Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 544 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), 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.

General Leave

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Madam Speaker, it is budget week. I have been trying to contain my smile all week long. I have the great pleasure of sitting on both the Budget Committee and the Rules Committee here in this House. The rule that we have before us today, House Resolution 544, does candidly what I think my friend from Massachusetts and I came here to do, and that is to have an open debate on the floor of the House about absolutely everyone's ideas.

I want to tell you what that means, Madam Speaker, because we sit on the Rules Committee, my friend from Massachusetts and I, and part of that responsibility is deciding whose voice gets heard and whose doesn't. It is a very solemn responsibility, one that neither of us takes lightly. I believe we would both say that whenever possible we should err on the side of having more voices instead of less. What we have today, Madam Speaker, is a rule that provides for absolutely every budget alternative written, drafted, and presented in this House, every one.

I want you to think about that, Madam Speaker, because this ought to be a place where we debate ideas. This ought to be a place where we talk about what tomorrow looks like, how can we make tomorrow better than today. And on this day, we will be voting on a rule that will make every single alternative idea available for robust debate on the floor of this House.

Now, the underlying bill is the bill that came out of the Budget Committee. Again, Madam Speaker, in full disclosure, I am a member of that Budget Committee. I am proud of the work that that committee put out.

Some folks call it the Paul Ryan budget. I take umbrage at that. I sit on that committee. I work shoulder to shoulder with Paul. I am going to call it the Budget Committee budget. I hope at the end of this budget week it will be the House-passed budget, because I think it reflects the priorities of this institution, and I think it reflects the priorities of the American people.

If it does not reflect the priorities of any Member in this Chamber, they will have alternatives to vote on. One of those alternatives is written and drafted by the ranking member of the Budget Committee, the lead Democrat on the Budget Committee, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen), that substitute amendment made in order today.

The Congressional Black Caucus, Madam Speaker, comes together to put together a list of priorities, a full substitute budget, has done that for a number of years, has done that again this year. This rule makes that Congressional Black Caucus substitute in order for a vote.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus, Madam Speaker, they have presented a budget. Now, their budget is one that raises taxes by $5 trillion over the next 10 years. It is not going to be one that I support here on the floor of the House, but it is absolutely a legitimate list of priorities, as I talked about earlier, priorities that affect the young people of this Nation. We are going to get a vote on that budget here on the floor of this House.

The Republican Study Committee, Madam Speaker, of which I am also a member, a proud drafter of that budget document, that vote, espousing the absolute fastest path to balance that we will be hearing in this institution during budget week, Madam Speaker, will get a vote on the floor of this House.

Finally, a budget presented by Representative Mulvaney of South Carolina but intended to replicate the budget written by the President of the United States of America. It is a funny thing in constitutional government. Of course we have article I, legislative branch; article II, executive branch. Certainly, we have different responsibilities, but I don't think there is anyone in this Chamber who would say the President hasn't invested an incredible amount of time and energy presenting his budget. It wasn't here on time, but it did arrive here. It is a complete budget, and it deserves a hearing. No one on the Democrat side of the aisle picked up that budget to present it until Representative Mulvaney did. Again, I think that is part of the robust debate that we must have.

All together, we are going to have 4 hours of debate on these budget alternatives. That is in addition to all the regular order that has already gone on in committee, in addition to the hours that we have invested in the Rules Committee already, 4 hours here on the floor of this House.

Why is that important, Madam Speaker? Because I think what I will hear on both sides of the aisle is that these budgets represent a statement of values. Who are you going to take the money from? Who are you going to spend the money on? How are you going to invest in the future? How are you going to prevent the future from being eroded by payments on debt after debt, after debt, after debt? These are the discussions that we are going to have.

Just 10 years ago, Madam Speaker, the public debt in this country was $7.3 trillion. Today, it is $17.5 trillion--all of the debt that we have racked up in the history of this country through 2004 more than doubled in just the last 10 years.

Madam Speaker, there may be folks in this Chamber who say that is a debt worth making, that the investments that we are creating by borrowing this money from our children and spending it on the generations today, that that is worth doing. I say no. I say our obligation to our children tomorrow, to our grandchildren tomorrow is not to advance ourselves at their expense. I think our obligation is to pay down that debt, but that is a legitimate discussion that we are going to have over the next several days.

The $10 trillion on the Nation's credit card in just the past 10 years, Madam Speaker, let there be no doubt that that is the gravity of the conversation that we are having today.

I remember back in 2012, Madam Speaker, President Obama said in an interview with ABC News: ``We don't have an immediate crisis in terms of debt. In fact, for the next 10 years, it's going to be in a sustainable place.'' In 2012, the President predicting that for the next 10 years the crisis won't come, that the crisis will be out beyond year 10. Madam Speaker, he may be right, but that was 2 years ago, and there are only two bills, two budgets that we have before us this budget week that even balance in that 10-year window.

This is a debate worthy of this Chamber; this is a debate worthy of America. And I hope that by the end of budget week, Madam Speaker, by the time we take our vote on final passage, irrespective of which substitute has passed or whether the House-passed or committee-passed budget remains, that we have a document that represents not just this institution's values but that represents our constituents' values, that represents American values, that is true to the obligation that we all have to protect the opportunities of the generations of tomorrow.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes to say to my friend from Massachusetts, I believe we share many of the same priorities. But because of past Congresses, because of past administrations, because of past decisions that have been made in this Chamber, we are on track to spend $6 trillion on interest over the next 10 years.

Madam Speaker, that is opportunity to fulfill every single one of those goals my friend from Massachusetts laid out that is frittered away by the borrow-and-spend behaviors of the past.

There is no disagreement in this Chamber about the commitment to a hand-up. The disagreement is about how much further out of reach we put opportunity and success by trading away future opportunities for spending today.

I have great respect and admiration for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who have said yes, let's do raise taxes by $5 trillion. Yes, let's do reset our priorities. Let's actually describe a pathway to a balanced budget. It is not an easy pathway to get to, but it matters.

It doesn't matter because it's a number, Madam Speaker. It matters because every year we don't balance the budget we steal opportunities from our children, and that is undeniable.

The debate is, Do the investments today outweigh those stolen opportunities from tomorrow? Or do the savings today that ensure that opportunity for tomorrow represent the best course of success that we can provide, again, for our children and grandchildren, about whom there is no disagreement about our strong and steadfast commitment?

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I do not yield for that purpose. All time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

Madam Speaker, I seek time for debate.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.

Madam Speaker, there are often reasons to come to this floor and instruct the Rules Committee about how the Rules Committee could do better. We do the very best we can, but we accept constructive criticism from all comers.

The rule that is before us today is an example of what has gone right, not what has gone wrong. The rule that is before us today makes in order every single budget that was offered to the Rules Committee.

Now, I don't dispute that there are lots of different agendas that are being pursued here on the floor at this time; but for the budget agenda, for the openness agenda, for the full debate agenda, we have a rule before us that has made in order every single substitute offered in the Rules Committee, which happens to be five substitutes in addition to the base bill, but had there been more, we would have made more in order.

Again, there are lots of things that we can come to the floor of the House and disagree on, but this rule, to bring those disagreeing budgets to the floor, should be a point of great pride for both sides of the aisle.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Parliamentary Inquiries

Madam Speaker, at this time, it is my great pleasure to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions), the chairman of the House Rules Committee.

Madam Speaker, all time is yielded for the purpose of debate only.

Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions), the chairman of the Rules Committee.

Madam Speaker, at this time, it is my great pleasure to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), a member of both the Rules Committee and the House Budget Committee.

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

Madam Speaker, at this time, it is my great pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Nugent), a former sheriff, a member of the class of 2010, and a member of the Rules Committee.

I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx), the secretary of the Republican Conference.

Madam Speaker, I advise my friend from Massachusetts that we have no further speakers remaining, if he is prepared to close.

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

You couldn't tell it from the acrimony that has been expressed over the last hour, but this is a good day. There are so many opportunities we have to come to this House and be disappointed with the bills that are here before us.

Why? Because we have different ideas, we have different ideas. My constituency, different from the constituencies of so many of my other colleagues, I don't question that they do their best to serve their constituencies, but in serving their voters, they harm mine and sometimes vice versa.

Today, that is not the question. We don't have a choice between the lesser of two evils. We don't have a choice against my way or their way. We have a rule that allows for absolutely every Member of this Congress to write their own budget. Think about that, Madam Speaker. We are talking about the budget of the United States of America, $3.5 trillion.

Now, everybody doesn't write their own budget. It turns out we have more in common than we have that divides us around this institution, Madam Speaker. We have six budgets that we are going to be voting on.

That is every single budget that was submitted, but it is only six budgets. One came out of the House Budget Committee, one came out of the Republican Study Committee, one came out of the Congressional Black Caucus, one came from the Progressive Caucus, one came from the ranking member of the Budget Committee, Mr. Van Hollen, and one came from Mr. Mulvaney representing the President's budget.

By golly, Madam Speaker, if you can't find something that you believe in, in that continuum of budgets, you are not looking hard enough.

Here is the thing: budgets are about choices; budgets are about priorities. The budgets of previous Congresses and previous Presidents have run up a debt the size of which servicing, even at these lowest teaser interest rates in American history, will suck out 18 months of productivity over the next 10 years.

I do not question my friend's commitment to the SNAP program, but understand that decisions of the past, paying the interest alone, require the SNAP program be closed completely for 18 months.

I do not question my friend's commitment to national security, but the budgets and the priorities of past Congresses have borrowed us into such a state that paying interest alone would require us to close our military for 18 months over the next 10 years.

We could not agree more that this budget week is about choices and priorities, and I tell you the choices and priorities of past Congresses and past Presidents are trading away hope for the next generation of Americans. They are trading away opportunities to serve Americans who need to be served today.

They are trading away security that folks should be able to have in a land as great as America; but because of decisions that this body, the Senate, and the White House have made over the past decades, that security is no more.

Not the budget-passed budget, Madam Speaker, the Budget Committee budget brings us to balance. We will begin to pay down that debt. We will reclaim those opportunities for those future generations.

Don't we owe it to them, Madam Speaker, not to advance ourselves at their expense? I think I know what the answer to that question is. We are going to be debating it over the next 3 days here on the House floor, and I hope my colleagues will agree with me, at the end of that process, that we owe it to them to do better today.

Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 539, I call up the bill (H.R. 1871) to amend the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 to reform the budget baseline, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on H.R. 1871 in the Record.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes.

I am pleased to be down here with the ranking member of the Budget Committee, the gentleman from Maryland, the gentleman whose opinion and counsel I have respect for.

What I love about the Budget Committee is that we have a chance to talk about issues that are defined by numbers in committee, but whose outcome is a difference in people's lives back home.

After all, the reason the gentleman from Maryland is the highest ranking Democrat on the Budget Committee is not because he cares about math, it is because he cares about people. That is who the Budget Committee consists of, Madam Speaker.

The bill that is before us today is a bill first conceived in this House by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert). I happen to be on the Budget Committee, I happen to have passion on this issue, so my name exists to carry this bill forward; but it has been an idea that has been around in this institution, and it says this.

We have all seen it. We have all been in townhall meetings, Madam Speaker, where you say: this is what we have done to spending for next year.

And somebody is going to raise their hand, and they are going to say: Rob, is that Washington math, or is that real math? Is this one of those things where you raise spending by $10, but you call it a cut because you predicted you would raise spending by $20 instead?

How sad is that? How sad is that, that in a country run by the American people, that they have to ask their representatives: Is this real math, or is this Washington math?

This bill, Madam Speaker, puts a stop to Washington math forever. It says this: don't assume you are going to spend more money next year than you spent last year unless the law requires it.

Social Security is a good example of that. We raise Social Security each and every year. Why? Because the law of the land requires it, but not so in Federal budgeting rules.

In the crazy world of Federal budgeting, Madam Speaker, you raise spending next year just because. The assumption is: well, of course, they are going to spend more money than they did last year. Are they getting more bang for their buck?

I don't know. Is the crisis still there? Does it still need to be funded? I don't know, but we are going to assume more dollars go out the door.

My bill asks one thing and one thing only, Madam Speaker, that is to justify the American people's tax dollars when they are spent. If you need more money next year, come to Congress and say so.

