Chuck Grassley: “I rise to make an opposite point of view and critical comments on a statement that was made yesterday by the Senator…”

“I rise to make an opposite point of view and critical comments on a statement that was made yesterday by the Senator from North Dakota, Mr. Dorgan. Once again, he made a very impassioned case, and everybody who hears him knows he presents his case very well. He made an impassioned case for American workers whose jobs have been lost when plants move overseas. We have all witnessed this heart-wrenching event. I know even in my home State of Iowa we have had plant closings for that reason. Some of those operations have been moved out of the United States. But as far as Iowans are concerned, let me remind you this has been a phenomenon of plants moving from Iowa to other places for a long time, before we ever heard the word ``outsourcing.'' I remind my colleagues I was a member of the International Association of Machinists at a sheet metal factory, the Waterloo Register in the town of Cedar Falls, IA. We made furnace registers. I started working there in 1961, when I was a young member of the Iowa Legislature, to supplement the income of a citizen legislator, and also to supplement the income of a young farmer getting started at that time because I was only farming 80 acres at that time. Even in 1961, you could not make a living farming 80 areas. You could not make a living getting $3,000 every other year being an Iowa legislator. So I became a factory worker.…”