Alan B. Mollohan

The gentleman seeks to increase by a factor of two the hurricane intensity forecast capability. There is a lot of concern with regard to this. We certainly are extremely sympathetic to the purpose of the amendment. We do not like the…

They do have the right take, and she obviously has picked a substantive issue to be concerned about and defend, and the gentleman is to be commended for picking it up and fighting for her and sea turtles.

If I have any time left, Mr. Chairman, I would just point out that about 90 percent of the account where the gentleman is seeking an offset, the general administrative account, goes towards operational support for the Department of Justice…

I just will stipulate to our concerns about trade with China and the necessity to review it. That is why we have this office. You are suggesting that we need additional funding. You are suggesting doubling the funding, which impacts Census…

No. It's terminal. It's a bad offset. It degrades the Census Bureau's ability to collect economic statistics, which is terrible. But please.

Every Member of this body is looking at their congressional district and thinking about economic developments and what are the needs. If you are in a transition economy, transitioning from a basic industry, manufacturing economy to a new…

The gentleman really answers the question why should we even consider it here. You say, why should we not use this? That is exactly why this ought to be considered by the authorizing committee. We ought to have testimony taken by the…

I was just going to compliment the gentleman from North Carolina for bringing this issue up. I remember when he first brought it to the Congress, and I want to compliment him for bringing this amendment to the floor. I also want to…

Not in 5 minutes, unfortunately. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the distinguished gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Gordon).

With that representation, I will not oppose the gentleman. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

As I yield to another gentleman from California (Mr. Farr) to close, I note that the minuscule amount results in 100 RIFs out of NOAA. Mr. Chairman, I yield the remaining time to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr).

If I may inquire, what was the unanimous consent request stated by the gentleman from Virginia? The Acting CHAIRMAN. The Chair would state that the unanimous consent request, which has been agreed to, was for 5 minutes for the gentlewoman…

I reclaim my time. My point is, Mr. Chairman, the cuts are simply unacceptable. The purpose is laudable. The offsets are unacceptable.

Reclaiming my time because I only have 2 minutes, I need a little more efficient answer. Does the gentleman think that the FBI's counterterrorism program can stand a $50 million cut from what we have appropriated and recommend in this bill?

Reclaiming my time, exactly. Under the new rules, to be perfectly clear about it, the 45-day period would toll once an investigative subcommittee were appointed. But the point here is that the effort of any of those who did not want to…

The gentleman makes the point that in the case that he worked on, and it is unnecessary to mention it by name, but that his investigative subcommittee, he and his colleagues, did an excellent job. And one of the reasons they did is because…

I agree that should funds under the VA-HUD allocation increase, VA medical service would most definitely be one of our first priorities.

Mr. Chairman, the appropriations bill being considered today provides appropriations for a broad array of Federal agencies. While our allocation of $112.7 billion, of which $90 billion represents discretionary spending, sounds large it is…

I understand that, but the gentleman understands, because he is a real student of this, that the dollars are just too far in excess of the authorization and that complying with both paragraph one and paragraph two is impossible.

But the Member is setting up here an impossible situation. The gentleman is taking the flexibility away from NASA to manipulate funding between these projects, to engage the international community to help fund these projects, to delay…

None of the funds may be used to obligate amounts in contravention of that act. Then it says, or defer or cancel construction of the habitat module crew return vehicle propulsion module. As I understand that, the gentleman is saying they…

That would have straight-out eliminated the station program. I understand why the gentleman did that. It has been defeated on this floor a number of times and the body has spoken pretty overwhelmingly with regard to that issue. I frankly…

I understood the gentleman's first International Space Station amendment here. It was an amendment much like the amendments he has offered in the past, I think the last 5 years, as a matter of fact. It was a straight-up cut; was it not?

There is a net decrease of $47 million as I compute it. The drug elimination program was funded at $310 million in 2001, and eliminated this year. $263 million was added to the Public Housing Operating Fund, and that resulted in a net…

I question the gentleman's estimate about when we can finish this bill even if we were to proceed here tonight. There is a lot of material here. He might be right, he might be wrong, but my judgement is he is probably underestimating the…