[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 16 (Tuesday, February 15, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H621-H626]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
IRAQ WATCH
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Conaway). Under the Speaker's announced
policy of January 4, 2005, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) is
recognized for 60 minutes.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, we are moving swiftly into the Iraq
Watch time, and many other Members will be down here shortly to talk
about a couple of different issues, one would be the issue of Iraq that
has been going on for some time in a working group here.
Congress has been talking about this issue over and over and trying
to bring some awareness and some clarity to many of the people of this
country who are very concerned with what is going on in Iraq. I would
also like to, since we claimed the time here, I would also like to talk
a little bit about the veterans and a little bit about what is going on
here with the budget.
As we just talked about, and as the gentleman from New York
articulated and the gentleman from Florida articulated as well, there
is some real pressure being put on the budget here in the United States
Congress, and I did mention it towards the end. One of the programs
that is going to take a real beating here in the 2005 budget is going
to be the issue of veterans.
Now, the President has made a formal request of this body for another
$80 billion to help fund the Iraq war, and this will take the grand
total over $300 billion that we will spend on the Iraq war. And that is
just today. That is up to this point. This $80 billion may get us
through the year, but some analysts say it may not. We are going to be
over $300 billion in what we have spent in Iraq.
Now, there is nobody in this Chamber who will not support the troops,
who need our support. Many of us have argued, and I was on the
Committee on Veterans' Affairs in the last Congress, many of us argued
vehemently that we need to fully fund veterans health care in the
United States of America. If we are going to continue to say there are
other priorities in the budget, or that a certain amount of people who
make a certain amount of money, a lot of money, the Bill Gateses of the
world, should somehow get a tax cut and that we should do it on the
backs of the veterans of the United States of America, and tell them
their copay is going to go from $2 to $7, $7 to $15; that their annual
fees are going to be increased up to $250 if they are a category seven
or eight veteran, then this is an issue that I think as much as Social
Security attacks some of the fundamental concepts and promises of this
country.
Is there anything more despicable than to go out and tell a veteran
who has left a limb somewhere across the world that somehow he is not
going to be able to get the kind of benefits he was promised? That is
what is happening with the irresponsibility of the budgeteering that is
going on in the United States Congress today.
We showed the deficits: $450 billion. We are out borrowing money,
paying interest on it, and eating up a bigger share of the budget in
years to come. And we are not challenging the top 1 percent, or people
making $1 million a year or more to somehow pay their fair share, to
say they do not have to on the backs of the veterans.
And no one can squirm out of this one. This is one you just cannot
get away from. You can maybe talk private accounts will yield more
interest and at least get people thinking, but how can you not ask
people who benefit the most from the capitalistic system to pay and
meet their obligation to the rest of society? Because if it were not
for those people, if it were not for the veterans of the United States
military, there would be no capitalistic system for anyone else to make
money off of. That is the fundamental premise. So we need to make sure
that we find the resources in the Congress to do it.
I would like to just take this opportunity to acknowledge the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), who was the Republican chairman
of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, who was a great advocate for
veterans in this country and who was removed from the chairmanship of
the committee because he was too strong of an advocate because he
wanted more resources put in.
I live in Ohio, and a lot of those folks have moved into the State of
Florida, south Florida, Miami, and they have some sun and fun; but
there are a lot of veterans who have stayed in my community and who are
having a lot of difficulties accessing the system. So I think it is
appropriate that we are here following this debate, the generation that
gave us Social Security, the generation that freed Europe, the
generation that saved southeast Asia in many ways, and who created a
lot of the opportunities that we have here today and set us on this
path of democracy and fiscal responsibility for years to come, social
justice. I think we have an opportunity to honor those folks,
especially as we have more people from our generation coming back.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek).
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from
Ohio for his comments, and I am very excited about the fact that some
Members of the Congress are watching out for our veterans, making sure
our veterans are receiving what they deserve.
