[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 17]
[House]
[Pages 24015-24016]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           THE MAJORITY PARTY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. LaTourette) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. LaTOURETTE. Mr. Speaker, this has been one heck of a day here on 
Capitol Hill. As a matter of fact, it's been one heck of a week.
  About 13 days ago, the Secretary of the Treasury came down to Capitol 
Hill, said that our markets are a mess, Wall Street's a mess, and if we 
don't give him $700 billion immediately, it's going to be a big 
problem. And we take that seriously.
  But then there was a little investigation, and they asked the 
Treasury, Where did you come up with the number $700 billion? Well, 
they answered it last week in Forbes Magazine, and here's the Treasury 
spokeswoman's quote: ``It's not based on any particular data point. We 
just really wanted to come up with a really big number.''
  Well, they succeeded. Seven hundred billion dollars is a really, 
really big number. It means really, really big things to Americans.
  A lot of us, because the Treasury Secretary also indicated that he 
could only spend $50 billion of your money a month, we had an amendment 
last night and we said let's make it a lot less. Let's save half a 
trillion dollars, and let's give him some money. If he's right, he can 
rescue the economy and everything will be all right. We're going to put 
in place some reforms, and we will come back on November 17 and we will 
figure out whether it's working or not. That sounded like a pretty 
reasonable plan to a lot of reasonable people.
  But that didn't happen. People who watch the House know that 
everything that comes to the floor comes to the floor pursuant to a 
rule. And the Rules Committee voted on that proposal last night, to 
save half a trillion dollars. And they voted ``no,'' 8-4. And, sadly, 
all 8 were members of the Democratic Party.
  Each of us represents about 600,000 people. So 4.8 million people 
basically, through their representatives, denied 305 million Americans 
the opportunity to have a vote, to take 10 minutes and take a vote 
about whether or not we could save half a trillion dollars and perhaps 
not give the whole $700 billion of tax money to the Treasury.
  Then the bill left the House, and it went over to our good friends in 
the Senate, who, of course, are very fiscally conservative. They're 
wiser than we are because they have 6-year terms; we only have 2-year 
terms. And do you think that they just were happy sending it back to us 
at $700 billion? No. They sent it back to us at $850 billion, and they 
added such wonderful things like $192 million for rum.
  Now, listen, I like rum. And it may be some of the Senators were 
nervous that they were losing the pirate vote. I don't know. But 
there's $192 million for rum, $100 million for NASCAR. I like NASCAR, 
but what's it doing in this bill saving the treasury? There's $81 
billion to Hollywood and $2 million for wooden arrows for children.
  Now, listen, all of these projects might be okay. They don't belong 
in a bill when the administration is saying that we need to act now or 
else the economy's going to melt down.
  But, you know, some of my friends back home say, well, 3 weeks, okay, 
if it's an emergency. What have you guys been doing?
  Well, we had in August a little discussion around here, and I don't 
know how Mr. McCotter from Michigan feels, but my constituents were not 
really happy when gasoline went to $4 a gallon. And I'll bet we were 
probably talking about that and that's why we couldn't get to the 
economy.
  Well, this Congress started in January of 2007. Gas was $2.22 a 
gallon. People said that's high, but, okay, I can get by. So the 
Congress got together and we decided--actually, it was the Democratic 
majority that decided that the most important thing that we could 
discuss on that day was congratulating the University of California at 
Santa Barbara soccer team for their championship. I like soccer. That's 
important. I'm sure their parents are real proud. But gas is $2.22.
  Well, then it goes up to $2.84. And people say, well, sure, I'll bet 
now you're going to try to figure out an energy policy for the country. 
Well, on that day we declared it National Passport Month. And I know 
that everybody in America, when they filled up their gas tank at $2.84 
a gallon, said, well, I know it's expensive but at least it's National 
Passport Month.
  Then gas went up to $3.03. And we have all been told that we have to 
get the vote of the soccer moms to be reelected. So we tried that 
again. When gas was at $3.03, we commended the Houston Dynamo soccer 
team because we really like soccer.

[[Page 24016]]

  Well, gas goes up to $3.77. Surely now your elected representatives 
in Washington get the picture, that we're going to vote on gas. We 
declared it National Train Month, folks. National Train Month.
  Well, then it goes up a little higher, $3.84 a gallon. Your Congress, 
thanks to the new majority, figures the most important issue is the 
Great Cats and Rare Canids. And for those of us who don't follow this, 
canids are dogs. So basically we were voting on foreign aid for cats 
and dogs rather than dealing with energy.
  Then it goes to $4.09. The first time in my history I paid over $4 
for gasoline. Well, we're going to act on your behalf: We declared it 
International Sanitation Month because we really felt your pain.
  It crested $4.14 on June 17 of this year. You know that the United 
States Congress was grappling with energy prices. You know that the 
United States Congress had to be grappling with this meltdown of the 
economy. The majority party that day decided that the most important 
issue facing America was the Monkey Safety Act.
  Now, folks, you deserve better than the Monkey Safety Act. You 
deserve lower gas prices. And, folks, you deserve a better bill than 
you got today.

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