Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20140404

Journalthe washington pos morning that is in the the wall street journal this morning. The Supreme Court is working on things. If you have a public aussie issue youd like to discuss this morning, here are the numbers. Front page of the Orange County register. First call this morning comes from julia, a democrat in greensboro, north carolina. Good morning, julius. What is a Public Policy that is on your mind . I want to let the people know that the aca is working and karl rove, i dont know why he wants to come up. And say that he couldnt get 7 million people, but he did. Want to thank all the democrats and let people know that the aca is working. Billy, miami, independent. Good morning. Caller i have an issue around gay people. I my partner and i have been together until his death in 1999. We ran a business together, we own a home, we have a mortgage is like everybody else. Saying that iis was not entitled to benefits because we were not married. I ofnk is a complete rip off this country by taking the taxes of gay people and not giving them benefits like are harder like heterosexual counterparts. Thank you and have a great day. Host up next is rich in kingsport, tennessee. To bring up the issue that was discussed in the day about the limits on campaign opinions and the scotus. I keep hearing people saying that politicians are buying elections. Im skeptical about this. I was people would just come out and say that they think that voters are stupid. Looked,the last time i and talking about people having a voice, it is still one person one vote. I am not getting any checks. I have been voting since 1972. No one has ever sent me any money to buy my vote. Meg whitman lost an election in california even though she outspent her opponent. If theyre talking about buying commercials, ive have not ever talk to anyone who said i really look forward to seeing more campaign commercials. In fact, i reach for the mute button every time i hear, about the third time i have heard something, that is three times too many. Said, youre ok with these limits being removed by the Supreme Court . Sure am. With all the information we have, starting with cspan, with the internet, with all the Information Available to find , ifabout the candidates people cant watch debates and things and determine for themselves if it is simply a matter of who has the most funds put out, which are also are annoying to everyone, if it is just name recognition and if people think that every political ad, if they buy everything is being said, that they believe every commercial on tv when an advertiser says their product is the best host all right, we will leave it there. Rich, tennessee. Cindy in wyoming. Caller im concerned about this military shooting that happened. My son is in the military. The information that is coming out is quite sketchy. Frankly, a little scary. I need to and i have let my congressmen know that im disappointed in what they are doing on this issue. You disappointed in congress . What would you like to see them do . Care, ibetter medical dont know, it is something. Thank you. Host the hill asked this question. Will be discussing this issue in about 20 minutes or so with Donald Mccann who is a former chair of the federal election commission, and Brenda Wright, who has argued cases in front of the Supreme Court. Os. Was a group called fem sable is calling in. Concur with the caller before the last caller. I think the money in politics is not a big issue. One thing we should be working towards is educating the voters. One thing that plays a role is [indiscernible] many people know the judges on American Idol than they know the names of the Supreme Court justices. That is a very bad situation. I think the money is not the big issue. Linda, calling from tennessee. Caller tina or memphis tennessee is . Thea hundred 26 miles from county. Host linda, what is on your mind this morning . Linda, you have to turn down the volume on your tv. We will put you on hold and someone is going to talk to you. We will come back to you. Don and sumter, South Carolina. Caller i just wanted to point out the inconsistency of the very itcourt as of late seems a favor Corporate America so much. The dismantling of the election it,aign laws on one end of allowing people to have great influence. The guy from tennessee was wrong. Commercials to influence people. Then, on the other side of it, they dont seem to mind the voting act of 64 when they had protections in place to allow voting. They are expanding the money that can be thrown at politics on one side and decreasing the ability for the average person to vote. I think that is a serious inconsistency. Wouldwhat kind of limits you like to see, don . Caller they should go back to the original laws that came right after watergate, and just leave those in place. Also, they should go back to where we were with Voting Rights and try to expand the ability for everyone to vote. That is really what we want. We dont want to restrict. All right, linda in tennessee. Go ahead with your comment about a Public Policy issue. Caller ok. I was calling about the unemployment. Were listening, maam. Im host will try one more time, linda. Tom from oak olive, florida. Cala, florida. Im not sure thomas knows hes on national television. We have a longtime democratic representative here in the suburbs in virginia. He says that members of congress cant afford to live decently in washington dc, despite what constituents outside of washington might think, members of congress are underpaid, branch legislative appropriator suggested on thursday. Virginia democrat james moran said he plans to highlight the injustice by introducing an amendment to the legislative branch bill during its full Committee Markup and for consideration of the bill. Moran made the comments on the got members hundred 74,000 salaries hundred 74,000 salaries are being marked up. I think American People should know that the members of congress are underpaid he told cq roll call. The fact is, this is the board of directors for the largest economic entity in the world. That is jim moran who is retiring from his seat care isses in the Washington Post this morning. Senator dan kurtz, republican of indiana was wrapped for hearing on the indiana defense budget. Theres one problem. Coates was in the wrong hearing. Here is some video. I just got a note saying im at the wrong hearing. I have the right room number, but the wrong hearing. [applause] [laughter] this is the first time mrs. Happened to me. Youre always welcome in this committee. We will let you off the hook on this one. Thank you, senator. I hope youre able to respond as quickly as the other test as he under secretary of the army. Im going to find out where i am supposed to be. And from the call him anthony in miller place, new york. What is on your mind . I look so forward to fridays. He is a busy. Guys do a tremendous job. Every time someone criticizes you folks im always at odds with it because i dont think they have a comprehension of the amount of reading you must do when you are off air. The research that goes into it uses outstanding. Aegor braun is doing wonderful job. Theres a girl from alaska whos gone, she was great, too. Your replacements have been outstanding. You guys are like family and weve grown accustomed, you are our walter cronkite. You are very important to us. That said, i would like to hope that the producers at cspan might do some more coverage of the accident of fukushima, because i believe that is the greatest threat to homeland downity, is three melted Nuclear Reactors out the coast of california. It athas been no talk of all. The student cam winners of 2010 or a group of High School Students who were proponents of nuclear energy, touting its safeguards and safety and the redundancies and there can never be an accident. And yet it was in year later that we have the worst disaster that could that we could possibly imagine. They really dont have the technology to fix it. I wonder what were going to do about it very hear anybody talking about it is almost like were on the deck of the titanic and no one is mentioning that we are about to sink. Also, a lot of times you have these people, the 9 11 truth theres always calling in an touting this Building Seven stuff. I wish we afternoon or morning host are you a 9 11 truth or, anthony . Their they keep hanging hat on Building Seven. Theres a lot to be said about that. There is so much other stuff, evidence that was never sandi bergen still some document from the national archives. I want to know what he stole why stole it. What you do in miller place new york and what is their . Extremely an politically corrupt area. I take every child with down syndrome. Im a caretaker. In fact, im at work right now. Im waiting to prechild on the bus for the program. Host anthony, thanks for calling in. I appreciated very much. Ron is calling it from cincinnati. Hello, ronald. Caller my problem is they keep talking about obamacare. It nt they just call didnt want to pass it, that two thirds of the majority of they want to. He is the executive. He is one that initiates it. That is all. See why they want to throw it on him all the time. Thate had to do is the one administered it. I would just leave it at that, thank you. Host from the hill newspaper. Bill in reading, pa on the republican line. Caller boy, youre looking good every time i see you. God bless you and god bless cspan. I want to say this about the situation in texas. Hello . The one who killed 15 people in the mall and they gave him 150 years in prison. He then he killed himself. Is not a mental case. He knows what he is doing. These people know what theyre doing, believe me, it is not a mental case. I dont care if your mental case or not, you should get the death penalty. If you get a crime like that, dont use it as a mental case situation. My point is this, the people in america dont know how to vote. They criticize the politicians, they criticize this and that. They put him back in for 20 years or 30 years. So dont blame the politicians. We have to blame ourselves because we vote these people over and over and over again. That is the whole situation. The gentleman in new york when he said, i agree about cspan. You have the best program and all United States. Thank you for calling in. Butch in kingston, ohio. Where is kinks in ohio, but where is kingston, ohio . Every year we have a shortage in the winter time. Were going to get the short end of the stick if they go ahead and do that. That is my biggest concern. That is my comment. Host we think about your governor and his reelection, would you vote from . Caller everybody thinks he is great. But you live out here any evidence in view. Ban after court calls it illegal in turkey. Youtube remains unavailable in that country. The Washington Post has an article here about democrats to target, single women. Front page of the Washington Times this morning talks about the vote in afghanistan. Afghans will vote saturday for a new president in an election that will not only beginner countrys first democratic transition to power, but also may provide clarity about, u. S. And foreign troops will remain in a wartorn nation after this year. The vote in afghanistan is on saturday. Also from the Washington Times, an article about Speaker Boehner mr. Boehnerlenge by can afford the ads. His campaign ended last year with 2. 9 million in the bank urges challenges have not kept pace. That is in the washington the New York Times has an article about the ceo of mozilla being fired after they found out that he sent a check to support prop eight, which was viewed as an antigay marriage proposition. Steve in ridgway, pennsylvania. You are on the washington journal. What is undermines morning . Caller i have to take exception this morning with the very first caller called in and the way that he referred to karl rove as some white boy coming down here. The racial overtones in a statement. Almost look like youre going to laugh about it hurt i find that unacceptable. Aboutere to Start Talking way,dy of color being that or become immediately and i would expect because of immediately. ,ut that is one small thing amid the many great things you guys do. At times, new jersey great job. You carry the torch farewell. Still does a q a on sunday nights. I dont know if you are aware of that. He is an interview program. Caller i should, and i dont third i should watch among the rebroadcast. I dont think about the political time the political time for me is in the morning. Host what is your work . I work for a company out of indiana that supplies sensors chemicals to the Food Industry and stuff. I have been with them for about eight years, working in the Paper Industry 20 years prior to that area the economy has been upanddown and down. I live in rural pennsylvania right near the Allegheny National forest. We have taken some pretty big hits from some they shut down logging in the Allegheny National forest years ago. It was a class project out of the university where the ticket to court because he said the conditions were ripe for the there was no evidence that it was. It was suggested that you could. The Allegheny National forest is one of the prime producers of black cherry lumber in north america, in the world. When they did that, it essentially cut off the funding for many of our Public Schools, because that is where a lot of our Public School funding came in. You have to remember, we live in a very sparsely populated area where we may only have hundredhundred 20 a hundred thousandhundred 20,000 people. The publishing growth has helped. It is not a perfect industry by any stretch of imagination. The economic gains in my immediate area have been pretty intense. Steve, thanks for checking in with us. From the the wall street journal. Tim, drexel hill, pennsylvania. Tim, you are on the washington journal. Talk aboutant to incredibly destructive influence of Citizens United heard on top of that the latest Supreme Court ruling. The easiest ways of illustrating debate overwhole obamacare, the aca. Just some quick facts that are absolutely denied and all of the seenic advertising we have again, because of the big money that is being spent. To promoteresident the idea of health care was theodore roosevelt. Yet you never died. No president made a persistent effort until franklin roosevelt, who made two major attempts, both of which failed, probably