[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 148 (Wednesday, November 9, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H10124-H10129]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       30-SOMETHING WORKING GROUP

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Fortenberry). 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, it is once again an honor to come 
before the House, and we want to give thanks to the Democratic 
leadership for allowing us to be here one more night.
  Mr. Speaker, as my colleagues know, the 30-Something Working Group 
and hard-working members on this side of the aisle have come to the 
floor repeatedly, night after night, in some instances, 2 to 3 hours, 
to inform not only the Members, Mr. Speaker, but also the American 
people on what is happening to them under this budget. I will tell my 
colleagues something for them.
  As I stand here now on the floor, Mr. Speaker, the Rules Committee is 
meeting. They are not meeting under the lights of the American people 
or even in the daylight. They are meeting here at almost, close to 9 
o'clock at night to try to figure out how they can come to the floor 
and put forth a budget that is going to increase lines at veteran 
hospitals and clinics in rural areas, decrease services to veterans, 
and also bring up a higher copayment and premiums for veterans to be 
able to receive health care.
  They are meeting now trying to figure out, Mr. Speaker, how poor 
children, who do not have to pay a copayment to get health care, they 
are trying to figure out how they can explain that to the American 
people and how they can bring it to the floor and package it in a way 
that even some moderate Republicans can vote for it.
  They are trying to figure out now, Mr. Speaker, they are going to be 
able to ask Members of this Congress, who have been federalized by the 
fact that they have been elected to Congress, to watch out for the 
well-being of the country; and drilling, having oil rigs just miles off 
the coast of Florida where so many of us here in this country go to 
these destinations for relaxation.
  And also as it relates to even helping our own U.S. economy, people 
fly from overseas to come over and try to enjoy themselves and, at the 
same time, bring dollars to the United States. They are trying to 
figure out how they can go to pristine areas throughout our country and 
national parks and how they can stick an oil rig in the middle of a 
national park because special interests want that to happen, not that 
the American people want it to happen.
  They are also trying to figure out, Mr. Speaker, how they can save 
face, and when I say ``they,'' I am saying the Republican majority, how 
they can come to this floor and ask Members to vote to increase fees 
for students, which is going to be handed down to the States and they 
are going to have to increase fees to students for college education as 
it relates to loans.
  They also are trying to figure out how they are going to say that 
their budget is better than the Democratic alternative, and it is all 
about priorities.
  Mr. Speaker, that is the reason why we are here on the floor tonight. 
This is the eve of the budget vote. I will tell my colleagues this: I 
just do not know how, on the majority side, they can swell up about the 
troops, how they can get teary-eyed, how they can talk about the War on 
Terror, how they can talk about all of the things that they talk about 
as it relates to defending our country, and then those very individuals 
that are defending our country, as we speak, Mr. Speaker, will come 
back only to have to wait 6 months to see a specialist at the VA.
  Where is the money going to come from and the services if you are 
pulling the rug out from under the veterans?
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, this is about third-party validators. 
This is not Kendrick Meek, Tim Ryan, Bill Delahunt; this is not just us 
spewing out rhetoric to the American people, Mr. Speaker.
  I want to read a letter that I think may be of some interest to the 
Republican majority as they are all deciding right now how they are 
going to vote. It is about time you get on your knees, you say your 
prayers before you go to bed tonight. The Republican majority needs to 
remember this letter:
  ``The absolute folly and moral bankruptcy of this plan is apparent.'' 
He is referring to the budget reconciliation package that the 
Republicans are about ready to pass out of this Chamber.
  This gentleman says, ``The absolute folly and moral bankruptcy of 
this plan is apparent to the United States Senate, who voted to bar 
funding for it from the appropriations bill now in conference.
  ``The VFW,'' I say to my friends, ``urges the Congress to put a stop 
to the wartime assault on past and present warriors who have fought for 
and continue to defend our country.''
  Mr. DELAHUNT. That is from the VFW.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. ``Understand that this situation is totally 
unacceptable to the VFW and its 2.4 million members and auxiliaries. We 
will do what is necessary to protect, in Lincoln's words, `He who bore 
the battle, and his widow, and his orphan.' These words are marked on 
the front of the VA headquarters building. I urge you to take them to 
heart. Sincerely, Robert E. Wallace, Executive Director, the Veterans 
of Foreign Wars, Washington Office.''
  We are not making this up. This is the VFW.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. That is the Veterans of Foreign Wars.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Veterans of Foreign Wars.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, will 
the gentleman from Ohio give that to the Clerk so that we can enter it 
into the Record.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I will enter the letter into the 
Record at this time.

