David Obey: “Mr. Speaker, what I say is meant in no way to criticize the gentleman from Florida, because he has been one of the few…”

“Mr. Speaker, what I say is meant in no way to criticize the gentleman from Florida, because he has been one of the few realistic voices on the other side of the aisle trying to point out what the realities are. But the fact is, this is, what, the third continuing resolution that we have had. The budget is supposed to be done on October 1. We are now getting much closer to November 1 than we are to October 1. What have we seen? We have seen bill after bill emerge from conference which have wound up spending much more money than is in the President's budget. Those bills have virtually no relationship whatsoever to the budget resolution which was laid out at the beginning of the year. Yet, we have no real progress in meeting the needs that we feel on this side of the aisle with respect to the most crucial issue remaining in the budget, which is education. We also have seen, although one of the appropriation bills tries to provide a fig leaf on this issue, we have seen this Congress take no action on prescription drugs. We have seen this Congress take no action on the Patients' Bill of Rights. Both of those issues are still pending in one form or another in various appropriation bills. Yet, none of them have any real prospect of being dealt with by this Congress before we adjourn. Now we are being asked to support another week's extension of the deadline for finishing our business. Frankly, I have about had it.…”