Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I take this time for the purposes of inquiring of the majority leader the schedule for the following week.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I thank the majority leader.

Mr. Leader, the transportation reauthorization, on a bipartisan basis today, as you know, we extended for 2 months. The surface transportation bill that would have been reauthorized last September was the final phase-out date, but we have extended that a number of times since then.

It is my understanding that a meeting at the White House is scheduled tomorrow, to which no Democrat Member has been invited, to decide the

overall size of the new transportation bill.

First of all, Mr. Leader, can I ask why are House and Senate Democrats not being included in the discussion about this job-creating legislation that is critical to our Nation, particularly in light of the fact that, as you well know, because you and I have been here for some period of time, historically, Mr. Shuster and his counterpart, in the latter years the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), worked hand in hand on this legislation; the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young) and the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) have worked hand in hand on this legislation, as you know. We voted for it on an overwhelmingly bipartisan basis. But now we, apparently, are not continuing to have discussions with reference to the level of funding on this bill on a bipartisan basis.

Can the majority leader inform me, and the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) who was just on the floor, as to whether or not we might expect to be included in such meetings in the future, so that we could again go forward, as we have in the past on this particular bill, on a bipartisan basis?

Mr. Speaker, I again yield to my friend, the majority leader.

Reclaiming my time once again, Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that information.

As the gentleman knows, I would hope the Speaker would go into these discussions with the President armed with the fact that well over two- thirds of the House voted for this bill and, therefore, a very strong sentiment that this bill is the appropriate level of funding. And, in fact, I think the Senate level probably would have passed with a pretty healthy majority as well on this floor.

In any event, I am hopeful that when the Speaker determines how he wants to proceed and appoints conferees, I would certainly hope that all of the conferees will be included in the meetings of the conference to discuss the resolution of the differences between the bodies and the shape and levels of the conference report that would be reported back to the House.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend, hopefully for assurances that that will happen.

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I thank the majority leader for that representation.

As the majority leader knows, we have been very concerned about that in the past on some of the legislation, the Medicare prescription drug bill in particular. I believe the majority leader and I had a number of conversations on that, and I am pleased at the assurances the leader is giving us on this particular bill.

Mr. Leader, tomorrow we had scheduled, as I understand it, the consideration of the budget resolution conference report. That, obviously, is not coming to the floor tomorrow if we are not going to be here tomorrow. Can the gentleman tell me where the negotiations stand on the proposal that some of us feel very strongly about, and obviously a majority of the Senate feels very strongly about, and that is the pay-as-you-go provision which affects both expenditures and revenues? Where are the negotiations on that issue at this point in time?

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman has listed the alternative minimum tax as a schedule for the floor. I want to ask him the question I asked him about today's bill. Will that go through the Committee on Ways and Means process or is it the expectation that it will come directly to the floor without consideration by the Committee on Ways and Means?

Does the gentleman know whether or not this will be a 1- year extension or 1-year effect on the AMT or will it be longer than that or permanent?

The last question with reference to the particular bill that is scheduled for next week, is it the intention as far as the gentleman knows to treat the handling of that bill the same way the marriage penalty bill was treated with respect to us having a substitute obviously that is germane and in order under the rule?

In addition to the AMT, does the gentleman expect the 10 percent bracket extension to be included as part of the agenda next week as well?

I think I asked this last week, but let me ask him again because he will be disappointed if I did not ask this. Will the folks, $26,000 and under, that were included in the Senate bill but did not come out of the House here be included as far as he knows in the child tax credit?

I realize 14 days is a long time away, particularly when we

are working, people over here, we are working at least a day and a half a week. It is a pretty onerous schedule that the gentleman has got us on.

Might I ask the leader, is he sure we are going to meet next Thursday?

That is going to make a lot of our Members nervous, I might say.

Mr. Speaker, this week the American people will see that what our Republican friends lack in policy candor they more than make up for in chutzpah. Why do I say that? This week, as we have just heard, the Republican majority is expected to take up legislation that would permanently eliminate the marriage penalty. Everybody on this House floor is for that objective.

But do not be fooled. Democrats and Republicans both agree that married couples should not have to pay more in taxes than they would as unmarried individuals filing separately. That makes sense. That is fair. We are for it. Members in both parties agree that the so-called marriage penalty should be remedied.

However, here is the crucial difference between the Republican bill and our Democratic substitute. Our bill is paid for, theirs is not. What is the difference? The difference is that the penalty that we are eliminating in terms of marriages will be passed along to every young family in America, every young person in America. All of my children and my grandchildren will pay an additional penalty in the interest they will have to pay because of the irresponsible policies being pursued by the majority.

That is right. With a record budget deficit this year of more than half a trillion dollars, and with a projected 10-year budget surplus of $5.6 trillion inherited by this administration turned into a projected deficit of more than $4 trillion, an almost $10 trillion turnaround to the negative, our friends on the Republican side of the aisle plan to drive us even deeper into debt.

The chairman of the House Committee on the Budget, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle), perhaps summed up the Republican fiscal policy best on March 17 when he said, and I am quoting, ``We don't believe that you should have to pay for tax cuts, period.'' Well, Mr. Nussle and my Republican friends, of course you do not; but our children and grandchildren will have to pay that bill. Somebody, sometime, sometime in the future will have to pay the piper.

According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, this Republican marriage penalty bill will cost $96 billion over the next 10 years. None of it is paid for. And to make matters worse, House Republicans intend to bring up bills in the next 3 weeks to make the 10 percent tax bracket and child tax credit permanent. We are for that. It ought to be paid for. And to temporarily fix the alternative minimum tax. We are for that. It ought to be paid for.

Again, Democrats support such legislation, but it must be paid for so that we do not simply say to our children,

``You pay for it''; to our grandchildren, ``you pay for it, we don't want to.''

Democrats believe it is a serious failure to pay for these tax cuts, which not only threatens our economic future as these deficits grow and the American people become more concerned about rising interest rates, as Alan Greenspan last week said was a definite possibility, but we also have a responsibility.

We talk a lot about personal responsibility. We passed a bankruptcy bill, and we made it tougher for people to go into bankruptcy because we said they needed to be responsible. I voted for that bill. It was a bipartisanly supported bill. We need to be responsible on behalf of the public that sent us here and on behalf of future generations.

Meanwhile, as we debate this tax bill, Republicans on both sides of Capitol Hill are riven by internal conflict. They still have not produced a budget conference report for fiscal 2005 because of the intransigence of House Republicans to accept pay-as-you-go rules. That sounds very common sense. You pay as you go. You pay your bills. We talk about every American family having to do that. That may be the case; but we do not have to do it, and we are not doing it.

