Jim McDermott

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, do you have the right to close? I think you have the right to close.

Mr. McDERMOTT. We have the right to close?

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield the remaining time that we have to the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. McDERMOTT. I hope you understand we put in more money because we hoped to cover more people.

Mr. McDERMOTT. You will concede that the Department of Labor says that no State ran out of money, but that GAO said that nine States ran out of money, that there is an argument about how the States keep their books, will you not?

Mr. McDERMOTT. If we change some of the regulations, it will be more accessible to people.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. McDERMOTT. Yes.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, this is the choice we have to make today. We stand up for our children and their future or we stand down with the President and tobacco companies. Good health or no health for millions of poor and disadvantaged children across America--that is what's at stake today. The President will spend $50 billion in 5 months on a war in Iraq, but he won't spend $35 billion over 5 years on poor and vulnerable kids. We pay for SCRIP but we will keep paying for the war for decades to come. We take care of our children while the President passes his war costs on to our children, and grandchildren. We can vote to provide access to quality, affordable health care for our Nation's children by voting to override this veto, or we can vote to sit back and watch the economic security of our working families erode day by day, as this Administration has done. The President said he is using his veto pen on SCRIP to show he is relevant, but with the stroke of a pen he has merely shown he is irresponsible with the health and welfare of America's future. Let's set a good example for our children and support a bipartisan, fiscally responsible, health care bill that will get us one step closer to universal coverage for all Americans.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, let me talk about a surge in Iraq the President is not talking about. An outbreak of cholera is spreading across the country, harming and killing innocent Iraqi people. Five hundred new cases were confirmed in Kirkuk in the last 5 days. The World Health Organization says there have only been 12 deaths so far, but there are 3,000 confirmed cases and 30,000 more Iraqis are sick. As a medical doctor, let me tell you that cholera is caused by human waste contaminating the water supply. In other words, the sewage treatment plants that we were supposed to rebuild that worked prewar are still not working after the surge. And innocent Iraqis are suffering. When a Seattle church group sent me to visit Iraq in 2002, they asked me to see firsthand how Iraqi children were suffering from the effects of the first war in 1990, the subsequent economic sanctions and how their suffering would only get worse in a new war. They were right. Cholera is the latest example of a failed war. Instead of talking about the surge, the President should be talking about the scourge of cholera.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, today is a very special day. Today, October 2, marks the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi. To honor him, the United Nations approved a resolution that, beginning today, designates October 2 as International Day of Nonviolence. It's a start, one that was inspired by Sonia Gandhi after she successfully led an international conference called ``Peace, Nonviolence and Empowerment--Gandhian Philosophy in the 21st Century.'' There is a yearning for peace, for an end to world hunger and poverty, and a world in which peace and justice for all is not a dream but a reality. Gandhi showed us the way. He said: ``Nonviolence is not a garment to be put on and off at will. Its seat is in the heart, and it must be an inseparable part of our being.'' Gandhi's philosophy is a legacy he left to benefit the whole world. It is up to us to preserve this great gift. And I will do my part. I have introduced House Resolution 653 to express the sense of the Congress that the concept of nonviolence and the teaching of Gandhi remain relevant in this world. As Gandhi himself said: ``Nonviolence is the greatest force at the disposal of mankind. It is mightier than the mightiest weapon of destruction devised by the ingenuity of man.'' The U.N. resolution itself shows Gandhi's remarkable ability to change the world. A record 143 nations co-sponsored the U.N. resolution, Gandhi uniting us again. Let us resolve to honor his memory by dedicating ourselves to Gandhi's philosophy of peace through nonviolence. It is the only path to true peace in the world.