[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 26 (Thursday, February 29, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H1625-H1631]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE AGRICULTURAL REAUTHORIZATION ACT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. 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, we have just passed the Agriculture
Reauthorization Act that reauthorizes farm programs, and I think it is
very important to take note of an unprecedented development. We had a
bipartisan breakthrough of the truth in respect to agricultural
subsidies and the agribusiness welfare program in America, and this
deserves to be noted. Been a lot of frustration for a long time
experienced by those of us who recognize the fact that the agribusiness
among all the recipients of Federal subsidies was the one that was most
hypocritical. It received great amounts of money for a small number of
people, and they made lengthy speeches about getting government off
their back and not being a part of a welfare program. So we finally
made a breakthrough, I think, in that not any great changes were
wrought.
The bill that passed has a lot to be desired; the bill that passed is
loaded with agribusiness welfare. The bill that passed is not a great
reform measure, as it is touted to be. The bill that passed will
probably be vetoed by the President. It pleases only segments of the
population. Large numbers of the people are displeased with it.
But the phenomena that took place on the floor of the House yesterday
is what I am rejoicing about. I rejoice that truth broke through and
there was a real honest discussion of the nature of the welfare
subsidies that have fueled the agribusiness for the last three decades.
The truth broke through, and there were very close votes. We almost got
rid of several subsidies that were terrible and have been going on for
some time, and, most important of all, it was not partisan. You know,
you could find no pattern of partisan voting. Both sides supported a
breakthrough of the truth.
The debate was a real debate in that it was not locked into some kind
of ideological dogma, it was not a ceremony where, no matter what you
said, one side or the other side was not listening. I think for the
first time, for one of the few times on the floor the House, the minds
of some Members were actually changed by the course of the debate.
So we rejoice that the agribusiness is now being honestly examined,
and the agribusiness and the tremendous amount of corporate welfare
that the agribusiness has enjoyed is now up for scrutiny. The common
sense of the American people can be allowed to examine it, and I expect
that you will have an escalating amount of concern from ordinary people
that common sense is now going to take hold of the situation, and we
are going to have a real look at the kind of money that has been poured
into the agribusiness empires over the last three decades.
Of course, you know most people do not realize that this bill, which
was mainly focusing on cash subsidies and the details of crops and
particular commodities, this bill does not even touch the surface of
some of the most generous corporate welfare that has been heaped upon
the agribusiness. We were not talking about the Farmers Home Loan
Mortgages. We were not talking about a whole set of loan programs that
feed into the farm economy.
And they say farmers. I think it is a misnomer to call anything
related to agriculture now on a large scale farmers. They are not
farmers. It is agribusiness. The farmers long ago were moved from the
land.
You know when Franklin Roosevelt, the greatest Democrat probably in
history, when Franklin Roosevelt conceived of the crop support programs
and provided support for poor farmers across the Nation, if was very
much needed and very much in order, and for a long time it did serve
the purpose of keeping the family farm alive, allowing poor farmers to
survive. It was very important.
But long ago the agricultural subsidies ceased to keep family farms
alive and provide help for those that needed it most. That ended a long
time ago. That is not the case any more. It is a great business, a
great corporate welfare program, and some of us have complained about
it for years. It has a dual evil. The taxpayers are forced to pay for
the agrabusiness program subsidies, the corporate welfare, on the one
hand. On the other hand, the fact that they pay for them to keep the
prices up means that the people in other parts of the country that are
not farmers pay higher prices for foods and commodities than they would
if they were not propped up with special programs.
We had a command and control structure for agriculture second to
none. I think the Soviet Union bureaucrats would probably envy the
command and control structure of the Department of Agriculture and how
agriculture over the years has evolved into this kind of protective
command structure with farmers home loan mortgages and all kinds of
goodies being fed to farmers and agribusinesses and establishing their
own standards. We had situations were $11 billion over a 5-year period,
$11 billion in loans, were forgiven under the farmers home loan
mortgages program.
{time} 1715
When you try as a citizen or as a Congressman to find out exactly
what
[[Page H1626]]
criteria was used and who authorized the giveaway of $11 billion of
American money, you know, they forgave the loans over a 5-year period
to the tune of $11 billion, and the process of forgiving, writing down,
adjusting is still going on. We have delinquent loans outstanding right
now related to agriculture which reached the proportion of $11 billion
or $12 billion, more than $10 billion, right now outstanding in
delinquent loans for agriculture.
The giveaway took place more than 5 years ago, so that brought down
the outstanding delinquencies greatly, but it was as high as $23
billion at one time. I have some statistics here. They are not always
easy to read, because the way they give it to you, they do not clearly
explain themselves. You have to read between the lines.
The various farm loan programs, they call farm programs direct loan
fund activities. This is a report that took me some time to get. It is
still very incomplete. At one point the outstanding delinquencies were
up to $27 billion, as high as $27 billion, the outstanding delinquent
loans. They forgave a lot of these loans, forgave them. If you forgave
$11 billion worth of loans in New York City to homeowners and the
owners of property and buildings, that would be a great boost to the
economy of the neighborhoods. I find it hard to conceive of the
Government giving away $11 billion to any group, but this was done and
it has never been discussed.
