Joe Barton

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Texas is in a quandary. I am not aware we were able to determine anything for the other side. I don't know why they are allocating their time. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. We have the same understanding.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, page 76 and 77, section 143 of the original committee print repeals the requirement for documentation presentation for children covered under SCHIP. With that, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Michigan, a member of the committee, Mr. Rogers.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Hallelujah. Mr. Speaker, at this point in time, I reserve my time.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentlewoman from Nashville, Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn), a member of the committee.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to another member of the committee, Mr. Sullivan of Oklahoma.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to another distinguished member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Radanovich).

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished former Speaker of the House and currently the ranking member of the Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentleman from the great State of Illinois (Mr. Hastert).

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the ranking member of the Health Subcommittee on the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Deal).

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, could I inquire as to how much time there is remaining?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. I would like to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished Republican whip and a member of the committee who is on leave, Mr. Blunt of Missouri.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to a distinguished member of the committee, Mr. Walden of the great State of Oregon.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. I reserve.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, in addition to myself, I only have one additional speaker that's currently on the floor. I would encourage my friend from Michigan, if he has any speakers, to use some of his time at this point in time.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona, a distinguished member of the committee, Mr. Shadegg.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. I withdraw my reservation on the gentleman's unanimous consent request.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. I would be happy to yield.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Reclaiming my reservation, my understanding was that the Energy and Commerce Committee was going to go first, and then the Ways and Means Committee was going to go in the second hour. That is why Mr. McCrery is reserving his 30 minutes.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. I yield to my friend from California to explain to me why they don't want to use some of their time right now.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Reserving the right to object, Mr. Speaker, I will not object if the gentleman from California will explain to me why we are fighting over what was in a pre-agreed-upon time arrangement. We have got six or seven speakers from the Energy and Commerce Committee. We are simply trying to do it in a balanced way. The gentleman from California has 17 minutes; the gentleman from Michigan has, I believe, 21 minutes. We just wish that the time go down in a balanced way. I don't understand why that should be a problem.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to proceed out of order and engage in a colloquy with Mr. Stark and Mr. Dingell for purposes of trying to understand what is going on.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. I object to that.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Well, progress is being made. Last night, if you mentioned the word ``SCHIP'' on the House floor, a point of order was made that you couldn't talk about it. At least today we can talk about it. I rise in the strongest possible opposition to this self-executing, closed rule. I want to just recapitulate the history of the SCHIP bill as it's come through the House and the Energy and Commerce Committee. Last Tuesday night at 11:36 p.m., after the House had had its last vote, the minority on the Energy and Commerce Committee staff got the 465 SCHIP bill that was scheduled to be marked up the next morning, the following Wednesday, at 10 a.m. So that happened at 11:36 p.m. last Tuesday. As we all know, last night the Rules Committee got the Ways and Means version of the SCHIP bill, I'm told, at 12:30 a.m. this morning, met at 1 a.m. this morning, reported out a closed, self-executing rule, with no amendments. What does that mean? A self-executing rule means if you pass the rule, everything that's in it automatically happens. There's no debate; there's no policy argument or anything. It just happens. Now, this is from my friends on the majority side that when they became the majority said there was going to be openness; there was going to be transparency; Rules Committee wasn't going to meet at midnight; we were going to include the minority in discussions. Such hypocrisy. 11:36 p.m. last Tuesday night we get a bill from over the transom that's 465 pages. Midnight last night, or this morning, Rules Committee meets at 1 o'clock, reports out a self-executing closed rule. That is a joke. Vote ``no'' on this rule.