[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 16550-16551]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                     MOVING FORWARD IS BEST FOR ALL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Metcalf). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 19, 1999, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. 
Frank) is recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, I have been struck by the 
change in the rhetoric from my Republican colleagues with regard to the 
work of the Congress, particularly the House of Representatives. For 
years, I have heard them talk about what they were going to accomplish 
beginning with the Contract with America that they trumpeted.
  Now in the last couple of weeks, there is a new tone. Instead of 
telling us what they are going to do, they are explaining why they have 
been unable to do it. The Republicans are into a new phase in the 
Republican revolution, whining. They are complaining that while they 
wanted to do all of these things, they have been unable. What we now 
have, rather than an announcement of a program is an explanation for 
its failure.
  I was particularly struck to note that they were blaming the minority 
leader, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), in large part. I 
reread the Contract with America. One does not get to read only for 
pleasure in our work. Sometimes we must read as a duty, so I reread the 
Contract with America, and I did not find in there that the gentleman 
from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt) was listed as a subcontractor.
  I did not read in there that the Contract with America said here are 
these bold things we will do if the Democrats let us. But now what do 
we hear? The Democrats would not let me do it. It is a kind of a 
reverse Flip Wilson. It is no longer the devil made them do it. It is 
that the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt) would not let them do 
it.
  Well, I should say in fairness, Mr. Speaker, that they have even been 
giving me a little bit of the credit. We are not a profession known for 
great modesty, but I am a little reluctant to accept quite as much 
credit for their failure as they give me. Clearly, it would be in my 
interest in many quarters to accept that credit without dissent but I 
do have to be honest and say they give me a little more credit than I 
deserve.
  I want to say right now that when the Appropriations bills have come 
up, I have not worn my costume of the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. 
Coburn) and held the bills up. That was not I. It was not the gentleman 
from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt). That was a member of their own party.
  It is not I who has decided, for instance, that term limits, and 
remember term limits? Some members do. The gentleman from Washington 
(Mr. Metcalf) does because he is an honest man who is abiding by his 
promise, but term limits was part of the Contract with America. Well, 
that contract apparently has been declared null and void because in 
this year we have the Republican Party in control of the House, and no 
one has brought up the term limits issue. It seems to have evanesced 
into the wind.
  Now, as I said, they are arguing that it is the fault of the 
gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt) and myself. They are clearly 
wrong. They have been the majority. They are in their third Congress of 
a majority. They have the votes. They are, in fact, unable to do things 
for which I am glad, but they have misargued the cause. Their platform 
has not become law, not because of myself and the gentleman from 
Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), much as I would love to take the credit, but 
because it is unpassable, and it is unpassable because it is 
unacceptable to the American people.
  Their problem is that they won an election in 1994 based on 
dissatisfaction with the Democrats, acknowledgedly, and then proceeded 
to a program which included at one point shutting down the government, 
excessive tax cutting that even a few on their own side do not like, 
trying to roll back environmental regulations, term limits which they 
are not prepared themselves to abide by.
  It is not we who have stopped them. It is the American people. And 
indeed what has been notable is the extent to which the Republican 
Party has fallen out of love with the American people. They came 
announcing themselves as the tribunes of the voters and increasingly 
what we have from my Republican colleagues is a sense that the voters 
are not to be trusted. We heard that, of course, most clearly during 
the impeachment hearings, but we hear it in other things. They are 
afraid that if they do not engineer a fiscally irresponsible tax cut 
far more than the economy calls for, the people will ask Members of 
Congress to vote for things.
  We cannot trust those people. They want a prescription drug program 
for the elderly. They just lack the moral fiber to go without drugs. 
They are

[[Page 16551]]

going to insist that if Congress has some money there we say to 73-
year-old people who are faced with a $3,000 and $4,000 drug bill on a 
$25,000 income that we ought to help them. They will insist on more 
transportation facilities. They will insist on cleaning up some 
environmental sites. So that is the problem, Mr. Speaker.
  The Republican Party, it is true, is not getting anywhere with its 
agenda. By the way, on those rare occasions where they have gotten 
somewhere, we have paid too high a price. If I were tempted to try and 
listen to their pleas and help them out, I would remember the 1997 
Balanced Budget Act where they cut Medicare to pay for capital gains 
tax cuts and all over this country in hospitals and home health care 
agencies in Massachusetts where we have lost prescription drugs, people 
are paying the price for this.
  I have been struck by the ``dear colleagues'' I get from time to time 
from some of my Republican colleagues who having voted for the Balanced 
Budget Act of 1997 have now decided that it did a terrible thing. It 
cut Medicare. Apparently, they were somewhere else at the time. 
Apparently, when the Balanced Budget Act was being formulated and voted 
and cutting Medicare to pay for a capital gains tax cut, they were 
absent. They now have returned to find that the capital gains tax cut 
undid some important parts of Medicare.
  Now, it is true, Mr. Speaker, if they want to make another deal 
involving a tax cut and taking funds away from Medicare I will try to 
block it. The minority leader, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. 
Gephardt) will try to block it and I am glad, but essentially the 
fault, dear Republicans, lies not with the minority. It lies with 
themselves and with the unacceptable nature of their program to the 
American people.

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