[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 18]
[House]
[Pages 25272-25278]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




EXAMINING RECENT COMMENTS BY MAJORITY LEADER ON ADMINISTRATION'S POLICY 
                                IN IRAQ

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. 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 debate on the $87 billion 
supplemental appropriations bill to fund military and reconstruction 
efforts in Iraq, Majority Leader Tom DeLay said Members who had the 
audacity to challenge the Bush administration's foreign policy and not 
support the appropriations bill were not supporting our troops over in 
Iraq. This statement, Mr. Speaker, comes on the heels of statements 
that Mr. DeLay made last month after Senator Edward Kennedy seriously 
questioned the Bush administration's reasoning for the war in Iraq and 
its handling of Iraq during the postwar period. The majority leader 
called Kennedy's criticism ``hate speech.'' During a speech at the 
Heritage Foundation on September 24, Mr. DeLay said, and I quote, ``Ted 
Kennedy unleashed the most mean-spirited and irresponsible hate speech 
yet.''
  One day earlier, the Associated Press quoted Mr. DeLay as saying, and 
I quote, that ``Kennedy's brand of hate speech has become a mainstream 
in the Democratic Party.''


                Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair would remind the gentleman that he 
must refrain from improper references to Senators.
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, the majority leader must have a short 
memory. If these statements are hate speech and mean-spirited, I would 
hate to see how Mr. DeLay would characterize his own comments about 
President Clinton on the eve of a successful bombing campaign that 
ejected Serbian troops from Kosovo and led to the uprising that ended 
the murderous regime of another dictator, Slobodan Milosevic.
  Here are some examples of DeLay's criticism of President Clinton 
during that Kosovo conflict that I would like to point to this evening. 
This was a statement that Tom DeLay said, a floor statement opposing 
the resolution commending America's successful campaign in Kosovo on 
July 1, 1999.
  He said, and I quote, ``For us to call this a victory and to commend 
the President of the United States as the Commander in Chief showing 
great leadership in Operation Allied Forces is a farce.''
  On the same resolution, floor statement, Mr. DeLay said, and I quote, 
``So what they are doing here is they are voting to continue an 
unplanned war by an administration that is incompetent of carrying it 
out. I hope my colleagues will vote against the resolution.''
  I would like to point out to my colleagues that on one occasion, Mr. 
DeLay is basically questioning the President's ability as Commander in 
Chief, in the case of President Clinton; and in this other case, he is 
suggesting that the Clinton administration is incompetent of carrying 
out the war in Kosovo. Again, the reality of it is that these 
statements by Mr. DeLay went much further than Senator Kennedy's and 
than those of most of my colleagues during last week's debate on the 
Iraq supplemental. Of course as a Member of the House of 
Representatives, Mr. DeLay has a right, even a duty, to question the 
administration when he does not agree with its policies, just like 
Members of the other body have the right to speak out and Senator 
Kennedy did several weeks ago.

[[Page 25273]]

