Jared Polis

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran).

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida, a former member of the Rules Committee, Ms. Castor.

Mr. POLIS. I yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself 30 seconds. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide that, immediately after the House adopts this rule, we will bring up H.R. 1689, the Big Oil Welfare Repeal Act of 2011. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, with regard to the subsidy issue, the simple fact of the matter is that the Republicans are not for free markets. But what they are for is Big Oil co-opting free markets. In fact, 70 percent of all energy-related subsidies go to fossil fuels like oil and coal. Less than 5 percent of subsidies go to renewable energies like wind and solar. The gentleman from Utah pointed out that many of these subsidies help small drillers, and, in fact, that can be true. But it is easy to apply changes only to the Big Oil companies and not even affect independent producers. There's simply no excuse not to end this corporate welfare which keeps taxes for all Americans who pay their taxes artificially high. In fact, at the same time that BP was reaping sizable tax benefits from leasing the Deepwater Horizon rig, it turned out that the company was using the tax break for the oil industry to write off 70 percent of the rent for Deepwater Horizon. That tax subsidy cost American taxpayers $225,000 a day since the lease for Deepwater Horizon began. And that's just one example of many. I also want to address some misperceptions regarding President Obama's policies regarding oil resources. The Obama administration is allowing, on average, more drilling than the Bush administration did. In fact, the Obama administration approved more leases in 2010 than the Bush administration did in any year except one of his presidency. Again, in moving forward and reissuing permits, which the administration has already begun to do, this bill helps validate President Obama's leadership on this issue. The real issues at hand are the subsidies that the industry continues to receive. As long as we continue a policy of using taxpayer dollars to artificially pick winners and losers in the economy, the winner here being Big Oil, the loser being American taxpayers, we will continue to hurt energy security, destroy jobs, and continue to put our environment at risk. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Cicilline).

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself 15 seconds just to restate what my colleague, the gentlewoman from Maryland, stated: If the Republicans are against the public option, if they are against the private option in the form of the exchanges, the only option left is pay more insurance premium. That simply is not acceptable to the American people. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Garamendi).

