John Tanner

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman. It is a curse of where I am from, I guess. But I do want to continue this line. The economic engagements that I believe this country must engage in is truly a matter of national security. As I said, history teaches us that economic partners become military allies, and we have seen over the course of the last few years over 190 trade agreements and we are not a part of them, and we will not be a part of them because we do not have the institutional ability to engage to the bottom line those who would trade with us and those who would negotiate with us on these trading arrangements. So for that reason, and because I think the bill is far better than any law that we have ever passed before in TPA, and better than TAA in every respect than current law, it deserves our consideration and our vote.

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I would like to start by thanking the conferees. This trade is a hard issue for all of us, but the conferees worked long and hard. We have a Republican House and a Democratic Senate. This is a conference report. I think that is bipartisan. We are talking about economics, basically, and it is a fact that in this country, we can grow more food than we can eat and make more stuff than we can buy and sell to each other. Given that fact, it is an economic fact that unless we can get rid of this surplus production through trade, somebody is going to lose their job. That is not a political argument; that is an economic fact of capitalism. Now, how do we get this surplus production out of here? We do it by economic engagement with the rest of the world through the institutional process of granting to any administration, not this one, but any administration the ability to negotiate to the bottom line with those who would negotiate with us so that we can get rid of this surplus production and keep jobs in this country. This bill is stronger in every respect than current law. The TAA provisions are really unprecedented, and many others have spoken to that one. But finally, I would like to convey this thought to my colleagues. Economic engagement is truly a matter of national security. If history teaches us anything, it teaches us that economic partners sooner or later become military allies, and I want to see us having American jets flown by the Brazilian Air Force or having American ships sailed by other countries; not French, not others, not Japanese or whatever.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of my long-time personal friend, Dr. James M. Powers, for his invaluable dedication and leadership to our community. Dr. Powers is a past mayor of Waverly, Tennessee, and has run one of middle Tennessee's largest private dental practices. He has proven time and time again that he is a leader among his peers, and now all our best wishes go with him and his family as he settles into retirement. Dr. Powers contributed to the community through his political leadership. He was elected mayor of Waverly and served in that position for 19 years. During his tenure as mayor, he assisted in the development of a new city hall, opened a police department, upgraded the water system and helped attract several companies to Waverly. He served at the state level on the Tennessee Water Quality Control Board and the Tennessee Arts Commission, and was chairman of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission. An alumnus of Austin Peay State University, Southwestern at Memphis, and the University of Tennessee, Dr. Powers moved back to our area and with his brother helped build a highly successful dental practice that will continue to help people in our community. He also served two years in the United States Army Dental Corps. He has proven his dedication and leadership in dentistry through his membership in several associations, including the American Dental Association, Nashville Dental Society, Tennessee Dental Association, Academy of General Dentistry, Fellow of the American College of Dentists, and Fellow of the International College of Dentists. He was also named outstanding alumnus of the University of Tennessee's College of Dentistry. Dr. James Powers and his wife Helen have four children and three grandchildren and have established themselves as true leaders in Middle Tennessee. While Dr. Powers begins this new chapter in his life, I am hopeful that they will continue to be leaders in our community. Mr. Speaker, I ask that you and our colleagues join me in thanking Dr. James M. Powers for his years of selfless service and leadership in our community.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of my friend Gordon Veazey for his 14 years of dedicated service to our nation's veterans. Now, Mr. Veazey begins a new chapter in his life as he retires from his position as Henry County veteran service officer. I ask that the United States House of Representatives thank him for his selfless service. Mr. Veazey's father, the late Bailey Veazey, was gassed by German soldiers during World War I, causing him serious health problems the rest of his life. Witnessing his father's disability led Mr. Veazey to devote his entire life to veteran causes. After serving in the Army during the Korean War, Mr. Veazey understands the struggles many of our veterans face. He says one of his greatest satisfactions has been in assisting aging veterans whose ability to earn were limited by disability. Mr. Veazey was appointed to the office in 1987 after working at Paris Manufacturing Company. During his tenure, he has assisted more than 2,000 veterans in our community in receiving the veterans claim benefits they deserve and depend upon. We care deeply about our veterans and their courageous service to this great nation. Through Mr. Veazey's leadership he has set an example for future veteran officers who will serve our friends, neighbors, and children whom are fighting in the war today. We should be proud and honored to have had such a dedicated man working for our nation's veterans. Mr. Speaker, I rise to ask that you and our colleagues join me in applauding the selfless service and dedication Mr. Veazey has contributed to our nations veterans.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) for yielding me time. I personally do not care whether it is a Democrat or Republican bill. What we have got in this country is a $6 trillion debt. We are paying a billion dollars a day interest, and all we have asked for is a plan of some kind to get us out of this hole before we pass another $450 billion authority to borrow money. If anybody thinks that is unreasonable, I would like to debate that point. There is not a business or a family listening tonight anywhere in this country that would run their own business like we are running the Nation's business, borrowing another $450 billion with absolutely no plan. The plan we are operating under does not balance for the next decade without using Social Security trust funds. Now, if anybody can convince the American people that that is a reasonable approach to this Nation's financial problems, I would like to talk to them because it is absolutely, I tell you what you can do. You can bamboozle people a little while, but the American public is not stupid by any stretch of the imagination, and they know that year after year of red ink is sooner or later going to catch up with us and with our children. I will tell you something else. The most insidious tax raise, tax hike in the world is borrowing money because you pay interest year after year after year, today a billion dollars a day in interest because our predecessors and us did not have the fortitude to either cut the programs we do not like and do not need or to raise the revenue for the ones that we do. That is where we are. This is shifting responsibility, and it is a generational mugging.