On the recordSeptember 20, 2013
I thank the chairman. I appreciate him yielding. Madam Speaker, I have to tell you that I agree with the statement of my good friend from Indiana (Mr. Visclosky). In fact, most people sitting on the Floor are on the Appropriations Committee and agree with him that we need to get back to regular order. I can tell you that our chairman and the ranking member have been trying to get us back to regular order where we pass individual appropriations bills and get them done. So far we haven't been able to do that, so it's necessary to do a short-term CR. I can tell you that we've heard over the last couple of days a lot of talk about Republicans trying to shut down the government. That's the last thing we want to do. If we wanted to do that, we wouldn't be doing a short-term CR. The reason we're doing a short-term CR instead of a long-term CR is because we need to allow the Appropriations Committee to do their work--to finish their bills, to work with the Senate and get conference reports done, and do our individual bills. And that's what we're working on. We can't fall into the abyss of a long-term CR. I will give you an example. As many of you know, the West has been on fire this summer--in fact, our chairman was out in Idaho reducing the number of fish in our streams out there this summer. He saw the effects of the fires and what it's having in Idaho and throughout the West.…