Congress, I thought, would at least have hearings on it, when we
first brought it up as a result of an article which appeared on the
first page of the Washington Post, which talked about the $11 billion
which had been forgiven in loans. They talked about four or five of the
recipients of the loans that had been forgiven. They talked about the
fact that they were millionaires. Several were multimillionaires that
have been the recipients of this generosity of the American taxpayers.
I thought we would have hearings. I thought--you know, Whitewater is
dealing with $60 million. We are talking about $11 billion.
I thought we would be inundated with hearings, the Committee on
Agriculture, the Committee on Ways and Means, the Committee on
Appropriations. I thought all the committees would want to know how was
$11 billion of the taxpayers' money forgiven, and why were millionaires
involved in receiving these loan forgivenesses, the generosity of the
loans, and what was the criteria. You still find it sort of like the
savings and loan swindle. It is one of those things that got swept
quickly under the rug. All our numerous media outlets and commentators
and analysts, all of a sudden they just lost interest and it never
surfaced. To this day it has not surfaced.
So anything related to agriculture has been sort of mysterious, and
it has sort of been out of the reach of ordinary people. For that
reason I was quite pleased that we made the breakthrough, and yesterday
for the first time the Congress came to grips with the corporate
welfare program that feeds agribusiness. We ought to be applauded. It
was a bipartisan activity. I hope that it certainly continues.
My frustration began some time ago, and I thought I would go back and
take a look at some of the things that I had said over the past. One of
the items that I have placed in the Congressional Record to lament my
pain and suffering as a result of watching the agricultural lobby and
the agricultural complex ride herd over us, I went back and pulled it
out of the Congressional Record.
On July 20, 1990, I think it was the day after, I was very frustrated
when I saw on the floor a bill which was a very reasonable bill which
called for farmers, agribusiness earning more than $100,000 a year to
be dropped from the subsidy program. I thought that my colleagues who
were interested in saving money and streamlining Government and
guaranteeing that the waste would be removed and that every dollar
taxpayers pay would be spent wisely and efficiently and effectively, I
thought my colleagues would rally to that; but, you know, when the
gentleman from New York, Chuck Schumer and I proposed the bill, we were
shocked with the number of votes that we received. As a result of that,
I wrote my lament.
I am just going to re-read that, because today is February 29, 1996.
This was written July 20, 1990. I spoke at that time. I am quoting from
my entry into the Congressional Record: ``Mr. Speaker, during the
deliberations on the Schumer-Armey amendment,'' and it is very
interesting that at that time it was also a bipartisan attempt, and of
all people, you had the gentleman from New York, Chuck Schumer, the New
Yorker, on one end of the spectrum, with the gentleman from Texas, Dick
Armey, honestly waging war against waste in the U.S. Government through
the agriculture program.
I said: ``Mr. Speaker, during the deliberations on the Schumer-Armey
amendment to the Food and Agriculture Resource Act of 1990 (H.R. 3950),
I joined with a number of other colleagues in seeking to convince the
Congress that the time has come to use common sense and make some
reasonable changes in the farm subsidy program. Although numerous
changes are needed in the obsolete subsidy formulas, the amendment
proposed only one small correction. Farmers earning more than $100,000
in adjusted gross income would be dropped from the subsidy program and
would no longer be eligible for a government check of up to $50,000.
``Despite the fact that the authors of the amendment could prove that
no family farmers would be hurt; despite the fact that less than 3
percent of the present acreage would be impacted by the change; despite
the fact that it was demonstrated that the people in greatest need
within our country--the children, the homeless, and the unemployed--are
not eligible for $50,000 government checks; despite these and many
other illuminating facts, the Agriculture Committee refused to accept
the amendment. On a floor vote, the committee was overwhelmingly
supported by the Members of Congress.
``* * * it is obvious that we have learned nothing from the pattern
of massive waste in military spending and the monstrous giveaways to
the savings and loan crooks. ``There was a clear statement to the
electorate of America. Let the people suffer but we have to do our
deals.'' That was the statement.
I offered the following as a concession speech to the powerful
Agriculture Committee, and I added a little rap comment here which I
call Let the People Suffer.
Let the People Suffer
(A concession speech to the powerful Agriculture Committee)
Let the people suffer!
But we got to do our deals
When hungry babies holler
Make them swallow bitter pills.
We got to do our deals:
Family farmers are really quite rare
But lawmakers never despair
We let millionaires profit
From the myth that farmers are there.
Let the people suffer!
Subsidize fat farmers
Guarantee corrupt banks
Cut kids' anti-viral vaccinations
But we must maintain our tanks.
Let the people suffer!
They fully understand
Why all our foreign embassies
Are built to look so grand.
Let the people suffer!
Let the children feel the pain
Government can't do it all,
So leave the homeless in the rain.
Let the people suffer!
