Sherrod Brown

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Taking back my time, Mr. Chairman, my friend, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Wilson], brings up a good point. But that only proves my point that in the last 5 years India has made progress. The pro-Pakistani tilt at the State Department has begun to right itself. As we have seen as we have extended an arm to India and they have to us, they are becoming much more of an ally to us. They will become much more of an ally to us as we begin to treat them with respect and treat them as the kind of ally they should be.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. The gentleman from Maryland is right, this is purely a humanitarian issue. The Armenians have suffered in the early part of this century, in the early part of this century at the hands of the Turks. The Armenians have suffered through a Soviet regime for decades. This is simply the transition that the Armenians are trying to make from being part of the Soviet union as a State in the Soviet Union to a free market, independent, free society. The American tradition is to extend a helping hand to countries like that. That is all that the Visclosky-Bilirakis amendment is about, to extend that helping hand, to help Armenia in a humanitarian way. That is all we are asking for.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, when the status of United States relations with China and/or Taiwan is debated, references are often made to the ``One China'' policy. This policy dates back to the Shanghai Communique, which since 1972 has formed the legal framework of Sino-American relations. It reads: ``The U.S. acknowledges that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China.'' I have always been puzzled by the ``One China'' policy. It is a complete abstraction; it simply does not comport with reality. It might serve the interests of the hegemonists in China, but it is an unrealistic as it is outdated. When Mao Tse-tung's Communists seized power in China in 1949 and established the People's Republic of China [PRC], ``Generalissimo'' Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists fled to Taiwan and established the Republic of China [ROC] on Taiwan. According to Mao, the PRC consisted of China, Taiwan, Tibet, and Mongolia. According to Chiang, the ROC consisted of exactly the same territory, i.e., China, Taiwan, Tibet, and Mongolia. Until 1972, the United States and most countries around the world chose to recognize the ROC regime as the sole, legitimate government of the whole territory. When President Nixon and Henry Kissinger went to China in 1972 and shifted recognition from Taipei to Beijing, they substituted one abstraction of reality for another. The rise of the Soviet Union to superpower status had necessitated a Sino-American relationship; the United States perceived the need for a powerful ally in the area, able to counter the Soviet threat. Indeed, on February 28, Nixon and Mao concluded the aforementioned Shanghai Communique. It completely neglected the rights and wishes of the people of Taiwan. Today, with the recent tension in the Taiwan Strait it is becoming more and more clear that the ``One China'' policy is an outdated and untenable relic of the cold war. It therefore needs to be abolished. Constructive ambiguity, strategic ambiguity, and even tactical ambiguity are terms that arise when our relationship with Taiwan is being discussed. To prevent the recurrence of the recent crisis in the Taiwan Strait, we cannot afford to be ambiguous in our China policy; it is time to acknowledge reality. There is one China and one Taiwan; the United States and the rest of the world should adjust their policy to current reality. The people of Taiwan have fought long and hard to establish a democracy on their island. The world should respect their choice. And if their wish is recognition by the rest of the world of their status as separate from China, then the United States, as the leader of the free world, should take the lead in that process. Mr. Chairman, we can make a beginning by acknowledging that Taiwan is not a part of China and scrap once and for all the outdated and unrealistic ``One China'' policy.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Thank you, Mr. Pallone, for your work in opposing these extreme Gingrich Medicare and Medicaid plans. What is amazing, and I want to take one small part out of what you said. The Gingrich plan and what they are trying to do in this body today is not much different from when they shut the government down last year. Medicare cuts, student loan cuts, cuts in the environment, all to pay for tax breaks for the richest people in society. One particular issue that you touched on is what they want to do to nursing home protections. Last year we thought we had won that battle. We thought that they would not try that again. Again, this year in their budget and in our committee, in the Committee on Commerce, and the Health Subcommittee when they are talking about these issues, the Gingrich plan again says let us repeal all the protections for nursing homes that this Congress, with President Reagan, passed 10 years ago. I though in this society there was a consensus around making sure that there were protections against oversedation, protections against restraints or senior citizens in nursing homes. I thought there was