Waiving Points of Order Against Confrence Report on H.R. 4818, Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2005 and Providing for Consideration of H.J Res. 114..

Floor Speech

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Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, first, on the choice issue, I want to commend those other speakers who have stood here and pointed out how this bill will lead to the death of women who are suffering from partial miscarriages and will lead to the partial death of our federalist system as we deny States the right to protect women in their own hospitals.

Three process issues. Frist, we never debated VA-HUD on this floor. Offering amendments to appropriations bills is about the most significant thing rank-and-file Members get to do on this floor, and it illustrates the total irrelevancy of the rank-and-file of both sides when we take that important function away and nobody seems to care. It is all about leadership. And as to VA-HUD, we were not even given the right to pass amendments that could be stripped out in conference.

Second, as the gentleman from Washington (Mr. BAIRD) pointed out, we were not given a chance to read this bill. Why are we not given 3 days to read it and then we can vote on it? Why? Because we want all of Thanksgiving week off; not just 2 days, the whole week. Hey, we are going to get 2 months off because we do not want to do our work. We do not want to read that boring bill. We are going to go home without reading it, but we want to rubber stamp it first.

Finally, and both parties deserve criticism over decades on this one, fiscal management. There is no corporation or major institution in this country that does not decide on its annual budget a month or two before the fiscal year begins. Do my colleagues think General Motors waits until February to figure out its budget? We should have done this bill in August.

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