John Dingell

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. I yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. DINGELL. Reserving the right to object, Mr. Chairman, and I do not think I will, I did not hear some of the other amendments raised.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. (Mr. DINGELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, with all due respect to the author of the amendment, I want this committee to know what is going on here. EPA has a long history of having used contractors. Very frankly, the contractors are a sorry lot. The Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations last year investigated them. I want you to hear what the contractors did with the taxpayers money, the money that we are charged with protecting. Frankly, this amendment should be called the Corrupt Contractor Protection Act of 1995. It tells EPA that it cannot save money. In fact, it tells in its original form that EPA must spend money on contractors in the office of research and development. First of all, we found that the contractors were cooking the research. We found that they were playing games politically in support of the Clean Air Act and Clean Air Act in its strongest and, I think, particularly unacceptable form to my colleagues on this side of the aisle. Now, the contractors, it should be known, enjoyed a very good living at the expense of the taxpayers. They charged the taxpayers with reindeer suits, with clown suits, with Santa Claus costumes. These were all charged to the taxpayers. They charged the taxpayers for golf outings and golf balls. They charged the taxpayers for chocolate bars with the contractor's logo on them. They bought lots and lots of alcohol. They had lots and lots of parties. They had entertainment of all sorts. They spent money on tickets for Johnnie Limbo and the Lug Nuts. They used the taxpayers' money to finance trips by an assortment of persons to Alaska on fishing junkets. [[Page H 7910]] The money which was spent by the contractors was spent under not only improper circumstances but most curious circumstances, because in many instances they were charged by the former EPA with the responsibility of opening the mail, of negotiating contracts, which they negotiated with themselves. In many instances they paid themselves for work which was not done. They kept records which were incapable of being audited. They threw Christmas parties. They did work under contracts which never existed and paid themselves lavishly for the privilege. Now, this amendment in its original form would sanctify that kind of behavior. It would permit those scoundrels who had been doing those things that we are supposed to be cleaning out of the public purse to do the same thing which they had done before under the same conditions. I do not believe that this House wants to have that kind of situation. I commend the gentleman from Virginia for striking the language which would keep these scoundrels hooked up to the public teat. But I do want you to understand one thing, that to foreclose EPA from the privilege of firing them is bad, but to now not allow EPA to retain enough people on its own payroll to see to it that the public work is properly done is enormously unwise. Let me remind you that the work which is involved here is work which involves research on important questions like air pollution, like whether or not your constituents are violating the air pollution laws or whether what the consequences of a particular Superfund dump might happen to be. I think those are important questions. And we are entitled to have the utmost integrity, truthfulness and ability brought to bear on those kinds of questions. To allow contractors who can come in here and impose upon Members of this body who know nothing about the history of contractor misbehavior is wrong. To permit them to continue to prosper at the taxpayers expense on the kind of sorry, shoddy record of serious misbehavior which should have sent the whole lot of them to jail is, I think, extremely unwise and improper on the part of this body in which we are a part. preferential motion offered by mr. dingell

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that the motion be withdrawn.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, as I understand what the gentleman is doing, he is leaving only the first part of the amendment and striking the second part of the amendment and, in striking the second part, he is striking the part which freezes existing contracts; is that correct?

