates would go from 35 to 391⁄2 percent. 

Finally, we’re going to protect Social 

Security, Medicare, and Medicaid because these programs are essential and 

vital, particularly in times where people are truly having tough economic 

times. 

b 1950 

So that’s where we start the conversation tonight, focused on dealing 

with a proper resolution to these huge 

budget fights that we are about to have 

because so many important features of 

our fiscal reality are coming to expiration on December 31. 

So I want to say that this deal that 

I think that we should have, we should 

work on, Mr. Speaker, and this Budget 

for All, this Deal for All as well, it’s 

something that I think we can reach, 

we should reach. The American people 

need us to try to work toward a solution. This is why the Progressive Caucus has come together and said this is 

what we should do: 

We should have a deal. The deal will 

be comprehensive, a deal that could 

help us avoid the harsh realities of sequestration, that could avoid the complete expiration of all the Bush tax 

cuts or the extension of all the Bush 

tax cuts, a deal that will help us do the 

doc fix and do all the things we need to 

do. 

We do need some kind of agreement, 

but the agreement has to have some 

key benchmarks. I’ve laid them out to 

you, and I’ll just repeat: 

Ask the richest to help pay the 

freight for America; 

Ask the military to share in the cuts; 

good, safe, sound cuts that will help position us for the 21st century are available; 

We need to make sure that we protect those who benefit from Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid; 

And, most importantly, we need to 

grow the economy by investing in jobs. 

But we have had some difficulty getting together, and I’m not surprised. 

Colleagues on the other side of the 

aisle, on the Republican side of the 

aisle, have been, Mr. Speaker, slow to 

try to come together and work out the 

deals that we need, but we do extend 

our hand. Hopefully, we will be able to 

come together and work out these 

problems because the American people 

depend upon us to do that. 

But I do want to say that we have 

seen some real challenges over the 

course of the year just in terms of getting things done. So I think this is the 

time when we really need to come together and focus on what’s needed. But 

in order to be fair, Mr. Speaker, I think 

the people should know what some of 

the real serious challenges that we’ve 

been facing are. 

I just want to make note right now 

that we have had a Congress where obstruction has been the norm. It doesn’t 

have to stay that way—and I urge colleagues on all sides of the aisle to work 

together. But I’ll never forget being in 

this Chamber just about a year ago, a 

little more than a year ago, when, because of obstructionism, we could not 

come together. The Republican caucus 

refused to vote to raise the debt ceiling, something that had been done literally dozens of times both under 


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Democrats and Republicans. But they 

refused to do it, and this political rancor resulted in the downgrade of America’s bond rating. 

This was a tragic moment that happened a year ago, but it marks the obstruction that we’ve seen. Hopefully, 

this kind of obstruction will not be 

what we see going forward. 

But I think it’s important that much 

of the obstruction that we began to see 

had to do with the budgetary position 

that we saw starting with the Congress 

from the very beginning. The bottom 

line is that it started with the idea 

that we could only have massive cuts 

and no revenue. Our colleagues even 

continue to this day to talk about how 

terrible the economy continues to be, 

but their only prescription for fixing it 

is to take, as President Obama said, 

two tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and call us in the morning. That’s 

funny, but it’s, sadly, true as well. Tax 

cuts seems to be their only prescription for all problems facing the American economy. 

We started out this Congress with a 

budget being laid out. It was talked 

about as the Ryan budget, but really it 

was the Republican budget. He may 

have been the author of it, but they all 

voted for it, embraced it. But this 

budget, where we started out with massive cuts, didn’t balance for a long, 

long time. The budget never really 

added up, and it still doesn’t. 

So in order to get to a deal or some 

kind of grand bargain to deal with our 

fiscal challenges that are coming right 

up soon, we need a new spirit of cooperation, and it cannot be based on 

the budget that was offered by PAUL

RYAN and backed by the Republican 

Congress. Like I said, it didn’t add up. 

