[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 87 (Thursday, June 29, 2006)]
[House]
[Pages H4899-H4905]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           BLUE DOG COALITION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2005, the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. ROSS. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
  This evening I rise on behalf of the 37-member strong, fiscally 
conservative Democratic Blue Dog Coalition to discuss a grave concern 
of ours and that is the Nation's debt. As you walk the Halls of 
Congress, there is never a doubt whether you are walking past one of 
the 37 of us that make up the Democratic Blue Dog Coalition because you 
will see this poster as a welcome mat by each of our doors. As you can 
see from this poster, today the United States national debt is 
$8,346,401,298,731 and some change. For every man, woman and child 
living in America today, including the children born this hour, their 
share of the national debt is $27,905. I might add, a staggering 
$27,905. It is what we call the debt tax, D-E-B-T. Mr. Speaker, that is 
one tax that cannot be cut or eliminated until this Republican Congress 
and this Republican administration gets its fiscal house in order.
  As members of the fiscally conservative Democratic Blue Dog 
Coalition, we are here tonight, Mr. Speaker, to talk about trying to 
restore some common sense and fiscal discipline to our Nation's 
government. It is hard now to believe, but from 1998 through 2001, this 
Nation had a balanced budget and the economy was much better. People 
were saving more. They had good jobs. Today, for those fortunate enough 
to have a job, many of them have had to leave the good-paying jobs with 
the good benefits for low-paying jobs with little or no benefits.
  It is time to get our fiscal house back in order so we can jump-start 
this economy, invest in alternative and renewable fuels and bring down 
the high cost of gasoline, ensure that our children are getting the 
very best education possible, ensure that health care is affordable and 
accessible, and ensure that we are doing right by our men and women in 
uniform and our veterans.

                              {time}  2015

  In order to meet what I believe should be America's priorities, we 
must first get our Nation's fiscal house in order. And we are not doing 
that. We had deficit spending, record deficits in 2002, 2003, 2004, 
2005, 2006, and, yes, the projected deficit for fiscal year 2007, you 
will hear a lot of people refer to it as $350 billion. The deficit for 
fiscal year 2007, a lot of people will tell you it is $350 billion, but 
it is not. It is not, Mr. Speaker. The real deficit for fiscal year 
2007 is $545 billion.
  Why the difference between the $350 billion and the $545 billion? It 
is quite simple. Our Government is borrowing from the Social Security 
Trust Fund to fund this deficit, to fund tax cuts for those earning 
over $400,000 a year.

[[Page H4900]]

