Earl Pomeroy

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, I heard the gentleman say now, as well during the debate on the martial law rule, that the rule brings forward the conference report on the pension bill. Now, I was unaware that the pension bill had been reported out of the conference. And, indeed, I do not believe the conference report has ever been signed. If that is the case--

Mr. POMEROY. If gentleman would further yield. This would conclude my question. I will make a point on debate. In my understanding of how Congress works, there is no conference report until the report has been signed by the conferees representing agreement between the House and the Senate.

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I rise to oppose this rule. It is, on its very face, absurd. The bills this rule would allow to the floor include the obscene proposition that Congress must allow a massive tax break for the wealthiest few multi-millionaire families in this country in order to get an increase in the $5.15 per hour minimum wage paid to the lowest- income workers in this country. The rule also allows to the floor a pension bill which has been falsely labeled as the conference report between the House and the Senate. Twenty million Americans in the workforce today have pensions. They are counting on a pension check to sustain them in old age, yet month after month of nontransparent legislative wheeling and dealing and the pension bill now in conference committee is stuck. It has been an ugly process. The debate has been hot. The games played have been silly, and the differences have been personal and intense. And that is just within the Republican Party. Let me read to you from today's edition of CQ a description of last night's conference committee action: ``Anger Erupts As House GOP Snubs Pension Vote: After days of tense negotiation over pension legislation, tempers flared Thursday night when House Republicans boycotted a vote on a conference report proposal, provoking the scorn of their Senate counterparts and leaving the bill in jeopardy. `` `I wonder why you wouldn't have guts enough to come forward and vote,' said an emotional Senator.'' Have you ever seen such foolishness? The fate of workers' pensions hangs in the balance and our House Republicans stage a walkout on the conference and refuse even to vote. They didn't vote ``yes''; they didn't vote ``no.'' Basically, they thumbed their nose at America's workers and they thumbed their noses at the United States Senate. And tonight they bring a new bill on pensions, a bill never voted on in the House, never voted on in the Senate, never seen any legislative committee markup, and they have the brazen gall to call it the conference report. Our workers counting on their pensions deserve so much better than this rancorous game of legislative brinksmanship. Some may be inclined to write this whole evening off as the frantic egocentric last throes of a powerful chairman about to lose his power in retirement. But that is no justification for this nonsense. My colleagues, let the games stop and stop right now. Reject this rule and get that conference committee on pensions back to work and let's pass a minimum wage for the lowest paid workers without being held to ransom in giving massive tax relief to the wealthiest multi- millionaire families in this country.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. I am pleased to follow the preceding speaker, who like me is on the Ways and Means Committee. He knows darn well the Ways and Means Committee had nothing to do with this bill. This bill has been marked up in a nontransparent conference committee, and then last night, on the eve of the vote, the Republicans walked and didn't vote. It is utter nonsense the gamesmanship that has been played. But there have been deals cut. A lot of deals have been cut. So some unions cut their deal and they are for it; some companies are for it; some industries are for it. And I don't have any problem with any of them. What I have a problem with, with this bill, is the great majority of plans, covering 20 million workers in the workforce today, with pension protection, pensions that they are counting on to pay that monthly payment in old age. We have seen this argument before. Remember last year, when the President wanted to privatize Social Security? Suddenly, we heard about how Social Security was on the rocks; we had to end Social Security as we knew it to save it. We had to privatize it to protect it. This is the same thing that is going on now. They are saying pensions are on the rocks. We have to pass this bill to save pensions. Baloney. Don't believe a word of it. Jane Bryant Quinn, noted commentator on financial matters, writes in a recent column about the recovering health of pension funding. ``Plans are coming back to sounder footing, thanks to rising interest rates, massive corporate catch-up contributions to their plans, limitations on benefits and the recovery in the markets.'' And in addition to that, my colleagues, we passed a big premium increase in that budget and so more money is coming in yet. But none of that is mentioned. And so there is a lot of confusion on the floor. Does this bill toughen that funding requirement or not? It is the wrong question, my colleagues, and I used to be a solvency regulator as a former insurance commissioner. The right question here is: Will this bill continue pensions or will