[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 43 (Wednesday, March 31, 2004)]
[House]
[Pages H1772-H1779]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE 9/11 COMMISSION
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Ginny Brown-Waite of Florida). Under the
Speaker's announced policy of January 7, 2003, the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Pallone) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of
the minority leader.
Mr. PALLONE. Madam Speaker, this evening I want to discuss the
serious accusations that former White House counterterrorism chief
Richard Clarke has leveled at President Bush over the last week. I
would also like to discuss my concern over the administration's
attempts, attempts that have now been joined by several congressional
Republicans, to draw attention away from the serious accusations by
instead viciously attacking the messenger; and, finally, I come to the
floor to highlight inconsistencies in the statements that Condoleezza
Rice has made over the last week, inconsistencies that will undoubtedly
be addressed when she testifies as early as next week under oath in
front of the 9/11 Commission.
Madam Speaker, it is nice to see that after months of stalling the
Bush administration has finally made an agreement with the 9/11
Commission to have the President, Vice President and National Security
Adviser all appear before the entire 9/11 Commission. The announcement
was a complete retreat from the Bush administration's previous belief
that Condoleezza Rice should not testify in public.
Last evening, the President went before reporters and said that he
had ordered this level of cooperation because, and I quote President
Bush here, I consider it necessary to gaining a complete picture of the
months and years that preceded the murder of our fellow citizens on
September 11, 2001.
Madam Speaker, I think it is great that the Bush administration
finally caved in and will allow Condoleezza Rice to testify, but it is
somewhat disingenuous for the President to say that he has cooperated
with the Commission in the past. In fact, President Bush has stalled
the Commission for months on many of their requests.
Up until yesterday, the President said that he would only testify
before the Commission's chair and vice chair;
[[Page H1773]]
and now President Bush and Vice President Cheney will testify together
but not under oath and only one member of the Commission will be
allowed to take notes. Allowing one person in the room to take notes,
in my opinion, is no way to fully document critical testimony from the
President and the Vice President, and I am also interested in why the
President and the Vice President insist on testifying together.
So, Mr. President, thank you for finally caving in to political
pressure and allowing Condoleezza Rice to testify, but do not try to
spin your way out of this by making it appear that you have been
cooperating with the 9/11 Commission from the very beginning, because
that is simply not the case.
By delaying, the Bush administration has made it extremely difficult
for the 9/11 Commission to finish its work in a timely fashion, and the
Commission should not be expected to complete its work until it has
heard from all the principals involved in the events leading up to and
coming after 9/11.
Public testimony from Condoleezza Rice is perhaps even more important
now that we have heard from Richard Clarke, the President's former top
counterterrorism adviser. Last week, Richard Clarke raised eyebrows all
over the Nation when he appeared on 60 Minutes, released a book
critical of the Bush administration's policy on fighting terrorism, and
then testified before the 9/11 Commission where he personally
apologized to the victims' families and told them that they had failed
them or that he had failed them.
Richard Clarke raises some serious questions, questions that
Condoleezza Rice should attempt to answer before the 9/11 Commission,
and I would like to mention some of those questions, Madam Speaker.
Question number one: Did the Bush administration, as Richard Clarke
claims, and I quote, ignore terrorism for months when maybe we could
have done something to stop 9/11? You do not have to take Richard
Clarke's word for it. President Bush bluntly acknowledged as much
during an interview with Bob Woodward for Woodward's book titled Bush
At War.
Despite repeated warnings of an imminent al Qaeda attack before 9/11
President Bush admitted to Woodward, and I quote again, I did not feel
the sense of urgency. That is what the President said. If he did not
realize the sense of urgency, one has to really wonder what kind of
advice he was receiving from his National Security Adviser and others.
According to Richard Clarke, he tried repeatedly to get the
administration to pay serious attention to the issue of terrorism.
On January 24, 2001, just days after President Bush took the oath of
office, Richard Clarke wrote an urgent memo to Condoleezza Rice, asking
for an urgent Cabinet-level meeting to deal with an impending al Qaeda
attack. Clarke claims this request was never acted upon. Three months
later, in place of a Cabinet-level meeting, Richard Clarke was finally
able to schedule a meeting with Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul
Wolfowitz. Clarke said he started the meeting by stating to the Deputy
Secretary of Defense that we needed to deal with bin Laden.
{time} 2115
And Wolfowitz's response? ``No, no, no, we don't have to deal with al
Qaeda. Why are we talking about that little guy? We have to talk about
Iraqi terrorism against the United States.'' That's what Wolfowitz
said.
Again, meetings like this are critical because people like Wolfowitz,
Cheney, Rumsfeld and Rice were the very people advising the President.
If Wolfowitz was describing Osama bin Laden as a little guy to Richard
Clarke, one has to assume he was making the same sorts of comments to
his boss, Donald Rumsfeld.
Clarke could not believe Wolfowitz's characterization of bin Laden as
a little guy. Clarke then responded to Wolfowitz, and again I quote,
``Paul, there hasn't been any Iraqi terrorism against the United States
in 8 years.'' Clarke turned to the Deputy Director of the CIA, who
agreed with his assessment. Clarke's statements contradict those of the
National Security Adviser.
