Jim McGovern

Mr. McGOVERN

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier). All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only. General Leave

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 365 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. McGOVERN

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. McGOVERN

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I am honored to stand here today in support of the fiscal year 2010 budget resolution conference report. I want to thank my friend, the Budget Committee Chairman, John Spratt, for his incredible work on this budget. He is smart, he is fair, and no one cares more about these issues. I also want to thank Ranking Member Paul Ryan. I believe he is a thoughtful and bright Member of this House, even though we usually disagree on most of the issues of the Budget Committee. I also want to thank the staff of the Budget Committee, Democratic and Republican, for their tireless effort and their commitment to public service. Madam Speaker, the budget conference report that we are considering today represents so much more than a clean break from the past. It is a blueprint for the future. It is a roadmap for economic recovery and for investing in national priorities that will provide the American people with shared prosperity in the years and decades to come. The conference report lays the groundwork for health care reform, clean energy and quality education. It will create jobs, support working families, strengthen our national defense and renew America's global leadership. By cutting taxes for the middle class, $1.5 trillion in tax cuts for over 95 percent of the American people, Madam Speaker, and investing in affordable health care, education and clean energy in a fiscally responsible way, we are taking the first critical steps to lifting our economy out of recession and creating good jobs for America's workers. For the last 8 years, President Bush flat out mismanaged the Federal budget. How? By enacting huge tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans that led to skyrocketing deficits, by spending hundreds of billions of dollars on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan without paying for them, and by refusing to invest in the American people. This budget cuts the deficit by more than half by 2013. And in order to get us back on a fiscally sustainable path, the budget provides a realistic assessment of our fiscal outlook. Unlike the Bush administration, we actually budget for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan instead of hiding them under the emergency spending categories. We budget for natural disasters that inevitably will occur. This conference report cuts taxes for 95 percent of Americans. Let me repeat that, because we will hear a lot of rhetoric from the other side about taxes. This budget cuts taxes for 95 percent of Americans. It provides immediate relief from the alternative minimum tax, it eliminates the estate tax on nearly all estates, and works to close corporate tax loopholes. You see, all of us believe in altering the Tax Code. We believe that we should reduce the tax burden on the middle class and those trying to get into the middle. We believe that corporations shouldn't be allowed to shirk their responsibility by hiding their profits in offshore tax havens. The other side believes we should reduce taxes for the very wealthiest. It's a simple difference in philosophy. Most importantly, this budget, the Democratic budget, actually invests in the American people. What a welcome change from the past 8 years. We invest in health care reform, not just to improve health care quality and improve coverage, but to reduce the crushing burden of health care costs on American businesses. Everybody likes to talk about health care reform. This budget actually lays the groundwork to get it done. We invest in clean energy in order to create jobs, improve the environment and reduce our dependence on foreign oil. We invest in renewable energy and energy efficiency. Everybody likes to talk about energy independence, but this budget actually lays the groundwork to get it done. And we invest in education to reclaim our place as the best-educated workforce in the world. We work to expand early childhood education and to make college more affordable. Everybody likes to talk about improving education. This budget actually provides the basis to get it done. And this is a budget that will allow Congress, if and when the time comes, to vote up or down on health care reform and education reform and avoid the infamous obstructionism so characteristic of the other body and the other side of the aisle. It certainly doesn't guarantee passage of such reforms, but it will allow for and require a straight up-or-down vote in each Chamber. Now I know that change is hard. I know some of my colleagues want to cling desperately to the failed policies of the past. But the good news is that despite all the nasty press releases and television ads and talk radio attacks on the President, the American people still support President Obama's vision for America. That's why this budget is so very important. This is a budget with a conscience. It is a budget that believes in the American spirit, and it's a budget that fulfills the promises that the President made to the American people. Madam Speaker, we are at a crucial moment. Our country can meet its potential, our children can have a better future, our economy can once again create good-paying jobs. But in order to make that happen, we need change. We need to move in a bold, innovative new direction. We need to pass this budget. I urge my colleagues to join me in support of this rule and the underlying bill. I reserve the balance of my time. Point of Order

