Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, let me stipulate from the outset that the gentleman from Ohio is a good man, and I think, with some exceptions, he and I have priorities in this bill that are pretty much the same. What I say is not in any way designed to be an attack upon him or his leadership of the subcommittee; but the fact is that this subcommittee has been given an inadequate allocation and as a result, this Congress is about to make a large mistake if it passes this bill because it will be shortchanging this country in terms of the long-term investments that we should be making in America's working families and programs that are focused on the needs of America's working families.

The gentleman argues that we ought to vote for this bill because if we do not, then the majority will bring forth a continuing resolution which will do certain bad things. That is like saying, ``Save us before we are irresponsible again.'' I really think we understand that what needs to happen to this bill is that it needs to be repaired, not further savaged; and that is what we want to see done.

The reason we are in this fix is because the majority, just in the last week and a half, passed almost $70 billion in tax cuts and a very large percentage, approaching 50 percent, went into the pockets of the most well-off 1 percent of people in this country, people who make over $400,000 a year. And then they pay for it, partially, by squeezing bills like this one.

Let me make clear, this bill is virtually identical to the bill that the House rejected just a few days ago by a 209-224 vote on a bipartisan basis. It has moved around a small amount of money in hopes of picking up a few votes because of an improvement in rural health care, but outside of that the bill is virtually the same.

I want to make clear when we vote against this bill today, we will be voting against it not just because we are unhappy with the $1.6 billion cut below last year that this bill represents. To understand what this bill is doing, you must look at it in conjunction with the next step that the Republican leadership of this Congress has already announced that they intend to take, which is to further cut this bill by 1 percent across the board as they cut the entire discretionary budget 1 percent across the board.

That means that this bill will have a double hit. That means in the end this bill, for 1 year alone, will be $3 billion less than was provided for these same programs last year. Over a 5-year period, because this sets us on a course, over a 5-year period if we pass this bill, we will wind up spending $15 billion less for programs in this bill than we would otherwise spend if we simply stuck to last year's baseline.

In addition to that, 2 weeks ago our Republican friends pushed through a package of rescissions and reconciliation actions which cut $33 billion out of programs that benefit the same people who are benefited by this bill. They, for instance, cut $5 billion out of child support enforcement which will result in women in this country over the next 5 years getting $24 billion less in child support money than they are entitled to.

They are cutting over 200,000 kids off health care screening and cutting well over 200,000 families off food stamps. They are saying to people on disabilities, ``Sorry, but you are not going to get your full entitlement in your first check after you are declared eligible for disability.'' Right now the law says that if you apply for disability and if you are adjudged to be eligible, when you get your first check, you will be paid retroactive to the date of application.

The bill that passed 2 weeks ago on this floor, the reconciliation bill, said, ``Sorry, folks, if you are declared eligible, you will get only the first 2 months' entitlement in that check; the rest will be strung out over a period of months.'' The only reason the government saves money under that plan is because people will die before they get what they are entitled to get.

So this House has already taken all of those actions which will cut the assistance to middle-income families and poor families in this country by $33 billion, and then this bill over the next 5 years will wind up imposing an additional $15 billion cut in resources provided over that time.

And as far as I am concerned, it is ironic that this is happening at Christmastime. Usually, Mr. Speaker, at Christmastime, we fill children's stockings. This time around, in sort of ``Scroogenomics'' fashion, we are emptying those children's stockings and instead moving that money into the pockets of some of the wealthiest people in this country. I do not think that is a way to live up to the Christmas spirit.

I want to point out what some of the real reductions will be. We have 55 million children in public schools. State budgets are stretched thin. And yet, No Child Left Behind funding in this bill is cut $779 million and would be cut $1 billion after the 1 percent across-the- board cut is imposed.

Pell grants: Both parties go home and tell people how much we want to help families who are trying to send their kids to colleges. The College Board spelled out that in the last 5 years, the cost of a 4- year public education has increased by $3,100. The President's response to that was to add $100 to the Pell Grant maximum grant. So he proposed a $100 solution to a $3,100 problem. House Republicans said, ``Oh, no, that is too much.'' So, originally, this bill cut that to $50, and then the conference came back with nothing, zippo. So the Congress is doing nothing to ease the squeeze on families trying to send their kids to college.

And in the reconciliation bill which they passed just 2 weeks ago, they are making that problem, over the next 5 years, $12 billion worse or, I am sorry, $8 billion worse for those same families by raising fees, raising interest rates on student loans. And then they say that they are friends of education.

If you take a look at education technology, this bill cuts that program by $221 million or 45 percent. If you take a

look at low-income heating assistance, we have a need to at least double that program, given the fact that we have these huge increases in natural gas prices and home heating-oil prices. In fact, this bill freezes low-income heating assistance. And with the 1 percent across the board that is contemplated that will be on top of this freeze, you will wind up actually reducing money for low-income heating assistance.

Our Republican friends say, ``Oh, well, we are going to try to add $1 billion in the reconciliation bill.'' But we are already told that there is less than a 50/50 chance that reconciliation bill will even be passed before Congress leaves here for the holidays.

Then if you take a look at the International Labor Affairs Program, the program which is supposed to protect American workers' wages by seeing to it that they do not have to compete internationally against slave and child labor, that program is being cut by $21 million or 22 percent by this bill and the across-the-board cut that will shortly follow.

Community health centers: Everybody on both sides of the aisle talks about how important they are. But there is virtually no funding for new community health centers beyond those approved last year. And the majority, in this bill, eliminates the Healthy Communities Access Program, $83 million gone that helps provide health care to persons who do not have any or who do not have health care.

So I would say simply, Mr. Speaker, this bill is highly inadequate. It short sheets America's future. It does not make the investments in health research, in education, in worker training that any civilized, healthy leading society would make.

We do not meet our obligations in this bill, and I would urge a no vote. And I would urge that the majority go back to the drawing board, give this bill a better allocation and live up to the expectations of the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds. Let me simply say with respect to IDEA, aid to the disabled children, the fact is, this bill cuts the Federal share of that program from 18.6 percent to 18 percent. And under the across-the-board cut that will be coming shortly, it drops further to 17.8 percent. In all, the bill will provide $4 billion less than the glide path to full funding that the Republican budget resolution promised just 2 years ago.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Kennedy).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the distinguished minority whip.

(Mr. HOYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 4 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, one of the previous speakers on the majority side of the aisle said that we have limited resources, we have to make priority choices. That is absolutely right. The problem is with the priority choices that the majority has made.

They are fond of pointing to the fact that we have had extraneous expenses such as Katrina, and they say that is why we have to squeeze bills like this. But, in fact, under actions already taken by the majority party in this Congress, over the next decade they will provide $1.2 trillion in tax cuts for persons who make more than $400,000 a year, the top 1 percent of earners; and they have done virtually all of it by borrowing money to provide those tax cuts. I would point out that that $1.2 trillion is more than five times as much as the Federal Government will spend by anybody's estimate on repairing Katrina.

I would say that also the actions of the last week, when they added $70 billion to the tax breaks that they are providing, again with 50 percent going to the top 1 percent, demonstrate what the values and what the priorities of the majority party would be.

