macleginn/stanford_congress_record_longer_speeches huggingface dataset:
Date: 2011-01-26
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. First of all. Mr. Chairman. the ranking member of our committee has been very fair in the proceedings that he had with us over the last number of years. and I appreciate that. We will continue that tradition. We were unable to have any hearings or consideration of this matter before our committee until yesterday when we finally were told by the minority party as to who they wish to have on our committee. We could not meet as a full committee until we had a complement of both Democrats and Republicans. We established our side several weeks ago. I am sorry that happened. We will have plenty of hearings in the future on this and other issues. What is the current system that we are hearing the other side defend? What has it given us? It has given us Lyndon LaRouche. but it would prevent Eugene McCarthy from being a successful Presidential candidate. Thats what we dont hear. The system works against some people like a Eugene McCarthy. who was a poor fundraiser but managed to have a number of people who supported him. who gave him large contributions. And yet he was able to change the course of history. bringing down a sitting President and allow forwell. he was called the Pied Piper of the youth vote. So lets understand the complexity of the history of this law. The fact of the matter is. Mr. Chairman. this law has failed us. It has failed the American people. The American people have rendered their judgment. Nearly 93 percent of the American people who paid taxes have voted "no" to this system. That ought to give us good guidance as to where we could find savings to bring down our national debt. As I understand it. we are going to have an amendment from the Democratic side of the aisle which causes any money saved here to go to bringing down the debt. I hope that it comes forward. and I will support it. I hope we have the support of our colleagues for this bill.
Date: 2011-01-26
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. On the most recent clarification by the gentleman from Colorado. the intent of our legislation is to stop this program. Not only would the funds be returned that are already in there. but the program would not go forward. So. therefore. the administrative costs to the IRS would be eliminated. The gentleman. by continuing the program. increases the net cost because you will continue having the administrative costs that otherwise would be no longer in effect as a result of the underlying bill. and therefore. the point of order would still be appropriate.
Date: 2011-02-09
Speaker: GARY MILLER (republican)
Chamber: H
State: California

Thank you for giving me the time. Mr. GALLEGLY. I know you are honored to represent the library and are personal friends with the family. and that speaks volumes for your character. I rise today to honor the remembrance of the most beloved figure and inspiring man I know of in politics. the late Ronald Reagan. I think many Members of Congress and politicians speak volumes for the man when they stand before a crowd and say. "Im a Reagan Republican." When you can leave a legacy like that behind. because not many people say theyre a Miller Republican or a Gallegly Republican. but a Reagan Republican. speaks volumes for who the man was. As we commemorate Ronald Reagans centennial birthday. I am honored to have the opportunity to reflect on his many accomplishments as a leader and a person. As President. Ronald Reagan believed in the American Dream. And when he talked about the American Dream. he always had this huge smile on his face because he believed in the American Dream. His wisdom and leadership in promoting freedom. prosperity. and compassionate respect for all individuals guided our great Nation during times of both tranquility and turmoil. President Reagans strong belief in a limited government and fiscal responsibility should serve as a model for us today. As President. he refused to deviate from his principles and strong belief in the power of the free market. His success in reducing taxes and government spending led to a period of unprecedented economic growth and prosperity. In the area of foreign policy. Ronald Reagans support for a strong national defense strengthened Americas standing in the world. His belief that America should serve as a beacon for democracy and freedom was unrelenting. The Reagan administrations tough stance against communist regimes and the negotiation of treaties with Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev culminated in the symbolic end of the Cold War and the liberation of millions across the globe. As we reflect on the life and legacy left by President Reagan. his resounding words of resolve bring hope to our Nation through these times of trial and tribulation. It is my hope that President Reagans vision for our Nation will long be remembered and revered. I am honored to represent this man in California and say he is a hero.
Date: 2011-02-09
Speaker: AUSTIN SCOTT (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Georgia

