[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 58 (Wednesday, May 1, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H4387-H4393]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE REPUBLICAN VISION FOR AMERICA
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the
gentleman from California [Mr. Radanovich] is recognized for 60
minutes.
Mr. RADANOVICH. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to come
speak to the American people regarding the important issues of the day,
and I would like to start off by commenting on how important words are,
I think in conveying messages. In my short term here in Congress, I am
a freshman, I have been here a little over a year, I have learned a
couple of vital things, and that is that we have to be very, very
careful about the words that we say to make sure that they are
communicating exactly what we mean to the American people, because
words are very important.
It is in that spirit that I offer the following vision, in an attempt
to determine a way to communicate to the American people the role and
the mission of the Republicans here in Congress. If we can say things
and put them down into easily understandable terms, using very symbolic
figures, it can go a long way to explaining to the American people how
we would like to go and where we would like to take this country. It is
in that spirit that I offer this following vision.
Let me use the simple symbol of a chair to illustrate where we are in
America and I think where the Republican Congress would like to take
this country. In starting with something such as this, I think it kind
of illustrates where America is right now. I believe that before we can
entrust or get the American people's trust in following us, we have to
accurately describe where America is right now, and this portrait of
this chair is a good illustration of American society. So welcome to
America.
Basically we have an unstable chair, something that does not provide
very much freedom, something that does not provide very much security.
This is really the condition of our country right now, I believe. You
will notice the chair has four legs, but the problem is that none of
the legs are the same size as the other legs on the chair.
Look at the government leg, way too long. Look at the family leg. It
would be very easy to sell the argument to
[[Page H4388]]
the American people that the family unit has basically been decimated
over the last 30, 40 years with the notions of the Great Society and
the Great Society mentality that this Congress has been operating under
over the last 40 years. Business institutions and religious and civic
institutions in this country are not operating up to their fullest
capacity because of the large leg that knocks everything out of
proportion and creates much instability and insecurity in the society.
Take the next chart to further illustrate this in a different way,
and that is by saying I think that it is safe to state that in America
today our institutions are disproportionate to one another, and that is
the basis or the cause of a lot of our civil and financial problems in
this country.
You will notice in the government institution, of all dollars spent
on government, 70 percent of those dollars are spent at the Federal
level, 30 percent of those dollars are spent at the State and local
level.
Religious institutions and business institutions, as I mentioned, are
not operating at full capacity due to overtaxation and regulation and
problems with civic institutions that do not really fill their proper
role in society, that basically have been taken over by the government
institution.
The family institution has been decimated over the last 30 years.
There are two ways that we can solve this problem, because we believe
that the American people sent us to Congress in this wave of the 1994
election to solve the problem of the reality that I just described.
There are two ways that we can solve the problem.
This is not the way to do it. This somewhat illustrates the current
efforts that we have been going through during the last year with our
great deal and our determination to downsize Federal Government. What
we failed to do, though, in chopping off certain responsibilities and
lopping them out of the government sector, is to take into
consideration how the downsizing of Federal Government would have an
effect on the other institutions in the American society.
Now, I will say that Lyndon Johnson said it right. When he began to
campaign for the Great Society in the early 1960's, he said ``Great
Society.'' He did not say ``great government,'' even though that is
what he did. He tried to solve all of society's problems through a
great government, and it ended up getting us $5.5 trillion worth of
debt and expanded the ranks of the poor and needy.
Everything that government got into basically in many of the areas of
our lives has made the problems worse, not better. So I think what the
Republicans need to learn is that in addition to our concept of
downsizing, we have to think in terms of relationships, of how to build
these other institutions in this country so that they can begin to
fulfill some of the obligations that we feel government should no
longer be in.
If Members would like to do it like this, we have a helter-skelter
approach. It is not good for this country. Basically this is the result
of a negative message, and anti-Great Society message, an
antigovernment message.
I think what we would like to do, the Republicans would like to do,
is to paint an accurate picture of what America would look like after
using the balanced budget process as a blueprint to get to a better
America. That can be accomplished, I believe, in two ways. One is
through the legislation that we would be accomplishing on the House
floor and in the Senate and through the White House, and the other
would be to illustrate how the issue of personal responsibility ties
into the reestablishing of the family institutions and the downsizing
of Federal Government.
If we are to downsize Federal Government and take into consideration
its effect on the other institutions in this country, and also build
these other institutions up so that they are able to receive these
responsibilities that we therefore determine are no longer the
responsibility of the Federal Government, then it should occur in some
of the following examples such as this:
There are many who believe that once government entered into the
social programs, that they actually made them worse. The war on poverty
is not over. There is more poverty since war was declared on poverty by
the Federal Government in the early 1960's. Many of the concepts of the
Good Samaritan I think people agree are found in scripture, not in the
Constitution. They are better met by civic and religious institutions
in this country.
We should begin designing tax overhaul problems in relationship to,
with the objective, I should say, of shifting that responsibility from
the institution of government over to civic and religious institutions.