this bill make their freezing and termination more likely? And on that, consider the words of David Wyss, chief economist for Standard & Poor's. ``The more that is required of plans, the sooner they will go extinct.'' Private pensions are going the way of the Dodo. Because, you see, when you make funding too onerous or too unpredictable, you force the executives to cancel or terminate or freeze the plan. And that is exactly what is at foot. So the enemies of pensions can stand on the floor and say they are protecting workers by increasing funding, but they know all along they are going to cause the freezing of plans. We have a trend here that is very worrisome, because my friends, this is the mounting number of frozen pension plans. And I am telling you, if we pass this bill, this number is going to skyrocket. Indeed, one trade group with expertise in this area predicts 60 percent of the plans might freeze if the bill is passed. Let me tell you what happens when a plan freezes. It means that you no longer get to count future years' earnings in your retirement benefit. So baby boomers in the workforce today, following this debate, you are going to get killed under this bill. You are not going to get final rate of pay as considering your pension benefit. Instead, you are going to get a reduced pension than you ever counted on, and they are going to swap you for a 401(k). Is that a fair trade? Well, Jane Bryant Quinn's column says that workers in this situation may take an annual company contribution in their 401(k) of 15 percent to be equal. Now, how many of you know of 401(k)'s where they put in 15 percent? So what we are seeing here, directed right at the baby boom workers, is a bill that will cause the freezing of their pension, the reduction of their benefit, and yet the majority, in their hypocrisy, has the nerve to suggest they are doing it to protect workers. Kill this bill. Protect worker pensions.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, we know what extortion is. You know those old movies? ``Give me all the money or the kid gets it.'' Well, this is legislative extortion. You want a minimum-wage increase? Give the multimillionaire families a tax break. No tax break for multimillionaires, no minimum-wage increase. So who gets this tax break? Well, as you can see, the bulk of it goes to estates worth more than $20 million. How much do these estates get? As you see, they get $5.8 million on average. So that is the deal they offer us: Oh, we will give you an increase in that $5.15 per hour minimum wage, just as long as you give $5.8 million to those $20 million estates. What do they think, we are crazy? That is no deal. That is legislative extortion, and it needs to be rejected with a ``no'' vote tonight.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, 25 years ago the abduction and killing of Adam Walsh was a tragedy that changed forever the lives of his family members. And the change that occurred in his father, John Walsh, has, as a result, changed our Nation as he has become such a superbly effective advocate of the families of victims as they have stood for justice time and time again. Today this Congress has a chance, in memory of Adam Walsh, to again change this country by passing a law that will bring much needed protections and fully capturing the marvelous new technologies of the Internet and using them as a means for families to protect themselves, to protect their children from those who would prey upon them. And the need to address this nationally is demonstrated time and time again. Some might suggest the heart of this bill is the Dru Sjodin National Sex Registry, named in memory of Dru Sjodin. I have a card that I carry of Dru. She was a talented, engaging, wonderful student at the University of North Dakota. She was abducted from the parking lot of a shopping center and killed. The individual now on trial for her murder was a registered sex offender, but only across the State line, which, in the context of Grand Forks, North Dakota, is just across the river. So Alfonso Rodriguez, identified, long incarcerated in the State of Minnesota, identified as a high risk sex offender within the State of Minnesota, but unknown to those of us in North Dakota. We need a national registry so we know where these high risk predators are and we can find them, not just law enforcement finding them, as has been advanced so nobly over the years by the Jacob Wetterling Registry, but all of our families. It is time for all of our families to have access to this information. And so this registry, providing name, providing residence, providing place of employment, providing automobile, is all very vitally important information to be available to the public. Additionally, the components of this bill that have stepped up monitoring by local law enforcement, Federal grant dollars to assist them in the manpower required to keep an eye on these predators in our midst. And then the stiff minimum sentences, also an essential component of this legislation. I commend the chairman, Chairman Sensenbrenner, with whom it has been my great pleasure to work as one of the Democrats strongly supporting this legislation. I believe that there is nothing more fitting for us to do in honor of these victims than pass the legislation which will keep other families safe. I urge support of this legislation.