The fact is that my Republican 

friends think that businesses always 

want a tax cut. I owned a small business myself. I was a lawyer. I had a law 

firm. I had staff that I had to pay. I had 

machines I had to purchase. I had rent 

that I had to pay. I had a payroll that 

I had to make. What I needed was clients coming through the door so that 

would justify me adding and hiring 

more people. But just tax cuts alone is 

not what small business people need. 

What they really need is greater demand, which is what we’re not addressing if we don’t deal with the key feature in the Deal for All, which is to invest in jobs. 

If people can’t buy, Mr. Speaker, 

then stores can’t sell; if stores can’t 

sell, they can’t hire; and if they can’t 

hire, people can’t buy. This is the heart 

of the problem: slack demand, high unemployment, people who do have jobs 

nervous about making purchases. This 

is the heart of the problem and what 

we’ve got to address. Misunderstanding 

these simple ideas about the importance of the American consumer having enough wherewithal to buy things 

that they need is really part of the 

heart of this problem that we’re in 

right now. 

This idea of thinking that, oh, yeah, 

just a tax cut will solve the problem, 

or, oh, yeah, and get rid of all the 

health and safety regulations, too, 

these two things could never bring 

America prosperity. But making sure 

that Americans are working and optimistic about their economic future will 

absolutely help this economy, and it’s 

what we’ve got to do. I think through 

the Deal for All, any bargain we come 

to will put us on the right footing as 

long as we keep those key features in 

place. 

So here’s the thing: We’ve got to get 

to the point where we’re working together. The key to that is to scrap this 

budget, this Ryan budget the Republicans have adopted. We’ve got to scrap 

that idea that we can’t raise any taxes, 

that raising taxes is bad, that taxes are 

wrong, and that taxes are always a 

problem and that they’re a punishment. We’ve got to scrap that idea. We 

know better than that. 

So many of our colleagues even 

signed pledges that they wouldn’t raise 

taxes, and this, of course, has been a 

problem. The only pledge I say around 

here is the Pledge of Allegiance. 

But the fact is that we’ve got to 

scrap this idea so that when we face 

this real serious fiscal cliff, some people are calling, that we are able to negotiate. This means letting go of some 

of our long-held attachments, starting 

with the so-called Ryan Republican 

budget and these no-tax pledges. If we 

were able to do that, we could solve our 

problems. 

Again, it’s not all tax raising. It’s 

going to be cuts, too. We have some 

ideas about where we can cut in a way 

that makes our country stronger, but 

there will have to be a mixture of both 

of these things. 

I just want to talk a little bit about 

the Ryan Republican budget and just 

to help dramatize what some of the key 

problems are with it and why it’s not 

workable and why we need to reject it 

as we move into this fiscal time. We’re 

going to have to deal with this fiscal 

cliff, as has been named. 

One of the key features of why it’s 

not going to work and why it’s wrong 

is that it ends the Medicare guarantee. 

It replaces it with vouchers. Some people around here like to talk about 

ObamaCare. Well, I far prefer 

ObamaCare to voucher care. And it 

makes it dangerously more expensive 

for seniors and the disabled. We don’t 

want to put seniors in a more precarious financial situation, which is what 

the Ryan voucher care idea would do. 

The Ryan budget, adopted by the Republicans, would also cut Medicaid 

funding by 34 percent. It cuts away 

tens of millions of needy people and 

turns the program into an underfunded 

block grant program. This is a sad way 

to treat some of our most vulnerable 

citizens. And you should know, Mr. 

Speaker, that Medicaid actually impacts seniors, too, because so much of 

the money that funds nursing home 

care is from Medicaid. So it’s not just 

Medicare. Medicaid cuts, 34 percent, 

would be very harmful. 

The Ryan budget also cuts transportation by 25 percent. Now, transportation is a job creator. Transportation 

puts Americans to work—building 

roads, bridges, transit, helping people 

get from here to there. I can imagine 

high-speed railcars. 

