[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 1]
[House]
[Pages 1094-1100]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                THE NATION'S PROGRESS IN THE WAR IN IRAQ

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening with my fellow 
colleagues in the Congressional Black Caucus to discuss our Nation's 
progress in the war in Iraq.
  First and foremost, Mr. Speaker, I would like to honor those soldiers 
who have paid the ultimate price of war through the sacrifice of their 
own lives. I continue to pray for their families and friends who are 
struggling to cope with their grief and loss.
  I also pay tribute to the soldiers who have returned from Iraq, 
forever changed as a result of injuries sustained during their tour of 
duty. Just a week or so ago, I visited Walter Reed Army Hospital and 
looked into the faces of young 19 and 20 year olds as they told stories 
as to how they lost their legs or lost their arms or lost their hands. 
I said to one young man, How do you handle this? I mean, looking at 
your life and where you go from here, how do you handle this? He said, 
Well, I simply look at it as a day's work. As I stood there, I could 
not help but think about the fact that this young man, if he were to 
live another 50 years, will be living without a leg and without an arm. 
So we pay special tribute to these young people, many of whom just came 
out of high school, fighting a war.
  So often, Mr. Speaker, the stories of the men and women performing 
their daily operations in Iraq get lost as we debate the merits of the 
war and our post-war intelligence, and I want to make it very clear 
that the Congressional Black Caucus has and will continue to support 
our troops. We see them as some very brave men and women who every day 
go out in sometimes 130 degree heat, in difficult circumstances, in 
many instances not having the proper equipment that they need although 
we paid for it; and yet and still they go out, and they give the best 
they have. So we honor them.
  We read newspaper accounts here and television reports of another 
soldier killed in Iraq by a roadside bomb, and we are momentarily 
touched; but, ultimately, Mr. Speaker, after the moment has passed, our 
lives continue on. Unfortunately, the lives of the five soldiers who 
are reported to have died in Iraq from my home State of Maryland will 
not continue on. The families of Command Sergeant Major Cornell W. 
Gilmore, 45 years old; Lieutenant Kylan A. Jones, 31 years old; 
Corporal Jason David Mileo, 20 years old; Specialist George A. 
Mitchell, 35 years old; and Staff Sergeant Kendall Damon Waters-Bey, 29 
years old. He was one who was either the second or third person to lose 
his life in Iraq, and we just want it made very clear that our prayers 
are with the families and friends of these strong and wonderful people.
  Mr. Speaker, please do not mistake my intentions. I am not invoking 
the names and memories of our troops to fulfill any political purpose. 
Whatever the political affiliation of these soldiers and their 
families, they deserve to be remembered and honored for swearing to 
protect our freedoms and for laying down their lives in the pursuit of 
their mission.
  Mr. Speaker, it is because of these courageous Americans that so many 
of my colleagues and I in the Congressional Black Caucus vehemently 
opposed launching war on Iraq. As elected representatives, we realize 
that the decisions we make here in the Congress of the United States of 
America reach far beyond these hallowed halls. We understand that the 
price of war cannot be captured in any budget.
  Speaking of moneys appropriated by the Congress, just today we read 
in the news reports that Halliburton will be returning some $27 million 
to the Government of the United States because it overcharged our 
government; and I tell my colleagues, Mr. Speaker, it bothers me 
because I shall never forget that when the Congressional Black

[[Page 1095]]

