Congressional Record—House H2885
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May 12, 2004 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — HOUSE H2885 (Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California executive suites and board rooms, but struction and helping to lend a hand to addressed the House. His remarks will the other economy has created the the people in that country. appear hereafter in the Extensions of largest income disparities in this Na- But a gruesome video, posted on a Remarks.) tion. radical fundamentalist site, shows this f David Rosenberg, chief economist at young man, Nick Berg, bound in an or- Merrill Lynch, one of the leading in- ange jumpsuit with five hooded al A TALE OF TWO ECONOMIES vestment banking firms on Wall Qaeda operatives standing behind him. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a Street, said, and I quote, ‘‘The income One of those operatives read a prepared previous order of the House, the gen- from the recovery has been locked up statement, pulled a large knife from tleman from Illinois (Mr. EMANUEL) is in the corporate sector. We have had a his pocket, proceeded to push his head recognized for 5 minutes. redistribution of income to the cor- to the ground, and then with five Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, the porate sector.’’ strokes of the knife, decapitated Nick past 3 years show a tale of two econo- This redistribution has been acceler- Berg and then held the head up to the mies and an unprecedented redistribu- ated by the President’s economic and camera. tion of wealth in this country resulting tax policies. A study cited by The New I tell you, Mr. Speaker, my thoughts in one economy for middle-class fami- York Times this week found that and my prayers go to Nick Berg’s fam- lies and one for the special interests. Americans are being taxed more than ily and friends. While there is a profits boom for cor- twice as heavily on earnings from work b 1945 porations and a compensation boom for as they are on investment income, even the CEOs, there is a growing wage and though more than half of all invest- I honestly cannot imagine what the benefits recession for the middle class. ment goes to the wealthiest 5 percent family is going through right now and To those who say redistribution of of taxpayers. how they must feel, but this act by al wealth is wrong, I agree. I say redis- While this administration has been Qaeda is a reminder of the evil we face tributing the wealth to the wealthy is cutting taxes, the rest of working in this world, and it should reinforce wrong and bad economics. America have been literally going from this country’s determination to win The tale of two economies is a con- paycheck to paycheck and having a tax this war against terror. trast fueled by executive compensation increase. As paychecks have often been Yet another concern in the tragic that too often bears no relation to per- effectively frozen for many, what has death of Nick Berg is the lack of any formance and regressive tax policies happened to their lives? Health care forceful response and condemnation that punish work and reward wealth, costs have gone up from $6,500 for a from the European nations or the Arab creating an upside-down economy that family of four in 2001 to $9,000 today. community over this incident. has shifted the tax burden from wealth College tuition costs have gone up 10 The worldwide broadcast of the to work, burdening middle-class fami- percent in 2001, 10 percent in 2002, and photos of Iraqi prisoners has brought lies already facing skyrocketing health 14 percent in 2003. $180 billion worth of forth outrage by Americans and Iraqis care costs, skyrocketing and rising tui- retirement securities locked in 401(k)s alike, but not surprisingly, the anti- tion costs, job uncertainty, and retire- have lost their net value. Americans who are already on the ment insecurity. We have literally put a squeeze on radio exploiting that incident as an op- While this administration creates tax the middle-class family, and what we portunity to condemn America and loopholes for corporate jet use and has have today is the end of the middle Americans, further promoting this dou- reduced the audits of millionaires, it is class as we know it. ble standard of which I speak. Yes, a auditing hundreds of thousands of peo- As President Bush seeks reelection, small number of American soldiers ple and families earning $30,000 or less. he can say he kept his commitment to committed crimes against Iraqi pris- This is the essence of class warfare. the top 1 percent of America. The other oners. Those soldiers should be and will And as the famed investment adviser, 99 percent has not made out quite so be tried and punished accordingly. Mr. Buffet, once said, ‘‘There is class well. This administration has two However, while explaining our anger warfare and my class is winning.’’ books, two sets of values, two sets of over these crimes and our will to pun- A report this week, recently out and priorities, and a single economic strat- ish these people rightfully when found reported by Bloomberg in the Chicago egy that divides the country along appropriately guilty, calling for the Tribune showed U.S. corporate profits class. Compared to how Americans resignation of a Secretary or even ap- have increased by 87 percent between view their futures, we cannot deny the pearing over-apologetic for actions at the third quarter of 2001 and the end of middle-class families the same dreams the prison, I think it is a mistake and 2003. Compensation for the average of affordable health care, quality edu- plays into the hands of the double CEO got a big raise of 8.7 percent while cation, a safe place to live that the standard. salaried employees have seen an ane- most fortunate in this country have The anti-American left, in this coun- mic increase of 1.5 percent. That is the today. try and elsewhere, forever remembers lowest salary and wage growth since A government that pays no heed to every single American misdeed while World War II in the beginning of an the yawning gap between rich and the forgetting every anti-American and ‘‘economic boom.’’ middle class does it at its own peril. every anti-human atrocity that the Bill McDonough, the former chair- As Louis Brandeis, a famous Supreme terrorists have taken against those man of the New York Fed, and now Court Justice, once said, ‘‘We can ei- who oppose any one of their causes. chairman of the Public Accounting ther have democracy in this country or Mr. Speaker, what of the media out- Oversight Board, describes the gap be- we can have great wealth concentrated lets? They detail the outrage of Iraqis tween CEO and worker pay as ‘‘im- in the hands of a few, but we cannot based on the images of a few soldiers’ moral.’’ That is his quote. And the New have both.’’ crimes against prisoners. They are the York Fed is not a bastion of liberalism. f same media outlets that showed no re- He notes that in 1980, CEO pay was 40 morse, no outrage whatsoever a few times higher than the average salaried DOUBLE STANDARD years ago, for the thousands of lives employee and now is 500 times higher. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a that Saddam Hussein killed using his He sums it up, and I quote, ‘‘I know a previous order of the House, the gen- mass graves, nor when the Iraqi crowds lot of CEOs from 1980, and I can assure tleman from New Jersey (Mr. GARRETT) in Fallujah burned and mutilated four you the CEOs of 2000 are not 10 times is recognized for 5 minutes. American contractors and then hung better.’’ Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Mr. their corpses from a bridge, there was The performance of Ken Lay from Speaker, I rise now to speak on a dou- no outrage or remorse. Enron, Dennis Kozlowski of Tyco, and ble standard. Yesterday, the world A while back in an article, Eason Bernie Ebbers of WorldCom bear his learned of a young brave man from Jordan from CNN, he admitted that his statement out. At every turn the ad- Philadelphia named Nick Berg. Nick network had deliberately covered up ministration tells us the economy is Berg was a 26-year-old man who was in and ignored Saddam Hussein’s atroc- coming along. That may be true in the Iraq looking for work with the recon- ities and they did that just so they VerDate May 04 2004 02:46 May 13, 2004 Jkt 029060 PO 00000 Frm 00069 Fmt 4634 Sfmt 0634 E:\CR\FM\K12MY7.139 H12PT1 H2886 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — HOUSE May 12, 2004 could stay on TV. This policy of cau- Qaeda is hoping for. No Republican or vised around the world every hour of tion by CNN is not reflected in their Democrat should do or say anything every day. Virtually no one on the face current coverage of the charges against except that we are profoundly sorry for of the earth has not seen or heard American soldiers. their loss. The country and Congress about the photographs and the atroc- Although the actions against the must remain focused on those respon- ities. Yet some of the administration Iraqi prisoners are unacceptable, they sible for the abuses at the Abu Ghraib insist things are not so bad. Every time are not part of the standard procedure prison.