I’m from Minnesota. I’d love to see us 

have a high-speed train from Duluth to 

Minneapolis to Chicago. It would be a 

great thing. It would put lots of people 

back to work, and it would improve 

productivity. It would allow people, 

after it’s built, to get from here to 

there faster so they can get to meetings, so they can do what they need to 

do, and stop the bottleneck, cut down 

on carbon emissions and move people 

around, not just cars. 

b 2000 

Transportation, a huge job creator, 

cut 25 percent in the Ryan budget. 

Cuts education by 40 percent, 45 percent. Now, if there’s one engine of economic development, having smarter, 

better-trained people has got to be the 

core of that, and yet education is cut 

by 45 percent in the Ryan budget. 

So the bottom line is, these are some 

of the key things that are wrong with 

this budget. There are many more. I 

plan on talking about them. 

But I want to just return to my 

theme a little bit, Madam Speaker, to 

say that we are facing a fiscal cliff. 

Americans do need to focus on it and 

do need to call their Members of Congress and say focus on the job at hand. 

We need you to focus your attention. 

We do know all these things are expiring. What are you people in Congress 

going to do about it? 

What we’re saying we’ve got to do 

about it in the Progressive Caucus is 

that we do need to come together and 

have a deal, but the deal has to have 

four pieces. And I’ll repeat, Madam 

Speaker. 

We need to make sure the military 

shares in the cuts by being more efficient. We need to make sure that we 

protect Social Security, Medicare, and 

Medicaid. And we need to make sure 

that we are putting jobs up front and 

investing in American jobs to a very 

large degree. And we need to ask the 

wealthiest among us to contribute a 

little bit more so we can meet our 

budgetary challenges. That’s what the 

Progressive Caucus says we need to do. 

We’ve had difficulty coming together 

because, well, quite frankly, obstruction, Republican obstruction has made 

it difficult to move forward and do anything. 

Why did we have the obstruction? 

Because we started out with signing 

pledges that we won’t raise taxes, and 

we had a Ryan budget that imposed 

significant and deep cuts that have already resulted in a number of public 

sector workers being laid off and Federal employees having a reduction in 

their health care. And so these things, 

this sort of obstructive nature and insisting on cuts only, has been the 

source of the problem. 


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In order to get to a solution, we need 

people to come off these rigid positions 

so that we can do the people’s business. 

I mean, just to sort of like think 

about the level of obstruction, I already mentioned, Madam Speaker, last 

August, how dramatic it was when the 

Republican majority refused to raise 

the debt ceiling and caused us to have 

a downgrade in our bond rating. That 

was a sad moment. 

But we’ve also wasted a lot of time. 

For example, we voted 32 times to repeal ObamaCare. And I do call it 

ObamaCare because Obama does care, 

which is more than I can say for some. 

But in this time, we had time for cutting or voting to repeal ObamaCare 32 

times, but we didn’t have any time to 

offer serious fixes to the economy. 

And I just want to mention that 

President Obama, to his credit, has 

done, I think, great and excellent work 

in offering solutions. They just simply, 

Madam Speaker, have been ignored. I 

mean, it’s really kind of sad when you 

think about the fact that the President 

has offered real serious and important 

solutions to the problems of the Nation 

and yet, they really, really have not 

been seriously addressed. 

For example, the President called us 

all here and talked about the American 

Jobs Act. This is a great piece of legislation. But, do you know, Madam 

Speaker, we’ve never even had a vote 

on it. We never even had an opportunity to say who wants the American 

Jobs Act. It was simply something that 

the Republican majority in the House 

wouldn’t even address. 

The fact is that there were great 

ideas in this bill, and I just want to 

talk a little bit about those ideas because I think that they would really do 

a lot of good. 

It includes a national infrastructure 

bank bill, a proposal that we would be 

able to fund by the Federal Government putting some seed money and 

then leveraging that money, that public money, with some private sector 

bonds. We would then have a fund of 

money that we could then use to make 

investment in important infrastructure 

that would be a key and important element of the program. 

We would be able to make investments in the transmission lines that 

would help take wind energy from the 

western part of my State in Minnesota 

and bring it to where the population 

centers are. 