By that I mean providing generous deductions for contributions made to
not only church groups but civic groups, nonprofit groups, private
charities, anybody, any group that takes care of the poor and needy, so
that as this fulfillment of that need to care for the poor and needy
expands in this civic and religious institution, the social programs of
the government are correspondingly reduced so that we can have a
phaseout of government's participation, but the need is met and even
met more effectively in this institution that begins to rebuild this
one.
Deregulation and tax relief, a mantra of the Republican Party, and
justifiably so, will reduce the amount of overhead of the Federal
Government. Regulation costs money, and they have to raise taxes in
order to make the money in order to pay for the increased regulation of
government. That is, as it is shifted down, it begins to rebuild the
business institution because business can expand when they get tax and
regulation relief, so we have a downsizing of that institution and a
beginning of the rebuilding of the business institution.
Third, an example of education and how much it can rebuild the family
institutions is by making the point that the education system in this
country must be answerable to the family unit, because parents are
ultimately responsible for the education of their children, and not the
government. I do not mean that everybody in this country should be home
schoolers. What I do mean is that through local control of education,
not Federal control, by the abolishment of the Department of Education,
returning responsibility back to the community level, local control or
a voucher system puts that responsibility back onto the family unit, so
our parents can have more after choice in their child's education. It,
too, reduces the amount of government.
{time} 2230
On the issue of localizing, you have today 70 percent of all total
dollars spent on the Federal Government, you have like laws that are
current State level, and also local level. So it is to the benefit if
you take all these programs and push them back down to the State level
by block granting. Or if you push them down at the local level by
further block granting to counties, you begin to reduce the amount of
government by reducing the Federal Government's role in these problems,
but still having government obligations met at the State and local
level.
Mr. Speaker, these are indications of how we start downsizing in such
a way that we begin to rebuild these institutions.
I want to make one point, and that is that we have begun to get some
rebuilding of these institutions. But they are not operating at the
full capacity that they could, and this will never occur at their full
capacity without the issue of personal responsibility, which is the
next slide, if you would like to go ahead and put that up there.
The issue of raising the conscience of the American people is really
a very important key in bringing stability and actually recreating a
free society in America, and that is not a role of the government
institution. It is the role of religious institutions.
Now, civic organizations can take care of poor and needy, but it is
the responsibility of the churches across the land to begin to raise
the conscience of the American people so that they, the American
people, can begin to operate effectively in these other institutions.
By raising the conscience of the American people, it allows their
capacity through religious and civic institutions to take over the
social programs in this country. By raising the conscience of the
American people in the family institution, it encourages personal
responsibility so that parents are better parents, kids are better
kids, marriages are not conducted frivolously, divorces are not
conducted frivolously, people actually take serious responsibility
within the family institution.
[[Page H4389]]
Raising the conscience of the American people allows the business
institution to expand through two things, by encouraging less lawsuits
and by the establishment of peer review. By peer review I mean that
doctors police doctors, lawyers police lawyers, like-minded business
policies like-minded business so that peer review, those of us judging
each other, acts as a buffer between direct government control and no
government control at all. It provides a cost-effective way by
decreasing the cost of regulation, therefore decreasing taxes on
business, to allow that business institution to expand to its fullest
capacity.
So while you have downsized Federal Government, and the other issue
is through raising the conscience of the American people, it allows us
to flip this awkward percentage of large Federal, 70 percent being
spent by Federal Government, and 30 percent at State and local
governments, to be switched back down. Not only would we reduce the
size of government, but that which we do spend is returned, 70 percent
spent at the local level, 30 percent spent at the Federal level.
I cannot tell you how many times I heard on the House floor,
especially when we were talking about block granting crime money at the
local level, various Members standing up here, and we were arguing for
no strings attached, let the local people decide how best to take care
of crime in their various districts and people arguing that you simply
cannot trust those local elected officials because they will go spend
it on something else. My statement is, by raising the conscience of the
American people, we can give more responsibility to elected officials
in this country so that we can begin to attack the arrogant assumption
that the only elected officials that you can trust are the 536 that are
in Washington right now.
Through this idea I think what we begin to get is a proper vision of
where we would like to take this country through a balanced budget
process. And it is pretty much described in this one, which I call a
free society, and that is where a Federal Government's role in this
country is in equal proportion to the other institutions that form
American society so that government is equal to religion, is equal to
family, is equal to business. Not only that, but in a government
institution the Federal Government's role in total spending is back to
30 percent, State and local control is the larger share of 70 percent.
Throughout history we have faced times of disproportionate
institutions. Our country was developed because of the overly
repressive monarchy in England, and that is what caused this
disproportionate system for the Pilgrims to come to this new land.
During the Industrial Revolution the business institution was
disproportionate in its influence to other institutions in this
country. During the inquisitions, an early church period, the religious
institutions were far too disproportionate to the other institutions in
this country. And in the last hundred years, through socialism,
Communism, fascism we have experienced disproportionate government over
the other institutions in this country. And in America we felt the
ancillary effects of that through the Great Deal and also the Great
Society.