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California (Mr. Stark) for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, my problem with the bill that is under consideration tonight is in the theory behind it. My family has been in the insurance business in Tennessee for over a hundred years, and the reason we have Medicare in this country is because in the private world of insurance, there is no way that a senior citizen 80 years old with heart trouble and diabetes can buy health insurance. That is why Medicare came into being. They still could not buy it if we did not have Medicare. So what we are trying to do here is put a square peg in a round hole in that this bill tries to make an insurable product out of a benefit for which there is no risk pool for the concept, the theory of insurance to work. Insurance does not work when every policyholder is also making a claim against their policy. By the very inception of this kind of protocol, every policyholder will be making a claim. It is simply not an insurable product. What we are going to wind up with, I am afraid, and we will be back here in a year if this passes and passes the Senate, is we are going to have a patchwork across the country of differing coverages, differing plans, differing copays, differing premiums, differing in every respect. Nobody will know for sure what they have got. What is one to do? One will figure what one's drug payment is a year; and if it is less than what they would get if there is a plan offered and knowing they cannot go to their neighborhood pharmacy even if the pharmacy is willing to abide by the plan, if their drug benefit is more than what they are spending, they will take it. If it is less than that, they will not. So everybody that the insurance company signed up will be making a claim and will be getting more than their premium copayments. The whole structure of this thing is flawed, and that is why I cannot support it.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the years of selfless public service of a dear friend of mine, Mr. James Neely. Jim recently received the Pinnacle of Excellence Award, the highest honor offered by the people of Huntingdon, Tennessee, which I am proud to say is also the hometown of my wife, Betty Ann. Mr. Neely and his wife, Rachel Todd Neely, live in Huntingdon in Carroll County, Tennessee. They have a daughter and son-in-law, Hope and Michael Turner, a granddaughter, Neely Turner, and a second grandchild on the way. Jim is a graduate of Huntingdon High School and the University of Tennessee at Martin. Since that time, he has been a leader in our community and in the state, including serving as Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Labor and as President of the Tennessee AFL-CIO Labor Council. Other state positions he has held include seats on the Employment Security Advisory Council, the Cabinet Council on Indigent Health Care, the Commission on Higher Education, the Advisory Council on Worker's Compensation and the Safety Congress Board of Directors, which he also founded. He has chaired the Planning Committee for the Tennessee Job Partnership Council and the state Workforce Development Planning Committee. His other accomplishments include past Chairman of the Huntingdon Special School District Board of Education and past Member of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta Advisory Board. Jim has said he is proud to be from Huntingdon, Tennessee. Today, Mr. Speaker, I say that we are proud to have such a fine leader as one of our own. I ask that you and our colleagues join me in recognizing my friend, Mr. James Neely, for all he has done to make a difference.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I went before the Committee on Rules last night and asked that rather than consider a constitutional amendment, which I do not favor normally, to restrict the raising of revenue, I thought it would be much better and more honest and forthright if we changed restricting the ability of the Congress to raise revenue to restrict it from borrowing money. We owe $6 trillion collectively, every man, woman and child in this country, and we see that today as was the case yesterday, we continue to see the amount of borrowing go up. The problem is excessive spending and unbalanced budgets because Congress in the past has not had the will to either cut services to come in line with the existing revenue or to raise revenue to pay for the services that they deem to be in the public interest at that particular time. The most insidious tax increase in the world is for us to continue to borrow money, because that requires us to pay interest. I hope every young person is listening to this, because what we are doing is saddling your generation with debt that we are unwilling to raise the money to pay for the services that we think we require today. That is what is going on. It has been going on, and this will do nothing to stop that. In fact, this will make it worse. Because if we have to do some things that were unforeseen last year when some of us voted for the tax bill when we did not know about 9/11 and if we have to do some things to spend money to protect the citizens of this country, the passage of this will restrict that ability to do so, number one. And, number two, what we are really doing is engaging in the politics of shifting responsibility, not accepting it. We are shifting to the Constitution something that it was not intended to do. But beyond that, I just feel so strongly that what we are doing is so wrong to the next generation by continuing to borrow money because we do not have the willpower to raise the money to pay for what we need today that we are enjoying the benefits of. One could argue from now until kingdom come. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) was the father of the balanced budget amendment. He worked on it for 14 years, I guess, before we got it up, and it was good and we passed it. Unfortunately, we have not been able to live up to it, but it is not because we are unwilling to do so, in many instances. It is because it is tough. It is tough to raise the money to spend $1 million a copy on a cruise missile, to build the aircraft carriers we need, to do the things we need in this country. That is not easy to do. But it is our responsibility to do it. Instead, we shift it to the next generation by saying, well, no, we are not going to raise taxes. As the gentleman said, we are not going to stick it to the American public today, to us. We are going to stick it to the kids. Kids are people, too, and the people that are going to pay the bills for what we have been doing are not here. They do not have a voice. It is hard to raise taxes. Nobody comes here saying, ``I want to raise taxes. Send me to Washington.'' It is easy to say, I want to cut taxes. But yet I want to build the strongest military in the history of the world. But we are not going to ask you to pay anything for it. We are going to borrow the money and send it to the next generation. The President sent us a budget down here that does not balance without using Social Security money for 10 years, for the next decade, and nobody has raised a voice to say, look, we owe $6 trillion. We are paying $1 billion a day in interest. You talk about taxes. If you want to make sure that all of us are overtaxed the rest of our lives, continue to borrow money and continue to pay $1 billion a day in interest and leave that to your children to pay. Just like we say we do not want to leave them a country where the air is so bad one has to wear a mask to ride a bicycle, and the water is so foul that fish cannot live in it and kids cannot swim in it, I do not want to leave them a country that is so burdened with debt that they are going to be paying over $1 billion a day in interest on the consumption we had while we were in charge and either would not pay for or did not have the fortitude to cut the programs that we did not think were necessary. This is an ill-conceived constitutional amendment. If you are really serious about a constitutional amendment, put one in that says it takes a supermajority to borrow money. Then we will get down to the brass tacks of why we are here.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to remember a very dear friend of mine, Mr. George Canale Tagg, who passed away May 14th of this year. George's career is the perfect example of how hard work can pay off. Originally from Memphis, he started working at the Federal Express hub there, some 30 years ago. He stayed with FedEx over the years, eventually making his way here to Washington, where he became the company's managing director of Government Affairs. He retired and started his own firm, retaining FedEx as a client. Although he called Memphis home, he most recently resided in Chevy Chase, Maryland, and was very active in the community here. He was a communicant of the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Washington, a member of the Columbia Country Club and the University Club of Memphis. George was one of my best friends. He was a kind, gentle man who genuinely cared deeply about all his fellow human beings. This unique devotion to goodwill shone through to all who knew and worked with him. He made a huge and valuable contribution to our country in his all- too-short life. I know I will miss George Tagg tremendously, and I know his presence will be missed on Capitol Hill.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I, like all of us here, remember the first day I got here to Congress. I came here to represent my constituents like all of the Members did consistent with the national interest. And we know that over time we lose some of that. And, quite frankly, the leadership on both sides, in the interest of party unity, ask us to vote for rules that we know are wrong and are not in the best interest of our constituents and not in the best interest of our country. That happened yesterday on this floor. We tried to make a fight of it, but you know in your heart that you are putting party politics above the interests of this country and the people here when you come to the floor under this rule that disguises a raising of the debt limit of our country. This may be the most cynical rule in my 14 years here. I honestly believe that this is the most cynical rule I have seen in 14 years I have been here. Members on both sides of the aisle I know are called on in the interest of party unity from time to time to vote for rules. That happened yesterday. It was wrong for our country. We know it was wrong when we hide this attempt to raise the national debt like we did. As has been said many times, we will vote for unanimous consent today, right now, for every dime the President requested to fight this war, but when my colleagues come to the floor and say this is for the war effort, I have read through the bill. Do my colleagues realize there is $425,000 in here for a school district in this country for after-school activities? There is $250,000 in here for after-school activities for another school district. There is $250,000 to equip a community technology center in this bill. There is $250,000 for a mental health agency for the planning and development of a facility. There is $600,000 for a community enrichment corporation for construction of a facility; $500,000 for an affordable housing program; $100,000 for the renovation of a historic building; $200,000 for construction of another facility; $200,000 for facility improvements; $600,000 for renovation of a facility; another $200,000 for facility construction. It goes on and on. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the defense of this country, with homeland security, with the troops or anything else. That is what we object to. We object to hiding stuff like this under the guise of the flag and patriotism. It is wrong, and I would just simply ask that the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations again please go to his leadership and say, look, we will pass by unanimous consent every single nickel that the President has asked for the homeland defense of our Nation and for the troops, but do not bring this here and do not pad, under guise of raising the national debt, this cynical rule, the most cynical rule I have seen in 14 years here, and all of us know it. Surely to goodness we can put partisan politics aside and do what we came here the first day we were sworn in, and that is represent our constituents consistent with this country's interest. That is what all, that is all we are asking our colleagues to do.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, if the Democrats had proposed this rule, I would be up here speaking against it. This rule is, I think I will put it this way, if I were doing business with someone who devised or ran their business like this rule, I would quit doing business with them immediately; and I think the American people ought to as well. What my Republican colleagues have done with this rule is they have made passing reference to the statutory assurance that the United States take all necessary means to protect our credit, which is the debt ceiling, and then they have provided that the amendments printed in the Committee on Rules shall be considered as adopted. That is not an open rule and they know it. No one can call that an open rule. We cannot get at striking section 1403 because it will be held out of order. So when my colleagues say it is an open rule, it is not and my colleagues know it. It is crystal clear that it is wrong. It is dead wrong. We are engaged in a generational mugging of the next generation here because we will not face up to what we are trying to do to pay for this. It is wrong.

