Sam Gejdenson: “Our greatest frustration, of course, was not with this portion of committee funding. Many Members on the other side of…”

“Our greatest frustration, of course, was not with this portion of committee funding. Many Members on the other side of the aisle, obviously, were upset and I think outraged by the amount of funding and the uncontrolled situation with the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Burton] and his committee. In some other matters in this area, frankly, there are some differences on this side, but generally there is not strong disagreement with what the committee is doing. We are glad to see in general that some of the things that were tried are now being returned to the way they had operated in the past, in a more regular order. This Congress does the people's business, and while great focus is placed on the numerical activity that will occur here on the floor in the budget sense, the real question is how well we are doing our people's business. There is a frustration there as well, not so much with what is happening in this committee but generally on the floor of the House of Representatives. Issues that need to be addressed, from campaign finance reform to children's health, do not seem to be moving. We are in danger in the budget process of not simply ignoring deadlines, which would sound somewhat arbitrary, but the pressure of tax cuts and other things there that may balloon the deficit in the out years loom once again.”