  The problem that I see, and I point this out to my Republican 
colleagues, it stems from the fact that whenever someone speaks out 
criticizing the Bush administration or its policies, there is a 
concerted effort on the part of the Republican side to attack those 
critics as unpatriotic. This is what we keep getting over and over 
again, that those on the Democratic side of the aisle that suggest that 
the administration's policy in Iraq is wrong or that it should not 
continue or that it should not be funded are somehow unpatriotic. I 
just want to remind my colleagues on the other side, and I just would 
like to use a quote that was made by Thomas Jefferson in 1815, because 
I think it says it all and the reason that I am here tonight and some 
of my Democratic colleagues are here tonight. Thomas Jefferson said in 
1815, and I quote, that ``differences of opinion lead to inquiry and 
inquiry to truth and that I am sure is the ultimate and sincere object 
of us both. We both value too much the freedom of opinion sanctioned by 
our Constitution not to cherish its exercise, even where in opposition 
to ourselves.''
  That quote, I think, from Thomas Jefferson says it all, because I 
think what he says is that we should feel free to criticize the 
administration when we do not agree with its foreign policy, when we do 
not agree with a war, when we do not agree with paying for the war, 
when we do not agree with the conduct of the war. And for anyone, 
particularly the majority leader on the Republican side, to question 
whether it is a Member of the other body or a Member of this body's 
patriotism or say that they do not support the troops or that they are 
unpatriotic or that they do not care about this country because they 
oppose the war in Iraq or any aspect of it, I think, is an outrage; and 
it is important for us to say this over and over again tonight as well 
as in the future.
  I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
  Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I thank my friend from New Jersey for his 
persistent work in bringing the truth and bringing important issues to 
the floor of the House of Representatives night after night. We all 
have heard people in the administration, highly placed people in the 
administration, from the Attorney General to Mr. DeLay and leaders in 
the House of Representatives, Republican leaders, talk about patriotism 
in sometimes directly, certainly by implication, sometimes directly, 
question the patriotism of Americans, whether they are Americans in 
Congress or American people generally, question the patriotism of 
people who disagree with them on a whole host of issues.
  I remember during the trade debate, during the Trade Promotion 
Authority whether we should extend NAFTA to Latin America that many of 
us were accused of not being patriotic because we did not want to pass 
these trade agreements, which incidentally tend to hemorrhage lots of 
jobs overseas in this country that never come back, manufacturing jobs, 
all kinds of jobs.
  But when I think about patriotism, I want to tell a story. I met 2 
weeks ago in Akron at St. Paul's Episcopal Church with 25 families who 
had loved ones in Iraq, sons, daughters, husbands, wives, cousins, 
nephews, nieces, whatever. These 20 families talked about the treatment 
that their loved ones were getting by the United States military, by 
the administration, by our government. There were not enough Kevlar 
vests, not enough body armor for our troops, one-fourth of our troops 
do not have adequate body armor, even though the President of the 
United States knew that we were going to war well over a year ago. They 
are now saying, well, we will probably have enough body armor for our 
troops by December of this year. They talked to us about not having 
safe drinking water, hundreds and hundreds, thousands probably, of our 
troops have come down with dysentery. They talked about some shortage 
of antibiotics, that they actually had to go to the corner drug store 
and send antibiotics to their son, one in the case of a son, another in 
the case of a wife he had to send antibiotics to her. Many servicemen 
and servicewomen when coming home on leave, if they got leave, had to 
pay their flights home.
  When you talk about patriotism, and then you look at the other side 
of that issue, while we simply, this administration is spending a 
billion dollars a week, a third of it going to private contractors, 
much of that money going to Halliburton and Bechtel and friends of the 
President and contributors to the President, when they accuse people 
who disagree with them, the administration, of a lack of patriotism, 
then I look and see we are not taking care of our troops but we are 
taking care of the contributors to the President? Hundreds of millions 
of dollars have gone to Halliburton. Much of that has been unbid 
contracts. Yet Halliburton still pays Vice President Cheney $13,000 a 
month. Halliburton contributes thousands of dollars, its executives and 
its company, thousands of dollars to President Bush.
  And while our troops are not being supplied with Kevlar jackets, our 
troops are not being supplied with body armor, our troops are not 
getting safe drinking water, our troops are not getting the antibiotics 
they should get, this administration has the gall to charge injured 
soldiers $8 a day for their food at Bethesda Medical Hospital, in other 
hospitals around the country. At the same time we are shoveling money 
to contributors of the President. And they call us unpatriotic? And 
they call people who disagree with them unpatriotic? There is just no 
room for that in this debate. The fact is we ought to do this right. We 
ought to be working together in this effort in Iraq. We ought to come 
up with an exit strategy. We ought to come up with a plan. We ought to 
bring the United Nations in. We should not be shoveling money to 
private contractors who are friends of the President, who are 
contributors to the President, who continue to pay Dick Cheney, the 
Vice President of the United States, $13,000 a month. We ought to do 
this right.
  The charges of lack of patriotism ought to stop. We ought to get down 
to business. We ought to do this right. We ought to make this work. 
There is just simply no reason for those charges to continue, whether 
they are from Tom DeLay, whether they are from the top people in the 
administration, whether they are from anybody else.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. PALLONE. I yield to the gentlewoman from Texas.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. I am going to be very brief, but I was just 
moved by the comments of the distinguished gentleman from Ohio, and I 
appreciate the fact that he has met with families, military families. 
So have a number of us. I would like to just add that these comments 
certainly are protected by the first amendment. Some of them are 
protected by the rules of this House.

                              {time}  2100

  But I think they need to cease and desist because they are on the 
brink of or on the verge of cutting a very divisive line in this body 
and the other body, and that is that the appropriate discourse and 
debate is no longer allowed.
  As we moved toward the Declaration of Independence and the 
Revolutionary War, I know, by reading history books, that there was a 
vigorous divide in America as to whether or not we should stay with the 
British, get along to go along, live and let live, or whether or not we 
should follow the pathway of independence and seeking equal opportunity 
and become a sovereign Nation. I can imagine it was probably a deeply 
dividing debate, and I would hope to think that the reason why this 
sovereign Nation has withstood the test of time is because that debate 
went forward and each side managed to get through that debate without 
undermining the other's patriotism to a certain extent or love for this 
new fledgling 13-colony group of States. And one maybe wanted to stay 
with the British Kingdom, if you will, or the United Kingdom, and 
others wanted an independent land. I cannot imagine why we have now a 
majority leader that, one, cannot remember his words of just a few 
years ago, and now wants to divide this body by suggesting who is 
patriotic and who is not.