On Sunday night, in an interview on ``60 Minutes,'' Condoleezza Rice
said, ``The administration took seriously the threat of terrorism
before 9/11,'' in stark contrast to the very comments of her boss,
President Bush. And I would like to see Rice's response to a report in
Newsweek magazine that the administration was trying to deemphasize
terrorism as an overall priority. As proof, the report pointed to the
fact that only two out of a hundred national security meetings the
administration held before 9/11 addressed the terrorist threat.
I look forward to hearing if the National Security Adviser thinks two
meetings on the issue of terrorism shows a true dedication on the
administration's part to fighting terrorism and to taking terrorist
threats seriously.
The National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, also stated during
her interview on ``60 Minutes,'' and I quote again, ``I don't know that
a sense of urgency any greater than the one we had would have caused us
to do anything differently. I don't know how we could have done more. I
would like very much to know what more we could have done.''
The salient answer to this question, Madam Speaker, is a lot more
could have been done. First, the administration could have held more
than two national security meetings on the issue. Based on the major
intelligence spike in the summer of 2001, the administration could have
held more meetings with top officials from the CIA and the FBI to make
sure the agencies were sharing information.
Earlier this week, 9/11 commissioner Jamie Gorelick said that the
lack of focus and meetings meant agencies were not talking to each
other and key evidence was overlooked.
Richard Clarke is also very critical of the administration's
obsession with Saddam Hussein. Again in her interview on ``60
Minutes,'' Rice claimed that Iraq was put aside immediately after 9/
11.'' But Rice's own claims were refuted, this time by a Washington
Post report stating that 6 days after the 9/11 attacks, the President
signed a 3-page document directing the Pentagon to begin planning
military options for an invasion of Iraq.
Furthermore, CBS News reported in 2002 that 5 hours after the 9/11
attacks, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld was telling his aids to come up
with plans for striking Iraq. This is also consistent with Clarke's own
statements in which he says that ``Rumsfeld told him on September 11
that they needed to bomb Iraq.'' Clarke writes in his book that, ``On
September 12, he went home for a brief period of time to eat and take a
shower and return to the White House.'' Clarke writes, and I quote, ``I
expected to go back to a round of meetings examining what the next
attacks could be, what our vulnerabilities were. Instead, I walked into
a series of discussions about Iraq. At first, I was incredulous we were
talking about something other than getting al Qaeda. Then I realized,
with almost a sharp physical pain, that Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were
going to try to take advantage of this national tragedy to promote
their agenda on Iraq. Clearly, the administration continued to have its
eyes set on going to war with Iraq.''
Now, Madam Speaker, I ask: Was the war on terrorism a convenient, yet
flawed, justification for going to war against Iraq? That is what
Richard Clarke believes. It is also supported by another former high-
ranking Bush administration official, Paul O'Neill. The former Treasury
Secretary stated in his book that ``Vice President Cheney strongly
suggested U.S. intervention in Iraq well before the terrorist attacks
of September 11.'' This is another question Condoleezza Rice should
answer in front of the American people.
Madam Speaker, it is clear that President Bush's rationale for war
against Iraq was flawed. The Bush administration used two things to
justify war with Iraq: first, a connection between Iraq and al Qaeda;
and, second, the idea that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
In addition to the new questions raised by Richard Clarke about the
Iraq-al Qaeda link, experts have concluded that Iraq did not have
weapons that posed an immediate threat to the United States. CIA
Director George Tenet recently admitted that the intelligence agencies
never told the White House that Iraq posed an imminent threat. And
former chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix stated that the Bush
administration made up its mind
[[Page H1774]]
that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and it was not interested in
evidence to the contrary.
Madam Speaker, when the President signed the law creating the
commission in November 2002, he urged the panel to, and I quote,
``carefully examine all the evidence and follow all the facts wherever
they lead.'' But, clearly, the Bush administration did not mean
following it to the President's National Security Adviser. And while
the administration charges the panel to follow the facts wherever they
may lead, they and some congressional Republicans are attempting to
minimize some of those possible facts by attacking the character of
Richard Clarke.
Last week, the majority leader in the other Chamber implied that
Richard Clarke had perjured himself either during his testimony before
the 9/11 Commission last week or during his testimony before the Joint
Congressional Intelligence Committee hearing in July 2002, because,
according to Senator Frist, he appears to have told two different
stories. However, despite some pretty harsh words for Mr. Clarke, the
Senate majority leader could not point to one specific example, but
called for all of Clarke's testimony before the House Senate
intelligence panel 2 years ago.
Now, this past Sunday, Clarke said he would support the
declassification of his testimony before the joint intelligence panels
if the administration also declassifies the National Security Adviser's
testimony before the 9/11 Commission and the declassification of the
January 25, 2001, memo that Clarke sent to Rice laying out a terrorism
strategy, a strategy that was not approved until months later.
Madam Speaker, House Democrats really want a full accounting of the
events leading up to the September 11 attacks, including the extent to
which a preoccupation with Iraq affected efforts to deal with the
threat posed by al Qaeda. It is nice to see the White House has finally
stopped stonewalling the commission and now says that it will provide
the public testimony the commission is requesting. But Americans need
to be able to fully evaluate the decisions of government leaders,
especially when it comes to the life and death decisions of war and
peace.