But we have to do our deals
Leadership lacking strong wills
Rule against creative minds
Then stumble into old binds
This budget is stale stew
Nothing is really new
Our current game Is still insane
The present message
Is too much the same:
Let the people suffer!
But we have to do our deals.
Mr. OWENS. Mr. Speaker, that was the result of my frustration on July
20, 1990. I am happy to report that some movement has taken place since
the awesome power of the Committee on Agriculture came down on that
amendment on that day before July 20, on July 19. The agriculture lobby
came down and squeezed the opposition to death. I think we got less
than 60 votes for that amendment, which said simply that any farmer
which had an adjusted gross income of $100,000 would not be eligible
for the subsidy program.
Then again on March 7, 1995, I wrote a piece, placed a piece in the
Congressional Record, which also reflected my continuing frustration
over the power of the agribusiness lobby and the agribusiness empire,
the agribusiness
[[Page H1627]]
industrial complex. On that day, Tuesday, March 7, 1995, I said: ``Mr.
Speaker, American agribusiness is one of the most successful industries
on the face of the earth. Due to the vision and foresight of the
Congress which enacted the legislation which created the land grant
colleges, the agricultural experiment stations, and the county agents,
government research and development made it possible for our farmers to
leap way ahead of the rest of the world. No other Nation's agricultural
industry is even close to the U.S. when it comes to farm output and
efficiency. Let us applaud the Department of Agriculture and all of the
nameless workers who over the years have done such a magnificent job in
supporting our farmers.
``But now, Mr. Speaker, most of that work has been done. The mission
has been accomplished. We have a monumental success and we can relieve
the taxpayers of the burden of helping the agriculture industry,
especially the rich corporate farmers. Let's have a means test and from
now on let's support only the few remaining poor farm families. Let's
stop the indiscriminate subsidies. Let's end the crop insurance. Let's
stop the special mortgages. Let's leave the marketplace alone and end
the crop subsidies and price supports. Let's get the fat farmers off
the dole. The time has come to drastically downsize the Department of
Agriculture. We must end farm welfare as we know it. We owe it to the
American taxpayers. In this Congress let us work hard to get fat
farmers off the dole.''
The following poem summarizes and conveys the seriousness of the
situation. I call it ``Farmers on the Dole.''
Farmers on the Dole
Republican patriots
Come play your role
Keep fat farmers
On the dole
Helping cuddly honey bees
Coddling cattle grazing fees
Meat a city orphan
Never eats
Dole for welfare
Dole for cheats
Congress sink your fork
Deep into Republican pork
Hypocrisy over all
Drives you up the wall
O beautiful spacious skies
Small town editorials
Festering full of lies
Farmers on the dole
Farmers on the dole
Hi-ho the dairytake
Rich farmers on the dole
Decades over
And over it repeats
Dole for welfare
Dole for cheats
The story's never told
About farmers on the dole
Seeds not sown
Wheat not grown
Plow the dollars
Deep in the dirt
Hide the shame
Cover hypocrisy's hurt
Farmers on the dole
Farmers on the dole
Confess to free money's role
Rich farmers on the dole
Mortgage the barn
Until it drops
Timid taxpayers
Insure the crops
Rural swindlers
High on the hog
Food for the homeless
Thrown to the dog
The story's never told
About farmers on the dole
Republican patriots
Come play your role
Keep fat farmers
On the dole.
Mr. OWENS. At that time, Mr. Speaker, there was a partisan defense of
farm subsidies. I am happy to report that yesterday on the floor that
partisan defense crumbled, and we had legislation, amendments being
offered by both sides of the aisle which sought to break through the
hypocrisy of corporate welfare for agribusiness.
Common sense is on the rise, you know. We should be pleased. In this
great democratic process, common sense raises its head from time to
time, and common sense is our greatest hope. If this great democracy of
ours is to endure, and I think it will endure, because of the fact that
built into the structure are opportunities for common sense to come
forward.
I think the fact that our legislators and Members of Congress have
gone home and spent several weeks at home had something to do with the
fact that there was a breakthrough and a recognition that agriculture,
the agribusiness, is corporate welfare, and that we should get off the
dole. Billions of dollars down the drain, billions of dollars down the
drain, in contradiction of marketplace, the marketplace economy; a
command structure similar to the Soviet Union's command structure. The
problem is the Soviet bureaucrats would end it.
But there is still much work to be done. Until we are able to deal
with farmers' home loan mortgages and other farm loans out there to the
tune of $10 billion or $11 billion that are going to be forgiven, we
have only begun to scratch the surface. I think we ought to cancel the
Whitewater hearings, cancel the hearings on the travel office at the
White House, cancel the hearings on the travel problem at the
Department of Energy.
I do not say there is not a problem there. I am not going to get
involved in trying to deal with the complexities of the White House
travel office and the fact that the spoils system, which has been
practiced for the entire time this Nation has existed, went into motion
in a very crude kind of way, and has become a big, big, problem.
Taxpayers' money should no longer be spent to probe the travel office
at the White House, when we have $10 billion or $11 billion outstanding
in the farm loan programs.
