David Obey: “as I understand the rules under which this bill is brought to the floor, this amendment would be in order if no Member…”

“as I understand the rules under which this bill is brought to the floor, this amendment would be in order if no Member of the House chooses to lodge a point of order against it. My understanding of the rule that the committee reported is that it has waived the rules for numerous provisions that were placed in the bill by the majority party. It is hard for me to imagine that the House would feel comfortable in not providing that same courtesy to this amendment. I would also suggest that what I am trying to do by this amendment is to do a favor for the majority leader, because he does not want us to have to cut into NASA in order to fund this restoration for law enforcement grants. If he allows this amendment to go forward, if no Member of the majority party lodges a point of order against this amendment, then we can restore the badly needed funds for local law enforcement without having to go after some of the increases in the majority leader's favorite program. I would urge the House to do a favor for the majority leader by not lodging a point of order against this amendment. If they do that, we could proceed to restore badly needed funds. I would concede, Mr. Chairman, that if any individual Member does lodge a point of order, I would have to concede the point of order, but I would hope that a point of order would not be offered, or if it has already been offered, I would hope that it would be withdrawn as a special favor to the majority leader. Mr.…”