  I am now beginning to understand why when I came to Congress in 2001 
the first bill I filed was a bill to tell the politicians in Washington 
to keep their hands off the Social Security Trust Fund. This Republican 
Congress refused to give me a hearing or a vote on that bill. And now 
we know why. Because for fiscal year 2007 the real deficit is not $350 
billion as they want you to believe, it is $540 billion, because the 
difference is money they are taking from the Social Security Trust Fund 
with no provision on when or how it gets paid back and no idea where 
the revenue is going to come from to pay it back.
  The national debt. Listen to this. The total national debt in 1789 to 
2000 was $5.67 trillion. But by 2010, the total national debt will have 
increased to $10.88 trillion if we continue down this path. That is a 
doubling. That is a doubling of a 211-year debt in just 10 years.
  Interest payments on this debt are one of the fastest-growing parts 
of the Federal budget. And the debt tax, as I refer to it, is one tax 
that cannot be repealed or cut until we get our Nation's fiscal house 
in order.
  Again the D-E-B-T tax, the debt tax, $27,905 for every living man, 
woman and child in this country today. That is what it would take to 
pay off this massive debt of $8,346,401,298,731 and, of course, some 
change.
  Why do deficits matter? Deficits reduce economic growth. They burden 
our children and grandchildren with liabilities. They increase our 
reliance on foreign lenders who now own 40 percent of our debt.
  Mr. Speaker, the U.S. is becoming increasingly dependent on foreign 
lenders. Foreign lenders currently hold a total of more than $2 
trillion of our public debt. Compare this to only $23 billion foreign 
holdings back in 1993.
  The top 10 current lenders, now get a load of this, think about this. 
We are passing law after law providing tax cuts to those earning over 
$400,000 a year, while cutting Medicaid, while cutting student loans. 
And where is the revenue coming from? We are borrowing $1 billion a 
day. We are spending half a billion dollars a day paying interest on 
the debt that we have already got, and we are borrowing another billion 
dollars a day on top of that.
  Where is it coming from?
  Japan. We owe Japan $640.1 billion.
  China. Our Nation has borrowed $321.4 billion from China to provide 
tax cuts in this Nation to those earning over $400,000 a year.
  United Kingdom, $179.5 billion.
  OPEC. Imagine that. Our Nation has borrowed $98 billion from OPEC.
  Korea, $72.4 billion.
  Taiwan, $68.9 billion.
  The Caribbean banking centers, $61.7 billion.
  Hong Kong, $46.6 billion.
  Germany, $46.5 billion.
  Mexico. Our Nation has borrowed $40.1 billion from Mexico to give tax 
cuts in this country to those earning over $400,000 a year.
  Mr. Speaker, I submit to you it is time for us to get our Nation's 
fiscal house in order, to stop the deficit spending, to pay down this 
debt and get back to addressing the real needs and the real priorities 
of America's working families, America's farm families, and America's 
seniors.
  Mr. Speaker, if you have any comments or questions about what we are 
discussing tonight dealing with the fiscally conservative Blue Dog 
Coalition and our concern about the debt and the deficit, and as we 
talk more about accountability this evening, restoring accountability 
to our Nation's Government, Mr. Speaker, if you have any questions, 
comments or concerns, I encourage you to e-mail us, sir, at 
[email protected]. That is [email protected].
  Now, I have laid out the problem that this Nation faces. We are not 
here as members of the 37-member-strong, fiscally conservative 
Democratic Blue Dog Coalition to simply criticize the Republican 
leadership for their failures since they took over this House and 
became the majority, became the ones in charge of this place.
  We are here to also offer up solutions, something that I believe too 
many politicians fail to do. They are quick to criticize, but they are 
not quick to offer up solutions.
  Mr. Speaker, we have a 12-point plan that will cure our Nation's 
addiction to deficit spending that has been laid out by the Blue Dog 
Coalition. We will be talking about these 12 points tonight, including 
a constitutional amendment calling for a balanced budget, among others; 
and we will also be talking about restoring accountability to our 
Government.
  But at this time I will yield to my friend, a fellow Blue Dog, who 
comes to us from the State of California. That is the gentleman from 
California, Congressman Jim Costa.
  Mr. COSTA. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to join tonight with my fellow 
Blue Dog, Congressman Mike Ross, the gentleman from Arkansas, who does 
an excellent job on behalf of representing his constituents from the 
great State of Arkansas.
  Tonight, as a fellow Blue Dog member, I want to echo a number of the 
comments that Congressman Ross has made, because in that 12-point 
program that Congressman Ross will talk more about I believe lies 
solutions to the problems facing our Nation today, solutions that come 
to the heart of criteria and qualities that all Americans I think 
share. Those are accountability, competence and what kind of 
representation they want to see in their House of Representatives.
  It does not matter what party you are a member of in this great 
Nation of ours. Accountability and competence are characteristics that 
Americans value throughout our great land.
  In coming to the Congress as a new Member and becoming a fellow Blue 
Dog, we have had an opportunity to share and really spend a great deal 
of time in examining the challenges that our Nation finds itself in in 
getting its fiscal house in order.
  Recently, the Blue Dogs, in consultation with a lot of research, 
uncovered an unpublicized Department of Treasury document that made a 
report that I think most Americans, unfortunately, are unaware of. This 
Department of Treasury, run by this administration, using the same 
tried and true accounting methods that every business in America uses, 
cast new light on the fiscal severity that our Nation is facing, what 
some would call a mess.
  This Treasury report, filed by the Bush administration, reinforces 
what the Blue Dogs have been saying for years. One of the startling 
revelations of this 158-page report indicates by the admission of 
Secretary Snow that the U.S. deficit, as Congressman Ross said, under 
current accounting methods in 2005 was more than twice the amount that 
is being reported.
  As a matter of fact, if you do not take into account, as Congressman 
Ross just stated, the Social Security surplus, our fiscal deficit, 
ladies and gentlemen, is over $700 billion today. And, yes, we pay the 
interest on that debt every day. But do not take my word for it. Look 
at the financial report of the United States Government, 2005.
  Because it goes on to say that, in fact, in conjunction with the U.S. 
Comptroller, that there is no way we can get a clean audit from the 
books of most of our Federal agencies. Why? Because no one is being 
held accountable. Congressional leaders are not conducting the 
oversight hearings that we should do as a part of our responsibility as 
Members of Congress. And so, frankly, we do not know what the true 
state of our budget is, because so many of these agencies have not been 
able to provide the proper audits.
  In a letter contained within this report, in this report, David 
Walker, the Comptroller General of the United States, explains that the 
model currently used by Government provides a potentially unrealistic 
and misleading picture of the Federal deficit, its overall performance, 
the financial conditions and what the future outlook will be for future 
generations of Americans to come.
  The financial report makes it very clear that if we got into honest 
budgeting today, that in fact we would find ourselves with a much 
larger deficit than we have today. It goes beyond that to say that, in 
fact, if you looked at all 26 agencies in the Federal Government, that 
is on page 23 here, and you asked them for a clean fiscal audit, that 
over two-thirds of them would not be able to provide that clean fiscal 
audit.
  That obviously is not the kind of condition that Americans want their 
Federal Government to be in. That is not the kind of operation and 
management that provides for the true fiscal