a consensus in the society that they in fact would be protected if those laws would be in place to make nursing homes safer because clearly those laws passed by the Democratic Congress with the Republican President in the mid-1980's made sense and would stay in place. Yet the Gingrich extremists, this Congress, has tried to pull that consensus apart when a great majority, probably 90 percent of the public, believes, yes, we should have those protections in nursing homes. Yet this Gingrich extremist group says, ``Let's not; let's repeal it, turn it over to the States.'' That was the problem we had in the beginning where State governments simply were not providing for safe nursing homes with the kinds of regulation that is necessary to protect those senior citizens in nursing homes. And not only are they making cuts in Medicare and Medicaid to pay for tax breaks for the richest people in society, at the same time they are stripping away those protections for the safety of our parents and our grandparents in nursing homes. Mr. Speaker, it just simply does not make sense, and they are trying to explode a consensus, these Gingrich extremists are trying to explode this consensus that we have built in this country on this issue, on clean air laws, on safe drinking water laws, on pure food laws, on worker safety laws. They are trying to explode this consensus that society in this great country has built, and I simply do not understand it.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, the President might have delinked human rights from trade, but that should not be taken as a signal by other countries that the U.S. Congress no longer cares about human rights. Indeed, concern for human rights in our own country and around the world remains a prominent concern on both sides of the aisle. Congresswoman Pelosi, Congressman Lantos, Congressman Smith of New Jersey and Congressman Wolf are just four of the many Members who have made human rights a burning concern. I want to add my voice today to the concern about human rights in a part of the world about which we hear very little: Kashmir. Indeed, Kashmir is one of the main trouble spots in the world today. India and Pakistan have fought two wars over Kashmir, and it remains a sore spot in Indo-Pakistani relations. Pakistan has taken every opportunity to destabilize the situation in Kashmir. Soon after I took office in 1993, I received a group of activists from the Kashmiri Pandit community. The Pandits are not well known in this country. They are Hindus who have been made refugees in their own country. They are also a proud people with a special place in the history of India and the subcontinent. I might note that as India struggles to form a new government in the wake of the historic defeat suffered by the Congress Party, the Pandit community has made enormous contributions to Indian culture, including Jawaharlal Nehru. Listening to the Pandits, I was touched by their story. And I was shocked by the human rights abuses that have been perpetrated in Kashmir against the Hindus. Indeed, the Pandits have been the target of a campaign of ethnic cleansing. They have been brutalized and killed because they are Hindus. Many of them have been forced from their ancestral homeland and now live in squalid camps. Their future is uncertain. I believe the Pandits are truly the forgotten people of Kashmir. The State Department recently included a mention of the Pandits' plight in the annual ``country reports'' on human rights. That is at least a start--a recognition of a human rights problem. We must not look the other way while Pandit people are killed, raped, abducted, brutalized and exiled. We must not accept the fact that they have been exiled in their own country. We must pay attention to the plight of internally displaced people, a status that is becoming all too familiar in our new world. I urge other Members to look below the surface of the conflict in Kashmir and focus on the human cost. In the refugee camps there is a growing sense of unease, even panic, at the thought of being forgotten by the rest of the world. As we have shown in Bosnia and other places, the United States is not the type of country that turns its back on people who are in dire straits. That hope is what keeps the Kashmiri Pandits and other internally displaced people from lapsing into despair at their predicament. They look to the West for the hope of a better future. We must not look the other way.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, here we go again. Speaker Gingrich has put together his new budget, Medicare cuts, Medicaid cuts in the tens of billions of dollars, cuts in student loans, all to give tax breaks to the richest people in the country. Here we go again, Mr. Speaker. Last year when the Speaker introduced this Gingrich budget, again, tax breaks for the rich paid for by Medicare and Medicaid, student loan cuts. It kept going and going. Finally, they shut down the Government to get their way. The public clearly did not buy what they were saying. The public opposes these Medicare and Medicaid cuts, opposes these student loan cuts to give tax breaks for the rich. Here we go again. The public again is going to have to stand up as we are on this side of the aisle and reject that way of thinking. Let us work together, Mr. Speaker, to get a good budget without the draconian Medicare and Medicaid cuts, without tax breaks for the richest people in society. Balance the budget, move forward on increasing the minimum wage and building middle class wage jobs.