So this is the vision of America: this is a free society. It provides
the maximum amount of freedom and security for Americans so that they
can go on to begin to pursue life, liberty and happiness with the
surest amount and the greatest of success. What you end up with in
relationship to my first slide was the result of that, and you can go
ahead and change those, and that is a chair that works, a chair much
like society in that both of them provide freedom and security so that
you may sit in a chair, discuss, read, go about your business, and
government is constructed in such a way that people can pursue life,
liberty and happiness and not worry about insecurities or lack of
freedoms.
Mr. Speaker, this is the vision of the Republican Party. This is a
free society. This is when government is no longer any bigger than the
religious institutions and civics institutions in this country, no
longer bigger than the family institutions who have been restored to
their full effectiveness, and no longer disproportionate to the
business institutions providing a firm foundation for us to live on and
experience the maximum amount of life, liberty and happiness in this
country.
So I submit that to the American people and appreciate the time.
I do have time and want to yield to my friend and colleague from
Maryland, Mr. Bob Ehrlich, who wants to begin a second portion of his
presentation. I also welcome my friend and colleague, the gentlewoman
from California, Andrea Seastrand. So, Bob, I want to switch over to
you and give you the magic wand, and I will be back up on that seat
there.
Mr. EHRLICH. I thank my colleague from California. I also officially
congratulate him upon his election to the presidency of the freshman
class, and I welcome our colleague from California. Very well put,
George, very well put.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to take the next half hour to engage my two
colleagues in a discussion of what we see happening in America today,
which is big labor bosses trying to buy themselves a Congress. I know
the gentlewoman from California has some very, very strong views on
this. I have taken the liberty actually of bringing my AFL-CIO report
card, and blowing it up, and bringing it to the floor of this House
because I know my two colleagues and I want to talk about exactly where
big labor bosses are coming from the distinction of big labor bosses
and how they have grown apart from the working folks in this country.
Mr. Speaker, what I would like to do, with the permission of my
colleagues, is go over, one by one, the major issues on this report
card. I am going to start with a favorite, and I know the president of
the freshman class, my friend, the gentleman from California [Mr.
Radanovich], is a businessman voting against an increase in the minimum
wage. We have just heard an hour of discussion concerning the merits of
raising the minimum wage. During that discussion I did not hear one
sentence uttered about the ultimate irony of raising the minimum wage
which is putting at risk marginal workers in this country out of work.
Every economic study I have ever seen, and, I submit, any economic
study folks on the other side of the aisle have seen, holds the same
result. When you raise the minimum wage, you automatically put x amount
of marginal workers, unskilled, untrained, disabled workers, out of the
work force, and that is compassion. That equals compassion. That is the
traditional assumption that this majority challenges on this floor
every day.
I know the gentlewoman from California would like to make a comment
about that.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Well, I would also say that we came here to do away
with unfunded Federal mandates, and if there was anything that was a
mandate, it is to increase the minimum wage, and it is just artificial.
I say, why not raise it to $10 or $25? Why stop?
Mr. EHRLICH. We could really be compassionate, let us get real
compassionate. Why not $20? Why not? We could put a lot more money in a
few workers' pockets, and we would cause an awful lot of unemployment.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Well, I think statistics have proven over the years
that a minimum wage will not create one job. Statistics prove that we
lose jobs for those very people that we are trying to help. And you
know none of us want to people to stay in a minimum wage job.
Mr. Speaker, I would just say my children, Curt and Heidi, worked
their way through high school and college with different jobs. They
depended on those minimum wages. You know, there are very few folks
that really wanted to give them more. They were training, they were
learning about getting to a job on time, learning what it meant to be
there and to follow some of the rules and some of the basics.
Many of these minimum wage jobs apply to students across this Nation,
both in high school and in college, and many of those students and
young people are the very people, the minority students and such, that
we are trying to help.
Mr. EHRLICH. Another irony at work here, and of course we have the
President of the United States acting in a very compassionate way in
this
[[Page H4390]]
election year, trying to sell the American people on the notion that he
supports an increase in the minimum wage. Yet it is words, it is these
words that keep rebounding against the President.
February 6, 1995, Bill Clinton: It, raising the minimum wage, is the
wrong way to raise the incomes of low-wage earners. In 1995, a
nonelection year; 1996, we see quite different words coming from this
White House.
The gentleman from California?
Mr. RADANOVICH. Mr. Speaker, my comment would be that the timing of
this issue, at least in my view, and I have to let you know where I am
coming from, and that is that basically I think that the establishment
of a minimum wage really is a violation of the separation of government
and business. I do not think that the Federal Government should be
involved in the establishment of a minimum wage, No. 1.
No. 2, this issue was raised, and the comment about the President
illustrates this point as a diversionary tactic, to divert the Nation's
attention away from the real business at hand in Washington. That is
balancing the Federal budget, getting our Federal act in order,
learning how we can privatize certain things that government does,
learning how we can localize.