Caucus and others got up before this war started and began to talk 
about this war and began to address the issues of why we were going to 
do this preemptive strike when it seemed that inspections were working, 
when we talked about it was so important and we emphasized that we not 
lose lives if we could avoid it, when we asked the question how all of 
this would be paid for and we could not get the President to meet with 
us or even talk to us, but here and then we were called by some 
unpatriotic, unpatriotic. I ask the question, if that was unpatriotic, 
what is it when we have a corporation during a time of war that turns 
around and has to return some $27 million to the Treasury of the United 
States of America? That is a key question, and is that patriotic? I 
would submit to my colleagues that it is not.
  The key is that as we debate over and over again the 9 million people 
who are unemployed in this country, when we debate over and over again 
the fact that there are 44 million people who have no health insurance, 
when we debate over and over again the fact that so many of our people 
are going through so many difficult circumstances, and then we think 
that as April 15 approaches people will be making sure that they write 
those checks out to the Government of this United States and then we 
turn around and find out that we have been overcharged $27 million, 
something is absolutely wrong with that picture.
  Mr. Speaker, something is wrong with our auditing and oversight if a 
company like Halliburton can be paid that much for something they did 
not provide. The price of war is far greater than the original $79 
billion funding request and even greater than the $87 billion 
supplemental request that Congress doled out to support the war effort 
last year.
  The price of war is the human blood spilled in Iraq's deserts. The 
price of war are the tears of children shed over flag-draped caskets. 
The price of war are the widowed wives and husbands working a second 
job or collecting government assistance to support their families. The 
price of war is the young man who I ran into at BWI Airport the other 
day who said that he was a Reservist and because of the war he was not 
getting the type of money that he would normally get and he and his 
wife not only were getting divorced but the fact is that he was trying 
to find a way to file for bankruptcy.
  War and death are inextricably linked, Mr. Speaker. Therefore, in our 
considerations to authorize war, we must decide whether the cause is 
great enough to die for. Mr. Speaker, I believe that fighting for 
freedom is always a worthy cause. As Martin Luther King once said, ``An 
injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.''
  However, Mr. Speaker, that is not how the urgency of this war was 
communicated to the American public. President Bush did not initially 
come to the American people and say that we must engage our military 
forces to remove Saddam Hussein because he is a bad dictator and is 
oppressing his people. Rather, the President very clearly, time and 
time again, told the American people that Saddam Hussein had weapons of 
mass destruction and must be disarmed.
  On October 16, 2002, the President said, ``The Iraqi regime is a 
serious and growing threat to peace. On the commands of a dictator, the 
regime is armed with biological and chemical weapons, possesses 
ballistic missiles, promotes international terror and seeks nuclear 
weapons.''
  On January 16, 2003, President Bush, as the Commander in Chief, said, 
``In the name of peace, if he does not disarm,'' talking about Saddam 
Hussein, ``I will lead a coalition of the willing to disarm Saddam 
Hussein.''
  The message was clear and the stage was set. The United States had to 
deploy our troops and disarm Saddam Hussein.
  But early last year, Mr. Speaker, we noticed a rather curious 
phenomenon. As the polling numbers for American approval of the war 
adjusted, so did the rationale the administration used to convince the 
American public that this war was not necessary.
  Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill is quoted as saying that he 
was surprised that no one in a National Security Council meeting ever 
asked why Iraq should be invaded. He was shocked, when he probably 
could have predicted that there would be so much death, that there 
would be so much harm not only to our American soldiers but to innocent 
Iraqi people by the thousands. He sat there shocked that no one asked 
the question why are we going to invade Iraq.
  In a recently published book describing the operations of the Bush 
White House, Secretary O'Neill says, ``It was all about finding a way 
to do it. That was the tone of it. The President saying go find me a 
way to do this.''
  Mr. Speaker, the conscience of the Nation should be shocked and awed 
by this sort of back-door and backup policy-making. The lives of our 
American soldiers should not have been bartered away in closed-door 
meetings between people whose own children are not asked to stand in 
harm's way.
  Mr. Speaker, I cannot help but think of Staff Sergeant Kendall 
Waters-Bey. The family of United States Marine Staff Sergeant Kendall 
Damon Waters-Bey is from my district. In fact, his family used to live 
about five blocks away from my home. Mr. Speaker, the words of his 
father will forever be ingrained in the DNA of my memory. As he held a 
picture of his son, Michael Waters-Bey, he said, ``I want the President 
to get a good look at this, really good look here. This is the only son 
I had, only son.''

                              {time}  1945

  I ask, Mr. Speaker, was Mr. Waters-Bey's son at the forefront of the 
National Security Council's consciousness as they made their decision 
to take this country into war? I would think not, because otherwise I 
am sure they would have come to a different conclusion.
  Mr. Speaker, if you remember, in November of 2002, the United States 
called for U.N. weapons inspectors to comb Iraq in search of hidden 
weapons of mass destruction. After 4 months, the weapons inspectors 
found nothing. Then, the United States concluded that it was our 
responsibility, our right to invade Iraq forcibly and disarm Saddam 
Hussein. During that time, Mr. Speaker, many of my colleagues and I 
came to this House floor urging, begging, pleading, and petitioning 
this President to give the inspections process a chance. We asked the 
President to work with our international allies to exhaust every 
diplomatic option possible before deploying American troops to disarm 
Hussein. Yet our letters and pleas went unanswered.
  Now here we are today, almost a year later, Mr. Speaker. It has been 
almost a year since we declared the U.N. inspections process to be 
ineffective, almost a year after the first soldier died in Iraq. Almost 
a year later and we still have not found any weapons of mass 
destruction. Yes, we have found Saddam Hussein but, no, we have not 
found any weapons of mass destruction. It is interesting that Saddam 
Hussein is still alive and over 500 of our bravest men and women in 
uniform are not.
  Now, Mr. Speaker, we have the Secretary of State, Secretary Powell, 
in a recent Washington Post interview, saying that if he had been told 
that Iraq did not possess stockpiles of banned weapons, he is not sure 
that he would have supported the Iraq invasion. Almost a year to this 
day, Mr. Speaker, Secretary Powell told the U.N., and I quote, ``Our 
conservative estimate is that Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 
and 500 tons of chemical weapon agents. That is enough to fill 16,000 
battlefield rockets.'' Yet just last week, former chief U.S. weapons 
inspector David Kay told a Senate committee that, and I quote, ``Iraq's 
large-scale capability to develop, produce, and fill new chemical 
weapons munitions was reduced, if not entirely destroyed, during 
Operation Desert Storm and Desert Fox. Thirteen years of U.N. sanctions 
and inspections.''
  Considering these facts, Mr. Speaker, we must ask ourselves if the 
ultimate goal of this preemptive war was to disarm Saddam Hussein, was 
our mission really accomplished? Could we have