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. The medical savings accounts that the Speaker has extolled, the virtues, over and over and over again, as an idea of a big insurance company, major contributors to the Speaker that salivate over the prospect of getting to write all this insurance for a Medicare program that is withering on the vine. It means major income to them, major costs to senior citizens to pay for a tax break for the wealthy.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. It is so important that Americans not be fooled by Gingrich saying that we just want to protect Medicare by the next round of speakers trotting out their articles from conservative, generally pro-Republican newspapers, saying they just want to protect, whether it is the Washington Post or the Washington Times, that typically support the Republican agenda, the Wall Street Journal, to say that we are just trying to save Medicare. The Medicare cuts are for tax breaks for the wealthy, as have you said over and over, Mr. Pallone, and as the voters clearly, and the public clearly understands from last year, when Gingrich tried to do this before. And it is clear that the Gingrich crowd here, the far right of the Republican Party that has supported all of this and pushed all of this, they have never believed in Medicare. They voted against it 30 years ago. Last fall the presumptive nominee of Speaker Gingrich's party has said, ``I was fighting the fight 30 years ago because we knew Medicare would not work.'' Speaker Gingrich last fall himself said, ``We just want it to wither on the vine. We cannot politically afford to get rid of it in round one, because the public will not stand for it.'' They have never cared about Medicare. They voted against Medicare for 30 years, most not the middle of the Republican Party. But because that was the consensus, that Democrats and Republicans alike realized that the public supports Medicare, because that far right of the Republican Party that Speaker Gingrich is so close to and that really runs things, and particularly the freshmen, all of them have clearly shown their opposition to Medicare year after year after year after year and that part of the party clearly does not support it. They still do not support it. They will trot out newspaper articles showing how responsible they are, but it is obviously tax breaks for the rich and watch Medicare wither on the vine. That is what they are about. That is what they want to do. They have a Washington Post article they will use, a newspaper that supported the Gingrich agenda time after time. It has a reputation of once being a more moderate paper with an editorial board made up of people that are conservative and do not support these programs, but representing the far right of that party. Speaker Gingrich's comments about Medicare that he wants to see it ``wither on the vine'' and ``it is tax breaks for the rich'' tell the whole story. They are simply not interested in saving this program but in gutting this program and in seeing it wither away.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I would say compliments to Mr. Pallone on his leadership, not just last year but it seems that we are having the same debate this year. Last year the voters said no to the Gingrich plan of Medicare cuts and Medicaid cuts and draconian student loan cuts in order to give a tax break to the wealthy. This year it is the same old song. It is coming back saying let us do it again. Last year, Speaker Gingrich shut the Government down in order to try to get his Medicaid cuts and Medicare cuts and student loan cuts and weakening environmental laws in order to give tax breaks to the rich. He shut down the Government trying to get his way, and clearly the voters and the people of this country said that is not the way it ought to be. He gave up and now he is trying it again. I cannot believe that we are going to have to go through this same debate. I hope that Speaker Gingrich is not going to go so far this year that he threatens a Government shutdown to make Medicare wither on the vine and in order to get Medicare and Medicaid and student loan cuts, because clearly the country does not want to see this health care program--30 years ago, 50 percent of the elderly in this country had no health insurance. Today, only 1 or 2 percent have no health insurance. It has been a success. We have to get costs under control, but we do not let the program wither on the vine. And on student loan cuts, it makes no sense because we as a nation have to compete globally. We cannot see middle-class students charged $5,000 per student more for a 4-year college education in order for Speaker Gingrich to take that money from the cuts in student loans and giving it to tax breaks for the rich. It is not to balance the budget, but to give tax breaks to the wealthiest people in the country. Mr. Pallone, I applaud your work in opposing this budget rerun as we had a year ago that ended up in a Government shutdown trying to get tax breaks for the richest Americans and gutting the programs that matter to our parents and grandparents and to students.