Madam Speaker, there are others that I would like to yield my time to
tonight; but I just wanted to say before we go on that I have been to
the floor many times over the last few months talking about the
Republican abuse of power and the Bush administration's abuse of power.
Yesterday, there was an op-ed column in the New York Times by Paul
Krugman that was entitled, ``This Isn't America.'' And it kind of sums
up my concern about the abuse of power.
I mention it tonight in the context of Richard Clarke and the 9/11
Commission and the National Security Adviser, but Krugman pretty much
sums up how this abuse of power is rampant with the Bush administration
and the Republicans in Washington. And I am not going to read the whole
thing, but I just wanted to read a couple of parts of it, where Krugman
says, ``Last week an opinion piece in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz
about the killing of Sheik Ahmed Yassin, said, `This isn't America; the
government did not invent intelligence material nor exaggerate the
description of the threat to justify their attack.' So even in Israel,
George Bush's America has become a byword for deception and abuse of
power. And the administration's reaction to Richard Clarke's `Against
All Enemies' provides more evidence that something is rotten in the
State of our government.''
Krugman goes on to say that not only in the case of Richard Clarke,
but in many other cases there is abuse of power by the administration
and the congressional Republicans: ``A few examples: according to the
Hill, Republican lawmakers threatened to cut off funds for the General
Accounting Office unless it dropped its lawsuit against Dick Cheney.
The Washington Post says Representative Michael Oxley told lobbyists
that `a congressional probe might ease if it replaced its Democratic
lobbyist with a Republican.' Tom DeLay used the Homeland Security
Department to track down Democrats trying to prevent redistricting in
Texas. And Medicare is spending millions of dollars on misleading ads
for the new drug benefit, ads that look like news reports and also
serve as commercials for the Bush campaign.''
Krugman ends and he says, and I quote, ``Where will it end? In his
new book, `Worse Than Watergate,' John Dean of Watergate fame, says
`I've been watching all the elements fall into place for two possible
political catastrophes; one that will take the air out of the Bush-
Cheney balloon, and the other far more disconcerting that will take the
air out of democracy.''
The reason that many Democrats, including myself, come down here on a
regular basis now to talk about the Republican abuse of power is
exactly for the reason that John Dean quotes in his book, and that is
we are very concerned about the future of democracy and where we are
going with these kinds of abuses of power by the Bush administration
and the Republican majority.
I see my colleague from California is here, and I probably took up
too much, and so I want to yield to her.
Ms. LEE. Madam Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for yielding to
me and for continuing to speak the truth, and for making sure that our
country understands the type of abuses that are taking place here in
Washington, D.C. I believe that democracy is at a crossroads, and I
think the gentleman has made that very clear tonight. So I want to
thank the gentleman for his continuing to speak truth to power, as we
say.
Madam Speaker, let me also tonight thank the distinguished chair of
the Congressional Black Caucus for his leadership on this and so many
other issues as he continues to consistently attempt to wake up
America.
We are here tonight, Madam Speaker, to talk about the Bush
administration's systematically deceiving the American people. This
administration has spun a web of deception that really enshrouds the
truth and hides, mind you, reality. Specifically, I want to talk about
the administration's foreign policy and how it has based a doctrine of
preemptive strikes on a foundation that is really built on falsehoods,
lies, and distortions.
But first let me just say it is especially telling and especially
tragic that we are here tonight as we mourn nine new victims of this
misguided war. Five soldiers and four contractors were killed today.
Our thoughts and our prayers go out to their families and to all of
those whose loved ones are still at risk.
We mourn these latest deaths as we speak out against the deliberate
decisions and the deceptions that took this country to war. This
administration did not tell the truth to Congress, to the American
people, and to the world about the causes, the costs, and the
consequences of the war in Iraq. The deceit started, mind you, well
before the war did, and that is no accident. The web of deception was
woven in order to create a reason for the war.
The administration told us time and time again that Iraq posed an
immediate threat to the United States. In the President's State of the
Union address, the Secretary of State's presentation to the United
Nations, and in many other statements and speeches the administration
told us that Iraq was developing nuclear weapons and it already had
vast stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons. This was apparently
all false.
President Bush said that Saddam Hussein was buying aluminum tubes and
African uranium for nuclear weapons. This was false. Vice President
Cheney said we know, and this is a quote, ``We know he has been
absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons, and we believe
he has in fact reconstituted nuclear weapons.'' This was false.
President Bush said, we gave them a chance to allow the inspectors in
and they wouldn't let them in. This was false. As for the weapons of
mass destruction, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said, we know
where they are. This was false. The administration time and time again
tied Saddam Hussein to the terrorist attacks of September 11, and this
was downright false.
These statements were, however, part of a larger pattern of
distortion that included warping intelligence to fit the
administration's vision of the world and then passing on that warped
intelligence to the American people and to the world as a fact.
