On the recordMarch 15, 2011
I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I can tell the gentleman that just spoke, the minority whip, a good friend of mine, what we can pass in this House and what our conference will agree to, and that is the $61 million in cuts or $100 million overall that we have already agreed to and already passed. We can pass that in this House. I have heard that this is no way to run a railroad. My good friend from Virginia said this is no way to run a government. I have heard this is operational outrage. I will tell you the outrage here is that we are having to do this because the former majority, when they had the majority in the House, the majority in the Senate and the White House, failed to pass an appropriation bill. They left the American people in this country with this pile of crap. They should not complain about how we try to clean this up. Mr. Speaker, by the end of this week, the appropriations subcommittee which I am privileged to chair, the Interior and Environment Subcommittee, will have had 12 budget oversight hearings over the past 3 weeks. That is 12 hearings addressing the fiscal 2012 budget that we will soon be writing. It is worth noting that we are now 5\1/2\ months into the fiscal year 2011, and we still don't have a budget to fund the government through the end of the current fiscal year. The CR we are considering today keeps the government operating for another 3 weeks. And you're right: We need to solve this within this next 3 weeks.…