[[Page H4901]]

accountability and the competency. Competency. Remember, I said 
accountability and competency are characteristics that American 
taxpayers care about. They are values and characteristics that really 
make a difference.
  So what we have today is not just a problem with accountability, but 
it is competence. It is not just the problems in the aftermath of 
Katrina and Rita with FEMA, but it deals with a budget deficit. It 
deals with a budget deficit that has been compounded by a trade deficit 
that has grown by 1,400 percent in the last 4 years.
  In 1992, our trade deficit was over $36 billion. 2005, our trade 
deficit has grown to over $670 billion. Along with it, I might add, a 
lot of American jobs that have been exported overseas.
  Let me close my comments, Mr. Speaker, by telling you that, as a new 
Member of Congress, I had served previously for 24 years in the 
California legislature. I think I did not come back here to Washington 
with any Pollyanna view of the world. But I also believe very 
passionately in representative democracy, when it works well and when 
it does not work.
  I have just recently finished reading a book that I want to recommend 
to Americans back home. It is called Flight Club Politics. It is an 
accountability of what has occurred in the House of Representatives 
over the last 15, 20 years.
  It did not begin with the Republicans. It involved the Democrats in 
the late 1980s and 1990s. And notwithstanding the Republican's efforts 
to pledge to reform the House in 1994 when they took over, the fact of 
the matter is, as the evolution of this, Flight Club Politics: How 
Partisanship is Poisoning the House of Representatives, has 
unfortunately, in my opinion, only multiplied the problems that we now 
have exist today.
  We no longer have a system of checks and balances. Under the 
Republican leadership during the Clinton administration, there were 
over 1,000 subpoenas of the administration.

                              {time}  2030

  Now, one could argue that the Congress was doing its part to provide 
checks and balances. Unfortunately, by comparison, under the last 5 
years, with the Republican administration, there has been less than 10 
subpoenas requested of this administration to hold them accountable, 
regardless of what Department or agency you are talking about.
  When you have a view of the world that the only legislation that we 
can bring to the floor of the House must first pass with a majority of 
the majority, you are taking away the opportunity to have true 
bipartisan solutions. And it is one of the reasons, I believe, why 
today in America one of the fastest growing views of voters in America 
is ``decline to state or independent.'' So regardless of what party one 
must be registered under, people more and more view themselves as 
independents.
  What we have to do today and in the future is to restore 
bipartisanship to this Congress. The Blue Dogs believe in that. We have 
to reinforce the opportunities that we don't need a de facto 
parliamentary system, where there is less focus on checks and balances 
and one party basically runs the entire government. Those are among the 
many challenges that we face today.
  My colleagues, I am proud to be a member of a group of moderate to 
conservative Democrats who frankly believe that we must first get our 
fiscal house in order. How do we do so? We do so with true 
accountability, we do so with competence in terms of how our Federal 
Government is run, and we do so by ensuring that our House restores the 
civility and bipartisan workmanship that is what our founding fathers 
had in mind.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back to my colleague and good friend, Mr. Ross.
  Mr. ROSS. I want to thank the gentleman from California, a member of 
the Blue Dog Coalition, Jim Costa, for joining us this evening.
  The gentleman mentioned the financial report of the United States 
Government for 2005. You pointed out that in that the debt is really 
not, for 2005, it really wasn't $319 billion; it was really $760 
billion. And I just want to make sure, Mr. Speaker, that you understand 
we are not trying to make things sound worse than they really are, or 
make up some numbers or anything. The $760 billion deficit for 2005 is 
contained here in the financial report of the United States of America, 
which was published by John Snow, President Bush's Secretary of the 
Treasury.
  Now, how does this financial report say that the deficit is $760 
billion in 2005 when everyone else has been saying it is $319 billion? 
And, again, there is no reason to make it any worse than it already is. 
It was already one of the largest deficits ever in our Nation's 
history. There is no reason to try to make it worse. But here is a 
little known fact that very few Members of Congress are even aware of: 
it is not well published on Capitol Hill.
  When the budget rolls out, you will see them bringing it to Capitol 
Hill with a lot of fanfare. It is about that thick and several volumes. 
This is quietly brought to Capitol Hill, and not even provided to every 
Member of Congress. Why is that? Because this is true accounting.
  The difference is that the budget uses cash-base accounting, which 
only the tiniest businesses in America use because it hides future 
obligations, thus painting, potentially, an unrealistic and misleading 
picture of the Federal Government's overall performance. That is 
according to David Walker, the Comptroller General of the Government 
Accountability Office.
  So when you do cash-base accounting, the deficit for 2005 was $319 
billion. But in this financial report of the United States of America, 
as required by law, the Treasury Secretary has to report what the real 
debt is, the real deficit is, based on accrual accounting. And, Mr. 
Speaker, accrual accounting is something that most businesses in 
America are very aware of because it is the method required by law. It 
is the method required by this Congress to be used by every business in 
America with revenues over $5 million.
  This financial report takes into account future obligations of the 
Federal Government, presenting a clearer, more understandable picture 
of Federal finances. So the real deficit for 2005 was not the $319 
billion contained in the budget using cash-base accounting, but rather 
it was $760 billion as contained in the financial report of the United 
States Government for 2005 issued by the Secretary of the Treasury, 
John Snow, as required by law, using accrual accounting.
  This is the same accounting method required by this Congress for 
businesses with revenues over $5 million to use; and if they don't use 
the accrual method of accounting, they are slapped with all kinds of 
fines by the IRS and in all kinds of trouble with the Justice 
Department.
  So I thank the gentleman from California for bringing that to our 
attention this evening.
  Now, as I said earlier, the Blue Dog Coalition has a plan on how to 
fix all of this. We have a 12-point plan for meaningful budget reform. 
I mentioned one of them, which is requiring a constitutional amendment 
for a balanced budget.
  Forty-nine States require a balanced budget. Most businesses require 
a balanced budget. And I can assure you, in the Ross family my wife 
requires a balanced budget.
  A second idea we have in our 12-point plan for curing our Nation's 
addiction to deficit spending is don't let Congress buy on credit.
  Back when President Clinton gave us the first balanced budget in 40 
years, we had something implemented on this House floor called PAYGO 
rules. Pay as you go. If you want to fund a new project, you have to 
show us which project you are going to cut. If you want to pass tax 
cuts, you have to show us which program you want to cut. In other 
words, pay as you go. Don't continue down this track that we are on 
today of running up the deficit, running up the debt, and borrowing 
money from China and Japan and Korea and OPEC to pay for this reckless 
spending.
  Another thing that we are doing, as members of the Blue Dog 
Coalition, is we have a plan to restore accountability.
  The author of this plan is a founding member of the fiscally 
conservative Democratic Blue Dog Coalition, John Tanner, of Tennessee.
  Let me just say that under the United States Constitution, Congress