We would be able to improve our grid 

and have a smart grid that would make 

energy use much more efficient and 

much more effective. And we would be 

able to use this infrastructure bank 

bill to be able to fund programs all 

over the United States where we 

wouldn’t only build things that we 

need, we would improve them. 

The American Society of Civil Engineers has addressed this issue, Madam 

Speaker, and what they said is about 

$2.3 trillion of infrastructure maintenance needs to be done. You know, I 

come from the city of Minneapolis and 

in my city, about 5 years ago we had a 

bridge fall into the Mississippi River. 

Maintenance in this country is critical. We have bridges that are old and 

deteriorating all over this country. We 

have bridges that are in need of repair, 

roads as well. 

And we also have other projects that 

need to be taken care of in terms of our 

grid, in terms of wastewater treatment, in terms of all types of important infrastructure tools, but we are 

not investing in them. In fact, we’re relying on the things that our grandparents gave us. We’re relying on Eisenhower-era infrastructure because we 

haven’t, in our age, focused on the 

needs of the American people to have 

an infrastructure bill. 

You know, just to talk a little bit 

more about the American Jobs Act, it 

would also extend cutting payroll taxes 

in half for 98 percent of businesses. It 

would also offer a complete payroll tax 

holiday for added workers or increased 

wages. It would extend 100 percent expensing throughout this year, and if we 

were to pass it, maybe even longer. 

And this continues to be an effective 

way to incentivize new investment. 

And also, it would address and reform 

regulatory reductions to help entrepreneurs and small businesses access 

capital. We do need to help small business people be able to get the money 

they need to do investment in their 

company, and that means access to 

capital. 

The American Jobs Act would also 

have a returning heroes hiring tax 

credit for veterans. This is something 

we addressed already, which is a great 

thing, but it would move on from 

there, and it would prevent up to 

280,000 teacher layoffs. 

Madam Speaker, you should know, 

we have had, now, about 30 months of 

private sector growth. But we have had 

also significant number of months of 

public sector layoffs, mostly teachers. 

This is because of these draconian cuts 

that the Federal Government has 

made, and State governments have 

been affected by and, therefore, city 

and local governments. But we would 

be able to address these massive public 

sector worker layoffs, which are really 

hurting our economy. And of course, 

teachers have been some of the most 

negatively impacted of all. 

We also would move from that idea 

to another great one: modernizing at 

least 35,000 public schools across the 

country. You know, our public schools 

across this Nation, our kids go there, 

they spend hours and hours a day trying to learn there. But many of them 

are in very bad repair. Some 35,000 public schools need help. We can support 

new science labs, Internet-ready classrooms, and renovations to schools 

across the country in rural and urban 

America. 

The American Jobs Act, with all 

these great ideas, never got a shot in 

this Congress. It would, as I said, call 

for infrastructure investment with a 

national infrastructure bank, which 

I’ve talked about already. 

I didn’t mention airport improvements. I did mention waterways. But it 

would put literally thousands of workers back on the job. 

And also, we need to wire up this 

country. We would expand access to 

high speed wireless, as part of a plan 

for freeing up the Nation’s spectrum. 

b 2010 

Now, I want to just remind you, 

Madam Speaker, that our Nation at 

one time didn’t have the entire country 

on the electrical grid. There was a program called Rural Electrification, 

which was a program under the Roosevelt administration by which our Nation just decided that you would not 

have to leave the countryside, the 

rural areas, to take advantage of electric lights, but we would wire the 

whole country—and we did. 

The new wiring, the new Rural Electrification program, is connecting all 

of America with high-speed wireless. 

This is a project we should embark on. 

It’s worthy, and it would help improve 

economic activity. It would help revitalize rural communities, and people 

wouldn’t have to move to the urban 

centers for work. It would be a great 

thing. 

