Dave Obey

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Alabama made a point which I think bears repeating. Every day we recognize the fact that Congress cannot bind future Congresses in terms of the action that they will take. But if we pass this legislation today, we are enabling future presidents to bind future Congresses, because if we pass this proposal and discover, as we most assuredly will, that it does not work the way we intended, we will not be able to change it without the permission of the President of the United States. That is not a position which any independent legislative body should be in. Secondly, on 2-year budgets, there is a vast difference between multiyear planning and multiyear budgeting. I favor long-term planning. I favor 5- and 10-year planning. But when we go to a 2-year budget, we put the House at a huge disadvantage vis-a-vis the Senate. In the House, we have germaneness rules, so if we pass an Interior supplemental through the place, no one can attach an education item or an agricultural item to it. We stick to the subject. But in a world of 2-year budgeting, we will have constant supplementals. When supplementals move through this body and move to the Senate, we will have individual Senators free to add any item they want to any supplemental that moves through there. That means a giant loss of control of spending and it means a giant transfer of powers and prerogatives to the Senate. Most perniciously, I believe it ruins our ability to keep agencies on a short leash. The healthiest thing that occurs in this town is in the annual appropriation process, when senior program managers discover that they are not ordained by God to follow policies of their own making. They have to answer to the Congress. The problem is that if we put them on a 2-year leash rather than a 1-year leash, it will be very difficult to get them to follow congressional intent in legislation that we pass. People will say, ``oh, well, don't worry about it; as long as they need supplementals, they will need the support of the Congress''. But supplementals are different than regular appropriation bills. Supplementals add money only to programs. They do not deal with personnel levels, they do not deal with agency size. That is where we really have control over agencies, and we should not give that control up.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Chairman, I often quote my friend Archie the cockroach, and Archie said once, ``Did you ever notice when a politician does get an idea, he gets it all wrong?'' I think that can be said of the remedy that is being proposed for the budget process problems. But Archie also said something else that I think is useful in this context. He said, ``Man always fails because he is not honest enough to succeed. There are not enough men continuously on the square with themselves and with other men. The system of government does not matter so much. The thing that matters so much is what men do with any kind of system they happen to have.'' That would be my message with respect to the budget resolution. Whether we get our work done on time depends on how serious we are, it depends on how political both sides of the aisle are, and it depends on what determination we have to compromise. The problem with this proposition which is being set up today is that if a President does not want to compromise with the Congress on a budget, he can delay his approval of the initial budget resolution forever before he signs it. And then after he signs it, he can delay action on every appropriation bill again, and it strings you out forever. I would say to my conservative friends here, I do not think that is the result that you want, but that is the result you are going to get if this proposition passes. I would also say that every authorizing committee needs to understand that they will be out of business if this proposition passes, because Senate authorizing chairs who have not been able to have their way with House authorizers, when the budget resolution goes to the Senate they will say (because they operate in a body that has to run on unanimous consent so that any one Member can throw a monkey wrench into the gears) so every authorizing Chair will be able to say, ``Mr. Leader, if you don't put my authorizing bill in here, if you don't put my banking bill in, if you don't put my farm bill in, if you don't put my interior bill in, I `ain't' going to vote for your budget resolution.'' That means that every House authorizing committee will be dealing with a Senate authorizing committee in a budget summit situation where they get buried in larger issues, and that is not the way this Congress is supposed to run. The reason this Congress survives as a vibrant institution is because of each of our individual expertise which we apply to the areas that we work with in our committees. I urge you not to destroy that by putting the President in the middle of it all.