mr. speaker , my colleague from florida , i wish he would stay , because we are here today because the republican majority would like to repeal the estate tax , but they have forgotten history . 
i am sure my colleague was not here , but i would like to remind him that it was a republican , president roosevelt , teddy roosevelt , who strongly supported an estate tax in the first place . 
here is what he said . 
there is no argument for this . 
`` the man of great wealth , '' teddy said , `` owes a particular obligation to the state because he derives special advantages from the mere existence of government. '' wow , nicely said , and a republican , too . 
that proves two things , that republicans can sometimes speak eloquently , and sometimes they can even do something that is right . 
though republicans want to undo all the good for the sake of greed , please , america , do not be phonied up by this rhetoric that we hear on this bill . 
they will pitch some gibberish about how they are helping americans . 
that is nonsense . 
we just came from the committee on ways and means . 
the reason this place was in recess is because we were over there giving out $ 8 billion to oil companies . 
those poor people , whose profits have quadrupled in the last 2 years , that is what we did a little while ago . 
now we come over here , and we are going to give more money away . 
does that seem like it benefits real people ? 
this is not about real people . 
this is about very , very , very rich people , and that is about as plainspoken as teddy roosevelt would have said it . 
only 2 percent , at the most , pay any estate tax whatsoever . 
three-quarters of the money that comes in comes from people with estates over $ 2.5 million . 
if we repeal this , the rich get richer and america 's deficit gets deeper and redder . 
we create an oligarchic class in this country from whom the money can never be taxed . 
if they can manipulate it around while they are alive , they can never have to pay a penny . 
the real losers in this are not only the american people . 
it is the american universities , the american churches , all those people who get money contributed by rich people because they do not want to pay the inheritance tax . 
now my colleagues have taken away the encouragement . 
why should they give anything away ? 
oh , well , because they have big hearts . 
they have big hearts we are told . 
really ? 
then why are we out here with a bill like this which gives them the ability to keep every single dime ? 
now if you can give your kid $ 2 million and say , now , johnny , here is two million bucks , i think that ought to kind of get you a start in the world . 
does that not seem like enough ? 
well , to the republicans , there is never enough ; take as much as you can from everybody and keep it . 
ronald reagan put the sign of the cross on it . 
he said , are you better off today than you were 4 years ago ? 
never does anyone say on my colleagues ' side , are we better off . 
we are in debt to the world . 
we borrowed from the japanese last year our entire deficit , more than $ 400 billion , and the president wanders around the country saying , well , that is just paper . 
those things in the social security trust fund , that is just paper . 
do not pay any attention to that . 
if the japanese stop buying dollars and they start buying euros , and the chinese start buying euros and the middle east buys euros , where do my colleagues think we are going to borrow money and what kind of interest rate are we going to pay ? 
this is a bad bill , it is bad policy , and it is bad ethics . 
