[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 19]
[House]
[Pages 26435-26440]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




          FURTHER CONTINUING APPROPRIATIONS, FISCAL YEAR 2004

  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 417, 
I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 75) making further continuing 
appropriations for the fiscal year 2004, and for other purposes, and 
ask for its immediate consideration.
  The Clerk read the title of the joint resolution.
  The text of H.J. Res. 75 is as follows:

                              H.J. Res. 75

       Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
     United States of America in Congress assembled, That Public 
     Law 108-84 is amended by striking the date specified in 
     section 107(c) and inserting ``November 7, 2003''.
       Sec. 2. Public Law 108-84 is further amended as follows:
       (1) In section 103, by inserting ``(a)'' after the section 
     designation and by adding at the end the following new 
     subsection:
       ``(b) For purposes of section 101, the term `rate for 
     operations not exceeding the current rate' has the meaning 
     given such term (including supplemental appropriations and 
     rescissions) in the attachments to Office of Management and 
     Budget Bulletin No. 03-05 entitled `Apportionment of the 
     Continuing Resolution(s) for Fiscal Year 2004'.''.
       (2) In section 125, by inserting before the period at the 
     end the following:

     ``: Provided, That such amounts as may be necessary for 
     administrative expenses of the Grants-in-aid for Airports 
     program shall be available to the Secretary of Transportation 
     out of the Airport and Airway Trust Fund at a rate for 
     operations not exceeding the current rate and for which 
     authority was made available under the Department of 
     Transportation and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 
     2003''.
       (3) By striking sections 126 through 130 and by 
     redesignating sections 131 through 135 as sections 126 
     through 130, respectively.
       (4) In section 127, as so redesignated, by striking 
     ``through 130, and section 134,'' and inserting ``and 129''.
       Sec. 3. Section 8144(b) of the Department of Defense 
     Appropriations Act, 2003 (Public Law 107-248), as amended by 
     Public Law 108-84, is further amended by striking ``October 
     31, 2003'' and inserting ``November 7, 2003''.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 417, the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young) and the gentleman from Wisconsin 
(Mr. Obey) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young).
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise to explain the bill before us. It is a continuing 
resolution to extend the original CR until the 7th of November, 2003. 
This CR is basically noncontroversial. We need this CR because we have 
not completed all the appropriations bills in conference, although the 
House passed all of our appropriations bills in the summer. But we are 
making progress.
  After we do the CR today, we will be dealing with the conference 
report on

[[Page 26436]]

the interior appropriations bill. Also, I have just filed the 
conference report on the Iraqi supplemental, which we expect to get a 
rule on and we expect to have on the floor some time this evening, and 
which we hope to conclude by tonight.
  The CR does include a few technical corrections to the first CR and 
adds a provision that codifies the term ``rate for operations'' under 
the CR, pursuant to OMB bulletin No. 03-05.
  Again, Mr. Speaker, I believe this CR is noncontroversial, and I urge 
the House to move this legislation to the Senate so that the government 
can continue to function smoothly and efficiently and so that we can 
continue to finish our work on the appropriations bills.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1115

