Bill Thomas

Mr. THOMAS

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

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. I guess everyone is thoroughly confused right now, based upon the statements made by my colleagues on the other side of the aisle: Why do we not do this in the light of day? Do we know where and how we are going to be spending any of this money? I hate to be the one to tell my colleagues, if they are not aware of it, but the House and the Senate have already passed a budget. That budget takes care of paying down the debt. It covers Medicare. It protects Social Security. It provides more than sufficient money for defense. I find it ironic they have now reached a point that on a Republican administration, with the former Secretary of Defense as the Vice President, the former military chief of staff as the Secretary of State, and with the honored Donald Rumsfeld as the Secretary of Defense that we are worried about whether or not the defense of this country is going to be taken care of. Where were my colleagues in the last administration based upon the folk who were running the show? I hate to tell my colleagues this, but we have already passed three tax bills. It was more than a month ago. Even above the Arctic Circle, the sun does not stay up that long. And I know some of my colleagues want to make this a partisan fight, but on one of those tax bills that we passed, the marriage penalty, there were 64 Democrats that agreed with us. We do not call that partisan; we call it bipartisan. On the Estate Tax Bill there were 58 Democrats who voted on that package. We call that bipartisan. It has been said that my colleagues engage in the politics of envy in an attempt to slow down giving people their money back. And when we hear the other side talk about the fact that only millionaires benefit, we begin to think that maybe that is true. When we say sometimes our colleagues use fear tactics, if we listened to the gentleman from California, who said there were going to be no Social Security checks going out; that, in fact, there was not enough money for prescription drugs for Medicare, I would remind my colleagues that it was this Republican majority that for the first time put preventive and wellness, when we became the majority, provisions into Medicare. Long overdue; not done by the previous majority. So I guess our concern is that a few months ago we were hearing from the Democratic leadership that we had to get money out into the hands of people. It had to be done fairly quickly. We are on the verge of doing that, and now the statement is this needs to slow down; this needs not to move forward. And at some point, I hope people realize that my colleagues will be arguing the issue of the day when this majority, with right-thinking Democrats, are trying to make sure that programmatic change goes forward and assists the beleaguered chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. But more importantly, since we have more money than we are spending right now, it is called a surplus, and we need to reduce the taxes that, under a budget we have already passed, takes care of the gentleman from Pennsylvania's concerns, we ought to return some of the taxpayers' money. It is not this bill. We are going to conference to find out what that bill is going to be, and it is time we do that so we can move forward.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. McCrery), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, might I inquire about the time remaining on either side.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), a member of the committee.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. McInnis), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I cannot help but observe the indication of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett) that they are going to get 3 gallons, and he repeatedly held up a 1 gallon tank. That is about as accurate as the rest of his statement. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Blunt), the chief deputy majority whip.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I must say that I do have fun trying to follow which argument has now been determined by the brain trust of the Democratic Party is the appropriate one to make. Apparently now we need to slow this process down because this is a fast-moving train. I thought earlier the argument was the train was not moving fast enough, and that we have to make sure that we get money out to the American people. I do want to put in context the fundamental nature of the political and partisan argument that is being made. I would simply lay before the Members the story which has run in a number of newspapers. This happens to be from the Los Angeles Times: The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate another half percentage point, to 4 percent on Tuesday, and contrary to what had been expected, left the door open for still more cuts aimed at getting the stumbling U.S. economy moving again. It was the fifth time in 5 months that the central bank shaved the so-called Federal funds rate, a benchmark for interest rates in general, and continued one of the swiftest rate reductions in Fed history. I would hope this Congress is on a fast-moving train to provide additional assistance. It is not the end-all and the be-all, but if we can move, as the budget resolution said, up to $100 billion over the rest of this fiscal year and next fiscal year into the hands of the American income tax payers, it would simply assist the Federal Reserve chairman in making sure that this stumbling economy recovers. I just find it humorous. Earlier we were not moving fast enough, and now that we are involved in a procedure which enables us to get to conference to produce a result before Memorial Day, and whoa, this is a fast-moving train. I hope the American people believe us when we say this majority in the House and Senate is going to produce a fast-moving train. It will produce a responsible, permanent marginal rate reduction, along with other adjustments, so that we can make sure that we do not stumble in this economy. Our goal is to keep the country strong, not to gain some kind of a narrow partisan advantage by exploiting this opportunity. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I do not know that I have the power. It is a cooperative effort. But after this exercise and the clear feeling on the part of the gentleman that it is now outrageous and painful, that I found a new ally in trying to make it work. I did not realize the gentleman was so outraged and that there was so much pain laboring under the Byrd Rule. For fear of putting everyone to sleep, I will spend just a minute talking about why we are in the situation that we are in. Under reconciliation with the Senate, given their rules, there are two key points that need to be remembered when the House and the Senate try to resolve issues surrounding the budget and taxes. There is only one opportunity in any given session of Congress to have a decision made on the budget and taxes associated under that budget with just 51 votes, because the Senate's fundamental rules do not limit debate. Therefore, anyone can filibuster at any time they want, which requires 60 votes from the Senate to stop that filibuster. This is an opportunity to do the people's work under a simple majority. That is one of the reasons we have labored under the Byrd Rule. The 51 vote means we can do meaningful and useful change instead of some of the outrageous change dictated by a minority, whether it is Democrats or Republicans at the time, or a coalition that can control the floor of the Senate. In addition to that, the Senate does not have the equivalent of our Committee on Rules. One of the things the Founding Fathers created was a structure in the House that could be relatively responsive to needs. There is a time limit in terms of debate; I have already said the Senate does not possess that. We have a traffic cop or a structure for controlling debate on the floor called the Committee on Rules. The Senate does not have that. So we are willing to be subjected, to a certain extent, to the outrages that the gentleman has expressed for the opportunity of moving needed legislation with a 51-vote number in the Senate. We only get it once. If we fail on this, we go back to the 60-vote requirement. As the gentleman knows, the tyranny of the minority on a 60-vote requirement will not enable us to do things that I believe the gentleman and I would like to do. So we are putting up with this, notwithstanding the outrage; but we will be looking at ways to modify this in the future so that the prerogatives in the House are not quite so controlled by the other body. It is the opportunity to make law by 51 votes in the Senate that is driving us to this what I would otherwise consider outrageous and painful situation. However, knowing how the other body works, the opportunity to resolve problems with 51 votes is an opportunity neither one of us should pass up, because we have seen what they are doing with 51 votes. We can imagine what they would have to do with 60 votes. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time. announcement by the speaker pro tempore

