Bill Thomas

Mr. THOMAS

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I tell the gentleman from Mississippi, the answer is an unequivocal yes.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that a colloquy between the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Pickering) and myself be made a part of the Record.

Mr. THOMAS

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, for those of us who really want to know, the Senate passed an Andean trade act bill this month. Into that bill, because they could not pass them separately, they amended the trade promotion act bill that this House passed back in December. They amended into it the trade adjustment assistance that this House passed back in November. They amended into it a Customs border security bill that we passed back in May. They could not pass bills the way we usually do. We should have gone to the Trade Promotion Authority conference 5 months ago. We should have gone to the TAA conference 4 months ago. The Senate could not pass individual bills, so in an unprecedented way, they took all of those bills, rolled them into one, and then said, let us go to conference. All we are doing are taking the bills we have passed in the past, put them together now, and going to conference in the way the Senate is going to conference, with all of the bills together. I guess it is our fault that we did our work earlier this year. Parliamentary Inquiries

Mr. THOMAS. The Speaker just said that the rules of both the House and the Senate require those bodies in the unique situation under the Constitution, when bills have passed both Houses in different forms, to come together to reconcile the differences. That is a conference. The scope of the conference is defined by the bills that are brought to the conference. The Senate brings 374 pages of 15 different bills. What the Democrats are asking us to do is to go to conference with one bill, the Andean bill, which is what the Senate requested that we go to conference over. What we want to do is take the bills that have been passed, put them into this motion, go to conference with the scope of the conference being fair and equal on both sides, and that is the sum and substance of the response of the Speaker to the parliamentary inquiry of the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. THOMAS. Is it my time?

Mr. THOMAS. Is it coming out of my time?

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Florida for stating the case; and the case is, as he indicated, we are asking the House to include in this rule to go to conference 191 pages. That is absolutely correct. Out of the 191 pages, more than 165 of them, over 80 percent, have already been passed by the House, some of these pieces more than 6 months ago. But what the Senate did was to take the House-passed Andean trade bill which passed by a voice vote, it was so broadly supported, there was no recorded vote and it passed by a bipartisan vote. That Andean bill is 40 pages. That is what they sent us to go to conference. Under the rules of conference, that was what the House would have in front of us. What the Senate did was to pass 374 pages. This is what the Senate goes to conference with. How many of these pages have previously passed the Senate like the more than 80 percent of ours? Absolutely not one. So what the gentleman from Florida wants the House to do is to go to conference with this to battle the Senate against this, and what we are saying is let us just make it a little bit fair. Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. THOMAS. Certainly, for parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. THOMAS. No, I will not yield for a parliamentary inquiry on my time.

Mr. THOMAS. I appreciate the gentleman from Florida's (Mr. Hastings) attempt to stop the rhythm, but the rhythm will not change when what they want us to do is to go to conference on one bill when the Senate put 15 different bills together. These are all within the scope of the conference. The Senate has these in front of the conference, and the House of Representatives would have only 40 pages. Point of Order

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I did not characterize. I indicated factually what the Senate was doing; and would Members notice, I have had two consecutive interruptions on parliamentary procedure which were both wrong and simply an attempt to cover up the facts because they will not be able to argue on the substance. These 191 pages are 80 percent passed already by the House. These 374 pages by the Senate had not passed the House until they put it together this way. The institution of the House should not go to a conference with the Senate unilaterally disarming. That is wrong institutionally. All this rule does is put bills that we have passed previously together so we can have our bills in front of the conference, as the Senate has as well. Members might learn something from this. We can actually say what we need to do in 191 pages; the Senate needs 374.

Mr. THOMAS. I thank the gentleman for yielding time. Mr. Speaker, some of us over here are somewhat baffled because, as we had stated earlier, more than 160 pages that are contained here are bills that have previously passed the House. But the way in which the Senate called us to go to conference, those bills would not have been within the scope of conference. All we are doing is taking previously passed work product of the House and placing it before the conference. As far as health credits are concerned, the 60 percent structure was contained in the stimulus bill. As you will recall, this House passed it four times until the Senate finally passed it. Two of those times it had health credits in there. I do not understand why my colleagues do not want to take previously passed House work product and make it in order in front of the Senate so we have a chance that the House-passed work product could be in competition with the Senate-passed product. That is all this does is take passed, previously-agreed-to measures like the Andean bill, like the trade promotion bill, and put it in front of the Senate. Why are you so afraid of using a House-passed product as the House's position? Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. THOMAS. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. THOMAS

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on the subject of H.R. 4931, the bill just passed.