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to H.R. 2389, The Pledge Protection Act of 2005. As I said in 2004 when the House voted on the Pledge Protection Act in the 108th Congress, I strongly believe that the Pledge of Allegiance, including the phrase, ``under God'' is a constitutional expression of patriotism. Therefore, I--along with many of my colleagues--was outraged by court decisions that erroneously declared the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional. As a result, I consistently have voted in favor of legislation reaffirming the place of the Pledge of Allegiance in its entirety in our schools. In the 108th Congress, I voted in favor of H. Res. 132, which urged the Supreme Court ``to correct the constitutionally infirm and incorrect holding'' by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in its revised decision on the Newdow v. U.S. Congress case. This resolution also expressed the sense of the House of Representatives that the recitation of the Pledge is a patriotic act--not a religious act, that the Pledge should retain the phrase ``One nation, under God,'' and that Congressional policy should encourage the voluntary recitation of the Pledge in public school classrooms. I also voted in favor of an amendment offered by Rep. Hostettler to H.R. 2799, the Commerce, Justice and State and Related Agencies Appropriations bill, which prohibited any funds appropriated by the bill being used to enforce the court's decision in Newdow v. U.S. Congress. In the 107th Congress, I voted in favor of H. Res. 459, which expressed the view of the House of Representatives that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals' original decision in Newdow v. U.S. Congress to strike the words ``under God'' from the Pledge of Allegiance was incorrectly decided. Similarly, I strongly supported S. 2690, legislation that reaffirmed the language of the Pledge of Allegiance, including the phrase ``one Nation under God.'' However, as I stated last year, I am concerned that the passage of H.R. 2389 would threaten the separation of powers set forth in the United States Constitution. Historically, the United States Supreme Court has the final authority on questions regarding a Federal law's constitutionality. However, H.R. 2389 would allow future Congresses to enact laws that clearly violate basic constitutional principles, while at the same time barring these laws from review by the Supreme Court. This lack of checks and balances could undermine the strength of America's most fundamental founding document. Given these significant issues with H.R. 2389, I again plan on voting against this measure.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Chairman, I rise both as a Representative of North Dakota and also as a former State insurance regulator, a solvency regulator, to speak in favor of the substitute and against the underlying legislation. Let me talk about the underlying legislation first. This essentially ``go to a laissez-faire, let the market determine rating agency credibility'' is a very different departure from the long-established course we have been on with national registered statistical rating agencies. Just a little textbook lesson here: Transparency is generally regarded as essential to the free function of financial markets. But transparency depends upon the ability of those participating in the markets to know the credit worthiness of the players. These statistical rating agencies make an assessment of the credit worthiness of the players and put the information out so the market can employ it. Now what they would do is move away from a guaranteed assessment of credibility by a national registry on these statistical rating agencies, and they would let you have this designation for an outfit that has been in existence 3 years, with no evaluation of the competence and the credibility underlying the assessments made by these credit rating agencies. The result, of course, is predictable: widely different quality in the credit assessment brought forward by the rating agencies. This is very bad business. Very bad business for virtually all involved. For the investors: Well, you want to make an investment, but they say the Humpty Dumpty rating agency gives this a triple star, grade A rating. Well, you don't really know a lot about Humpty Dumpty rating agency, but it sounds pretty good. They are one of these statistical rating agencies because they have been around 3 years, and you make your investment accordingly. The competence of the Humpty Dumpty rating agency matters, which is why the present approach to the national registry matters. Deregulating it is bad for investors and people will lose money. Now, if it is bad for investors, you might say, well, that must really be a boon, then, to companies that want to fleece investors by raising capital on noncredit-worthy enterprises. Not necessarily. I think this is bad for companies too. And let me tell you about an experience I encountered as an insurance commissioner. We had standard rating agencies, and then there was a startup rating agency. It got a lot of press. Inevitably, they kept coming up with more alarming rating assessments of the insurance companies, and that got widely reported in the financial press because it was newsworthy. It was a bit of the ``sky is falling'' rating agency. And yet here is how that rating agency made money: If you wanted to call in and get their rating of an insurance company, you had to pay them money to get that information. They