[[Page 1096]]

reached the same end by utilizing a different means? If we had enough 
intelligence to determine that Saddam was hiding chemical and 
biological weapons from the U.N. inspectors, then why has the 
Intelligence Community not been able to lead us to those weapons? Mr. 
Speaker, something is wrong with this picture.
  I am glad the President has finally agreed that there should be a 
commission to look into the apparent intelligence failures, but the 
Congress should have a role in that selection process. In the name of 
the over 500,000 troops that were deployed in Iraq, I call on the 
President to ensure that this process remains immune from election year 
politics, and I call on the President to hold himself and his 
administration accountable for the findings of any commission report.
  Mr. Speaker, last year, around this time, the President addressed a 
group of Governors and said, and I quote, ``The country expects leaders 
to lead.'' I would agree with President Bush on that point. The country 
expects leaders to lead and not to mislead the American people blindly 
down a path of war.
  Mr. Speaker, I wish now to yield to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. 
Jackson-Lee).
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished 
gentleman for yielding to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I wish to ensure that this evening is a somber occasion 
because it is a dialogue with our colleagues and one we hope will not 
be mired in politics but in truth. I stand somewhat, Mr. Speaker, with 
tears in my eyes. The chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus has 
convened this Special Order, and I am grateful to him for his continued 
leadership, and I look forward to working with the caucus to provide a 
voice and a message not only to the American people but to our 
colleagues.
  As I said, Mr. Speaker, I rise with a heavy heart and tears in my 
eyes because we are talking about life-and-death matters; peace and 
war. I almost wish, Mr. Speaker, I could turn back the hands of time, 
turn back the clock, and find ourselves on the floor of the House on 
that fateful fall of 2002. Out of respect for their families, I will 
just call them by their first names, but maybe Private Ray David, out 
of San Antonio, who died during the Christmas holiday would still be 
alive; and maybe Armando, who was a private in the United States Army, 
who died just 12 hours ago, might still be alive; or maybe Irving, who 
died just about 5 or 6 days ago, from Fort Worth, Armando being from 
Houston and Irving being from Fort Worth Texas, might still be alive.
  This is not a frivolous discussion, Mr. Speaker. It is a very serious 
discussion. I think I would like to raise with my colleagues a 
discussion of what do we do next. There are families whose pain will 
never leave them, the pain of the loss of their young child, son or 
daughter, will forever be with them. Our respect and admiration for 
those brave young men and women will forever be a mark on our souls. We 
will honor them each Memorial Day, we will cite them year after year, 
some 500 and growing.
  There are names that many of us will never know. Included in that, of 
course, are the loss of civilian lives in Iraq, lives for which the 
leaders of our government have said were innocent lives, some even have 
been children. The turmoil in Iraq speaks to the fact that this is a 
somber and sobering time. So I rise today because my challenge is 
whether or not the Congress will perform its duty.
  Let me also acknowledge a veteran and friend and respected member of 
this House who we will hear from shortly, the gentleman from New York 
(Mr. Rangel). I would like to say to him that I look forward to joining 
him in commemorating the fallen soldiers as we proceed in this session, 
because I think that is extremely important.
  But I rise this evening for a different challenge of this Congress. 
Yes, the President has accepted the constant request and inquiry for a 
commission. He has done so by embracing it and putting it close to the 
bosom of the administration. It is one appointed by the administration, 
dominated by the administration, run by the administration. And I ask 
my colleagues, does the Constitution, in establishing three branches of 
government, want us to abdicate our congressional duty of oversight 
over the executive branch? They are independent branches, judiciary, 
executive and legislative, but just as we have the responsibility of 
the purse strings in the House, we also have the responsibility of 
oversight over operations and policies of the President and the 
administration.
  So I believe it is imperative that this Congress, whether it is a 
parallel duty, an action, or whether or not it substitutes for this 
commission, I believe it is imperative that this Congress wage its own 
investigation as to the reasons and the basis of the use of 
intelligence that generated a unilateral preemptive strike against 
Iraq.
  So I intend to offer the Protect America's National Security Act of 
2004 that will call on full congressional hearings, no holds barred, if 
you will, to use a phrase that we often utilize, questioning what 
intelligence was used in the decision of the administration to go to 
war, how that intelligence was analyzed, and on what basis was it 
utilized to convince the Congress, the representation to Members of 
Congress, that weapons of mass destruction existed. How was that 
intelligence gathered, who gathered it, who analyzed it, and how was it 
presented to Members of Congress for the decision to be made in a 
resolution that a preemptive unilateral attack should be made? I 
believe also that the American people need to know.
  Finally, included in this bill, I want to ensure that the general 
amount, the bottom-line figure utilized by this government in 
intelligence gathering, the budget of the CIA, should be produced to 
the American people. Mr. Speaker, not the line-by-line item, not to 
give them an excuse that we are now intruding on secured matters, but 
to give the American people the lump sum as to how much is being 
utilized. They deserve to know and we would not be violating any 
security for doing so.
  This legislation will also include more resources for more trained 
intelligence analysts, more analysts trained in Arabic, more 
recruitment of diverse analysts, if you will, and then it would have a 
provision that would enhance the checks and balances on the use of 
intelligence that would be placed as a basis for going to war with any 
country in any Nation. The Protect America's National Security Act of 
2004.
  It is imperative that for the lives lost, for the tears shed, for the 
mothers crying, for the fathers' broken hearts, for the wives in 
complete confusion, for the children without fathers, sisters without 
brothers, brothers without sisters, aunts and uncles that are missing, 
we need and owe this to the American people.
  I simply would say, Mr. Speaker, that we can now look at language 
from the Vice President of the United States on August 26, 2002: 
``Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons 
of mass destruction.''
  ``Right now Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used 
for the production of biological weapons.'' President Bush, September 
12, 2002.
  ``The Iraqi regime possesses and produces chemical and biological 
weapons and is seeking nuclear weapons.'' President Bush, October 7, 
2002.
  On what basis were they making these statements? This cannot be left 
to a bipartisan commission selected by the President, even if it is 
represented to be bipartisan. Congress must do its duty.
  ``We have also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a 
growing fleet of manned and unarmed aerial vehicles that would be used 
to disburse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We are 
concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using UVAs for missions 
targeting the United States.'' Again, President Bush, October 7, 2002. 
Yet the Carnegie report of just a few months ago, and David Kay has 
indicated there are no weapons of mass destruction. There were no 
weapons of mass destruction at the time that the President and the 
administration represented to this Congress and the American people 
that they existed.