If we ask the average family in this country what they need in order to be able to deal with their own problems, I think what they would say is they need help to see to it that they have adequate access to education for their children. I think they would say that if somebody loses a job, they need help to get decent retraining. I think they would ask for fair treatment in the workplace. I think they would ask that their family have decent health care. And I think seniors would ask that they be provided a secure retirement with adequate medical care and help to pay their drug costs. The fact is that this bill fails on virtually all tests.

I would say also, as the gentleman from Maryland indicated, we did try to do one additional thing for senior citizens. Because of the incredibly confusing prescription drug program which seniors are being asked to sign up for, because that program is so incredibly confusing, we tried to get the majority to consider a 6-month delay in the deadline that seniors have to meet in signing up for that program. That motion failed on a party-line vote, unfortunately, on a 7-7 vote.

I would hope that before this Congress ends, the Congress will recognize that that program is so incredibly convoluted that there must be a delay in the sign-up deadline so that seniors have more time to make what could be a very confusing and devastating choice if they make the wrong choice.

Having said that, Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the staff on both sides of the aisle for the work that they have done on this bill. It has taken a good number of good people to produce what I think is a bad product because of the allocation; but, nonetheless, I appreciate the hard work and I appreciate the enduring friendships that we have across the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, I assume this is the last time I will speak on the floor before Christmas, so I want to wish everyone Merry Christmas and a happy new year, and enough blessings so that you will reconsider some of the mistakes in this bill.

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

Unfortunately, our constituents would not.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my support for House Resolution 458, a resolution honoring the lives of four American churchwomen who were murdered just over 25 years ago in El Salvador. I am a cosponsor of the resolution and am gratified that the House has chosen to bring it to the floor under suspension of the rules.

In late 1980, four American churchwomen were serving communities in El Salvador that were wracked by the violence of that country's civil war. They were murdered by members of the National Guard of El Salvador, horrifying the world and bringing home the impact of that war to the American public. These four lives were but a fraction of the 70,000 civilians who perished in that conflict, and those numbers are dwarfed by the toll of the misery inflicted by the violence that raged up and down Central America in the 1970s and 80s.

Locked in the struggle of the cold war, the U.S. turned a blind eye to much of the suffering in the region, focusing its efforts on the geopolitical ends of thwarting potential communist movements through military means, whether supporting the contras in Nicaragua or right- wing governments in places like El Salvador. We look back on this period today with a mixture of relief that democracy prevailed and disgust at the tactics that were used.

Brave action by these churchwomen carried the flag of democracy and human rights into that region, and helped freedom prevail. Our reliance on institutions like the School of the Americas to train the soldiers of leaders whose primary attractiveness to us was being ``not a communist'' rather than sharing our ideals of human rights hamstrung our efforts. Sadly, our military's reluctance to track those that we have trained makes it impossible for us to look beyond the anecdotal record of those who were the worst, or the best, to assess the true measure of what we did. However, that record was enough for those of us concerned about U.S. training of foreign militaries to push for closure of the School of the Americas and ensuring that the training that the U.S. military conducts here in the U.S. and around the world ensures respect for human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. People like Joe Moakley and Tip O'Neill, who I wish were here to see this. As chairman of the Foreign Operations Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee in the 1980s, I led the fight with them to restrict U.S. military assistance to despotic regimes, and to conduct better oversight of foreign military training programs.

Today, as much of our foreign assistance seems to be focused on the military front, in places like Colombia and elsewhere, we should remember that humanitarian assistance, development assistance, and people-to-people contact foster stronger bonds and better allies than military assistance alone. Ensuring clean water, education and stronger civil society provide a better life for everyday people do more to further our goals of fighting terror than another shipment of the weapons of war.

Mr. Speaker, do we have to tell the truth about the persons we are honoring tonight?

Mr. Speaker, I guess if we have to tell the truth, then I will have to say the same thing I would have said if we did not have to tell the truth, that John Dingell is one of the great men in the history of this institution.

I want to thank John Dingell, not because he is Dean of the House, not because he is the third longest serving Member in the history of the House. I think the most notable aspect of John Dingell's career is not his length of service, but its quality.

When each of us comes to this institution, we come with one of two desires, either to be something and somebody, or to stand for something. In the end, we take little note of those who merely want to be a Member of Congress, or be a United States Senator. But we take great note of those who use their service here to do things on behalf of the country and the people they represent.

John Dingell and I both share admiration for former Congressman John Moss, who is a great leader in his own right in this institution. John Moss earned a reputation as a lion fighting for justice and for the rights of the common people of this country. Like John Moss, John Dingell personifies integrity, courage, independence, and dedication to the public interest. John follows in the footsteps of his father. He has championed the cause of wildlife, of wild lands and wild places. He has championed the cause of consumers in an economy of corporate giants.

He has championed the cause of medical research. He has followed in his father's footsteps in championing the cause of health insurance for all Americans. He is truly a social gospel Democrat who understands that we are elected to this House for the same reason that we are placed on this Earth, namely, to try to do good for others.

I want to congratulate John Dingell for his passion, for his conscience, for his vigor; and I want to thank his remarkable wife, Debbie, for helping him focus his prodigious abilities on behalf of not only his constituents but so many of our own.

I feel privileged to have served in the same institution with John Dingell. I am proud of his service, and I want to thank John for the honor that he has done this place by the quality of his service for the last 50 years.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct conferees.

Yes, I do, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, 2 weeks ago the Labor, Health appropriation bill was defeated on this floor largely because it contained inadequate investments in education and health. Today, the bill is back, and what this motion would do is to say to the majority that if they do not want to recognize the need for additional education and health funding, that they at least recognize that an emergency situation exists with respect to the rapidly rising home heating costs with natural gas, for instance, expected to be 50 percent higher than it was last year and with only 15 percent of persons in the country who are eligible getting help from LIHEAP as it is.

I would simply ask the majority to withdraw the point of order in order to allow us to simply proceed to at least debate and vote on the question of rearranging priorities so that we can add $2 billion to the Low Income Heating Assistance Program and fully pay for that by cutting back the scheduled tax cut for persons who make over $1 million to $131,000. I think that is quite ample for them. I would urge the gentleman from Ohio to withdraw his point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a second motion to instruct conferees.

Yes, I do, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the last motion sought to increase funding for the Low Income Heating Assistance Program by $2 billion and fully pay for that with an offset on the revenue side of the ledger. The gentleman from Ohio did raise a point of order against that. We would have preferred to fully fund the amendment, but given the fact that the majority has chosen to exercise its rights under the rules of the House to raise a point of order, this is the only remaining avenue that we have to try to increase funding for Low Income Heating Assistance, recognizing that there is indeed an emergency; and we would simply ask that the amount of money for Low Income Heating Assistance be increased by $2 billion and recognized as emergency funding under the Budget Act so that we can proceed to deal with the very real problem that persons in this country will have heating their homes with higher energy prices. If we are not allowed to do that, then there is no way that we are going to be able to provide substantial help to them.

Mr. Speaker, because we have no other way to bring this to the House, I most reluctantly appeal the ruling of the Chair.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, let me say, first of all, I want to congratulate the gentleman from New York. He always does a fine job. On this bill, he has not only done a good job on substance, he has dealt with the ranking minority member, Mr. Edwards, with fairness and openness and we appreciate it.