because republicans opposition to social security. Truman tried and failed. Neither eisenhower nor kennedy made any attempt at all. Starting with lyndon b. Johnson, the president has made some attempt to Pass National healthcare. Tank89, republican think Heritage Foundation heavily promoted a plan that included a mandate that all uninsured would be required to Purchase Health care in order to allow increased revenues to Insurance Companies to lower premiums and increase host all right tim, bring this to a conclusion. Caller there are so much disinformation that people dont understand that everybody has wanted this, but each party denounces the other if it is not being done the way that party wants it done. Host that is timid pennsylvania. Morning. Itical this clinton discussed her work of the state department. Calls for young women not to take criticisms personally and wrapped the media for treating powerful women with a double standard at the kickoff of women onthe world in new york city thursday night. Star article is in political. From the Washington Post, state Department Inspector general issues where other. Again, that is in the Washington Post. Reunion looksh 41 to burnish his legacy. This is from the New York Times. Little bit from the New York Times article. , michigan. Nt michiga what is on your mind . Speak i would like to about the Marijuana Legalization issue, which is a National Issue at the time. The use of marijuana does not rise to the level that one should be jailed or prosecuted. Basically is a cultural issue. Ank it is a time whose time that is come. They should support candidates and issues that support them. I think they should work against those that are against them. They should start a movement, maybe Something Like the marijuana Anonymous Movement where you can make small contributions to candidates, maybe a dollar figure. Attached to it let the November Vote coming. We can sway the national elections. Host why is that important to you, sir . Caller it is important because many people are users that i know. I think it is a cultural thing. , the european nations dont have a history of using marijuana, but everybody else in the world does. Smoking hash was something that Thomas Jefferson wrote about. It was way back in our history. It has been prevalent in American Society throughout time. Host all right, that is rushville russell in flint, michigan. What the Supreme Court did on Campaign Finance reform in Supreme Court cases. Maybe some of its effects as well. After that, we will look at the performance of urban schools. This a new report out that some urban schools are doing better than they have in the past. Morning. 9 a. M. This wednesday on the floor of the senate floor, senators reid and mcconnell on thursday talked about the fort hood victims. Heres a little bit of that. We have to reflect on what took place at fort hood yesterday. We have yourdy general understanding. Our hearts are all broken as a result of another tragedy at this great military training facility. Just a few years ago there was another mass murder here. Every casualty is the false are brave service members. It is such a sad thing. Fort hood has seen more than its fair share of tragedy. Community and the families are greening are grieving. This seems to be a senseless act. Chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, chairman Martin Dempsey said it as follows. Heres a community that is faced a crisis with equanimity and strength. That is true. We stand with the people of fort. Ood today we stand wherever there situated in the world. We admire the strength and resilience. I would like to start today with a word about yesterdays tragic shooting at fort hood. As investigation continues, we will learn more fax. What we already know is that fort hood is has faced a great deal of adversity and challenges over the past two years. The community there has rallied around our uniformed personnel. We also know that the onbase military police appeared to have responded quickly, appropriately , and obviously at great personal risk to themselves. As always, a tragedy like this, admire the courage and commitment of those who rush to help the victims. Of course we are thinking and praying today for the victims, their families and their fellow shoulders soldiers and civilians at fort hood. Washington journal continues. Dominick m is the former chair of the that election commission. Were going to be discussing Supreme Court decision on campaign financing. Lets start with you. Of atuldve the effect the Supreme Court did in wednesday, or tuesday echo the case were talking about, mccutchen versus sec, was brought by what the alabama who want to contribute more to federal candidates than the current limits allow. He wanted everyone to contribute a 223,000. The court issued that extension the effect of that decision takes us from a total of contribution for any one individual of hundred 23,000, although a way up to about 3. 5 million if you look at the amounts that an individual can now contribute to all federal candidates and Party Candidates combined. Major influx of big money into the political process. Our organization is estimated that it will add about a billion dollars to political spending in the next election. Is that a good thing, that thing, neutral thing . A disasterhink it is for our democracy. We already had a system in which the wealthiest few are able to exert so much more influence on our elected system and our elected representatives than the rest of us. A decision like this just makes a bad situation worse. Donald mccann, do you agree with that opinion . No, i dont. First, the idea that there is going to automatically be a billion dollars of new money in frankly, with all due respect, ridiculous. People in this country can spend Unlimited Money on their own, independent of candidates already. This is been the case for years didrs going back to you that there will be additional money is not exactly true. The candidates would then disclose the money that they are receiving. We would have more information, not less. Finally, the candidates would be more accountable for the message. Idea we have to be real clear of what was before the court and what is not before the court heard theres there are contribution limits as to member ofe given to a congress or senator. The hundred 22,000 was a biannual limit that capped all giving. The ideathat is gone, that there are going to be folks who can figure out a way to give over 3 million in our election cycle is kind of far fetched her it Supreme Court dealt his head on in the opinion. They felt it was a wild hypothetical. Theres a. That you can do this, but every state party in america, every candidate, and the National Party must get together. It is a rather elaborate example that the court dealt with and rejected. The 2600, whered you get that figure . It remains, correct . One person cannot give more than 2600 more than one candidate. 70s theack to the 19 contribution was a thousand dollars per election per mccainfeingold, it was raised to 2000 per election per candidate. It was indexed for employees. Host is more transparency legitimate in your view . I think the short answer is that if people didnt want to spend more on federal elections, this case would never have been brought. The whole theory of the case was to havewasnt enough only 123,000 in funding. Past history is that when you open up new evidence and donors toig boner russian. The furthest use our system toward the entrance of the very wealthiest of us and away from the ideal of one person one vote. This was a 54 decision, in our decision. Went into great which about the ways in the avenues of fundraising would be [by the very result that the majority reached. To say that the court found there wouldnt be any problem is really papering over the fact that the court was deeply divided on this issue with a 54 decision. Hisustice breyer said in dissent, the majority really did the firstdea of amendment. It was never supposed to be a bludgeon dominate the political marketplace. The bill, understanding of the First Amendment, means that we have a democracy in which our voice can be heard. That is where the clerk will he went wrong in mccutchen and frankly in many of the previous upon whichch to mccutchen court relied. Aest first, lets talk little bit about the emphasis on the 54 decision. Itsoesnt really matter if 549zero, and becomes opinion of the court. The idea that we are going to ise to emphasize fivefour like trivializing the makeup of the court. Second, swing court doesnt really find problems or make policy judgments, they merely react to the law that is being presented to them. In this case, it is an act of congress. It was part of the mccainfeingold reforms. They certainly did acknowledgments of what is going on in the modern campaignfinance landscape. They talked expressly about socalled super packs. These are committees are formed independent of campaigns. I was struck by the reaction that somehow your transparency is not the answer to this. I am the one hear arguing against disclosure. It seems every verse roles and listen to be saying with the court is saying, which is your better off having the money go to candidates because is more accountability with transparency and the like, as opposed to the system that enforces upon us as a result of the misguided policy choices of mccainfeingold. It is pretty system where you have candidates being vastly obstreperous single issue groups, nonprofit groups and the like. Certainly they have a right to speak, but in america the central voice should be the voice of the candidates. The voters should have real choice between candidates and have as much information about the candidates as possible third i think the best way to do that is to ensure the candidates have the resources sufficient to fund their message. Third, lets not get too carried away with the bogeyman of the rich. Certainly, this is not the sort of opinion that will benefit ordinary americans today. It certainly is a lot of money to say that hundred 22,000 is not enough to give. That is not really the issue. The issue is a little more nuanced. First, mccutchen is an electrical engineer by training. He runs a small business. He is from alabama. He wanted to give money to more than 18 candidates under this biannual limit, he was prohibited from doing so. In fact, the maximum contribution can be sent to candidates. Ninely give the maximum to candidates for federal office. It leaves 1800 to spread out among park committees and the like. He thought that was wrong. He did make a lot of sense. Somehow, giving the nine candidates was all right. The court, on that back pattern, realized that would probably go too far. Second, the other issue that never comes up is the idea of Corporate Tax and union tax and other groups. Corporations can form separate funds within the Corporate Structure that can give money to candidates. They were never subject to the sort of biannual limit. You have a situation where individuals have a limit on what they can give to candidates generally. Didorations and union packs not have its a limit. That seems to be manifestly unfair. I was not really something that appeal to the majority of the Supreme Court area did seems to be the sort of thing that ordinary americans, when you look at the quality versus the inequality of the money, i think we got all types of there are bizarre rules that seem to perpetuate a system that most of us dont really think should be a quickted. Host response before we go to calls, bonnie. Guest i think it is interesting that you should mention that the court should not be making policy. That is precisely the point that Justice Breyer made in his dissent. Congress should be making this policy. It was congresss determination that the limits that we are talking about were necessary to prevent corruption and the appearance of corruption. It was the 54 majority of the court that decided to insert its own policy views on an evidentiary record that hadnt even been developed yet in the case below. To substitute its judgment for the judgment of congress on this case. The idea that courts should not the making policy decisions is one of the things that is precisely wrong with what the court did this week. Host and, it is time to take some calls from viewers. Our guest, donald madame, former sec chair, and Brenda Wright who is Vice President of legal group. Ies for the demos kim, go ahead. Really, i called in on this over a year ago. We are talking about the other findings and what do we do and we didnt get that vote for transparency with the congress by one vote. Control thek we can amount of money. If the Supreme Court says everybody should be able to spend as much as they want, the problem i see is that it goes right up to the last minute. My suggestion to the united democracy,old onto is that we should implement a law that says there is no advertising. In the last 30 days prior to an election. Go ahead, spend all your money, say what you want to say, truth or false, but at the 30 point prior to election day, no more advertising. Host mr. Mcgann. Band Union Advertising within 30 days of primary elections and 60 days of general elections. I would go twice as far as you suggest. Supreme court consider that band first. It is a series of cases that limited the region. Citizens united struck the band. That is been tried. It is interesting you say that, because the thing about the ads, and the spending, is that it most urgentt smote affect an application. Answer far away from election tend not to be persuasive. It seems to me to ban speech at a time when it had its its most negative impact, seems to be backwards. Other countries try to limit Campaign Spending to only the election. Im not particularly knowledgeable about any countries, but my understanding is great britain, for example. The exacte suggest opposite, which is like stop the around campaign. These are very interesting ideas, but where the court has said that this sort of speech is actually speech protected by the First Amendment, it is for difficult to ban it without some sort of compelling interest. Lacking,eally what is although congress should limit the policy choice reviews a policy choice, commerce and the government was unable to justify. His biannual limit don mccann. The Supreme Court ruled on wednesday. Away . Y take effect right is it now law that people can give essentially a lot more unlimited amounts . Technically the face has been remanded. They will issue an order that declares a lot to be no longer. There were regulations on the books that implement this statute. Those are still on the books. In fact, check this morning. The ftc has not updated their charts and whatnot on the limits of people. Theyre making fun of this already. Matter, it is the law of the land. It is more of a ministerial process from here on out. How long was ministerial process last . It shouldnt take too long. Enough to staffed take all these changes, to account for these changes. Ill think would require less people to implement the law. People, younal think you would need to elect law,e to enforce that Brenda Wright, who does this affect more . Caller i did just want to jump think the i did question and the answer illustrate something important. Guest what they illustrate is that time after time, the principal limits that congress is try to put into place that will dominate influence of money in a political system, has been shut down over the years by a Supreme Court majority that is really, in my view, missed understanding and misapplying the First Amendment. The idea that we need a compelling interest for these laws, of course is correct, as a matter of constitutional law. One of the biggest problems of the Supreme Courts choose prudence is that it is taken off the table. One of the most obvious and important interests that undergird any effort to reduce the role of money in politics. Does the basic interest in sureical equality, making that we all come to the table as political equals. The mccutcheon case would have been a slamdunk if the court had been able to consider the important and compelling interest in ensuring that the dont gone out the voices of the rest of us. In 1976, it was really in my view a longterm in a constitutional jurist prudence around money in politics. It is something that needs to be ably rethought this is in regards to how you answered the phone. You said the republican line this time. Most of the time you do not the democrat, republican or independent. Why . Host do you have a question for our guest . Everybody isng as put up there who shows that who gave the money and how much immediately within 48 hours of giving the money, it should be fair, for everyone. That is free speech. I just dont agree. I believe that if we have a system in which the size of your wallet determines the strength of your voice in the political system, we do not have a system that the framers intended. I believe it should be and must be within the powers of we the people to make a decision about what role money will play in our political system and take us back to a system where we have one person am a onevote, instead of the more money you have come the more power and influence you have. Thet the concept that First Amendment requires a quality of speech is something that the Supreme Court has never embraced. The First Amendment states unequivocally that Congress Shall make no law. It seems odd to say that a provision to the constitution that says Congress Shall make no law somehow empowers congress to make a law to make speech equal. This is not a new or novel concept. From 1976 case back which people on both sides of the aisle agree has some issues. It is a precedent of the court. This was not from a modern, 54, 54, uberconservative court. Considered a liberal, activist court. It really does not matter if the court is perceived as liberal or conservative, activist or not. Beenems that the court has consistent that the First Amendment means what it says. What never gets mentioned in this debate is what about a large Corporate Media . We want to talk about equality of speech. Why does the media have an unfettered right to speak, wheres individuals seem to incur the wrath of congress for various limits and prohibitions . The issues that caught the attention of several justices in the Citizens United case. That some corporations could speak and others could not. The answer has to be more speech, not less speech. Lets not forget how state elections are run. In several states, they do not have contribution limits. My home state of virginia does not have contribution limits. Yet, virginia has a remarkably clean history with regard to public corruption and the like. Other states that do not have limits, like illinois, have a little bit of a different tradition. Various states have tried different limits. Yet, democracy is not crumbling. In virginia, you did not see the expendituresendent of the sorts you see in federal elections because people can give more money directly to candidates, so the candidates get to speak the loudest or have a fair shot to talk to real americans. That you canne is only give to summon the candidates and the candidates people are going to give to is the incumbents are part of the existing power structure. It was starving off Party Committees and people not on the proverbial a list. S could print actually this could actually provide a little bit of the quality to those who could not receive the the limits in place. \ host the next call comes from houston, texas. Democrats line. Caller i have a statement. I believe the Supreme Court made to bad decisions. Citizens united. , the last decision they made about limitations on contributions. You cannot tell me that money will not influence congressmen or senators about making decisions. They have a personal interest in this. That is the only reason they would give that kind of money. Court needssupreme to get tenured on the bench. People up there are 80 years old. The brains are not functioning. They are not up with the times. Thank you. You raise some good points. , merely reverse order because of some of this up in Court Justices are old does not mean they have lost a step. Astice ginsburg is not physical presence, but intellectually, she is certainly a force to be reckoned with. She has not lost a step at all. I think they all remain fairly sharp. I hear you though if you do have hisstice that is beyond years, so to speak. This has happened in the past. That maybe there ought to be a way to deal with that. That would take a constitutional amendment and a lot of work. As for what the Supreme Court , i done with these two cases guess i have two thoughts. It is what it is. The court has ruled. We have to proceed. The court did as a reaction to what congress has passed in a way to limit the political participation of individuals. That is the fundamental problem. If congress would take seriously what the court has said over decades of judicial precedents, they may be able to develop a system that is constitutional and brings more the sort of fairness that the caller six. Seeks. Idea that the court is simply trying to encourage more political participation is really a misguided analysis of the opinion. The only folks who can take advantage of a decision like and engage in more socalled participation are those who have the wherewithal to spend more than 123,000 in a single federal election. That is twice the median annual income of an american family. Opening the about doors for participation, lets not fool ourselves with slogans like that. The court has given us anatole transfers amendment. Law in its majestic impartiality prevents the rich and poor alike from sleeping under bridges. The Supreme Court we have had that has given us this permits ordinary citizens and china corporations alike the same right to spend as much money as they want to giant corporations alike to spend the same much as they want to. This is a notion of equality that is entirely empty and is entirely formal and has nothing to do with the real world, and which the interests of the wealthiest among us, the donor class, are heard loud and clear and congress, while the interests of the rest of us are not. One of the clearest illustrations this week, a big majority of americans support an increase of the minimum wage. The house refused to bring it to the floor. We need to have a system that encourages real participation by everybody and not just dominance by the people who have the most to spend on elections. Host harmony, north carolina. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I have a comment and a question. Comment is that harry reid is having a pit about the och brothersut the ki donated money to the republican party. They are American People and they hire thousands of people and put them to work. Not even an is american. He donates more money than the Koch Brothers and yet there is never anything said about him. George soros is not even an american. What i would like to know is what interest does george soros have in the Democratic Party that he donates so much money, millions of dollars to the Democratic Party, why this he donate all this money to the democrats and there is never nothing said about it . I will take my answer off the air. I certainly cant speak for george soros or anybody else. Actually hear his name brought up quite a bit. That nobody is mentioning him in the context of this discussion. That itcomes down to is is not enough to say, the wealth brothers is offset by the wealth of george soros. I think we would be much better off in a system where wealth is not the ticket. To our democratic process. Whether it comes from the democratic side a republican side is not the issue in my view. I think it is just bad for america that we have a system in which so much of Public Policy depends on the contributions and the spending of the wealthiest among us. We need a system that takes us back to one person, one vote, that restores political equality as the central meaning of the constitution and how we analyze the First Amendment issues in that ita, and i think is not democrat versus republican. It is across the board that we need more participation by ordinary people in our process and the less control by the wealthiest. It is an awkward question. Would you are getting at is you people do talk about george soros. What i dont hear is anyone theg to i dont hear Senate Majority leader going to the floor of the senate and talking about george soros the way he talks about the kochs. When that happens and someone the government to declare someone unamerican, that is something that we can all declare is not a good thing. If brenda surprised could even defend that one. The court reacts to what congress does. The people react to what congress does. When they single out certain help who provide jobs and grow the economy, it really is a sad day. Equality, what i have not heard is an answer to this other than slogans about equality and whatnot. Made a couple points about what about the media and corporate pacts. All of these concerns are ignored and swept aside for this idea that we need more equality and that sort of thing. I am all ears to hear if there is better way to do this. , if someoneence does campaigns and elections for more speeches better than less speech on the candidate should be the central voice. Let the candidates raise more money, more accountable, more transparent it is a much better system than the weird bifurcated system where candidates are diminished in the money they can raise, where is the money can be spent independently of the candidates. That goes back decades of Supreme Court precedent. This is not something new. , thiso my original point is not new money in politics. This is just where the money is going to go. Is it going to go directly to candidates or is it going to be spent in the shadows . Guest the people dont include republicans . That is an interesting statistic. I have not seen that. I have seen statistics go the other way was a major donors tend to be more democratic than republican. I have seen stats both ways. It was not referenced in the Supreme Court opinion to say that somehow this was an opinion designed to help republicans. It does not make a lot of sense. Wealth, notduals of limited to one side of the aisle. It happens on both sides of the aisle. In most statistics that i have seen, they say that the benefits of Citizens United and mccutchen is going to help left of center more than right of center. Time will tell. Host the next call is from bruce in chicago. Republican line. Issues. I have two i know how politics is influenced greatly by money. We see the lack of tort reform and the large donations that trial lawyers give to democrats that wrote the Affordable Care act. Theer two, the fact that unions are big donors to the Democratic Party and at the heart of it, we come in and we dealout that the unions with the same people that they, i dont want to say bribed. Moneyople that accept the are admitting that they can be bought. Heart ofaying that the all the stuff that this is money and it corrupts people. Host would you like to respond, brenda . I think it kind of this concern about the role of money in politics is not partisan in nature. I think the polling has shown. The collar that we just had. That is shared by republicans, democrats, independents. We dont want our elected officials to be making decisions because theyre worried about where their next Campaign Contribution is going to come from. The more money we pump into the system, the higher the spending iss, the more pressure there on elected officials to behave in exactly that way. Does a system that really need change. There are bills pending in congress that are really to longterm answers to this problem. A bill to Institute Public financing of elections and to make sure that small donations, the donations of small donors, our subset subject to matching funds so that the influence of small donors becomes greater. If we move to a system in which the people were financing our elections, rather than individual wealthy private interests, we would go a long way toward fixing the problem that we have and restoring peoples confidence in government and the idea that government acts in the peoples entrance. George soros became a naturalized u. S. Citizen in 1961. Here are some more numbers from the Washington Post. Host just a few minutes left with our two guests. Mike in beaverton, oregon. I am autistic and i used to work at a bank, wells fargo. They fired me for being autistic. Anyway, they do give to a lot of candidates. It tends to be the republicans that they give more to. My point that i want to make here is that i know how to solve the sole thing. With campaignfinance. You can give as much as you want, ok . Want, but itas you does not go to one specific percent. Account that is nonpoliticians, a