"If only we could get the NSA to start spying on members of Congress. Tap their phones and read their email, no warrants necessary. We could call it a "Corruption Surveillance Program," and leak the details to the New York Times to make sure everyone in Congress is made aware they're being watched." - Tom Bevan
"We are a nation that has a government--not the other way around. And this makes us special among the nations of the Earth. Our Government has no power except that granted it by the people. It is time to check and reverse the growth of government which shows signs of having grown beyond the consent of the governed." - Ronald Reagan
"House Speaker Dennis Hastert demanded Wednesday that the FBI surrender documents and other items agents seized on Capitol Hill in what lawmakers said was an unconstitutional raid.
"I think those materials ought to be returned," said Hastert, adding that the FBI agents involved "ought to be frozen out of that (case) for the sake of the Constitution."
The Saturday night search of Rep. William Jefferson's office on Capitol Hill brought Democrats and Republicans together in rare election-year accord, with both parties protesting agency conduct they said violated the Constitution's separation of powers doctrine."
"They claim that it's unconstitutional. Funny...nothing in the Constitution about searching a corrupt public official's office. It protects against unlawful search and seizure...but the feds had a warrant. Separation of powers? Eh..that's a stretch. A crime was committed...what were they supposed to do, look the other way? Right at the front of yesterday's whining was House Majority Leader John Boehner, who said that "the congress will clearly speak to this issue of the justice department's invasion of the legislative branch. In what form I don't know. I've got to believe at the end of the day it's going to end up across the street, at the Supreme Court. I don't see anything short of that." Aww...poor baby."
"I love playing villains." - Alfred Molina
"[Is] being bad was more fun than being good?"
"Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines." - John Benfield
“What is acting but lying and what is good lying but convincing lying?” - Sir Laurence Olivier
"Mexico and four Central American nations condemned the U.S plan to build hundreds of miles of triple-layered fencing on its southern border, saying it would not stop illegal immigration.
In a joint news conference in Mexico City late Thursday, the foreign ministers of Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Mexico said that building barriers was not the way to solve problems between neighboring nations.
"The position of Mexico and the other countries is that walls will not make a difference in terms of the solution to the migration problem," said Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez."
""All of us are looking for a comprehensive migratory regulation so that millions of Latin Americans can continue working in and supporting the United States economy," Briz said."
""Building walls, constructing barriers on the border does not offer an efficient solution in a relationship of friends, neighbors and partners," Fox said in the border city of Tijuana."
"[Fox continued], "We will go on defending the rights of our countrymen without rest or respite. With passion we will demand the full respect of their human rights.""
"Newspapers will run a headline: 'Shark kills human.' You never see a headline from the other perspective: 'Man swims in shark-infested water, forgets he's shark food.'" - Gary Larson
“If you don't stand for something you will fall for anything.” - Malcolm X
"Give us clear vision, that we may know where to stand and what to stand for - because unless we stand for something, we shall fall for anything." - Peter Marshall (preacher, 1902-1949)
"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything." - Alexander Hamilton
"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." - H. L. Mencken
"The more I see the less I know for sure." - John Lennon
"One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I'll never know." - Groucho Marx
"You can't base your life on other people's expectations." - Stevie Wonder
"An earmark in the bill's Senate version would give $500 million to Northrop Grumman to reimburse cost overruns on U.S. Navy shipbuilding contracts caused by Katrina damage at the Mississippi Gulf Coast shipyards in Pascagoula and Gulfport.
...The company, whose revenue last year totaled $40.7 billion, has received $500 million from its insurer and is in litigation seeking another $500 million. The Defense Contract Management Agency has declared "it would be inappropriate to allow Northrop Grumman to bill for costs potentially recoverable by insurance because payment by the government may otherwise relieve the carrier from their policy obligation." Factory Mutual Insurance Co., with 2004 revenue of $2.7 billion, then would be receiving indirect corporate welfare."
"...barely lost, 51 to 48, in a rare Senate vote crossing party lines. Republicans split 28 to 27 against Mississippi's powerful senators, with John McCain and Majority Leader Bill Frist supporting Coburn. Democrats voted 24 to 20 for Northrop Grumman. North Dakota's twin deficit hawks, Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan, voted with Coburn, but Edward M. Kennedy, Hillary Clinton and Democratic Leader Harry Reid supported corporate welfare."
