Joe Barton: “here we are again. For the ninth time, we are here on the floor of the House to vote on some form of consideration of…”

“here we are again. For the ninth time, we are here on the floor of the House to vote on some form of consideration of the latest version of the Democratic leadership's SCHIP and Medicaid expansion bill. And if you count the votes on the Rules Committee resolutions for consideration of these bills, we will be debating this issue for the 13th time this morning. And while the Democratic leadership has tried a dozen times to stuff their ideology down our throats on the floor of the House, the same Democratic leadership still hasn't held one single legislative hearing or completed one single legislative markup in the Energy and Commerce Committee, the committee with jurisdiction over the SCHIP program. In December, the Democrats held their second debate on a motion to postpone consideration of the President's veto. Since that vote, Congress and the President have passed legislation that fully funds the SCHIP program through March of 2009. It was my hope that once we passed the SCHIP extension legislation that we could come together and begin a true legislative process that could yield results. We've heard all this talk lately from the Democratic leaders about bipartisanship, but all we actually get is empty words and authoritarian process. Then why are we here again today, Madam Speaker?”