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, Seattle recently lost a prominent and much loved citizen, Walt Crowley. I would like to insert in the Record a statement on his passing from HistoryLink, an impressive organization Walt helped to found. Remembering Walt Walt Crowley, visionary cofounder of HistoryLink.org, passed away on September 21, 2007. Looking back at the rich tapestry of his life and work, one sees that it would take an encyclopedia to document how much of an effect he had upon the city of Seattle and on the state of Washington. Fortunately--and thanks to his efforts--we can do that here at HistoryLink.org, the Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History. Walt moved to Seattle at the age of 14, when Boeing hired his father. Many of the friends and colleagues who knew him the longest probably met him during his days at the Helix, Seattle's first underground newspaper, for which Walt wrote, cartooned, edited, and even sold copies of out on the street. Whether it was at a social gathering, during a street march, on the campaign trail, or even in the midst of riots, Walt touched the lives of many people, and made numerous friendships that lasted for decades. Walt's passion for civic activism led to a career in city politics. During a sit-in protest at Seattle City Hall, Mayor Wes Uhlman was so impressed with the young man's wit and political savvy that he hired him. Over the next few years, Walt worked in various city departments, most notably as deputy director of the Office of Policy and Planning, where he often advocated for historic preservation. His love for Seattle grew, based on his awareness of its past. The Write Stuff His skills as a writer opened up new vistas in his career when he formed Crowley Associates Inc. along with Marie McCaffrey, whom he would later marry. The two collaborated on books about the Seattle Aquarium and Pioneer Square, and provided writing and advertising services to numerous political campaigns, voter initiatives, and labor unions. Walt also wrote articles for the Seattle Weekly and was brought further into the public eye when he was hired to conduct biweekly ``Point-Counterpoint'' debates with conservative activist John Carlson on KIRO-TV News. But it was the history muse that inspired Walt's greatest creative output. His introduction to historical research came when he was hired to write a history of the Rainier Club. He followed this with books about Seattle University, Metro Transit, and Group Health Cooperative, as well as two of his proudest accomplishments, Rites of Passage: A Memoir of the Sixties in Seattle and The National Trust Guide: Seattle. In 1997, he and local historian Paul Dorpat, a dear friend and colleague from their days together at the Helix, tossed around the idea of publishing an encyclopedia of King County history. A book of this size and scope had not been published since Clarence Bagley's tome, written more than 70 years before. Worried that such a venture might prove to be too unwieldy, Walt's wife, Marie, suggested that an online encyclopedia would be a more suitable way to keep and maintain the historical record. Work soon began, and the rest is history . . . or shall we say, HistoryLink. Making History When HistoryLink launched in 1998, it was the first encyclopedia of community history created expressly for the Internet--an accomplishment that made Walt exceedingly proud. But being the first meant blazing trails where no historians had gone before, not only in designing and organizing the online encyclopedia, but also in competing for funding in a dot-com world. Walt always referred to our efforts as ``venture socialism.'' Helped along by a hand-picked staff--many of whom still write, edit, and contribute to the site--as well as by a topnotch board of trustees, HistoryLink.org grew to become a success, and in 2003 expanded its coverage statewide. Today it receives more than four million hits a month. It is read by students, teachers, journalists, genealogists, history buffs, and anybody who wants to know more about the people and events that shaped Washington's growth and development. Besides penning some of HistoryLink's books, Walt wrote a large number of essays and editorials on topics that appealed to his interests, including state politics, political shifts, mayoral transitions, municipal ownership, civil violence, Seattle's neighborhoods, streetcars, monorails, aviation, the Space Needle, and even flying saucers. With such a wealth of Walt's words and knowledge and insight contained in our site, we here at HistoryLink.org take comfort in the fact that as we continue to grow and expand our content, we will never lose his voice--even though we have lost a colleague, a mentor, and most of all, our friend.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, out of a sense of duty and a growing fear, I rise to say that I hear the drumbeats of war coming again from this administration. This time, Iran is in the crosshairs. It's ironic that the alarm has sounded today, the birth date of Mahatma Gandhi, and the United Nation's first World Nonviolence Day in honor of Gandhi's commitment to peace. Perhaps the contrast between the man of peace and an administration of war will underscore the need and the urgency for Congress to act before the President orders a military strike. I listened and sounded the alarm in 2002 regarding Iraq. But the President and the Vice President had already set in motion their invasion plan, and those who got in the way were called unpatriotic and uncaring or worse. Back then, too many in the media, the Congress and across the Nation were willing to accept a war without justification or justice. Now, at least the American people overwhelmingly recognize the tragic consequences of the Iraq war and the occupation. At least one development in 2008 may make this time different than 2002. The Internet has grown exponentially. Today, credible and factual information is readily available. The blogosphere is on fire sounding alarm, and we will have no one to blame except ourselves if we let this administration take us to war in Iran. Go to your computer and Google ``Iran war.'' The search yields 74 million hits. Let me read a few of the top search results: Day One: ``The War with Iran.'' ``Iran: The next war,'' in the Rolling Stone. ``America's hidden war with Iran,'' Newsweek. ``Is U.S.