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Medicaid cuts across a broad section of people. It is poor children. It is also the elderly in nursing homes and it is also hospitals similar to the one I visited in Cleveland some months ago called Health Hill Hospital. It is a hospital where young people typically from under 18, not young children, who have been in a car accident or had some major traumatic injury, often head injuries, and their medical bills are $5,000 or $10,000 a month. They are often from middle-class families, but no middle-class family can pay that kind of medical cost, nor does their insurance very often cover that for more than a few months or a year or so. It is things like that that can happen to all kinds of middle-class families and those major cuts in the Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for so many others are so troublesome. But it is not just the dollars with Medicaid, it is also from the Gingrich plan last year in Medicaid. It took away the standards for nursing homes that President Reagan and the Congress in the mid-1980s enacted in response to oversedation of nursing home patients, in response to problems of safety in nursing homes where some older people were either, as I said, oversedated or restrained in their beds, and it took away these standards that both parties agreed to in the 1980s. And that is what is so troublesome. There is consensus that Medicare and Medicaid makes sense for almost all of the American people. Almost all of us agree to that, both parties in the 1980's and both parties in the 1970's and both parties in the 1960's when they were created. Yet today this extreme Gingrich faction that is running this Congress says we want to not only cut these programs and let them wither on the vine; we want to take away the safety standards in nursing homes that mean so much to older people to make their lives a little better in the last 1 or 2 or 5 or 10 years of their lives and to take away the protection that people that your age, Mr. Pallone, and my age have if our parents are in nursing homes that we will not go bankrupt in order to keep them in a nursing home to do that, or that we will not have to choose between do I put my mom and dad in a nursing home or do I pay for a children's education? Particularly with the student loan cuts. To put Americans in that position where 40 or 50-year-old adults have to make choices between their parents or their children or where the protection is taken away, if in 20 years or so or 30 or 40 years I have to put my wife, or I would have to go in a nursing home, would my wife not even be able to live in the house that we live in at present? That sort of situation simply does not make sense. Surely, again, we have to get these costs under control, but we do not let these programs wither on the vine and we do not take away this health care system that has worked for so many people in this country and today their lives are better. People that paid their taxes and raised their children and played by the rules and signed a covenant, they expect after paying into Medicare all of these years that they will have that health program for themselves and their family. Yet Speaker Gingrich want its to wither on the vine and not see that program anymore. I do not think it makes any sense. I do not understand why they want to rerun this debate that clearly the American people rejected in 1995 and are going to reject this year as long as people know about it and they cannot sneak it in the back-door.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, does that mean I cannot mention Speaker Gingrich?

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I apologize for that. At the time about 30 years ago, then Congressman Dole said that Congress----

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the leadership the gentleman has shown in this issue, not just this year but last year. This is sort of ``There you go again with the Gingrich budget,'' or ``The same old song,'' or whatever that we saw in 1995, last year, we saw the same kind of budget, Medicare cuts, Medicaid cuts, student loan cuts, cuts in environmental protection and environmental laws, all in order to pay for tax breaks for the richest people in the country. Clearly with this budget, it is simply not much different this year than last year. Last year the American people rose up and said no to Medicare tax cuts for the wealthy, no to Medicaid cuts and student loan cuts of $5 billion in order to give tax breaks to the wealthy, and this year the Gingrich crowd, Gingrich extremists, are basically doing the same thing, trying to sneak in the back door while some of these other issues are going on, trying to sneak in the back door in making these cuts so they can give major tax breaks to the wealthiest people in the country. The real key I think is what you said, Mr. Pallone, that they talk out of both sides of their mouth. Speaker Gingrich himself said that we are trying to save Medicare, yet a year ago, some 6 or 8 months ago, speaking to a group of insurance executives, who stand to make a whole lot of money under the Gingrich Medicare plan, he said, ``We do not get rid of Medicare in round 1 because we do not think that is politically smart.'' Then he goes on to say, ``We believe under our plan Medicare is going to wither on the vine.'' That is clearly what he thinks about it. Then the Speaker says, ``We are going to save Medicare. This plan is to save Medicare.'' Obviously it is not. This plan is to weaken Medicare, because he did not believe in it in the first place. As you said, the same with the Senator Dole, that he saw the same thing, that he was against Medicare 30 years ago as a young House Member, and now that he voted against it then, he led the fight then, he does not want to see that kind of thing happen today.