We talk about silver and blue hair once again, but there are a number
of veterans that were in the first Gulf War, in Korea, even some in
Grenada, definitely in Vietnam and World War II, and other conflicts
that we have been involved in over the years; and it is important they
receive the care they need not only at our veterans hospitals but also
because these veterans were told when they signed up and they went into
harm's way on behalf of this country, on the philosophy of our
leadership and this Congress, that we would provide those kind of
benefits.
That is the reason why in the President's budget, as we heard in the
last hour where we said how can we talk about Social Security and not
talk about the budget, that it is important that we realize that this
budget is deplorable as it relates to keeping our promise to our
veterans and to our young veterans. We have a lot of young veterans out
there that are trying to raise families and dealing with real issues.
Some are on 50 percent benefits, some are on 100 percent benefits
because they laid it down for this country, Democrats and Republicans.
{time} 2115
I will tell you once again, when you see the land of milk and honey,
when it comes down to the top 1 percent and what they get and the
promise that is kept to them by this administration and by the majority
side, it is really night and day. If you are in the top 1 percent, you
are in good shape right now. You are receiving every tax cut that you
could possibly get at this particular time, and I am pretty sure there
are some Members of this body that would have some other great ideas
for you. But what happens to that individual that works every day? What
happens to that individual that puts it on the line every day?
We are talking about Iraq Watch, and this is the hour that usually
our colleagues come to the floor to talk about Iraq. I just recently
returned with a bipartisan group going to Iraq and Afghanistan to visit
our troops and also to visit some of the civilians that are over there.
I will tell you that news reports are not even covering half of what is
happening there. Tomorrow we will have the opportunity on the Committee
on Armed Services to hear from Secretary Rumsfeld. We will have an
opportunity to hear the administration's vision as it relates to Iraq,
and also to talk about this budget in the Department of Defense. But it
is important that we have past statements and hopefully not to say that
we want to have the Secretary responding to misstatements or anything
of that nature, but we want to make sure that we are giving voice to
those future veterans and we are giving voice to the troops that are
over there in harm's way right now. There are individuals,
[[Page H622]]
and God bless them, they want to do and they are doing the right thing
that they are being told to do. But we just had the Iraqi elections.
New elections are going to be coming up in December. Hopefully the
Iraqis will be ready or close to being ready for taking responsibility
for their country and for the security of their country.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Just as we are talking about this and all the
sacrifices that are being made over there and all the questions that
are coming up and what is going on, before I yield to the gentleman
from Ohio, there are a couple of statistics that I think we need to
share with the American people about the investment in our veterans,
because we have to focus on the ones that are coming back and new
veterans that are being created every day. I know the gentleman has
been out to Walter Reed and I have been out to Walter Reed several
times. There is nothing more tragic for any of us who serve in this
body than to go over there and see some of these soldiers and the
sacrifices that they have made for the country, and to come and look at
some of what is happening here in the Congress, where our President's
budget for health care programs provides only 106 million more dollars
than last year, $3.5 billion less than the veterans service
organizations that come here and testify before the Committee on
Veterans' Affairs and meet here say they need. The veterans groups, the
American Legion, they are not going to come before Congress and ask for
anything more than their soldiers that they served with need. And they
say they need $3.5 billion more. And so when you are telling us that
you are only going to increase it by $106 million in the President's
budget, it is outrageous.
I yield to the fine gentleman from Ohio whom I split Mahoning County
with in the great State of Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. I thank the gentleman from Ohio for yielding. We also
have with us tonight the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee). There
are some things that I think the American people need to understand
about what is happening here in Washington, D.C., especially as we
discuss the budget and its relevance to the veterans population. I am
amazed. I am truly amazed and puzzled. I really do not understand why
the President and why the Republican leadership in this House would
choose to treat veterans with such disdain.
Why do I say that? I will share with you some recent history with
this administration. One of the first things the President did after
becoming President during his first term was to increase the cost that
a veteran pays for a prescription drug from $2 a prescription to $7 a
prescription. I introduced legislation to repeal that increase but
unfortunately I was unable to get that legislation passed. So now many
veterans, thousands of veterans, pay $7 for each prescription they get
through the VA. Seven dollars may not sound like a lot of money, but
many of the veterans who are in need of medication take 10 or more
prescriptions a month, and many of these people are on fixed incomes.
