Providing for the adoption of the resolution (H.Res. 1000) providing for earmarking reform in the House of Representatives.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1003 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

Mr. Speaker, today we are considering a very important reform that is a bipartisan reform. It is bipartisan because it is an issue that I am happy to say, as we have moved down the road towards reform, has enjoyed strong bipartisan support. In fact, it was a key provision in the House-passed Lobbying Accountability and Transparency Act, which did enjoy bipartisan support, not as strong as I would have liked, but it did enjoy bipartisan support.

Specifically, Mr. Speaker, with this new rule, Member-directed spending to projects in their district, or earmarks, will no longer be anonymous. It is very simple.

We all know, as it stands now, there are no disclosure requirements in appropriations, tax bills or authorizing legislation. Earmarks can be buried in the text of bills that often number into the thousands of pages. There is no easy way to account for how many earmarks are in a bill or who is sponsoring them.

This new rule requires sponsors of earmarks to be listed in committee reports. Conference reports must also have a list of earmarks that are ``air-dropped'' or brought into an agreement in the conference report itself. It is just that simple.

We are blowing away the fog of anonymity so the public can have a clear picture of what the projects are, how much they cost, and who is sponsoring them. It is just a very simple case of transparency.

Mr. Speaker, this is a victory for fiscal responsibility and a victory for spending taxpayer dollars more wisely.

As an enforcement mechanism, this new rule also provides for a question of consideration when a bill or conference report does not contain a list of earmarks. The question of consideration is debatable for 30 minutes, 15 minutes equally divided.

Mr. Speaker, if a Member feels strongly enough about a proposed earmark, they will have to attach their name to it. That is all we are asking. And they need to be prepared to make their case in full view of their colleagues, their constituents, and the American people as a whole.

Mr. Speaker, the earmark reform bill will build on the reforms that have already been implemented by the Appropriations Committee, and I take my hat off to the Appropriations Committee for the very bold and dynamic reforms that they have made. They have reduced the number of earmarks already by 37 percent. Overall spending on Member projects was reduced by $7.8 billion below last year's level.

Over the last 2 years, Member project spending has decreased by over $10 million, and I want to especially express my appreciation to my very dear friend, Jerry Lewis, who has so ably chaired the Appropriations Committee and has stepped up to the plate and taken on this issue of reform and done it with great success because of the fact that he has been able to rein in Federal spending. It doesn't get a lot of attention, but he has been very successful in doing that.

Mr. Speaker, I also want to make very clear that our focus is not solely on appropriations. This was one of the requests that Chairman Lewis made of us as we were proceeding with this work.

For this reform to be effective, it must be comprehensive, and that was the commitment that the Speaker of the House and our leadership team made to our Members. So let me point out that this earmark reform applies across the board. It doesn't just apply to some committees. It covers all committees, all appropriations, all tax, all authorizing legislation, anything that moves through this House through regular order.

Mr. Speaker, we have taken great care to clearly and precisely state what constitutes a tax, an appropriation, or an authorizing earmark. And the good news is that there is more agreement than disagreement on those definitions. Yet clearly there is no magic bullet. There is not going to be one definition that will be perfect and please everybody. But at the end of the day, we have to come together. We have to come together, Mr. Speaker, and move this process forward. If there is an earmark in a bill, it belongs on a list. It is just that simple.

If there is an earmark, we need to see it. Now, is this new disclosure going to completely end the practice of earmarking? I certainly hope not. I don't want it to, because I believe that earmarking is part of our constitutional responsibility. But it will shine a spotlight on earmarks without grinding the legislative process to a halt.

Let me make very clear that the larger goal of this new rule is to make a profound and lasting change in how this institution handles earmarks and spends taxpayer dollars. The goal is to increase transparency, disclosure and accountability, and the goal is to pull back the curtain on earmarks for the public, because I believe, Mr. Speaker, that they have a right to know.

For this earmark reform to be both meaningful and lasting, everyone, from committee chairmen on down, must make a good-faith effort to comply with the spirit of the new rule. Our leadership, and certainly the Rules Committee, has made such a commitment, and we are determined to make this work.