Alan Greenspan, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, said applying pay-as-you-go to both expenditures and revenues is essential if we are to have fiscal responsibility. Our colleagues on the other side of the aisle sent us a budget which says we are going to do that; but on this side of the Congress we have overwhelming, almost unanimous, support, if not unanimous support, for that proposition. It was in place from 1990 to 2002. But it was changed. Why? Because it would make us be responsible, and being responsible would not allow us to do some of the things the Republican majority wants to do.

Here is what the Bipartisan Concord Coalition said, headed up by, among others, Senator Warren Rudman, a Republican from New Hampshire, and three other budget watchdog groups have said about such pay-as-you- go rules: ``If Congress wants to pass particular tax cuts, it should either reduce mandatory programs or raise other revenues to offset the tax reduction measures, not simply give itself a free pass to enact tax cuts without financing them.''

It feels good for us to say, Hah-hah, we have cut your taxes. Hooray. But unless we cut spending at the same time, which is what pay-as-you- go says we need to do, then do not pass that debt along to future generations. That is all it says. Every responsible American with common sense would say, yes, that is what we ought to do.

They have turned the foreign sales corporation bill, another bill which requires that some $5 billion in export subsidies be repealed and replaced by modest tax breaks, into a $170 billion special-interest giveaway.

Not only are we creating greater tax liability by passing these tax bills without paying for them, we want to see them pass, we want to pay for them, but now they are talking about this Foreign Service Corporation bill which could cost us and we could fix for less than $10 billion, now they want to make it into a $170 billion tax giveaway. One business lobbyist even told the Washington Post that this bill ``has risen to new levels of sleaze.''

Is it any wonder pursuing those kinds of policies that we have now gone into a $10 trillion turnaround in terms of from black to red? We talk about blue States and red States. We have gone from black, having surpluses, $5.6 trillion, four surpluses in a row from 1997 to 2001, the first time that had happened in 80 years. In just months, that was turned into escalating deficits.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my Republican colleagues to come to their senses, to do what makes sense to the American families, to the American public. No married couple wants to have a marriage penalty but I do not think there is any married couple who wants to have their children saddled with the escalating debts incurred in their generation and passed to future generations.

For years, House Republicans preened as deficit hawks. Some even suggested that tax cuts are not, in fact, sacrosanct. My friend the majority leader spoke a little earlier. In 1997, the majority leader, Mr. DeLay, who just spoke, said of Jack Kemp, another Republican who ran for Vice President, a former Member of this body, an ardent proponent of supply-side tax cuts: ``Jack Kemp worships at the altar of tax cuts. Jack has always said that deficits don't matter. We think that deficits do matter.'' So said Tom DeLay with reference to Jack Kemp. If they matter, Mr. Leader, why are we not addressing them? Why do we make them worse? Why are we escalating the debt that our children will be confronted with?

With this vote on the marriage penalty relief this week, we will see whether Republicans still believe that deficits matter.

Certainly. I will, as John Brademas did, I will use the traditionally opposite podium. I understand Nancy had spoken to you a little earlier and welcomed you here. I have spoken at many of these, perhaps not all, in the last few years.

I might say that I heard how long Senator Nunn served in the Senate. There are some of us who believe he did not serve long enough in the Senate; and, Sam, congratulations to you for this honor and appropriate recognition of the extraordinary work that you have done for our country and, happily for our country, continue to do. We appreciate that.

For those of us from the University of Maryland, we recognize Bill Archer's claim to fame is that he is the father-in-law of Fred Funk, the former coach. For those of you who are golf fans, Fred Funk is one of the great golfers in America on the pro circuit and always does a great job; and I always tell Bill Archer that is why he is famous, not for being in the House.

I am pleased to be here with all of you and add my word of welcome to you. I have said it in the past. Sam just mentioned it. At a time of great challenge for our country abroad, we find ourselves unfortunately divided at home, not only in the Congress but our country divided, as all of us know, and that is reflected in the very close divisions that we find when the public goes to the poll; and when they are polled, we find out how closely divided they are.

It is important, I think, for those of you who had the opportunity to serve, and John Brademas, this morning, my predecessor, I hung the pictures of all the former whips in the hallway leading to my office now, an extraordinary group of people.

And, John, thank you for all that you have done for our country as well.

But I would urge all of us, not you and me, but all of us, together, to try to increase the dialogue and understanding, lower the confrontation and increase the cooperation that we so desperately need when challenged so heavily, I think, abroad.

I noticed the Speaker, my Speaker, has his arm around a wonderful staffer as well, Billy Pitts, who left the Congress, went out and made vast sums of money in the private sector, I hope, and is now back with us trying to straighten out David Dreier. A very difficult job, but Billy is so talented, he may be able to do that.

So welcome to all of you. We are glad you are here, but much more importantly, we are glad that you continue to be active, involved, and leaders in our country. Thank you very much. Good to see you.

Oh, I might just say, and I was going to start with this, that, tragically, sadly, and, Larry, I came in as you were reading the list of Members who have passed away, but two of the Members who were my predecessors in the Fifth Congressional District of Maryland passed away this past year.

Dick Lankford, I know some of you knew Dick, he was here for 10 years, served on the Committee on Armed Services. I was a sophomore at the University of Maryland. I think he was the first Member of Congress that I really met. Dante Fascell was the first one I knew about when I was going to high school in Florida.

And then Carlton Sickles. You mentioned Carlton Sickles, who called up Danny Brewster, for whom I was working in 1962 and 1963 and 1964, when I was graduating from law school, and they asked me to run for the State senate. I turned them down twice. Tom, you may remember this. I turned them down twice because I did not think I could win the State senate seat. And Carlton Sickles, who was then the Congressman-at-large over here and was running for Governor, called up Brewster and said, no, urge him to run, he can win. I will help him. We will give him a lot of money, et cetera, et cetera.

You have all been there and done that. I did run. He did give me a lot of support; no money, but a lot of support, and I was successful. But he passed away, and I had the honor of speaking at his memorial service just a few weeks ago.

So we have been diminished by their losses, but we are advantaged by your continuing participation. God bless you. Thank you very much.

Mr. BUECHNER (presiding). In order to provide some sort of balance with the comments by sitting Members, the Chair would like to invite the chairman of the Committee on Rules, the Congressman from California, David Dreier, to say a few remarks.

Mr. Speaker, I take this time for the purpose of inquiring of the majority leader the schedule for the following week.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Ms. Chairman, I appreciate that information.

With respect to the transportation reauthorization bill, can the leader tell me for what length of time we will extend the existing authorization?