If it is a priority for my constituents back home, I promise you, you will get my ``yes'' vote, but gone are the days of assuming Congress will always spend more, irrespective of the merits.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 60 seconds.

I think I have got one of the best chart teams on Capitol Hill. I will say to my friend from Maryland that that is a great Big Mac chart, and I think it drives home my point exactly, which is that Federal Government math assumes that, if you bought a Big Mac 10 years ago, you are still buying a Big Mac today. I just wonder if that is true. I have switched to the value menu. I get the McDouble from time to time for 99 cents. The Spicy McChicken is now a part of what I do. I have to get into my wallet and justify the expense, and when prices double, sometimes we, as Americans, have to substitute.

I would be happy to yield to the gentleman from Maryland.

In reclaiming my time, absolutely, inflation is not going to go away, but we have to make tough choices, and this bill requires us to make those choices in a transparent way for the American people.

At this time, Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert), who first said that we must be transparent in this way, that we must be fair and honest in this way. He is the original author of the Baseline Reform Act.

Madam Speaker, at this time, it is my great pleasure to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock), a champion for budget transparency and a member of the Budget Committee.

Madam Speaker, at this time, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan), chairman of the Budget Committee.

Madam Speaker, I would say to my friend from California that I do not have any further speakers remaining. I am prepared to close.

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

Madam Speaker, I brought down a chart that takes us from 2006 out to 2044. For almost everyone here in the Chamber, that it going to get into the meaty part of our lifetime.

What it shows with the green line, Madam Speaker, is what revenues have been in this country, historic revenues going backward and projected going forward, not in dollar values but as a percent of our economy. What it shows us is that revenues going forward will continue to be historically normal at just under 20 percent of GDP.

But the red line, Madam Speaker, represents projected spending. This is the projected spending if we do nothing at all. We don't need to show up for work another day in this Chamber. We don't need to come down here and pass one new law, spend one more dollar. The spending on autopilot, Madam Speaker, is represented by the red line. You see it rising off the top of the graph.

Spending is the problem. For decades, since 1974 and the passage of the Congressional Budget Act, there has been an assumption that spending was going to rise each and every year. My friends on the Democratic side of the aisle called it inflation. Inflation existed before the Congressional Budget

Act was passed. It is going to exist after the Congressional Budget Act is modified or repealed. Inflation is an economic certainty, and that is not the topic of discussion today.

The topic of discussion today is who makes decisions when it comes to America's budgeting. If spending is the problem, if it is spending that is rising faster than revenues, if it is spending that has changed over the past decade, who should make those determinations?

Here is the thing, Madam Speaker. I will go back to that Washington math that I talked about coming from townhall meetings, because I know everyone here has been a part of that. I know everyone here has had that hand go up when we talk about cutting spending and they say: Is that a real cut or is that a Washington cut? When you say ``cutting spending,'' Rob, do you mean cutting spending or do you mean that you are only going to increase it by $10 and the projection was it is was going to go up by $20?

Only here is increasing spending by $10 considered a cut. There is no family in America that considers that a cut.

Think about your budget back home, Madam Speaker, whatever that is. I remember buying milk for $1.99 a gallon. I am a big milk drinker. Skim is my favorite. But $1.99 I was comfortable paying. Today I am prepared to pay more--I am. There has been inflation. I am prepared to pay $4 a gallon for a gallon of milk.

I didn't assume that I was going to drink the same amount of milk every day going forward. In fact, I confess, I found powdered milk, Madam Speaker. It was on the discount shelf at Giant. I got two gallons of powdered milk for $2.25 total. That is $1.12 a gallon for that powdered milk. I am not paying $4 a gallon. I am paying $1.12 because I have to make choices.

American families don't get unlimited dollars to spend. Though, the Federal Government pretends like it does.

We are borrowing from future generations every time we make a decision. So this bill says one thing and one thing only: Who makes decisions for America? Is it going to be the Congressional Budget Office? Is it going to be a statutory baseline, or is it going to be the men and women in this room who put themselves up for election every 2 years?

Madam Speaker, for me, the answer is clear. I have got a Constitution that lays it out fairly clearly here in my pocket. I don't think I need to read it to folks here to get them to understand because I think we all share that view.

We share the view that difficult decisions are not supposed to be made by unelected bureaucrats in a back room. Difficult decisions are supposed to be made by us, right here in this Chamber.

If you have a project back home in your district, if you see a national priority, and you want to spend a penny more than we spent last year, come to the floor of the House and make your case. Make your case. For Pete's sake, I am a huge supporter of Federal research. The work that goes on at the CDC down in Atlanta, the work that goes on in Maryland at NIH, it is amazing. Nobody else is going to do that if we don't come together and do it here in this body.

I have got to tell you something. I don't need a baseline. I don't need a bureaucrat. I don't need any Washington math to come and make the case that we ought to spend more at NIH next year than we did last year. Why do I not need them? Because I believe it. Because my constituents elected me to stand up for Federal research. We came here to make these tough decisions.

Back in the day, before the class of 2010, before the class of 2012-- back in the day, there is good reason to assume that Federal spending was going to go up every year because every year since the end of the Korean war that is exactly what happened. I watched it. Every year, we spent more than we did in the last.

Something has changed in this town, Madam Speaker, and I think the thing that has changed in this town are the people that the folks back home are sending to this town. I think the town's actually the same. I think the folks back home are sending new folks, folks like the gentleman from California, folks like the gentleman from North Carolina. Sending people to town with the direction of not trading away their children's future because they are afraid to make tough decisions today.

So, what does that mean? That means in the 4 years I have been in this institution, Madam Speaker, we have spent less money in these discretionary accounts that this bill would affect every single year than we did the one before. Think about that.

In the absence of this legislation that I am proposing, we are going to go assume that spending goes up every year, but the reality that my friends on the other side of the aisle are talking about, the reality of inflation, the reality of congressional decisionmaking, the reality of our budget is that that spending has gone down, not just from 2010 to 2011, though it did; not just again from 2011 to 2012, though it did; not just again from 2012 to 2013, though it did; and not just again from 2013 to 2014, but it did that too. Four years in a row we spent less the following year than we did the year before.

When are we going to get back to that 2010 level of spending? Is it going to be next year? No, it is not. Is it going to be the year after that? No, not by the budgets that we will be passing on the floor here this week. What about the year after? No, not then either.

So, the opponents of this legislation suggest that we should create a process in Federal law that assumes that spending goes up every single year, and yet the reality of this institution, as it exists today, not as it existed 10 years ago, not as it existed 20 years ago, not as it existed in 1974, when this legislation was first enacted, but as it exists today, is the responsible men and women in this Chamber who are prioritizing taxpayer dollars in such a way that for the entire 10-year window we won't spend a penny more than we did on day one. That is the reality.

Could we spend more each and every year? Of course we could. Could we borrow more and more from our children and grandchildren and ask them to pay it back tomorrow with interest? Of course we could. Did our constituents elect us to come here and make difficult, difficult, difficult discussions? They did.

I was in the Rules Committee last night, Madam Speaker. My colleague from Massachusetts said, Some of these decisions have real consequences for folks back home. I disagree. I think every decision has real consequences for folks back home. Every single one.

This legislation simply asks that before we spend another penny from folks back home that we come to the floor of this House, to the committee chambers around this institution, and make the case for why it is worth doing. I challenge you to look in the eyes of young people whose future we are mortgaging and suggest that they deserve anything less.

With that, Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion to recommit.

Madam Speaker, I hold in my hand a copy of the motion to recommit. I will read from line 1. It says: Section 3: Prohibiting cuts in education, health, and safety protections.

I said something that generally speaking here on this floor we agree on, but it makes the case of why this bill is so necessary. Because this bill has nothing to do with cuts in any account, no cuts in education, no cuts in health, no cuts in safety protections.

This bill does one thing and one thing only, and that is to say, let's spend next year what we spent this year, unless someone makes the case to do more.

I thought the gentlewoman from Illinois made a powerful case for why it is important to pay close attention to these accounts and focus the dollars on those accounts that we can do the most good. But to solve this misunderstanding that there are cuts in baseline budgeting, to solve this misunderstanding that prevails across the conversations across America, let's support H.R. 1871. I reject this motion to recommit.

I support the underlying bill, Madam Speaker, and I ask that we can bring fairness and transparency to the budget again for the first time since 1974.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 8 o'clock and 31 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Tuesday, April 8, 2014, at 10 a.m. for morning-hour debate.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 539 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend from Florida (Mr. Hastings), 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.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, this is a big day for me down here on the House floor. I don't know if you were catching every word of the rule as it was being read, but what you've got here in a nutshell, Mr. Speaker, is a rule that makes in order absolutely every germane amendment that was offered, not to one budget reform bill, not to two budget reform bills, but to three budget process reform bills.

We talk so much about numbers in this institution, Mr. Speaker. We talk about baselines. We talk about CBO scores. We also talk a lot about people. We talk a lot about families. We talk about why what we do here matters in the lives of folks back home.

Father Conroy prayed this morning, Mr. Speaker, that we could get out of some of our old habits that the inertia leads us to disagree and find those things around on which we do agree. There is one thing that is undisputed in this Chamber--in fact, on Capitol

Hill; in fact, in this entire town--Mr. Speaker, when it comes to budget process, and that is that every time we decide we are going to spend money today, we get a little boost in the economy, and that boost comes from a mortgaged future. We can get a little today at the expense of a little tomorrow, or, conversely, we can lose a little bit today in exchange for gaining a little bit tomorrow.

There is no free lunch when it comes to budgeting, Mr. Speaker. I only get to spend each dollar once in this institution, and I can either raise that dollar from today's taxpayers or I can borrow that dollar from tomorrow's taxpayers. There are arguments on both sides. Daniel Patrick Moynihan was fond of saying: Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but they are not entitled to their own facts.

What these three budget process bills before us today, Mr. Speaker, will do is make sure we are working from the same shared set of facts. Now, again, this rule, Mr. Speaker, provides for these three bills. It is H. Res. 539. It is a structured rule for H.R. 1874, the Pro-Growth Budgeting Act. That is going to be on the floor today immediately following this rule. If we are able to secure passage, and I certainly hope that we can, we will be debating H.R. 1874.

H.R. 1874 will instruct the Congressional Budget Office to calculate, when we make these decisions, whether we are going to spend a little today and mortgage tomorrow or whether we are going to save a little bit today in exchange for growth tomorrow, to calculate that impact. It is not enough to spend the dollar, it is not enough to save the dollar. We have to explain, not just to our colleagues, but to the American people, what the benefit or the burden of that decision is going to be. H.R. 1874 brings some clarity to that decision.

One of my personal favorite bills, Mr. Speaker, is H.R. 1871. H.R. 1871 and H.R. 1872 are also made in order by this bill. H.R. 1871 happens to be the Woodall bill, Mr. Speaker. It is the Baseline Reform bill. Candidly, I can't claim credit for it. I want to, pride of authorship and all. But, Mr. Speaker, the truth is it is the gentleman from the great State of Texas. Mr. Louie Gohmert has been fighting for this bill long before I arrived in this institution. I happened to get a seat on the Budget Committee; he happens to serve elsewhere; so I am carrying this language. I couldn't be prouder to do it, but I want to give credit where credit is due.

The fight that the gentleman from Texas has been making over the years--and it is not a fight against one another; it is a fight against inertia, as Father Conroy talked about this morning--is to say that it is just crazy in today's tight economic environment to assume that if the government spent X dollars this year, we are going to give them X plus 3 percent next year, that irrespective of what your mission is, irrespective of what your productivity is, irrespective of what your success is, we are just going to assume that your agency is going to get more money next year than it got this year. That is not the way anybody operates at home. That is not what we do around the dinner table. That is not what any business in America does. That is not what we should be doing.

So H.R. 1871 says we are going to assume you are going to get next year what you got this year, with absolutely no inflation whatsoever.

Now, this is not an area of wide agreement. I would argue what you get next year ought to be less than what you get this year, because we ought to expect some productivity increases from you. It is fair in the industrious society in which we live that we expect you to do more with less next year. But we are not trying to achieve all of that today. We are just saying that what you get next year is going to be what you get this year. Eliminate those automatic inflaters that bias us towards less productivity and more cost.

