Lloyd Doggett

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. As you have pointed out, when our fellow Texan signed Medicare into law in 1965, about half of the seniors in this country had no type of health insurance at all. Now we have covered about 99 percent of those seniors, and it seems to be a plan that works for them. I do not find many of those seniors saying that they need somebody to manage them. The folks that I know down in Texas are a pretty independent lot. Managed care has its place; I am all for people being able to choose that alternative. But folks there do not seem to be too interested in being managed. They seem to be interested in having the kind of Medicare System that they can depend on. There is some concern that under the plan that is being proposed that we will actually end up with a two-tier system, as you point out, leaving the sickest people within the Medicare System and then having some new kind of system that takes some for those who are in a little healthier condition. I know also that in the city of Houston, as with many other parts of the country, as I am sure this is true in New Haven as well, that you have a huge medical complex there, a teaching hospital there. And there will be even more burden, I am confident, on the teaching hospitals, on the public hospitals for this kind of approach; is that your feeling?

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. In statements all over the country, have voted against it, have told their neighbors they are against it, perhaps at times have written against it, have been on television against it, have been on radio against it, and now they are saying, ``We won't give you the details of our pay-more, get-less plan, but please trust us, because, even though we have been against Medicare all our lives and don't really want Medicare to be here and think it's an imposition on our freedom,'' as my colleague from Texas [Mr. Armey] said, the Republican majority leader, ``it imposes on us, but trust us because we are going to preserve and protect it from bankruptcy.''

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for those observations. Indeed, it is a total contradiction for the same Republicans who were complaining last year that they needed more time to study health care to now say that the only time the American people need to see the details of the plans with the far-reaching consequences that the gentleman identified with 30 years' experience will be reviewed in 1 day in this Congress, and it is an outrage.

Mr. DOGGETT. I thank the gentleman for his observations and leadership on this critical issue.

Mr. DOGGETT. In other words, if you want to really strengthen, and preserve, and improve the Medicare system, Democrats and Republicans come together in bipartisan partnership, not by grabbing some figure like $270 billion out of the air in order to provide tax breaks for the privileged few, but coming together to preserve and improve the Medicare system by doing things, as you suggested, like fighting fraud and abuse in creative ways.

Mr. DOGGETT. On that point, in fact when the appropriations bill was here on the floor of the House only a few weeks ago, they actually cut the money available for enforcement of fraud; did they not?

Mr. DOGGETT. And this whole approach of trying to create the appearance that, unless we rush something through here in a single day of hearings, suddenly the system will go bankrupt, and people will be without their Medicare. That is all a gimmick; is it not?

Mr. DOGGETT. Well, you used the word ``gimmick,'' and I noticed in looking at it, and I hope my colleague from Connecticut will hold or point to that Washington Times in the way that our many colleagues who are watching this in their office on television can see; that is the word that Republican staffers, there in the Washington Times, are using; it is not, Congresswoman DeLauro?

Mr. DOGGETT. If I might just make a further observation on that part of the article, because I think it is important. I noticed just in advance of the portion you were quoting your colleague from Connecticut, the article says that seniors are unlikely to want to leave the existing program, that is the Medicare we have known for 30 years, if it remains so inexpensive. And one Republican Member is quoted as saying, ``It is too good a deal. Seniors are shielded from the cost.'' Is not part of the problem here just a basic premise on the part of our Republican colleagues that seniors do not pay enough for their health care, that they are getting off too cheap, that just having to pay 21 percent of their income out of their annual income for health care is just simply not enough, and that we need to hike the cost of health care for seniors.

Mr. DOGGETT. I noticed that there are, according to reports, some 11 million elderly women in this country who have incomes below $8,500 per year, and I am wondering, based on not only your service here in the Congress, but your experience in the health care professions, if you represent some of those people and what impact you think it will have on them if they are suddenly faced with this new Republican Medicare plan which requires them, out of that little bit of income, to pay more and get less.

Mr. DOGGETT. And I know this pay-more, get-less Republican Medicare plan is going to have severe consequences in North Carolina, and I see our colleague from North Carolina here to comment on the impact of people in her State.