-Iran war inevitable?'' Time magazine. ``The Iran plans,'' the New Yorker. And ``The U.S. trains gulf Air Forces for war against Iran.'' Some see the same signs as I do, and they are writing across a broad spectrum of the media, trying to be heard above the beats of war. However, the President and Vice President are using friendly fire from the right-wing media to lull the Americans to sleep, while they lay the groundwork and shop for a Gulf of Tonkin-like provocation to launch a military strike. Journalist Tim Shipman of the Telegraph in London writes ``American diplomats have been ordered to compile a dossier detailing Iran's violations of international law. Some U.S. diplomats believe the exercise will boost calls for military action by neoconservatives inside and outside the administration.'' In the New Yorker, renowned journalist Seymour Hirsh says, ``The revised bombing plan for a possible attack, with its tightened focus on counterterrorism, is gathering support among generals and admirals in the Pentagon. Hirsch adds, ``A Pentagon consultant on counterterrorism told me that, if the bombing campaign took place, it would be accompanied by a series of what are called short, sharp incursions by American special forces into suspected Iranian training camps. Cheney is devoted to this, no question.'' Now, does that sound like a diplomatic solution to you? For at least a year we've been lulled into believing that the administration cannot fool the American people again. But I say this is just the kind of wishful thinking this administration is hoping for. It gives them time to spin the rhetoric and plot the missile tracks into Iran. We stand on the brink of a conflagration in the Middle East, spreading from Iraq to Iran, to Pakistan and Afghanistan and the entire region. The legacy of this administration could be wars without ends and wars without borders. Waiting for the next election may be too late; 475 days is a long time. As a medical doctor, I was trained to listen to the patient. I've been listening to this President, and he's telling us that Iran is his next military target. Congress is all that stands in the way of this President carrying out a bombing strike of how many sources, how many sites we don't know. And I urge the House to act before it is too late. We need a resolution that requires the President to come back to the Congress before any act of war is taken against Iran.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, we now know that the President intends to keep U.S. forces in Iraq throughout the remainder of his term and that he intends for the U.S. to perpetually occupy Iraq via massive and permanent military bases he has ordered built. We have just learned of the staggering loss of life as a result of this war. According to a new and incredible study, the number of civilians killed in Iraq since the war began now exceeds 1 million Iraqi people. The Iraqi civilian death toll exceeds the death toll from the genocide in Rwanda. For years, we and others said we didn't know how bad it was in Rwanda. With this report, that excuse is no longer valid in Iraq. The official death toll in Iraq, fewer than 100,000 is what the official number is, has long been considered fictitious by humanitarian and other international organizations. Now we are forced to confront evidence that puts the death toll above 1 million Iraqis. Opinion Research Business, a respected and mainstream London-based research company that works for major corporations and government clients, including the U.K.'s Conservative Party, conducted the survey in August. I point this out to inoculate my colleagues, the media and the American people from the venom that will spew from this for those who want to keep the real cost of this war in human lives as far from public view as possible, because no one who knows the truth could stand and let it go on. Joshua Holland, a journalist at AlterNet, broke the news online the other day. I enter his story into the Record, which includes a link directly to the Opinion Research site where people can read the entire research survey online. It was conducted in 15 out of Iraq's 18 provinces during mid August. In his speech last week, the President referred to Anbar Province as a model of success. The research company did not even visit Anbar or Karbala for security reasons. And they were not allowed to conduct their field research in Irbil. While the President is willing to stand up and say that he sees signs of success, the survey found that in Baghdad alone, almost half the houses say they have lost at least one member of their family. That's the reality in the largest Iraqi city, which has the largest concentration of U.S. military forces. Baghdad may have a fortified green zone for U.S. diplomats and Iraqi government officials, but the rest of the people live in a bloody red zone, where the killing has claimed someone from 50 percent of the households. The President cannot claim signs of success in Iraq when his stubborn determination to remain is dissolving Baghdad into a dead zone. The civilian carnage is not isolated in Baghdad. Other major cities also registered dramatic civilian murder rates that would make the world weep at the staggering loss of humanity occurring in Iraq. For a long time, I and other Members have spoken out about the number of U.S. soldiers killed or gravely wounded in Iraq, and