Ladies and gentlemen of the House. I just want to say this about President Reagan. He understood that it is the American. not the government. that will make America the greatest Nation on Earth. Its time for this body to tackle some tough issues and follow through on tough decisions. And if I can just read his words. the Gippers own words: Let us be sure that those who come after will say of us in our time that in our time we did everything that could be done. We finished the race. we kept them free. we kept the faith.
Date: 2011-02-10
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. Absolutely. I mean. the reason I came to the House of Representatives was in response to 9/11. to try to make sure we had the tools necessary to protect this country from these kinds of attacks and. at the same time. as someone who has devoted his entire life to enforcing the law but with the protection of civil liberties. to make sure that is done in this case as well. Let me just say one last thing about the roving wiretap. It is not controversial. It has been used in domestic criminal cases since at least 1980. And all it does is respond to new technology. You have a wiretap that now grants authorityonce provengrants authority to follow the person with whatever device he uses becauseguess what?-most people are not confined to a single landline today. Thats all this does. And you would think that we would have the same provisions we use against criminals. that we could use those against those who would want to destroy Americans and America. terrorists.
Date: 2011-02-10
Speaker: BONO MACK (republican)
Chamber: H

I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker. we are going to rightfully hear a lot today during this debate about how excessive government regulations are hurting our economy. but there are other forces at work as well. and they are just as damaging. even. perhaps. more insidious. Shortly after taking office. President Obama issued an executive order encouraging Federal agencies. which was really sort of a wink and a nod. to require project labor agreements on government construction projects costing more than $25 million. Mr. Speaker. with unemployment in my California district over 14 percent and unemployment in the construction industry above 20 percent. these socalled "crony contracts" are not only wrong. they are immoral. Instead of an executive order. what we really need from the White House is a cease and desist order. Simply put. project labor agreements mandating "union labor only" are anticompetitive. The infamous Big Dig in Boston is clearly the biggest boondoggle of them all. Originally projected to cost about $3 billion. this 3mile tunnel project turned out to be one of the most expensive Federal highway projects in U.S. history. At last count. the meter was still running: $15 billion in construction costs and another $7 billion in interest alone. Put another way. when its all said and done. the Big Dig is going to cost us about $1.2 million per foot. Not only do these PLAs waste taxpayer money. but they are also unAmerican. Today. less than 15 percent of construction workers in our Nation are unionized. So every time a PLA is mandated by some government bureaucrat. 85 percent of Americas construction workers. some 8 million hardworking men and women across the country. are told either tough luck. too bad. or maybe next time. Since 2007. nearly 2 million construction workers across America have lost their jobs. Enough already. Lets put an end to political favoritism. Lets demand the best deal for the taxpayers. Lets say "no" to the "wink and nod" culture in Washington.
Date: 2011-02-10
Speaker: BONO MACK (republican)
Chamber: H

As the new chairman of the House Subcommittee on Commerce. Manufacturing and Trade. I am going to do everything to make "made in America" matter again. That starts by taking a critical look at what we do here at home to foster competitiveness. Today. with the economy still struggling to recover. it is time to do what is best for all Americans. not what is best simply for a select. favored few.
Date: 2011-02-10
Speaker: HERRERA BEUTLER (republican)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. let me clear up something really quickly. The reason Im rising in support of this resolution and the reason it is so important that we debate the jobkilling costs of regulation is because we are at an alltime high in my neck of the woods for unemployment. Were at doubledigit unemployment in southwest Washington. and weve been doing it just in about every single county in my district for weeks. The other side keeps saying. oh. my goodness. this is simple. this is kids stuff. If this is kids stuff. why are we dealing with it today at the beginning of this Congress? Why wasnt it dealt with last Congress? Ill tell you why. because we need to make changes. We need to tell these agencies back off small businesses. back off families. back off our cities. Operate within the law. Dont make your own laws. Last year. the EPA promulgated 928 new rules last year alone. 928 new rules. You know. when I have my construction workers who are out of work right now come to me and say weve got these storm water regulations and theyre requiring us to go back into preLewis and Clark days. we dont even know what that looks like. Weve got these regulations handed down to us from the Feds and we cant hire new workers. We cant build new businesses. We cant even redevelop without cutting our arms off. when it comes to costs. It needs to change. Im all for commonsense solutionoriented regulation. I want to protect our environment. I want to protect our way of life. but business and our economy are not mutually exclusive with our environment. Were simply saying. and were taking the time today to say. that the EPA and other Federal agencies that have overstepped their bounds need to check themselves. or were going to have this debate. So I invite my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. We want to create jobs. We want America to be working again. I have friends and family out of work in southwest Washington and they want to work. but then their small employer says. Im sorry. Ive got to put new money into this infrastructure piece to retrofit it to bring it up to speed with this new regulation. I cant hire you or I need to minimize your hours. So there is work to be done.
Date: 2011-02-10
Speaker: GARY G. MILLER (republican)
Chamber: H
State: California