Finally, H.R. 1872, Mr. Speaker, that is a bill from my friend from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett). That bill says we ought to have accurate accounting, fair cost accounting, of government loan programs.

We are in the business of guaranteeing a whole lot of loans in this institution, Mr. Speaker, loans for all sorts of meritorious activities that we would agree on both sides of the aisle are worthy of being carried on, but the question is how do we account for that in the budget process.

Today we assume that those loans will never go bad--that those loans will never go bad--and that we will only reflect a cost of the American taxpayer guaranteeing those loans when and if those loans do go bad. But that is not what happens in the real world. That is not what we ask of our bankers down on Main Street. That is not what we ask of any financial institution. We would run you right out of town if you tried to do your accounting that way in the real world, Mr. Speaker.

So what Mr. Garrett says is: Why can't we apply real world accounting to this institution? Why can't we hold ourselves to the same high standard that we hold folks back home? I applaud him for that. I think that is something, again, that brings us together rather than divides us.

What I like most about this rule, though, Mr. Speaker, is that when the amendments were offered--and that is the way the process goes, for folks who don't watch the Rules Committee as closely as my friend from Florida and I do. Members of Congress come; they submit their amendments to the Rules Committee; and the Rules Committee decides what is made in order. But we do that in consultation with the Parliamentarians. We need to make sure that amendments are germane. We want to make sure that the conversation is on the topic that the bill is on. We don't allow nongermane amendments most of the time, but sometimes Members submit amendments in good faith that don't comply with the rules as they were submitted, but they can be worked on to make them better.

What I am particularly proud of, Mr. Speaker, is that, when we received some amendments that were not quite within the four corners of the rules, rather than just rejecting those amendments out of hand, which would have been a perfectly appropriate response, we didn't do what was appropriate; we did what was right. And that was to go and work with those Members to improve those amendments, get them within the four corners of the parliamentary process, and make those in order today.

So, again, every single germane amendment that was submitted to the Rules Committee on each of these three bills was made in order for debate under the bill. We will do the first of those bills today. If this rule passes, we will do the remaining two next week, and all done in the name of transparency and accurate information for the American people.

It is perfectly legitimate to have your own opinion about what the Federal budget ought to look like, but you are not entitled to your own facts about what the impact of those decisions will be.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes to thank my friend from Florida for laying out exactly what the case is that needs to be made today.

It just so happens all of those spending priorities that the gentleman from Florida mentioned are spending priorities I share-- investments in education; investments in roads and bridges; investments in cutting-edge research that makes a difference in people's lives, not just in terms of treatments, but in terms of cures.

In the absence of crystal-clear budgeting, in the absence of the reforms that we have proposed here today, the $5 trillion that the Budget Committee passed that proposes to reduce Federal spending over the next 10 years is exactly the same as the interest that that very same budget proposes to pay over the next 10 years.

I want you to hear that, Mr. Speaker. Every single reduction in spending that the gentleman just laid out is necessitated because, dollar for dollar, we are wasting those same amounts on paying the debts that previous Congresses have racked up.

That is a Budget Committee-passed budget. The President's budget, Mr. Speaker, proposes to spend $6 trillion over the next 10 years on interest alone--interest alone.

Mr. Speaker, by not taking responsibility today, not only are we mortgaging our children's future by piling these debts on them, we are trading away opportunities to make a difference in their future.

Because those dollars that we are sending to the Chinese and Germans who loan us money and the money that we are spending to pay our debts is money that we could be spending on those shared investment priorities that the gentleman from Florida and I have in common.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from the State of Florida (Mr. Nugent), one of the great members of the Rules Committee, a former sheriff.

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

It never surprises me how much I have in common with my friend from Florida. We come from very different parts of the world, Mr. Speaker. If you go to many events in this town, they will generally have a Southeastern State section and a Florida section. Florida is a little bit different from the rest of those Southeastern States. Our constituencies may not look the same demographically, may not look the same on paper, but when it comes to caring about one another, I have no doubt that our communities are incredibly similar, as the gentleman from Florida and I are very similar.

The debate is not about whether or not we have an obligation to our neighbors. We do. The question is are we meeting our obligation to our neighbors, and I will tell you that we are not. The pathway up in this country is what our obligation is here. I would say to my friends that providing a safety net that has no ladder out is a cruel and unsatisfactory path for this House.

I was talking with a gentleman down in southeast D.C., Mr. Speaker, and he runs a project that takes folks from homelessness and drug addiction to employment. He said: The problem with you Republicans is all you do is offer people hope: pick yourself up by your bootstraps; tomorrow will be better than today. He said hope in the absence of access is futile. He said: But Democrats offer help. If you are naked, I will clothe you. If you are hungry, I will feed you. If you are in prison, I will visit you. But he said help in the absence of a pathway out is to condemn someone to a life of poverty. He said: What you all have to do is to come together. You have to provide that help to meet people's immediate needs, but you have to provide that pathway out.

Mr. Speaker, I don't care if you are rich today; I care whether or not the

opportunity exists in America for you to be rich tomorrow. And I don't mean rich by having six figures or seven figures or eight figures; I mean rich because you have got a roof over your head and you can feed your family.

The American Dream, Mr. Speaker, is not to be the next Bill Gates. I don't know where that ever got started. The American Dream is to be able, by the sweat of your brow and the power of your ideas, to be your own man or woman, to make your own decisions.

I listened deeply to the words of my friend and I looked for where we might find that common ground, because, Mr. Speaker, I would say to my friend from Florida, if you go into any public housing facility in my district, they will tell you that the Federal Government prevents them from succeeding. The residents would say: You have got to let us kick the bad actors out. The residents would say: We have got folks here who are trying to make a difference, and we have got folks here who are bringing us down. You have got to give us the ability to keep our kids safe. You have got to give us the ability to keep our community safe. You have got to give us the ability to run our lives.

But Federal law says no, Mr. Speaker. Federal law says we know what is fair; we know what is best.

But I know the gentleman from Florida and I share a heart for letting folks in these communities take control of their lives, make those choices that will enable tomorrow to be better than today.

Mr. Speaker, with this budget--again, I can't make this point sharply enough--the President proposes to spend $6 trillion on interest alone over the next 10 years--$6 trillion. Now, at the President's spending levels, Mr. Speaker, that is almost 18 months of running this country. Understand that because of the borrowing patterns of past Congresses and administrations, we are losing 18 months of the very services the gentleman from Florida proposes that we provide. Eighteen months are eroded out of the next 10 years with interest alone.

Mr. Speaker, one of the things that the Pro-Growth Budgeting Act does, for example, is say you have got to project out over 40 years.

You will remember, when the President proposed his health care bill, no question, his intention was to help folks; no question, his intention was to make life better for folks. We can absolutely debate whether or not those were successes or failures, but this is the way that budget sorted itself out. He said: I am not going to spend more than $1 trillion on this program.

Now, I don't know when in the world, Mr. Speaker, $1 trillion became the low number that we decided would be tolerable as a program, but he said: I don't want to spend more than $1 trillion on this program.

So, instead of creating a 10-year program, he created a 6-year program, put the implementation off for 4 years. Critical health care services, absolutely necessary we provide these services to the American people, but they can wait 4 years. We have got families in need, families that don't have options, families that don't have choices, but I am not going to help them get choices for another 4 years. Six-year program, $1 trillion.

The Pro-Growth Budgeting Act says we need to look at programs over 40 years because that $1 trillion, 6-year program explodes in years 7 and 8 and 9 and 10. And it may be money well spent. I hope that is what the gentleman from Florida believes because I know he supported the program. I don't believe it is money well spent. I think we are losing trillions of dollars in health care costs that could be better controlled. I think we are losing trillions of dollars in care that could have been provided to folks but, instead, is being lost in an inefficient health care system.

But we don't have those answers when those bills come to the floor of this House for a vote. Who is it that opposes that, Mr. Speaker? Who is it that opposes, when we make trillion-dollar decisions that are multigenerational, that we don't have access to long-term data?

The gentleman from Florida says it seems disingenuous for us to pretend inflation does not exist. That is not what I am proposing, but disingenuous to pretend that it does. I think it is similarly odd to pretend that the program stops after 10 years instead of it continuing on in perpetuity, as these programs do. These bills do nothing but provide us with other information.

I will close with this, Mr. Speaker. My experience in this House with a voting card began in 2011. And while the gentleman is absolutely right, Mr. Speaker, when he talks about inflation and how services can be eroded, my experience in this House, your experience in this House, Mr. Speaker, is that we spent less in 2011 than we did in 2010, not more. Inflation was there, but we spent less. My experience, Mr. Speaker, is that we spent less in 2012 than we did in 2011, less in 2013 than we did in 2012, less in 2014 than we did in 2013. Every year I have been here we have spent less. I think that is what our constituency expects from us, not to cut critical service programs, but to increase our productivity and prioritize their dollars, prioritize their dollars to those places where they can do the most good.

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

I would say to my friend from Florida, Mr. Speaker, I, too, am prepared to close.

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

Two paths diverged in the wood, and I took the path less traveled, and that has made all the difference.

Mr. Speaker, this is Washington, D.C. There is a term called ``Washington, D.C., math,'' which, as my friend from Florida, the sheriff, described earlier is when you can raise spending by $5 and call it a cut. That is Washington, D.C., math.

The path less traveled in this town is the path of fiscal responsibility; the path less traveled in this town is the path of accountability; the path less traveled in this town is the path of transparency, and that is what these three measures before us today propose, Mr. Speaker.

I held a townhall meeting, Mr. Speaker, about 12 months ago. They asked if I was going to support the congressional pay raise. I said: Well, we are not going to do a congressional pay raise this year, but I hope one day to come home and tell you that I have earned it.

I do. I want to show up back home, Mr. Speaker, and tell folks that, dadgummit: I have earned it. Be proud of what we have done in Washington, D.C. I have earned it.

I think that is true of every dime of spending the Federal Government does. I don't think we ought to assume, as the current baseline does, that every single Federal agency is going to have their budget increase next year by the cost of inflation. I think those agencies should come to this institution, as they do in an annual appropriation process, and say: I have earned it. I have earned it.

I am not just talking about making a difference in people's lives; here are the results. I am not just talking about lifting people up; here are the results.

The hardest thing to end in this town, Mr. Speaker, is a Federal program. Once they get started, they seem to last forever. Mission creep. If they solve one mission, they are going to adopt a new mission, roll right on down the line. Nobody wants to work themselves out of a job.

Is it so outrageous, is it the role only of the fringe, as my friend from Florida proposed, to suggest that, if we are going to borrow and spend more of our children's money, we should come and justify it?

Mr. Speaker, that kind of budget transparency has become relevant only to the fringe of America. It is not the America I know.

I tell the young people--and I try to start every day back home with young people, Mr. Speaker. I say, listen, just tell me what you want in terms of support for higher education because the only dollars I am going to spend, I am going to borrow from you. I am borrowing it from you.

We all love our children. We all want our children to succeed. But we are borrowing from them. Every decision we make. These three bills ask for three things, and three things only before we make the decision to borrow from our children:

Number one, the Pro-Growth Budgeting Act. It asks that for those programs that are going to have a big impact on our economy, that we look not just at what the 1-year impact is, not just at what the 10- year impact is, but that we look at a generation of impact.

Before we start down that road less traveled, Mr. Speaker, we should know what it is going to cost us and how it is going to benefit us. We don't get that information today, as the gentleman from Florida, the sheriff, noted. We have not reformed the Congressional Budget Act since 1974. That kind of multigenerational information is worthy of this body. This bill would provide it to us for the very first time.

The Budget and Accounting Transparency Act. If you are going to lend money, you ought to account for it; you ought to evaluate it.

We often talk about our $17.5 trillion debt, Mr. Speaker. That comes from Washington math because if we were anywhere else other than this town, we would have to evaluate all the promises that we have made. I mean, you know how Social Security is funded, for example, Mr. Speaker. It is today's workers that are paying for today's retirees. There is not a dime set aside for today's workers when they retire.