{time} 1730
We ought to focus. The same committee responsible for investigating
and probing in great detail the travel office problems, scandal,
whatever they want to call it, that same committee is responsible for
oversight for the Department of Agriculture loan programs. In fact, I
first learned of the great outstanding number of delinquent loans in
the farmers' home loan mortgage program and other programs as a member
of that committee sitting there and hearing them talk about it. I was
almost certain that we would have a return of the people who were there
from the Department of Agriculture to tell us more about all of those
billions of dollars, all those billions of dollars of outstanding
loans.
It seems that there are certain places in our United States
Government and our executive branch and here in Washington where
billions of dollars misused, abused do not matter. You have $60 million
at stake in Whitewater. The taxpayers have to shell out $60 million as
a result of the collapse of the Whitewater bank, a savings and loan
venture which, in the constellation of savings and loan operations, was
tiny, you know. We had one that collapsed that owed the taxpayers $2
billion. The taxpayers had to bail it out for $2 billion. One in
Denver, CO, almost $2 billion.
Quite a few collapsed for almost $1 billion, another $900 million. We
have a whole lot of savings and loan collapses that we have not even
discussed that we ought to be really examining. But the committee chose
to deal only with Whitewater for some reason.
I said before I had a report, one of several reports that has been
done on the savings and loan scandal, and one is the Department of
Justice Financial Institution Fraud Special Report put out by the
special counsel for financial institution fraud. And they give actual
case histories in here, case highlights of things that happened during
the saving and loan investigations and the kind of results that they
got.
There is a piece in here, a case history, on Charles Keating. It is
called ``The High-Flying Financier.'' Charles Keating, sentenced to
over 12 years in order to pay $122.4 million for costing the taxpayers
$2 billion. Keating was sentenced to 12 years and ordered to pay $122.4
billion. And it goes on to tell in summary what happened to Keating.
Then there are other examples of great amounts of money lost, and
finally what happened in most cases, we lost the money as taxpayers and
it was not recovered.
Keating will stay in jail for less than 12 years, and when he gets
out, he will find a way to pay some of his $122.4 million. I am sure he
has money salted away in various places, and he will live happily ever
after. But he is one of the few that was even prosecuted. He is
certainly one of the very few in the billionaire category that received
a jail sentence. So there is a lot of unfinished business that we
should be addressing in Congress in order to deal with the fair
dispensation of the taxpayers' money.
[[Page H1628]]
I do not want to dwell on that too long. I just want to make the
connection between the excesses in the agribusiness and the corporate
welfare subsidies for agribusiness and the other excesses that our
Government, we have permitted, and now common sense is moving to
address. I mentioned common sense before, I think, in connection with
the phenomenon that has happened in the Republican primaries.
Normally I do not comment on the other party's primaries and I will
minimize my comments. But the phenomenon of Pat Buchanan is everybody's
business because Mr. Buchanan offers a very unusual development. A new
dynamic has taken place within the Republican primary, and part of that
dynamic relates to the fact that only Mr. Buchanan among the candidates
has bothered to talk about what has been happening to workers in
America, what is happening with respect to the average middle-class
family. The Republican majority speaks incessantly about its concern
for families. ``Families'' is a code word used over and over again in a
thousand different ways. But when it comes to the economic security of
families, the economic opportunity for families, what Mr. Buchanan has
demonstrated is that there is a great vacuum. There is no discussion
out there of the insecurity that families feel, that middle-class
families now feel.
I have a great proportion of my district of people who are poor,
working-class people who were actually quite poor and they felt
insecurity all their lives. In certain communities in this country, the
Depression never went away. It has been there since 1930, and the pain
and the struggle is there on an ongoing basis. But there are large
numbers of middle-class families, both black and white and various
ethnic groups, middle-class families who have been enjoying a measure
of security. They worked at a plant 15 years. 20 years, they could look
forward to staying there and retiring and being able to spend their old
age comfortably. They could look forward to having their children come
behind them and get similar jobs, and it went on for a couple of
generations. But now the person has worked there for 15, 20 years,
finds that there is a threat to their pension funds. They cannot even
look forward to retiring without problems, or they are suddenly
dismissed at just the point where they qualify for the pension funds.
All kinds of tricks are played and that dream is shattered. Then many
others find that they will not get close to the retirement age because
the streamlining and downsizing has begun to take place in large
corporate organizations.