[[Page 1097]]



                              {time}  2000

  Mr. Speaker, why is this important? It is important because we have 
to go on. Now the President comes to us with a budget that has a 
deficit of over $500 billion. He offers to the American people $4.1 
trillion in tax cuts because he is asking to make his tax cuts 
permanent for 1 percent of Americans. Then he provides a gift to the 
American people, $10,368, a burden for each family of four, making tax 
cuts permanent. At the same time he increases the burden on veterans by 
increasing their copayments, closing veterans hospitals, and denying 
access to health care.
  I believe this Special Order tonight is so crucial because it raises 
for the American people a challenge to them standing up for their 
destiny, their destiny as to whether or not we remain in Iraq and lives 
continue to be lost. But more importantly is the question of whether or 
not we have now a road map that will lead us to war with other 
countries around the world unilaterally and preemptively. That is why I 
believe it is crucial for the American public to stand up and be heard 
on the Protect America's National Security Act of 2004, demanding this 
House and Senate to do its job with a full and comprehensive 
investigation.
  Lives that were lost, those willing to go into harm's way, did not 
for a moment stop and ask the question why. They were called to duty. 
They took an oath of office. They were National Guard, Reservists, and 
enlisted personnel; and they went willingly on behalf of the United 
States of America. They died on the fields of battle, their blood shed 
because of us. We in this Congress who still live owe them not only a 
debt of gratitude but we owe them the truth. We owe our Reservists an 
extension of their benefits, the ability to retire at 55, and we owe 
them the greatest understanding of the sacrifice that they have made.
  In closing, as my colleague indicated, we have all visited the young 
men and women in our hospitals, Bethesda Naval and Walter Reed. Their 
faces are bright with a sense of hope and duty. They talk about the 
tragedy of their loss, lost limbs, lost spirit; but they remain 
undaunted, willing to serve again.
  I cannot imagine that this Congress, many of whom stood on the floor 
of this House and cried as they debated the resolution to make the 
choice of giving the President unfettered authority to go to war, I 
cannot now imagine that this Congress would refuse its duty for finding 
out the truth on behalf of those who were sent to war by our vote, by 
those who voted for it, and then of course then sent these young men 
and women off to war and refuse to now stand to find out the truth. We 
hope that that will occur.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask that we make sure that this occurs as we move 
forward in this year.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, in the Congressional Black Caucus I have 
often said that many of us are truly honored to have two of our 
founders of the Congressional Black Caucus, the gentleman from Michigan 
(Mr. Conyers) and the next gentleman, to speak. That we are able to 
serve with them is a tremendous honor because they bring so much wisdom 
and history to us and so much excellent guidance. Certainly the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) is one of those gentlemen. I say 
to the gentleman that as he has consistently pressed on this war in 
trying to make this President and this Nation look at war as something 
of last resort, we appreciate it. We will join you as you salute all of 
our soldiers who have given so much.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel).
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Cummings) for giving some of us an opportunity to show what patriots we 
really are and how much we love this country, which has given us one of 
the highest opportunities, and that is to serve in this House of 
Representatives.
  On November 30, 1950, I found myself shot by the Communist Chinese on 
the northern border of North Korea. When it was all over, I thanked God 
I had my life with the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star and came home 
and felt I was a patriot. That fighting was to give all Americans the 
opportunity, some that had been denied my forefathers, to participate 
fully, to support our government when we thought she was right and to 
be patriotic enough to be able to criticize our government when we 
thought she was wrong.
  I think we in the Congressional Black Caucus have even a higher 
responsibility than a lot of Members of Congress because our 
constituents believe in us so much that they give us the latitude to 
express their concerns and to talk about their aspirations as well as 
their fears. That is one of the reasons why we do not have to take 
polls, we do not have to get on the phone and ask them what do you 
think about the war. But we know that as great as this country is, that 
one of our responsibilities is to make certain that she is all that she 
can be; and it is our responsibility, as our forefathers before us, to 
take it to that higher level, and we cannot do that if the resources of 
this country are depleted or we find our youth are not there to pick up 
the baton and take it to a higher level.
  If this country can decide because we do not like somebody or we 
think that person is a threat or because they have demonized their own 
people or they have talked in a way that we do not like against the 
United States, that we can have a preemptive strike and remove that 
person, and then we find out later as we find every day that the 
information we relied on was faulty, what happens if next time the 
information is reliable but just no one believes us? What happens when 
the President says that there is an imminent threat against the United 
States of America, and then we find that Americans and the Congress 
say, yes, we have heard that before.
  It just seems to me that those people who voted to give the President 
this authority felt in their hearts that there was an imminent threat 
to the United States of America. But I listened carefully to the 
President changing all of the reasons that he had given for why he 
asked this Nation to send its young people to Iraq in a unilateral 
preemptive strike against Iraq and Saddam Hussein. There used to be a 
time when he would talk about the relationship to al Qaeda. There used 
to be a time when he talked about weapons of mass destruction. There 
used to be a time that he talked about an imminent threat to the United 
States of America.
  But if I hear him correctly now, he is saying, what difference does 
it make, we got rid of Saddam Hussein. What difference does it make? It 
makes the difference if the President had come here to the House of 
Representatives and said, do you want to get rid of Saddam Hussein. We 
probably would have had a unanimous vote, yes, we do. But what if the 
next question was: Are you prepared to give us 532 lives of young 
people in order to do it?
  Suppose he said the price to get rid of this international terrorist 
was to have 2,000 men and women maimed and crippled and in our 
hospitals. Suppose he said in this war the Secretary of Defense would 
report to the American people, albeit by a leak, that he did not know 
if we were winning this war or not even after these losses. Suppose, 
further, Mr. Rumsfeld would say he had no clue whether or not we were 
creating more terrorists than we were killing. Suppose he said that he 
was just thinking out of the box, but in his opinion the whole thing 
was a slog.
  Suppose he said that in addition to having our young men and women 
who love this country and salute the flag every time it goes up, that 
enlisted into the Army coming from our inner cities and rural areas in 
order to get a better education and better handle on life, or like some 
of us who volunteered, that we could not make it economically and this 
was an opportunity to get better training. Suppose he said even though 
they had 3-, 6-, and 9-year enlistments, that they would give them 
additional time to serve because it was a national emergency, suppose 
the President had told us when he asked the Congress to take out Saddam 
Hussein that 20 percent of the soldiers over there would be men and 
women from the Reservists and the National Guard.
  Suppose he said they would not be all young people, they would be 30, 
40, 50,