"Be careful in revising those immigration laws of yours. We got careless with ours." - advice given to Hubert Humphrey by an American Indian from New Mexico
"Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing." - Salvador Dali
"Only a fool, Mr. President, Sen. Kennedy, Sen. McCain, would believe you when you speak of new legislation. You don't enforce the laws now."
"...318 employers out of five and a half million in this country have been fined for hiring illegal aliens since 2001. In 2004, only three employers were fined. That is a dismal record, Mr. President, as dismal as the fact that the number of ICE agents assigned to enforce immigration laws in the workplace has declined from only 240 back in 1999 to now less than 100.
The problem in our lack of border security and illegal immigration is becoming increasingly obvious: two political parties that are beholden to corporate America, the largest employers of illegal aliens, and the leadership of both parties that are selling out American citizens in search of cheap labor and political advantage. How dumb do you all think we are? Again, that's only a rhetorical question.
Over the next few days on my broadcast, I'm going to make a suggestion that I hope may help the leadership of both the Republican and Democratic parties begin to take some notice of our laws and our expectations that those laws be enforced. And also take at least some notice of the fact that Republicans and Democrats also represent American citizens, not just corporate America and special interests."
"I have wondered at times what the Ten Commandments would have looked like if Moses had run them through the US Congress." - Ronald Reagan
“Politics: “Poli” a Latin word meaning “many”; and "tics" meaning “bloodsucking creatures”.” - Robin Williams
"Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." - Benjamin Franklin
Mr. President, in the past week, the Senate has voted to reduce the overall cost of H.R. 4939, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Hurricane Recovery, 2006, now totaling nearly $110 billion by a mere $15 million. I'm delighted that President Bush has pledged to veto this bill because Congress has, once again, been unable to resist the temptation to load up a must-pass bill with pork.
Mr. President, I offered several amendments to eliminate non-emergency items in this bill. I appreciate the patience of my colleagues. I'm very pleased and encouraged that this body is increasingly willing to depart from our business-as-usual practices.
That's good, because the American people are paying attention to this process. In a recent Wall Street Journal/NBC poll, the American people said that ending earmarks should be the number one priority for Congress this session. Thirty-nine percent said that members should be prohibited from "directing federal funds to specific projects benefiting only certain constituents." It's interesting to note that ending earmarks was ranked ahead of immigration reform, which was cited as the number one priority by 32 percent of Americans.
I hope that these results, combined with polls showing a 22 percent approval rating for Congress, will encourage conferees to avoid a confrontation with President Bush over spending. I would hope that when conferees look for items to remove from this bill they take a close look at my amendments that lost by a narrow margin as well as those I withdrew.
Mr. President, I believe that in this time of war and disaster recovery the American people expect us to make hard choices about spending. Taxpayers want us to be serving in a spirit of service and sacrifice, not searching for new ways to raid the public treasury.
Congress is raiding the treasury in two ways with this bill. First, many of the items in this bill should be considered in the regular appropriations process and through the regular order. The War on Terror is no longer a surprise. We're entering our fifth year of this war. It shouldn't come as a surprise to Congress that we have needs related to this effort. We've also developed a good understanding about many of the priorities in the Gulf Coast that could have been addressed in the regular budget process.
Congress has also added billions of dollars for items that have no connection to the War on Terror and the Gulf Coast recovery. Again, few of these items are true emergencies. The American people deserve to understand what defines a true emergency. According to the budget resolution for fiscal year 2006 all of the following five criteria must be met to be considered an emergency:
o Necessary, essential, or vital;
o Sudden, quickly coming into being, and not building up over time;
o An urgent, pressing, and compelling need requiring immediate action;
o Unforeseen, unpredictable, and unanticipated; and
o Not permanent, temporary in nature.
Designating a project as an "emergency" excuses Congress from paying for a project. The result of abusing the "emergency" designation is an even greater emergency. Our nation's debt is nearly $8.4 trillion. Each American's share of this debt is $27,964.86. Our national debt is increasing by an average of $1.95 billion per day. Social Security, Medicare and the standard of living of future generations of Americans are in jeopardy as a result of decades of fiscal irresponsibility and rationalizations for spending more money today without considering the consequences tomorrow.
The Social Security trustees' reported this week the program will exhaust its trust fund and begin running annual cash deficits in 2040. A year ago, that prediction was 2041 effectively meaning two years have been lost by a refusal to act. The trustees reported Social Security's unfunded liability is $13.4 trillion.