The American Jobs Act also included 

pathways back to work for Americans 

looking for work. Of course, we have a 

serious unemployment problem, and we 

see some of our friends on the Republican side of the aisle shaking their fingers, criticizing. Well, where are the 

jobs? I remember Speaker BOEHNER

asking, Where are the jobs? Often, 

when I hear that from my colleagues, I 

think to myself, well, the jobs are in 

the American Jobs Act. Can we take it 

up? Can we have a vote on it? 

There is something we can do for 

Americans who are looking for work. 

One of the most innovative reforms to 

the unemployment insurance program 

in 40 years is a program which is part 

of an extension of the unemployment 

insurance to prevent 5 million Americans who are looking for work from 

losing their benefits. 

The President’s plan would include 

innovative work-based reforms to prevent layoffs and give States greater 

flexibility to use unemployment insurance benefits to fund and support job 

seekers, including things like, one, 

work sharing, unemployment insurance for workers whose employers 

choose work sharing over layoffs; two, 

a new bridge-to-work program, a plan 

that builds on and improves innovative 

State programs and where those displaced workers take temporary voluntary work and pursue on-the-job 

training; three, innovative entrepreneurship and wage insurance programs. 

States could also be empowered to implement wage insurance to help reemploy older workers in programs that 

make it easier for the unemployed 

workers to start their own businesses. 

So these are a number of things contained in the American Jobs Act which 

we have never had a shot at, and it’s a 


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H5984 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — HOUSE September 13, 2012 

key feature of what we propose in the 

Deal For All: get to work. We’ve got a 

country to rebuild. This is absolutely 

the case, but if the Republican majority would allow us to take up the 

American Jobs Act, I am confident 

there is something in there that my 

colleagues would like. 

Maybe they’d like the $4,000 tax credit to employers for hiring long-term 

unemployed workers. That would be a 

great benefit to workers and employers. 

They might like another feature of 

the American Jobs Act, that of prohibiting employers from discriminating 

against unemployed workers when hiring. We know now that many workers 

who have been out of work and out of 

the market for a while are asked, Do 

you have a job? No. Have you been unemployed? If the answer is—yes, for a 

certain amount of time—well, we’re 

not going to hire you, which simply 

prolongs the problem. These are valuable workers with good skills, and they 

should have a shot in getting back into 

the workforce. 

We might also find support for expanding job opportunities for low-income youth and adults through a fund 

for successful approaches for subsidized 

employment, innovative training programs and summer and year-round jobs 

for youth. One of the groups of people 

that has been really hard hit during 

this recession is young people. The 

American Jobs Act proposed by President Obama addresses youth employment; yet we haven’t had a chance to 

deal with it because of Republican obstructionism. 

I want to encourage all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to let 

go of their attachments. Let go of the 

pledges. Let go of the Ryan budget. 

Let’s come together to solve our problems. Many of them can be found in the 

American Jobs Act. 

For example, there is a whole section 

in there on tax relief for every American worker and family. Now, I don’t 

think we need to extend tax cuts for 

the richest folks, because they don’t 

need them; but when people do need 

them, Democrats are happy to cut 

taxes, and we have. We cut payroll 

taxes for about 160 million workers. We 

could extend that if the President’s 

plan will expand the payroll tax cut 

passed last year. Another thing is allowing more Americans to refinance 

their mortgages at today’s near 4 percent interest rates. It would put nearly 

$2,000 a year in a family’s pocket. 

But the American Jobs Act—an excellent vehicle for putting Americans 

back to work—never really had a shot 

because, as the minority leader in the 

Senate said, the number one priority 

for the Republican caucus was to make 

President Obama a one-term President. 

Is it right to make getting rid of 

Obama your top priority when we have 

so many Americans out of work and 

when we have an economy that really 

has never come back? I think that is 

not a good thing, and I wish we could 

move away from that and start focusing on the things that people really, 

really, really need. 

In fact, I go back to the Deal For All, 

which is the Progressive Caucus’ idea 

for how we negotiate what the basic 

foundation of any deal needs to be. It’s 

simple the way things are shaping up. 