[[Page 1098]]

even 60 years old. They would have to give up their civilian jobs, and 
some have already served the military. Suppose he said they would have 
a drop in their income from their civilian pay, and these people who go 
away for weekends and 2 weeks to train would now have to be separated 
from their wives and families for over a year. Suppose he had said that 
they would have to go to Iraq two and three times and that soon these 
civilian soldiers will be 40 percent of the occupation of Iraq.
  Mr. Speaker, suppose he had said that we are running out of people 
and that we would have to consider a draft, that we are talking about 
our Nation will have to make a sacrifice in order to remove terrorism 
from this region of the world, and everybody had to share in the 
sacrifice. Members of Congress, their children and grandchildren would 
be drafted, members of the cabinet would be drafted. Suppose he said in 
order to get rid of this demon, all of these things would be necessary, 
I wonder whether or not the President would have gotten the vote if we 
knew all of these facts.
  Mr. Speaker, that is why I am saying it is so important for us to be 
able to alert America that this whole idea of removing Saddam Hussein 
had absolutely nothing to do with the terrible strike that the 
terrorists had in my beloved City and State of New York. The President, 
by the admission of Secretary O'Neill and other competent writings, had 
already planned to remove Saddam Hussein, that the whole concept of a 
preemptive strike was a part of our foreign policy, and it was the 
tragic event of 9/11 that allowed him to connect an idea that they 
already decided to do, taking advantage of the emotion of the Members 
of Congress who thought they were reflecting the emotion of the people 
in the United States.
  If we just allow this to go by, if we do not have competent outside 
investigations and if our Secretary of State said he did not know if he 
would have gone to the U.N. and supported this invasion if that 
information had been there, then what happens if we do have another 
crisis and that is the situation that is before us?
  So I ask the Congress to do this, please do not forget our true 
fallen heroes. It is not the ones that just return home; it is those 
that come home in the darkness of night. We do not even know whether we 
have a flag over their coffin because the press are forbidden to be 
there. We ask that those of us in the Congress form a caucus for these 
fallen heroes to be there for their families and kids and to make 
certain that we are treating them not like we are treating the veterans 
in the budget today, but that we make a commitment that even though 
they are not our kids in terms of being our biological kids or 
grandkids, they are the children of our Nation and we have made a 
commitment that we are going to protect them.

