Dave Obey

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hall) very much for the time. Let us review why we are here. We have this legislation before us today because the President determined that we had an emergency with respect to Iraq; that we have an emergency need for additional funds to support our troops in Bosnia; that we have had a number of natural disasters around the country which require assistance to localities; we had a severe economic emergency facing the country because of the collapse of Asian currencies, something which will result in a huge trade deficit in this country which will close American factories and put American workers out of work; and that it was also time for us to pay the almost $1 billion in back dues that we owe the United Nations and its associated agencies. The normal process under the budget rules is that, if the President declares an emergency and if Congress concurs, that these funds will be provided without offsets, on the theory, for instance, that if God decides that there is going to be a hurricane somewhere, he does not first have to check with the House of Representatives to make certain that his actions fit under our rules. Some people I guess disagree with that. The response that we have had from the Congress and from the majority party leadership has been to insist that a number of large cuts in domestic programs be attached to the President's emergency request. And what has happened is that instead of dealing with this bill in an atmosphere of conciliation and partnership, instead we are facing an atmosphere of extreme confrontation as a result of that decision. Now I believe there are 3 basic problems with the rule before us and with the legislation before us. First of all, it strips out of the bill any ability to deal with the economic crunch facing the country because of the disequilibrium between Asian currencies and our own. That is, in my view, the most serious economic problem faced by the country at this time. And yet we are not going to be allowed to do anything about that despite the fact that the President requested we do so on an emergency basis. Secondly, this proposal blocks our consideration of 75 percent of the President's request for disaster assistance. That will mean that if we have one more major storm in summer, our ability to deal with emergency needs of communities will be gone, it will be eliminated, we will not have funds readily available to deal with those problems and we could face not only substantial delay in providing assistance to those communities, but they would also see the need for FEMA to take money from States who have already experienced disasters in order to try to deal with those emergency problems. That would slow down the recovery effort in States that are already receiving Federal funds. Thirdly, it breaches the agreement of the budget deal last year which said that we would not raid domestic programs to pay for defense and we would not raid defense programs to pay for domestic, we would keep a fire wall between the two. This blows that away. Instead it says we are going to cut $2.2 billion in housing costs. Now it was asserted by one Member on that side of the aisle that that will not cause a problem because these funds are not needed until next year. The fact is we do not just need $2.2 billion in funds next year in order to renew the contracts for subsidized housing for low-income citizens and the elderly. We need $10.8 billion in the budget next year for that purpose or else, if we do not provide that $10.8 billion, there are going to be millions of low-income people and senior citizens knocked out of their housing. This bill takes 20 percent of that money and uses it for this purpose. That means if it is not replaced, if it is not replaced we will have 935,000 low-income Americans evicted from their supported housing, and one-third of those folks are elderly. I do not believe that is what America wants to see done. This bill also terminates one of the President's favorite programs in a stick-it-in-your-eye response to the President, namely AmeriCorps. It also cuts $75 million from bilingual education. I do not know about my colleagues' districts, but in my district I have thousands of Hmong refugees who do not even have a written language, who desperately need help in order to learn language, and I resent the fact that my local taxpayers are going to get stuck with the tab because the Federal Government will not meet its responsibilities in this area. This reminds me of something an old friend of mine used to say when I served with him in the legislature, a fellow by the name of Harvey Dueholm who said, ``You know the problem in American politics is that all too often the poor and the rich get the same amount of ice, but the poor get theirs in the wintertime.'' That is what the Congress is doing by reshuffling priorities the way it is doing it here. I can find no rule, I can find no rule, which governs the debate for supplementals, I can find no rule that has ever in the past denied the minority an opportunity to offer an amendment to a supplemental appropriation. But that is what this rule does. That alone is reason enough for Members to turn it down. Mr. Speaker, this bill, in its refusal to move ahead with the IMF, represents a reckless disregard for the future economic security needs of this country, and we ought not to ignore that problem today. There is one other problem associated with the bill. I will be moving immediately after the rule to ask the House to go into executive session, that means secret session, to discuss a classified item in this bill. The reason I need to do that is because last year this Congress made significant cuts in the intelligence programs of the country in order to pay for a number of projects not