Mr. DOGGETT. So these are people that have opposed Medicare----

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, during the next hour, on behalf of the Democrats, I want to discuss the future of Medicare in this country. It is a very serious matter that affects literally millions of Americans, not only American seniors but several million Americans who are disabled, people with disability who rely on Medicare, and on all of us who care for an individual who is beneficiary of Medicare, who might someday be on Medicare ourselves if we are fortune enough and who care about what is happening to health care for some of the most vulnerable people in our society. This particular discussion and other discussions we will have during this special order period of Congress this week are very important because of the fact that there is an effort in this Congress to rush through a destruction of the Medicare system, at least the beginning of the destruction of that system, to rush it through without adequate consideration by this Congress or adequate opportunity for the American people to know exactly what is about to befall them. We are at a time near the dinner hour here in Washington when many Members will be pursuing other matters. So, for any who are unable to participate in all of these deliberations tonight, I think I can sum up the hour in pretty short terms, and that is that now that we have the Republican Medicare plan before us, we know that it is a plan that essentially says to the people of America that you will be able to pay more and get less. That is what this plan is all about, and we will be talking about the details of that plan and fleshing out what it is about. In nature, scientists have theorized that there is a natural phenomenon known as a black hole. It is a fitting symbol for this Republican pay-more-yet-less plan, a black hole. A star may shine very brightly and then implode upon itself, and the gravitational forces become so severe, so strained that finally matter is compacted in and on top of itself, it is theorized, to such an extent that even light cannot escape. That is what is really occurring with this so-called Republican Medicare plan, the Republican star having glowed so brightly in the early days of this session of Congress, now imploding and falling in on itself so that when we talk about Medicare and the pay-more-get-less plan, it is difficult for even light to escape concerning the details of this plan. The Republican leadership, of course, has a longstanding ideological opposition to both social security and to Medicare. Individual leaders have not been the least bit bashful until recent days in voicing their strong opposition to Medicare and to Social Security. They have [[Page H 9125]] spoken out against it again and again and again to anyone who was listening. They have been clear in their purposes. They have not hid their light under a bushel. They have made it clear that they are opposed to the basic premise upon which Social Security and Medicare depend. Indeed, their forbearers in this Congress were equally clear about their objectives. When my colleague of years back, a great leader, a central Texan, Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law, Medicare, 30 years ago, over 90 percent, over 9 out of every 10 Republican Members of this Congress, House and Senate, opposed what President Johnson was doing, opposed setting up Medicare in the first place. The current majority leader of the Republican Party, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Armey] has been quite clear in his sentiments on the subject. In 1984 he said that Social Security was a bad retirement and a rotten trick on the American People. A few years later, in fact, a decade later, last September, he said, ``I would never have created the Social Security system.'' And speaking in my home State of Texas in the summer of this year, July 1995, the Houston Chronicle reported on his comments under the title, ``For now, Armey keeping lid on Medicare reform.'' ``It is risky to debate in public,'' he says. He was quoted as saying, ``I resent the fact that when I am 65, I must enroll in Medicare. I deeply and profoundly resent that,'' he said. ``It is an imposition on my life.'' Mr. Speaker, it is that kind of philosophy that has generated the Republican Medicare plan, the pay more, get less plan. It is the kind of philosophy that begins in weakening the Medicare system and will eventually affect Social Security itself. Indeed, we have a further indication of the commitment of this Republican Party with reference to Social Security itself in a very interesting article from the Progress and Freedom Foundation newspaper called ``American Civilization.'' In February of this year, this is 1995, not 1935, in February of this year, the lead editorial is called, ``For Freedom's Sake, Eliminate Social Security.'' It talks about the importance of slaying the Social Security dragon, of privatizing Social Security. Mr. Speaker, it is this goal to privatize and to destroy Medicare, and the Social Security system, that is at the heart of what is happening during this point in the life of this particular Congress. It is essential that the American people understand that this is not a matter of short-term