The same period as we had on this bill.

I thank the gentleman.

With respect to the fiscal 2005 budget resolution, do you expect we might see a conference report on the budget next week?

Is the pay-as-you-go provision still a major stumbling block in the conference, or does the gentleman know?

With respect to the marriage penalty tax bill, will this bill be considered in the Committee on Ways and Means?

Reclaiming my time, the reason I asked the question, obviously, is members of the Committee on Ways and Means had not heard about marking up that bill. Is there some reason we are not pursuing the regular order and having that bill reported back out of the committee?

I cannot help myself for making this remark, Mr. Leader, but I am not surprised that the chairman of the committee feels it would not be necessary to go to the committee to ask for approval to have something passed out of that committee. We Democrats particularly know that that is the case.

Mr. Leader, we have information that leads us to believe that on subsequent weeks we are going to be considering the child care tax credit, the 10 percent tax bracket and possibly AMT. Is that information accurate?

Reclaiming my time, I take that as a yes.

The gentleman mentioned extending the $1,000 child tax credit. Do you think this time we might include those families that are making less than $26,000 on this go-around? That has been pending for many, many months now, and, seeing as how you mentioned it, I thought I might inquire as to whether or not we might finally include the poorest working Americans in the benefit that has been extended to those that are doing a little better.

I yield to my friend.

I doubt that there is any bill that can pass that will take care of all my concerns, Mr. Leader, but I appreciate the information.

On those additional items, do you expect them as well not to go through the committee process and be considered by the committee, but come directly to the floor?

I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Leader, the last question I would ask you with respect to these tax bills, is it your expectation that the minority will be given the ability to offer a substitute on the bill coming up this week, the marriage penalty, but as well on the subsequent bills?

I yield to my friend.

Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, let us assume the substitute is germane. Will we be allowed the opportunity to offer a germane substitute?

I thank the gentleman for that observation.

Lastly, I would say to the leader we understand this morning that the National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice briefed the Republican Conference. I want to say that we have been offered the opportunity to have the National Security Adviser brief the Democratic Caucus. I think we will take advantage of that. But, Mr. Leader, clearly the present situation in Iraq is not what any of us would want.

During the course of this effort in Iraq, and immediately before it, we had briefings on this floor. Secretary Rumsfeld and from General Myers, from Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz, from Mr. Tenet, the Director of the CIA, from Mr. Mueller of the FBI, numerous others. And we came together as Republicans and Democrats and had the opportunity to be briefed. We had the

opportunity together to ask questions. Some of those, as my colleague knows, were in closed session because we discussed security information.

I want to say to my friend that we were disappointed that we did not do that this morning. Both of our caucuses are partisan; they represent parties. We were disappointed that this briefing was given on a partisan basis. We do not think that is in the best interest of the country; we do not think it is in the best interest of this Congress.

Mr. Leader, I would urge you to, on behalf of your leadership, join with us in assuring that, A, we have a number of bipartisan briefings from the principals involved as to what is going on. Our public is concerned, my colleague's people, my people, very concerned about what is happening to our troops, very concerned about our success in Iraq. I say that, as my friend knows, as one of those who supported the effort, supported the funding of this effort. But all of us have to be concerned about the situation.

So I would ask the leader if he might comment on the fact that we have historically had under Democratic leadership, Republican leadership, bipartisan briefings. I would hope that we could continue to have such. As I say, I think it is in the best interest of the country.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that comment. I understand his observation. The gentleman will remember one of the most wrenching caucuses in which I participated was a bipartisan caucus after we tragically lost those 18 members of the service when the Black Hawk went down in Mogadisho, Somalia. And as you may recall, it was extraordinary. I think we must have had 350 of our Members in HC-5 in which Secretary Christopher and Secretary Aspin came and reported to us on the situation on the ground.

I understand what my colleague is saying, and he certainly has that right; but I think that the fact that we can meet together to get information together so that we are all getting the same information and hear one another's questions, hear one another's concerns, which reflect the concerns of the 280 million Americans, many of whom have young people overseas, and some, as he knows, because he has met with them as I have that are not so young in the National Guard and Reserve, we think it would be useful to do that in a bipartisan way together so that we could all hear the same information and therefore be able to work together to assist in solving what is a very difficult problem, ensuring to the greatest extent we can the safety of our people and the success of our mission.

But I thank the gentleman for his observations.

I thank my friend from Illinois for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, number one, I was the sponsor of the Federal Employee Pay Comparability Act back in 1990. We included it in the Treasury- Postal bill. It was signed by President George Bush. It was signed on the theory that we needed to pay Federal workers comparable wages to their private sector counterparts. In other words, if you are a scientist at NIH or if you are an FBI agent or if you are a CIA agent or you are a defense analyst, a civilian in the Defense Department, you would get paid comparably what your training and responsibilities required in the private sector. That was the whole theory. It was passed overwhelmingly in a bipartisan fashion. In fact, it is the law today.

My friend from Oklahoma has always opposed this adjustment. Always. This is not a new posture for my friend from Oklahoma. He simply does not believe in the comparability act and does not believe in compensating Federal employees fairly.

He talks about ECI. I wish my friend from Oklahoma would listen to these figures because I think he will find them interesting because he misrepresents what the facts are. I know he would be very interested.

Using 1969 as a base year of Federal service pay, average annual wage adjustments and CPI, which are all different figures, we specifically used wages because that is what we are competing with, not CPI. We are competing with wages in the Federal sector. Listen to this and I think you will be shocked.

Since 1969, if you take wages as the base, they are now at 614 percent. If you take CPI, it is at 509 percent over those 44 years. If you take civil service wages, they are 371.8. So they are still about 100 points behind the CPI adjustment, and they are 180 points behind what private sector wages have been adjusted. That is what this is about.

The Federal Salary Council under the law makes findings. They are in the Department of Labor. They make findings. Let me read their findings of this past year:

Based on calculations provided by the Office of Personnel Management, taking a weighted average of two sets of pay gaps, et cetera, the overall gap between base general schedule average salaries locality and non-Federal average salaries surveyed by BLS, the difference between private sector salaries and public sector salaries was 31.8 percent. In other words, for comparable responsibilities, Federal employees were making 31 percent less than their private sector counterparts.

The law said back in 1990 we get to 95 percent of private sector, saying that we are not going to put Federal employees on a par per se with the private sector but the objective is to get to 95 percent of what the private sector makes. We are not there.