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to point out that while this is an important milestone in the path toward reform, we have not reached the goal

line. In fact, I don't believe that we will ever reach the absolute goal line because reform is a continuous process. It gains momentum from Members who never let up and never settle for the status quo.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' for reforming earmarks, and ``yes'' to setting the stage for more reforms that we will face down the road.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds to say in response to my good friend from New York once again, this is a bipartisan effort. I know that the Democratic Caucus has talked about the need to implement this reform. We hope very much, when we come back to majority status in January of next year, to renew and build on this kind of reform.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to my very good friend, a hardworking member of the Commerce Committee, the

gentleman from Phoenix, Arizona (Mr. Shadegg).

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to yield 2 minutes to a very hardworking member of the Committee on Rules, my very, very good friend from Marietta, Georgia, Dr. Gingrey.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I am very happy to yield 1 minute to the very distinguished majority leader, who has been a great champion of earmark reform for many, many years, my friend, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner).

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

I thank my friend for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I would simply say that the gentleman has some very interesting, creative ideas. As I said in my opening remarks, the reform process is an ongoing thing that we are dealing with, and I am more than happy to look at the proposals that the gentleman has, especially as we look at our opening day rules package for January of next year.

Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to yield 2 minutes to a strong proponent of the issue of earmark reform, our friend from Mesa, Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the majority leader, and I, in my role as chairman of the Committee on Rules, have made a commitment not only to the appropriators but to all Members of this body that we will enforce this rule with respect to unreported measures and amendments, including managers' amendments, submitted to the Rules Committee. If the House considers a bill that has not been reported by a committee, the committee of jurisdiction must comply with the earmark rule and provide a list of earmarks along with the name of the Member who requested the earmark. If the House considers a manager's amendment on a bill, the committee must comply with the earmark rule and provide a list of earmarks along with the name of the Member who requested the earmark. By adopting this new rule, we as a body are not only making the commitment to live under its provisions, but every Member must make a commitment to adhere to the spirit of this new rule. This is more than just adding a new rule. It is making a commitment to change the culture of this institution.

I am happy to yield to my friend from Wisconsin.

Yes. If I could reclaim my time, the agreement that we have for implementaton of this rule means that if there is anything that has a so-called airdrop provision in it, this rule will apply to--

So this rule will be implemented immediately.

Mr. Speaker, if I could reclaim my time, I will tell you this. I know full well that the United States Senate is watching this debate very, very closely and they very much are interested in seeing us comply with this.

Mr. Speaker, at this point I would be happy to yield 2 minutes to my very good friend from Columbus, Indiana, the chairman of the Republican Study Committee, Mr. Pence.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Well, Mr. Speaker, I guess it is pretty obvious that we are 54 days away from an election. I listened to that speech, and the only thing that I can say is that we have seen a challenge here, both political parties in this institution, and we have stepped up to the plate, and we believe that accountability, transparency, and disclosure will provide an opportunity to address the understandable concerns that have existed, and I believe that we have a great opportunity with this legislation to bring about that change.

Let me just respond to Mr. Obey's concern briefly, before I yield to my colleague, on the issue of bringing back the defense conference report. When we implement this rule, we will clearly be placing onto the shoulders of whoever is chairing that conference from the House side the responsibility of bringing back a conference report that includes a full listing, full transparency and full disclosure of all earmarks that were not in that measure when it was passed through either the House or the Senate. So for that reason we in the House would not be able to bring up and pass a report that did not have that full list that we are looking for.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Dallas, our good friend who has worked very hard on this issue, Mr. Hensarling.

Would the gentleman yield?

If I could yield myself 10 seconds out of my time.

I was just going to say that there was no amendment offered in the Rules Committee whatsoever, so nothing was rejected.

No, there wasn't. I chair the committee, and I will tell you that there was not an amendment that was offered in the Rules Committee.

It wasn't offered in the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 45 seconds to say to my friend that to call increasing transparency, accountability, and disclosure as pretend is absolutely outrageous.

There is bipartisan concern about this problem, as stated from my friend from Wisconsin and from other Members on both sides of the aisle, and I believe that this measure will allow us to do that.

The proposal that the gentleman is talking about may have been listed upstairs, but it wasn't offered on the Committee on Rules for us to consider. And in looking at it, Mr. Speaker, I have got to tell you that we found that it was the most impractical thing imaginable.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to my very good friend from Newport Beach, Mr. Campbell.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Austin, Texas (Mr. McCaul).

