John Tanner

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of Dr. Doug Ligon, one of only four national finalists for ``Country Doctor of the Year 2001.'' Dr. Ligon is a family doctor at Trinity Hospital in Erin, Tennessee, where his coworkers describe him as a big-city boy with a country heart. Born and schooled in Nashville, Ligon attended Vanderbilt University and the University of Tennessee Medical School, then planned to stay in an urban area to work as a dermatologist. His plans would change, however, after he accepted what was originally to be a temporary job in the small town of Erin in Houston County. Almost thirty years later, Dr. Ligon is still working in Erin. He says he could not leave, once he realized how much he was needed at Trinity Hospital, where he worked eighty hours each week as one of only a handful of doctors treating a five-county area. Dr. Ligon also acted as Houston County's medical examiner and county coroner, for which he would not accept pay, saying that the county needed that money more than he did. Dr. Ligon says he appreciates getting to know his patients and their families over time, following the progress of babies he delivered, some of whom are grown now and have families of their own. He says working in a small town allows him to experience what being a family doctor is all about--getting to know his patients, treating them and being able to watch after their general welfare. Dr. Ligon says his family has been supportive of his decision to remain in Erin. His wife Betsy is, in fact, the person responsible for nominating Dr. Ligon for the prestigious ``Country Doctor of the Year'' award, as a way to recognize him for the service he provides to the people of Houston County, Tennessee. We know many medical professionals care deeply about what they do and the patients they see, but Dr. Ligon's years of free-hearted work have been invaluable to the people of Erin and the surrounding communities. He has proven time and time again that he is a leader among his peers. Mr. Speaker, I ask that you and our colleagues join me in thanking Dr. Doug Ligon for his years of selfless service and congratulating Dr. Ligon for his distinguished recognition as a national finalist for the title ``Country Doctor of the Year.''

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlemen for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, this has been an honest, intellectual exercise in a negotiation to try to do something for this country which desperately needs to be done. The irony of part of this argument today is the very means by which we address child labor, labor and environmental standards of all sorts, is through a vehicle just like we have the vote on today. It is the only way Congress can participate, and it ought to be done. The irony is if we turn it down, what have we done? Nothing. Absolutely nothing, and Congress has no voice at all in what goes on around the world in the area of the world marketplace. That is really pathetic. The other thing I would like to say, if Members believe, as I think everyone has to, that we can grow more food in this country than we can consume, that we can make more products and stuff than we can sell and buy from one another, then it is an economic fact of life, not a political argument, that those engaged in surplus production are going to lose their jobs. That is not a political argument; that is an economic fact. How do we save those jobs, how do we create new jobs, is by exports so that people in this country can work to make, as an earlier speaker said, tractors in Iowa to send to the rest of the world. That is what this is about: jobs in this country. Mr. Speaker, if we turn this down, we are going to wait awhile, 1, 2, 3 years, I will tell Members what is going to happen. Maybe 4, 5 years from now we are going to wake up and the economic partnerships which have been created between the Asians, the South Americans and the European Union, we are going to be wondering what happened to the United States leadership, to the United States jobs and to the United States role as a leader in the world.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a dear friend of mine, a remarkable woman who teaches us there are no limits to what a person can accomplish. At 3 years old, Dianne O'Dell was diagnosed with polio and, soon after, began her life in an iron lung. Her parents, Freeman and Geneva, were told Dianne would not reach adulthood. Now, more than 50 years later, Dianne is still going strong. It is believed she has lived longer in an iron lung than anyone else in the world. Ms. O'Dell's physical handicaps have not discouraged her. While living inside the yellow, seven-foot-long iron lung, she used a two-way radio to complete coursework and graduate from Jackson High School. She took classes from Freed-Hardeman College, now Freed-Hardeman University, and accepted an honorary doctorate in psychology from Freed-Hardeman. She wrote a children's book, ``Blinky Less Light,'' and is currently working on her autobiography. Dianne says she has been able to reach her goals despite her physical limitations because of positive thinking and her sense of humor. She often refers to her iron lung as her ``yellow submarine'' and enjoys having it decorated for holidays. Dianne remembers one Halloween when she costumed the machine as a giant roll of Life Savers candy. Ms. O'Dell also credits her strong sense of faith. She worships with the Campbell Street Church of Christ in her hometown of Jackson, Tennessee, although she is not able to attend services. Members of the congregation bring her taped sermons and the Lord's Supper. Dianne's family has also played a valuable role. Mr. and Mrs. O'Dell, along with Dianne's two sisters, have been by their daughter's side her whole life, often making personal sacrifices for her health. Over the years, Ms. O'Dell has worked with others coping with disabilities, especially families with disabled children. She tells them how important it is to keep faith and a positive outlook. I believe Dianne's spirit and love of life are encouraging--not only to those facing similar situations, but to all of us. She is an inspiration to everyone who knows her or has heard her remarkable story. Above all, Ms. O'Dell is a reminder that there is no limit to what a person can accomplish with an unyielding spirit like hers. Mr. Speaker, I ask that you and our colleagues rise and join me in recognizing Ms. Dianne O'Dell.