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 5 minutes. Mr. Chairman, absolutely the budget process is broken. The problem is that what is being proposed today will make it even worse. The major argument that is being used for adopting this proposal is that too much time is spent in the budget and appropriations process and we have to find a way to shorten it. By making the budget a joint resolution which requires a signature by the President rather than a concurrent resolution which does not, you double the length of time that it will take for us to finish our job, because it requires Congress to reach agreement with the President not once but twice during each budget cycle, once on the budget resolution and the second time on each and every appropriation bill that will work their way through here. That is a prescription for having us never finish our budget business. Secondly, we also have the problem of 2-year budgeting, which apparently is going to be attached to this proposal. The problem that I see when you move to 2-year budgeting is that we wind up living in a permanent racetrack of supplementals. We have too many supplemental appropriations now when we set the budget for a year in advance. If you set the budget for 2 years in advance, the world is not static, wars happen, disasters happen, economic disruption happens, and that means we will be required to push through more and more supplementals. When that happens, there is a huge shift of power that takes place if we are in a 2-year budget versus a 1-year budget. First of all, we will transfer an unparalleled amount of power to the Senate, because Senators do not have to work under a rule of germaneness. If we pass an education supplemental through here, the Senate can go through and add anything they want to it because they do not have a rule of germaneness. We have a Committee on Rules that requires a rule of germaneness. That fundamentally transfers power to the Senate. Secondly, we have a total abdication of power to the agencies. It is hard enough right now to get unelected agencies to follow the instructions of the elected officials of the Congress. And if they do not have to pay any attention to us until the last 18 months of a budget cycle, you know that they will be even more obstreperous than they are right now in dealing with Congressional intent in any legislation. To me, that creates an even more unresponsive government than we have right now. I would make just this one point. We are the last independent legislative body on the face of the Earth. The reason we are is because we hold tightly and fiercely to the power of the purse. It is only when you have the power of the purse firmly in the hands of this House that this House can meet its constitutional responsibilities to protect liberty, to protect justice and to protect the country against the abuse of power that comes from anyone who does not have to seek anyone else's approval for their conduct. It is no accident that every President for as long as I have served here, including the one who serves now, wants to see 2-year budgeting and wants to see a joint resolution approach to the budget. It is because Presidents by nature want all the power--95 cents out of every dollar in every budget we have passed except 2 over the last 20 years has gone where Presidents have wanted that money to go. The other 5 percent is the difference between having a President and having a king. And when you move from 1-year budget to a 2-year budget and when you move from a resolution which is a congressional product to a resolution that requires the blessing of the President, then he controls the process at every juncture. And when we allow that to happen, we violate the very constitutional oath that we took to uphold the Constitution and within it Article I, which speaks to the duty of the Congress to stand independent, not on our behalf but on behalf of the people we represent.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, what the Ryan amendment says is that no matter how big the surpluses become in the future that you cannot spend a dime on veterans health care, you cannot spend a dime on education, you cannot spend a dime on cancer research. All you can do is use that money for tax cuts or entitlements, which are the fastest growing portion of the budget. With all due respect, he may define that as being balanced and fair. I think veterans and persons suffering from cancer and people who want their kids to get a decent education would respectfully disagree.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, before any of us can speak on this floor, we first have to take an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States. That Constitution was created by our Founding Fathers because they had a huge suspicion of power, especially executive power. That is why they created an Article I of the Constitution, the Congress of the United States, an independent branch of Government. And to keep it independent and to make certain that we would never have excess power in the hands of the executive, they lodged in this institution the power of the purse. Today if we pass this proposal, we are walking away from our constitutional obligation to defend the power of the purse. The chairman of the Committee on Rules is absolutely right. There is absolutely nothing partisan about this debate. This is a debate about power and the use and misuse of power and how you best maintain checks on that use of power. I think there are two fundamental problems with this proposition. First of all, because we create a joint resolution instead of a concurrent resolution when the budget resolution passes, that means for the first time the President imposes himself right in the middle of Congress' obligation to define its own budget resolution. So the President gets two kicks at the cat: once when he submits his budget and then another when he puts together a huge budget summit out at Andrews or some other place like they have been in the past, and the President will come to totally dominate that debate. And every rank and file Member of this place will be on the outside looking in, passing notes in, hoping that a handful of people on the inside will give them an occasional listen. We do not want to do that. Secondly, it will enhance the power of the Senate vis-a-vis the House. The House has a Committee on Rules but the Senate runs on unanimous consent and a system of