[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15672]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1030
                             THE OBEY RULE

  (Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California asked and was given permission 
to address the House for 1 minute.)
  Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California. Mr. Speaker, last night, we were 
informed over and over again by the other side of the aisle that we 
were supposed to follow what's become known as the Obey rule, O-b-e-y. 
Now, out west where I come from, that's pronounced ``obey.''
  So I looked up in the dictionary to see what o-b-e-y means, and it's 
from middle English and old French, and it means to carry out or 
fulfill the command, order and instruction of, to carry out or comply 
with the command, or to behave obediently. That's the problem.
  We have been told that we are supposed to obey, that is, behave 
obediently at the whim of the chairman of the Committee on 
Appropriations and their staff.
  I was not elected to obey anybody here. I was elected here to 
represent the people of the Third Congressional District of California. 
That's what the debate was about last night. That's what the debate 
will be about today, and that's what the debate will be about for the 
rest of the appropriations cycle.

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