[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 19]
[House]
[Pages 26016-26017]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        RETHINKING THE IRAQ WAR

  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to speak out of 
order.

[[Page 26017]]

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from California?
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, first, I need to say I did not know 
Congressman Edward Roybal; but if he did nothing more than bring his 
daughter, Lucille Roybal-Allard, into this world, he brought a gift to 
all of us. I honor him for that.
  Mr. Speaker, I was struck by something that I heard the chairman of 
the Senate Intelligence Committee say over the weekend. Now that it is 
all too clear that the intelligence leading up to the Iraq war was 
deeply flawed, he was brave enough to say, ``I think a lot of us would 
really stop and think a minute before we would ever vote for war or 
take military action.'' And then he added, ``We do not accept this 
intelligence at face value anymore.''

                              {time}  2030

  Great. I am glad that the gentleman from Kansas, Mr. Roberts, is so 
cautious and skeptical now, after more than 2,000 soldiers have been 
killed, after we have poured $200 billion into this war, after we have 
squandered America's global credibility and goodwill.
  Back when this could have made a difference, the chairman and so many 
others in this body and the upper Chamber fell in line behind the 
President, rubberstamping his war with barely a peep of dissent.
  Where were the hard questions then? Where was the oversight and the 
scrutiny back when it could have saved lives and changed the course of 
history?
  The latest line of argument from the White House is essentially this: 
Sure, we were wrong about Saddam and weapons of mass destruction, but 
we did the best we could with what we had.
  Leaving aside whether they were mistaken about the intelligence or 
they actively manipulated it, I would like to see the President look a 
widow or a grieving mother in the eye and use that line.
  The other thing they are saying is maybe we were wrong, but so were a 
lot of other people, including a lot of Democrats, so get off our 
backs. This attempt at spreading the blame is dishonest, and it is 
irresponsible. It was not the previous administration, nor was it the 
President's opponents in last year's election who launched a preemptive 
war and put American credibility on the line in selling it.
  It was not some other Vice President that leaned on analysts at 
Langley to reach certain conclusions. It was not some other White House 
that was fixing the intelligence and the facts around the policy, as 
the Downing Street Memo put it.
  There is only one Commander-in-Chief, and the buck must stop with 
him. Besides, there were plenty of us who were deeply skeptical about 
the case for war; and for raising our concerns, many of us had our 
patriotism called into question.
  Ambassador Joe Wilson was among those who raised the red flag, and 
look what they did to him and to his family.
  But of course, as the President is now implicitly admitting, we who 
questioned the intelligence were right. The very fact that they are 
trying to rewrite the history of the run-up to war is evidence that the 
war has been a disastrous mistake. If all were going well in Iraq, the 
President would not be in this defensive posture, casting about for 
scapegoats.
  There is a way to make it right. There is a way to fix the problem. 
By ending the war once and for all. It is time for the President not 
just to admit his mistakes but to correct them. It is time to return 
Iraq to the Iraqi people and return our troops home to the families 
that have gone too long without them.

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