In contrast to the Labor-Health-Education bill which caused so much trouble yesterday, I am happy to support this bill today, and I know Mr. Edwards will be, too. But before we vote, I would simply like to recite some facts about the history of veterans health care, because I think it is important that no matter how divided we might be on any given military action, whether it be Vietnam in the past or Iraq in the present, we should not be divided on the question of what we owe to each and every person who has worn the uniform of the United States and defended the national interests of the United States, often at great risk to their own lives and at great risk to the future economic security of their own families. That is why this bill is so important.

I want to recite what has happened on veterans health care in the hopes that the divisions which we have had over the level of funding for veterans health care in the past will not be repeated in the future. Here is that history.

In March of 2003, House Republicans voted for a budget resolution that called for cutting veterans health care by $14 billion over 10 years.

In July 2003, after agreeing to reduce some of those budget cuts in the House, the GOP reneged on its promise to increase funding for VA health care and passed an appropriation bill providing $1.8 billion less than what was called for in their fiscal 2004 budget. Mr. Edwards tried to offer an amendment to that bill to add $2.2 billion for veterans health care, but he was blocked.

In October 2003, I offered a motion to recommit on the Iraqi supplemental that called for an additional $1.3 billion for veterans health care. The majority rejected it.

We continued to push for veterans in fiscal 2005. For 2005, the administration requested $18.3 billion for veterans medical services. In subcommittee, the House recommended $19.5 billion. At that time, veterans groups and many Members on this side of the aisle indicated we felt that those numbers fell far short. The Republican chairman of the Veterans Committee agreed. Unfortunately for him, a year later, he was removed from his position as chairman and he was removed from the committee by the Republican leadership because he had the temerity to agree with us and with veterans groups that more funding was needed in order to meet our obligations to veterans on the health care front.

In full committee, Mr. Edwards in July 2004 offered an amendment to try to do the right thing and bring the VA medical services account up another $1.3 billion. He was defeated on a party-line vote. Of course, the bill had so many problems that the majority could not even bring it to the House floor. It ended up getting wrapped up into the omnibus.

On September 29, 2004, I again offered a motion to recommit on the first CR, trying to add $1.3 billion for veterans health care, and that effort was rejected.

On June 23, 2005, we learned how wrong that original mark had been. The administration admitted they were a billion dollars short and even admitted that they had known about it for months. The next day, Mr. Edwards tried to offer an amendment to the Labor-Health bill on the House floor to try to use that vehicle to make up the $1 billion shortfall in VA health care, but again we were blocked by the majority.

After that failed, I offered a motion to recommit with instructions to include the $1 billion for veterans. Again, I was blocked.

On June 29, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards) was blocked again from bringing up an amendment to add to the veterans budget $1 billion. This time we tried to use the transportation appropriation bill as the vehicle. And now we come to the subject of this conference for 2006.

When the request came at the beginning of the year, the administration was only asking for $20 billion for medical services. On the other hand, veterans organizations' independent budgets said that $22.5 billion would be needed.

In May 2005, the subcommittee increased the medical care account to $21 billion, a half step in the right direction. In full committee, I offered an amendment that would have added $1.5 billion to this medical care account, plus increased funding to some other areas. That would have brought us pretty much to where we are today, except that my amendment would have been paid for because I proposed reducing somewhat the tax cut that was scheduled for the wealthiest of Americans, those making over $400,000 a year. This agreement before us uses an emergency designation so the costs will go directly to the deficit. The majority defeated my amendment.

Then, in July of this year, the administration finally admitted that the 2006 bill was short as well. They amended the VA budget request, asking for an additional $2 billion.

Some of the carryover funds from the additional $1.5 billion that was provided last summer is being used, and the conference agreement before us includes, guess what, $22.5 billion for VA medical services. I hope that number sounds familiar. I will repeat it, $22.5 billion in medical services. That is what the veterans organizations said they needed. It is what we were trying to get on this side of the aisle. I simply say ``Welcome Aboard'' to our friends on the majority side.

I want to make clear, I believe every Member of this House, regardless of party, recognizes their commitment to the veterans. The problem is that all too often in this place we wind up with pressures of party or party program getting in the way of our better judgment and making choices that really do not measure up to the facts.

I believe that was the case over the past 3 years, because I believe that fealty to the Republican budget resolution and to the Republican leadership's desire for tax cuts, especially tax cuts that were aimed at the very high-income people, I believe that that fealty prevented the House from doing what it really knew needed to be done on both sides of the aisle, or at least had a strong suspicion needed to be done, and when the numbers finally were revealed, it has become difficult for people to avoid reality, and so I think this bill reflects reality.

I will say that with one caveat. I hope that we can count on the numbers that are coming from OMB and the Veterans Administration on this bill. I hope we can count on them, because if we cannot, then we will have to be back here again asking for yet more money. It is not enough for us to applaud the troops when they are leaving to go to war, when the bands are playing, when everyone's blood is up. What we have to be willing to do is to remember our fundamental obligation to those troops when they return.

I do not believe that we are doing enough to meet our obligations to those troops, but this bill is certainly a good-faith effort, and I congratulate the gentleman from New York for the role he has played in trying to get here.

I most especially want to congratulate the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards), the subcommittee ranking member. There is no one in this House who has had a more dedicated history of fighting for the needs of veterans on the health care front and on so many other fronts than has the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards), and I am pleased to stand in for him temporarily this morning.

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

Mr. Speaker, how dare you. How dare you. Yesterday, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), the ranking Democrat on the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, a 27-year marine, a veteran of, I believe, three tours in Vietnam, a well-known conservative hawk, announced that he was introducing a resolution that was meant to stimulate a thoughtful and profound debate on how we salvage a failed policy in Iraq. That resolution was meant to stimulate the kind of hearings that Bill Fulbright ran during the Vietnam War, hearings which could bring in the best military minds and the best experts on the Middle East to try to help us find a new direction to American policy in Iraq.

The reaction of the Republican leadership of this House is nothing short of disgraceful, and, in my view, that reaction dishonors the traditions of this House and this democracy.

This resolution, which is now going to be offered as an amendment to this rule out of the Rules Committee, is nothing less than an effort to drive a stake through the heart of the Murtha resolution, without any effort to get at the facts with respect to Iraq.

For the House to be asked to vote on whether or not we ought to withdraw immediately from Iraq without having the benefit of those thoughtful hearings is a disgraceful abdication of our responsibility to think this issue through clearly and with judgment. I am absolutely appalled, I am absolutely appalled, at this action. It is a cheap political stunt that does a disservice to every serviceman and woman fighting in Iraq today, and whoever thought up this pipe dream should be ashamed of themselves. It brings incredible shame to this House.

If I have to choose between supporting the Murtha resolution, even without these hearings, and the failed, discredited policy that we are now pursuing in Iraq that dead-end nowhere-going policy, I would happily endorse as an alternative the Murtha amendment.

It is irresponsible of the House to be dealing with this in this manner. What this House ought to do is to set aside the cheap political tricks and to address the thought behind the Murtha proposal. This House, instead of politicizing this issue, ought to try to find a way for once to bring people in this institution together, instead of dividing them by phony, cynical, political, outrageously tricky and sneaky maneuvers like this.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the gentleman from California why he introduced a counterfeit Murtha resolution rather than allowing us to vote on the real Murtha resolution, if he wanted us to vote at all.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I will not take very long on this bill either, but I do think it is important to take note of a few facts.

