[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 52 (Wednesday, April 21, 2004)]
[House]
[Pages H2240-H2247]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PRESIDENTIAL MISTAKES
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Burns). 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. Mr. Speaker, last week during President Bush's press
conference, he had a difficult time with a question from one reporter
asking him whether or not he had made any mistakes as President since
the fateful events of September 11, 2001. Today I would like to
basically join with some of my Democratic colleagues who have already
spoken today during their 5 minutes in trying to help out the President
to answer the question about any mistakes he has made as President
since 9/11.
I think one of the President's biggest mistakes over the last year
was signing
[[Page H2241]]
a so-called prescription drug bill into law which he knew would benefit
the pharmaceutical companies a lot more than the millions of seniors
who need help now with their prescription drug bills.
Mr. Speaker, seniors have done the math. I had some opportunities
during the district work period, during Easter and Passover, to meet
with senior citizens, and they have done the math with regard to the
President's so-called prescription drug plan. They realize that the
President's law was a mistake because it will not help them with the
ever-increasing cost of prescription drugs. I want to use an example
because I know I have talked about this many times on the floor about
how the so-called prescription drug bill will not really benefit most
senior citizens.
{time} 1515
If one would consider a senior who now pays about $1,000 a year on
prescription drugs, who will pay at least $857 a year out of pocket
under the President's law, seniors with a bill of $5,000 a year will
still pay at least $3,920 under the President's Medicare bill, and as
we can see, the problem with the President's bill is that they are
going to have to pay so much money out of pocket to get any kind of a
meager benefit that for most seniors it is simply not worth the effort.
And I know from being back in my district in New Jersey for the 2-
week break that the seniors see the minuscule help that they would
receive under this legislation, and they realize that it is really not
them, but the pharmaceuticals who are benefiting from the law because
of all the profit that the pharmaceutical companies plan to make. And
as I have said before, one of the reasons why the pharmaceuticals were
so involved in this prescription drug legislation was because they
wanted to make sure that the government did not do anything to lower
the price of prescription drugs, because if the government got involved
in negotiating to lower prices, as does the government in almost every
other Western nation, they would not see the same level of profit that
they wanted under the President's bill.
And we, as Democrats, made a point during the debate on the Medicare
bill that we wanted the Secretary of Health and Human Services or the
Medicare Administrator to have the power to negotiate better prices,
essentially what we do now with the Veterans Administration, what we do
with our military and our military retirees, but because of the support
that the President receives and the Republicans receive from the
prescription drug industry, that would not happen. That was not going
to happen.
In effect, what was written into the law was a clause that
specifically said that the Secretary of Health and Human Services and
the Medicare Administrator could not negotiate lower prices. That was
prohibited by law. I would maintain that that was a mistake, a major
mistake, on the President's part not to allow the negotiation of lower
prices, but the bill itself was a mistake because the bill, as I said,
does not really provide any meaningful benefit to seniors who are
looking for their prescription drugs to be paid for in a major way by
the Federal Government.
But the President and his administration made a lot more mistakes
than these, Mr. Speaker. The President made a big mistake also when he
allowed the Medicare Administrator, Tom Scully, to negotiate the final
prescription drug legislation on behalf of the administration here on
Capitol Hill. At the same time that Mr. Scully was the Medicare
Administrator negotiating the legislation, he was also negotiating a
new job with various companies representing health care interests that
stand to make millions from this Medicare law. Tom Scully did not do
this, as I said, outside. He was doing this at the same time that he
was negotiating the Medicare bill.
And one might say to oneself, how does he do that? How does someone
who is in charge of Medicare in the Bush administration end up
basically negotiating a job for himself with those same interests that
are now looking for some benefit in the Medicare bill? And the reason
is because he received a waiver from the Bush administration that
allowed him to participate in job negotiations while he was negotiating
the Medicare bill. I would maintain that that is not only a conflict of
interest, but also another mistake in the context of this Medicare
legislation that President Bush made.
Administration officials should not be allowed to interview and go on
job searches with the companies at the same time that they are working
on legislation that directly impacts these companies. That is why we
have laws that bar that as a conflict of interest, and it should not
have been waived. That was a mistake of the President.
President Bush also knew that this Medicare bill he signed into law
had passed Congress, in my opinion, under false pretenses. Members of
this House did not know the true cost of the legislation, and the
reality is we probably never would have known what the true costs were
were it not for the fact that the President's own Medicare actuary
actually came forward after the legislation was passed and detailed
what the true costs were. But that Medicare actuary was not allowed to
give the House Members, be they Democrat or Republican, the true costs
of this Medicare legislation when we were voting and negotiating the
bill because essentially this actuary was told that his job would be
threatened, he might be fired, or he would be fired if he gave out the
real information about the cost of the Medicare bill.