political debate, but it is a part of a long- range, highly ideological strategy to go to the heart of Medicare and to go to the heart of the Social Security system itself. We know that there is therefore, as the heading in the Houston Chronicle story of this summer indicates, very little interest in debating in public this particular proposal. Indeed, last week, we had a great build-up to a performance that was going to occur here in the Congress. When the day arrived on Thursday after announcements in the national news media, on Meet The Press, and in other forum around the country, we had all of these Republican bright lights and not-so-bright lights assembled, the luminaries, supporting this Medicare plan, and when all was said and done, we knew about as little at the end of the day as we did before the performance ever occurred. It was as if they had forgotten the lines to their play or their song or whatever you will with reference to Medicare reform, because, as Congress Daily reported after that great performance, they said, ``It is clear the proposal is more of a wish list than a finished product.'' The Wall Street Journal, never known for its particular dislike of the Republican party said, ``The plan lacked many important details.'' Indeed, we have few details other than that it is a pay more, get less plan for American seniors after the program had been completely unveiled. Mr. Speaker, the interesting thing, and perhaps one of the most interesting comments, came not from any Democrat or from any commentator, but from a Republican Member of the U.S. Senate who happened to chair the Medicare working group. He was quoted in The New York Times of last week as saying, ``We do not know exactly what is going to be in it but we think we can get it approved by September 22.''. Is that not really the heart of the problem, that a plan developed in secret, that we know only a few details about, having leaked out through a staff memorandum here, or through a particularly able investigative reporter there, a few details come out regarding the plan, and the members, though, say that they are ready, like the star that implodes on itself and gets packed in in a packed kind of mentality, to go out and support a plan that they really do not even have the details on. In fact, as recent as this morning, in this morning's Washington Times, we find the black hole symbol has another meaning with reference to this plan, and that is a giant hole in the plan itself, and the fact that they have taken a number, $270 billion, out of the Medicare system, and they are not sure where the numbers are going to come from to yield that $270 billion. Today's Washington Times leads off, ``The Republican budget experts are nervous that their emerging Medicare reform plan could fall as much as one-third.'' That is $1 out of every $3 that they have promised, off the targeted $270 billion in savings, and be dismissed as gimmickry, and indeed, there is a good bit of gimmickry here. It says that the backup plan that they are considering does not yet spell out which payments will be cut. It only lists a menu of services, such as home health care. That is the kind of health care that allows people who are as independent-minded as some of the people that I represent down in Texas are and who want to have the alternative of staying in their own home instead of going into a nursing home, allows them to do that. But that is one of the ones that is on what they call the menu of services, along with medical laboratories, to be targeted. The article goes on to describe the great concern over the gimmickry of announcing a plan without announcing the details, or explaining how it is that the changes being proposed can ever lead to $270 billion in savings. There are a good many other things that I want to say about this plan, but I see that among the most forceful and eloquent opponents of this plan, several have arrived here who I know want to join in explaining the ramifications of this plan, not only for those of us who live in Texas, but for people across this country. Mr. Speaker, I would yield at this point to the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro], my colleague and a distinguished Member of Congress, for observations that she might have on this matter.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield on that point. Of necessity, we talk here in Washington of billions and millions of people, but let me give the gentleman just one example of the same thing happening even under our current Medicare system in my hometown, Austin, TX. It is the experience of a 72-year-old retiree, Marjorie Greenhall, who moved down to Austin from Mineral Wells, up near Dallas, where Congresswoman Johnson serves so ably, to live with her daughter. She got down there and she reports her aggravation at being refused by the receptionists in 24 different physicians' offices because they do not take Medicare. Now, if on top of the existing problem, we have this look-back provision and we come in after a year is over and there is this black hole or black gap in the Republican plan, and they start cutting those providers back even further than now, what will happen to someone like Marjorie Greenhall, whether she lives in Austin, TX, or in California?

