[applause] >> ladies and gentleman, the majority leader, the honorable steny hoyer.ard brooke iii, an historic figure. a friend. someone to be used as an example. we're pleased to have you and your family here with us on this wonderful day. i walked into the room. he said, how was your chief of staff doing? my chief of staff is named terry. his daughter is named brooke, after senator edward brooke iii. vicki, thank you for being here. we know ted is here with you. on his arrival in the senate, he tells us in his autobiography the same senators who spoke up so forcefully for segregation are happy to invite me into their senate swimming pool. the same man who stoat racial fears of their constituents, who did so much to haulback equality in this country. he said have no qualms t(about sharing their pool with a black man. i am sure ed brooke taught them a lot. if you believe in racial separatism, he said, i can live with that. he went on to say, it was evident that some members played on bigotry for political gain. the senate was not alone. and that small incident senato

[applause] >> ladies and gentleman, the majority leader, the honorable steny hoyer.i, an historic figure. a friend. someone to be used as an example. we're pleased to have you and your family here with us on this wonderful day. i walked into the room. he said, how was your chief of staff doing? my chief of staff is named terry. his daughter is named brooke, after senator edward brooke iii. vicki, thank you for being here. we know ted is here with you. on his arrival in the senate, he tells us in his autobiography the same senators who spoke up so forcefully for segregation are happy to invite me into their senate swimming pool. the same man who stoat racial fears of their constituents, who did so much to haulback equality in this country. he said have no qualms t(about sharing their pool with a black man. i am sure ed brooke taught them a lot. if you believe in racial separatism, he said, i can live with that. he went on to say, it was evident that some members played on bigotry for political gain. the senate was not alone. and that small incident senator brooke so h

i want to congratulate all of the present members of congress, and steny hoyer for his leadership.count the numbers of mr. lawson. mr. miller, slaughtered, i do not know that she has joined us. but the other members were part of bringing together this important end of the session. i just want to say that when we began this year, it is important to say that when we began this year, the first month of the year, the economy lost 740,000 jobs. because of the recovery package and the leadership of obama, in the last month, the economy lost 11,000 jobs. 741 year ago, 11,000 last month. we do not want to lose any of them. but now we are on the path of a gain. it is important to say that during that same time, the stock market went up over 3000 points. from the day obama took office, where the market was about 7000, and now this is over 10,000. the economists say that much of these changes come from the recovery package and the actions of congress. it is important to know what has happened to the gdp. we have stimulated the economy to grow. in the first quarter of this year, as a result of

the problem is senators like steny hoyer and max baucus are virtually running a whole industry on the side where all of the former aides are bankers, they go make millions of dollars from health care company where senator steny hoyer is supposed to be working for constituents. it is a conflict of interest. host: if you are interested in there is a story on politico.com yesterday, and impact of all of this on k street. it said k street had a very good year with health care being the no. 1 source of lobbying money here in washington. caller: right. k street, a look appeared $635 million has been spent so far -- i will look up. $635 million have been spent so far -- host: and that was the first nine months. check it out. leslie miller has this twitter comments. a piece in the business section of " the new york times." moving the process forward, what happens when the house and senate comes back next year. host: you can track all of this, including details of the health- care bill by logging onto c- span.org and clicking on healthcare hub. the debate that ensued the last year, the town ha

. >> holman: democratic leader steny hoyer argued the new agency would prove its worth if it helps prevent another meltdown. >> let's say there is a significant cost, lets say its a couple of billion dollars, you say $4 billion, lets just say, for the sake of argument a couple billion dollars, pales into insignificance in the one point five trillion dollars we have borrowed to get this country out of the deep, deep, deep hole cause by the failure to regulate properly. >> holman: democrats tried and failed to let federal bankruptcy judges rewrite mortgages to lower monthly payments. georgia democrat jim marshall was a co-sponsor of the proposal. >> since this is only applicable to existing mortgages, it will have no effect on the cost of future mortgages, the beauty of it is we'll have fewer all of those folks will be helped by this without putting a single dime of taxpayer dollars in the deal, it seems to me that's a complete justification for doing this, we should've done it long ago. >> holman: but republicans, like virginia's bob goodlatte, rejected that argument. the gentleman may clai