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, in the previous comments, the majority manager of the bill has referred to this as an open rule. Therefore, under this open rule, I would like to ask unanimous consent that the amendment offered by the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore) be made in order in the ensuing debate.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in honor of my dear friend Jim Crow, whose hard work has proven invaluable, not only to the people of Shelby County and Tennessee's 8th District, but also to the state of Tennessee and indeed the nation. I have had the pleasure of working alongside Jim since before I came to Washington back in 1989. His public service stretches back even farther than that. Jim was born in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1934. His father being in construction, the family moved where the work was--from Memphis to Ohio, then to Michigan. After also living in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Jim moved back to Shelby County in 1959 and married Shirley Roberts the following year. They bought a house in Frayser, where their family saw the addition of two children, Elizabeth--now Elizabeth Vaughn--and James. The family relocated to Millington, Tennessee, in 1975. Jim is retired from International Harvester, where he worked for 26 years and served as a union steward for the United Auto Workers. It was during this time that he became active in politics and the Shelby County Democratic Party. In 1969, Jim was instrumental in helping bring my predecessor, Mr. Ed Jones, to this House of Representatives. Jim helped establish the first Congressional office in Shelby County for the 8th District and operated the office on a voluntary basis. Five years later, Mr. Jones hired Jim Crow as a field representative for Memphis and Shelby County. When I came to Washington 15 years after that, I was lucky to have Jim stay on board as a field representative, the position from which he is now retiring. Jim has always been very active in the community, serving in such organizations as the Millington Industrial Development Board, the Millington Airport Authority, the Frayser Exchange Club, the Navy League and the Millington Chamber of Commerce, which once named him Man of the Year. Millington was formerly home of the Navy Air Technical Training Center, but during the base restructuring in the early 1990s, that function was moved elsewhere. Jim, with his involvement in the community and on the base, followed the base's transition as it became known as Naval Support Activity Mid-South, currently housing the Navy Bureau of Personnel. As field representative, Jim was active in the communication involved with the change. Later this month, he will retire his position as a field representative for the 8th Congressional District. He will spend more time with his family, including his grandchildren, Kali and Nicholas, and I am certain he will continue to stay active in our community. Mr. Speaker, today I ask that you and our colleagues recognize the outstanding, selfless public service Jim has offered over the years. All the best wishes are with my friend Jim Crow as he begins an exciting new chapter in his life.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a Tennessee couple who prove that love is still very much alive. Next month, Eddie and Mary Emma Cherry will celebrate the 62nd anniversary of the day they committed themselves to one another. Eddie, originally from Dover in Stewart County, and Mary Emma, originally from Danville in Houston County, met through a mutual friend in 1938. The pair met up again the following year when they both enrolled at Austin Peay State College--now named Austin Peay State University--in Clarksville, Tennessee. After becoming reacquainted, the two decided they wanted to spend their lives together, and they wedded June 1, 1940. Since then, the Cherrys have added to their family two sons, Charles and Don, a daughter, Ann, seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Over the years, Eddie and Mary Emma have undertaken numerous successful business ventures in West Tennessee but eventually returned to Dover. Eddie spent many years raising cattle and hogs and growing corn and hay. Mary Emma worked for years as a teacher and administrator at Dover Elementary School. The two are retired now and spend their days together. Mrs. Cherry has said of their marriage, ``Love is the basis of all of it. I never thought of not loving him.'' Mr. Cherry has added jokingly that his secret is in learning to agree with his wife. The couple says that now, as they celebrate more than six decades of union, their children should be planning a big party to celebrate their 70th anniversary. Mr. Speaker, I rise to ask that you and our colleagues join me in applauding the marriage of my friends Eddie and Mary Emma Cherry and in wishing them many more years of happiness with their family and many friends who admire them greatly.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of my friend, Dr. Mickey McAdoo. Tomorrow, he will become president of the Tennessee Medical Association. The organization represents roughly 6,500 doctors in Tennessee and works to raise awareness of issues important to the medical community. The TMA is often the only voice to speak for the rights of Tennessee's patients. Dr. McAdoo, a family physician in Milan, is in private practice with Dr. Wade Reeves and Dr. Jerry Wilson at Milan Medical Center. He also operates Integrity Clinical Research in Milan and is chief of staff and committee chair at Milan General Hospital. A Tennessee native, Dr. McAdoo is a graduate of the University of Tennessee Martin and earned his medical degree from the University of Tennessee Center for Health Sciences. Even outside of his medical capacity, Dr. McAdoo has long been valuable to our community. He has acted as president of the local Chamber of Commerce, serves as team physician for Milan High School athletics and is an ordained deacon, teacher and Personnel Committee chair at First Baptist Church in Milan. He is a past president of the Tennessee Academy of Family Physicians. Now, as he begins his tenure as Tennessee Medical Association President, I congratulate and applaud my friend Dr. McAdoo and wish him all the best in this important endeavor.