mr. speaker , i thank the gentleman for yielding me time . 
mr. speaker , reauthorizing the patriot act before it expires on december 31 is literally a matter of life or death because it is helping us to win the war on terrorism . 
since we passed the patriot act in 2001 , we have convicted 212 terrorists , and we have frozen $ 136 million in terrorist assets . 
passing the patriot act is purely a matter of common sense . 
is it not common sense that we give law enforcement the same tools to go after terrorists as they now have to go after mafia dons and drug dealers ? 
is it not common sense that we can now share data between the intelligence community and the law enforcement community ? 
is it not common sense that we can now track deadly terrorists even though they cross jurisdictional lines or switch cell phones ? 
now , some members of congress want to postpone this legislation or even filibuster it . 
the worst thing that these critics can say about the patriot act is that supposedly law-abiding citizens will have their book store and library habits monitored . 
that is a totally bogus allegation . 
in reality , a prosecutor seeking this information must go before a federal judge , get a court order and prove that it is a matter of international terrorism . 
now , how many times has that happened since we first passed the patriot act in 2001 ? 
exactly zero according to the u.s. attorney general . 
i urge my colleagues to vote yes on the patriot act and yes on the underlying rule . 
