H 4526 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE May 3, 1995

Except for a very few of the top graduates from the most prestigious

schools, or the very few who have good

family connections, most find out they

could make more money managing a

McDonald’s or driving a truck.

We possibly should require colleges

and universities to put warning labels

on some of their degree programs such

as ‘‘There are currently almost no jobs

available in this field’’ or ‘‘This degree

will do you absolutely no good whatsoever in obtaining employment.’’

If you think I am exaggerating, listen to these two letters in the April 24

issue of U.S. News & World Report:

Thank you for including ‘‘Gypsy Profs’’

with your rankings of liberal arts programs.

It should give pause to anyone misinformed

enough to think a graduate degree will guarantee a chance to teach. Like those in your

article, I have a Ph.D., which entitles me to

drive 480 miles each week to teach five

courses for two community colleges. Each

semester is an employment uncertainty. But

I love what I do—something not true of most

people—and I don’t see a great deal of employment security anywhere. I knew what I

was getting when I entered graduate school.

Still, I dearly wish that the future looked

more promising. There’s no dignity in being

a mercenary teacher-for-hire; last week my

father-in-law described me as ‘‘unemployed’’

at a family gathering.

MICHAEL J. BOOKER.

KNOXVILLE, TN.

I received my Ph.D. in history from the

University of Chicago in 1993, and after two

years in the job market and well over 100 applications for employment, I have yet to be

called for my first interview despite my

teaching experience and track record of publishing in professional journals. The time I

spent working toward my doctorate would

have been better utilized in almost any other

career, where I would have been earning

money and accruing seniority. The ‘‘gypsy

profs’’ may not realize it, but they are the

lucky ones in the fraud America’s graduate

schools are perpetrating on their students!

JONATHAN R. DEAN.

CRAWFORDSVILLE, IN.

Now, I hope I will not be misunderstood. A college education is a good

thing.

I am not saying people should not go

to college.

I am saying that many college graduates cannot find jobs today, particularly in fields like law and in teaching

school.

There is a huge surplus of lawyers—

and a huge surplus of teachers—and a

huge surplus of people who want jobs in

law enforcement or other Government

jobs.

All I am really saying is that we need

to do everything possible to encourage

young people to go into fields where

they are needed more—where the future is brighter.

We should also do a better job promoting what used to be called vocational education, but which in most

places today is called technology education.

We need more young people today

with technical training.

It is sad to see so many young people

today getting college degrees, and particularly graduate degrees, which really do them no good.

It is just wrong to continue perpetrating fraud on our Nation’s young

people so some universities can make

more money or so that some colleges

can continue to employ professors who

are teaching in fields in which there

are almost no jobs.

Fortunately, our unemployment is

low; but our underemployment is great

and, unfortunately, is growing. Many

colleges and universities are helping to

make this situation worse.

IN HONOR OF FALLEN SECRET

SERVICE AGENTS

fThe SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a

previous order of the House, the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. HOYER] is

recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I rise as

the ranking member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Treasury, Postal Service, and General Government. I rise today to pay a solemn

tribute to the six employees of the U.S.

Secret Service, one of whom is missing

and five of whom we know have lost

their lives as a result of the heinous attack on the Federal building in Oklahoma City. I rose yesterday in the context of the Oklahoma City resolution

to talk about all the Federal employees.

I want to express my deepest sympathy to all the families, friends, and

neighbors, but particularly, at this

time to the family, friends, neighbors,

and colleagues of the brave six Secret

Service employees who we lost at Oklahoma City. This is a time of deep anguish and pain for the families of those

killed, those injured, and those whose

loved ones are still unaccounted for as

they were doing the business of the

people of the country.

Today we remember Assistant Special Agent in Charge Alan G. Whicher,

who served as part of the detail protecting President Clinton, and then

was transferred to what I am sure he

and his family thought was a more

tranquil environment in Oklahoma

City. He lost his life.

Special Agent Cynthia L. Brown, appointed a special agent only a little

over 1 year ago. She lost her life.

Special Agent Donald R. Leonard.

His career assignments included the

Vice-Presidential Protective Division.

He lost his life.

Special Agent Mickey R. Maroney,

who served with the Secret Service

since 1971. He lost his life.

An investigative assistant, Kathy L.

Seidl, appointed to the Secret Service

in 1985, to the Oklahoma City office;

and the office manager, Linda McKinney, who was recovered from the rubble

only yesterday. She was the one I said

was missing, and I was in error. She

has been located.