Last year when Republicans were writing their version of the
prescription drug bill that eventually became law, the Republican
leadership made assurances to many of the conservative Members in the
Republican Party that the total costs of the program over 10 years
would not be higher than $400 billion. That is what they put in the
budget, and that is what the Republican leadership and the President
told the conservative Members that they would be facing, a cost of $400
billion. When the bill finally came up for a vote, the Bush
administration said the total cost of the program would be actually
$395 billion, close to the 400-. But as my colleagues know, last month
we learned that the administration's own analysts had concluded
repeatedly that the drug benefit could cost $100 billion more than what
they said publicly at the time, not $400 billion, but $500 billion, a
big increase, about a 20 percent increase, but they never made that
information public until the bill was signed into law.
The individual who was the chief Medicare actuary, Richard Foster, at
the time did come forward and say that the administration knew and that
he knew at the time when the bill was being voted on that the true cost
would be $100 billion more, that it would be 500- instead of $400
billion, but he was warned that he would be fired if he told his
colleagues here in the House the truth; so he never told us.
So here we go again. What kind of mistakes did President Bush make in
the context of this Medicare bill? Quite a few. In this case he knew,
or at least the administration knew, that this information was
available about the true cost, but they probably also knew that if that
cost had come out, it would kill their chances for passing the bill. So
essentially they kept the facts from coming out, and one could argue
that the House made a mistake in passing the bill because it was based
on misinformation, another mistake that the President made which
contributed to the big mistake of this Medicare bill when it finally
passed.
I just mentioned this because many of my colleagues on the Democratic
side would like to point out some of the mistakes that the President
made in the last year, and hopefully when he has his next press
conference, he will have a little more opportunity to talk about some
of those mistakes. If not, we can just give him more information
ourselves along the lines of the Medicare bill, which was a huge
mistake.
Mr. Speaker, I would also like to bring up some other matters that
relate to what I consider the ongoing credibility problem that
President Bush and his administration faced, and there are many. There
are many cases where information has been given out that is essentially
misleading, that Congress relies upon it, as it did in the case of the
Medicare bill, or in the case, one of the biggest that I would mention,
is the Iraq War. We know now that much of the information that was
given to the Congress and they used in
[[Page H2242]]
making a decision to go to war and to pass a resolution to authorize
the war was essentially misleading, information about the threat from
Iraq, about the weapons of mass destruction, about links that did not
exist between Iraq and Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda and those that
bombed the World Trade Center on 9/11. And I would like to talk a
little bit about the President's credibility gap with regard to the war
in Iraq.
Again, some of my colleagues mentioned earlier that 100 of our U.S.
soldiers have died this month, and not that I want to emphasize that,
because I certainly do not, but I do think that this credibility gap
has cost lives, and it is not just something that we can sort of toss
aside and say, okay, well, we had this misinformation, and what was the
impact? It had a major impact on our decision to go to war and upon the
people who have lost their lives or have been injured during the war.
As concerns rise about the lack of planning for the war in Iraq, it
is important that we determine how America got into the mess in Iraq,
and probably even more important, because that is the past, how are we
going to get out? Concern about the situation in Iraq crosses party
lines. The House Republican leadership continues to block any
congressional oversight. And, Mr. Speaker, we have heard some of my
colleagues on the Democratic side of the aisle talk earlier this day
during the Special Orders about the need for congressional oversight.
We have congressional oversight on everything. I am the ranking
member on the Subcommittee on Fisheries, Conservation, Wildlife and
Oceans. We have congressional oversight on what the agencies do with
regard to fisheries management. If that is true, why would we not have
it for something so important like the war in Iraq?
The House Committee on Armed Services and the House Committee on
International Relations are not holding hearings to ask important
questions that must be asked about the Bush administration with regard
to the war in Iraq. Essentially House Republicans are allowing the
President and his administration to do anything they want in Iraq, no
questions asked. And I just find that simply unacceptable given the
responsibility of this House and the committees of jurisdiction to have
oversight over any important matter that we deal with.
Yesterday in the other Chamber, the Foreign Relations Committee held
a hearing where Members of both parties asked the tough questions about
Iraq. Yet here in the House, Republicans have completely abdicated
their power to President Bush and essentially said that he as
Commander-in-Chief can do anything he wants without any oversight.
Mr. Speaker, the problems in Iraq, I believe, are the direct result
of the Bush administration's failure to adequately plan for what would
happen after the initial U.S. incursion in Iraq. We know what happened
when the U.S. first went to war. We know that it was largely successful
in a very short period of time. But what planning was done about the
aftermath after the initial incursion and after essentially Saddam
Hussein and his forces were defeated and forced to flee? President Bush
and his national security team assured the world that Iraq would be a
swift and easy mission where U.S. troops would be greeted as
liberators. This assessment proved dead wrong and is now costing
Americans greatly in terms of lives, funding, and international
support. And I do not think there is any question when we listen to
some of what has come out the last few weeks both before the 9/11
Commission and other venues that the Bush administration was caught off
guard.
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said last week that he was surprised by
the recent level of violence in Iraq. Secretary Rumsfeld said, ``If you
said to me a year ago, describe the situation you would be in today 1
year later, I don't know many people who would have described it. I
would not have described it the way it happens to be today.'' Those are
Secretary Rumsfeld's very words.