Many of them have fought our wars. In fact, you can be a combat-
decorated veteran and you can be a priority 8 veteran. That is the
veteran that the administration says makes too much money to currently
qualify to participate in VA health care. Or you can be a priority 7
veteran, and a priority 7 veteran is a veteran that has a medical need
but the medical need is not a direct result of the military service,
and so they are charged more for the VA health care they receive.
So the President increased the cost of a prescription drug from $2 to
$7. Shortly after, the VA issued a new policy. It was in the form of a
memo that went to all the VA health care providers. It said basically,
and I am summarizing, but it said too many veterans are coming in for
service and we cannot afford to treat all these veterans and
consequently there are waiting lines; and so we are going to solve this
problem by rationing care to veterans, and we are going to ration care
by prohibiting our nurses and social workers and physicians from
proactively informing veterans of the services they are entitled to
receive under the law.
We are talking about services that lawfully were made available to
them by the actions of this Congress. I thought that was egregious. I
have filed suit against the Veterans' Administration in conjunction
with the Vietnam Veterans of America to try to overturn this egregious
policy. That suit is currently before the court. I am hopeful the court
will recognize that the VA is in violation of law and will force them
to withdraw this onerous gag order.
We see a pattern developing here. Because then the VA decided that
they were going to create a brand-new category or priority group for
veterans, and they called that new category priority group 8. They
said, this group just simply can no longer enroll and receive VA health
care. And why? Well, because they make too much money, so they should
not be able to get health care. The formula that is used to determine
if a veteran is high income and no longer entitled to receive VA health
care is based on a Housing and Urban Development formula.
In my district, you can make as little as $22,000 a year and the VA
will consider you high income and tell you that you can no longer
receive VA health care. Think of that. Those of us who serve in this
Chamber, the American people have a right to know that, make over
$150,000 a year. Maybe we can pay $7 a prescription for our
prescription medications if we need to. Maybe we can find the ability
to afford the kind of health insurance that will take care of our
medical needs if we need to. But I submit to you that if you make
$22,000 a year, you are not high income. I think it is shameful, I use
that word, but it is shameful that this government would make a
decision to treat our veterans in that manner.
And now, before I yield back to my friend from Ohio, the Republican
leadership in this House has done something just very recently that the
American people have a right to know about. Because over the last
Congress, Democrats and Republicans worked together on the VA Committee
to preserve adequate funding. It was not as much as I wanted it to be,
but at least it was enough to maintain at least the current level of
services. And we did that with the help of some of our Republican
colleagues. The chairman of the VA Committee in the last Congress
really enabled us to keep VA funding at a level that enabled current
services to continue. That Republican Congressman's name was Chris
Smith. He is a Republican Congressman from the State of New Jersey.
Many people who watch C-SPAN know Chris Smith because he frequently
stands in this Chamber and he argues and advocates for an end to
abortion. I would call Chris Smith, at least in my judgment, he is the
most pro-life Member of this House. I just point that out to emphasize
that he is a true conservative. He is a true conservative.
Chris Smith had served on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs for 24
years, nearly a quarter of a century. He had been the chair of the VA
Committee for the last 4 years. But because he was an advocate for
veterans, Speaker Hastert and the leadership in this House decided they
were going to strip him of his chair's position. Not only did they do
that, they removed him from this committee that he had served on for 24
years, and they did that in the face of opposition from 10 of the
national veterans service organizations. I am talking about the
American Legion, the Disabled American Veterans, the Veterans of
Foreign Wars, the AMVETS, the Vietnam Veterans, the Paralyzed Veterans
of America, the Noncommissioned Officers, the Jewish War Veterans. All
of these veterans organizations wrote Speaker Hastert a letter, they
all signed their name to that letter, and they said to Speaker Hastert,
it would really be a shame for Chris Smith to be taken out of the
chair's position and to be removed from this committee because he has
been our friend. He has been an advocate for veterans. What was Speaker
Hastert's response? Chris Smith was stripped of his chair's position,
removed from the VA Committee.