At the beginning of this year, it was made quite clear by the majority that they desired to finish all appropriations bills on time and that there be no omnibus appropriations bill lumping all kinds of disassociated items into the same package.

We on the minority side of the aisle have provided procedural cooperation at virtually every step of the way. We have provided time limits on debate on virtually every bill that we were asked to provide them. Those time limits were sometimes stringent and they met with objection from a number of Members. We provided unanimous consent so that the scheduling of legislation could be accelerated on numerous occasions. And despite that fact, today some 6 weeks into the fiscal year, we have four bills which are still not finished. Those bills are the Treasury, Transportation, HUD bill, the military quality of life bill, the Labor, Health, Education and Social Services bill, and the defense appropriations bill. Together, those four bills, which we have yet to complete, represent 78 percent of appropriated financing for the coming year.

Why are we still not finished? It is certainly not because of any failure on the part of the Appropriations Committee. The Appropriations Committee kept to its schedule and every bill was passed earlier than almost any year that I can recall. And yet we are here with so much unfinished business on the appropriations side of the ledger.

The reason I think is very clear. Despite the fact that the White House, the Senate and the House are all under control of the majority party, despite that fact we have reached this delay and are forced once again to seek another continuing resolution.

The reason that has occurred, in my view, is because the budget resolution was so skewed in favor of the ideological right within the majority party caucus that in the end, even a number of Republican moderates have not wanted to vote for some of these bills, most especially in the Senate. And we find that even Republican committee chairmen, like Senator Specter, have described one of the bills as being totally inadequate to its responsibilities.

This country is in the middle of fighting a war. That war has a huge cost, and yet the Republican majority is in pursuit of its goal of providing huge tax cuts, a huge percentage of which will be put into the pockets of the most wealthy people in this country. Their desire to do that has led them to a willingness to borrow whatever it takes in order to put the money in those pockets and then use the resulting deficit as a reason to cut back on a number of other bills.

They use it as a reason to make significant cuts in education, in health, in science, environmental protection and the rest, and then pretend that the cost of Katrina is what made them do it, when, in fact, the cost of tax cuts for persons in the top 1 percent of income in this country over the next decade will cost about 10 times as much as the cost of Katrina.

So then we are forced because of the squeeze, we are forced to endure delays, and we have to bring forward a continuing resolution such as we are doing today. And I would point out that after we have gone through all of this effort, we, in the end, are probably still going to be stuck with an omnibus appropriations bill at the end, despite the fact that the majority party indicated they were going to move heaven and Earth in order to avoid such an eventuality.

The game plan apparently is to try to pass three appropriations bills yet this week, and then that will leave us in December with the defense appropriations bill, and evidently the intention at this point is to attach everything but the kitchen sink to that bill so that we will, in effect, have a recreated omnibus.

It is my understanding that the people expect to attach the bird flu appropriations, the appropriations for Katrina supplemental, and every other special deal that somebody can conjure up and attach it to the defense bill, and then hide it behind the skirts of military spending.

The betting is that Members will want to support funding for the troops and so they will vote for whatever other garbage is attached to that bill by way of nongermane items. That, I think, would be a dysfunctional result, but that appears to be where we are headed. It could be avoided if the majority had chosen to be a little less ideological, if they had chosen to pull the rubber band just a little less tightly, and if they had chosen to cross the aisle and work in a bipartisan fashion on taxes, on spending, and on other items that affect the shape and nature of the budget. We have not seen that, and so that is why we are here today with the necessity to pass a continuing resolution.

I will vote for the continuing resolution at this point because we need to keep the government open, but I am certainly not very pleased with how we have gotten here.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 11 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Ohio is my friend. I have a great deal of respect for him, and I know he tries to do the best job with the tools he is given. The problem is that he has been given a totally inadequate set of tools.

``This is the budget that you get when you elect a Republican White House, a Republican House of Representatives, and a Republican Senate.'' I did not say that. The former majority leader of the Republican caucus said that, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay).

This is the day when the price of Republican tax cuts for the wealthy becomes quite clear, on this bill and on the bill that will follow, the reconciliation bill.

This is the day when this Congress chooses to walk away from its investments: obligations in education, health care, job training and the like. This is the bill which shortchanges the Social Gospel. This is the day that we pass legislation that chooses to make the lives of the most privileged among us quite a bit more pleasant because of their tax cuts while at the same time we are making the lives of the poor just a little bit more desperate.

This is a growing country. It has growing problems. It has growing opportunities. If this bill does not grow with it, then we lose ground; and we are certainly losing ground under this bill today.

This is the bill for education, health, social services, worker protection programs. This is the guts of the Federal effort to try to see to it that, regardless of one's station in life, people have the greatest possible opportunity to get ahead.

Yet, this bill is $1.5 billion on a program-for-program basis, once you cut out the funny accounting, this is a bill which is $1.5 billion below last year.

The Department of Labor, funding in that Department: $37 million below the House bill, $193 million below the Senate bill.

There are 7.5 million Americans out of work. Yet the bill cuts $437 million out of training and employment services. That is the lowest level of adult training grants in a decade.

This bill also cuts the Community College Initiative, the President's initiative for community colleges, an effort to train workers for high- skill, high-paying jobs. It cuts that effort by $125 million and rescinds $125 million from funds provided last year, denying the help that the President was talking about giving to 100,000 Americans.

State unemployment insurance and employment service offices are cut by $245 million, eliminating help for 1.9 million people.

The International Labor Affairs Bureau will certainly have a hard time protecting American workers from being undercut by child and slave labor abroad after this program has been cut by 20 percent.

In the health and human services area, this bill cuts health care to the

poor and underserved rural areas of the country. It eliminates the community access program that helps coordinate services and programs to provide health care to people who do not have it.

This bill cuts by 69 percent health professions training. This bill cuts by 73 percent funding for rural health outreach.

We have only about 10 percent of physicians in America who practice in rural areas, and yet one-fourth of the U.S. population lives in those areas. We have huge shortages of health care providers in urban, underserved areas as well, but training grants for health care professionals are cut by $206 million.

We have the Maternal/Child Health Care Block Grant. That program is cut by 20 percent below fiscal 2002 levels, and we have a 24 percent cut in block grants for State health departments. And then, all of us are going to run home and brag about how much we have done to prepare the country for public health disasters.

My friend talked about the National Institutes of Health. We have the smallest increase for NIH in 36 years, and under that budget, because funding for NIH does not keep pace with inflation, we will actually see 500 fewer research grants coming out of NIH than we would have seen 2 years ago. We have effectively ended the President's initiative to expand the number and the capacity of community health centers around the country, $238 million less than the President requested. For the low-income heating assistance program, our oil companies, one company, $10 billion profit the last quarter. We expect to see natural gas prices rise 46 percent, home heating oil prices rise 28 percent, and yet we freeze the program that is supposed to provide help to people to pay their bills so they do not have to choose between heating and eating, and we only serve 15 percent of the persons who are eligible to be served under that program.

Education: This is the first cut in education funding in a decade. Education programs under the No Child Left Behind rubric are cut by $784 million below last year. That is $13 billion below the authorization, and on a cumulative basis, it is some $40 billion short of what we promised we would have provided these past years since we passed No Child Left Behind.

Title I is up $100 million. That is in comparison to a $600 million increase that came from that well-known ``liberal'' George W. Bush. Special education, it is up $100 million in comparison to the $508 million request from the President of the United States.