The fact is that the Bush administration was warned before the war of
the possibility that events might not play out as well as the
administration was telling Congress and the American people. General
Anthony Zinni, the former CENTCOM Commander, questioned how the
escalating war in Iraq could have caught Rumsfeld off guard, and
General Zinni said that he was surprised that Secretary Rumsfeld was
surprised, because General Zinni said a lot of other people were
telling him that it was going to be similar to what we are now seeing.
The administration's coalition of the willing is quickly unraveling,
meaning more burdens on American troops. We had Secretary Rumsfeld
saying that this was going to be quick, and our troops were not going
to have to be there that long essentially. But obviously the opposite
is the case. The coalition of the willing, of those forces from other
countries that are willing to support us, seem to be dissipating.
Spain, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic have announced plans to
withdraw troops as soon as possible. Poland is also considering
withdrawing from Iraq. Lacking troop support from other countries,
about 20,000 American soldiers who were due to come home will now have
their tours extended, breaking a Pentagon commitment to limit
assignments in Iraq to 12 months. Again, the President's credibility is
at stake.
Mr. Speaker, this is not a war that we had to fight. It comes from an
administration that from its very first days in the White House was
preparing to take out Saddam Hussein. And I join my colleagues here
today to highlight the misrepresentations that the President and his
administration included in their public comments. If the Members are
interested in reading this comprehensive report, they can find it, and
I will give out the information at www.reform.house.gov/min.
{time} 1530
We can go into that a little more if some of my colleagues want to.
But the bottom line is that this misinformation that was given out
seriously makes us question the credibility of this administration and
what they were doing then and now in terms of the future and what we
are doing in Iraq.
I see that some of my colleagues have arrived. I would like to yield
to the gentleman from Washington, who has been down on the floor on a
regular basis talking about this issue of credibility, particularly
with regard to the war in Iraq. I thank him for joining us this
afternoon.
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from New
Jersey for coming out here and giving us an opportunity to talk about
the abuses of power of this administration.
I think we have had so many that it is really hard. You sit in your
office and say, which one should I come out here and talk about? Well,
the most recent and striking one to me was on ``60 Minutes'' last
Sunday night when they talked about the book by Mr. Woodward in which
he describes the run-up to the war.
Now, anybody who knows anything about the Congress knows it is our
job to collect the taxes. I sit on the Committee on Ways and Means. We
collect the taxes, and then the Committee on Appropriations says this
is how it is going to be spent, and the President is supposed to spend
it that way. He does not have the freedom to just spend it anywhere he
wants. Otherwise, what do you need a Congress for? Why do you not just
give him the money and say, Mr. President, do whatever you want? If it
looks good to you, buy it. Do it. See if you cannot make it work.
So with that background, the revelations that came out of this book
on Sunday on ``60 Minutes'' were absolutely mind-boggling. The
President secretly diverted $700 million from the war on terror in
Afghanistan to begin building airstrips in Kuwait, starting a war that
nobody knew anything about, that was hidden totally from view. They
took $700 million appropriated for dealing with the war on terror.
We just had two enormous buildings in New York knocked down and the
Pentagon attacked, we were over there trying to find Osama bin Laden,
and the President decided, on his own, I do not know, sitting there
talking to I do not know whom, maybe he was praying, for all I know,
and he came up and said, I am going to use $700 million to start a war
in Iraq. Now, the question is whether that is not only not
constitutional, but whether it is illegal for the President to have
done that,
[[Page H2243]]
whether he has broken the law, and we hear nothing of it.
Ask yourself just for a minute, what would $700 million have bought
in Afghanistan? It is fascinating. Just today the Pentagon came out and
said it needs another $700 million to keep 20,000 troops in Iraq for
another 90 days. So effectively what the President of the United States
did was, in the middle of this war on terrorism in Afghanistan, he
said, I am taking $700 million, I am taking 20,000 troops for 90 days
out of the country. I am reducing our ability to deal with the war in
Afghanistan, because I want to start this war over in Iraq.
It was not inconsequential what he did. Remember, this is when the
Secretary of War, Mr. Rumsfeld, was quick to point out that they knew,
it was not even close, that we suspect or anything else, we knew that
bin Laden was hiding in the Tora Bora area of Afghanistan. Right in the
middle of our dealing with Tora Bora, the President says, hey,
Rumsfeld, out of my way. I want that money, and I want to put it over
here.
Now, we were still in the shock of the attacks of 9/11, and all
America watched and waited for the word that bin Laden would harm us no
longer. The President still has not found bin Laden. He still is out
there, still organizing, still sending out tapes, still having impact
on us. And the President decided, I am tired of this, I do not want to
chase bin Laden anymore. Because when this was happening, right in the
middle of having him located in Tora Bora, the President said, I have
lost interest in this, and I am going somewhere else.
Now, he acted unilaterally and without the Congress or the people of
the United States understanding what he is doing. The President reduced
America's resources in the hunt at the very moment when we had the best
information about where bin Laden was.
Now we are talking about maybe he is in the border areas with
Pakistan, or maybe he is here, maybe he is there. We knew apparently
where he was at that point, but the President was not interested in
getting him, I guess. I do not know.
