[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 63 (Wednesday, April 5, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5166-S5168]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                  WRONGHEADED PUBLIC POLICY DECISIONS

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, the discussion in Washington this week, 
and I suppose next week, and around the country during the Easter break 
will be the first 100 days. What do we make of the first 100 days in 
the change of majority status in the Congress, Republicans replacing 
Democrats as the majority party in the 1992 elections?
  I said yesterday, and let me remind people again today, the score in 
1992--in a democracy, those who win by one vote are still called 
winners--the score in 1992 at the end of the election process was the 
Republicans 20 percent, Democrats 19 percent and 61 percent of those 
eligible to vote said, ``Count me out, I won't even participate.'' So 
with a 20 to 19 victory, the Republicans have claimed a mandate for 
their ideas, and a mandate for something called the Contract With 
America.
  The Contract With America contains a number of ideas that are 
interesting, provocative, in some cases radical, in my judgment. Some 
of the ideas in the Contract With America are ideas that I embrace, 
that I have voted for and have supported. Some of the ideas are ideas 
that the majority party, who now brings them to the floor, filibustered 
in the previous Congress and prevented coming for a vote because they 
felt apparently they will not support them and now they apparently do 
and even put them in a contract.
  By whatever device they come to the floor of the Senate, a good idea 
is a good idea no matter who proposes it. A number of them have passed.
  Unfunded mandates has passed the Senate and gone to the President. 
The Congressional Accountability Act has passed the Senate. The line-
item veto has passed the Senate. A 45-day legislative veto, which makes 
good sense, on the subject of regulations and rules has passed the 
Senate. I voted for all of those issues, and I think they make good 
sense.
  But the Contract With America is a mixture of good and bad. The fact 
is, some of the ideas in the Contract With America reinforce the 
stereotypical notions of what the majority party has always been about, 
and that is to keep their comfortable friends comfortable, even at the 
expense of those who in this country are struggling to make it.
  I would like to talk just a few minutes about some of those items in 
the contract that we have had to fight and that we even now try to 
fight and reject because we think they are wrongheaded public policy 
decisions for this country.
  One hundred years from now--not 100 days--but 100 years from now, you 
can look back and evaluate what this society decided was important by 
evaluating what it invested its money in, what did it spend money on, 
especially in the public sector, what did it invest in. That is the way 
to look back 100 years and determine what people felt was important, 
what people valued and treasured. Was it education? Was it defense? Was 
it the environment? Was it public safety? Fighting crime? You can 
evaluate what people felt was important at that point in their lives by 
what they spent their money on.
  And so you can look at the Federal budget and look at the initiatives 
brought to the floor of the Senate and the House to increase here and 
cut over there and determine what do they view as valuable, what do 
they view as the most important investments.
  The Contract With America, in the other body, had a debate recently 
by the majority party pushing the contract provision that said to the 
Defense Department, ``We want to add $600 million to your budget.''
  The Secretary of Defense said, ``We don't want it, we don't need it, 
we're not asking for it.''
  The Republicans over in the House of Representatives said, ``It 
doesn't matter to us, we want to increase the Defense Department budget 
by $600 million. That is our priority. We don't care if you don't want 
it, don't need it or don't ask for it. We want to stick more money in 
the pockets of the Defense Department.''
  How are we going to get it? ``We are going to pay for it,'' they 
said. ``We simply will cut spending on job training for disadvantaged 
youth and we will cut spending on money that is needed to invest in 
schools that are in disrepair in low-income neighborhoods.''
  So they cut those accounts that would help poor kids in this country 
and said, ``Let's use the money to stick it into the pockets of the 
Pentagon,'' at a time when the Pentagon and the Secretary of Defense, 
Mr. Perry, 50 feet from this floor in a meeting said, ``We don't want 
it, we didn't ask for it, we don't need it.'' But the Contract With 
America folks said, ``It's our priority, it's what we believe in, so 
we're going to shove money in your direction.''
  Then they come out on the floor of the Senate and the House and stand 
up and crow about what big deficit cutters they are, how they dislike 
public spending, how much they want to cut the budget deficit, how 
everybody else are the big spenders but they are the frugal folks. 
Right. They are the folks who are trying to stuff money in the pockets 
of the Defense Department that the Defense Department says they do not 
want.
  How do they get it? It takes it from poor kids. Now, that says 
something about values. That says something about priorities, I think.