made money for every call into their office. So they put out a fancy press release on an insurance company or on insurance company ratings at large, drum up free media coverage, get people calling in, and by the calls, make a lot of money. In the process, I believe they were often very unfair in their ratings and giving a falsely ominous impression of the solvency status of the insurance companies. So this thing, while bad for investors, it may be bad for companies too because in this proliferation of unregulated rating agencies, you are going to have some rating agencies that just love to tell a terrible story, irrespective of whether it is fair or whether it is not. So really disconnecting from the Securities and Exchange Commission and to have the majority in the House run this deregulation of rating agencies, ultimately so critical to the function of our financial markets, is, frankly, just a little nutty, not well founded, not well thought out; and it is an idea that ought to be cured by the passage of the substitute, which basically brings it back in line with the quality assurance of nationally registered statistical rating agencies. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. POMEROY

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

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. To start out, let's have a little truth in labeling. The chairman of the Ways and Means Committee calls it a compromise bill. Compromise involves some give and take. This is a bill that he created, no consultation, no discussion with the Senate, no discussion with the Ways and Means Committee, no discussion with anybody. That is not negotiation, that is not a compromise. A compromise involves meeting people halfway. If you look at the revenue lost here, fully considering the lost revenue between 2010 and 2020, it is virtual repeal. We have been able to calculate it is roughly 80 percent of the cost of full repeal. Again, no compromise. Let's put this in the context of the fiscal situation facing this country, because this House majority has voted to raise the debt limit of this country, voted to raise it in March, and because the deficits were so horrendous, they had to vote to raise it again in May. It now exceeds $9 trillion. With the revenue, the $800 billion revenue lost in the next decade, it will all have to be borrowed. Who are we borrowing from to help under their bill? The shocking fact is 43 percent of those who we are borrowing from to help are estates over $25 million, the richest few in this country. There is another way. We can take the 2009 of $7 million for joint estates. This is the compromise Democrats would be willing to go for. It takes care of 99.7 percent of the estates in this country. We will go one further. We will dedicate the estate tax revenue over that to the Social Security Trust Fund. Social Security actuaries tell us such a step would add 5 years to the life of the Social Security program. So you have a very stark choice here, the majority bill which is going to hurt Social Security, or our bill which would add 5 years.

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

Mr. POMEROY. Yes, I am.

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, I am going to be brief with the 5 minutes allocated for this side. I do not intend to use all of it, with the reason we are presenting this information and this alternative under the motion to recommit is because the Rules Committee, when offering this House a so-called compromise on the estate tax reform, only allowed one version and did not allow the minority even the opportunity to present a different level of compromise. So we have to use this motion to recommit, and I will tell you quickly what it does. It would exclude all estates from taxation at the $3 million level and $6 million joint level beginning January of next year. In 2009, it would move as the present law affords to the $3.5- and $7 million, excluding all estates below that. Many of us believe that the estate tax needs reform, and we think this reform at the levels $7 million joint exclusion from 2009 and thereafter is very meaningful reform indeed, and, in fact, it makes the estate tax go away for 99.7 percent of the people in this country. Yet it compares very favorably in cost impact to the Thomas proposal before the House; indeed, 40 percent of the costs of outright repeal for the motion to recommit compared to the Thomas proposal, which, when fully phased in years 2010 to 2020, costs 80 percent, maybe even more. We estimate at least $800 billion will be lost, and we mean actually borrowed because we are in deep deficits. It is a simple fact. You take the tax off some, somebody else is probably going to have to pick up the tab. So here you have got a tax that is of no consequence to 99.7 percent of the people in this country. We are going to repeal the tax on the wealthiest sliver. You know what it means. Everyone else is going to have to pick up the slack. This is a House that has voted to raise the national borrowing limit in March, raised it again in May, all of this driven by out-of-control deficits, and here you are about to advance a proposal that would lose $800 billion in the next decade, the very decade when 78 million Americans will move into that 65-year age group beginning the draw on Medicare, which goes out of balance in 2012, beginning to draw on Social Security, which goes out of balance in 2017. We have got to take a breath here and ask ourselves what have we done to the revenue base of this country? We have got solemn commitments, the promise of Medicare and the promise of Social Security, and there is no way in the world we have the funding base, particularly if the Thomas alternative would become law, to meet those promises to the American people. So I say this: Let us pass this motion to recommit. Let us give estate tax relief to 99.7 percent of the people in this country, and let us retain some ability of our great Nation to meet the promises of Medicare and Social Security to those counting on it.