H.R. 205, the “Death Tax Repeal Act”, would completely abolish the death tax, the gift tax, and the generation-skipping transfer tax. This permanent repeal will eliminate one facet of our indefensible tax code – the death tax is wrong, unfair, and goes against the American ethic to work hard and pass something along to your kids. This permanent repeal will also provide folks the stability and certainty they need to plan the future of their family farm or small business.

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H.R. 490, the “Quadrennial Foreign Affairs Review Act”, would require the Department of State to review all aspects of its organization and operations every four years. This legislation will help us to examine whether the U.S. has a coherent, focused foreign policy strategy, as well as the structure, programs, personnel, and budget needed to implement it.

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H.R. 489,  the “Strategic Communications Act”, would establish a Center for Strategic Communication. Strategic communication describes the tools our government uses to understand the attitudes, languages, values, and cultures of other countries, as well as those we use to promote our ideas and messages abroad. It encompasses public diplomacy, public affairs, international broadcasting, and information operations. The non-partisan, non-profit Center for Strategic Communication would exist outside of government and be a cooperative partnership between government and the private sector. It would allow us to have a deeper understanding of the world by providing information on global public opinion, technologies, and the cultures, values, and religions of other countries.  It would then advise policymakers on communication strategies, as well as how best to implement them.

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H.R. 2539, the “No More Excuses Energy Act”  Many in Washington have chosen to pursue a road that raises taxes on energy, forces people to buy small cars, and raises the price of practically every consumer product with the belief that Americans can be punished into saving energy.  I believe a better road for our energy future is to reduce America's dependence on foreign energy resources and help the environment by having a sensible plan to increase production of all kinds of energy here at home.  Specifically, H.R. 2539 would open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to responsible drilling, potentially producing nearly a million barrels per day for several decades.  This bill would encourage new refinery construction by requiring action to issue tax exempt bonds to be used for construction of certain refineries and make federal lands available for refinery construction.  The legislation would also encourage building new nuclear power plants by reducing the tax burden on that industry.  Another provision would repeal the minimum capture requirement for the newly created CO2 sequestration credit in order to help smaller facilities qualify for the credit.  H.R. 2539 would also boost alternative energy development by extending the Wind Production Tax Credit (PTC) for 10 years, extending the PTC for 5 years on other alternative energy sources, such as Closed-loop biomass, Geothermal, Landfill gas, Marine and Hydrokinetic, etc., and extending the Investment Tax Credit (ITC) for solar energy through 2018 for 2 years.  This bill also supports alternative fuels by making the excise tax on Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and diesel comparable on an energy-equivalent basis and extending the Alternative Fuel Credit through 2010.  Instead of resorting to punishing taxes and regulations, we should encourage the production of all forms of domestic energy, which includes nuclear, alternative energy and fuels, and oil and gas -- the energy our nation depends on for our jobs and economic growth. 

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H.R. 2692, the “CAH Designation Waiver Authority Act” Critical access hospitals are certain hospitals that serve a vital need in a community due to a lack of other health care options in the area. These hospitals receive a higher reimbursement rate from Medicare and Medicaid due to the higher cost of operations they face because of their location. In order to be classified as a critical access hospital, a particular hospital must meet a number of requirements, one being that they are not located within 35 miles of any other hospital. This requirement has hurt many hospitals in our district because they fulfill every other requirement but there might be another hospital some 30 miles away or so and therefore they are not eligible for the designation. This situation causes a significant financial burden on them. H.R. 2692 would return the authority to grant waivers to this requirement to the states so that a state can decide to grant a waiver to an otherwise deserving critical access hospital even if it is located within a 35 mile radius of another hospital. Congressman Thornberry introduced H.R. 2692 with his Democratic colleague, Congressman Mike Ross. There is also a companion bill in the Senate that was introduced by Senators Pryor and Brownback. 

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H.R. 2784, The Partnership to Improve Seniors Access to Medicare Act, a bill that would create a program that would provide $20,000 a year in student loan repayment to medical professionals who agree to fill up to 30% of their practice for the year with Medicare patients. The goal of this bill is to provide an additional incentive for doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals to accept Medicare patients into their practice.

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H.R. 2786, the Patient Fairness and Indigent Care Promotion Act, a bill that would help doctors treat low-income patients by allowing them to deduct the costs of treatment as a bad debt write-off from their federal taxes. This bill will provide incentives to doctors to treat more non-paying patients.

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H.R. 2785, the Health Care Fraud and Paperwork Reduction Act, a bill that establishes a Commission on Billing Codes and Forms Simplification that is tasked with working with Medicare and the medical community to standardize and simplify billing practices while protecting patient privacy. The Commission would also study electronic forms and billing practices while protecting patient privacy.

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H.R. 2787, the Medical Liability Procedural Reform Act, a bill that will authorize the Attorney General to give grants to states that establish health care tribunals that provide alternatives to current tort litigation.

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H.R. 4261, the Congressional Notification Bill, strengthens the legal requirement to provide Congress with timely intelligence and covert action information. It clarifies current law by developing a more objective standard of what information U.S. intelligence agencies must give to Congress regardless of which party controls Congress or the White House. It also empowers Congress to limit itself, rather than allowing the President to limit Congress. By doing so, H.R. 4261 protects the President's constitutional authority to classify information, and ensures Congress's authority to set its own rules. 

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H.R. 4505, a bill to enable State homes to furnish nursing home care to parents any of whose children died while serving in the Armed Forces, permits admission into a State VA Nursing Home to any parent that lost at least one son or daughter, while fighting to protect our freedoms and way of life.  

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H.R. 4625, the Civil Service Reform and Government Reorganization Commission Act, a bill that creates a commission to examine our civil service system, and focus on new, actionable, common-sense reforms that will attract America’s best and brightest into careers of public service. The legislation requires these reforms to be presented to Congress as a legislative package under procedures similar to the Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC) process. 

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