David Obey: “I have great reverence for this House and great respect for the office of the Speakership. It is, after all, the third…”

“I have great reverence for this House and great respect for the office of the Speakership. It is, after all, the third highest office in the land, and despite partisan attachment, the Speaker, as the leader of the legislative branch of government, serves as a symbolic representative of every Member. The manner in which he fulfills that role reflects, like it or not, on all of us. That is why I must express great regret about the recent action of Speaker Gingrich with respect to U.S. policy in the Middle East. In my view, this represents the most reckless and destructive undermining of an American peace effort that I have ever seen. Mr. Speaker, I have been closely involved with U.S. policy toward the Middle East since 1974, when I first began my service on the Subcommittee on Foreign Operations of the Committee on Appropriations. From 1984 until 1994, I chaired that subcommittee. I think it is fair to say that during that time, every effort by any American President to pull Arabs and Israel toward peace was supported on a bipartisan basis by our subcommittee and by the Congress as a whole.”