[[Page H4902]]

has an obligation to provide congressional oversight of the executive 
branch. Congressional oversight prevents waste and fraud, ensures 
executive compliance with the law, and evaluates executive performance. 
However, under this Republican leadership, Congress has abandoned this 
responsibility by failing to conduct meaningful investigations of 
allegations of serious waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement of 
taxpayer dollars.
  By failing to serve as a check and balance for overspending, waist, 
fraud, and financial abuse within the executive branch, this 
Republican-led Congress has failed the American taxpayer. Every 24 
hours, $279 million of your tax money is being spent in Iraq. But don't 
ask the President to be accountable for it. He will tell you you are 
unpatriotic.
  That is where I disagree with this President. I believe we have a 
duty and an obligation to be accountable for taxpayer money. The 
current Federal debt, as you know, is $8.346 trillion, much of which, 
as we talked about earlier, is borrowed from foreign countries. This 
President, this administration, and this Republican Congress must be 
held accountable for our massive Federal debt and for the $279 million 
of tax money that is being spent in Iraq every day. Now, as long as we 
have troops in Iraq, I want to support them, and I want to send money 
there. But I want to make sure that money is accounted for and being 
spent on our men and women in uniform.
  American taxpayers simply deserve to know how their money is spent. 
They deserve answers as to why their children and grandchildren will 
have to foot the bill for this administration's fiscal mismanagement of 
the Federal budget. And, Mr. Speaker, this includes answers as to why 
the Federal Emergency Management Agency continues to pay $250,000 a 
month to store almost 10,000 mobile homes, to be exact, as of tonight 
9,957 of them, at the Hope Airport in Hope, Arkansas, in my 
congressional district, here is an aerial view of it, while many 
victims of Hurricane Katrina and other storms remain homeless.
  It is past time for FEMA to be held accountable and provide these new 
fully furnished mobile homes to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. 
FEMA's response so far has been, oh, my goodness, they are liable to 
sink in this pasture. As you can see here from a better view, and you 
have to see this to believe it, here are the 9,957 mobile homes just 
sitting in a hay meadow. Here is the barbed wire fence at the Hope 
Airport in Hope, Arkansas.
  Instead of moving them to storm victims that have been left homeless 
from various natural disasters, FEMA's response has been, oh, my 
goodness, the Inspector General is right, they are liable to start 
sinking in the hay meadow, so now they are spending $6 million putting 
gravel in this hay meadow at the Hope Airport in Hope, Arkansas.
  It is time, it is time for FEMA to be held accountable for this 
mismanagement. No business in our country could succeed financially if 
it failed to fully report back to its shareholders on how it is 
spending its money. But that is exactly how our Federal Government is 
operating. The administration is not telling its shareholders, the 
American taxpayers, how it spends the money coming into Washington.
  We have a plan to fix this. It is House Resolution 841, introduced by 
Representative John Tanner, a founding member of the fiscally 
conservative Democratic Blue Dog Coalition, and at this time I want to 
call on Mr. Tanner to use as much time as he so desires to explain this 
bill, our solution, to try to address this lack of accountability in 
our government.
  I am real proud that we are not just here to criticize this 
administration, this Republican Congress, but also to offer up a 
solution. At this time I yield to the gentleman from Tennessee.
  Mr. TANNER. Thank you, Mr. Ross, and I am delighted to be here and 
delighted that this hour is being devoted basically to common sense.
  You know, when I was growing up in Tennessee, my parents basically 
taught me three things about financial responsibility: one was live 
within your means; two was to pay your debts; and three was to invest 
in the future, whether it was for your retirement or your kids' college 
or whatever. But those were three pretty good financial guidelines, I 
thought. Live within your means, pay your debts, pay who you owe, and 
save enough to invest in the future.
  Unfortunately, this government of ours, all of us, we are not doing 
any of those things. We are not living within our means, not paying our 
debts, and we are certainly not investing in the future.
  I have been so frustrated because, for the last 3 years, anyway, 
along with Congressman Ross from Arkansas, some of us have been talking 
about the consequences of what is going on here. Unless one can figure 
out how to repeal the laws of arithmetic, folks, I am telling you, this 
country is getting in deeper and deeper financial trouble.
  To give you some idea, in the summer of 2002, on the same tax base we 
have in the summer of 2006, there is now $60 billion less of the money 
that Congress takes away from the American taxpayer involuntarily in 
the form of taxation and appropriates to any administration. There is 
$60 billion a year less because we have borrowed, just since the summer 
of 2002, this Congress and this political leadership in Washington have 
borrowed, in your name and mine, over $1.5 trillion. And what is worse 
is that 75 percent of those borrowings have come from foreign sources.
  I wish I was making this up. It is no fun to talk about. And as 
Khruschchev said, the former dictator in the old U.S.S.R., he said, an 
American politician will promise to build a bridge where there is no 
river. And part of our problem is the political leadership here in 
Washington is not leveling with the American people about the 
consequences of what we are doing in terms of hitting the Nation's 
credit card for not only that $1.5-plus trillion but all of the surplus 
money that is going into the Social Security trust fund. So we are 
borrowing that too. We just don't have to write interest checks to the 
Social Security trust funds every year.
  Anyway, I was thinking about this, as a father and grandfather now, 
what kind of country are we going to leave our children? There are two 
things that come from reading of history. One is, there is no nation 
that is strong and free that has no infrastructure.
  Our infrastructure in this country is in bad shape. Everybody knows 
that. Whether it is water, sewer, dykes, levees, and you can go down 
the list, we have serious infrastructure problems. In my home State of 
Tennessee, most of the county courthouses were built during the 
Depression, during the WPA days.

