Dave Obey

Mr. OBEY

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

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman for his comments. Let me simply respond by saying I think that is a red herring. The fact is that it is not the fault of the other body that this House has only produced five of the 13 appropriation bills. The other body is not even supposed to consider appropriation bills until they are reported and handled in this body. So, I think it is quaint indeed to blame the body which is supposed to act after we act for the fact that we have not acted in the first instance. The fact is that this House has produced final action on only five of 13 appropriation bills. We have the responsibility to finish all 13 of them. This is the worst record that the House has had in finishing its appropriations work of the last 15 years. The last time we had such a serious problem was the year after the Reagan tax cuts were passed and the Congress was trying to find ways, after those tax cuts resulted in huge additions to the deficit, to take additional money out of appropriations bills. So we got hung up in 1981.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, of course not. That is the problem. This House has ducked its responsibility for 8 months, and is now looking for a way to get out of town without having voted on the specifics. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. OBEY. I yield to the gentleman from Iowa.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Speaker, this resolution does not belong on the floor of the House of Representatives. It belongs on the floor of the Mickey Mouse Club. This resolution says that Congress, which has not been able to do its work, ought to use its time to pass resolutions telling itself to get its work done. Only in this place would that make sense. What is also revealing about this turkey is the fact that it selects what work it wants to put at the top of the priority list. And guess what it is? This resolution does not say that this House should sit down and meet its basic responsibilities by passing the budget for the year, by passing the appropriations bills. Those are the only real budgets. The budgets that come out of the Committee on the Budget are a joke. This resolution does not say that we should meet our responsibilities to homeland defense by passing an appropriations bill that adequately funds the FBI and the Coast Guard and the U.S. Marshals to protect the American people from terrorists. It does not say the Republican caucus ought to end its internal war so they can finally bring to this floor the Labor, Health and Education bill so we can meet our responsibilities to fund education and Federal investments in education for the year. Oh, no, no, no. It does not do that. It does not say that the Congress ought to get off its duff and assure that we have a fully funded fuel assistance program to ensure that our low income elderly do not have to choose between heating their homes and eating this year. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. All it says is that the one thing we will take the time out to prattle about is the need to satisfy the richest people in this country with yet another tax break. Those people just happen to be the people who can make the most generous response to fund-raising requests. The leadership of this House apparently does not want the House to vote for a Labor-H bill that adequately funds our schools and funds health care problems, and yet they also do not want their caucus members to vote for a bill that sticks it to the schools and the elderly before the election. They want to put that dirty business off until after the election. Oh yes, we will solve that problem later we are told; you understand, we are too busy to do that now. What they want to do is obvious. They want to do the same thing they did 2 years ago. They want to hide from parents interested in education in this country what their intentions are for the education budget until after the election; and then after the election, they will cut back the expenditures for education just as they did 2 years ago, just as they did 2 years ago. Mr. Speaker, in my view, this House is sick. It is dysfunctional. It focuses only on the needs of a tiny fraction of our society, the most well-off 2 percent. If ever there was a product that demonstrated the true values of the people who run this House, this is it. This is it. For all practical purposes, this Congress is in a government shutdown. You just have not had the guts to tell the people yet, and then you single out one little exception of that shutdown to reward the people who can respond with thousand-dollar and hundred thousand-dollar contributions. My God, what a set of priorities.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Iowa just attacked my positions as a ``tax and spender.'' I would point out that when he took over as chairman of the Committee on the Budget, this committee was running a large surplus; and under his magnificent leadership he has managed to return us to deficits of over $300 billion when you count the Social Security account. Taxes and spending may be bad, but taxes and borrowing is a whole lot worse.