[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 131 (Monday, October 17, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H8830-H8836]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
30-SOMETHING WORKING GROUP
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania). Under the
Speaker's announced policy of January 4, 2005, the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Meek) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the
minority leader.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, once again it is an honor to come
to the floor. We would like to thank the Democratic leader as well as
the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), our Democratic whip, for
allowing us to have this hour here to talk about the issues that are
facing Americans and the issues that we feel should be brought to the
forefront which are not being addressed.
Tonight I am joined by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone)
and also by the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan). I am glad to be joined
by them once again because, as we have said before, we are going to
come to the floor night after night to try to push the American agenda
forward as best we can.
As my colleagues know, being in the minority here in the House of
Representatives does not bring about the kind of power one needs to be
able to respond to the needs of Americans. But I can say that being in
the minority and pointing out these issues of how we could do the job
better than the majority side has done, I think is not only educational
for the Members of this House but also should bring about some kind of
change so that we can have better representation here in Washington,
DC, especially representation in terms of legislation that passes from
this floor and out of this Congress and on to the White House.
We have been out for a week on the Columbus Day break, and I know the
gentleman and his constituents have been getting lots of rain in New
Jersey, so my prayers go out to your constituents and many others.
Being from Florida, as you know we receive our fair share of good and
bad weather. Mainly good, and so we want folks to come to Florida; but
we know the Garden State has been hammered, along with other States
around it, for quite a few days now. So I hope all is well with those
counties that are trying to survive some of the flood waters.
I think it is important to begin where we left off almost a week ago,
Mr. Speaker, and to address the issue of having an independent
commission for the aftermath of hurricanes Katrina and Rita and making
sure that not only are those Americans not forgotten but that we not
forget the mistakes that took place during the aftermath of Hurricane
Katrina so that they never happen again. Never again in the United
States.
I think it is important for us to also realize, Mr. Speaker, that it
was not just a storm. It was the aftermath of the storm and the lack of
governance on the front end, making sure that our levee systems were
where they should have been and the issues as relates to those buffer
islands in the gulf coast area, especially in Louisiana. Those issues
should have been addressed by the Federal Government in making sure
that we have the kind of buffer to protect one of our greatest U.S.
cities.
As my colleagues may know, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings)
and also the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Menendez) on our side of
the aisle have introduced an independent commission bill that we have
been working to get to the floor for some time now. I think that not
only the Members but the American people need to realize that the power
of this House, if we were in the majority, and this is not a partisan
issue, but if we were in
[[Page H8831]]
the majority, because there is a bill that is there that almost every
Member, if not every Member from the Democratic Caucus, has signed on
to this bill calling for a 9/11-like commission to deal with the issues
that are facing the Katrina victims and to be able to analyze in an
independent way outside of this process, outside of the partisanship,
to make sure we do what we did for the 9/11 victims, to give them their
fair share of representation and insight; making sure that they are not
dragged through the mud, becoming victims once again.
Mr. Speaker, as we open our discussions here tonight, I also wanted
to make sure that we deal with the issue of corruption and cronyism.
When we left here over a week ago, we were dealing with that issue; and
I wanted to make sure that we talk about that a little tonight with my
colleagues.
I also brought some articles with me that I think Members should be
made aware of, and that we share with them the importance of governance
and oversight. So there are a number of issues that we are going to
talk about, and I just wanted to make some opening comments regarding
those items, but I will be happy to yield to my colleagues at any time.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I want to welcome our newest 30-
something member joining us from New Jersey this evening; but before I
get into it, I want to make an announcement. Since we left here last
week, we had last week off, and since we left here, there has been an
addition to the Ryan family. My brother had a baby last Friday night on
his birthday. Nicholas John Ryan. So I want to welcome him into the
world officially, and say hello to his first two friends, Zack and
Molly Leonard, who were all over to the house the other day, and I fed
the baby for the first time the other day. So here I had the bottle,
and I fed him. It was great.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Well, A, congratulations; and, B, because you
were feeding the baby for the first time yesterday, I hope that you
knew what to do when you were feeding the baby.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Well, see, I took a week and I watched. I was very
timid. I did not want to make any mistakes, so I watched for a while. I
watched my brother. I was being a little hesitant with the bottle, and
my brother is like, jam it in there, you are not going to hurt the kid.
So you pick up and gain a little confidence, and then I burped the kid.
It was great. Bingo.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. There you go. Great uncle.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And the godfather. I am also going to be the
godfather.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Two-fer.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Yes. So this is a lot of pressure. You think being
a Member of Congress is a lot of pressure, try being the godfather to
the first new baby in the family.
So that for me has kind of changed my perspective, and it makes all
of the stuff we talk about here that much more important because you
begin to see the timetable, the effect our decisions have over the long
term.