                                                 November 7, 2005.
       All Members of Congress: The absolute folly and moral 
     bankruptcy of this plan is apparent to the United States 
     Senate, who voted to bar funding for it from the 
     appropriation bill now in conference. We have heard, however, 
     that the House Leadership fully intends to strip this 
     provision from the bill, and require the VA to execute this 
     witch-hunt of a review.
       The VFW urges the Congress to put a stop to this wartime 
     assault on past and present warriors who have fought for, and 
     continue to defend our country. Understand that this 
     situation is totally unacceptable to the VFW, and its 2.4 
     million members and auxiliaries. We will do what is necessary 
     to protect, in Lincoln's words, ``He who bore the battle, and 
     his widow, and his orphan.'' These words are marked on the 
     front of the VA headquarters building. I urge you to take 
     them to heart.
           Sincerely,

                                            Robert E. Wallace,

                                               Executive Director,
                                            VFW Washington Office.

  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, what is going to happen is that 
historians are going to look at this moment right now in the U.S. 
Congress; they are going to look at this very moment, as we are on the 
floor right now, and the Rules Committee, they are meeting behind 
closed doors, at night, in the dark, making decisions that are going to 
affect the American people, the everyday American people. It is going 
to affect them.

[[Page H10125]]

  This is not a hearing that is broadcast to the American people; it is 
not a hearing, not even in the daytime. It is a hearing in the middle 
of the night. And what they are going to do in that closed-door hearing 
is set the stage to try to come to this floor.
  They cannot persuade our Members on this side, because we are already 
on the side of the American people. We already know, together we can do 
better on this side of the aisle. We already know that we put forth 
amendments in the Budget Committee that were voted down on a party-line 
vote.
  As it relates to the oil companies' profits, there was a hearing 
today with the oil companies here. They must have heard us talk about 
it, and so they said, Well, let us call a couple of them in and let us 
talk to them about why the American people possibly got price-gouged. A 
lot of talk.
  But it was the Democratic Caucus and the Democrats in committee that 
put forth the amendment, not talk, but action, to make sure that the 
American people no longer were being price-gouged; and also making sure 
that those individuals in America that have to pay higher fees, 
especially our poor, for heating oil and gas this winter. Action, not 
talk. To come to the floor and to just talk, without action.
  We in the minority, and by the fact that we are in the minority, we 
are trying to do the best that we can to fight on behalf of the 
American people that sent us here to represent them throughout this 
country, we are here fighting. We are not just giving them lip service. 
We are not saying, Hey, listen, we are going left, but we are really 
going right. We are not here to sugar-coat or glaze the reality.
  The reality is the fact that they know that they are wrong, and they 
know they are going to have a problem with the vote. I guarantee my 
colleagues, as sure as my name is Kendrick Meek, when that board opens 
up tomorrow, the vote on the budget, we are going to be here for some 
time. We are going to be here for some time while arms are being 
twisted, while the special interests are calling in on cell phones 
saying, you have to vote for this because our stuff is in that bill.
  But meanwhile, back at the ranch, I grabbed the PAC list a little 
earlier. I did not see a PAC on behalf of people who fought for this 
country. I did not even see a PAC that was put forth by the children in 
America that are on Title I and free and reduced lunches; I did not see 
a PAC on their behalf to get the attention of this Congress. I did not 
even see a PAC that said, Hey, listen, we just want you to do the right 
thing on behalf of the American people. I did not see that PAC listed 
on the PAC list.
  But I will tell my colleagues this: This is very disturbing.
  The reason why I asked the gentleman to put that VFW letter into the 
Record, and we need to put that AARP letter that came in yesterday 
since we are helping seniors, into the Record, because we want 
historians to look at the time when we had the highest deficit in the 
history of the Republic, we want historians to be able to look at when 
one President, with a majority Congress, with a majority House and a 
majority Senate, borrowed more from foreign countries than 42 previous 
Presidents and 42 previous administrations, Democrats and Republican.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, it was interesting to listen to our 
Republican colleagues and friends in the previous hour. I heard the 
word ``reform'' over and over again. I heard the term ``fiscal 
responsibility.'' I heard the concept or the phrase ``spending cuts 
reining in'' and ``making government smaller.''