I am asking my friend from Ohio, do you see a pattern here? It seemed
that time after time after time, this administration and the leadership
in this House of Representatives, they are taking steps that are
harmful to veterans.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. We just had an hour where we discussed Social
Security and the private accounts, not to get back into it, but this
many Members on the other side are willing to
[[Page H623]]
borrow $5 trillion over the next 20 years to pay for the privatization
plan. If you had come here and said, you know, we maybe need to borrow
$3.5 billion to fully fund veterans, I think many of us on this side of
the aisle would say, well, we think we should balance the budget, we
probably think that there is a better way of doing it, but what a much
better reason to go out and borrow money, $3.5 billion compared to $5
trillion granted, to meet the obligation that we have.
I thought it would be interesting just to show since 2001, I have
these charts working tonight so I am going to do one final chart. This
is the increase, funding increases since 2001. This is the percent of
increase in funding. The red is defense, the lavender is homeland
security, and the blue is 9/11 response, New York City, international
and airline relief. This is 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001. In 2004, 69 percent
of the increase in funding from this Congress went for defense, 9
percent for homeland security, and 12 percent for 9/11.
These are three priorities I think the whole Congress could agree on.
But to have a 70 percent increase in the military? You are telling me
we could not find $3.5 billion that could not get to Halliburton in
order to fund some of this for our veterans? My point is that this is
an issue of priorities. This comes down to one word, choice.
{time} 2130
What is the choice that this Congress wants to make?
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, what the gentleman says is true. There
are several ways we can find the money to pay for veterans health care.
For one thing, we can cut back on these tax cuts that have gone to the
richest people. There are people in this country who have never served
in the military, never put their lives on the line; and yet this
President, during this time of war, has decided to give them a huge,
huge tax cut, while our veterans, many of them becoming increasingly
elderly and disabled, are being deprived of adequate health care,
having to wait for weeks and months to get a doctor's appointment. That
is just wrong.
So the President had a choice: tax cuts for the richest people in
America or adequate funding for VA health care. He chose tax cuts for
the richest among us.
There is something else I would like to share with my friend from
Ohio. We are spending in Iraq today about $1.25 billion a week. Think
of that. And we cannot find an additional $3.5 billion for our
veterans, all of our veterans. I do not want to choose among our
veterans. I do not want to say this veteran is worthy and this veteran
is not worthy. All of these people have served the country. They are in
need of help and health care, and I am getting sick and tired of
hearing about focusing on the core constituency. Of course we need to
focus on the core constituency. But that does not mean that we should
neglect other veterans as well. And that is what is happening. And I
hope the people in this country, especially the veterans and the
families of veterans, are paying attention because we are treating our
veterans in a shabby manner.
The President's budget that he sent us a couple of weeks ago is a
shameful document. It cuts back on nursing home care for veterans. It
is a shameful document. And I do not want to hear my colleagues over
there say these are tight budgetary times, we just do not have the
money.
We have the money, Mr. Speaker, to pay for what we think is
important. We have the money for that. The fact is that President Bush
and this leadership do not consider America's veterans a priority. They
cannot run from that fact. And I would just invite any of my Republican
friends to come to this floor and let us discuss this openly. Let us
discuss the fact that President Bush is asking that our veterans pay
increased costs for medications, that he wants to impose a $250 annual
user fee for many of our veterans to use a hospital. I think it is
shameful. I really think it is shameful.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I appreciate the
comments, and I have just got to say it is stunning. We are down here a
lot and we get wrapped up and frustrated and upset about this; but I
mean, when we take a step back, this is stunning what we are doing. It
is absolutely stunning that we can somehow expect the American people
and the veterans that are sitting at home tonight who make $22,000 a
year, who struggle and many people in our community in northeast Ohio
who have lost their steel jobs or their rubber jobs and have moved into
the VA health, they have moved into VA health because they do not have
anything else. But they made the sacrifice. When the bell rung, they
were there.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, as I say, I would invite any of my
Republican friends to come down here and challenge what we are saying
because what we are saying is the truth.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, let me add just to what the gentleman from
Ohio (Mr. Strickland) was saying. He was asking why this administration
cannot make veterans a priority, but I would suggest that we are not so
much even asking the administration to recognize veterans as a
priority, but just asking them to give them a decent kind of regular
order priority, because the fact of the matter is this administration,
and it is sad to say, has not only failed to give the veterans
priority. They have really treated them like about second- or third-
class citizens.
