[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 58 (Thursday, May 11, 2000)]
[House]
[Pages H2956-H2957]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     MATTERS OF NATIONAL IMPORTANCE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise this afternoon to briefly discuss two 
unrelated but very important matters of national importance.
  Last year, we spent billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars bombing Kosovo. 
As the Scripps-Howard Newspapers said a few weeks ago, ``the outcome 
certainly has not been a happy one.'' As the Scripps-Howard chain 
noted, ``many innocent civilians killed.''
  How cavalierly we brush over that, ``many innocent civilians 
killed.'' Hundreds of innocent civilians killed and we are not ashamed 
of that for some reason. Hundreds of thousands made homeless by our 
actions. We wasted billions of hard-earned tax dollars to make a 
situation many times worse than it would have been if we had simply 
stayed out. We bombed people who would like to have been our friends, 
and we bombed in a situation, and bombed repeatedly, where there was no 
threat whatsoever to our national security and no vital U.S. interest 
at stake.
  To make things even worse, Newsweek Magazine this week has a major 
story entitled The Kosovo Coverup. Listen to what part of this article 
says. ``An antiseptic war, fought by pilots flying safely three miles 
high. It seems almost too good to be true, and it was. In fact, as some 
critics suspected at the time, the air campaign against the Serb 
military in Kosovo was largely ineffective. NATO bombs plowed up some 
fields, blew up hundreds of cars, trucks, and decoys, and barely dented 
Serb artillery and armor. According to a suppressed Air Force report 
obtained by Newsweek, the number of targets verifiably destroyed was a 
tiny fraction of those claimed: 14 tanks, not 120, as claimed; 18 
armored personnel carriers, not 220; 20 artillery pieces, not 450. Out 
of the 744 `confirmed strikes' by NATO pilots during the war, the Air 
Force investigators who spent weeks combing Kosovo by helicopter and by 
foot found evidence of just 58.''
  About 5 years ago, I remember reading on the front page of The 
Washington Post one day that we had our troops in Haiti picking up 
garbage and settling domestic disputes. A couple of years ago, I 
remember another Member on this floor saying we had our troops in 
Bosnia giving rabies shots to dogs. Well, I have nothing whatsoever 
against the Haitians, but they should pick up their own garbage. And I 
have nothing whatsoever against the Bosnians, but they should give 
their own rabies shots.
  We should stop sending our troops into situations where there is no 
vital U.S. interest at stake and no threats to national security and 
turning our military into international social workers and spending 
billions and billions of hard-earned tax dollars in the process.
  This administration has committed troops to other countries 36 times 
more than the six previous administrations

[[Page H2957]]

put together. Mr. Speaker, it is time for this type of thing to stop.
  Mr. Speaker, the other unrelated topic I wanted to discuss was this 
predawn raid of the home where Elian Gonzalez lived in Miami.
  All of the polls showed that most of the people thought that this 
young man should have been with his father. And as a father myself, I 
certainly can understand that. But regardless of what people thought 
about the custody, everyone should have been shocked and saddened by 
that picture of that INS border agent in full riot gear pointing that 
submachinegun at that little boy. Anyone who was not shocked or 
saddened by that, I think, does not really appreciate freedom.
  I want my colleagues to listen to what three very liberal left-wing 
people have said about this just recently. A.M. Rosenthal, the very 
liberal former Executive Editor of The New York Times said ``The armed 
invasion of the home of Elian's relatives in Miami by federal officers 
combat-ready with the deadliest of military rifles, the shocking 
abduction of the boy seen around the world, are so unconstitutional and 
cruel that they keep the hope alive that this time the courts and 
Congress will not allow the White House to get away with it.''
  Laurence H. Tribe, the very liberal law professor from Harvard, 
writing in The New York Times said, ``Ms. Reno's decision to take the 
law as well as the child into her own hands seems worse than a 
political blunder. Even if well intended, her decision strikes at the 
heart of constitutional government and shakes the safeguards of 
liberty.''
  And the very left wing, Alan Dershowitz, another Harvard law 
professor writing in the Los Angeles Times said this, ``By enforcing 
its own order, without the judicial imprimatur of a court mandate, the 
Justice Department has reinforced a precedent that endangers the rights 
of all American citizens.''
  Mr. Speaker, I was a Circuit Court judge in Tennessee for 7\1/2\ 
years before coming to Congress, and I believe that the Justice 
Department has grown so arrogant, abusive, and out of control that, 
unless we greatly downsize this department and decrease its funding, 
the freedom of all Americans is in jeopardy.

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