[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 15286]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   PAYING FEDERAL WORKERS NOT TO WORK

  (Mr. DOGGETT asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, Federal workers, already under sustained 
attack from the Republican Shutdown Caucus, certainly deserve to have 
no further abuse, but the approval of this bill is surely one of the 
more bizarre moments in a truly bizarre Republican-controlled House.
  These great conservative stewards of the taxpayers' dollars refuse to 
let our Federal workers work; and now, today, they approved legislation 
to pay them for not working. Getting nothing for your tax dollar. 
That's the new Republican-Tea Party concept of fiscal responsibility.
  Of course, the Federal workers, even though they have paid leave now, 
are justifiably unhappy because of the uncertainty of not knowing from 
day to day whether they will be called to work and not knowing whether 
that paid leave will arrive in time to meet their bills at the end of 
the month.
  Paying Federal workers not to work--a new level, truly, of absurdity 
in this politically manufactured government shutdown.

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