[[Page H1775]]
The administration also, mind you, disguised the cost of the war,
which of course taxpayers are paying for. When economic adviser Larry
Lindsey said in 2002 that war in Iraq could cost between $100 billion
and $200 billion, well, he was right; but you know what, he was fired.
When asked about the possible consequences of the war, the
administration presented a portrait of a country that would be
uniformly grateful to its American invaders. This week's Nation says,
and I quote, ``The idiotic and arrogant statements by Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld and others that policing Iraq would be a simple matter
that could be quickly cleaned up by all those flowers they were going
to throw.''
{time} 2130
The many distortions, deceptions and omissions amounted to, as I was
actually taught like many of us were taught as a child, lying. I was
also taught that this is really wrong. This deception was clearly and
deliberately escalated. The very impressive and thought-provoking
report by the Carnegie Endowment For International Peace found a very
dramatic shift in the fall of 2002 as the administration sought to
rally support for its unnecessary war. Let me just read what the
Carnegie Foundation indicates:
Administration officials systematically misrepresented the threat
from Iraq's WMD and ballistic missile programs, beyond the intelligence
failures noted above by, one, treating nuclear, chemical, and
biological weapons as a single WMD threat. The conflation of three
distinct threats, very different in the danger they pose, distorted the
cost-benefit analysis of the war.
Secondly, insisting without evidence, yet treating as a given truth,
that Saddam Hussein would give whatever WMD he possessed to terrorists.
Thirdly, routinely dropping caveats, probabilities, and expressions
of uncertainty present in intelligence assessments from public
statements.
Next, misrepresenting inspectors' findings in ways that turned
threats from minor to dire.
The Carnegie Endowment For International Peace is a world-renowned
institution. I suggest that if Members have not read this report, they
should read it because, in fact, it lays out the facts, the reality and
what actually went down prior to this war.
The gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), ranking member of the
Committee on Government Reform, has presented a comprehensive
examination of the statements and misstatements by the President, the
Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense and
the National Security Adviser. The gentleman from California has
compiled a database of deception about alleged weapons of mass
destruction, alleged ties to al Qaeda and the allegedly urgent threat
to the United States posed by Iraq. That database shows just how far-
reaching these distortions were, and they do not stop with Iraq, and
they do not stop with foreign policy. But let me just read a couple of
the gentleman from California's quotes which have been recorded in this
document:
One is from Vice President Dick Cheney. He said, ``We know he's got
chemical and biological weapons.'' But, rather, the truth is the
statement failed to acknowledge that the Defense Intelligence Agency's
position was, ``There is no reliable information on whether Iraq is
producing and stockpiling chemical weapons or where Iraq has--or will--
establish its chemical warfare agent production facilities.''
President Bush: ``We've also discovered through intelligence that
Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that
could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad
areas. We are concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs
for missions targeting the United States.''
The explanation of this tale is this was misleading because it
claimed that Iraq's UAVs were intended and able to spread chemical or
biological weapons, including over the United States, but this failed
and the President failed to mention that the United States Government
agency most knowledgeable about UAVs and their potential applications,
the Air Force's National Air and Space Intelligence Center, had the
following view: ``The U.S. Air Force does not agree that Iraq is
developing UAVs primarily intended to be delivery platforms for
chemical and biological agents.''
Another President Bush quote: ``We found the weapons of mass
destruction. We found biological laboratories. You remember when Colin
Powell stood up in front of the world, and he said, Iraq has got
laboratories, mobile labs to build biological weapons. They're illegal.
They're against the United Nations resolutions, and we've so far
discovered two. And we'll find more weapons as time goes on. But for
those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or
banned weapons, they're wrong. We found them.''
What this really was, according to the Defense Intelligence Agency,
was that these trailers which the President said were to produce
biological weapons did not disclose the fact that the engineers at the
DIA examined the trailers and concluded that they were most likely to
produce hydrogen for artillery weather balloons. That is what the DIA
concluded.
We could go on and on tonight about this, but I think the public is
beginning to get the picture.
Let us look at Haiti for a minute where the administration claimed it
was defending democracy while in fact it was conspiring to undermine
and to overthrow the duly elected President of Haiti. That is why we
need an independent commission to investigate the role of the
administration in the overthrow of the Aristide government. That is
also why we still need a truly independent commission to investigate
the use and the misuse of intelligence in the war in Iraq.
Of course, the same deceptions permeate our domestic policies as
well. Look at the administration's track record on its domestic
policies.
Example. He said that his tax cuts for the rich would create jobs.
Instead, we have seen 3 million jobs disappear in this country since
President Bush took office. He said the vast majority of those tax cuts
would go to those at the bottom end of the economic spectrum. Instead,
the top 1 percent of earners reap over a third of the tax benefits by
themselves. Only the top 1 percent. The President said that our schools
will have greater resources to help meet the goals of Leave No Child
Behind. But for the third year in a row the President's budget falls
billions of dollars short of fully funding Leave No Child Behind.