Mr. Speaker, at this time I am happy to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wantage, New Jersey (Mr. Garrett).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.

Mr. Speaker, under the very able leadership of my California colleague Jerry Lewis we have seen a 37 percent reduction in the number of earmarks. We have seen either a flat line or real cuts in the appropriations bills with the exception of our priorities of national defense and homeland security, and we have seen a very strong commitment to institutional reform. I take my hat off to Jerry Lewis for the fine work that he has done.

Mr. Speaker, we are constantly looking at more reform. The Speaker of the House, the majority leader, I believe that Members on both sides of the aisle believe that we should pursue greater transparency, greater disclosure and greater accountability. I have heard Democrats and Republicans alike say that over the past hour. We have an opportunity to do just that right now.

We, I am very happy to say, have put into place bold economic policies that have led to a $58 billion reduction in the deficit over last year's number.

We today have the lowest unemployment rate on the face of the earth. There is no other country in the world with an unemployment rate as low as our unemployment rate, and yet we need to continue to do everything that we can to try and rein in Federal spending.

I, as a Republican, believe that the reach of government not only costs money, but it impinges on individual initiative and opportunity. I believe that as we focus on this kind of reform we will be in a position where we will be able to improve the quality of life and the standard of living for our constituents.

Mr. Speaker, vote ``yes'' on the previous question and ``yes'' on this rule.

Mr. Speaker, I am inserting in the Record a list of additional Members who would like to be considered as cosponsors of H. Res. 1000.

Additional Members include: Mark Green, John Linder, and Charles Bass.

The material previously referred by Ms. Slaughter is as follows:

Previous Question on H. Res. 1003 Rule providing for consideration of

H. Res. 1000

At the end of the resolution add the following new

sections:

``Sec. 2. Immediately upon the adoption of this resolution

it shall be in order without intervention of any point of

order to consider in the House a bill consisting of the text

specified in Section 3. The bill shall be considered as read

for amendment. The previous question shall be considered as

ordered on the bill to final passage without intervening

motion except: (1) 60 minutes of debate equally divided and

controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the

Committee on Rules; and (2) one motion to recommit with or

without instructions.''

Sec. 3. The text referred to in section 2 is as follows:

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might consume.

Mr. Speaker, it is no secret why fewer than 30 percent of Americans approve of the job that Congress is doing. It is not hard to figure out why nearly 75 percent of Americans feel as though the country is headed in the wrong direction, and it is easy to see why so few citizens are confident that this government will turn things around.

Our elected officials routinely abuse the public trust, promising one thing and delivering another. They intentionally disguise business as usual to look like positive reform, and Members of the House have ignored the rules written in the public interest, and have allowed the deliberative process at the heart of our democracy to be captured by special interests.

The result has been a Congress where corrupt lobbyists write the bills, 15-minute votes are held open for 3 hours and entirely new legislation is crammed into acts in the dead of night. The American people know it, and they are tired of the old games. When finally faced with public awareness and anger over just how corrupt our House has become, Republicans promised a great deal.

In fact, they opened 2006 with a flurry of promises. My good friend and colleague, David Dreier, the chairman of the Rules Committee and Republican ethics reform leader, had this to say on the floor in February, and I quote, ``We are committed to bold, strong, dynamic reforms for this institution,'' he said. Adding the quote, ``the Republican Party has stood for reform ever since I can remember.''

But since then, Mr. Speaker, very little of anything has come from my Republican friends, even though their party controls the House, the Senate and the White House. If they were interested in ethics reform, they would have passed it swiftly. Instead they seem here at the last throes simply determined to merely run out the clock on the issue of passing a few deceptive bills here and there while secretly hoping the whole subject would go away.

We saw this strategy with the first ethics reform act passed by the House in February, which was a minor rules change that simply prevented former Members from using the House gym, as if that is the only place that dishonest business transpires in Washington.

Then in May a broader Republican bill theoretically focused on preventing future lobbyist abuses was lambasted by commentators of all stripes for being what it was, a sham. It has been a history of deliberate inaction, Mr. Speaker, and the same story here today.

As this legislative session comes to a close, it is truly shameful that bills like this one are all the House is going to be able to accomplish. Consider the context in which this bill comes to us.