He must have a short attention span to just say I am going to walk
away from this. My belief is that unilaterally reducing American
resources in the hunt for bin Laden really raises questions the
President must face with the families of every 9/11 victim and with the
Congress and with the American people and the mothers and fathers and
brothers and sisters and husbands and wives of the 700 Americans who
have died in Iraq.
What was he thinking about? Now, none of us think that the President
was stupid, none of us think that Rumsfeld is dumb. But the question
is, why were they so intent on going to Iraq? It clearly was not about
weapons of mass destruction. It clearly was not about al Qaeda. There
is no connection.
Yet we are now mired down in the war, and the question is, how do we
get out of it? The fact was that the State Department predicted all of
this in a big study, and the War Department just ignored it.
Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, if my colleague would yield for a minute,
you talk about the misappropriated or misallocated $700 million. One of
the issues that I have repeatedly talked about, and I think has come to
affect all Americans, is larger than the $700 million, although that is
an adequate question, and it is we passed a budget here for $2.3
trillion that had a $500 billion deficit here at home; and in that
budget, there were some priorities set for America. But it is very
interesting how you contrast those priorities for Iraq, which I think
raises a lot of questions about the misappropriated values by this
administration.
I will give you an example. In the area of health care, in Iraq there
are 150 clinics that have been rebuilt, serving 3 million Iraqis that
provide 100 percent prenatal care and infant coverage in Iraq. In
America, there are 43 million uninsured Americans, of which 10 million
are uninsured American children of parents who work full-time. In the
President's budget, we have cut the dollars for health care training
for doctors and nurses and professionals.
If you expand that, in the area of veterans, we have provided Iraqi
veterans $60 million for job training. Yet in the United States, the
President's budget cuts $257 million for medical care for American
veterans.
In the area of education, we built 2,300 schools in Iraq, rebuilt and
refurbished the schools. Yet in America, under the President's budget,
$8 billion for Leave No Child Behind has been underfunded by this year
alone.
Iraqi universities are receiving $20 million for higher education job
training, yet Pell grants here in the United States, the biggest
assistance for Americans to go to college, have been frozen for 3 years
in a row while college costs have risen by 10 percent on average.
In the area of law enforcement, the President has dedicated $500
million for training of law enforcement and the police in Iraq. As you
know, they did not perform too well the last 2 weeks. Yet the
President's own budget for the United States cut $657 million for the
police program to train our police on community policing on America's
streets.
In the area of housing, $470 million has been allocated for Iraq's
housing program, yet we have cut $700 million out of section 8 here at
home for our housing.
It is true about the environment, one last area. We are rebuilding
all of Iraq's water and sewage for drinking water to the tune of $3.6
billion, yet the revolving fund in the United States for water
treatment and drinking water has been cut by $500 million.
When the President said in 2000, not said, he declared he was opposed
to nation-building, who knew it was America he was talking about? So as
we talk about the $700 million of allocated money, where it went from
Afghanistan to Iraq and the theater of war, we have allocated well over
$150 billion to that mission, of which $20 billion is for rebuilding
Iraq's society, and we have made a commitment.
What worries me, because the American people have been very generous
and have been very committed, what worries me is when you start to talk
about a future for Iraq and their children that is better than the one
we are providing here at home for our own families and our own
children. We will continue to be generous, we will continue to provide,
but we have misallocated, in my view, billions of dollars. The $700
million on the war front in building an airport in Kuwait is only the
tip of the iceberg, in my view, of the misallocated dollars that raises
real questions about the commitment.
When you look at the two budgets, the one here at home for America
and America's future and the one in Iraq, you realize this
administration is not only running two sets of books but they have two
principles and two value systems. We need to have the same values at
home that we are talking about for Iraq, the same type of investments
we are talking about, law enforcement, education, health care, the
environment, policing; and we need to make that commitment here so the
American people maintain that the future for their families and their
children is one for a good tomorrow, a better tomorrow, not one that is
less than the one we are talking about overseas.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, if I could reclaim my time, I just want to
stress, if I can briefly, that this did not have to be. I do not want
to keep talking about the past, because I believe the President made a
huge mistake in going to war. But it was not only that he made the
mistake. It is also the way he went about it, and, even more so, the
way he continues to go about it.
Not only would we have saved tremendous resources if we had not gone
to war, as well as the lives of those who have been lost, but also if
this had been done in an effort to try to internationalize the war, so
that we had our allies not only fighting the burden in terms of their
own soldiers, but also the burden of the cost of the war, which was
what was done in the case of Bosnia and the Persian Gulf War before. I
was here, so I remember. But not only did the President not want to do
that, but he continues along the same path.
I know he is saying he is going to go to the United Nations; but the
attitude, and, in my opinion, the arrogance of the President and the
administration in wanting to go it alone, even when they talk about
going to the U.N., it does not seem real. I think that is why countries
like Spain and some of these others are pulling out.
In other words, instead of seeing countries get more involved, not
only
[[Page H2244]]
in terms of men but also resources, we see less. I think that
continues. I really question, as much as I would like to see and I
think this needs to be, that the U.N. needs to get into Iraq and the
situation needs to be internationalized. This whole idea of other
countries sharing the burden is very much, I think, something that the
President opposes.
Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, I know we want to get back to our friend
from Washington State, but people remember in the first Gulf War, which
cost $60 billion, the United States paid $5 billion of that $60 billion
and we were part of a larger international effort that included members
of the armed services of Syria, Egypt, and other Arab-Muslim countries.
Today we are bearing 95 percent of the cost and well over 90 percent of
the, shall we say, the blood and the force presence in Iraq. So the
contrast is stark.
What is also stark is if you look at both the war in Kuwait, the
first time, Bosnia, Kosovo, East Timor, all have been very successful
strategies in the post-Cold War era, where America with its allies
fought the war, but America was a partner in the rebuilding of the
society. And it worked successfully, especially in Bosnia, Kosovo and
East Timor.
Why you would take a successful playbook like that, throw it out,
when everybody, regardless of what their position was on the war prior
to the war, everybody said the war would be easy, the peace would be
hard, you need a plan. How you commit 150,000 to 175,000 American
troops, $180 billion worth of our resources, and not have had a plan on
the peace, this was not Monday morning coaching. Everybody knew that
peace would be hard and that you went to war with no plan, when
Democrats and some Republicans, but all Democrats, regardless of what
their position was, said the war will not be hard, it will be the peace
and rebuilding once you own it that will be hard. And you did it
without that, when the President has an obligation to have asked
questions. Not to have asked questions and not have a plan was a
miscarriage of responsibility, in my view.
{time} 1545
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, one of the things that the gentleman from
New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) raised was the issue of arrogance. And
certainly it takes a certain amount of self-confidence to be a national
leader. I mean, a President has to be a confident person and act
confident and so forth. But there are times when one needs to ask
forgiveness for making mistakes.
This administration has absolutely blanket not asked for a bit of
forgiveness on anything. The dismantling of the entire Army they now
say was a terrible mistake. The dismantling of the police was a
terrible mistake. The dismantling and driving out everybody who was a
Ba'ath Party member, university professors, doctors, lawyers,
everybody, they threw them out of work. They threw the whole country
out of work. And then they are surprised by the chaos.
Now, it would be bad enough, as that was a long time ago, but the
viceroy we put in there, Mr. Bremer continues to do these stupid things
on his own. I was talking to some people who are in Iraq at the moment
who said it is absolutely inconceivable that he shut down a newspaper.
Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, he did not do
these things on his own.
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Bremer?
Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, he is in constant contact with both the
State Department, the White House, and Defense.
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, he never talked to the Iraqi Governing
Council. No Iraqi would have given him that advice. I mean, it is the
President's mistake for putting a guy like that there.
Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, my colleague is obviously referring to the
mistakes the President was asked at his press conference, and he could
not think of a mistake.
The first lesson in life your parents teach you and your first grade
teacher teaches is one learns from their mistakes. That is the first
lesson in life. Usually by 8 in the morning my wife has identified four
of them for me. By 5 when I am heading home, I come to the conclusion
she may have something there.
But to not have known, as my colleague identified four in literally a
minute, the first lesson is you learn from your mistakes. Saying that
he cannot think of one is why we got the situation we got both in the
war and on terror. In 3 years 3 wars, and he cannot think of one thing
he would do different, even if he did not want to call it a mistake.
Mr. McDERMOTT. This most recent one I spoke about, this closing this
newspaper, now, we are bringing them democracy, right? Free speech.
Newspapers should be able to say whatever they want to say. Well, we do
not like somebody, so we go over and shut it down. These Iraqis say,
hey, what is this about? I thought we had free speech now that we had
democracy.
Now, clearly we want them to have free speech as long as they say
what we want them to say. The conflagration that has come out of the
Shia community was provoked by Mr. Bremer. That did not come from the
outside. It did not come from foreigners. It came from the United
States Government going in and saying, you shut your mouth.
We put gasoline on the fire of a guy who was a nobody. He had been
talking 6 months before, and he lost all of his oomph. So we go down
and throw some gasoline on the embers, and now we have a flame.
We have the worst month we have had in the entire war. More people
have died this month. They have not learned anything from their
mistakes. They continue to make them because they are arrogant. They
think because they are from the United States, and they come over with
all this knowledge in their head, that they could not possibly know
anything about what was exactly the right thing to do.
We are doomed as long as the President of the United States and Mr.
Bremer and Mr. Rumsfeld and Mr. Wolfowitz who cannot ever reexamine
what they have done are in control. We have no chance if they do not go
to the United Nations and get the United Nations actively involved and
in control so that the United States is not the sole occupying force.
There is a wonderful article in the Atlantic Monthly by James Fallows
that I think everybody ought to read from almost 6 months ago that lays
it all out. It is called ``Blind into Baghdad.'' It is a statement
about every mistake we have made. And we still continue to make them,
and our kids are dying. That is the worst part.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for his
comments and certainly join in them, because I think you have it right
on point that this administration simply is not capable of conducting
this war. Whether you are for the war, which I voted against it, or you
are against it, it does not matter. Bottom line is the administration
is just not capable of carrying it out.
I now yield to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), who has
been one of the most vocal persons on the Iraq war from the very
beginning. I appreciate what she has been saying for the last few
years.