Streamlining, downsizing, is said to be necessary in order to make
corporations more efficient, more effective. Streamlining and
downsizing are necessary in order to maximize profits so that on Wall
Street the stock offerings will be more attractive. Streamlining and
downsizing accomplish all of those things, of course. Streamlining and
downsizing is really seldom for the purpose of ending a structure,
eliminating positions. Actually, they are going to hire new workers in
most places. They are going to hire workers at much lower wages. They
are going to hire workers that do not have seniority and have not
accumulated certain benefits. Many of the downsizing and streamlining
organizations are going to hire, rehire workers, but they are going to
rehire them at much lower wage levels. Others are not going to rehire
workers in the United States. They are going to hire workers in foreign
countries. They are going to hire workers in Mexico. They are going to
hire workers in Bangladesh. They are going to contract out to China
certain parts of their processes. Whatever the reason, there is a great
dislocation in the economy created as a result of the behavior of these
corporations. The Democrats know it, Republicans know it. Members of
Congress certainly know it. And yet we have not placed it high on the
agenda. Oh, yes, there are some Members of Congress who have placed it
high on the agenda. It is the leadership, it is the majority who have
not. But the Progressive Caucus for some time has been talking about
the need for a jobs program, a job creation program, a job training
program. We have been talking for some time about that. We put
legislation in.
One of the first questions I was asked by my constituents was where
is the Democratic program? Why doesn't somebody match Pat Buchanan's
interests and his concern? Why doesn't somebody indicate that they
understand that there is a wage gap, there is an income gap that keeps
growing; that while 10 or 20 percent of Americans are making more than
they made for great amounts, their incomes are escalating, they are
getting more wealthy all the time. The rest of the 80 percent are in a
stagnant position, they cannot gain on the cost of living. Cost of
living is way ahead of them. Insecurity is there for a good reason.
Those who have jobs are actually not able to maintain the standard of
living they had before. Those who have jobs are very anxious about
their ability to keep those jobs.
We have been aware of this, and there are many voices raised that are
concerned. Certainly David Bonior here in this House among the
Democrats led the attack on NAFTA and the consequences that NAFTA would
bring, and there were nearly 175 Democrats who consistently voted
against all provisions related to NAFTA, and then they followed the
same pattern with GATT. We understood that NAFTA and GATT were being
stampeded through in order to guarantee that there was a minimum
discussion of consequences. NAFTA and GATT, we knew, would bring
problems. Not all of us. I think most of us were not trying to turn
back the clock and back away from the globalization of the world's
economy. Most of us were not trying to turn back the clock, as Pat
Buchanan wants to do, and throw a ring around the United States, build
walls, tariff walls, and resort to measures that are kind of crude and
would maybe do more harm to the economy of this country as well as the
world than they would do good. Not all of us, not most of us were
concerned about those kinds of measures. We were concerned about the
fact that the steamrolling of NAFTA and GATT would result in a
dislocation for large numbers of American workers. We were concerned
about the fact that nobody was willing to discuss building into the
provisions for NAFTA and GATT some safety nets for workers in terms of
education, in terms of opportunity. We were concerned about the fact
that the technological revolution which rolls on, technological
revolution which is fueled by the taxpayers' research and development
efforts 20, 30 years ago, that that technological revolution would be
to the benefit of a handful of people and that no provision would be
made for the other people, the other Americans who certainly
participated and were a critical part of the process of creating the
technology which is so beneficial to the telecommunications industry
and the computer industry and the information industry. We were
concerned about the fact that human beings and human resources were the
lowest thing on the list of the people that were pushing for the
approval of NAFTA and the approval of GATT.
We were right. The problems have only been compounded. And now as the
problems are compounded and workers found an opportunity, middle-class
people who are concerned found an opportunity to express it, even one
election in New Hampshire, immediately we have some visibility for the
issue. Immediately there is a discussion on ``Nightline,'' there is a
discussion on all the Sunday talk shows, everybody suddenly has
discovered there is a problem in America. There is a problem of
anxiety. There is a problem of insecurity. There is a problem of seeing
no effort to deal with the losers. There is a problem with the concept
of inevitable losers. The people who negotiated GATT and the people who
negotiated NAFTA will tell you, well, we knew there would be losers.
There will be some workers who are going to lose their jobs, some
entrepreneurs put out of business. There are going to be losers.
What is happening now is that the losers are revolting and saying we
did not volunteer to lose. We have not accepted the status of losers
quietly. We are Americans. We helped to build this country. We helped
to build this economy and we do not want to be thrown overboard
casually by people who say there have to be some losers.
Now, there are nations and there are economies, there are societies
that do not accept the theory that there have to be losers. They do not
accept that
[[Page H1629]]
theory in Japan. You want to know the difference between the Japanese
negotiators at the table dealing with GATT or dealing with bilateral
trade agreements between the United States and Japan? The great
difference is that every one of the negotiators from Japan knows that
they are at the table to protect every strata of their society. They do
not want to have losers. When they negotiate agreements, they are
protecting small merchants, they are protecting categories of workers.
The pattern of Japan has been quite pronounced. It is not a subtle
thing anymore. Everybody knows that Japan negotiates to protect its own
interest and it considers its human beings, the workers, the merchants,
the small business people, the corporations, you know, but mainly the
folks who need the most protection are the small business people.
{time} 1745
Consumer prices are very high in Japan. The price of a pear or an
apple or a piece of fruit is very high. The price of rice is very high.
You know, it is a commodity that everybody needs and uses. They keep
certain prices high, and they keep certain things in place in order to
guarantee that certain classes of people are not ever in need of a
safety net. They erect barriers in terms of inspection of our products,
in terms of licensing, in terms of requirements of safety. They do all
kinds of things to keep our products from flowing in rapidly into their
market, because they are protecting their people. They do not want
losers.