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I offer a preferential motion.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. This is the amendment which would eliminate expenditures which are important to the future transportation needs of the country. It would essentially cripple, or hurt, an attempt to run a high-speed rail system from Detroit to Chicago to Milwaukee to St. Louis. It is a program which affords great advantages to this country. It is a program which is supported by our Governor, a friend of my dear friend the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Smith]. It is a program which is geared at enabling this country to finally begin to move towards getting a good high-speed rail system for this country. It is not one which is going to add to the bureaucracy or the number of government employees. It is one that is going to be run by the people using this as seed money only.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to a fine lady and great friend, who is a shining example and reminder to us all, of the tremendous good a single person can perform in a career of public service. Lenny Donnelly has served this country with distinction in a career that has spanned 36 years. Early in her career she worked on President Kennedy's White House staff, where one of her duties was scheduling all VIP and congressional tours of the White House. There are still a few left in this Chamber, including myself, who will always be indebted to Lenny for her help in graciously accommodating our scheduling needs. Lenny has been Chief of Democratic Pages for 10 years and in that time she has become a friend to us all. She has trained, guided, counseled, and cared for over 2,000 pages from all over the United States. Lenny has helped equip a wonderful group of young people with the tools to become part of the next generation of American leaders. Perhaps we will best come to understand her contribution to this institution when in the future, a public leader is asked to name a major influence, and they respond, their time spent as a page under the tutelage of Lenny Donnelly. Lenny has left her unmistakable mark of expertise on the Page program and she will be sorely missed. She has set a standard of excellence in the field of public service that we should all strive to meet. I wish Lenny the best in all of her future endeavors and am confident she will continue to positively influence the lives of many people in the future. On this, her last working day before retiring, I wish to give Lenny my profound thanks, gratitude, and respect for a job well done.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I am delighted to see the gentleman from Kentucky offer this amendment, and I congratulate him for it. This makes the issue very clear. This is the kind of amendment that we Democrats love to see Republicans offer. It is the kind of amendment that will lead the voters of America and the consumers of America to vote the offeror out and all who vote for it. I urge my colleagues to join in supporting the gentleman from Kentucky. What does the Food and Drug Administration do? It protects against bad and dangerous blood and dangerous blood products. It protects against filthy, dirty, adulterated, contaminated food manufactured and imported into this country. It protects the American public against unsafe biological products. It protects the American people against unsafe products which are medical devices. It protects the American people against contaminated, dangerous, and unsafe commodities such as cosmetics. It protects the American people against the distribution of materials which affect the health of the American people and which are, in fact, not safe. It assures that products which are sold in commerce are, in fact, efficacious. It has come into being because the Congress needed a body which would protect the American people against things like sulfanilamide elixer, which killed millions of Americans in the 1930's or against milk which was made safe and preserved by the addition of formaldehyde. It protects Americans against the kind of situation which we saw created generations of European babies who were born with flippers and without hands and legs, because of thalidomide. I have been more critical than anybody else in this body about the Food and Drug Administration and about their failures, and I have seen to it that one administrator of the Food and Drug Administration has left public service and that a number of them have gone to jail. I have seen to it that the entirety of the generic drug portion of the Food and Drug Administration has left that service, and we have cleaned it up. Drugs are safe in this country, and they are safer here than anywhere in the world. Foods are safer in this country than anywhere in the world because of Food and Drug, and American women can buy cosmetics in the knowledge that they are safe, and the American mother can buy food for her baby in the knowledge that that food is going to be safe and not risk the health and the welfare of that child. America can look to its food, America can look to its cosmetics, America can look to its appliances, to its blood and every other commodity that affects health and that sustains life and know that it is safe because of the Food and Drug Administration. No other country until the world can have that comfort and satisfaction, and I would urge my colleagues, as they vote on this piece of legislation and on this particular amendment, to understand it is easy to criticize, but it is very, very hard to make the situation better.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I commend the gentleman for the way he was offered his amendments and that he has not offered the others. I want to tell him I will be pleased and happy to work with him on his concern with regard to the Food and Drug Administration. I do want to inform my colleagues that the food and drug law has been written in a very harsh fashion by the Congress of the United States because of the fact that it is susceptible to serious abuse, not by the honest people in the prescription pharmaceutical industry or in the device industry but rather by fly-by-nights who come in and go out and who will use pharmaceuticals and use other devices in an improper fashion. The law requires that these devices and that these prescription pharmaceuticals and other things be, first, safe and, second, that they be effective, that they do not hurt and that they do what they are supposed to do. It is FDA's difficult mission to see to it that products are used in the fashion for the purposes that they are used for. They can be tested. I will tell my colleagues that the testing process is long, and it is so for a very good reason. Other countries have had massive scares over pharmaceuticals and other things which have caused huge health problems in the country, and I would just remind my colleagues about the thalidomide scare of some years ago where a whole generation of European children were born with flippers and without hands and arms and were otherwise deformed. That was something which created a massive scare in this country and resulted in a very major change. The result was a good piece of legislation which has been balanced. It is possible, I think, that it shall and can be reviewed, and I would look forward to working with the gentleman toward that purpose.