[[Page 25274]]

  And I would just like to share with my colleagues some words that are 
constantly found throughout the Congressional Record as President 
Clinton tried to direct this country in a way that would provide 
defense to the defenseless, whether it was Somalia, and that, of 
course, was not the best military operation but there was a desire 
there to help those who could not help themselves, whether it was 
Bosnia or whether it was Kosovo.
  So this statement on March 11, 1999, said ``Bombing a sovereign 
nation for ill-defined reasons with vague objectives undermines the 
American stature in the world. The international respect and trust for 
America has diminished every time we casually let the bombs fly. We 
must stop giving the appearance that our foreign policy is formulated 
by the Unibomber.'' One could take from that that he has just called a 
President of the United States the Unibomber. That happened to be 
Kosovo, where millions of Muslims were being ethnically cleansed. 
People were actually dying. The world could see it, and we were asked 
to come in by the NATO allies.
  There is no such basis in the preemptive attack against Iraq. We were 
told there were weapons of mass destruction. We still cannot find them. 
And so what is the reason for not having the right discourse and debate 
on issues that are confusing and where the administration has been, if 
you will, less than forthright on its reasons for going to war? Saddam 
Hussein still exists. Osama bin Laden still exists. Then I think debate 
is appropriate.
  Let me close on this point. I, likewise, have had the opportunity to 
engage military families in a townhall meeting that I held in Houston. 
No one can experience their pain. Even though their loved ones are 
alive, they feel the pain of those whose families are now experiencing 
the continuing devastating pain of having lost a loved one in Iraq. But 
one has to know what it is like to know their loved ones do not have 
body armor, bulletproof vests, that their loved ones who are in the 
National Guard or Reserve cannot get their paycheck on time, or they 
have loved ones who are there who have not seen their newly born child 
and ask a simple question of Secretary Rumsfeld which is when can we go 
home? There is nothing wrong with that.
  And I do not want to point the finger at the military because they 
are following orders, and the policymakers are the ones who set 
priorities. So when we do not have priorities that deal with 11 
suicides, that represent 34 out of 100,000 when we analyze the number, 
11 suicides since May 1; and we pass an $87 billion supplemental and we 
do not provide for paychecks on time to Reservists and the National 
Guard; we do not have a date certain on exit strategy; we do not deal 
with suicides and mental health resources in Iraq and on the bases when 
they return home? Then I would question the person who questions our 
patriotism for asking these questions on behalf of the troops. And that 
is what the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) has done, and I think it 
is unpardonable. I will certainly uphold his right to the First 
Amendment, but when we debate on this floor, we should not cast those 
kinds of ugly statements about one's patriotism because we allow free 
debate, when he in 1999 suggested that our President was the Unibomber. 
And I can assure my colleagues that we are still being thanked for what 
we did in Kosovo. And I thank those troops there. I thank them in 
Bosnia, and I thank them in Iraq. Because the troops are not the issue. 
It is the policies that have sent them there, and each of us have the 
responsibility and the obligation under this Constitution to engage in 
debate and discourse, certainly on behalf of our constituents.
  They say that lawyers get two and three closings; so let me make this 
the last one, in fact, and I want to thank the gentleman from New 
Jersey (Mr. Pallone) for his leadership, but I can assure him that the 
kind of unpatriotic actions that we are being subjected to in Texas 
where we are losing 50 years of congressional experience, individuals 
who happen to be prominently placed on the Committee on Appropriations 
and have been champions of veterans' rights are being drawn out because 
of political reasons in this politically-gerrymandered massacre of a 
redistricting process, I can assure the gentleman that we could 
probably use a lot of names to call people, but that is not 
appropriate. The issue is a legal issue, a political issue, a court 
issue or judiciary issue. And taking up and casting about and calling 
people names as it relates to their patriotism, which anyone could do, 
is not what we choose to do, and I do not believe we should choose to 
do it in this body.
  I thank the gentleman for allowing me to participate this evening, 
and maybe we can bring some civility to this place and debate fairly 
without name calling because people passionately have a difference of 
opinion, and maybe someone would say ``I told you so'' after all of 
this is over.
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments from the 
gentlewoman from Texas. And, again, I know other speakers are going to 
follow me, but I just want to point out, again, I find it incredible 
that the majority leader, who just a few years ago in the case of 
Kosovo, severely questioned and essentially called the President of the 
United States names because of the actions that he was taking in 
Kosovo, now gets up on the floor and essentially has the audacity to 
criticize Democrats for questioning this President's policies in 
another war.
  I yield to the gentleman from Washington.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for 
yielding. It is a pleasure. I am pleased that he would raise this 
issue. The questioning of Members of Congress because they dispute with 
the President is not unpatriotic. And those who take that route, I 
think, are simply not understanding what this country is all about.
  This country was formed by dissenters, people who said, We will not 
be taxed without representation. Now, they were speaking to the King, 
for heaven's sake, who could cut their head off. All we have to deal 
with is the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay). And I think Thomas 
Jefferson's words in 1815 need to be repeated: ``Difference of opinion 
leads to inquiry and inquiry to truth, and that, I am sure, is the 
ultimate and sincere object of us both. We both value too much the 
freedom of opinion, sanctioned by our Constitution, not to cherish its 
exercise even where in opposition in ourselves.''
  For us to be unwilling to have debates out here and categorize people 
who are talking here as being unpatriotic is absolutely nonsense. What 
is really fun, though, is to go through the Record and see what the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) says. I really had a great time doing 
this. We have already heard this quote, which I think he was talking 
about the President in bombing Baghdad when he said ``Bombing a 
sovereign nation for ill-defined reasons with vague objectives 
undermines the American stature in the world. The international respect 
and trust for America is diminished every time we casually let the 
bombs fly. We must stop giving the appearance that our foreign policy 
is being formulated by the Unibomber.''
  If I did not know that came from March 11, 1999, and had to do with 
Kosovo, I would think that one of my colleagues had made that statement 
about our present President. When it was said on that day, nobody got 
up and said ``You are unpatriotic, Mr. DeLay. You are unpatriotic.'' We 
let him say it. He is wrong. History has proven him wrong, but he has a 
right to say it in this country.
  My favorite quote of all the quotes is one that I wish that I had 
said. I wish that I was as smart as my distinguished colleague from 
Texas. He said ``I cannot support a failed foreign policy.'' I wish I 
had said that about 3 days ago. He said it on April 28, 1999. ``History 
teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace.'' I thank 
the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Delay) for laying that out for me. I 
agree with him. I agree with the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Delay). It 
is very seldom that I can think of a way to agree with him. ``This 
administration is just learning that lesson right