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I would ask that every young person under the age of 35 years old in this country listen to what I have to say. We are almost $6 trillion in debt as a Nation, as a people, we owe. That is 16 percent of the money that comes here every year. That means we have a 16 percent mortgage on this country. The President has submitted a request to the Congress for authority to borrow another three-quarters of a trillion dollars. That is another $750 billion. The administration has submitted a budget that is not balanced for the next 10 years. If there ever was a recipe for financial disaster, if there ever was a generational mugging going on in this Congress because we will not cut spending or raise the money that we need to finance the war and other things that we want today, then let me just say to all of you young people, under these policies, you are going to be overtaxed the rest of your lives because you are going to have to pay 16 or 18 percent interest before you ever get to what you need in your day when it comes.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I would agree, but whether I agree or not, I think the facts speak for themselves. Last year at that time we were told there was money as far as the eye could see. We had a $5 trillion surplus. That did not come true. The budget that the President submitted shows red ink for the next 10 years. Once this interest figure gets up 20, 25 percent, I have never seen a country that was proud, free and broke. There is not one on the face of the earth, and we are going broke under these policies, and people are going to begin to realize that I think that, unlike maybe public perception now, at least when it comes to the Blue Dog Coalition, there are some Democrats around here that are more fiscally and financially responsible than all the Republicans who want to tell my colleagues, as they have, we are going to cut taxes, increase spending, but they do not say more borrowing, and more borrowing means more interest, and more interest means more taxes from now on, forever.

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I come tonight to talk about debt. That seems to be the topic of the day, and I have got to tell my colleagues, I watched the previous hour and I was thinking all of the time I was watching that these are the same folks that last year touted the tax plan as presented and now tonight say, oh, no, it is terrible because it was not permanent. We were criticized last year, but let me talk about what is happening in this country. My colleagues are seeing a group, a minority within a minority really, the Blue Dog Democrats, my colleagues are seeing a group emerge from all of the rhetoric here in this town, partisan rhetoric. They are seeing a group emerge that has some credibility on the debt. What was missing and what is missing and what will be missing on Thursday morning when we talk about making the tax cut bill that the House passed last year and the Senate passed last year permanent, what they do not say is that we have right now in, and the citizens of this country right now last year paid $360 billion in interest on a revenue total of $1.991 trillion. This comes out of a CBO publication of March of this year. That is an 18 percent mortgage on this country. There is no business in the world, in America or anywhere else that I know of, that can withstand an 18 percent mortgage on their inventory, on what they are doing in terms of their business. If we take away the interest on the debt that was paid as far as Social Security goes, we have a net total of $206 billion, which on nonSocial Security revenue, amounts to 16 percent. Said another way, this country right today has a 16 percent mortgage on it that we all have to pay. Now, if we want to ensure and people want us to ensure that not only those that are my age but my children and my grandchildren will be overtaxed all of their lives and all of the foreseeable future, then keep us on the road of the Republican policies that have been enunciated here and will be enunciated here Thursday, and that basically is we are going to spend more because we are in a war, which we should. We are going to do a tax break for those of us in my generation passing on to those who are in uniform tonight in Afghanistan, fighting the war and their children. We are going to borrow money so that we can have a tax break to spend more money, knowing we have an 18 percent or 16 percent, whichever figure we want to use, mortgage on this country. If people want to make sure that we are going to be overtaxed as an American public for the rest of our lives, then continue down the Republican policies. Because what it means is it means cut taxes now, spend more and borrow, and borrowing means interest and that interest has got to be paid before we do anything, before we have a missile system, before we have a submarine, before we have an aircraft carrier, before we have an interstate highway. Before we have anything, we have got to pay the interest. If my colleagues want to make sure that we are going to overtax ourselves and those who follow us for the rest of their lives and ours, then just follow down this road and borrow more money and borrow more money, and we will make sure, we will make very sure that we are overtaxed and they are overtaxed as follows. This is something that they do not say. Nikita Khrushchev once said that an American politician is a fellow that likes to promise to build a dam or a bridge where there is no river. This is not easy stuff, to stand here and say to the American public we cannot