I thank the gentleman for his response, and he says the earliest day possible. I tell my friend that Tim Walz of Minnesota has had a bill, as the gentleman probably knows, of the STOCK Act--also, Louise Slaughter, ranking member of the…

For the purpose of inquiring about the schedule for the week to come, I am pleased to yield to my friend from Virginia (Mr. Cantor), the majority leader.

I think that all of us, hopefully, agree with what the leader has just said. We clearly want to make sure the American public has confidence and trust in the actions we take in that they are not driven by personal interests but by public…

We could make some progress if, frankly, the majority leader could get 60 votes to enact the legislation and transact business on the floor of the Senate. Unfortunately, as the gentleman very well knows, the majority leader, Harry Reid…

The gentleman knows that a number of those proposals had bipartisan support in this House, I think have bipartisan support over in the Senate. But they need to be paid for, and that's where the contention comes, as the gentleman knows. Let…

I thank the gentleman. Wonderful, wonderful logic. A Republican leader in this House is appointed to include bipartisan--and the Secretary of Transportation, who was a leader in this House, and the chief of staff of the minority leader of…

I thank the gentleman. And we all look forward to working together in a bipartisan way. We sure have found great difficulty doing it, however, because we have trouble having a meeting of the minds. I will tell my friend that what I…

I thank the gentleman for his comments. Of course we have long been a supporter of small business. We believe small business is the engine of our economy. We believe we need to grow entrepreneurs. We need to expand, frankly, small business…

I thank the gentleman for his information and would ask him on the timing. The conference committee has met twice on the payroll tax cut, the unemployment insurance, and the so-called ``doc fix,'' or to ensure the fact that doctors are…

I thank my friend for yielding. Frankly, this issue is of such importance, it is a shame we don't have a lot of time to discuss it because I think in many respects we do agree. Where we disagree, however, is when you say that body that is…

Yes. Not spending money we don't have. From my perspective, we did that when we cut taxes. We didn't pay for that. It wasn't like we had a real surplus. We had a projected surplus. We banked on that; and as I said earlier, we lost on that…

I thank my friend, the ranking member of the Budget Committee, Chris Van Hollen from Maryland, for yielding. I, unfortunately, have not been able to listen to all of the debate, but I've listened to enough of it. This week we're playing…

I simply don't think this bill or any other bill will get us to that end if we do not have the courage and, your word, ``discipline,'' to effect that end.

I thank Mr. Van Hollen for yielding. If Members in fact, not for political gamesmanship, want to vote to restrain and eliminate their COLA this year, they have an opportunity to do that segregated from any other issue on the previous…

You can't, and the American public knows that. We talk about, well, we ought to operate like a family. Family understands that. They know their electricity bill goes up, and they know they can't get the same kind of heat this year or next…

I don't believe in dynamic scoring. I think dynamic scoring is a liberal, radical idea. Why? Because it pretends something you don't know. George Bush said we had $5.6 trillion we could rely on and therefore have very deep tax cuts. Didn't…

I was just going to kid him that he's just now trying to get to things that we can all agree on.

I listened to the gentleman's comments. The gentleman is new to the Congress and probably doesn't have the background in terms of how this developed as to how we pay Federal employees. As the sponsor of the Federal Employee Pay…

Then I tell my friends what we ought to do is we ought to pass a big deal. We ought to pass a $4 trillion to $5 trillion to $6 trillion big deal to get the fiscal house of the United States of America in order. It ought to include all…

But what we should not do is pretend that we're going to balance the budget by undermining middle class workers, middle class workers who work for, in my opinion, the finest country on Earth and who give excellent service, extraordinary…

I don't know whether you were able to hear that response. As Gabby looked with that extraordinary smile, the twinkle in her eyes, she said to me and to all of us, ``I miss you.'' Do any of us doubt that that is the case? Pia, we are…

I thank the leader for yielding. I thank the Speaker for ensuring that we would have this opportunity to speak to our friend, Gabby Giffords. I thank the majority leader for his comments. None of us on this floor are talented enough to…

Gabby, we love you. We have missed you.

I thank the gentleman for yielding. I saw my young friend passionate about not passing these bills along to his children. I thought to myself, I could give that speech. But, very frankly, I voted against cutting taxes without paying for…

I thank the gentleman for his comments. And I want to thank him for his participation in addressing this issue. And frankly, in my opinion, he was one of the 100 signatories that we had saying let's get a big deal, we have to get a handle…