This is a perfect example of things that probably should not be
discussed on this floor of this House, is better left at the State
level or even the local level for the establishment of minimum wages in
States.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. If the gentleman will yield, we are going to be
having an initiative on the ballot come November regarding the minimum
wage. If there was someplace to discuss it, it would be at the State
level.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out, I think the two gentleman
would agree with me, that the irony is the President was in control 2
years. He had a House, he had a Senate. They could have increased the
minimum wage, and instead we see comments such as on the board there,
and they failed to do it, and you are right, he did do it for just
getting us away from balancing the budget.
Mr. RADANOVICH. It is a political issue to divert attention away from
the more urgent business at hand, and that is balancing the budget.
Mr. EHRLICH. Mr. Speaker, I think there is a far larger point here
that I know many of us have discussed on the floor of this House.
Should not words have meanings, even in this town, even on Capitol
Hill, even in election years? It seems the institutional memory of this
administration is quite limited. If you listen to the State of the
Union, or you listen to this President, words simply have no meaning.
An eloquent speaker, a wonderful speaker, charismatic, great on TV, yet
the words are empty. The words have no meaning.
I think the American people want a little bit more out of their
elected officials, both in the executive branch and the legislative
branch. I know as I go door to door in the 2nd Congressional District
of Maryland, people tell me they want their Representative to actually
believe something.
It has become a traditional view of politics. You go get elected to
anything, the State legislature or the county council, the Congress of
the United States, President of the United States, because you actually
have principles, because you are carried forward to public service on
the philosophical foundation of things that you believe in and the
vision you have for the country.
Mr. Speaker, words should have meanings.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. If the gentleman would yield, you mentioned
principles. I know that, as we are discussing the minimum wage, we see
polls where we see across America that perhaps Americans would like to
see an increase in the minimum wage. But we came here as new Members to
this Congress trying to change the policy, and I do not know about you,
but I really cannot look at myself in the mirror to know that I hop on
something that is popular instead of standing here and trying to share
with the American people why this is not good policy and it is not
going to be helpful to those people that we all say that we want to
help.
{time} 2245
It is not the compassionate thing to do. In fact, it is going to have
the reverse. Here is an example where we might look at polls, but I
think all of us came here to do what is right and not just what is
correct for the next election.
Mr. EHRLICH. Which is a radical thought in this town. It is a radical
thought in this town that politicians would act on the basis of what
individually he or she believes is best for the country, and not on the
basis of what the latest poll would dictate.
Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, that is a radical thought in American
politics. As I campaigned in my district, and I know you both find the
same thing, people find that refreshing. They are stunned. Even people
that believe in this opportunity agenda in the Congress of the United
States still have a hard time believing that folks can go to Washington
with ideas, with a philosophy, debate that philosophy, pass that
philosophy, defend that philosophy, and actually believe in something,
and not what the latest poll should dictate.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, you have
your congressional report card there by the AFL-CIO. I just want to
share with the two gentleman here today that I have the AFL-CIO news
for April 22, and I will tell you, I made the front page, because I
also have a picture here of my congressional report card with Andrea
Seastrand. It is the same report card. I guess, as I said, I made the
front page. It says, ``Lawmakers don't make grade. Extremists feel the
sting,'' that is you and me, you know, and ``Ready Smear Campaign.''
I would like to share with you the fact that that is not what I am
hearing from the fellows and gals that belong to the unions in
California on the central coast of California. I would just like to
share the fact that I have a letter here from a gentleman from Santa
Maria. I had also received one from Templeton, and a lady who is a
firefighter from the northern end of the District, Atascadero, went on
television and was upset with the way she is seeing her dues being
spent.
This gentleman says: ``I see that the freshman congressional class is
a breath of fresh air. I praise you and your fellow congressional
Republicans for tackling head on many of the important issues of
today.'' He said:
I am a blue collar union member. Many in our union feel the
same as I do on national issues. I am a registered
Republican, but our leadership is rabid Democrat. They
seem blind to the destruction that liberalism is causing
our Nation. They use our dues without regard to if the
membership wishes to attack our party. Many of us wish we
could stop our leadership from attacking your platform,
but are powerless in a very undemocratic organization. I
understand these attacks on you must frustrate and anger
you, but I plead with you not to look on all blue collar
workers as mindless robots. We still vote our conscience.
Our contracts with management are the way we ensure a
decent standard of living and protection from abuse.
Please keep going.
I would just say, I am sure that is what you heard. They had an 800
number to call us, the ads on television from the AFL-CIO. I am sure my
colleagues from California and Maryland heard what I did. They used
that 800 number and said, ``Please, do not give up. We believe in what
the freshman class is doing. We believe in what this Congress is doing,
and do not believe that all union workers feel the way that
bureaucratic leadership in Washington, D.C. feels.''
Mr. EHRLICH. Mr. Speaker, I know the gentleman from California wants
to add a point, but I have to add just a quick observation. The only
thing left out of that letter, and that was very well written, was the
fact that also many Democrat members of unions who are blue collar, who
are conservatives, share that gentleman's views.
How ironic that the big labor bosses who want to buy this Congress,
who are lying to the American people every day, many of them live out
in nice valleys with big houses and make lots of money. I will bet you
they are the rich. I will bet you they are rich people, and we hear a
lot of demagoguery about class warfare and the rich on this floor.
