mr. speaker , i think this piece of legislation that the majority is clearly going to be able to pass today is one of the most outrageous tax cuts that we have brought to the house floor . 
the democrats are going to offer an alternative , and i appreciate the fact that it was allowed by the rules committee , but this alternative would exempt 99.7 percent of american families from having to pay inheritance taxes . 
so all we are really talking about is three-tenths of 1 percent , a relative handful , the people who clearly can most afford to pay taxes . 
this excessive , unnecessary cut will pass despite the fact that , within the last few legislative sessions , this congress has voted to take 300 , 000 families off food stamps , to take 300 , 000 children off daycare , to run the risk , by taking $ 20 billion out of medicaid , that as many as 7 million very poor elderly people dependent on government help in nursing homes will not get that assistance . 
where are our priorities ? 
where is our source of fairness ? 
you know , i think that we would all agree that we believe in equal opportunity . 
but in this country , unfortunately , when you see the effect of these tax cuts , that equal opportunity is really dependent upon the accident of birth . 
millions of people in our country are suffering for the accident of birth , without health insurance , without any real prospect of getting decent schooling . 
and yet where are we putting our tax cuts ? 
what excuse are we using for burdening the next generation with hundreds of billions of dollars of debt ? 
we are taking hundreds of billions of dollars , borrowing it from the social security trust funds , just to give more help to the very children who , because of the accident of birth , have the very best education that this country can allow , have all the contacts imaginable , are virtually guaranteed economic success unless they choose to turn their backs on it . 
what we have done is to turn our backs on the vast majority of the american people , and to close our consciences to our children 's generation , who are getting swamped with debt . 
this bill is going to cost $ 290 billion added on to a public debt that our children will never be able to recover from . 
and it is not necessary . 
i ask you to consider the fact that it takes away the stepped-up basis at the point of inheritance , insuring that there will be more small businesses , more family farms that are going to get hurt -- over 70 thousand -- by this provision , by this legislation than are going to be helped , because they are going to have to pay capital gains at the point when they actually inherit calculated by going back to the original cost to the deceased . 
so it just does not make any sense , other than to people gripped by this ideological fervor to cut taxes irregardless of the rationale or the consequence . 
it is terrible legislation . 
it ought to be defeated . 