                              {time}  2015

   And we are going to raise the standard before we go to war to make 
certain that our Nation is being threatened. Going over there and 
having people being killed by land mines, just standing up as sitting 
ducks or falling helicopters, that is not what you call fighting for 
America. That is being put in a no-win position and we are losing the 
life of one American a day.
  I am asking Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, be 
patriotic, be patriots. Sometimes it takes a little courage and we have 
to explain to our voters and our constituents what we are talking 
about. But we do not have a draft. Some Members do not know the pain 
the families are going through, and the President says that some 
Americans do not even know we are at war. Mr. President, the families 
of those that have been struck in Iraq, they know we are at war. We in 
the Congressional Black Caucus would like to educate the American 
people that war is hell and we should never, never, never go to war if 
we can negotiate a peace.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank the gentleman from New York. I really 
appreciate what he has said. We thank him for his service to this 
country in so many, many ways.
  Mr. Speaker, it is my honor to yield to the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Waters) who night after night and day after day before 
this war started came to this floor and laid out a brilliant case, over 
and over again, as to why we should not be going to war. If there was 
anybody in this entire Congress, Mr. Speaker, who could say I told you 
so, it would be the gentlewoman from California. I have absolutely no 
doubt that this is an issue that tears at her heart every time she 
hears about another person being harmed in Iraq.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the chairman of the 
Congressional Black Caucus for organizing this Special Order and I too 
commend him for taking so much of his time to organize us to come to 
this floor to help shed light on what is going on in this Congress and 
in this world. I look forward to every opportunity that he affords me 
to participate.
  The massive costs of the war and how they will affect Americans in 
their everyday lives is an incredibly important issue that we must 
continue to discuss. This past Monday, the President sent his fiscal 
year 2005 budget to Congress. We found out that under this President's 
guidance, the Nation's debt has grown to record numbers. This year 
alone, the deficit is expected to be at least $521 billion. And the 
national debt has grown by $1.7 trillion since 2001. Yet instead of 
taking the necessary steps to bring our fiscal house into order, the 
President has proposed more of his failed policies.
  I am having an interesting time, Mr. Speaker, discussing this with my 
friends. They say to me, Maxine Waters, I thought that you were the one 
that has been accused of being one of those tax-and-spend liberals but 
now your President has outdone you. He is spending money like a drunken 
sailor. How can you explain it?
  I say to him, I cannot explain it, but it falls into that category of 
misdirection, of tales that are being told that just do not hold up 
when you place them under scrutiny.
  The President's budget is extremely dangerous. It calls for 
eliminating 38 education programs and cutting funding for dozens of 
others. It does virtually nothing for the 43 million Americans who have 
no health insurance. It cuts $1.6 billion from HUD's section 8 voucher 
program and an additional $130 million from public housing. The 
President's budget even cuts, by 7 percent, programs designed to 
protect our drinking water, keep our air clean and other important 
environmental programs.
  The budget even calls for imposing copayments and enrollment fees for 
our veterans in order to receive health care for their injuries 
sustained while protecting our Nation. I find it appalling that our 
President would require our veterans to pay up to $250 enrollment fees 
in order to receive the care they need. But these are just a few 
examples of the administration's policies that penalize working 
Americans. The war in Iraq is a continuation of these policies. It is 
the working American that is fighting, dying and paying for this war. 
The wealthiest of Americans, on the other hand, are not being asked to 
make any of these sacrifices. None are serving themselves, and few if 
any have sons or daughters in the U.S. Armed Forces. And they are the 
beneficiaries of hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts which 
makes it increasingly difficult to pay for this war.
  To date, the President has asked for and received $157 billion for 
this war in Iraq. Amazingly, recent press reports suggest that the 
President will ask for another additional $50 million shortly after the 
next election for military activities in Iraq and Afghanistan. This 
will bring the total to $206 billion. What is so disappointing, though 
not surprising, is the difference between what we were told the costs 
would be for this war and what the costs are turning out to be. 
Throughout the buildup to the war, and even during the early stages, 
the American people were assured that the costs would be minimal. Who 
can forget Deputy Secretary of Defense Wolfowitz' statement in March of 
2003 when he said, ``We're dealing with a country that can really

