[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 21]
[House]
[Page 28267]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            THE FREEDOM PATH

  (Mr. POE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, in less than 24 hours, the Iraqi people will 
elect a permanent parliament that will govern their free nation for the 
next 4 years. They will stand tall against tyranny and watch democracy 
unfold before their eyes. Mr. Speaker, I went to Iraq for the first 
historical elections in January and saw firsthand the birth of 
democracy in this land far, far away.
  We will not cut and run on freedom and on Iraq. Otherwise, the 
terrorists will have won the day, and the Iraqi hope for freedom will 
disappear into the dismal abyss of lost causes. Freedom has a price. 
Our troops are paying that sacrificial price for the Iraqi people and 
world freedom. We will continue to support these sons and daughters of 
liberty. On the eve of the elections, we pay tribute to our freedom 
fighters.
  President Kennedy once said, ``The cost of freedom is always high, 
but Americans have always paid it, and one path we shall never choose 
and that is the path of surrender or submission.''
  Mr. Speaker, we have chosen the right path, the hard path, the 
freedom path. We will persevere with the freedom-loving people of Iraq 
until the journey down this path is successfully completed. That's just 
the way it is.

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