[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 179 (Monday, November 13, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H12163]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       ``LET THEM EAT DOG FOOD''

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Colorado [Mrs. Schroeder] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. Mr. Speaker, about now in the First Congressional 
District in Denver, CO., Federal workers, thousands of them, are going 
home after a long day's work and they are wondering if they come back 
tomorrow. What do they do? Does anybody recognize how hard their work 
is? What is going on?
  Mr. Speaker, 45 days after the fiscal year ran out, they cannot 
believe this body cannot have a budget together. They also cannot 
believe we could not even get anything of substance on the President's 
desk, really; that the fight is with the other body. We cannot even get 
it down Pennsylvania Ave. So, they are driving home in their cars 
wondering what kind of career mistake they ever made to go into public 
service and dedicate their lives to this.
  Mr. Speaker, people who live in the First Congressional District are 
hearing now that this shutdown is going to cost the economy $10 million 
to $15 million a day. It is going to cost taxpayers, and that is 
outrageous.
  Mr. Speaker, people going home in their cars who have been designated 
``essential,'' so they can go back tomorrow, and they are realizing how 
inefficient it is going to be without support staff. Poeple are going 
to phone in and not get an answer, and they are going to phone in to 
this body and not get an answer.
  What is all of this about? Last night we got a little window into 
this, because the GOPAC people had a gala. They had a gala. GOPAC is 
the group that the Speaker put together that brought all the new 
Members of Congress is here on the other side of the aisle.
  Mr. Speaker, they had address this great gala the person who they 
have designated as an honorary member of their class, Rush Limbaugh. 
Rush Limbaugh stood up to talk about what a great night it was. He said 
he greeted his fellow extremists and he hailed the new Republican 
budget, because he said it would starve the poor and it would take 
those on Medicare, like his mother, he said, and force them on dog 
food. But, he said, his mother was probably watching C-SPAN and he 
wanted her to know he was sending her a new can opener.
  We have all heard of Marie Antoinette who said, ``Let them eat 
cake.'' Apparently the new cry of this group is, ``Let them eat dog 
food.'' Take a sock for Christmas and take cans of dog food and insert 
them for people who are on Medicare, because if the President is to be 
able to stop this tonight, he has got to agree to $13 more in premiums 
for the people on Medicare. That is why Rush Limbaugh is so happy that 
his mother is going to be on dog food.

  Well, Mr. Speaker, I am not. My mother is not going to eat dog food, 
and I do not think we ought to have Federal employees going to dog 
food. I think for the great Nation that this Nation is, that kind of 
talk is absolutely outrageous.
  Mr. Speaker, if we condemn, and we have as a nation, the Marie 
Antoinettes who were so out of touch, who said, ``Let them eat cake,'' 
we ought to be condemning just as insensitive a statement as, ``Let 
them eat dog food.''
  Mr. Speaker, we should not be attaching mandatory increases to 
Medicare to keeping the Government going. None of it makes any sense. 
This is about a dysfunctional part of the Government right now, the 
legislative branch.
  Mr. Speaker, we ought to come in here, reconvene, and we ought to 
pass a clean continuing resolution so Government goes on. We ought to 
increase the debt ceiling, so Government goes on and the full faith and 
credit of this country is not run to the cliff. And then we ought to go 
back and work out that budget that was due 45 days ago. Mr. Speaker, 85 
percent of it has not been finalized. Work that out. Bring it here in 
the regular process.
  No wonder the American people are disgusted. The haughtiness and the 
arrogance of laughing about one's mother and laughing about how the 
poor are going to suffer and, ``Isn't that a great day?''

                              {time}  1930

  If you really think the problem of America is that the real needy are 
the greedy and that the real greedy are needy, are not greedy, they are 
too greedy, then you are going to love what is going on. But I think 
most Americans do not think that the greedy are real needy.
  If you have got hundreds of dollars to go to these great galas and 
fundraisers, you are not exactly suffering. And you may think it is 
funny for those who are suffering but I do not. I think it is tragic 
for Federal employees who have families, who have mortgages, who have 
school tuition. I hope Members of this body try and write notes to all 
of them, see if they can get some kind of an extension on their 
mortgage. See what they can do. They cannot. We should not do this. We 
should convene. We should have a clean continuing resolution. We should 
have a clean debt resolution. We should get on with business as usual 
and let us knock off this talk about dog food.
  I am not from the heritage of Marie Antoinette. I am from the 
heritage of the great leaders of this country who believed every 
American counted and you did not make fun of them, of their social 
status or their economic status. Let us move forward in that tradition.

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