requested by the administration. The two major add-ons in the bill last year were a $700 million piece of pork for the Senate majority leader in Mississippi, and a $500 million piece of pork for the Speaker of the House in his home State of Georgia. Now, this bill would make further domestic cuts in order to restore some of those intelligence fund reductions. Since that funding is contained in the classified portion of the bill, the House has to go into executive session to discuss this bait-and-switch strategy. So I will be making that motion at the end of consideration of the rule. Mr. Speaker, I urge Members to vote ``no'' on the rule, to vote ``no'' on the gag rule, and to vote ``no'' on the bill. This is no way to establish bipartisan consensus. This is no way to establish a decent working relationship between the executive and legislative branches of government. We need to try to find common ground between the two parties. I thought we had done that fairly well in the appropriations process last year, but apparently the confrontation artists in the majority caucus won the day, and so the rule today, instead of cooperation, is going to be confrontation. I think that is highly unfortunate. I think the best way to avoid needless confrontation is to turn down this rule and start over.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding me this time. Let me simply say that I have mixed feelings about this bill. I certainly have no objection to the bill as it is leaving the House. I think the House bill is a responsible bill. But as both gentlemen know who are managing the bill, I have three major concerns with the Senate bill with which this bill will be conferenced. As the gentleman from Louisiana just indicated, first of all, that Senate bill creates new mandatory spending for agriculture research. While I certainly support an expansion of agriculture research, I strongly oppose making ag research an entitlement program. Research is inherently a discretionary function of the budget, whether it is cancer research or energy research or agriculture research, and there is no reason to elevate agricultural research to a different standard. I would also say that creating new mandatory programs in the ag research area will not add to a net gain in spending for the agricultural research community because, if a new mandatory program is created, you can bet your last dollar that when the 302 allocations are made in the appropriations process, that that new mandatory research will be taken into account and discretionary research will be reduced accordingly by the majority party when they establish their 302 allocations. So there will be, in the practical world, no net gain for ag research. My second objection is that the source of the savings in the mandatory spending is the food stamp program. And while I certainly agree that States should not be able to double bill the Federal Government for food stamp administrative costs, there are other pressing needs in the food stamp arena that ought to be met, including restoring food stamp benefits to legal refugees, including the Hmong veterans who fought side-by-side with American troops during the Vietnam war. Thirdly, even if full savings were not needed to restore food stamp benefits to immigrants or refugees, there are other mandatory spending issues that the authorizing committee ought to be addressing, in my view, rather than raiding the jurisdiction of the Committee on Appropriations. I would point out that spending $200 million a year for sales commissions in the crop insurance program means that there will be less discretionary money spent for important agricultural research programs, and I think that the authorizing committee ought to fix that problem before they set up new mandatory spending programs. So I would simply say to Members who have asked me about whether they should vote for this bill or not, I have no problem voting for this resolution at this time. But I hope that Members who talk about holding spending caps will, if this bill comes back from conference with new mandatory spending, I hope they will be prepared to vote against that conference report and deep-six it, as it will justifiably deserve to be deep-sixed, if it adopts the approach taken by the Senate.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, evidently the Congress is into the business of naming things after people who have nothing whatsoever to do with the facilities that are being named after them. I would say that while I had great personal affection for President Reagan and served with him, I would say that he had about as much to do with Washington National Airport as I have to do with an airport in Tibet. I am old-fashioned enough to believe that if we are going to name something after somebody, we ought to give the name to something with which that person is intimately associated. So I would simply have a question. Would it not be more appropriate, for instance, to name the Bureau of Public Debt the Ronald Reagan Bureau of Public Debt? The act of this Congress that has made me more angry than any act since I have been here is the action that this Congress supinely took in 1981 when it whooped through here, with people in both parties voting for it, the Reagan budgets, which took the deficit, which had never been higher than $74 billion, up to well over $200 billion. It has taken us almost 20 years to dig out from under that, with strong efforts on the part of people in both parties to accomplish that fact. And so I simply make that point to note that there ought to be a certain degree of appropriateness, and a certain connection between the name of the person and the act, and I think that would be at least as appropriate as the action being contemplated both by this amendment and by this bill in general.