The Federal council goes on to say that the overall average pay gap in 2003, including a current average locality rate of 12.12 percent, which of course we do not do, is 17.57 percent. This is the Federal pay council, out of OPM. Therefore, we recommend an overall average locality rate adjustment of 25.54 percent. That is in addition to the

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is not characterizing me as having said that.

Personal privilege.

I ask for personal privilege.

Parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.

I simply wanted to make the point, what I said was treating them disparately implied that they were second-class citizens. The implication in the gentleman's comments was that he disagreed with the implication that they were second class. There was no implication of that, clearly.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I also want to congratulate the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) for his extraordinary leadership in the Committee on the Budget which has led to the 3 past years of this very provision being included in the budget.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, with all due respect to the chairman of my committee, Mr. Chairman, that is inaccurate. It is inaccurate, because, as you know, you did not fund that in subcommittee. In subcommittee, the provision to which you refer had not been added.

So you are inaccurate. You had the money available. And, by the way, as you know, I supported that $500 million so that we could give additional compensation above and beyond what the law requires. The law.

This is not some speculation. The law requires that we give special compensation to high performers. I agree with that premise, as does the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Tom Davis).

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably detained on rollcall 97, the motion to instruct conferees. I was attending a memorial service for the wife of a very dear friend and, therefore, could not attend. Had I been in attendance, I would have voted for the motion to instruct, which I understand would have made the tally 210 for and 209 against.

Appointment of Conferees

Madam Speaker, this week we are going to see just how committed our Republican friends are to the irresponsible budget that they passed 4 days ago.

Tomorrow, Democrats will offer a motion to instruct House conferees on the fiscal 2005 budget resolution to accept the Senate's bipartisan pay-as-you-go budget enforcement rules. Those rules would require us to find offsets for both new spending as well as tax cuts. As a matter of fact, one of the real authors of pay-as-you-go, the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), in the 1990s is here, which led to the most fiscally responsible administration's performance, frankly, in history, under Bill Clinton. And with a projected budget deficit of more than a half a trillion dollars this year, it is fair to ask, What could be more reasonable than that?

After all, our bipartisan agreement to pay-as-you-go rules in 1990 led to the steady decrease of our deficits throughout that decade and 4 consecutive years of budget surpluses between fiscal 1998 and 2001, the first time that has happened in 80 years.

But in their budget resolution, our Republican friends pretend that we can get our fiscal house back in order by applying so-called pay-as- you-go rules to spending only. Tax cuts, they believe, are a freebie, even though the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that 40 percent of our deficit is attributable to revenue reductions. Who is going to pay that bill? Our children will pay that bill. Our grandchildren will pay that bill.

And even the respected chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, my friend, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), said in February, ``No one should expect significant deficit reduction as a result of austere, nondefense discretionary spending limits. The numbers simply do not add up.'' So said the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), conservative Republican.

So I urge my Republican friends: join us. Join us in this effort to restore fiscal sanity to our Nation's budget. Vote for this important Democratic motion to instruct. That is not so hard. And remember, you have done it before.

Last year, a mere 96 hours after you passed your fist 2004 budget resolution, you turned right around, 180 degrees, and voted for the Democratic motion to instruct conferees to reject the deep cuts called for in your budget for education, for veterans, Medicare, Medicaid, and other areas. The chairman of the Committee on the Budget, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle), even stood on this floor and railed against our motion for half an hour. For half an hour he railed against our motion, before he and most of the Republican leadership flip-flopped and helped pass it by a vote of, listen to this, Madam Speaker, 399 to 22. That was the Democratic motion passing. Why? Because Republicans wanted to pretend that they were actually for the motion to instruct's priorities when their budget clearly denied that, contradicted it, did not provide for those priorities.

So I urge my Republican friends to support the adoption of pay-as- you-go rules which helped Democrats produce a budget for fiscal year 2005 that was both fair and responsible.

Our Democratic substitute would balance the budget within 8 years. The Republican resolution would actually increase our deficits. Our Democratic budget would protect Social Security. Our democratic budget would match the Republican budget on defense spending to ensure our national security and provide nearly $6 billion more over 5 years for homeland security to ensure that our people here at home are safer. Our Democratic budget would provide tax relief for hard-working families; and our budget, the Democratic budget, even as it reins in deficits caused by the Republican Party's failed policies, would provide more resources than the Republican budget for education, veterans, job training, public health, and infrastructure, the last, of course, being extraordinarily effective jobs-producing.

Finally, Madam Speaker, we also will consider this week, as I have said, the transportation reauthorization bill, which will pass, I predict, with wide bipartisan support, but leave both Democrats and some Republicans shaking their heads.

This is not only a bill about infrastructure, critically important to our economy, critically important to the safety of this Nation, critically important to every American; it is also a jobs bill. Democrats and some Republicans, including the chairman of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young), himself supported a spending level of $375 billion, which would have created 1.7 million new jobs.

Why is that important? Because for the first time in 75 years since Herbert Hoover, the first time, this is the first administration in three-quarters of a century that will end its 4-year term having lost jobs net in this economy. That is why we have over 8 million people unemployed and 2.5 million jobs lost. Yet, the President, who has the worst record of job creation since Herbert Hoover threatened a veto of that jobs-creating bill, demanding a funding level that would create 1.1 million fewer new jobs.

I urge my Republican friends to stop ignoring the plight of the unemployed who have suffered under your failed policies.

Since December, more than 1 million jobless workers have exhausted their regular State unemployment benefits without receiving temporary Federal assistance. Why? Because Republicans allowed the Federal program to expire. Democrats have been asking for the last 6 months to extend that program, as we did under the Reagan administration, as we did under Bush 1. They have refused to do so.

Before we leave Washington this week for a 2-week recess, we should pass an immediate extension of temporary Federal jobless benefits. It is the right thing to do, it is the moral thing to do, and I would suggest to you it is the right thing to do for our economy as well. There is no excuse for failing to act.

Madam Speaker, I hope that when the motion to instruct on the budget resolution is made to have a responsible, effective, historically effective pay-as-you-go process, to discipline our budget so that America's children and America's grandchildren and America's economy will not be put deeper into debt and that we will have an effective enforcement process, which will, like America's families, make tough decisions so that we will have a better future for our country.

Mr. Chairman, perhaps the chairman believes what he says. If so, he is extraordinarily wrong. But those of us who have been here for some period of time have heard this rhetoric before, over and over again.

In 1993, when we offered an economic program, every leader, the chairman of the Committee on the Budget, the ranking member of the Committee on the Budget, Speaker Gingrich, Leader Armey, an economist, came to this floor and said if you adopt the Democratic alternative, the economy is going to go to hell in a handbasket.