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, I want to express my appreciation for the fact that the committee did correct what I thought to be the most fundamental problem associated with the original draft just sent down by the White House. That draft gave unprecedented authority to bureaucrats to spend money without congressional supervision, and I think it would have been a threat to the Constitution itself, and I appreciate the fact that that disastrous proposal has now been removed. That leaves us with the question of what we think of the organizational structure which is left, and we can have honest differences about that. I happen to think and I happen to fear that the remainder of this product will in fact make it more difficult rather than less difficult for us to respond to terrorist attacks and to prevent them, for two reasons. First of all, this agency that is created is going to be composed of 170,000 people. That is not going to be a lean, mean, agile agency. It is going to be a slow, cumbersome agency which I think will slow down our ability to react. Secondly, even though some 22 offices and agencies are being pulled into that Department, there are 111 agencies that have something to do with homeland security that will not be tied into that Department, and my question is who is going to coordinate them? In my view what we need is to have a substantially upgraded and strengthened Office of Homeland Security within the White House, and that is the reason I personally favor Senate confirmation. Not because it in any way weakens the occupant of that office, but because it would put them on an equal footing in terms of prestige and clout with the Office of Management and Budget, with the President's science advisor and the like; and I think that is what is needed if we are going to coordinate those 111 agencies outside the tent effectively. I also believe the FBI needs to be substantially reshaped because right now they simply do not have the analytical capacity that is needed to engage in this kind of analysis as opposed to looking at what is happening with 25,000 separate crimes around the country. It is a very different mindset that is required, and I think the FBI director recognizes that fact. And, lastly, we have to look at resources. We have to commit substantially more resources to enhancing our translation capacity because right now the hard fact is there are thousands of pages of raw data, raw intercepts lying on floors and sitting on shelves all over the security agencies in this town. No one has ever looked at them because we have not had the personnel and they have not had the focus. That needs to be fixed if we are going to truly improve the security posture of the country.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I think the record shows that I have tried to be extremely cooperative with the White House and everyone else involved in dealing with the aftermath of September 11. Within a week after we were hit, I helped, along with the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), push a $40 billion supplemental through this place to give the President virtually all the money he needed to deal with the problem. I appreciate the fact that the committee has corrected a number of problems with the original draft. I think that was very useful, but I am afraid that what we are about to do will actually in the end weaken our ability to respond to terrorist attacks. This bill will still do nothing about the central problem of the FBI and its relationship with other intelligence agencies. This bill will create an additional lack of focus by the new Department that we are about to create; and I would point out that it is, in fact, parading around under false pretenses. It is called a new Department of Homeland Security, but in fact, at this point, there are 133 agencies and offices that have some responsibilities with respect to homeland security. This bill takes 22 of them, containing 170,000 employees, lumps them into one Department and says it is a Department of Homeland Security. My question is, Who is going to coordinate the 111 offices and agencies left out? In my view, that is the central question which is not being answered by the legislation; and until it is, we are likely to, what the GAO told the committee, we are likely to have 3 to 5 years of absolute chaos. It also does not do something about the principal problem that we still face. After September 11, I talked to every intelligence agency in this town. We discovered literally thousands of pages of documents lying on floors, sitting on file cabinets, sitting on people's desks of raw data, raw intercepts, not looked at by anybody. We need new translators. We need a reshaping of the FBI. That is not happening in this bill; and until it does, we are going to be making a significant mistake.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Clayton).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Speaker, Article I of the Constitution indicates that it is Congress which is given the power to determine the expenditure of taxpayer's money. Nowhere in the Constitution, in Article I or any other article, do we have a mention of the Office of Management and Budget. And yet I think as has been often the case, or has often been made obvious, the present director of the Office of Management and Budget seems to believe that the only role of Congress in the appropriations process is to salute whatever whim seems to occupy OMB that day. It is not the first time in our Nation's history OMB has had that attitude; but it is the most recent and, therefore, the most annoying. Let me simply say OMB and the White House itself has on numerous occasions chastised this Congress for the decisions we have made on the supplemental, and they have also chastised the Congress for being somewhat tardy in getting this bill to the White House. Let me point out that the White House did not send this bill to Congress until late March. They could have sent it up in January. They did not. They could have sent it up when they sent up their budget in February, but they did not. They delayed until late March, and then on three separate occasions after the conferees reached agreement on the content of this bill, OMB saw fit to blow up that agreement and ask for a different cut of the cards. Because of that history, it has taken the Congress more time than it otherwise would have taken. Nonetheless, we now have a product which does not suit everyone exactly, but it is a reasonable product; and I believe it deserves the support of the House. I do not support every item in it; no Member does. But it is a reasonable effort to reach a conclusion on this matter, and I personally intend to support it because of that fact. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Speaker, I think there are a number of items in this bill which Members ought to know about. This bill, for instance, has $13 million in the conference report for safety of imported meat and poultry above the amount recommended by the President. We have $17 million above the amount recommended by the President for bioterrorism responsibilities of the Food and Drug Administration. We have $37 million above the President's request for the Marshals Service to safeguard U.S. Federal courts. We have $165 million above the President's request for the FBI to provide, among other things, additional analysts to increase the FBI's ability to process and disseminate counterterrorism information. We have $78 million more for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, including $25 million for analysis to help find, arrest, and deport high-risk, undocumented immigrants in the United States. We doubled the President's request for the Securities and Exchange Commission, and we try to provide additional funds for staff and pay parity in information technology, improvements for that agency so that they can be more effective in dealing with some of the accusations of corporate fraud that are now flooding the country and ruining its markets. We have a number of other items in the bill as well, which I would be happy to comment on if any Members have individual questions about it. Let me simply say there is nothing in this bill that anyone is going to be very thrilled about, because it is the product of a long compromise process, but it is a reasonable package, and I think the most important thing we can say about it is that we simply need to get on with it and get this down to the President. This bill also includes a fix of the problem that we faced with respect to a dip in highway funding and support to States because of the anomaly in the ISTEA highway distribution formula, and we provide sufficient money; unlike the White House, we provide sufficient monies so that we do not have to, in fact, demobilize the Guard and Reserve forces until they can be replaced in sensitive areas by adequately trained personnel to deal with terrorist threats facing the country. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes to filibuster, in hopes that the gentlewoman who wishes to speak on this gets here. Let me say that, given the fact that I am trying to stall until another Member gets here, there are several items that I think the membership ought to know about that we have provided in this bill above the administration request. We have provided $225 million for modification of airports. Those modifications are needed in order to create an actual place to install the explosive detection systems which are supposed to be placed in those airports. It would be pretty difficult to meet the deadline without that additional funding, which the administration did not request. We also now have the situation in which air marshals at this point cannot communicate with the ground except through the pilot. We think that is fairly unfortunate and risky, and so we provided $15 million to fix that problem. We have also provided additional funding for port security grants, and I think that is probably among the most important money in the bill. We have taken a number of other actions which I think will enhance overall security, even while we have not provided all of the funding that the Transportation Security Administration asked for for other activities, in large part because the Congress, on a bipartisan basis, has so little confidence in the way that agency has approached its job to date. With that, Mr. Speaker, I will end my filibuster. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler). (Mr. NADLER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Boswell) who has been very much focused on several aspects of this bill. (Mr. BOSWELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute. Mr. Speaker, I did not want to insert myself in the colloquy that has just preceded, but I would simply say that while there may have been negotiations going on outside of the room with the administration, the negotiations that count were the negotiations between the four parties that produced this language. And I think that the understandings discussed here are not necessarily those that were reached between the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), myself, Mr. Byrd and Mr. Stevens. I think the language speaks for itself without being maneuvered one way or another by any after-the-fact colloquies that may or may not relate to the language involved. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Serrano).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I demand that the gentleman's words be taken down.

Mr. OBEY. I want the rules enforced.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, it is not worth it.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I think the previous speaker has raised many legitimate points, but out of courtesy I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.