David Obey: “let me simply ask the House one question: Do we really know everything that we need to know about how children learn? Do…”

“let me simply ask the House one question: Do we really know everything that we need to know about how children learn? Do we really know enough about how children learn to guarantee that every child will perform to their maximum ability and potential? I think the answer to that is obvious: we obviously don't. There is no great political constituency for educational research. But you know it's a funny thing, in any field of endeavor, research is what separates bull gravy from intelligent approaches to issues. That's what research does: it helps lead one to a right understanding of a problem. What this amendment is, frankly, it's another television ad. What this amendment does is to pretend that it does no damage to education by eliminating $50 million out of the educational research budget. It then puts it into special education. We have a lot of posing for holy pictures on this floor by Members who are trying to escape the fact that the White House is asking them to vote against this bill because the White House claims there is too much money in the bill when, in fact, every single one of these amendments demonstrates that our own Republican Members know that there is not enough money in this bill to fund programs like special education unless you make damaging cuts to other portions of the bill. And I would suggest that we not do that. The President cut special education in his budget by $291 million.”