JOHN LINDER: “Mr. Speaker, I hope the American people just saw that display, because what they saw is Big Brother on the prowl again…”

“Mr. Speaker, I hope the American people just saw that display, because what they saw is Big Brother on the prowl again, Big Brother government trying to stifle the American people once again, and they are not even satisfied with open and honest debate. They want the debate on their terms, voting up or down on their bills, and they do not want any amendments. Well, I look forward to having a vigorous and complete debate about the state of our campaign laws, the laws that the gentleman from California enacted around 1974. Some believe that the laws that govern our elections are in such desperate shape that we should erect a huge government bureaucracy and sharply limit the ability of our citizens to participate through further spending limits; others believe that things are so serious that we need to scrap the First Amendment to the Constitution, the premier political reform in human history, and start all over with a new First Amendment that restrains the exuberance of the American electorate; and the president uses campaign finance reform as a way to distract the American people from his own campaign's shameless abuse of the campaign laws. Well, Mr. Speaker, I do not think we need to throw the baby out with the bath water.”