[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 143 (Sunday, October 11, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H10518]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              WAG THE DOG

  (Mr. SOUDER asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, it would be really helpful if we did not 
attack each others motives. I do not consider myself a mean person. I 
consider myself like other Members of this body on both sides, deeply 
committed to the issues we believe in, and we confuse the American 
people because they do not understand what is going on right now. They 
look at this and say this looks a lot like the NBA strike lockout where 
we have people on both sides with strong differences of opinions. But 
they are adults; why can they not sit down?
  Obviously we both care about education. We differ how to do it. We 
obviously both care about health care. We disagree how to do it. We 
obviously both want to see a form of government; in this case some of 
us are more local than state-oriented and some are more federal, but it 
is not that we are not trying to do a good government.
  In 1995, actually right after the 1994 elections, we had a historic 
point in American history. For 40 years we had had a Democratic 
Congress, and all of a sudden we had a conservative Republican Congress 
and a liberal Democratic President, and we had those passions on both 
sides tested, and we went through this before. This is now our fourth 
time. There is no reason that we cannot come to an agreement unless 
there is another political reason, unless there is a wag-the-dog 
problem going on right now where the President is trying to distract 
attention.
  We know he feels passionately, we feel passionately. Let us be adults 
and get it resolved.

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