After all the dust has settled from the 

2012 election, an average middle class 

family could face tax increases of $2,000 

unless Congress acts. That’s how important it is for us to do something and 

to act. This fiscal cliff they talk about 

is an opportunity to address the budget 

in a responsible way that grows our 

economy and puts Americans back to 

work. 

We talked about the American Jobs 

Act. There are other great ideas, as 

well; but too many folks in Washington 

and too many folks here in the Capitol 

would rather cut Medicare, Medicaid 

and Social Security, which are benefits 

that millions of Americans depend on. 

As I said, this particular chart shows 

it all. When you see the huge numbers 

of people who rely on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, rather than 

getting together and working on a 

problem, they’d rather cut Medicare, 

Medicaid and Social Security benefits 

that millions of Americans depend on 

and raise taxes on middle class Americans to protect tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires. It’s as simple as 

that. 

So let’s just take a look at what’s at 

risk, Madam Speaker. One in every 

four families depends on our Social Security system—61 million folks, including 36 million retired Americans. It’s 

important for people to remember that 

Social Security also cares for people 

with disabilities and survivor benefits 

for people who have parents who pass 

on. So many children in this country 

today are surviving on those benefits 

which some of us in Congress are trying to protect and others are trying to 

cut. Nearly every American senior can 

depend on Medicare to cover health 

care costs. 

Turning Medicare into a voucher system, as the Republicans have proposed, 

would not only make seniors pay thousands more for Medicare—about $6,000 

more estimated—but it would leave as 

many 65- and 66-year-olds without any 

health care coverage at all, which 

would be a shame. It would return our 

Nation to a time when seniors were in 

desperate and bad shape. 

So that’s why the Progressive Caucus 

is proposing the Deal For All. They are 

commonsense proposals that would 

solve our deficit problems and protect 

the American middle class. 

The Deal For All says that any plan 

cannot slash benefits for millions of 

America’s seniors, children and disabled Americans who depend on Social 

Security, Medicare and Medicaid. 

The Deal For All says we must make 

and ask and expect that the wealthiest 

2 percent pay their fair share of taxes 

and close loopholes that let companies 

ship jobs overseas. 

The Deal For All makes smart cuts 

to defense spending—not just any old 

cuts, smart cuts, efficient cuts—to 

focus our Armed Forces on combating 

21st-century risks. 

The Deal For All also calls for any 

plan to invest in America’s future by 

putting Americans back to work. 

Yes, we are facing a fiscal cliff, as 

some call it, but that doesn’t mean the 

middle class should get pushed over the 

edge of that cliff. 

b 2020 

If working and middle class people 

are going to take a hit in tough times, 

it shouldn’t be to pay for tax breaks for 

rich folks and millionaires and billionaires and oil companies. It’s time for 

all Americans of every economic situation to step up and do what’s right for 

this country, and it’s time we had a 

deal in Washington that reflects our 

values. 

I just want to elaborate on this a little bit by telling you, Madam Speaker, 

about how the Progressive Caucus has 

been bringing experts together to study 

this issue. This is not just something 

we’ve thought up. We’ve brought experts from the field, economists, people 

who really focus hard and have expertise in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, jobs, how to reduce the military 

budget in a wise way. We’ve brought 

folks together to discuss this. 

In fact, yesterday was one of the 

hearings that we’ve had, and the Progressive Caucus was hard at work holding a hearing. We’re going to put some 

of it online so people can see it. We had 

these experts from across the political 

spectrum—some conservatives—to detail the best ways to avoid the fiscal 

cliff and to rejuvenate the economy 

without harming essential protections 

for the middle class. The pending fiscal 

cliff is an enormous opportunity to address our jobs crisis. I say ‘‘jobs’’ first, 

Madam Speaker, and then we need to 

put our country on the path to fiscal 

health. 

The Progressive Caucus is laying the 

groundwork to make sure that any 

agreement reflects these core values. 

Our bipartisan panel yesterday confirmed that the best way to grow our 

economy is from the middle out, not 

from the top down. No trickle down. 

We also cannot expect to put Americans back to work unless we protect 

Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, 

and ask the wealthiest to contribute 

their fair share. 