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' and defeat the previous question so we can debate and pass jobs legislation today, rather than legislation to increase the health care premiums that Americans pay. I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and the underlying bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, I want to further discuss the benefits of school-based health centers. A wide range of research and evaluations have demonstrated that school-based health centers are cost-effective investments in our Nation's health care safety net for children and adolescents and also help improve academic performance. Now, each school-based health program is different, as they should be. Some of the services often include things like well-child and well- adolescent exams, immunizations, treatment for illness or injury, including management of chronic conditions, like obesity, diabetes and asthma; and they also frequently include services like mental health assessment and treatment, prevention programs to help reduce smoking, to help reduce teenage pregnancy rates, to help reduce violence. They frequently include substance abuse counseling and nutrition counseling, as well as dental cleaning. These are services that prevent costly emergency services and hospitalizations later and help keep kids in school where they should be learning. Most importantly, stronger school-based health centers lead to stronger, more successful children and adolescents across the country. By bringing health care services to the children where they spend most of their day, at school, school-based health centers are a sensible and inexpensive way to deliver basic health care services to children all over the country. This unwise legislation undermines our fiscal condition by wasting an opportunity to leverage local funding. Providing capital support to school-based health centers is a Federal investment that is a good deal for taxpayers. That is because when we provide modest Federal support to school capital projects, local and State funding, in partnership with nonprofits and community health clinics, is spent on operating activities, staffing and other equipment. What a great value for our Federal dollar. Likewise, the value of this Federal investment is immense to local districts, many of whom are at their bonding capacity, who can't build school-based health centers on their own. However, many of these districts will benefit tremendously, and the students and families, from school-based health care clinics. The research is clear, Mr. Speaker. Over a decade of studies consistently find positive benefits of school-based health centers. These benefits include better student academic achievement, increased school attendance and reduced tardiness among inner-city children who receive counseling in the school-based health center, fewer school discipline referrals for students who receive mental health services, and increased learning readiness and parental involvement. As we discuss in this Congress reducing the learning gap, helping all students achieve, and ensuring that every American, regardless of where they live, has access to hope and opportunity through a quality education, school-based health care clinics are an important part of the solution. In Colorado alone, there are 46 school-based health care clinics in 18 school districts, including one in the Summit County School District, which I represent, which is applying for funding under this program, and another applicant from Eagle County, Colorado. Eight other Colorado applications are going forward under this opportunity, as they are throughout the Nation. This is the initiative, Mr. Speaker, that Republicans are seeking to eliminate. They say they want a fiscally responsible budget and more jobs, but what we see instead is their priority to stop programs that save money and create jobs and increase student achievement and learning, like school-based health care centers. There can be no doubt about how the new majority is going about its business. There are no attempts to find common ground, like we have in House Resolution 9, and to work on ways to improve health care or to implement pooling mechanisms or to allow purchasing across State lines of insurance policies. Rather, we are dealing with press releases disguised as legislation that will neither pass the other body nor be signed into law. That's not governance. That's immaturity. And the only Americans being asked to sacrifice in the name of deficit reduction are those who have very little, if not nothing, left to lose and no real way to fight back. That's not leadership. Mr. Speaker, we can and must do better. I urge my colleagues to oppose the rule and the underlying bill. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide that immediately after the House adopts this rule, it will bring up H.R. 1366, the National Manufacturing Strategy Act of 2011. This bill, introduced by Mr. Lipinski of Illinois, will require the President to develop a national manufacturing strategy in order to boost traditional and high-tech manufacturing, spur American job growth, and strengthen the middle class. This bill passed the House on a bipartisan vote of 379-38 in the 111th Congress. Manufacturing is a cornerstone of our Nation's economy. The U.S. Government, through its policies and programs, has major influence on our manufacturing base, and our national security, energy, and transportation systems rely on that base. We must unify government programs, leading to increased efficiency, and promote policies to promote our domestic manufacturing base to help our competitiveness in the global market. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record along with extraneous material immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. I am happy to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Garamendi).

Mr. POLIS. I will be happy to yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from California.

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

Mr. POLIS. I yield an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds to respond really briefly. In the minority report from the committee, it discusses the oversight of the exchanges. Specifically, the Government Accountability Office is required to review the operations and the administration of the exchanges. In addition, not one, not two, but three congressional committees--Energy and Commerce, Oversight and Government Reform, and other congressional committees--can provide the oversight of the implementation of the Affordable Health Care Act according to section 1311. Again, if there is additional oversight, as the gentleman from California seeks, why are we not discussing a bill that provides additional oversight? We all want this money to be spent correctly and well. With that, I am proud to yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee).

Mr. POLIS. I yield the gentlewoman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute to respond before further yielding. The gentleman from California again identified several areas where there are opportunities for both parties to work together: allowing the sale of insurance across State lines, something I certainly support; pooling for high-risk individuals; reforming the medical liability system. Again, it really goes to a question of if we are, in fact, repealing in part or all various parts of the health care reform, what is replacing it. When we talk about pooling of high-risk individuals, if we can put together a way of doing that, that can effectively serve as a marketplace or as an exchange. What this bill simply does is repeal the support for the exchanges, leaving many of these with preexisting conditions, particularly those who work for small businesses or are self-employed, entirely in the lurch. As we discuss how to improve health care for the American people, it's critical to actually have the solution to the policy problem that's been identified. The gentleman talked about an inadequate selection process with regard to the use of funds, inadequate congressional oversight. Again, why not bring a bill forward that talks about setting the right process in place to allow for the correct oversight of the use of these funds? It's a question of making it work for the American people rather than throwing the baby out with the bath water. With that, Mr. Speaker, I am proud to yield 2 minutes to my colleague, the gentlewoman from Maryland (Ms. Edwards).