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I just want to point out, Madam Speaker, that, notwithstanding the constant attacks on President Obama that have come from the other side of the aisle on this floor since he was elected, since he was sworn in as President of the United States, notwithstanding the constant attacks by the patron saint of the Republican Party, Rush Limbaugh, and notwithstanding the attacks by former Speaker Gingrich on every TV show that will allow him on, a poll done by CBS recently showed that, by a 56-32 percent margin, the American people believe that President Obama's budget sets the right priorities. I believe in the American people. I believe in their instincts. I think they know what they want better than my friends on the other side of the aisle. I will also point out--and my friend admitted to this because, when it comes to reconciliation, they like to cherry-pick--that their budgets in 2001 and in 2003, which allowed for these massive Bush tax cuts and which nearly bankrupted us--the tax cuts that went to the wealthiest Americans--had reconciliation instructions. In 2005, with reconciliation instructions that allowed them to make deep cuts in Medicare, they increased the deficit by an aggregate of $1.8 trillion. That's what they did to the economy. That's what they did to the American people. So we don't want the same old, same old. Madam Speaker, at this time, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Bishop), a member of the Budget Committee.

Mr. McGOVERN. I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and to insert extraneous materials into the Record.

Mr. McGOVERN. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. McGOVERN. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. McGOVERN. I just want the gentleman to know there are 40 million Americans without health insurance, and if we can get a health care reform package that covers them, I would be proud to cast a vote for that.

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I would say to my friends on the other side of the aisle, you have had your chance. We did it your way for 8 years, and we have the worst economy since the Great Depression. We have more people in poverty, we have the worst job creation since the Great Depression, we have more people who are hungry in America, we have more people without health insurance. I mean, give me a break. The bottom line is we have tried it your way for 8 years, and you have failed. And the American people sent my friends a message loud and clear on Election Day that enough is enough.

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. First of all, when people talk about partisanship, I recall my friends on the other side of the aisle giving us the prescription drug bill, which was probably one of the most partisan health care votes I can recall ever having here. Our hope is not to have a partisan health care bill. President Obama has already had a summit at the White House where he invited not just Democratic leaders but Republican leaders to come and to provide their input to try to figure out how we can do this together. But the deal is we are going to get health care reform this year. My friends on the other side of the aisle, they have had 8 years. If it's such a priority, why haven't they done it in 8 years? The number of people that have fallen into the ranks of the uninsured has increased dramatically while they were in control of the Congress and the White House. So no one's talking about trying to create a partisan vote. What we're trying to do is get what the American people want accomplished. And, quite frankly, I think the onus is on the other side of the aisle to demonstrate that they are, in fact, sincere about working in a bipartisan way. I think this President has done everything humanly possible to reach out the hand of friendship and bipartisanship to try to work with the other side of the aisle. I would like to yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from Pennsylvania (Ms. Schwartz).

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Engel).

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Let me say to the gentleman from Indiana, whom I respect, I agree with half of what he said. I agree that his party did mess up and leave us with a terrible economy at this particular juncture. But I think here's where we may disagree philosophically. The question is, how do you dig yourself out of this ditch? Is it more cuts? Is it throwing more people off the health care rolls? Is it creating more joblessness? Is it cutting back on educational programs? Is it cutting back on infrastructure programs? I mean, is that how we get out of this? Or, as I think we are suggesting, is it that maybe in the short term there needs to be some investment upfront to try to stimulate and resuscitate this economy, to create more jobs, to create more revenue, to try to get this economy back on the right track? We are in deep trouble. We have inherited the worst economy since the Great Depression. Now, the gentleman and others have spoken as if we are not concerned about the deficit or the debt. First of all, we have joined with the gentleman from Indiana over the last 8 years complaining about the size of the debt. And we were told repeatedly by some of my friends on the other side of the aisle that the deficits don't matter, the debt doesn't matter; well, now all of a sudden it does. The fact of the matter is, in the budget that we are proposing, we cut the deficit by nearly two-thirds in 4 years. That is our promise. That is our pledge in this budget. I will briefly yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. McGOVERN. I will yield to the gentleman.