  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, as everyone knows, we are supposed to have our 
appropriation bills done by the beginning of the fiscal year on October 
1. Right now, even if we pass the Interior bill today, the bill to 
which the distinguished gentleman from Florida has just referred, we 
will still have 9 of 13 appropriation bills that are pending, and only 
God knows when we are going to finish them.
  This continuing resolution keeps the government open until November 
7. It is a very short CR, highly unrealistic in my view, if people have 
any expectation that this is going to be the last CR that we need. That 
means that the good news is we are going to get to do this all over 
again next week and the following week and probably the following week. 
I distinctly hope that we can be finished here by Thanksgiving. I 
desperately hope that we can, but my experience and my instincts are 
beginning to tell me that that is not at all likely.
  I notice that the reports this morning in the National Journal's 
Congress Daily, I notice the report there, and in one of the newspapers 
this morning, I have forgotten if it was Roll Call or The Hill, which 
indicated that the Speaker himself is contemplating the possibility of 
our adjourning until January 15 because of the inability of the House 
and the Senate to get together on a variety of bills, not just 
appropriation bills, but also bills like the energy bill and the 
Medicare bill.
  If we wind up doing that, it will be in essence a repeat of last 
year. And it means that we will be still dealing with last year's 
business midwinter of next year, and that will put the entire system 
again months behind where it ought to be, and God help us, there is an 
election year coming up, Presidential election year which is going to 
chew up a good piece of July and August.
  So I see here confusion and chaos. And I would point out that when 
this happened in the last Congress, the majority party had a convenient 
target. They tried to blame it all on good old Tom, Tom Daschle, the 
then-majority leader in the Senate. Well, to paraphrase what President 
Nixon said once, the majority party does not have the Democratic 
majority to kick around anymore because the party, the Republican Party 
is in control of both Houses. And the White House. And so any delays 
that we have in passing appropriation bills or other bills for that 
matter, any delays we are experiencing come because the Republican 
majority is having an argument with itself, between its House Members 
and its Senate Members.
  I think one of the reasons that this is dragging everything behind 
again is because, as we all know, there has been a conscious decision, 
certainly on the part of the leadership of this House, there has been a 
conscious decision on the part of the Republican leadership to run this 
House on the narrowest of partisan majorities, rather than putting 
together bipartisan compromises on each of the 13 appropriation bills. 
The most spectacular example of that is the Labor Health appropriation 
bill. The choice has been made to try to govern with only Republican 
votes.
  Now, if you have 300 people who are in support of a bill, it makes it 
a whole lot easier to get your work done because you have a much wider 
margin of error. But if you are only trying to run the House with a 
narrow margin of 220 or 230 votes, then every time you lose five or six 
votes, it is a big problem because that slows the train down.
  So I think there is a lesson in here somewhere if the Republican 
Party leadership wants to hear it, and the lesson is, that if you reach 
out and try to reach bipartisan conclusions, the House runs more 
smoothly and you have a much better chance of not having every little 
disagreement within your own party lead to delay, delay and more delay. 
That is just a pragmatic observation, and I would urge that the House 
leadership take it to heart. I have no expectation that they will, Mr. 
Speaker, but I wish they would.
  I think the problem that we have is that even within the Republican 
Party, there are a substantial number of Members, if not in this House 
then in the other body, who have substantial concerns about some of the 
appropriation bills. Example: Veterans health care has been a huge 
issue since the President presented his budget, and veterans groups all 
over the country are objecting to the inadequate level provided for 
veterans health care, but the VA HUD bill that left the House did not 
contain sufficient funding for veterans health care even to satisfy 
Republican Senators. So we had the Senate adopt, because they could not 
get the VA HUD bill to the floor, we had the Senate Republicans offer a 
motion which added $1.3 billion for veterans health care to, of all 
bills, the Iraqi supplemental.
  Last night, the conference jettisoned that $1.3 billion and promised 
that they would put it on the VA HUD bill, but we have no idea 
whatsoever of how that will be done, whether it will be done by busting 
the caps, whether it will be done by providing emergency funding, 
whether it will be done by an across-the-board cut in other items in 
that bill. We just do not know.
  And in that same bill, we have the problem of inadequate funding for 
local law enforcement because the White House budget tries to pretend 
that it is funding homeland security items by reducing funding for the 
normal aid to local governments, local police departments, in the form 
of the Byrne Grants and other regular law enforcement programs.
  We also have the problem of the Labor Health and Education bill where 
the education funding falls billions of dollars behind the No Child 
Left Behind Act which the President trumpeted so loudly just 2 years 
ago. We have a dispute between Republicans in both Houses over adequate 
funding levels for NIH, and I think there is considerable discomfort 
within the Republican Party, and certainly within ours, about the 
inadequate level of funding for special education for handicapped 
children.
  My point is simply that we are here, late in the year certainly it is 
not unprecedented. It has happened before under both parties, but I do 
not recall in quite some time it being this chaotic. And I also believe 
that it would have been very easy to avoid had we had at least modest 
efforts at reaching a bipartisan approach to the budget resolution, for 
instance, which has caused the squeeze on appropriation bills.
  So, Mr. Speaker, I think we have no choice but to pass this 
continuing resolution, but I think it is simply another small bridge to 
next week when we will have to pass yet another one, and I think the 
best way to break through this problem is not by exhorting people to 
reach agreement where there is no agreement. I think the best way to 
break through this problem is by changing the parameters so that we 
consider a broader-based compromise on some of these bills than has 
been considered to date.
  That is the only way that I see that we can get out of here before 
Thanksgiving turkey time with any degree of satisfaction and self-
respect. Certainly the gentleman from Florida was able to put his bills 
through the House in a timely fashion, but when such limitations have 
been imposed, as is the case in this session, it becomes almost 
impossible for the House and the Senate