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, the rule before us allows only one alternative. You know, it has been said before but it deserves repeating today: As our troops fight for democracy in Iraq, we ought to show that we can have democracy on the floor of the House. I went to the Rules Committee with another alternative for reforming the estate tax, and to have on a party-line vote the majority refuse to allow the Members of this body to even consider any other alternative but the Thomas proposal, in my opinion, does violence to notions that this is a deliberative body where ideas can be considered. The bill before us is not a reform bill of the estate tax, it is virtual repeal, and make no bones about that, virtual repeal of the estate tax. Look at this chart. The cost of the alternative I advance and have not been allowed to offer is 40 percent the cost of repeal. Our early estimates on the full phased-in cost of the Thomas proposal is that it will lose 80 percent at least of the revenue of full repeal. That is not a compromise. I bet you are going to hear some of these guys say we are going to compromise. This is not a compromise, it is virtual repeal. You lose 80 percent of the revenue, it is virtual repeal, no compromise. Now this is a shocking loss of revenue to help a very, very few people. The proposal that I was not allowed to introduce would have made exempt all of the estates but for 3/10 of 1 percent. Earlier there was a gentleman from Indiana said small businesses have been lost all over the State of Indiana. I believe he is factually mistaken. I issue a challenge to him right now and anyone else, bring me the names. Bring me the names. There is no fact whatsoever behind these assertions that this is about small farms and family businesses. This is about the wealthiest estates in this country, and now let me put it really to bear. The distribution table on the Thomas proposal is that of the $800 billion that would be lost between 2010 and 2020, 43 percent would go to those worth more than $20 million. In a decade when we are going to have 78 million Americans turning 65, we have Social Security going out of balance in 2018, we have Medicare going out of balance in 2012, we are going to take $800 billion and ship it to those who make more than $20 million? What in the world are we thinking about? Medicare and Social Security apply to everybody. The estate tax proposal advanced by the majority today applies to way fewer, way fewer than 3/10 of 1 percent. This sliver showed the number of estates that would have been taxable under the proposal I have not been allowed to offer today. Their proposal that goes to the $20 million crowd and up even deals with a smaller number yet. What in the world are we thinking? The preceding speaker said he cannot think of anything more that does violence to the American dream than the death tax. Let me tell you about a few other things that do violence to the American dream: This Congress running up a debt and having to vote not just once in March, but again in May to raise the borrowing limit of the country, putting us nearly $10 trillion in debt. Another thing that does violence to the American dream, the cuts that have been made in student loans so people can pursue the notion of upward mobility, they can get ahead in this world, but they cannot afford to get to college, and they cut student loans in the face of it. And yet the portion of the American dream that they seem most concerned about is for this $20-million-and-up crowd, even while we have no idea how we are going to solve this Medicare solvency imbalance or how we are going to fund the Social Security imbalance. Let me come back to the basic issue presented by this rule. How come we only have their plan to consider? We have a plan, a plan that makes the estate tax go away completely for 99.7 percent of the people in this country, and they won't even allow it for consideration. Vote down this rule, vote down this virtual repeal of the estate tax.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall votes Nos. 289 and 290, I was unable to cast votes due to the delay of my Northwest Airlines flight as a result of a thunderstorm over National Airport. There were six of us House Members on this flight. I would have voted ``yea'' on the Sergeant Jacob Dan Dones Post Office Designation Act--H.R. 5540, and also ``yea'' on the Larry Winn, Jr. Post Office Building Designation Act--H.R. 5504.