                              {time}  2045

  I am sure that is the same way in Arkansas and probably in Arkansas, 
Georgia, Alabama, Kentucky, all over. The courthouses were built back 
in those days, a lot of courthouse, I betcha. But that is not the real 
crux of the matter.
  The real crux of the matter is we have to, and only the government 
can, invest in infrastructure. Because, after all, that is where 
private enterprise can go to create the jobs, to create prosperity, so 
that people have water, sewers, bridges, highways, airports, whatever 
it may. That is how private enterprise grows, around infrastructure 
investment by the government.
  We are not able to do that because we have, just in the last 60 
months, transferred out of the tax base, not raising taxes, not 
lowering taxes, we have transferred out of the tax base over $60 
billion a year every year that goes not for veterans, not for 
education, not for infrastructure, but for interest. Seventy-five 
percent of that $60 billion that we are writing every year in checks 
for interest is going overseas, not even staying in this country.
  The consequences of that are twofold. One is, we cannot invest in 
infrastructure to keep our country in as good of shape as it needs to 
be for private enterprise to prosper and create jobs in a good economy. 
The second thing we are doing is we are depriving ourselves and the 
government of the ability to invest in human capital.
  What is human capital? Basically, it is the ability of the citizens 
of this country to compete in an increasingly globalized world.
  Now, the government loses its ability because of this transfer of the 
tax base to interest, loses its ability to make the necessary 
investments in public education. Public education is not important in a 
dictatorship. Public education is not important in a Communist country. 
But public education

[[Page H4903]]

is critically important in a democracy, because we are called on.
  As President Jimmy Carter said, the highest office in this land of 
ours is not the office we hold, it is that of citizen. Because the 
citizen holds the card, the voting card, if you will, to determine what 
happens. They hire guys like us every couple of years or so, but the 
citizen is the highest office that one can hold in our country. If we 
deprive the citizens because we do not have the ability to invest in 
public education, then we are on a downward spiral, I would say.
  So you have two human capital factors. You have public education, 
because we are called on as citizens, the highest office in our land, 
to not only make a decision affecting us and our immediate families but 
also make a decision affecting our States and our country. In order to 
do that, we have to be educated; and in order to maximize that 
participation and that ability to understand what is going on, the 
masses of free people in a republic like ours have to be educated so 
they can read, write, think and rationalize their decisions. Public 
education is part of this investment in human capital.
  The second thing is health care. Our country is no longer able to 
make the necessary investment in health care.
  If one reads history, as I do, one will readily understand and 
discern that no nation, since the dawn of civilization, has ever been 
strong and free with an unhealthy, uneducated population. It is simply 
not possible. So the consequences of what you have been talking about 
on the national debt are very real to the citizens of this country.
  They may not realize or think so in terms of the national debt, $8.3 
trillion, but don't try to make it off of me. I am trying to make a 
house payment, car payment, and all the other things that I have to do 
with my kids and everything else. So that is a big number, but that is 
not a number people really relate to.
  What people relate to, I believe, if we adequately articulate it, is 
the consequences to them, every day to us, of what is going on in this 
town, which leads me to this House Bill 841.
  It is hard to imagine this, and when I tell civic clubs that I speak 
to in Tennessee from time to time, they look at me aghast. They can't 
believe it. In the year, fiscal year 2005, the Government 
Accountability Office reports that 19 of 24 Federal agencies cannot 
produce an acceptable audit. What that means is, if you go and ask them 
what did you do with the money that Congress involuntarily extracted 
from the taxpayers of this country in the form of taxation and 
appropriated to any administration, what did you do with it, 19 of 24 
Federal agencies can't tell you.
  Now I am in business in Tennessee. Well, my brothers and I are in a 
family business. Can you imagine going to your comptroller or your 
treasurer or whoever you look to handle your money in your business and 
saying, here is an expenditure of $5,000, $10,000. What is that for? 
The answer would be, you know, I can't tell you. I don't know.
  No private enterprise in America would tolerate that. Because if they 
did, they wouldn't be in business. They would be broke. Yet that is 
what the American people are tolerating in this one-party government 
town where Congress not only takes money away from people in the form 
of taxation and then doesn't even ask the administration they 
appropriate to what they did with it. If they asked them, they couldn't 
tell them.
  If there is one thing that the American citizen, highest officeholder 
in this land ought to expect from this Congress and any other Congress, 
in my view, is, what did you do with the money? If you can't tell us, 
any administration, if you can't tell us what you did, well, you don't 
get it next year.
  So House bill 841 that we have introduced, the Blue Dogs have 
introduced is basically under three circumstances, when the inspector 
generals in every department, and every department has one that 
identifies waste, fraud, abuse, so forth, right now, the inspector 
general reports are just laying around gathering dust, because Congress 
is not going to ask, what did you do with the money?
  There is no oversight here. Everybody knows that. All you have to do 
is read the paper about the money that is flowing out of here through a 
fire hose. Congress isn't asking the administration, where is it going? 
All we hear is, well, there is a no-bid contract here, a no-bid 
contract there.