They were 180 percent absolutely wrong. In point of fact, we had the best economy, the best economic performance in the next 8 years that we have had in the history of America. They do not know what they are talking about. Maybe they believe it, but they are wrong.

Let us compare the 8 years under George Bush, George Bush the senior, and George Bush ``W.'' They ran deficits of $2.5 trillion. There is one person in America that can stop spending in its tracks, just one, the President of the United States.

Neither George Bush nor his son have ever had a veto overridden stopping spending. Not once.

Let us get real. Under the 8 years of the Clinton budget, which the Republicans said would take us down the road of deficits and unemployment, we had a $61 billion surplus and ran the last 4 years in surplus, the first time that had happened in the lifetime of anybody in this room.

Get real. Stop giving us this stuff. And the reason to stop giving the stuff is what you are doing is back to the same old $2.5 trillion in debt, except this time you take it from a $5.6 trillion surplus. Who said we had that surplus? George W. Bush said we had that surplus. What is it now? A $4 trillion deficit, an almost $10 trillion turnaround.

I say to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle), that is your performance. That is the result of your budgets. That is the result of your economic program, a $10 trillion turnaround to the worst. And who pays the bill? That is the sad part. The children and grandchildren of America, that is who will pay the bill.

What this budget that the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) is offering does, unlike that of the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle), it brings the budget to balance within 8 years.

Does it ask some people to pay the bill that those young men and women in Iraq are paying? It does. Is that right to do? It is.

It is exactly what you said in 1993, and you were dead, flat wrong. Vote for the Spratt alternative. Put America on a safe track so that our children will not be put deeply, deeply, deeply in debt. Vote for Spratt. It is right for America.

Mr. Speaker, I rise for the purpose of asking the majority leader the schedule for the week to come.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

I thank the majority leader for the information.

First of all, Mr. Speaker, on the highway reauthorization bill, can the majority leader give us some view? I see the chairman of the Committee on Rules is on the floor. Can the gentleman from Texas give us some view of the rule under which the majority contemplates consideration of the highway bill?

I thank the gentleman. Obviously this is a very important bill. I think most of us believe it is very important to pass this bill.

I yield to the gentleman from California.

I thank the chairman for his comments. I understand the background. As long, obviously, as we do have, within the structured rule, an opportunity to debate different points of view, that will be, I think, helpful to all the Members.

The gentleman from Texas did not mention in his initial discussion of the schedule whether or not there was any plan, at least on Monday, to do anything with respect to going to conference on the budget or instructions. Can we assume from that that there will be no action on the budget going to conference, at least on Monday night?

I am going to go back. There will be no votes until 6:30 on Monday.

I had asked the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) whether or not he contemplated any action on Monday. He indicated that he had not. Subsequently, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle) and the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) have talked, but I do not know whether the gentleman from South Carolina knows that at this point in time. Do we know whether they have really made a decision on that? I know the gentleman hopes to do that, but would it be fair to believe that this matter is still under consideration, or is the gentleman positive that there will be action on Monday afternoon?

Mr. Leader, let me correct for the record because I was in error, it is my understanding that Mr. Kahn has been told, who is our chief clerk on the Budget Committee. I am sure that the gentleman from South Carolina now knows. I thank the leader for his comment. I wanted to clarify that, that we have received, apparently, notice.

Is it the majority leader's thought in light of the fact that we will be leaving next Friday for a 2-week break, district work period, that the conference report will be returned to the House next week? Would it be the gentleman's expectation that we might take up the conference report next week?

I thank the gentleman for his comments. One additional, and I think final, item, the continuity of Congress challenge that we have has been discussed. There are obviously a number of different proposals, including constitutional amendments, as well as legislative action, as well as rules considerations. We have heard on this side there may be something happening next week. The gentleman did not mention it in his announcement. Can he tell us whether or not there is any possibility of having that matter on the floor next week.

I thank the gentleman for that information.

Reclaiming my time, I think we still have some work to do on that, hopefully in a bipartisan fashion. This is obviously a critical problem confronting the Congress and the American people. Hopefully, perhaps, we can reach some agreement on that. If we had some extra time, that might be possible.

I thank the leader for his comment.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize Mr. David Wartofsky's contributions to National Transportation Week. For the past five years, Mr. Wartofsky has closed Potomac Airfield, his private airport in Ft. Washington, Maryland, so that 1,000 school children can participate in National Transportation Week events.

This year, on May 20, Potomac Airfield will host nearly 1,000 students from Washington D.C. area elementary, middle and high schools. These children will have an opportunity to view 22 different aircraft and 18 transportation-related exhibits. In addition, the winners of several contests will be recognized. Winners of Odyssey of the Mind Aircraft Flyer Contest will demonstrate their aircraft on the runway. Winners of the Music of the Mind will perform on stage, celebrating, ``One Nation on the Move.'' Winners of the poster contest will see their work on display.

All of this would not be possible without the cooperation and support of Mr. David Wartofsky. Fondly nicknamed the ``Big Cheese,'' Mr. Wartofsky is a pilot and self proclaimed gadget freak. As the owner of Potomac Airfield, he prides himself on being at the ``heart'' of our nation's airspace, and that statement has come to mean so much more than geography. His passion for aviation is more than the business he operates; he's transformed it into an investment in our community. I applaud Mr. Wartofsky for his contributions to National Transportation Week. Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing Mr. David Wartofsky and Potomac Airfield which reflects the personality of the ``Big Cheese'' and is often described as a ``fun airport and a good bunch of interesting friends.''

Mr. Chairman, yesterday on this House floor, the Republican majority leader, the gentleman from Texas, remarked that this budget debate frames the Democratic and Republican Parties' competing visions of America. On that, we are in complete agreement. The Federal budget is indeed a statement of our national priorities. It is a statement of our values. And today, through its budget resolution, the Republican Party tells all of America that it lacks the will and it lacks the courage to address the fiscal crisis that its failed economic policies have created over the last 3 years.

Last week, the chairman of the Committee on the Budget, the gentleman from Iowa, said this: ``We don't believe you should have to pay for tax cuts.'' Well, my Republican friends, you do not. But our children and grandchildren will pay for them.

With a projected record budget deficit of more than $500 billion this year alone, this budget resolution would dig an even deeper deficit hole. It would increase the deficit by nearly $250 billion over the next 5 years, and over the next 10 years increase the deficit already projected by the Congressional Budget Office to be $2 trillion, an additional $1.6 trillion of deficit, that young people will have to pay off.

Democrats believe that it is irresponsible, indeed immoral, to adopt such a policy and to plunge our Nation even deeper into debt and to force future generations to pay our bills. Republicans apparently are not bothered by that.