The deficit. The President says our budget will run a deficit that
will be small and short-term, but the fact is that the 10-year deficit
projection by the Congressional Budget Office, assuming extending the
tax provisions, is $4.7 trillion. In just 2 years, there has been an
almost $12 trillion swing in the deficit outlook. The $5.6 trillion 10-
year surplus projected when the President took office has been replaced
by deficits as far as the eye can see. For 2004, the President's budget
proposes a record deficit of $521 billion, $146 billion more than the
2003 deficit, which was also a historic record. Yet the President said
on January 7, 2003, ``Our budget will run a deficit that will be small
and short-term.''
We have to really get our administration to begin to understand the
value of telling the truth, because in both the domestic and foreign
policies of this administration, this administration and the President
has deceived the American people about their national security, their
economy, their children's education and their future. We should be
leading the world, not misleading it. That is exactly what we are
doing.
Finally, let me just say one of the biggest farces which the
President said and indicated he wanted to do was to unite the country.
I believe that this country is more divided tonight than ever.
announcement by the speaker pro tempore
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Ginny Brown-Waite of Florida). The
gentlewoman will suspend.
The Chair would remind the Members not to refer to the President or
the Vice President in terms that are personally offensive, such as
accusations of deceit.
Ms. LEE. Madam Speaker, may I respond?
Mr. PALLONE. I yield to the gentlewoman from California.
[[Page H1776]]
Ms. LEE. Madam Speaker, I am referring to statements of fact and
information which has been documented and quotes which have been
published already.
I thank the Speaker for reminding us of the rules of the House.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman is reminded that Members may
not read into debate extraneous material which would be improper if
spoken in the Member's own words.
Mr. PALLONE. I just want to thank the gentlewoman for her comments.
I know I have to yield to my other colleague from Maryland, but I
just wanted to point out that again, going back to what I said before,
and I was referencing this New York Times article about the future of
democracy, in order for us to make fair and accurate decisions in the
way we vote on the floor, whether it is to go to war in Iraq or it is
to provide funding for various programs, we need to have accurate
information. I think what the gentlewoman is pointing out is that,
whether it is foreign policy or domestic policy, with the kind of
deception that we are getting, we cannot rely on the information that
is being provided by the administration because many times it is
distorted or it is not accurate. That is, I think, the real problem
here.
I voted against the war but many of our colleagues, both Democrats
and Republican, voted for it because they relied on representations
that were being made by the White House that there were weapons of mass
destruction, that there was an imminent threat, so many of the things
that she pointed out. So, ultimately, they made the wrong decision,
many of whom now regret that decision, because they did not get
accurate information. They relied on the White House to make a decision
that was the wrong decision.
The whole point is that we cannot make the right decisions, we cannot
figure out what to do here if we continue to get this inaccurate
information from the White House. What ultimately is going to happen is
we are not going to believe anything we get. We are just going to have
to come find some other source and assume that whatever comes from the
White House is not accurate and cannot be relied on. I think the
gentlewoman pointed that out so many times.
Ms. LEE. I would just like to say, I think it is very important for
us, as the leader of the free world, the greatest superpower in the
world, to be credible, to be credible as we move forward in this 21st
century in terms of how we view the world in terms of our strategic
position, in terms of our quest to have a peaceful world, a secure
world and in terms of our efforts to eliminate terrorism.
There is no way we should sweep under the rug the facts. The facts
are here, they are published, we know what who said when. I hope that
the American people understand that we come to this floor to try to
present the facts because oftentimes the media does not do that. We
have it right here, and we are urging people to read what has been said
over the last few years.
We have lost over 560 young men and women in the military. Their
lives are lost, their families' lives are shattered as a result of this
misinformation and this deceit which led us to war.
I believe it is our duty and our responsibility to put these facts
out and to make sure that the American people know what was said, what
was the basis for this war and what the outcome, unfortunately, has
been.
Mr. PALLONE. I mentioned before about this op-ed with Krugman where
he was quoting the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, a major publication in
Israel. I just want to read that quote again in their editorial where
they said, ``This isn't America; the government did not invent
intelligence material nor exaggerate the description of the threat to
justify their attack.''
We tend to think of this country and I have always felt it as the
country that stands for what is right, what is just, what is honest,
and to think that an Israeli newspaper is now saying, we're not like
the government of the United States, we don't make up things, we don't
lie, we don't exaggerate, as if that is the norm for us, is a pretty
sad state of affairs.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland.
Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank the gentleman for yielding, and I want
to thank the gentleman for his vigilance and for consistently standing
up for what is right.
I have often said that I would like to see my children and
grandchildren have a better country, inherit a better country than the
one that existed on January 18, 1951, when I was born.
I must say that when I listened to my colleagues speak and I look at
the very subject that we are talking about tonight, I am very much
concerned that they will not inherit a better country. As a matter of
fact, the kinds of things that we are talking about tonight, where
words of this administration are inaccurate, should give the entire
American public chills, because they are the things that lead to the
chipping away of this wonderful institution that we call a democracy.
So I thank the gentleman for standing up and I thank all of my
colleagues for coming out tonight, certainly the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee) and the
gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).
I want to just for a moment talk about some of the misconceptions
that we have seen and heard here as Members of this great body. First
of all, as Members of the Congress, our constituents have vested a
unique trust in us to represent their interests to the fullest degree
and to make decisions that have a tremendous impact on their daily
lives.
