30-Something Working Group
30-SOMETHING WORKING GROUP -- (House of Representatives - September 21, 2005)
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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) speaks the truth. There is no question about it. Now we are hearing on CNN, and we have to hear it on CNN, unfortunately, that the Republican leadership plans to go forward with their partisan committee to investigate Hurricane Katrina. Rightfully so, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) has refused to appoint Democratic Members, and everyone I have spoken to in our Democratic Caucus, if asked to serve by the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hastert), we will stand our ground and insist on there being an independent commission.
The example we have been using here on this floor is would the American public be comfortable if Enron executives examined and investigated what went wrong in their corporation and their corporate scandals? How about Tyco? You would never accept those kinds of internal reviews as being accountable, objective, or independent.
If Congress is going to truly inspire the confidence again of the American people, which is what we so desperately need to do when it comes to our emergency preparedness procedures, it is to not engage in partisan infighting and backside-covering, because that is what they are doing here with insisting on having a partisan internal congressional committee instead of an independent, objective 9/11-style commission. It is confidence that we need to restore because it is the issue of security that Americans most want to feel comfortable that their government is taking care of.
That was supposedly why the President was reelected last year. One of the reasons many people cited was because they felt he would keep them safer, this administration would be more likely, supposedly, to keep them safer. I bet a lot of those people are scratching their heads wondering why they cast that vote and where is the action to back up the words that the administration campaigned on all of last year.
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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MEEK of Florida. I yield to the gentlewoman from Florida.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I want to piggyback on what he is saying here because not only do the American people want an independent review so that their confidence can be restored. They want their representatives in Congress to be statespeople. They want us to step up and put partisanship aside. My colleagues are veterans of this process, and I have been here 9, almost 10 months now, and the thing that has been the most startling to me is how partisan it is here. It does not need to be this way. I know. I have spoken to some Members even today, some Members who are leaders on the Republican side who I know if we came around the table and sat down and hashed out how we could best approach the review of what happened with Katrina and the response and our lack of preparedness, I know we could work it out. But the leadership here does not allow that to happen. It is all about winning. It is all about ``our way or the highway.'' And Americans are sick of ``our way or the highway'' politics. They just want us to get it done and do the right thing. And I just do not understand why it has to be about winning, it has to be about we are going to protect our backsides, we are going to make sure that the truth really does not come out. God forbid if we actually admit that we made a mistake. That is just irresponsible.
And to me the most devastating thing, besides the loss of life and the children, the little babies that we see being held by people who are not their mothers, because their parents are gone and no one knows where they are, the thing that is most devastating to me is knowing that there are millions of people in this country who do not believe in us anymore, who do not believe in this process. Look at the polling numbers on Congress and how Americans feel about the job we are doing. Our constituents might like us as individuals, and that is only some of us; but as a body, as an institution, we have lost their faith. And we have lost their faith because all we do is throw up our elbows and duke it out and fight to the finish. They want us to do our jobs and do right by them, and that means putting aside winning, and making sure that we can come together as Americans, like we did after 9/11, like I saw Congress do after 9/11 when we were all linking arms and working together.
Maybe Katrina, because it only happened to one region of the country, was not a unifying enough event. But if there is ever a time. We just had Rita hit Florida. It is bearing down as a category 5 on Texas now. I mean, clearly no one is immune from this in this country, and it is time that we exercise some leadership. And I think we should ask our leadership, especially the leadership running this Congress, to say to themselves, it is not all about me. That is what the American people want us to do. I just wonder whether they have the courage and the nerve to do it. It certainly does not seem that way.
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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, let us make the meat on that bone turkey, and let us talk turkey now, because beyond the partisan commission and beyond what we are saying, which is that there should be an independent commission so that we can truly get to the bottom of this, let us go a step further, because there are other things going on in Congress related to the reaction to Katrina.