This budget resolution would spend the entire $1 trillion Social Security surplus, all of it, every nickel of Social Security surplus over the next 5 years and in subsequent years. Democrats believe that it is irresponsible, indeed, as I have said, immoral, to rob Social Security and Medicare to pay for tax cuts. Republicans apparently do not.

And this budget resolution would freeze funding for domestic appropriations outside of homeland security to make room for tax cuts. Even a respected Member of your own party, Mr. Chairman, the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Florida, has recognized the folly of trying to balance the budget on the backs of children, veterans, the elderly and the uninsured.

In February, Chairman Young, one of the most respected Members of the Republican Party, a leader in this House, said: ``No one should expect significant deficit reduction as a result of austere nondefense discretionary spending limits. The numbers simply do not add up.''

Why do the numbers not add up? Because nondefense discretionary spending represents only 17 percent of the entire Federal budget.

And then we are told, my friends, that we will eliminate waste, fraud and

abuse. I am for that, and I am shocked that the Republican administration has been in office for 3\1/2\ years, controlled this House and the Senate, and we still have significant waste, fraud and abuse in Washington. What is wrong with this administration? Do they not care about waste, fraud and abuse? Why have they not gotten rid of it?

The truth is, we could wipe out all nondefense discretionary spending and we would still be running a deficit of more than $100 billion. In other words, we would shut down all of government. Maybe some would like to do that. But the people who ride on roads, the people who want the FBI on the job, the people who want the CIA on the job, the people who want NIH researchers trying to find out how to cure cancer would want them on the job.

Mr. Chairman, Democrats fought for pay-as-you-go budget rules that require both spending increases and revenue decreases to be offset. That is what Alan Greenspan said was responsible. That is what the other body voted for. A bipartisan majority of the other Chamber voted for that. And all of us know that our bipartisan agreement on such rules in 1990 led to steadily decreasing deficits, four consecutive surpluses and the strongest economy in our lifetimes.

But House Republicans have refused. Instead, they want to pretend that they are committed to fiscal discipline. They say they want to apply PAYGO rules to spending increases, but not tax cuts. In fact, they will not bring it to the floor. The majority leader says it has got to ``ripen.'' I am not sure what ripening means, but that is what, apparently, it has got to do.

But, of course, it is doubtful whether their budget enforcement bill will ever see the light of day.

For years, Mr. Chairman, House Republicans preened as ``deficit hawks.'' Some even recognized that tax cuts are not, in fact, sacrosanct or freebies. That is what the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) said.

We ought to reject this Republican budget resolution and adopt the responsible, effective Spratt alternative. The Blue Dog alternative does the same.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the distinguished majority leader, for the purpose of inquiring of the majority leader the schedule for the coming week.

He is right.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for the information. There are, of course, so many things which disappoint us when the majority leader announces them; but that is not one of them, I assure him.

I appreciate the majority leader's advice that Wednesday and Thursday we will be considering the budget, obviously one of the most important policy documents that we consider. And it appears from his announcement that there will be substantial time on Wednesday and substantial time on Thursday, I presume, for a full and fair debate on the underlying proposal that will be reported out of the committee, as well as such substitutes as may be made in order. Is that correct?

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. I think that is very important for the House and for the American people, and we look forward to that discussion and the substitutes. As the gentleman knows, we will have the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), our ranking member, who will have a substitute. I expect the Black Caucus to have a substitute, and perhaps there will be some other substitutes as well. Certainly the Blue Dogs will have a substitute, all of which I think, in the gentleman's understanding of it, would be very substantive budget resolution proposals, and we anticipate them being made in order so we can debate each of those as well.

Mr. Speaker, one of the other aspects, as the majority leader knows, there has been a lot of discussion about enforcement mechanisms. We believe on this side of the aisle that enforcement mechanisms are critically important if we are going to get to balance at some time in the future, which is our objective and I think the gentleman's objective as well.

Can the gentleman tell me when and in what form enforcement mechanisms will be brought to the floor? I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman for his response. I would observe that, clearly, enforcement mechanisms we believe are critically important as we consider the budget in the mid- 2005 budget, but also the outyears as well, whether we use a 5-year or 10-year budget analysis.

Without enforcement mechanisms, obviously, we really do not know what we are doing. We can say we are doing something, but without enforcement mechanisms to make sure that, in fact, we are controlling spending, controlling revenues, controlling entitlements, we do not have really a budget that is meaningful and enforceable. So we are hopeful that that will come relatively soon.

We would like to do it contemporaneously, but I understand what the gentleman is saying; the Committee on Rules wants to consider that. The Senate I think considered that contemporaneously and, of course, there are some in this country who have made it very clear that an enforcement mechanism that impacts on both spending and on revenues was the only kind of enforcement that would really be meaningful. I know there is a difference of opinion among people on that issue, but we think that needs to be debated fairly soon and fairly proximate to close the consideration of the budget.

Mr. Leader, my last question would be, if the gentleman knows, and I notice we have a member of the Committee on Rules on the floor, when will substitutes need to be filed, if the gentleman knows; or can the gentleman inform us when substitutes will need to be filed?

Mr. Speaker, in a world of priorities, the gentleman just got mine.

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

Mr. Speaker, I will support this resolution. I will support it as an expression of our Nation's gratitude and pride in our men and women in uniform who have performed with brilliance and valor in Operation Iraqi Freedom. To date, 565 Americans have given the ultimate measure of devotion to our country in Iraq, including a young soldier from my district, Jason C. Ford who was killed just a few days ago by a roadside bomb, 2 weeks after arriving in Iraq.

We mourn the loss of Jason and all other fallen patriots, and extend our most profound sympathies to their loved ones. We also pray for the full recovery of the more than 3,200 servicemen and -women who have been wounded there.

And to the approximately 110,000 Americans still in Iraq, we must offer this pledge: we will do everything within our power to ensure your success and safe return home.

Mr. Speaker, this resolution should have simply expressed the support of this House for our Armed Forces now in harm's way. Regrettably, however, the majority has handled this resolution in a manner which inevitably led to division. Our troops and the American people expect and deserve better. On a matter of the highest national importance, the majority has undermined the democratic process in this House, treated those who hold different views with disdain, and created a bludgeon where it should have built a bridge. This is the same approach that has guided the current administration's foreign policy and which has undermined our Nation's credibility and driven many allies away from us. This is a time to bring together, to consult, to be unanimous.