holds, and in order to get anything done in the Senate, the Senate leadership is going to be vulnerable to having any Senate chairman come to them and say, ``I'm not going to vote for your budget resolution unless you add my authorization bill to the budget resolution,'' and you will have a huge incentive to have everything but the kitchen sink added in the Senate. Secondly, we have another problem with this proposition, and that is 2-year budgeting. Right now every year, every agency of government has to justify every action to the people's representatives. What will happen if we move to a system of 2-year budgeting is that we will move to a system of permanent supplementals and it is far more difficult to control spending on supplementals than it is on regular appropriation bills, because again in the House we have a germaneness rule, but in the Senate there is no germaneness rule. And so they can add virtually anything they want. That in my view weakens the House vis-a-vis the Senate; it allows Senators to add amendment after amendment and project after project. House Members will not have that same privilege or opportunity. And most of all, it makes the agencies of government even more independent of legislative power than they are right now. Because once you have passed an agency budget, they have their money for a 2- year period and they do not have to come to this House for anything. Now, Members will say, ``Well, but if you have supplementals, they'll have to come back here for those.'' That is true. But supplementals are always to add money to their programs. They are programmatic supplementals. They have nothing whatsoever to do with agency staffing levels, agency bureaucratic structure, and so they will have been able to pocket what they want on the administrative end of their budgets, and that means that they will be far more immune to the legitimate Congressional questioning of their actions than they are right now. I think in the end that makes this institution fundamentally weaker in constitutional terms than it is right now, both vis-a-vis the executive branch of government and vis-a-vis the other body. I think both actions would be a mistake. I would urge the House to cast a bipartisan ``no'' on this proposition when we get the opportunity.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I flatly disagree with those who say we do not need substantially more land acquisition. We are going to have 35 million more people knocking on the doors of national parks in 10 years and we need to buy a lot more land in order to preserve it for posterity. But I also support this amendment. I am uncomfortable being here. I do not like to oppose my friends, and I do not like to be standing in the way of this legislation. But I think there are some substantial problems with it. The Federal Government has the responsibility to take care of our national parks and our national forests and our national wildlife refuges in dealing with national environmental priorities. This bill takes almost $3 billion of national resources and locks them into a handful of projects, many of them focused on dealing with State parks, State forests and State priorities. Every year for the next 15 years that money is steered to acquisition of land, to specific wildlife programs, to coastal environmental projects. Those programs are good, and I strongly support them, but they are not the only priorities we have as a Nation and they are not even the only priorities we have on the environmental front. They are important to me, but they are not any more important than is education or health care or some others. I do not understand why we are taking Federal money and using it to fund State priorities when many of our States have been running budget surpluses. I did not come here to be my governor's tax collector. I came here to deal with responsibilities that could not be dealt with at any other level of government. I simply do not believe in insulating even my favorite programs from congressional oversight for 5 years. I believe in a much larger land acquisition program. But I do not put land acquisition ahead of other priorities like education and health care. I want to make it very clear, I will work to the fullest extent of my ability to make land acquisition a much higher priority of this Congress. But I will not support the idea of making it an exclusive priority. That is not fair to other environmental problems, it is not fair to our other national obligations. We sit here and see, for instance, that half of our national wildlife refuges have no staff. I do not think that we should make it more difficult to correct that problem by something we do tonight on this bill. I congratulate the gentleman for his amendment. I think it is a responsible middle ground. I intend to support it when we vote on it tomorrow.

Mr. OBEY. Madam Chairman, I rise in support of the Shadegg amendment.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, does the Chair think that we might obtain the vote faster if it were indicated that a number of us are inclined to vote for whichever side stops talking first?

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I would like order.

Mr. OBEY. I have 1 minute. You can get your own time.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, it is a joke to hear Members of the party that tried to blow up Social Security for 30 years now pretending that they are defending it. I would like to just make two points: It has been suggested that our comments with respect to National Institutes of Health funding are inaccurate. Does the other side deny that they turned down the Senate amendment that would have added $1.6 billion to NIH?