[[Page 26437]]

to reach agreement on time, even when one party is in control of all 
the levers of government as the majority party now is.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for 
time, and I only have a brief closing statement. I wonder if the 
gentleman from Wisconsin has any additional speakers.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I think we have two additional speakers at 
this time. I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry) 
a distinguished member of the committee.
  Mr. BERRY. Mr. Speaker, I think that we have indeed on the Committee 
on Appropriations had good leadership. I compliment the gentleman from 
Florida on the great job he has done leading that committee. I 
compliment my own ranking member the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. 
Obey) for the wonderful work that he does, but I think, Mr. Speaker, 
rather than just pass another CR and let us see how long we can stall 
dealing with the problems of the American people, facing up to the 
reality that we have got some massive problems in this country, it is 
time to realize that we have some serious problems, and the way to fix 
those problems is for us to work together like we have under the 
leadership of the gentleman from Florida and the gentleman from 
Wisconsin. Let us face our problems, come to some realistic solutions 
that do not involve enriching our friends, do not involve enriching 
large corporations, do not involve further enriching the pharmaceutical 
industry in this country.
  One of the things that is holding up the completion of this year's 
work is the Medicare reform bill. One of the things that is holding it 
up is the massive debt that we are creating for our children and 
grandchildren with absolutely no plan, no plan whatsoever to deal with 
it. Our seniors do not have the medicine that they need, and we know 
how to fix this problem. We can actually fix this problem without 
spending a large amount of government money.
  We should not leave this Chamber again until we solve these problems 
or at least come to some mutual agreement as to how we are going to 
work to try to get this done. We should stay in this Chamber day and 
night for as long as it takes to get the job done for the American 
people.
  This is not about Republicans. It is not about Democrats. The senior 
citizens in the 1st District of Arkansas do not give a hoot whether it 
is Republicans or Democrats, but they do care about the fact that they 
get robbed by the prescription drug manufacturers of this country to 
the point where they cannot buy their own food and they are not going 
to be able to heat their homes this winter. They care about that, and I 
care about it for them.
  It is time that we face the reality of the problems and quit trying 
to take care of those that have patronized us and work in a cooperative 
way between the parties, with the leadership of good men like the 
gentleman from Florida and the gentleman from Wisconsin, to lead us 
through these efforts and get the job done for the American people.
  Let us work together to do this, but let us not leave this Chamber 
again until it is done.

                              {time}  1130

  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).
  Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  I do not believe that either the chairman of the committee, and I 
certainly know that the ranking Democrat on the committee is not 
comfortable with this process, not comfortable with the allocations 
that have been put forward for crucial legislation for the American 
people.
  At issue and still hanging out there are everything that goes to 
Health and Human Services and Education that the government does, 
things crucial to the health of our people, crucial to the education of 
many; also the issue of veterans health care, as the gentleman from 
Wisconsin said. We still have not adequately funded and taken care of 
identified problems with veterans health care, and yet money to do that 
in the bill coming up later today was stripped from the legislation 
late in the night.
  We have the issue of homeland security. I serve on the Select 
Committee on Homeland Security, and we know that we are not meeting the 
needs adequately of aviation security; of port security; of the other 
aspects of homeland security; of first responders, those who we are 
going to call on, our fire, our police, and others in our home States 
who do not have the tools they need to respond day to day, let alone to 
potentially catastrophic emergencies and terrorist attacks. Yet here we 
find ourselves again on the floor of the House, yet again continuing 
through a temporary measure the operations of the government.
  I guess things would not be this way if the Republicans held the 
White House and controlled both the House and the Senate. Oh, well, 
actually, they do. That is right, I forgot. So it must be the Democrats 
that are holding things up. Maybe it is Bill Clinton who is responsible 
for this. I think maybe it is his fault, actually, because he left us 
with a surplus and now we have a $500 billion deficit and we do not 
have the money to adequately fund these programs, so we are hung up and 
cannot get the votes together to pass anemic bills that will not meet 
the needs of homeland security, will not meet the needs of America's 
young people, will not meet the needs of our veterans or our seniors. 
We just do not have the money to do it. We do not have any money at 
all. We are just stuck here.
  Except, wait a minute, later today we are going to take up a bill to 
borrow $87 billion to continue the conflict in Iraq and to build Iraq; 
to build an economy for Iraq, to build an infrastructure that is gold 
plated, a wonderful gold-plated infrastructure; but we do not have 
money here in the United States to perform some of the same functions. 
We are going to put another $50 million into the Port of Umm Qasr. I 
cannot get $8 million to dredge the ports in my district. The President 
says we are simply out of money. But we can borrow $50 million for the 
Port of Umm Qasr, and we will be voting on that later today.
  Mr. Bremer, the proconsul in charge of Iraq, is appalled that many 
people get their water through lines from open canals. He thinks they 
need a modern water system. The city of Albany in my State is doing a 
bond measure to meet Federal mandates for water supply because they get 
their water supply through an open unlined ditch, but they cannot get a 
penny from the Federal Government to help with that project; but we can 
borrow the money to do it in Iraq.
  How is it we can borrow money for all these projects in Iraq and we 
cannot find enough money here, under arbitrary limits, to fund 
education programs for Americans, to fund veterans health care 
programs, to fund homeland security? What is wrong with this picture? 
Well, it turns out that the Republicans themselves cannot agree, 
between the White House and the House and the Senate. So we find week 
after week we do these temporary bills, temporary bill after temporary 
bill; and yet they do not deliberate toward any real result.
  I am certainly not on this esteemed committee, but I am on another 
committee that will be the subject of debate later today; and I was 
just involved in a conference committee, except the conference 
committee never met. The result was dictated by the White House, 
something that I believe will jeopardize public health and safety, and 
it was accepted by the majority party. But then they found they could 
not get the votes to do what the House was dictating they should do. 
Same thing is happening here with our education programs, with our 
veterans health care, with our first responders, with our homeland 
security. The dictates have come down from above the level of this 
committee that say this is all the money there is.
  We can borrow money for Iraq, but we cannot borrow money to fund 
these