I know a couple weeks ago when we left, we were talking about this
administration, this Congress putting people in charge of key
positions, in charge of key processes that need to happen here, whether
it was in FEMA, Medicare, or regardless of what it is. There has been,
over the past 5 to 10 years in this body and now in the executive
branch, a host of cronyistic appointments to key positions. There have
been people put in key positions, like FEMA, that have absolutely no
experience whatsoever. All we are saying in this Chamber from the
Democratic side is give us a chance to run this place. Give us an
opportunity to be able to handle the levers of government and allow us
to lead.
That is the opportunity that we are asking the American people for,
my good friends, because our colleagues who have had the levers of
government over the past, since 1994 in the House and since 2000 in the
White House and in the Senate, have not been able to govern. They just
have not been able to do it.
You do not have to look very far. Ask yourself sitting at home, what
is going on here? I mean, we have higher energy costs, we have more
people in poverty, we have tuition costs that have doubled, we have our
FEMA administration that has been devastated financially. We have put
cronies in key governmental positions. We are leaking information about
CIA agents. I mean, what good is going on right now? Somebody please
help me.
We are bogged down in a war that is costing us $1.5 billion a week. I
repeat, $1.5 billion a week. We are getting our clock cleaned by China.
Delphi, the largest auto supplier in the country, filed for bankruptcy.
They are asking their workers to take 60 percent pay cuts. I have over
5,000 workers in my district, in Warren, Ohio. What positive is
happening today due to the Republican leadership in the House,
Republican leadership in the Senate, and the Republican leadership in
the White House? I cannot seem to find anything.
I think this country deserves a lot better, and I think we need to
start talking about that, my good friends. This country deserves
better. After September 11, this President had more political capital
than any President probably since FDR after Pearl Harbor, and he asked
the American people to go shopping. That is the best leadership you can
come up with in the United States of America? We deserve a little
better than that, I think.
He did not start an alternative energy policy, not to fix the health
care system that is a mess, not to take care of the millions and
millions of young kids that live in poverty, not fund No Child Left
Behind. What are we doing? The biggest leadership move is to ask the
country to go shopping? What is that? That is terrible. That is
terrible leadership.
We have given this President the opportunity time and time and time
again to lead, and he has not done it. He has not done it. And now the
whole Delphi situation, which I am a little too intimate with because
of the workers in my district. And General Motors. I have a General
Motors plant in my district. Believe me, I understand why the
corporations are doing what they are doing. The rising costs of health
care are crippling the American businessperson. Crippling the
corporation and the small businessperson.
So now they are trying to squeeze blood out of a turnip in the form
of asking middle-class citizens in the United States of America to get
less health care or to pay for more health care, whether they are in a
union or not in a union, instead of addressing the key issue, which is
that the insurance lobby and the health care lobby and the
pharmaceutical lobby which has a stranglehold around the United States
Congress.
Let us be honest. How about a little straight talk from the House
floor tonight? Check it out. When you are passing the Medicare
prescription drug bill, there are four lobbyists for every one Member
of Congress; and I know I did not have a lobbyist, I did not have one,
let alone four, so somebody had eight. Now, imagine that. When we get
this health care issue under control, that will release a lot of
potential that can get freed up, investments that could be made back in
the United States of America.
{time} 2115
For example, and I am sorry because we have been dealing with this
for the last week, with the Delphi situation, this money that this
corporation saves, and we all want to save Delphi. We want it to be a
solvent company and we want them to maintain the work that they have in
Ohio. Of course we do. The way the system is set up is any savings that
they get, they are going to invest that money into China. That is what
they are going to do. So the whole system is screwed up to where you
are forcing corporations to invest into these other countries.
Here we have an opportunity with this independent commission to
oversee a problem with the government through FEMA, the problems that
FEMA had, to oversee it in an independent manner like the 9/11
Commission, and the Republican leadership put the kibosh on it. They
put together a bust-out committee that is 11 Republicans, 9 Democrats,
that is going to totally, totally, whitewash this thing. Get out the
Brillo pads because they do not want the truth to come out. The
Democrats will not have any subpoena power. Get a Republican Governor,
a Democratic former Member of Congress, put together an independent
commission and let us try to fix this problem. Let us try to fix this
in a way that we are putting partisanship aside.
[[Page H8832]]
Mr. Speaker, next we will hear from the newest member of the 30-
Somethings, and we charge him two sets of dues because he is almost 30-
Something twice.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I do not know how many times I am going to
have to endure these comments about my age.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I never say anything about the
gentleman's age.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, that is because the gentleman is
almost his age. Tell the American people how old you are.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. I am 39.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. See, he graduates out of the 30-somethings next
year. I am going to be a one-man show.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, since the gentleman from Ohio (Mr.
