Louise Slaughter

Ms. SLAUGHTER

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Tanner), the head of the Blue Dogs.

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Baird).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross) to address the fantasyland of this Mickey Mouse budget.

Ms. SLAUGHTER

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I once said that budgets are moral documents. They reflect our choices, our priorities and they most clearly define our values, as a government and as a Nation. Today's 5-year budget reconciliation is no different, and that is exactly why the Republicans in the House are worried. They are worried that the American people will see that they have sold out our American values. So it should come as no surprise that it has taken a week of intraparty fighting in the Republican Conference and one false start to get the bill to the floor. Why? Because they cannot muster the votes in their own party to get this budget passed. One of my Republican colleagues captured it best in yesterday's CQ Daily when he said, ``If the Republican Party cannot stand for responsible spending, then we stand for nothing at all.'' I agree with him on that point; and as this Republican leadership continues to flail and flounder, there can be only one conclusion drawn from this budget reconciliation, that this majority has come to stand for nothing at all, except for making the rich richer while the rest of America pays the bill. Because at its core, that is what this budget does, and it is what the budget was intentionally designed to do, cut vital programs and increase the national debt in order to create tax cuts for the rich and the superrich. I and many of my colleagues in this body, both Republican and Democrat, see nothing at all responsible about this agenda, and neither will the majority of the American people. This budget reconciliation is not worthy of the ideals of this Nation. If it gets out of the House tonight, this Congress should be ashamed. Republicans call this the Deficit Reduction Act, when very shortly they will actually increase our already-obscene deficit by another $5 billion by passing the tax cut bill. Republicans will claim on the floor tonight that they are reducing the deficit, but it is a deception. Do not be fooled by their Enron-style accounting. The majority deliberately chose to separate this bill from its planned package of $56 billion in tax cuts for the rich, more than half of which goes to the superrich, those with incomes over $1 million a year. Without missing a beat, they are trying to finance the tax cut, as well as the skyrocketing debt, on the backs of the poor, the disabled, the elderly, and the middle class. As a result, working Americans will pay more and get less. For instance, the budget will cut student aid programs by $14.3 billion, which will make college more expensive, or totally unaffordable, for you and your children and will ensure that literally millions of students will not have the means to achieve a higher education. Until earlier this evening, they were even planning to cut the school lunch programs for poor children and food stamps for needy families. I would ask, whose values are these? They certainly are not mine, and they are not the values of the hard-working families that I represent, which leads me to a very important point that I need to make here today. Three months ago, a stunned Nation watched as the national horror that was Hurricane Katrina unfolded on our television screens. No one could believe that this kind of widespread suffering could happen here in America. It was a sobering moment for this Nation. It was the moment that we understood that America had forgotten our moral responsibility to provide for the security and welfare of all our fellow Americans. I would ask my friends in the majority, in the wake of that realization, how can we cut the very programs that the victims of Hurricane Katrina will depend on to rebuild their lives? So that the richest among us can be even richer? Unfortunately, this majority sees fit to pull what little these victims have left right out from under their feet. The result of this budget will be the denial of affordable medical service to those who have nowhere else to turn and the creation of unprecedented health care premiums for those who can least afford them. Child support services are cut as well, making it harder for working parents to raise their children. I would ask my fellow citizens, have we learned nothing? Is this the America that you believe in? Last year alone, the salary of the major corporate CEOs increased by just an average of 30 percent. This year, the oil companies are making the highest profits in history. In fact, over the last 4 months alone, Exxon Mobil has earned just shy of $10 billion in profits, and middle- class Americans at this time can no longer afford to fill their cars with gas. As the winter approaches, middle-class families in the Northeast are having to choose between paying their skyrocketing heating bills and buying food for their families, and it is only November. All the while, the majority is making it harder for your children to go to college and more expensive to get decent health care for your family. I cannot think of anything less American than this. I cannot think of anything more out of touch with the values of our families. After all, no responsible parent in America would fail to provide their children food and clothes or an education just so they could afford to buy a boat or take a trip, but that is the moral equivalent of what this majority seeks to do here today; and it is a subversion of every value we hold dear, because as Americans we meet our responsibilities. We take care of our families. We pay our bills, and we should demand the same thing from this Republican government. That is why I am asking my colleagues to oppose this rule and strongly oppose this bill, because the budget sells out America. I would ask, if we accept this, what will be next? If we say that it is acceptable to slash education, health care, trade protection, senior medical coverage, affordable housing, student loans, foster care and family planning, if we agree to abandon all fiscal responsibility and further increase the already record national debt, just so that we can orchestrate one of the biggest giveaways to the rich, then what will be next? I know if we band together America can do better than this. We can do better than turning the American Dream into a privilege for the few, instead of a right for all. We must do better, and we need to start today by rejecting this bill. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Bean).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Scott).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Cardoza).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd). (Mr. BOYD asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

Ms. SLAUGHTER

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, due to an error, my vote for rollcall No. 580, on H.R. 2419, on agreeing to the conference report was not recorded. I voted ``yes'' on this rollcall.