I do not think, and I submit to the gentleman from California this
observation, I will bet you a lot of those big labor bosses who are
trying to buy this Congress make an awful lot of money, a heck of a lot
more than that gentleman who wrote the gentlewoman from California.
Mr. RADANOVICH. I believe that is the case, Mr. Speaker. I think,
too,
[[Page H4391]]
what the American people need to know when they are confronted with
what I call fearmongering like this, all the F's that were on the
report cards, and how you are against so many good things, reminds me
of a scene in a jungle somewhere where a group of people, say 10
people, get stuck in a murky old swamp and they are up to their armpits
in swamp water, and they are stuck in the mud and cannot get out. They
have been in there so long, and by the way, the Great Society is the
name of the swamp, and they are stuck in there and they cannot leave.
They have been there so long that they cannot think that there is
anything better than that swamp.
So finally a couple of people out of those 10 get the inspiration.
They see a hill, a shining hill, and want to begin to stir the efforts
of those to begin to get themselves out of the swamp, and you have
people full of fear, so used to being stuck in the swamp that they
cannot imagine anything different and do not want to take what even
might be a perceived risk to get out of the swamp and change to a
better country, which I call what the Republicans are trying to do.
That is a sad state of affairs when you have to defend the order that
we are in this country right now, because many people feel, and many
people believe that we indeed are stuck in a swamp. But many people
believe that they would love to be inspired by that shining hill and
make the journey out of the swamp and onto the hill. The people that
attack you the people that give you F's, are the same people saying let
us stay in the mud because we fear change. That is really what the big
sin is.
One more point that I want to make, too, on the issue of minimum
wage, standing up for families and seniors, and, you bad person who got
the F, educational opportunities. All of those things are good things,
but if we are going to change this country for the better, we have to
start answering the question: If those are things of value to me, to
Andrea, to Bob, to everybody in this country, if they are so valuable
to you, why on earth would you trust those things to a Washington
bureaucrat?
Mr. EHRLICH. Mr. Speaker, I would ask the gentleman, is that a
question?
Mr. RADANOVICH. Yes; answer me.
Mr. EHRLICH. The gentleman just used the term ``fear'' twice in the
last minute. That is a great lead-in to category 2, issue 2, standing
up for families and seniors. ``Ehrlich voted to slash Medicare and
Medicaid,'' my personal favorite whopper from the big labor bosses.
How many times have you heard the word ``extremist'' out there in
these ads? How many times have you heard the word ``slash,'' have you
seen the word ``slash'' from the big labor bosses?
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Or ``gut''?
Mr. EHRLICH. The last time I checked, under the Republican budget
reconciliation proposal, the Balanced Budget Act, Medicare spending per
beneficiary was to increase from $4,800 a year to $7,200 a year. Yet
they used the term ``slash and burn,'' and the fear and demagoguery.
But do you know what, I do not think it is going to work, because the
philosophical foundation of this tactic is that seniors are dumb. They
have to think that the seniors of this country are dumb; that they
cannot read; that the seniors will ignore the fact that the trustees
just last week, and we have a quote coming up, I know, from my trusty
assistant, reported just last week in the Washington Post, April 29,
1996: ``The Medicare trust fund that pays hospital bills for 39 million
elderly and disabled people will go bankrupt sooner and accumulate far
deeper deficits over the next decade than previously projected by the
trustees.''
Now, short-term political calculations, which have ruled this town
for 40 years, would dictate that the three of us ignore this language,
because you know what, that will get you reelected. The folks on that
side of the aisle know that. It kept one party in control of this town
for 40 years on the basis of fear and class warfare. But I do not think
that the seniors in the Second Congressional District of Maryland sent
me here to be a politician.
Mr. RADANOVICH. Mr. Speaker, I have a question. I hope I will get
some answers here. Was I not mistaken? Did you not say that the current
amount that a beneficiary gets from Medicare is about $4,800 a year?
Mr. EHRLICH. That is correct.
Mr. RADANOVICH. If I am to believe that you are slashing and burning
Medicare, my assumption then would be that we must be cutting that,
then, from $4,800 a year to, what, $2,300 or $2,200.
Mr. EHRLICH. Again, what was the budget figure that the Republicans
propose for the next 7 years? Was it an increase of $7,200 in the year
2002, which was very close to the President's number, by the way?
Mr. RADANOVICH. I am confused. Is that an increase?
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Mr. Speaker, apparently the gentleman from California
was brought up on new math. I would just say, we know there is a big
difference, and the big difference has had a big plus sign on it, so we
are actually increasing Medicare spending per beneficiary. We are also
going to take in more people into the system.
Mr. RADANOVICH. Excuse me, you two, but that is very extreme, I want
to tell you.
Mr. EHRLICH. There is that word again.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, I think,
too, we talk about the seniors, but also our union members back home
understand what we are trying to do. They are going to see through
this.
I have a copy here of one of our local Capitol newspapers, the Hill.