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, we had 28 on Whitewater, did we not? We had 28 days of hearings.

Mr. DOGGETT. That is so very true. You know, we have had important observations like yours from a number of our Democratic colleagues, and I am sure there are people across this country that are wondering, where are the Republicans? Why are they not out discussing this plan? Not just tonight, but, you know, it is September 18 in the evening. We are approaching the end of this Federal fiscal year, less than 2 weeks away. And yet to this very moment, we have yet to have one Republican colleague tonight or at any other time take the floor of this House and outline how deep it is they are going to reach into the pockets of senior citizens across this country, how big the cuts are going to be. I do not know whether it is because they do not know, as this morning's Washington Times says, and they have a black hole or a giant gap in their plan, and they are just committed to whacking $270 billion out of Medicare; or they are afraid to say how they are going to do this. But they have refused to come and stand on the floor of this Congress tonight or at any other time and level with the American people and tell them how hard the hit is going to be, how much more are they going to have to pay, and how much less are they going to have to get. Tonight, as we conclude this special order, I think it is important to remember that the same group that gave us the Contract With America, Lunz & Associates, advised our Republican colleagues not on how to reform Medicare, but how to sell what they were going to do. They said, ``Keep in mind that seniors are very pack oriented and are susceptible to following one very dominant person's lead. Do not talk about improving Medicare.'' Well, indeed they are not improving it. They think the seniors of America will be quiet. They think people all across this land will not listen, will not care; that they can sneak this through in a single day of hearings, can run it through here at the end of the fiscal year, and that, before you know it, the cost is up, the benefits are down, in New Jersey, in Connecticut, in California and Illinois, across this land, with seniors having been affected in a very dramatic way that they will not speak out. But just as with your experience in New Jersey, when I had a meeting last week in Texas, if our seniors know about this and they speak out, they can make a difference.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I strongly oppose this compact. This plan causes me, it causes many people in the city of Austin and across the State of Texas, the gravest concern. Though a new Member here, I had understood there was at least some tradition of giving a certain degree of deference to the Members in whose district a project of this type is going to be located. I have listened to the eloquent comments of the gentleman from El Paso, TX [Mr. Coleman] who has fought steadfastly, along with his staff, to resist this compact, to try to block it. I have listened to the very telling comments today of my colleague from Texas, a fellow Texan, Mr. Bonilla, in whose district this particular project would be sited. And I think what they say has a considerable degree of merit. My district, the city of Austin and Travis County, is halfway across Texas from where this project will be located. Hundreds of miles. But I can tell you that the people of central Texas are every bit as concerned about this as are the people of Sierra Blanca or the people of El Paso. I believe that I have now received a total of 1,415 communications from people in Travis County, TX, expressing opposition to the location of this dump; and, oh, by the way, six people who said they were for locating it at this point and approving this compact. What these people kept saying is the same thing that the Austin City Council said when it voted 5 to nothing against this compact, and that is do not make Texas the dumping ground for this Nation. Mr. Speaker, let us acknowledge from the beginning that when Congress passed this piece of legislation, the 1986 Low Level Radioactive Policy Act, it was planning on agreements that did not look anything like the one we are taking up here today. When it referred to a regional compact, it has in mind just that, a region, because there would be less danger of spills and other problems if you localize the nature of the disposal. Well, we in Texas have a rather big idea of our State. I have even heard some Texas talk about Colorado as north Texas, and indeed when we declared our independence in 1936, it was north Texas. But I have yet to see the [[Page H 9114]] most boastful Texan ever suggest that Maine and Vermont were in the region of Texas. There is good reason for everyone and not just Texans, boastful or otherwise, to be concerned about this compact. Because to get from here to there, to get from Maine and Vermont to Texas, you are going to have to cross a little of these United States. So if you represent Ohio or New Jersey or New York or Kentucky or Tennessee or Arkansas, or any number of other States, you have every reason to be concerned about what happens when this highly toxic radioactive waste is transported across your State and across your district. Though this compact has been lobbied through the Texas Legislature very successfully as a way to limit the dump in the State of Texas, exactly the opposite is going to happen. There is absolutely no reason that the commissioners of this compact cannot get together without any input from the people in Sierra Blanca or in El Paso or in Austin or in this U.S. Congress and expand the compact to include every State in the Nation. Under the definition of ``region'' being used here, there is no more basis for excluding New York or California than there is for including Maine and Vermont. Texas could well become the place where all of this toxic waste from around the country is located. Mr. Speaker, there are already proposals up talking about mixing radioactive waste, low-level radioactive waste, with other types of toxic waste once this compact is ratified. Other States and economic pressures are going to cause this compact to include other States and have Texas be a dumping ground. The Hudspeth County site that has been chosen in the district of the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bonilla] raises a number of safety concerns. Seepage of radioactive waste into ground water supplies has been a problem with other dump sites. This is just a few miles from the Rio Grande River which provides a water supply to all of the southern