[[Page 1099]]

finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon.'' But the sad 
reality is that it is the American people who are paying for this war.
  Mr. Speaker, as we look at this administration and this war, we 
cannot help but now understand why the American people are finally 
waking up to how they have been misled and misdirected by this 
President and this administration. Of course, we heard references 
tonight to the reason we were told we were going into this war and we 
must say it over and over again; we did a preemptive strike because 
Saddam Hussein and Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and we were in 
imminent danger. We were told this over and over again and Colin Powell 
even had some maps. He pointed to some sheds where chemicals were being 
made and the weapons of mass destruction were being developed.
  But we have been misled on many things by this President and now we 
find ourselves in a terrible situation in Iraq. We are not in control. 
Our soldiers are dying, being picked off one by one. Suicide bombings 
are taking place. Soldiers are losing their lives. I am sure their 
families are asking, why? Or what does this all mean? Not only are they 
losing their lives, we were told after the President could no longer 
support or justify the weapons of mass destruction that we really 
needed a regime change, that we had to be about the business of 
creating democracy in Iraq. Now we are at the point where our President 
has said they are going to turn over governance to the Iraqis, only to 
find out that this President does not want free and fair elections, he 
does not want free and fair elections because, oh, somebody may win 
that he does not like. And I want you to know that the protests are 
growing in Iraq about the fact that this President now wants to select 
and choose who will be in charge of Iraq. He wants to put in a council 
through some kind of caucuses to avoid the Shiites being in control, 
because they may be the ones that get elected in this war as opposed to 
the Sunnis that they would like to have elected. But whether we are 
talking about Iraq or Afghanistan, we really did not have a plan. We 
really thought we could just bomb everybody into submission, take over 
the oil fields and chop up the spoils. And are we disappointed.
  My goodness, how much more insult do the American people have to take 
from this administration? Here we have the Vice President of the United 
States of America, Mr. Dick Cheney, who is still receiving paychecks 
from his old company, Halliburton. And what have we found out about 
Halliburton? They are cheating us right and left. Not only have they 
overcharged us for the oil they are importing from Kuwait to Iraq, we 
find out they are cheating us on the amount of the food that they are 
serving to our soldiers. They are giving us extraordinary numbers, only 
to find out that they are not really serving the numbers that they 
represent.
  I talked about some of this last night, but it goes on and on and on. 
We are paying for a war that we should not have been in in the first 
place. We are paying contractors who are cheating us like Halliburton, 
who are getting no-bid contracts, and there is no end to all of this. 
This administration is going to have to pay a price for what it has 
done. I am glad that we are here talking about it this evening.
  Mr. Speaker, the administration's rhetoric does not support the 
situation we find ourselves in today. We were not welcomed as 
liberators, there are no weapons of mass destruction, hundreds of U.S. 
soldiers are dying, and taxpayers are paying billions of dollars for a 
war that need not be fought. Meanwhile, our responsibilities here at 
home are being neglected.
  The Senate's ricin scare yesterday reminds us that our homeland is 
not as secure as it should be. Our schools continue to be in disrepair 
and hundreds of thousands of workers are losing their jobs.
  Mr. Speaker, we need to reassess our priorities. Unfortunately, this 
budget does not do any of these things. There is so much more we can 
say, but I am going to yield my time to our leader here so that he can 
wrap this up tonight. But we have more to say and we will be back again 
because the American public wants to hear from us.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank the gentlewoman for her statement. I 
also want to thank her for her compassion. And so it is tonight, Mr. 
Speaker, the Congressional Black Caucus, which has earned the title of 
being the conscience of the Congress, but I often say the conscience of 
the Nation, has come together to try to address these issues. As the 
gentleman from New York and as the gentlewoman from California stated 
very clearly, what we are about this evening is trying to make sure 
that we let the American people know what is going on, because we 
believe that they need to know and they need to understand what goes on 
in this Congress and how it affects them on a daily basis.
  But the fact still remains that there are families tonight who are 
sitting watching this, and they are asking the question, as the 
gentlewoman from California said, of why is it that my son is no longer 
with me? Or why is it that my mother is no longer with me, a child may 
say.
  But the fact is that we must be clear. We have asked this President 
over and over again to meet with the Congressional Black Caucus which 
represents over 26 million people. And as I have often said, they are 
not just African American people. As a matter of fact, more than a 
third of them are white. The fact is that we believe very strongly that 
when we come to this floor, we are speaking for America. And so it is, 
Mr. Speaker, the Congressional Black Caucus urges our constituents and 
urges the Nation to pay close attention to all that is going on with 
regard to this war and all that is not.
  Mr. PAYNE. Mr. Speaker, last year, I led the opposition to a pre-
emptive war in Iraq--which, according to testimony given this week by 
former top U.S. Weapons Inspector David Kay, wasn't even pre-emptive. 
If Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction program, what 
potential harm were we pre-empting?
  President Bush has led our country further and further away from the 
fold of the international community, ignoring the United Nations 
Security council's findings, and virtually demolishing the 
international support we had received following September 11th. He has 
challenged Americans to a ``you're either with us or against us'' 
agenda, which leads to the most dangerous kind of patriotism--where 
questioning and dissent are considered un-American. Well I, as an 
American and a patriot, am now standing again to ask questions about 
the cost of this war.
  We spent $396 billion in military spending alone for 2003. As big as 
this number is, it does not even include the cost of the Iraq war, 
which was funded through two additional supplemental requests; the 
first for $79 billion, the second was another $87 billion. Together, 
that amounts an amazing $562 billion. For 2003, that amounts to almost 
$11 billion dollars spent ever week, and more than $1.5 billion spent 
every day. Compare that to this year's Department of Education budget 
of $54 billion, which works out to less than 150 million dollars per 
day, which averages out to less than $3 million per day in education 
spending in each state. $1.5 billion on the military, $3 million on 
education: so where are our priorities?
  Here at home, 9 million Americans are unemployed, 35 million live 
under the official poverty line, 44 million have no health insurance, 
and millions more are unable to make ends meet. States face their worst 
fiscal crisis since the Great Depression, and the yearly federal budget 
deficit is passing $500 billion and growing rapidly. My own state, New 
Jersey, is facing a projected $5 billion budget deficit for 2004.
  And this administration doesn't intend to change course anytime soon. 
According to the 2005 budget released this week, they are planning to 
spend $2.2 trillion on the military over the next 5 years.
  For 2004 alone, they plan to spend $399 billion on the military 
(which does not include any possible future supplemental funding 
requests for Iraq or Afghanistan) which is more than the combined 
spending that year for education, Health, Justice, Housing Assistance, 
International Affairs, Veterans Benefits, Natural Resources & 
Environment, Science & Space, Transportation, employment, Employment 
Training, Social Services, Income Security, Economic Development, 
Social Security, Medicare, Agriculture, and Energy.
  Where we spend our money is a telling sign of where our priorities 
lie. We have abandoned our children, our teachers, our laborers,