It says, ``Local unions take back in labor blitz.'' So the people back
home are taking a seat, going in the back seat, while the union bosses
here on Capitol Hill, big special interests that make those high-priced
salaries and such, they are the ones calling the shots on this
congressional report card. Our union people at home did not give this.
This came all from a PR firm here in Washington, DC. That is what we
are up against.
Mr. EHRLICH. Mr. Speaker, if the gentlewoman would yield, I know the
gentlewoman and the gentleman are both familiar with the poll that was
recently conducted, a nationwide poll of union members, workers, people
that built this country: horrible results for the big labor bosses. I
know the results, and I know my two colleagues are familiar with the
results, but I would like to share the results with the American people
tonight.
We are talking about union folks, working folks. Eighty-seven percent
support welfare that requires work and is of limited duration. They
also support a balanced budget amendment by a huge margin, with 82
percent of union folks in favor of a constitutional requirement that
Washington keep its fiscal house in order.
More than three-quarters of union families in this country voiced
their support for tax cuts for working families. Think about those
numbers. Demagogues hate facts. That is why the big union bosses who
love big government, who want to buy this Congress, issue ``report
cards'' such as this one. They cannot stand facts. They cannot stand
the light of day. They cannot stand the fact that people that work for
a living, people that built this country, are not bought and paid for
by the left wing of the Democratic party, as they are. That is why we
have these report cards. They just cannot stand it.
When we see poll results like this, it makes us feel pretty good,
does it not?
Mrs. SEASTRAND. What I found amazing about that survey is when
informed about those Washington union bosses here on the Hill, when
they found out, the union members back home found out that those bosses
took their union dues to more or less come up with this demagoguery,
the report card and the ads that are attacking us on television and
radio, 59 percent said they want to ask for a refund for their dues.
Mr. Speaker, the folks that picketed me on this one particular day,
it was interesting, because I found out that one came from Los Angeles,
one came from San Francisco, another was from San Jose. One was the
executive director, who is the paid bureaucrat. The regular union
members who are making a living were out working.
Mr. RADANOVICH. Is the gentlewoman telling me those folks were paid
to picket you?
Mrs. SEASTRAND. I would certainly say they must be on a payroll. They
came from San Francisco.
[[Page H4392]]
Mr. EHRLICH. Paid protesters? It is good work if you can get it.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. A paid protester. We call them rent-a-protester. This
is an interesting thing; that when union Members found out that their
dues were even increased, and that they were used to attack the new
ideas that we are trying to push through here and work through in
Congress, 59 percent said they would ask for a refund of their dues.
The letter I read and the lady that appeared on a local television
who is a firefighter, she says she is tired of her hard-earned money
being used in such a way when she agrees with what we are trying to do
in this different Congress; as I say, the Congress with a new attitude.
They want to see that balanced budget, they want to see a $500 tax
credit per child, they want to see a line-item veto. They want to see a
change in Washington, DC. It is those Washington union bosses that, you
know, they are gasping. They are on their last legs. They know if they
do not get control of this House once more, it is kind of gone for a
long, long time. Their special perks, their large salaries--here is the
president, $192,500 a year. A chauffeur is getting $53,143 for the
union boss. These are people that are living off my folks, your folks
in Maryland, and the gentleman from the central coast of California,
they are living off of our blue-collar workers.
{time} 2300
I think the moment many of these members find out more about this we
are going to see a change.
Mr. RADANOVICH. I think you need to get back to the fact that when
the gentlewoman from California, Andrea Seastrand, was mentioning that
the rank and file member, even the rank and file members of the unions,
they want a balanced budget. They want welfare reform. They want these
changes to the American society. Not because they want to give tax
breaks to the rich, not because they want to promote class warfare to
keep things the way they are, simply because they see that as the road
to a better country, to a better America, not for certain people but
for everybody so that everybody, depending on how they were born into
this world and what their lot in life is, has the opportunity to better
themselves.
That is what is so scary, I think, because after 40 years of
operating things the way that they have been used to operating in this
House, they love it in the mud and they do not want to change. It has
become very comfortable. Change is scary, and you have got to learn a
new way to count. That is not all that easy. Those are the things that
we come up here--by the way, we are all freshmen and proud of it, and I
think that those are the changes that scare the living daylights, not
out of the American people, because they know what they want, they tell
us what they want. They want a balanced budget. They want welfare
reform. They want a better country as a result of that for them and
everybody else. It is not that they are scared. It is those that have
been hanging on to power and having been so used to having power for
the last 40 years.
They cannot begin to grapple with the idea that maybe their
philosophy was wrong to begin with and they have to begin to accept new
realities. That is what the freshmen have done here in the new
Congress. That is the beachhead that we have established. That is the
change that is beginning to operate in this town finally.
Mr. EHRLICH. I would add this point, I want to get back to education
and I want to get back to the TEAM Act. I want to go right to the
balanced budget, because it includes my favorite whopper: the rich, tax
cuts for the rich.
