David Obey

Mr. Speaker, it is not the majority party that is in a hole. It is the U.S. policy toward Iraq that is in a hole. It is not the majority party that is in disarray. Last time I looked, the headlines said that there was a bunch of…

I do not know why we should be surprised that we are divided as a Nation when in fact we have an administration whose governing principle has been to govern by dividing. I would simply observe that there are some Members of this body…

Again, we can debate yesterday until the cows come home. What Mr. Murtha and I are trying to focus on is what we do in this bill today to make tomorrow better for our servicemen and our country. That is the issue, and that is the issue…

My preference is that additional funding would be available for enhancement grants which can be used for hiring. But that final decision will be up to the administration.

The answer is that there is money, there is adequate money to provide for that committee, if, in fact, it is created. But the formal action on creation has not yet taken place.

Mr. Speaker, it is not correct that we are cutting BRAC. We are increasing BRAC $1 billion above the existing levels in the continuing resolution under which we are operating today. We will deal with the additional requests for BRAC in the…

Let me simply point out to the gentleman who just spoke that our committee took no action whatsoever on all of the items he just mentioned. They are all mandatory programs. All this resolution does is to carry forward the same limitations…

We have just heard unmitigated nonsense from the gentleman. The gentleman is somehow claiming that we are funding that silly rain forest that your party agreed to 2 years ago in Iowa. The fact is that Senator Byrd and I made clear we would…

The gentleman is right to want this program to continue, but he is wrong if he thinks that the Appropriations Committee is the proper venue for it.

But the fact is we have not reauthorized expired programs. That is the difference. We do not have the authority to reauthorize a mandatory program. If we did, we would have to find another $320 million, and I would like to know where that…

I observed that the minority is complaining about the fact that this approach has not been sufficiently bipartisan. As I recall, during the 10 years that the Democrats were in the minority, or more, I asked the Rules Committee almost 100…

Let us remember that the Congress has a right to make policy judgments. Indeed, it has an obligation to make policy judgments that direct money -- money to one place or another.

So none of the Senate earmarks will be included; the Senate will continue to be anonymous?

I thank you. Will you tell me how this is going to apply to the defense appropriations bill that will be coming back to us this year from conference?

I regret very much that this legislation is before us this afternoon. In my view, this is a badly conceived and most especially a badly timed action which will weaken the nonproliferation regime over the long haul and, in the end, wind up…

I want Congress to finally know what the costs are going to be. I want Congress to not have anymore surprises on this package.

Every time we turn around, there's more money and even more money going into the war in Iraq that people didn't know about. He basically says what the president and the administration need to do is level with the American people.

Oh, I think the White House and the Pentagon, the civilian leadership of the Pentagon have done every possible thing in order to conceal those numbers.

I am going to take back my time. I was prepared to entertain a serious question. That is not a serious question. I am not interested in what happened 200 years ago. I am interested in what is happening today and tomorrow.

I would simply say that is useful, but I am still concerned about the fact that we will be allowing a very high- technology aircraft to wind up in the hands of people who may be allies today, but God knows what they are going to be…

If I can borrow this Republican mike, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson- Lee).

I understand you are saying it is in a different pocket, but the overall account is being cut, right?

This House thought of it yesterday that we wouldn't do anything about them, didn't they? This House denied the funds for fixing that problem yesterday, didn't they?

I thank the gentleman. We were just told this amendment goes too far. The fact is the State Department made phone calls to a number of people here yesterday indicating they would be willing to support this amendment. The only difference…

My views on this bill are well known, as well as the provisions in it. I think the report speaks for itself.