John Joseph Moakley: “I reclaim my time. As I say, this is a noticeable improvement over the gag rule within the closed rule that we did on…”

“I reclaim my time. As I say, this is a noticeable improvement over the gag rule within the closed rule that we did on opening day, but I am still going to oppose the rule for the consideration of the unfunded-mandates bill. I am very concerned about the careless way this bill has been thrown together, and I think on such an important bill the American people deserve to be assured that Congress knows what it is passing. After one Rules Committee hearing and with one Republican member testifying at a markup, I cannot say that we do. Here is a bill that has an open rule on the floor, but it has been closed everywhere else. It has been closed to Democrats who want to have input in the committee structure, it has been closed to interested parties who wanted to ask questions, it has been closed to committees of secondary jurisdiction, and, Mr. Speaker, it has been closed to the American people. When people are asked about it, they say that we can handle that on the floor.”