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of the late Bill Manning, a decorated war hero, a faithful public servant and my friend. A California native who settled in Tennessee with his wife Jane, Mr. Manning served two tours of duty in Vietnam and was wounded both times. During his second tour in 1968, he lost both his left arm and right hand as a result of a rocket grenade attack. Mr. Manning had a prosthetic left arm and shoulder, and he designed and patented the Accra Hook to replace his right hand so he could maintain its functionality. Those disabilities did not stop what would become a long list of great achievements. When he returned from Vietnam, Mr. Manning was elected Recorder in Gibson County, Tennessee, and later, Governor Ned McWherter appointed him state Commissioner of Veterans' Affairs. During that time, Mr. manning played an important role in the construction of three retirement homes for veterans and three cemeteries for veterans in Tennessee. The West Tennessee Veterans Cemetery and the state veterans home in Humboldt are named in his honor. In 1999, Mr. Manning was first elected mayor of Bradford, Tennessee, and has been credited with reinvigorating community spirit in that town. He was elected to his second term in that position in May 2001. I am honored to have worked alongside Bill Manning, who is truly an American hero. His spirit and determination allowed him to overcome his physical obstacles and become a leader whose good work still benefits the people of Bradford, Gibson County and the state of Tennessee. We have lost an amazing man, a courageous leader and a dear friend. Mr. Speaker, I ask that you and our colleagues join me today in recognizing my friend, Mr. Bill Manning.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in honor of my dear friends, the Barner family, who have worked as West Tennessee dairy farmers for more than four decades. James and Lois Barner, married for 53 years now, began dairying on a farm in Kenton, TN, more than 40 years ago. Eight years later, they moved their operation to nearby Martin, TN, which has been home to Barner & Sons Dairy ever since. The couple's three sons Donnie, Ray, and Doug now oversee most of the dairy farm's daily operations, but James and Lois Barner continue to help with the over 500 head of Holstein cattle currently raised at the farm. Mr. and Mrs. Barner have four grandsons and two granddaughters, whom they hope are the start of a third generation of successful Barner dairy farmers. Mr. Barner has said two of his grandsons, Dusty and Cody, often help with chores around the dairy. The Barners often open the farm for hands-on lessons for visiting agriculture students from the University of Tennessee at Martin, as well as students visiting from nearby elementary and secondary schools. Mr. Speaker, please join me in honoring Mr. and Mrs. James Barner and their family for their years of hard work on their Weakley County dairy farm and their dedicated service to their West Tennessee neighbors.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, the only thing I would add is 45 days ago, less than that, we in this country incurred the most barbaric act in the history of civilization against humanity, save maybe for the Holocaust during World War II. There is no higher duty that a Representative in the United States Congress has than the safety and defense of this country and the citizens that live here. We ought to do that first.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I would like for the Record to indicate that had I been present on Monday, September 24th I would have voted ``yea'' on both rollcall votes 349 and 350, the Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy bill and the continuing resolution. My plane was delayed as a result of inclement weather in the Washington, D.C. area.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, Tuesday's events were an attack on the United States, but they were more than that. They were an attack on humanity and civilization itself. This resolution tonight represents a policy change in our country, a big policy change, a monumental policy change, because we are declaring war not against any nation, not against any individual, not against any religion. We are declaring war against animalistic, inhuman behavior called terrorism wherever it exists on Earth. That is a monumental step for this country. This country needs to take that step in my opinion, though, because we are the leader in freedom and democracy and human rights in the world. And so on behalf of humanity and on behalf of civilization, on behalf of our children and grandchildren's future, we take this burden on tonight. We did not seek it. But, ladies and gentlemen, we have seen the face of evil and we must crush it. We are filled with grief, yet buoyed by pride. Like all Americans, I want to right this wrong and to avenge these cold, calculated killings. While this might seem a forgone conclusion to the overwhelming majority of those home and abroad watching and awaiting our decision, this is the single most difficult obligation for a Member of this House to fulfill. In approving this measure, one is reaffirming one's support for our nation, our President, our military leadership, and expressing our collective outrage and defiance on behalf of the thousands of American families that have been torn apart. In this respect, this is an easy decision. But, as Members of Congress, we do not have the luxury of reacting solely on emotion. Ultimately, the weight of this awesome responsibility and the consequences of this decision falls on each of us. Thus, we as members of this institution, are required to divorce ourselves from the emotions, consider