Mr. POLIS. Today, while millions of Americans remain unemployed and millions more await the chance to receive affordable health care, the Republicans are spending another week rehashing old debates instead of talking about creating jobs and, in fact, in this case, undermining Americans' access to quality health care. This rule brings forth two bills. First, the majority brings forth, under this bill, legislation that will prevent Americans from accessing the exchanges which are competitive marketplaces in which to buy private insurance. Now, there's a lot of subterfuge and misinformation in this debate. For instance, there is no ObamaCare option. There is no public insurance option that we are even discussing here. What is being discussed is a marketplace in which individuals, primarily those who work in small businesses or are self-employed, will have access to choose from the private policy of their choice. According to the Congressional Budget Office, under this Republican proposal, 2 million fewer Americans will be enrolled in exchanges in 2015. The Congressional Budget Office also says that H.R. 1213 will result in higher premiums in the exchange. Again, a bill that is delivering higher premiums for American citizens--hardly, hardly the outcry that I have heard on the stump. I had a chance to have public meetings in the last 2 weeks back in our district, as many Members of Congress have. My constituents, Mr. Speaker, did not request that we deliver higher health insurance premiums. They wanted us to deal with the deficit. They wanted us to deal with jobs and the economy. Not a single constituent of mine asked for higher health insurance premiums, which seems to be a priority of this Congress. Now, there may be a talking point involved, and certainly both of these bills today were also included in H.R. 2, which was a repeal of health care reform, largely. Now we are looking at individual pieces. But this new marketplace has historically been an idea that has had strong bipartisan support: to have competitive health care exchanges; to keep in tact America's employment-based system while expanding access to tens of millions of people, including small businesses and people who are self-employed. Truly, the exchanges represent an opportunity for a more competitive and a more transparent marketplace that empowers consumers to make the choice between private insurers. The other bill that is brought forth under this particular rule, after we have dispensed with denying health care to an estimated 2 million more Americans through the exchanges, we are also, in this next bill, eliminating funding for school-based health clinic construction, renovation, and equipment. That would particularly harm our Nation's health care services, especially for children, youth, and families and those with low incomes. School-based health care clinics serve students whose access to health care is limited; and frequently, the scope of services is determined by school officials in partnership with parents and community-based health care initiatives. Services are designed to identify problems early, provide continuity of care, and improve academic participation. These programs save money by providing access to preventive care that frequently alludes many of the families affected. And yet also, while we are denying basic preventive care to our Nation's youth, the passage of this bill will also deny job opportunities to Americans all across the country who are ready with shovel-ready projects to begin improving and building school-based health care clinics. So here we are with a bill: less jobs, less health care, less education--hardly the priorities that I think the voters wanted for the 112th Congress. Democrats believe strongly that we need to make tough choices to end the deficit and end the climbing spiral of debt. But what we are left with with these two bills, as separate from H.R. 2, is actually the worst of both worlds. The Republicans leave in place the taxes that were used to pay for health care reform--they leave in place in these two bills the medical device tax; they leave in place the tax on unearned income--and yet they remove the benefits to the American people from these taxes. Whenever the American people agree to any degree of taxes, they want to see a tangible result. But what is being done with these bills is leaving in place the taxes of health care reform and removing the benefits to the American people of health care reform. That's hardly a balanced and fair approach, and it's one that the House should reject. I would remind my colleagues of House Resolution 9, which I supported on the floor of the House of Representatives. It dealt with 13 items out of the original jurisdiction of our Rules Committee before the gentleman from New York joined our Rules Committee. We instructed