The true cost of government, the true national debt, as recently calculated by Dr. Larry Kotlikoff of Boston University, not a conservative by any stretch of the imagination, is over $200 trillion-- $200 trillion. ``Trillion''--we throw these words around as if they are nothing--that is 1 million millions. We have not had 1 million days since the birth of Christ, Mr. Speaker. We won't for another 730 years. Mr. Speaker, 1 million millions is 1 trillion. We have borrowed and promised on behalf of our children $200 trillion.

The fair value accounting request is only that we be honest with the American people. I am prepared to live by whatever decision the American people make. I believe in our Republic. But we cannot ask people to make decisions without providing people with good information. This bill does that.

Then finally, Mr. Speaker, the bill, again, sponsored by my good friend from Texas, Louie Gohmert, a long champion that I have the privilege of serving with in this Congress, the Baseline Reform Act. The Baseline Reform Act says, if you are going to raise spending by $1, you are actually raising spending by $1.

I know it sounds radical, Mr. Speaker. I know it sounds like the province of the fringe, but it is not. If you are going to raise spending by $1, you should say you are going to raise spending by $1. Dadgummit, Mr. Speaker, I can't even have a town hall meeting these days and talk about budget numbers--because I am a budget guy--I can't talk about budget numbers without someone raising their hand and saying, now, Rob, when you talk about spending reductions, is that really a spending reduction, or is that just a reduction in the rate of growth? That is how it has become.

For 4 years in this institution, we have spent less each and every succeeding year. Now, I would argue, contrary to what my friend from Florida suggested, that we are prioritizing spending on shared goals, and we are deprioritizing spending on which we do not have those shared goals. It seems fair in these difficult economic times, as we are taking those dollars from hardworking American taxpayers across the country, that we identify high-priority spending and low-priority spending.

I will take the work at NIH, as I mentioned earlier, Mr. Speaker. That is high-priority spending. That is basic research that is going to make a difference in people's lives and not a difference in something minor, Mr. Speaker, but perhaps a life-and-death difference. It is a goal that we share. It is a goal that the Appropriations Committee shares. It is a goal that we are going to be able to realize.

But I don't think there is a single man or woman at NIH, I don't think there is a single professor at NIH, I don't think there is a single Ph.D. candidate at NIH who is embarrassed to come up here and say, I have done well. I am a good steward of the taxpayers' money. Trust me again.

Mr. Speaker, that is where I want to take us with these budget bills. I want to have folks proud of how they are spending the dollars, proud to come and share that with us here in this Congress and have the American people proud to get onboard with renewing those dollars once again.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all of my colleagues to support this rule. This rule has made in order every amendment that was germane to these three bills. I ask them to support this rule so that we can begin voting these bills this very day.

The material previously referred to by Mr. Hastings of Florida is as follows:

An Amendment to H. Res. 539 Offered by Mr. Hastings of Florida

At the end of the resolution, add the following new

sections:

Sec. 4. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution the

Speaker shall, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XVIII, declare

the House resolved into the Committee of the Whole House on

the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R.

1010) to provide for an increase in the Federal minimum wage.

The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All

points of order against consideration of the bill are waived.

General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not

exceed one hour equally divided and controlled

by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on

Education and the Workforce. After general debate the bill

shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule.

All points of order against provisions in the bill are

waived. At the conclusion of consideration of the bill for

amendment the Committee shall rise and report the bill to the

House with such amendments as may have been adopted. The

previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill

and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening

motion except one motion to recommit with or without

instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports

that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the

next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the

third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV,

resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further

consideration of the bill.

Sec. 5. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the

consideration of H.R. 1010.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend from Rhode Island for bringing the amendment. He and I were elected in the same class together just 3 years ago, and I think we have been able to work together to make a difference in the short time that we have been here.

I share his commitment to making sure that we have jobs estimates coming out of legislation, which is why I am so proud that as drafted-- as drafted--this bill, introduced by my friend from Georgia, Dr. Price, requires ``employment and labor supply analysis'' in subsection B.

Now, that is incredibly important, Mr. Chairman, because what we do in Washington absolutely has consequences, and what those consequences are is a fair subject of debate here in the Chamber. But today there is no mechanism for determining, again, employment and labor supply numbers on a dynamic basis over time recognizing what those actions are.

Now, my concern about the amendment from my friend is that, rather than scoring those jobs dynamically--again, understanding that for every action there is a reaction--it scores in a static methodology assuming that the government creates jobs, that there is anything at all that the government does that actually creates a job.

Now, we can redistribute the wealth, but short of putting someone on the Federal payroll, this amendment perpetuates the myth that the government is in the job-creation business. The government is absolutely in the job-destroying business, and we both work together on that facet, and we can make some decisions that help the private sector to succeed. It is those decisions, Mr. Chairman, that the bill, as drafted, will make sure are measured, recorded, and reported here on the House floor for the first time.

Again, I very much appreciate the intent of the gentleman to make sure that this Congress is focused like a laser on job creation, but scoring it as if the government is creating jobs instead of recognizing it is only our actions that the private sector is being impacted on that creates those jobs, I believe, would take what is a very good underlying bill and move it in the wrong direction.

With that, I urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment and yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the chairman for yielding.

Madam Chair, this is often characterized as a Western issue, and it is not a Western issue. The water wars that go on in the West are certainly a special type of battle; but this is an American issue in what it does.

There are two really interesting things going on, on the House floor today, that I hope all of my colleagues and I hope the American people are watching.

On the one hand, there is a really neat moment of agreement that is happening here. You hear so much about disagreement in Washington. The Federal Government issues an order that says, in order to continue to exercise your business, you must surrender your private property to the government. Well, we could all agree that is outrageous.

I thank the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tipton) for leading in the effort to repeal that, which has been a bipartisan effort on both sides of the aisle. We have an actual order--an actual proposal, and we can come together and agree that this is not who we are, as a people. It is very interesting, and I am glad that we are able to do that.

The second thing that is happening, Madam Chair, is that there is a concern that a certain class of citizen is going to get a higher and better use of land; and I just want to point out that that certain class is the owner of a private property right. Right? That is actually the debate that is happening here.

If you own something, if something belongs to you, should you be allowed to use it? Or in the name of creating a better country, in the spirit of maximizing the utility of Federal lands, should the Federal Government be able to take that from you and redistribute it, so that things are fairer? That is a legitimate discussion to have.

I come down on the side of my friend from Colorado who says not only is it outrageous that the government tried to take private property rights in this circumstance; but why not take this step now to recognize that private property means something? Not only are we going to protect our ski resorts, but we are going to make sure this never happens to any other American citizens again.

``Extortion'' is a strong word. It is a strong word, but I can think of no other word to apply to what the government was trying to do here today. I am grateful to my friends on both sides of the aisle for moving to stop that.

Mr. Speaker, you know, back home, folks don't think we find areas of agreement. I have only

been on the floor for about 20 minutes this morning, and I have already found areas of agreement with my colleague from California. You can't just walk the walk and talk the talk. You have got to get in here and make things happen.

We have an opportunity today as we talk about jobs, as we talk about energy security in Ukraine, we have an opportunity today to move forward on the Keystone pipeline, which has languished for more than 2,000 days. The President cannot say he is interested in energy security and then thwart those very proposals that would provide it. The President cannot commit to energy security for our friends overseas, and then thwart those efforts that would provide it.

Mr. Speaker, we are blessed in this country, blessed by the Lord God Almighty with more energy resources than any other nation on the planet, and yet the President is standing between the American people and those resources.

It is about national security, Mr. Speaker, and yes, it is about jobs.

I thank my friend from Oklahoma for yielding, Mr. Chairman, and I appreciate his leadership on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

He has only been in this institution for 3 years, but he brought with him, when he came, a heart of service that he has been applying his entire lifetime; and it is that heart of service that I think has enabled him to work in a bipartisan way across the aisle.

I will say that it is not without a heavy heart, Mr. Chairman, that I hear folks talk about a Republican assault, a majority this, conservatives that; there are some things that happen in this institution that are party line events. There are things that happen in this institution that are Republicans driving in one way and Democrats driving in the other.

But this is an openness bill today, and by its very introduction, Mr. Chairman--I have a copy of the bill here; it is available for anyone to read online--the very first thing they will see when they open up this piece of legislation are the men and women who came together to offer it.

Now, one of those people is my good friend, the chairman of the subcommittee, Mr. Lankford from Oklahoma; but so, too, is the gentlelady from California, Loretta Sanchez, who believes in this piece of legislation--not just believes it passing on the floor today, but believes in being a part of the process that drives this forward.

Yes, we heard from my friend, Virginia Foxx, Republican from North Carolina, but also among the original cosponsors bringing this legislation forward, Mike McIntyre, Democrat, from North Carolina.

Mr. Chairman, this bill is about one thing and one thing only, and that is providing more information and more transparency to all the stakeholders in the process. There are things that are worth doing and there are things that are worth using the power of government to do, but if we are proud of what those things are, we should be proud of sharing that information.

When you get in a car today, Mr. Chairman, there are airbags everywhere. I can't even count the number of airbags when I rent a car these days. Old cars that folks drive, they don't have them, but the new cars do. I don't know what it costs to put that airbag in. I don't know what it cost to promulgate that regulation. I would like to know. But I promise you that, if we were to look at those numbers, we would say it is worth it. It is worth it.

Regulatory burdens on this economy--and we are seeing GDP revised down again today, Mr. Chairman--are undeniable. Maybe they are worth it, but the burden is undeniable. Let's just tell folks what that burden is, and then let's come together and decide whether or not it is something worth doing.

This is not a partisan bill today, Mr. Chairman; this is a bipartisan bill. This isn't about hiding the ball today; this is about transparency. This bill is not about dividing folks; this is about, again, what my friend from Oklahoma has been about since the day he showed up in this institution, and that is bringing people together around tough challenges, but challenges that this institution can rise to do.

I am very proud of the many, many hearings that have been held, the many, many hours of effort that have been invested, and I am pleased to support this legislation on the floor here today, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 487 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend from Colorado (Mr. Polis), 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.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their comments.

Mr. Speaker, you have heard me say it before, it makes me so happy to be a member of the Rules Committee because our entire resolution gets read down here. The entire Rules resolution gets read, and by golly, Mr. Speaker, if you are not proud of what you are doing in your committee, you better not sign up for a committee where every word of the work that you do gets read each and every time, but I am proud of the work we are doing in the Rules Committee.

The rule that we have on the floor today, Mr. Speaker, is going to make two bills in order. Both, I would argue, are incredibly important for providing

not just transparency to what goes on here in Washington but also to ensure that the people's voice continues to be heard in Washington.

House Resolution 487, this rule, is a closed rule for consideration of H.R. 3865. That is the Stop Targeting of Political Beliefs by the IRS Act, Mr. Speaker. That is in response to what now every American understands to be the 501(c)(4) scandal, for lack of a better word; that for the first time in my lifetime, there are allegations that the IRS is targeting folks on the basis of their political beliefs for whether or not they are able to have their organization certified as a tax-exempt organization. That is not just a concern of groups on one side of the aisle or the other, Mr. Speaker, that is a concern of folks across the spectrum, and I would argue it is a concern for all Americans who believe that having their voice heard is important.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution provides for a structured rule for the consideration of H.R. 2804, the All Economic Regulations are Transparent Act.

Mr. Speaker, in that structured rule, we made in order 11 amendments. We had two Members come by and testify on behalf of their amendments last night in the Rules Committee. We made both of those amendments in order. In addition, we made four Republican amendments and five other Democratic amendments in order; so for a total of 11 amendments, four Republican amendments and seven Democratic amendments were made in order on that underlying bill. As is customary, it provides the minority with a motion to recommit on both bills.

Mr. Speaker, I sit on the Government Reform Committee. We just had a Government Reform Committee bill pass here on the floor of the House, and we have another one here today. It aims for transparency. There is just no question in my mind, Mr. Speaker, that we have replaced taxation in this country with regulation. Rarely does someone come down and say, ``I want to tax an industry.'' What they will come down and say is, ``I want to regulate an industry.'' In fact, in my great State of Georgia, Mr. Speaker, we are regulating jobs right out of existence. We don't have to tax them out of existence. We don't have to outlaw an industry. We just regulate it out of existence.