the interests of our nation, and to give serious consideration to the very real prospects, or one might say, the inevitable consequences of our choice. One cannot avoid the probability that the action we consider here tonight will likely bring additional loss of American life. As such, the exercise of this Constitutional obligation is never easy, regardless of the relative merits or personal convictions with respect to the course prescribed. Moreover, tonight each Member has the additional burden of knowing that in approving this measure we are not only responding to this action, but we will be embracing a monumental change in U.S. policy. With this resolution, we declare that we will no longer draw any distinctions, limiting our response to those individuals who materially participate in an act of hatred and cowardice against the United States and its citizens. We are clearly at a point of demarcation in U.S. foreign policy. From this point forward, we say to the world, choose sides. Either you join us in the singular purpose of rooting out and destroying these merchants of fear and networks of hate, or we will regard you as a co-conspirator and, as such, you will be subject to the same fate as the perpetrators. Again, this seemingly simple adjustment is no insignificant matter. This is a major policy shift which presents numerous challenges. This resolution will change the tone and tenor forever. This was an attack on civility and as such it will require a monumental effort. It will require us to have the fortitude and strength of resolve to see it through to its conclusion, without regard for the unavoidable unpleasantries. We must stay the course. To deviate or to shy away would surely risk exposing our nation, our citizens and life as we know it to far greater dangers. America is the embodiment of freedom, the beacon of hope and in a very real sense, the guardians of justice--a justice shaped and honed by our values and morals. From this point forward, we will surely have our morality and values tested. We must strive to seek that delicate balance between accomplishing our objectives and ridding the world of these vessels of hate, while showing utmost care not to allow it to lead to a decay of our appreciation of humanity. We must not allow our anger to burn so deep that we become like those we condemn. In our zeal to right the wrongs we must show care not to dim the lamp of freedom or diminish the sacrifice of those who have given their lives to promote, protect and preserve this great democracy. This was not just an attack on New York City, the Pentagon or even America, but rather an attack on civilization, itself. It marks an escalation which cannot be ignored. We must join the other nations in an all out fight against these enemies of society. I applaud President Bush and Secretary Powell's efforts to reach out and build international support. We must spare no efforts to seek the full support and cooperation of allies, as well as friend and foe in the Arab world. This effort will certainly require an unprecedented level of diplomatic cohesion and demonstration of political sensitivity. Failure to gain the support and cooperation of the international community will surely limit our effectiveness and expose this nation to grave dangers. We can ill afford to become isolated in this pursuit. As a nation, America has slumbered in the naive belief inherent in our decisive military might, superior technology and the safe labor provided by the great expanse of open ocean. Heretofore, we have been afforded the luxury of remaining unsoiled by the dirty business of hatred so common in a majority of the world today. On Tuesday, we were rudely awakened, our naive sense of security shattered by the ugly realities of terror. We did not choose this course of our own volition, but having seen evil's face we must be resolved to join the fight with everything we can muster. I stand in support of this resolution. May we proceed wisely.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Speaker, yesterday this nation, our citizens and really the entire civilized world witnessed what is arguably the most barbaric action against humankind on this Earth since the dawn of civilization, save maybe the Holocaust. Mr. Speaker, I think if anyone who has been listening for the last 6 hours or so has any doubt that this Congress, speaking on behalf of our constituents, has the total and complete resolve of them, our constituents, and this Nation, to take whatever action is necessary to revenge and to stamp out terrorism where it exists anywhere in the world, they must be reassured by what they have heard. I want to join in expressing my profound sorrow for those who lost their lives, their families, and all of the innocent people who were used as instruments of evil yesterday. I would just simply say that the resolve of this Congress and what the President said last night should send a clear and unmistakable signal all around the world that, yes, this country was changed yesterday, and, yes, the world was changed. And the way it was changed, as one of the speakers before said, is that no longer will countries who harbor these terrorist organizations be able to say, we did not have anything to do with it; it was them. That will not work anymore. From now on, as far as this Member of Congress is concerned, governments are either willing to be with us in this fight, in this war against terrorism, wherever it exists in the world, or they are co-conspirators in it.