Richard Pombo: “Several years ago, as a cattleman in the Central Valley in California, I was faced with the frustrations of dealing with…”

“Several years ago, as a cattleman in the Central Valley in California, I was faced with the frustrations of dealing with the Federal Government and the ever growing bureaucracy, and as I became more and more involved with what was going on with our Federal Government, I made the decision to come here and to fight for the property rights of the people that I represent and the people across this country. Over the last 2 years that I have been here, I have pleaded and I have begged and I have tried to compromise on every piece of legislation that has come through here that affects private property. And it is being in the minority party and what at that time was the minority mindset in Washington, not across the country, but here, it was defeated time and time again, and in our dealings with people like the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Tauzin], the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Fields], and the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith], who carried those issues for years, we were defeated over and over again.”