Sam Gejdenson

I regret that Speaker Gingrich is not in the Chair today. He was here earlier and left. But Speaker Gingrich was elected to this Chamber with fewer votes than the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Sanchez]. It was a democratically…

It is easy to get caught up in the process of what we do here, but the substance is also terribly important. I would say, for both procedural reasons and substantive reasons, we should reject the proposition of my colleague that is before…

if this was an ideological debate or an attempt at evolving a philosophy for the operation of the globe, we might want to discuss, in a theoretical sense, how government got to this point and where government should go. But this is a very…

In 1980 in New Jersey, the Republican Party brought people to the polls in uniforms to intimidate minority and Hispanic voters from voting. They filed a consent decree not to do it any more. In 1992, the Republican Party of California paid…

if the fact that there was a lobbyist in this town working on a bill was a reason to vote against it, then I guess everybody is going to vote against the tax cut tomorrow because the reality is on the merits we cannot beat OPIC. It makes…

Let us do campaign finance reform. Let us at least end soft money. Americans are being driven out of the political process when they see hundred-thousand-dollar contributions given to both political parties. The Speaker says there is not…

I think one of the great frustrations here, of course, is that not only have we violated all the traditions of the House in the Sanchez case, changing the rules, having the committee kind of being the adversary for an elected Member of…

I must be missing something. One of the great things about this country was that we have been a compassionate country. My Republican friends seem to have incredible compassion for billionaires. Let me explain the difference to Members…

what has developed here over a number of years is class warfare. It is exhibited in almost every action taken by the Republican majority on the Sanchez matter. It did not start with Sanchez. In 1980, we watched men wearing black armbands…

I have an apology to make. When I saw the $7.9 million the majority Republicans were going to put into a slush fund, they call it a slush fund, it is not a slush fund. It turns out it is the taxpayer-funded Speaker's make-a-wish…

Mr. Chairman, we have gone through a number of pieces of legislation here today, and the sum total of what we are doing seems to say, bring on the darkness; that if we came out of the dark ages and went into the renaissance, if we put this…

the question is about choices: are we going to give the policeman a choice of buying his family and kids new clothes for school or having a decent diet, or is somebody going to be able to extend their European vacation going over on the…

we are close to July 4, and it was not that long ago the President asked us to come to the Congress with a campaign finance reform bill that we would vote on by July 4, get it through the House, the Senate, and bring it to the President's…

the debate here is rather simple. The question is, as the elected representatives of the people of this country, is it our responsibility to make it easier for those who are walking into the showrooms where they sell Mercedes or people who…

Mr. Chairman, we have a very clear situation here. We have lived through it before. The Defense Department at one time told American manufacturers of machine tools, you cannot export these, the quality is too good. Do you know what…

I would like to just have a slight correction to my colleague in that these people do pay taxes, and they pay a lot of taxes because they are at the bottom and their FICA taxes eat up a big portion of their earnings. The basic question is…

The government and the private sector together made the decision that these systems were not controllable. So for all the rhetoric about our desires, the reality is, when the United States says no, this is buried somewhere in an…

I think there is one fact that cannot be argued here. If the Smith amendment wins, as well-intentioned as it is, there will be more abortions because every time we shut down a family planning project we end up with unwanted pregnancies…

Mr. Chairman, let us be clear what this amendment is about. This amendment is not about abortion. This amendment is about family planning. If we went to the door of every household in this country and said, do you think our Government…

I would just ask my friend, and I know he is earnest in this without any question, but does he have any evidence that the general population of Cuba to any significant degree or to what degree it might be able to view these? I think we…

I think Mr. Duffy has changed his position on that, and in more recent testimony before the Committee on Appropriations felt that nobody was hearing it. I think whatever happens here today, I would hope we could join together. If we look…

I guess I would say one thing having been through both Democratic and Republican Presidents, of both parties, I have seen them able to certify almost anything or not certify almost anything they chose to certify or not certify. The other…

I cannot tell my colleague what would have happened if the League of Nations had survived and this country had stayed active politically in the world, whether we could have avoided the horrors of World War II. But there is no question in…

It says the President should have a study. But we know what we need to do on retirement protection. There is legislation that I have authored, and others. Fifty-one million Americans do not have pensions today. Women, one-third of them are…

I think those are good rules. We are all trying to live by them. The question is, Are we going to respond to a system that is endangering the support of the American people? When they see a half a million dollars given to one campaign or…