While my colleagues on the other side spent years railing against the evils of Congressional earmarks, they have been presiding over the greatest earmark explosion in American history. According to the Heritage Foundation, earmarks are appropriations bills that increased tenfold between 1995 and 2005. In the mid-1990s, they accounted for $10 billion in Federal spending. Today it is over $27 billion.

Nonappropriation earmarks have skyrocketed as well. Last year's transportation reauthorization bill, for example, contains 6,371 earmarks, totaling $25 billion, including the ``Bridge to Nowhere.''

We cannot afford to keep spending in such an irresponsible way, Mr. Speaker. One look at our skyrocketing national deficit is proof enough of that. But this is about more than just debt, it is about the future of democracy itself.

Unchecked earmarks, and many of them for relatives of the persons who wrote them, or for businesses that they own, are a cause of the culture of corruption that pervades Washington and undermines our democracy. They are routinely traded for political favors, exchanged for votes and used to benefit family members. They are, in the words of Representative Flake, the currency of corruption in Washington.

Yet, my Republican friends have given us a bill today that is a nonresponse to the crucial issue, a deceptive bill that is riddled with loopholes. Just like the previous legislation, this is, once again, a sham.

This measure is supposed to increase disclosure of which Members are behind which earmarks. But it is intentionally limited. It leaves numerous means by which Members can conceal their earmarks. The rules change proposed to the resolution applies only to reported bills, so a Member who wanted to avoid disclosing earmarks to the public could simply include them in the manager's amendment or bring the bill straight to the House floor without a committee markup, therefore, no identifiable earmarks. That is a loophole you could drive a truck through.

If that is not bad enough, the bill defines many types of earmarks right out of existence. For example, spending on Federal entities can no longer be classified as an earmark under the bill. That would have allowed the infamous $200 million ``Bridge to Nowhere'' earmark that blew up in a scandal last year to avoid disclosure entirely. The $400 million Home Depot ceiling fan giveaway that we heard so much about would not have counted as a earmark either, just because the resolution did not include tariff and duty changes in its definition.

Of course, this entire piece of legislation would expire in January. Let me make that point again. What we are doing here today, when this passes today, it is only good till the end of the year. How serious a bill is that?

This is a deeply flawed solution to a serious problem, a temporary stopgap measure, and I think we won't be writing any more earmarks this year, which is designed to do little more than get the Republicans through the November elections.

As always, there is an alternative. More than 6 months ago my Democrat colleagues and I offered a tough, commonsense report package that would have corrected many of the most rampant abuses plaguing Washington, abuses that have diverted the work being done here away from the good of the people and toward the wants of a few.

Legislation I introduced on behalf of the Democratic leadership in May bans travel on corporate gifts, bans lobbyist gifts, slows down the revolving door between Capitol Hill and K Street, prohibits lobbyists writing the bills, addresses many of the broken procedures and rules here in this House.

It focuses on earmarks, too, in a much more direct and systemic way than the bill before us does now. In fact, it requires Members to publicly disclose all district-specific earmark requests that they make on bills and conference reports. This past May I am proud to say that 16 Republicans joined with the Democrats in support of this bill.

In the end, it failed the House by only two votes. It was deeply encouraging to see rank-and-file Republicans of conscience challenge their Republican Party's leadership, to see them back up their pledge to clean up the House with real action. They will have other chances to do it, too, because Democrats have not given up this fight.

We have always prided ourselves on delivering what we have promised, and we are committed to eliminating the corruption that plagues our Congress today. We won't stop until we get there.

Together, we will give the country a Congress they can be proud of again.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui).

(Ms. MATSUI asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of giving a response, I would like to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel).

The world knows who is doing the big spending. We have the worst deficit we have ever seen. And as far as stepping up to the plate, the Democrats never get a chance at bat. We have absolutely nothing we can do, all we can do is vote up or down. We don't know when the bills were written, we have no impact on them at all. As far as the deliberative body, it is all on your side. So I urge all of my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this today.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen).

If the gentleman will yield, and I will give him the extra time, but let me make clear that this amendment was submitted to the Rules Committee for consideration. The fact that you would not take it up is not the fault of Mr. Van Hollen.