Mr. THOMAS. I yield to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I share my colleague's outrage. I share his pain. I only wish that when he was in the majority, he would have shown the same degree of outrage and pain which produced this particular situation that we are in. It is not called the Byrd Rule for nothing. And Senator Byrd was in the majority when this was created, as was the gentleman from New York. So I find it somewhat perplexing, although amusing, that he wishes to characterize this as something that this majority has perpetrated on the House and the American people. Quite frankly, it was under his watch. What this chairman will do is make changes in this outrageous and painful current structure. I aim to pluck some feathers from the Byrd Rule, and I hope the gentleman joins me in making sure that that happens. We do have the constitutional prerogative to initiate revenue. I think it is an outrage that we are told when and how we are to deal with this issue by the other body. However, under the current rules passed on the gentleman's watch with the Democrats in the majority, we are in the current circumstances. However, I am quite sure that the gentleman and his side of the aisle will take this time to discuss taxes. It is certainly one way to consume the time that we have available to us. I would much prefer that we work together as Members of this institution to be able to reclaim some of the prerogative we should have had that was given to the other institution when the gentleman was in the majority. I will work with him to make sure that we claim what I think are the House's rightful prerogatives in determining time, place, manner, and circumstances in which we deal with the Senate on questions of revenue. Unfortunately, we are laboring under the current law supported by the gentleman, passed by the gentleman, and imposed upon this House when he was in the majority.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, perhaps first of all we should talk about what this debate that is going to ensue is not about. It is not about the structure of the taxes that this Nation will have based upon a conference between the House and the Senate, notwithstanding the fact that the House has passed a number of tax revisions and the Senate is in the process of passing a tax revision package. What we are doing today is a process which is dictated by the budget bill and largely tied to the rules under which the Senate must operate. Notwithstanding the fact that the content of this bill in front of us, H.R. 1836, has already been passed by the House under the bill titled H.R. 3, we are not debating the content of this bill, because when this bill passes, it becomes the reconciliation vehicle under the Budget Act. It will go over to the Senate, the Senate will take H.R. 1836, remove the contents, and place therein whatever it is that they have come up with, send it back to us; and then we will reject what the Senate has done, and we will go to conference. The reason we are doing this now, notwithstanding the fact that we have already voted on the substance of this bill under a different title, is because under the reconciliation needed by the Senate to go to a simple majority, or 51 votes, only those tax items passed after the budget and reconciliation has passed are recognized as appropriate vehicles. We are here today then to meet that narrow technicality. We are providing an appropriate vehicle to send over to the Senate so that this process can continue, leading to a conference between the House and the Senate to put together the final product. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 142, I call up the bill (H.R. 1836) to provide for reconciliation pursuant to section 104 of the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2002, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. THOMAS

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, we actually have three unanimous consent resolutions. This is the first one. If we could actually do the first two and then hang on to the third one and conduct this dialogue, at least we would be two-thirds home.

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

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 include extraneous material on H.R. 10, the bill just passed.