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, there were three main issues associated with this conference. First, should we add $4.1 billion to defense spending, increasing overall spending by that amount, and reducing the surplus by that amount? The conference said ``yes'' to that question. Second question: Should we increase efforts to fight dreaded diseases by increasing spending for NIH by $1.6 billion, which would increase overall spending by that amount? The conferees said ``no'' to that question. Third: Should we increase student assistance by as much as $200 per grant in order to offset the higher cost of higher education and pay for that by a small cut in the size of tax breaks planned for the high rollers in this society? The conference again said ``no.'' Those are the issues before the conference. Those are the issues before the House today. This huge Republican tax cut will simply not permit us to do what nearly everybody knows we ought to be doing to help students get the kind of education they need. That reflects what Candidate Bush said in my State last week. He is reported in the Eau Claire newspaper saying as follows: ``George W. Bush gave strong indications Thursday he is not inclined to increase Federal spending to give more grants to students to go to college. Bush, who attended both Yale and Harvard, conceded that some people have complained that loans carry a repayment burden. ``Too bad,'' he said. ``That is what a loan is.'' There is a lot of money available for students and families willing to go out and look for it. Some of you are just going to have to pay it back, and that is just the way it is.'' What this really is is Richey Rich indicating that he does not have a clue about how the other half lives. What this conference also does today is gut our ability to deal with the problems we need to deal with respect to health problems. This chart shows the amount by which every appropriation to attack major diseases will be cut from the Senate amendment in order to make room for my colleagues' Republican tax cut today. They have been talking to folks about how they are going to promise to help increase research on diabetes. This says they are going to have to cut $47 million below the amount in the Senate amendment. They are going to have to cut $14 million for Parkinson's disease. They are going to have to cut $350 million for all types of cancer research. They cut $41 million from research that could have taken place on Alzheimer's and $180 million from research that could have taken place on AIDS. So when my colleagues vote on this conference today, think of the 150 people a day who will be diagnosed with cancer this year, think of those suffering with diabetes and Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, and think of all of the students who are struggling every day to get a decent education who my colleagues will not be able to help. That may be consistent with the Republican values. It is not consistent with the values of the people I represent. [From the Leader-Telegram, Mar. 31, 2000] Bush Averse to More College Grant Funding--Let Students Get Loans, Candidate Says in EC (By Doug Mell) Texas Gov. George W. Bush gave strong indications Thursday he is not inclined to increase federal spending to give more grants to students to go to college. Instead, Bush said, he has more affinity for giving students loans. ``I support Pell Grants (the federal government's main college grant program),'' Bush told reporters after visiting Locust Lane School in Eau Claire. ``I support student loans.'' Bush, who attended both Yale and Harvard, conceded that some people have complained that those loans carry a repayment burden. ``Too bad,'' he said. ``that's what a loan is.'' Bush, the Texas governor and likely GOP presidential nominee, added: ``There is a lot of money available for students and families who are willing to go out and look for it. ``Some of it you are going to have to pay back, and that's just the way it is because there is nothing free in society. College is not free.'' He also said the federal government should not get involved in setting tuition levels for state colleges and universities. Here are edited remarks from a question-and-answer session between Bush and reporters after visiting Locust Lane School: What are your plans to increase school accountability? We are going to ask the question, are children learning? We are going to say to states, `If you accept federal money, you have to develop an accountability system.' I believe a national test will undermine local controls of schools. Under the Title 1 initiative, it says that after a three- year period, if standards aren't being met for disadvantaged students--in other words, if students remain in failed schools--instead of subsidizing failure, something must happen. You can't have an accountability system, you can't measure, unless ultimately there is a consequence. Otherwise, there is no accountability. And the consequence is, the parents get to make a different choice. It's funding children and it's battling failure. I believe if you set high standards and hold people accountable, people will learn. I've seen it with my own eyes. Is it the school's fault when test scores are low or is it a combination of things? I think it's the system's fault. When you have kids that can't pass a basic test, it sounds like to me that they have just been shuffled through the system. Because nowhere along the line has someone blown the whistle and said, `Now wait a minute; we are not going to move you through until you know what you are supposed to know.' When you have high school kids who can't pass basic reading comprehension exams, you've got a problem. If a kid can't read when he gets to high school, something is fundamentally wrong with the system. That's why it is so important to address these problems early, before it is too late. What has been the response to your proposals from teachers? I differentiate between the union leaders and the teachers. I think the teachers are helping. I