[[Page 26438]]

vital programs here in the United States of America; and we put a 
higher priority on cutting taxes. Therefore, we cannot get the bills 
passed. The votes are not here. This is a very sad state of affairs.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), the ranking Democrat on the 
Subcommittee on Defense of the Committee on Appropriations.
  Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the chairman a question. Why 
are we only doing this for a week? We are going to have to do this 
whole thing in another week? We get up here with all this debate, but 
could the gentleman tell me why? He knows we are not going to get done 
in a week; he knows it will take until Thanksgiving. Why are we only 
doing this for a week? Can the gentleman tell me?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. MURTHA. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, the answer is that I agree with 
the gentleman, that we will not conclude our work prior to the 7th and 
we will need another CR. But that will not be due to any problems in 
the House. That will be because we are having some very difficult 
negotiations in the conference on the remaining bills, and also the 
fact that the other body has not even passed four of the bills in their 
own House.
  So I would suspect that the gentleman is correct, that we will need 
another CR; and maybe I can have a better explanation at that point.
  Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I just do not 
understand. We know it is going to take longer. I do not understand why 
we would be forced to go through this same administrative procedure 
every week. We know we are going to pass the CR. I just do not 
understand. Are we controlling this from the appropriation side, or is 
this above our pay grade?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. If the gentleman will continue to yield, I 
would say that the resolution before us today is the resolution that 
the chairman of the committee has presented, and that was a decision 
that was made at my level and at other levels.
  Mr. LEWIS of California. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. MURTHA. I yield to the gentleman from California.
  Mr. LEWIS of California. Mr. Speaker, I very much appreciate the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania yielding to me.
  I might mention, because the chairman certainly would not say this, 
that we are going through this routine, I know in large part, or maybe 
in small part, because for 40 years the Democrats ran the place and 
that gave us time to learn a lot by watching what they did. And from 
time to time they were even smart enough to understand that there was a 
need to put pressure on the other body, because that other body 
operates in a way that is hard for me to imagine.
  Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, if the gentleman would 
not mind, let me just respond that I always went for the longest 
possible CR. I did not want ever to bring up a CR where we had to go 
through this every week, every 7 days, every 10 days. It is always 
easier to get it done in a reasonable time. But I understand what the 
gentleman is saying.
  Mr. LEWIS of California. Mr. Speaker, if my friend from Pennsylvania 
would continue to yield, I know that he is one of the smartest guys in 
this place, and the leadership has difficulty getting everybody to be 
as smart as he is. And I would note, Mr. Speaker, that the gentleman 
from Pennsylvania is speaking today longer than I have seen him speak 
in the entire time I have been in the Congress. That is how smart he 
is. And it is a pleasure doing business with him.
  Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time once again, I know the 
chairman wanted to extend this, but I just wanted to needle him a bit 
about doing this every week.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.
  Let me simply say, Mr. Speaker, in response to the gentleman from 
California, that the last year the Democrats were in control, I was 
chairman. We finished every appropriation bill before the end of the 
fiscal year, not because there was anything special about me, but 
because my party leadership allowed me to walk across the aisle to work 
out a bipartisan allocation between the 13 subcommittees. Even then, we 
had two-thirds of the Republicans voting against the final product much 
of the time. But at least I was allowed to put together a bipartisan 
allocation of dollars, and that is why we were able to finish it on 
time.
  That is in contrast to the instruction that the gentleman from 
Florida has unfortunately been given by his leadership, which has led 
to the fact that the Republicans at this point in the House and the 
Republicans in the Senate are losing an argument with themselves. That 
is the problem.
  Mr. Speaker, how much time do we have remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Thornberry). The gentleman from 
Wisconsin has 7 minutes remaining.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. Cardin).
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. Speaker, let me thank the gentleman from Wisconsin 