we must never forget the sacrifices made by American soldiers and the painful losses suffered by American families across this country. But Congress must not ignore the overwhelming loss of life in Iraq. News that 1 million Iraqi civilians have been killed should compel us to get the U.S. forces out of Iraq immediately. I know and respect many of my Republican colleagues. Our politics may differ, but our principle to protect innocent people does not. How many more Iraqis must die? The carnage will continue as long as Republicans in Congress wear the blinders that the President hands out to enforce allegiance to his blind and bloody armed occupation in Iraq. For the sake of humanity, remove the blinders and speak the truth to power. The Iraq war is a humanitarian catastrophe on a scale that exceeds the genocide in Rwanda. We claimed we didn't know about Rwanda. We can't claim that any more about Iraq [From AlterNet, Sept. 17, 2007] Iraq Death Toll Rivals Rwanda Genocide, Cambodian Killing Fields (By Joshua Holland) A new study estimates that 1.2 million Iraqis have met violent deaths since Bush and Cheney chose to invade. According to a new study, 1.2 million Iraqis have met violent deaths since the 2003 invasion, the highest estimate of war-related fatalities yet. The study was done by the British polling firm ORB, which conducted face-to-face interviews with a sample of over 1,700 Iraqi adults in 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces. Two provinces--al-Anbar and Karbala-- were too dangerous to canvas, and officials in a third, Irbil, didn't give the researchers a permit to do their work. The study's margin of error was plus-minus 2.4 percent. Field workers asked residents how many members of their own household had been killed since the invasion. More than one in five respondents said that at least one person in their home had been murdered since March of 2003. One in three Iraqis also said that at least some neighbors ``actually living on [their] street'' had fled the carnage, with around half of those having left the country. In Baghdad, almost half of those interviewed reported at least one violent death in their household. Before the study's release, the highest estimate of Iraqi deaths had been around 650,000 in the landmark Johns Hopkins' study published in the Lancet, a highly respected and peer- reviewed British medical journal. Unlike that study, which measured the difference in deaths from all causes during the first three years of the occupation with the mortality rate that existed prior to the invasion, the ORB poll looked only at deaths due to violence. The poll's findings are in line with the rolling estimate maintained on the Just Foreign Policy website, based on the Johns Hopkins' data, that stands at just over 1 million Iraqis killed as of this writing. These numbers suggest that the invasion and occupation of Iraq rivals the great crimes of the last century--the human toll exceeds the 800,000 to 900,000 believed killed in the Rwandan genocide in 1994, and is approaching the number (1.7 million) who died in Cambodia's infamous ``Killing Fields'' during the Khmer Rouge era of the 1970s. While the stunning figures should play a major role in the debate over continuing the occupation, they probably won't. That's because there are three distinct versions of events in Iraq--the bloody criminal nightmare that the ``reality-based community'' has to grapple with, the picture the commercial media portrays and the war that the occupation's last supporters have conjured up out of thin air. Similarly, American discourse has also developed three different levels of Iraqi casualties. There's the approximately 1 million killed according to the best epidemiological research conducted by one of the world's most prestigious scientific institutions, there's the 75,000-80,000 (based on news reports) the Washington Post and other commercial media allow, and there's the clean and antiseptic blood-free war the administration claims to have fought (recall that they dismissed the Lancet findings out of hand and yet offered no numbers of their own). Here's the troubling thing, and one reason why opposition to the war isn't even more intense than it is: Americans were asked in an AP poll conducted earlier this year how many Iraqi civilians they thought had been killed as a result of the invasion and occupation, and the median answer they gave was 9,890. That's less than a third of the number of civilian deaths confirmed by U.N. monitors in 2006 alone. Most of that disconnect is probably a result of American exceptionalism--the United States is, by definition, the good guy, and good guys don't launch wars of choice that result in over a million people being massacred. Never mind that that's exactly what the data show; acknowledging as much creates intolerable cognitive dissonance for most Americans, so as a nation, we won't.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, I was unable to vote on passage of the conference report on H.R. 2669. Were I able to, I would have voted ``aye'' on this important bill. Furthermore, I was also unable to vote for final passage of H.R. 1908. Were I able, I would have voted ``aye'' on this legislation, noting that while the bill is not perfect, the Congress must continue to consider legislation to reform our patent laws. I look forward to considering a more refined product when this bill is next before the House.