group of citizens. Host what would happen to that money . Caller it would be given out equally. They would get the exact same amount. Every candidate for every office would get the exact same amount. Host lets see what our guests have disabled that idea. The formerrt with chair of the federal election commission. Guest it is actually not that bad of an idea. It is not unlike what we used to have in this country. Where you had a twoparty system or Party Committees were composed of people who would raise money and then they would decide how candidates would be funded. Early 1970s reform laws, the Party Committees would dole out money to candidates and candidates did not raise their own money for the most part. Relied on the Party Committee system to fund campaigns and the Party Committees would hand out money somewhat equally to candidates. Not a neutraly body that would make some sort thebjective decision across political spectrum, but the twoparty system is something that has served us well for a couple hundred years, it has been a stabilizing force in our democracy. It answers a lot of concerns raised by many collars. Callers. This is not all that is similar to what we have had before. Even though it may come across be hardhing that would to do, it would not be hard to do it all. Ishink what has happened that because of the reform laws of the 1970s and mccainfeingold, it has pushed the Party Committees on the back burner am a it has diminished the role. It has diminished the role to help cleanse the money. A very unfortunate thing. Party committees used to be. Eople and not Bank Accounts you can trace that primarily to aree reform laws, that wellintentioned but do not live up to the hype and end up causing more problems than they solve. If i understand you correctly, you are an agreement with a system in which no one would be permitted to contribute directly to candidates, as long as it sounded like you were agreeing with the caller in terms of the system he was proposing and that you are suggesting that we used to have a system in which people could not contribute to candidates, but instead are only contributing to parties, who dole out the money. It is not my understanding that we ever had such a system. Was saying is that historically the Party Committees played a much larger role in doling out a larger some of the money and were much more involved in doling out money to candidates, which was the concept that the caller suggested, and i was making the point that historically that was the system that got us through much of our history, until the law was radically changed and the 1970s with all of these notions are reform and equality and all of this other stuff that has frankly made a mess. I think that what the collars question points us ofard is the importance being the influence of individual donors and the officials on elected who are needing to ask for these contributions. The best way is to move to a system of full Public Financing and you do remove this totion between financing. You replace it with a system in which you have publicly financed elections, multiple matches of so that that magnifies the voice of small donors in the system and makes elected officials part dependent less dependent on fundraising. In that way, it makes absolutely no sense to have the Government Fund the campaigns of people wishing to serve in the government. Public financing systems, you have bureaucrats managing Campaign Spending. S is totally contracting in contrast to our free society. It sounds good in theory. It sounds like everyone is going to get the same. As a practical matter, it has been a failure. It just does not work. Second, i never hear any discussion of what to do with the media, which is corporately owned, has a very large megaphone in american politics, can endorse candidates yearround on election day, can put in the newspaper who you should vote for, but yet i hear no concern about that. Yet the bogeyman of corporate is trotted out as some sort of unfair part of american politics. Wayve not heard about a that would level the Playing Field entirely and not simply diminish voices of certain people we dont like. Host we will have to conclude with these to tweets. Guest i dont think it will further entrench it. Ais opinion could be precursor to further challenges on the restrictions of mccainfeingold on the parties. This could be successful and get the Party Structure more in place, which i think will help diminish some of the polarization that has happened. Parties force people to work together. The cause people to compromise more than you would initially think. The parties are so secondary, the polarization has taken over. Tost i just want to go back the question of Public Financing for a moment. It is simply factually incorrect to say that Public Financing has not worked. It has worked well in maine, connecticut, arizona it has brought more women into the system, more diverse representation to the system. It has given people greater confidence that their elected officials can work in their interest. It has made elections or competitive. It has made government more accountable to the people and the states that have tried it. Host i apologize that we have to leave it there. We are out of time. Thank you both for being on our program. One more segment before the house comes in at 9 00 a. M. We will be looking at a new study on how urban Public Schools are doing. But first, we want to show you a ands bit from this week coverage on American History tv and on book tv. We have been visiting cities across the nation and this week and we will be visiting the city of bend, oregon. We talked to the city manager. Bend is in the central part of oregon. It is in the high desert climate about three hours from portland and a seven8 hour drive from san francisco. It is in a transition zone. On the west side of town is the ponderosa pines, a more mountainous field. On the side of town, a trier climate. Rier climate. We straddle those climates. Began as aon really one industry town, focused around timber. As that industry begin to fade away with the onset of the recession and some other challenges, we reinvented ourselves as a tourismbased industry, attracting visitors here and the building and Development Industry has helped accommodate that growth. We are moving to the next evolution of diversifying the economy, bringing more mobile businesses here, focusing on startup, hightech businesses. Quality of life is extremely high. Of thes an extreme value work, life, family balance. Toloyers regularly commit days where it is acceptable to get a few runs in before heading to the office if there is good snow. Get tok to cut out and the rivers for some good flyfishing and find another way to squeeze work in. There is still that harddriving resultsoriented culture because of the entrepreneurial spirit, but then there is that value of being close to the outdoors and being part of it. That is part of why bend is so special. Host now joining us on the set, peggy carr with the National Center for Education Statistics. She is the associate commissioner for assessment. Stephen sawchuk is with Education Week. He is the assistant editor. We will be looking at a new study on the naep. What is the study . Guest thank you for the invite. I always welcome the opportunity to talk about this important study. This is our trial urban district assessment. It is a special project of the National Assessment of educational finance. In 2002 with the National Center for Education Statistics, the governing board. Host what are you measuring . What are you studying . Guest this is basically an extension of the program at the national and state level. What was discovered . Found some quite remarkable progress among sign of the districts. Some of the districts. The District Of Columbia made gains in all four of the tested subjects and grades. It was the only district to do that in all four . Host lets go through the study a little bit. Why do you look at 4 8 grade 4th through 8th grade . Guest this is an extension of the mandate. 21 urban districts were assessed. You can see the map here. All over the country. How are these picked . Host they volunteered to participate guest they volunteered to participate. We want about 50 of the students minority. It does not matter what minority. Should be students eligible for free or reduced price lunch. We would like a size that will accommodate about three state in that particular operational assessment. Host what does all that mean . Guest we are about progress. One of the things we focus on is how much gain we are seeing for districts over the time period, over the long term since we started the assessment, and in the short run. We look at gains. We also compare where the district scores on the scale. The gain is not indicative of where the district starts. We look at where they compare to the nation and to large cities across the country. , when youhen sawchuk look at these results, give us the headline. Naep is very good at telling us the what. Not as good at telling us the why or the how. The District Of Columbia Public Schools had gains in both subjects and both great tested levels. Tested grade levels. There have been a lot of controversial policy changes. Training ofot of teachers and students on harder curriculum standards. It is easy to look at these results and say, it is because of these policy changes. There is something bewitching in the data. It was a particular program or Early Childhood education in fact, it is very hard to draw those conclusions. A me give you an example. Washington, d. C. Has had a remarkable chefs and demographics. Shifts in demographics. It is possible that that is fueling the results as well. Probably a, it is combination of factors. Host what is your headline . Guest i think over time, we do see that urban districts are making progress at a rate that is faster than many states. I think that belies a lot of the rhetoric about urban schools. We think of them as low performing. You look at these gains in some and say aistricts room proving. They are improving. Guest we also look at how pervasive the gains are. ,n the District Of Columbia those gains are consistent across all subgroups. Who areludes students eligible for free and reduced price lunch. The gaps are large. The gaps being, urban, suburban, role . Rural . Minority students. HasDistrict Of Columbia some of the top scoring white students in the country, while their black students are still struggling in comparison to their peers. Host do you have a wide to that . Why to that . The overwhelming majority of the students are eligible for free and reduced price lunch. Not the case for the white students in these districts. We have to be careful. We are looking at multiple variables when were looking at these data. Matteroes income level when it comes to School Performance . Guest i think it has been shown again and again that, yes, Parents Educational levels and do socioeconomic status represent in test scores to a certain degree. Do know from a decade of research that the quality of the tshirt teacher impacts test scores. Host we would like to hear from you and have you weigh in on urban schools under urban School Performance, especially if you are a student, teacher, or parent connected with an urban school district. We are calling some urban schools. What are we saying . Guest these are districts that have about 250,000 or more in terms of their population. Are urban in the sense that theyre located in large cities across the country. Host this is one of the most confusing charts i have ever looked at. I graduated both fourth and eighth grade and i am having trouble reading it. [laughter] what we tried to do is monitor the progress of the districts across time. This is a trend chart. We are comparing scores here. To 2011. An up arrow indicates significant improvement for the district. We also have a national and large city comparison. Grade four, there is an up arrow and a 5 next to it. Guest that means atlanta 5 points in scores for grade 4 mathematics. Scores declined by six scale score points for grade eight mathematics from 2011 to 2013. Host most of these large cities are up. The only two negative cities are detroit and houston, grade four in reading. What is the analysis . Guest there are a lot of hidden stories in the data. This is one of the examples. One of the things that you would not necessarily know looking at this is that states choose whether students participate in this exam and they set their own rules. Students can be anything from problems,behavioral but typically they score lower on exams. Detroit improved participation of the students on the exams. It is possible that some of the decline is due to that, in combination with or in relation with quality schooling. It is hard to parse out what is going on there. May be the lowest scoring average. City has been bankrupt, there are labor strikes. Situation. Gic host here is a map of the districts that we are talking about. The urban school district. Three in california and then spread through the southwest, texas, florida. Some in the midwest. And then the east coast. When you see these scores and the improvements that have been , does no child left behind have anything to do with this . This common core . Guest i will start with common core. And thee 45 states District Of Columbia who have agreed to a shared standard of academic expectations for english and mathematics. I would be very hesitant to say the common core is driving these increases. States adopted those standards in 2010 and 2011. These things take time. A think it would be careful about that. , that haseft behind been in place since 2001. Increasesst predatedy were either or in the early period of the law. It is quite possible that that law had some effect here, but very hard to say that ostensibly. Try to avoidlly any causeandeffect to data. This is not designed to tell us why. These are snapshots of what students are doing at a particular point in time. They are indicators. They give us a lot of hypotheses that people can use with other data of indicators. I think that we have it about right. Host you have been with the National Center for Education Statistics for a very long time. What surprised you or stood out to you in the data . Districts, of the the magnitude of their gains over the course of this time period, it was a bit surprising. The District Of Columbia, for example, the magnitude of gains