for yielding me this time and acknowledge the fact that the work done 
by the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Appropriations and 
the ranking minority member in moving the appropriation bills through 
this body has been on time. We understand that. And we understand that 
there is a political process that must go forward in order to reconcile 
the differences.
  I agree completely with the ranking member that the parameters in 
which we are operating under make it very difficult for us to work this 
out, and we should acknowledge that sooner rather than later so that we 
can finish the appropriation bills.
  I also understand it is unlikely we will finish all our work by 
November 7. But, Mr. Speaker, I would think that we would use this time 
to get our work done, rather than a very short week and not dealing 
with the business that needs to be done. The committee I serve on, the 
Committee on Ways and Means, has two very important issues we have to 
resolve before Congress adjourns, and yet we are not doing any work as 
a collective body on those two issues.
  One of the two issues I refer to is unemployment insurance, which is 
scheduled to expire at the end of December; and yet our committee has 
not even held a hearing or done any work at all on extending the 
unemployment insurance bill. One would think that we would use this 
time in order to make sure that we do not do what we did last Christmas 
and adjourn leaving those people who cannot find employment without the 
help they need and deserve through monies that are held in the Federal 
unemployment trust account. There is $20 billion there. We should be 
using this time to extend the unemployment insurance system for people 
who are going to need that help. Instead, another week goes by with no 
action at all.
  Mr. Speaker, let me mention the second issue which my friend from 
Arkansas mentioned earlier, and that is the prescription drug issue. 
Since last week, I have had three or four town hall meetings in my 
district in which the seniors have asked me what is going on on the 
prescription drug issue, and I have to tell them I do not know because 
the conference has not met in the open. The House Democrats have been 
excluded from the conference. I do not know why that is true. After 
all, one would think that this is an issue that we would want to get 
completed this year, where we have a real benefit within the Medicare 
system for our seniors to cover their prescription drug needs.
  In my district, there are literally thousands of seniors who cannot 
afford their prescription drugs. They are cutting their pills in half. 
They are taking a pill every other day when they should be taking it 
every day. We need to get that done before Congress adjourns. But the 
only way, as my friend from Arkansas pointed out, that that is going to 
be done is if we have a true,

[[Page 26439]]

open conference in which Democrats and Republicans can work together to 
bring out a bill that really provides a real benefit within the 
Medicare system to get our work done.
  So I understand we are going to extend the CR for another 7 days so 
that Congress can try to work its will on the appropriation bills. I 
also understand we are nearing the end of the session, whether it is 
Thanksgiving or Christmas; and one of the, I would hope, must-do bills 
is the prescription drug bill. But not just any bill; not a bill that 
will hurt seniors, not a bill that is going to affect those who already 
have prescription drugs and they are going to find out their employer 
is going to terminate their prescription drug coverage because of what 
we are doing here; not a prescription drug bill that has no true 
benefit our seniors can rely on; not a prescription drug bill that has 
gaps in coverage where seniors are wondering why they are paying high 
premiums and not getting any benefits; not a prescription drug bill 
that does not do something to bring down the cost of prescription drugs 
in our country. That is not what they want.
  The only way we are going to make sure that we carry out our 
commitment on prescription drugs is we openly meet, with the public 
looking at what we are doing, and resolve these differences in a way 
that makes sure that we get our job done well and right.
  So, Mr. Speaker, I hope that we use these next 7 days not only to 
reconcile the differences on the nine remaining appropriation bills 
that should have been passed by October 1, which we should have done 
well before this date, but we reconcile our differences on the other 
mandatory bills before Congress adjourns to provide prescription drug 
benefits for seniors who desperately need it within the Medicare 
system, a real benefit, a benefit that they know will help them deal 
with the ever-increasing costs of prescription medicines, and a bill 
that will extend the unemployment benefits not just to those 80,000 
Americans every week who are exhausting their State benefits, but also 
the million and a half who already have exhausted their Federal 
benefits that need extra weeks that are included in the legislation 
that has been filed by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) and me.

