mr. ellison: thank you. i appreciate that. mr. cravaack: you're welcome. mr. ellison: what you're doing is trying to say that you're going to stand up for the big money people as opposed to the cumulative small business people. i think if you put the number of small business people together your big multinational mining interests that are going to pollute their businesses -- mr. cravaack: reclaiming my time. mr. speaker, i'd ask my colleague, i'm going to tell my colleague how much mining and timber contribute to the school trust fund yield. mr. speaker, in the most recent school trust fund report, mining and timber contributed $23.17 million in 2011. now, maybe that's not -- doesn't sound like much here inside the beltway but that's a lot of money where i come from. does the gentleman think that schools in minneapolis are adequately funded? i'll answer that for you. probably not. because the public school it's just went to four days which are live and we have 40 kids in a classroom. i think our teachers and kids could use the extra funding. also i'm very inter

mr. ellison. mr. ellison: i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from florida, mr. ross, is recognized for one minute. mr. ross: thank you, mr. speaker. i wanted to take a brief moment to thank -- say thank you to today's chaplain. i would also like to thank the speaker for making this possible. the indcation today was given by reverend matthew mellow from my hometown of lakeland, florida. in 1963 my mother and father helped found the church father mellow calls home and like my parents, father mellow is a geographic mutt. born in new jersey, atended grade school in puerto rico, went to high school in florida, attended seminary in indiana and studied theeologist in chicago. we don't know if he's a yankees fan, a cubs fan or a white sox fan. but since 1998 father mellow has been a constant and reassuring presence

mr. ellison: mr. speaker, my name is keith ellison, i'm co-chair of the progressive caucus. tonight i come before the people on the floor of the house of representatives to discuss important issues facing our economy and the huge challenges that our nation is facing, particularly with regard to the events that are going to take shape right after the election. the progressive caucus has come together, mr. speaker, and fought very -- thought very carefully about what a deal would look like and should look like. i want to talk about that tonight. i want to go into what we call the deal for all and to elaborate on some of the complexities that our -- that are facing our country and how this is a time when we really need to focus on the real core of what's important to make sure that as all these fiscal matters come together, that the united states and the people of america, particularly the working people, come out on top and in the right space. before i dive into that, mr. speaker, i do want to yield just for a moment to talk about the great service of ambassador chris stevens.

and ellison and mr. wright took great glee in writing terrible things about him back and forth, as if they were passing notes in class. it was really the conservatives in congress that disliked ottley the most because of his connections with the fwd. in 1939, the harlem branch came under the scrutiny of congressman martin dees and his un-american activities committee in the house. he found himself soon without a job. as a side note to this, certainly his management style was brisk. he tended to play his cards close to the vest. there was no transparency in his decision-making. he was very interesting in the way he dealt with talented writers and artists are that i think one of the things that really upset people is that when he lost his job, on his last day, he snuck into the office and it's gone but with 35 boxes of the wpa papers that had been accumulated during his time there. he was responsible for the projects in those boxes, but he had written very little of the material himself. over the next 15 y