[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 58 (Thursday, May 5, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H2984-H2985]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE WAR IN IRAQ

  (Mr. PALLONE asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, President Bush and the Republican 
leadership in the House are asking us today to vote again on a huge 
appropriations bill to fund the Iraq war without any oversight. I do 
not understand how we can be asked to vote on another huge 
appropriations bill to spend money in Iraq, and yet we do not have any 
oversight, any hearings to determine what the costs are and what the 
money is being spent on.
  Yesterday I talked about how there have been renewed reports about 
how our soldiers are not properly protected. There is no exit strategy. 
What are the overall costs of this war? And what does it mean when we 
continue to go into deficit and do not have money to pay for domestic 
programs without having an exit strategy or even any defined strategy 
of what our goals are in Iraq?
  As was mentioned earlier today by other speakers, we know that we 
went into Iraq for the wrong reasons. The weapons of mass destruction 
were never found, were never there. Yet no one within the Bush 
administration or within the Republican leadership basically tells us 
what the reason is, why we are remaining, how long we are going to be 
there or what the cost is going to be.

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  I do not think we should be voting on this bill today until we have 
answers to those questions.

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