Ryan) is at the younger end, he wants to talk more about the older
people that are involved and the wiser people. And I would say to the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), we will not prolong it any
more.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want you to know that one way to deal
with the age problem is to hang out with the younger people so I feel
younger.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. You are welcome here every time we are here, my
friend.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, let me follow up on what the gentleman from
Ohio (Mr. Ryan) said because he certainly was right. We had a week when
we were back in our districts doing things locally. I was thinking when
I was listening to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) about three
events that I attended in the last 48 hours in my district or nearby
which point to this whole idea of what is good and what is the
Republican leadership and what is President Bush doing because all I
hear are complaints about his policies.
For example, on Sunday, I went to a senior complex for a group of
seniors that were meeting in Lakewood, New Jersey, which is a community
just outside my district. It used to be in my district until
redistricting a few years ago. What I heard was how expensive it is for
seniors to buy their prescription drugs, and how they did not feel that
the President's new program, which goes into effect in January, was
going to help them in any way.
One gentleman in particular, I remember, was one of these guys who
was essentially forced into early retirement and promised a fairly
generous health care plan that included prescription drugs. What he has
found since he retired is that every year the cost goes up and the
whole agreement, if you will, that was initially set out has
essentially made it so he really cannot afford to buy the prescription
drugs even though he has the coverage under a plan for his early
retirement.
The other seniors were talking how the Federal Government should
negotiate price reductions like they do for the VA or the Department of
Defense. My answer was that is what the Democrats wanted to do. The
reason it did not become law was because the Republicans opposed it. I
remember in the Committee on Energy and Commerce I had an amendment
that would have required negotiated prices by the Medicare
Administrator, and it was defeated on a party line vote.
The bottom line is Republicans are so aligned with lobbyists and the
cronyism they do not want to do anything that is going to be helpful to
the average person. This prescription drug bill is a perfect example.
In addition, all the seniors were saying as of October 1, all these
different private drug plans are being promoted on television and they
have no idea what they are all about. I said be very, very careful. Do
not sign up for these things until you really look at the details
because they may not be helpful to you.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to highlight that fact. This
totally puts into perspective what happens down here under their
leadership.
We have a prescription drug bill that we spent $700-some billion over
the next 10 years on, but we were told it was $400 billion. So that is
another issue, to start a prescription drug Medicare program, and we
are not doing anything to control the costs, whether it is
reimportation from Canada or to allow the Secretary of Health and Human
Services to buy in bulk.
There would be every Medicare beneficiary behind that proposal. And
you can say Merck, you want to negotiate this, we want 30 to 40 percent
chopped off, and they would do it because they want the contract. We
would not have to create a new bureaucracy. If people think the old
Democrat Party wants to create a new bureaucracy, they are wrong. This
is a progressive idea of giving the Administrator already in place the
power. It is a progressive idea that makes sense, but you can only do
it if you are not tied to the pharmaceutical lobby like our friends on
the other side of the aisle.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I have ceased even referring to this
program as Medicare because as far as I am concerned there is nothing
Medicare about it. You said we need to show to the American people how
we would do things differently because we want a chance to be in the
majority and to run the country.
Here we had a clear contrast. The fact of the matter is every
Democrat, or maybe one or two that did not vote for a substitute, that
basically would have been just like we do now with Medicare Part B, how
seniors pay for their doctor bills, and that would have been under
Medicare as a regular government program. They would have paid a $25
premium per month, and had their choice of whatever prescription drugs
they wanted. They would not have to go out privately and shop around.
They would have had a $100 deductible and 80 percent of the cost paid
for by the Federal Government, 20 percent copay. We already have it for
Part B, and the Republicans rejected that to a person. There is clear
contrast. This is the kind of thing we would do if we were in the
majority and in charge.
I want to use another example. The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek)
talked about the rain and the storms in New Jersey. There was a senior
complex in my district that was near a brook where a number of homes
were completely destroyed and people had to be moved out. I went there
this morning with the Army Corps of Engineers because the Corps has a
project that would correct the situation that we would like to do. It
would cost about $8 million to do it. What I am hearing from the Corps,
we would like to do it but we have to see if we have the money.
What happened with those levees in New Orleans is no different from
what is happening around the country. We are not funding these
infrastructure needs, whether flood control or whatever it happens to
be. The reason, and I am going to go back to another forum, right after
I met with the Corps this morning and talked about this flood control
project which has been delayed for a number of years now, I met with
students at Rutgers, a State university in my district, and we talked
about the Iraq war.
I started out talking about an exit strategy and what needed to be
done. A lot of the students were talking about the cost of the war, not
only cost in terms of the lives and the wounded, but also the cost of
the actual dollars we were spending and the fact that because we were
spending so much money on the Iraq war, we were not able to pay for a
lot of domestic needs, whether it be student financial aid. They were
stressing that, of course. But I was thinking about my flood control
project which would have avoided all of the damage and all of the
people who had to move out if it had been in place.
