[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 153 (Thursday, September 28, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H9660-H9666]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
RADICAL LEGISLATIVE CHANGES ON HORIZON
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bunn of Oregon). Under the Speaker's
announced policy of May 12, 1995, the gentleman from New York [Mr.
Owens] is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority
leader.
Mr. OWENS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to associate myself with the
remarks of some colleagues of mine who were here earlier speaking about
the Medicare cuts and the Medicaid cuts. Nothing is more important now
on the legislative agenda than the rape of Medicare and Medicaid.
Many people have focused on Medicare and do not even know that
Medicaid is being cut even more drastically than Medicare. Medicaid is
being cut by $180 billion over a 7-year period. But it is a smaller
program and the percentage of the cut is much greater.
Of even greater significance than that is the fact that there are
proposals on the table to eliminate the entitlement for Medicaid.
Medicaid at present offers a means-tested entitlement. That is, if you
can prove that you are poor and needy, then you qualify for Medicaid if
you are in the category which on the basis of this means-testing
process makes you eligible.
This means-tested entitlement, as we call it, is now on the chopping
block. It is being proposed that it be eliminated.
We have a precedent that has been set in the last few days. We have
witnessed the Senate follow the pattern of the House and eliminate the
entitlement for AFDC, Aid to Families with Dependent Children. That is
welfare mothers in popular terms.
Welfare mothers, welfare families, welfare children, under the law
that has existed since the Social Security laws were enacted, under the
New Deal, under Franklin Roosevelt, have had an entitlement. That is,
if you can prove that you are really in need and you are poor and you
qualify under the means-testing, then you are eligible for the benefits
of the Aid to Families with Dependent Children.
That is gone now. It is only a matter of the President signing it
into law. The Senate has passed a bill which removes the entitlement.
The House had already removed it before. It is a barbaric act.
I have used the word ``barbaric'' before. I have defined barbarians
as those who have no compassion. Many barbarians have a great deal of
education but they have no compassion.
When I use the word ``barbarian,'' I do not refer to religion. I do
not care which religion or which denomination they belong to. If they
have no compassion for anyone except their own kind and kin, then they
are barbarians. They are incapable of having compassion.
Barbarians are a threat to society, especially when barbarians have
power. When barbarians are able to make decisions and they do not have
any compassion, they are a threat to any society. They are a threat to
America, because they are making these horrendous cuts and taking away
entitlements like the entitlement of a needy child to help from their
Government.
They are threatening to take away the entitlement from Medicaid, the
entitlement of a person who is sick or families who are in need of
medical attention and are unable to pay for that medical attention
themselves. They are going to take it away.
They are going to leave the elderly out on the hillside to die, in
symbolic terms, because when you cut Medicaid and you take away the
Medicaid entitlement, what you are doing is cutting nursing home care,
because two-thirds of Medicaid goes to nursing home care and care for
people with disabilities. Two-thirds. One-third is for families who are
poor, but two-thirds goes for nursing home care for the elderly and for
people with disabilities. So you are going to take away the nursing
home care from the elderly people when you remove that entitlement.
The Federal Government is going to get out of the responsibility of
promoting the general welfare in that respect and leave it all up to
the States who would not do it before. Before we had Medicaid, they
would not do it. Before we had Medicare, the States would not do it. So
there is no reason to believe the States are going to take up that
burden once the Federal Government gives them that responsibility and
slowly the amount of money made available by the Federal Government is
decreased.
I want to loan any support and certainly associate myself with the
remarks of my colleagues who spoke earlier about this problem of
Medicare and Medicaid being number one on our agenda. Everybody has to
be concerned about it. It is a snapshot of our civilization.
Where are we in America right now? If the American people sit still
and allow this to happen, where are we? If we allow coverage for health
care to instead of going forward to become universal coverage as we
were discussing just a year ago, just a year ago we had plans on the
table to move forward universal health care coverage, where eventually
95 percent, at least, of all the people in America would be covered
with some kind of health care plan. Now instead of moving forward, we
are going to take away the coverage which is already guaranteed to
people who are eligible for Medicaid and move backwards.
There will be many fewer Americans who are covered with any kind of
health care plan after this Medicaid entitlement is removed. That is a
great step backwards, and the American people must focus in and take a
close look at who are we, what are we, where are we?
Are we so desperate that we have to act as barbarians? Are we so
desperate that we have to sit by as the voters and the citizens and
approve of such barbaric acts? Are we going to swallow the arguments
that we are on the verge of bankruptcy and there is no other way to get
out of this threat of bankruptcy except to do mean and extreme things
to each other, to the least among us, those who are unable to help
themselves?
Please try to stay with it, because the pace of change over the next
3 or 4 weeks will be quite rapid. Next week we will have a week off,
but the pace goes forward even though the Congress will not be in
session, because the negotiations now on the appropriations bills, the
negotiations and the details of the health care plans and Medicaid, the
welfare reform, a number of things are happening, and they will go
forward even while Congress is not in session next week.