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, the resolution under consideration today presents Congress with a single option--to endorse the Administration's handling of the War in Iraq. Such an endorsement means committing our troops to protracted, open-ended involvement for an indefinite number of years while incurring thousand of additional casualties and spending hundreds of billions of dollars. Unfortunately, this is a counterproductive option. I do not believe the newly elected Iraqi government can achieve the politically daunting challenge of building a democracy as long as there is an expectation that the United States will always be there providing the principle security and defense roles for the country. Exceedingly difficult compromises between the ethnic and secretarian factions in Iraq need to be made, and those compromises must be determined by the Iraqis themselves. The Administration's course currently is emboldening these factions to seek maximum advantage for their respective groups--even as the business of building a united country is harmed significantly. The result is a full blown insurgency which increasingly looks like a civil war in destruction and effect. The Administration did not foresee these challenges, and certain officials still appear to be in denial of this reality. The United States deserves new leadership on Iraq and a new course, and the Administration should take the steps to remove those who have brought us to the present circumstances and revitalize our effort with a new leadership team. I have traveled to Iraq on three occasions. After my last trip in October 2005, I came away strongly believing in the need for a timely transition of responsibility to Iraqis. One month later, when this House debated a resolution ordering an immediate withdrawal of troops from the nation, I opposed the resolution, but I noted the following: ``We need to come together on an exit strategy for our soldiers based upon the transition of security to the Iraqis themselves in order to give the new democratic government of the people of Iraq a fair chance of success.'' I still oppose an ``immediate withdrawal'' ordered by the U.S. Congress. Some will argue that opposition to an indefinite U.S. military presence in Iraq means support for immediately abandoning Iraq. This is completely false. I favor leaving military commanders with authority for the military redeployment and troop drawdown. I do not favor near term deadlines imposed by Congress as the way to accomplish this result. I strongly support our troops and their families. I support giving them the resources they need to do their job, and the benefits they deserve. I support winning the Global War on Terror. For these reasons, I cannot support this resolution. It is too open- ended, too blind to the reality of the difficulties we are facing, and too simplistic a resolution for the complex situation in which we find ourselves.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, a preceding speaker noted the supplemental bill just passed. I want to speak about an aspect left out of this supplemental bill because of the actions of the majority. Any assistance for farmers outside of the gulf region who suffered disaster losses in the 2005 production year were left out of the disaster bill. Supported by a bipartisan majority in the Senate, left out on a party-line vote in the House. Our Nation's farmers have provided this majority and this President with plenty of help over the years, and they certainly deserve better than to have the President of the United States issue his first veto threat on a disaster bill that helped farmers when natural disasters took their crops. They, instead, provided just for hurricane, farmers who lost during the hurricane. Well, look, maybe a drought does not have a name, maybe a flood does not have a name, but when you have a natural disaster and it wipes out our farmers, they deserve help from our government. That is how you keep family farmers in business, and it is a darn shame the Republicans stopped it in this bill.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Madam Speaker, rural America is anxiously awaiting the deliberations taking place regarding the relief for those who experienced 2005 crop failure. Farmers across the country have just completed the most expensive spring planting in the history of U.S. agriculture, and for those carrying the debt from last year due to disaster losses in reaping their crop, it has pushed them to the brink of bankruptcy. The Senate has committed on a bipartisan basis meaningful disaster assistance, when the House Appropriations Committee voted it down on a party line vote with Republicans opposing. Now in conference committee, we have learned that House Republicans are doing their dead level best to strip this assistance our farmers need so badly out of the legislation. Farmers of this country need to know if disaster assistance efforts fall short, it was the majority, the House Republicans, that stood in the way and prevented us from getting the disaster assistance they so desperately need.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Chairman, I very much thank my chairman for yielding. We are at a time when we have the greatest trade imbalance that we have ever had in the history of our country, and the effect of this amendment would be to significantly encroach upon a sugar program that has kept domestic sugar production part of the agricultural production in this country. It is very much on the bubble. Throw open the doors, there are countries around the world heavily subsidizing their domestic product, providing a global dump price well below fair cost to production, meaning the end of U.S. production, reliance entirely upon imported sugar. Now, that has a consequence that goes well beyond trade imbalance because, at that point in time, the pricing of our groceries, turning in part upon the sugar ingredient found in so many of our processed foods, is like the oil we import and burn, out of our control. Volatile pricing of global sugar, volatile pricing of groceries. What we have with the sugar program is fair pricing, a stable food market, a program that needs to continue.