Deborah Koff Ross: “I would thank the gentleman from Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, one of the 12 points is to ensure that the Congress reads the…”

“I would thank the gentleman from Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, one of the 12 points is to ensure that the Congress reads the bills we are voting on. We cannot pass a law to make Members of Congress read a bill, but several examples have been given this evening of what we are talking about here. Last year, before the election, there were 13 spending bills that had to pass to fund our government. Two were passed before the election. They brought us back up here after the election, saying that they could roll all 11 into one and call it the omnibus spending bill and pass it in 3 or 4 days, and they did. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the majority leader, did. It was over 1,000 pages, over 12,000 local spending projects. We had just a few hours to read it. Sure enough, it was full of errors, including allowing congressional staffers to look at people's tax returns. And so all 435 Members had to fly back up here to fix that, among other things. That is just one of 12 common-sense budget reform steps that we think have to happen before Democrats or Republicans can provide a truthful, meaningful budget again.”