[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15451]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 PRESIDENT REFUSES TO CHANGE COURSE IN IRAQ DESPITE INCREASING VIOLENCE

  (Mr. HODES asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. HODES. Mr. Speaker, last week the President's new war czar told 
the Congress that the troop escalation plan is failing and that the 
American people should expect sectarian violence in Iraq to continue.
  Finally someone in the administration is making sense of the 
situation on the ground in Iraq, but honesty does not make up for the 
fact that President Bush continues to stubbornly oppose any change in 
war policy.
  In the wake of the deadliest 2-month period in the war, 231 U.S. 
service men and women were killed in April and May. The facts on the 
ground show an increasingly grim picture.
  In fact, a recent internal military assessment shows that the U.S. 
military's plan to secure Baghdad against a rising insurgency is 
falling far short of its goal. To date, according to the document, only 
one-third of the Baghdad neighborhoods are under the control of 
American and Iraqi security forces. The administration's goal was to 
have the entire city under control by next month. Clearly, that is no 
longer possible.
  Despite the continued stubbornness of this President, the Democratic 
Congress will continue to demand that we move this war in a new 
direction.

                          ____________________