                              {time}  1145

  Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) for 
yielding me this time so we can put this particular legislation in 
context. It is not just about extending government, it is also giving 
us an opportunity to get our work done before we adjourn this session 
of Congress.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, since I first came to this body in 1969, we have had 
divided control of government for all but 6 years. The only time we 
have had Democratic control of all of the power levels of government 
was the 4 year period under President Carter and the first 2 years 
under President Clinton. For the rest of that time, we have had divided 
government until the Republicans took the whole shebang in the last 
election.
  It is clear that regardless of what we want to talk about in 
yesterday's chapters, the chapter being written today makes clear that 
the majority party is in control of all of the power levers of 
government, and they are in a very big debate with themselves. As a 
consequence, we again, as was the case last year, do not have the work 
done. That is not the fault of the gentleman from Florida. I do believe 
it is the fault of those who have decided that every issue will be 
decided within the Republican caucus rather than trying to work out 
more broad-based bipartisan bills.
  Nonetheless, that having been said, we have no choice but to pass 
this resolution. I would hope that we would have a sense of realism 
about how to get the job done between now and Thanksgiving. I doubt 
that we are going to, so I am afraid the gentleman from Florida (Mr. 
Young) and I will be back on the floor next week and the following week 
pursuing these week-to-week extensions. Sooner or later, we simply have 
to change the mind-set which has allowed this drift to continue.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask for an ``aye'' vote on the resolution.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my 
time.
  First, I want to needle the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha) 
and then I am going to compliment the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. 
Obey), and then I am going to have a few comments about the issues on 
the CR.
  When the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha) said in a friendly 
way that he was going to needle me, I want the gentleman to know that I 
have been needled so many times there is not much room left to put 
needles in, but I am prepared, willing, and able.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to compliment the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. 
Obey) for several reasons. The truth of the matter is that the House's 
part of this appropriations process has worked very well. The gentleman 
from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) has been a major player in making this 
process work. Now, I would say we do not always agree with each other. 
In fact, we disagree a lot. But occasionally we agree with the 
gentleman from Wisconsin and we support what he wants to do. But when 
we do not agree, we do not agree; and we are the majority so we can 
outvote him.
  The year when the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) was chairman, 
we did not have any CRs. All 13 appropriations bills were passed by 
October 1, which is the beginning of the fiscal year, and I compliment 
the gentleman for that because that does not happen very often. In 
fact, in the last 16-18 years, it has only happened twice. Once was 
under the watch of the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), and he 
deserves a lot of credit for that. But I would also remind the 
gentleman that he had 82 more Democrats than Republicans, and that made 
his life a lot easier.
  Mr. Speaker, the House has been very successful this year. Let me 
just relate quickly what we have done in the House. The gentleman from 
Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) said he did not want a repeat of last year, and I 
say Amen to that. We do not want a repeat of last year when we could 
not even get our bills brought to the floor, although we had marked 
them up in committee.
  So at the beginning of this year, we completed 11 of last year's 13 
appropriations bills. We completed, conferenced, and passed them, and 
they were signed into law. We have also completed, in the House and 
conference, one major supplemental. We have passed all 13 of our 
regular fiscal year 2004 bills. We have also passed a mini-supplemental 
that has been conferenced and sent to the President which has now been 
signed. We have filed the major Iraqi supplemental, which we will take 
up in the House this afternoon. So we have had a very, very busy year 
on the Committee on Appropriations front, here in the House of 
Representatives.
  Our work is not done yet. When we pass the Department of Interior 
bill today, that will be only four of the 13 bills completed. There are 
four more in conference: military construction, energy and water, 
Labor-HHS and transportation. We expect to send to conference the 
foreign operations bill next week. There are still four bills in the 
Senate waiting action by the full Senate, Commerce-State-Justice, the 
Veterans and HUD appropriation bill, the District of Columbia 
appropriation bill, and the agriculture appropriation bill. We cannot 
go to conference until they pass those bills.
  But to suggest, as one Member did, that there is hardly any action at 
all, this Committee on Appropriations has been pretty busy and pretty 
effectively busy.
  Another Member suggested that Democrats are excluded from our 
conferences. I only go to conferences on appropriations bills, but 
since I have had the privilege of chairing this committee, no Member of 
either party has been excluded from the work we are doing or from our 
conferences.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.