Mr. Speaker, I will be asking for a ``no'' vote on the previous question so I can amend the rule to give the House an opportunity to vote today up or down on a comprehensive reform package.

I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment and extraneous materials immediately prior to the vote on the previous question. That will include the listing of the amendments at the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, the Republican leadership in this House has promised for months it would enact comprehensive ethics and lobbying reform legislation in this Congress. We all know that it has not and most likely will not happen before the House adjourns for the mid-term elections in just 2 weeks. But we still have time and opportunity to do something today if we will defeat the previous question.

The amendment provides that, immediately after the House adopts this rule, it will bring up ethics and lobbying reform legislation that is identical to the motion to recommit that I offered this past May. That motion to recommit, which had bipartisan support, came within three votes of passing.

This legislation, called the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act, is a truly comprehensive ethics and lobbying reform initiative. It takes a tough stand on a number of the problems that have led to the culture of corruption that has evolved in the 109th Congress.

I urge all Members to vote ``no'' on the previous question so we can bring up legislation and give Members of this House the right to cast a vote for cleaning up the ethics problems that have plagued this institution for too long. Time is running out for the 109th Congress. If we do not act now, there will be no opportunity to show the American people that we are serious about reform.

Vote ``no'' on the previous question and vote ``no'' on the rule for this piece of legislation that will only live for two more weeks.

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

Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, today we are considering H. Res. 1003, a rule providing that, upon its adoption, H. Res. 1000, providing for earmarking reform in the House of Representatives is hereby adopted.

Mr. Speaker, today we are considering an important reform that members of both parties have supported. In fact, it was a key provision in the House-passed Lobbying Accountability and Transparency Act. Specifically, with this new rule, member-directed spending to projects in their district, or earmarks, will no longer be anonymous.

As it stands now, there are no disclosure requirements for earmarks in appropriations, tax and authorizing legislation. Earmarks can be buried in the text of bills that often number into the thousands of pages. There is no easy way to account for how many earmarks are in a bill and who is sponsoring them.

This new rule requires sponsors of earmarks to be listed in committee reports. Conference reports must also have a list of earmarks that are ``airdropped'' into the agreement.

We are blowing away the fog of anonymity so the public can have a clear picture of what the projects are, how much they cost and who is sponsoring them. This is a victory for fiscal responsibility and a victory for spending taxpayer dollars wisely.

As an enforcement mechanism, this new rule also provides for a question of consideration when a bill or conference report does not contain a list of earmarks. The question of consideration is debatable for 30 minutes--15 minutes equally divided.

If a Member feels strongly enough about a proposed earmark, they will have to attach their name to it. And they need to be prepared to make their case in full view of their colleagues and constituents.

Mr. Speaker, while the report to accompany H. Res. 1000 addresed several issues regarding the implementation of this new rule, I believe that it is important to further clarify how this rule will operate after its adoption.

First, this rule will become effective immediately upon its adoption. Any report filed by a committee from that point forward should address this new rule. If there are earmarks in the bill or report, they should be listed appropriately; if there are none, I would encourage the committee chairmen to include a statement to that effect, as is often the current practice with other reporting requirements under rule XIII.

Secondly, with regard to measures in conference, we recognize that the exact requirments of the resolution may be problematic given that this rule was not in place at the point of House consideration. We believe that it is important that committee chairmen make a good faith effort to comply with the spirit of the rule, and would regard inclusion of a list of earmarks which were not in either the House or Senate bill or their accompanying reports, i.e. ``airdropped'' earmarks, as meeting the intent of this new rule.

Mr. Speaker, the earmark reform will build on the reforms already being implemented by the Appropriations Committee--reforms that have reduced the number of earmarks this year by 37 percent. Overall, spending on member projects was reduced $7.8 billion below last year. Over the last 2 years, Member project spending has decreased by over $10 billion.

I want to thank Chairman Lewis and the Appropriations Committee for making significant progress in reining-in government spending.

I also want to make very clear that our focus is not solely on appropriations. For the reform to be effective, it must be comprehensive, and that was the commitment made by Speaker Hastert and the leadership of the House. So let me point out that this earmark reform applies across the board. It does not just apply to some committees. It covers all committees and all appropriations, tax and authorizing legislation that moves through regular order.