was unusual in a twoyear period. Even some of the california districts, fresno gained seven readingn eighth grade or mathematics, one of the two. That was surprising. Usually we see about three points that is statistically significant. When you see this magnitude of gain, it does put you to ask questions like, what is going on . Is it something we need to be concerned about . Is there something that this district is doing that is good . Host harold in brandenburg, kentucky. Thatr why in the world they cannot control the kids . Is it against the law to grab one by the hind end and set them down like when i was in school 20 years ago. There is no discipline in the schools on the classes go wild and do know that because i had my grandkid tapes them. He taped five classes he was in and he said, how can you study with that . Nobody does that. Started when we started mixing the whites and the blacks. That is all i have disabled or it that is all i have to say. I think discipline in the classroom remains an issue. Recently oneased , particularly restraint and seclusion in Public Schools. I think a lot of parents would agree with you that students should be able to be disciplined. When we look at these statistics, black students and students of color tend to be disciplined more. That raises troubling questions about the degree to which discrimination is still alive and some of our public institutions. Tweet. His is a do you see evidence that since the federal department of education has come into being that American Education scores have dropped . I would really hesitate to draw that type of parallel. I think it is very complicated when we start looking at international data. Countries are coming in and out in relative standing. Hypothesisplicated to support with these types of data. Host edward from here in the suburbs. Maryland. Caller i am a proud africanamerican scientist and i decided to leave this country to become a scientist. Iseel that the country failing our young people. We do not invest in our young people enough. In germany, the law is that people go on vacation in the summertime. The german industry has to pay the same salary as the germans to go on vacation. Coming back into the United States, i was shocked. We do not value our children enough in the schools. Both of your guests have good ideas. Unfortunately, our country is not lending enough help to people like your guests come who could help our kids in the schools and all of these systems that we are dealing with. If we dont turn this around, our country is going to be failing in the industry and everywhere else. The United States is falling behind. There are countries ahead of us. Host where do you work . Caller i have a phd in physical science. I am a retired scientist. I was always challenged with racism. You have incompetence at the top. We still have racism even to this day is one of your guests pointed out. Racism is still present. Host thank you. Any response . Challenge when you aggregate the data by race and you look at africanamerican students, hispanic students. They are disproportionately scoring in are below basic category on our assessment. The caller is absolutely right. There is still a daunting challenge in many ways for the minority group. Yearsd say that in recent , perhaps closer to the 2009, 2011 time period, we have seen most of our growth coming from the bottom of our distribution where the students are. Is some encouraging news, i have to say, in the data itself. Host stephen sawchuk, what is your response . St one thing i was at would add is that the federal government just supplies and nine cents on the dollar. When we are talking about investing more in purely monetary terms, we are talking about state and local investment. That is where most of it is coming from. You have 50 states and 14,000 school district. They are making these decisions. That is a really complicated matter. To the question about producing scientists and mathematics, that is a tough nut to crack. I do not think we have quite the answer there. There is a shortage and qualified teachers of subjects. What are we looking at on our screen now . Guest earlier, we talked about our comparisons to the large cities. Comparison is the best or most comparable comparison. That looks very much like the cities of volunteers to participate. Some of the districts are scoring below their peers nationwide in these large cities, in both reading and math. That is the case. That is the case for the majority. Baltimore city has a down green arrow and a down green arrow for mathematics in grades four and eight. Down green arrows in blue for reading. What does that mean . Are they scoring lower than. . Lower than their peers and large cities nationwide. Their scores are lower. It does not mean they are not making progress, but they are still scoring significantly lower than their peers. Host stephen sawchuk, when you look at some of the larger, urban school districts, which stand up to you from your perch as an editor for Education Week . Guest certain districts continue the flipside of this is the districts who are doing better. Lawsuit boston, charlotte. Those are the ones where we start to try to take a look and figure out, what is it that they are doing . Is it a particularly systemic use of resources in a way . Is it attention paid to curriculum . Host what is your conclusion . Why is charlotte doing better . Guest that is a really good question. It is really important. The nation,cross students of color and disadvantaged students tend to have teachers with less experience, teacher with fewer uptodate credentials. One of the things is to figure out how to make sure there is equal access to highquality instruction. I dont want to say definitively that that is why we see great results, but i would hazard a guess that that is somehow contributing. Host were redoing before you joined nces . St i was the chief said statistician for the office of civil rights. When you were talking about the discipline data, i was reminiscing about the findings i. Sed to have to work with absolutely, there are a lot of challenges for minority students and girls, too, when it comes to disproportionate discrimination in our schools. Host really . Yes. Guest caller good morning. Thank you for cspan. I love it. Topic anothero a caller raised. In terms of science, the focus on math and reading scores is intense. I am with a volunteer organization that provides science enrichment to d. C. Public schools. There is no doubt science is being pushed out in order to focus on improving these test scores in reading and math, especially since principals and teachers jobs depend upon that. I am wondering how much of the gains that are being made are a result of other topics, the subjects being diminished, in order to practice for these tests and then taking the tests . Thank you. Guest very tough question to answer. Monitor whatry to schools are focusing on. Their background questions within our assessment, of the administrators, of the teachers. We ask them, how much time do you spend on the subjects . We have not seen any strong patterns one way or the other. Hatt does not mean that w the caller is saying is not true. Host before you joined Education Weekly, what redoing . Guest i have always been an education reporter. That makes me either very sh orst or very fooli very dedicated to this. I think we have seen over the last 10 years no child left behind in 2001, federal initiatives in 2009 that changed the game on a lot of different , future evaluation, professional development things we have not seen. I think the debates have gotten louder. Sometimes less informed. All in all, i think it is really good that we are focusing on these issues. I think this has helped us find interesting stories we may not have been able to find otherwise. We were talking about the atlanta data before we came in. One thing that was curious to me is that there was a huge ski cheating scandal in atlanta Public Schools. Indictedintendent was for masterminding to improve scores on state tests. Atlanta has made great gains, when you look at these results. When you look at that, it is showing a 17 point increase in mathematics. Is that correct . Did i read that correctly . Guest absolutely. Host what is interesting about these charts, here is where the nation is as a whole . Is that the aggregate . Suburban, role . Fink you both so much for joining us. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2013] with the United States house of representatives. Any use of the closedcaptioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u. S. House of representatives. ] the speaker the house will be in session. The prayer will be offered by our chaplain, father conroy. Chaplain conroy let us pray. Loving and gracious god, we give you thanks for giving us another day. Bless the members of the peoples house. There are many important issues to be considered with multiple interests and priorities dividing the house in its deliberations. May the inertia that has solidified various blocks of opinion be stired to productive action and grant that a new light might shine on Creative Solutions to longstanding and vecksing disagreement. Vexing disagreement. It is the intentions of those who serve here, may their hopes and prayers for constructive legislation be satisfied to your divine grace and the good will of all in this chamber. May all that is done this day be for your greater honor and glory. Amen. The speaker the chair has examined the journal of the last days proceedings and announces to the house his approval thereof. Pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1 the journal stands approved. The pledge of allegiance today will be led by the gentleman from georgia, mr. Barrow. Mr. Barrow i pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The speaker the chair will entertain up to five requests for oneminute speeches on each side of the aisle. For what purpose does the gentleman from South Carolina rise . Without objection. Mr. Speaker, i rise today to recognize bell Street Middle School for their outstanding accomplishment of winning their sixth science owe lip add. This is a science olympiad team. They bring together schools from all over the state to compete in sciencerelated contests to change the way science is learned and taught. This year bell street finished 12 in 20 of the individual competitions. Last year they placed in the top six. We are very proud of these students, what they have accomplished and im confident theyll go on to represent them in the competition. I want to thank the students, teachers, parents and volunteers who have worked tirelessly to make this dream a reality and wish them a Great Success in the Upcoming National competition and continued success in the years to come. With that i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the entlewoman from illinois rise . The gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. I rise today to address the urgent need to raise the minimum wage to 10. 10 per hour. Ms. Kelly weve had the same minimum wage. Over the last five years, inflation rates caused the value of that to decrease by an average of 13. 6 cents per year. Today, 7. 25 is worth 9 less than it was in 2009. For someone working full time on minimum wage, this is like getting a 26 decrease in pay. Meanwhile, the cost of everyday necessities continues to increase. Between basic needs like gas, milk, heat and electricity, americans are paying 23. 19 more per month. Many times ive urged my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to do the right thing and allow a vote to ensure American Families can have the comfort of a livable wage. For those who arent working and struggling to keep asloat in these tough times, lets keep afloat in these tough imes, lets vote to increase the minimum wage. Lets pass a fair minimum wage. The speaker pro tempore the gentleladys time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from missouri rise . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Thank you, mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the problems with obamacare never cease to stop hurting families and individuals in missouris eighth district. Mr. Smith theyre experiencing huge increases in their monthly premiums and bureaucrats are continuing to get between doctors and patients. Additionally, workers are seeing reduced hours because of a 30hour rule contained in obamacare. The save American Workers act 30hour al obamacares rule. Because of this legislation, Small Businesses will no longer be forced to choose between providing Health Insurance to parttime workers or drastically cutting jobs or even eliminating employees. A recent study estimated the 30hour workweek rule could cost as many as 2. 6 million american jobs. Make no mistake, im still fighting to fully repeal obamacare, but the save American Workers act will not fix every problem with the Obamacare Health care mandate but it will save millions of americans jobs and help americans struggling to make ends meet. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlemans time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from georgia rise . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend. The speaker pro tempore without objection, so ordered. Mr. Barrow thank you, mr. Speaker. Today i rise to recognize the elementary School Students in my district in georgia who are part of the inaugural class of barrows book worms. Last fall i challenged students in my district to read 20 books over the course of a semester. Upon completion to be recognized for their good work with a ceremony in the district. More than 1,300 children accepted the challenge and completed the program collectively reading more than 27,000 books. As part of this program, students were also asked to create a book mark that would be distributed to all of the participants. Becca mccord, an outstanding third Grade Student in dublin, successfully completed the barrows book worms Reading Program and was selected as the winner as the first book mark contest. I want to thank this opportunity to congratulate becca and all of the students who participated this year and i look forward to next years barrows book worm challenge. Ith that i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania rise . Mr. Thompson request unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Thompson mr. Speaker, i rise today to offer my thoughts and prayers to the individuals, families and loved ones of those affected by the tragedy at fort hood. To have this happen a second time adds more heartbreak to a Community Still grieving from the tragic events of 2009. There are still a lot of questions to be answered. Surely, like many cases, where suicide is involved, we may never know the motive. Undoubtedly, the gunman and others continue to be under investigation. And not until we know from the leadership of the investigation, we couldnt speculate about the facts. Its hard not to place the tragedy in perspective. In context of the great challenge our nation faces when it comes to better addressing issues of behavioral health, Mental Illness and suicide, but for now we pray, for now we praise and for now we honor each individual and each sacred life lost. Mr. Speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from california rise . Mr. Speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks. The speaker pro tempore without objection, so ordered, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Takano mr. Speaker, i rise today to pay tribute to marlin borns, a local Riverside County inventor and philanthropist who passed away at the age of 93. Marlin and his wife, rosemary, founded what was then known as bournes laboratory out of michigan but the quick growth propeled them to relocate to my hometown of riverside, california. There his business grew to become a significant contributor in the fields of engineering and technology. His inventions would be used by nasa, the medical device industry, Telecommunication Companies and personal computer manufacturers. His fair pay for employees and respectful treatment of them are several of the reasons why some stayed with the company for 50 years. He was able to pour much of his success back into the community through his generous endowment of the university of california t riverside which is home to the creative engineering. His friends will remember a man who carried with him a gentle nature and giving spirit. He will be greatly missed. I yield back, mr. Speaker. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania rise . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, so ordered. Mr. Speaker, im here today to offer congratulations to why you castle red hurricanes for winning the firstever pennsylvania quad a state championship with a 310 record. La salle he won over high school making them the fourth undefeated High School Quad a basketball champion in pennsylvania history. I sent a congratulations to the players families as well as e head coach and new castler group. Castle the canes arent special because they won the state championship, one said. He said theyre special because of their good grades and the fact that every one of his seniors are going to college next year. He says his players just do things the right way. I couldnt agree more. Go, canes, and i yield back my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from tennessee rise . Mr. Cohen i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, so ordered. The gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Cohen today marks the 46th anniversary of dr. Martin luther king jr. Being gunned down in memphis, tennessee. Dr. King is wellknown for his speech i have a dream about civil rights, social justice. But when he died he was fighting for economic justice. He was fighting for the right to organize and for better wages for human beings and to attack poverty. Unfortunately in this house too often we hear about opposition to jobs bills, opposition to the minimum wage, opposition to health care for individuals who cannot afford it and we even see the Voting Rights bills being struck down in the Supreme Court and a difficulty of getting a new one in the house and people dont question the need for the civil rights bill. Dr. Kings dream is still that, a dream, but many of us share that dream and one of us will wake up and see the reality that the dream must be fulfilled. I hope that day comes soon. In memphis, its a holiday for dr. King. It should be a holiday for everyone and we remember the great man and his great works. I yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from illinois rise . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Hultgren thank you, mr. Speaker. I rise today to recognize an inspiring leader from illinois 14th district for her Exemplary Service last month, aircrafta was named 10 of aircrafta was named 10 of the women white house champion for change. She served as director for Illinois Department of veterans affairs. Under her leadership, they have launched the nationally acclaimed Illinois Joining forces, which connects veterans with more than 200 veterans serving organizations. Shes a rhodes scholar, truman scholar and was valedictorian at west point. Her military service spans from south korea as an Army Medical Service officer to iraq as commanding general David Petraeus trusted speech writer. General petraeus calls her one of the talented officers i ever served and exemplary in every respect. Her strong record of excellence ensures a Bright Future for Illinois Service members and veterans. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from hawaii rise . Without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Ms. Hanabusa thank you, mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, february of this year marked the 20th anniversary of the passage of the brady handgun violence prevention act. Since becoming law, its credited with stopping more han 2. 1 million gun sales to convicted felons, domestic abusers and fugitives. The recent tragedy of two days ago at fort hood brings light again the issue of ptsd, Mental Illness and what our men and women in uniform have suffered throughout all of our wars, and i mean all of our wars. We cannot continue to ignore virginia tech, fort hood, what our colleagues Gabby Gifford and ron barber endured, aurora, colorado, sandy hook, Washington Navy yard, littleton and fort hood again, just to name a few. The families, communities, the friends cry for action. Mr. Speaker, let us act by at least bringing h. R. 1565, the kingthompson bill to this floor and i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time. All time for one minutes has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from georgia rise . Mr. Woodall mr. Speaker, by the direction of the committee on rules, i call up House Resolution 539 and ask for its immediate consideration. The speaker pro tempore the clerk will report the resolution. The clerk house calendar number 96, House Resolution 539, resolved, that at any time after adoption of this resolution the speaker may, pursuant to clause 2b of rule 18, declare the house resolved into the committee of the whole house on the state of the union for consideration of the bill h. R. 1874, to amend the congressional budget act of 1974 to provide for macroeconomic analysis of the impact of legislation. The First Reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour equally ivided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the committee on the budget. After general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment under the fiveminute rule. The amendments recommended by the committee on the budget now printed in the bill and the amendment printed in part a of the report of the committee on rules accompanying this resolution shall be considered as adopted in the house and in the committee of the whole. The bill, as amended, shall be onsidered as read. All points of order against provisions in the bill as amended are waived. No further amendment to the bill as amended shall be in order except those printed in part b of the report of the committee on rules. Each further amendment may be offered only in the order printed in the report, may be offered only by a member designate in the record, shall be considered as read, shall be debateable for the time specified in the report equally divided and controlled by an opponent and a proponent. Shall not be subject to amendment, and shall not be subject for demand of division of the question in the house or the committee of the whole. Owl points of order against such further amendments are waived. At the conclusion of consideration of the bill for amendment, the Committee Shall rise and report the bill as amended to the house with such further amendments as may have been adopted. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill as amended and any further amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or without instructions. Section 2, upon adoption of this resolution, it shall be in order to consider in the house the bill h. R. 1871, to amend the balance budget and emergency deficit control act of 1985 to reform the budget baseline. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. The amendment recommended by the committee on the budget now printed in the bill shall be considered as adopted. The bill as amended shall be considered as read. All points of order against provisions in the bill as amended are waived. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill as amended and on any amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one, one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the committee on budget. And two, one motion to recommit with or without instructions. Section 3, upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in order to consider in the house the bill h. R. 1872, to amend the balanced budget and emergency deficit control act of 1985 to increase transparency in federal budgeting, and for other purposes. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. The amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the committee on the budget now printed in the bill shall be considered as adopted. The bill as amended shall be considered as read. All points of order against provisions in the bill as amended are waived. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill as amended and on any amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one, one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the committee on the budget. And two, one motion to recommit ith or without instructions. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from georgia is recognized for one hour. Mr. Woodall thank you, mr. Speaker. For the purposes of debate only id like to yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend from florida, mr. Hastings, pending which i yield myself such time as i may consume. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Woodall mr. Speaker, id also like to ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and ask that during consideration of the resolution all time be yielded for purpose of debate only. The speaker pro tempore without objection, so ordered. Mr. Woodall mr. Speaker, this is a big day for me down here on the house floor. I dont know if you were watching every word of the rule what as being read, but you got here in a nutshell, mr. Speaker, is a rule that makes in order absolutely every germane amendment that was offered not to one budget reform bill, not to two budget reform bills, but to three budget process reform bills. We talk so much about numbers in this institution, mr. Speaker. We talk about baselines. We talk about c. B. O. Scores. We also talk a lot about people. We talk a lot about families. We talk about why what we do here matters in the lives of folks back home. Father conroy prayed this morning, mr. Speaker, that we could get out of some of our old habits of that the inertia leads us to disagree and find those things around which we do agree. There is one thing thats undisputed in this chamber. In fact on capitol hill, in this entire town, mr. Speaker, when it comes to budget process, and that is that every time we decide we are going to spend money today, we get a little boost in the economy. And that boost comes from a mortgaged future. We can get a little today at the expense of a little tomorrow. Or conversely, we can lose a little bit today in exchange for gaining a little bit tomorrow. Theres no he free lunch of when it comes to budgeting, mr. Speaker. I only get to spend each dollar once in this institution. And i can either raise that dollar from todays taxpayers, or i can borrow that dollar from tomorrows tax payers. There are arguments on both sides. But as Daniel Patrick moynihan was fond of saying, everyones entitled to their opinion, but they are not entitled to their own facts. And what these three budget process bills before us today, mr. Speaker, will do is make sure we are working from the same shared set of facts. Again this rule, mr. Speaker, provides for these three bills, House Resolution 539, structured rule for h. R. 1875, the progrowth budgeting act. Its going to be on the floor today immediately following this rule, if we are able to secure passage, i hope we can, well debate h. R. 1874. H. R. 1874 will instruct the Congressional Budget Office to calculate when we make these decisions whether we are going to spend a little today and mortgage tomorrow, whether we are going to save a little bit today in exchange for growth tomorrow to calculate that impact, because its not enough to spend the dollars. Its not enough to save the dollar. We have to, plane not just to our colleagues but to the American People what the benefit or burden of that decision is going to be. H. R. 1874 brings some clarity to that decision. One of my personal favorite ills, mr. Speaker, is h. R. 1871. H. R. 1871, 1872 are also made in order by this bill. H. R. 1871 happens to be the woodall bill, mr. Speaker. Its the baseline reform bill. Candidly i cant take credit for it. I want to. But, mr. Speaker, the truth is its the gentleman from great state of texas, mr. Louie gohmert, has been fighting for this bill long before i arrived in this institution. I happened to get a seat on the Budget Committee. He happens to serve elsewhere, so um carrying this language. I couldnt be prouder to do it, but i want to give credit where credit is due. And the fight that the gentleman from texas has been making over the years, and its not a fight against one another, its a fight against inertia, as father conroy talked about this morning, is to save it. Its just crazy in todays tight economic environment to assume that if the government spent x dollars this year, we are going to give them xplus 3 next year. That irrespective of what your mission is, irrespective of what your