The administration really has decided to put veterans, some of whom
have lost limbs and health and their lives in Iraq, on a second or
third tier below other folks that the administration values more
highly. That is a fairly dramatic thing to say, but let me back up what
I mean by that.
The administration has decided to put people who earn over $400,000 a
year and got about almost a third of the tax breaks that the President
handed out, the President refuses to ask any of those folks to
contribute in any way to the Iraq war, and so basically the
administration has put veterans behind those folks on a lower tier. He
has not just put them on a lower priority. He has put them on a second-
class tier, but it is not just folks earning a high income.
The President has also put Halliburton on a higher tier than the
veterans who have actually fought the wars. We have not seen this
administration really get aggressive about the misuse of funds in Iraq.
We Democrats had to hold sort of a rump hearing. The gentleman from
California (Mr. Waxman) and the Senator from North Dakota had a hearing
to find out what happened to all this money that disappeared into the
financial swamps of Iraq.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, the fact is that, as I understand it,
about $9 billion is unaccounted for.
Mr. INSLEE. Exactly, Mr. Speaker. And if the gentleman will continue
to yield, three times, three times the amount of money it would take to
fix this problem with veterans so they would not have to stand in line
for 6 months to get treatment when they come back from Iraq, this
administration lost three times as much money in the financial
netherworld of Iraq, and they refuse to do anything about it because it
is embarrassing.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would just like
to say that that would not be the least embarrassing thing about this
war.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, let me mention maybe one of the most
embarrassing things, and I read about this today. When I said that this
administration has put veterans on a lower tier of value, let me tell
my colleagues the sort of icing on the cake. Today, I read that a group
of veterans from the first Persian Gulf War who were tortured by Saddam
Hussein in the Abu Ghraib prison brought a lawsuit in the American
courts against Iraq, the Iraqi Government, and they were granted a
significant judgment, several millions of dollars for the abuse, and it
was horrendous abuse. These were fliers who
[[Page H624]]
went down in the first Persian Gulf War, were captured by Saddam's
forces, and were terribly tortured; and they won a judgment that seemed
to me to make the right decision considering what they went through.
They now are attempting to enforce that judgment against Iraq and
against the oil revenues that are generated in Iraq.
So what did the administration do? Did it come to the aid of these
veterans who were so terribly tortured at Abu Ghraib? No. This
administration went to court to refuse to pay these veterans the
judgment they had received against the Iraqi oil field money,
essentially, which is now pouring into Iraq.
And the irony of this is pretty amazing because our Secretary of
Defense, Rumsfeld, has said we are going to pay damages to the Iraqis
who were subject to the abusive conditions in Abu Ghraib by our forces.
The same defense Secretary who said we ought to pay the Iraqis who were
abused in Abu Ghraib, unfortunately, in our situation, in our custody,
now steps in and refuses to allow our Americans to get payment when
Saddam Hussein tortured them. What kind of convoluted cockamamie,
knuckleheaded policy is that.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, I have introduced legislation to make
this government stop what they are doing, stop fighting these veterans,
these tortured veterans. The gentleman explained it well, but I would
like to just take a stab at it as well because what we have here is
these are soldiers that were captured during the first Gulf War, and
they were terribly tortured under Saddam Hussein's regime. This
government, as my colleagues recall, had held on to billions of dollars
that were Iraqi dollars, and when these tortured Americans sued and won
their suit, they were laying claim on those dollars that this country
had possession of, and this administration returned that money to Iraq
and literally used the Justice Department to go to court to try to set
aside that judgment that would compensate these soldiers.