{time} 2145
Every day we are required to consider legislative proposals, policy
solutions, and programmatic activities that shape the future of our
Nation. In order to carry out our task for this greatest benefit of the
American people, it is absolutely essential that the most accurate and
current information be at our disposal. Anything less would force us to
abdicate our duties and perform an extreme disservice to the American
people.
So, Madam Speaker, I am growing increasingly disturbed and angered by
the Bush administration's penchant for being less than truthful with
the people's representatives.
One striking example of this tendency towards strategically bending
the truth is the rationale provided for the Iraq War. What disturbs me
most about the faulty reasoning provided by our rush to war is the fact
that not only was our Nation's credibility at stake, but most
importantly human lives were at stake. Recent remarks by the Spanish
Prime Minister in which he called the United States' occupation of Iraq
a fiasco, and those are his words, make it increasingly evident that
international goodwill is beginning to turn against the United States.
Madam Speaker, it is clear that one of the very first casualties of
this war was international respect for the United States of America.
Although terrorists may be jailed or killed on the battlefield, the war
against terrorism will be fought and won in the hearts and minds.
By advancing unilateralist policies that isolate the rest of the
world without concrete proof of imminent threat, we have endangered not
only our national security, but also our national identity.
The Bible says, ``Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness
shall be heard in the light and that which ye have spoken in the ear in
closets shall be proclaimed upon the housetops.''
Several revelations have come to light as of late that seem to
indicate that the administration's reasoning for war was flawed and the
information provided to the public as justification for the war was
misleading. First, we had Secretary Paul O'Neill, a former member of
President Bush's Cabinet, saying that invading Iraq was a top priority
of this administration only 10 days after the inauguration of this
administration. That is, in January of 2001, long before September 11,
the administration had already had its sights on Iraq.
Then to add insult to injury, former U.S. weapons inspector David Kay
testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee that ``we were
almost all wrong'' as it relates to our prewar intelligence. And
Richard Clarke, the President's former counterterrorism adviser, is
asserting that even though all credible evidence pointed to al Qaeda as
being responsible for September 11, the administration still insisted
on finding a link to Iraq.
[[Page H1777]]
And now, Madam Speaker, we have this report entitled ``Iraq on the
Record: The Bush Administration's Public Statements on, Iraq'' issued
by the special investigations division of the Committee on Government
Reform approximately 2 weeks ago and which was referred to by the
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee) just a moment ago. This startling
report, which I submit for the Record, chronicles over 200 misleading
statements about the threat posed by Iraq that were made by this
administration.
This chart, which was included within the report, graphs the
occurrence and timing of these misleading statements. Madam Speaker,
the Members may notice this sharp spike between August, 2002, and
October, 2002. I am sure the Members will recall that this happens to
be around the same time Congress was considering the resolution
authorizing the use of force in Iraq.
Madam Speaker, I am sure that it is far more than a coincidence that
just as Congress was debating whether or not force was necessary in
Iraq, President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Secretary Rumsfeld,
Secretary Powell, and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, the
administration, made 64 misleading statements in 16 public appearances.
Madam Speaker, that amounts to more than two misleading statements per
day during the 30-day period between September 8, 2002, and October 8,
2002.
I am sure that some of my colleagues across the aisle will find
objection with this information, but in advance let me assure my
critics that this report only contains statements that were misleading
at the time that they were made. I am not referencing statements that
the administration thought to be true at the time, but were proven
false in hindsight. I am talking about statements that were not
accurate reflections of the views of intelligence officials at the time
they were made.
Madam Speaker, as a Member of Congress, I am outraged by this
purposeful twisting of the truth, and every American who believes in
truth and justice should be outraged also.
Madam Speaker, unfortunately, the argument made for war in Iraq was
not the only case wherein the administration has knowingly misled the
Congress and the American public. In December of 2003, the
administration sent Congress its ``National Healthcare Disparities
Report.'' As I am sure the Members are aware, Madam Speaker, the law
requires the Department of Health and Human Services to report to
Congress on national healthcare quality and national healthcare
disparities.
These reports enable us, as legislators, to assess the status of the
health care crisis in our Nation and propose new solutions to
eliminating those barriers to ensuring quality and affordable health
care to every single American.
Madam Speaker, eliminating disparities in treatment and access to
health care is a major priority of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Oftentimes people speak of health care disparities as an abstract issue
that only exists in the realm of policy and political discussions.
Under the leadership of the gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands (Mrs.
Christensen), chair of the Congressional Black Caucus Health
Braintrust, we have tried to make the issue of health disparities one
that people understand and that we are working diligently to improve
through our health care disparities legislation. Apparently, Madam
Speaker, instead of joining the members of the Congressional Black
Caucus and other concerned Members of Congress in our effort to
eradicate health disparities, the Bush administration has chosen to
delude Members of Congress as to the extent and nature of the problem.
The report that the Department of Health and Human Services provided
Congress was absolutely shameful. The Special Investigations Unit of
the Committee on Government Reform has found that the Department of
Health and Human Services altered conclusions of its scientists on
health care disparities in order to gloss over the appearance of a
national problem which is literally costing human lives.