The bottom line is we are spending all of this money on the Iraq war.
The President does not have an exit strategy. He keeps talking about
how everything is going to get better, and the cost is not only lives
and the wounded, but also in terms of the dollars we are not spending
here domestically, and we are not investing in the future to remain
competitive with China and the other countries competing with us.
People get this. I am not making this up. This is within the last 48
hours at three different forums or opportunities I had to meet with my
constituents, and this is what they are saying. They are not happy.
They realize there are alternatives. The bottom line is some of those
alternatives are easy, some are hard. Democrats are saying we have
alternatives, whether it is prescription drugs or any of the other
topics.
Many of us voted against all these tax breaks that the President gave
because we knew it would put us into debt and we would not have money
to
[[Page H8833]]
pay for a lot of the domestic programs, and most of the money went to
the wealthy rather than the average person.
One more thing, and that is when we were here last time, the week
before being back in our districts, I think it was the gentlewoman from
Florida (Ms. Wasserman Schultz) talking about the energy bill because
the next day we voted on the Republican energy bill. She pointed out
there was no benefit from this bill. It would not do anything to reduce
gas prices or reduce our dependence on foreign oil. All of the things
that people would like us to do, the Republicans were not doing.
What it was doing, two things she mentioned, one was it was going to
allow for offshore drilling off the coast of Florida and New Jersey,
all these sensitive areas. The second thing the gentlewoman mentioned
was it was going to weaken the Clean Air Act. Lo and behold, the
interesting thing was the next day the Republicans took those
provisions out of their energy bill because there was such a hue and
cry. When they finally passed the energy bill, they barely were able to
pass it. We had to wait an hour for them to get the votes.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Ninty minutes.
Mr. PALLONE. The bottom line is that this Republican majority is
starting to fall apart because their policies are not good for the
American people. Even some of the Republicans are starting to realize
it and are not willing to vote for some of the junk bills that come to
this floor with the Republican leadership.
I just mention that because I think there is hope here. I left last
Friday thinking maybe now because of yourselves getting on the floor,
maybe because Democrats are speaking out and talking about why these
Republican initiatives are not helpful, maybe people are starting to
realize it. Maybe some Republicans are starting to realize it. That is
why I admire what you are doing because I think it is making a
difference.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek)
has been resilient in pushing us to get up to the floor once or twice a
week. I just saw a poll last week that had 60 percent of the
independent voters in the country are sick and tired of what has been
going on in Washington, D.C.
Mr. Wagner from General Motors said D.C. better do something about
health care. We are not doing anything. What we are doing seems like we
are doing something, but the energy bill is not really doing anything.
The gentleman mentioned the $1.5 billion a week that we are spending
in Iraq. I want to share one thing. This is a great article today in
the Washington Post. The first line says it feels like the 1990s minus
the good parts, all of the scandals that were going on, but the
economy, energy costs and everything is bad.
There was a proposal made, and talking about dealing with the
Chinese, we need to offer, and that is what we are doing as Democrats,
we just need to convince the American people that we are offering
alternatives and do have ideas, whether it is prescription drugs or
alternative energy.
I want to share a proposal from the National Academies and it is a
combination of a variety of different things to get our math scores up.
Our math scores in 8th grade, we ranked 15th internationally and in the
9th grade we ranked 24th internationally. We are not going to stimulate
the economy if we do not have engineers and math and science majors,
and the 30-Something Group is calling for a million new engineers and
scientists over the next 10 years because we believe that is going to
be the greatest stimulus.
But let me share the proposal from the National Academies to spend
money on math prizes for high schoolers, pay raises for math teachers
and to boost Federal research funding by 10 percent annually for 7
years. That would cost $10 billion a year. That is it. We are spending
$1.5 billion a week in Iraq. The American people judge, $10 billion a
year on increased Federal funding for research and development and
targeted investments to increase math and science scores in the United
States of America among K-12 school kids. That is what the Democrats
want to do, versus $1.5 billion a week in Iraq, versus hundreds of
thousands and millions and trillions of dollars over the next 10 years
in tax cuts for people who make more than $600,000 a year.
{time} 2130
Pick what they want. Democrats, increased funding for Pell grants to
lower tuition costs. Republicans, cut taxes for the top 1 percent.
Trillions.
Democrats, fully fund No Child Left Behind, make sure every kid who
is eligible for more funding, for afterschool tutoring, summer school,
before school; Democrats are for full funding of that. Republicans, no.
We have to give our tax cuts to our buddies.
And that is the difference. Time and time again and over the course
of the next year, we are just going to hammer the differences between
the two parties.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, the gentleman
from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) brought up some interesting points; and I can tell
him, as a parent myself, this issue of No Child Left Behind, we would
talk to our Republican leadership colleagues and they would say, well,
that was a bipartisan bill and over on the opposite side, in the
Senate, folks were having press conferences and bill-signing ceremonies
and everything.