                              {time}  2100

  And they kept referring to Democrats and the minority side with 
certain gestures. I guess my response is, who has been running this 
place for 12 years? Who has been in charge, Mr. Speaker, for 12 years? 
It was in 1994 that the Republicans came to power and took control of 
this body. Twelve years ago. Is it just dawning on you now that fiscal 
responsibility is essential to our economy, essential to the future of 
our children? And reform, you have had 12 years to do reform. They 
speak of the veterans and health care and they recite statistics and 
they were mostly newer Members of the Republican Party that spoke here 
tonight, so maybe they are unaware of what the Republican leadership in 
the House did about a year or two ago. The chairman of the veterans 
services committee, the then chairman was the gentleman from New 
Jersey, someone whom I disagree with on occasion, but for whom I have 
great respect because he tells it like it is and he stands tall, and if 
he believes in something his commitment is unwavering. He made a big 
mistake. He sided with the VFW. He sided with the American Legion and 
the DAV, Disabled American Veterans organization. These are the people 
who understand best. They are not governmental organizations. They are 
nonprofit voluntary associations of veterans.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Who do not give money.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Who do not give money to politicians. But because he 
sided with them in terms of their priorities, their expression of what 
was needed to properly respect the needs of American servicepeople who 
have done so much for this country, you know what happened to him? Now, 
they probably do not know this. He got fired, for all intents and 
purposes. He was removed as chairman of that veterans services 
committee. And that is Chris Smith, a man of courage and moral 
principle.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. If the gentleman will yield, even more, not only 
was he removed as chairman; he was taken off the committee. I think he 
was taken off the committee as it relates to being the chairman. I am 
not just talking about being off the committee, taken out of the 
chairmanship. But that is what you get when you stand up against the 
machine.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. The machine.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. That is what happens to so many individuals that 
stand up against the machine.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Yes.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I thought it was very interesting how, as we were 
gathering or coordinating our efforts here tonight, I thought as I was 
listening to our Republican friends on the other side, there were 
things missing that I think the American people, Mr. Speaker, need to 
know about. No one on the other side said that we should cut the $16 
billion in oil subsidies to pay for some of the other cuts that are 
being made for poor children or middle-class college students. No one 
on the other side said anything about the $100 billion in subsidies 
that are going to the pharmaceutical companies. No one said anything 
about that. And if there is any concern about the lack of 
responsibility, the incompetent leadership, complete incompetence, 
complete inability to govern, all we need to do is look at what has 
happened in the last 4 years.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I say to the gentleman from Ohio, how about some 
welfare reform? Welfare reform for the oil industry and welfare reform 
for the pharmaceutical companies. You know, when they speak to the 
issue of welfare reform, they are not talking about the oil industry or 
the drug manufacturers. No, they are not talking about those folk. They 
are not talking about corporate welfare. And as you just indicated, $16 
billion to go to Big Oil for what? For an industry that just had record 
profits.
  As you indicated earlier, they were up here today, brought up here by 
Republicans because it is so embarrassing to have passed an 
appropriation and provided subsidies for Big Oil, and then they report 
these incredible profits. I mean, it was embarrassing.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, we may be a little more intense 
tonight than normal, and the reason is that tomorrow this budget may 
come before this House, and all the rhetoric over the past few weeks 
may become reality tomorrow on this floor. And we are not going to sit 
up in our offices and watch C-SPAN and watch this happen. We are not 
going to sit in our office and turn on Chris Matthews or some MTV, VH-1 
show and just relax tonight.
  The American people will be hurt if this budget passes this Congress 
tomorrow. People who are on Medicaid will be hurt tomorrow. People who 
are trying to bite, scratch, and pinch to send their kids to college 
will be hurt tomorrow. And veterans who fought for this country will be 
hurt tomorrow. And if they think we are going to stand up, or lay down, 
in our offices and turn

[[Page H10126]]