Mr. THOMAS

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Massachusetts has been literally jumping up and down through this entire debate saying, ``Wait until the motion to recommit. Wait until the motion to recommit. We are going to make you vote on Bermuda.'' If you do not know what that means, we are talking about corporate inversions. In a couple of weeks you are going to get a real solution from the Committee on Ways and Means taking the tax structure change away from these corporations. But what you have in front of you on the motion to recommit is a political dirty bomb. It is an attempt to raise this issue in a way that operates like this.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, now let me explain why, based upon their desire to offer this motion as a motion to recommit, they hope it is a political dirty bomb. The reason is they want this to be a vote on inversions. They want it to be a vote on Bermuda. What in the world do corporate inversions have to do with the underlying pension bill? When you listen to their arguments, never once did they say union pension funds. Never once did they say union pension funds. Why? Because this has nothing to do with that. Let me explain something: if a foreign company owns a U.S. subsidiary, the U.S. subsidiary has to follow U.S. laws. They are talking about corporate inversions. What are those? U.S. companies that want to have a package of foreign ownership. If you are a U.S. company, you have got to follow U.S. pension laws. So do you know what this motion to recommit really says? It says you have to follow U.S. pension law. If you are a foreign corporation with a U.S. subsidiary, you have to follow it. If you are a U.S. corporation and you want to make yourself a foreign corporation with a U.S. subsidiary, you have to follow it. This motion to recommit does nothing. Why in the world is it in front of us? Because on page 6 there is one little tax hook, and that is all this is about. As a matter of fact, I apologize; this is not a political dirty bomb, it is political hot air. I ask for a ``no'' vote on the motion to recommit and a ``yes'' vote on the underlying bill. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion to recommit.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, in our debate on previous portions of the tax package that became a law last year in which we have attempted to make particular provisions permanent, the argument has been made that we do not need to do it now. In fact, that argument was made as recently as the rule on this bill. While there may have been some kernel of truth somewhere in the debates over the permanent repeal of the death or estate tax because we cannot control, in normal circumstances, the time of our death, that same argument made against this piece of legislation is an argument that is totally cynical and totally political. Why? Because this is a provision to make permanent that portion of the tax bill that allows people to plan for retirement. Retirement is a voluntary decision, and the voluntariness of it depends to a degree on our ability to have effectively planned ahead of time. The section that is probably most unfair to most Americans is the fact that we are going to keep them in doubt about what they can do with their own money to plan for their retirement. Mr. Speaker, the argument that we do not need to make this permanent when we are dealing with the question of retirement is to basically tell those people who are in their last decade of work, who are around 50 years of age, and especially those who, in their forties, are going to be making their most significant retirement decisions, that we do not care. For what must be pure partisan reasons, we are not going to let them have that certainty. And why do I say for pure partisan reasons? For a very simple reason. This bill passed the House as H.R. 10 by a vote of 407 to 24. I know that is not unanimous, but around here that is pretty overwhelming. So it is not the desire to implement the underlying provision, and perhaps the argument is, well, the budget situation has changed since that vote was recorded. We will accept that argument. Obviously we would not want to be voting out of here a budget-busting bill that we do not have to really deal with from a political point of view for 10 years, but from a personal financial-planning point of view, we desperately need this certainty. Well, if one investigates, this bill only costs $6 billion over 10 years; and I know when I say only $6 billion, people would tend to relax, but I have to tell everyone, for the investment in the comfort, in the belief in security of those Americans within a decade of retiring, $6 billion is a very, very worthwhile investment. Then we heard the argument under the rule that why are we doing this today? We have other really important things we need to do. This is not going to become law anyway. Well, we also heard that argument about a stimulus package that was before this House in March. Why are we doing this? It is not going to become law anyway. That measure passed the House with 417 votes, and the Senate moved it on to the President and it became law. If the 197 Democrats who voted for this measure last year vote for it this year, it will become law. And if they are going to hide behind the $6 billion price tag for 10 years, if they are going to argue one does not need to have this kind of knowledge to plan one's retirement, then we need to understand it is politics. I find it ironic that we are going to see criticism of the cost that this somehow is for fat cats when in fact the Democrat substitute costs five times as much as this one. So as we listen to the debate today, just keep a couple of things in mind. This portion of the tax bill that became law is not like the other portions. People can with certainty plan. It is extremely difficult to plan without certainty. The Democrats almost gleefully announce they are going to deny those people who are within a decade of retiring some certainty about the way in which they can manage their financial affairs so that in their retirement years they can live a little bit comfortably; and if this measure does not pass and if it does not become law, I want every American who cannot plan the way they should be able to plan to remember there were certain people here who thought it was more important in a political game of chess to try to advance a pawn in their goal to reclaim the majority of the House by playing stunts with this measure than it was to assure seniors and near-seniors of certainty for their retirement. That is what this vote is all about. It is the ability to plan or the denial of the ability to plan. A ``yes'' vote lets Americans plan; a ``no'' vote denies them that opportunity. Let us see who will not let Americans plan their own futures. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 451, I call up the bill (H.R. 4931) to provide that the pension and individual retirement arrangement provisions of the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 shall be permanent, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Did my colleagues hear it? Why are we dealing with something that is 9 years away? For someone who has worked 40 years, what is 9 years in terms of planning? It may be everything. The cynicism with which they simply disregard someone's few dollars, trying to be planned most efficiently for the time, value of money, so they can have a marginally better retirement, does not mean a darn thing. It does not mean anything to these people. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I want to publicly, if it does not do him too much damage, compliment my friend and colleague from Maryland. I have worked with the gentleman on the Committee on Ways and Means with some of the original preventive and wellness provisions that went into the Medicare bill. I have worked with him in a number of other very difficult and politically sensitive areas. Very much enjoyed the working relationship with the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) on our side of the line. The proof of the product was that people have accepted their work product in a nonpartisan, nongimmicky environment by more than 400 votes, and with great difficulty, and with enormous courage, the gentleman from Maryland is supporting a position he knows to be right. I do hope there will be no permanent political damage done because I know his own leadership has changed the rules of the game to create significant pressure on him, and I just want to say it publicly that I admire someone who stands up on the floor and speaks with what they truly believe is right, rather than simply mouthing comments that are designed to advance a cynical, purely partisan position. I want to say I am extremely proud of two Members of the House of Representatives, one on our side of the aisle and one on the other side of the aisle, who want to make sure that those who want to plan for a retirement with dignity have those 9 years that some folks think are not worth anything. Mr. Speaker, I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman), and ask unanimous consent that the gentleman control the remainder of my time.