But we believed that we were going to see full funding of No Child
Left Behind and that this Congress would go down in history as the
education Congress, and we are not even close to fulfilling our
obligations. As a matter of fact, we have about eight States that are
suing the Federal Government over No Child Left Behind unfunded
mandates. These are States. These are not other countries. These are
States here in the United States that taxpayers pay money.
We have a number of school districts that say, listen, if we can opt
out of it, we want to opt out. We do not want to opt in. That is not a
federalized education program to help local communities and chambers
and all the other do-gooders in small communities and big communities
who want to make sure they have an educated workforce. It is not that
same theory.
We have one other issue that is here. The gentleman mentioned the
issue of the energy bill. I am glad that resurfaced because I am going
to tell the Members the reason why that is important. The energy bill
came to this floor, and for 90 minutes we sat and stood here on this
floor waiting for the board to close. What we call the board here in
Congress is a voting board. For several minutes, almost 1 hour. The
bill was defeated. And, Mr. Speaker, I think this is where if I had a
yellow flag and I was a referee or an official on the 40 yard line that
I would actually throw a flag. I would have thrown the flag because the
spirit of the rules were violated because when the board opens up and
there are 15 minutes to vote, there are 15 minutes to vote, give or
take 1 or 2 or 3. But when they say the board is open for 15 minutes
and we will close it when we win, then that is a violation of the
spirit of the rules of this House. And it feeds into the whole issue of
the corruption and cronyism.
I have two young children; and if there were a homework assignment
that was due, and my wife and I have to sign their reading stuff and
say that it is done, but it would not be fair if my children were to do
their homework and there were two other children in the same classroom
or in the same school that say, Well, I do not have to do my homework.
I will just do it two nights from now because my father or my mother is
a chairperson of the PTA and we have power like that. We can do it.
That would not be fair to the children who actually did their homework.
I use that analogy because I want to make sure that the Members and
the American people understand what we are talking about. Yes, it is a
bad thing dealing with children, but it is a horrible thing when we are
talking about national policy for the greatest country on the face of
the Earth, the shining example of democracy. Now, we salute one flag.
And my colleagues heard me speak a couple of weeks ago about those
Americans; and, yes, we think about those 2,000-plus individuals who
have fallen in this war, but for those Americans who are still here who
are voting for representation and fair play, they are individuals that
are without limbs now.
We have all gone to Walter Reed. We have all gone to these hospitals
in our own communities, these VA hospitals, watching these men and
women come
[[Page H8834]]
back, half of their head blown off, legs and arms missing. And we are
here and we walk through this door and we put our voting cards in these
machines to represent them and the Americans that they fought for. And
then we come to the floor because the majority did not get what they
wanted when they wanted it, to say that they will hold this vote open
as long as they have to to make sure that they twist enough arms on the
Republican side because every Democrat voted against the bad policy,
this bill.
I do not even want to address it as an energy bill because basically
it was just a giveaway to the industry. That is all it was. Everything,
7 months prior, that could not go straight-faced into the ``energy
bill'' at that time they got in this last time right before we took a
break of the bill that just passed recently. And the reason why they
got it: A, Hurricane Katrina came through. Hurricane Rita was on its
way. The bill was already being marked up before Rita came, but it was
on its way to help deal with the issue of price gouging and making sure
that we are able to provide energy for our country and hopefully bring
down the price of gas, and it did not do that. What it did was it raped
our environmental laws. It raped the process of fair play in this
institution.
There are certain things, as Members of Congress, we cannot allow to
happen on behalf of the institution. When the record books are opened,
the annals of history of the 109th Congress, yes, there will be
individuals that will be mentioned; but also it will be that day that
we were on the floor and the spirit of the rules of the House were
violated in the worst way, time after time again. Time after time
again.
The leadership from this side, Mr. Speaker, came to the floor with a
parliamentary inquiry. The clock was at triple zero. Obviously, the
measure did not pass, Mr. Speaker. Can we ask for the Speaker to call
the vote? And each person was gaveled down for not making a
parliamentary inquiry, and the Speaker said what he had to say at that
particular time to keep it going. The gentlewoman from California (Ms.
Pelosi), Democratic leader, came to the floor, gaveled down for asking
the question and then pointing out the fact this is what is wrong with
Washington now, the culture of corruption and cronyism, not in the dark
corners of Congress but under the lights on international, not
national, but international television that we are willing to rape the
spirit of the rules of this House and the spirit of fair play in
America. Not something that we watched on cable television in some
foreign land somewhere in a Third World country. Not there. But right
here for the world to see. I would not say the hypocrisy of the
democracy of everyday Americans, but because of the leaders who allowed
it to happen here in this House.