do what some of these people around here want to tell them that we can do. We cannot spend the money that is necessary to win and fight, fight and win the war on terrorism. We cannot cut taxes for everybody in this land right now and spend that money without borrowing money to do it, and when we do, we are making a mistake that I think generations will pay for because that interest keeps going, whether someone is on vacation, whether someone is sleeping, whatever they are doing they have got to pay the interest. People know that and so I am proud that the Blue Dogs took this hour to talk about fiscal responsibility. There has not been in my mind a sitting down and talking about prioritizing what we have to do. We have got to win the war on terrorism. Whatever it takes, we have got to do it. We are willing to do that, but by gosh, to cut taxes on somebody making $50 million a year at the same time my colleagues are trying to ask everybody else to sacrifice is simply not right. It is not right generationally. We do not want to leave this country to our children with rivers and streams that fish cannot live in and kids cannot swim in. We do not want that. We did not inherit that and we sure do not want to leave it. We do not want to leave a country where kids have to wear a hospital mask to ride their bicycle because the air is so polluted that they cannot breathe unless they have a mask on. We did not inherit that, and we do not want to leave that. We did not inherit a country that was broke, and I do not want to leave my kids a country that is broke. If we continue down the path we are going, where we are spending more, cutting revenue, and borrowing more so we pay more interest, that is exactly the formula that we have been asked to pass, and I just think it is wrong. I think it is wrong generationally, not only to people, our contemporaries, but it is wrong to our children, and I hope that we can, the Blue Dogs and others who are here with us tonight, can impress on the American people that it is not easy to be against tax cuts. It is not easy to be against more spending, but there has to be priorities given to what we need, and we are willing to cut and cut spending any way we can to make sure that we are doing the things only that are necessary, but we have got to have the revenue to pay for what we want. If we are not willing to do that, then I think we are generationally immoral with regard to what we are giving to our children. I appreciate the gentleman taking this time. I do not know if anybody is listening to what we are saying or not, but when we have got an 18 or 16 percent mortgage on this country and we do not make any attempt to get back in the black, I think what we are doing is passing the buck, and I think that is wrong.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Chairman, the reason the sign used by the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle) was made yesterday was because the majority knew last night when we went to the Committee on Rules with our plan that we were not going to be able to offer it. So these nice charts we see about not having a plan, we would have a plan today, but the other side of the aisle would not let us offer it. We would like to look in August and see if what the gentleman says tonight is actually coming true. What the other side of the aisle said last year we know has not come true, and we only ask to review it in August. We used the Republican plan as a gesture of bipartisanship. The other side of the aisle will not let us have a plan, and then they bring all of these charts down here that they made up yesterday and say the Democrats do not have a plan. This raw partisanship, people are not dumb, they see it. It is going to get you in trouble just like it got this side in trouble sooner or later.

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Chairman, let me just say, that we are in a time of war and the President called for unity, and in that spirit, four of us, the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore), the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm), the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Matheson) and myself, went to the Committee on Rules last night and asked that this amendment be made in order. Concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2003, we used their numbers, the Republican numbers. We offered this using their numbers. We offered to extend the debt ceiling till the end of this fiscal year without any strings attached save one, that was that we would be able to review the numbers in August when the CBO numbers come out again to see if we are on the right track and what they say today is actually coming to fact and coming to fruition. We were denied that. That is a plan. This is a budget that we tried to offer last night. Not in order. People watching may wonder, why is all this arguing going on. I want to tell them. Only the majority can make a legislative body bipartisan. The minority cannot do that. We are like a jackrabbit in a hailstorm, all we can do is just hunker down and take it, and if my colleagues do not want to be bipartisan, when we offer a budget based on their numbers, offering to extend the debt ceiling, without the approval really of our leadership and they turn us down and then come here today and say there is no plan, we do not have plan. Some of us did, I tell my friends. I saw naked raw partisanship work when I was in the majority here and my colleagues are practicing that today when they deny us the ability to at least debate using their numbers, a different approach. People are not dumb in this country. They know unfair partisanship when they see it, and if they insist on keeping on doing this, we are going to have a very difficult time solving the problems that the people of this country face. So I would just tell my colleagues that I am very disappointed in the way this debate has gone today, and I hope we can do better in the future.