Because we mandated that local school districts provide service to special education children, we are supposed to be providing 40 percent of the cost. This bill actually reduces the Federal share of that cost from 18.6 to 18 percent. That is going in the wrong direction.

The Comprehensive School Reform Program, totally wiped out. The Goodling Even Start Program, named after Bill Goodling, the former Republican chairman of the Education Committee, cut by 56 percent. Education technology cut by 45 percent, and that comes on top of a 28 percent cut that was made last year. We cut Safe and Drug-Free Schools by 20 percent in this bill. We freeze afterschool programs for the 4th year in a row. That means that there are 14 million kids in this country who want those services who will not get them. And I could go on and on.

On higher education, the college board tells us that the 4-year cost of attending a public university has increased by $3,100 over the past 5 years. The President's answer was to raise the Pell Grant maximum by 100 bucks. A $100 solution to a $3,100 problem. The Congress said ``No, that is too much.'' The House cut it to $50. This conference report totally eliminates it, totally eliminates it. No increase in the maximum grant. And then in the reconciliation bill that follows today, they are going to add $8 billion more in costs to students who borrow money to go to college. And then this bill freezes all other student aid programs, SEOG, Work-Study, Perkins, TRIO, GEAR UP. It freezes title VI foreign language program.

The backlog at Social Security, those caseload backlogs are going to increase. This bill provides $189 million less than the President asked, $80 million less than was in the House bill, $130 million less than the Senate bill. And we do all of this in order to free up necessary room so the Republican Party can deliver on its $100,000-plus tax cuts for people who make 1 million bucks.

This is going in the wrong direction. These priorities are wrong. This bill is a disgrace. The gentleman would have provided a much better bill if he had been given a decent allocation, but he was not. So he did not have the tools to do it. There is no reason to vote for this bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman brags about the additional money that the Republican Congress has put into education. President Clinton and the Democrats had to drag them kicking and screaming into providing that money. We provided $19 billion more in education since they took over the Congress than would have been provided if we had simply passed the Republican House bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Jackson).

(Mr. JACKSON of Illinois asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, the gentlewoman claimed there is a $115 million increase in here for low income heating assistance. There is not. The formula grant has been increased by $115 million, but the contingency portion of the program has been reduced by $115 million. The net result: no help in the teeth of huge energy increases.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Lowey).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the distinguished minority whip.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Kennedy).

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

A previous majority Member said today that this bill represented fiscal responsibility. The fact is the Republican Party will provide, over the next decade, $1.2 trillion in tax cuts to people who make over $1 million a year. Yet in this bill, they will freeze student loans, they will allow people without health care to increase in number by 2 million, they will provide the first cut in education in a decade, they will cut safe and drug-free schools by 20 percent, and they will slash the President's initiative for math and science education.

In the teeth of the fact that they have given $14 billion in subsidies to the big energy companies, they then say to low-income people who have to pay those higher prices, ``Sorry. Despite the fact you're going to have a

huge increase in home heating costs, we're not going to give you a dime in additional money in this bill.''

That is what they do. What we are going to see today in the reconciliation bill and in this bill is a double whammy on the most vulnerable people in this society. That is wrong morally and it is wrong economically. We hear a lot of talk on this floor about preserving life. Yet this program is going to cut maternal and child health care by 20 percent below the 2001 level. How is that going to encourage women to carry their babies to term?

This bill falls far short of our responsibilities in meeting the growing economic and social needs of this country. It ought to be defeated. We should not put tax cuts for millionaires ahead of providing basic education, basic health care and basic job protection to America's working people.

I urge a ``no'' vote on the conference report.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Madam Speaker, I want to say at the outset I have a great deal of admiration for the gentleman from Virginia. I think he is one of the best committee chairmen in this House, and I think he has treated the substance of this bill absolutely down the center, and I think he has dealt with the majority and the minority in a very even-handed fashion. I respect that and appreciate that.

Frankly, I had thought I would be voting for this bill as I have for the Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, and as I intend to work for the Energy and Water conference report. But I find myself unable to support this bill in the final instance for a number of reasons which have very little to do with the gentleman from Virginia or the gentleman from West Virginia. I have three basic problems with this bill.

First of all, the conferees stripped the Sanders amendment out of the bill.

I think this Congress has done a miserable job of oversight with respect to Iraq, a miserable job with respect to oversight of the PATRIOT Act and a number of other security-related issues.

I might not be so concerned about the fact that the conferees stripped out the amendment which precluded the administration from snooping into people's use of libraries, I might not feel so strongly about it if I felt that the Congress had a better record of conducting oversight hearings on this, but I do not. So under those circumstances, I think what the committee has done in stripping out that language is quite dangerous.

Secondly, I would say there is a kabuki dance going on in this town with respect to local and State law enforcement funding. This bill now effectively funds State and local law enforcement at a level which is $1 billion less than it was in fiscal year 2001.

What happens each year is that the President makes very large cuts in that program. This committee then restores a significant portion of those funds, but still leaving us below the funding level for last year. As a result, this bill is $300 million below last year in terms of its aid for State and local law enforcement assistance; and last year was $226 million below the year before. I think that is headed in the wrong direction.

Lastly, I think there is one provision in this bill which is especially mean and that is the funding level for legal services. Legal services is the program that we provide in order to enable indigent people to have some access to civil courts, and yet this bill reduces funding for legal services below last year's level.

As I said in the conference, every day we come onto this floor and we pledge allegiance to the flag, and at the end of that pledge, we talk about our dedication to providing ``liberty and justice for all''. I do not think anybody can stand on this floor with a straight face and say that anymore. I think, if you vote to cut legal services, what you are really saying is that we stand for liberty and justice ``for those who can pay for it''.

I do not think that is what this country is supposed to be all about. By the time you take into account not just the nominal number in this bill for legal service, but when you take into account the across-the- board cut that has already been applied, and when you add to that the additional across-the-board cut which is expected to be applied at some point in the process before we are finished, you have substantially weakened funding for legal services. I think that is an indefensible thing to do.

I would point out that these reductions are being made at the same time that NASA is being given upwards of $2 billion to deal with a manned mission to Mars. I have nothing against going to Mars. I think in the long term it is a wonderful expansion of the human endeavor. But I do believe that to add that kind of funding to NASA for a Mars mission and to make the kind of tax cuts for the most wealthy people in this society that the Congress is going to be supporting in the coming days, while at the same time we are cutting legal service funds for the indigent, cutting aid for local and State law enforcement grants, I think that represents a wrong set of priorities. I think it is taking us in the wrong direction.

I note that this subcommittee has been reorganized at the demand of the ex-majority leader on the other side of the aisle, Mr. DeLay, who last year, representing Houston, wanted to see to it that NASA had a clear track to funding increases. So he did a very effective job of representing his district by moving NASA into this subcommittee where it has to compete against programs such as I have just mentioned. And as a result, NASA is at the front of the train and some of these other priorities are at the back of the train. I regret that.

I do appreciate very much the dedication that the gentleman has shown to the science budget. I think the National Science Foundation is one of the keys to our future economic growth. I congratulate him for that. But in the end, for the reasons I have cited, I am going to feel constrained to cast a ``no'' vote on the passage of the conference report.