[[Page 26440]]


  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, what the previous Member said was not in any 
way directed at the Committee on Appropriations. The Member was 
pointing out in a number of the authorizing committee conferences, that 
Members of the minority were excluded; and I might point out in the 
process, probably the public interest was excluded as well.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's 
comments, and he is exactly right. On the Committee on Appropriations 
bills, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and I communicate on a 
regular basis. I try to make sure that the gentleman and the minority 
are aware of anything that we are planning. We often consult and ask 
them how they would deal with issues. On the appropriations process, we 
have a good arrangement and I think we provide a good product. We do 
not exclude Members.
  I know there are some strong feelings about a 7-day CR or a 15-day 
CR, and probably it would have been more realistic to go a little later 
into the month when I think we could conclude our bills. I know Members 
are anxious to adjourn, but for Members on either side who want to 
complain about getting done so we can get out of here, I have to remind 
them, that we get paid 12 months a year, and the people should expect 
us to work 12 months a year. And if it takes 12 months, we are going to 
do it. Members sign up to get their paychecks every month, and should 
be prepared to work. We are still not at the end of the year. We will 
conclude our business before then, but if someone is really anxious to 
get out of here, maybe they should look for different employment.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time and ask for a yes 
vote on the CR.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Thornberry). All time for debate has 
expired.
  The joint resolution is considered read for amendment, and pursuant 
to House Resolution 417, the previous question is ordered.
  The question is on engrossment and third reading of the joint 
resolution.
  The joint resolution was ordered to be engrossed and read a third 
time, and was read the third time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the joint 
resolution.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a 
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not 
present.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
  The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 406, 
nays 13, not voting 15, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 583]