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Chairman, we submitted a budget proposal, concurrent resolution on the budget for the fiscal year 2003, using my colleagues' numbers and they were denied. How can my colleague say there is no plan. At least four of us had a plan, and now they come here and say our plan is to raise taxes. Our plan was not to raise taxes. Their plan was. All we asked was to review the numbers in August to see if what they say today is coming true, and we were not even allowed to do that, and naked partisanship is going to get my colleagues in trouble eventually. Got this side in trouble.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Madam Speaker, I am not going to add a lot to what my colleagues have said on the technical side of it. I just want to say that I came here from Tennessee in 1988; and when I came here, people said, John, please, if you get elected, go up there and do something about this horrendous national debt. We are borrowing more money every year as a people than we can pay back in our lifetimes, and we want you all to do something about it. Please, if you go up there, concentrate on retiring the debt and living within our means. Now, we have tried to do that and I have been here, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) has been here longer than I have, and this is hard. This is not easy. The easiest thing that anybody who seeks political office can do is to promise a road or a bridge or a dam and promise to cut taxes all at the same time. That is what we hear on the stump, and this is really tough work that we are trying to do here as Blue Dogs because we are doing something that is oftentimes not politically expedient. We do things that we hope are in the best interest of the country and our children that are not maybe politically popular today. I mean, it is tough to stand here with a new President, as we did last year, and say we really need to slow down on all these projections and all of these ideas that money is flowing into Washington as far as the eye can see. That is what we were told. We said, to be conservative in our own business, if it were our own business, we would not run it that way. We would not devote 100 percent of a projection for 10 years to a program that we did last year. We tried to say, that is not a conservative view, it is not the way we would run our own businesses. Why on earth do our colleagues want us to run the country's business that way? So last year, as my colleague, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm), said, we were unsuccessful when we tried to say we need to slow down on this. And the funniest thing I have heard since I have been here is when people around here actually, with a straight face, said that we are in danger of paying off the debt too quickly. That reminded me of a guy my size, weighs 400 pounds, and the first night on my diet somebody asks me how I feel and I say I am worried about becoming emaciated. To me, that was almost ludicrous, but that really is what we were told by people with a straight face. As the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore), the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm), and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) have said, nobody is prophetic. We do not know, I certainly do not know what the price of cotton is going to be next Friday, yet we are supposed to base how we conduct the business of our citizens of this country on these projections. And by the way, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Phelps) was talking about us, and we do have a very special place here because we are privileged people to represent free men and women. That is an honor that none of us deserve, but as President Jimmy Carter said, the highest office in this land of ours is that of citizen, because a citizen is the owner of our country. So we are very, very privileged people to be where we are, and with that privilege comes an awesome responsibility. And sometimes that responsibility is to do tough things; to say, look, in response to, we need to give the people their money back, it is theirs. Well, kids are people, too, and they do not have a voice here. But they are people, and there are a bunch of them that are not yet born, and we are spending their money tomorrow if we pass this budget, and they do not even know about it. Somebody asked me one time if I would agree to a supermajority to raise taxes. I said, no, there is plenty of pressure in this system not to raise taxes. But I will vote for a supermajority to borrow money, because the people we are spending their money are not here to tell us, please do not do that to me, I am 2 years old. But what my colleagues are doing is going to not only make sure that our citizens are overtaxed, because they do not have the willpower to say no to either a tax cut that is irresponsible or to a spending program that is irresponsible. My colleagues do not have the willpower to say no to that, so they want to put it on me. That is basically what has been going on around here, and it is very simply wrong. So as the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) said, this debt limit is really one of the last lines of defense we have to insist that the people who run the House here, the majority party, bring a budget to the floor. We cannot bring anything to the floor. We can ask for it, as we did tonight in the Committee on Rules, a substitute that puts at least in place some safeguards, but we cannot bring anything to the floor here because we are in the minority. And that is all right as long as we are treated fairly and we get a vote on what we have asked for and then people know. But it is not easy to stand here as someone who asks for votes every 2 years and say, as much as I would like to, we just simply cannot afford that program in west Tennessee or middle Tennessee or east Tennessee or wherever; or we cannot afford to do some of the taxing initiatives in terms of tax cuts that we have been doing. We do not have the money. So I would hope that as we go into the budget debate tomorrow, we would keep in mind that we are not just talking about ourselves, but we are talking about our country. I have been to countries that do not have a government. I have been to a country that is broke. And I have yet to find a country on the face of the earth that is strong and free and broke. And that is where we are headed when we are paying a billion dollars a day in interest. And that is going up every day because we simply, in the here and now, say let us give the people back their money, they earned it, it belongs to them. And it does, except kids are people, too, and we have not done them right. And anybody who says we have, I would have to take violent disagreement with that. We are going to be overtaxed the rest of our lives, and we should be, because we are paying 13 percent interest before we ever get to tanks, before we ever get to any of the projects that we need in the country to give private enterprise the opportunity, with the infrastructure that only government can provide, the ability to grow and create private sector jobs, which is, after all, the backbone of the country. We understand that. But we are going to be overtaxed the rest of our lives because people back in the 1970s and 1980s spent more money than they were willing to pay for, and now we are being asked to do the same thing. We are going to make sure, if we keep on this course, that not only are we overtaxed the rest of our lives, but our children are going to be overtaxed all of their working lives because we simply cannot find within ourselves the ability to make tough, hard decisions that are not politically expedient. So, Madam Speaker, I appreciate my colleague, the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore), for having this special order tonight and inviting us to participate.