Ms. LEE. Mr. Speaker, let me thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Pallone) for his continuing leadership and his quest to pursue the
truth. Our democracy is standing at a crossroads, and he is helping us
move in the correct direction. Hopefully we are not too late.
I also want to thank the distinguished chair of the Congressional
Black Caucus, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings), for being a
leader on this issue and on so many issues that we are confronted with
here in our country and for continuing to try and every week now
attempt to wake up America.
And at this moment in time, our Nation is confronting a growing
credibility gap from the highest reaches of power. So I am glad that my
colleague continues to keep on this because there is no way we should
rest until the gap between the administration's rhetoric and reality
become closer together. I think people deserve to know the truth.
Let me just first start by talking about the ongoing tragedy in Iraq.
I would also like to talk about how this pattern of distortion about
the most fundamental issues of war and peace is
[[Page H2245]]
really reflected in other foreign and domestic policies also. This is a
very consistent kind of trend that we are seeing.
In Iraq, first of all, we have to begin by recognizing that the
latest and ongoing tragedies really, once again, cause us to pause in
terms of the terrible loss of life and in a conflict that is escalating
every day out of control. So our thoughts and our prayers go out to all
of those who have lost loved ones or who really anxiously now watch the
news each night, each terrified night, actually, and worry about what
they might hear.
The chaos in Iraq today is a direct contradiction to the picture
painted by the administration before and during this war. When it comes
to Iraq, we see an enormous gap between the truth and the
administration's message to the American people, the Congress, and the
world. As the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, also our
ranking member of the House Committee on Government Reform, the
gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman) and many others have found, this
credibility gap on Iraq emerges especially in terms of claims about
weapons of mass destruction, claims about Iraqi connections to al
Qaeda, and claims about how much the war would cost and how long it
would take.
For instance, on the weapons of mass destruction before the war, Vice
President Cheney stated that we believe Saddam Hussein has, in fact,
reconstituted nuclear weapons. Before the war President Bush said that
Iraq was buying aluminum tubes and African uranium for nuclear weapons.
Secretary of State Colin Powell said, and these are quotes mind you,
that by conservative estimates, he said, Iraq today has a stockpile of
between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. Secretary of
Defense Donald Rumsfeld stated that Saddam Hussein has another, quote,
``large unaccounted for stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons
and an active program to acquire and develop nuclear weapons.''
Now, all of these statements are frightening, and they present a
portrait of an Iraqi Government that possessed enormous stockpiles of
chemical and biological weapons and even nuclear weapons. Well, even
the administration's chief weapons inspector David Kay said, ``We were
almost all wrong.''
Well, the fact is there were many people who were not wrong, many
countries who were not wrong, from Members of Congress who voted for my
amendment that would have rejected the war and would have said the U.N.
inspections process should move forward, that is the way we find and
destroy weapons of mass destruction, to IAEA Director Mohammed el-
Baradei who challenged the administration's interpretation.
In fact, it has really become increasingly clear that there were
voices inside the United States Intelligence Community who also raised
questions. But their questions and voices were silenced, which, again,
is a pattern that we have noticed with this administration. Their
shades of gray were repainted in stark black and white. So it is not
just that mistakes were made, I believe the choices, deliberate choices
were made.
Secondly, we have the issue of alleged Iraqi connections to al Qaeda.
Nothing could frighten Americans more than this combination of Iraq
with its supposed nuclear weapons and al Qaeda with its proven
terrorist agenda.
President Bush said that Iraq was the central front on the war on
terror. The President also said ``You cannot distinguish between al
Qaeda and Saddam.'' The administration could and should have been able
to distinguish between al Qaeda and Iraq.
And many argue that the war in Iraq has seriously, seriously
undermined our efforts to bring al Qaeda to justice and to make our
people and our country safe. In fact, it appears that because of the
Bush administration's policies, terrorists are now consolidating
forces. That is now. That did not happen 4 years ago.
Finally, regarding credibility in Iraq, there is the question of how
long the war would take and how much it would cost in terms of blood
and our treasure. Before the war, Vice President Cheney predicted that
the conflict would be measured in weeks, this is what he said, rather
than months. Well, it has been over 56 weeks since the fighting
started. Our casualties are still rising, and our troops are
continually being told to expect longer and longer tours of duty.
White House Budget Director Mitch Daniels predicted in April of 2003
that Iraq would be an affordable, he said, an affordable endeavor that
will not require sustained aid. This is coming from the administration,
the White House.
When White House Economic Advisor Larry Lindsey dared to speak the
truth and estimated that the war would cost between $100 and $200
billion a year. Remember, he got fired.
If you downplay the cost of war in dollars and lives, then you
deceive the American people, and that is what has happened. If we
refuse to plan for postwar chaos, then you will be poorly prepared to
deal with it, and our young men and women and other Iraqis and other
international workers will die.
In May of 2003, President Bush landed on that aircraft carrier under
the banner of ``Mission Accomplished.'' Well, then, I ask why are
American soldiers still dying, and why is it Iraq is still in chaos?