Mr. Speaker, we have taken great care to clearly and precisely state what constitutes a tax, an appropriations and an authorizing earmark. And the good news is that there is more agreement than disagreement on these definitions. Yet clearly, there's no magic bullet. There is not going to be one definition that will be perfect and please everybody. But at the end of the day, we have to come together and move this process forward. If there's an earmark in a bill, it belongs on a list. It's just that simple.

Now, is this new disclosure going to completely end the practice of earmarking? No. But it will shine a spotlight on earmarks without grinding the legislative process to a halt.

And let me make very clear that the larger goal of this new rule is to make a profound and lasting change in how this institution handles earmarks and spends taxpayer dollars. The goal is to increase transparency and accountability. And the goal is to pull back the curtain on earmarks for the public, who have every right to know.

For this earmark reform to be both meaningful and lasting, everyone, from commttee chairman on down, must make a good faith effort to comply with the spirit of the new rule. Our leadership--and certainly the Rules Committee--has made such a commitment. We are determined to make this work.

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to point out that while this is an important milestone on the path toward reform, we have not reached the goal-line. Reform is a continuous process. It gains momentum from members who never let up and never settle for the status quo. I urge my colleagues to vote yes for reforming earmarks and yes to setting the stage for more reforms down the road.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman.

Mr. Speaker, this bill represents the death of lobby reform. Over the last year, as we all know, this House has received a black eye because of the DeLay scandal, stories about lobbyists paying for golf trips to Scotland, the Cunningham blatant bribery case, the Abramoff scandal, and we have been awash in talk of reform. But comprehensive reform packages have not been allowed to come to this floor. We have not been allowed by the majority to have votes on them.

But now, 7 weeks before the election, we get a chance to see that the majority has labored long and produced a mouse, or a fig leaf at best.

My old friend, Archie the Cockroach, said once, ``The trouble with most people is that they lose their sense of proportion; of what use is it for a queen bee to fall in love with a bull?'' Think about it a minute.

The problem with this bill is that there is a huge problem and this bill proposes a minuscule solution. The answer of the majority leadership is to require a list of what they call earmarks. But this package is more notable for what it does not include than it is for what it does include.

I would call it the 1 percent solution.

Now, my personal anger about earmarks I think is well known in this body. The last time I chaired the Appropriations Committee there was not a single earmark in the Labor-H appropriation bill. Today there are over 1,200. And 3 years ago the Labor-H Subcommittee used the earmarks as blackmail by threatening to cut off earmarks for any Member who refused to vote for an inadequate bill. I did not especially like that and I made that quite clear. But the point is that the problem is not earmarks. It is the abuse of the earmark process.

This proposal does nothing to ensure institutional integrity. It is consumer fraud masquerading as earmark reform. Look at what it does not cover: It applies only to committee reported bills. It exempts managers' amendments. That means the famous ``Bridge to Nowhere'' would be exempted from this bill. On tax earmarks this bill actually makes the existing law worse. Right now a tax earmark is defined as a special treatment for 100 or fewer persons. This bill says the only time that it is going to be counted as a tax earmark is if it affects one entity. That means you can have a huge tax break for two multinational oil companies and it isn't even covered in this package.

In the 1986 tax bill, there were 340 separate transition rules costing over $10 billion. There were special tax breaks for two Chrysler plants. This bill wouldn't cover it. The only way that that would be exposed under this bill is if there had only been one tax break for one of those Chrysler plants.

The tax bill that passed last year that provided special treatment for ceiling fan imports or for U.S. horse and dog racing or Hollywood studios that produce the movies in the Gulf, all exempt under this bill.

There were 190 special provisions in the Pension Protection Act of 2000, costing $180 million in taxpayers' money--virtually all of them would be exempt under this proposition.

If you want to save taxpayers' dollars, rather than continuing this silly game of Trivial Pursuit, what you would do is to require that reconciliation bills can be used only to reduce the deficit rather than increase it as the majority party has cynically used the reconciliation process the last 4 years. This bill, indeed, is Trivial Pursuit.

I don't care if you list the Members who sponsor earmarks. I put out press releases on every one of them. I attended a ceremony last week where we had a groundbreaking for an expansion of the Mel Laird Medical Center in my district. I got that earmark. I am proud of it, and I am proud to stand for it. The problem is what this package doesn't contain.