But once we return, then all other things will have to be wrapped up
in a matter of a few weeks and the pace will be mind-boggling. There
will be radical legislation changes. We are not just finishing up the
first half of the 104th Congress.
The agenda for the 104th Congress requires, because of the way the
leaders have structured it, that we pass radical legislative changes
before this half of the session ends. That means that in the next 3 or
4 weeks, you are going to have to follow very closely while some very
mean and extreme changes are made rapidly. Under the cover of the
rapidity, the swiftness with which things are done, much will be lost
unless we follow very closely.
We did pass a continuing resolution today. A continuing resolution, I
have explained before, is a resolution necessary to keep the Government
going when the appropriations bills have not been passed to cover
programs and activities of the Government. Most of the appropriations
bills have not been passed by both the House and the Senate.
I would like to applaud our leaders in the House, our leaders in the
Senate and our leaders at the White House for not indulging in
melodrama. We did not have any melodramatic showdown
[[Page H 9661]]
at this point. Because to have any attempt to stop the Government or
even pretend to stop the Government at this point would be ridiculous.
There is so much to be done, there are so many appropriations bills
that have not been passed by the Senate. There is so much, it would be
ridiculous to pretend that we could stay here over the weekend or work
out some kind of solution in such a short period of time. There will be
still a problem later on. We have expanded it until November 13, I
think, and the continuing resolution ends on November 13.
The train wreck that has been talked about, the train wreck that is
coming will definitely occur at that time, I assure you. There will be
a clash between the President and the Republican-controlled Congress,
because the President says he will not accept certain bills. He has
made it quite clear. On some he says he may not accept them, but on one
or two he has said he will not accept certain appropriations bills.
One of them is the human services, education and job training
appropriation bill. If it comes out of the Senate and comes out of the
conference process and looks the way the bill looks in the House, with
$4 billion in education cuts and $5 billion in job training and human
services cuts, then the President has made it quite clear he will not
sign the bill, he will veto it.
Probably he will veto a Medicare bill which is as outrageous as those
that are being proposed. I hope the President will shortly, in the next
few days, make a clear statement that he will veto any bill which ends
the entitlement for Medicaid.
We have lost the entitlement for Aid to Families with Dependent
Children. We have lost the entitlement for people who are poor and are
in need of assistance. It is lost. Overwhelmingly the Democrats joined
the Republicans to vote for it in the Senate. They can never override
in Presidential veto. The power of the actions of the Senate has come
back to influence the people in the House. It is a lost cause.
The House stood up firmly, Democrats in the House stood firmly on the
principle of entitlement. I congratulate my Democratic colleagues, the
conservatives, the liberals. Everybody got together on the bill that we
offered as a substitute.
We offered a substitute bill which would have provided job training,
would have provided a longer time for people to be educated and get job
training. It would have provided some kind of program to help create
jobs. In addition to that, most important, the bill that was offered by
the Democrats on the floor of the House at the time of the welfare
reform bill consideration kept the Federal entitlement. The Federal
Government stands behind individuals who are in need. The Federal
Government stands behind individuals who are in need when a hurricane
happens. We take it for granted. It is not written in the legislation
that automatically you will get Federal aid; it is going to be there no
matter how rich you are. If your house is blown down by the winds, no
matter how many times you build your house in a place where the winds
are likely to blow it down, when they come again, you will get Federal
help. When floods occur, no matter how close you build your home to the
river, no matter how many times you keep building your home close to
the river, no matter how well-off you are, when floods occur, you are
going to continue to get help from the Federal Government. Earthquakes,
$7 billion, $8 billion for the California earthquake. You can expect,
regardless of the state of a person's income, everybody who is affected
by the earthquake will get some help from the Government.
That is a civilized government. That is a government designed to
promote the general welfare. That is the way it should be. But it
should also be that way for people who have economic difficulties and
need help.
Oh, yes, there are abuses in the welfare program. There are abuses in
the earthquake relief program. Have you heard? There are abuses in the
flood relief program. There are abuses in programs that relieve
hurricanes and tornados. Wherever human beings exist, they promulgate
abuses of programs. Some people take advantage of the situation. There
are going to be abuses.
I am going to talk in a few minutes about two sets of abuses, abuses
that are in the welfare reform program that enrage so many citizens and
abuses that took place in the savings-and-loans program, which seem to
be forgotten already although they cost more than $250 billion. That is
a most conservative estimate. I will make a comparison in a few
minutes.
Before I do that, I just want to end my alert on Medicare and
Medicaid. American people, please, keep your eyes on Medicaid and the
Medicaid entitlement. Do not let the Medicaid entitlement be wiped
away. We can only mourn now for the entitlement for poor people, public
assistance, and only mourn now for the entitlement for children,
dependent children. We can only mourn because it is almost all over.
The agreement has been reached. There is very little we can do
politically to roll back the clock and to gather the forces necessary
to maintain an entitlement that was instituted by the Social Security
Act under Franklin Roosevelt. We cannot bring it back.