[[Page 1100]]

our homeless, our veterans, and our seniors in order to fund these 
regime-changing, unilateral military actions. We are under funding No 
Child Left Behind, IDEA, after-school programs, and family literacy 
programs. We have not extended unemployment benefits for those without 
jobs. We have offered our seniors a Medicare program that does almost 
nothing to cut their prescription drug costs, and we're threatening to 
destabilize their Social Security through privatization.
  I am very concerned about the direction in which our country is 
headed. We're sliding further and further down a slippery slope where 
our county's basic needs are not being met. That is why this year's 
presidential election is so key. We need a leader that can mend the 
relationships broken by this unnecessary war and its ill-administered 
aftermath. We need to bring home the tens of thousands men and women 
whose lives have been placed on the line for no good reason. We must 
see change for the better.
  More numbers:
  For the cost of every cluster bomb, we can enroll 2 children in Head 
Start.
  For the cost of every minute of the war on Iraq, we could have paid 
the annual salary and benefits for 15 registered nurses. For every hour 
of the war on Iraq, we could improve, repair, and modernize 20 schools. 
For the cost of one day's war on Iraq, we could have prevented all of 
the budget cuts to education programs in 2003. For the amount of money 
we spend every week in Iraq, we could build 142,857 units of affordable 
housing. For the amount of money we spend to buy one stealth bomber, we 
could pay the annual salary plus benefits for 38,000 teachers. We might 
be able to give a few of them a raise--image that!
  Each day the Pentagon spends $1.7 billion, which is enough to build 
200 new elementary schools, house 136,000 homeless, or provide Pell 
grants to one million college students (per day!).
  With less than the cost of ONE of the Iraq supplementals, we could do 
all these things: Provide basic health and food to the world's poor: 
$12 billion. Rebuild America's public schools over 10 years: $12 
billion. Reduce class size for grades 1-3 to 15 students per class: $11 
billion. Reduce debts of impoverished nations: $10 billion; Provide 
health insurance to all uninsured American kids: $6 billion; Increased 
federal funding for clean energy and energy efficiency: $6 billion; 
Public financing of all federal elections: $1 billion; Fully fund Head 
Start: $2 billion.
  Other countries military spending: Russia--$65 billion; China--$47 
billion; Japan--$42.6 billion; U.K.--$38.4 billion.
  These combined are a total of $193 billion, which is less than half 
our FY '03 or FY '04 military spending--not including the cost of Iraq 
and Afghanistan.
  Please don't confuse military spending with the safety and security 
of our Nation. It is a common misconception that higher military 
enhances homeland security. However, many of these responsibilities 
fall onto our struggling, under funded State and local government 
agencies, whom we know as ``first responders,'' and to agencies outside 
of the Defense Department, such as the FBI, FEMA, and the Coast Guard. 
This massive military spending budget addresses none of these programs.
  Another matter of concern to me is not only how much money we're 
spending on our military, but how that money is being spent. The 
President's $87 billion supplemental contained an astronomical waste of 
taxpayer dollars. These are just some of the administration's requests:
  $100 million for several new housing communities, complete with 
roads, schools, and a medical clinic; $20 million for business classes, 
at a cost of $10,000 per Iraqi student; $900 million for imported 
kerosene and diesel, even though Iraq has huge oil reserves; $54 
million to study the Iraqi postal system; $10 million for prison-
building consultants; $2 million for garbage trucks; $200,000 each for 
Iraqis in a witness protection program; $100 million for hundreds of 
criminal investigators; and $400 million for two prisons, at a cost of 
nearly $50,000 per bed.

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