Perhaps there are some industries that need to be regulated out of existence, and we should have that full and open debate on the floor of the House, but what is absolutely certain is that the American people need to be able to understand the power of the regulatory process, and the impact that it has on jobs and economic development in their community.

Today in statute, Mr. Speaker, there is a requirement that the administration twice a year publish a notice of all of those regulations that are being considered and what their impact is anticipated to be, but we have had instances, as recently as 2012, Mr. Speaker, where the administration just ignored that statute altogether. Now understand, the requirement is that you must inform the American people twice a year, just twice a year, about the regulations that are coming through the pipeline that will impact them, their families, and their businesses, and yet, that has been ignored. There has been no ability for folks to understand the magnitude of those regulations.

So we came back in this piece of legislation, Mr. Speaker, and said, listen, not only should you be doing that, you should probably be doing it once a month. If you have seen the Federal Register, Mr. Speaker, it is thick. It comes out every day of the week. It captures all of the new rules and regulations that are coming out. They are coming out like water out of a spigot. They are tough to keep track of. So this bill says let's do it not twice a year, let's do it once a month. Let's make sure that the American people understand in a volume that they can see and read once a month what those new rules and regulations are, and, if an agency chooses to ignore that requirement, that proposed rule and regulation will not go into effect such that the American people will get six months of notice about what it is that is going on.

I will give a good example, Mr. Speaker. It goes to the second bill we are considering, the Stop Political Targeting bill that is on the floor here today. There is a public comment period that is on right now. I don't know if most folks in America know that. I know everybody understands the IRS targeting scandal. I don't know if they know that the administration is involved in a rulemaking right now. The investigation is still ongoing into the IRS. The extent of the abuse is not yet understood at the IRS. The committees are continuing to work through that process, as the law requires, and yet the administration has released a rule that says we think we know how to fix this, even though the investigation is not done yet; this is what we want to do, and the public comment period ends tomorrow. The public comment period ends tomorrow.

Now, folks can go to www.regulations.gov. They can still go and file their comment if they believe that the people's voice being heard is important, but think about that, Mr. Speaker. A scandal that everyone in America understands, a scandal that I believe is offensive to absolutely everyone in America because it doesn't matter which party you are in, you shouldn't target folks who disagree with you; we should absolutely have an full and open debate and let the best ideas win. Yet the administration has proposed a solution to a problem that is not yet fully understood, and the opportunity for the American people to comment on it ends tomorrow. I don't think folks know that back home, Mr. Speaker.

This transparency bill we have on the floor today intends to address that, not just for this regulation, but for all future regulations, and the Stop Political Targeting bill that we have on the floor today says this and this alone: it says since we don't fully understand what is going on, and since we know with certainty that the IRS has breached the public's trust, not the entire IRS but just this one scandal here in the 501(c)(4) operations, since we know with certainty that the public's trust has been diminished, let's not have the administration, in the absence of a full understanding by the Congress, the absence of full comment by the American people, let's not have the administration completely re-regulate that area. Rather, let's put this off, not forever, Mr. Speaker, because we all agree that work needs to be done, but for 1 year and 1 year only so that the Congress can have a full understanding and the American people can have a full accounting of what it was that led to citizens' voices being silenced by the Internal Revenue Service in their applications for 501(c)(4) status.

Those are the two bills we have on the floor today, Mr. Speaker. Again, all of the germane amendments that were offered, and candidly, there were no germane amendments that were offered to the Stop Political Targeting Act, so that is a closed rule with just the one motion to recommit, and 11 amendments made in order for the government transparency bill on the floor today, only four Republican amendments, seven Democratic amendments, so we can have a full and open debate. I am very proud of this rule, Mr. Speaker.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 10 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins), a freshman Member, a young Member of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, in support of this legislation.

I yield the gentleman an additional 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I would ask my colleague from Colorado if he has any speakers remaining.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes to say, if you care about any of these issues that have been brought up today--and these are not issues that are involved in the rule, and these are not issues that are coming to the floor today--then you care about whether or not the American people are able to make their voices heard, because I am absolutely certain, as I have learned in my 3 years of having a voting card, Mr. Speaker, that the American voters still run this show. Now, the voters have a tough time having their voices heard, but if they can have their voices heard, they can make a difference.

We are talking about issues that we wish we could change, Mr. Speaker. Today on the floor, we have an issue that we can change. The administration is proposing regulations that will silence voices on these very issues that my colleagues are raising.

Let me read from Cathy Duvall, the Sierra Club's director of public advocacy and partnerships, who says this about the proposed regulations from the Obama administration's Treasury Department:

The proposal harms efforts that have nothing to do with

politics--from our ability to communicate with our members

about clean air and water to our efforts to educate the

public about toxic pollution.

Mr. Speaker, if you believe in this process as I do, if you believe in this Nation as I do, then you believe that it is paramount that the people's voices are able to be heard. That is the issue here today. If you believe that the priorities of this House should be changed, if you believe the priorities of this Nation should be changed, if you believe anything in this Nation should be changed, you must believe that we should preserve the power of the individual's voice.

That is why this rule moratorium is here today, Mr. Speaker. That is why the investigations must go on. That is why we must reject the administration's rush to judgment here and ensure that our priority continues to be that of the board of directors of this country--the American voters.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

I say to my friend from Virginia I think he is absolutely speaking from the heart when it comes to sharing the voice of his constituents in Virginia. My constituents take a slightly different view. They look to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office that said, yes, you can raise the minimum wage. You called it a modest raise. I think they called it a more than 40 percent increase in the minimum wage. But you can raise the minimum wage, as some are proposing, and that is going to lift 900,000 families above the poverty line and that is going to destroy 500,000 jobs.

I don't fault my colleagues at all for being concerned about those 900,000 individuals that are going to be lifted above the poverty line. I think we all want folks lifted above the poverty line. I don't want folks working a lifetime for minimum wage.

I want people working their way up the ladder. It is a ladder of opportunity that we ought to be building in this House. But to dismiss those 500,000 individuals that the Congressional Budget Office said will lose their jobs altogether are not partisan fights we have, Mr. Speaker. These are heartfelt discussions that we have about how best to serve the American people to whom we have sworn an oath to the Constitution that rules this land.

These are very difficult issues, but they are made better each and every time, I am certain, Mr. Speaker, if we preserve the power of the American people to have their voice heard in this debate. That is what is so important about this rule and why we must pass this rule today-- to bring to the floor the Stop Targeting of Political Beliefs by the IRS Act--so that Americans' voices are not just silenced on the basis of their content, but not silenced period.

It is abhorrent that we would silence voices on the basis of their content, but I would argue, Mr. Speaker, it is abhorrent if we have an opportunity to stop voices from being silenced at all.

I believe this House will take that step today, and that is why I am proud to be here representing this rule.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I do not have any remaining speakers.

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

Mr. Speaker, you have heard a lot of heartfelt sentiments from my friends here on the floor of the House today. Unfortunately, what you haven't heard is what we are going to do together to ensure that the heartfelt sentiments of every single citizen of these United States can be heard here in Washington.

I fear my friend from Colorado is right. I don't say that lightly. He has a lot of good ideas, and I hope to collaborate with him on even more. I fear he is right that this is a single-Chamber solution. I fear that only the United States House of Representatives is concerned with protecting the voice of the people--not just people who agree with me, Mr. Speaker, but people from all stripes.

I have read from the Sierra Club earlier. Let me read from the ACLU's comments to the administration on this rule. This is what they say: ``Social welfare organizations praise or criticize candidates for public office on the issues and they should be able to do so freely, without fear of losing or being denied tax-exempt status.''

That is ``the heart of our representative democracy,'' the ACLU says.

``The proposed rule''--that is the administration's rule; that is the rule we are here today to stop--``threatens to discourage or sterilize an enormous amount of political discourse in America.''

Mr. Speaker, I have a chart here today. It lists what tax-exempt organizations are able to do. A 501(c) is that section of the Tax Code that deals with tax-exempt organizations.

You have 501(c)(3)'s that are able to do get-out-the-vote work, voter registration work, and candidate forums. 501(c)(4)'s are where the administration is regulating, and that is the source of the scandal: the targeting of American citizens based on their political beliefs. And 501(c)(5)'s are the labor unions in the country.

Mr. Speaker, what folks need to understand is that, as we sit here today, all of these groups can do get-out-the-vote work. All can do voter registration work and candidate forums. Why? Because it advances our Republic. It advances the cause of freedom and discourse in America.

But this, Mr. Speaker, is what the administration is proposing. For 501(c)(5)'s, or labor unions, it is proposing they continue doing all of that material. Also, for 501(c)(3)'s to continue doing all of that. But the 501(c)(4)'s--the very same 501(c)(4)'s that were targeted by the IRS on the basis of their political beliefs--those groups, and those groups alone, would be silenced.

Mr. Speaker, America is not advantaged by that rule. Maybe in some shortsighted way someone believes their personal political agenda is advanced by that scheme, Mr. Speaker, but we do not. We as a Nation do not. It is a shortsighted gain. That is why we put this bill on the floor today to delay these new regulations, this change of how American political discourse occurs, for 1 year--and 1 year only--while the investigation completes itself.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to read from the report that the inspector general crafted at the Treasury Department. He says, What were the words, what triggered this additional investigation that went on?

This is what they were, Mr. Speaker.

If you use the word ``Tea Party,'' you might get special scrutiny. If you use the word ``patriot'' in your name, you might get special scrutiny. If you were concerned, Mr. Speaker--and this is reading from the Treasury Department report--if you were concerned about government spending, government debt, or taxes, you could be subjected to special scrutiny. If you wanted, Mr. Speaker, to ``make America a better place to live,'' you could be subjected to special scrutiny.

The administration has gone far beyond that, Mr. Speaker. They are not just going to subject some groups to special scrutiny, as is the source of the scandal. They are silencing all groups. If you had a statement in your case file, Mr. Speaker, that criticized how this country is being run, you were subject to special scrutiny.

Mr. Speaker, that is not just our right, that is our obligation. Our obligation as citizens is to criticize the way this country is being run when we don't agree. Because, after all, Mr. Speaker, the President doesn't run this country. The Congress doesn't run this country. We the people run this country.

This rule to bring this bill is about one thing and one thing only, and that is making sure that those people to whom the Constitution invests every bit of power that the country has to offer, the American citizens have a voice with which to express their concerns and the information on which to educate that voice.

My colleague from Georgia was absolutely right, Mr. Speaker. There are so many things that happen on the floor of this House, you can't tell the difference between who is who regionally, politically, and what it is that folks believe. But this issue is one of those defining issues.

Do you believe that the board of directors of America, the United States citizen, deserves a loud voice and full information? If you do, you vote ``yes'' on this rule, you vote ``yes'' on the underlying legislation, you reject the administration's effort to silence the American people on both sides of the aisle, and you commit yourself to believing that a full and open debate is the only way in which this country will succeed.

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

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 478 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend 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.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 478 provides a closed rule for the consideration of S. 540.

Now, if you heard the Clerk read S. 540, you might not have understood why we were here today. He read it exactly as it is drafted in the title, but we are here today to move a clean debt ceiling.

Now, I won't tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I am excited about being down here today. I am excited to be carrying the rule, because I believe this is the way that regular order ought to operate. But I came here, as you did, Mr. Speaker, and as so many of my colleagues did on the other side of the aisle, to try to move the needle, to try to move the needle on Federal spending, to try to move the needle on the borrowing that is going on from our children and our grandchildren.

We talk so often back home, Mr. Speaker, about raising taxes. In fact, so many folks in this Chamber have signed a pledge to say I will never raise taxes on the American people, and I admire that sentiment. But, Mr. Speaker, when we have a vote to raise the debt ceiling, debt that has to be paid, we are, in effect, raising taxes on the American taxpayer.

Now, it is not a surprise to anyone in this Chamber. I sit on the Budget Committee. Anyone who has looked at the budget understands that we don't have enough revenue to pay our bills.

In fact, Mr. Speaker, I have the great pleasure of being on the Republican Study Committee as chair of their Budget and Spending Task Force. I had an opportunity last year to offer the most conservative budget offered in this Chamber--the most conservative budget offered in this Chamber--and we had to continue borrowing money as far as the eye can see.