the TV on or go back home to our apartments and watch this happen 
without a fight, they have got another think coming, because they have 
taken this country, and in the last 4 years borrowed over $1 trillion 
from foreign countries. In the last 224 years, we have not borrowed 
that much from foreign countries.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. I know you have a point there. I just want a 
point of clarification. Point of clarification. I did speak correctly, 
Mr. Speaker, when I said that the chairman, the past chairman of the 
Veterans' Affairs Committee, Republican, was not only removed as 
chairman, but kicked off of the committee. They did not even want his 
thoughts on the committee because he stood up for veterans. He stepped 
out of line. He stepped out of line. Chairman Smith, Chris Smith 
stepped out of line, because he did what he thought was right. I am 
holding in my hand, and I am sorry, but I just wanted to share that 
because we were making a point earlier and I said he was off the 
committee, and then folks were looking around. I knew that I was 
correct.
  Here is the legislative directory for the 109th Congress. It has the 
names of the members on the committee, and I do not blame the Members. 
I am talking about the leadership. But there are two spots there that 
say vacancy, vacancy. One of those vacancies was the past chairman of 
that committee who was a Republican that could no longer stomach doing 
what the Republican leadership was asking in this House for him to do.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Because he sided with the veterans of foreign wars, 
with the American Legion, with the disabled veterans and the various 
veterans services organizations.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And the American people, for that matter.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. And the American people. Because the American people 
want to take care of the veteran. Before we leave the veteran issue, if 
anyone who should be watching our conversation this evening has any 
doubts, do not call us. Do not call our offices. Do not call the 
offices of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Do not call 
the Republican Members. Do not call the Republican leadership. Call the 
Veterans of Foreign Wars where you live. Call the American Legion where 
you live.
  MS. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. We have a very important holiday coming up the 
day after tomorrow, and each of us is hoping that we have an 
opportunity to go home and look our veterans in the eye and tell them 
how much we appreciate and honor them. And I know that I will be able 
to do that in good conscience. I know that I will stand proud with my 
veterans and tell them that I did everything I could and will continue 
to do everything I can and House Democrats will continue to do 
everything we can to ensure that we honor their service.
  I certainly would not want to be any Member of Congress with an R 
next to their name that votes for this bill tomorrow if it comes up on 
the floor because, growing up, my mom always told me that the guide 
that I should use when making a decision was whether I was going to be 
able to sleep well and then wake up in the morning and look at myself 
in the mirror and be comfortable with the decision that I made and know 
that I did the right thing.
  Well, I wonder just how well our Republican friends on the other side 
of the aisle are going to be sleeping tonight. They have a lot for 
their stomach to be churning about; and for those that are going to 
wake up in the morning and decide that they are going to vote ``aye'' 
and support this legislation, I do not know how the very next morning 
they are going to be able to stand on the podium with their veterans 
and look them in the eye and say that they continue to honor them.
  And, you know, we sometimes stand here and people listening to us or, 
Mr. Speaker, sometimes people might think that, you know, this is just 
our opinion, that we are obviously committed Democrats and committed to 
our beliefs and our agenda. But we are here every night not 
representing just our own opinion, although we certainly do 
vociferously express our opinion. We like to make sure that we bring 
third-party validators to back up the opinion that we are espousing on 
this floor.
  I just want to read an excerpt from a letter that was sent to each 
Member of Congress, all 535 Members of us, of these two Chambers, on 
Monday, November 7, 2005 by Robert E. Wallace who is the executive 
director of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Washington office. And I am 
hopeful that I am not being repetitive. I am not sure if you have 
already read his words. But, you know, for those that may question 
whether or not we know what we are talking about or that we are 
exaggerating or engaging in hyperbole when it comes to what is in this 
bill and the priorities of the Republican leadership versus our 
priorities when it comes to commitment to veterans, he says:
  ``Dear Senator or Representative. To all Members of Congress, we have 
at the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States, VFW, observed for 
the past several months astonishing efforts to cast veterans who have 
been found to be severely disabled by the Department of Veterans 
Affairs' own determinations as undeserving of the veterans benefits 
their grateful Nation has provided for them in the law. This assault on 
the most vulnerable members of the veteran community, disabled in 
service to this country and suffering from post-traumatic stress 
disorder, is broad in its scope and execution. At a time when the VA 
should be preparing to serve combat veterans returning from the war on 
terrorism being fought in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, they are 
expending their limited resources planning a systematic effort to 
reduce or remove benefits earned by the parents and older siblings of 
the troops fighting in the field today.''
  Well, that is not Tim Ryan saying it. That is not Debbie Wasserman 
Schultz or Bill Delahunt or Kendrick Meek saying it. That is the 
executive director of the VFW's Washington office.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. They are just saying stop. The VFW is telling the 
Republican Party, Mr. Speaker, stop. Look what you are doing. You are 
hurting veterans. I mean, the executive director of the Veterans of 
Foreign Wars does not just say I am going to send a letter to Congress 
today, Mr. Speaker. Stop it. You are going to hurt veterans. And at the 
same time, you are giving tax cuts to people who make $1 million a year 
or more. You are giving $16 billion in subsidies to the oil companies. 
You are giving handouts to the pharmaceutical companies, the wealthiest 
corporations in the world. And you are cutting veterans benefits. What 
is going on here?
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Well, I think what is going on is that there is a 
misunderstanding on the part of the Republican leadership when they 
speak of patriotism. Patriotism is not about a parade. It is not simply 
respect for the flag. It is about treating the men and women who go to 
war for us, who serve the country with respect.

