Lloyd Doggett

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, as millions of Americans across this country were sending a message to this Republican Congress to reject the Medicare cut plan, the Committee on Rules was meeting here in the Capitol to approve this rule, to call up a bill to raise premiums for Medicare recipients in January of this coming year. Will one dime of that raise in premiums go into the Medicare trust fund? No, it will not. It will go to pay for tax breaks for those at the top of the economic ladder. The Republicans simply do not want to hear the complaints of the American people who say, ``You broke your promise when you said you would not cut Medicare and Social Security. You are cutting it, you are raising our premiums. We will have to pay more and get less for health care.'' Of course, they have been accomplishing all of this through their secret task forces. Now they are meeting in secret here in the Capitol. We even had bloodhounds out this afternoon trying to sniff out their secret meetings, because they do not want to do it in the bright light of day. There is a direct connection with this so-called Istook amendment. Which lobby groups in America did they go after? The loophole lawyers? The people who put all the pork barrel in these appropriations bills? No, they are after the Girl Scouts and the Red Cross, those very dangerous groups like the Girl Scouts; and in this case, the National Council of Senior Citizens, because they had the courage to speak out against these Medicare cuts, and they just happened to administer a program with Federal money to help provide jobs for our seniors, the same people that are going to need these jobs after these Medicare cuts go into effect.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, a few days ago Speaker Gingrich went to New York, and he stood defiant to default, proclaiming, ``I don't care if we have no executive offices and no bonds for 60 days, not this time.'' Well, in order to counter that kind of extremism, the Republicans got a couple of their big campaign contributors from Wall Street to come down here to Washington yesterday and tell them not to be concerned. I would suggest the American people have every reason to be concerned if we continue to pursue this approach of, ``It's Newt's way or no way, even if it means the first default in the history of this great Nation.'' Indeed, perhaps our Republican colleagues would be well advised to read this morning's Washington Post and the comments of one of their senior Members, our colleague, the gentleman from New York [Mr. Houghton], who says, ``I think the whole thing is nuts. Nobody knows the potential impact. If you play this hand and lose, you can really do a lot of damage.'' It is like threatening to explode an atom bomb in your own backyard. Yes, that is the approach. These Gingrichites who defaulted to the people on Medicare ought not to default to the rest of America as well.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chairman, the hard truth is, sir, some can never conceive of a circumstance when an abortion is proper, even when it requires that the mother sacrifice her life. They call themselves pro- life? What about the life of mother which is at stake here? Because that is what is involved. I have read this bill. It provides absolutely no protection to the physician who would go out and perform this procedure in order to preserve the life of the mother. You see, this is all part of a broader agenda. These antichoice militants have an agenda: Prohibit abortion. No matter what the reason for that abortion, prohibit it. Prohibit all family planning monies. Even go in and dictate what type of birth control a woman can use. Today's initiative reflects on the successes that some have had in this Congress: Successes like saying to an American service woman in a foreign land who is a victim of rape that she must bear that child; successes such as telling the minor daughter of a Federal employee who is the victim of incest, you must bear that child; successes such as telling a female prisoner who is beaten and raped, you must be a mother. That is the kind of successes that have come out of this Congress to date. We will compel you to carry that child to pregnancy; you have no right to privacy, these zealots say. Well, late term abortions are extremely rare. This procedure is even more rare. Indeed, I have yet to find a physician anywhere who ever heard the term ``partial birth abortion,'' until this bill came out. You see, it is not a medical term that they use in a medical school. It is a political term. It is a public relations term that they have come up with to describe a procedure that is used in the rarest of circumstances, when a woman's life is at stake. It is properly known as the intact dilation and evacuation procedure. In those circumstances, when it is used, it is necessary to use it to protect the life of the mother. Some of the zealots as recently as this past month for this position have said they will never cease until they are able to declare in Federal law that having an abortion or providing one is murder. That is where this bill is leading us.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, adjust your hearing aids, purchase new spectacles. Yes, if you were surprised to hear Newt Gingrich telling the truth for a change that he wanted, as his words say, ``Now, we don't get rid of it in round one,'' referring to Medicare, ``because we don't think that is politically smart, and we don't think that is the right way to go through a transition period; but we believe it is going to wither on the vine,'' then you have not been listening and you have not been watching. Because there is nothing new about this plan to wreck Medicare. It was only in February that his very own Progress and Freedom Foundation newspaper entitled their lead editorial ``For Freedom's Sake, Eliminate Social Security,'' and proceeded to say it is time to slay the largest Government entitlement program of all, Social Security. What we have had here this year is round 1 of eliminating and destroying Medicare and Social Security. The Republicans did not come to this Congress to save Social Security and Medicare. They came to bury it.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DOGGETT. Of course, Mr. Speaker, the only reason it is nongermane is because the Committee on Rules refuses to make it germane. As far as lobby reform is concerned, I am sure Members have seen today's history of bills and resolutions and realized an indication of Speaker Gingrich's commitment to reform is the fact that the lobby reform bill came onto his desk on July the 26 and sat there for three months, over three months, until yesterday afternoon before he even bothered to refer it to committee. That is hardly an indication of any commitment to clean this place up, is it?