This side hasnt forgotten what went on. We havent forgotten about Madoff. But the problem is that some people have forgotten that. in 1998. a whistleblower first went to the SEC on Madoff and they did nothingnothing. Repeatedly. individuals went to the SEC on Madoff and they did nothing. Now. we can pass all the new regulations through DoddFrank we want to pass. Madoff went to jail because he was a criminal. He violated the law. And you dont need 20 laws in place to punish a person for one act. We did it. DoddFrank goes far beyond that. It is 243 new regulations in the pipeline. 243 is scary. Now. the SEC has failed in many ways. I know many of my friends on this side of the aisle heard me talk about mark to market principles for 4 years with the SEC. Now. mark to market means when the lender makes a loan. they have to mark the value on their books of what the product is worth at current market value. For example. if 5 years ago a piece of property is worth $20 million. they lent $15 million. today its worth only $12 million. well. the SEC says we should lend no more than $8 million. Now the loan comes up for renewal and the loan is performing. meaning the individual who owns the property is current on his payments. What the lender is required to do based on SEC requirements. because Federal regulators have no control over that because SEC sets the requirements. they can either set a $7 million setaside because the loan is overvalued based on the books. or they can say to the individual. You owe us $7 million to reinstate the loan. In this economy. most people dont have the $7 million. Had we modified mark to market standards and looked at loans on realistic fortune principles in the future. most of these lenders today would be in business and many people would not have lost their loans and their product that they had under that loan. We have done nothing through the SEC. In fact. the first time I asked the SEC Chairwoman in the hearing. and the question was 4 minutes long regarding mark to market principles. she looked at me and she said. Ill get back to you on that. Congressman. Nothing to date has happened. So to look at the SEC and say they are saints. they are doing their job and they are protecting the citizenry and the individuals out there. I cant say that. I would like to see these individuals held accountable for what they did not do. In 1998. had they moved with Madoff and done what they should have done. or in 2000 or 2002. a lot of investors would have more money than they have today. but they did not. Just as our Nation is trying to recover. it seems like the Obama administration is doing nothing but making it harder for American businesses.
Date: 2011-02-10
Speaker: SCOTT TIPTON (republican)
Chamber: H

SCOTT. I just want to make sure you knew. any time you want to jump in here. we could talk a little bit about this. What is your reaction here? You are a little bit newer here to D.C. But you take a look the size of this entitlement that is the same size as what we take in for a whole year. isnt that a little bit of a spooky thing to be walking down here and run into this as a problem?
Date: 2011-02-11
Speaker: AUSTIN SCOTT (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Georgia

Madam Speaker. we all know this is a challenging time for many families across America. Just like the rest of the country. folks in middle and south Georgia are struggling because of this economy. You see. the government has taxed and spent the American home into a recession. In fact. Madam Speaker. the current administration. in the last 2 years. in piling on regulation after regulation has made it more difficult for small businesses and family farms to grow and create jobs. Agencies like the EPA and laws like the recently enacted financial regulatory reform bill stand to do nothing but kill jobs. As a member of the Agriculture and Armed Services Committees. I look forward to working with my colleagues to tackle the burdensome regulations at these Federal agencies. President Eisenhower famously said. "Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil and youre 1.000 miles away from the cornfield." We need to take an eraser to a lot of these rules and regulations that the bureaucrats in Washington are placing on the American small business owner.
Date: 2011-02-14
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. I did not question the motivation of the gentleman from Michigan. nor would I. but I would question his conclusions and the impact of his decisions.
Date: 2011-02-14
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. I thank the gentleman for yielding me 2 minutes. What I would just like to say. Mr. Speaker. is that with respect to roving wiretaps. its only available after the government has been able to prove to the court that the target may engage in countersurveillance activity such as rapidly changing the cell phone number. It doesnt allow the government to make a general boilerplate application. It requires them. if they cant identify the individual. the very specific individual. to give some particularity in the request to identify that person as much as they possibly can. It is also a requirement we put in the law that once they have actually utilized this roving wiretap on different instruments of communication. they have to report to the court within 10 days as to what took place. So we have refined this as much as absolutely possible. What were trying to do is keep up with technology. We know that some of these targets will buy 100 cell phones and use them for a single conversation and throw that cell phone away. You cant just think thats going to happen. You have to prove to the satisfaction of the court that there is a reason to believe that they are going to take these kinds of efforts to try and stop surveillance in these regards. Again. this is before the FISA court. and it only deals with these kinds of cases. This is not regular criminal cases. So the gentlemans concerns have been raised before. and we met those concerns in our prior treatment of this law. So it is a careful balance that we created here. to take into consideration the new techniques utilized by those who would threaten us and at the same time try and provide for a third party. a court. a Federal court made up of Federal judges. to look at this. We have to report before. and we would have to. that is. our agency activists. would have to report afterwards. within 10 days. I believe thats about as much protection as you can give and still be effective in this environment.
Date: 2011-02-15
Speaker: SAM JOHNSON (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