But we can stop the escalation of the barbarity. We can stop the
barbarians from taking away the Medicaid entitlement. We can act. Let
your Congressman know. Let your Senators know. Let everybody know you
do not want to move further away from universal health care. The thing
that brings us closest to health care for poor people is the Medicaid
Program. You do not want to take health care away from seniors who,
after they exhaust their income, they exhaust whatever assets they
have, go from Medicare to Medicaid. You do not want to do that. Too
many of our senior citizens would be left on the hillside to die, in
symbolic terms.
Let us move for a minute to take a look at the fact that Americans
are outraged by abuses in welfare and the welfare reform has certainly
been in response to some ridiculous kinds of things that have occurred.
I would criticize the social work profession. I would criticize the
public policy planners for allowing a lot of little things that could
have been corrected to mushroom. But I assure you that welfare, as a
system, is far more honest, the system for providing public subsidy to
children who are dependent is far better run and far more honest than
most Federal programs that exist today. Let me repeat that: There are
abuses in any program that has ever been conceived by the Federal
Government, State government, or local Government, and any government,
any programs that have been conceived of by any government anywhere in
the world. The human mind is such that there are people who can move in
and begin to find places to take advantage of the system. The abuses
are inevitable because of the fact that human beings are so intelligent
and some of them who are very intelligent are not at all honest. There
is always the guy who is looking, the hustler who is looking for a way
to take advantage of the system.
So welfare has had its abuses. The abuses, again, are minuscule
compared to the abuses that we have seen in some other programs.
Let me just stop for a moment and read a couple of clippings to you.
Let me just stop for a moment and take advantage of some recent
developments which you might have missed. You might have missed the
fact that in the New York Times, on September 25, and many other papers
in the last few days, there has been a big discussion of the fact that
the CIA had more than $1.5 billion. I know these numbers lose you. You
know, you think in millions, and hundreds of millions, but when you get
to billions, people just cannot understand a billion dollars and what
you can do with that. You know, a billion dollars, I assure you, would
pay for a lot of nursing home time for hundreds of thousands of people.
A billion dollars would cover a lot of food for a lot of school lunch
programs. A billion dollars is a lot of money.
The school program, lunch program, was cut by about $2 billion over a
period of 7 years. We could give back that $2 billion and say:
School lunch program, you don't have to worry about
searching out the immigrant children. You don't have to worry
about driving out the immigrants, legal immigrant children,
by the way. You do not have to worry about looking for the
illegal ones. You do now have to deal with these draconian
cuts that are going to be squeezed as you move the program
down to the State level
[[Page H 9662]]
and cut back on the amount of funds, because you have a $1.5 billion
windfall here in the CIA.
The CIA has secreted. They have so much money and there are so many
abuses, and the administration is so loose and so lax until $1.5
billion was secreted away in a slush fund without the Members of
Congress being informed. The heads of the agency, the agency heads, the
people in charge said that they did not know about it. The President,
the White House, they did not know about it; $1.5 billion. Put that
down. You know, that is an estimate of the New York Times. It is
secret, of course. It probably was more, but it is a secret figure. The
conservative estimate is $1.5 billion.
Mr. Speaker, what I am trying to do is demonstrate that there are
widespread and very costly abuses throughout the Government. There are
many at the city level and State level which never get the visibility
that Federal programs get. But occasionally there are some secret
programs in the Federal Government, like the CIA slush fund that I am
talking about.
They discovered $1.5 billion in a slush fund that nobody knew about
except, I guess, the people who keep the money. I mean, how can they
not know? How did it not show up on the books? What welfare recipient
could ever get away with a few hundred dollars not showing up in the
system? Here we have $1.5 billion.
What is going to be done as a result of finding that there were
people who were keeping $1.5 billion or more out of the reach of their
supervisors and out of the reach of Congress and the President? What is
being done? Excuses are being made. All kinds of excuses are being
made.
Now, this is in an agency which has been guilty before, ladies and
gentlemen. This is the spy satellite agency. You know, in popular
terms, this is the Nation's spy satellite agency. It is the National
Reconnaissance Office. The National Reconnaissance Office was cited,
you know, not too many months ago for having a building under
construction which cost $317 million, more than $3 million. This was a
building under construction for more than, and I have it here, $347
million last year. Last year, Senators said they were surprised to find
the agency had built a new headquarters in northern Virginia near
Dulles International Airport. The Senators of the United States were
surprised that a whole building had been built, a new headquarters in
northern Virginia near Dulles International Airport. You cannot hide a
building, and you certainly cannot hide a building next to the airport,
I guess, unless you are the CIA. But the Senators were surprised to
find that $347 million had been used to build a building.
But $347 million had been concealed in accounts that did not appear
to be for construction. The agency said it has been negligent. ``Oh, we
are sorry, Mr. Senator, we are sorry, Mr. Representative, but we have
been a little negligent. We had this $347 million, and we built a
building, and you did not see it.''