                              {time}  2115

  That is what patriotism is about.
  We hear a lot about patriotism on the floor of this House, and I am 
sure that those words are uttered with great conviction and sincerity. 
But I guess what we are trying to convey is that patriotism is not just 
rhetoric.
  Remember what Franklin Delano Roosevelt used to say during World War 
II? Shared sacrifice. Who is sacrificing for our veterans? Those that 
receive this egregious tax benefit who are among the most affluent in 
America. I daresay if those people were inquired of, one by one, they 
would say, Take that tax break; I want the veterans to be respected.
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I heard some of our friends on 
the other side of the aisle taking issue or calling into question what 
we have been saying about what they would propose to do to our Nation's 
veterans. I did not notice them holding up anything in black and white 
that disproves what we are saying.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Did you hear about reform?
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. I did not notice.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Did you hear about limited government? Did you hear 
about fiscal responsibility?
  You know what is interesting? I served with a gentleman who is a 
genuine conservative and he was part of the leadership on the 
Republican side. He chose not to run again. And I guess that must be a 
very liberating experience, because he recently spoke out and this is 
what he said:

[[Page H10127]]

  Our President is publicly oblivious to criticism, although off-the-
record reports indicate his patience is running thin inside the White 
House. He argues the right wing is now spending like profligates with 
no tomorrow, and is displaying a very real arrogance. What they say 
about absolute power is coming to reality.
  Those words were written by, as I said, a former member of the 
Republican leadership, Representative J.C. Watts of Oklahoma, a 
conservative, a man of principle.
  As I said earlier, we have heard about reform. We hear about we have 
got to limit government. Well, what have they been doing for 12 years?
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. It had to be a joke. They had to be kidding.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Maybe it is just that they do not get it. They have not 
been here long enough to understand that they have been in power for 12 
years. I mean, we have a single-party government in this country today, 
the Senate, the House, and the White House. And yet conservatives like 
the President of the American Conservative Union, David Keen, he noted 
in a letter to members that Federal spending has increased by $300 
billion since George Bush took office, including $96 billion for 
domestic social welfare programs. By comparison, Keen said, spending 
increased by only $51 billion during President Clinton's 8 years. So I 
guess what we are talking about is the capacity of an administration to 
spend money wisely and effectively.
  We heard about welfare reform, Mr. Speaker, and yet we have created a 
welfare state for major corporations. We have created in Iraq a welfare 
state for Iraqis. And as we have said here before, it was the 
Republican majority that insisted that the money that goes to Iraq, to 
rebuild Iraq, never be paid back to the American taxpayers. That just 
does not make any sense. That makes absolutely no sense. And we stood 
here on this floor and said, Make it a loan so that we get the money 
back, so that we can use it to control the deficit, this deficit that 
is the product of this administration and this Congress.
  When Bill Clinton left office, there was a surplus of $5.6 trillion. 
And I kept hearing something about facts over here. Well, that is a 
fact that they should recognize, the Republican majority. Bill Clinton 
left a surplus for the American people. And what do we have now? We 
have trillions, trillions of a deficit that will explode in future 
years harming the interests of generations of Americans to come.
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. And their answer to the deficit that they have 
ballooned is to not just hurt veterans, but to hurt people just when 
they are on the cusp of being able to make a change and turn the corner 
in their life. There are $844 million in food stamp cuts in this bill.
  Now, I have heard some of our friends on the Republican side of the 
aisle argue that there is fraud in the food stamp program and that 
there are people who are collecting food stamps that do not deserve it 
or maybe we do not have as many people who need food stamps these days. 
Well, today, not yesterday, not 5 months ago, not a year ago, today, 
this is a picture of a line of 25,000 people, 25,000 people in Broward 
County where I am from, who lined up as early as 3:00 in the morning to 
sign up for food stamps following Hurricane Wilma.
  Now, I checked to make sure that I was being accurate when I came 
down here tonight. This food stamp application process is through the 