Mr. DOGGETT. Because Mr. Speaker, the gentleman knows that last year twice the House approved the gift ban.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, you know, sometimes these gifts come gift wrapped, with a ski trip, a golf fee being paid, a little Cabernet Sauvignon. Sometimes they are not big enough to hold the gifts that come. Because the whole problem is that our Republican colleagues, when they talk about reform, and it is an amazing response to our request for bipartisan support to clean this place up, instead of getting a broom, they get a golf club. They have been unwilling to stand up to the golf caucus in this House. Since day one, they have given us plenty of speeches, they have given us plenty of talk of delay, but they have done absolutely nothing to separate the union between this Congress and the lobby. In fact, they place the lobby on the committee dais. They turned over committee computers to the lobby to write the bills up here. We ought to be putting the lobby names on some of these reforms, like the Gingrich golden rule Medicare cut bill that we passed here a couple of weeks ago. That is the way they have chosen to operate this House. And now, now that we have pressured them to come forward with reform, after they voted against cleaning this House up on January 4 they voted against cleaning this House up on June 20, they voted against cleaning this House up on June 22, they voted against cleaning this House up on September 6, last week they got so scared about it they jerked this bill off the floor. So, finally, after all the pressure from the Democratic Party, which last year the Democrat Congress passed reform twice, only to see Republicans kill it over in the Senate, finally, they have given us their answer: They held another press conference. Well, is that not marvelous? At that press conference they told us, as they have this morning, oh, they want to improve the Senate bill. They want to strengthen it. And what was the one example that they gave us of strengthening it at that great press conference? The golf caucus ruled again. They said they might have an exemption for us in the Senate bill to allow more golf gatherings to occur. That is the kind of reform we have been promised here. Mr. Speaker, I would say that what we need is not more speeches, not more press releases, but a little more bipartisanship. Indeed, in the words of an old Texas song, what we need is a little less talk, and a lot more action. It is time to get down to the main attraction, which is not a matter of showmanship, but a matter of action on this bill. Dr. King said it more eloquently, when he said that often wait means never. And that is exactly what it means. They have a plan to delay this bill and delay reform, to respond to the golf caucus, not to the needs of the American people. It is time clean up this House, and to do it today; not with a golf club, but with a broom. All we are asking is that bill that these very Members say they have sponsored, that they support, a bill that was approved in the U.S. Senate by a vote of 98 to 0, with Republicans and Democrats coming together, that that be made law today; not next week, not never.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I think it is appropriate here on Halloween to be focused on trick or treat. Today we have an opportunity to do that on the question of reforming this Congress and the issue of gifts and lobby reform, whether there will be more tricks for the public and more treats for the Members of this Congress. Since the opening of this Congress, our Republican colleagues have had repeated opportunities to join us in the type of bipartisan reform of lobby and gift ban that has occurred across the rotunda in the U.S. Senate. thus far, whether it was on day 1 of this Congress, whether it was on June 20, whether it was on June 22, or whether it was on September 6, our Republican colleagues have thus, with the exception of I think two of them, refused to join us in that kind of bipartisan cleanup. What better day than Halloween to say it is time to stop tricking the American people and stop taking treats from the lobby. It is time to get about cleaning up this House and doing the business of the American people.