think teachers want the best. I think really good teachers do not care about being held accountable. I think they understand that accountability is not a punishment. We need to expand the program at the federal level that encourages, trains, pays stipends to, ex-military people who come into classrooms. I want to increase the teacher training, teacher recruitment aspect of the federal expenditures, but I want to send it back to the states with a lot of flexibility. One of the cornerstones of the education reform package at the federal level is maximum authority and maximum flexibility back to the states. The more flexibility states have to spend federal money to meet their needs, the more money is freed at the local level as well. I think there needs to be a teacher protection act, which will say that if teachers uphold standards of discipline in their classrooms, they can't get sued under civil rights statutes. Could Gov. Tommy Thompson play a role in your administration? Tommy is a friend, and he's smart and he's capable. He's led the way on a lot of interesting initiatives and education reforms. There is a lot of different roles Tommy could play. Have you approached anyone concerning being a vice presidential candidate? No, and I won't with anybody. I obviously have thought about it. People say to me all the time, `Why don't you consider so and so, and why don't you consider this and that? But I have yet to put a process in place. Over the next couple of weeks, I will be thinking through the strategy. I think there is going to be a need to have a different attitude in Washington. There has to be a different type of politics and a different type of attitude about expending political capital. And I tell people point-blank in this state and every state: If you want four more years of Clinton-Gore, I'm not the right guy. That's really what much of the election is about. What are your plans on dairy policy? I'm going to say the same thing that other presidents have: We need to have a national plan, a national dairy policy. Until there is one, until there is one that the country can agree to, there is going to be compacts. Do you oppose dairy compacts? I'd like to see a national dairy plan. That includes something on compacts? It would include a national plan that all regions of the country could live with. If you had a national dairy plan, hopefully, if it made sense, it would make them moot. I'm going to be a president for everybody. Surely there is plan that is best for the nation. Would Wisconsin dairy farmers get a fair break under your administration? I think what Wisconsin dairy farmers can expect is a fair, even-handed policy that tries to develop a national dairy strategy. I recognize it's going to be difficult to do. What is your position on the Elian Gonzalez controversy? He should have his day in a family court in Florida. And the (Clinton) administration has been heavy-handed on this issue, and I disagree with them, I strongly disagree with them. There needs to be a full hearing, and I hope his dad gets to come over (from Cuba) and testify. I don't trust Fidel Castro. I don't trust the system. I do not believe we ought to trade with Cuba and Fidel Castro, because foreign trade with Castro becomes an avenue for propping the administration up. I hope the dad is given the chance to make the decision in a free world, give him a chance to make a decision about his son in a totally free environment. There needs to be a venue to make that decision. What is your position on trade with China? I do believe we ought to have China in the World Trade Organization. But as opposed to trading with government entities, most of the trade with China, as a result of the World Trade Organization, will be with private entities. What is your position on campaign finance reform? I think we ought to have campaign funding reform. It starts with people being honest about the law. Secondly, I think we ought to ban corporate soft and labor union soft money, so long as you have paycheck protection. We need instant disclosure who the campaign contributors are and I want full instant disclosure on what went on in the White House when the vice president was there. I think we can make it more fair, more open and more realistic so people know what is going on. I'd love to work with Sen. (Russ) Feingold and Sen. (John) McCain on that issue. I would hope he (Feingold) would allow paycheck protection so union members don't have their money spent by union bosses without their permission. What is the first bill you would send to Congress after you are elected. First is to go to the Defense Department, the secretary of the defense, and ask for a top-down review, a top-to-bottom review of the strategies in place to reconfigure our military. I worry about haphazard spending, political spending when it comes to procurement, research and development. And I want there to be a procedure in place to reconfigure how war is fought and war. Our military needs to be lighter, more lethal, easier to move, harder to find. We need to think 20 or 30 years down the road. The first bill I would like to see coming out of education is Title 1 reform with flexibility to states. I would like Congress to pass a tax-relief package, with a tax fairness component, I think we need to get rid of the death tax. This code we have today penalizes people who live on the outskirts of poverty. If you are a mother making $22,000 a year and you have two children, for every additional dollar you earn, you pay a higher marginal return than someone making $200,000. It's not right. So my simplification plan drops the bottom rate from 15 percent to 10 percent and increases the child credit, which facilitates upward mobility among people who are struggling. It may sound strange to hear a Republican talking that way, but I'm passionate about this subject. Al Gore is going to say it's risky. But what is risky is locking people in place in America. What we ought to believe in is having a tax code that encourages upward mobility, not discourages upward mobility.

