mr. speaker , i yield myself such time as i may consume .  again , i am having trouble following this debate here .  the gentlewoman from tennessee talked about the thousands of people in her district that had to pay the estate tax last year .  i am reading from a report here that said there were roughly 440 taxable estates , or about 2 percent of all taxable estates were made up of farm and business assets in the year 2004 .  what we are talking about here , and again , if we agree to the pomeroy substitute , is three-tenths of 1 percent of the wealthiest people in this country .  that is what we are talking about .  we are not talking about family farms .  i mean , that is a red herring .  we are not talking about small businesses .  we are talking about the campbell soup fortunes , the mars candy fortunes .  we are talking about the richest of the rich .  that is what this is about .  what is unconscionable is that we are moving forward on this at a time when the majority of this house is proposing budgets that slash medicaid , that cut community development block grants , that cut veterans health benefits , that cut education , that cut things that people rely on every single day .  this is absurd that we are having this debate here today .  again , i would urge my colleagues to look at the facts .  please do not exaggerate the impact of the difference between what the gentleman from north dakota ( mr. pomeroy )  has suggested and what you are proposing here .  what you are doing here is trying to extend this to protect the richest of the rich , and that is just wrong .  mr. speaker , i reserve the balance of my time .  