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I want to rise in a sense of disappointment also. I want to thank the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle). It is too bad his leadership has chosen the route it has chosen today, because there were some of us that wanted to reach out, do a bipartisan budget for this country that, albeit the tax number was a little higher than we thought and there was not enough debt retirement as the Blue Dogs thought, but the real kicker in all of this is the House leadership has not only taken us out of play, they have taken their own Members out of play. It does not matter what the House does. Do you know if you read the budget document, the House will not even agree to reconcile to the same number that their White House agreed to with the Senate. I have never seen a conference report like that before. But if you read it, it is there. The intransigence of this House leadership is destroying the House of Representatives when it comes to public decisions made for and on behalf of this country. Let me say one other thing. When I came here 12 years ago, all I heard was, John, do something, please, about the horrendous debt of this nation that we are passing on to our children, a 13.5 percent mortgage on this country. Every dime of debt reduction that they talk about comes from the Social Security surplus money. You know what that is like? That is like you or I paying off our Visa charge with a MasterCard. It alone does nothing to reduce the obligation that the next generation has to pay and has to come up with, and that is plain and simply morally, generationally bankrupt.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. Dunn), whom I have worked with on this issue, as well as the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) for his, I think, outstanding work in fashioning a substitute. Look, I came to this issue from the standpoint of agriculture and small business. The Democratic substitute is very attractive from the standpoint of immediate, substantial relief to those sorts of individuals, small businesses and family farms. The Democratic substitute, in my judgment, is weak in terms of addressing what I consider to be rates that are exorbitant, 55 percent. I do not believe in taking over half of anything by the government from the people. So we have that situation, but we have immediate and substantial relief. We have in the Republican bill almost no immediacy, but we have an addressing of the exorbitant rate I spoke about. I may be like many Members here in that I want something to happen this year. Nothing happened last year. I want it to happen not just in legislation, but to people, real people who have small businesses and family farms. That is the shortcoming of the underlying bill that I am a sponsor of. So I do not believe that the two ideas are necessarily mutually exclusive. I think this is a work in progress, and I think we can fashion something if we could somehow figure out how to work together here to do something both on an immediate relief from the current code of $675,000 credit, and also something on the rate. We have not been able to put those two together. I was not consulted on the chairman's mark in the committee, but nonetheless, I think we have an opportunity somewhere down the line, a window of opportunity, to actually make something good happen in this area of tax law.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Chairman, everybody within the sound of our voices here knows that we cannot have it all. We cannot have it both ways. The Blue Dog budget basically says what we ought to do as a Nation is pay our debts, meet our needs in defense and other areas that have been talked about this morning, and then give the money back to the people. The Republican outlook is to give the money back over a 5- or 6-year phased-in tax cut based on 10-year numbers, the uncertainty of which is known to all of us in a very, very vivid and real way. Our budget is a movie; the Republican budget is a preview of coming attractions. We have a real budget. If Members want to talk about tax cuts, we do four times this year the amount of tax cuts that the Republican budget does. If we want to talk about meeting our needs in defense, this year we provide $7 billion in emergency supplemental to fully fund a pay raise, to fully fund housing allowances, to immediately address the crisis we all know we have about spare parts and maintenance. We provide $45 billion more over the CBO baseline in the next 5 years for defense, $26 billion more than the Republican plan does; we fund the Murtha pay increase proposal; in short, all of the things that some of the folks over there talked about with regard to defense we actually do. We do not say, ``Wait around a while and we will get to them when we can, but, first of all, we have to shove this money out of here, because if we do not, we are liable to spend it.'' If Members look at our budget, it is truly a budget that we recommend to people.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me, and I want to commend the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner), the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff), the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor), and others who have come out here this afternoon on the floor to talk about the Nation's debt. The Blue Dogs agree that Americans are overtaxed, but we will always be overtaxed as long as we have a billion dollars a day in interest going out and as long as we have a 14 percent mortgage on this country. That is one of the reasons we are overtaxed. What we want to do as Blue Dogs is to try to keep our eye on the ball and to retire some of this horrendous national debt that we are leaving to those young people. That is how we give them a tax break. They do not have a voice here now. They cannot vote. It is up to us and this generation to protect not only our own country, as the gentleman from Mississippi so eloquently pointed out with respect to the military, that we need to support in a manner that we have not been able to find ourselves in a position to do, but we also need to look out for the young ones coming along and not burden them with $5-plus trillion of debt with an interest bill of $1 billion a day. Now, the other point I would like to make is that the House leadership is asking this country to take a risk that we do not have to take right now. All of these budget projections we have heard about are, by anyone's definition uncertain, speculative in some regards. But more than that, the money is not here. It is not real. It is not even supposed to come in, except over the next 10 