On the recordOctober 3, 2013
Mr. Speaker and my colleagues, I am pleased to hear the gentleman from California from the other side of the aisle who just spoke and his willingness to work together. I think that's the kind of cooperation that the American people are looking for and that Congress needs to adhere to in coming together and resolving this. No one wants a shutdown. No one wants to see vital and essential government programs eliminated or withheld from the public. Sometimes in these situations that are most difficult, you actually become concerned about basic common sense or, again, the attempts of certain people to try to embarrass each side. I think one of the worst things I've seen in my service was the closedown of some of our memorials. This probably won't show up for my colleagues very well, but this is the Martin Luther King Memorial. You just walk up and look at it. But to deploy Interior and park personnel to put out barriers to constrain the public from even walking is an absolutely senseless and mindless bureaucratic move. Many people saw also the construction. And this, again, is not a very good photo, but this is Park personnel that were deployed putting fences up in front of the Lincoln Memorial and then, most offensively, to put barriers to block, in an open-air park memorial, our World War II veterans' memorial. This is senseless. I have talked to Mr. Issa and the Oversight subcommittee that I chair--Mr. Issa chairs the whole Oversight Committee of Congress. I know Mr.…