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 371 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. McGOVERN

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Mrs. Bernice McGrail, an extraordinary woman who has devoted fully thirty- six years to the children of the Clinton, Massachusetts Public School System as a member of the School Committee. Today, a reception is being held in Bernice's honor so that the legions of former students, faculty, administrators and local officials can offer her their good wishes as she ends a remarkable record of public service to her beloved hometown. I regret that I am not able to attend today's reception to personally express my profound gratitude, respect and admiration to Bernice. However, I did want to submit these heartfelt words of appreciation into the Congressional Record so that her immeasurable contributions to the development of generations of young people will be forever remembered in the annals of this great institution. Bernice McGrail's tenure on the Clinton School Committee is not only noteworthy for its longevity but also for the quality of the service she rendered. For Bernice, the job of serving on the school committee did not begin and end with the weekly public meetings. In painstaking detail, she reviewed all of the school department correspondence, meeting minutes, curriculum proposals and staffing recommendations. Bernice's knowledge of the school department budget is unrivaled and when combined with her dogged determination she was an especially effective advocate for the programs she vigorously supported. In addition to doing the difficult committee work, Bernice was also a constant presence at all of the numerous school social functions and activities. From graduations, to football games, to school plays and dances, Bernice never missed an opportunity to show her pride in the achievements of the school children. Her warmth and sense of humor have endeared her to so many people over the course of nearly four decades in elected office that Bernice is widely regarded as a political force of nature. Her support for any local initiative is prized and her endorsement of any candidate for elected office is coveted. I, for one, am eternally grateful for the loyal friendship, unwavering support and thoughtful advice Bernice has provided me during my career in Congress. After thirty-six years of tireless dedication, Bernice McGrail is leaving a legacy of selfless public service that will not soon be equaled. She has made an indelible imprint on the Clinton Public School System and helped shape a promising future for an untold number of its students. Madam Speaker, there is no greater gift than that. I wish Bernice and her family continued good health and happiness and kindly ask that the United States Congress publicly acknowledge her exceptional service to the Town of Clinton, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the United States of America.

Mr. McGOVERN

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to my friend, Kate Donaghue from Westborough, Massachusetts for her outstanding service to the people of my district and my home state of Massachusetts. On Sunday, April 26 of this year, Kate will be this year's recipient of the Democrat of the Year award from the Middlesex Worcester Coalition in appreciation for her lifetime of service. For over 20 years Kate has given countless hours of her time to help promote social and political change in Massachusetts. Kate has been an avid volunteer with many groups and has worked tirelessly for the greater good for more than 40 years. She has served as an elected member of the Massachusetts State Democratic Committee for the past 13 years and has served in many capacities with the party. She is one of the founding chairpersons of the Middlesex Worcester Democratic Coalition and is also a board member of the recently formed Worcester Democratic League. She has also represented her district at countless state and national conventions. Kate is also the founder of the widely read Donaghue's Democratic Dispatch, which she founded in 2000. This popular email newsletter provides information about political and civic events that are happening across the commonwealth. Thanks to her efforts, thousands of individuals are kept abreast about how to be engaged in local and national political efforts. Kate has also worked tirelessly to get others involved in community service efforts. She has helped organize Earthday Clean-ups, food drives and clothing drives. Madam Speaker, I commend Kate Donaghue for her dedication to Massachusetts and the political community in promoting activism in politics throughout the community. I congratulate Kate on receiving this award and I ask my colleagues to join me in paying tribute to this fine example of civic engagement.

Mr. McGOVERN

Mr. McGOVERN. I thank the gentleman.

Mr. McGOVERN. We are really tight on time, Mr. Dreier.

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Maffei). (Mr. MAFFEI asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. McGOVERN. I'd like to yield 10 seconds to the gentleman from Oregon.

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, may I inquire of how much time remains on both sides?

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon, a member of the Budget Committee, Mr. Schrader.

Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews). (Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)