years. And then only 29 percent of it is supposed to show up here in the next 5 years, beyond our new President's term of office. Yet we are asked on the floor last week and again probably next week to start spending money, in either a tax cut or some other way, money that has not even shown up yet. Any prudent businessperson, any person who is a head of a household, a family, I do not think would put his or her family at risk to the extent that we are being asked to do, nor would they put the country at risk or their business at risk if they had a vote here. And this is a risk that we are being asked to take on their behalf that we do not have to accept. We do not have to accept just what those who have more votes in this House than we do say. We say, let us wait and see where we are. We can do a tax cut that we can afford, and we want to do that. We can do some spending on the military, on agriculture, on education, on medicine that the country desperately needs if we do it across the board in a businesslike fashion with a budget in place so that we at least have some idea of what the trade-offs are going to be. Had we rather retire debt or had we rather continue to pay a billion dollars a day in interest and have our young men and women in the armed services of this country flying around in 30-year-old helicopters? I do not think that is a very hard choice, but until we get a budget so that we know what the trade-offs are, we are flying blind, so to speak, as some of those young men and women are in these 30-year-old helicopters. That is an unacceptable risk to them, it is an unacceptable risk to us and to these young people that are here today, and in my view it is an unacceptable risk for our country. What we are saying, basically, is two things: one, we are overtaxed and we always will be as long as we are carrying around this 14 percent mortgage on our country; and, secondly, we need a business plan in force and in effect so that we know and we hopefully can make some intelligent trade-offs as to how much of the money that belongs to the people that we should return to the people which we want to do, but, more importantly, what are the needs of this country. I serve on the NATO parliamentary assembly which is the civilian arm of the NATO military alliance, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which as many of my colleagues know came into being after World War II. I have been to several countries as a result of that duty, and I have yet to see a country anywhere on this planet Earth that is strong and free and is broke. There is not one, there never has been one, and there never will be one. That is why we sound like Johnny one-note on retiring some of this debt. That is why we say, keep your eye on the ball, Congress; continue to pay down the debt. As we can afford and as the money shows up, let us return it to the people who earned it, but let us also take care of the needs of this country and the people who live here. Let us take care of the medicine needs that people have, particularly the aged population, with a prescription drug benefit. Many people need that and need it desperately. There is no reason we cannot do it if we do things across the board with known trade-offs as to where we are and where we are going. In my own business at home with my brothers and my father, I would not take a risk that we are being asked to take when we have these tax bills come through the House here without any budget. I do not think that you want us to take that risk. As I have said, at the pain of repeating myself, it is a risk the country does not have to take right now. We can do better than what we have done. We should do better than what we have done. And if we can get the support of people who believe that retiring debt and not taking heedless or unnecessary risk is important to the country, it is a fight that we hopefully can eventually succeed in. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Texas again for taking this time this afternoon and allowing some of us to come down and talk about the priorities of the country and talk about the children of this country and the education that they must have for this country to remain strong and free and also to try to put as best we can the financial integrity of the United States Treasury back where it rightfully belongs.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I am one of the Blue Dog members on the Committee on Ways and Means, and I tell you, we want as large a tax cut as is responsible and consistent with protecting Social Security and Medicare and retiring the national debt, not to mention the needs of military, education and agriculture. The way you do that is you get a budget. I know of no prudent business person in this land who would make a critical operating decision in his company without a budget. And, you know, people are overtaxed. Let me give my colleagues one reason why. Look at the debt of this country. Every person in this country is responsible for $20,300 of debt. For a family of four, that is $82,000 worth of debt that they have on them. Retiring the debt is one of the priorities of the Blue Dogs. We think there is room to do both. But the way you do that and to make sure that you are in a position to do both is to have a budget first and then you get to where we want to go with the tax cut.