productivity is, irrespective of what your success is, we are going to assume that your agency is going to get more money next year than it got this year. Thats not the way anybody operates at home. Thats not what we do around the dinner table. Thats not what any business in america does. Thats not what we should be doing. So h. R. 1871 says, we are going to assume youre going to get next year what you got this, with absolutely no inflation what so ever. This is not an area of wide agreement. I would argue what you get next year ought to be less than this year because we ought to expect some productivity increases from you. Its fair in the industrious society in which we live that we expect you to do nor with less next year, but we are not trying to achieve all of that today. We are just saying what you get next year is going to be what you get this year. Eliminate those automatic inflators that bias us towards less productivity and more cost. Finally, h. R. 1872, mr. Speaker, thats a bill from my friend from new jersey, mr. Garrett, and that bill says we ought to have accurate accounting. Fair Cost Accounting of government loan programs. We are in the business of garne he teaing a whole lot of loans in this institution, mr. Speaker. Loans for all sorts of meritorious activity that we would agree on both sides of the aisle are worthy of being carried on, but the question is how do we account for that in the budget process . Today we assume that those loans will never go bad. That those loans will never go bad and we will only reflect a cost of the american taxpayer guaranteeing those loans when and if those loans do go bad, but thats not what happens in the real world. Thats not what we ask of our bankers down on main street. Thats not what we ask of any financial institution. We run you right out of town if you tried to do your accounting that way in the real world, mr. Speaker. So, what mr. Garrett says is, why cant we apply real world accounting to this institution . Why cant we hold ourselves to the same High Standard that we hold folks back home . I applaud him for that. I think thats something that brings us together rather than divides us. What i like most about this rule, though, mr. Speaker, is that when the amendments were offered, and thats the way the process goes for folks who dont watch the rules committee as closely as my friend from florida and i do, members of congress come, they submit their amendments to the rules committee, and the rules committee decides whats made in order, but we do that in consultation with the parliamentarians. We need to make sure that amendments are germane. We want to make sure that the conversation is on the topics that the bill is on. We dont allow nongermane amendments most of the time, but sometimes members submit amendments in good faith that dont comply with the rules as they were submitted, but they can be worked on to make them better. And what um particularly proud of, mr. Speaker, is that when we received some amendments that were not quite within the four corners of the rules, rather than just rejecting those amendments out of hand, which would have been perfectly appropriate response, we didnt do what was appropriate, we did what was right. And that was to go and work with those members to improve those amendments, get them within the four corners of the parliamentary process and make those in order today. Again every single germane amendment that was submitted to the rules committee on each of these three bills made in order for debate under the bill, well do the first of those today if this rule passes. Well do the remaining two next week. All done in the name of transparency and Accurate Information for the American People. Perfectly legitimate to have your own opinion about what the federal Budget Office looked like but youre not entitled to your own facts about what impact of those decisions will be. With that, mr. Speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from florida rise . Mr. Hastings mr. Speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Hastings id like to thank the gentleman, my friend, mr. Woodall from georgia, for yielding the customary 30 minutes for debate. And i rise today in opposition to the rule and underlying bills. I y friends commentary, perceived him as being very reasonable, particularly when he gets to the part of the rule that deals with those amendments that were made in order that are germane. It is of particular concern that he has demonstrated in the period that he has been on the rules committee, and he also is an advocate for open rules. And that said one of the down sides to our process in my judgment is that i would imagine that at least a significant portion of this body, not the majority, dont even know what we are debating today and wont he know until they come here to vote. For that reason we should make open rules whereas ideas that germinate during the course of the debate could be put forward by members under our rules process. Mr. Speaker, this rule provides for consideration of three bills. Before getting into it, normally when people leave our offices, when we complete the process of debating a measure and want to do kudos to the staff, we so at the end of the process, but today i want to recognize the rather extraordinary staff on both sides of the rules committee, an particularly the young man seated next to me, ian wolfe, who labors actively to help me put words together to come here with, and two young men that are working in the or e with me, tom kearns, recently came to me as a Phi Beta Kappa graduate from maine, and mike sikse is a psyches is a wounded warrior. Sikes is a wounded warrior. Many of the words i speak hence forth are from those three gentlemen, an i thank them for that. Normally like my friend from georgia, mr. Woodall, we both are, in my judgment, good extemporaneous speakers, but today im going to stick to the script because of these two young men, and then if im provoked by my friend from florida, ill speak extemporaneously. Mr. Speaker, this rule provides for consideration of three mills , all of which impose torturous new rules on an already convoluted budget process, and an attempt to embed republican doing ma into dogma into what is intended to be an objective analysis based on reality not fantasy. The bouquet of imagery to explain this latest budgetary behavior is certainly painful. Yogi berra and deja vu all over again, groundhog day, bill murrays character, doing the same thing over and over again, to push a bolder Upper Mountain only to see it karine to the bottom and start all over again, weve seen these proposals before, mr. Speaker. Yet, once again, my friends across the aisle try their best to throw up smoke screens right and further right. Once again, my friends, led by chairman paul ryan, present reforms that are not common sense but actually nonsense. Once again, republicans proposed budget process, changes that are nothing more than gimmicks. To eliminate spending on ssential services and to reduce taxes for the wealthy. We need to consider dynamic scoring and whether we should factor in inflation when accounting for future spending instead of dealing with the important issues of the day. The need for Immigration Reform isnt going anywhere. The need for investment in our infrastructure isnt going anywhere. The need to provide health care for our veterans is not going anywhere. Nd when i tell you that your budget gimmicks arent going anywhere either and you know it. You can pass these gimmicks all day long. Youre in the majority and you can pass them all day, 24 hours a day and twice, three times on sunday. But you know that they are dead on arrival in the senate. So lets turn to serious business, business the American People would like us to take up rather than wasting our time and the time of millions of americans. The changes envisioned within these bills tie congress and the Congressional Budget Office to a knot in order conserve the ideology of taxes and spending is going to grow our nations economy. Not creating more jobs, not stimulating demand, not investing in infrastructure or education or any of the many endeavors that are critical to improving the lives of all americans. H. R. 1871, mr. Woodalls favorite bill and for good author of is the s and gave a attributeation to the person who made it go forward. Its proposed that the Congressional Budget Office not include annual inflation when making their budget baseline. This seems like a rather money dane technical change but it is. I would be pleased to support this, mr. Speaker, because it means in making my own personal budget projection, i can simply ignore the fact that the costs for everyday items and activities tend to go up every year. I can just assume that what im paying today i can keep paying 10 years from now and still expect the exact same amount of goods and services. But of course we all know that isnt true. Simply wishes away inflation wont make it so. For the math, as its been described by some, does not equal fiscal responsibility. By eliminating inflation adjustments from Discretionary Spending projection, republicans are actually reducing the funding for a federal program. Since the dollar amount would stay the same every year, the amount of services that could be covered would decrease. I hasten to add that i agree with my friend, mr. Woodall, that accountability ought to be factored in and that these ograms should be able to perform in a way that is accountable to the public. And when they do not, they should be dispensed with. And that is a prerogative we can exercise, but it doesnt have to be done the way that its put forward. It is our responsibility of oversight of these structures in our government. Over the long term, this results in a massive decrease in essential services that millions of americans rely on. This technical change, then, is actually a back door effort to slowly starve necessary government programs. Rather than be upfront about which programs my friends on the other side want to eliminate, theyd rather put sneaky rules into place to an antee the house not have open debate. Through 1874, mr. Speaker, republicans want to introduce dynamic scoring to the c. B. O. s projection process. Dynamic scoring . Take a closer look. Its more like dynamic stealing. By implementing this fantasy math, the republicans artificially inflate the cost of important programs as a way to steal them out from underneath those who are most in need of them. They tweak the c. B. O. s analysis so that tax cuts for the wealthy seem like they grow the economy while investments and programs that help Everyday Americans do not. Let me repeat that. They tweak the c. B. O. s analysis so that tax cuts for the wealthy seem like they grow the economy while investments in programs that help Everyday Americans do not. I have lived here long enough to see trickle down fail repeatedly. Republicans make it easier to cut taxes for the rich, to build bridges and schools rather than build bridges and schools for the rest of us. This bill specifically instructs the c. B. O. To ignore the positively economic effects that would come about from investments in things like infrastructure and education. And i want to underscore the word infrastructure. We talk about it all the time around here, and a decade ago one of our colleagues spent a portion of his career here asking us to spend money on bridges. When i came here in 1992, we had 14,000 bridges in this nation in need of repair, and we have not addressed the circumstances surrounding that and we need to and we can. But rather than deal with frastructure and education rather than spending on things americans need and want wont boost our economy, thats what their approach suggests. Mr. Speaker, the republicans are at it again with h. R. 1872. This proposal seeks to significantly change how the office of management and budget and the Congressional Budget Office calculate the costs of government loans and loan guarantees. This bill would just add an extra price tag to programs based on what an individual would pay for a loan in the private market. Never mind the fact that the United States government is not an individual acting in a private credit market. What this bill really represents is another attempt by the republicans to make important programs for the poor and middleclass families appear too expensive to be continued. Programs meant to help young people get an education, programs that help struggling families afford homes, programs that help the elderly in their need of security in their failing health, programs that help farmers and Small Businesses grow this economy by artificially inflating the costs of these republicans, the republicans hope to fool us into thinking we cant afford them. But as far as i know, april fools day started and ended on tuesday. I will tell you this, i am not going to be fooled. My constituents arent going to be fooled, and the American People arent going to be fooled by your gimmicks. But these budget bills are only the appetizer. The entree was served up by chairman ryan when he recently introduced his next budget, which he dubbed and i was reading it last night the path to prosperity. But would be more accurately called the path to poverty. As much as i hope for the opportunity to turn down a path where we consider meaningful legislation, were again forced to battle against chairman ryans latest march down his path to poverty. And since weve already adopted top line numbers for the next two budget cycles, theres no reason for this budget beyond feeding the Political Base of my friends on the other side. And well see the bumper stickers. Well hear the talk. Well hear the echo chamber recite the mantra of those who would feed their base. I suppose this budget is a solid start for a 10minute standup set at your local yuckyucks, but thats about the best i can say for it. I mean, youre going to cut spending by 966 billion over the next 10 years by cutting funding for food stamps, by cutting funding for Income Assistance to help needy families, by cutting pell grants for kids to go to college. You cant be serious. Youre going to implement draconian cuts to programs millions of americans rely upon, but you make sure that we increase defense spending. You cant be serious. Mr. Speaker, what the republicans are really showing us here is their blueprint for americas future. You dont even have to look that closely to see that this blueprint