A congressional investigation released in January entitled ``A Case
Study in Politics and Science: Changes to the National Healthcare
Disparities Report,'' which I will submit for the Record, made some
startling findings which I want to share with the American people
tonight, Madam Speaker.
The investigation revealed that the Department of Health and Human
Services' scientists ``found `significant inequality' in health care in
the United States, called health care disparities `national problems,'
emphasized that these disparities are pervasive in our health
care system and found that the disparities carry a significant
`personal and societal price' in its initial report.''
However, the final version of the disparities report, that is the
version the administration submitted to Congress, contained none, none,
of these conclusions and instead minimized the importance and scope of
the disparities in health care.
Madam Speaker, not only did the administration mislead all 535
Members of Congress by rewriting a scientific report required by law,
but the administration officials were dishonest with me personally when
I asked about the changes made to the report.
Dr. Carolyn Clancy, director of the Department of Health and Human
Services Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, wrote a letter to
me that began: ``I am writing in partial response to your letter to
Secretary Thompson expressing your concern that these changes were made
to scientific facts and findings in the National Healthcare Disparities
Report.'' She goes on to say, as we will see on this chart, the very
next sentence of the letter read: ``At the outset I want to make it
clear that no data or statistics in the report were altered in any way
whatsoever.''
This is a letter that she sent to me. However, Madam Speaker, if one
were to visit the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's Web site
right now, they would find another letter from Dr. Clancy which reads:
``Over the course of the summer and fall, changes, with which I
concurred,'' meaning she concurred, ``were made to the report by a
broad array of staff including Agency for Healthcare Research and
Quality.''
The question becomes, Madam Speaker, which one is the truth? Is this
the truth, or is this the truth? No matter what, there is an
inconsistency that goes to the heart of a major issue on health care
disparities.
Finally, Madam Speaker, I ask how is it that Dr. Clancy can in good
conscience tell me that no changes were made to the disparities report
but a month later, after public pressure, admit that changes were
indeed made?
Madam Speaker, this is about more than my feeling personally insulted
by Dr. Clancy. Madam Speaker, this is an insult to African American
women who are more than twice as likely to die of cervical cancer than
are white women and are more likely to die of breast cancer than women
of any other racial or ethnic group. This is an insult to African
Americans who are having more strokes at earlier ages, who are more
likely to die from them, and who experience worse levels of recovery
than other racial groups. This is about the prevalence of high blood
pressure within the African American community that ranks among the
highest in the world. This is about the administration knowing that all
of these problems exist and choosing to do absolutely nothing about it
and, furthermore, masking the truth about its existence.
So I could go on and on, but it is so interesting too that on Dr.
Martin Luther King's birthday, President Bush visited an African
American church and said, ``Today would have been his 75th birthday,''
and this is President Bush speaking as I conclude. ``It's important for
our country to honor his life and what he stood for.''
Later in the day, the President visited Dr. King's memorial in
Atlanta, Georgia, and held a moment of silence at his tomb. All of this
was very moving and touching. Yet, Madam Speaker, the very next day the
President appointed Judge Charles Pickering over the objection of
United States Senators, the Congressional Black Caucus, and all of
these civil rights organizations.
I find it rather ironic that 1 day after the photo-op with Dr. King's
widow, Coretta Scott King, and after saying that the Nation should
honor what Dr. King stood for, that President Bush would have appointed
a judicial nominee that was vigorously opposed by nearly every single
civil rights group in the entire Nation.
[[Page H1778]]
So I would say to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), I
thank him for yielding to me. Again, we all have come out. We could be
at home resting, but we cannot rest when we see the deceptions that are
taking place for we know that those deceptions lead to erosions. It is
just like a water leak in one's house, drip, drip, drip; and every
single drip, it may take a long time, but eventually something wears
away. And we are convinced that we have to stand up. We could not sleep
unless we did stand.
Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Ginny Brown-Waite of Florida). The Chair
would remind all Members not to attribute intentional
misrepresentations to the President or Vice President.
Mr. PALLONE. Madam Speaker, I just want to thank the gentleman from
Maryland for his statement. I know he is also the chairman of the
Congressional Black Caucus. And, again, I think it is important,
whether it is foreign policy or domestic policy, that we point out that
we are not getting accurate information from the White House and it
makes it very difficult for us to proceed in making policy decisions if
we cannot rely on accurate information from the White House.
I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).
{time} 2200
Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman so much for
yielding.
Madam Speaker, I stand here today with such a pride in joining true
patriots who are coming to the floor tonight under the leadership of
the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the distinguished chairman
of the Congressional Black Caucus (Mr. Cummings), and my colleague the
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), who has really been a conscience
for all of us, that we have to ask the questions.
We stand here as people who love our country. We love our country so
much that we fought to be here to represent over 600,000 people, to
represent the views of ordinary Americans, and we are here tonight
because we are concerned that our country is losing its credibility and
its moral leadership around the world; and that our democracy is in
jeopardy right now, because democracy depends on the truth.
It depends on the light of day. It depends on discussions being held
out in the open, so that people can make up their own minds, so the
facts, the real facts, get laid on the table. And to question, yes,
even to question the President of the United States, Madam Speaker,
about things that have been said, and the Vice President of the United
States.
