Hon. George W. Gekas

Mr. Speaker, when I first ran for the Congress many years ago, I ran on a platform that included 10 separate items, much like the Contract With America. One of them, much like the Contract With America, was to advance the cause of…

I take it the gentleman believes the death penalty is a proper circumstance with which a jury should grapple in a terrorism case. Is that correct?

This was an act of mass murder, willful, deliberate, intended to kill people, and succeeded in that. Our job, as the American people and the law enforcement and Members of Congress, communities together, must focus to bring those culprits…

I cannot believe it. We are here reporting to them through our deliberations on the floor that we actually fulfilled the promise that we made that day. And it was not just a wild political type of atmosphere in which we made promises as…

Recapturing my time, I would say notwithstanding the gentleman's own State policy and my own State policy of not having this collateral source, 20 other States do have it. So in those States which we have reviewed, and particularly that in…

The amendment does call for the plaintiff, for the jury, to have the right to take into account what the plaintiff has paid for this coverage.

What we are saying is that the final verdict of the jury is, in effect, if it finds against the plaintiff, if it finds zero, that is prima facie evidence for the late determination as to whether or not attorney's fees and so forth should…

The only test of whether it is a nonmeritorious claim, that is, frivolous, is when the jury brings in a verdict of zero for the plaintiff. Then, at that point, is triggered the loser pays situation.

What we are really saying--I do want to predict how the argument is going to go later when the amendment process begins. The gentleman is saying that the present language, not the Michigan rule, but the present language, is more likely to…

That razor would be brought down on the neck of the $50,000 to $100,000 proposal that the gentleman and I are using as an example, and even under the main language of the bill, because if the verdict is $49,999, are we not making an…

That can never happen under the circumstances we currently have in this bill because, if it got that close together, $1, or even $1,000, or $5,000, the way the bill is written they will close that up. They will not go to court over a…

And if it comes under $75,000, at $62,000, or $73,000, or whatever, then the plaintiff would have to pay the--because the median figure was not met. Now I know the gentleman agrees with me when I say to him and I say to the Members, ``This…

I say to the gentleman, ``You and I had discussed, even before markup, the possibility of utilizing the Michigan rule, to which I referred to before. In that case let me give the hypothetical and see if you agree. I offer--as a claimant I…

It still remains, under your definition, to determine whether or not it is frivolous, but you would favor loser pays in that situation?

I will not start with William and Mary or 1066 or the Battle of Hastings or 1215 or any of those historical dates, but I will start in this House of Representatives when long ago, I say to the gentleman from Michigan, we abandoned the…

The issue at hand is whether or not we want to extend the good faith exception to the warrantless arrests. That is the issue.

The Gekas language does provide for life without parole by the court imposing same----

I am inclined to support the Black Caucus budget because the Black Caucus budget is the only one that has a forward look about it on the funding for NIH, the National Institutes of Health. Why do I say that? ... the budget that is…

But we want that opportunity mandated just like the members of the Cabinet are to have an alleged wrongdoing in the Congress, a high-ranking profile Member who is tied in with the Attorney General and the White House in the same party…

I subscribe to the statement that the gentleman made, but that does not preclude the new wave of authority that we want to put in the Attorney General to investigate wrongdoing in Members of Congress, high-profile Members of Congress, who…

The American people know to the fullest extent possible that the Congress exempts itself, excuses itself, recuses itself, from 1001 mandates that they impose upon the American people or on other members of the Government of the United…

Yes. That is borne out by this fact, I say to the gentleman from Pennsylvania, that indeed even though the Attorney General, the current incumbent, in effect was hedging as to whether or not to appoint a special counsel and was receiving…