regular food stamp program, nothing special, no special appropriations, 
nothing from FEMA. This is 25,000 people, most of whom have never 
before applied for public assistance.
  Now, if the Republicans are going to say that there are not people in 
need and that it is more important to cut taxes for the wealthy then to 
provide for the people who are standing in this line, who have already 
been through so much, then really I guess we are serving with many who 
are serving in this Chamber without conscience.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, may I say something?
  I do not know if the gentlewoman had the opportunity to listen 
earlier to our friends and colleagues, but they talked about common 
sense and they talked about respect for families. And yet in their 
proposal there is a cut of some $5 billion in a category called child 
support enforcement.
  Now, common sense would dictate that if you invest money, if you 
invest $1 and get $4 in return that you do it because that is a good 
deal. Well, that is a bureaucratic term, child support enforcement. 
Really what it comes down to is, in most cases, deadbeats, deadbeat 
fathers who are running out on their obligation to their children, 
leaving mom and the children without any support, and forcing them onto 
welfare.
  So instead of really demonstrating common sense, this Republican 
budget reduces the enforcement of audits on fathers to provide support 
for their children and former wives. It eliminates that or reduces it 
by $5 billion, and that translates, if you look at it as a business 
decision, into a loss of some $20 billion, $20 billion that would go to 
support children in this country.
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Let us just make sure people understand and 
the Speaker understands that we are not talking about made-up numbers 
here that we are just pulling out of thin air.
  In the Washington Post last Thursday, another third-party validator, 
they describe the cuts in this bill and they go on to say, The food 
stamp cuts in the House measure would knock nearly 300,000 people off 
nutritional assistance programs, including 70,000 legal immigrants, 
according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which is the 
office that we get our economic facts from.
  Those immigrants would lose their benefits because the House measure 
would require legal immigrants to live in the United States for 7 years 
before becoming eligible for receiving food stamps. About 40,000 
children would lose eligibility for free or reduced-price lunches, the 
CBO estimated. The food stamp cuts, if approved, will especially affect 
11 States, including Maryland, that use the changes in the food stamp 
law, approved with the President's support in 2002, to expand 
eligibility and to simplify the application process.
  Under the House measure that we will consider tomorrow, eligibility 
for food stamps would be tightened to exclude some recipients, get 
this, who qualify for nutritional support simply because they qualify 
for other antipoverty programs funded by the Federal welfare program 
known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, not eliminate fraud, 
not eliminate people who are not supposed to be getting food stamps, 
but eliminate people who already qualify because they qualify for other 
poverty programs.
  And then today we have 25,000 more people in one county applying for 
the same program that we are going to cut 300,000 from tomorrow if this 
bill passes.
  Where is outrage? Where is the conscience? I want to know how our 
colleagues are going to sleep tonight knowing that they have to cast 
this vote tomorrow.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, we have been talking for a little 
while here. I think it is important for us to just kind of recap before 
we get on to something else.
  The Republican budget that is going to pass this House tomorrow, 
probably without one Democratic vote, probably anyone on this side of 
the aisle will not vote for this bill because of the egregious cuts in 
there.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, let me just say real quick, the 
gentleman said, when it passes the House floor tomorrow, and I think 
the reason why you said that, because I know personally that the 
gentleman has watched on 3, 4, 5 major votes, that 20 minutes into the 
vote, 30 minutes into the vote, 1 hour into the vote, 90 minutes into 
the vote, the arm-twisting, the squeals, the cries from this side of 
the aisle of individuals getting hammered, literally, with their hands 
on the table saying that you will vote for this. You will vote for 
this. And that is the reason why the gentleman is speaking in those 
terms, ``when it passes.''
  But I am going to say something. I believe in the spirit of the 
American people. I hope it rises up tomorrow in a way that it should 
rise up against this very bad budget. I hope that we can adopt the 
Democratic budget that is sensible, that put us on the trail for fiscal 
responsibility by 2015, to make sure that we prioritize on behalf of 
Americans and not on behalf of special interests.

