[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 4 (Tuesday, January 15, 2013)]
[House]
[Pages H160-H162]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        ADMINISTRATION IN REVIEW

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Gohmert) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to get to know you better 
all the time and to be serving with you.
  I enjoyed hearing my friends talking about the economy and things 
that are going on. So I wanted to address a few things. I didn't come 
over here and plan to address what they had, but they were mentioning 
their hope for us, bringing our troops home from Afghanistan. And 
having been there a few times, having talked to the former allies that 
this administration has thrown under the bus that initially defeated 
the Taliban for us with less than 500, possibly less than 300 embedded 
Special Forces, special ops, and intelligence personnel embedded with 
the Northern Alliance, they defeated the Taliban in about 3 or 4 
months.
  Then we added troops and became occupiers. Occupiers in that part of 
the world don't do well. Someone reminded me of what I already knew, 
that Alexander the Great conquered that area around Afghanistan, and I 
had to remind them that he died on his way out of the area. I don't 
consider that a great victory.
  Nonetheless, we helped give the Afghans a government and sharia law, 
making it difficult for Jews and Christians to reside in a country 
where they once had. Under this administration's watch, like I say, 
we've thrown our allies under the bus, and the Taliban has come back 
almost strong as ever, not quite. Some of my Northern Alliance friends 
told me in one of our visits over there that on national television 
last year, the Taliban leader that this administration released for 
humanitarian purposes from Gitmo didn't seem to be having health 
problems and was on national television and was making clear that the 
U.S. would be withdrawing in the next year or two, and that when they 
did the Taliban would be back in charge as they were before. So it was 
time to come beg forgiveness from the Taliban and ask for their 
protection under sharia law.
  That doesn't sound like we're going to be in a whole lot better 
position after all the losses of life, all of the servicemembers who 
have laid down their lives in Afghanistan, who continue to do that as 
we speak because the Commander in Chief has them there without any real 
mission laying down their lives. As one of our troops told me, ``I 
don't mind laying down my life for my country, but please don't waste 
it.''
  They're not laying down their lives for a wishy-washy government that 
can't figure out what it wants to do, that leaves our military without 
a clear mission, that allows the Taliban to come back stronger than 
ever, supplied and funded in part from Pakistan. They deserve better. 
They deserve much better.
  Our Commander in Chief was on television yesterday talking about the 
debt limit, the debt ceiling. He's talked about our economy. I think 
it's worth noting that since 1923, the President was required to 
furnish a budget and a time deadline given for furnishing that budget. 
Ninety years. Ninety years, the President is required by law to furnish 
a budget.
  Since 1923, those ensuing 90 years, there have apparently been 11 
times when presidents have been unable to

[[Page H161]]

get the budget to Congress as required by law. For some of those 11, 
there were very good reasons. But it's interesting to note in the last 
90 years, out of the 11 times that the budget from the President has 
been late, 4 of those 11 have been under the Obama administration.
  We're also informed that there is a chance once again, as there was a 
year and a half ago, that our credit rating of the U.S. could be 
lowered again by another credit rating agency. Some have tried to paint 
it as a different story, a different picture. But for those of us who 
recall what happened, S&P made it clear that they didn't believe that 
the United States was serious about dealing with this dramatic 
overspending problem, where we were spending $1.5 trillion, $1.6 
trillion, over a trillion dollars more than the 2-plus trillion dollars 
that we had coming in. And that if we didn't at least reduce the 
massive overspending annually by at least $400 billion for 10 years, a 
total of $4 trillion over a 10-year period, then it would make it 
pretty clear that we were not serious about dealing with our debt.