You know. every Texas family must live within a budget. I dont understand why the Federal Government cant do the same. To get our fiscal house in order. we need to cut spending. balance the budget. pay down the debt. and shrink the deficit. As a fiscal hawk. I know that in November the American taxpayers voted for Congress to roll back the failed stimulus spending. stop bailing out Wall Street. end Government Motors. stop saving Fannie and Freddie. and defund and repeal ObamaCare. Plain and simple. the American people want Washington to tax less. spend less. and borrow less. The CR represents some tough choices. but I know the American public is willing to make some sacrifices now so we can make a brighter and better future for our children and grandchildren tomorrow.
Date: 2011-02-16
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker. I dont know whether were in an episode of "Alice in Wonderland" here or not. Just because you say something is true doesnt make it true. The gentlelady just spoke a moment ago and said we need to look at this. we need to scrub this. And yet she is asking her colleagues to vote against the rule to not even allow this to be brought up. Whats the conclusion of that? Whats the intimation of that? That we should allow these provisions to expire. Not that we would have time to look at it. but they would expire. one legislative day left. There are three major provisions in our effort to fight against terrorists. These are the provisions that initially were put under a sunset by the gentleman from Wisconsin when he was chairman of the committee. And then later on when we redid. reviewed. and reformed provisions of this. I authored and brought forward the extension with the sunsets on these three provisions. So I find it interesting to have my friends on the other side of the aisle tell us what we were doing and tell us now that there has been a proven unconstitutionality or unconstitutional basis for these three provisions. Interestingly enough. they refer to the lone wolf provision. That was known when it was first passed as the SchumerKyl provision. Now. some people may not be aware that those are two Senators. Members of the other body. I would say probably extending from the left to the right. Why did they put that in? Because we believe that we were actually burdening ourselves in a way that would not allow us to find out about terrorism before it was actually carried out. The lone wolf provision recognizes that the greatest threat we have today are. as was said by the two cochairs of the 9/11 Commission. less consequential attacks. meaning attacks on a smaller scale than that we saw on 9/11. still meant to do grievous harm to Americans. to cause us to see the loss of life. to do tremendous fiscal damage to this country. yet with smaller cells or even from individuals. Do we have to be reminded of what happened on that Christmas Day a couple of years ago? That was a lone wolf. even though these provisions wouldnt apply because hes an American citizen. Major Hasan was a lone wolf. Just to prove the point that we have to be concerned about lone wolves. The other two provisions. the business records and the roving wiretaps. Id like to talk about those because theres been so much misunderstanding. misstatements.
Date: 2011-02-16
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. I actually observed a Member of the other body this morning on television saying the reason that he voted against these extensions was that under the Constitution he believes that one ought to have a warrant so theres intervention of a third party that is a judicial officer. Well. these two provisions. the business records provision and the roving wiretap provisions. require the government to go to the FISA court to get permission to carry out those elements directed at any individual. And so lets just make sure we know what were talking about here. Were talking about two provisions that require the government to go before the FISA court to get permission to utilize those provisions in their investigation. And the third part deals with the lone wolf definition. and the lone wolf requirement is needed now more than it was when it first passed because of the difference in the threat to us that has been recognized by our intelligence agencies and by the 9/11 Commission and. most recently. by Secretary Napolitano.
Date: 2011-02-17
Speaker: MARIO DIAZ-BALART (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Flor

ida. Mr. Chairman. I move to strike the last word. The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman is recognized for 5 minutes.