[[Page 25275]]

now.'' You had better believe it. Read a newspaper. Pick it up every 
day. Kids are dying over there. Go out to Walter Reed and you can see 
kids without limbs, you can see all kinds of horrible things that have 
happened to our troops. It is easy to make war, hard to make the peace, 
and they are learning over in Iraq day by day that when you treat 
people that way, hey, they are going to maybe fight back. I do not know 
why people think that only Americans would fight back. Why would the 
other side not fight back? It should not be any surprise. But they did 
not plan for that. They thought these people were going to come out 
with flowers and put them in the ends of their rifles. What nonsense 
could have been going on in the Pentagon I have no idea, but it 
certainly was a failed foreign policy.
  ``The President began this mission with very vague objectives and 
lots of unanswered questions.'' He must have been talking about Mr. 
Bush. Who else could he mean?
  ``A month later these questions are still unanswered.'' No, I say to 
the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay, 6 months later these questions are 
still unanswered. Things that were said here on the floor were 
inaccurate. We all know it, but the President says nothing.
  ``There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no 
timetable.'' One of the amendments out here the other day was let us 
have a timetable, but the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Delay) said no, we 
cannot put a timetable on our President, let him kind of fumble around 
until he figures it out or put the training wheels on his bike or 
whatever. I do not know. But no timetable was allowed. The amendment 
was not allowed here to say we had to have a timetable before we gave 
$87 billion away.
  ``There is no legitimate definition of victory.'' Boy, that certainly 
fits this situation. How are we going to declare victory and get out of 
there?
  ``There is no contingency plan for mission creep.'' He means Syria 
and he means Iran, and I do not know where else he means. ``There is no 
clear funding program.'' Oh, yes, there is. Borrow. Borrow from the 
Social Security and Medicare funds; put us deeper in debt. That is what 
the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Delay) wants. That is what he came out 
here and did. He took $87 billion out of thin air and gave it to the 
President and said, Hey, go over there and do whatever you have to.
  ``There is no agenda to bolster our overextended military.'' That is 
exactly what we are hearing. The Reservists are being kept away from 
their jobs. Everybody is in trouble. The troops are worn out. The 
equipment is worn out. Things that were supposed to go 80 hours have 
gone 500 hours, and so things are breaking down. Gee, he was prescient 
about what Mr. Bush was going to do.
  ``There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are 
at stake.'' Well, we are still looking, boy. It must be they are 
connected to al Qaeda. No, that is not true. It must be because of 
weapons of mass destruction. No, it is not that. What is it? What was 
our national interest? Oil, or something else? I do not know.
  I can hardly wait for our President to come here next year and stand 
in the well and tell us what our national interests have been saved 
from, because it is not clear what happened before.
  ``There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this 
thing, and there is still no plan today.''
  I watched with amazement and amusement in a certain sad sort of way 
when we had this hurricane out here, Isabel, and they had all these 
generators lined up and all these water purification units lined up. 
They saw that coming out a week before, and they said, hey, we are 
going to need electricity, we are going to need water. They planned for 
3 years for going into Iraq, at least for a year, fully planning, all 
the time. From October right after 9/11, they started planning, and 
they did not think they would need an electrical generator. They did 
not think they would need purification of water. Did they think they 
were just going to kind of march in and it would all come back up out 
of the dust after they had bombed it? They bombed them for how many 
days, until there was nothing hardly standing, and they could not 
figure out that if they bomb something, they are going to have to build 
it back up. They should have had all that planning done. They 
prepositioned every weapon imaginable to man and woman on the border 
with Kuwait. It was right there ready to go, but they had nothing 
behind it in the way of planning for how they were going to deal with 
the aftermath.
  The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Delay) wants to come out here and say 
we are unpatriotic for raising these questions. This is what he said to 
President Clinton. It was not unpatriotic, I guess, when the gentleman 
from Texas (Mr. Delay) does it, but if the gentleman from New Jersey 
(Mr. Pallone) or I do it or the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-
Lee) or anybody else comes out here and does it, the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Sandlin), I mean suddenly we are unpatriotic. No way.
  I say to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) answer these questions. 
Answer your own questions. You put those questions to a President. Why 
do you not put them to your fellow Texan and ask him?

                              {time}  2115

  What is the answer? What do I say to these guys? Because they are 
tearing us apart. We intend to keep it up until we see a way out. There 
is no plan, there is no timetable, and our troops are dying day by day.
  The worst thing about it, you pick up the New York Times today, the 
young man who was killed yesterday, he is not on page 1, he is not on 
page 2, or, 3, or 4, or 5, or 6, or 7; he is on page 8. Like, you know, 
just a kid, right? Those are our young men and women. We asked them to 
go over there. They ought to be on the front page, every day. They 
ought to be in the President's mind every day.
  I really thank the gentleman for giving us an opportunity to come and 
raise these questions and make it very clear to the American people.
  I wear this little button. I started wearing it. I am not one who 
goes around, but I got that because I served during the Vietnam War. 
Now, in the war, I spent 2 years in Long Beach, California, dealing 
with casualties coming back. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) did 
not serve. I do not know where he was. I know he loves his country; I 
would not even question that. But the question ought to be, how do we 
get out of this, not is somebody patriotic or not.
  I thank the gentleman for the opportunity to speak.
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's comments.
  I would like to yield to the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. SANDLIN. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from New Jersey for 
yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, one time the House majority leader said, ``American 
foreign policy is now one huge big mystery.'' I think I would have to 
agree with that.
  I enjoyed listening to my colleague from Washington as he gave the 
quote, and I have a copy of that quote, and I began reading it. Without 
going through that long quote again, it does have a lot of relevance to 
the situation our country finds itself in today and to our debate 
tonight, where the leader says, ``I cannot support a failed foreign 
policy. The President began the mission with vague objectives and lots 
of unanswered questions. There is no timetable, no legitimate 
definition of victory, no contingency plan for mission creep, no clear 
funding program.''
  Those are the very issues that we debate today, and those are 
legitimate questions raised by the majority leader. Those are 
legitimate issues. That is a legitimate debate.
  Those comments were about, of course, the war in Kosovo. And while I 
may not agree with all of those points, I certainly do not see it as 
unpatriotic to raise those issues, just as it is not unpatriotic to 
raise those same issues today.
  Just last week, Mr. Speaker, as we engaged in one of the most 
important debates of this Congress on the $87 billion supplemental 
appropriations bill