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, less than a week ago, we were celebrating Earth Day. Today our country's environmental laws are under assault not only by the Gingrich extremists in Congress but also in the World Trade Organization, the WTO. The United States lost yesterday in the WTO. The WTO said our Clean Air Act violates international trade laws--yes, the same Clean Air Act that we celebrated last week. But our environment wasn't the only loser in the WTO. Workers in America's refineries lost, too. Workers in places like Ohio and Pennsylvania and Louisiana lost because they will have to compete with dirty gas imports from Venezuela and Brazil. Mr. Speaker, America lost yesterday in the World Trade Organization. It was our first loss; unfortunately it will not be our last unless we repeal some of these trade agreements.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, these same folks who shut down the Government now claim to be working in a fiscally responsible manner to balance the Federal budget. They are asking us to support a continuing resolution laden with $342 million in special-interest pork to help the Republican Governors of New Hampshire and Louisiana balance their budgets without violating their no new taxes pledge. It is easy. Here is how to do it: ``You run for Governor. You say you are not going to increase taxes. You overspend and run up a deficit. Then you call your political friends in Washington to bail you out with a little bit of money. You than can go back and run for reelection, say, `Look, I did not raise taxes, and I balanced my budget.' ''. The fact is the taxpayers in 48 other States are going to have to have their taxes raised or their spending cut so that we can have this little payoff to help these two Governors in New Hampshire and Louisiana. Every State in this Nation grapples with balancing their books. My State, the State of Ohio, is plagued by the rules, has made the tough choices to keep spending in line. We will never be able to balance the Federal budget if a couple of States that have particularly good political connections in Washington, or might have had an early Presidential primary, if those States are overspending and get bailed out by the Federal Government. We have had too many bailouts in this Congress, we have had too many times in this new Congress, where pork has been the order of the day, ``We have to have more pork in these bills in order to satisfy special interests.'' Think, Mr. Speaker, how much pork we would have had to put in this bill if a certain other Presidential candidate had won New Hampshire. Think of what the price might have been, how much money would have had to be in this bill, in order to satisfy those demands in one of those States then. Mr. Speaker, if this is how the Republicans handle block grants, I want to know where my State can apply.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak of a tragic loss that the people of the 13th District of Ohio, and the entire Nation, recently suffered. Marine Col. Robert Overmyer, born in Lorain, OH, died last month while bravely working as a test pilot. The prototype plane he was flying lost control and crashed before he could eject. His sacrifice, made while insuring the safety of others, will not be forgotten. Colonel Overmyer was a true American hero and served his country with great pride for almost 40 years, both as a Marine and a celebrated astronaut. He worked on the Air Force Manned Orbiting Laboratory Program, served as a NASA astronaut on the Apollo 17 mission, and more recently commanded the 1985 Space Shuttle Challenger mission. Colonel Overmyer grew up Westlake, OH, near Cleveland Hopkins Airport. His love of flying was born while watching planes take off and land at that airport. He never forgot his roots in Ohio, and always found the time to give back to his childhood community. He returned several times to speak to students and adults about the role of the military and future of the American space program. Colonel Overmyer will be remembered not only by his family and friends, but by all Americans for his dedicated service to our country. I thank you, Colonel Overmyer, for giving the most while you were with us. You will be missed.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, three years ago the insurance industry spent $100 million to kill comprehensive health care reform . How many of these companies are ominously silent on this Gingrich special interest health care bill. One politically active insurance company located in Indiana would benefit handsomely under the Gingrich plan thinks to a special interest giveaway larded onto the Republican bill. Medical savings accounts will enrich a select group of high-end catastrophic providers, skim the well-off and the healthy out of the insurance pool, and increase costs for everyone left behind. This Gingrich special interest plan is a bill written by the insurance companies, of the insurance companies, and for the insurance companies. Approximately 40 million Americans are without health care and without health insurance. A majority of these Americans are from working families, working hard, paying their taxes, playing by the rules. They need our help in this Chamber tonight. Mr. Speaker, pass the Dingell substitute. Defeat the Gingrich special interest bill.