We know that for the next several years we will have what will be a massive public works effort to rebuild the Gulf States, which we will be behind wholeheartedly, because there but for the grace of God go we, and we would want our colleagues to do the same and be supportive if it happened in our State. Our colleagues were very supportive of Floridians when we faced Andrew down and the follow-up to Andrew. But there are going to be some serious needs that will need to be met.
How is the Republican leadership talking about responding to those needs? Well, let us go through it. First, they are talking about keeping the tax cuts in place: Let us not touch the tax cuts, because wealthy people, they need them. It is really important. So those are off the table, those are off limits. On top of that, they are saying, you know, we got some concern occasionally about the deficit, so the right-wingers on the other side of the aisle are saying that, you know, the cost of rebuilding the Gulf States is going to be prohibitive, and we want to preserve wealthy people's tax cuts while we are rebuilding the Gulf Coast States, so we need to look to some more spending cuts. And where are they talking about those spending cuts being from? Well, they are starting off with delaying the prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients, for senior citizens who can barely make ends meet, for senior citizens who have to choose between medicine and meals, for people who literally live, bottom line, day to day. Then, they are also talking about cutting transportation projects, thousands and thousands of transportation projects, billions of dollars.
Now, who did Katrina hurt the most? The poor people, the people who are poverty stricken, 100,000 of them at least, who could not get out of New Orleans and who had to go to the Superdome to be able to find refuge. So how, when we are trying to find them jobs, are we going to get them to those jobs if we cut transportation projects, if we do not have mass transit assistance? That is how poor people get to work.
Where is the heart? Where is the trust? There is no heart in this leadership, no caring, no feeling. It is all about them. It is, you know, we got ours and the people that support us, we gave them theirs, and we are going to make sure they keep it, and everybody else be damned. That is what these people are all about.
When it comes down to it, over the next 14 months, as we go through a discussion with the American people about the choices that they will have, it is going to be about trust. Who do you trust to take care of you? Who do you trust to be there for you in your time of need, to protect you when you are in potential danger, and to be there for you when it is time to clean up and help you move your life forward?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And let us be honest. This outfit, this gang has had their chance for the last 5 or 6 years, in Congress for the last 11 years, going on 12 years. They have had their chance. Look at FEMA. Look at the economy. Look at the tax structure. Look at the Medicare program. Look at the health care situation. Look at the poverty that we saw, with no real attempt to even try to fix it. I mean, let us be honest, there has been no attempt, none. Tax cuts? Wait a minute. How are tax cuts helping people that can barely survive?
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, in the last few minutes, and if the gentleman from Florida wants to go over this, I would be happy to yield to him.
We have on our side of the aisle a series of proposals, an action plan that Leader Pelosi has put forward related to housing and economic security and health care that we are going to be talking about over the next several months, because it is not all about complaining. It is not all about we do not like what they are doing. We have a series of proposals that we want to see happen to ensure that people can move their lives forward. We have to make sure that these people have health care. We have to make sure that they have roofs over their heads. We have to make sure that they have access to jobs and job training. We have to make sure their kids have a place to go to school and that the communities where these kids go to school can actually make sure they have room for them, like our community. The people coming down to south Florida, we are exploding in our public schools. We could barely take on another kid who is moving to south Florida voluntarily. So we have plans, and we are going to make sure that those plans are outlined and that we pursue them and that the American people understand that we are going to be there for them when they need us.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Well, plans would actually be action if we were in the majority, or if we had a majority party that were willing to move in a bipartisan way in responding to the aftermath of Katrina. And also what Hurricane Katrina has exposed in America is the fact that we are not prepared to face a natural disaster or a disaster, period. We are not coordinated in this country to be able to have a response that will be appropriate to the American people in their time of need.
Mr. Speaker, the gentlewoman left off with what is being proposed, and what is also being proposed is a $9 billion cut in student aid. I know we passed a bill to kind of help with a Pell grant, but this week the majority comes back with a $9 billion discussion of helping to pay for Katrina. So it is almost like I am going to give you something, but I am going to take $9 billion back.