Madam Speaker, I object to the gentleman's words. He is reminding me of a painful loss to Penn State.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct conferees.

Mr. Speaker, I will not take more than 3. I simply would like

to, as a courtesy to the House, explain the motion.

For the last 2 weeks, the attention of the House has been focused on the efforts of the majority party to pass its reconciliation bill, which includes significant cuts in food stamps, in child support enforcement, in disability payments in order to pay for the tax cuts which this Congress has already largely passed. The problem that we have with that is that this bill, in effect, hits those same poor people a second time with cuts in education, health, worker protection programs that are in the bill.

The Senate appeared to give the persons interested in this bill some hope that those cuts could be avoided by adding a $3 billion financing gimmick to their proposal. But it is clear now that that provision is being discarded, and that means that the new caps that the Appropriations Committee adopted last week will eliminate the ability of the Senate to provide that extra $3 billion. That means that the only way that we can avoid that hit is to reduce the size of the tax cuts being provided to make room in the budget for some of these crucial items.

So this motion simply attempts to instruct the conferees to accept the Harkin amendment which would add $8 billion in order to pay fully for the flu pandemic work that needs to be done. It would instruct the conferees to add $3 billion to the low-income heating assistance program to take into account the huge increase in home energy prices that consumers will face this year, especially low-income consumers.

It would provide an additional $1.5 billion in programs that are meant to discourage abortion, programs such as a maternal and child health block grant, Head Start, domestic violence and numerous others, one-half billion dollars to restore health professions training, and $3 billion to put title I on a 5-year track to full funding under No Child Left Behind; $1.6 billion in additional funding for disabled and handicapped children trying to put that program on the same 5-year glide path; and one-half billion dollars in restoration for worker training and job training programs.

It would ask the conferees to support a provision which would reduce the size of the tax cuts for millionaires from an average of $140,000 to $36,000. That is still a pretty hefty cut.

Mr. Speaker, in essence, that is what the motion to instruct would provide. We are offering it because this is the last chance that this body has to reach a different set of judgments concerning budget priorities that affect the poorest and most defenseless people in this society.

Point of Order

Mr. Speaker, if one looks at the Budget Act, the purpose of the Budget Act was to force a Congress to get away from runaway spending and runaway deficits by forcing the Congress to confront trade-offs between spending and revenues. In fact, the Congress is being prevented from doing that and the Congress is being shielded from facing those explicit trade-offs unless amendments such as this are offered and debated fully in the House.

We recognize that funding for these programs under the budget resolution is being cut back in order to make room in that same budget resolution for the tax cuts that have been provided and to make room for further tax cuts which the majority party is talking about offering this week. If we cannot offer this kind of an amendment, then it would seem to me that the entire budget process has been intellectually corrupted and turned into a mere enforcement mechanism for majority party will rather than being used as a device to work out an explicit and forthright set of trade-offs.

I would urge the Chair to reject the point of order.

Mr. Speaker, most reluctantly, I do appeal the ruling of the Chair, not because I have any fault with the Chair, but because this is the only opportunity this institution will have to make a different set of priority choices.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for the time.

Mr. Speaker, I intend to vote for this bill; but I want to make a few observations, some of which I find to be quite ironic in the process.

I want to congratulate the chairman of the subcommittee. He has done his usual workman-like job. He is a first-rate public servant, and I appreciate the bipartisan and nonideological tone that he brings to his work. That is fully appropriate to the nature of the bill that he brings to this House.

But I must confess a sense of irony. This Congress has already voted to provide $1.2 trillion in tax cuts for millionaires over the next decade. It has voted to provide more than $250 billion in spending for the war in Iraq; and yet, there are a number of Members of this body who begrudge the fact that in this bill you would find roughly $15 billion to be spent on what I would call the tools of peace and mercy: peace because I think economic assistance to the poverty stricken parts of the world help create conditions that avoid war, and mercy because I think a good portion of this bill could be called the most important pro-life bill that we vote on each year.

Literally in the hour that it took to deal with the rule, you will have had several hundred children in this world die, and that is no accident. A lot of it occurs simply because of the negligence of the developed world, and I would like to think that that would rapidly change; but I do not expect to see it, unfortunately.

The New York Times wrote an editorial this morning suggesting that this bill be vetoed because this bill provides $2 billion or so less than the President supposedly requested to attack poverty problems in the Third World. I agree with the concerns expressed in that New York Times editorial; and I would say, imagine how different the world would be if instead of spending $250 billion on the dumbest war in American history, at least since the War of 1812, imagine how changed the world would be if we led the world and provided just 10 percent that amount each year to see that by the end of the next decade we could deliver clean drinking water to every single human being on this planet.

Imagine how the world's attitude toward the United States would change. I doubt very much that you would see some of the poll responses that we see these days where a majority of people in all too many countries consider America to be a threat, unfortunately, rather than a friend. I think the view of the United States is unjustified; but nonetheless, that is the way a lot of people think around the world, and it is in very large part because we put so much money into an action like Iraq and put so little money into helping people achieve the basic necessities of life.

But I do not think that this bill can be blamed for the fact that we fall

short of the President's budget for economic and anti-poverty help. What I do not understand is why anybody takes the President's budget seriously on this, because the President knew full well that while he was asking for this money, he knew full well that his allies in Congress would never allow that kind of an increase in foreign assistance as long as they were gleefully cutting aid to children under Medicaid, as long as they were gleefully about to take 300,000 American families off food stamps, as long as they were gleefully cutting children off the SCHIP welfare rolls in this country. They knew that public opinion would not tolerate providing large increases even for starving people around the world.

So in that sense, I think the New York Times editorial is aiming at the wrong target. It is not the fault of the gentleman from Arizona or the gentlewoman from New York. It is not the fault of this committee that these misbegotten priorities are being carried out. It is the fault of the Republican Party leadership in this country, led by President Bush and the leadership in this House.

I want to say one other thing. We saw yesterday headlines about the fact that $100 million was being surreptitiously spent by this administration to develop secret detention centers where torture is performed around the world. What is ironic is this bill contains $21.5 million in appropriations for the victims of the torture. How hypocritical it must seem for the United States to provide money for the victims of torture at the same time that we allow torture to go on in our name around the world. Do we really want to have people every time they hear the words George W. Bush, do we really want them to think in their minds George W. Pinochet? I do not; but, unfortunately, that is what you are going to trigger in people's minds around the world.

I hope that this Congress will live up to its responsibilities to end that practice by supporting the McCain amendment on the Defense bill. I hope that when that Defense bill leaves the House and goes to the White House that it contains that provision, despite the White House's threat of a veto, despite the action of the Secretary of Defense in opposing the McCain amendment. It is a moral imperative that we adopt that amendment on the Defense bill. Otherwise, the $21 million in this bill for victims of torture is a joke and a sham.

Madam Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct conferees.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 9 minutes.

Madam Speaker, let me say that this motion to instruct is, I think, fairly straightforward and simple, although the context in which it is offered is certainly not.

What this motion attempts to do is simply insist that the $50 million contained in the House bill, but not contained in the Senate bill, for the purpose of retrofitting existing facilities and constructing special overhead cover devices to protect soldiers in bases throughout Iraq, is maintained.

That overhead cover system would provide protection from artillery, rocket-propelled grenades and missile attack up to and including 122 millimeter rockets. That is virtually exactly what this does.