We had Larry Korb come in, and he is 

a person with an extensive background, 

a very wise gentleman, is politically on 

the conservative side, but has done a 

lot of important research on how we 

can reduce our military footprint in a 

smart way. Mr. Larry Korb was a very 

well-prepared witness and shared his 

views and was really a big help as he 

laid out his presentation. 

I just want to share with you a little 

bit about what he had to say, Madam 

Speaker, because it really was fascinating. I would urge people to check 


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September 13, 2012 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — HOUSE H5985 

out Mr. Korb’s presentation online. He 

had a number of things that would 

really provoke a lot of important 

thought, and they’re online. You can 

go to the Progressive Caucus Web site 

and see some of that. 

Let me talk a little bit about what 

he said. Mr. Larry Korb was asked how 

best to summarize his take on the current defense budget, and he pointed to 

our poster, this one right here. Mr. 

Korb made himself very clear when he 

said, Don’t pay for a 20th-century military in the 21st century, which I think 

sums it up. I’ll elaborate more on what 

he had to say, but we had another expert who I think I would like to direct 

people to listen to, Ms. Maya 

Rockeymoore. She is the chair of the 

National Committee to Preserve Social 

Security and Medicare. She said, 

‘‘Changes to programs must be based 

on what is best for the beneficiaries, 

not on what is expedient for reducing 

America’s debt.’’ She also went on to 

add that Social Security, Medicare, 

and Medicaid are vital to the economic 

and health security of millions of senior Americans. 

Chad Stone was also there, and he 

talked about the jobs picture. He actually referenced our poster right here, 

as well. Chad Stone, he is the chief 

economist for the Center on Budget 

and Policy Priorities. He said that piling tax cuts on will only lead to Draconian cuts in programs that millions of 

Americans rely on. So we can’t go with 

this cuts-only approach. We’ve got to 

have some jobs, and we’ve got to have 

some investment. 

Steve Wamhoff from the Citizens for 

Tax Justice put it best. He said: 

I think all of us here agree that the most 

important job for Congress right now is to 

help the economy to create jobs. Tax cuts 

are one of the least effective tools to accomplish this goal. 

We had a great lineup. I urge folks to 

go on our Web site and study what they 

had to say. But I do want to go back 

for a moment to just talk about the 

ideas Larry Korb had to share. He mentioned sequestration. He said that sequestration is certainly not a smart 

way to cut the defense budget because 

it’s just an across-the-board cut, but 

close analysis and careful cuts and 

strategic ones could help a lot. He 

talked about how the Pentagon actually is pretty well endowed. He talked 

about how if the automatic sequestration defense cuts were to go into effect 

the fiscal year of 2013, non-war expenditures of the 2013 base, he said the budget will be reduced by about $55 billion 

down to what is about $500 billion and 

remain at that level in real terms for 

quite a while. He said that this will result in total reduction of about $500 billion over a decade from the projected 

levels in defense spending. He also went 

on to note that it also means that the 

Pentagon will still be spending more in 

2013 after sequestration than it did in 

2006. So they’re not going to be poor by 

any means. 

At the height of the Iraq war in 2006, 

we still would have been spending more 

than that if sequestration goes into effect, but he’s not just saying do sequestration. He’s actually promoting a 

strategic and smart way to do some 

cuts. He says that the United States 

military can do well, defend our Nation, and protect our country for about 

$500 billion, and that seems to make 

sense to me. We’d still be spending so 

much more than any other country in 

the world. 

He went on to also note that in short 

the military really doesn’t have a resource problem. They have what they 

need to defend the country. He noted 

that if sequestration goes into effect, it 

would not be ideal to just do acrossthe-board cuts, but there are a number 

of weapon systems that could be retired and a number of strategies for reducing the military budget that would 

not hurt national security, but would 

really put our country in a position 

where we are dealing with our financial 

problems in a forthright way. I think 

that it makes sense to really look carefully at these ideas. 