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, when the President arrived in Australia the other day, he told the prime minister, quote, ``We're kicking ass'' in Iraq. It is a clear sign that he intends to keep a massive U.S. military force in Iraq as long as he remains in office. And he will make it official administration policy next week. ``We're Kicking Ass in Iraq'' might be the headline of the report the White House is writing for General Petraeus to deliver to the Congress next week. It is supposed to be an objective military assessment, but the President has declared it will be a White House spin document, as usual. Here's what the President's ``kick ass'' assessment translates to on the ground: 10 U.S. soldiers killed this week; 793 U.S. soldiers killed so far this year; 3,752 U.S. soldiers killed since the beginning of the war; and 27,186 U.S. soldiers wounded since the beginning of the war. And, 71,000 documented Iraq civilian deaths since the beginning of the war, although the actual number is much higher. As the Times of India newspaper said today, Iraq is getting worse day after day after day. We don't even know how bad things really are. The ACLU filed a lawsuit the other day demanding the U.S. release military documents concerning the number of innocent civilians killed by the U.S. forces. They fear the government is hiding the human cost of war. We don't know, but reliable information does exist. There is plenty of factual information for the President to rely on, but he won't. An independent commission of retired U.S. generals released a report today that concludes that the Iraqi national police force is so corrupt the force should be disbanded. These U.S. military experts concluded that Iraq's Army over the next 18 months, ``Cannot yet meaningfully contribute to denying terrorists safe haven.'' The GAO released its own independent study showing the Iraq Government has reached only three of the 18 benchmarks established as part of the U.S. continuing to fund the war. In case anyone thinks that achieving three of 18 isn't too bad, let me tell you what they are. The first benchmark we achieved was passing a law that legally protects the rights of minority parties in Iraq. Except the minority Sunni population remains outside the political situation totally. The other two benchmarks the Iraqi Government achieved was setting up security and public relations offices to support the military escalation. But the White House will use the military brass to paint a much rosier picture next week in its report to the Congress. Besides the kick-ass assessment by the President, there have been recent reports trying to bolster the administration's position. I enter into the Record at this point a story appearing in today's Washington Post. It's on page 16, but it ought to be on page 1. The headline is: ``Experts Doubt Drop in Violence in Iraq. Military Statistics Called Into Question.'' I urge everyone to read this important news story. The only conclusion one can reach is, here we go again. [From the Washington Post, Sept. 6, 2007] Experts Doubt Drop in Violence in Iraq--Military Statistics Called Into Question (By Karen DeYoung) The U.S. military's claim that violence has decreased sharply in Iraq in recent months has come under scrutiny from many experts within and outside the government, who contend that some of the underlying statistics are questionable and selectively ignore negative trends. Reductions in violence form the centerpiece of the Bush administration's claim that its war strategy is working. In congressional testimony Monday, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, is expected to cite a 75 percent decrease in sectarian attacks. According to senior U.S. military officials in Baghdad, overall attacks in Iraq were down to 960 a week in August, compared with 1,700 a week in June, and civilian casualties had fallen 17 percent between December 2006 and last month. Unofficial Iraqi figures show a similar decrease. Others who have looked at the full range of U.S. government statistics on violence, however, accuse the military of cherry-picking positive indicators and caution that the numbers--most of which are classified--are often confusing and contradictory. ``Let's just say that there are several different sources within the administration on violence, and those sources do not agree,'' Comptroller General David Walker told Congress on Tuesday in releasing a new Government Accountability Office report on Iraq. Senior U.S. officers in Baghdad disputed the accuracy and conclusions of the largely negative GAO report, which they said had adopted a flawed counting methodology used by the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency. Many of those conclusions were also reflected in last month's pessimistic National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq. The intelligence community has its own problems with military calculations. Intelligence analysts computing aggregate levels of violence against civilians for the NIE puzzled over how the military designated attacks as combat, sectarian or criminal, according to one senior intelligence official in Washington. ``If a bullet went through the back of the head, it's sectarian,'' the official said. ``If it went through the front, it's criminal.'' ``Depending on which numbers you pick,'' he said, ``you get a different outcome.'' Analysts found ``trend lines . . . going in different directions'' compared with previous years, when numbers in different categories varied widely but trended in the same direction. ``It began to look like spaghetti.'' Among the most worrisome trends cited by the NIE was escalating warfare between rival Shiite militias in southern Iraq that has consumed the port city of Basra and resulted last month in the assassination of two southern provincial governors. According to a spokesman for the Baghdad headquarters of the Multi-National Force-Iraq (MNF-I), those attacks are not included in the military's statistics. ``Given a lack of capability to accurately track Shiite-on- Shiite and Sunni-on-Sunni violence, except in certain instances,'' the spokesman said, ``we do not track this data to any significant degree.'' Attacks by U.S.