Now the same agency is discovered to have an additional hidden amount
of $1.5 billion or more, and they are saying the same thing. ``We are
sorry, you, we are a little loose.'' Excuses are being made because
these are white middle-class males. Excuses are being made. They can be
sloppy. They can waste your money. They are not welfare children. They
are not welfare mothers, who most people think are black or Latino,
although the statistics will show that there are more whites on
welfare.
The racism that creeps into the outrage about welfare will not here,
because, after all, these are educated people, very well educated. If
you can hide the building of a building next to an airport, you are a
genius. It takes a whole set of geniuses to build a building next to an
airport and, you know, Dulles is here in the Capital. It is in the
Washington area, and the Senators not see it, not know about it, the
Representatives not know about it, the White House not know about it.
These are geniuses who have misspent $1.5 billion or more. They are
geniuses, but barbarians in the sense that they have no qualms, no
conscience, to say, ``Look, we did not use this money, you can have it
back, and you can use it to cover some Medicaid costs in the nursing
homes or you can use it to cover some food stamp costs, you can use it
to cover some earthquake victims' costs, some flood victim costs.''
No. They have kept the money and, fortunately, something happened
that it was discovered. This is the same agency that so mismanaged and
blundered so much that they had a man named Aldrich Ames in there for
years in charge of the spy operation in Eastern Europe and Russia, and
he was a spy for Russia, for the Soviet Union. Aldrich Ames is his
name.
Aldrich Ames grew up in the CIA culture. His father was in the CIA
before him. Aldrich Ames was an alcoholic. Aldrich Ames was a guy who
took his girlfriend to the safe houses of the CIA against regulations.
Regulations, you know, we have got family values in the regulations,
but he violated that. He violated all of the operating principles of
the agency, and yet he was promoted again and again, and he caused the
death of at least 10 people working for the CIA, according to official
count, caused their deaths.
My point is, I do not want to dwell too much on this, my point is
here is a blundering, deadly agency of the Federal Government, and all
they get are raps on the knuckles. This a very poisonous agency that
causes life and death in large numbers. This is the agency which
labeled Jean-Bertrand Aristide as a psychopath. This is the agency
which gave money to the group in Haiti that was fighting against the
United States Government's effort to reach a peaceful solution in
Haiti. This is the CIA.
The CIA budget, we do not even know what it is, but we can go on the
floor and propose to cut it, whatever it is, We wanted to cut it by 10
percent. The estimates by the New York Times and those media groups
that are able to get good information, the estimate was that it was a
$28 billion operation, and we looked forward to a 10-percent cut, which
would have produced $2.8 billion that could have been put into
education, college Pell grants. You know, we are cutting all over the
place.
{time} 1945
You know we are cutting all over the place. You have heard my
colleagues before on the other side of the aisle talk about Government
waste must go. Well, let us not continue to cover up where the real
waste is. Let us not join the barbarians. Let us cut, I say cut.
Ten percent of the CIA would have produced at least $2.8 billion per
year. We want to cut it 10 percent for 5 years so that you would cut
the agency down to about half the size, and this made sense. But on the
floor of the House we have produced this bill three times, and each
time we get fewer votes from the Members of the House of
Representatives.
Do they want to streamline Government? Do they want to cut waste? Do
we want to balance the budget by the year 2002?
No. We want to terrorize the poor. We want to go after the blacks. We
want to go after the Latinos. We want to demonstrate that this
Government does not exist for certain people. We want to throw certain
groups overboard and produce a situation where only the elite can
survive. Otherwise why do we not go after an obviously blundering
dangerous agency and do to it what we have done to the welfare program?
Radical reform; they need radical reform.
The radical and extreme reform that took place with respect to
welfare was not necessary. Reform was necessary. In fact, Government
should be in the business of reform. We should always be reforming.
That is what Government should do, trying to streamline itself, trying
to make better use of the taxpayers' money, trying to get greater
value. That is what we should be all about. But we are blind when it
comes to certain favored groups, certain favored operations.
You think that is an extreme situation? Let us take a look at the
article that appeared in the New York Times on September 7 of this
year, not too long ago. It is about the old mining law where the
Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Babbitt, is complaining about the fact
that he is powerless to stop some other white males who are educated
and rich from taking advantage of the system. Mr. Babbitt is upset. He
says his hands are tied by a century-old law which forced him to
approve reluctantly the sale of 110 acres of Federal
[[Page H 9663]]
land in Idaho for $275. I did not make a mistake, my colleagues, $275
for 110 acres of land.
Now I would say that $275 for 110 acres of land is a bargain almost
anywhere, you know, even in a swamp. Well, you might hope that 1 day
you are going to find something in the swamp that is going to be
useful. You got nothing to lose if it only cost you $275. But this land
is estimated to contain a billion, a billion dollars worth, of
minerals.
Let me repeat, $275 for 110 acres of Federal land in Idaho. The land
may contain a billion dollars worth of minerals. I am quoting from the
New York Times, September 7, 1995. You can go check it out with Mr.
Babbitt, the Department of the Interior.