Mr. Speaker, last point, I just want to make sure that we understand,
as Members of Congress, that we have a responsibility in the majority
and minority. I take full responsibility for what took place, Mr.
Speaker, here on this floor, yes. Did I do everything I could? Of
course I did. Did I walk over to the other side of the aisle and talk
to some of my friends over there that are level-minded individuals, who
will go unnamed because we do not want them to receive any
repercussions for speaking out, who said, I think that the vote should
have been called. Well, you need to go tell your leadership that the
vote needs to be called.
I mean, we want to do it in a gentlemanly way. We call ourselves, Mr.
Speaker, gentlemen and gentlewomen, respect for the institution, and
still the vote was not called. I mean, individuals' arms were twisted.
You vote, hurry up, and trying to call the vote while they went. And it
almost happened once, and then the conscience kicked in of some Members
and they changed their vote and it went back to a losing vote again,
and they said we have to hold the board open another 20 minutes because
we did not get our way.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, he is
absolutely right. This is strictly an abuse of power. That is what is
going on here. This is the majority, the Republican majority, abusing
their power. And I think that last Friday was the perfect example of
it. And it was not the first time. I have to say one thing that was
interesting that he pointed out was that was the first time I remember
that they did it in broad daylight, because if the gentleman remembers,
most of the time when we had to deal with these major policy
initiatives, which that was not, they waited until 3 or 4 o'clock in
the morning so nobody was watching. And, of course, the best example of
that was the Medicare prescription drug bill, which, as the gentleman
knows, was voted on at 3 o'clock in the morning. We had to wait here
for hours while they were twisting arms all night for that too and even
lied about the fact of how much it was going to cost; otherwise they
would have never passed it. Remember when they said it was only going
to cost, I guess, 400 billion, and then it ended up being 600 or 700
billion?
We see this abuse of power constantly. I see it in my committee
because what happens is when bills come to committee, they do not go to
a subcommittee. They do not have a hearing. When the Democrats were in
the majority, every time we had a bill that we wanted to move, we had a
hearing, sometimes several hearings, in the subcommittee. Then we would
have a markup in the subcommittee. Then it would go to the full
committee. Then it would go to the Committee on Rules. And at every
point there was an opportunity not only for the majority but also for
the minority to have some input into what went on.
But that does not go on around here. A lot of bills just go to the
floor without even having a hearing or even go into committee, and then
they change it when they get to the Committee on Rules. They do not
allow us the opportunity to offer an amendment or to offer a substitute
so that our voice is not even heard. And what is going on, the reason
why they have these closed votes and have to do this arm-twisting is
because these are bad bills. These are not bills that are good for the
average American, and they can barely get enough people to make a
majority and they are even starting to lose some of their own
Republicans.
If the gentleman noticed, a lot of Republicans voted ``no'' on that
energy bill, and then they had to twist their arms to get them to come
back and barely pass the bill. This is happening all the time. It is an
absolute abuse of power. It is not letting the minority have its say,
not letting the minority have a voice. And I think it is very important
that we get that out there.
This is procedure and a lot of times people maybe listen and maybe
they get bored or they yawn because they say this is just procedure,
but in a democracy these kinds of procedures are very important. And
when the Republicans are abusing the procedure, it is really bad.
And I want to mention one more thing. I cannot help but mention it.
The other day when the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the majority
leader, was forced to step down because of the indictment by the grand
jury, a lot of people forgot that the only reason why that happened was
because Democrats insisted that the Republicans go back to the original
rules. They tried to change the rules of the Committee on Standards of
Official Conduct at the beginning of this Congress to say that if
somebody was indicted in leadership that they did not have to step
down. And we came here, and the gentleman was part of it too, and
insisted that we go back to the old rules, the bipartisan rules, that
had that type of provision in it. And there were other changes as well
that we insisted on.
So, again, it is important that we speak out because we can make a
difference and the public needs to understand the abuse of power and
the cronyism that is going on here.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I just want to
share something with the gentleman, because this is serious business
when we come to the floor to talk about these issues. We always say we
were elected to represent not only our constituents but also the
American people. When they voted for us, they federalized us. They
allowed us to come here to vote on policy and to create policy on
behalf of the betterment of this country.
The gentleman mentioned something and we do a lot of work here. We
have information. We meet off the floor to be able to talk about some
of these issues. The Washington Post Federal
[[Page H8835]]
Page, I just want to take this and make sure everyone understands this
is about saluting one flag. This is not about what side of the aisle we
are on. But the reason why we point out the fact, Mr. Speaker, that the
majority leadership has not taken leadership to lead us in a way that
we should be led in fair play when we are saluting one flag on issues
that are facing national security, I am on the Committee on Homeland
Security and I am on the Committee on Armed Services with the gentleman
from Ohio (Mr. Ryan); and I can tell the Members right now that energy,
as far as I am concerned, is a national security issue.
