James Traficant: “I say to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Visclosky), good job. We passed an unbinding ban resolution in October and the…”

“I say to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Visclosky), good job. We passed an unbinding ban resolution in October and the imports dropped, but not enough. Mr. Speaker, this is not a debate today about protectionism; it is about illegal trade. These countries have ripped us off. I do not understand the philosophical differences here, unless the Republicans are trying to set us up, get the President to veto this after he promised every worker in America he would put his foot down on illegal trade. He also promised every worker in America he would pass a scab labor bill. He did not, either. I want to give credit today to Ronald Reagan. I can remember him coming to my district telling our steelworkers that he would, in fact, reinvest in industry, and he passed the investment tax credit program, and he would provide money for training. He did that, and they did not support him. As a Democrat, the White House, they are not called slick over there for nothing, Mr. Speaker. They may just go ahead and sign this because if they do not, unless they are trying to veto Al Gore's presidency, I do not know what is going on here today. I want to make this point. I did not make a pledge in the World Trade Organization. I pledged an oath to the Constitution of the United States. What bothers me the most is our unemployed workers, their taxes coming from their unemployment check are being used to bail out Russia, South Korea, Asia, Japan, and recently Brazil. What is it with us?…”