Why does the Washington Post, I believe it was this morning, why does
the Washington Post predict that the administration will come back
right here, must come back to Congress, and will come back for money
for the escalating war on top of the $166 billion already authorized,
and also that is on top of the $420 billion defense budget?
We see here there is really a growing and very clear credibility gap.
Also this extends far beyond Iraq. Let us look at Haiti, for example,
where the administration claimed it was defending democracy while, in
fact, it was undermining that democracy and engaging in regime change
by other means. That is why we need an independent mission to
investigate just what was the role of the United States Government in
the overthrow of the democratically elected Government of Haiti. That
is also why we still need a truly independent commission to investigate
the use and misuse of intelligence in the war in Iraq.
And this same pattern of saying one thing and doing another really
permeates the domestic agenda of this administration. The President
said his tax cuts for the rich would create jobs, yet we have seen
around 3 million jobs disappear in our country. He said the majority of
those tax cuts would go to those at the bottom end of the spectrum.
Instead the top 1 percent of earners reap over a third of tax benefits
all by themselves.
{time} 1600
Of course, we know the President said we would have greater resources
for education. What has happened to Leave No Child Behind: 9.4 billion-
plus underfunded. Leave No Child Behind has been a shame and disgrace.
I will conclude by saying that we need to also look at the
credibility gap as it relates to another life-and-death issue and that
is the HIV/AIDS pandemic. In 1998, the Congressional Black Caucus and
the Clinton administration worked together to establish the Minority
AIDS Initiative, but of course since President Bush came in, despite
the growing trends of infection in the African American rate, which
today accounts for 39 percent of AIDS cases, despite the fact that only
12 percent of our population is African American, once again he talks
about increasing funding, but we cannot even seem to get the additional
money not only for domestic AIDS programs but also for our
international programs. It continues to be 600 million-plus
underfunded.
Let me conclude by saying that I believe this country is deeply
divided today. Actually, it is more divided than when President Bush
came in even though he said he would be a uniter, not a divider. I
think we must once again communicate directly to the American people
what we know and that is the fact that their tax dollars are going from
misplaced priorities of waging war rather than securing peace, waging a
PR campaign to try to instill in the American people these notions of
facts that they want us to believe, they want people to believe, when
really they are not fact. They are really distortions put mildly and,
in fact, a way to boost the foundation and the debate and the rationale
for waging war which, unfortunately, has cost the
[[Page H2246]]
lives of hundreds of our young men and women.
I thank the gentleman for once again giving us this opportunity to
try to convey what we know to the American people. I want to thank the
Congressional Black Caucus for continuing to be the conscience of the
Congress and for pushing this information forward so hopefully we will
be able to save our democracy and save our young men and women from
more injuries and more deaths abroad.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlewoman, and I want
to thank the members of the Congressional Black Caucus for this ongoing
debate that they have been putting forth about the President's
credibility gap, whether it relates to the war in Iraq or other issues
that have been raised.
I just want to mention I think there are about 11 minutes left, and I
do not know how many other speakers there are. I think there are maybe
three. Please keep that in mind, we have 11 or 12 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Washington, D.C.
Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Pallone), and I thank the Chair of our own Black Caucus for his
leadership in coming forward.
I will try to be as brief as possible so everyone can speak. I do
want to say that as we reach more than 700 Americans now killed in
Iraq, more than were killed in the taking of Iraq itself, we have the
obligation to come to the floor as we have, even if the President did
not fulfill his obligation to tell us what we need to know, because we
have an obligation to ask the hard questions and to pose those
questions for the American people.
The largest question in my mind has to do with money. This President
has said he will not come to the Congress for more money until January.
Does something not seem strange about that date to you? As we are about
to send more troops to Iraq, as we were told when the $87 billion was
before us that this was all they would need, is it credible to say that
we can go until January without any sense that there may be more money
needed? Particularly since Members have gone to Iraq and told us that
members in the service are wanting for equipment, the very equipment
that could mean the difference between life and death.
This is the question we should pose over and over again. Is there
enough money? Are there enough troops? And this without saying, I told
you so, because, indeed, we did tell him so; but it looks as though if
these troops do not have what they need that we are going to be
sacrificing the lives of troops that could have been spared had they
been given what they were entitled to there. This is not a question
that the Members on the floor are raising.
No one who heard Mr. Lugar yesterday, a member of the President's own
party, the Chair of the Foreign Relations committee, has ever heard
sterner words from a member of his own party. The Congress is no better
informed than the general public about where we are going and how we
will get there because this President has refused to come forward.
Mr. Wolfowitz came forward yesterday and his half-hour speech was
about demonizing the demon, the demon that has a hundred percent
demonization from all the American people without giving us any sense
of what the President's plans were for stabilizing Iraq, for getting
out of Iraq, for turning over power to somebody in Iraq.
I have been asked recently by the press about these coffins that no
one can see at Dover, Delaware. I think that is a matter for the
family. If the family wants to be in Dover, the family should be in
Dover. If the family wants the hometown newspaper to be in Dover, they
should be in Dover. No one should be telling the people that you cannot
come to Dover to get your own folks. What is happening is that the
administration believes it can hide the policy by hiding coffins. It
will not work.
