[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 18061-18062]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




          HOLLOW TRIBUTE TO THE VICTIMS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001

  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I begin my words today by reading from the 
33rd verse of the 18th chapter of the Second Book of Samuel, the King 
James version of the Holy Bible.

       And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber 
     over the gate, and wept: and as he went, thus he said, O my 
     son, Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would God I had died 
     for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!

  Mr. President, tomorrow will be a day of painful remembrance for our 
Nation. The passage of time has done little to numb the anguish of that 
September morning 3 years ago--how we do remember--when 19 ruthless 
terrorists commandeered four commercial aircraft and transformed them 
into the stuff of nightmares. The memories are still too raw, the 
images are still to vivid, the toll of human misery is still too 
overwhelming.
  And so we remember, and in our remembrance we pay homage to the 
victims and the heroes of 9/11. But we owe more. We owe more to those 
who perished on September 11, 2001, than merely remembrance. And we owe 
more to the American people than merely paying lipservice to their 
safety.

  That is the primary reason that we are here today, debating the 
Homeland Security funding bill. We are here because of the rescue 
workers who moved so quickly, so valiantly, to save lives, only to 
sacrifice their own. We are here because of those thousands of men and 
women who, on that crystal clear morning of September 11, 3 years ago, 
were sitting at their desks, walking through the halls, doing their 
jobs, only to have such brutality abruptly end their lives. We are 
here, Senators, because we can never forget--never forget--that day, 
and because we never want to repeat that day of horrors.
  Congress has passed a blitz of legislation and appropriated billions 
of dollars over the past 3 years in response to the 9/11 attacks on 
America. Congress overcame the objections of the President and created 
a new Cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security. With great fanfare 
and acclaim, we passed legislation to strengthen both port and border 
security. We have tightened airport security, turned our most prominent 
public buildings into barricaded fortresses, and acquiesced in the 
suspension of basic rights to privacy in the name of security.
  And frankly, to little avail--to little avail, I say. Today, 3 years 
out from the 9/11 attacks, we are living under the yoke of an 
``imminent'' threat of future attacks. Sectors of New York, New Jersey, 
and Washington are functioning under a heightened ``orange alert'' 
threat level while the rest of the Nation perches uneasily under the 
umbrella of a yellow, or elevated, threat. Security at virtually any 
major public event--from the political conventions to the Olympics--is 
oppressive. We quake, we tremble, at the notion that the November 
elections might spark another devastating terrorist attack on these 
United States.
  We can talk until we are blue in the face about all the steps we have 
taken to enhance security since 9/11, but the bottom line is this: Does 
anybody really feel safer and more secure than they did 3 years ago?
  Much of the legislation that Congress has passed since 9/11 was 
envisioned as a legacy to those 3,000 men and women who lost their 
lives on that day 3 years ago. Yet, I fear it is becoming a hollow 
legacy. Congress has been thwarted at every turn by a White House that 
spends lavishly on rhetoric yet demonstrates a pinch-purse mentality 
when it comes to delivering on its promises. The Department of Homeland 
Security that we took such pains to create has been hamstrung from the 
outset by inadequate funding from the White House. Our port and border 
security initiatives, so essential to fighting terrorism, are 
languishing for lack of money. The people hear that their safety, their 
security, are the paramount priority of this White House. Have you 
heard that? Yes. Time and again, the people have heard that their 
security is the paramount priority of this White House down at the 
other end of the avenue, but then see the very same administration play 
shell games with security funds.
  Surely this is not the legacy we want to leave to the victims of 9/
11.
  The President crisscrosses the country claiming that he has made 
America safer. Don't believe it. He has signed legislation intended to 
protect our airplanes from hijackers. He has signed legislation 
designed to close the porous borders in our north and south. He has 
signed bills to stop terrorists from slipping through our seaports. But 
what he hasn't signed is the check.
  The President tells the country that we are safer because of him, but 
he has forced dangerous cuts to the Federal Air Marshal program.
  The President tells Americans that they can rest easy because of him, 
but he has refused to approve funds that would help to prevent Madrid-
style bombings at our train stations.
  The President campaigns on an image of being tough on terrorists--the 
two-gun slinger, the man at high noon, as it were. But he has rejected 
effort after effort to invest critical dollars in police officers and 
firefighters. It is as if the President wants our emergency responders 
to pay for homeland security with bake sales and bingo nights. When it 
comes to protecting this Nation, there should be no distinction between 
providing necessary resources for troops in Iraq and for first 
responders at home in America.
  To continue this homeland security hoax pays little tribute. To tell 
the American people that they are safe, when, in fact, they are not, 
honors few memories of those victims of 9/11. This White House has made 
an absolute sham of homeland security.
  And yet there is more. This President has staked his credibility and, 
to a large extent his Presidency, on the assertion that the war in Iraq 
is an extension of the war on terror--do not believe it--despite the 
fact that no Iraqis were among the 9/11 hijackers and despite the fact 
that no credible evidence of a link between Saddam Hussein and Osama 
bin Laden has ever been documented.
  Oh, the President loves to tell us over and over again that America 
is safer because Saddam Hussein is no longer in power in Iraq, but the 
President fails to mention that post-war Iraq has become the foremost 
breeding ground of anti-American terrorism on the globe. The President 
likes to talk to the troops, and he likes to talk with the background 
of troops standing behind him. But he doesn't like to talk about the 
steadily mounting death toll in Iraq.
  Why are the people mute about the death toll in Iraq? Despite the 
President's rose-colored view of Iraq, the number and recently the rate 
of American and Iraqi deaths and injuries are continuing to rise. Yes, 
Iraq may be free of the yoke of Saddam Hussein, but it is not free of 
the yoke of violence. As of this very week, the death toll of American 
military personnel in Iraq has exceeded 1,000.