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, it has only been a few hours since we resolved the vote on the budget. To the disappointment of many of us, the budget was passed, and the fifth debt limit increase, the second since March of this year alone, has now been authorized. But there are other features in this budget passed last night that many of us found objectionable, including those steep, steep cuts in nondefense discretionary spending in order to pay for those tax cuts disproportionately benefiting the wealthiest people in this country. Those who need the help the least get the most help in terms of huge tax cuts, and vital programs to this country get savaged under the spending cuts moved forward. I want to elaborate on the earlier debate carried by our ranking member, Dave Obey, in the Appropriations Committee, because in this rule there is language which incorporates the spending limits of the House-passed budget last night. I want to make this point very clear, because there were 12 Members of the majority that voted against that budget. There was another group that got nonbinding language saying some of the money may somehow, somewhere, possibly be put back. Well, now we know that nonbinding language means nothing at all. The rule carries forward enforcement of these cuts. And so if you are a moderate Republican or a member of the minority that believes going down this path is unwise and sells out priorities of the American people, then you should not vote for this rule today. Anyone voting against that budget with concerns about these devastating cuts in nondefense discretionary spending should vote against this rule. It imposes the cuts on the appropriations process.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, the preceding 1 minute could not have been more false. Today's budget raises the debt limit again, today's budget will add deficits in each of the years of its operation, today's budget will bring the national debt to $9.6 trillion, and to hear words on the floor of this House about this being a budget of fiscal discipline, this being a budget responding to the concerns of taxpayers worried about red ink, that is pure unadulterated hooey. This budget is a fiscal catastrophe. It raises the debt limit in May, just after we raised the debt limit in March. Anyone thinking that the Nation's finances have spun completely under control under the consolidated power of this administration and this Republican Congress needs only to look at this budget and only needs to look at the fact that they are back at the bank one more time, raising the debt limit, to understand the deep trouble that we are in.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, today's time line reveals everything about the programs and the politics of the majority running this Congress. This afternoon they gathered at the White House. The President signed at a time of staggering deficits yet another tax cut skewed to help the most affluent while doing little to help those who needed help. This evening in the middle of this debate, they are going to recess so they can go to a big fund-raising party and reap the special interest contributions of those who have benefited so much from their cash-and-carry government. And after that, they are going to come back to the floor of this House and vote to raise the national debt as part of this budget. That is right, raise the national debt as part of this budget. I haven't heard Mr. Putnam say anything about the language in here that raises the national debt $653 billion. It was buried on the bottom of page 121 of their budget. It is a mere 2 months since they last raised it. They raised the national debt in March, they pass the tax cut, they have a fund-raiser, and they come back to the floor of the House to raise the national debt again. In fact, it is the fifth time under this President that they have raised the national debt: June 2002, May 2003, November 2004, March 2006, May 2006. And do you know what? They are planning to raise it again once the election is over. If there is any further clearer evidence that we have a totally irresponsible majority running this country into a fiscal ditch, that is requiring unending borrowing which will saddle our children with a legacy of debt, I do not know what could more perfectly illustrate it than the events unfolding today. Sign a tax cut, have a fund-raiser, raise the national debt again: That is the fiscal record of this majority. That is why this budget must be defeated.