[[Page H10128]]

                              {time}  2130

  So you are 110 percent right. If things happen at all the way it 
appears here under this Republican majority, it will pass. It will pass 
because they will literally make their Members vote for it.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I appreciate that. So we go through this bill here 
and we look at the cuts.
  Medicaid cuts on poor and working-class families who are trying to 
get some health care for their kids, student loan cuts $14.3 billion; 
$24 billion in reduced child support collections. It is going to knock 
300,000 Americans off food stamps. Many of them have been displaced 
because of the natural disasters. 40,000 kids are going to get kicked 
off school lunch programs. Foster care is going to take a hit of 7 or 
$800 million, I believe. Veterans are going to get cut $600 million. 
There is a funny thing here because at the same time all this is going 
on, our friends who make more than a half a million dollars a year are 
going to receive a tax cut worth $70 billion.
  So as all of these programs on college students and their parents, 
Medicaid, child support, food stamps, veterans, foster care are getting 
cut, there is going to be $70 billion in tax cuts for people who make 
more than a half a million dollars a year; and before I yield over 
there to my friend from Florida, there is something funny about this 
list that we have here.
  I am looking at this: poor kids and poor mothers on Medicaid, who 
have their kids on Medicaid; college students who are just trying to 
get a better life, improve themselves; kids on child support and 
mothers who are receiving child support; people on food stamps; kids 
and families who qualify for the school lunch program; veterans.
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, do you know what that is called? 
That is called taking from the needy and giving to the greedy.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Exactly right, and there is a funny thing here. It 
is that none of these groups who are going to face the cuts tomorrow 
from our Republican friends have a lobby group on Shakedown Street, on 
K Street, not one of them. There is no lobby group for the college 
students who are going to have to pay more on student loans. There is 
no lobby group for the kids who need foster care.
  I hope, Mr. Speaker, that the American people recognize that this 
budget is bought and paid for by the special interests on K Street, 
down on Shakedown Street, because our friends who are given the tax 
cuts will not take the $16 billion from the oil companies that they are 
giving in subsidies. They will not reduce the cost of the Medicare part 
B prescription drug bill. They will not do it, the billions that are 
going to go to the pharmaceutical industry. Those people are off the 
table. The Republican majority will not cut from them.
  They have to go to poor kids who qualify for free and reduced lunch 
to go try to balance the budget; and at the same time, they are giving 
more tax cuts. It is frustrating to me as a Member of Congress, from a 
district that has a high unemployment rate, a district that 50 percent 
of the people in my district who pay taxes did not even receive a tax 
cut and many who either qualify for these programs or want to qualify 
for the student loans and the Pell grants so they could improve their 
lives are going to get hurt because of this.
  At the same time, the lack of leadership, the incompetence, the 
inability to govern in a way that will improve the country and invest 
in the country continues down here, this is a disgrace.
  This budget is an absolute disgrace, and you take any American and 
you ask them to come down here and be the distinguished gentleman like 
the movie and come down here and try to make the decisions that we have 
to make and you look at what we look at, there are not many Americans 
who would say giving tax cuts to people who make $1 million a year and 
cutting from the middle class, cutting from Medicare, cutting from our 
seniors' health care program or the poverty programs in this country is 
somehow okay.
  One final comment. We heard from a lot of the religious organizations 
through the course of the last election, the Christian Coalition. I 
spent 12 years in Catholic schools, and I remember the Christianity I 
learned about had more to do with helping people who were not doing so 
well and trying to do your best to lift them up. To listen to the 
rhetoric come out of the organizations, not the members of the 
organizations because there are a lot of Christians in my district, 
these cuts offend them. The people who work at Catholic Charities, this 
offends them; and for the organizations who say they are religious to 
be deaf on this issue is an outrage.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Well, there is nothing more evident than the 
truth as it relates to this budget, and I mentioned earlier about 
holding the clock open and violating the spirit of the rules of the 
House when there is a 15-minute vote called. It is customary to give 
Members 5 extra minutes to get here to vote, but it is not customary to 
hold a clock open for 3 hours.
  Let me just say, October 7, 2005, Republicans held open a 5-minute 
vote on the Gasoline for America's Security Act for over 40 minutes to 
pass the energy bill, Republicans, which also passed by two votes 
because of the arm twisting.
  On November 22, 2003, the majority held open the vote for 3 hours, 
the longest in the history of the House of Representatives, on the 
prescription drug bill.
  Then on the Central American Free Trade Agreement on July 27 and 28, 
it has two dates because the clock was held open so long. For a 15-
minute vote, the vote was held open for over an hour; and it passed on 
a 217 to 215 vote.
  Here is the evidence. It is in the Record. I do not need to enter it. 
It is already there.
  When you talk about how can this happen, how could this be allowed to 
happen in America, as we speak now, the Rules Committee is meeting in a 
dark room just above this Chamber, trying to figure out how they are 
going to come to the floor under the lights and the cameras and justify 
voting for a budget like this.
  I am wondering where the majority's letters are from Family U.S.A. 
that is saying that these Medicaid cuts that the House has, that it 
will cause enormous hardships out there. Where is their letter and 
support from the AARP, the largest retirement organization in the 
world, that is saying that they are against the Medicaid cuts because 
it will affect seniors? Where are their third-party validators, these 
nonpartisan groups? I have to question that because I cannot help think 
about what we are facing right now.
  We are facing allegations in the White House of outing a CIA agent 
and several other agents because someone thought that it would be 
politically right for them to share classified information about a 
clandestine agent with reporters. This is not what I am saying; this is 
what the indictment says.
  You know what I did get, not from help from the majority, but we 
finally got the list of the subpoenas that were issued under the 
Clinton administration versus the Bush administration. It saddens me to 
see that the Republicans can provide oversight when they want to. They 
can get to the bottom of what actually happened when they want to.
  I will tell you this, just one committee I am going to take, just one 
committee, the House Government Reform Committee issued over 1,089 
subpoenas to the Clinton administration. That is the record. That is 
not my report; that is what the record reflects. Ninety-seven percent 
of those subpoenas were targeted towards the Clinton administration and 
the Democratic Party. Only 11 subpoenas for the Republicans, 11 out of 
1,089.
  It goes on further to say that the GAO, this is the Government 
Accountability Office, examined the White House's efforts to provide 
documents to the Congress over an 18-month period from October 1996 to 
March 1, 1999. The Government Accountability Office found that during 
that period the White House staff spent, alone, over 55,000 hours 
responding to over 300 congressional requests, producing hundreds of 
thousand of pages of documents and videotapes and audiotapes to the 
Congress.
  They called 134 Clinton administration White House agency officials 
to hearings concerning allegations of the Clinton administration. The 
witnesses were called to appear before the committee and in public 
session, not secret session, but public session, so the

[[Page H10129]]