This is a joke. It is a fraud. It plays Trivial Pursuit. It focuses on the minutiae instead of the big problems. That should not be surprising given the track record of the majority party in this House. But this House ought to be able to do better.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

I thank you. Will you tell me how this is going to apply to the defense appropriations bill that will be coming back to us this year from conference?

So none of the earmarks presently in the bill will be required?

So none of the Senate earmarks will be included; the Senate will continue to be anonymous?

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time.

I would simply point out under this provision, when the defense appropriations bill comes back from the Senate, not a single Senate earmark will be listed, and in the future only House earmarks will be listed. The Senate earmarks will not be listed.

I would also point out that if you read the language of this resolution, it makes quite clear that the tax provisions covered by this bill are, in fact, fewer than under existing law and also that same fact applies to trade preferences.

Trade bills are hard enough to pass now. So what happens is they slip in all kinds of special deals for special commodities in order to get 218 votes.

This bill will not lay a glove on them, and for that matter, it will not lay a glove on a single appropriations earmark. It doesn't do anything to any earmark in the House or the Senate. This bill is a fraud.

Mr. Speaker, despite the huge scandals that have worked this town, this Congress has failed to pass a lobbying reform bill, we failed to pass an ethics reform bill, we failed to deal with the gift ban, we

failed to stop the flying on the corporate jets, we failed to shut the resolving door. There has been a shameful lack of accountability.

Now, I support greater transparency in the earmark process, I support greater sunshine. But we should get right at the root of the problem and eliminate the worst abuses outright. Now, Mr. Emanuel and I and others offered an amendment the other day in the Rules Committee to stop the inside dealing and to stop the sweetheart deals, and the Republican leadership said no.

What did that amendment do? It was pretty simple. It said a Member of Congress can't take Federal taxpayers' dollars and earmark them for an organization that employs their spouse or their family members. They said no to that. It says let's not take Federal taxpayer dollars and steer them to an organization that just employed one of their former staffers. They said no to that.

Not out of my time, Mr. Chairman.

I would be happy to.

There was an amendment.

There was a proposal.

We made some proposals to address that issue.

Thank you.

There is a proposal also out there that we have sponsored that I hope you will address and make in order to this particular piece of legislation with respect to prohibiting funds from going to somebody who has an organization, if that person is also the head of a political action committee of a leadership PAC, some simple rules of the game that we should all therefore be able to agree to, I hope. If you didn't take it up in the Rules Committee, maybe we can take it up now today if we all agree that those are abuses that we should end.

Mr. Speaker, we submitted an amendment to the Rules Committee for its consideration. I am sorry that the chairman decided not to take up the amendment, but what the amendment did was outline the very simple prohibitions that we talked about, to prohibit us from steering Federal taxpayers' dollars to organizations that employed family members, that employed former staff members, or where monies were steered through lobbyists and lobbyist organizations that employed spouses or family members or former staff members.

The key issue here is trying to end the sort of inside dealing and sweetheart deals that have rocked this town. We have not done that. What worries me about this piece of legislation is that people are going to pass it and they are going to go home to their congressional districts and they are going to tell people: We have cleaned up Washington; that we have stopped the abuses, that we have done something about the nexus between lobbying problems and the earmark process, when in fact we haven't done it.

The earmarks have skyrocketed since the Republicans took control of Congress, and yet they have also refused to adopt a rule that we proposed for a pay-as-you-go budget. The President and others complain about earmarks, but he hasn't vetoed a single bill except the stem cell bill. We keep hearing about the problems on the spending side, and yet every one of the bills that has gone through this Congress has been signed by the President. Again, the only bill he has vetoed is the bill dealing with stem cell research.

So if we are serious about fiscal accountability, let's adopt the pay-as-you-go rule that has been proposed by the Democrats, and let's adopt the measures that I talked about that we submitted to the Rules Committee that would end the worst abuses. And I still don't understand why the Rules Committee failed to take up and consider those proposals.

I thank my colleague from New York for the time. Let's send a signal to the people around this country that we recognize the abuses that have taken place, that we are going to do something real, let's not just pretend we are doing something. There is some momentum to do things here. We are not taking advantage of it. Let's do that.