No one in this great democracy is beyond being questioned, and that
is the duty of Americans, not just of Members of Congress, but of
citizens of the United States, of the media, of the press, to find out
the truth.
Madam Speaker, for over 6 months this administration has been
fighting tooth and nail against all of the facts being laid out in
public before this commission investigating 9/11 and what happened. It
is not just the 3,000-plus people that died that day, and it is not
just the 570, 580 or 590-plus people now that have died in Iraq and
their families that are suffering, presumably because we were fighting
terrorism, and some of us question the rationale for that war. But all
Americans deserve to know the truth, and this administration over the
last 6 months has battled against the commission over access to
documents and witnesses.
The panel has issued two subpoenas to the Federal Government for
aviation and military records, and twice had to threaten to do the same
for access to presidential briefing materials. The panel fought the
White House over an extension of its statutory deadline for issuing a
report which was originally set for May 27 in order to really do its
job. There has been pressure on this commission not to explore fully
and readily exactly what happened on 9/11.
Now, fortunately, under tremendous pressure right now, we are going
to hear more information, under oath, from the National Security
Advisor, who has found it fit to speak on every single broadcast and
radio station and television program about this. But now under oath she
will appear. I think this is a wise decision, and I am glad that it is
going to happen.
But I want to talk for a minute about one of the strategies that is
used to silence people who would ask those kinds of questions, who
would come up with information that the administration does not like,
that runs counter to the administration's version of the truth.
I am not saying that the other versions are always true or more
correct, but what I am saying is that anyone who dares to stand up and
say something different is slimed by this administration. Let me give
you some examples of the ways in which the integrity, the competence,
the motives and even the patriotism of those who raise questions is
attacked.
The Medicare actuary who came up with the numbers that said that this
Medicare bill that passed in the middle of the night, after arm-
twisting and holding the record open for 3-plus hours, the actuary who
came up with dollar figures that said it really was going to cost about
$140 billion more than the administration said, was warned that he
would be fired if he told key lawmakers about a series of Bush
administration cost estimates that would have torpedoed, or could have,
any Congressional passage of this White House-backed Medicare
prescription drug plan.
Richard S. Foster, the Chief Actuary for the Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services, told colleagues last June that he would be fired if
he revealed the numbers relating to higher estimates to lawmakers. This
is a person who was supposed to give us the truth. That is his job. He
is supposed to come up with the facts. For doing so, he was told he
would be fired.
Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill, 3 days after Paul
O'Neill criticized the Bush administration's Iraq policy, the
administration, quoting from an Associated Press story, ``began an
investigation into whether any laws or regulations had been violated by
O'Neill.'' The probe came despite O'Neill having specifically ``cleared
all of the documents with the Treasury General Counsel's Office.''
Of course, the problem ended by fully absolving O'Neill. But, right
away, rather than answering the charges that were raised, the
administration went after the man and tried to undercut his
credibility.
White House Adviser Larry Lindsey was fired when he told a newspaper
that an Iraq war could cost $200 billion.
General Anthony Zinni, fired, a retired Marine general who was Bush's
Middle East mediator. He had the audacity to anger the White House when
he told a public policy forum in October that ``Bush had far more
pressing policies than Iraq and suggested there could be a prolonged,
difficult aftermath to the war. He was not reappointed as Mideast
envoy.'' The source, and that is a quote, was the Associated Press in
July of 2003.
Even troops fighting in Iraq were threatened for telling the truth
about combat in Iraq. After soldiers in Iraq raised questions about the
Bush administration's deceptive WMD comments, General John Abizaid said
no soldiers ``are free to say anything disparaging about the Secretary
of Defense, or the President of the United States. Whatever action may
be taken, whether it is a verbal reprimand or something more stringent,
is up to the commanders on the scene.'' The source, ABC News.
No, we are not even going to let those who are putting their lives on
the line publicly raise questions.
The CIA was blamed for telling the truth about bogus Iraq nuclear
claims. Despite the CIA having made advance objections to the White
House about false Iraq nuclear claims, ``President Bush and his
National Security Advisor yesterday placed full responsibility on the
Central Intelligence Agency for the inclusion in this year's State of
the Union Address of questionable allegations that Iraq's Saddam
Hussein was trying to buy nuclear weapons.''
So much for taking personal responsibility for words that come out of
one's own mouth. Let us blame someone else.
And then, of course, there is Richard Clarke.
But even before I get to him, the Secretary of Commerce the other
day, in talking about people who are concerned about losing their jobs,
because jobs are being exported overseas, said that basically this kind
of outsourcing is really a good thing for the economy.
[[Page H1779]]
``People who are out of work because of outsourcing, who said, no, they
think maybe we ought to try and keep jobs at home, he called them
economic isolationists, and he said economic isolationists wave the
flag of surrender, rather than the American flag.'' That is a quote.
So, in other words, people who are out of work because their jobs
have gone overseas and have the audacity to complain about our policies
that do that are said to wave the flag of surrender and not the
American flag.
What does that mean? They are not patriots? These people, whose
children every day go to school and say the pledge to the flag while
dad or mom is looking for a job?
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