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Texas and the other Members who have been here tonight to talk about this. We have heard a lot of talk about the fact that we think we need a budget first and we say that because, as one of the speakers said, that is the only way you have a business plan for the country, it is the only way you have a budget for a family, is to put this in some semblance of order. But the real question is why do we say we need a budget, a universe within which to work on these competing interests, whether it be paying down debt, tax cuts, increased spending for the military. The reason that we do is because we want to do the right thing for the children of this country in terms of fiscal discipline. As the gentleman from Mississippi said, if we do not get a handle on this now, we will be the first generations of Americans to actually leave this country worse than when we found it. So why do we say we need a budget first? First of all, we want to protect the trust funds that the gentleman from Mississippi talked about. Those are solemn promises and all we have to give to back them up right now are IOUs. The second thing we think we ought to do and we must do is pay down the national debt. Why is paying down the national debt important? There are 280 million people in this country. We have a total debt, according to the government, of $5.7 trillion, thereabouts. Of that, $3.4 trillion is publicly held debt. That means that each one of us owe $12,140 apiece, per person. That means for a family of four that is going to get this $1,600 in 5 years that they have talked so much about, that means their share of the public debt is $48,600. Now, Mr. Speaker, that just includes the publicly held debt of $3.4 trillion. If one adds the other debt, the Social Security debt and the things the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor) talked about, we have a $20,300 per person debt on our head when we are born as American citizens. For a family of four, that is $82,000. The proposal that has been put to us from the White House proposes $590 billion less in debt reduction from now until 2005 during this President's term than present law provides. Do we know what that means to a family of four? It means their share of this debt that we have will increase unnecessarily by $8,000. Where I come from, as the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore) said awhile ago, one of the things we think about in Tennessee is do not spend more money than you make but pay your debts. If you have some extra money coming in and you owe somebody, you do not go buy a new car and leave that somebody that you owe still waiting for their money. You go and pay them because that is the thing to do. If we do not keep our eye on the ball and continue to pay down this debt, then I will be ashamed to say, but I will have to admit, that I was one of the first generations of Americans who left this country worse than when we found it. We do not know what it is going to do to national defense. There are some defense needs in this country that all of us know about, not the least of which is our obligation to the military retirees, our obligation to the men and women who are giving us their productive years that are in the uniform service of this country. They need more pay allowances. We need to modernize their equipment. Agriculture, a nation that cannot feed and clothe themselves internally is at risk to whatever extent that food supply is interrupted. Agriculture is truly a national security concern. So when people say well, all you guys are doing down here is whining about the fact that you are not in the process, that this process has left you behind and you are whining about it. Well, let me just say this: The process that we put in place with the Budget Act and the process by which we govern ourselves is the only thing that separates this country from a dictatorship or from communism or anything else. You do not have to worry about process if you live in a dictatorship. You do not have to worry about process if you live under communism. There is none. Process is important, and that is why we are here to try to get some process in place so that we can intelligently make some decisions, if that is possible, make some decisions that are going to leave this country better, not worse, than when we leave here.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I am afraid we are getting into the area of everything having been said about this bill but not everybody having said it. Nonetheless I think it is important to reflect and realize that this action that was taken last year by the House was done at the end of the session, with a lot of unfinished work poured into one huge package, and I am afraid we are going to do that again today. It was thought to end abusive practices within the code as it relates to businesses with accrual accounting and installment sales and to actually pay for the ticket to work which was a smaller part of a broader welfare reform bill, that this was a desirable change in the code. After it was discovered by almost everyone connected with it, it was quickly realized that this covered far more than those abusive practices that were being closed to pay for the ticket to work, and so the gentleman from California (Mr. Herger) and others, myself and others, put a bill in, H.R. 3594, some time ago. I am glad we are getting this done. This is truly, I think by anyone's definition, the law of unintended consequences at work. It demands that one who has an accrual basis of accounting in one's business when one sells it to report all of the income at the time of the sale when one has, as Members know under accrual accounting, a right to the income. This makes no sense, as the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cardin) said; and so we changed it back to the way it was and the way that is sensible, sane, and reasonable. And so what we will do is by this change assure every small business owner, every small business prospective buyer that on the installment sales contract method of transaction, one may count on not having a tax liability until the money is actually realized. I want to thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Archer) for working with us on this this year and also the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) and the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kleczka), who is the ranking member of the subcommittee. I think this is a good thing we do to straighten out an obvious error that was made last year in the haste of closing up shop for the year. I hope we do not have to do this again next year.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. No insurance company can survive when every policyholder is also a claimant. That is not hard to understand.