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this is again the final minute of our consideration of the ``wreckonciliation,'' that is spelled ``wreck'' as in car wreck or disaster for the families that are most directly affected by this bill, those who will be impacted by the new sick tax; that is, Medicare recipients who will suffer under that aspect of the bill and those who will be affected adversely by the new work tax; that is, working families struggling, dependent on one of the tax provisions they have now that will see their taxes go up if they are a family earning $30,000 or less. Under either the House or the Senate bill they will be wrecked by the reconciliation bill, but, as we consider what will happen in conference, it is important to know that at least on the Senate side some of the more extremist provisions of this Gingrich House were rejected soundly in the Senate, and one would hope the same thing would be done by the conference committee. For example, the proposal that while we are increasing a tax on work, we would eliminate entirely the alternative minimum tax for some of the richest corporations in this country; that has been removed by the Senate, and I would hope it would be removed by the conference.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, today is the time for this House to act on lobby reform and a gift ban for Members of this House. It is not only today that I have offered those remarks, because today we take up the legislative branch appropriations bill, but it, in fact, was the first day of this session that many of us urged the House to reform itself in an attempt to pass lobby and gift ban reform on January 4 from this very spot, and yet the next day, Speaker Newt Gingrich had this to say of the effort. He described it as ``an astonishingly narrow and self- destructive act.'' With that background, we proceeded once again in the spring to attempt to reform this House and the way it handles itself both with regard to lobbies and with regard to gift bans. The Speaker responded again in a preadjournment news conference, saying, ``We have not had the mental energy and the time this summer to do anything about this issue of ethics and gift ban and lobby reform.'' Apparently the Speaker has still not been able to muster the mental energy. Apparently he still suffers from great mental fatigue, because although the Senate referred to this Speaker's podium on July 26 a lobby reform act, reforming and rewriting the legislation that had not been significantly reformed since the year of my birth, 1946, that bill has been sitting and is sitting at this very moment at the Speaker's rostrum from July 26 to today, July, August, September, October. That is, indeed, super fatigue, I suppose. I would not think that it takes a considerable amount of mental energy to simply be able to go through the act of referring the bill to a committee so that it could be studied. But Speaker Gingrich, perhaps referring back to his suggestion that reform was a self-destructive act, has not been able to muster the energy to even refer the bill. It is little wonder then that Gerald Seib, writing in the Wall Street Journal this past month, had this to say, ``The new Republican leaders of Congress have flat out blown it this year in one area, cleaning up the political system.'' Then he refers to Senator John McCain, who played such a significant role in the 98 to zero victory for lobby and gift-ban reform over in the U.S. Senate, where there is still a little bipartisanship when it comes to cleaning up the place. He says the signals that the House will not get to the gift ban this year makes Senator McCain worry that his Republican House colleagues may have developed a tin ear that will prevent them from making reforms that are in their own political interest in the long run. ``I detect over there a kind of heady environment that maybe is not as sensitive to public opinion as you would think.'' Indeed, that is what has happened here, because our Republican colleagues, rather than join us in a bipartisan effort to clean up this House when they had an opportunity to do that on January 4, voted ``no'' against gift-ban reform. When they had an opportunity to do that on June 20, on a vote on this floor, they voted ``no'' against gift-ban reform of the very type of character that their colleagues in the Senate would vote to approve unanimously only 1 week later. On June 22, a third time, they voted ``no'' when the issue was gift-ban and lobby reform, and then on September 6, you would think after Speaker Gingrich and his colleagues had had significant time to rest up over the August recess, no, they voted ``no'' consistently again one more time against gift-ban and lobby reform. So it was that last Wednesday, on October 25, many of us thought there would finally be an opportunity to address this issue once again, when the