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, the Hobson amendment is a very sensible amendment. I want to commend him, and I also want to commend my good friend from California [Mr. Packard]. The gentleman is a fine man and a fine Member, but his amendment is a bad one. Mr. Chairman, I want to make it clear that this is not a new issue. The question of handling of awareness meetings and courses of that sort did not begin with President Clinton. As a matter of fact, it took place first under Mr. Bush in 1990. That program was clearly and patently offensive. It also was granted on some rather sweetheart terms. It was terminated by this administration, and the individual at NTSB who started it went on a sabbatical. It would have been more appropriate that he had left the Federal service in its entirety, but that was not the case. In any event, the practices about which I complained when I was Chairman of the oversight subcommittee were brought to a halt, and they are no longer practiced. The big differences between the amendment offered by the gentleman from Ohio and the gentleman from California are, and there is only one, and that is whether you can explain to Federal employees in an intelligently run and responsible program what are the causes of HIV. Under the amendment offered by my good friend from California, you cannot do that. Now, if you will look at what goes on in Europe and in other countries around the world, they have recognized that dealing with HIV is something that can be dealt with only by education. And you have to talk about some nasty things to explain to people how they expose themselves to an absolutely incurable and hopelessly fatal disease. Mr. Chairman, I would urge my colleagues to recognize that the amendment offered by my friend from California is offered about 4 years late. preferential motion offered by mr. dingell

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw the motion.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I offer a preferential motion.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, it is time that we recognize that this country should join the rest of the world in an intelligent effort to alert our people to not only the peril of AIDS, which is the largest killer now of young Americans up to the age of 45, but is also a hopeless, fatal, and incurable disease. I would urge my colleagues to recognize that there is no vaccine. All the billions that we have spent on it will do nothing. The only defense at this moment which this country possesses against that is education. Education is not pretty, because you have to talk about some pretty ugly, nasty things. But they are things which have to be discussed if we are going to prevent and to reduce the threat of AIDS to Americans of all races, of all creeds, of all colors, and of all ages, because, remember, it is incurable, it is fatal, and people are going to die of it and the number of people who are going to be exposed is going to continue to grow. Now, if that does not concern you, then contemplate, if you please, the situation which is going to exist under the current state of affairs with regard to the incredible economic costs that it is going to impose upon this country, upon industry, upon the health care system, and upon everything else that we depend upon for the economic well-being of this country. I would point out to you that it can break Medicare and Medicaid. It can break Blue Cross and Blue Shield. It can break the private health insurance plans, and it can break the employer-operated plans. Mr. Chairman, this amendment would preclude the Federal Government from participating in that by banning the instruction in what might cause AIDS. Now, to come back to the whole question that is before us, the only basic difference between the two amendments, the amendment offered by my dear friend from California and the amendment offered by my dear friend from Ohio, is the AIDS instruction and prevention of AIDS cannot be conducted under the amendment offered by the gentleman from California [Mr. Packard] but can be offered under the amendment which is offered by the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Hobson]. That is strong enough argument alone for defeating the amendment that is offered by my dear friend from California. But I would have the committee know something else, and that is the question here is not has Clinton gone wild and begun to have some kind of wild employee awareness programs and programs of that sort taught and enforced against an unruly band of Federal employees. That was done under the Bush administration. It is not done under this administration. It was terminated in this administration in 1993. It was one of the first acts that was done by President Clinton in response to complaints that were raised by the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations and the Committee on Commerce. I like my good friend from California. He is one of the best Members we have around here and I respect him more than I can tell, but the fact of the matter is his amendment is a bad one and it ought not to be adopted. The amendment offered by the gentleman from Ohio is one which accomplishes all of the purposes. If there are abuses here, and I discern none and I have watched them very closely since President Clinton terminated the Bush program, if there are abuses or if they are likely to recur, they can be dealt with under the amendment that is offered by the gentleman from Ohio. [[Page H 7212]] Given that, Mr. Chairman, I would urge my colleagues to recognize if abuses are in existence, they ought to be dealt with, and they can be dealt with, even though they do not exist at that time, under the amendment offered by the gentleman from Ohio. But the gentleman from California, perhaps through some drafting misfortune, has given an amendment that says that your cannot conduct any instructional program which will warn or which will reach about the perils and how to avoid them of AIDS and all of the evils that are associated with that.