border of the big State of Texas. I agree that we also need to set a good example for our neighbor to the south, Mexico. Can Members imagine the uproar, the outrage on the floor of this Congress if Mexico was talking about locating a radioactive waste dump right on the border next to the United States? We would hear one Member after another denounce that kind of operation. But that is precisely what we are doing at the same time we are seeking the involvement of the people of Mexico and their government in cleaning up other kinds of environmental damage all along the border from San Diego, CA to Brownsville, TX. This is a step that really works against our national interest all along the border on a wide range of environmental issues. An earthquake. Well, most people associate those with San Francisco or California. Yet, as my colleague the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bryant] who has also fought so ably against the compact pointed our earlier, we just had one of 5.6 on the Richter scale within a relatively short distance of this Sierra Blanca site back in April when this measure was being considered here in Congress. Mr. Speaker, this is a deeply flawed plan. This is a facility that will house waste not just for a few years but for a few millennia. Do not make the Lone Star State the Lone Dump State. Vote against this legislation.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, well, the big day is finally here and all of America is happy. The time is here. After months of being Medi- scared to level with the American people and tell them how much their pockets are going to be picked to provide the same level of health care, Mr. Speaker, today is the day that has finally been announced by the Republicans as the day they will unveil the details of their Medicare plan. The Speaker has put out notice on national TV that we would finally get the details of how deep into the pockets of our senior citizens they are going to reach in order to provide a tax break for the privileged few. The Republican bright lights, and some of the not so bright lights, were all assembled. All the luminaries were gathered. And what details were provided? Absolutely none. Mr. Speaker, after all this waiting, after all this attention to the great performance, it is as if they forgot the words to the song. Now we know absolutely nothing more than we did before, and that is only that it is going to cost American seniors billions of dollars to pay for this tax break for the privileged few.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, ``silence,'' we have just heard. Silence is what we have gotten when it comes to the covert Republican plan to hike the costs of Medicare for all of America's seniors. Mr. Speaker, for months Speaker Gingrich and cohorts have been going around behind closed doors saying to themselves, America's seniors are getting off cheap. They are just not paying enough for health care. They have got a plan, and it has been whispered in the corridors of this Capitol, to increase deductibles and increase the monthly premiums for America's seniors; to increase the costs that they have to pay if they want to stay out of the nursing home or get home health care; to increase the cost of a lab test that a doctor might have, because they think America's seniors are not paying enough for Medicare. There are many words to describe it. Covert, secret, mysterious, concealed, hugger-muggered, veiled, tricky, latent, shrouded, suppressed, cloaked. But the best one is ``wrong.'' It is just wrong to do this to America's seniors.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, to resolve so many of the problems of this country, it is essential that Republicans and Democrats come together in a bipartisan fashion. We have seen in this session how this can work. We have seen a 50-year-old lobbying law adjusted. We have seen a gift ban rule to ban gifts to Members of the Senate approved. And yesterday in a dramatic action, we saw Republicans join Democrats to actually vote to expel a Member. But for some reason there is a line down the rotunda, and none of that bipartisanship is happening on this side of the Capitol. At the same time that action was being taken, this body was rejecting, on a party line basis, doing anything about gifts for Members of Congress. Mr. Speaker, today also is the first anniversary, 1 year ago a complaint concerning GOPAC and the Speaker was made to the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct and we have done nothing but dillydallied. It is time our Republican Members joined us and put a hand on the broom to sweep clean the questions of integrity concerning this House.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to accept the challenge of the [[Page H 8549]] last speaker, the gentleman from California. If he does not see enough lobbyists on the floor of this Congress or at the edges of this Congress, it is because in too many cases this new Republican Congress, instead of moving along fast enough, has moved along too slowly and has actually turned over the operation of some of the key parts of this Congress to the lobbyists. In one case, in which I personally observed, the staff attorney for our committee was unable to respond to questions from members of the committee without turning over his shoulder and getting the answers from the lobbyists for the bill that was under consideration. In one committee, the new Republican majority staff actually turned over computers, paid for with public expense, to the lobbyists who were writing the legislation. In another committee, a Republican lobbyist actually took the dais along with the Members of Congress that were considering the measure. In fact, it has gotten so bad, a recent column in the Wall Street Journal was entitled ``Special Interest or Feasting at the Congressional Trough.'' It is because we have not made enough progress in controlling lobby domination of this Congress and continued to not have sufficient change in this Congress that it is important today that opportunity has actually knocked a second time. Mr. Speaker, thanks to the leadership, to the continued leadership of my colleague and friend, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bryant], who spoke a few minutes earlier, we will have an opportunity today to consider again lobby reform and a gift ban. The first time that opportunity knocked at this Congress was that old Congress last year, and the Congress responded at that time in a bipartisan response, almost a three to one vote, in favor of a gift ban backed by Congressman Bryant. Today we will have an opportunity to consider