American people can see it. The White House chief of staff and the 
counsel to the President, the counsel to the Vice President, all of 
them were called here, spent over 568 hours in depositions with staff. 
That is just with staff. They also provided discussions between the 
President and his advisers. President Clinton waived the executive 
privilege and allowed these advisers to testify before the committee 
about their discussions with him.
  Internal White House e-mails, over $12 million was spent to 
reconstruct those e-mails. Confidential conversations within the White 
House counsel's office were provided to the Congress, but now we have 
questionable intelligence that sent us to war. We have a CIA agent that 
has been outed, and this is what the Republican Congress does now.
  Well, we know that CIA agents are being outed, but we are not looking 
over there because our friends may be embarrassed. It may jeopardize 
national security, but that is not important. It is all about making 
sure that we stay in power and that we do not pay attention to what the 
American people constitutionally have asked us to do, to provide 
oversight and to give the American people a voice when wrongdoing is 
evident, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
  It is a shame. It is a shame that this is happening as we speak in 
this Congress.
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. But do not worry because last week President 
Bush rode in on his white steed to the rescue of the American people 
and addressed the culture of corruption and cronyism and lack of 
competence that is going on and emanating from the White House.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. What did he do?
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. He required all of the White House staff to 
take an ethics refresher course this week.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Is that mandatory?
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Oh, yes, do not worry. White House staff 
attendance is mandatory for anyone holding any level of security 
clearance.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Is this a semester-long course?
  Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. No. This is a 4-hour class that actually I 
think it is being given this week by White House counsel Harriet Miers' 
office, who, of course, we know has been doing such a bang-up job at 
guiding the White House through their ethical morass.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Not being facetious for a moment, we have, I would 
submit, a very serious problem in terms of the health of our democratic 
institutions. There has not been, and if you reflect, you will not be 
able to identify another administration with the obsession for secrecy 
that this administration has.
  What I found particularly interesting, the Republican chairman, 
highly respected, former Governor of New Jersey, Tom Kean, who headed 
the independent 9/11 Commission report, he observed that many so-called 
classified documents he reviewed in the course of their investigation 
were not true secrets as much as there was information that was 
publicly available.

                              {time}  2145

  It just did not make any sense at all. And what we have seen is a 25 
percent increase on documents being classified almost on an annual 
basis in this administration. We know that they refuse to submit to any 
oversight or any accountability, and the American people should know 
that.
  In a moment of candor, a friend of ours, again a senior member of the 
Republican Caucus, had this to say. He aptly characterized recent 
congressional oversight of the administration. This is Mr. Ray LaHood, 
a very solid Member and someone respected on both sides of the aisle. 
These are his words, not mine. This is Ray LaHood, whom the Speaker and 
every Member in this body knows and respects.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Good man.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. ``Our party controls the levers of government. We are 
not about to go out and look beneath a bunch of rocks to try to cause 
heartburn.''
  In other words, you have a shroud of secrecy that has descended 
around the democratic institutions that are controlled by the majority 
party. That is dangerous.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. If the gentleman will yield, this is about 
protecting their party. If the Republicans control the House and the 
Senate and the White House, and they are not being investigated to find 
what went wrong, whether it was Katrina or the CIA leak or Karl Rove or 
``Scooter'' Libby or the Vice President's role in all this, or how are 
we going to balance the budget, if the Republican Party is not willing 
to investigate those problems, those situations, then they are putting 
the Republican Party before the interests of the country. And that has 
been the consistent modus operandi of this institution.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. And if you disagree with them, what happens?
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. You get punished.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Right. Ask General Shinseki, who was dismissed when he 
disagreed, when he gave just a different opinion as to the number of 
troops that were going to be required in Iraq. He said 300,000. The 
then-Under Secretary of Defense, Mr. Wolfowitz, said, Hey, that is 
vastly overrated. Subsequently, we have discovered that the good 
general was correct.
  What about Larry Lindsey, who was an economic adviser to the 
President and who came out with an estimate that the range of dollars 
that would be necessary in Iraq would go from $100 billion to $200 
billion. We are way past $200 billion now. But the administration, the 
White House, kept saying it will not exceed $60 billion. The American 
people should remember that.
  And what happened to Larry Lindsey? He got bumped too.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. If my colleague will give out the Web site 
before we have to close.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. We want an opportunity to take this Congress and 
this country in a new direction, change the way we are going and derive 
some independence. We are at [email protected]. That is 
30, the number, at mail.house.gov.
  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Members for 
joining us here this hour. I look forward to being back on the floor, 
all of us, in one more hour when my colleague claims his hour so that 
we can continue sharing good information not only with the Members but 
the American people.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the Democratic leadership for allowing us to 
have this hour.

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