When Rand Paul was elected to the United States Senate among much fanfare--lots of conservatives across the country looking to Rand Paul for guidance, and rightfully so--he dropped a budget in the United States Senate, the most conservative budget introduced at that time in Washington, D.C., balanced the budget in 3 years by abolishing agency after agency after agency, sentiments that I happen to agree with wholeheartedly but know that we don't have the votes to achieve, and even that budget required borrowing money from our children and our grandchildren for the next 3 years.

So it is not a happy day that we are here, Mr. Speaker. The happy day, I would argue, was back in August of 2011. I was a young freshman Member, Mr. Speaker. I remember it because it was the kind of vote that you ran for Congress to take. We were here, and the news commentators were back and forth; is it the right deal? Is it the wrong deal? John Boehner and President Barack Obama engaged in debate at the White House night after night after night, and suddenly, a deal was reached.

Now, as has been my experience in my 3 years in this Chamber, Mr. Speaker, the term ``a deal has been reached'' 100 percent of the time means what Rob Woodall wanted didn't happen. It is funny how that works out. I get one voice out of 435, and so when I have to send my Speaker down to the White House and negotiate with not just one President but 100 more Senators, I don't get what I wanted.

But what I did get in August of 2011, Mr. Speaker, was an agreement that, if we raised the debt ceiling, if we agreed to further encumber our children and our grandchildren, as everyone in this Chamber knows that the current laws of the books require us to do, we would take a step, a $2 trillion step to try to make sure that we didn't have to raise the debt ceiling again.

It didn't contain what anybody thought was the 100 percent right plan, Mr. Speaker, but it was a proposal that we could come together around--not just we Republicans; not we, the House of Representatives; not we, Capitol Hill, with the Senate; but we, the elected representatives of the American people, from the White House to the U.S. House to the United States Senate.

We have come 2\1/2\ years, Mr. Speaker, and we have done some amazing things. I created No Budget, No Pay last year, for example, Mr. Speaker, which attached an increase in the debt ceiling to the requirement that we pass a budget out of this House and that they pass a budget out of the Senate, allowing us to come together to produce the first budget this institution has seen since I have been elected to the Congress, the first one. Not the first House-passed budget--we do that every year; it is our responsibility; of course we do--but the first one with which we found agreement with the Senate and received a Presidential signature.

Mr. Speaker, the debt limit is a constant reminder of the imbalance of America's taxing and spending. We have a spending problem in this Nation. Everyone in this Chamber knows it. And the debt ceiling is an opportunity for us to come together and find solutions.

And try as hard as he might, Mr. Speaker, when the Speaker of this United States House dug deep to try to find those answers, he could find none. Not that there were no answers out there--of course there are--but there were not answers out there that could receive the approval of this body, the approval of the Senate, and the signature of the President.

I have to ask why, because there is not a man or woman who is going to come into this Chamber today who does not know that we need to take steps to address the problem. And dadgummit, Mr. Speaker, there is not a man or woman in this Chamber who doesn't know we have the ability to do it, because we have done it before--not 100 years ago, not 50 years ago, but just 3 years ago, with largely the same folks that are here today.

That is not what this rule is bringing to the Floor today, but what it is bringing to the Floor is a clean debt ceiling resolution. This should be a day on which we are coming together around solutions to that longer-term spending problem, but we find ourselves here today simply trying to bring America back from an economic brink the likes of which not a single Member of this Chamber wants America to see.

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

Mr. Speaker, I would mention to my friend from New York that if she has no further requests for time, I am prepared to close.

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

I am one of those Members the gentlelady from New York referenced, one of those Members who voted in favor of an appropriations bill that funds the government for this year. In fact, I have voted for the House-passed budget and the Republican Study Committee budget in each and every year that I have been in this institution. What is unique about those votes, Mr. Speaker, is they absolutely understand that we are going to have to spend money that we don't have, but they take steps to make the problem better instead of worse.

I want to take issue with what my friend from New York said about a raising of the debt ceiling with absolutely no strings attached as being the responsible thing to do. It is absolutely not. It is the worst-case scenario.

Now, I am going to have colleagues on the floor today, Mr. Speaker, who are petrified of what happens if we don't do this today. They are petrified that even though we know we can come together and find a solution forward, find a solution that makes the problem better instead of worse, they are petrified that they do not have a willing partner in the President or with the Senate. So unless they vote to pass this bill today, America faces default, and that is an awful box, an awful box that my friends have painted.

I want to read a few quotes, Mr. Speaker. I think words matter. This is from 2006, as a young Senator Barack Obama faced a debt limit increase in the United States Senate, and he said this--and I just want to point out, because my friend from New York talked about the obviousness of this vote, how clearly this is the right thing to do, just to raise the debt ceiling to whatever amount folks would like.

Here is what Senator Barack Obama said in 2006. He said: The fact that we are even here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. Leadership means the buck stops here. Instead, Washington is shifting the burdens of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren.

Then-Senator Barack Obama goes on, Mr. Speaker. He said: America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. America deserves better. Therefore, I intend to oppose this effort to increase America's debt limit.

I don't have to say it very often, Mr. Speaker, but when the President is right, he is right. This was an opportunity to come together and one that we searched for, searched for.

There is not a man or woman in this town who wants to find a path forward more than our Speaker, John Boehner, does. There is no one who has sweated to find that opportunity more than our Speaker has. Yet without a willing partner in the White House or the Senate, it can't happen.

The same here, Mr. Speaker, 2006. Then-Senator Joe Biden says this: The President's budget plans will bring our debt to $11.8 trillion at the end of the next 5 years. This is a record of utter disregard for our Nation's financial future.

Mr. Speaker, $11.8 trillion is what Joe Biden was concerned about. That number reached $16 trillion within that same time period.

He goes on: It is a record of indifference to the price our children and grandchildren will pay to redeem our debt when it comes due. History will not judge this record kindly. My vote against the debt limit increase cannot change the fact that we have incurred this debt already and will, no doubt, incur more. It is a statement that I refuse to be associated with, the policies that brought us to this point.

Mr. Speaker, 2010, then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen said this: Our national debt is our biggest national security threat. Not terrorism, not al Qaeda, not a rogue nation, but our debt.

Mr. Speaker, it is hard to deal with our debt. If it was easy, we wouldn't have the debt to begin with. It is hard, but I have seen us come together to fix it before. A $2 trillion worth of difference we came together to make 3 years ago, not even. Yet today, we find ourselves unable to find that path.

Mr. Speaker, with the indulgence of my friend from New York--I would very much appreciate it--I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton).

I thank my friend from New York.

I thank the gentleman. And again, I thank the gentlelady from New York as well.

Mr. Speaker, we don't have these opportunities very often. I would posit to my colleagues that if really the right answer is to pass clean debt ceilings whenever the debt needs to be increased, I would wonder why it is we don't just repeal the debt ceiling altogether. If this isn't a moment for us to come together, if this isn't a moment for us to do those things that have to be done, if this isn't a moment that focuses like a laser the American people on what the consequences are of the decisions we make today, I don't know what would be. This is our best opportunity.

I could not be more grateful to my friends on the other side of the aisle, Mr. Speaker, for coming together to make some of those things possible. In fact, that great day in August of 2011 that I talk about, that wasn't possible with Republican votes. Turning the dial on spending to the tune of $2 trillion, that wasn't possible with just Republican votes. That was a bipartisan effort. That was a collaborative effort that makes a difference for our children and our grandchildren, and it is one of which I hope we are both proud.

The men and women who are going to come to the floor of the House today to cast their vote are all going to be men and women who are deeply concerned about the future of this country. Now, some of those men and women are going to look into their hearts, and they are going to look at what default would mean to the Nation. They are going to believe earnestly that because we cannot find a partner in the Senate or in the White House to negotiate on solving the problem, that the only step left to take is either to default or not, and with a heavy heart, they are going to vote to raise the debt ceiling.

There are other men and women in this body, Mr. Speaker, who are going to come to the floor today for this vote, and they are going to say, Default is a terrible, terrible, terrible even threat to make, but if we do not find a way to curb the growth of Federal spending, default is not a question of if; it is a question of when. It is a question of when.

There is not a budget in Washington, D.C., that stops the borrowing next year or 2 years from now or even 10 years from now. There is not one, and the most conservative budgets we have don't have enough votes to pass. If not today, when?

Now, I think the votes have been counted. The decisions have been made, Mr. Speaker. Folks have been grappling with this issue in their hearts and with their constituents. Mr. Speaker, I plead with you to play that role in this debate so that when this decision confronts us again--not if, but when--we take advantage of that to do the hard things that must be done.

I say to my friends on the other side of the aisle--and I know I speak for a large plurality of our Members on this side of the aisle-- challenge me to do those things that are hard. Give me that vote to take that so enrages the right flank that I get sent home in the next primary, but I had a chance to do something that mattered while I was here.

Folks didn't leave their families to come and just cast a ballot to keep things going on the way they are going on, Mr. Speaker. They came from both sides of the aisle to make a difference. The path that we are on with spending and revenue is a path that is unsustainable to the tune of $17.3 trillion today and a path that is unsustainable to the tune of hundreds of trillions of dollars tomorrow.

The economic demise of this country on that path is not if, but when, but we have the ability right here in this Chamber to make that difference. We have the ability right here in this Chamber to look our children and our grandchildren in the eye and say, When I had that voting card for that brief time, I did everything I did to make a difference.

We have been on a streak here, Mr. Speaker, of coming together in surprising ways to achieve things that I thought could not be done. I hope we make deficit reduction in this next budget cycle that same bipartisan priority. I believe we can surprise even ourselves with the amount that can be accomplished.

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

Mr. Chair, On rollcall No. 38, I was unavoidably detained (the DeFazio Amendment No. 6). Had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Amendment No. 10 Offered by Mr. Holt

Mr. Speaker, I represent the northeastern suburbs of Atlanta, but I voted in favor of a large farm bill today. We don't have too many farmers in our district, but we have folks who care about their children and their grandchildren and moving this country away from debt and back towards prosperity.

I serve on the Budget Committee, and in my 3 years in this body, I have never been able to send a bill to the President that changes mandatory spending in the direction of savings as large as this bill does that we did today, over $3 billion in the first year.

Mr. Speaker, the American people are tired of broken promises, and they are tired of folks who promise the Moon and can't deliver. Today we took a small step in the right direction, and you will see me back here tomorrow looking for one more.

I was proud to vote in favor of the farm bill today.

I thank my friend from South Carolina. I appreciate his making this time available.

Mr. Speaker, truth be told, this is a leadership hour, so it tends to be Republicans down on the floor when it is a Republican leadership hour, and it tends to be Democrats down on the floor when it is a Democrat leadership hour, but as my friend Mr. Stewart said so well: this is not a Republican problem. This is not a President Barack Obama problem. This is a ``we, the people'' problem.

The concern is not that it is President Barack Obama who is saying the Affordable Care Act doesn't have to be enforced. The concern is that any President could say that any law doesn't have to be enforced. Thomas Jefferson said you are not likely to lose your freedoms through rebellion; you are likely to lose them little by little by little by little. That is why we all have to stand up together.

Mr. Rice is a freshman from South Carolina. I have only been here for two terms myself. I think about some of the giants of this institution, not just of the House but of the Senate as well. I think about one of my favorite Democratic Senators, Robert Byrd from West Virginia--a champion of article I of the Constitution. He was a Democrat second; he was an American first, defending the Constitution against Presidents, Republican and Democrat, who would take the people's power from Capitol Hill and take it down to the executive branch.

So I want to ask you now--and it may sound frivolous--if we had President Mitt Romney in the White House today and if Mitt Romney were deciding the Affordable Care Act did not need to be enforced, would you still be here on the floor, asking that Congress go to court to reclaim congressional powers? I ask my friend.

I confess to you that I went on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee--as all of my colleagues know, the Oversight and Government Reform Committee is responsible for doing all of the oversight over the executive branch--because I was certain Mitt Romney was going to win. I said, for far too long, power has been leaving the people's hands on Capitol Hill, gravitating down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House, and we in a Republican House will be able to do oversight over a Republican President and show the American people it is not about Republicans and Democrats; it is about article I and article II and about following the process, following the law, following the Constitution. It matters. It doesn't matter when times are good. It matters when things get dicey, when you begin to lose those freedoms little by little.