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, the majority Members have said this is all about jobs. No, it's not. It's all about debt. Let me tell you something that you are not going to hear from a single proponent for this tax cut. The passage of it is going to necessitate raising the borrowing limit for our country yet another time because we are spiraling into further red ink under their reckless fiscal policy. Look at the record. June 2002, they raised the debt. May 2003, they raised the debt. November 2004, they raised the debt. March of this year, they raised the debt. And do you know what we have now discovered? In their budget documents that will be presented on this floor this week or next, they are going to raise the debt again. They just raised it in March, now they are going to raise it again. The record of this President will be that 42 Presidents left this country with a debt of $5.6 trillion, and under the watch of President George W. Bush, that debt will double. This could not be happening at a worse time. Seventy-eight million Americans are going to retire next decade. The draw on Social Security and Medicare will begin. And yet we are saddling those that will follow in our country with this staggering debt even while we have the entitlement obligations to meet. This feeding frenzy of more tax cuts, deeper fiscal imbalance, more borrowing, yet another borrowing, has got to stop. We are leaving our children with a legacy of debt they will never get out of. Do you know any family whose approach to retirement is to blow everything they have got, expecting fully that the children are going to take care of their debts, pay their medical bills, give them income to live on in retirement? Of course not. Families take care of their children. This Congress is selling our children short by saddling them with unending debt.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Speaker, I am going to oppose this motion to instruct. I certainly think there is a good intention behind it. Clearly, all of us have been concerned when we have had some of these conversions from a traditional pension plan to a hybrid plan, and older workers have suddenly found that they have been terribly disadvantaged in the conversion, seen their pension benefits and expected pension benefits reduced significantly. But here is why I don't like this motion. It fails to really address this issue in the context of what is in the marketplace. You have got defined benefit pensions that pay an annuity for as long as the employer lives. I think we should work together to make sure defined benefit pensions continue in the marketplace to the extent possible. To the extent we don't have a defined benefit pension, alternative employee benefits relative to retirement include a 401(k) plan, which is essentially a savings account, and then there is something in between, a hybrid plan that does capture the annuitized feature of the pension, calculated in a different way than the traditional pension calculation. Now, it is important that we have best practices and fair treatment in the conversion of a pension to a hybrid plan. But guess what? If we overly regulate the conversion from the pension to the hybrid plan, the employer will simply say, okay, we will go from the pension to the defined contribution plan. We are not going to make this intervening stop in the hybrid option, the cash balance option. We are just going to either scrap the benefit altogether or go right to the defined contribution plan. I am convinced that that is not in the interest of workers, and that is why I am convinced that the Senate approach, which is advanced by this motion to recommit, actually does not help the very workers that we care about and we intend to help. There is no question about the sincerity of the language by the proponents of this motion. They care about protecting older workers. It is just that, technically, what they have put before this body in a motion to recommit does not do that. I believe it actually may disadvantage the very people they hope to help by instead of moving to cash balance hybrid plans that at least preserve some features of the pension, they will just scrap that option altogether. I don't see anybody winning under that proposal. I urge a ``no'' vote.

Mr. POMEROY

Mr. POMEROY. Mr. Chairman, I rise to say that I will be voting against H.R. 609. In this age of rising global competitiveness, graduating from college has never been more important for America's students. However, as the importance of obtaining higher education is rising, so is college tuition and the amount of debt that students must borrow to earn a college degree. Since 2002, the cost of college has increased over 40 percent, with North Dakota's largest schools increasing their tuition by double digits in the past two academic years. In addition, last year 9.7 million students received federal education loans, with the typical student borrowing $15,500 to finance a bachelor's degree. In this climate, the bill before the House today does not adequately address the problem of college accessibility. First, the bill does not reverse the changes made in the budget reconciliation bill passed earlier this year, which included the largest cuts to the student aid program ever. The reconciliation bill increased interest rates for new loans to students and parents and imposed new consolidation fees on borrowers, making the repayment of loans more difficult. Second, although H.R. 609 does include some improvements to aid programs, these changes are not adequate to address the problems outlined above. For example, although H.R. 609 increases the maximum Pell grant award, the award was only increased $200--not enough to meet the increasing costs of college tuition. Unfortunately, H.R. 609 does not do enough for students and parents facing college costs and I am hopeful that this bill can be improved as it progresses through the legislative process.