the House on replacing health care reform and what some areas for working on it would be. I would like to submit to the Record in the context of this debate, Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 9, which was adopted by the House and, indeed, discusses changing existing health care law within the various committees of jurisdiction to foster economic growth and private sector job creation; to lower health care premiums, preserve a patient's ability to keep their health care plan, provide people with preexisting conditions affordable access to health care; and many, many other good ideas. But rather than discussing any of these 13 points that were contained in House Resolution 9, the business of the committees of jurisdiction has apparently been not only to repeal health care reform generally but now to repeal each of the individual components while leaving the taxes in place. We would encourage these committees to comply with House Resolution 9. And I think by rejecting this bill before us today, we are sending a powerful message to the committees of jurisdiction that rather than talking about repeal, repeal, repeal, they need to also discuss replace. What are we going to do if the exchanges don't exist or are handicapped to provide people with preexisting conditions access to affordable health care? Again, if we repeal the support for the exchanges, how are we fostering economic growth and private sector growth? How are we encouraging small businesses and self-employed people to have access to the same health care services at a similar cost that large employers already have? I call upon my colleagues to reject this rule and both underlying bills and begin the discussions of how to improve and build upon health care reform, finding a common ground between Members of both parties and saving taxpayers money to help reduce the deficit. H. Res. 9 In the House of Representatives, U.S., January 20, 2011. Resolved, That the Committee on Education and the Workforce, the Committee on Energy and Commerce, the Committee on the Judiciary, and the Committee on Ways and Means, shall each report to the House legislation proposing changes to existing law within each committee's jurisdiction with provisions that-- (1) foster economic growth and private sector job creation by eliminating job-killing policies and regulations; (2) lower health care premiums through increased competition and choice; (3) preserve a patient's ability to keep his or her health plan if he or she likes it; (4) provide people with pre-existing conditions access to affordable health coverage; (5) reform the medical liability system to reduce unnecessary and wasteful health care spending; (6) increase the number of insured Americans; (7) protect the doctor-patient relationship; (8) provide the States greater flexibility to administer Medicaid programs; (9) expand incentives to encourage personal responsibility for health care coverage and costs; (10) prohibit taxpayer funding of abortions and provide conscience protections for health care providers; (11) eliminate duplicative government programs and wasteful spending; (12) do not accelerate the insolvency of entitlement programs or increase the tax burden on Americans; or (13) enact a permanent fix to the flawed Medicare sustainable growth rate formula used to determine physician payments under title XVIII of the Social Security Act to preserve health care for the nation's seniors and to provide a stable environment for physicians. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York for giving me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. It's my understanding this is his first rule that he is managing in his name on the floor of the House, and I congratulate him in that regard. In the 111th Congress, I had the opportunity to manage a number of rules, and I had a perfect record--I never lost a rule. This Congress as well, I too have a perfect record--I have never won a rule. I wish the gentleman from New York success in his efforts and congratulate him on his appointment to the Rules Committee and look forward to working with him throughout the 112th Congress.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from California for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, for all the talk of Republicans' commitment to cutting spending, there are several odd things about this bill before us that would lead one to believe that it's more of a partisan political exercise than a serious attempt to get the Nation's fiscal house in order, which we need and deserve as Americans. Under this bill, critical services that many Americans rely on to educate our children, to keep our streets safe, to improve public health, to keep our water and air clean would face tens of billions of dollars worth of real and difficult cuts. Times are tough. We know we have to cut spending. Okay. So why does this bill then provide the Pentagon with an additional $5 billion above the previous request at a time when the civilian and uniformed military, including thoughtful policymakers from both parties, believe that we need to reduce spending across the board? Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mullen stated that our national debt is our biggest national security threat. He also noted that the past decade's doubling of the budget of the Department of Defense has led to undisciplined spending and waste within the department. Secretary Gates concurs, stating that we can't hold ourselves exempt from the belt- tightening. Yet, despite members of the military and civilians involved with defense saying that they, too, can't be spared, not only have they been spared by the Republican majority, but their budget has been increased by $5 billion. The recent bipartisan Commission on Fiscal Responsibility, often called the ``Simpson-Bowles commission,'' called for substantial defense reductions over the next 10 years. They recommended cuts that would have led to $60 billion in savings and security spending in the first year and would have kept our Nation safe. In fact, if we were to implement the commission's recommendations around security spending, we would save $100 billion in 2015 alone. But Republicans didn't go after their favorite areas of Big Government spending. Instead, they went after our efforts to strengthen our schools, to keep our air and water clean and to keep our streets safe; and the rest of their so-called ``spending cuts'' don't seem to be saving much at all. In fact, yesterday, we had an interesting discussion in the Rules Committee about whether this bill really even saves close to the $38 billion claimed. Apparently, most of the savings are from allocations of money that wouldn't be spent anyway. An Associated Press story yesterday called this bill ``budget tricks,'' saying that $23 billion of the $38 billion aren't even real savings, that they're counting savings from unspent census money. This is from the AP: leftover Federal construction funding; $2.5 billion from the most recent renewal of highway programs that can't even be spent because of restrictions that have already been set by other legislation. Today's Wall Street Journal calls the Republican spending bill ``spending cut hokum.'' Now, the ``spending cut hokum'' bill identifies that there was $18 billion in real cuts and $20 billion in fake accounting tricks that are not real cuts. Yesterday in Rules, I actually had the opportunity to ask the chairman of the Appropriations Committee if he could explain that discrepancy between the claimed cuts and the real cuts which those who have dived in have identified, and he demurred on that account. So, in the end, what have the Republicans accomplished? I'd like to talk about this graphically and sort of show the American people what we're talking about here: Now, with these charts, I use the Wall Street Journal's figures, which credit the Republicans for more cuts than does the Associated Press, but out of caution, I want to trust the Journal in this case as a well-researched source and use their figures even though they have less than the AP. The Wall Street Journal still says that the majority of the Republican cuts are, in fact, hokum cuts. So here is what we're talking about, Madam Speaker: This is the deficit. This is the CBO's, the Congressional Budget Office, estimate of the deficit. It is $1.399 trillion. This is what we're talking about here. This is the continuing resolution savings. That's it; not one penny more. Let me sort of take an example of an American family. We'll have to take a few zeros off of this for most Americans to even understand these figures. Let's say the deficit is $139,000 and not $1.399 trillion. I was a small business man before I came to Congress; so I understand how to balance a budget. I know most American families are trying to balance their family paychecks, to stay in their homes, to make their mortgage payments. It's $139,000 you lose in a year. That's tough. You have to take out a second mortgage and max out your credit cards, and you try to cover that $139,000, okay? Then you know you've got to make some serious changes. What are you going to do? You hem and you haw for a couple of months; you argue with your creditors; you threaten to shut down your business. On the eve of shutting down your business, because you can't afford another loss of $139,000, what do you do? You figure out how to lose $137,000 the next year. Do you know what? That $137,000 is going to put that American family out of business just as surely as that $139,000, but that is the Republican approach to this bill. Now let me talk about some of the alternatives we have before us.