                              {time}  2100

  I know the Obama administration went on the warpath after the S&P 
credit rating was lowered. Personally, I think it's to S&P's credit 
that they did what they said. We came in with a debt ceiling bill that 
was agreed to with the administration. It had some sequestration in it 
with the supercommittee that some of us knew wasn't going to work 
because the Democrats had made it clear they didn't want a 
supercommittee to work because they wanted to be able to campaign and 
say, Gee, cuts are coming to Medicare because the Republicans were 
trying to protect their rich friends. It worked very well. They 
wouldn't reach an agreement. Even after somebody like a Republican 
Senator had a proposal to raise new revenue, a couple of Democrats were 
reported as saying that this was going to be the breakthrough that 
allowed an agreement. After consulting with the President, to Harry 
Reid it apparently was made clear we don't want to deal. No, no deal, 
so there was no deal, and now the sequestrations are about to take 
place.
  Mr. Speaker, what time did I start?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman has 22 minutes remaining.
  Mr. GOHMERT. So we had a debt ceiling bill that was undermined from 
the beginning. No deal was reached. Sequestration--massive cuts to our 
national security, to our national defense--would be inflicted and 
massive cuts to Medicare. Our leaders responded to me that, Gee, the 
Democrats will never allow the cuts to Medicare, the sequestration to 
Medicare, $300 billion or so. They'll never allow that. That's why we 
know the supercommittee will reach an agreement. I advised them that 
that would not happen, that there would be no agreement, that of course 
they're willing to have a $300 billion or so cut to Medicare, because 
ObamaCare cut $700 billion from Medicare from our seniors' care without 
a single Republican vote.
  So the only way that Democrats would run a commercial last year, in 
2012, with any sincerity at all was in saying, Gee, Republicans are 
cutting Medicare. If they were to prevent Republicans from reaching an 
agreement with the President and Democrats, then they could run 
commercials in 2012, and they'd blame the Republicans and say, See, 
they didn't reach an agreement. They wanted to cut seniors and help 
their rich friends.
  As some of us made clear, we weren't nearly as concerned at all about 
protecting anybody as we were future generations. How embarrassing that 
our generation is the first generation in American history that has 
said by our actions that we are not concerned with leaving our children 
and our grandchildren--future generations--a better country than we 
found. We're more concerned with lavishing money on the here and now 
that we can't pay for and that future generations will pay for because 
we can't stop spending on ourselves.
  We had a vote today on relief for Hurricane Sandy, and we know 
something about the pain that comes from hurricanes. In my district in 
east Texas, not only did we face consequences from Hurricane Katrina 
and the hundreds of thousands of people who came through--and many 
stayed in east Texas--and from the onslaught of weather that hit east 
Texas, but it was immediately followed by Hurricane Rita, which swept 
straight up through east Texas, through my district. We know about 
suffering. We saw how Louisiana was helped so much more than east Texas 
even though, at the very time we were hit with Hurricane Rita, we were 
taking care of victims from Hurricane Katrina. We understand about 
that, but there is a lot of misinformation about Hurricane Katrina.
  For Hurricane Katrina, we did offset spending when Republicans were 
in the majority. We actually then turned money back that was not spent. 
Our hearts go out to the victims of Hurricane Sandy, especially those 
who understand what that kind of suffering is.
  I was all over my district. A Democratic sheriff told his county once 
that he'll never forget midnight after Hurricane Rita hit--no power. 
There in the county, there was no power at the sheriff's office. There 
was a generator that had kicked on, and the lights were flickering. 
After midnight, his U.S. Congressman came walking through his door and 
said, What can I do to help? To get there to San Augustine, I had to 
cut down trees that were across the road and over to Hemphill.
  It's tough when dealing with the consequences of a hurricane. People 
are hurt. Buildings, homes are destroyed. We understand that. We wanted 
to help the victims of Hurricane Sandy, but what we didn't want to do 
and what we'd hoped there would be plenty of responsibility in dealing 
with was pork that was placed in this bill for emergency purposes. It 
just seems a bit immoral that you would take advantage of the suffering 
of people during a hurricane to get one last big plug of money. I mean, 
it's all so pretty discouraging to see that there is money being 
captured, taking advantage of the victims of a hurricane to enrich and 
engorge themselves. There ought to be a law against it, but there isn't 
because this Chamber, led by the Senate down the hall, is still putting 
pork in these bills to go to things that have nothing to do with the 
hurricane, and they're not offset. We have no problem on both sides of 
the aisle in helping victims who can't help themselves, but we ought to 
pay for it now.
  When a former Member of Congress and one of the greatest heroes Texas 
history has, named Davy Crockett--he was a U.S. Congressman from 
Tennessee--stood before the House of Representatives, right down the 
hall here in the old House Chamber, he explained what he was lectured 
to by a constituent: Don't take my money. Take your own money to help 
charitable causes.
  Not only do we not do that, but we take other people's money to help, 
and they get all this pork added in order to get enough votes to pass 
it. Then it ought to be the biggest regret of this generation that we 
don't even pay for it. How in the world could this body fail to pass a 
bill that would pay for helping the victims of Hurricane Sandy? But we 
don't have the money to do it, so we're going to borrow between 40 and 
50 cents of every dollar of money both for the pork and for the help 
for Hurricane Sandy because this body got sweet talked into refusing to 
pay for helping this generation. We'll let our children and our 
children's children and maybe their children pay for this. We will load 
them up with debt because we will not pay our own way. We're too 
narcissistic. We're too self-indulgent. We are not going to pay our 
way, and that kind of attitude is a tragedy. It brings countries down.