[[Page 25276]]

to fund the military reconstruction efforts in Iraq, not Kosovo, the 
majority leader denigrated the Members of the House who had the 
audacity to question the administration's Iraq policy or to ask for an 
accounting or to ask for a justification for the spending of taxpayer 
money.
  Those, just like in the Kosovo effort, were legitimate questions, it 
raised legitimate issues, it was a part of legitimate debate. It was a 
different war; it was a different political situation, different 
politics. Legitimate debate, different politics. And yet, once again, 
our majority leader equated a failure to blindly go along with the 
administration policy to be unpatriotic, while in actuality many on 
this side of the aisle wanted to make sure that the funds went directly 
to our servicemen and servicewomen and to their protection, and not 
just to the beneficiaries of no-bid contracts.
  Recently, the majority leader said this ``isn't about patriotism. It 
is about judgment.''
  Certainly, Mr. Speaker, judgment requires a presentation of the 
facts, and judgment is important. But, speaking of judgment, in a press 
release the majority leader complained about what he called the 
``vociferous Democratic critics,'' from Kerry to Dean, and Daschle to 
Pelosi, claiming they used ``hateful rhetoric.'' Now, what sort of 
judgment is that, when we are talking about legitimate debate, 
legitimate issues, about funding, about how we make sure our servicemen 
and servicewomen are protected in the field, and to call that hateful 
rhetoric?
  We may not agree in this House on all the points of the war effort. 
We do not even agree completely within the confines of each party, Mr. 
Speaker. That is clear. But it is our duty to examine these issues 
closely and to account for the American taxpayer dollar. It is our duty 
to exercise the judgment that the majority leader was speaking about.
  But I am sad to say he seems to be suffering from a crippling short 
memory. In questioning the administration's policy in Iraq, the manner 
in which it is handling operations in Iraq and the examining of the 
accounting, I would be interested to know how the majority leader would 
now characterize his own comments on the eve of the war in Kosovo.
  Many of them have been set forth tonight, but in case some of us have 
forgotten the rhetoric that was ``spewed,'' to use that term at that 
time, he said in April that ``this is the President's war.'' These are 
the comments made while we are in war, comments made about our 
Commander in Chief: ``This is the President's war.''
  Next he said, ``There is no national interest of the United States in 
Kosovo. It is flawed policy. It was flawed to go in. I think this 
President is one of the least effective Presidents in my lifetime. He 
has hollowed our forces while running around the world with these 
adventures.''
  That is what he said in 1999 about Kosovo, in the middle of a 
military action.
  He said, ``American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery.'' 
That is what he said. He said, ``Bombing a sovereign nation for ill-
defined reasons with vague objectives undermines the American stature 
in the world.'' That is what was said by the majority leader in the 
middle of a conflict.
  He said, ``Mr. Chairman, I rise today to voice my complete opposition 
to sending American troops to Kosovo. There is simply no vision to this 
mission.''
  Later he said, ``It is clear that any deployment in Kosovo will 
simply drag on and go enormously over budget,'' some of the same 
comments being made today.
  Later he said, ``So what they are doing here is they are voting to 
continue an unplanned war by an administration that is incompetent of 
carrying it out.''
  In April he said, ``It is very simple: the President is not supported 
by the House and the military is supported by the House.''
  The quotes go on and on. I do not want to bore this House with quote 
after quote after quote after quote, but the point is made. Those were 
legitimate issues, legitimate questions, legitimate things to debate in 