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, Scott Paper lays off 11,000 workers; their top executive gets millions of dollars in stock options. AT&T lays off 40,000 employees; its top management gets huge bonuses. Revco Drugstore in Twinsburg, OH, lays off 1,100 people; 4 of their executives get $1 million each. The Newt Gingrich response: Cut education by $3 billion, cut Medicare by tens of billions of dollars, cut student loans by $4 billion. Why? Just to give tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country. Mr. Speaker, the Gingrich solution is wrong.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, earlier this week I spoke in Wadsworth, OH, at the Wadsworth public library, to a group of young people and their parents who are looking in the next couple of years to attend college. It was mostly made up of sophomores and juniors in Wadsworth High School and Highland High School and other high schools in Medina County. Mr. Speaker, before I spoke to this seminar, a young person and her father came up to me and said, ``How come Republicans, how come Newt Gingrich wants to cut student loans? It simply does not make sense.'' The Gingrich budget wants to cut student loans $4 billion, wants to make other cuts in the safe and drug free school program, Head Start, title I, Goals 2000, other education funding programs, another $3 billion. It simply does not make sense. If we are ever going to be as globally competitive as we need to be in this country, we do not cut education. We do not cut student loans to middle-class families. We do not cut programs that help combat drug abuse in the schools. We do not cut title I. We do not cut school-to- work programs. Mr. Speaker, it simply does not make sense.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, it is clear that the Gingrich revolution is over. As Members of Congress returned finally for work this week, all of us have been hearing from voters in our district, Republicans and Democrats alike, that the voters are rejecting the extremism of the Gingrich revolution, rejecting Medicare cuts in order to pay for tax breaks for the rich, rejecting reducing safeguards on Medicaid, in nursing homes, nursing home standards, again for tax breaks for the rich, cutting student loans in order to pay for tax breaks for people in this country that do not need it. Republican policies, Gingrich policies, over the last 12 months would cut 2\1/2\ million students off direct student loans, would deny Pell grants to 380,000 students, would deny 50,000 young people the opportunity to serve their community while earning money for college, would deny 180,000 children access to Head Start, again all in order to pay for a tax break for the wealthiest people in the country. All evidence says that good education is the key to rebuilding the middle class, putting people to work, giving people good wages, so they can raise their families the way Americans always have.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I would say to the gentleman, that simply does not have to happen. In 220 years it never has happened in this country, through the Civil War, through World War II, through the burning of the Capitol.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, a lot of us in this institution are troubled by the threats to force the Nation into default, the comments made throughout the year by Speaker Gingrich and the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Armey, majority leader, that if they do not get their way on the balanced budget or if they do not get their way on a host of things that are they are going to shut the Government down. We heard those threats throughout 1995. Unfortunately, come November once and then in December a second time, they made good on their threats because they did not get the kind of, exactly the kind of balanced budget that they wanted. And they went ahead and shut the Government down. What that meant to lots of American families that depended on services from the Government, what it meant to people that work in Government, what it meant across the board to this country. Now the threats, in a lot of ways, Mr. Speaker, are even more serious, because those threats are to force the Nation into default, again, if Speaker Gingrich and the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Armey, majority leader do not get their way with the balanced budget. At the same time as we move toward this default on March 1 or February 29, the Congress is going to recess today or tomorrow for 2 weeks and just go home and forget about it, when default can be imminent, when they are threatening default. The gentleman from Texas is with me who knows more probably about what default will mean to veterans, has been a leader on these issues, what exactly it will mean to an awful lot of veterans in this country in addition to all the other problems that the first default in the history of the United States of America in 220 years would mean. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Edwards].