And the gentleman from Washington State is right. At the same time,
here is Secretary Rumsfeld speaking of the Iraqis who were abused at
Abu Ghraib prison saying they are going to be compensated. So our
Secretary of Defense is willing to use American dollars to compensate
Iraqis who had been abused by Americans, and at the same time this
government is fighting to keep our American troops who were tortured in
Iraq from being compensated with Iraqi dollars. How can one explain
that to the American people? It is unbelievable.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, there is an explanation, and it is very
clear what the explanation is. The explanation is that this
administration puts on a higher tier of value the Iraqi provisional
government in dollars than these American veterans who were tortured.
They put them on a higher tier, number one. Number two, the
administration puts Halliburton on a higher tier than veterans because
they refused to give this $9 billion back that could be used to finance
veterans, number two. Number three, this administration puts people who
earn over $400,000 a year and got a tax cut that the administration
refuses to even talk about now, it puts them higher than the people who
went to Iraq and came home sometimes without legs.
I do not believe that is consistent with American values on how we
ought to look at respective contribution by Americans to our freedom,
which was the ultimate contribution of these veterans. But it shows a
skewed value judgment by the administration. That explains why this
administration takes the position.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will continue to yield,
I think it shows a moral blindness. I really do. I mean, we are talking
here about decisions that are made that affect the lives of American
soldiers, and in this case soldiers who were tortured. There is no
question that they were tortured. There is no question about that.
There is no question as to who was responsible. It was the Iraqi
Government under Saddam Hussein.
Now this administration is trying to play, I think, word games
because they are saying, well, that was the government that existed
under Saddam Hussein and now that Saddam Hussein has been removed from
office, this new government is not responsible for what happened under
Saddam Hussein. But I would remind the gentleman from Washington State
the money that we were holding on to here was money that was from the
Saddam Hussein government and regime. So I would like to ask the
President if I had a chance to talk with him, I would like to say: Mr.
President, why do you think Iraqis who were mistreated at Abu Ghraib
deserve to be compensated with American tax dollars and at the same
time you do not believe that American soldiers who were tortured when
they were captured and held in Iraq should be compensated with Iraqi
dollars? That seems like a fairly straightforward question, and I just
wonder how the President would answer that.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, I think I know, if I can posit a hypothesis,
in general how the President would answer, perhaps in more diplomatic
terms than I will offer, but I think he would say: Mr. Strickland, with
all due respect, you just do not get it. Our administration has made a
decision for the first time in American history to fight a war, but the
only people we are going to ask to sacrifice are veterans. Nobody else
is going to have to sacrifice.
Mr. STRICKLAND. And the soldiers that are active duty.
Mr. INSLEE. And the soldiers that are active duty.
Mr. STRICKLAND. And Reservists and Nation Guard.
Mr. INSLEE. And Reservists, some of whom are going to have to go back
for a second and third deployment. These are the only Americans that we
have asked to suffer and sacrifice because I, as President of the
United States, do not think this is worth fighting enough to ask any
other Americans to sacrifice rather than that small, less than \1/2\
percent of the population. So as a result, I, as President, have made a
decision that if the veterans get in my way by needing health care or
if the veterans get in my way by having a judgment because they got
tortured by Saddam Hussein and if they get in my way because they want
to get Halliburton to pay the 9 billion bucks back that was
fraudulently used by at least somebody over in Iraq, then it is just
tough.
{time} 2145
They are not going to get in my way, because I as president am not
going to touch tax cuts, I am going to do deficit spending, I am going
to continue to cut these veterans off from getting payment, because if
I get away with it, that is good enough for me. That is the only answer
I can think of.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield further, we
are standing here and talking about this, and there are probably
Americans watching and perhaps a few listening to us, and what we are
saying sounds almost unbelievable.
I understand how someone listening to this may be puzzled, because
there is no rational explanation, as far as I am concerned. Why should
this government put a greater value on compensating Iraqis than on
compensating tortured Americans? It just does not make sense. And it
does not fit the image that is usually presented to the American people
by this administration, because you hear a lot of rhetoric about how
much we appreciate our soldiers, how much we appreciate what the
military does for us, but the world now knows, and certainly most
Americans that have paid attention, that we did send our soldiers into
battle without adequate body armor, and we have them driving around in
vehicles in Iraq that are not properly armored, and we have people over
there conducting patrols and driving long distances and taking fuel
from one part of Iraq to the other part of Iraq without night vision
goggles. So we know there has been that kind of neglect.