the House of Representatives. And while I do not agree with many of 
those points, I agree that it is legitimate to talk about these things 
in the greatest deliberative body that the world has ever known. And no 
one at the time questioned the patriotism of the leader or anyone 
setting forth those positions.
  He had no problem in questioning the legitimate action of American 
policy when it suited his political fancy, but now there are problems 
for those that question the actions we are taking today. When anyone 
speaks out criticizing the lack of accounting, the lack of 
justification for spending money, the lack of a plan, those folks are 
attacked as unpatriotic.
  I think it is important, Mr. Speaker, that we look at what was said 
recently, on March 27 of this year, by the leader when he said, ``Now 
is not the time to question the carrying out of the present war.'' A 
week earlier he said, ``Rhetoric does nothing more than demoralize the 
troops.''
  Well, Mr. Speaker, if rhetoric demoralizes the troops, I wonder what 
a lack of planning does. I wonder what a lack of equipment does. I 
wonder what a lack of preparation does. I wonder what a lack of an exit 
plan does. I wonder what those sorts of things do.
  Those are legitimate questions. The point being, it is hypocritical 
to raise them in one war, and it is then later unpatriotic to talk 
about it in the other. Either our majority leader was not supporting 
the troops in 1999, or he is the one that is spewing hypocrisy today.
  We are obligated, obliged in this body, to have an honest and full-
throated debate about all the issues that are being brought up and 
about the accounting of the public's money for the support of this war 
effort.
  Mr. Speaker, I think it is important to remember what Mahatma Gandhi 
said one time. He said, ``Honest disagreement is often a good sign of 
progress,'' and Mark Shields said, ``Debate and dissent are the very 
oxygen of democracy.''
  Mr. Speaker, our country faces many challenges today, both from 
within and from without. From within we face challenges of addressing a 
budget with record deficits, record debt, and reckless budgeting. We 
face a challenge of making prescription drugs available to our seniors. 
We have the challenge of educating our children and giving them access 
to quality health care at affordable prices.
  From without we face the threat from nameless, faceless, hateful 
terrorists who are bent on destroying the freedoms that we believe in 
this country are unalienable, granted to us by the Creator and 
protected by our Constitution and our Armed Forces.
  All of these issues deserve and demand a full debate and a complete 
examination. To turn this debate, this effort, this war effort into a 
political platform, to criticize or to call names or to point at one 
side or the other and say you are unpatriotic for asking for an 
accounting, for a justification, for asking that we air out the issues 
in this war is beneath this House.
  Our troops and our country deserve a full and complete debate on 
these issues. Our country supports knowing what our plan is, what we 
hope to accomplish, how we are going to get out, and how much it is 
going to cost. That is a complete support of the troops and our 
efforts, and our House needs to support the will of the American public 
in those areas. Calling one side or the other unpatriotic is simply 
improper.
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Texas for 
what he said and for pointing out to us those many statements made by 
the majority leader, because, again, I think that it is very simple, 
the point we are trying to make tonight, which is the majority leader, 
the Republican majority leader many times during the war in Kosovo 
questioned President Clinton about the conduct of the war and the 
paying for the war, and did so in ways that were, to say the least, 
very unflattering. Now, when Democrats question the conduct of the Iraq 
war, we are accused of being unpatriotic. So he cannot have it both 
ways. Obviously, he is trying to have it both ways.