Maya Rockeymoore went on to note, 

when she talked about Social Security, 

that it does not contribute to our Nation’s deficit. If you look at Social Security, it actually runs a surplus, and 

we don’t need to cut Social Security. 

What we need to do is to recognize that 

this important program is a program 

that has been one of the most successful in the history of the United States; 

and if we abandon our commitment to 

our seniors and the disabled, we will be 

abandoning a core principle of our 

country. 

Mr. Chad Stone was important in his 

testimony, as well. As we wrapped up, 

I was most impressed that it’s not just 

about cuts, that we also need to grow 

our way out of this recession. That 

means investing in jobs. I think the 

American Jobs Act and many other 

things would put us farther down the 

line if we were to make those proper 

investments. 

That’s what I want to say about the 

economy tonight. I’d like to urge people, Madam Speaker, to focus their attention on the so-called ‘‘fiscal cliff.’’ 

It is coming up. We will see expiration 

of the Bush tax cuts. We will see expiration of the payroll tax. We will see 

expiration of the doc fix. We will see 

expiration of the AMT. There will be a 

number of things coming together all 

at the same time. There will be budgetary negotiations. 

But no matter what they are, they’ve 

got to include protection of our social 

safety net: Social Security, Medicare, 

and Medicaid. The military must share 

in the cuts. The wealthiest Americans 

must help us get some revenue. Finally, we’ve got to put jobs up front 

and center and grow this economy. 

With that, Madam Speaker, I yield 

back the balance of my time. 

f 

b 2030 

ADMINISTRATION IN REVIEW 

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. 

NOEM). Under the Speaker’s announced 

policy of January 5, 2011, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 

GOHMERT) for 30 minutes. 

Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, in 

the summer of 1973, it was a real honor 

for me to be selected to go on an exchange program. Of course I had to borrow the money to go and had to pay 

that back by working hard to take care 

of the loan, but I went on an exchange 

program to the Soviet Union, 1973, that 

summer. It was quite an eye-opener for 

me. 

Despite how wonderful the country 

was made to sound and how great it 

was that the government, they proclaimed, was the safety net for everybody in the country, they were proclaiming because the government was 

in charge of everything and in charge 

of everybody’s business, there was 100 

percent employment. They talked 

about how wonderful their socialized 

medicine was. 

There were eight Americans on this 

program that were allowed into the Soviet Union that summer, and we all 

had very different backgrounds, had 

different political views. There were a 

lot of big hearts in the group on both 

ends of the political spectrum. 

But, for me, a kid growing up in east 

Texas, it was an extraordinary education. Because even though people 

talked about how wonderful it was to 

have socialized medicine, everybody 

had a safety net because the government was the safety net, that country’s 

economic system was rotting from 

within. 

I went to a medical school. It reminded me of pictures of American 

medical schools from 40 to 50 years before. We went to an economic exhibition, kind of like a world’s fair in 

Moscow, at one point. It reminded me 

of the pictures from a 1940 or early 

1950s world’s fair, you know, things 

like tractors sitting out there with 

people oohing and aahing over tractors. 

I’m going, good grief, because I knew 

we didn’t need a world’s fair to see 

tractors like that. You could go to any 

used tractor dealer and find tractors 

that nice in the U.S., but everybody 

was told how wonderful it was. 

During the course of the summer, 

during the course of my time down in 

the Ukraine, I got to be good friends 

with a few of the students there. They 

were very standoffish at first. I spoke 

some Russian back in those days, and 

they spoke better English than I did 

Russian. But one guy in particular, 

he’d bring his dictionary with him and 

translate, because both of us—you 

know, it’s amazing. You take a language course—I had two years of Russian at Texas A&M. You know, you’re 

taught to converse about, ‘‘I’m going 

to the library’’ and ‘‘I have a dog’’ and 

these kinds of things, but when you 

want to talk about really serious life 

issues, we weren’t prepared for those 

things. We needed a dictionary so we 

could get our ideas across. 

At one point he said, ‘‘You seem surprised that our country wouldn’t want 


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