[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 10]
[House]
[Pages 15286-15287]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1130
                          ALTERNATIVE UNIVERSE

  (Mr. BLUMENAUER asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute.)
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, welcome to the alternative universe in 
the House of Representatives. We just voted, as we knew we would, to 
pay the furloughed workers when the shutdown ends, as we knew we would.
  What started as a right-wing tantrum to defund ObamaCare, which

[[Page 15287]]

failed, as it inevitably would, and then it became a demand to pull the 
rug out for another delay, we're now arguing about something. 
Negotiations? What?
  Since we decided to pay everybody anyway, let's vote on the 
continuing resolution so we can at least get work in exchange for 
paying our employees and stop losing tens of millions of dollars every 
hour.
  The Republicans now want to negotiate. I think that's terrific. We've 
been waiting 6 months for the House Republicans to appoint their 
conference committee so we can reconcile differences on the budget.
  Let's vote on the continuing resolution. Let's appoint conference 
committees and get back to work.

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