Mr. THOMAS

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, in a further attempt to expedite the process, the gentleman from California asks unanimous consent to strike the words.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, just so everyone here understands that this is probably one of the grossest forms of politics that is being engaged in, the gentleman from California just took to his feet and indicated that we should be spending our time on other factors. He mentioned, for example, the question of inversions. I just want all of the Members here to know that 1 week ago today, the Committee on Ways and Means held a hearing on inversions. Is it not ironic that it was the gentleman from California (Mr. Matsui) who moved that the committee adjourn before the panel of experts was heard, before the Members had a chance to respond to questions? So here he is, complaining that we are not looking at inversions, when he was the one that moved to adjourn the committee. Now, that is politics.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I do not know about separating the wheat from the chaff, but I do think we ought to separate the bull from the waste. Notice that when we come to the floor to argue the issue in front of us, they always want to argue a different issue. One week ago today the elimination of the estate tax was on the floor. They did not like us voting on it. The Record shows it passed. Today the marriage penalty will pass. Next week we will be introducing legislation to deal with prescription drugs. But about this Maloney baloney, understand this, we have had 17 full committee hearings and only once did we have a member panel. It is not the ordinary and customary thing that we do. That is baloney. We have had subcommittee hearings. We have had 68 subcommittee hearings and we have had 60 members testify at those subcommittee hearings. We are having a subcommittee hearing on inversions. We have invited the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Maloney). Let us see if he comes, as all the other Members have come to the subcommittee. The reason they wanted to disrupt the hearing was because they want to try to make a political point. The Maloney business is baloney.