right before this session i was readinglines on my blackberry and i saw that house majority steny hoyer has said they're going to vote next week on rages the debt level to either $1.8 trillion or $1.9 trillion. as we have been talking, the can has been kicked further down the road, the fourth time in 18 months. the debt ceiling has been talked at least and effectively changed. we see how that vote happens next week. i would say one of the takeaways that i have just from consumer response or media response to the question of debt and deficits is that debt is a four-letter word that has absolutely no visceral reaction in the consumer face when they hear it because it's not real. 1.8, 1.9 doesn't sound real to people. they sound like fake numbers. in the past two days, we have gone through real issues and real potential danger that may result from high debt and high deficits in this country. i know alice just told us that the year 2010 may be a year when we see a change there in the public face in terms of their concept of what debt means to them. we're going to try to come up with some ac

[applause] >> let me echo the sentiments of steny hoyer and jim clyburn. we are fortunate to be led by such a capable leader in nancy pelosi. i know that every member of this leadership agrees with that. but our members are so grateful for her work. she never asks from anyone that she does not do a 10-fold herself. at this time, for our country, with a historical precedent, it is great we have a historic speaker who continues to speak on behalf of the people of this country. it is an honor for us to serve with her and continue to roll up our sleeves on behalf of the american people and get the job done. we are restless. we know there is much more to be done. but we have the appetite for it. we have someone who has the will, the dedication, the grace and the ability to accomplish that. that is why we follow her lead. merry christmas. feliz navidad. kwanza. happy chanakuk to everyone. >> a person with so much talent who wears two hats, the assistant to the speaker and chair of the democratic national campaign committee, a person who knows policies so well, u

steny hoyer says we have incurred the debt and we have to pay our bills.. the high court ruled in june that new haven connecticut officials violated of white firefighters the civil-rights when they threw out 2003 test results in which two -- too few minorities did well. sonia sotomayor ruled against them when she served on a federal appeals court. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> "washington journal" continues. host: elisabeth warren is at our table, the chair of the congressional t.a.r.p. oversight panel. they have asked treasury secretary tim geithner to appear before them today and on the t.a.r.p. program drew a report came out in anticipation of this hearing, the headlines are the study of this effectiveness is what? guest: there is good news and bad news. the good news, and it is very good, is that t.a.r.p. in conjunction with other federal actions, action from the fed, the fdic, the stimulus, kept this economy from plunging over the cliff into what would likely have been a depression. that is a powerful impact. the bad news

signed into law before the president gives his state of the union address, and please now welcome steny hoyer >> we have worked very hard to address the extraordinary fall in our economy that was left to us by the lasted administration. you have heard me say in the last month -- that was left to us by the last administration. last month, 11,000 people lost their jobs, still too many. we have made progress, but we have not had success. we believe in is our responsibility to continue to fight to keep jobs, -- we believe is our responsibility. -- it is our responsibility. whatever it may be, we need the jobs and the investment in infrastructure. that is what this jobs bill is about. that is why we are bringing it to the floor. we are confident we will pass it, and we hope the senate addresses it in the near term. i now want to yield to my distinguished friend, the majority whip, jim clyburn of south carolina. >> thank you. this jobs bill will build in some things for the american families. by doing this, we hope that the american people will know during this holiday season that we're serious abo

steny hoyer is a strong supporter of the commission approach.that is going to require a special process. >> thank you. senator carper. >> i am almost reluctant to ask . i want to say thank you so much day-to-day in the budget committee and all the time that you and senator gregg put into this idea. i know it's extraordinary. and to your staffs. just thank you for standing up and saying, all right, this is where we draw the line. i also want to thank you for showing a fair amount of flexibility in taking input and suggestions to modify the original proposal that you started off -- that you started off with. i'm not going to ask a question. i just want to say yesterday in the same room i hosted a charity hearing of another nature. when i was in the house, we sponsored a balanced budget amendment to the constitution. not one that mandated a balanced budget every year but mandated a proposal to the budget balanced and had the congress to unbalance the budget with a 3/5 vote, allow the congress to raise the debt ceiling by a 3/5 vote. but it put emph