The next paragraph goes on to explain the land was conveyed to
Faxcult, a Danish company, under an 1872 law that requires the
Government to sell Federal mining rights for as little as $2.50 an
acre. It is an 1872 law that requires the Government to sell Federal
mining rights for as little as $2.50 an acre. Do you hear? It was sold
to a Danish company, a foreign company.
Mr. Speaker, they are on the floor bashing immigrants and talking
about how terrible it is that immigrants come in and they take jobs and
do horrible things. Here we have given away to a foreign country 110
acres of land for $275, and the estimated mineral yield of that land is
a billion dollars.
Now you might say, ``Well, it's very generous of us. There's nothing
barbaric about that.'' You know, it is Americans who are compassionate
enough to give to foreigners a great gift. Foreigners are not their
kind and kin, so, if they are going to give to foreigners, the Danish
owners, this kind of bargain, this kind of gift, then that shows that
they are not barbaric. These are very generous people. They may be
naive, but they are very generous, because, after all, they are giving
it away, and they will not gain anything.
Well, life is a bit more complicated than that. Economics is a bit
more complicated than that. Business is more complicated than that.
Probably no American company thought they could stand up and take the
heat from the American people of having gotten away with that kind of
deal. So they have gotten a foreign company, but I assure you the
people that owned this company are not all Danish. I assure you that
the conditions which led to keeping this law would not be there just to
benefit a foreign company.
Congress has sought for years to change the law according to the New
York Times again. Congress has sought for years to change the law, but
under the strong pressure from the mining industry western lawmakers
have repeatedly blocked the legislation. Supporters of the law maintain
that it helps to promote mining in the United States and preserve jobs.
To promote mining in the United States and preserve jobs you have to
give away 110 acres at $2.75 an acre. Congress has sought for years to
change the law under strong pressure, but under strong pressure from
the mining industry.
Who is the mining industry? You know, I assure you it is not just
this little Danish company, not foreigners. The mining industry has
stockholders. The mining industry has very powerful people in very
powerful places.
Western lawmakers have repeatedly blocked the legislation.
Western lawmakers? Who are the western lawmakers? They are not
foreigners. We do not elect foreigners to office, so western lawmakers,
whoever they may be, have blocked legislation which is sought to
correct this 1872 law. Probably made sense in 1872 that everybody--you
would have to be a fool to believe it made any sense now. Any child can
tell you this does not make any sense except if you want to rip off the
American people.
Land is owned by the American people until it is conveyed to the
mining company, and they say it helps the United States to promote
mining in the United States and preserve jobs. If you charged more, you
charged a thousand dollars an acre, you cannot promote mining and
preserve mining jobs? You know, if it is a billion dollars that is
expected, a billion dollars worth of minerals, you certainly could get
a higher price.
We are back to that old issue of taxation and revenue. I proposed
before that we have a revenue commission, you might recall, a revenue
commission to look at ways to get revenue more creatively instead of
continuing to tax families and individuals so heavily. You know
families and individuals are heavily taxed; 44 percent of our tax
burden is borne by families and individuals, and only 11 percent is
borne by corporations.
Now these are not the only sources of revenue. There are other kinds
of revenue that help make up the total package. When you take a look at
some of those other kinds of revenue, we can get revenue from mining
lands that are sold, as the President proposes, but here we are up
against lawmakers, western lawmakers, who are not insistent, enraged by
the fact that somebody is ripping off the Government. No, those are not
poor welfare people, one out of every hundred who might be a hustler,
who might be taking advantage of the Government programs. These are not
people using food stamps who might buy cigarettes for food stamps
instead of buying food. These are not those kind of people. These are
people who are taking millions of dollars away from the American people
that could go into our revenue coffers.
Let me just read on a minute because it is a bit sickening, the whole
story, and you can get the flavor of how sick it is by just reading.
The wimpish way we react, the wimpish way our policymakers deal with
these outrageous abuses, is enough to give you a heart attack. It is
outrageous.
Quote from the New York Times article:
But Mr. Babbitt, in conveying the Federal tract in Idaho,
said he found making such deals, quote, ``increasingly
distasteful'', increasingly distasteful, and he called the
law, the law that does this, whose intent originally was to
promote development of the West, outdated and exploitative,
exploitative, exploitative of taxpayers. Mr. Babbitt found it
increasingly distasteful, and he found the law outdated and
exploitative of taxpayers.
Now I am not criticizing Mr. Babbitt except I think his language is
much too wimpish.
You know, I am reminded of the quote from King Lear. King Lear, after
his daughters have betrayed him, said, ``Fool me not to bear it tamely.
Touch me with noble anger.''
Somebody ought to have some noble anger when the CIA secretly has
$1.5 billion stashed away and nobody knows about it. Somebody ought to
have noble anger when the CIA can build a building near the airport and
the Senators and the Members of Congress do not know about it, and the
building costs $347 million. Somebody ought to be outraged.