How many times do we see class warfare strategy utilized on the floor
of this House? The bad news for the folks that we are talking about,
the working people who built this country, what they do not know and
what the bosses failed to tell them is that they are rich. They make
$25,000, $35,000, $45,000 a year. They are rich. Do you know how you
can prove it? How many times have you heard on the floor of this House,
the Republicans are slashing Medicare to make tax cuts for their rich
buddies? Do we hear that every day?
Mrs. SEASTRAND. We hear it day in an day out.
Mr. EHRLICH. Do we hear it on radio and TV? Depending on whose study
you believe, every study I have been concludes that under the
Republican sponsored bill, which is part of the Contract with America,
between 60 and 70 percent of the families or the tax cut that we were
talking about would go to families making between $30,000 and $75,000 a
year, between 60 and 70 percent of that tax cut would get to families
making between $30,000 and $75,000 a year. So these are facts.
If you place that fact next to what we hear on the floor of this
House every day, one could only conclude, in a logical way, that folks
who make between $30,000 and $75,000 a year are rich. And I am here to
tell the big union bosses in this country that if they think the folks
who sent me here who make $25,000, $35,000, $45,000 a year think they
are rich, I would suggest those big union bosses leave their big houses
out in the country and go talk to people who are still working for a
living who must balance their budget, who believe the Federal
Government is out of control, who understand our tort system is out of
control, who understand the need for regulatory reform, and who
understand the nature of government which will grow and grow and grow
and grow unless the budget is brought back into balance.
Mr. RADANOVICH. I want to propose something here. Say for example
person A paid $20 in income taxes to the United States Government and
person B paid $10 in income taxes, and we in the Congress decide to
give a 50 percent tax rebate. So the person paying $20 in taxes gets a
$10 rebate. The person who pays $10 worth of taxes gets a $5 rebate.
Now, that is basically because one person paid more and the other paid
less. They get the equal amount in percentage backs.
My question is, if you believe that, do you really think that you
want the Federal Government getting involved in income redistribution,
which would mean that the person that paid in 20 does not get 10 back,
he gets 5 back, and the person who paid in 10 does not get 5 back, they
get 10 back? Do you really trust the Federal Government to start
getting involved that closely in that detail in your life, and do you
really believe in income redistribution? Is that what we are here to
do? It is a simple fact that the person who paid 20 gets 50 percent
back. The person who paid 10 also gets 40 percent back. That is not
unfair. That is fair. You cannot call that tax cuts for the rich.
Mr. EHRLICH. You can call it that.
Mr. RADANOVICH. It is equal in its percentage of return. Only a
bumblehead would buy the argument that that is tax breaks for the rich.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. I would just say, I guess he would be an extremist.
Mr. EHRLICH. My favorite term in this debate.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. I would like to say that it is interesting, because
when we talk about these things, we see, we talk about being the
freshmen here trying to change the way Washington has done business for
all these years. I am in possession here of a Washington Post article
where the headline states, ``GOP Freshmen Top House Democrats Hit
List.'' It goes on about the AFL-CIO hit list. And I think that people
should understand that when they see those ads on the central coast of
California in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties on their local
television sets, they should realize that my colleague in Las Vegas,
John Ensign, is hit with that same ad. That gentleman saying our
congresswoman voted to cut Medicare and to gut education spending and
so on should realize again high-priced PR firms from Washington, DC,
ordered by those union bosses, they are after John Ensign, they are
after me. They are after--those union bosses are after Rick White and
Randy Tate in Washington and Jim Bunn. the gentlemen might be amused to
know that Jim Bunn from Oregon's ad was on my local television station
in Santa Barbara. They sent the wrong video to the wrong place. I do
not know where I was floating and where I appeared in this country, but
it is very orchestrated and it is paid by those union bosses to a high-
priced public relations firm.
I just think the people should know how their especially our union
members that are in our districts, how their dollars are being utilized
to fight what we are trying to do on this House floor.
[[Page H4393]]
Mr. EHRLICH. Of course, this whole debate is chock full of irony. You
have big union bosses asking the working people in this country to take
their hard-earned money to pay big time media consultants to run ads to
defeat folks in this Congress who have an opportunity agenda which will
benefit working people.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. Not only advertising in the form of radio,
television, but direct mail, phone banks, door-to-door campaigns. I
have been under siege, as I call it, since last April, a whole year.
Here is a local article from one of my local newspapers, Seastrand
Under Siege. Not only do they do it in advertising and direct mail, but
they are bodily sending people to protest at my office. But also there
is a gentleman here whose picture, Tim Allison, who is my Project '96
coordinator. He is somebody who is coming from outside the district in
my district to organize against me.
I say all is fair in love and war and politics. If folks at home want
to organize against Andrea Seastrand and say she is not doing it, that
is the way it does go. But I think be you Democrat, independent,
Republican, Libertarian, whatever your philosophy, I think we should
all be outraged to think that that special interest money from
Washington, DC is bringing in a gentleman such as this one, I do not
know where he lives. They have done that in Jim Longley's district in
Maine. They have done it in many of our districts. In fact, some of our
Members are trying to find out who their Project '96 coordinator is.
Not only are they doing it in advertising, they are actually sending an
organizer into the district.