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for yielding to me. He is right about the prescription drug issue. Let me just say this: The prescription drug issue cannot be resolved through an insurance-based model. I am in the insurance business at home, and was before I came here. Insurance is based on a spreading of risk. To use an example, if an insurance company insures 100 homes against fire, the odds are only two of them or one of them are going to burn that year, so they use the premiums paid for the other 98 or 99 to pay the one that burned. The problem with the Republican model is that they want to use the HMO model for a prescription drug benefit, and it will not work because every policyholder will also be a claimant, and there is no way that works under an insurance model. The reason Medicare came into being was because senior citizens who are sick and old could not get insurance, health insurance, for any price in the private marketplace, and with good reason, they are old and sick. I will be old and sick some day, if I am not already. That will not work. What we have to have if we are going to have a meaningful program is we have to have a Medicare derivative that is a part of Medicare to say to seniors, this is your prescription drug benefit, no matter where you live or what you do. Now, I want to thank the gentleman for having this special order tonight to let us have a chance to discuss this.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, it was the Committee on Commerce, it was not the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Moakley) for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I want to continue to talk a few minutes here about the Nation's financial picture. But before I do, we are now 25 days into the new fiscal year. Do my colleagues know how many days Congress has met of those 25? We have sat for 12, only 12 of those days. At the beginning of the fiscal year this year, on October 1, only two of 13 appropriation bills had been completed and signed by the President. Today only four, there are five more waiting, but we are still three or four away from even having something to negotiate to send to the President. Now, if one ran one's business in that manner or if a physician practiced medicine in that manner, I would suggest that a suit for malpractice, legislative malpractice would apply. This is not the way to conduct the Nation's business. It was done and the seeds were sown, as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd) said earlier, back in March when a political statement was enacted called a budget that was unrealistic and was never intended to be followed. We are now in a situation where the Republicans say, well, we have to stay in session here to keep President Clinton from demanding all of this money to be spent. If we look at history, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) just alluded to it, and the Blue Dogs went back and looked at this when we compiled our budget, over the 12 years Reagan-Bush, Bush-Quayle, the Democratic-controlled House at that time, part of that time, of course the Republicans had the Senate, spent less than those Presidents asked the Congress to spend. For the last 4 years, the Republican Congress has spent more on nondefense items than President Clinton has asked for. We now are in a never-never land 25 days into a new fiscal year with no idea in sight of how we wind up the business of the country for the previous fiscal year. We are in a position where the surplus is a projection and the spending is a fact. Now, we are going to support a CR to keep the government open. But this rule is a sham to get by for another 6 days, trying to keep this ball in the air before the November 7 election day so that no one can definitively and affirmatively state what this Congress did or did not do. I have been here 12 years. This is as poor a way to run the Nation's business as I have witnessed in those 12 years. Yesterday or 2 days ago, we were not only not consulted, we are told 2 days ago there is a tax package out there, and the leadership is going to brief the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means and the chairman of the Finance Committee in the Senate about what is in it. We are supposed to be a legislative body. I tell my colleagues, the country needs to know that whatever may happen November 7, this situation is not the way to conduct their business in a responsible manner.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to acknowledge the tremendous contributions and individual success stories that have helped our communities grow out of the presence of Lane College in Jackson, Tennessee, the heart of the Eighth Congressional District. Lane College is one of six Historically Black Universities and Colleges located in Tennessee that have helped set a standard for academic excellence. Lane was founded in 1882 as the C.M.E. High School by the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church of America. But the seeds for this great institution were first planted four years earlier in 1878. William Miles, the first Bishop of the C.M.E. Church of America presided over the Tennessee Annual Conference in 1878 accepted a resolution by the Rev. J.A. Daniels to establish a school. Two years later, after the great yellow fever epidemic and the ascension of Bishop Isaac Lane to the head of the Tennessee Annual Conference, four acres of land were purchased for $240 and in 1882 the school's doors were opened. Bishop Lane's daughter, Miss Jennie Lane, was its first teacher. In 1884 its name was changed to Lane Institute. Then, 12 years later a college department was organized and the Board of Trustees changed the school's name to Lane College. Lane College is a small, private, co-educational, church-related institution with a liberal arts curriculum offering degrees in the Arts and Sciences. Led by Dr. Wesley McClure, the College's ninth president, the school continues to play a critical role in Jackson and surrounding communities as an institution committed to academic excellence. Lane College is one of 120 historically black universities and colleges located in 23 states across the nation. Lane is one of six located in Tennessee and the other five are Fisk University, Knoxville College, Meharry Medical College, Lemoyne-Owen College, and Tennessee State University. In 1997, 28 percent of African Americans who received a bachelors degree earned them from historically black universities and colleges. Moreover, about 40 percent of African American undergraduates enrolled at historically black universities and colleges in 1996 were first-generation college students. Over its first 118 years, Lane College has ensured its place in the community of academic institutions devoted to the growth and achievement of our young people. So Mr. Speaker, we are quite certain it will build on that vision of community leadership and academic excellence well into the 21st Century. Thank you for setting aside this time tonight so that we may recognize the important role historically black universities and colleges play in our country.