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Washington, DC – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09) today welcomed Sen. Barack Obama's call to increase the Federal Depositors Insurance Corporation (FDIC) insurance limits from $100,000 to $250,000 and urged his House colleagues to support it.

“It doesn’t make any sense that a charity driver would get only 14 cents back per mile when a delivery driver for a for-profit business gets almost 60 cents back,” Alexander said. “After meeting with MIFA, Congressman Cohen and I have decided to fix this discrepancy. Tennesseans are struggling enough with high gas prices to have to worry about losing money for volunteering for charities. This legislation is a no-brainer, and I hope that Congress will act quickly to pass it.”

The bill is designed to address the phenomenon known as “libel tourism,” or the exploitation of defamation laws in foreign countries that lack the broad protections of free speech guaranteed by the First Amendment in the United States.

H. R. 2638 includes a $1.6 million appropriation for the University of Memphis, requested by Congressman Cohen in a letter to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton on March 13, 2008. The university will use these funds to develop a battlefield nursing program utilizing enhanced, state of the art procedures, techniques and equipment to train U.S. nursing students.

This funding will be used to develop a new trauma hemostat, a surgical tool used to manage blood loss. Smith & Nephew has developed trauma hemostat prototypes which are now ready for laboratory and field testing.