Volume 157, No. 29 covering the 1st Session of the 112th Congress (2011 - 2012) was published by the Congressional Record.
The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“TRUE COST OF H.R. 1” mentioning the Environmental Protection Agency was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E389-E390 on March 1, 2011.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
TRUE COST OF H.R. 1
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HON. STEVE COHEN
of tennessee
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Mr. COHEN. Mr. Speaker, by recklessly slashing more than $60 billion from the budget, the majority is trying to assume the mantle of fiscal responsibility. They claim that $60 billion in cuts creates $60 billion in savings and deficit reduction. But this claim is simply untrue, for many of the underfunded or eliminated programs actually save the government far more money than they cost. These cuts are penny wise but pound foolish. By eliminating funding for these cost saving programs, the majority is not reducing spending; they are increasing it.
As New York Times columnist Paul Krugman said, the majority's cuts are designed to eat the future by cutting spending in a way that undermines the nation's health and long-term prospects. Nowhere is this failure in fiscal policy more apparent than when it comes to the physical health of the American people. H.R. 1 cuts $60 billion in Fiscal Year 2011 spending, but it increases the deficit dramatically as a result of unseen healthcare costs associated with the degradation of the food we eat, water we drink, and air we breathe. Moreover, H.R. 1 slashes the National Institute of Health's funding for research to find cures for diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, diabetes, and cancer.
I believe that it is morally objectionable to leverage our physical health for perceived short-term fiscal and political health. But that is exactly what H.R. 1 does. It allows the majority to fulfill a political promise made during the last campaign. But in doing so, the majority is undermining the long-term health of our citizens and our country by:
Cutting funds for the Food and Drug Administration by $241 million below 2010 and $400 million below the Administration's 2011 budget request.
Cutting funds for the Food Safety and Inspection Service by $88 million below 2010 funding levels and $107 million below the Administration's 2011 budget request.
Cutting appropriations for the National Institutes of Health by $1.6 billion below FY 2010 and $2.5 billion below the President's budget.
Cutting funds for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Fund by 56 percent.
Cutting funds for the Environmental Protection Agency by $3 billion, a nearly 30 percent cut from spending in 2010 and the largest percentage cut in EPA's overall budget in 30 years.
Cutting appropriations for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services by $458 million below FY 2010 and $634 million below the President's budget request.
These fiscal cuts have severe physical impacts on the American people and jeopardize the health and well-being of our children. H.R. 1 cuts funding for the Food and Drug Administration's ability to test and regulate medical drugs. It is counterintuitive to think that drugs that people take to cure illnesses may actually create more health problems than they solve. But that is an unfortunate experience that many Americans know all too well. For instance, thousands of Americans took the weight loss drug Fen-phen only to find out years later that it caused severe heart problems and had killed people who had taken the drug for only a short period. The sad truth is that Fen-phen is only one example of a drug that did not undergo the necessary FDA testing and scrutiny, and H.R. 1 will ensure that many more medical drugs receive similar inadequate levels of review. Cutting spending for testing and regulating drugs does not seem like smart fiscal or physical policy to me. It is eating our future.
I believe it is important for parents to be confident that the food they feed their children is making them healthier and not killing them. Unfortunately that is not the case. In the last year alone, we have had food recalls for spinach, peanuts, chicken, eggs, and dozens of other foods. It was not long ago that millions of Americans were combing through their pantries throwing away anything containing peanut butter. This feverish action was a result of a salmonella contamination that claimed the lives of 8 individuals and poisoned more than 500 Americans in 43 states, half of which were children. And it was only a few years ago that E. coli in spinach was responsible for 5 deaths and more than 200 hospitalizations.
The American people deserve better. They deserve the peace of mind of knowing the food they eat and feed their children is safe. But by slashing millions of dollars for the Food Safety and Inspection Service, H.R. 1 denies the American people that peace of mind. In 2010 alone, an estimated 76 million people got sick with foodborne illness and 5,000 individuals died because of the food they ate, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Cutting spending that would prevent many of these deaths and illnesses is not fiscally or physically responsible. It is eating our future.
