[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 13]
[House]
[Page 18038]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




     PRESIDENT ATTEMPTS TO CONNECT IRAQ WITH OVERALL WAR ON TERROR

  (Mr. McDERMOTT asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, on Monday night, President Bush continued 
this difficult job he has of trying to connect the war in Iraq with al 
Qaeda. He said it is the most difficult part of his job. Because there 
is no connection.
  Even the Senate report this past week said, and it is a bipartisan 
report from the Senate Intelligence Committee, said there is no link 
between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. The Senators wrote: ``Saddam 
expressed only negative opinions about Osama bin Laden.''
  Yet the President had the audacity on Sunday night to say that our 
Nation's safety depends on what happens in the streets of Baghdad. Now, 
Mr. Speaker, we have to ask the President, where were you when you set 
this war up and you told General Shinseki, head of the Army, we didn't 
need 350,000 people; we could go over there with a minimal force?
  You led us into this quagmire, and you have got to give us a way out. 
We need the strategic redeployment that Mr. Murtha is talking about

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