host: didn't the democratic leader of the house, steny hoyer, tell a newspaper that that would not happen, that they would have the conference process in january? guest: yes, he did. also, senator baucus was talking about the idea of the conference, and it seems to be -- it seems as though the informal talks about pre- conference negotiations are going to get underway shortly after the senate passes the bill. host: state of the union scheduled for when, do you know, kate hunter? guest: it is usually the last tuesday of january, but i do not know if that is official yet. that seems to be the deadline for when the democratic leadership in congress is looking to send a bill to president obama and have it signed at the civic union. host: the front page of "the washington post," if photograph of 92-year-old senator robert c. byrd from west virginia. since he arrived in 1959, the senior senator has cast more than 18,500 votes. this week, amid a historic blizzard, the 92-year-old senator arrived in the wee hours after midnight, in the frigid minutes just after dawn. here is this quote from senat

later, steny hoyer and eric cantor discussed the upcoming session for the house. this is about half an hour. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. cantor: i thank the speaker and i yield to the gentleman from maryland, the majority leader, for the purpose of announcing next week's schedule. mr. hoyer: on monday, the house will meet at 10:30 a.m. for morning hour debate, 12:00 p.m. for legislative business, votes postponed until 6:30 p.m. on tuesday, the house will meet at 9:00 a.m. for morning hour debate, 10:00 a.m. for legislative business. on wednesday an thursday, the house will meet at 10:00 a.m. for legislative business, on friday the house will meet at 9:00 a.m. for legislative business. we will consider several bills under suspension of the rules. the complete list of which will be announced by the close of business today. in addition, mr. speaker, we will consider further action on h.r. 3326, the department of defense appropriations act of 2010. mr. cantor: i thank the gentleman. mr. speaker, i'd like to ask the gentleman about the schedule for

. >> as you can tell we have incredible leaders on the podium, steny hoyer certainly has been such a champion of paygo. speaker pelosi has come and she stated yesterday, is fully committed to making statutory paygo into law. and having the leaders, the blue dogs led by stephanie herseth sandlin, it is a full commitment. on behalf of the blue dogs. and one of the most important things, you may look at it today and say it's only paygo and what does that really entail? but to come three, five and ten years from now you will realize the importance of paygo and what is making the difference in future generations. when we are acting as proper business like when a key word in the federal government in a proper business approach pay-as-you-go, the way as families conduct themselves in a proper manner of not spending more than they have and putting themselves in deeper in debt this is a very, very large step and when this gets enacted and signed into law we it will look back in years to come and realize that this is a very important day. very important to the administration and so we are plea

the problem is, senators like steny hoyer and max baucus are virtually running a whole industry on there all their former aides and staffers go on to make millions of >> for the health-care company's that center whole year is supposed to be working for constituents -- force in nature -- senators ho yer is supposed to be working for constituents. host: there was a story on line about pastry having a very good money -- a very good year. -- k street has been having a very good year. caller: k street, i am going to look that up. host: leslie miller has this twitter comment. this is in the business section of the "new york times." house speaker nancy pelosi and her colleagues are in a tough spot. they already seemed poised to yield on abortion and the public option to get the bill through the senate. now the senate and the white house will be at asking them to be more serious about holding down costs as well. but the health care experts i spoke to thought there was room for a sensible compromise. the liberal leaders had few realistic demands to make in exchange for accepting the cost contro

my partner, great leader in the congress, congressman steny hoyer, house democratic leader.h, madam speaker. we came to congress in january, confronted with the worst economy in 75 years. we had already made some tough votes at the request of president bush to stabilize the economy. i am very proud of our speaker, of our leadership, and of our members. we made very tough decisions throughout the course of this session to respond to the economic crisis. to stabilize our economy. as the speaker pointed out, 71,400 -- 74,000 jobs lost in the last month of the bush administration, 11,000 lost last month. that's progress, but not success. success will be measured by a growth in jobs, the addition of jobs. more people having the opportunity to work and support themselves and their families. we also confronted the challenge of energy independence for this country. and global warming. we also have addressed the issue of literally millions and millions of americans, almost 50 million americans without health care. all of theseÑi were tough issue for us to confront. but in the course