Japan probably does it better and has done it better than any other
economy. But they certainly do it in France, they do it in Germany. The
negotiators at the table who are negotiating GATT for all the other
countries, or NAFTA for all the other countries, they made certain
their people were protected. So we do not want to accept the premise
that there have to be losers. The losers happen to live in my district.
I do not want to be the district where the losers are. They have been
losers for too long in the 11th Congressional District in New York.
They have been losers for too long in Brownsville. They have been
losers for too long in Bedford-Stuyvesant. They have been losers for
too long.
I would like to have a government dedicated to the proposition that
we want to protect them as much as we want to protect corporate
interests.
So what I am saying is nothing new. We were aware of the problem, and
we have introduced legislation. I myself introduced several pieces of
legislation, and one of them I introduced at the request of the
progressive caucus. The progressive caucus has worked on the problem of
insecurity among workers, of dislocation of workers, lack of jobs, for
some time, and we developed a whole set of legislation.
One of the pieces that I was asked to introduce was the Job Creation
and Invest in America Act of 1995, the first year of the 104th session
of Congress. I introduced the Job Creation and Invest in America Act of
1995. That is there with a proposal for creating jobs in every area,
for dealing with the needs that exist in our economy, for
infrastructure changes, infrastructure improvement, surface
transportation improvement, aviation improvements, railroads. We go
into the nonphysical sector and deal with the need for postsecondary
education training lifelong learning and the need to fund that and
provide jobs in that area while you are providing more services, the
need for early childhood, youth and families to be taken care of, the
need to improve the health and environment. It was a comprehensive
bill, came out to a lot of money.
But at the same time we were preparing this bill, we read Japan had
proposed a bill similar. It is a stimulus. It is a stimulus bill, a job
creation, a job training bill, an education bill all wrapped in one.
But overall it is a stimulus package. Japan introduced a stimulus
package at the same time, and their economy is much smaller than ours,
for $90 billion. They have introduced a $90 billion stimulus package,
which was going to do similar things, focus on improving their
infrastructure, because when they improve railroads and highways and
airports, they know that it is going to redound to the benefit of the
economy eventually anyhow. So it is not a waste.
So Japan was doing something similar. But we were not without ideas
here in Congress. The progressive caucus and myself have repeatedly
discussed after the introduction of this bill ways in which some
portion of this stimulus package might be introduced.
There is a Federal Housing Trust Fund Act that I introduced which
called for some new ways to get affordable housing by changing the way
we finance housing, low-income housing, and it would create jobs as
well as create housing.
There is a Creative Revenues Act that I introduced, Economic and
Educational Opportunities Act, several acts that I have introduced and
other people have introduced which deal with education and deal with
job training. And, of course, the Congressional Black Caucus
alternative budget focused primarily on opportunity, job opportunity,
job training, and education.
We had a 25-percent increase in the education budget bill into our
Congressional Black Caucus alternative budget. We were pleased when the
President announced that he, too, would make education a priority, and
there is a great increase, I think, in the President's first 7-year
budget. He had $47 billion in increases for job training and education
over a 7-year period. I was quite pleased.
I was shocked, then, when I found out, of course, just before we went
on recess, that an agreement had been made for an extension, continuing
resolution, which actually agreed to the cuts that the Republicans had
proposed for certain critical education programs. They cut title I by
$1.1 billion by saying that it had to come in at 75 percent; it could
operate only at 75 percent of previous funding. That was a 25-percent
cut.
They cut Head Start. They cut other programs. The Summer Youth
Employment Program is still a shadowy kind of commitment. We do not
know exactly how much money is there for it, and I mention these
programs over and over again because they are critical. They are very
important.
If we do not have job training programs, as meager as the Summer
Youth Employment Program, job training and provision of income for the
lowest-income families in the country, if we do not have that, then we
are not moving at all to fill up the vacuum that Pat Buchanan has
exposed.
The least we could do is keep programs alive which exist already. The
least we could do is to energize our job training programs that are
already in existence while we try to convince the Congress and
everybody related that we need a massive education program, we need a
massive job training program, we need a massive undertaking to deal
with the fact that we are in a transition.
We need a program which deals with something as basic as minimum
wage. You know, that is a tiny step. If we cannot get a massive
response to the kind of dislocation and anxiety that exists, then
certainly we ought to take a small step. The meager step of an increase
in the minimum wage, common sense says that we ought to do that.
All of the polls taken in this country have shown repeatedly that
Americans favor an increase in the minimum wage. They want to move the
minimum wage from $4.25 an hour up in various parts of the country; it
varies as to how they want to move it.
But the meager proposal, the basic rock-bottom, proposal made by
Congressman Gephardt, our minority leader, that has also been endorsed
by the White House, has been an increase of 45 cents an hour per year
for 2 years, 90 cents an hour over a 2-year period.