They tremble and they shake when they talk about welfare people. You
heard them before saying they stand in line, and they get with their
food stamps better food than the guy behind them who is working all
day. That is outrageous, and they tremble and they shake when they say
that, but they can let the white males, educated in many cases, rich,
promulgate a system. Any lawmaker who is part of promulgating this
system is not dumb. Somewhere there are benefits that his constituents
are getting in larger amounts if you want to keep selling the land of
the people of the United States for $2.50 an acre, and you know
billions of dollars are going to be made.
The 110 acres in Clark County, ID, are believed to contained an
estimated 14 million tons of high-quality travertine, a mineral used to
whiten paper. I am quoting from the New York Times article again. Last
year, quote, ``when American Barrick Resources, a Canadian mining
company, used the law to buy a mine with $10 billion in gold deposits
for about $10,000, Mr. Babbitt called it the biggest gold heist since
the days of Butch Cassidy.''
Let me read that again. Last year, when American Barrick Resources, a
Canadian mining company, used the same law to buy a mine with $10
billion in gold deposits for about $10,000, Mr. Babbitt called it the
biggest gold heist since the days of Butch Cassidy.
Mr. Babbitt, I am glad you have such strong language for it, you
know. If you get $10 billion from the people of the United States for
$10,000, you think somebody would be on television screaming about it.
They could do nothing else except tell the American people about it.
[[Page H 9664]]
The President and his campaign said we want to end welfare as we know
it. Why does somebody not say we want to end the giveaway of billions
of dollars mostly to foreign companies, but they have American backers?
We want to stop American lawmakers from perpetuating this thievery. Why
does somebody not have the guts to stand up and be outraged about
stealing money which could provide coverage for thousands of people on
Medicaid? For hundreds of nursing home people?
I continue to quote from Babbitt. I find this process where my hands
are tied by a law signed by Ulysses S. Grant increasingly distasteful.
Mr. Babbitt likes the word ``distasteful.'' Again I am not criticizing
Mr. Babbitt. At least he is talking about it. Where have the other
Secretaries of Interior been? Where have the lawmakers in this House
been? Why does not anybody talk about this? Why does anybody not expose
it? Why is it the American people do not know that they are walking
away with billions of dollars in minerals that belong to you?
{time} 2000
He said that, ``While Congress is cutting programs across his
department,'' Mr. Babbitt is upset about his department being cut, as
he should be, the Interior Department, he said, ``While Congress is
cutting programs across my department, the government is losing $100
million a year from royalties from hardrock mining.'' One hundred
million a year in royalties for hardrock mining. How many school
lunches could you buy with $100 million a year? How many prescriptions
for Medicaid recipients can you fill for $100 million a year?
I quote again from the article: ``The bill to overhaul mining laws
would require a 2 percent royalty on net profits on minerals taken
under the 1872 law. Other proposals before the Congress would require
companies to pay fair market value for the surface land, but nothing
for the minerals.'' In other words, as we sit here today, as we talk
today, there are Members of Congress in the Senate and in the House of
Representatives who are protecting the thievery that is going on right
before our very eyes. This is a Federal program that should have
radical reform, radical change, but nobody is moving because white,
rich, well-educated males benefit from it. They protect themselves.
I talked before about the end of entitlement for Medicaid. I said,
``The end of entitlement for Medicaid is on the table.'' It is not here
yet. Medicaid is a patient in the emergency room, on the operating
table. Medicaid is about to be butchered. Aid to Families With
Dependent Children is on its way to the morgue. They have cut the
entitlements already. What would Franklin Roosevelt say? I am sure that
the spirit of Franklin Roosevelt is quite angry and quite agitated
tonight. Over the last few months, I am sure that spirit has been quite
angry and agitated at the wholesale destruction of the programs which
he began to put in place.
Franklin Roosevelt was the architect of the Social Security Act,
which created Social Security, and later Lyndon Johnson used Social
Security to go on to create Medicare and Medicaid. They are all
related. I am sure Franklin Roosevelt, having created entitlements for
the poor, he also created farm subsidies for poor farmers. Farm
subsidies for poor farmers now have become farm subsidies for rich
farming businesses, agricultural businesses, so I am sure the spirit of
Franklin Roosevelt is a little upset about that.
As he looks at the end of entitlements for people who are poor and
need public assistance, for children, mostly, Aid to Families With
Dependent Children is just that. If you do not have poor children, you
do not qualify. We are ending Aid to Families With Dependent Children,
the entitlement.
On the other hand, Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal, the
Congresses that surrounded him, were also the architects of the savings
and loans program. They were the architects of the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation for banks and for savings and loan agencies. I
wonder what the spirit of Franklin Roosevelt is doing as it beholds the
kind of abuse that took place in the savings and loan program, the
kinds of abuses that have taken place in big banks of the program that
he started; because when Franklin Roosevelt stabilized the economy and
the banking industry by creating the Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation, he brought into the equation every American taxpayer. The
taxpayers stand behind the banks. Every American can put their money in
the bank, knowing that up to a certain amount of money, it is insured,
backed up by our great Federal Government.