The irony of H.R. 1 is that not only does it make the American people sicker, but it dramatically cuts funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to develop cures for diseases, instances of which will increase as a result of H.R. 1's attack on safe food, water, and air. The NIH conducts cutting edge research to cure the diseases that plague millions of Americans, from infants to seniors. Nearly every American has watched a friend or loved one fight Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, or cancer or has fought one of these life-threatening battles first-hand. For years, Congress has provided NIH the necessary tools to help people win these battles. But H.R. 1 stops NIH in its tracks by cutting funding for research that would save American lives. That does not seem like smart fiscal or physical policy to me. It is eating our future.
Although more than 70 percent of the earth is covered in water, only about 1 percent of all the water on the planet is safe to drink. H.R. 1 would reduce that 1 percent by allowing major corporations and developers to pump toxins into our water and by failing to invest in the necessary infrastructure to maintain, treat, and deliver safe drinking water. H.R. 1 reduces the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund by 56 percent, a program that provides low and no-interest loans to states to fund drinking water infrastructure improvement projects. Already too many Americans are suffering from lead poisoning and chronic diarrhea as a result of antiquated infrastructure. We cannot afford to exacerbate the rate of these serious health threats by cutting funding to maintain and repair our water infrastructure. Doing so, does not seem like smart fiscal or physical policy to me. It is eating our future.
H.R. 1 eliminates several million dollars of funding for EPA to implement revised standards for the amount of mercury, lead, and other toxic air pollutants that cement plants across the country can emit into the air we breathe. These revised standards will safeguard the American people from breathing air that will harm their brains, hearts, lungs, and livers. But H.R. 1 strips EPA of any funding to implement this life-saving standard.
Mercury and lead target the developing brains of children and can cause devastating brain damage and death. Millions of American children already suffer from debilitating asthma and brain damage as a result of the dirty air they breathe. H.R. 1 does not try to clean the air; it makes the air even dirtier and exposes more children to air that will impact their health for the rest of their life or in some cases kill them.
According to EPA, these standards will save more than 2,500 lives a year and prevent 50,000 new cases of asthma and respiratory symptoms. But H.R. 1 cuts these funds. That does not seem like smart fiscal or physical policy to me. It is eating our future.
H.R. 1 will also increase the number of individuals in hospitals and doctors' offices as a result of illnesses related to polluted air, dirty water, and bacteria-filled food. And the kicker is that H.R. 1 will make these medical trips more expensive for these individuals and for the government. By eliminating funding for critical components of the Affordable Care Act, millions of Americans will not have access to affordable insurance to cover their respiratory medications to remedy the polluted air they breathe. Parents will have to pay out of pocket--
if they can pay at all--for the treatment their children receive thanks to the E. coli in the hamburger they had for dinner. And seniors will no longer have access to free preventative care visits, which are imperative to detect possible ailments caused by inhaling harmful toxins with every breath.
Worse than any of these medical costs is the heartache associated with the tens of thousands of deaths that will occur as a result of the dirtier air, water, and food every American will be consuming thanks to H.R. 1. It is clear that the American people will not be able to afford these costs, so this financial burden will continue to increase our deficit. That does not seem like smart fiscal or physical policy. It is eating our future.
The Republican majority is touting H.R. 1 as a fiscally responsible budget. Sure it looks nice on paper when you take the $60 billion dollars in cuts as $60 billions in savings. But by looking a bit deeper into the programs being cut, one can recognize that many of these cuts will end up costing the federal government billions of dollars. Not to mention that H.R. 1 will reduce the physical health and wellness of millions of Americans.
I urge the majority to go back to the drawing board and create a truly cost-saving budget that looks at cost holistically. I encourage them to create a budget that not only restores the fiscal health of this nation but the physical health as well. And I strongly recommend that we develop a budget that wins the future rather than eats it.
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