I want to ask my friend from South Carolina, because we went through this with recess appointments, whether or not there was the ability for the President to appoint folks of his choosing to various positions around the city. And what I read that D.C. court opinion to say is what President Obama has done is absolutely outrageous. It cannot possibly stand.

But what Congress allowed President Bush to do and President Clinton to do and President Bush before him to do and President Reagan before him to do, that was also unconstitutional; and Congress has to step up for the powers of the Constitution entrusted in us.

Is this your understanding?

We should absolutely have arguments on this floor about how much money should be spent on this program versus that program, whether or not we should authorize a new issue or do away with an old issue. Those are those things that divide us.

But we should be united, Republican, Democrat, House and Senate, over these constitutional issues of where does the people's power reside. Because if leaders like you, in the absence of Senator Byrd from West Virginia, in the absence of Daniel Patrick Moynihan, in the absence of some of those greats who formerly preserved the people's power, I don't know how it gets preserved.

I am certain that you face slings and arrows from folks thinking this is some sort of partisan stunt: you just don't like this President; you just have sour grapes over the last election.

I have gotten to know you well over your very short time in Congress. It is so valuable to me that you put your responsibilities as an American first--far above your responsibilities as a Republican--and that despite those slings and arrows, the Constitution comes first. It may not seem like we need the Constitution to protect us each and every day; but when we wake up and realize it is not there, it is going to be too late.

I hope this is something that spreads in a bipartisan way and in a bicameral way. We have preserved this Republic, this greatest form of government the world has ever known, only because folks have stood up when others did not see that necessity.

We need this. There is the necessity today, and I am grateful to you for your leadership.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 438 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend 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.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

As we are doing housekeeping here at the beginning, Mr. Speaker, I would also like to include a section-by-section analysis of provisions within the jurisdiction of the Committee on Rules in the Record.

Mr. Speaker, I won't speak for my friend from New York, but I enjoy the

Rules Committee debate when it begins with such a long reading from the reading clerk, Mr. Speaker, because you know you are involved in something special on a day like today. If it was just an ordinary rule, we would be done with that reading in 15 or 20 seconds, and we would move on to debate. But the rule today, Mr. Speaker, is taking on a number of challenges.

We are trying to move a budget conference report forward. This rule makes an opportunity for us to have that debate here on the floor of the House.

We are trying to move an SGR fix, what they call the sustainable growth rate, Mr. Speaker. That is that provision that threatens to cut double digits from the reimbursement rates of physicians, hindering the access of seniors to their Medicare benefits. We are trying to solve that here today, again, bringing forward a bipartisan, bicameral solution to that.

Also, we are providing for an opportunity to extend the farm bill language. We have gotten so close to a bicameral, bipartisan solution to the farm bill, Mr. Speaker, that those folks who are deeply involved in those negotiations tell us, if they could just get 30 more days, they will be able to get that done for the first time in far, far too long. This rule makes that debate available here on the floor of the House.

Finally, in terms of housekeeping, there are so many other provisions that are being worked on, again, Mr. Speaker, in a bipartisan, bicameral way, bills that are almost ready to go to the desk of the President of the United States to be signed into law, to address so many of the issues that are of concern to men and women across this country. This rule makes any provision that the House deems necessary available to be considered on the same day.

Now, I just want to be clear. As my colleague from New York knows, that is not the way we like to do business in this Chamber. There are a lot of serious Members in this Chamber, and every single one of them deserves an opportunity to review legislation before it comes to the floor, and so we have made a very strong commitment throughout this Congress to provide a 3-day layover for folks to review legislation. But during this season, with so many issues so close to fruition, issues that we have been working on, not for a day, not for a week, but issues that we have been working on collectively for months, those issues are almost ready to come to the floor, and so we waived that requirement that those bills lay over to make it possible for us to get as much of the people's business done as is allowable by the agreements that the House and the Senate come to.

Mr. Speaker, I have the great pleasure of sitting on the Budget Committee and the Rules Committee. In fact, I am only on the Budget Committee as the Rules Committee designee. And the proudest votes that I have been able to take in this House in my 3 years with the voting card of the folks of the Seventh District of Georgia have been on those budgets that we have crafted together in the Budget Committee, that we have brought to this floor, and that we have passed here on the floor.

In fact, as you know, Mr. Speaker, for far too long, the House has been the only institution in town that has been able to pass a budget. The Senate joined those ranks this year for the first time in a long time, and I am proud to have them here. But we have been getting that business done. What we haven't been able to do is to then take the budget that the House has passed and combine it with a budget that the Senate has passed in order to create a vision of the United States of America for the coming years.

Candidly, Mr. Speaker, with what I have seen in this town, with what I read of the differing opinions that are on each side of the aisle and each side of the Capitol, America didn't have any reason to expect that we would be able to come to an agreement this year either. They didn't.

But we sent one of our best and our brightest, Chairman Paul Ryan of the Budget Committee, into those negotiations, and he was joined by one of my colleagues from Georgia, Dr. Tom Price, also one of our best and brightest, to put that Georgia stamp of approval on where we were headed with that budget conference report, and they teamed up with our colleagues in the Senate.

Senator Patty Murray led the Senate side, led the Democratic side, let the Senate side. And they worked, again, not for a day, not for a week. They worked tirelessly around the clock to try to find an agreement that we could come to together.

Now, I am a person who came here for big ideas, Mr. Speaker. I don't think you came here to do the little things. I think you came here to do the big things. I know my friend from New York came here to do the big things, those things that really make a big difference for America. We don't have that big budget deal on the floor. This rule doesn't make available debate on a big budget deal. We could not find the big budget deal. And for that, I am deeply sorry. I wish that we could have found that. But what we did find are those elements of agreement that were available to be found.

In recent weeks, Mr. Speaker, I have grown fond of a quote first shared with me by our deputy whip, Peter Roskam. It was from a Thomas Jefferson letter to Charles Clay in 1790, and he says this:

The ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, and we

must be contented to secure what we can get from time to time

and eternally press forward for what is yet to get. It takes

time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good.

We are in the game of inches here today, Mr. Speaker, and I expect you will hear the same thing from my colleague from New York.

We are going to secure today what we can get from time to time, and we are going to eternally press forward for that that is yet to get.

My sense is my friend from New York is going to eternally press forward in this direction, and I am going to be eternally pressing forward in this direction, as is the process here, as she follows the wishes of her constituents and I follow the directions of mine.

But we have an opportunity today, for the first time in the 3 years that I have served in this body, to come together on a budget agreement to get that which we can get before we both wake up tomorrow morning and begin to eternally press forward on that which is yet to get.

I am grateful to those folks who have negotiated this budget deal. I am grateful to the folks of the Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee who have come together to begin to find that bicameral, bipartisan SGR solution. I am grateful to my friends on the Ag Committee on both sides of the aisle and both sides of the Capitol who have been working so long and so hard to find that agreement on the farm bill.

My great hope, Mr. Speaker, is that we are, with the beginning of the rule today, laying that framework and that foundation for bipartisan, bicameral agreement not just for this hour, not just for this day, but for this week and this month and the remainder of this Congress.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

House Amendment to the Senate Amendment to H.J. Res. 59 Establishing a

Congressional Budget

Section-by-Section Analysis of Provisions Within the Jurisdiction of

the Committee on Rules

Section 111. Fiscal Year 2014 Budget Resolution.

This section establishes a congressional budget for fiscal

year 2014 for the purpose of enforcing the Congressional

Budget Act of 1974. The section requires that the chairs of

the Committee of the Budget in the House and the Senate

submit a statement to the Congressional Record, which

includes a committee 302(a) allocation for the Committee on

Appropriations consisting of the total discretionary limit

set forth in the Act, committee 302(a) allocations for all

other House committees, and aggregate spending and revenue

levels required for enforcement of section 311 of the

Congressional Budget Act of 1974.

This section also maintains existing authority for the

chair of the Committee on the Budget to make further

adjustments to reduce the aggregates, allocations, and other

budget levels in the statement referred to subsection (b) to

reflect the budgetary effects of any legislation enacted

during the 113th Congress that reduces the deficit.

Section 113. Rule of Construction in the House of

Representatives.

This section provides that those provisions of H. Con. Res.

25 (113th Congress) necessary for budget enforcement will

remain in effect

to the extent that budgetary levels are not superseded by

other provisions in this subtitle or other action of the

House.

Section 115. Authority for Fiscal Year 2015 Budget

Resolution in the House of Representatives.

The purpose of this section is to ensure that the Committee

on the Budget has time to complete consideration of a Budget

Resolution for fiscal year 2015 and to preserve the ability

of the Committee on Appropriations to begin consideration of

its 12 annual funding bills in a timely manner. The Committee

on Rules expects that the Committee on the Budget will pursue

a budget resolution through regular order in the second

session of the 113th Congress. The authority to effectuate

the levels and allocations described in this section is only

provided after the date by which the Congress is otherwise

required to conclude consideration of a concurrent resolution

on the budget as prescribed in the Congressional Budget Act

of 1974. If a concurrent resolution on the budget is adopted

by the House and the Senate, this section does not apply.

This section establishes a congressional budget for fiscal

year 2015 for the purpose of enforcing the Congressional

Budget Act of 1974.

Subsection (b) requires that the chair of the Committee of

the Budget in the House of Representatives to submit a

statement to the Congressional Record after April 15, 2014,

but not later than May 15, 2014. The statement must include a

committee 302(a) allocation for the Committee on

Appropriations consisting of the total discretionary limit

provided for in section 251(c)(2) of the Balanced Budget and

Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, committee 302(a)

allocations for all other House committees, and aggregate

spending and revenue levels required for enforcement of

section 311 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.

Subsection (c) also provides that the statement referred to

in subsection (b) may include levels and limitations relating

to advance appropriations, reserve funds, and overseas

contingency operations/global war on terrorism. The Committee

on Rules expects that the Committee on the Budget will base

all levels and limitations established pursuant to this

subsection on prior practices for determining such levels,

including, in the case of advance appropriations and funding

for overseas contingency operations/global war on terror,

consistency with the President's request for such funding.

This section also maintains existing authority for the

chair of the Committee on the Budget to make further

adjustments to reduce the aggregates, allocations, and other

budget levels in the statement referred to subsection (b) to

reflect the budgetary effects of any legislation enacted

during the 113th Congress that reduces the deficit.

Section 118. Exercise of Rulemaking Powers.

This section clarifies that the provisions of this Act are

enacted as an exercise of the rulemaking powers of the House

and Senate, that they are considered part of the rules of

each House, and that each House has a constitutional right to

change the rules in the same manner that each House may

change any other rule.

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

I thank the gentlelady from New York. I appreciate her mentioning all of those things that we are working on together.

The gentlelady is absolutely right: we had an opportunity in the Rules Committee last night to add to these bills that we are considering today--these bills that are bicameral, bipartisan solutions to a budget; these bills that are bicameral, bipartisan solutions to a farm bill; these bills that are bipartisan, bicameral solutions to keep our seniors' access to Medicare. And to add to that an unemployment extension that we in the Rules Committee were seeing for the very first time, I don't know what the committees of jurisdiction were doing. I certainly was one of those ``no'' votes last night, Mr. Speaker. I don't think that is the appropriate place to do that.

But I will say to my colleagues again today, as I said to them last night, I am so pleased that this rule contains that same-day authority, Mr. Speaker, that I mentioned earlier. Because if my colleagues, who I know have deeply heartfelt opinions about this issue, as do I, if that bipartisan, bicameral agreement can be found, this House has the opportunity, if we pass this rule today--and only if we pass this rule today--we will have the opportunity to bring such a package up.

I hope we can find that agreement. But at the moment, Mr. Speaker, I hope we can pass this rule so that if such an agreement is found, we will have the authority on the floor of the House to bring that agreement immediately to the floor for consideration.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am glad that our bipartisan, bicameral spirit lasted for the first 5 minutes of the debate. It was going to be too much to ask that it lasted much longer. I regret that.

But I will say to you, Mr. Speaker, if you want to know why problems are so hard to solve in this town, when the folks who have such a heartfelt commitment to solving the problems begin the presentation with ``and we could do this, except for those heartless Republicans,'' it is easy to see why disagreement prevails and agreement is hard to find.