legislative branch appropriations was here on the floor of the House. But instead, the Republican leadership jerked that bill off the floor, afraid that real reform might occur. What did we get instead of an opportunity to vote on the issue of gift-ban and lobby reform? We got a press conference on Friday which represented simply more hem, hedge, and haw when it came to reforming this House, the possibility that there might be action by November 16, but the suggestion that they did not want to adopt what the Senate had done on a bipartisan basis; they wanted to strengthen the bill. How do they proposed to strengthen it? Well, they are considering an exemption for the golf caucus. That is their form of strengthening. I suggest that strengthening by exemption is the equivalent to the leadership by example we have seen when it comes to cleaning up this House. We have had, instead, the same timekeeper on that kind of reform that the House Ethics Committee has used with reference to the ethical complaints against the Speaker: Wait, wait, wait.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Chairman, our Republican budget chief is exactly right. This is a debate about promises, and how you feel about the promises depends on where you are sitting on the economic ladder of this country. If you are way up there on top, at the apex of the American economy, sitting on a cushion sipping champagne, you got your promise fulfilled by in Republican Party bountifully, because the better off are going to get a little more better off today. If you are one of the great corporations of America that back in the days of yesteryear never paid a dime of taxes on billions of dollars of profit, you also can smile. You are better off today. You will pay zero, zip, not a dime under the repeal of the minimum tax credit. Mr. Chairman, but what if you are not way up there on top? What if you are down on the lower rungs, just trying to struggle and make ends meet and get your kids through school? Well, those people on the economic ladder have a broken promise. If you are on Medicare, well, you get the new Republican sick tax. Yesterday, Bob Dole was boasting, he voted against Medicare, and Newt Gingrich said, well, we will just let it wither on the vine. The Republicans lever a hefty sick tax because they want to help those who are well. Very well. Well off. If you make $30,000 or less, these Republicans are going to raise your taxes, plain and simple. To the many who are trying to climb up that economic ladder and share in the American dream, they stomp on their working fingers as they try to climb up that ladder. That is why we call it Wreckonciliation, because it wrecks working families that are trying to make a go of it. It wrecks seniors who are going to have to pay that Republican sick tax.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chairman, 27,641 working families in the district of the gentleman who just spoke will have their taxes increased by this Republican tax increase bill they are approving today.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. So it was waived last week and waived this week. Mr. Speaker, is this supermajority protection for taxpayers as alleged in permanent suspension, or will it ever be applied?

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, is the supermajority, the alleged taxpayer protection provision rule that is being suspended here the same rule that was suspended last week in the Medicare debate?

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, nor does he point out that every Texas grandmother and young child is worth half as much as one in New York under his bill.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. I see that Legislative Branch Appropriations Act has been rescheduled for Monday. Are you sure we will reach it on Monday?

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DOGGETT. Will the rule that is provided there allow for consideration of a gift ban and lobby reform?

Mr. DOGGETT. Will there be any other opportunity next week to consider gift ban and lobby reform legislation of the type that the Senate approved 98 to 0?

Mr. DOGGETT. Without presuming what your press conference might cover, does the gentleman contemplate the possibility of a rule being in place for this body on January 1, as is the case with the Senate?

Mr. DOGGETT. Yes. Without getting into the details of your press conference, does the gentleman contemplate the possibility that we could have a rule in place here by January 1 as the Senate has done?

Mr. DOGGETT. Really sure?