                              {time}  2110

  What brings a country to the peak of their greatness is when 
generation after generation does not fail to honor the God that has 
blessed that country and they have a commitment that we were taught in 
Boy Scouts that you leave a place better than you found it, and you 
leave better for those coming behind you. And it's embarrassing that 
this White House and the Senate and this House are comfortable enough 
to leave a country massively more in debt than when this generation 
came to leadership. It's heartbreaking.
  And one of the reasons we are not effectively dealing with this 
problem is because not enough people know the truth. They don't know 
the history of

[[Page H162]]

this country. Apparently, the President thinks it's perfectly okay to 
just forget about the rule of law. Oh, there's a law that says I have 
to provide a budget. Well, I'm not doing it. I'll get around to it. But 
the law says he must. Is he above the law? Apparently so. Because of 
the 11 times in the last 90 years when the budget was late, four of 
them were this President.
  You know, when you talk to economists and you read what economists 
are saying, and you're concerned about the downgrade in the credit 
rating because of how much more money that will put us in debt that 
future generations will have to pay, when you talk to them, you look at 
what they're saying, there are a couple of things that they point out.
  Well, one of the things that helped this country is our belief and 
support for the rule of law, that no one is above the law. And yet you 
look at what this White House is doing: ah, we'll get around to the 
budget eventually. More insensitive to following the law than any 
Presidency that I can find in history.
  We have a President who says, you know, yeah, I get it, the Defense 
of Marriage Act was duly passed into law and signed into law by a 
former Democratic President, but I don't like that law and I realize 
Congress is not going to change it, so I'm going to ignore the law. I'm 
going to instruct my Attorney General to ignore the law. That kind of 
thinking means there's no support at the highest level of this country 
for the rule of law.
  When we have a President who makes speeches and an Attorney General 
who makes speeches about how they're going to go after illegal gun 
sales, and yet there is blood on the hands of people in this 
administration, and we can't even find out who they are because they 
are being obscured, for the death of hundreds of human beings who died 
because this administration forced gun dealers to sell guns that they 
knew and they reported should not be sold, and they were told by their 
Federal Government, their executive branch, you do it anyway because 
we're going to follow the guns, in effect. The guns were not followed. 
They made their way into criminals' hands, as was intended, but they 
weren't followed. And now the administration says they want to support 
the rule of law and go after these illegal gun sales? Well, they have 
to start with their own administration.
  And then we have a President that instead of coming to Capitol Hill 
where most of the elected representatives of the country are, there's 
one down Pennsylvania Avenue, actually two, the Vice President, and 
there are 535 down here, and sitting down and working out a 
comprehensive immigration bill, instead of doing that, the President 
announces, you know, I don't like the laws that were duly passed by 
prior Congresses, Democrats, signed into law by Democrats and 
Republican Presidents. I realize what the law is, I don't like the law, 
so as I speak, so shall the new law be.
  And the mainstream just laps it up because they're too ignorant of 
what the rule of law means, that you don't have a monarch at the end of 
Pennsylvania Avenue that just espouses law as he gets ready to, because 
he doesn't like the law that was duly passed.
  Come down here and work with us and if we can secure the border so 
that we can make sure that people won't get in that want to destroy our 