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I would like to make two points, I think. In business, when I was in business at home, if we could agree on some future course of action, we set that aside and went ahead with it; and those matters that we could not agree on what was best for our employees and ourselves we would discuss further. I think the facts are pretty simple here. We all say we agree on unemployment benefits, so why do we not go ahead and do that? That is what reasonable people would do, I think, in this country. Unfortunately, we get in here and get carried away with the politics of the moment. But reasonable people, I think across the country, would say we can agree on this, so let us do that today, then let us come back and talk further about what we cannot agree on. Now, speaking personally, there are a lot of things in the package, above and beyond the unemployment provisions, that I think are pretty good public policy. What I disagree on and what the Blue Dogs have talked about forever is the fact that we continue to pile on debt after debt after debt, with no attempt to look at the 10-year budget window and figure out a way to pay for this stimulus package, so-called stimulus package. We do not even make an attempt to do so. This package is going to put another $175 billion of debt on us. We already know we have another $1 trillion of interest coming in the next 10 years, if the projections hold. We tried to warn last year that we should not put out a 10-year package, where fully 70 percent of the expected surplus is not even going to get here for 5 years. That is not how we should run the business of this country, and it is foolish to try to say that that is going to be the case. But beyond all that, people in this country understand borrowing money, and they understand paying interest; and this is terribly unfair what we are doing when we make no attempt to pay for it. None whatsoever. There are some things in there, as I said, that I think are good public policy, and I would like to work on and try to figure out how to accomplish them. We have paid up to now about $140 billion this year in interest payments. That is as much as this bill costs almost for the next 5 years. That shows what kind of unbelievable, almost un-Godly thing we are doing to the next generation when we make no attempt to pay for these matters.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Mrs. Helen C. Hitz, a former employee here on Capitol Hill. Mrs. Hitz recently passed away, on January 15, 2002, at the age of 80. In 1960, Mrs. Hitz moved to the Washington, D.C. area and began her employment on Capitol Hill in February of 1961 as a secretary and receptionist to the Honorable Frank Moss of Utah. In September of 1961, Mrs. Hitz accepted the position as Secretary to the General Counsel at the House of Representatives Committee on Small Business. In April of 1965, she transferred to the House Committee on Banking and Currency where she was a staff director and supervised several Committee caseworkers. She was also the confidential and personal Secretary to Dr. Paul Nelson, Administrative Assistant to the committee chairman. In July of 1965, Mrs. Hitz accepted the position of Personal Secretary to Congressman Fernand St. Germain, a Democrat from Rhode Island. She coordinated the work of the Congressman between his personal office and the Committee. Mrs. Hitz retired from Congressional service in 1983 from her position with Congressman St. Germain after more than 20 years of federal civil service. In 1987, Mrs. Hitz moved from Virginia to Jackson, Tennessee to be near her son, John Hitz. In 1998 she relocated to Holts Summitt, Missouri to be near her other son, Charles Hitz, and to her hometown of Jefferson City, Missouri when she lived until her death. It is always an honor and a privilege to recognize folks who have given a large portion of their lives to government service. It is a noble profession and I am proud to recognize the service of Mrs. Helen C. Hitz.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I came here and asked the people in Tennessee to send me here in 1988 because I knew from my business and personal life that this country, not my business, not me personally and my wife could continue to borrow money every year, which is what we were doing then and pile up more and more debt without jeopardizing the future of this country. Now, here we are in 2002. Everybody knows from the budget presented yesterday that the country has physically deteriorated in a breathtaking way in the last year. We do not have the money that we thought we were going to have, that we were told we were going to have last year. And now we are in a position as the budget was presented by the Secretary of the Treasury to committee yesterday to be in the next 10 years never in a surplus position from an on-budget surplus number. That is to say, we are going to borrow money every year for the next 10 years. It is going to cost another trillion dollars. Let me state why deficits matter. Deficits matter because it is money you owe. And when you owe money, you have got to pay interest on it. Right now 13 cents out of every dollar that comes here goes to pay interest. They say we are paying for war. We are not paying for anything. We are borrowing for the war. That is wrong. We ask the young men and women in this country in uniform to go overseas and fight for us. We say no price is too high for you. We will protect you, give you everything you need; but we will not pay for it. We will borrow it from our kids. They are the ones making the sacrifice. This is a generational mugging, that is what is going on. It is like a heavyweight fight except that the kids are getting mugged and are paying for this because we are borrowing the money to pay for war. We are borrowing the money to pay for tax cuts. We are not paying for anything, nothing for the next 10 years, and that is absolutely wrong.