But let me, in the context of offering this proposal, make a few observations. Even if this motion is adopted, and I would certainly expect that it would be, I think that we still must face the fact that our troops will not be adequately protected, nor will American citizens abroad be adequately protected so long as our Government is still taking actions which discredit this Nation and this Congress is continuing to neglect its oversight responsibilities with respect to those actions.

Let me give three examples. In 2003, it came to the Nation's attention that the Secretary of Defense had established an operation known as the Office of Special Programs, the primary purpose of which was to vet intelligence and advise Pentagon leadership and the White House on plans for invading Iraq. That office was staffed by a select group handpicked by then Under Secretary of Defense Douglas Feith and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz.

It was charged with developing the rationale for invading Iraq, and it was created out of a frustration on the part of the Vice President and the Secretary of Defense and their allies within the administration, their frustration that the normal intelligence operations in our Government were not being ``sufficiently forward leaning,'' as the Secretary of Defense put it, in finding weapons of mass destruction and in building a case for going to war in Iraq.

The problem is that that office was established to provide information outside of the normal channels, and it was even designed to go around the Department of Defense's own intelligence operation unit.

The problem with that Office of Special Programs is that it relied on so-called intelligence from like-minded true believers, primarily Ahmad Chalabi and his allies in Iraq.

At the time, we asked that the Surveys and Investigations staff of the Appropriations Committee look into this matter and determine what the facts were surrounding the creation of this operation. We obtained some support from the majority party but not sufficient support under the rules of the House in order to allow that surveys and investigation study to proceed, and so it never took place.

Second, earlier this year, the committee became aware of intelligence actions that the Department of Defense was taking, actions of an under- the-table nature, which a number of us felt were highly inappropriate and highly dangerous, classified activities which cannot be discussed in public.

We tried to offer language to assure that in the future such actions would not be undertaken without proper notification to the Congress and to this committee. The fact is that when I offered language to try to do that, I received a phone call from Andy Card, the President's Staff Chief, and in that phone call he told me that if I would withdraw that language he would assure me that this matter would be worked out to the satisfaction of both the executive and legislative branches.

In fact, while we have made some small progress in reaching an understanding on this matter, there are still two very important issues that have not been resolved, that the administration has not agreed to, and they are key issues, including whether or not this Congress will be informed of those activities in a timely fashion so that the information provided to the Congress is, in fact, meaningful.

We are still being stonewalled on that matter, and the Congress still, in my view, has not lived up to its oversight responsibilities on that matter.

Now, yesterday, we see in the Washington Post a story which says CIA holds terror suspects in secret prisons. It notes that close to $100 million evidently was spent to establish these secret compounds at which detainees were evidently subjected to torture-related activities, including water-boarding, and yet we are told that not a single member of the Appropriations Committee and not a single member of the staff have been told by the CIA that that had been going on.

This committee has an obligation to protect the power of the purse. In my view, until we take action on this matter, we stand vulnerable to the justifiable charge that Congress is ignoring its responsibilities to protect taxpayers' money and to protect the reputation of the United States internationally; And when we do that, we put at risk the very troops that we are trying to protect through this motion this morning.

Madam Speaker, I would hope that this language would be supported by the majority. But I would also hope that this Congress understands that even if it is, we are failing our fundamental responsibility to the American taxpayer if we do not exercise considerably more vigorously than we have up to date our responsibilities to see to it that matters related to Iraq are being handled in a manner which makes certain that the Congress knows what is going on, and gives the Congress an opportunity to try to make certain that what is going on is consistent with American values.

That certainly is not the case when we see these kinds of horrific headlines in the paper, and I would associate myself with the remarks contained in the editorial in the Washington Post this morning.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record at this point the editorial which makes clear that Congress has not in any way, shape or form lived up to its responsibilities, and, in my view, they have enabled the administration to continue to cover up its activities with respect to Iraq, its activities with respect to manipulating intelligence, its activities with respect to allowing agencies to engage in conduct not at all consistent with American values or American interests.

[From the Washington Post, Nov. 3, 2005]

Rebellion Against Abuse

Last month a prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay military base

excused himself from a conversation with his lawyer and

stepped into a cell, where he slashed his arm and hung

himself. This desperate attempted suicide by a detainee held

for four years without charge, trial or any clear prospect of

release was not isolated. At least 131 Guantanamo inmates

began a hunger strike on Aug. 8 to protest their indefinite

confinement, and more than two dozen are being kept alive

only by force-feeding. No wonder Defense Secretary Donald H.

Rumsfeld has denied permission to U.N. human rights

investigators to meet with detainees at Guantanamo: Their

accounts would surely add to the discredit the United States

has earned for its lawless treatment of foreign prisoners.

Guantanamo, however, is not the worst problem. As The

Post's Dana Priest reported yesterday, the CIA maintains its

own network of secret prisons, into which 100 or more

terrorist suspects have ``disappeared'' as if they were

victims of a Third World dictatorship. Some of the 30 most

important prisoners are being held in secret facilities in

Eastern European countries--which should shame democratic

governments that only recently dismantled Soviet-era secret

police apparatuses. Held in dark underground cells, the

prisoners have no legal rights, no visitors from outside the

CIA and no checks on their treatment, even by the

International Red Cross. President Bush has authorized

interrogators to subject these men to ``cruel, inhuman and

degrading'' treatment that is illegal in the United States

and that is banned by a treaty ratified by the Senate. The

governments that allow the CIA prisons on their territory

violate this international law, if not their own laws.

This shameful situation is the direct result of Mr. Bush's

decision in February 2002 to set aside the Geneva Conventions

as well as standing U.S. regulations for the handling of

detainees. Under the Geneva Conventions, al Qaeda militants

could have been denied prisoner-of-war status and held

indefinitely; they could have been interrogated and tried,

either in U.S. courts or under the military system of

justice. At the same time they would have been protected by

Geneva from torture and other cruel treatment. Had Mr. Bush

followed that course, the abuse scandals at Guantanamo Bay

and in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the severe damage they have

caused to the United States, could have been averted. Key

authors of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, such as Khalid Sheikh

Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh, could have been put on trial,

with their crimes exposed to the world.

Instead, not a single al Qaeda leader has been prosecuted

in the past four years. The Pentagon's system of hearings on

the status of Guantanamo detainees, introduced only after a

unanimous ruling by the Supreme Court, has no way of

resolving the long-term status of most detainees. The CIA has

no long-term plan for its secret prisoners, whom one agency

official described as ``a horrible burden.''

For some time a revolt against this disastrous policy has

been gathering steam inside the administration and in the

Senate; it is led by senators such as John McCain (R-Ariz.)

and by the same military officers and State Department

officials who opposed Mr. Bush's decision to disregard the

Geneva accords. Their opponents are a small group of civilian

political appointees circled around Mr. Rumsfeld and Vice

President Cheney. According to a report in the New York

Times, the military professionals want to restore Geneva's

protections against cruel treatment to the Pentagon's

official doctrine for handling detainees. Mr. McCain is

seeking to ban ``cruel, inhuman and degrading'' treatment for

all detainees held by the United States, including those in

the CIA's secret prisons.

