[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 16]
[House]
[Page 21777]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            AMERICAN PARITY

  (Mr. EMANUEL asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, I find the debate over how we are going to 
pay for the reconstruction and revitalization of the gulf coast ironic 
because in the past few years this body has allocated nearly $400 
billion for the war in Iraq, without a peep, just a rubber-stamp 
Congress.
  We have added $3 trillion to our national debt with annual deficits 
at $400 billion as far as the eye can see.
  This has become the Congress known for hot checks. Yet when this 
Congress faces a tab for rebuilding America and American lives that is 
less than half of what we have spent in Iraq, suddenly everyone here is 
wearing green eye shades.
  In Iraq, we have spent millions to rebuild the Sweet Water Canal 
System, rebuilding and repairing the levee system; and here in America, 
we cut the levee construction down in Louisiana by 80 percent.
  Tuesday's Christian Science Monitor reported that the National 
Guard's response to Katrina was hampered by a lack of equipment because 
two-thirds of that equipment is in Iraq.
  We need a new direction with new priorities. We need a Congress that 
is going to put some checks and balances and not act like a rubber 
stump.
  In the coming weeks, I intend to reintroduce the American Parity Act, 
a bill to ensure that, as we rebuild Iraq, we ensure that we also 
rebuild America.
  This Congress cannot have one set of books, one set of priorities for 
Iraq, and another one for the American people.

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