Now, the least we could do for our workers is to indicate that we
recognize that $4.25 an hour is no way to try to earn a living in this
present economy. That comes out to about $8,400, I think, a year for a
person who is working 40 hours a week. And you bring home $8,400 gross
pay, you cannot support a family on that.
But common sense says we ought to change it. Why does the Congress
not listen to common sense? When are we going to have a breakthrough.
I am optimistic now. We had a breakthrough yesterday. Suddenly, we
could see that corporate subsidy for agribusiness is bad, suddenly we
do not want to face the American people again and try to convince them
we should pay farmers who earn $100,000 or more,
[[Page H1630]]
$50,000, for doing nothing. Suddenly, we made that break. I am
optimistic.
I think in the next 30 to 60 days we may have some real movement on a
minimum wage increase. The power of common sense is pushing from the
bottom. The power of common sense says that no legislator can stand
before his constituents and make an argument with a straight face that
the minimum wage should not be raised.
I know there are some legislators, some Members of Congress who have
said that the minimum wage will be raised ``over my dead body.'' There
are others who said we cannot afford to raise the minimum wage because
you are competing with the workers in Mexico, we are competing with
workers in Bangladesh and China. Common sense says in this economy, if
you are going to have some kind of semblance of order and law and
justice, you ought to pay people a little bit more than $4.25 an hour.
Common sense has broken through at the local level. There is an
article here that states, and this is from the Wall Street Journal of
Friday, February 23, ``Minimum wage issue heads to the ballot box.
Supporters of an increase skirt the unfriendly Congress.''
What they are saying in this article in the Wall Street Journal on
February 23, 1996, is that in towns and cities and States people are
taking steps to increase the minimum wage. They are disgusted with the
lack of concern and the failure to act on the part of Congress. So you
have, in a place like California, a coalition of unions and community
groups gathering signatures to place a measure on the November ballot
that would raise the minimum wage, which is now $4.25, to $5 in March
1997 and $5.75 a year later. That is an issue being brought, an
initiative being brought in California.
In Idaho, the State AFL-CIO has filed an initiative to raise the
minimum wage, now $4.25 an hour, by 50 cents for each of the 4 years
beginning July 1, 1997. A separate bill to raise the minimum wage has
been introduced in the State legislature. The AFL-CIO has filed the
initiative. They are going to try to get the voters to do it. The State
legislature has gone ahead in Idaho to file a bill to raise the minimum
wage.
In Minnesota, the State legislature is considering a measure to raise
the minimum wage, now $4.25, to $5.35.
In Missouri, the community group ACORN is gathering signatures for a
State initiative in November that would raise the minimum wage, now
$4.25, to $6.25 an hour in January 1997 and by at least 15 cents
annually thereafter.
In Montana, a coalition of labor and community groups is collecting
signatures to place a proposal on the November ballot to raise the
minimum wage, now $4.25, for all workers to $6.25 an hour by the year
2000.
In Texas, a rare State in which cities hold authority over the
minimum wage, Texas, the cities actually govern the minimum wage,
signatures are being gathered in Texas for a November ballot initiative
in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, and El Paso to raise the base pay for
all workers in those cities from $4.25 to as much as $6.25.
In Washington, the State of Washington, Gov. Mike Lowry backed
legislation raising the minimum wage from the current $4.90 to $5.30 an
hour. But this month business interests killed the measure. Supporters
are likely to counter the business killing of the measure with a ballot
initiative for November.
Common sense is breaking through. The people are forging forward to
make this democracy work for all of the people. Common sense.
There is every reason to be optimistic that common sense will
prevail. It moves slowly, and there is a lot of suffering that takes
place because we have people in power who have been elected by the
people who do not have common sense. But common sense eventually breaks
through. Common sense has broken through, and common sense prevails in
a number of areas, like Medicare and Medicaid.
The people who want to cut Medicare and Medicaid will do so at their
own risk. The level of common sense is so great until they are likely
to punish those who disobey the loss of common sense and persist in
those cuts.
We should not have to have a demagog like Pat Buchanan to raise the
level of visibility for issues of this kind. We should not have to have
a demagog like Pat Buchanan to bring to our attention the fact that
here in Washington we are ignoring common sense. The Washington wisdom
is stuck in the rut. The Washington wisdom is obsolete.
Conventional wisdom here just does not seem to understand. The danger
of having a Pat Buchanan as the general on the white horse riding out
there to defend the interests of the middle class and the workers is
great, because this is a general who is a deceptive general. He does
not really care enough about the workers to provide the solutions to
the problems that he highlights. Pat Buchanan has raised the issue of
the income gap, but he does not want to deal with the problem of the
minimum wage. He is not proposing a raise in the minimum wage.
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Unless he has done so within the last 24 hours, Pat Buchanan has not
addressed the issue that we want a simple two-step increase in the
minimum wage. He is not dealing with that. Pat Buchanan is not dealing
with the fact that corporations are paying a very small percentage of
the total tax burden, the income tax burden. Corporations now pay about
11.4 percent versus the tax burden borne by individuals, which is at 44
percent.
