David Obey: “this rule should not be before us tonight and neither should this bill. The conference report was just signed about an…”

“this rule should not be before us tonight and neither should this bill. The conference report was just signed about an hour ago, and now under a martial law approach it is before the House. No Member has had a chance to examine what is in that conference report, and there is one provision in the conference report which is absolutely outrageous. The best way to deal with that is to simply defeat this rule. This bill, pure and simple, if this rule is approved, will put the general counsel of the Federal Elections Commission out of business come January. Section 514 of the bill establishes term limits for the general counsel and the staff director of the Federal Elections Commission by requiring an affirmative vote of 4 of the 6 commissioners every 4 years. This is a blatant Republican political maneuver aimed at removing the Federal Elections Commission's current general counsel, Lawrence Noble. Why? Because during his tenure, Mr. Noble has aggressively sought to enforce election laws and has been willing to punish violators of the law from across the political spectrum. The Federal Election Commission's general counsel, Mr. Noble, suggested that the FEC crack down on soft money, because he has had to take some of these cases to court recently; for example, GOPAC and the Christian Coalition.”