Doris Matsui: “I am glad to see my amendment from 1995 suddenly appeared out here. When Newt Gingrich took over this place, there was a…”

“I am glad to see my amendment from 1995 suddenly appeared out here. When Newt Gingrich took over this place, there was a Contract on America. This was in it then, 1995. I proposed it in the Committee on Ways and Means, and every single Republican voted against it. Now we have a new day, and now we have all this money, or we did have all this money. We thought we had all this money. We set up a straw man. Last year we passed a bill that said, people are going to get this benefit, but then we get this and it is not permanent, so they voted last year for it; and now they come out here and they say, oh, oh, it is not permanent. Let us make it permanent, in the midst of fiscal chaos. Republicans ought to be ashamed of themselves. All the times I heard people standing out here telling me about those liberals just spend and spend and spend, well, I am watching the Republicans just spend and spend and spend, but not on things people care about. The drug benefit is gone. There is not going to be any drug benefit worth anything at all. On Medicare, people in my district cannot get a doctor to accept a Medicare patient. But no, no, we have to add this marriage tax penalty out here. That is what is going to save America.”