House Proceeding on May 3rd, 2006 :: 0:00:00 to 0:20:00
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James P. McGovern: at. this system right now has been corrupted. there is no other way to put it. this is the worst i think i have ever seen the congress in my lifetime. money is buying legislation. i mean it's happening

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Speech By: James P. McGovern

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Jim Cooper: every day. the people are losing their voice. this is not a democratic issue. it's a republican and democratic issue. everybody should be concerned about it. some of the republicans, by the way, have

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Jim Cooper: been complaining about this ear mashing process, the way things are snuck in in the middle of the night. they say you have to put your name on earmarks with regard to appropriations. okay, fine.

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Jim Cooper: but what about tax provisions? what about liability protection? what about authorizations? the bridge to nowhere was an authorization. so none of that even gets dealt with. so this is not reform. and

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Jim Cooper: it is not the result of a bipartisan process. let me just say one other thing. this bill is being brought to the floor under a restrictive, almost closed rule. 75 amendments, bipartisan amendments, were offered

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Jim Cooper: before the rules committee to come to the floor and make this bill better. the republican leadership decided to cherry-pick nine of them. i mean that in and of itself is undemocratic. that shows you

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James P. McGovern: why we need reform. the fact that members of congress, republicans and democrats, cannot amend this bill regarding the rules that govern them, that is ridiculous. >> host: port st. lucie, florida our next

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Jim Cooper: caller for congressman mcgovern. good morning. >> caller: good morning, mr. mcgovern. how are you? >> guest: great. how are you? >> caller: i understand you're saying different bills put on the floor, like

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Speech By: Jim Cooper

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Jim Cooper: you say, overnight and everything. i'm a registered republican. i'm african-american. but my thing here is, if all these bills are being pushed in so fast, i'm trying to figure out, all your under

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Jim Cooper: studies? do they give you guys this information? if it's being pushed in so fast, i don't understand why you guys can't get it together to read it and then get that information out? it is like the bills

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Jim Cooper: get brought to the floor, everybody is like arguing and fussing about it. >> guest: that's a very good question. let me give you an example of the prescription, this medicare part d. that bill

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Jim Cooper: was brought to the rules committee in the middle of the night. you know? thick bill. no one had a chance to read it. all of a sudden we report on a restrictive rule. it goes to the floor an hour later.

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Jim Cooper: again, nobody has a chance to read it. a short debate. we're supposed to have a 15 minute roll call. it turned out to be three hours so they could twist some arms to get votes. but the bottom line is

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James P. McGovern: the republicans leadership was able to twist enough arms to force that to get passed. they made all kinds of deals. the bottom line is i think everybody, democrat, republican, should insist that before

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Speech By: James P. McGovern

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James P. McGovern: major piece of legislation like that goes to the floor, that members of congress should be able to read it. their staff should be able to look over provisions. if a provision causes a concern, we should

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Jim Cooper: be able to call people in our district. the experts on some these issues and get their feedback. that's not the way it is run. the republican rules committee, the leadership, routinely waives the

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right to three days to read the bill. that's become commonplace. it is not necessary, it is what they do because, quite frankly, they don't want the debate. they want to move things as quickly

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Jim Cooper: as possible. the more debate we have on the floor, i think the more they fear people will see what's going on here. that's not just with the prescription drug bill. it is with a whole bunch of bills.

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Jim Cooper: when people read about these provisions that all of a sudden appear in the "washington post," "los angeles times," how did this get in there? i'll tell you, 90% of members who voted for it didn't

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Jim Cooper: know it was even in there. one of the reasons why democrats oftentimes vote against some of these bills is because we don't know what's in them. think we have a responsibility as members of congress,

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Jim Cooper: we all represent the same number of people, whether you are a democrat or republican. have you an obligation to do due diligence on these bills to see what's in it. as a result of that, there is a connection

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Jim Cooper: between corruption and the breakdown of the deliberative process. when the rules are tossed aside, when roll calls go from 15 minutes to three hours, when conference committees don't meet are closed,