Mr. OBEY

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

Mr. OBEY. In its present form, I am, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I have absolutely no objection to the job done by the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Sawyer] or the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Mollohan]. I think they have been imminently reasonable. I think they have produced a good product in what is in the bill. I certainly do not have any objections to the job done by the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Livingston]. I think he has done a very fine job. But I have to say my concern is what is not in the bill. As my colleagues know, an agreement was made by the Republican Party, just referred to by the previous speaker to, for the moment, concede on their views on Mexico City and family planning issues on the fast track bill. In retaliation for that, for that concession, the decision was made to strike the State Department reauthorization language, to strike the currency stabilization fund, and to strike the U.N. arrearage authority. I believe that is an extremely shortsighted and irresponsible decision, and I believe that decision significantly damages United States interests in two ways: It does not punish Bill Clinton, it punishes the country. It damages us in two ways because, first of all, it weakens our ability to develop consensus within the United Nations in building a proactive foreign policy against Saddam Hussein. It also undercuts the resources necessary to deal with the currency fluctuations and instability which we have seen throughout Asia and Latin America that could very well have incredibly serious effects on our own economy. Now, the response of the House leadership on this matter I find most troubling. The Speaker sent a letter to the President today which says, ``With the challenge of Iraqi defiance against the world community and the importance of the United Nations Security Council in responding to that challenge, the U.S. must continue to play a central role in the U.N.'' It says, ``With the turmoil in international markets, it is clearly prudent for the Secretary of the Treasury to seek additional resources.'' And yet, this bill tonight withholds those resources until the President capitulates on a totally unrelated matter. The letter then goes on to say, ``We do not believe that our disagreement over abortion should block action on national security issues.'' But then my colleagues proceed to block them anyway. I have infinite respect for the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Smith] and others who share his view on abortion policy; I share some of those same views. But the Constitution defines how one is supposed to win. In order to win on an issue, one needs to have a majority in both Houses or the signature of the President. If one does not have the signature of the President, then one needs two-thirds in both Houses. With all due respect, the only majority that the gentleman has at this moment is the majority in one House. Now, what he is trying to do is to exercise leverage in order to expand that majority by holding other proposals hostage. Individual Members have a right to try that, but it is an obligation of leadership to say no when that puts in jeopardy severe and important interests of the United States. It is reckless for the leadership of this House to do otherwise. Secretary Albright just called me. She was about to step on a plane going to the Middle East to try to build a tighter alliance to deal with Saddam Hussein. She said, ``I need those extra resources.'' I am going to be offering a motion to recommit, a straight motion to recommit, in order to give this committee an opportunity to put back into this bill the authority that they need for the $100 million in U.N. arrearages for the first year of the 3-year plan, and to also put into the bill the authority we need for currency stabilization. There is no problem in the Senate with that. The only group that seems to have any real problem with it is the House leadership. It seems to me that the only way to meet our responsibilities, unless we want to walk out of here for three months and risk seeing a further unraveling of the currency markets and the security markets around the world, unless we want to risk seeing that, it seems to me we have an obligation tonight to provide those resources. That is what I will attempt to do by offering the motion to recommit, and I urge every single Member to support that motion. Without it, Congress will be committing one of the most remarkably irresponsible abdications of responsibility that I have seen in all of the years that I have served in Congress.

Mr. OBEY

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

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, further reserving the right to object, let me simply say that with respect to some of the priorities in the bills that we passed, I am reminded of the question asked by Peggy Lee, ``Is that all there is?'' But, nonetheless, I guess at this point we cannot do anything to change those priorities. This simply extends the date, as I understand it, to the 26th of November, and we have no objection on this side of the aisle.

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

Mr. OBEY. Peggy. Pinky is more the gentleman's type. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. OBEY. Reserving the right to object, Mr. Speaker, I would ask the gentleman from Louisiana if he would explain what the effect of this new continuing resolution is.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for the time. Mr. Speaker, let me simply say that I am supporting and inclined to support this bill, but I have serious concerns about it. One, Mr. Speaker, is that this bill has consistently, when it left the House, been relatively free of earmarks. But then it goes over to the Senate, and when it emerges from the Senate, it almost looks as though it is a document designed more to facilitate congressional fund-raising than it is to facilitate the promotion of the United States' national interest. There are numerous earmarks which are added to the point where, for instance, in the portion of this bill which used to be focused on aid to Russia and former republics in the Soviet Union, so much has been earmarked that at this point one individual American, George Soros, will in the next 5 years be giving assistance to Russia which is more effective than that of the United States Government. I do not think that represents a rational allocation of resources on our part. But I must also say that I think this bill has two serious gaps. What has happened evidently is that in retaliation for the fact that Mexico City language, desired by some Members of the House, is not contained in this bill, because of that fact, we now have in retaliation a determination to eliminate from this bill all funding for the IMF program that has been mentioned by the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi] and also to eliminate from the State-Justice-Commerce bill any provision providing for funding of our arrearages at the United Nations. I believe that that is definitely not in the interests of the United States. On the first issue, we right now have seen the beginning effects of the exploding currency crisis in Asia. We saw our own stock market decline by around 500 points, in very large part triggered by the fact that Asian markets are extremely unstable and are likely to remain so for some time to come. I think it is a grave omission for the Congress, bordering on irresponsibility, for this Congress not to provide at least some bridge authority for the administration to meet any additional currency crisis if it would occur in Asia. We have three choices. If one occurs, we can either do nothing or we can try to foot the bill largely on our own in order to stabilize the currency situation, or we can try to rely on the multilateral approach which would reduce our own financial exposure. But the congressional majority has determined that that is not to be provided. I think that is a grave mistake. Secondly, at this moment we are trying to marshal the most united approach possible in the United Nations in whatever action we choose or we find necessary to take against Saddam Hussein. We do not strengthen our leverage in getting effective United Nations action when we do not pay our bills. We have about $900 million in arrearages owed to the United Nations. It seems to me that at least to put ourselves in a better position to strengthen our leadership in that institution, we should at least provide the $100 million that was requested this year as the down payment on finally ending that arrearage situation. I find it troubling that we are going to follow a high-risk strategy in both the Asian currency situation and the Iraqi situation simply in order to engage in payback because certain people did not get the language they wanted with respect to Mexico City. So, Mr. Speaker, I would simply rise to caution Members of the House that we are running a high-risk strategy and this country may pay a very high price for the omission that we are talking about here this evening.