I cannot say that I know the pain the

people of Oklahoma City are experiencing. I do know very well the feeling of

loss that communities all across this

country feel for the people of Oklahoma City and for the loved ones of

those who lost their lives.

Mr. Speaker, God blesses America,

and he does so through the services of

so many, and particularly through the

service of those who are fallen but not

forgotten. Let us, Mr. Speaker, resolve

at this moment to embrace the wives

and the children, the mothers and the

fathers, the sisters and the brothers,

the fellow colleagues, all those who

love them dearly, in the fellowship of

love and compassion. While they have

lost an important part of their families, we must assure them they will always be a part of our larger family.

To the family and friends of those

brave U.S. Secret Service agents and

employees, my words today, of course,

cannot express the sorrow for the loss

of this Nation’s best, and the gratitude

for their sacrifice. I recall the words of

President Lincoln, and I quote:

I feel how weak and fruitless must be any

words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming, but I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be

found in the thanks of the Republic they

died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father

may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished

memory of the loved and the lost, and the

solemn pride that must be yours to have laid

so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

President Lincoln, of course, spoke of

those who lost their lives in the preservation of the Union; those who lost

their lives in Oklahoma City did so as

well.

As a father, a husband, and as a child

of God, my heartfelt sympathies go out

to each of the families. May they, too,

find comfort in their sorrow.

Mr. Speaker, I know that every colleague joins me in expressing our sympathy and our sorrow, and our wishes

that God will bless Alan, Cynthia, Donald, Mickey, Kathy, and Linda.

THE DIFFICULTIES OF THE HOUSE

AS IT DEALS WITH THE BUDGET

fISSUE

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a

previous order of the House, the gentlewoman from Colorado [Mrs. SCHROEDER] is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mrs. SCHROEDER. Mr. Speaker, I

would just like to talk a bit about

some of the things that are in some of

the newspapers today about the difficulties this House is facing as it

forces itself to deal with the budget

issue. For the last 4 years, we had the

budget done on time. That was before

April 15. This year, for all the magic

done and all the things that got going,

guess what, we do not have a budget,

and everybody is saying ‘‘Just do it.

Where’s the budget?’’

I think the budget happens to be the

most important thing, and we should

have done that first, before we did all

the giveaways and all the tax cuts and

all the other goodies, but the goodies

have been given out, and now it is time
May 3, 1995 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD—HOUSE H 4527

to take the medicine. The first issue

that I thought was so interesting was

the Hill newspaper, which said, guess

what,

The Republicans are having trouble with

their own appointed head of the Congressional Budget Office.

Luckily, the Congressional Budget

Office is there. When the Democrats

appointed the head of the Budget Office, we had trouble. Mr. Reischauer

pointed out that we had underestimated the cost of the health care proposals that were out there. Thank

goodness he did that, because I think

he brought real reality.

Now they are very angry because the

new head that they appointed is telling

them their Medicare stuff does not add

up, that they have put in all sorts of

little amendments, and they want to

tinker a little bit with it, and it is

going to be a whole lot more costly

than they thought. That is not the

news they want to hear, but Americans

want to hear what is really going to

happen to the budget, so I am glad that

both under Republicans and Democrats

that Budget Office has worked to be

nonpartisan and look at the numbers,

not poll numbers, but budget numbers.

This budget fight goes on and on and

on because, as you see in the other

newspaper, you see both Republican

leaders out pleading with the President

to join them in the rescue of Medicare.

They want the President to join them

in the rescue of Medicare after they

have proceeded to raid Medicare. What

a deal. They get to raid it, we get to

rescue it. There is something wrong

with that picture.

The President and his administration

were very responsible in the last 2

years. They have dealt with Medicare

in our last budget. We bailed it out for

the next 3 years, added solvency to it.

We did it without one Republican vote.

We have been talking about how not

only Medicare but all health care

should be looked at, because of the rising costs. We have had many proposals.

Guess what, we didn’t get a lot of bipartisan help.

In this last election people went out

and said, ‘‘It is so easy. Those silly

Democrats, they just mess everything

up. Just give it to us. We can do tax

cuts, we can balance the budget, and

we can increase defense.’’ I guess people forgot they had heard that once before in 1981. It didn’t work then, and we

see it isn’t working now.

I really hope we get on with business,

we get a budget out here. The No. 1

issue people want is doing something

about that deficit, doing something

about that deficit as rapidly as possible. All the other stuff was frill. We

got the frill out of the way. We still

don’t have the main course, the budget.

I hope we don’t see politicization of the

budget office.