[[Page 18062]]

  I can hear the cries at night of the fathers and the mothers of those 
soldiers, marines, and military personnel who have laid down their 
lives in the hot sands of Iraq. I hear again, as though it were the 
king, crying:

       O my son, Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom! Would God I had 
     died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!

  Unlike the mass casualties of September 11, American military 
personnel in Iraq have died in relatively tiny clusters over the course 
of the past 18 months, one or two here or five there or seven at a 
time. In spite of the transfer of sovereignty in Iraq more than 2 
months ago, fighting continues to rage on in that crippled country, and 
American casualties continue to mount.

       My son, my son, O Absalom, my son, my son!

  The death toll of American military personnel in Iraq may not yet 
approach the death toll of civilians on September 11, but it is no less 
significant and no less heartbreaking.
  The September 11 terrorist attacks on America may or may not have 
been preventable. The missed intelligence cues, the missed 
communications, the ``what ifs,'' will haunt us forever. But the 
returns are already in on the war in Iraq. This President, President 
Bush, took this country to war in Iraq for the wrong reasons, based on 
faulty assumptions, with unanticipated and deadly results for untold 
numbers of Americans.
  As we pause to remember the moment when the airplanes struck the 
World Trade Centers, the Pentagon, and the Pennsylvania field, we will 
remember the sacrifice of the mothers and the fathers, the husbands and 
the wives, the brothers and sisters and the children, the firefighters, 
the police officers, the ambulance drivers. We will remember all of 
those who lost their lives in that tragic time and those tragic 
moments, and we will remember those who have been sent to battle in 
their name against the terrorist forces of al-Qaida and the Taliban in 
Afghanistan.
  That was the war in which America was attacked. America was invaded 
by an invader in the form of hijackers in the cockpits of airplanes 
used as deadly missiles. Tragically, this has become an enemy of our 
own making, through our own invasion, through our own attack, through 
our own pernicious doctrine of preemption, an enemy of our own making 
in Iraq. And the sorrow of those who have given their sons and 
daughters in that unprovoked war, the sorrows will not end at election 
day. The sorrows will not end this year or next or next or the next, 
but the sorrows will continue as long as there are memories of those 
who once sat in those vacant chairs around the kitchen tables of 
America. Those mothers and fathers will continue to weep. The tears 
will continue to fall. Those loved ones will cry out, as did the king, 
King David, cry out for their sons as David cried out for his.

       And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber 
     over the gate and wept: and as he wept, thus he said, O my 
     son, Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom! Would God I had died 
     for thee, oh Absalom, my son, my son.

  I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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