David Thomas

clearly, based upon the Chair's ruling, the fact that the argument had been made about the denial of a Member to appear before the committee is without substance. Perhaps if someone has a thesaurus and they look up synonyms for ``without…

Mr. Speaker, golly, if any Members listened to the first hour, they would think our friends on the other side of the aisle were in opposition to what we wanted to do. That it was a sham, a farce. And then, lo and behold, their substitute…

I will tell the gentleman it does not, because what we do is simply put in place the current tax structure on a permanent basis. If I might very briefly continue, and I will try to get time on this side if the gentleman does not have it…

just so everyone here understands that this is probably one of the grossest forms of politics that is being engaged in, the gentleman from California just took to his feet and indicated that we should be spending our time on other factors…

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the House was privileged in a joint session to hear from the Prime Minister of Australia. It was, I hope, for most Members a rather refreshing presentation of the closeness of the two countries, because he provided…

In addition to that, however, it seems to me that it is appropriate from time to time that we focus a little bit on the appropriate role of the Federal Government. What is the appropriate role of Government spending? I understand the…

Mr. Speaker, in terms of that honest, pleading appeal, I am going to just try to put a couple of tests in place to see how real it was. If this motion to recommit is so critical to the future of the Social Security trust fund, why was it…

Before anyone thinks that this is a decision on a narrow, technical parliamentary discussion, I want you to understand what is at stake. My friend, the gentleman from Massachusetts, said he could not believe that we would be doing this, or…

I guess one of the things we could do is run an auction on bills like this in which each provision goes to the highest bidder. If that is the case, our friends on the other side of the aisle would win every time, that is, as long as we…

There are, I can assure you, and I represent the poorest. And agricultural counties by nature of the cyclical work tend to be the poorest and have the highest unemployment and low literacy. Child care needs are very high. That is why we…

Since the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Watson) wants me to explain the reference about cesspools referred to by me, I referred to it as a cesspool of red ink. And if anybody does not believe $24 billion of State government…

I do want to correct the record, because I indicated that the substitute bill requires a mandatory payment by the States of $1 billion. My understanding is that that is only in the fifth year. My correction is that actually the…

Mr. Speaker, there will be a number of claims made on the floor during the debate of this particular piece of legislation. The one thing I hope people keep in mind is that it is my fervent hope that the goals of the legislation are…

Once again, as a Member from California, California currently, under the Democratic Governor, is $24 billion in the red and this would add another $1 billion over 5 years of an induced stick, if they want to receive the illusory benefits…

I will share some general thoughts I have. It seems to me as we look forward to the remainder of this session, the time is getting pretty short. In a couple of weeks we will begin our Memorial Day recess, and then we will be moving on…

It seems to me in a time when one of the real issues before us is the economy, what could you be doing better to help the economy than to reduce taxes? I think that is why the President has pushed that. That is why more conservatives have…

we are finally moving forward on the trade bill. I hope we can move quickly. It is one of the more important issues before us, of which there are many. I say again, I hope we can take a look at this bill in terms of what it is designed to…

I will discuss a bill we have introduced in the last several weeks that I think is very important. It is called the Medicare Equity for Veterans Act of 2002. It is designed to provide some fairness between Medicare and VA health care…

I am pleased we have a conference report on the agriculture bill. The conference report is before us and we can make a decision with respect to agriculture in the bill that is before us. For much of agriculture, of course, this is a key…

we have heard a number of topics discussed this morning which, of course, is the purpose of morning business and that is fine. We will, however, at the expiration of this time, move back into the topic that is before us--the one that seems…

I wish to focus on what I believe to be the more critical issue, and that is the Trade Promotion Act. This is often called fast track. It is designed to give us a system to bargain, if you will, and negotiate treaties with other countries…

I rise to recognize the fact that today is the 87th anniversary of the beginning of the Armenian genocide that began under the direction of the Ottoman Empire. From 1915 until 1923, 1.5 million Armenians were murdered and another 500,000…

I urge that we move back as soon as possible--I understand we will at 2 o'clock--to our energy bill. Certainly, there is nothing more important before us now than the completion of that bill and being able to send it on to the President…

recently we had a day called Tax Day. I think most of us thought a lot about taxes. We talked a lot about the process of filling in our tax forms and paying our taxes. I do not know about everyone else, but I came out of that with the…

No. I think the Senator from Massachusetts has had ample time to discuss this issue. One of the things we need to do is take a real look at this, of course. ANWR was set aside for future exploration, no question about that. ANWR…