Mr. DINGELL. I yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to vacate my preferential motion.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I rise to discuss the history of Medicare and to discuss the importance of that program to the United States. I have heard a lot of people discuss how it is that Medicare is in trouble. Well, Medicare is one of the best working and most efficient programs in the history of this country. The cost of collecting money and disbursing it is less than 1\1/2\ percent. The problem of Medicare is that costs of Medicare have, like all the costs of all other programs for paying for health, been stressed almost beyond belief by enormous increases which have occurred in health care costs across this country. The problem of Medicare is not one that it is not serving people. On the contrary, it has raised the number of Americans from something like 40 percent to better than 97 percent in the senior citizen category who have health insurance available to them now, something which was previously not available. Now, under Medicare, Americans can be assured that that health care system is going to meet their health care concerns. Is Medicare going to go bankrupt? Yes, if something is not done. But not until 2002. Nothing need be done to cut the benefits, but rather to assure additional efficiencies. And what really needs to be addressed is to understand that getting control of the overall costs of health care is something which has to be done in order to protect not only Medicare, but Medicaid, Blue Cross, and all of the other health care programs, that are both public and private inside this country. It is only fair to say that my colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle are talking not about cutting Medicare to save the system, but, rather, they are talking about cutting Medicare in order to make possible a tax cut. Medicare benefits are going to be cut, according to the Republican budget, about $270 billion. However, a health care cut of this magnitude is going to be matched by a tax cut which will go mostly to the richest 10 percent of the people in this country, and will cost the government about $240 billion. A wiser approach would be to address the underlying problems of our health care system. A wiser approach would be to see to it that we address the concerns of all in preserving Medicare, but to do so not to provide a tax cut to the wealthy, but rather to address the significant problems which exist in all health care costs and in payments for all health care costs. You know, it is a matter of history that the Republicans voted overwhelmingly against Medicare, and they opposed it time after time whenever the issue was before this body or was before the House or before the Senate. They opposed it in committee as well as on the floor of the two bodies. Medicare is something which was enacted because the Democrats forced it through. It is something which will be protected and preserved because the Democrats prevented the Republicans from eviscerating that program or from converting it into a private program. There are significant attempts going on now to privatize Medicare. One of the remarkable things which occurred in the early discussion was the comments of Republican Members who criticized Medicare, pointing out that it was socialized medicine, claiming that it was going to threaten independence and individual liberties of Americans who would derive benefits under that particular program. Well, history has shown that Medicare has been one of the great blessings, not only to this country, but to senior citizens, not only to senior citizens, but to the younger Americans [[Page H 7078]] who no longer have to choose between providing for themselves, for their own retirement, or the education of their children, and providing for the health care desperately needed by American senior citizens. This has been one of the great and shining examples of success of Government action in the history of this country. It and Social Security are two of the most popular programs in the lexicon of Government programs, and they are supported by almost everyone. Cuts in those programs would be regarded by almost every American as being something not only unwise, but dangerous from the standpoint of the well-being of our society, our economy and of this country. Indeed, these programs have not only contributed to the well-being of Americans and their health and peace of mind, but they are also programs which have done much to make meaningful the promise of America. I urge my colleagues and I urge my fellow Americans to support the idea that Medicare can be saved, not by draconian cuts, but by wise changes in administration. Let us use the money we have in Medicare for protecting the senior citizens and the people of this country, and not for tax cuts to the wealthy.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the Parker amendment and urge my colleagues to vote against it in the knowledge that they will be able to vote for the Olver amendment which will very shortly afford Members of this body full opportunity to protect the ballast question in a manner which will be satisfactory. It is totally untrue that this is going, that the energy requirements now in place are going to impose burdens on oven manufacturers and on refrigerator manufacturers. That is totally without fact. My colleagues have forgotten the reason we have these energy efficiency standards. It was to save energy. We did that because of the massive impact on the American economy because of cutoff of oil from the Middle East. If you ever have that happen again, you will understand how Members of Congress react when we have this kind of situation. I want to observe to my colleagues one thing that is important: The standards-making authority which this amendment would do away with is something which is supported and sought by American industry in the full knowledge that it avoids the problem of standards being imposed by 50 different States. You cannot run a nation when you have 50 different States imposing different standards at the borders. I urge my colleagues to reject this. Vote for the Olver amendment which is coming up next.