Franklin Roosevelt started out with I think it was $10,000, which was
a lot of money at that time, and he probably never dreamed that the
abuse, both official abuse and unofficial abuse, would lead to a
situation where we would raise the amount from $10,000 per person per
bank to $100,000 per person per bank. So you can abuse it by going to a
lot of different banks and getting insurance.
It was not ordinary Americans who abused it. People who put their
deposits into savings and loan associations did not abuse the loan.
People who put their deposits in the banks which later on failed, they
failed and we covered up the failure. Several big banks have failed in
this country and we have covered it up and bailed them out with the
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation funds. The savings and loan
debacle, which is the greatest swindle in the history of mankind, there
are no other swindles as great as the savings and loan swindle, that
could not be covered up. It was a federally assisted program.
Did we get rid of savings and loan associations? Have we put them out
of business? Have we been as radical in dealing with the savings and
loan situation as we were with the reform of welfare? No, we have not.
How many people were put in jail for their abuse, often outright
stealing of large sums of money that then had to be replaced by the
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation? How many people have been put in
jail? Relatively few, because most of them are white, middle-class,
well-educated, and sometimes very wealthy males. they are not treated
the same way as poor people, many of whom are Latinos and blacks, and
most of all, poor. They are not treated the same way. If they were,
then the savings and loans, the whole program would have had radical
changes. Large numbers of people would have been put in jail. Large
numbers of people would have been taken out of the banking industry.
There was collusion all over the place among well-educated, wealthy
people in high places, in many cases: accounting firms who turned their
heads away while all kinds of tricks were played with the books;
lawyers who found a way to make everything that was done, no matter how
terrible it was, legal.
In the State of Texas they had a situation where it was not the
Federal Government regulating the savings and loan association, but the
State of Texas. The State of Texas has the power to regulate the
savings and loan associations in Texas, but the Federal Government, all
of the taxpayers of America, stood behind their savings and loan
associations, just as they stood behind those in New York or any other
part of the country. Why do I say that? Because in Texas you had the
largest number of savings and loan associations failing, the largest
amount of money was lost in Texas, where the State had the power to
oversee the banks. But the Federal Government, the taxpayers, stood
behind the banks with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
dollars, so they made a killing in Texas. Not only did they oversee the
situation and let it get out of hand any way they wanted to, they made
millionaires, they made billionaires, most of whom have never gone to
jail.
Then when it all collapsed, we set up the Resolution Trust
Corporation. That was the device we set up. We did not take away the
entitlement, we did not wipe out the Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation. We did not do anything as radical as what we are doing to
poor people on welfare. No, we set up a Resolution Trust Corporation, a
very complicated animal, and most of the offices of the Resolution
Trust Corporation, the greatest percentage of the offices of the
Resolution Trust Corporation, had to be based in Texas. That is where
the greatest problem was.
California was next, and they spread it around. Denver had its
Silverado Bank, the famous bank. The son of the President of the United
States sat on
[[Page H 9665]]
the board of the Denver Silverado Bank. It was spread around, but Texas
had the greatest concentration. After they had regulated their own
banks to make rich those they wanted to make rich, they they got the
benefit of having a large Government agency locate there and spend
money there and hire people there. Many people who were hired in the
Resolution Trust Corporation had formerly worked in some of the banks
that had gone, that failed, some of the savings and loan associations
that had failed, so they got a jobs program as a result of swindling
the American people out of a large part of that $250 billion to $300
billion.
This is happening in America. This happened recently in America, the
largest swindle probably in the history of mankind, right before our
eyes, and we reacted by coddling and taking care of those who were
guilty.
Let me be more specific about guilt. You be the judge. The Silverado
Bank in Colorado, in Denver, CO, the Silverado Bank made a deal with a
person who came for a loan. One of the people who came for a loan
wanted to buy a building. The building was assessed to be worth $13
million, $13 million. The bank said, ``Look, we will accept an
assessment of twice that much for the building, $26 million, if you
will deposit in our bank the extra $13 million, so we will give you a
loan of $26 million for a building worth $13 million on the condition
you will deposit that $13 million back in the bank, because we know the
auditors are coming and we have problems.''
If that is not a criminal action, I do not know what is a criminal
action, but that was done by the Silverado Bank. That is just one of
the things they did. They lost almost $2 billion. They are not the
largest offender. We all know Mr. Keating in California was the largest
offender, but Silverado lost more than $1 billion, and on the board of
Silverado was the son of George Bush, Neal Bush. This kind of
transaction took place, and later on as they sorted it out a
recommendation was made that Neal Bush should be barred from sitting on
any boards of any other banks. He protested vehemently.
Later on, I think secretly, out of the eye of the cameras, he even
was made to pay some kind of fine, along with the other board members
who had been a part of that situation. But nobody has said he should be
put in jail or any other board members of Silverado should be put in
jail. Two hundred fifty billion dollars, at least, and there are some
estimates that it is twice that amount. You cannot get decent figures
because the white males, the educated white males, the wealthy,
educated white males who run the banking system and the accounting
system and the lawyer system related to it, they make it so complicated
you cannot get clear figures as of right now as to what the savings and
loan swindle has cost the American people.