  Now, do we oppose that? Of course we do. Some Members stand up and 
say we do not think that is the right way to legislate. We do not think 
we ought to give a Federal agency more money than it needs. If the head 
of the agency says we do not need or want this money, do Members think 
the legislature ought to be throwing money? I do not.
  Now, we have a number of things in the Contract With America that 
represent, in my judgment, wrong-headed priorities. I think we are 
duty-bound to create the debate on these subjects. That is what a 
democratic system is.
  When we disagree, bring all the ideas here and have the competition 
for ideas, and strong aggressive public debate. Respectful, but strong 
public debate and see where the votes are.
  We had a case in the House of Representatives under the contract 
where the notion is that all Federal rules and regulations are 
essentially bad and we should dump them. They did not quite say it that 
way, but this is pretty much what they meant.
  I think there is a general understanding that rules and regulations 
in many areas have gone too far and have strangled initiative, and have 
been created by bureaucrats who do not understand 
[[Page S5167]] the effect of them, and that we ought to streamline 
them.
  So, here in the Senate we passed, with my help, out of the 
Governmental Affairs Committee, a risk assessment bill which I voted 
for and helped write. We passed a 45-day legislative veto which I voted 
for, and I am pleased to do that because we need to address that.
  In the House, what they did is they got a bunch of corporate folks, a 
bunch of big business folks in a room and said, ``Why do you not help 
write this? What bothers you? See if we can write something that 
satisfies your interest.''
  Then they bring it to the floor, called a moratorium. It is beyond 
the dreams of the big special interest folks to put a moratorium on 
every conceivable rule and regulation that has yet to be issued.
  It is like saying to the biggest businesses in the country, ``You can 
come in and write your own ticket. It does not matter. Just come in and 
write it up and we will legislate it.'' We have been through this. 
There needs to be in a free enterprise society like ours, some 
oversight, some sense of responsibility, as well.
  I told on the floor of the Senate the other day about the early days 
of this century when people did not know what kind of meat they were 
eating. When a noted author wrote a book that lit the fuse that started 
the chain reaction that led to the meat inspection programs in this 
country.
  The investigations in the slaughterhouses in the meat packing plants 
where they had rat problems, and they take a slice of bread or loaves 
of bread and lace it with rat poison and lay it out to kill the rats in 
the meat packing plants. They put the dead rats, bread, and rat poison 
all down the same chute with the meat and pump out the ``mystery meat'' 
that people got a chance to eat in this country.
  Finally, understanding that the captains of that industry at least 
were more interested in profit than they were in public health, there 
was a decision that we ought to do something about that. Now, when we 
eat meat in this country that has been inspected, we have some notion 
that it is safe. Safe to eat. Why is that? Because of regulations. 
Regulations in many cases are essential to public health and public 
safety.
  No one would want to get on an airline today that does not have a 
requirement to subscribe to some minimum safety standards in which 
there are not some air traffic controllers adopting public regulations 
to determine at what altitudes to fly when heading east and what 
altitudes to fly when heading west.
  Regulations in many cases are critically important. The right kind of 
regulations. It we have the captains of industry in this country 
deciding to write the regulations they want, it will, in my judgment, 
always impose profit as a virtue ahead of public safety and public 
health.
  We need to care a little about that. Those who say, well, we will 
open our offices to the captains of industry to write the regulation, 
and we bring them to the floor and push them to the floor under 
something called the Contract With America, some are duty bound to 
stand up and say, no, no, there is a public interest involved here as 
well.
  We must urge the private interest and the public interest to be sure 
that we care about public health and public safety.
  Now, those same people in the Contract With America say that they are 
the ones that care about public spending. They say we will take the $10 
billion in the crime bill and decide to move that as a block grant to 
State and local government.
  We will send it back to the States. They are capable of better 
spending it than we are. Remember what happened when we did that before 
with the Law Enforcement Assistance Act? You separate where you raise 
money from where you spend it, I guarantee you will promote the biggest 
waste in Government.
  Under the old LEAA Act, local governments got money and one had a 
study, and that was to try to determine why people in prison tried to 
get out. What would make people in prison try to escape? Well, we do 
not have to spend $25 million to study that. I tell you why--because 
they are locked up, for God's sake. That is why people in prison try to 
escape.
  Why would someone want to spend public money to determine why 
prisoners want to escape? Because it was free. The money came from the 
Federal Government.
  This notion about block grants in which we separate where money is 
raised from where money is spent and in which the Federal Government 
raises the money and sends it to the Governors to say, ``Here, you go 
ahead and spend it the way you want, no strings attached. Crime, spend 
it on roads if you want.''