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Madam Speaker, I want to join with the gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott) and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) and congratulate people talking about debt reduction. I do not know where my colleagues have been in the last 18 months or so, but if it were not for the surroundings in this room being familiar to me, I would think I was in another country in another parliamentary setting. This is what we have been saying for 18 months and we have been told repeatedly, it is the people's money, give it back to them. We have seen hundreds of billions of dollars of tax cuts enacted by the people who come down here today and try to convince us that they want to reduce the debt. I mean, I thought I was in another country. This is familiar and, so, I guess I am in the United States. Let me give my colleagues some example of what I am talking about. They keep talking about 40 years. Here are facts. This is history. This is not conjecture. This is not speculation. This is not a projection. This is facts. These are the budget deficits under the Presidents. Right here the red is President Carter. This is President Reagan. This is President Bush. Reagan starts here. All of this debt. Blue starts with Clinton. If we start 40 years, they are trying to tell people that Democrats in the House did something that is constitutionally impossible. They had a Republican President for 24 of those 28 years with a veto pen, just like President Clinton has. During 6 years of Reagan's 8-year term, they had a Republican Senate. There is no way under this Government that the House can do anything by itself. So I appreciate what they are saying. But as the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) said, they are asking people to believe something that is constitutionally impossible. Beyond that, what we are talking about is a real debt of over $3.5 trillion that we have been screaming about here for 18 months. I had the motion to ask my colleagues to just reserve half, split it with the kids of tomorrow, half of the on-budget surplus over the next 10 years, just split it with the kids. No. We got one vote from them. The rest of it was let us take 87 percent under those projections for a tax cut now for ourselves, we will not worry about the future, notwithstanding the fact that it was only a projection. Now, if my colleagues want to talk about debt reduction, let us not just do it this year, let us do it in connection with what we have been telling people about tax cuts and let us do it over 10 years. That is what the Blue Dogs ask them to do. If they are going to use 10-year numbers to do a tax cut, then, for heaven's sake, let us do a 10-year number for a debt reduction package. Then we have got apples to apples. Then we have got something that people can relate to, understand, appreciate, and either agree or disagree with. But to come here now, I mean I am going to vote for it, too, why not, but this is I hope the forerunner of people who have been talking about what, I think, are irresponsible tax cuts based on projections coming and saying, let us do it the conservative way, let us do it on a 50- percent split with the kids. As a matter of fact, they say 90 percent of a unified budget, that is only $7 billion more than the Blue Dog plan would have been this year under a 50-percent on-budget surplus. We would have put 35. They put 42 for 1 year. Over 10 years we will put under the Blue Dog plan over $1.3 trillion more toward debt reduction than anything my Republican colleagues have voted for this year. Let me just say this in closing. I appreciate the time. I hope that we can come together and quit all this finger pointing and so on. But there is no way that you can disregard 18 months and come down here and say, Well, you guys come along and join us. What we need to do is a 10- year projection, not a 1-year or 30-day, or it will not even be 30 days. October 1 is the new fiscal year. It will be 15 days.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, when Betty Ann and I came to Congress in 1989, Herb and Laura were some of the first people we met. I was on the Committee on Armed Services at the time. And he was a good and decent man. More than that, he was a gentleman and a friend to me, he and Laura to Betty Ann and I. We traveled many times on CODELs to the NATO meetings with I see the gentleman from Nebraska (Chairman Bereuter) over there and the gentleman from Virginia (Chairman Bliley). And I could just simply go on and on. I am going to say this about Herb Bateman: he looked for the best in others, and he gave us the best he had. He always put his constituents and his country first. And if there were more Members of Congress like Herb Bateman, this place would be a better place and our country would be the better for it.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, last night my plane, Northwest Flight #858, was delayed in Memphis and I missed Rollcall votes 373-378. If I had been present, I would have voted as follows: Coburn--Roll Call Vote 373--No; Royce--Roll Call Vote 374--No; Crowley--Roll Call Vote 375-- Yes; Royce--Roll Call Vote 376--No; Coburn--Roll Call Vote 377--Yes; and Sanford--Roll Call Vote 378--No.

Mr. TANNER

Mr. TANNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I just say to my friend from California (Mr. Bilbray), as I said at the outset of my remarks, we are going to support his resolution here. And there is nothing wrong with it. It is just that when, at the end of this day, we had probably one of the most important Medicare bills in the history of the program here, this prescription drug benefit, and his leadership would not even give the Democrats an alternative. Today, an hour ago, we tried to do this very thing this resolution does in a motion to recommit. Not one single vote for help. And so, when my colleague says they reach across the aisle more than we do, when their leadership does not even give us an alternative, reduces us to nothing more than a motion to recommit and we cannot get that, when we have a bill that does this, when we have an amendment that did this, after a while we begin to say, what is going on here? Do these people really want to do this? We have the wherewithal to do it. It is called a bill. This resolution is fine, and we are going to support it, and we are going to reach across every time we can. But I just tell my colleague, when we try to work legislatively and we are virtually shut out, as we were today, from any input at all and then after the fact, as the gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott) said, they have a resolution that says we are going to promptly do this, well, we could have promptly done it 2 weeks ago or tonight but we did not. So I do not want to be partisan, either. I just say there is a way to do this called a bill and we are ready, willing, and able to do it. In fact, we would have done it an hour ago if we would have had some help. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.