[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 22]
[House]
[Page 30591]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          FUNDING OUR VETERANS

  (Mrs. DRAKE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Mrs. DRAKE. Madam Speaker, this is day 39. That is 39 days so far 
that our veterans have not had the use of the increased funding for 
their benefits in health care. That is $18.5 million a day not able to 
be used.
  The work on this bill has been done for months. But instead of 
sending this bill to the President, the Democratic leadership decided 
to use our veterans as a smoke screen in an effort to pass billions in 
unrelated domestic spending.
  They failed in their scheme when the Senate yesterday split the bills 
to consider these funding issues separately and on their own merits. 
But today, with Veterans Day quickly approaching, the Democratic 
leadership is going to put our veterans aside to consider billions in 
bloated domestic spending instead of bringing a clean veterans bill to 
the floor.
  I won't stand for it. The American people won't stand for it. I'm 
standing with our veterans. Send a clean Veterans appropriations bill 
to the President now.

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