-allied Sunni tribesmen--recruited to battle Iraqis allied with al-Qaeda--are also excluded from the U.S. military's calculation of violence levels. The administration has not given up trying to demonstrate that Iraq is moving toward political reconciliation. Testifying with Petraeus next week, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan C. Crocker is expected to report that top Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish leaders agreed last month to work together on key legislation demanded by Congress. If all goes as U.S. officials hope, Crocker will also be able to point to a visit today to the Sunni stronghold of Anbar province by ministers in the Shiite-dominated government--perhaps including Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, according to a senior U.S. official involved in Iraq policy. The ministers plan to hand Anbar's governor $70 million in new development funds, the official said. But most of the administration's case will rest on security data, according to military, intelligence and diplomatic officials who would not speak on the record before the Petraeus-Crocker testimony. Several Republican and Democratic lawmakers who were offered military statistics during Baghdad visits in August said they had been convinced that Bush's new strategy, and the 162,000 troops carrying it out, has produced enough results to merit more time. Challenges to how military and intelligence statistics are tallied and used have been a staple of the Iraq war. In its December 2006 report, the bipartisan Iraq Study Group identified ``significant underreporting of violence,'' noting that ``a murder of an Iraqi is not necessarily counted as an attack. If we cannot determine the sources of a sectarian attack, that assault does not make it into the data base.'' The report concluded that ``good policy is difficult to make when information is systematically collected in a way that minimizes its discrepancy with policy goals.'' Recent estimates by the media, outside groups and some government agencies have called the military's findings into question. The Associated Press last week counted 1,809 civilian deaths in August, making it the highest monthly total this year, with 27,564 civilians killed overall since the AP began collecting data in April 2005. The GAO report found that ``average number of daily attacks against civilians have remained unchanged from February to July 2007,'' a conclusion that the military said was skewed because it did not include dramatic, up-to-date information from August. Juan R.I. Cole, a Middle East specialist at the University of Michigan who is critical of U.S. policy, said that most independent counts ``do not agree with Pentagon estimates about drops in civilian deaths.'' In a letter last week to the leadership of both parties, a group of influential academics and former Clinton administration officials called on Congress to examine ``the exact nature and methodology that is being used to track the security situation in Iraq and specifically the assertions that sectarian violence is down.'' The controversy centers as much on what is counted--attacks on civilians vs. attacks on U.S. and Iraqi troops, numbers of attacks vs. numbers of casualties, sectarian vs. intrasect battles, daily numbers vs. monthly averages--as on the numbers themselves. The military stopped releasing statistics on civilian deaths in late 2005, saying the news media were taking them out of context. In an e-mailed response to questions last weekend, an MNF-I spokesman said that while trends were favorable, ``exact monthly figures cannot be provided'' for attacks against civilians or other categories of violence in 2006 or 2007, either in Baghdad or for the country overall. ``MNF-I makes every attempt to ensure it captures the most comprehensive, accurate, and valid data on civilian and sectarian deaths,'' the spokesman wrote. ``However, there is not one central place for data or information. . . . This means there can be variations when different organizations examine this information.'' In a follow-up message yesterday, the spokesman said that the non-release policy had been changed this week but that the numbers were still being put ``in the right context.'' Attacks labeled ``sectarian'' are among the few statistics the military has consistently published in recent years, although the totals are regularly recalculated. The number of monthly ``sectarian murders and incidents'' in the last six months of 2006, listed in the Pentagon's quarterly Iraq report published in June, was substantially higher each month than in the Pentagon's March report. MNF-I said that ``reports from un-reported/not-yet reported past incidences as well as clarification/corrections on reports already received'' are ``likely to contribute to changes.'' When Petraeus told an Australian newspaper last week that sectarian attacks had decreased 75 percent ``since last year,'' the