But what my friend has brought to our attention here tonight
regarding these tortured Americans and the administration's fighting
them through
[[Page H625]]
the courts to keep them from getting compensated by the Iraqi
government is nearly unbelievable.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I think if you are
sitting at home listening to this debate that we are having here, the
discussion we are having here, there is a real key component, and I
mentioned it earlier and I think it is worth reiterating: Every major
veteran's service organization is against what the President and this
Congress is doing.
This is the most noble generation in the history of our country. They
are fiscally conservative. They are Republicans and Democrats. They are
frugal. They saved. They never had the kind of personal debt that our
Nation has today, not their generation.
They are not going to ask for money just to ask for it. They need it,
and they see the need with their friends, within their organizations,
and they are asking for it. If you do not believe the gentleman from
Ohio (Mr. Strickland), the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee), the
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) or the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Meek), believe all the veterans organizations that are out there
sticking up for their membership. If there is anybody you should
believe, it is them.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield further, I want
to tip a hat to these veterans groups, who are really one of the least
demanding groups of people I have ever worked with, considering how
they have been mistreated since this Iraq war started and since this
administration started to cut health care. Incredibly, they have been
respectful in bringing this to our attention. But, frankly, if they
were yelling at the top of their lungs and circling the White House
with pitchforks and torches, I think that would be, frankly,
understandable.
I was talking to somebody the other day saying if you are a World War
II veteran right now and you have a urological concern and you want to
get an exam, you have to wait like four months in the State of
Washington to get in for an examination. That is just not right. Those
lines are getting longer, and they will continue to get longer because
of these cuts in the general VA budget.
The gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) has talked with some
eloquence about raising the deductible that individual veterans have to
pay. Now they are also trying to soak veterans for $250 up front before
you get your first dollar of health care payments, if you make the
enormous sum of $22,000, which puts people right up in the Donald Trump
category, I am sure.
They are also cutting the general budget, or not raising it to the
level it demands, for the whole hospital system, which means these
waiting lines get longer, just as the number of people who need them
get larger. So it is a multiple. It is like a death by a thousand cuts.
Let me suggest one reason why we do not hear as much as we should
about this issue. If you look at the pictures of our Iraqi veterans who
are coming home, and we in Congress on both sides of the aisle have
visited with them and know how courageous these mostly young and not-
so-young people are, if you look at pictures of them, they are a lot of
times alone. They have gone back a lot of times to a small town and are
living in somebody's basement, and you see them sitting on the edge of
a chair with a missing limb. They are kind of alone. There is not a big
group around them except maybe their immediate family. They do not have
a blaring group of bugles and a press corps to advocate their cause.
Maybe that is what we ought to be doing here tonight, and in some small
way I guess we are.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield further, why
is there not an outcry about this? I think one of the reasons is that
the American people are not fully aware of what is happening and find
it hard to believe. I can understand why someone listening to us
tonight would find it hard to believe what we have said, because it is
so outrageous.
It is outrageous. As I said a little earlier, it is contrary to the
public image we get from this administration, because if you listen to
rhetoric coming from the White House and coming from the leadership in
this House here, you would think that they really appreciate the
veterans and they care for veterans and they were going to do
everything they could to care for veterans. But the facts just do not
match the rhetoric.
You could also wonder why is there not an outcry from many of the
Republicans who I know care about veterans? I have friends on that side
of the aisle that I know are veterans themselves, and they deeply in
their hearts care for veterans. The gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Smith) was one such person that I mentioned, the former Chair of the
committee. But I think there is a hesitancy to speak out, because if
you speak out and you challenge the leadership over there, there is a
price to pay.
The gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) found that out. When he
spoke up for veterans, he was stripped of his chairman position and he
was taken off of a committee that he had been on for 24 years. That is
almost unbelievable. Twenty-four years, a quarter of a century almost,
this man had served on that committee.
Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, when they
stripped the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) of his chairmanship,
he was sort of politically decapitated, if you will, because he had a
dissenting voice in the Republican caucus. He wanted to bring to the
country's attention the fact that veterans were not getting their due.
That was a courageous step by him. As a result, the leadership
essentially lynched him and excommunicated him from the leadership
position he held, after 25 years.
Think of what that message is to Iraq. We saw Iraqis really
courageously go to the polls. That was amazing. They had a 58 percent
or 60 percent turnout, almost 82 percent in a lot of the Shiite areas.
There were people who walked through violence to get to the polls. This
was a lot of personal courage there that we should respect in a lot of
ways. One would think we ought to honor that and send some messages to
Iraq about how to run a democracy.
Well, look at just three examples, how under the leadership of the
current House, what our lessons to Iraq are. Number one, to the Sunnis,
we want the Sunnis to come into the Iraqi government. We want the
minority group to participate in the government, because if we do not
get the Sunnis involved in the Iraqi government, this insurgency is
going to continue to bloom. So our message is to the Shiites, embrace
the Sunnis. Let them come in and have a voice in your government. Let
dissent have a voice. Reach a consensus through embracing the minority.
What do they do here in the House of Representatives? To their own
Member, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), who had a dissenting
viewpoint, kind of the position the Sunnis are in as a minority, boom,
off with his head, silence him. Take him out of the political discourse
here by removing his chairmanship. That is not a good message to the
Iraqis about how democracy ought to run.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield further, I
do not think is it is a good message to the rest of the Republicans who
serve there. The message is if you challenge us, you are in trouble. So
it silences even their own Members. It keeps them from having the
ability to speak up and speak out.
I have said before, we are elected to come here to represent the
people who vote for us and make us their representative. We do not come
here to serve the gentleman from Illinois (Speaker Hastert). We do not
come here to serve the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) or the
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi). We come here to represent the
people who send us here.
If my Republican friends do not have the freedom to speak up and
speak out about what they think is right for their constituents without
getting a committee taken away from them or getting a position taken
away from them, well, then they become impotent, quite frankly. They
are not able to be a true representative.
I ask this question: Where are the friends of the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Smith)? Where are they in the Republican caucus? I want to
tell you, if that happened to my friend from Washington State, if our
Democratic
[[Page H626]]
leadership did that, or if our Democratic leadership did that to my
colleague from the State of Ohio, I would be outraged, and I think
Members of our caucus would be outraged. We would not stand for it.
But there is a silence over there that is very, very troubling. What
it means is there is one or two or three people who are in charge of
what happens in this House, and the others go a long to get along.
I quoted this statement from Ben Franklin before. I think it is good
and applicable. Ben Franklin said, ``If you act like sheep, the wolves
will eat you.'' I wonder if my colleagues over there are not acting
like sheep? They are being awfully quiet. They let an honored,
respected, hard-working, committed, devoted, dedicated member of their
caucus be treated in that manner, be treated in that manner, and I did
not hear any public outcry at all. None at all.
I think it must be because of fear, because I know there are people
over there who respected the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), who
believed he was right in his thinking and in the position he was trying
to take as an advocate for veterans. Yet I did not hear any public
outcry.
I think it is a shame that this House would be so constrained out of
fear of what the leadership may do if the individual members speak up
and speak out.
Mr. INSLEE. If the gentleman will yield further, the President had
some eloquent language about freedom around the world, which is
something we all aspire to. I guess we are saying people ought to have
freedom in the House of Representatives to stand up for veterans, and
not be punished as the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) was. That
is wrong, and we are going to continue to be a voice for veterans so
this administration does not cut their health care.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would like to
thank both gentlemen tonight and just say we are willing to work with
the other side to find the $3.5 billion, whether it is out of the $500
billion or $600 billion increase to the Medicare program that we just
found out about, we could squeeze $3.5 billion out of that, or whether
it is asking the wealthiest to help. We are willing to work with them
and follow the veterans organizations and do what is right to our
veterans who made the sacrifices.
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