Mr. THOMAS

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

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. It is also true that members of the Committee on Ways and Means are very concerned about this, including the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Neal), who indicated that it is not the appropriate way to deal with this issue, through a motion to recommit; but that we would be pleased to look at it in committee. As we continue through the 22 pages of this bill in terms of the specific directives, my colleagues might also be interested to know that if they vote in favor of the motion to recommit, on page 16 they would be in favor of the imposition of a tax. The tax is an excise tax. The amount of the tax imposed, and I am quoting, by subsection A, shall be 50 percent of the amount of the excess pension assets in such plan. Now, we are more than willing to talk about reasonable adjustments where we find fault, but that is a bit Draconian. And I would only ask my colleagues to look on page 22 of this motion to recommit and look at the effective date: ``The amendments made by this subsection shall apply to plan amendments taking effect after December 31, 1998.'' I would ask my colleagues, as this bill was constructed in a bipartisan way, let us reject this motion to recommit in a bipartisan way. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from North Dakota (Mr. Pomeroy) in opposition to the motion to recommit.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, the authors of the underlying bill said that they addressed the issue, not that they had dealt with it. This motion to recommit is 22 pages of very specific directed information that I will address in a moment. We have had an excellent discussion about needful changes in the area of pensions and IRAs. I would hope it is enough for my colleagues to know that the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) and the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cardin) are in opposition to this motion to recommit. This is not the way to deal with pension legislation. Twenty-two specific pages. For example, in the materials explaining the bill it says, ``The fact that cash balance plan conversions violate current pension age discrimination laws is clear.'' If it is clear, why on page 12, beginning on line 6, does it say, ``Directive. The Secretary of the Treasury shall apply section 411 without regard to the portion of the preamble. Such preamble is and has been since its adoption without the force of law.'' If it is clear, why do my colleagues direct the Treasury to a particular conclusion about that section? It also involves the ERISA area, which is the jurisdiction of the committee of the gentleman from Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner).

Mr. THOMAS. I am, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I also would thank the Committee on Education and the Workforce for the cooperative effort on the product that we have in front of us, H.R. 10, but also just as importantly on the inter-committee relationship where committees share jurisdiction on a particular piece of legislation. The quality of the product will be seen, as was said earlier, on the basis of the number of speakers on both sides of the aisle supporting the document that is in front of us; but it would not have been possible without the willingness of the committees to work together in a bipartisan way. In turning to the Committee on Ways and Means, I clearly want to give enormous credit to the co-sponsors of this bill, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) and the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cardin). It is extraordinarily easy to take an issue like this and produce a really good looking $200 billion bill. It is also relatively easy to produce an okay $100 billion bill. It took extraordinary effort to focus on what needed to be changed, overdue adjustments on amounts contributed, and produce this evenhanded excellent piece of work for $51.5 billion over 10 years. Why do I say that? Because it is exceedingly easy to double the cost of this bill because we want to do as much as we can for as many people as we can. Of course, that is a positive motivating effort; but what I would hope most Members do is focus on the particulars in this bill. Frankly, some of the adjustments are overdue. If it were based upon an indexing on inflation from the time that these numbers were first created, at the time we were talking about creating super IRAs as the Bentsen-Roth-Pickle-Thomas bill did, $2,000 seemed like a major achievement. Today, in this bill, moving it to $5,000 is a significant advancement, but all of us would like to say we would like to do more. I find it interesting that those who might oppose this bill want to increase the amount that we are going to spend and provide support for people slightly different than the fundamental underlying intention of this bill. The fundamental underlying intention of this bill is to assist people, without punishing them, in putting their own money away to assist in retirement. In that aspect, the Tax Code should reward people who do this; should create incentives and support for people who do that. The question of assisting people who do not have the wherewithal to do it themselves is a question worthy of consideration, but not at the time that we are considering this particular bill; shaped the way it has been shaped, to make it easier for employers to offer, to allow those who want these various programs to put more of their own money away under the fundamental structure, adjusted to make it timely today. So I just want to underscore to my colleagues that there are a number of issues that we could debate; but they ought to be debated at a different time, under a different forum, if in fact we want to do something fundamentally different than what we are doing in this bill. This bill is excellent as it has been crafted. The evidence of that is the list, which I am sure is growing, of the more than 100 supporters of H.R. 10, ranging alphabetically from the Airline Pilots Association, the American Bankers Association, all the way down to the United Brotherhood of Carpenters, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and virtually every labor and business and corporate group in between. This bill is frankly overdue. It is time to move it. It is modest and appropriate. And from the chairman of the committee's point of view, it was a real pleasure to work on a measure that passes the committee 35 to six and will be discussed on the floor in the way we would prefer, all of us would prefer, more bills being discussed, and that is, we would like to do more. But this is an excellent work product, the authors are to be complimented, and we ought to support it. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time. And, Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) and ask unanimous consent that he be allowed to control the balance of the time.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 127, I call up the bill (H.R. 10) to provide for pension reform, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.