[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 13]
[House]
[Page 17688]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 GOP DEFECTIONS ON IRAQ SHOULD SERVE AS A WAKE-UP CALL TO THE PRESIDENT

  (Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, over a 2-day period this week, 
two influential Republican Senators came forward urging that we begin 
to pull our troops out of Iraq.
  Rather than seriously listening to these opinions, however, the White 
House, through its spokesman, Tony Snow, said yesterday that he hoped 
Members of Congress would give their Baghdad security plan ``a chance 
to unfold.''
  Is Tony Snow serious? How long does he expect congressional 
Republicans to continue to blindly support the administration's failed 
policy? After all, it was the President who said earlier this year that 
we should see significant improvements by September. But now, General 
Petraeus says that simply is not going to be possible, ladies and 
gentlemen.
  Mr. Speaker, Democrats and the American people knew that this latest 
administration plan would not bring stability to Iraq. We also 
concluded long ago that we needed to start bringing our troops home. 
But with an administration that still refuses to face reality, we need 
help from our congressional Republicans.
  Let us hope that the statements made by Senators Lugar and Voinovich 
will serve as a wake-up call to House Republicans to finally join us in 
changing course in Iraq.

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