                               YEAS--406

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Aderholt
     Alexander
     Allen
     Andrews
     Baca
     Bachus
     Baird
     Baker
     Baldwin
     Ballance
     Ballenger
     Barrett (SC)
     Bartlett (MD)
     Barton (TX)
     Bass
     Beauprez
     Becerra
     Bell
     Bereuter
     Berkley
     Berman
     Berry
     Biggert
     Bilirakis
     Bishop (GA)
     Bishop (NY)
     Bishop (UT)
     Blackburn
     Blumenauer
     Blunt
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bonner
     Bono
     Boozman
     Boswell
     Boucher
     Boyd
     Brady (PA)
     Brady (TX)
     Brown (OH)
     Brown (SC)
     Brown, Corrine
     Brown-Waite, Ginny
     Burgess
     Burns
     Burr
     Burton (IN)
     Buyer
     Calvert
     Camp
     Cannon
     Cantor
     Capito
     Capps
     Cardin
     Cardoza
     Carson (IN)
     Carter
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chocola
     Clay
     Clyburn
     Coble
     Cole
     Collins
     Cooper
     Costello
     Cox
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crenshaw
     Crowley
     Cubin
     Culberson
     Cummings
     Cunningham
     Davis (AL)
     Davis (CA)
     Davis (FL)
     Davis (IL)
     Davis (TN)
     Davis, Jo Ann
     Davis, Tom
     Deal (GA)
     DeGette
     Delahunt
     DeLauro
     DeMint
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart, L.
     Diaz-Balart, M.
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Doggett
     Dooley (CA)
     Doolittle
     Doyle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Edwards
     Ehlers
     Emanuel
     Emerson
     Engel
     English
     Eshoo
     Etheridge
     Evans
     Everett
     Farr
     Fattah
     Feeney
     Ferguson
     Flake
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fossella
     Frank (MA)
     Franks (AZ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frost
     Gallegly
     Garrett (NJ)
     Gerlach
     Gibbons
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gingrey
     Gonzalez
     Goode
     Goodlatte
     Gordon
     Goss
     Granger
     Graves
     Green (TX)
     Green (WI)
     Greenwood
     Grijalva
     Gutknecht
     Hall
     Harman
     Harris
     Hart
     Hastings (FL)
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayes
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Hensarling
     Herger
     Hill
     Hinchey
     Hinojosa
     Hobson
     Hoeffel
     Hoekstra
     Holden
     Holt
     Honda
     Hooley (OR)
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hoyer
     Hulshof
     Hunter
     Hyde
     Inslee
     Israel
     Issa
     Istook
     Jackson (IL)
     Janklow
     Jefferson
     Jenkins
     John
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (IL)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones (NC)
     Jones (OH)
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Keller
     Kelly
     Kennedy (MN)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kildee
     Kilpatrick
     Kind
     King (IA)
     King (NY)
     Kingston
     Kirk
     Kleczka
     Kline
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Lampson
     Langevin
     Lantos
     Larsen (WA)
     Larson (CT)
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Leach
     Levin
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (GA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     Lipinski
     LoBiondo
     Lofgren
     Lowey
     Lucas (KY)
     Lucas (OK)
     Lynch
     Majette
     Maloney
     Manzullo
     Markey
     Marshall
     Matheson
     Matsui
     McCarthy (MO)
     McCarthy (NY)
     McCrery
     McGovern
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntyre
     McKeon
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meek (FL)
     Meeks (NY)
     Menendez
     Mica
     Michaud
     Millender-McDonald
     Miller (FL)
     Miller (MI)
     Miller, Gary
     Mollohan
     Moore
     Moran (KS)
     Moran (VA)
     Murphy
     Murtha
     Musgrave
     Myrick
     Nadler
     Napolitano
     Neal (MA)
     Nethercutt
     Neugebauer
     Ney
     Northup
     Norwood
     Nunes
     Nussle
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Osborne
     Ose
     Otter
     Owens
     Oxley
     Pallone
     Pascrell
     Pastor
     Payne
     Pelosi
     Pence
     Peterson (MN)
     Peterson (PA)
     Petri
     Pickering
     Pitts
     Platts
     Pombo
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Portman
     Price (NC)
     Pryce (OH)
     Putnam
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Rahall
     Ramstad
     Rangel
     Regula
     Rehberg
     Renzi
     Reyes
     Reynolds
     Rodriguez
     Rogers (AL)
     Rogers (KY)
     Rogers (MI)
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Ross
     Rothman
     Roybal-Allard
     Royce
     Ruppersberger
     Rush
     Ryan (OH)
     Ryan (WI)
     Ryun (KS)
     Sabo
     Sanchez, Loretta
     Sanders
     Sandlin
     Saxton
     Schakowsky
     Schiff
     Schrock
     Scott (GA)
     Scott (VA)
     Sensenbrenner
     Serrano
     Sessions
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Sherman
     Sherwood
     Shimkus
     Shuster
     Simmons
     Simpson
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith (WA)
     Snyder
     Solis
     Souder
     Spratt
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Strickland
     Sullivan
     Sweeney
     Tancredo
     Tanner
     Tauscher
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Terry
     Thomas
     Thompson (CA)
     Thompson (MS)
     Thornberry
     Tiahrt
     Tiberi
     Tierney
     Toomey
     Towns
     Turner (OH)
     Turner (TX)
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Upton
     Van Hollen
     Velazquez
     Visclosky
     Vitter
     Walden (OR)
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Watson
     Watt
     Waxman
     Weiner
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     Wexler
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wilson (NM)
     Wilson (SC)
     Wolf
     Woolsey
     Wu
     Wynn
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)

                                NAYS--13

     Capuano
     Conyers
     DeFazio
     Filner
     Ford
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     Kucinich
     Lee
     McDermott
     Miller, George
     Paul
     Stark
     Waters

                             NOT VOTING--15

     Akin
     Bradley (NH)
     Carson (OK)
     Case
     DeLay
     Fletcher
     Gephardt
     Gutierrez
     Isakson
     McCollum
     McCotter
     Miller (NC)
     Pearce
     Sanchez, Linda T.
     Stupak


                Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Thornberry) (during the vote). Members 
are advised that there are 2 minutes remaining in this vote.

                              {time}  1216

  Ms. WATERS and Ms. LEE changed their vote from ``yea'' to ``nay.''
  So the joint resolution was passed.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________