There is no more important issue before the country or

Congress. Yet the advocates of decency and common sense seem

to have meager support from the Democratic Party. Senate

Democrats staged a legislative stunt on Tuesday intended to

reopen--once again--the debate on prewar intelligence about

Iraq. They have taken no such dramatic stand against the

CIA's abuses of foreign prisoners; on a conference committee

considering Mr. McCain's amendment, Democratic support has

been faltering. While Democrats grandstand about a war debate

that took place three years ago; the Bush administration's

champions of torture are quietly working to preserve policies

whose reversal ought to be an urgent priority.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), the ranking member on the Government Reform Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, a moment ago I cited the Washington Post editorial which appeared in the paper today. I would like to read just a portion of that editorial. The editorial reads as follows:

``As The Post's Dana Priest reported yesterday, the CIA maintains its own network of secret prisons into which 100 or more terrorist suspects have `disappeared' as if they were victims of a Third World dictatorship.''

When I see references to the disappeared, my mind goes back to President Pinochet in Chile and the ``Disappeared'' under his regime. And I wonder whether or not many Americans and many Members of this Congress are comfortable with our White House being tossed into the same terminology, into the same basket as the outrageous conduct of the Chilean Government a number of years ago.

The editorial goes on to say that under the policies of the CIA with respect to these institutions ``prisoners have no legal rights, no visitors from outside the CIA, and no checks on their treatment, even by the International Red Cross. . . . President Bush has authorized interrogators to subject these men to `cruel, inhumane and degrading' treatment that is illegal in the United States and that is banned by a treaty ratified by the Senate. The governments that allow the CIA prisons on their territory violate this international law, if not their own laws.''

It then goes on to point out that despite all of this, ``not a single al Qaeda leader has been prosecuted in the last 4 years.'' It then goes on to say ``the CIA has no long-term plans for its secret prisoners whom one agency official described as `a horrible burden.' ''

Then it notes that a congressional rebellion against this kind of activity is being led in the Senate by Senator McCain and that his main opponents are ``a small group of civilian political appointees circled around Mr. Rumsfeld and Vice President Cheney.''

The editorial then goes on to say, ``According to a report in the New York Times, the military professionals want to restore Geneva's protections against cruel treatment to the Pentagon official doctrine for handling detainees. Mr. McCain is seeking to ban cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment for all detainees held by the United States, including those in the CIA secret prisons.''

So I would submit, Mr. Speaker, that in addition to passing this motion today, this House needs to stand as one; every single Member of this House ought to be willing to support the retention of the McCain amendment on the defense appropriations bill. And I would hope that we would see this House finally face up to its obligations on that score.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), the distinguished ranking member of the Armed Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, in keeping with the spirit of this motion to instruct, the purpose of which is to protect American troops, I want to simply say that no matter how hard we try, we are going to have a difficult time doing that unless we change some unpleasant facts on the ground in Iraq. When more than 80 percent of Iraqis tell pollsters that they want America to leave their country, when almost one-half of Iraqis respond to pollsters by saying that they believe that terrorist attacks on U.S. troop are justified, we have a serious problem.

In my view, we are not going to be able to turn that around until we make clear that our policies are consistent with our interests and our professed values. We need to get to the bottom of how we got into Iraq and how we are conducting this operation in Iraq now. We need to get to the bottom of that. We need to determine who is responsible for some of the stories that we have seen in the papers the past few days; and if we do not do that, we are going to continue to invite the kind of negative opinion around the world that is plaguing our ability to succeed in Iraq. I would hope that this House would recognize that responsibility.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the distinguished minority leader (Ms. Pelosi).

Mr. Speaker, I must confess I am confused about where we are at this point. I thought I heard the Speaker----

Mr. Speaker, parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. Speaker, I thought I just heard you indicate that for the motion to be in order one of the questions that might have to be present was the question of the dignity of the House. When we are told that $100 million of taxpayers' money has been slipped into an appropriation bill for an illegal purpose, is that not, in fact, a challenge to the dignity of the House?

Mr. Speaker, I note that the majority party is considering a number of actions to cut spending, including actions to cut back child health care under Medicaid and including actions to cut back SSI payments to disabled Americans.

I wonder if some of those same Members of Congress would be willing to eliminate Federal coverage for health care for Members of Congress before

they reach down to the low-income groups in this society and cut their health care. It seems to me that if you are going to start by cutting health care benefits anywhere, we ought to start right on this floor, with the people who work here.

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

Mr. Speaker, this motion is really meant to do two things: it is meant to rein in bureaucratic arrogance on the part of USDA, and it is meant to rein in bureaucratic arrogance on the part of the State government of Texas. With respect to USDA, this motion would prevent the arbitrary and secret closing of almost one-third of Farm Service Agencies around the country.

In the agriculture appropriation subcommittee hearing this year, the subcommittee chairman asked the USDA witnesses if their budget was based in any way on an assumption that there would be a closure of Agriculture Department offices. The agency responded in the negative.

And yet The Washington Post has now revealed in a September article that FSA had plans afoot to close 713 Farm Service Agencies around the country. When that was discovered, the Agriculture Department indicated, ``Oh, this was just a draft. It was just a draft.'' But in fact USDA had pulled all 50 State FSA directors into Washington to give them instructions about how to go about selecting which offices would be closed.

So it seems to me that USDA was disingenuous in their response to the Congress of the United States and that any self-respecting Congress would pull that agency's chain until we get straight answers to straight questions.

The second issue that this motion deals with is the question of whether or not Texas ought to be able to go off on its own, in violation of Federal law, by privatizing the administration of the food stamp program.

In June of 2004, Texas asked USDA to approve their request to privatize the administration of that program. The USDA sent them numerous letters requesting information that would enable USDA to determine whether or not the plan that Texas was providing was rational or not and whether it was consistent with law or not; and Texas has, frankly, stiffed the agency.

If you take a look at the letters sent by the agencies, you will see for instance that in a letter from USDA to Senator Harkin, USDA said: ``We do not yet have enough information to ascertain whether or not Texas's proposal is in compliance with the act in regard to the certification of recipients.'' It also then went on to say: ``We are concerned with the State's aggressive schedule for rolling out this project, especially with regard to contingency planning.''

In another letter from USDA to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, USDA stated: ``FMS needs to have clear and coherent narrative explanations of the food stamp certification process that are grounded

in the contract and its supporting documents.'' USDA then went on to tell Texas: ``We must ensure that your new system is in full compliance with food stamp rules, regulations, and policy and that service to our program clients is not compromised.''

Nonetheless, despite that, the Texas State government has yet to respond and provide the kind of information that is needed by USDA if USDA is to consider approval of their plan.

The problem with the Texas plan is that while recipients are guaranteed under the law that they will have an opportunity to have their eligibility determined by a State employee, in fact, what Texas is trying to do is to circumvent Federal law and allow eligibility to be determined by a private party. The problem with that is that if you have a public servant who denies you a right, you are entitled under the law and you have a somewhat more direct redress than you do if you have a private citizen working for a private company who has no long- term commitment to the government and who can simply stiff the recipients and does not have to answer questions from the government.

The government is supposed to be active in protecting the rights of each and every individual citizen of this country. Texas is interposing itself to prevent that right from actually being delivered; and in the process, in my view, Texas is clearly in violation of the law because they have proceeded with a plan that has not yet been approved by USDA.

Again, any self-respecting Congress, in defense of what is existing law, would pass this motion so that Texas cannot unilaterally obviate State law.