This is a Government program: wasteful, blundering, billions of
dollars down the drain. Nobody has ever said, ``Let us get rid of all
savings and loans, let us get rid of the Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation.'' No, we have found a way to take care of the needs of the
white middle-class wealthy who are involved in the abuse that have
wrecked the savings and loan associations.
This is strong language, I know, but the barbarians do not hesitate
to drive their spears through the bellies of babies. The barbarians
have no shame. The barbarians come to the floor of the House and they
talk about the need to streamline Government and the need to have a
balanced budget by the year 2002. But the barbarians come to the floor
of the House and they will not cut the B-2 bomber, which might cost us
$33 billion over the lifetime of the program. The barbarians with a
straight face said, ``We must continue the B-2 bomber.'' They fight
hard on the floor and they win the votes to keep the B-2 bombers. The
barbarians want to increase the funding for star wars, a system that
has always been questioned by scientists.
The barbarians come to us and say that they want to give a tax cut,
and I am all in favor of a tax cut, but if the tax cut is close to the
same amount as the Medicare cut, the tax cut is, I think, $240 billion
over a 7-year period, and the Medicare cut is $270 billion over a 7-
year period; $240 billion for the tax cut, $270 billion for the
Medicare cut. The barbarians look at us with straight faces and say,
``We must have a tax cut. If that means that the elderly cannot have
nursing homes, then so be it. If that means that prescriptions are
going to be limited because people cannot afford to pay for their
prescriptions, and of course when they cannot get their medication many
will die, so be it.''
The barbarians are not afraid to make their case forcefully. The
barbarians want to end Davis-Bacon, which was created to stop bringing
in slave labor. It was created by two Republicans to stop people from
bringing in slave labor and undercutting the wages of working people.
We are going to have to have some other kind of Davis-Bacon to stop the
nations like India from bringing in computer programmers who work for
one-twelfth the amount of money computer programmers who are Americans
work for. We are going to have to have some kind of Davis-Bacon to stop
the Russian physicians and technicians who are working here for the
minimum wage. They can come here and undercut American physicists.
We are in a situation where the civilization, the society, must take
some steps to do what is rational to make for an orderly transition,
where people are able to earn a living and not disrupt things by
allowing hustlers to take advantage of the situation by bringing in
outsiders who can undercut the labor market. The labor market that we
may be protecting tomorrow may be our physicists and our chemists and
our college professors. We had better take a look at the logic of
Davis-Bacon, the invention of two Republican Members of Congress.
The barbarians refuse to look at this chart, which I will have in the
future when I speak, I will have a larger version of it. This is the
chart I have been talking about on several occasions.
{time} 2015
This shows corporate versus family and individual share of Federal
revenues. The share of the revenue burden that is born by corporations
went down from 39.8 percent in 1943 to 11.2 percent today, while the
share of the individual and family tax burden went up from 27.1 percent
to 48.1 percent, and now it is at 42.7 percent.
This chart is one I bring to every session to let my colleagues see
the remedy. If my colleagues want to balance the budget, here is the
remedy. Balance the tax burden, raise the tax burden, the percentage of
the tax burden borne by corporations. We can lower the percentage of
the tax burden borne by individuals at the same time. We can do justice
to the American people and American families who have paid enough high
taxes. At the same time, we can balance the budget by having the
corporations, which are making profits now at a higher level than ever
before, having them pay a greater share of the burden.
It is a simple solution. We do not have to cut Medicare, we do not
have to cut Medicaid, we do not have to act barbaric, in a barbaric way
toward children and the elderly. We should on a rational basis sit down
and take a look at the next 7 years, or as the President has projected,
the next 10 years; whatever my colleagues want to do to balance the
budget, it is possible to do it in a rational way.
On the one hand we have to save money by dealing with all of these
abuses that we allow to go on if white, rich, educated males are
involved, get rid of those abuses and at the same time look at the
revenue question, the revenue side and produce the revenue in a
rational way and a less painful way.
This is income taxes. We can take a look at the mining, how much more
we may realize by taking a hard look at the mining situation or other
resources that are presently owned by the American people that are
being squandered. I have talked about the frequencies, the fact that we
have auctioned off certain frequencies and earned $9 billion already.
We can take a hard look at that. There may be more.
There are solutions that are not barbaric solutions, and I ask the
American people to keep their eyes on activities in the Congress for
the next few weeks. It is your money, it is your civilization. We do
not want to be accomplices to barbaric acts. We want to promote
[[Page H 9666]]
the general welfare. We want to take America forward, out of the spirit
of Franklin Roosevelt and the spirit of Lyndon Johnson. We want to
continue to have a great society. We want to take care of the majority
of the people that need to be taken care of. We are Americans, we are
not barbarians.
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