a similar measure as opportunity knocks a second time. It is time that this Congress accepted that opportunity; and, indeed, Members on both sides of the aisle have said they want a gift ban. In October 1994, last year, on ``Meet the Press.'' then-Congressman Newt Gingrich said, I quote, ``I am prepared to pass a bill that bans lobbyists from dealing with Members of Congress in terms of gifts.'' Unfortunately, Mr. Gingrich did not say when he was prepared to pass that bill, but the when should be now. It should be today. Since 1994, the Senate has, this summer, approved the very type of gift ban measure that it killed last year. It has approved a measure to plug the loopholes in an almost 50 year old lobby registration act, and it has approved a gift ban that is quite similar to that that Congressman Bryant offered last year. It is long past time, in view of that Senate action, for this House to act and send a message to those who come bearing gifts and bearing golf junkets, that things have really, in fact, changed in this Congress. It is time to let the people back home, whom we represent, know that our standard of integrity is high and that we are committed to seriously and diligently working to support the public interest, not just the interest with the person who has got the largest charge limit on their gold card. Yes, Congressman Gingrich said he was prepared to pass a gift ban, but where is Speaker Gingrich on this issue? Well, we need look no further than the words again on ``Meet the Press'' in July, just after the Senate passed the measure this summer of the Republican majority leader Dick Armey, and he said, and I quote: I intend to get a gift ban as soon as we can, but we are going to attend to the Nation's business first. When we have an opportunity, when there is room on the schedule, I want that up, but I am not sure I will find time this year. I would submit that the gentleman has got the priorities all backward. How is it that we are ever going to get to a fair consideration of the Nation's business unless we have reformed our lobby and gift provisions to assure that the Nation's business is really the business of the people of this country rather than the special interests who have enjoyed too much power here in the Nation's Capital. Yes, these Republican leaders talk and talk of gift ban and lobby reform, but it seems that all we hear is the whistle of some day. Some day over the rainbow they will get around to really taking action and doing something about meaningful gift ban and lobby reform. I believe that we do not need to go down the yellow brick road with them. What we need to do is to act today, and we will have an opportunity this evening, a second opportunity to do something about the gift ban. As a new Member of this House, I am committed to constructive change, and my main complaint about the Republican majority, when it comes to the way this House operates, is not that they have changed too much the operation of the House, but they have changed too little. They have never really gotten to grips with the matter of campaign finance reform, lobby reform, or gift ban reform. They are setting the agenda. There is no reason that those items could not have been considered. Indeed, some of us sought to have them considered on the very first day of this Congress. The time for action is now on meaningful gift ban and lobby reform. Let us get about the public's business.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. I will yield on your time as long as you want to talk about this act of intimidation right here on the floor of the Congress.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, the Senate of the United States has acted on this issue and they achieved a good result because they had some bipartisan support. It is unfortunate today that there appears to be no bipartisanship on this question of how we can cut the ties that have bound legislators and lobbyists, because it definitely needs to be attended to. I think that all that this will accomplish is to take an imperfect compromise from the Senate and put it in place here in the House. If anyone needs a reason as to why this ought to occur, let me reflect on my own experience in this regard, because when this measure was up before, I spoke on it here on the floor of the House. I addressed the issue on the floor of the House in the motion to recommit, and [[Page H 8570]] I did so without making any reference to either Democrats or Republicans, but suggested there was a need to end these freebies. What I got from that in response was a member of the Republican Committee on Appropriations, one of the great cardinals who is here on the floor today, to tell me that he had told his staff to go out and look for a project to cut in my district. They found one to the tune of $90 million, a project in my district to whittle out because I had the audacity as a new Member to stand up and say we need to do something about a gift ban. Well, I am here today to say I am not going to be intimidated on that issue because I think it goes to the core of what this Congress is about and the demand of people to see this place cleaned up. My objection to the Republicans is not that they have done too much to change the way this Congress operates, but they have done too little, and they know it. In Texas when you shake hands on something like Speaker Gingrich did up in New Hampshire, it means something. It is an agreement. You lend your word. But all we got was a promise and a lot of talk and whistling in the background. Someday over the rainbow we will get around to dealing with this.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, with the House resuming its work today, the time is now for action on lobby and gift reform. There are Members, both Democrat and Republican, who are eager to obtain immediate reform on this subject. But unfortunately, we have been stymied by an indifferent and intransigent House Republican leadership. It took a bipartisan effort in the Senate, both Republicans and Democrats working together, to approve real gift and lobby reform. Yet the only response to that action from the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Armey] and the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Gingrich] has been, ``Well, maybe next year.'' Let us act now to plug the loopholes in the 50-year-old lobby registration law and do something about those who come to this House bearing gifts or perhaps merely bearing golf junkets for the Members to obtain influence. Before we act on all of the other business, let us have an up-and-down vote on loby reform and gift ban.