[[Page 25277]]



                              {time}  2130

  I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey 
(Mr. Pallone) for gathering us together to call for some 
accountability, some of the remarks of the majority leader of the 
House, but actually to make an even more important point, I think. When 
I was elected to this great body in 1998 and came to the U.S. House of 
Representatives in 1999, I was under no illusion that the elected 
Members would agree on every issue. I looked forward to the vigorous 
debate that would take place between Republicans and Democrats and even 
among Members of my own party and would expect that since free and open 
debate is not only a tradition of this Congress, it is, perhaps, the 
most highly-valued principle of our great democracy.
  The very first amendment to our Constitution is freedom of speech, 
our precious right to say exactly what we believe, even when those 
words challenge those who are in power. Maybe I should say particularly 
when those words challenge people that are in power.
  Voltaire's words, quote, ``I disapprove of what you say, but I will 
defend to the death your right to say it,'' is the spirit of the first 
amendment. And all of our great Presidents have defended that right to 
speak one's mind in this great country. And one of those eloquent 
statements was made by a Republican President, Theodore Roosevelt, who 
said, ``To announce that there must be no criticism of the President or 
that we are to stand by the President right or wrong is not only 
unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American 
public.'' Very strong words.
  But now in an environment in which one party dominates the U.S. 
House, the U.S. Senate, the Presidency, and even the Supreme Court, 
those who challenge the policy decisions of the Republicans are being 
accused of being unpatriotic, of aiding and abetting terrorists, 
disloyalty to the Commander in Chief, of needing to apologize for 
voicing their views. And leading that effort has been the majority 
leader, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay). And I think it is time to 
call him to account for his hypocritical comments and his effort to 
stifle important and legitimate debate.
  We are now engaged in war, in a war in Iraq. And our young men and 
women as well as innocent Iraqis are dying every day. There is nothing 
more serious than this. Many of us have been critical of the decision 
to engage in a preemptive war of choice, not necessity, of the poor 
planning, of the lack of proper equipment provided to our troops, of 
the lack of accountability of the billions of dollars being spent, more 
than a billion per week, much of which has gone to friends of this 
administration and not to provide things like clean water and modern 
body armor to our troops. There are legitimate issues to raise whether 
one agrees or not.
  But rather than deal with the substance, the gentleman from Texas 
(Mr. DeLay) has, to put it bluntly, slimed the questioners. On March 20 
of this year, Mr. DeLay said, quote, ``This destructive rhetoric does 
nothing more than demoralize our troops and second-guess our Commander 
in Chief,'' unquote. But in May of 1999 while our troops were there 
fighting against genocide and ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, that same 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) said, quote, ``It is a flawed policy, 
and it was flawed to go in. I think this President is one of the least 
effective Presidents of my lifetime. He has hollowed out our forces 
while running around the world with these adventures.''
  It was perfectly fine then for him to make this critical and, I would 
argue, somewhat intemperate comment about his Commander in Chief in 
1999 while our troops were engaged in conflict. But not now. Oh, no.
  Last week during the debate on handing another $87 billion to this 
administration that cannot seem to provide enough fresh water or 
sunscreen to our troops, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) said, 
``Let me just say that the old debating tactics of `I support the 
troops but' is just not going to cut it this time. If you support the 
war, and you support the troops, you must, you must vote for this 
bill.''
  Well, that is a very, very different story, again, from what he said 
in 1999. Our leader, the Republican majority leader, came to the floor 