He talks about corporations taking jobs overseas, which we applaud.
We applaud him for his ability to command the media and make the media
pay attention to the injustices and the foolishness, the wrecking of
the economy that takes place as a result of taking jobs overseas while
you do not deal with compensating workers, while you do not deal with
the adjustments necessary and the kind of transition program that you
need.
Pat Buchanan does not really deal with the workers in this country in
terms of the environmental laws that are necessary, in terms of the
attack by his party on the Occupational Safety and Health Act. He does
not deal with the need to guarantee that workers are safe. He does not
deal with the Striker Replacement Act, the fact that the right to
strike has been abrogated, almost wiped out, by the striker replacement
phenomena taking place across the country where management replaces
strikers. Although they have the right to strike, collective bargaining
is a right under law, if the strikers can be replaced, how can we argue
that they have a right to strike?
So Pat Buchanan is not the answer. So I close by indicating that the
hypocrisy of Mr. Buchanan when it comes to concern for individuals and
concern for workers is revealed in his own statements. He has not
denounced himself, he has not walked away from his own statements that
have been repeatedly made.
The people on the bottom are of no concern to Pat Buchanan. I have a
number of quotes. I do not have time for all of them. In the days ahead
we should pay attention to what Pat Buchanan has said about justice, we
should pay attention about what Pat Buchanan has said about immigrants,
about African-Americans, and understand that this general on a white
horse will lead the troops into great danger. This general on a white
horse does not care about the majority of American people. This general
on a white horse waves a flag that is a hypocritical flag.
Certainly when it comes to African-Americans, Pat Buchanan, according
to the Daily News of October 1, 1990, made it quite clear where he
stood. He was a White House advisor to President Nixon at that time,
and in a memo to President Nixon about the visit to Coretta King, who
was the widow, of course, of Martin Luther King, on the anniversary of
the assassination, Pat Buchanan advised Nixon not to visit Mrs. King.
He said a visit to Mrs. King would ``outrage many, many people who
believe Dr. King was a fraud and a demagog and perhaps worse. Others
consider him the Devil incarnate. Dr. King is one of the most divisive
men in contemporary history.''
That quote appears in the New York Daily News on October 1, 1990.
Buchanan has repeatedly insisted that Ronald Reagan did so much for
affirmative action that civil rights groups no longer need to exist.
Pat Buchanan said, ``George Bush should have told the NAACP
Convention that black America has grown up,
[[Page H1631]]
that the NAACP should close up shop, that its members should go home
and reflect on John F. Kennedy's aspiration, `Ask not what your country
can do for you, but rather ask what you can do for your country.' ''
That quote is in his syndicated column of July 26, 1988.
There are many, many quotes that show that Pat Buchanan is not the
person to lead the people who are suffering in America, those who are
insecure and uncertain. You cannot be led by a demagog who makes these
kinds of statements and called Capitol Hill ``Israeli-occupied
territory'' in the St. Louis Dispatch in October, 1990. He referred to
Capitol Hill as ``Israeli-occupied territory.''
In a 1977 column, Buchanan said despite Hitler's antisemitism and
genocidal tendencies, he was an ``individual of great courage. Hitler's
success was not based on his extraordinary gifts alone. His genius was
an intuitive sense of the mushiness, the character flaws, the weakness
masquerading as morality that was in the hearts of the statesmen who
stood in his path.'' The Guardian of January 14, 1992, is the source of
that quote.
I cite all of these because we are at least making the breakthrough
on the issues. But the issues would be thoroughly confused, the issues
that relate to working people, the issues of concerns to those people
who are experiencing anxiety and who are the victims of the
dislocation, the people suffering because our Government is guilty of
great waste.
Our Government is guilty of continuing corporate welfare for
agribusiness, guilty of continuing to overfund the defense industry.
Our Government is guilty of continuing to fund an overbloated CIA that
loses $2 billion in its petty cash fund. Our Government is continuing
to not pay attention to the kind of priorities that common sense has
set forth.
Common sense says we should put more money into education, we should
not be cutting title I by $1.1 billion. We should not be cutting Head
Start, we should not be dillydallying around with the Summer Youth
Employment Program. Common sense says we ought to maximize our programs
for educational opportunity. Common sense says we ought to maximize our
job training programs. Common sense says we ought to pay attention to
the fact that a technological revolution is going to cause a lot of
suffering, and no one has a right to make a judgment that some people
are expendable, that some people should be thrown overboard, that in
the process of streamlining and downsizing, either the Government or in
the private sector, human beings do not matter. Common sense says no.
I am happy that common sense is on the rise. That common sense in the
final analysis will save this democracy. This Nation will probably
endure for 1,000 years because of the fact that there is a process
built in which allows common sense to percolate and allows common sense
to rise to the top. Ever so slowly the process takes place, but it is
underway, and I think that it will have an impact; a revolution that is
underway, pushed by the Republican majority, will hear from the people
out there who will fall back on the wisdom of common sense. That common
sense will prevail.
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