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Jim Cooper: and they still iner is things into the bill for somebody who is a big contributor, that's corruption. that has to come to an end. this so-called reform bill does not do it. >> host: yesterday congressman

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James P. McGovern: tom cole, republican of oklahoma joined us. if you want to watch his comments, you can do so on c-span.org. st. martinville, louisiana, good morning. >> caller: good morning. mr. mcgovern, thanks for

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James P. McGovern: coming on. i watch c-span and the incident that you're talking about. and when the time ran out, they kept trying to bring this to a vote and the speaker of the house would not allow it. they would say

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James P. McGovern: it was not a parliamentary question, so they kept postponing it, while tom delay, under indictment still, was running around twisting people's arms and changing the vote. >> guest: right. >> caller:

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James P. McGovern: this is -- if american people would have seen that, just a few people probably watched that. >> guest: well, look. the gentleman is right. but the prescription drug bill is one of many bills. there was this

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James P. McGovern: so-called notorious green bonds initiative that appear in the energy conference report in the 108th congress which turned out to be a subsidy to build a hooter's restaurant in shreveport, louisiana.

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James P. McGovern: i mean give mow a break! i mean we got people who can't afford gas at the pump. you got people who can't afford the prescription drugs, and we're spending taxpayer money on something like that? i mean

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Jim Cooper: you think that's the kind of stuff that gets snuck in. part of what's happened here i think is that i think power corrupts. absolute power corrupts. that's what's happened here. there is no accountability

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Speech By: Jim Cooper

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Jim Cooper: in this congress. there is nobody held -- no transparency. everything is done the way a few people in the leadership want it to be done. and i think that they're so used to doing it this way that they

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James P. McGovern: don't even know what they're do something tantamount to corruption. i mean people want to know why they don't have an energy policy. well, look at the correlation between campaign contributions from

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Jim Cooper: the oil companies, and the tax breaks and subsidy and protections. i mean i'll tell ya, i don't know -- i mean for the life of me, i can't understand why this congress and this president doesn't

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Jim Cooper: get tough with these oil companies which essentially have a monopoly. people are paying too much at the gas pump. oil companies are making record profits and we pass energy bills to give them billions of

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Jim Cooper: dollars in subsidies and tax breaks? that is outrageous. people should be furious. and i'll tell ya, when you asked me before what do you say to your constituents, you tell them the truth. people

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Jim McCrery: can be told the truth. don't be a cheap date. don't be fooled by a soundbite. you go to your constituents and you tell them what a sham this bill is. i'll tell ya, they'll get it. if anybody, we

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James P. McGovern: should use this bill against those who vote for it, protecting perks like corporate jets, being able to fly in corporate jets. that's -- think people would be outraged when they hear that. >> host:

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Jim Cooper: virginia, you're next. >> caller: yes, sir. okay. now i'm sure you know what mtbe is. >> guest: right. >> caller: i'm sure you know mtbe has a very strong lobby in washington. tom delay an abramoff

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have strong tie thoz that lobbying. >> guest: right. >> caller: and, okay. you can comment on that later. but aside from that, there is a gasoline additive that was debated to be used next to mtbe

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in the clean air act of 1990 that had a lot of research done on it and proverbs that it safely gives 20% more -- proves 20% more gas mileage and 20% less emissions. to go one step further, that

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additive is actually used when refining gasoline. >> host: your question, caller? >> caller: that actually gasoline can be refined simply by turning up the -- adding a little bit more of the additive,

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we could have 20% more -- basically 20% more gasoline in the world through 20% more gas mileage with 70% less emissions. >> host: let me stop there. >> guest: i mean, look. the point the caller is trying

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Mark Foley: to make is the ties between the oil lobby and how lj legislators vote. again, that's -- we need to break that connection between money and the way things are done here. let me give you another

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Speech By: Mark Foley

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Mark Foley: example of the corruption we're talking about. a provision was slipped into the homeland security conference report at end of the 107th congress that protected eli lilly an a number of other farm suit