Steve Scalise: “I thank the chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee for yielding and for bringing this bill. Especially I thank Mr.…”

“I thank the chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee for yielding and for bringing this bill. Especially I thank Mr. Self for his leadership in working for so long on this important bill. Mr. Speaker, it is not often that we will walk amongst people who are larger than life. During my years in Congress, I have been honored to serve with two people whom I would put in that category: Sam Johnson and John Lewis. Both of them have amazing stories that are well chronicled. I got to know Sam over the years that I served with him. It was a treat to be able to just sit down and hear stories and talk to him about the things I had heard about him because Sam was truly larger than life, Mr. Speaker. We heard stories of his early days as an Air Force pilot. This was back in the days before the Apollo missions when our Air Force pilots were trying to push the boundaries to figure out just how far we could go, how fast we could go, and how high we could go. They were doing things that had never been done before. I had heard a story that Sam challenged Buzz Aldrin. Buzz, of course, famously was the commander of the Apollo mission, the first mission to land on the Moon. He was the second man to walk on the Moon after Neil Armstrong. I heard that story, and one time after Sam had left Congress, I had the opportunity to meet Buzz Aldrin. I said: I want to ask you about this story. I heard that Sam Johnson challenged you to a fighter pilot race. He just lights up.…”