[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 8]
[House]
[Page 10859]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    MISSION ACCOMPLISHED ANNIVERSARY

  (Ms. LEE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Ms. LEE. Mr. Speaker, 4 years ago, President Bush stood on the deck 
of the USS Abraham Lincoln, in front of a banner that said ``Mission 
Accomplished,'' and told us that a major combat operation had ended. 
Since then, 3,200 United States troops have died in Iraq, and almost 
25,000 have been wounded, and countless Iraqis.
  The President has said that he will veto a bill very shortly that 
sets a goal for ending the occupation of Iraq signaling his insistence 
on an open-ended commitment to a failed policy. Rather than change 
course, the administration offers only increasingly desperate rhetoric 
about victory and surrender.
  The fact is, you cannot win an occupation just as there is no way 
that the United States can win a civil war. The American people 
recognize that this failed policy is making our Nation and the world 
less safe, even if the Bush administration refuses to recognize this.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people are squarely behind our efforts to 
end the occupation of Iraq and to bring our troops home, and history 
will record the President's veto of those efforts with the same 
ridicule as it does his remarks 4 years ago.

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