Ms. SLAUGHTER

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably detained and missed 3 rollcall votes. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on H. Con. Res. 260, H.R. 1973, and H. Res. 444.

Ms. SLAUGHTER

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Lowey).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Lowey).

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

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, lately when Americans turn on the news at night, they do not see the government that they recognize. They hear about a war in the Middle East gone wrong, and they see suffering people left to fend for themselves in times of crisis. They learn more and more about a White House under siege, and they are forced to recognize the ugly truth that many of their congressional leaders are entangled in a web of corruption. While the criticism is justified and the concerns are real, the failures do not define America. It is important to remember that in difficult times, especially in difficult times, we must always keep close, in spite of the challenges at home and abroad, and that no other nation has shined the light of freedom and liberty as brightly as we have here in our country. No nation in history has given so much and asked for so little in return. That romantic and powerful notion of America as a force for good in a troubled world strikes at the very heart of what it means to be an American. It is that spirit which drives us as a Nation to create a government as good as its people, and today we take one step in helping to restore that feeling in America to embody the ideal of what we hold dear. It is a bill that will help Americans recognize their government once again. The foreign operations bill funds a number of different foreign assistance agencies and international organizations and, as such, has become both a critical and effective tool for this democracy to spread democratic values and concern for human rights around the world. This is legislation that the American people can take great pride in. After all, today you will generously give $2.82 billion to some of our noblest callings, such as easing the suffering of those around the world stricken by HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, and particularly in Africa. $14 billion that Americans earned this year will be used to give foreign assistance. These moneys will also help economic development in countries like Israel, Egypt, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Tibet, Colombia, and a number of other Eastern Bloc countries now struggling to become functioning democracies. It further spends $1.6 billion to help fund many of the well- intentioned international financial institutions which the United States participates in, such as the World Bank, the African Development Fund, and the voluntary U.N. programs such as UNICEF and the U.N. Development Program. These American dollars will assist those struggling societies to build a better life for themselves and their families. What we often fail to recognize is that foreign operations also help us here at home. The spending in the bill directly benefits our domestic economy. Through our many foreign assistance programs, we export American goods, American services and agricultural products all over the world. That means jobs for American families and a brighter future for families across the world. Of course, as with many complex pieces of legislation, I have some concerns with the conference report. Key among them is the Bush administration's insistence on maintaining a global gag rule which prevents critical family planning and health services aid from reaching the U.S. health clinics in underdeveloped and overpopulated countries where abortion counseling services are provided. Clinics in overpopulated regions are not even allowed to take a public pro-choice position, and the United Nations fund for Population Assistance Program, which provides critical family planning services abroad, has been unfairly targeted by such administration policy. The UNFPA does not provide abortion services, but the program has been repeatedly denied critical U.S. funding by the Bush administration under the gag rule. As a result, thousands of women in overpopulated developing nations are without the health care and family planning resources each of us takes for granted here in America. Thankfully, this conference report provides $34 million in funding for this important program. But antichoice House and Senate conferees stripped the language which would protect the funding from the gag rule, and as a result that money will most likely never reach those it was intended to help. Despite these attempts to politicize the considerable aid this Nation provides abroad, this legislation, on the whole, serves an unqualified good for the people all over the world. I would submit, though, that through the money we spend here today on foreign ops, we do a better job of spreading universal values of democracy and liberty and freedom than with the hundreds of billions of dollars we have spent on the war in Iraq. By helping to improve the quality of life for people all over the world, we export the seeds of our American Dream; and by investing in international organizations that open markets, create trade, foster economic development and promote democracy, we create a rising tide that truly lifts all boats. This is the way America spreads its values most effectively. By serving the world community and investing as both a partner and leader in the global community, we exemplify what it truly means to be American; and as a result, we provide a living example that the America we have long known is still standing tall. These programs effectively address global challenges at their root source and seek to overcome those challenges the right way, by fostering hope and opportunity, rather than fear and hostility. They are the best ambassadors of the American spirit that we could ever hope to export. After all, what better way is there for us to spread democracy, freedom, and social justice than through the methods that have proven time and time again to actually work. Therefore, I urge my colleagues to vote for this bill. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr).

Ms. SLAUGHTER

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey).

Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui). (Ms. MATSUI asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)