[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 117 (Wednesday, July 19, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H7185]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  THE GINGRICH CORPORATE WELFARE MODEL

  (Mr. LEWIS of Georgia asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. LEWIS of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, this morning Speaker Gingrich will 
present a check to students who participate in the Earning by Learning 
Program which pays schoolchildren $2 for every book they read.
  Speaker Gingrich has touted this program for years, stressing the low 
overhead as a major selling point. In a speech this January the Speaker 
declared:

       The money only goes to the kids * * * So if you have $1,000 
     you can pay for 500 books, whereas in the welfare state 
     model, if you have $1,000, you pay $850 of it for the 
     bureaucracy.

  But, lo and behold, according to the Wall Street Journal this week, 
Mr. Gingrich's official biographer, Mel Steely, also happens to run 
this program. And according to this report Mr. Steely and two friends 
were paid 90 percent, yes 90 percent, of the money raised in the past 
year for the program.
  Ninety percent for the Speaker's friends and 10 percent for the 
children; this is the way, this is the way things work in the Gingrich 
corporate welfare model.


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