Mr. OBEY. The gentleman understands the rules. Mr. Speaker, I would point out with respect to Pell grants, their standard bearer, Richie Rich, or, excuse me, George Bush, said in my state last week when asked if he would help students who have such a huge debt overhang, ``Too bad, that is what a loan is. There is a lot of money available for students and families willing to go out and look for it. Some of you are just going to have to pay back, and that is the way it is.'' Do you disagree with that? Do you disagree with your standard bearer? You certainly cannot tell it from your budget resolution. You specifically eliminated the $600 million the Senate added for Pell grants. I think that makes clear where you stand.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I find that incredibly troubling. Perhaps it was fortunate we did not take this up last night so we have had a chance to reread the gentleman's amendment. What appeared to be innocent last night, absent the presidential waiver, would be extremely troubling, especially in light of the Secretary of Defense's statement it would put the interest of U.S. troops at risk.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask the author of the amendment a question, please. Last night, I had thought that I was going to be supporting this amendment, but I have a question. The House adopted last night a human rights amendment which had a presidential waiver on the subject, which is important to us, but certainly is not absolutely essential to our own national security interests. It is my understanding now this morning that the gentleman's amendment does not have the authority for presidential waiver even if he believes that this would threaten national security or put U.S. troops in danger. Is that correct? Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kasich).

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, this is a general instruction to the committee. The committee has the authority and latitude to bring a bill back within existing or lower levels, and it is fully authorized. This motion would require the Committee on Appropriations to report a new supplemental bill that includes $262 million for the Office of National Drug Control Policy for purposes of distributing grants to State, local, or national organizations that provide substance abuse treatment and prevention services. The intention is to recognize that if the House is going to spend $1.3 billion for source-country control of cocaine, then we ought to include at least some funds for treatment services which, according to the Rand Corporation, are 23 times more effective. This motion recognizes that only 37 percent of the 5.5 million Americans in need of treatment can get it, and a vote for recommittal will reduce that treatment gap in all of our communities. If we want to destroy the drug traffickers, we should destroy their source of income. That is the best way to get at them. If we invest in drug treatment and drug prevention, we are destroying their source of income. That is the way to kill them. Vote for this motion. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Condit).

Mr. OBEY. I most certainly am, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman for his comments, and close by simply saying that we are putting the money in the drug czar's office because this subcommittee which funds this office currently has $262 million remaining under its existing 302(b) allocation. I ask for a vote in support of the motion. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, in addition to that, the fact is that, for this fiscal year, rather than the next fiscal year about which the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) has just been speaking, for this fiscal year, if my colleagues vote for this bill, they are going to be voting for a bill which is $17 billion in spending over the amount the President asked for for this existing fiscal year. I will be interested to see how many so-called fiscal conservatives are going to do that. Amendment Offered By Ms. Kaptur

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, since the subject has been raised, and since the subject of what the content is of this bill and ``Who shot John and who has not'' in terms of busting the budget, I think it is important to point out the facts on the overall bill. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the distinguished gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), ranking member on the Committee on the Budget, to illuminate the House on that matter.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I would like to correct the statement of the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Stearns). He said that I supported the supplemental when I was chairman. There never was a supplemental appropriation bill when I was chairman, so the gentleman is wrong on that fact too. What the gentleman has done with his amendment, we have got a nice fat sugar donut on the floor and he is managing to go after the hole.