Mr. OBEY

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

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, continuing my reservation, let me simply make this point, I think we have terrific staff on the Committee on Appropriations. But as good as they are, they are likely to make some significant mistakes if they are reading out these bills when they have been strung out through night after night with virtually no rest. It seems to me that if there is not a reasonable expectation that we can finish, that we ought to recognize that so that Members can get some sleep. My observation is that this place usually works better and the Members get along better with each other when their tails are not dragging, and everybody's are, as far as I can see right now, and certainly the staff. Mr. Speaker, we are not going to get any more information, but what we have been told so far is that the fast-track legislation is going to come up sometime tonight, that we may or may not be moving ahead with other appropriation bills, and, if we do move ahead with them, they may or may not be in an omnibus form, and we do not really have any idea at this point how long it is going to take to read out these bills or to bring them to the Congress in a form which is safe for Members to vote on. Under those circumstances, I would simply say I am dubious that a one-day CR is going to solve anything. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I guess under my reservation of objection again, I guess I would simply say that this is not the most organized way to end the session that I have ever seen, and I would simply ask that before any actions are taken with respect to any of the three appropriation bills, that both our leadership and the ranking members on each of those subcommittees be given ample time so that whatever changes might be contemplated by the minority to the greatest extent possible can be cleared with our side so that we do not run into some last-minute blowups. Mr. Speaker, we are not going to elicit any information.

Mr. OBEY. If I can just, under my reservation of objection again, note that I am informed that so far staff has found at least 50 mistakes in the Senate version of the State-Justice-Commerce bill as it was sent over here. I am not saying that by way of criticizing, I am saying that by way of alerting Members to the fact that it is essential that we have enough time to read out those bills at a staff level, and perhaps Members of the leadership who have not served as committee chairs do not sufficiently appreciate the need to make certain that we have these things right before we proceed. But my concern is that a lot of Members want to know whether they should cancel their Veterans Day plans. If they are going to be back in their districts for Veterans Day, they are going to have to leave here Monday. We are being told that people should expect to be here Monday, and I think, frankly, I doubt very much that a 1-day CR is going to be enough, and I would ask why we have not just proceeded with a CR that is 4 or 5 days so that Members would have some clarity about what is going to happen on Veterans Day.

Mr. OBEY. Could the gentleman further tell us, under my reservation of objection, what are the plans for handling the D.C. appropriations bill?

Mr. OBEY. Again under my reservation of objection, Mr. Speaker, let me simply explain to the Members what I understand is happening with respect to one of the appropriation bills. The State-Justice bill has a number of contentious items. Frankly, right now, although there is language which apparently may meet with the approval of the administration, we have a meeting going on right now with a number of lawyers to try to decipher what that language is and to see whether or not we can work our way to agreement on that. If we can, I would grant that there is the possibility of going to conference tonight without a lot of problems on the State-Justice bill. But we still have confusion about the other two bills. Let me ask, does the gentleman know of any other so-called compromise language which is circulating with respect to Mexico City? There are rumors rampant about different language being floated by the administration, by somebody else. Has the gentleman been given any language that would effect the Mexico City provisions of the foreign operations bill?

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

Mr. OBEY. I yield to the gentlewoman from Ohio.

Mr. OBEY. Again under any reservation let me simply say I, too, hope that we can finish in 24 hours, but, frankly, I do not approach this like I am a permanent president of an optimist club, and it just seems to me that we have massive confusion here. Let me ask the gentleman, does the gentleman know how many bridges the administration has given away today to try to pick up votes?

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object, am I to understand that the continuing resolution which went into effect at midnight is now to be superseded by this continuing resolution, making the previous continuing resolution the shortest CR in the history of the United States Congress, and that under the resolution the gentleman is offering, that the CR will run until next Friday?

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