creates nothing but Structural Integrity problems for our economy. Blueprint lays bear their full frontal assault on middleclass families and the poor. Their blueprint calls for turning medicare into a voucher program. They will describe it differently but it comes out to nothing more than a voucher program. Their blueprint calls for nondefense Discretionary Spending to be cut to the tune. F 791 billion this will result in draconian cuts to education, public works, medical research and the list could continue. It goes on and on. Do you want to bet you are yourself by obtaining a College Degree . Well, ryans road to ruin is going to make sure that theres no money there for you to do so. Do you want to grow your economy by shipping your goods on our roads and bridges . Good luck. Since your goods will undoubtedly be held up at one of mr. Ryans roadblocks to prosperity that will strip the budget of muchneeded infrastructure investment. Are you a member any member of your family suffering from a disease, the cure for which by d certainly be further medical Research Dollars . Sorry. You found yourself on mr. Ryans fast track to despair. Rather than lead this country into a new era of economic growth, republicans want to cut taxes for the rich, cut programs for everyone else and then feel like theyve set this country on the right track. This is no way to run an economy, no way to run a budget process and no way to stick up for the millions of struggling americans, as my friends on the democratic side are doing and have done for years, who need us to focus on improving the economy. Mr. Speaker, at this time i thank mike and terry and ian and the rules Committee Staff working with me, and i reserve the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentlemans time is reserved. The gentleman from georgia. Mr. Woodall thank you, mr. Speaker. I yield myself two minutes to thank my friend from florida for laying out exactly what the case is that needs to be made today. It just so happens all of those Spending Priorities that the gentleman from florida mentioned are Spending Priorities i share. Investments in education, investments in roads and bridges, investments in Cutting Edge Research that makes a difference in peoples lives, not just in terms of treatments but in terms of cures. In the absence of Crystal Clear budgeting, in the absentence of the reforms that we have proposed here today, the 5 trillion that the Budget Committee passed budget proposes to reduce from federal spending over the next 10 years is exactly the same as the interest that that very same budget proposes to pay over the next 10 years. I want you to hear that, mr. Speaker. Every single reduction in spending that the gentleman just laid out is necessitated because dollar for dollar we are wasting those same receipts on paying the debts that previous congresses have cracked up, an that is a Budget Committee passed budget. The president s budget, mr. Speaker, proposes to spend 6 trillion over the next 10 years. On interest alone. Interest alone. Mr. Speaker, by not taking responsibility today, not only are we mortgaging our childrens future by piling these debts on them, we are trading away opportunities to make a difference in their future because those dollars that were sending to the chinese who loan us money, and germans who loan us money, the money we are sending to pay our debt is money we could be spending on those shared Investment Priorities that the gentleman from florida and i have in come. With that, mr. Speaker, id like to yield to one of the great members of the rules committee, the gentleman from florida, former sheriff from the great state of florida, mr. Nugent. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from florida is recognized. For how much time . Mr. Woodall four minutes. The speaker pro tempore for four minutes. Mr. Nugent thank you, mr. Woodall. I certainly appreciate. To my colleague from florida on the other side of the aisle, once again its always a pleasure. Mr. Speaker, only in washington can politicians pat themselves on the back for cutting spending while actually increasing spending. Thats a novel idea. Say, for example, we spend 100 on a program one year. The next year we automatically assume, we automatically assume we are going to spend 103 on that same program due to inflation. We only end up sending 10 versus 103, according to official government accounting, we cut spending but we increased spending by 2. In the real world, at least back home, you cant simultaneously cut spending while increasing spending and say you cut spending. You cant do both. Its one or the other. Families dont budget this way. Businesses dont budget this way. And i can tell you it would have made my life a whole lot easier as sheriff if my budget automatically increased 3 . Because of inflation that may or may not exist within the program. If you change the baseline every year by inflation, no one has to justify what their increase is. But then again we live in this fantasy world called washington, d. C. This is where we live today. Fantasy, we can spend more money than you take in, and it will all work out in the end. We can be 17 trillion in debt today, but dont worry about it because it will get better. On its own. How does that work . Doesnt work that way. Mr. Speaker, our current budget process is broken. By assuming automatic increases in spending, our system favors more and more spending without any accountability. Under this scenario, programs dont receive a real examination as to whether or not they deserve the increases. They just get it anyway just because they exist they get more money. Not that they need it. Not that they can show folks i absolutely have to have it, we just give it. As chairman ryan pointed out last night in the rules committee, our current budget process has not been signaturely reformed since the budget control act of 1974. 40 years ago. We havent done a thing. Given our fiscal situation, its about time we do something to try to get this on the right track. And i appreciate the committees work and i appreciate mr. Oodalls bill tonight. These are important steps to refine and reform the budget process. You hear folks from the other side of the aisle that these are gimmicks. I will tell you back home its not a gimmick when you stand there and you have to justify why i needed more money in my budget as sheriff. I had to stand to the appropriators and say heres the reasons why i need more money. By the way, mr. Speaker, heres what we have done with the money to show weve actually earned it for the taxpayers to show there was a reward at the end of the day that the taxpayers got what they paid for. Up here there is none of that. I sit in Committee Meetings day in and day out in regards to seeing money being spent by government with not nobodys held accountable. We give people five digit bonuses, mr. Speaker, for doing a lousy job. But thats the way government works. We reward mediocrity. This budget idea if enacted actually reins that in and makes people accountable for the dollars they are given to the American Public so the American Public can see, listen, we are just not talking about it, we are doing it. So to mr. Woodall and mr. Ryan, the chairman, i do appreciate all their hard work in what they have done and where they are trying to move this process forward. With that, mr. Speaker, i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from florida. R. Hastings now i turn to the extemporaneous side. Mr. Speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized. On hastings mr. Speaker, monday evening of next week my friend, mr. Woodall, and i will be in the rules committee and we will be taking up the ryan budget. I might add we use the names of individuals. I have Great Respect for paul ryan. I think he is a brilliant young man and clearly ideologically he nd i have differences. I remember being on the floor and the two best speeches in the 21 years that im here that were made pertaining to issues of the ron t, one was made by dellums who was chairman of the Armed Services at that time, and the other by john kasich, who is now the governor of ohio, and i still consider those two speeches to be the best that i have heard in the time that im here mine and mr. Woodalls notwithstanding. On that night that kasich made his remarks, i listened very intently to him and i forget the exact numbers that the budget was proposing, but after he finished his remarks, i went up to him and congratulated him on his remarks and then said to him what i will say to mr. Ryan at some point in the future. I understand what it is that you want to spend. And i believe that we would probably spend right at or about the same amount of money. The difference is what you want to spend it on and what i want to spend it on. Thats what i said to john that night. And i find myself in that situation repeatedly through the ears where i perceive, many of us, i certainly know that i am a champion of those who are less fortunate in our society, and i dont believe that my friends are unmindful of the great need that our constituents have, be they republican or democrat, independent or otherwise situated politically. The simple fact of the matter is that there are people in this country who are not as well off as some others in the country. And there should be nothing to decry the fact that there are some in our society who have done exceedingly well, even during recessions. I have a friend that is a billionaire that told me, he he made money during the he made money during the depression, he made money during the Second World War ii, he made money after every recession largely for the reason that he knows how to make money. And i dont bebrudge him that, but that same individual told me that any amount of taxes that he pays, he would prefer to see that it goes to educating our children appropriately, and if it required them to pay more taxes, he would have no problems doing so. Toward that end i feel the same way. Last year people think that those of us up here in Congress Live a life of luxury and that we have a high salary of 174,000 a year. Well, the simple fact of the matter is, and rightly perhaps, we have not had a raise here in congress for Congress Members for five years. At the very same time, if i use myself as a for example, my rent right here in this town has gone up 600 during that period of time. And my salary didnt go up, so ere was i supposed to meet these bills . The simple fact is when we talk about a household budget, that is an n tirely different set of circumstances than a federal budget or a state budget or a city budget. They do not operate the same. And we should stop making that analogy. It is not like i sit down and fill out my budget. This is an extremely complex process, and the Congressional Budget Office only gives us the that that we tell them the policy is going to be, and they told us what the numbers are going to look like. They dont provide the numbers. They dont do the oversight on the programs that we make here. And we dont have to just give them the money, but if we set a baseline and if we do allow for inflation, when those programs have failed or those that are sunsetting and more of them should sunset and too many of them have failed, that is our responsibility. But when we cut poor people, when we cut middle class people in this country, that is the base of this country, that is the bedrock of this country. It has been and will continue. If we go the path that my friends want us to passthrough, what we will do is we will allow for those people that are better off in our society, that could afford to help more the poor and the middle class, and we will cause more middle class people to become more poor and then the needs will be greater. If we dont see ourselves as a Better Society than that, then something is drastically wrong with us. I dont begrudge a single rich person on earth, but i do feel strongly responsible for those at are poor and not poor necessarily by virtue of their circumstances. What we tend to to to poor people here is rather than what we tend to do to poor people here is rather than ask them what we can do to lift them out of poverty, we do things to them. Thats why we know, most of us, that they wont vote at voting time largely for the reason that they have the most reason to vote and at the same time have the least reasons to vote. The inseparable triumphant of inadequate jobs, housing, Educational Opportunity persist in this country. And the fact of the matter is that we can do better and we should do better by those that are poor. And we should do something meaningful to create jobs. I defy my friends after monday of next week when we talk about this budget, i defy my friends to tell me that they are going to put that budget on the floor. When we vote on it on wednesday, i say lets go in to debate thursday. And debate it until its conclusion. And then vote on it. I guarantee you we are not going to vote on the ryan budget. Everybody knows that. And i challenge my friends to bring it forth any day after next wednesday, after next monday when we do the rule. I reserve the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, would you tell me how much time i have and how much time my colleague has . The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from florida has five minutes remaining. The gentleman reserves. The gentleman from georgia. Mr. Woodall thank you, mr. Speaker. I yield myself such time as i may consume. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized. Has 1 minutes remaining. Mr. Woodall i thank the speaker. It never surprises me how much i have in common with my friend from florida. We come from very different parts of the world, mr. Speaker. If you go to many events in this town theyll generally have a Southeastern State section and a florida section. Floridas a little bit different than the rest of those Southeastern States. We are constituents our constituencies may not look the same demographically, may not look the same on paper, but when it comes to caring about one another, i have no doubt that our communities are incredibly similar as the gentleman from florida and i are very similar. And the debate is not about whether or not we have an obligation to our neighbors we do. The question is whether were meeting our obligation to our neighbors, and i tell you we are not. The pathway up in this country is what our obligation is here. I would say to