the 109th Congress's rules package, which was adopted this past January on a straight party-line vote, included provisions that made major unfortunate changes in the rules governing consideration of ethics complaints by the Committee on…

on Friday evening, the German Embassy here in Washington will pay tribute to a man of extraordinary talent, a native son whose artistry with a camera has opened the eyes the world over. Today I rise to salute this remarkable gentleman and…

The amendment would add $1.8 billion in additional funding to VA medical care. It is demonstrably true that veterans' medical care is in need of additional funding. More than 235,000 veterans are currently waiting six months or more for…

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…

the gentleman's amendment shines the light on the problem we have in this bill: to provide additional funds for one account, you have to raid another account. There has to be an offset. That is why so many of the account funding levels are…

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.

Mr. Chairman, the Superfund program is funded at $1.2 billion, which is barely enough. It is at the President's request, and barely enough to cover the responsibilities which Superfund is charged to cover. We are talking about toxic waste…

I simply want to rise and compliment the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee) for this amendment. It brings to the attention of the body the fact that in this bill this account, the Corporation for National and Community Service, was…

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?

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…

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…

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…

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…

Not very many months ago, Mr. Chairman, this Congress passed a $1.6 trillion tax cut. That simply means that $1.6 trillion over the next 9 or 10 years has been taken out of general revenues for this country. This amendment looks at that…

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…

Mr. Speaker, the rule before us today is an open rule that allows all amendments provided for under the House rules to be offered. It also waives all points of order against provisions included in the committee-passed bill. Of particular…

Indeed, it is about export-related jobs. We have exported 23,000 steel workers' jobs because of the insensitivity of the American Government, and particularly this institution, over the last 3 years. This particular loan was egregious, and…

we have had, in the last 3 years, 19 steel companies go bankrupt. That is sobering. Nineteen steel companies in this country. We have had 23,000 steelworkers, real jobs for real people, laid off. This is here and now.

We are trying to protect the steel industry from unfair foreign competition, on the one hand; and we are definitely trying to protect it from an agency that is funded with the people's money going out and empowering China, which has a…

I will stipulate to that. What does concern me when we have this debate and there are those who cite the statistics, and stand up and do so so eloquently, is when do we talk about the downside? When do we talk about concern for the 23,000…

Then they granted this loan guarantee. Then they came out and said, ``Another review of this policy has already been planned to begin shortly.'' We are waiting forever for the Ex-Im Bank to review its plans not to hurt American…

If we were to go to the authorizing committee, it may be 2 more years and another 19 steel companies going bankrupt.

The lack of wisdom is in paying off these companies to support investments of the Benxi steel facility in China in order to enable the production of tremendous excess capacity in that plant.

What happens when a crisis is not resolved, a crisis that is allowed to grow, both in scope and intensity? In time, that crisis will become a disaster. Such a time is near at hand for our domestic steel industry. We are in the third year…