Earl Pomeroy: “the rule before us allows only one alternative. You know, it has been said before but it deserves repeating today: As…”

“the rule before us allows only one alternative. You know, it has been said before but it deserves repeating today: As our troops fight for democracy in Iraq, we ought to show that we can have democracy on the floor of the House. I went to the Rules Committee with another alternative for reforming the estate tax, and to have on a party-line vote the majority refuse to allow the Members of this body to even consider any other alternative but the Thomas proposal, in my opinion, does violence to notions that this is a deliberative body where ideas can be considered. The bill before us is not a reform bill of the estate tax, it is virtual repeal, and make no bones about that, virtual repeal of the estate tax. Look at this chart. The cost of the alternative I advance and have not been allowed to offer is 40 percent the cost of repeal. Our early estimates on the full phased-in cost of the Thomas proposal is that it will lose 80 percent at least of the revenue of full repeal. That is not a compromise. I bet you are going to hear some of these guys say we are going to compromise. This is not a compromise, it is virtual repeal. You lose 80 percent of the revenue, it is virtual repeal, no compromise. Now this is a shocking loss of revenue to help a very, very few people. The proposal that I was not allowed to introduce would have made exempt all of the estates but for 3/10 of 1 percent.…”