  I am going to bring a list of things that we have identified, $10 
million to rehab an old Army base to house six people, no-bid contract. 
It cost $10 million to some contractor to rehab a house that holds six 
people.
  That is what is going on under these no-bid contracts, and this 
Congress has totally, in my judgement, completely abdicated its 
constitutional responsibility to say what is going on over here.
  I am going to read something in a minute that is going to even more 
shock people. One, any inspector general, I don't care whether it is a 
Democratic administration, Republican administration, Democratic 
Congress, Republican Congress, we have got one economy. We have got $1. 
We don't have a Democratic or Republican dollar bill. We have got a 
dollar bill that is an American dollar bill.
  So we don't care. The Blue Dogs don't care whether it is a Democratic 
administration, Republican. This is what ought to be done on behalf of 
the American taxpayers who are Americans, first. They may be Democrat 
or Republicans. They are Americans. We are all Americans first.
  What this bill would do is say when there is an adverse finding by 
the inspector general in any, any agency, Congress must hold a hearing 
within 60 days of that adverse finding so that at least we can bring it 
to light and the general public will know that, one, they can't find 
the money we appropriated to them.
  Or, two, the inspector general has what they call a high-risk 
program. That is government talk for it means it probably is not 
working like we intended it to and like the people want it to. But they 
can't find the money for the high-risk program.
  Or three, the auditor issues a disclaimer. Here is what I want to 
read about the department.
  Four, that, basically, when they tried to audit these departments, 
the auditors said, look, we don't know whether this is true or not.
  On the front page of the audit, they say everything you are about to 
read here about what these people are doing with taxpayer money, we 
don't know. We can't vouch for it. We make no, absolutely no assertion 
that any of this, what you are about to see, is true, because we can't 
find out from the people that Congress appropriated the money to.
  I wish I was making this up, but I am not.
  This is what the Office of the Inspector General says about the 
Department of Energy, for example. This is one. Audit work performed by 
the auditor identified significant deficiencies in financial management 
and reporting controls related to the Department's FY05 consolidated 
financial statements. Specifically, the Department was unable to 
correct previously described weaknesses and could not provide a number 
of supporting documents required for audit. Not only can it not produce 
an audit, they can't even provide a document so the auditors can 
produce an audit.
  Listen to what they say about the Department of Homeland Security. 
Quote, unfortunately, the Department made little or no progress to 
improve its overall financial reporting during fiscal year 2005. The 
auditors were unable to provide an opinion on the Department's balance 
sheet.
  Now we sit here in Congress and pass all these laws, Sarbanes-Oxley 
and all of this, about what private companies ought to do in terms of 
audit.
  Here is the Homeland Security. You were just talking about 12,000 or 
10,000 or 9,000 trailers at Hope Airport in Hope, Arkansas. They say, 
we are unable to provide an opinion. They can't even tell you. We don't 
even have an opinion because the books are so screwed up. This is 
quotes.
  So House Bill 841, the Blue Dog bill, just says, when an IG report 
comes back like this, Congress must take action. What you have here, 
unfortunately, and this, again, is not partisan. I am a taxpayer. All 
of us pay taxes. We ought to be able to tell the American people what 
we did with the money we extract from them involuntarily in the form of 
taxes.
  Here is an IG report. There hasn't been oversight on this, because 
Congress is not going to ask. You have a