Mr. POLIS. I would be happy to discuss this on the gentleman's own time. I want to go through this excellent chart. If the gentleman wants to come over, he can look at what we have here and what the Democrats have presented. If we were serious about deficit reduction, Republicans could have supported several amendments offered by Democrats and voted on in the House when we debated H.R. 1. The Democratic amendments alone would have cut spending by nearly $129 billion, more than three times the amount that's even claimed in this bill. Here are some examples: Congressman Stark and Congresswoman Lee offered one amendment that would have reduced defense spending to its level 3 years ago--we were already in two wars at that time as well-- saving $36 billion in the first year alone, and that would have left intact the defense budget of $688 billion, more than enough to meet the security needs of our Nation. Congressman Nadler offered an amendment that would have finally ended our support for the war in Afghanistan, saving $90 billion. Congresswoman Woolsey offered an amendment that would have saved $415 million by ending the V-22 Osprey program. In fact, just yesterday in Rules, I also proposed an amendment that would have reduced our troop presence in Europe, which would have saved $415 million. Our European allies, Madam Speaker, are some of the richest countries in the world. It's time they paid their fair way. What is the strategic rationale for an ongoing presence in Germany? The Nazis are gone. The Soviets are gone. Even former Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld has questioned the ongoing presence of our troops in Europe. I also proposed an amendment eliminating the drug czar. The drug czar's office spends $21 million a year; yet drug use has gone up since its inception. Madam Speaker, we are never going to balance the entire budget just by reducing the funds Congress spends each year as part of the appropriations process--clearly, we all can agree we need to look at revenues and entitlements--and you're not going to make even the slightest dent in the deficit if you exempt defense spending from any cuts. In this continuing resolution before us, Republicans have exempted more than half of the domestic discretionary spending from any cuts, and it becomes very clear that the Republican plan isn't so much about serious deficit reduction than it is about protecting their favorite Big Government spending while simultaneously slashing away at their favorite targets, like education, the environment and the safety net. Here is what we could potentially accomplish if we work together: This shows the Republican cuts in this CR. We even add in, for the sake of argument, the hokum cuts. We put them in here too--it's the Wall Street Journal's term, not mine--and we include the proposed Democratic amendments. I think this is something that we could be proud of. Do you know what, Madam Speaker? I think more Democrats would support a program that didn't only cut the program which so many on my side of the aisle feel strongly about but that also makes some of the difficult decisions with where the real money is with regard to defense and security spending. Yes. Just like that American family that we raised, digging its way out of a $127,000-a-year loss, we need to make a real impact on reducing the Federal budget deficit. This will take action across the aisle to make sure that we can leave our country in a better situation and that we can help the next generation fight its way out from the burden of debt that we risk placing upon them if we continue the big spending policies of the Republican Party. [From the Wall Street Journal, April 13, 2011] Spending Cut Hokum A mini-revolt is brewing among Republican backbenchers on Capitol Hill now that the specific spending cuts in Friday's budget deal are being revealed. After separating out the accounting gimmicks and one-year savings, the actual cuts look to be closer to $20 billion than to the $38 billion that both sides advertised. This is not going to help Speaker John Boehner's credibility with the tea party. Even $20 billion is worthwhile, and the genuine reductions include cuts in high-speed rail, Pell grants, highway projects, renewable energy programs, housing subsidies, low- income home energy assistance, agriculture programs, contributions to the United Nations, and many more. There is also an immediate across the board 0.2% reduction in all nondefense accounts. But the continuing resolution also saves money on paper through phantom cuts. The whopper is declaring $6.2 billion in savings by not spending money left from the 2010 Census. Congress also cuts $4.9 billion from the Justice Department's Crime Victims Fund, but much of that money was tucked away in a reserve fund that wouldn't have been spent this year in any event. The budgeteers claim $630 million in cuts from what are called ``orphan earmarks,'' or construction that never started, and $2 billion more for transportation projects, some of which were likely to be canceled. The Associated Press reports that $350 million in savings comes from a 2009 program to pay dairy farmers to compensate for low milk prices. Milk prices are high this year, so some of that money also would never have been spent. An estimated $17 billion comes from one-time savings in mandatory programs. The cuts are real, but the funding gets restored by law the next year, which means Republicans will have to refight the same battles. States lose some $3.5 billion in bonus money to enroll more kids in the Children's Health Insurance Program, but many states failed to qualify for that extra funding. These cuts don't reduce the spending baseline, so there are no compound savings over time. None of this is enough to defeat the budget at this point, but it is infuriating given the GOP leadership's flogging of that $38 billion top-line figure. On Sunday we heard the leadership might lose 30 backbenchers on the budget vote, but yesterday we were hearing it may be closer to 50 or 60. This will only heighten skepticism over the next budget showdown, and Mr. Boehner will have to drive a harder bargain. Above all, the hokum belies the House GOP's promise to usher in a new era of lawmaking candor and transparency. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. We have three speakers. We are possibly expecting a fourth.

Mr. POLIS. It is my honor to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews). (Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself 1 minute to respond. The gentleman from Kentucky called this an historic bill. I think much more of this kind of history, and we risk making our country's solvency history by drowning ourselves in a burden of debt. Again, effectively, for a family business that lost $139,000, losing $137,000 might be nice, but it puts you out of business just the same. I continue to express our wish that we included some of the Democratic cuts in this that added up to four times the amount of the proposed Republican cuts in this bill. As the Bard put it, the cutting in this bill is a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing. With that, it is my honor to yield 3 minutes to the ranking member of the Rules Committee, the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter).

Mr. POLIS. I yield the gentlewoman an additional 30 seconds.