Roy Blunt

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. I would only say that I understand the point. I also understand, as the gentleman does, in this particular case, the White House was highly involved in the discussion in the Senate; and it does seem to me that this is an issue of unusual sensitivity and important to try to work through as much as we could before we put our conferees in place, but I clearly understand the position that the whip has on that and appreciate it.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and before I go to that, I would like to say, and I would hope he would share my view of this, that while the Katrina supplemental is important and needs to be done before the end of the year, that also anything in the tax structure that encourages rebuilding, making a decision to get your business back in the affected area rather than stay somewhere else you may have moved to is also important. I would not want our colleagues on the other side of the building to think that somehow the tax portion of this can wait until next year. They both need to be done this year, and we are going to work hard to see that both of those things get done this year. We have worked this year well beyond our schedule to work in Washington. Members had every reason to believe before the August work period that they would be home now and would have been home for several weeks talking about what we have done and what we hope to do. But when we do go home at the end of the next working series of days we will be working, we would anticipate that the Members would not come back until the 31st of January, and the first votes for the second session would occur on and after that date.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, the House will convene on Tuesday at 12:30 p.m. for morning hour and 2 p.m. for legislative business. We will consider several measures under suspension of the rules. A final list of those bills will be sent to Members' offices by the end of the week. Any votes called on these measures will be rolled until 6:30 p.m. For Wednesday and the balance of the week, the House will consider additional legislation under suspension of the rules, as well as H.R. 4437, the Border Protection, Antiterrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005, under a rule. We also anticipate the House will consider additional conference reports, including the USA PATRIOT Act; the Labor, Health and Human Services and Department of Defense appropriations bills; and possibly the deficit reduction and tax relief packages.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank my friend for yielding. This is an important topic for us to deal with. Pension security is incredibly important to Americans and their future. We believe we have a good bill from the Ways and Means Committee and the Education and Workforce Committee that has been put together. But I also understand that because both bodies have to be involved, it is highly unlikely that whatever we do would find its way to the President's desk this year. At the same time, circumstances might allow us to move that bill next week. But I would not put that on the list of things that we are almost certain to do, but certainly it is on the list of things we are looking at to see if there is a way we can go ahead and advance a House position so that our friends on the other side of the Capitol can move on this issue as well, and early next year, we could come to conclusion on an issue that is so critically important to so many Americans and their families.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Those bills were combined into one bill in the Judiciary Committee markup today, so I would expect to see that as one bill. And amendments could be submitted to the Rules Committee on that bill and the Rules Committee, I am sure, will allow some amendments on the floor as well.

Mr. BLUNT. As I said, we intend to have that bill on the floor next week. I think it is probably more likely to be on Thursday, but that decision will be a lot easier to make once we get a greater sense of how all of the work next week will present itself. Certainly we hope to have these two appropriations measures on the floor; and as we have discussed before in the last few minutes, the importance of getting them done next week. The PATRIOT Act also will be on the floor next week, we anticipate. And depending on how that work becomes available to us will determine the scheduling of the border security provisions. I do not think it is likely that that will be on the floor on Wednesday, but it is not impossible. I think it is more likely that that bill will be on the floor on Thursday, or maybe even later if other measures present themselves quicker than we think.