Of course, the real problem with Social Security and Medicare is much worse because the federal government uses an Enron-style accounting scheme. We habitually borrow or, more accurately, steal money from these trust funds to pay for more spending today.
When the 77 million Baby Boomers begin to retire in 2011, our nation will be faced with the greatest economic challenge in our history. If we continue to indulge in earmarks, the gateway drug to spending addictions, we will never address these complex challenges, particularly if we can't resist the urge to abuse the earmark process on a bill designed to address the emergency needs of our troops and displaced people in the Gulf Coast.
Another reason we must act today to rein in wasteful spending is because our ability to influence world events is diminished by our debt to other nations. We now have the distinction of being the world's largest debtor nation, and this bill will add to that debt. Many serious economists are warning that our excessive borrowing from foreign sources could cause the value of the dollar to collapse, which would lead to a disaster for our economy. It is incredibly short-sighted for this body to sell treasury bills to countries like China so we can finance economic development programs and other pet projects while, at the same time, we hope to encourage China to be more aggressive in terms of discouraging Iran from developing nuclear weapons. This is not just a numbers game. The future vitality of our nation is at stake. We are slowly but surely whittling away our national power and ability to leverage other nations away by our refusal to make hard choices about spending.
Many of the items in this bill are obviously not emergencies, which is why this bill will be vetoed by President Bush if it is sent to him in its current form. Again, I hope conferees do not force the President to take this step. I'm confident the President will veto this bill. He understands that it is more important to secure the next generation rather than the next election.
Past presidents and Congresses have made hard choices during difficult times. Between 1939 and 1942, Congress and FDR cut spending for nondefense programs by 22 percent. In 1950, President Truman and Congress cut nonmilitary spending by 28 percent. I would suggest to my colleagues that if we want to be here past 2006 we better do the same.
Still, I agree with my colleagues who say that the President's priorities don't come down from heaven. I would suggest, however, that we are all subject to the judgment that comes down from the taxpayers. If we flippantly disregard the President's insistence that we make hard choices, the judgment of the taxpayers will not be kind to any of us.
Families across this country are faced with hard choices every day in order to live within their budget. They have elected us to make hard choices. Our refusal to do this only reinforces the perception that we are disconnected from the priority-setting reality that governs the rest of the country.
It is wrong, for example, for this body to fund pork projects like grape research in the state of California then force the taxpayers in my state and every other state to pay for a so-called 'emergency' project that has been ongoing for the last 46 years and has already received more than $130 million from the American taxpayer. Where this body sees an emergency the taxpayers often see a series of misplaced priorities.
The state of California received 549 federal earmarks this year totaling $733 million. That included $10 million in federal resources alone for museums. Is it more important to protect the residents at risk from flooding by the Sacramento River or to fund grape research? Congress is spending over $3.6 million on a grape research center in California this year. We are spending another $1 million on a pedestrian walkway project in Calimesa and a half a million on pedestrian/bike improvements on Tower Bridge in Sacramento? What is more important for Sacramento? Why can't we prioritize today so future generations are not forced to make even tougher choices between massive tax hikes, drastic cuts to Medicare and Social Security or the defense of our nation?
Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Cowardice asks the question - is it safe? Expediency asks the question - is it popular? Vanity asks the question - is it popular? But conscience asks the question - is it right?"
I plead with my colleagues. Do what is right. Our nation is on an unsustainable course and that course correction must begin today, not when it is too late.
I yield the floor.
"Football combines two of the worst things in American life. It is violence punctuated by committee meetings." - George Will
"An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last." - Winston Churchill
"All the time a person is a child he is both a child and learning to be a parent. After he becomes a parent he becomes predominantly a parent reliving childhood." - Dr. Benjamin Spock
1. Texans: DE Mario Williams.
2. Saints: RB Reggie Bush.
4. Jets: OT D'Brickashaw Ferguson.
5. Packers: LB A.J. Hawk.
6. 49ers: TE Vernon Davis.
31. Seahawks: CB Kelly Jennings.
8. Bills: QB Jay Cutler. Marv Levy would like another Jim Kelly, but he'll settle for Jay Cutler. Bills may also trade down to let someone else draft Cutler. Don't be surprised if another team gets nervous after the Raiders take Young and offers the Bills too much for the pick.
