David Thomas

I find interesting the fact that we are now reduced to simply saying that 13 weeks of unemployment insurance is the proper response to a Nation in need, not just those who are currently finding themselves, through no fault of their own…

It was a remarkable speech because it was interrupted by a number of standing applauses for the statements that the President made. One of those that I listened carefully to was one that elicited a significant amount of response. It was…

I worked on this proposition, of course, last week. Our purpose, and our goal, is to try to make the marketplace more responsive. Our cattlemen take their cattle into a marketplace, into an auction market, hopefully, to sell at the best…

I rise, too, in support of the Crapo amendment. Certainly for those of us in the West there is nothing more important than water rights and how we handle those water rights, nothing more important to us than to maintain the concept of…

one of the issues we are faced with, which will be most controversial, I suppose--and certainly very important--is that budget about which the Senator from Massachusetts has been talking. Obviously, there are different views as to how one…

one of the things we are seeking to do, of course, in an economic stimulus package is to cause some jobs to be created. The amendment which I have offered increases the expenditure limitation on small issue bonds for manufacturing…

I am delighted we are going to take that up and take a look at it. In some ways I think it would be well if we could hold our fire until after we hear the President's notions next Tuesday. I am sure he will talk a great deal about the…

I rise to make a couple of general comments. As we move towards perhaps the final day, certainly very close to the final day of our time here, I hope we can move forward. We have three appropriations bills that we have been looking forward…

I am sure that there was significant labor on the part of my friends to put this package together. The package is, and all my colleagues should know, to strike all after the enacting clause and insert the following. The following is a…

Some people might think it is the late hour when they listen to the math on the other side of the aisle. I have to assure those who believe it is the late hour that, actually, they do this in daylight as well. I read off the amount of…

If anyone wants to look at any of the other pages in the bill, they will find out that on the health provision, there was $3 billion provided, and on unemployment, there was 9.2. That bill had $12.2 billion directed toward the unemployed…

Mr. Speaker, I tell my friend I have great admiration for the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell). But this health insurance plan was devised by someone who proudly calls himself a compassionate conservative, and the description the…

Mr. Speaker, the last time we addressed a piece of legislation that was designed to help us stimulate the economy, as requested by the President, as Alan Greenspan had indicated, this economy needed some help, and that perhaps by making…

Mr. Speaker, perhaps the gentleman fails to remember, I know it was sometime ago, that we passed on the floor a Trade Adjustment Assistance Act. We said that since the events of 9-11 were so similar, that we attached a rider which provided…

The gentleman failed to tell anyone that if they are actually under the COBRA program they can take the certificate, they can go to the unemployment office. As they get the registration for unemployment, they apply it to COBRA. That…

I rise to commend the fiscal year 2002 Defense authorization conferees, particularly Senator Levin and Senator Warner, for retaining the language adopted by the Senate with regard to reforming the Federal Prison Industries. During…

perhaps in the explanation if we could start with the bill that originated in the House, which was an attempt to take current law that is available to service members and civilians overseas in a terrorist attack, which would provide income…

I had the privilege at one time, for example, of accompanying the gentleman to Ground Zero... to understand firsthand what had happened to the Big Apple.

Of course, it does not even address the game playing that would go on if we were able to set up a system and we were losing $40 billion out of the trust fund. We would have employees negotiating with employers where particular benefits or…

In addition, of course, not everybody has the luxury of a large staff being paid to manage payroll and computers to deal with it. So we do not know the uneven burden that is going to be placed on employers who would now have to add a…

Apart from the obvious in immediate lost to the trust funds, there has been some concern about the ability to execute the proposal. The loss of funds is bad enough, but when we strip it to the essentials of the proposal, those…

Especially when they are arguing that we need to do this very risky scheme, jeopardizing the ability to be accurate, and committing enormous general funds to the trust fund to replace the hole in the trust fund that would bring insolvency…

I am not certain of that. I only know this nomination has been waiting now for over 200 days.

I would like to talk about a number of things. First, we are talking about the farm bill, but we have taken many different directions in terms of the economic stimulus. It needs to be extended. The President suggested a package. The…

Although in committee we had a full and, I think, useful discussion about a number of concerns dealing with Customs and the way in which Customs deals with our border security and the way in which they enforce the law, one provision which…