[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 18]
[House]
[Page 24749]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          MISPLACED PRIORITIES

  (Mr. BISHOP of New York asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute.)
  Mr. BISHOP of New York. Madam Speaker, on Wednesday of last week, the 
Education and the Workforce Committee, of which I am a member, passed 
the single largest cut to student aid in history.
  By taking $15 billion out of the Federal aid programs, the Republican 
leadership proved again that its agenda is replete with misplaced 
priorities. When we had the choice to lift up a generation of young 
Americans by helping them achieve the dream of a college education, we 
chose instead to give more comfort to the already very comfortable. Our 
differences are profound. It appears that so are our values and what we 
perceive to be America's priorities.
  Future generations of Americans are entitled to a basic education, 
but they will not be able to afford it after we reconcile how to pay 
for the hurricane damage, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and even 
two more tax cuts that have not yet begun to take effect and will not 
even benefit 97 percent of American families.
  Madam Speaker, we cannot afford to hold sacred the tax cuts for the 
wealthiest Americans at the expense of the values, priorities, or needs 
of the middle class. Americans deserve better.

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