Mr. BLUNT. We are hopeful that both of these reconciliation conferences can proceed. Both the tax conference and the deficit reduction conference are very complicated. It is our hope we can work through these, get these in place and work through them next week; but there is a tremendous amount of work that needs to be done because of the differences in the bills. We are hopeful that we go to conference next week on one or both of those issues, and then could even get one or both of them back to the floor to vote on the conference product next week, if that is at all possible.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet at noon on Monday next, and further, when the House adjourns on that day, it adjourn to meet at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday, December 13, 2005, for morning hour debate.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the business in order under the Calendar Wednesday rule be dispensed with on Wednesday next.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I am in opposition to the substitute because I am for the underlying bill and I am for the things it has done for our economy. One of the great changes that this bill showed in what happens in the Federal Government is a belief that people are better at solving economic problems than government is. When the tax structure that we are voting today to extend was put in place, the determination was made that we were in a difficult economic time, and the way to get out of that difficult economic time was to trust the people, not to come up with some big complicated government program, but to trust the people to let them keep more of their money, to put some minor incentives in the Tax Code to do whatever they wanted to do sooner, rather than later, but no incentive in the Tax Code to do a specific thing. The incentive was to trust the American people to see what we could do to get the economy growing again and going again, and that is what has happened. But this is no time for that to stop. This is no time to say we should put the brakes on this economy, just because the unemployment rate is lower than the average of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. It is still 5 percent. We should want it to be lower than that. Just because income to the Federal Government increased last year at a rate three times the projection, the highest increase in Federal Government ever without a tax increase, how did that happen? It happened because the economy was working. It happened because more people had jobs, that $100 billion that came in in the fiscal year that ended September 30 that we did not anticipate, did not come in by accident. It came in because of a strong and growing economy. What the underlying bill does is say, let us not increase taxes. Let us keep the tax structure that is growing this economy in place. Let us send a signal that that tax structure is in place, at least until 2010, and it makes a difference. I was listening to the debate earlier, and so much of the debate earlier was about wealthy Americans. Amazingly, those same Americans yesterday were the upper middle class. Overnight somehow the upper middle class became wealthy Americans. But not just the upper middle class benefits from this. All Americans benefit from this in their own way. In the reduction in the capital gains rate, one out of five people that take advantage and benefit from the capital gains rate has an income below $50,000. Fifty-eight percent of the people that have a benefit from that have an income below $100,000. The capital gains, I know these people, as other Members do. The janitor at school who has figured out how his renters help him pay for two rental houses, and every time the pipes freeze, he is crawling under that rental house. It has depreciated down to where the value for tax purposes may not be very high, but it is everything that man or woman had been able to accumulate, and that person benefits greatly from this 15 percent rate. Why raise that rate back? Why send a signal that that rate is going to go back? The dividend tax, six times as many companies are paying dividends to people that own the company today as were paying dividends in just 2003 when we made that change. And the numbers are about the same. For the dividend rates, one out of four people that benefit from that tax make under $50,000. Fifty-nine percent of the people that benefit from that tax make under $100,000. Those are the same people that on this floor yesterday we talked about how important it was they not be negatively affected by the alternative minimum tax. I agree with that. So did everybody but four people on the floor of the House that voted yesterday. I agree that we ought to continue these tax policies that are working for America. That means we need to reject the substitute, even a substitute from my good friend (Mr. Rangel), and move to the underlying bill and keep this economy growing.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Richard Walter on his retirement from more than 36 years of dedicated service to the State of Missouri. Richard Walter distinguished himself in Missouri by his commitment to improving the lives of citizens in this great State. On December 31, 2005, Richard will retire as District Engineer for MoDOT's District 7. The leadership he provided during his time with the department was crucial to the success of several projects currently moving forward in the 7th Congressional District. Just a few of the projects Richard spent his time advocating include the completion of MO 249, commonly known as the Range Line By-Pass, building four lanes of U.S. Highway 71 south from Joplin to the Missouri-Arkansas border, and completing four lanes of MO Highway 13 north of Springfield to Kansas City. These major projects are vitally important to the economic growth and quality of life in southwest Missouri. The citizens of southwest Missouri owe a great deal of gratitude to Richard for his efforts to advance these projects. I congratulate Richard on his accomplishments during his tenure with the Missouri Department of Transportation and wish him the best in his retirement.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. I thank my friend for yielding. At this point, we are still talking to the Ways and Means chairman about his schedule of moving forward with that event. Like some of our other chairmen, he is also involved in the mandatory spending reconciliation, and we will be talking to him about his view of how he manages those two conflicting things going on and whether we can have them both going on at the same time or not.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank my friend for yielding. My expectation is not that we would have that on the floor next week, but that we would have that on the floor between now and the time we leave here for the end of this year.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank my friend for yielding. I understand everybody has their holiday plans or wants to begin to make their holiday plans. The gentleman is correct in his observations about our past discussion here. We would not intend to be here the week of Thanksgiving or the week after Thanksgiving. We do plan to be back and do not see any reason we would not be, and every Member should anticipate being back the week of December 5. It is possible it could take 2 weeks to complete our work for the year and that we could have some work even into the week that begins on December 12. But we definitely intend to be here the 5th and would encourage Members to plan to be here both of those weeks in case our work carries over into the week following the week of December 5. That would be the week of December 12.