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I am hard put to explain why such a punitive and harsh rule is before this body at this time. This is a bad rule for a bad piece of legislation. It establishes bad precedence. It curtails the rights of the Members to adequately debate the measure before us, and it confines Members to a straitjacket with regard to the amendment process, the opportunity to speak and to explain these amendments. It is, all in all, a bad rule, and it should be rejected by the House. It permits only Members on the Republican side to offer a motion to rise, it permits only Members on the Republican side to have a motion which would require the House to rise and report the bill back to the House with such amendments as may have been adopted. It requires that amendments which are offered may be only debatable for 10 minutes, 5 minutes for the proponents, 5 minutes for the opponents. Legislative amendments which would deal with fuel efficiency standards for appliances and buildings would get 5 minutes on each side. Those are important matters and they were debated in this House for a number of hours at an earlier time. The action which is being taken here is not being taken by a legislative committee, but rather by the Committee on Appropriations. I would make the observation to this body that fuel efficiency and energy efficiency standards for appliances are something which are of importance to American industry, and the standards which are now on the books with regard to energy efficiency for appliances was adopted as a result of the solicitation of American industry. This is something which is probably not known to my Republican colleagues, because most of those who are pushing this kind of change were not present in the House at the time it was adopted. The reason industry wanted those standards was so that they would not confront the certain probability of every State in the Union coming forward with different energy efficiency standards for appliances. Why? Because they could not have meaningful interstate commerce in appliances when they have to have standards which are enacted in 50 different ways, in 50 different sets of language, by 50 different States. Five minutes on each side is going to be afforded to this body to discuss a proposal of that importance. Let me make another observation. The language of the rule prohibits division of the question. It sets up the curious situation where we may find that two amendments will be adopted, after no reading and after no debate. Members who might wish to amend an amendment to perfect it are now precluded by this rule. For example, if a member of the legislative committee desires to offer an amendment which would perfect a rule, perhaps the one offered by the gentleman from Mississippi [Mr. Parker] or perhaps by the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Olver], he will not be permitted to do so. Why? Because of the rule. That is the amendment under the rules, which is a normal action which is taken by this body, to perfect amendments and to make the legislation more meaningful, more correct, and more in the broad, overall public interest.

Mr. DINGELL. I will be happy to yield to the distinguished gentleman from California.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, this is a little like rape. The issue here is not how much force is used, but just that force is used. The hard fact is 10 minutes to discuss a matter on one side, to discuss a matter of this importance, is not an adequate amount of time in which to engage in responsible debate. The gentleman has not corrected any of the concerns, and I thank the gentleman for yielding, I have enormous respect for him, but he has not corrected nor has he proposed to correct the fact that the amendments may not be amended.

Mr. DINGELL. The gentleman's kindness is extraordinary, but it is not adequate, nor does it do the things that have to be done to make this rule the kind that a responsible legislator may support.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, like the many seniors who have contacted me, I am shocked that the Republican budget slashes Medicare by $270 billion. It now appears that Republicans are preparing to end Medicare as we know it. Recent media reports indicate that they want to privatize this valuable program, as they did when it was enacted in 1965. Sadly, the Republicans are hiding their plans for reforming Medicare. The current legislative schedule allows for only a few days in September to introduce, review, and vote on their proposed changes. If my colleagues across the aisle have such wonderful ideas for ensuring the solvency of Medicare and the health of their seniors, why are they keeping them a secret? What are they afraid of? It appears that they are trying to sneak their radical and extreme cuts by the American public. I can understand why they would be inclined to do so, given the fact that they are also pushing a $240 billion tax cut for the wealthy. Raiding Medicare to pay for this unwise tax cut will inflict unacceptable pain on this Nation's seniors. Out-of-pocket expenses for seniors will rise by $850 by the year 2002. These cuts will also greatly diminish the ability of older Americans to access quality care. Seniors have a right to know what is in store for Medicare, especially if they are being asked to bear skyrocketing premiums and limited access to care to help finance tax breaks for the wealthy. I call upon my Republican colleagues to deliver a full and open debate on how best to improve and strengthen Medicare. I also urge them to join me in rejecting the unfair tax break/Medicare cut tradeoff being advanced.