This administration was willing to embed photographers and reporters
in the scenes of battle because they wanted the American people to be
with them in battle. But they are not willing to let us see folks who
want to be with their folks when they come home. They want us to see
the mission, but they do not want to let us see the cost of the
mission.
It is very scary to hear these folks act as though this is a bunch of
thugs. There have got to be thugs about them, but this is an uprising.
When you see it here and everywhere, them fighting back the way you saw
them fighting back in Vietnam and World War II, this is a battle. This
means we do not have this place under control. We wake up each morning,
and there is some new coordinated attack. This time, bomb attacks in
three different places on no less than police stations.
Ultimately, I am going to continue to look for ways that we can help
our country, but if I were to be absolutely truthful, I would have to
say that I do not think the United States is going to get back its
credibility, is going to draw allies to us from NATO or anyplace else
until we start with a new President of the United States.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I agree with the gentlewoman. I was
thinking about this whole idea of getting our allies involved, and what
immediately comes to mind is after the initial incursion the U.S. had
essentially routed the Iraqi Army and Saddam Hussein had fled. If you
remember, both France and Germany offered at that point to get involved
in the rebuilding of Iraq, and the President said absolutely not. He
did not want them involved in any way. That is the kind of arrogance we
face. I think if we do not have a change of leadership at the top,
there is no way to conduct this war.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings).
Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I rise this afternoon in solemn
recognition of all the soldiers who have lost their lives or who have
been injured in the war on Iraq. I want to thank the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Pallone) and the Congressional Black Caucus who stood up
for our soldiers in this war.
As I am sure you are aware, Mr. Speaker, April has been one of the
deadliest months in the war in Iraq. Approximately 100 troops have lost
their lives and countless others have been injured in the escalating
violence. I continue to pray for the families of the deceased and
wounded and for the safe return of those fighting in the Iraqi desert.
Mr. Speaker, as Members of Congress we must ask the crucial questions
that go to the heart of our mission in Iraq, namely, Mr. Speaker, we
have the responsibility to our constituents and to our American
servicemen and -women to ask what is the strategy for returning Iraqi
governance to the Iraqi people. How long are our troops expected to be
in Iraq and at what cost in American tax dollars and human loss of life
must we expend?
Just last week, the President held a prime-time press conference to
address the concerns of the American people regarding the United States
occupation of Iraq and the resulting loss of life. President Bush told
the American people that we must unequivocally stay the course. But I
must ask, Mr. Speaker, is this really a course worth staying? And most
courses have an end. On our current course, Iraq Shiites have now
joined forces with the Sunnis to fight against the United States
occupation of their country.
Mr. Speaker, the irony of this situation is that the United States
expected the Iraqi Shiite majority to be the most grateful to the
United States for liberating them from years of oppression. But now
they are literally united with their former oppressors against the
United States.
Mr. Speaker, on our current course, our servicemen and -women do not
have the necessary equipment and support necessary to succeed in their
mission and furthermore to protect their own lives. Week after week I
hear from my constituents and others in the military that are lacking
the proper resources despite the fact that they face real and present
dangers every day. When I hear these stories I am completely baffled.
This Congress recently appropriated $87 billion in addition to the $79
billion in an original funding request for the war efforts in Iraq and
Afghanistan. And we were assured that these monies were being used to
supply the troops with equipment and other needs.
At that time, I came to the House floor to request a full and
complete accounting of what the funds would be used for and received no
such reporting. And now, Mr. Speaker, we see a
[[Page H2247]]
story in today's Washington Post which reads, ``The Army has publicly
identified nearly $6 billion in funding requests that did not make
Bush's $402 billion defense budget for 2005, including $132 million for
bolt-on vehicle armor; $879 million for combat helmets, silk-weight
underwear, boots and other clothing; $21.5 million for M249 squad
automatic weapons; and $27 million for ammunition magazines, nights
sights and ammo packs. Also unfunded: $956 million for repairing
desert-damaged equipment and $102 million to replace equipment lost in
combat.''
Mr. Speaker, the article goes on to further say, ``The Marine Corps
unfunded budget request includes $40 million for body armor, light
weight helmets and other equipment for `Marines engaged in the global
war on terrorism.' ''
Mr. Speaker, this is simply outrageous. While the President tells the
Nation that we need to stay the course, his own budget did not include
the funds necessary to accomplish that goal.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman. We started
this Special Order today talking about the lack of planning and the
cost of the war and how we are getting all kinds of misinformation in
that regard, and it continues. This is the problem. We are hearing now
the President saying that he wants to go to the U.N. and
internationalize the war, but we are still not getting any adequate
information about what the strategy is, what the cost is going to be.
And I think those are answers that the American people want.
I think, again, whether you supported the war in the beginning or you
did not, I did not, I know most of us who spoke today did not, but that
is not the issue any more. The issue is where are we going from here.
We are still being given inaccurate information about where we are
going.
Mr. CUMMINGS. Certainly the issue is accountability. We simply want
accountability. We are asked to appropriate large sums of money, but
the question is, where does the money go?
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank all of our speakers that
joined us today.
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