Mr. Speaker, I share the view that the Middle East and the world are better off with Hussein in custody and his Baathist regime on the run. But our mission in Iraq has not been accomplished. Even as we speak here, a car bomb has rocked Baghdad and killed more than 20 people. This comes on the heels of attacks on our troops, civilians and even innocent worshipers. Success must be our only exit strategy. And only when our objectives are accomplished can we say with certainty and conviction that the world has been made safer. As today's events in Baghdad and last week's horrific attacks in Spain make clear, this war has not been won. Yet. But we send an unequivocal message to those who perpetrate such madness: we will not retreat from our objective to eliminate the source of terrorism and those who perpetrate it. The legacy of the men and women who have committed the ultimate sacrifice in Iraq demands that we do no less. It should also demand that we do so united, united by common resolve and not divided by efforts to achieve political advantage.

Mr. Speaker, one week ago today, the majority leader, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), told the Members of this body and the national television audience watching C-SPAN, and I quote, ``It is responsibility week here in the House.'' ``It is responsibility week here in the House.''

Well, Mr. Speaker, the majority leader was only half right. Last week indeed was responsibility week, but the real responsibility was being exercised not here in this House but on the other side of Capitol Hill.

While we named post office buildings, honored professional sports teams, and passed legislative solutions in search of national problems, the other Chamber adopted a bipartisan pay-as-you-go measure that repudiates the central fiction of the Republican Party's fuzzy math: that we can somehow reign in record budget deficits created by the Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress while ignoring the consequences of tax cuts.

Do not take it from me, my Republican friends.

Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. Speaker, as responsible?

Mr. Speaker, do not take it from me, my Republican friends, listen to a respected Member of your own party, the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young.) In February Chairman Young said, and I quote, ``No one should expect a significant deficit reduction as a result of austere nondefense discretionary spending limits. The numbers simply do not add up.'' So said the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, one of the most respected Members of this body.

And why do not the numbers add up? Because nondefense discretionary spending represents only 17 percent of the entire Federal budget. The fact of the matter is we could wipe out all domestic discretionary spending, the funding for this House, the funding for the Senate, FBI, CIA, NIH, NASA, all of that. If you wipe it all out, we would still be running a deficit of more than $100 billion.

Yet this week the Republican majority continues its markup of a budget resolution for fiscal year 2005 that utterly ignores mathematical and fiscal reality. By applying pay-go rules to spending only, the Republican budget resolution pretends that making existing tax cuts permanent or enacting new ones are a freebie with no budgetary impact. But, of course, that is false. And if one said it, it might even be a lie.

The truth is this Republican budget resolution cuts taxes while spending the entire $1 trillion Social Security surplus between fiscal year 2005 and 2009. All of it. Every nickel of Social Security surplus, spent. And it would continue to do so in subsequent years.

The truth is the Republican budget resolution would make our deficits $247 billion worse over the next 5 years under current law. And over 10 years it would increase the deficit, already projected by the Congressional Budget Office at $2 trillion, by another $1.6 trillion.

There are a lot of young people who are going to pay the price for our profligacy and irresponsibility. Indeed, this budget resolution proposal, as has the economic policies of this administration, been immoral to the extent that they adversely affect generations to come. And the truth is this budget resolution would freeze funding for domestic appropriations outside of Homeland Security to make room, not for defense, not for homeland security, but for new tax cuts.

For years House Republicans preened as, quote, deficit hawks. Some even suggested that tax cuts are not in fact sacrosanct. For example, in 1997 the majority leader himself, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) who I quoted earlier, said of Jack Kemp, you all remember Jack Kemp, he served in this body, a member of the Committee on Appropriations, candidate for Vice President of the United States, he quoted and he said the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) said this: ``Jack Kemp worships at the altar of tax cuts. Jack has always said that deficits do not matter.''

Now, this is the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) the majority leader, the Republican leader of this House. He concluded by saying, quote, ``We think that deficits do matter.''

What a tragedy for our country and for our young people that the policies do not follow that conviction. My Republican friends, this week and next you are going to show the American people whether you are really serious about reducing the deficit you created or whether you are simply taking it and lack the courage to make the tough choices.

Now, when I say the deficit of your creation, let me remind all of our colleagues the first 4 years took us on a straight line out of deficit financing and the last 4 years, for the first time in 8 decades, in the lifetime of anybody older than 80, was in surplus for 4 years straight. So this administration inherited a budget surplus which they said, not what we Democrats said, which they said was $5.6 trillion surplus over 10 years that they had to work with. It is now $4 trillion of debt. That is what I refer to as immoral.

As Republican Senator John McCain said last week in supporting pay-go rules that apply to existing as well as future tax cuts, and I will quote again, Senator John McCain.

Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. Speaker, parliamentary inquiry. While I cannot characterize the debate that occurs on the other side or characterize the position of the Senate itself, is the Parliamentarian or is the Speaker saying that the quoting of a Member who happens to be a Member of the United States Senate is contrary to the rules of this House?

Mr. Speaker, let me say to my friends that a prominent American has said recently that our failure to start making some of the tough decisions will land squarely on the backs of our children and grandchildren.

Their financial future will be strapped with the digging out of holes that have been created by our actions

and inactions. I agree with that sentiment, and let me add that our failure to make the tough decisions also threatens the very future of Social Security and Medicare, two programs which now keep millions and millions and millions of Americans out of poverty.

Next week, Democrats will propose a budget plan that meets America's priorities and gets our financial house back in order. I urge all of my colleagues to support it because it is intellectually the right thing to do. From a fiscal policy, it is the right thing to do, and from a moral values, pro-family perspective, it is the right thing to do. It is time we delivered real responsibility this week to the American public.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to address the House for the purposes of inquiring of the acting majority leader the schedule for the coming week; and I would be glad to yield to my good friend, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman), who chairs the leadership committee, or I am not sure of his exact title, but he is my friend and an able Member of this body, and I am glad to yield to him.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for the information he has provided us.

This is the first time at least that I have heard of the consideration of the Iraqi resolution next week. I understand the timing of that and the date on which that effort began. Because I have just heard about this and have not had an opportunity to talk to our ranking members on either the foreign affairs committee or on the defense committee, can the gentleman inform me as to whether or not this resolution has been put together in a bipartisan way, with participation by the minority? The reason I ask the gentleman that is I think all of us want to ensure that we are united on it.

I have not seen the statement so I do not know what it is, but clearly we are, I think, all proud of the actions of our Armed Forces; and they carried out their mission in an extraordinarily effective, efficient, and courageous manner. We are all proud of our men and women in uniform for what they have done. We are all pleased, as well, that Saddam Hussein has been captured and is in custody and no longer at least poses a personal threat; but I am sure my friend from Ohio agrees that hopefully this statement will be one which is reached in a bipartisan way and we can have overwhelmingly bipartisan support of.