way of life, the drug cartels, the radical Islamists across the border 
that are working with the drug cartels now that want to destroy our way 
of life, we've got to make sure that we have people coming in that will 
continue to make the country great. And I have great hope for what the 
Hispanic community can do for this country because, generally speaking, 
those I know have strong faith in God, devotion to family, and hard 
work ethic. That's what made America great, in my opinion. We need that 
kind of input, but it's got to be legal.
  The Immigration Service is an embarrassment, one of the worst in the 
world. You can get a visa quicker to other countries than you can here. 
It's embarrassing the snafus in this government.
  But if we are going to get on track, we have to get back to a 
President and a Congress that believes the rule of law. And when the 
President will not follow the law, there have to be consequences.
  I've talked to Democratic and Republican individuals who were part of 
prior Presidential administrations and I've said at different times, 
different individuals: tell me, when you were in the administration, 
when you were in the White House, is it true what I've heard that 
individuals would come together, both parties, both ends of the Capitol 
and talk to the President and say, look, you are usurping control that 
was given to the Congress in the Constitution, and we're going to have 
to shut you down if you don't get back and acting within the 
Constitution?
  That doesn't happen under this administration, and it's time that it 
must. We owe it to the country. We owe it to future generations.
  The President has said: If Congress in any way suggests they're going 
to tie negotiation to debt ceiling votes--which, by the way, we have 
never done in our history until we did it last year--I will not play 
that game.
  The President needs to have someone around him that knows the truth. 
That poor man is being lied to. All you have to do is look back in our 
history. Every time there was a cut in spending, it was often tied to 
the debt ceiling negotiations. Go back to 1985, to 1990, 1993, 1997, 
2010. Speaker Pelosi in 2010, with President Obama, tied a PAYGO 
provision. She did it. Why is it so wrong that the Republicans want to 
do that in the House like Speaker Pelosi did. Let's get responsible. 
But the President doesn't even remember 2 years ago when Speaker Pelosi 
did that.

  Somebody has got to help this poor man understand recent and distant 
history before the rating agencies say, you know what, we used to think 
that the rule of law was going to help the U.S. economy and help the 
Federal Government get around to taking care of its debts, but these 
guys don't even follow the rule of law anymore.
  And as far as what economists say, yeah, but we have economic 
dynamism. Well, look what ObamaCare is doing to that. Look at what 
overregulation is doing to that. It is hurting our economy. The economy 
is sitting waiting to take off if the President and the Senate, that is 
bogging down bills that would free up the economy to go, if they would 
get out of the way, this economy could go. People could get back to 
work. They wouldn't need unemployment. They wouldn't need to be begging 
to the master government. They could do it on their own as free people.
  It's time to get back to following the rule of law. It's time to get 
back to having a government that doesn't put off the current debt on 
future generations because if we don't, our names will not be called 
blessed by future generations. Our names will be cursed.

                              {time}  2120

  Mr. Speaker, it is my prayer and desire that we can finally get to be 
responsible in the coming months. And the only way we can really get 
there is if people are honest about our history.
  I yield back the balance of my time.


                Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair will remind Members to refrain 
from engaging in personalities toward the President.

                          ____________________