Rep. Steve Buyer (R-Ind.) might have revealed a little too much about his youthful indiscretions during House debate on the FDA tobacco bill.
Arguing that it's actually the smoke from a cigarette--not tobacco itself--that's harmful, Buyer speculated about what else should be regulated if that criteria was taken into account.
"Do you realize if you were to take that lettuce, dry it, and roll it, and smoke it-- and you go ahead and you smoke your lettuce," Buyer said. " Do you realize that you are going to end up with similar problems than if you were smoking tobacco? It's not the nicotine that kills. It's the smoke that kills. So It's the inhalation of the smoke. That's what causes and is responsible for the pandemic of cancers, of heart disease, respiratory disease, and other disease. It's the smoke."
Buyer didn't specify whether he meant romaine or iceberg, however.
Here's some video of Buyer's remarks, courtesy of C-SPAN. (The lettuce remarks begin at 1:05).
Leaders of the Senate Finance Committee are using North Korea's nuclear test to press President Obama to move forward with a controversial trade agreement with South Korea.
The deal is opposed by some U.S. automakers and organized labor, and Obama has offered few signals that he intends to pick it up anytime soon.
Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and ranking Republican Charles Grassley (Iowa) urged Obama to "begin the hard work of winning broad approval" of the deal in a letter dated Monday. They also offered their full support for the deal, while acknowledging that work still needed to be done to satisfy automakers and U.S. beef produces, who face restrictions on exports to South Korea.
Presdent Bush celebrated Colombia's independence day at the White House this afternoon, two days after the holiday, offering a "brief discurso" on why Congress should approve his trade agreement with the South American nation.
The president appeared with members of his cabinet, GOP Reps. David Dreier (Calif.),
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President Bush on Wednesday vetoed the farm bill for a second time, paving the way for Congress to override it and make it into law.
Congress had passed $290 billion measure with veto-proof majorities in May. But that version, which Bush vetoed, lacked a key foreign aid portion due to a clerical error. The version that Bush vetoed Wednesday included the missing piece. The bill now goes back to Congress, which is expected to override the veto.
Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Byron Dorgan (D-S.D.), as well as Reps. Mike Michaud (D-Maine) and Linda Sanchez (D-Calif.), will call for a review of all existing U.S. trade agreements tomorrow.
The four members will join Teamsters leader Jim Hoffa for a press conference outside the Senate, where they will unveil legislation mandating a review of trade agreements and outlining a process to renegotiate them. The members are calling their bill the Trade Reform, Accountability, Development and Employment (TRADE) Act.
For those wondering why Congress can't get a farm bill passed, the Associated Press has a must-read story Saturday.
Reasons for the bill impasse include election-year politics, a smaller discretionary budget and a president in his last year in office, Mary Clare Jalonick writes. And that has led to some acrimonious negotiations.
Read this snippet:
Negotiators face several obstacles. The Democratic chairmen of the House and Senate agriculture committees, Minnesota Rep. Collin Peterson and Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, have lost control of the legislation as tax packages were added to both bills to help pay for them and win votes.
That has brought into the mix House Ways and Means Committee chairman Charlie Rangel, who represents few farmers in his New York City district. He and Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., are charged with finding an extra $10 billion for the bill but have agreed on very little.
At a farm bill meeting in Rangel's office Thursday, shouting could be heard behind closed doors. Several senators, including Baucus, left angrily.
"Let's just say it wasn't good," Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said afterward.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) argued that the Bush administration has failed to discuss the merits of the Colombia-U.S. free trade agreement with Congress, leading the House to delay a vote on it.
Rangel had joined other Democrats in delaying a vote on the agreement on Thursday. Rangel and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi argued earlier in the week that that Bush's decision to send the deal to the House this week had showed a "disregard" toward Congress and "jeopardiz[ed] prospects for its passage."
Bush had sent it to Congress under "fast track" rules, which had required to Congress to consider it within 90 days. But the House Democrats' delay means that the vote is postponed indefinitely.
Rangel on CNBC Friday said that the Bush administration has taken the attitude that says, "I don't have to negotiate with you."
"It would seem to me that if you were trying to get something passed in the House of Representatives, you wouldn't confuse me with the facts as you see them," Rangel said. "You would say, 'What is the problem? What is the impediment?'"
Labor groups and both Democratic presidential candidates have opposed the free trade deal, saying that they're concerned about its effects on American workers. Democrats in the House have also called for greater protection in the deal for union workers in Colombia.
Rangel said that the bill's supporters have couched their support for it in terms of its effect on national security and Latin American relations.
"It's absolutely surprising, as I remind them, whether it's the secretary of commerce, the secretary -- every time they come, they want us to know the threat that Hu Chavez is, how we would violate the friendship that we have with these wonderful people -- and I love the Colombian people -- and that Castro is in on it," he said. "And so, it's a question of national defense."
Warning that an immediate House vote on the Colombia free trade agreement would fail, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wants to delay voting on the deal.
At a Thursday press conference, she said she will have the House decide Thursday on a rule change removing the deadline requiring the House to vote on the deal within 60 days of receiving it from the president. Pelosi said that she disagreed with the president's decision to send the bill this week.
"But the President took his action," she said. "I will take mine tomorrow."
Unions and several Democratic leaders, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, have come out against approval of the free trade pact. They have called for expanding programs for U.S. workers displaced by jobs that went abroad and better protections for Colombian union members .
"We're first and foremost here to look out for the concerns of America's working families," Pelosi said.
House Minority Leader John Boehner said that he's disappointed in Pelosi's call for a delay and that he believes that it's an attempt to kill the deal.
"And when you look at the fact that exports are the one silver lining in our economy, why would we avoid dealing with a Colombia free trade issue that can enhance our ability to export products that are produced here, by American workers, around the world," Boehner said.
President Bush set out an agenda for Congress this morning: reform FISA, modernize the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), and approve his Colombia free trade agreement.
Congress returns today from two weeks of recess, and Bush spoke this morning as he departed from the White House for NATO's summit in Bucharest, which will begin Wednesday.
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