I certainly, as one who supported, as my colleague knows, the effort in Iraq and supported the funding for that effort, want to be able to support it. I have not seen it, but I am hopeful that we do this in a bipartisan way.

I would be glad to yield to my friend to comment on this issue.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that information; and I understand he is a little bit in the same position I am, having just learned of this in the last few minutes. I am pleased to hear that the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hyde) will be communicating with and working with the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos). Again, while there are, obviously, as we all know, disagreements on the prosecution of that effort, whether we should have undertaken it, there is no, I think, dispute on the underlying support of our troops, their effort, their safety, and their objectives. Hopefully, that is what we will articulate.

I thank the gentleman for his information, and I will surely be talking to the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos), as I know our leader will, to try to make sure that we are all together on this statement, which I think will be good for our troops and good for the world to see as well. I thank the gentleman.

We had expected to see the budget resolution on the floor next week. Then, frankly, we had heard in the last few hours, or few minutes, that that was not going to be the case, that the markup had been called off or cancelled, rescheduled by the gentleman

from Iowa (Mr. Nussle) for next week. Our presumption was, if that was the case, then the budget would be delayed a week.

Now the information is, and I know the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the leader, is not on the floor, it is my understanding that perhaps he is working on trying to effect agreement, but can the gentleman tell me whether or not he has confidence that that will be on the floor next week, or are we waiting to see what is going to happen today to make that final decision?

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

Last week, I asked the leader and would ask the gentleman, as we approach next week, assuming that the budget is to be on the floor next week, about the commitment of the majority to allowing the minority, as has historically happened, to have various alternatives. As the gentleman knows, the Congressional Black Caucus has always had the opportunity to offer an alternative that was a thoughtful, persuasive budget. I did not always support it.

We have other caucuses who may want to offer alternatives as well, and clearly the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), the ranking member of the Committee on the Budget on our side of the aisle, will want to offer a substitute as well.

Is the gentleman aware of whether or not, as has happened in the past, we will be afforded the opportunity to offer various alternatives to the budget document that will be reported out of committee?

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that observation, and I would hope we do follow that practice. Because, clearly, while the budget document, in particular for those of us who serve on the Committee on Appropriations, is a relatively broad-brush document, it does very pointedly speak to the priorities that Members have and that we think our country ought to have. Because of that, it becomes even more important, I think, in the people's House that the people's representatives have an opportunity to offer alternatives so that not only Members, but the American public can form a judgment of their own as to what alternative is in the best interest of our country.

So I appreciate the gentleman's observation that full substitutes, and usually, as you know, that is what we have been offering, and certainly it is the intention of the gentleman from South Carolina, as the ranking member, to offer a substitute. Of course we do not know what ultimately is going to happen, we will have to see what the Committee on the Budget produces, but I am sure that the gentleman from South Carolina will want to offer a substitute.

The gentleman mentioned enforcement mechanisms. The Senate, as you know, the other body, has adopted an enforcement mechanism, which we think if you are going to have an enforcement mechanism makes sense.

First of all, does the gentleman know whether the enforcement mechanism will be in a separate piece or legislation included in the budget offering itself?

Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's response. In addition, of course, to the substitute, or an amendment to the budget in the form of a substitute, I am sure that we would be, depending upon what comes out of the committee, very much committed to offering an enforcement mechanism proposal of our own. We believe that the enforcement mechanism that was in place some years ago was effective in reaching balance and, in fact, taking us into surplus. That was allowed to lapse, and is not in force now, which allowed us to do the tax cuts that were passed over the last 3 years.

Is the gentleman of the view that we will be allowed to have, under the rules, a substitute and/or amendments to the proposal for enforcement that is reported out of the Committee on the Budget?

I yield to my friend.

Mr. Speaker, I understand the gentleman's comment, but as he knows, Mr. Greenspan, who has not been necessarily an advocate of our side of the argument, as a matter of fact, has been on the gentleman's side of the argument on the tax cuts, has

made it very clear that he believes, for the interest of economic security and stability in the country, that the pay-go rules ought to apply on both the spending and the tax side. Because, of course, in either event, you can plunge yourself, as we believe we have, into deep deficits.

So I think that will be a good debate. We will obviously point to Mr. Greenspan's assertions, which we agree in this instance, that it is very difficult to control if you do not have pay-go applying on both sides of the ledger.

Lastly, if I might, as a distinguished member of the Committee on Ways and Means, a senior member of the Committee on Ways and Means, the gentleman knows that the Foreign Sales Corporation legislation has been pending for many, many months now. We are concerned, as you know, that the Europeans are now imposing sanctions as a result of the WTO's finding that we are not in compliance.

Can the gentleman tell me whether or not the FSC legislation will be on the floor any time soon; and, if so, whether or not the Rangel- Manzullo alternative will be made in order as an alternative?

I yield to my friend from Ohio.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments, and while I accept his premise that it is a high priority, very frankly, I will tell my friend from Ohio, there is no doubt we could have passed a bipartisan supported bill here with a very substantial number of votes many, many months ago. That was not the determination, apparently, of the committee to report out such a bill. We think that is unfortunate.

We believe that if the Rangel-Crane or the Rangel-Manzullo bill, or the Manzullo-Rangel bill were reported out, I think we would see well over 225 to 230 votes for that, maybe more. But in any event, I appreciate the gentleman's comments.

Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to yield to the gentleman.

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, if I can just briefly, I share the gentleman's view. I do not think such a bill could be reported out of the Committee on Ways and Means either. Our perception is, as the gentleman well knows, it is tough to pass bipartisan bills out of the Committee on Ways and Means because I do not think there is any interest in doing that. I think that is unfortunate because this is a critical problem confronting us.

I think we could have, as we have in the past, and the drug reimportation being a perfect example of a bill that passed very handily in a bipartisan fashion through this House. Unfortunately, it did not make it out of the conference committee. Notwithstanding the fact that both Houses were for it, there were people who were not for it.

But this is a critical problem, and my only suggestion to my good friend, with whom I have worked in a very bipartisan fashion on very successful legislation, and I know the gentleman's inclination is to do that, to legislate, not just to throw bombs at one another. I thank the gentleman for his observation and hope, in fact, that he is correct and we move on this quickly. And if it is not a bipartisan bill as it comes to the floor, I hope that we do provide for the minority an opportunity to offer an alternative which we think will be in the best interest of this country. We will debate that and the majority will prevail.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments and thank him for the information.