[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 17]
[House]
[Page 25452]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                  A CONTINUATION OF HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, how much is enough?
  When we talk about education, it is about where the decisions are 
going to be made. There are those in Washington who would like to take 
primary responsibility for building our local schools, wiring our local 
schools, buying the technology for our schools, hiring our local 
teachers, developing our curriculum, testing our kids, feed them 
breakfast, feed them lunch and develop after-school programs. When they 
get done with taking that decision-making to Washington, they are very 
willing to step back and say, the rest is now under your control. But 
in fact, what they have done is they have moved the focal point from 
our local teachers and our local administrators from taking a look at 
the needs of our children to taking a look at the bureaucratic 
requirements coming out of Washington.
  How much is enough? We have enough. Local schools get 7 percent of 
their money from Washington, 50 percent of their paperwork. That 
paperwork goes to an agency here in Washington that cannot even get a 
clean set of books, that every time we give them $1 for education 
spending at a local level, they consume 35 cents of it before it ever 
gets back to a local classroom.
  I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I want to point out two things. One of the 
reasons I think we cannot get an answer to the question of how much is 
enough is because the President is no longer in town. We know that part 
of the strategy seems to be keep Washington tied up, keep Congress in 
Washington, and then I will hit the campaign trail. The President is on 
his way to Kentucky to campaign against the gentlewoman from Kentucky 
(Mrs. Northup). Now, that must feel great if one is the President of 
the United States, but we are talking about children here. We are 
talking about real business here, and we are talking about, it is time 
to put people in front of politics.
  The gentleman knows, since he has worked real hard on the dollars to 
the classroom bill by the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Pitts) that 
said our efforts on education would go to the teacher closest to the 
student in the classroom and not Washington bureaucrats. Right now, 
when we spend $1 on education, 50 cents never gets out of town. That is 
not acceptable.
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I yield to the 
gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Thune).
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I would just say to the gentleman from Texas, as a past supporter of 
the Blue Dog budget as well, and someone who did not vote to raise the 
caps to the $645 billion level, that I think if the Blue Dog budget had 
been the one adopted by the House, it would have met probably the same 
fate that the budget today has met.
  We did our work in the House. We passed bills at a $602 billion 
level; and the President, as is customarily the case at this point in 
the legislative process, is extorting us or using I think his leverage 
at the end game to try and get more money out of the Congress. So that 
is why this thing keeps getting bid up and bid up and bid up.
  We have, in fact, in the past, done some good things here. We 
balanced the budget. This will be the 4th year in a row. We have 
stopped the raid on Social Security. We have been paying down 
systematically the Federal debt over the past 3 years. But all that 
good work could be for naught if we give the President everything that 
he wants and everything that he asks for, which, as the gentleman 
noted, also includes a number of things that we just fundamentally 
disagree with, like putting more power in the educational bureaucracy 
here in Washington instead of getting it back in the classroom.
  So I appreciate the issues that have been raised by our colleagues on 
the other side here about the budget; but the reality is, we are still 
going to be in the same positions that we are in today when it comes to 
negotiating with the President who wants to spend more and who cannot 
answer the very simple, fundamental question, and that is, how much is 
enough?
  Mr. SCHAFFER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.
  Mr. SCHAFFER. Mr. Speaker, it is an interesting question, and it is a 
sad commentary, I think, on the legislative process in Washington to 
just see what is taking place here. We have Democrats and Republicans 
essentially agreeing that we are spending too much money. Why is that?
  At this point in the game, it would seem that if we agree we are 
spending too much money, it seems logical that maybe a few months ago, 
a few weeks ago, we might have been able to agree on spending less. But 
we do have to compromise not only with Republicans and Democrats, but 
we have to compromise with the White House as well, and we have 
compromised and compromised and compromised, trying to, in good faith, 
reach agreement with the White House, the President's liberal spending 
habits, and yet as a result of our efforts, there is a point in time 
when it is a legitimate question to ask, how much can we spend? How 
much is enough? That is the point we are at now. We have conceded on 
issue after issue after issue with the White House.

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