William Clinger

I would indicate that I think a ``yes'' vote on this matter would in effect be saying that we would allow an unfunded mandate to be passed through, or open the door to passing through, an unfunded mandate to the States. Those who would…

As I indicated, this would also go into effect if the President would agree to the balanced-budget agreement.

Just to briefly say, Mr. Speaker, the President has agreed to the date. Obviously he is confident that he is in fact going to be reelected. I do not share that confidence, but he believes that he will be. Therefore, he is going to have…

I rise in fervent support of S. 1124, the Department of Defense authorization conference report. I want to commend the chairman... The provisions that are in this bill are consistent with H.R. 1670, the Federal Acquisition Reform Act of…

I would just question the appropriateness of the inspector general making policy in these kinds of areas. It seems to me it is the policymakers of the Department of Defense who really should be paid attention to in this area.

But it does not have to be Defense Department. Mandatory spending is all across the board.

In fact, the offsets can come, when this happens, if the President decides to waive it now, he, under this bill, would be required to provide the offset. We could make it very clear that they were not to be taken out of military spending…

The gentlewoman makes a very, very strong point. This is one way that we can help preserve the industrial base. If we see that shrink dramatically, it would, in fact, jeopardize us in the event we have hostilities somewhere else in the…

Despite the fact the gentleman opposed my position on title I, I would say what I consider to be a very generous example of noblesse oblige, we are prepared to accept the gentleman's amendment, and I understand that any problems have been…

That is absolutely untrue. What we are saying is that the procurement officials, very front and center, they are very much on the front line of the decisions that they make, are going to be given a little more flexibility, a little more…

Well, I think it bears repeating. The administration in their statement we received tonight supports House passage of H.R. 1670 as reported by the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight, and I think the gentleman from Virginia…

There is no bar to anybody who is, as my colleague knows, anyone can get in and bid on these Government procurements.

Absolutely, and that is one of the changes that has been made, frankly, since we last considered this measure, the DOD authorization bill. There was a concern that we were eliminating the language which has been relied on so long and…

I have to suggest that it is a little more than a minor disagreement. I think that in my view it really goes to the heart of this bill. We have a fundamental disagreement over the impact. I believe, and I hope a majority will believe, that…

I think that for the first time we are really going to have some consideration for what are the compliance costs, what does it cost to carry out the number of the mandates that we have had in the past, but I think that the environmental…

The conference report is intended to clarify that it is the intent of Congress that section 3512 requires agency information collection requests applicable to 10 or more members of the public to be submitted to OMB and receive a valid…

I think this is a historic piece of legislation. It is going to be the first step in reordering the relationship between Federal and State and local governments. It is going to substantially restructure that relationship and, I think…

Reauthorization, if there are no additional new mandates imposed as a result of a reauthorization of an existing program, it would have no effect at all. It is only where there would be an additional or added mandate that would exceed the…

Let me say I commend the gentleman for the contribution he made to this bill because he did, took a great interest and had a very helpful contribution. We were unfortunately unable to sustain all of his amendments in the conference report…

To close, I yield myself such time as I may consume, to say to the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Tauzin], I think this is a very thoughtful and helpful addition to the debate we are having on this matter. I do think it goes to far…

That may well be true, but I am suggesting to the gentleman that we are not blameless in this exercise of deficit reduction. As I indicated to the gentleman, we had an event in 1992, where an effort was made to try and deal with 1996…

I am suggesting that the Congress, and I think we can apportion the blame on both sides, there has been an inability under existing procedures, certainly under the existing empowerment procedure for us to really effect cuts in spending…

But I think fundamentally we have a philosophic difference over how tight this provision should be. What we are saying is we want to make it as difficult as possible, as difficult as possible, for this House, which has proven in the past…

We have a guarantee you get a vote. There is no such guarantee in the gentleman's amendment, because it could be waived.