I will say to my friend that I appreciate his recognition of the tireless effort we have put in on this side of the aisle to repeal the President's health care bill, which is denying not only the choice of plans to my constituents; it is restricting their choice of doctors as well.

But the issue that he brings up is an important issue, Mr. Speaker, and I hope that we will have more success on his issue than we have had the 40 times trying to repeal the President's health care bill.

If what he wants is a symbolic vote on this issue, more power to him, but I don't believe that is what he wants. I think he cares deeply about challenges that folks have in this country and he cares deeply about solving those problems.

I will say to you, Mr. Speaker, as I have said to all of my colleagues, we can do these things together. This is not a case of first impression. The gentleman knows that. We have come together in a bipartisan way to extend unemployment benefits.

Just to be clear, because we spend a lot of time in this Chamber, Mr. Speaker, creating fear out there, I think that is one of the most shameful things that we are a part of, Mr. Speaker: creating fear for families that needn't have that fear.

For families that are concerned, we are talking about the emergency extended unemployment benefits. Those basic unemployment benefits that your State has guaranteed to you, nothing is happening to those, and folks need to know that. Those weeks of unemployment that the Federal Government has always provided, nothing is happening to those, and folks need to know that. What we are talking about are those emergency benefits.

Now, what we have done in this Chamber, Mr. Speaker, is to have come together not once, not twice, not three times, not four times--but more--to do this together, and we can do this together; but I promise you, Mr. Speaker, that we are only going to do it in working together. If the answer is that someone has got a heart and the other folks don't have a heart, we are not going to be able to solve the issue.

I would be happy to yield to my friend from Massachusetts.

In reclaiming my time, I would say to my friend, who has incredible expertise on this issue, that, instead of being on this floor, impugning our committee's process or impugning my heart, the gentleman could be hard at work in creating a bipartisan, bicameral solution, because the gentleman knows, Mr. Speaker, that anything short of a bipartisan, bicameral solution is showboating for those folks who are hurting and is not doing a dadgum thing to help them. We don't need showboating in this institution, Mr. Speaker--we need results--which brings me back to the bipartisan, bicameral solutions that this rule has made in order.

It wasn't easy, Mr. Speaker, but we came together on a budget for the first time not in 1 year, not in 2 years, not in 3 years--but more. It is important because we have come together on a pathway to a farm bill not in 1 year, not in 2 years, not in 3 years--but in more--and we have come together on a process to solve an SGR that has plagued us not for 1 year, not for 2 years, not for 3 years--but for more.

This is not a day for acrimony, Mr. Speaker. There is not a person in this Chamber who is getting everything he wants today. I promise you I am not. I promise you my constituents are not. This is a day for doing what can be done, and what we are doing today makes a difference.

I ask my colleagues to look at not just what we are doing today but at how it is we came together to do it, because that is the framework, Mr. Speaker, by which we will accomplish the rest of these goals that I know my colleagues on both sides of the aisle share.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, it is my great pleasure to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma, Mr. Tom Cole, a member of the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to say that I think the gentleman characterized much of that exactly right, and his characterization of all we have to do to make his idea a bipartisan idea is to agree to do it his way--that is all we have to do--and that is not the way we reach agreements in this institution.

In just one moment, I would be happy to yield to my friend from Maryland.

We have here on the floor, Mr. Speaker, a rule, again, to bring bipartisan, bicameral agreements on the budget, bipartisan, bicameral agreements on Medicare, bipartisan, bicameral agreements on the farm bill; and we have two of the finest minds in this institution with two of the biggest hearts in this institution, who want to do the right thing for the American people, who are using this as their opportunity to try to get that done. I can promise my friends, Mr. Speaker, that we are not going to solve that problem here in the 1 hour of debate on this entirely separate measure.

What the gentleman characterized as the agreement within the Budget Committee is we weren't going to be able to find an answer to SGR within the budget conference and we didn't. We found it outside of the conference. We didn't find an answer to my issues with Medicare in the conference. We didn't find the answers to saving Social Security in the conference. So many things I wanted we didn't find in the conference.

The commitment that was made was to deal with UI outside of the conference. I don't sit on any of the relevant committees for UI, but I take folks at their word that that is something we can solve outside of conference. We are not going to solve it here. Knowing that folks need that help, it is a great frustration to me, Mr. Speaker, that some of the finest minds in this Congress are focusing their energy on this hour while we are trying to move things forward that we do agree on instead of focusing their energy trying to find that agreement on things we do not yet agree on but we could agree on if folks would focus their energies in that direction.

I will be happy to yield to my friend from Maryland.

Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would say to my friend that I wouldn't want anyone to be confused who is listening to this debate that we can't find agreement on this in a bipartisan way.

Why would folks come to that conclusion? Well, much has been said here on the floor; but the facts are that time and time and time again these provisions have been extended and they were not extended January 2013, February 2012. All the way back to the beginning they were not extended on party-line votes alone. They were extended in a bipartisan, bicameral way.

In just one moment, I will be happy to yield to my friend.

Folks back home are so frustrated, Mr. Speaker. They know that we can argue with each other. They are absolutely convinced we can do that. We do that every single day.

Today, we have an opportunity on this rule to move forward those things that we have not found an easy agreement on, but things we have struggled to find agreement on for, again, not days, not weeks, in most cases months, in many cases years, and we have finally found that agreement.

I do not believe, Mr. Speaker, it advances any of our causes to turn what should be an hour on those things that we are doing well together into any kind of an hour on accusations that somebody is right and somebody is wrong and only if we do it one way can we find the answers.

I will be happy to yield 30 seconds to my friend.

Well, I would say to my friend suggesting anyone is skipping town is also not a good answer.

The gentleman knows, and it is so frustrating, Mr. Speaker, because, again, much, much to the surprise of the odds makers all across this country, we have got three provisions before us today on which Republicans and Democrats on the House side and the Senate side, with the support of the White House, have been able to come together on.

If we want to go down the road of moving things on which we don't have agreement, the gentleman knows those things don't move. If you want to make a difference for people, I say stop the recriminations and begin the conversations. That is the only way we have been able to find these, Mr. Speaker.

I say to my folks back home, Mr. Speaker, it is not the happiest day in the life of their Seventh District Congressman that we have these bills on the floor today. I would do something different in every single one of them--every single one. I would do a lot of things different in every single one.

While I appreciate the opportunity to speak on behalf of the Speaker, perhaps one day if I am Speaker of the House I will have the power to do those things by myself. I think if you ask the Speaker, he will say he does not have the power to do things alone. It takes herding 434 other cats to make that happen.

But we have successes here today, hard-fought successes on behalf of the American people. Not frivolous things, but things that are going to make a difference in people's lives.

My colleague from New York mentioned earlier, Mr. Speaker, medical research. I am a huge believer in medical research, a huge believer in NIH. CDC is stationed in my great home State of Georgia. We have an opportunity with this budget agreement to restore some funding to those two agencies that do amazing work on behalf of all Americans, in fact, in the case of the CDC, on behalf of the world.

We should take advantage of these successes, Mr. Speaker, and then we should show up again--maybe it is not even tomorrow; maybe it is the very next hour--and build on these successes to do more. We have got that framework now. We know what it takes to come together and do things that matter to the American people, do things that make a difference for this land that we both love. We have that opportunity today.

I would say to my friend that we are very lopsided on time. If the gentlelady runs out later in the hour, I will be happy to yield to my friend.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds to remind my colleagues about the successes that we have had when we worked together and about the terrible, terrible failures that we have had when we decide fussing with each other is better than seeking long-term solutions.

One issue at a time we can absolutely make a difference, Mr. Speaker. I am glad that my colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle have not come down to express all of their disappointments about everything that wasn't included. I hope that we will be able to use this time to celebrate our successes on those things that were included and again rise tomorrow to solve the rest.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to go back to the place I was earlier, and that is how one of the worst things we do in this institution is create fears in the minds of the American people.

The gentlelady from California has a powerful voice. She is listened to, admired, and respected across this great land; and it has to be said, I was just in a hearing, Mr. Speaker, in the Oversight Committee where we were hearing from doctors who were talking about all the fears their patients had that they were going to lose access to their doctor and lose access to their pharmaceuticals because of ObamaCare. Now, those fears have been realized. That is exactly what happened to those patients.

But these fears are not realized. I want to make clear to everybody back home because I talk to constituents every day who are losing their jobs in response to what their employers are doing to be able to afford the ObamaCare mandates. They are losing their jobs, Mr. Speaker, and absolutely every week of State unemployment that has always been available to them will continue to be available to them. Fear not from what you are hearing from the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, for those folks who are losing their jobs in my district as their employers are trying to comply with those mandates, understand that every week that you paid your insurance premium for unemployment insurance, all of those Federal weeks that have been there not for a year, not for 5 years, but for a decade, those will still be there for you. Fear not, that is still there.

What we are talking about here today, Mr. Speaker, are benefits in the emergency unemployment category, benefits that folks have not paid the insurance premiums for, benefits that are absolutely being utilized by families across this country. I don't minimize the impact of those going away. I don't minimize the impact; but I reject, Mr. Speaker, the fear creation that coming to the floor of the House and saying unemployment benefits are going away tomorrow is going to create in my district. Folks are losing their jobs today. Why, because after we do job creation bill after job creation bill after job creation bill, I can't find a bipartisan, bicameral agreement on those. I'm going to keep looking, but I haven't found it yet.

My message, Mr. Speaker, is if you are losing your job today because of the heavy foot--and I won't yield because I am running low on time. I know my friend has much time remaining. If you are one of those folks in my district or others who are losing your job because the heavy hand of government is on your employer, those unemployment benefits on which you are counting to apply tomorrow will be there.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Will the gentlelady yield?

I am sure that the gentlelady does not mean to suggest that there is meanness going on, I would ask the gentlelady.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, it is my great pleasure to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Messer).

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

No.

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

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

I am the final speaker on our side.

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

I am surprised we have spent most of the hour talking about what is not in this rule today because we have great cause of celebration for what is in this rule today.

It has not been months; it has been years we have been working to get a farm bill. There is an extension that this rule allows to be voted on that will bring us in the next 30 days that agreement we have been so long searching for.

Mr. Speaker, it has been since 1997 that the SGR has been a part of our lingo here. That is that provision that threatens access to health care for every senior in America. This bill today, this rule today allows us to have a vote on a bipartisan, bicameral solution to that. It is actually a 3-month extension that leads to the end of this discussion forever, putting at ease every senior's mind in America that around this time of year, every year, their access to care will be threatened.

Perhaps most importantly, Mr. Speaker, this rule allows for a vote on the bipartisan, bicameral budget agreement.

This is not a grand agreement. It is not the grand agreement that I have been fighting for on the Budget Committee for the last 3 years, but what it is is a small step in the right direction. The reason it is a small step in the right direction, Mr. Speaker, is that we take those sequester cuts that no one would argue were done in a discriminate manner, we preserve those savings, but we apply them in a much more discriminate manner. For me, that is national security. The concern has always been national security.

Today, Air Force units have reduced their training activities by about 25 percent. With the sequester, only 2 of 43 active brigade combat teams are ready or available for deployment in the United States Army. We absolutely must rein in Federal spending--this budget agreement does that--but we must do so in a responsible way that preserves our national security.

The sequester reductions that were coming up in January, as many of my friends know, fell on no program in the land except for our Armed Forces, except for our national security. The Constitution does not ask much of us in this House, Mr. Speaker--far too often we are doing too much here as opposed to not enough--but it asks us to protect and preserve our national security. And with this bill today, while it does not achieve my Medicare goals, while it does not achieve my Social Security goals, while it does not achieve the budget reduction goals I would like to see, it does replace an indiscriminate sequester with discriminate reductions in mandatory spending programs, putting those dollars, instead, towards our national security.

I will end where I began, Mr. Speaker, with the letter from Thomas Jefferson to Charles Clay in 1790:

The ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, and we

must be contented to secure what we can from time to time and

eternally press forward for what is yet to get.

I urge a strong ``yes'' vote on this rule and a ``no'' vote on my colleague's motion so that we do those things that we are able to do today and then tomorrow eternally press forward.

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

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