of this house, stood probably over there, and said to this body, quote, 
``This is a very difficult speech for me to make because I normally, 
and I still do, support our military and the fine work that they are 
doing, but, I cannot support a failed foreign policy.''
  Now last week, he is saying ``no buts,'' and in 1999 he was all about 
``but he could not support a failed foreign policy.''
  Mr. DeLay can say what he wants because that is his right, not only 
as the majority leader or an elected Representative, but because that 
is the right of every American. But I have the right and we have the 
right, and I think an obligation, to demand that he act in the spirit 
of the oath that he took to uphold the Constitution, to take 
responsibility for the hypocritical and, I would say, unpatriotic 
remarks he has made for the purpose of demeaning and defeating his 
critics and critics of the failed policies of the Republican 
administration and Republican Congressional leaders.
  I urge him, once again, to heed the wise words of the President from 
his own party, Teddy Roosevelt and let me repeat that quote, he said, 
Teddy Roosevelt, ``To announce that there must be no criticism of the 
President or that we are to stand by the President right or wrong, is 
not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the 
American public.''
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlewoman from 
Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky) for her comments, and I may ask that we leave 
up that quote, if we could, from Teddy Roosevelt, because I think it 
says it all about what this special order is tonight and why so many of 
my colleagues have gotten up here and spoken out about the statements 
that have been made by the majority leader.
  And if I could conclude tonight, I would like to conclude with a 
couple of quotes comparing what the majority leader said this year, in 
regard to the war in Iraq, and what he said a few years ago, with 
regard to the war on Kosovo, because I think that one of the greatest 
concerns I have is this notion that he has tried to spread that somehow 
if you do not support the war in Iraq or if you criticize this 
different aspects of the war or if you do not vote for the funding for 
the war in various ways, that you do not support the troops. Nothing 
could be further from the truth.
  Everybody in this House of Representatives on the Democratic side, 
and I know on the Republican side as well, support the troops and want 
to do whatever we can to support the troops. And much of the 
controversy and much of the debate last week on the supplemental was 
about how best to support the troops. But at no point was anybody 
suggesting that we not support them, just how best to support them.
  And the thing that is amazing about it is if you look up one of the 
quotes that the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) made this year with 
regard to the Iraq war, and this is the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
DeLay) on March 20 of this year, a quote from the Washington Times 
where he said, ``I think it is hypocritical to say on the one hand that 
you support the troops, while on the other hand you say the reason they 
are risking their lives was wrong. I think it undermines the effort and 
the unity this country ought to be showing right now.'' Yet just a few 
years earlier, talking about the Kosovo war, as quoted in the USA Today 
regarding floor votes on Kosovo, the majority leader, the gentleman 
from Texas (Mr. DeLay), then said, ``It is very simple: The President 
is not supported by the House and the military is supported by the 
House.'' What he essentially was saying that you do not have to support 
the President in the war in order to support the troops.
  And that is the bottom line. Everyone here on the Democratic side and 
the Republican side wants to do whatever is necessary to support the 
troops

[[Page 25278]]

and to make sure that they are not unnecessarily in harm's way. But the 
bottom line is that you can support the troops and not support the 
President's foreign policy, either collectively in Iraq, or separately 
on different votes.
  And I think it is very, very important for us as Democrats to 
continue to make that point. And we will continue to make it unless the 
majority leader stops his criticism and his comments relative to the 
patriotism of the Democrats.

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