Mr. Speaker, I am so glad that we have the opportunity to come to the floor, and we have had to double up on 30-Something, because it is too much, too much going on.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Too much to talk about.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. I will tell my colleagues, and I will warn my colleagues on the majority side, especially those who are making decisions, it is time to start making the right decisions. When you have 8 States who say that they want the Federal Government or this Congress to investigate oil companies, we are paying $3.50, $3.90 a gallon; meanwhile, profits still soaring as it relates to the oil companies that are saying, oh, we have to go up on gas prices because the oil production is not what it should be. But they are not hurting. There are some people who could not make it to work because they could not afford to put a quarter of a tank of gas in their car or their truck if it was a small business. Sure, prices went up, because they could not move product. Diesel fuel went up, let alone jet fuel. Flights were canceled. But, meanwhile, the folks that provide the oil, they are having record profits. So eight Governors have asked for intervention by this Congress.
And, I have been passed a note here that they are also predicting that gas, based on what Rita does, could go to $5 or better. So I hate to say to not only my constituents, but also Members of this Congress, run out and fill your tank now, because Rita is a reality, and it is going to be a category 5. Because we gave money away to billionaires, not to the folks that we are talking about, not the folks that are on the cover of these magazines. What happened? How did it go wrong? Is this America? Question: Is this America?
Deficits. The deficits were here prior to Katrina, prior to Rita. When this administration came into power, that is when we started getting into deficits. We had surpluses as far as the eye could see.
So I am saying that, and I am hopeful that some of our friends, especially the ones making decisions on the other side of the aisle, will say, well, you know, maybe we need to rethink this.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Maybe we made a bunch of mistakes. Maybe we made a couple mistakes.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. They do not make mistakes.
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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, you know, it certainly does not have to be that way. It certainly was not that way when the shoe was on the other foot, because some people listening might feel, well, you know, this is just the way Congress does it. Congress is a partisan body, it is a political body; and you know when one side is in charge, they run the show. They run these investigations, and that is just the way it is.
Well, in this situation, you have got a Republican Congress investigating a Republican administration. And let us go back to the Reagan years when you had the Iran-Contra scandal. Then you had a committee set up within the Congress, which was a Democratic Congress investigating a Republican administration, so obviously there was some inherently built-in accountability in that situation.
And when it came to the way that committee was appointed and developed, even internally within the Congress there was mutual agreement on both sides of the aisle that it was done in a bipartisan fashion. And I will quote then-Representative DICK CHENEY from Wyoming who is now our Vice President. He said, because he was one of the key sponsors of the committee of the legislation that created the Iran-Contra Committee, he said at that time, ``I must say the majority has been exceedingly fair in the proceedings. The leadership of both parties has worked in a truly bipartisan fashion to create this committee,'' referring to the Iraq-Contra Committee.
Well, it is really unfortunate that when the shoe is on the other foot and they have the opportunity to do the right thing and work in a bipartisan fashion, that they are choosing not to. And it is certainly within their discretion. It is within their choice, and they are just wiping their hands and refusing to do it.
I know the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) is pulling over our 30-something board, and we want to let people know how they can get in touch with us, and we want and we urge their feedback. We want to hear from people.
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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, the way I want to conclude for us, or my portion of the conclusion, is to reiterate that at the end of the day we have plans.
If we were in charge, we would be moving to ensure that we got health care to the people who are victims of Katrina. We would be making sure that we helped get them some economic security. We would make sure that there was some accountability in the process of the doling out of contracts for the clean-up and the construction.
We would be making sure that education was of primary and paramount concern. We would be initiating an agenda to assist people and restore confidence in the emergency preparedness and disaster response procedures in America.
Because Katrina was not the first hurricane that bore down on our country; and as we have Rita churning in the gulf as a Category 5, we know she is not going to be the last. And, you know, I think we should conclude by praying for the people who are going to be experiencing Rita in the next few days and sending them our best wishes and urging them to heed the warnings that your emergency managers are going to be sending out to you.
So I look forward to joining you again as we do each week, and now, you know, in double session, because we have so much to talk about and let people know what is going on here in the Congress.
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