Mr. BLUNT. I would expect to have that conference motion next week.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding to me. I do not know exactly when in the week we would get to that, but I am hopeful that enough staff work and other progress has been made on that bill that it could be on the floor next week. If it is on the floor next week, we obviously would have to go to the official conference sometime midweek.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend again for yielding. We are continuing to consult with the Senate on that. Of course, as a senior appropriator, as you well know, as we work the appropriations bills out, the nature of that CR changes. Ideally, we would not have to have a CR because it would be clear that we would have all the bills passed by Friday. If not, we would have to consult with the Senate, see how long they are willing to have a CR or how long we think is in the best interest of the process, but the appropriations work has gone well and I would not see any being extended for a significant period of time.

Mr. BLUNT. It is possible. I would like to say likely. I think it is likely it will be back, and certainly, it is possible it will be back next week.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Maryland for yielding and would say that the House will convene on Tuesday at 10:30 p.m. for morning hour and 12 noon for legislative business. We will consider several measures under suspension of the rules. A final list of those bills will be sent to Members' offices by the end of the week. Any votes called on these measures will be rolled until 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday. For Wednesday and the balance of the week, the House will consider additional legislation under suspension of the rules, as well as two measures under a rule, H.R. 1065, the United States Boxing Commission Act, and we anticipate either the budget or the tax reconciliation package on the floor next week. We also anticipate that the House will consider up to four additional appropriations conference reports as those reports become available. We have every reason to believe that those could all be available next week, and if they are, all of the appropriations bills will be passed individually and, with the exception of the defense and homeland security bills, the collection of the others, individually and under last year's spending limit.

Mr. BLUNT. Well, there are four bills remaining, and we think any and all of those bills could be here next week. We have already sent the previous eight bills to the President's desk, and so we have the remaining bills, all of which are likely to be done by the end of next week.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank my friend again for yielding, and we are continuing to work on that bill. We have asked our budget chairman to take one final look at it. We have not had a mandatory review of the mandatory programs in terms of looking at their budget for almost a decade now. Frankly, what we are learning is when you have not done anything in almost 10 years, it takes a little longer to do it than you thought it would. We hoped to have that bill on the floor today. The appropriate eagerness of Members to want to be sure and be home tomorrow for Veterans Day events and, frankly, the challenge of the last few details did not allow us to have that happen. So we have asked the budget chairman to look at those details again, and we hope to have that bill on the floor next week.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the business in order under the Calendar Wednesday rule be dispensed with on Wednesday next.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet at 6 p.m. on Monday next, and further, when the House adjourns on that day, it adjourn to meet at 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday, November 15, 2005, for morning hour debate.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the House vacate the ordering of the yeas and nays on the motions to suspend the rules and pass H.R. 1953 and H.R. 3665 to the end that the Chair may put the question on each motion de novo.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me. The week that is in question there has, of course, been on the calendar for a while as a workweek. We would intend at this point to have the reconciliation items on the floor that week. It will be a very full week of work if we hope to get out of here by Thanksgiving, by November 18, as is still our principal goal if we find cooperation in the Senate on that. I think it is likely that we would stay with the regular schedule. We have elections in Missouri too on that day, and while I hope to be there part of the day on Monday, I have already voted absentee, and I assume many of our other Members have already taken that action as well.