We saw earlier this year the Speaker

taking on his own budget nominee,

saying he didn’t like the way that they

were responding. They are supposed to

respond neutrally and according to real

numbers. That is the way it should be.

I salute Director O’Neill for continuing

that tradition, and I must say, let’s

stop whining about that and let’s get

on with the real budget. Just do it.

Let’s stop whining about how the

President should rescue them from

their own raids that they made to do

tax cuts for the wealthy. Hey, they

gave it away, now they have got to figure out how they pay. I don’t think

they should blame it on the President.

He didn’t get the credit for giving it all

away.

Let’s get on with it, let’s see that

budget, and let’s get on with the real

hard tasks of government.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. Speaker, will the

gentlewoman yield?

Mrs. SCHROEDER. I am delighted to

yield to the gentleman from Illinois.

Mr. DURBIN. I think I have heard

some speculation that the Republicans

want to cut somewhere in the neighborhood of $350 billion out of Medicare

spending, which would mean, of course,

that there would either be higher payments by senior citizens, or lower reimbursement to hospitals and doctors

and clinics and the like.

What I find curious about this is that

$350 billion figure is very close to the

figure that we hear will be the cost of

the tax cut bill, which was part of the

Republican Contract With America. So

this tax cut that took the money out of

the Treasury is obviously being

plugged with some cuts in Medicare.

Maybe I have missed something here,

but the two figures are very similar.

Mrs. SCHROEDER. The gentleman

from Illinois listened very properly and

very correctly. That is exactly right.

They raided it, they gave it away, and

now they are screaming to the President, ‘‘Rescue us, rescue us from our

own craziness.’’ If you remember, when

these tax cuts went into effect, the

Speaker attacked the same budget director who came out with this analysis

on what those tax cuts were going to

cost: ‘‘Did you write the numbers the

same,’’ and said it looked like she had

socialists doing the analysis. Really.

That is why I think the rhetoric has

gotten too high on this, and the gentleman has gotten right to the core of

the problem, as he usually does.

fb 1215

MEDICARE AND THE BUDGET

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr.

REGULA). Under a previous order of the

House, the gentleman from California

[Mr. MILLER] is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr.

Speaker, many of our colleagues on

this side of the aisle have raised the

question about exactly what is going

on with the Republican budget process

where we are now a month late in

meeting the deadline, a deadline that

we have not missed over the last 4

years.

I guess the answer is in the daily

press. That is, that the Republican

leadership is having a terrible time

with now trying to figure out how to

connect all of the dots in what they

have promised in their budget to the

American public. That is, that they

would provide a huge tax cut to the

wealthiest people in this Nation, they

would balance the budget, they would

add money to the military, and they

would not touch Social Security.

Of course, what we now find out is

that they cannot meet those targets

without touching Social Security, and

they plan to do more than just touch

Social Security. The speculation runs

from cuts of somewhere around $200

billion over the next 7 years to Senators estimating as high as $400 billion.

What that means, if you just take an

average, if you just save $250 billion,

you are talking over that 7-year period

of asking senior citizens to pay somewhere between $3,000 and $3,700 more

for their health care.

The problem is that many, many of

these senior citizens simply have no

way to replace that income. They have

no way to replace the money that they

would have to pay out for the additional cost of Medicare. They have no

ability to go back to work. They cannot get a job. They cannot lean on

their children any harder. So those

cuts are immediately translated to the

declining assets and the financial wellbeing of the senior citizens.

The Republican leadership has run

around the last couple of days trying

to explain that this is really about

their saving Medicare, this is about reforming Medicare. But it is interesting,

as each objective observer who has

looked at this says that this continues

to translate into cuts to Medicare that

must be made up by the beneficiaries of

that plan, the senior citizens of this

country, the $3,000 that I just talked

about.

It is also interesting to note that

when you get into a discussion of rural

hospitals, we find out that there are 10

million Medicare beneficiaries who live

in rural America, where often there is

only a single hospital available to service that population and the rest of the

community, and that these kinds of

cuts, the hospital association tells us,

translate into a serious threat of these

hospitals closing, and not only the senior citizens losing access to that hospital but the entire community losing

access to that hospital.

We also know that these rural residents very often are more likely than

urban residents to be uninsured. So the

ability to offset these cuts would then

be shifted in rural areas, perhaps to

those who have less access to insurance.

It is interesting also to note that the

plan of just cutting across the board in

Medicare is resisted by the National

Association of Manufacturers, companies like Eastman Kodak that say if

you do that, once again you are taking