[[Page H4904]]

compliant Congress, a friendly administration. Nobody wants to 
embarrass anybody else. So we have stuff like this that we tolerate in 
this town because we are all playing the political game.
  I tell you, I don't know why we can't get some of our friends on the 
other side to join with me. What are they going to tell their 
constituents? We don't want to know where the money you sent us goes 
to? What are they going to say?
  What could possibly be wrong with this Blue Dog bill for simple 
accountability? We took money from taxpayers. We gave it to the 
administration. What did you do with it? You can't tell us. You are not 
getting it. That is what the Blue Dog position is. I think that is 
where it is. I mean, I don't want to give them any more money when I 
don't know what happened to it.
  Mr. ROSS. You are so right on target with what we need to be doing as 
a Nation.
  In 2003, the Government Accountability Office identified 26 high-risk 
areas for the Federal Government.
  Mr. TANNER. High risk means it doesn't work.
  Mr. ROSS. Twenty-six. Since then, only three programs have been 
removed from the list, and four more have been added. Clearly, it is 
necessary that Congress become involved to curb mismanagement in 
Federal agencies.
  You raised a good point. In fact, to go into that a little more, in 
2004, $25 million of Federal Government spending went absolutely 
unaccounted for, according to the President's Treasury Department. The 
Bush administration was unable to determine where the money had gone, 
how it was spent or what the American people got for their tax money, 
$25 billion in 2004.
  Even worse, this Republican-controlled Congress failed to hold the 
executive branch accountable, failed to hold the executive branch 
accountable for this submission.

                              {time}  2100

  And with your bill, sir, it would require this Congress, it would 
require this government, to hold this administration accountable for 
this kind of reckless and irresponsible spending. Furthermore, in 2005 
the Government Accountability Office reported that 19 of 24 Federal 
agencies were not in compliance with all Federal accounting audit 
standards and could not fully explain how they had spent taxpayer money 
appropriated to them by Congress.
  And yet the Republican leadership in this Congress did not force 
these agencies to fully account for how the money was being spent 
before doling out billions more of taxpayer dollars to the same 
programs. Clearly, Congress has failed to ask serious questions about 
the Bush administration's fiscal irresponsibility, record-high deficits 
4 years in a row, and have now pushed the Federal debt to $8.3 
trillion.
  Mr. Speaker, if you have any comments or concerns about what we are 
discussing this evening, and I hope you do, I hope you will email us at 
[email protected]. I yield to the gentleman from Tennessee.
  Mr. TANNER. Let me tell you about another bill that our Blue Dog 
friend, Dennis Cardoza, has. And we passed the Sarbanes Oxley Act about 
holding the CEOs of all of these major corporations accountable. Dennis 
has a bill that says, basically, if a Department of the Federal 
Government cannot produce an adequate or passable or acceptable audit 
within 2 years, then that Cabinet Secretary must go back to the Senate 
for reconfirmation as to why you can't tell us what is going on in your 
Department with the money that is being appropriated to your 
Department.
  This is what would happen in private enterprise. And people tell me 
all the time, and I am sure they tell you, we would like the government 
to operate a little bit more like a business. Well, both of these 
bills, particularly 841, that is all we are asking is for this Congress 
to pass a bill that will require basically Congress to do its job and 
ask them what happened to the money, because Congress is the agency, is 
the separate but equal branch of government that levies taxes. The 
President doesn't tax people. The Supreme Court doesn't tax people. The 
Congress does. And it is the Congress's responsibility to see where it 
is going.
  And this Congress has completely, totally failed to ask or even 
inquire about what is happening to the money that we are appropriating. 
And, really, the American people shouldn't put up with that. The more 
we can talk about it, I think, the more people will realize that there 
has got to be some changes made around here on accountability. And, 
again, this is not partisan. I don't care what administration is over 
there at the White House. Any of them ought to be able to tell us what 
did you do with the money, so we can either determine that it needs to 
be cut or added to.
  When people get up and say we have got baseline funding, I say, you 
don't understand something. I want to cut some of this stuff that is 
not working. The IG reports identify government talk for high-risk 
programs. That means they don't work. But do you think this Congress 
has asked? Well, you just said it. They added four more since they cut 
them. And it keeps right on rolling along, money flowing out of here 
through a fire hose. It keeps rolling right on along.
  There is one other thing I would like to mention tonight if I could. 
We have a bill that the Blue Dogs have endorsed that sets up an 
independent commission in every State to redistrict for Congress. The 
Supreme Court, yesterday in the Texas case, left the door open for mid-
decade redistricting, which means that any State that gets all the 
levels of power, the Governor's office and the House and State Senate, 
can redistrict anytime they want to. I think that is one of the biggest 
threats to our process, to our Republic that I have ever heard of 
because I think where we are going here is a tit for tat. The 
Republicans did it to the Democrats in Texas, so the Democrats are 
going to do it to the Republicans in Illinois. Democrats did it to us 
in Illinois, so we are going to do it to them in Ohio, wherever, all 
over the country.
  And you are going to see nothing but political turmoil where the 
``ins,'' whoever the ``ins'' are, Democrats or Republicans, they are 
both ``ins,'' are playing this political game, and the people of this 
country are left in the dust. They are pawns on a chess board to be 
played with by the ``ins,'' whoever the ``ins'' are, Democrat or 
Republican. I think that this is one of the most misguided opinions I 
have ever read.
  The other thing about that is this: there was a case that came from 
Tennessee in 1962, Baker v. Carr, and that was a case that said in the 
case of the State House, State Senate and U.S. House, everybody had to 
represent approximately the same number of people.
  Now, how in the world any State legislature could reapportion 
Congress in 2008 based on 2000 census data and say we are complying 
with Baker v. Carr, in that everybody represents an equal amount of 
people, is beyond me. And I will tell you what you do. If you don't 
believe me, go pick up an 8-year-old phone book and see how many people 
you can call in that 8-year-old phone book or how many businesses you 
can call that are still there. There is no way that any legislature can 
comply with one person, one vote 8 years after the data was compiled.
  Yet that is what the Supreme Court left open. You talk about activist 
judges. I just think that what they are doing is setting this country 
up for nothing but a political food fight while the country's needs go 
unattended. And this is the ``ins.'' And what we have seen over the 
last 40-something years, since the Baker v. Carr decision is the 
``ins'' have manipulated the system for themselves. It suits all the 
Republicans to make Republican districts more Republican. It suits the 
Democrats to make the Democratic districts more Democratic. So what you 
have here is the wings coming here to Congress and being unable 
ideologically to figure out how to get along. And this is why I think 
we have one of the problems here, and that is the middle is 
disappearing where everything gets done in a free society where nobody 
can order anybody else to do anything.
  So I wanted to mention that because we have that bill, the Blue Dog 
endorsed bill, that would set up independent commissions. And one of 
the criteria is they can't take into account where the incumbent lives. 
And we are asking people to give up a lot of power. I understand that. 
But I hope the

