David Obey: “Mr. Speaker, as this joint resolution demonstrates, we are in another year that simply refuses to end. Last year we did…”

“Mr. Speaker, as this joint resolution demonstrates, we are in another year that simply refuses to end. Last year we did not see this Congress finish the work that was supposed to be done by October 1 until well into the winter of the next calendar year. At that time the majority party in the House blamed that inability to get the work done on the fact that there was a majority of the other party in the other body. This year they do not have Tom Daschle to kick around anymore. This year the Republicans control it all. They control the White House. They control the House. They control the Senate. They control the schedule. They control what gets to the floor. They control how long the votes are held open. They control everything. And yet we are in a situation where tonight, long after the fiscal year is supposed to be over, we still have not seen the budgets passed for VA-HUD, for the State Department, for the Justice Department, for the Commerce Department. We have yet to see the foreign aid budget pass. We have yet to see the budget for the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, social services agencies pass and the agriculture budget. I think we ought to ask why. I do not believe that we are in this box because of any failure of the Committee on Appropriations leadership. I think we are in this box because the Republican House leadership is insisting on having every decision made in a top-down style.”