{time} 2145
So when folks come to the floor not on behalf of the American people
and national security but on behalf of special interests, I personally
have a problem with it.
I take the Federal Page from the Washington Post. This is actually
from October 5. This story here talks about: Storms show system out of
balance. GOP Congress has reduced agency oversight.
I think it is important that we pay very close attention to not only
this article. It names not only three Republicans, one on the other
side of the body in the Senate and two here in this body. As a matter
of fact, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley) and the gentlewoman
from Florida (Ms. Harris), two of my colleagues, called for hearings,
Mr. Speaker, on FEMA, the money that was spent last year in Florida on
counties that were not truly affected by the four storms that came
through, the money that was just given out without any oversight, just
simply, for the committees wrote a letter, which one I sent on, to have
oversight hearings on FEMA. I agreed with that, yes, we should have
oversight hearings. If something went wrong, that is the thing that the
Congressperson does, call for oversight hearings.
These are Members that are in the majority. These are not Democratic
Members that have said we need to have oversight hearings. These are
the Members in the majority side that said we need oversight hearings.
Guess what. They did not happen, and this was last year. This was the
story that they asked for the hearings last year. It still did not
happen.
The point I am making on this article, it goes on to say that it took
an analysis of the first 6 months of Congress between 1983 and 1997, to
make a comparison. This researcher found that both Chambers of Congress
both reduced their numbers of hearings. Actually, in the House, there
were 782 hearings in 1983 of oversight, and it went down in 1997 to
287. In the Senate, they had 439 hearings on oversight, and in 1997 it
went down to 175.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, I want to
say, because I have been here longer than the gentleman, and he has
already told me that many times, the fact of the matter is I remember
when the Democrats were in the majority. I was here from 1988 to 1994
when we were in the majority. The core of our being in the majority was
oversight. That is what we did. That was our life blood. We spent more
time on oversight than anything else.
I remember specifically in my committee, the Committee on Energy and
Commerce, every one of the subcommittees had oversight on health care,
environment, consumer issues, energy, you name it. That was our MO. For
all practical purposes, the Republicans have eliminated any real
oversight. So you are absolutely right.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. We have said it 1 million times. Article I, Section
1 of the U.S. Constitution creates the House of Representatives. The
people of the country govern. Anything that is created from there we
have oversight of, and that is the essence of this democracy. We try to
represent the republic that we have. This is our job, overseeing FEMA.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Overseeing the Federal Government, but see, the
issue that is so difficult here is the fact that this is our main job,
and we are not doing it.
It takes a while to get a culture. If it is corruption, it comes and
it goes. When you have a culture of corruption and cronyism, that means
two things. Someone has not been overseeing the rules. Someone has not
been saying listen, no, I am sorry. We have the Department of
Transportation. This is what you are supposed to be doing because we
are the oversight committee of the Committee on Transportation and
Infrastructure, and we have oversight over you and we are elected by
the American people to make sure that your tax dollar is being spent in
the appropriate way.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. We write the checks out of this body. The checks
come if you are going to write the checks but not oversight.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. This is what we have done, and in the aftermath
of Hurricane Katrina, in the aftermath of Hurricane Rita. We are living
with the highest deficit in the history of the republic. We are
standing and we are doing this, and what goes back to this article that
I was addressing a little while ago, it talked about the fact that
there is no checks and balances.
I just want to remind the Members, since some might have maybe not
fully focused on what is happening, the Senate is Republican-
controlled. The House is definitely Republican-controlled. The White
House, we know for sure that it is under Republican control, and when
we see the amount of money that is now having to be spent, I am just
going to take Katrina. I do want to talk about health care, and I know
the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) has the next hour, and I just want
to talk a little bit about health care again.
But I can tell you this, I am going to take Katrina for an instance,
$200 billion plus. A big part of that is the fact that Louisiana or New
Orleans were flooded, under water. Hundreds of thousands of Americans
were displaced.
Two things happened there. Americans died but two things happened
there. There was a lack of governance, and I can tell you that if we
had the right kind of oversight, if maybe that Army Corps of Engineers
captain or commander would have gotten what he needed to do exactly
what the National Hurricane Center called for or to do exactly what
Members of Congress from that area asked for, or to say that since we
are doing all of these strategic review of vulnerabilities, I am on
Homeland Security so I know the language, since we are doing all of
that and we did all these things when we knew when we were vulnerable,
then we are supposed to respond to that, and we did not. That is where
the lack of governance comes in.
So this whole issue of oversight is a big issue, and if folks feel
that it is not going to be in a community by you, it is already there.
Katrina knocked the scab off of the Department of Homeland Security and
others that have said that we are ready for anything that happens. It
is a perfect example that we are not and we were not. Communities
should not have to go through it to learn it, and we are the Congress
and we are supposed to do better when we know better, and we know
better, and we are not doing better because we are not willing to lead.