[[Page H4905]]

American people realize that they are the victims of this with the 
``ins,'' Democrats and Republicans, who are in, manipulating the system 
for each other's benefit.
  And what do we have? We have a food fight here on the floor of the 
House every day. And it is not a parliamentary system. It is a 
representative system and one, I think, as Ben Franklin said after they 
got through with all the Constitution, everything, said, what have we 
wrought? And Ben Franklin said, a Republic, if you can keep it.
  We are in, I think, grave danger with what we have done to 
gerrymander the country. And it is the ``ins,'' Democrats and 
Republican, who are in that are doing it. And we are trying to change 
that, and the Blue Dog bill will do that. And I hope we can get some 
action. It will have to come from outside of this building, 
unfortunately. Thank you.
  Mr. ROSS. I want to thank the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Tanner) 
for his leadership as a founding member of the fiscally conservative 
Democratic Blue Dog Coalition. I want to thank him for his leadership 
on House Resolution 841.
  We have talked tonight about House Resolution 841 to require 
congressional hearings when there is fraud, waste and abuse and 
mismanagement of Federal agencies with your tax dollars.
  We have also talked tonight about another commonsense solution, and 
that is H.R. 5315, by one of the Blue Dog cochairs, Mr. Cardoza of 
California, who has a real commonsense idea, and that is if you are a 
Cabinet head and your Federal agency that you oversee cannot fully 
account for its spending, you should have to go back to the Senate for 
reconfirmation.
  So these are commonsense solutions that we are offering up. We are 
not here just to be critical of the Republican administration. We are 
here to say here is what is wrong and here are the things that we think 
we can do to fix it. Clearly, the time has come to hold this 
administration accountable for its reckless behavior. I believe 
Congress must act now to renew its constitutional responsibility to 
serve as a check and balance for overspending, waste, fraud and 
financial abuse within the executive branch of government.
  Wasteful government spending has forced the national debt to its 
current record level of $8,346,401,298,731, and future generations, our 
children and grandchildren, will be forced to pay that bill. Future 
generations will have to pay back with interest the money the Federal 
Government is borrowing from other countries due to this administration 
and this Republican Congress's fiscal recklessness.
  The time has come, Mr. Speaker. The time has come to restore common 
sense and fiscal discipline to our Nation's government. The legislation 
that I have described to you this evening, these are two different 
legislative proposals put forth by the fiscally conservative Democratic 
Blue Dog Coalition that will put our Nation back on the track toward 
balancing the budget and restoring accountability.
  Again, Mr. Speaker, the U.S. national debt, when we started this 
evening it was $8,346,401,298,731. And just in the past hour, as we 
have been discussing this financial crisis facing America, this number, 
this national debt has risen $41,666,000.
  Mr. Speaker, our Nation is borrowing $1 billion a day. We are 
spending a half a billion a day paying interest on the debt we have 
already got.
  Mr. Speaker, it is time to restore some common sense and fiscal 
discipline to our Nation's government, and once we do that, once we do 
that we can meet America's priorities. A half a billion dollars a day 
simply going to pay interest on the national debt. In my district 
alone, I have got $4 billion in road needs. I need $1.5 billion to 
finish I-69, Interstate 69. I need another $1.5 billion to finish 
Interstate 49. I need $200 million to finish Interstate I-530; $300 
million to four-lane 167 from Little Rock to El Dorado and beyond; 
about 80 to $100 million to finish the Hot Springs Expressway; and $200 
million to four-lane U.S. Highway 82 from the east to the west side of 
Arkansas. These kinds of road projects can create jobs and economic 
opportunities for one of the poorest regions in the country, the Delta 
region, which I am proud to represent.
  But before we can meet America's priorities and lift these folks up 
out of poverty and give them a helping hand by building the roads they 
need, we must first restore common sense and fiscal discipline to our 
Nation's government and pay down this national debt and stop this 
deficit spending.

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