  In the House of Representatives, they had an amendment on the floor 
that says at least with respect to this crime money communities ought 
not be able to spend it on roads. Guess what? They defeated the 
amendment. They said, no, we would not restrict that. We can send money 
back in which there is a problem to deal with the epidemic of violent 
crime, and they can spend it on roads. Those are the kind of things 
that make no sense.
  The previous speaker this morning spoke briefly about the hot lunch 
program. He said, ``Gee, it will increase.'' Yes, it is true, it will 
increase. The cost of food goes up, we increase the amount of the hot 
lunch program by exactly the amount of increase in the cost of food.
  Guess what? More children are coming into our school system that are 
eligible for hot lunch, and there is not enough money to provide hot 
lunches for all those kids. And some kids come up and say, ``I want a 
hot lunch, or I need a hot lunch,'' and they are told, ``well, gee, one 
of the Senators said we increased funding so there certainly should be 
enough money available for you.''
  Well, they did not increase funding enough to provide the money for 
all of the new kids coming into the hot lunch program. And besides, 
they in the contract for America provide that they will remove the 
entitlement for a hot lunch for poor kids.
  Now, what sense does that make? Poor kids in this country often find 
that the only hot lunch they receive during the entire day is a hot 
lunch they received at school. I recall a statement made by the 
Presiding Officer, about that very subject.
  I know the Presiding Officer happens to share my view, the hot lunch 
program is a critically important program. An entitlement for poor kids 
to get a hot lunch at school is an entitlement we ought to keep. Any 
country as big and generous as this country, can certainly be generous 
enough to be sure that poor kids in this country get a hot lunch in the 
middle of the day at school.
  So people say, ``Well, gee, why are you against all these? What are 
you for?'' I am for a hot lunch for poor kids. It seems to me you start 
with those kinds of notions, and you fight for those things against 
someone who will decide that we ought not have an entitlement for a hot 
lunch at school for poor kids. That is what I am for and that is what I 
am against.
  Now, words have meanings, and legislation has consequences. We can 
talk all we want about what legislation does or does not do. Here is 
the first 100 ways in the first 100 days that the Contract With America 
decides it is more comfortable to help the wealthy, help the big 
special interests, and to do so at the expense of a lot of folks in 
this country who are vulnerable.
  There is a difference in how we believe we ought to discharge our 
responsibilities. I think we ought to cut Federal spending and we ought 
to cut it in an aggressive way. But there is plenty of waste and plenty 
of Federal spending we ought to cut without hurting the vulnerable in 
our society. We can do that. It simply is a matter of priority.
  When those who push the Contract With America decide we want to shove 
$600 million at the Defense Department that they do not want or they do 
not need or they did not ask for, and, at the same time, they say, we 
want you to remove the entitlement to a hot lunch, for American school 
kids who are disadvantaged. And there is something wrong, in my 
judgment, with the value system that creates those regulations.
  I hope we can talk about all of that this week, because that is the 
standard by which we judge the first 100 days--some good, some bad. We 
accept the 
[[Page S5168]] good, vote to pass it along and improve things in the 
country. The bad we fight, because this country can do better than 
that. This country can do better than to compromise health and safety 
standards, than to say that poor kids in school, your hot lunch does 
not matter.
  I just touched on a couple of areas here. There are dozens and dozens 
of them that make no sense. I hope during this coming week, we can 
decide to explore some of those in depth and explore the reasons why we 
feel it is important to stand up and speak out on behalf of some of 
those as well.
  I yield to the Senator from Vermont, Senator Leahy, who has done an 
enormous amount of work in this area.
  Mr. President, I yield him the remainder of my time, and he may wish 
to add to that time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont has 6 minutes and 20 
seconds.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we add 12 
minutes to my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. COVERDELL. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, if I may 
ask the Senator from Vermont if I might address a question through the 
Chair, I think in the order of business I was to be recognized for up 
to 15 minutes?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator form Georgia is correct. He has 15 
minutes reserved.
  Mr. COVERDELL. Would morning business still allow that?
  Mr. LEAHY. I was aware of the order regarding the Senator from 
Georgia. The Chair will correct me if my addition is not right. It 
would make sure he would still have his full 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There are still several Senators who have 
reserved time. The Senator from Indiana has 10 minutes; the Senator 
from Georgia has also 10 minutes.
  Is there objection?
  Mr. COVERDELL. As long as I will have time, with the time remaining, 
for my remarks, I will not object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
Senator from Vermont is recognized.

                          ____________________