On this side of the aisle, we are here at some couple of minutes
before 10:00 saying that we are ready and willing to lead or share in
the leadership. What is important here is that we allow a bipartisan
nature in dealing with some of the issues that we pointed out here
tonight, and that is not happening. That is where it comes in.
So I am glad historically that the gentleman was able to share with
us what happened when Democrats were in control, how many opportunities
that the minority had an opportunity to be a part of legislation and
inclusion.
Mr. PALLONE. If I could just say, that is the other part that is so
important is, again going back when the Democrats were in the majority,
most legislation was done on a consensus, bipartisan basis. In other
words, you would find in my committee, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr.
Dingell), on the Committee on Energy and Commerce, who of course was
the chairman, and legislation, if it was an energy bill, if it was a
health care bill, he would start by going to the ranking member, the
Republican man, the minority, and saying what input do you want into
this bill and let us sit down and there would be meetings, and they
would try to build a consensus on legislation.
That does not happen anymore around here. I mean, it is very rare to
[[Page H8836]]
see someone who is the chairman of the committee on the Republican side
reaching out to the Democrat on the committee and saying let us see if
we can work together and come to a consensus on a bill. That is why
most of the time you did not have to have these situations where you
would vote in the middle of the night and have to get people to change
votes because, if the bill came to the floor most likely it was a
consensus measure and most people voted for it.
Some people may say not everything has to be that way, and not
everything was that way, but the bottom line is when someone is
elected, when you are elected or I am elected, our constituents send us
down here. They do not expect us to just come down here and object to
everything because we do not have input. They expect that we are going
to have some input on what goes on, and to deny us that, which is what
the Republican leadership does for the most part now, I think denies
the basic principle of democracy.
We are not supposed to be coming down here and just objecting. We are
supposed to be part of what goes on, but we are not allowed to for the
most part. We cannot bring up amendments or ask for hearings. So this
is the problem.
I just want to go back and say one more thing. The reason why the
Republicans do not want the oversight and do not want the
accountability is because they are doing bad things. The reason they do
not want to have this bipartisan Katrina Commission is because they do
not want the commission to come back and report that there were
problems in what the FEMA Director and the administration did during
the hurricane.
It is pretty simple stuff, because if it is bipartisan and it has
equal members and there is a lot of oversight, they are going to show
what the problems were. They want to whitewash. That is the bottom
line. That is why they do not want this independent commission. It is
uncovering things.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Exactly. So they are picking their own personal
political situation over what is best for the American people. Can you
think of a better reason to take someone out of their leadership
position?
We all play politics here. We are just here. You get 435 people in a
room, there is going to be politics. We understand that, but when you
consistently and constantly pick your own personal political interests
over the public interests, even if it means not getting to the bottom
line, not getting to the kind of reforms that are going to be needed,
then that is a real problem, I think, and I think the American people
from the polls and from the people we talk to in our district seem to
feel the same way.
Mr. PALLONE. There was an editorial in the New York Times on
September 26 about faking the Katrina inquiry. The last paragraph, if I
could just read it, said this. It says, There is no way to whitewash a
hurricane. A government dominated by one party should be disqualified
from investigating itself. Just as President Bush repeatedly fought the
creation of the
9/11 Commission until public pressure forced him to yield, so should
the public now demand the administration and Congress get real about
Katrina.
That is what we are getting with this Republican-dominated committee.
It is just going to be another whitewash, and we cannot allow it. So I
appreciate the opportunity.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. I think what is important here are several
points that the gentleman has already made.
You have this chart here dealing with the whole gas price issue on
the middle class, and I just want to take a couple of minutes of this
hour just to talk a little bit more about what is called an energy
bill.
We had an alternative, and the reason why I call it an alternative to
the gas or to the energy bill is the fact that we were in the majority
and it would be called an energy bill dealing with price gouging and
also making future investments and bringing out alternative fuels to be
done by a certain date. Also, our alternative said if you price gouge,
we are not talking about someone at the pump, we are talking about the
oil industry that has soaring, through-the-roof profits in a time that
we have individuals who cannot even make it to work now because they
cannot afford to buy a tank of gas. They did not get an increase. Their
employer did not say, listen, we are going to give you about three
hundred more dollars a month so you can pay for gas. They did not say
that.
So we dealt with those individuals in our alternative by saying that
if you price gouge the American people, not only will it allow State
Attorneys General to enforce the law, but you will pay serious fines,
up to $3 million a day. Every day you price gouge, you pay. You do not
get your profits and run off and the stockholders are happy. No, you
are punished, and it not only dealt with gas. It dealt with oil and LP
Gas and heating gas.
I think it is important for folks to understand that we were for real
about it, and the majority side was really defending the industry. I
know we are going to have more time.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Let me do this, we want to give the e-mail address,
[email protected].
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