Mr. RANDOVICH. I think you need to ask the question, why are they
doing that? That is simply because they have had influence, a special
influence on the Congress for the last 40 years. And they are going to
do anything they can to get that special interest influence back. It is
plain and simple. It is power and the loss of it.
We came here to undo things in Washington because of too much
government and too much government control. And we are here to
localize; we are here to privatize government. They do not like it
because they like it when they had influence. And under the old
administration that was here for 40 years, they ran this country into
the ground to the tune of $5.5 trillion worth of debt. They want to get
the reins back so that the can run us deeper into debt.
Mrs. SEASTRAND. I would just ask for the gentleman to continue to
yield to finish my comments. It is just interesting, because I have
list upon list here of union expenditures, whether it is the salaries,
the chauffeurs or the big perks, the free rent, the big ticket perks,
whether it is condos or purchasing videos or purchasing artwork or
whether it is gifts, on and on, luncheons, meals, convention
conferences, page after page where my folks at home are trying to do it
with their blue collar job, they are trying to make a living, in many
instances both spouses are working in the family, here the big union
bosses living off more or less the fat of the land are upset because we
are trying to bring some tax relief and some common sense for our folks
at home.
So with that, I just enjoyed being with my colleagues today, and I
thank you for letting me participate.
Mr. EHRLICH. We thank the gentlewoman.
I would just like to add one further observation. I hope we will be
able to do this again in the near future, because this is fun. This is
the fun part of the job. We can talk to the American people without
anybody filtering our words, directly to the folks that sent us here.
I just need to, because it is one of my favorites from the report
card, talk about the TEAM Act. We all received the same report card.
Protecting your rights as workers. Congressman Ehrlich voted for the
so-called TEAM Act, which allows employers to, listen to the words, I
would ask the American people to listen to the words here, which allows
employers to control who represents employees in discussions about
wages, hours and other working conditions, H.R. 743, September 27,
1995.
Now, we have made this point time and time again tonight. Demagogs
hate facts. They hate facts. Because facts kill demagogs. The
Protecting Your Right as Workers Act, H.R. 743, specifies the
following: Organizations, these new organizations will not have the
authority to serve as the exclusive bargaining representative of
employees. Second, they will not be able to enter into collective
bargaining agreements. Third, workplaces that already unionized are
specifically exempted under the bill.
Now, we are going to, hopefully, I know we are running out of time,
we will hopefully have time to go over the two categories that we
missed. But the fact needs to be made to the American people, the facts
are so dangerous even in this town.
One thing, just a suggestion I throw out this evening to my
colleagues in front of me and to the conservative Democrats who
supported us so much in these debates and to my Republican colleagues
and to the American people is that facts always kill demagogs. One
thing that we do in our office, when people call me up and they say,
Ehrlich, you say X and Gephardt said Y, or Gingrich said X and Fazio
said Y or Hoyer said Y, I do not know what to believe. In our office,
and I will throw this open to the folks in the second district of
Maryland, all across the country tonight, do not believe us if you
choose not to. If you are so cynical about politics, if you are so
cynical about Members of Congress regardless of party, do not believe
any word you have heard from the three of us tonight, nor should you
believe what you hear from that podium day after day. Just get the
facts. Call our office. I will send you the bill. I will send you the
budget numbers. I am sure my two colleagues would agree with me. We
will send you the raw numbers. We will send you the actual bills. You
figure it out.
Because I will not run a campaign on the foundation that the American
people are dumb, that seniors cannot read the newspaper, that seniors
do not expect this Congress to save Medicare. I will not run a campaign
on the basis of class warfare or generational warfare, where you turn
grandparents against grandchildren, where the guy making $20,000 a year
is encouraged to be jealous of the woman making $28,000. That is not
the way you run an economy. That is not the way you run a House. That
is not the way I am going to run my campaign.
Let the word go out to the big union bosses, class warfare,
generational warfare, this phony stuff will not work because the
people, the American people can read and they can write and they can
learn and they know better. I thank the gentleman.
{time} 2315
Mr. RADANOVICH. Thank you very much, Mr. Ehrlich from Maryland and
Mrs. Seastrand from California. In closing I would like to say that our
case to the American people, and you are right, this is the opportunity
for us to come unedited to the American people and let them know our
opinions and let them judge for themselves, because through the ballot
box, the American people are the ultimate judge of who should sit in
this Congress and whose philosophy should prevail.
But I would say that we are here to do a job, and the job is not to
promote class warfare, not to make the rich more richer at the expense
of the poor, or the poor more rich at the expense of the rich. It is
simply to build a better country. And we believe that by our efforts of
balancing the budget, using the balanced budget as a blueprint to
change this country, that we are changing America for the better, for
the betterment of everybody, for equal opportunity for everybody. We
are changing America for the better.
We are not playing silly games, and we are determined to do that, and
that is our job. And I hope people will realize that the changes that
we want to make through a balanced budget process, by localizing
government, by privatizing government, will make America a better
place, will make America a better place not only for you and I, but for
every American in this country.
____________________