[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 17]
[House]
[Page 23630]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




              THE SACRIFICE OF OUR FIGHTING MEN AND WOMEN

  (Mr. ABERCROMBIE asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Speaker, the spokesperson for the Pentagon in 
Baghdad today indicated that anyone who even comments on the fact that 
2,000 fighting men and women have died on behalf of the United States 
in Iraq, anyone who even comments on this, is undermining morale, 
should not even be allowed to make a comment unless they will be 
designated as having a political agenda. He went on to state that 
anyone commenting on the fact that 2,000 fighting men and women have 
died in Iraq in our name, that anyone who even comments on that at this 
stage is not entitled to regard themselves as being truly a patriotic 
American by implication. He went on to say that this does not even rise 
to the level of a story.
  Well, Mr. Speaker, I bet it was a story to the parents and loved ones 
of the fighting man who died No. 2,000. This is a benchmark, yes, a 
benchmark of the failure and our failure here in the Congress to come 
to grips with what the word ``sacrifice'' really means.
  We are not sacrificing in this country. We are watching it on TV. We 
are adding it up. We are looking at it, observing it, and not really 
understanding our obligation and our responsibility to the true 
sacrifice of these fighting men and women.

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