statistic was quickly e-mailed to U.S. journalists in a White House fact sheet. Asked for detail, MNF-I said that ``last year'' referred to December 2006, when attacks spiked to more than 1,600. By March, however--before U.S. troop strength was increased under Bush's strategy--the number had dropped to 600, only slightly less than in the same month last year. That is about where it has remained in 2007, with what MNF-I said was a slight increase in April and May ``but trending back down in June-July.'' Petraeus's spokesman, Col. Steven A. Boylan, said he was certain that Petraeus had made a comparison with December in the interview with the Australian paper, which did not publish a direct Petraeus quote. No qualifier appeared in the White House fact sheet. When a member of the National Intelligence Council visited Baghdad this summer to review a draft of the intelligence estimate on Iraq, Petraeus argued that its negative judgments did not reflect recent improvements. At least one new sentence was added to the final version, noting that ``overall attack levels across Iraq have fallen during seven of the last nine weeks.'' A senior military intelligence official in Baghdad deemed it ``odd'' that ``marginal'' security improvements were reflected in an estimate assessing the previous seven months and projecting the next six to 12 months. He attributed the change to a desire to provide Petraeus with ammunition for his congressional testimony. The intelligence official in Washington, however, described the Baghdad consultation as standard in the NIE drafting process and said that the ``new information'' did not change the estimate's conclusions. The overall assessment was that the security situation in Iraq since January ``was still getting worse,'' he said, ``but not as fast.'' We're kicking ass is the kind of assessment you'd hear at a football game, and the PR game is clearly on by this President and his minions. They will claim progress next week and tease the American people with talk of token U.S. troop reductions. But because it's coming from this White House, the only thing certain about next week is that it will be their latest attempt to try to mislead us into believing there are enough bullets and bombs, money and U.S. blood to prevail in Iraq. The best military in the world is being run into the ground by this President. That's the only truth the evidence supports. Don't believe anything else. The American people had it right in November, and they still have it right today. The U.S. must end its occupation. There is no other choice for this country, except to continue to shed the blood of our people and waste the resources of this country in Mr. Bush's failure.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, as we enter this period when the President is going to come before us and ask us to extend the surge in Iraq, we ought to hear the story of Jamie Dean. Jamie Dean was a 29-year-old who came from Hollywood, Maryland. He enlisted and served 4 years, including 1 year in Afghanistan where he cleaned out caves and did all of the tough things that went on there. He came home severely depressed, suffering from PTSD, was being treated at the Veterans Hospital after being honorably discharged from the United States Army. And then he got the letter. On November 26, he received a letter that said pursuant to Executive Order of 14 September 2001, you are relieved from your present reserve component status and are ordered to report to duty. He was going to be sent within 2 months into Iraq, a man who is suffering from PTSD. This man broke. He started to drink. He had weapons holed up in his home. The day after Christmas, he was surrounded by the police and was shot dead. We are breaking the Army. We are breaking the Marines. These people should be thought about when we consider the extension.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. No, I'll take my own time. I'm prepared to close.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. This is really a defining moment for the Congress, Mr. Speaker, and how we vote will define whether we embrace the future or cling to the past that is destroying us. Now, the last speaker talked about somehow, if we take back some of the obscene profits from the oil industry and use it to develop alternative energy and to invest in conservation measures around this country, that that will be the end of the Western World as we've known it. Between 2004 and 2006, oil companies experienced profit increases of an average of 62 percent, some of them as high as 117 percent. Now, oil profits, in the dictionary, that would be obscene, and anybody who thinks we're destroying the oil industry here simply is unwilling to look at the facts. Supporting this energy legislation is really a vote to move toward our national security because our addiction to oil makes us vulnerable to foreign countries and keeps our soldiers fighting and dying in Iraq. No one here in this House still believes that oil wasn't a major reason why we went into Iraq. Supporting this energy legislation is a vote to strengthen America's domestic economy because our addiction has made the American people vulnerable to punishing and unrelenting price shocks. We didn't start the increase in prices in energy. Gasoline prices weren't started in here by raising taxes. If you think that the oil companies, I don't know if there's anybody in this country who thinks that the Congress is what makes the oil prices go up, the gasoline prices. Now, supporting this energy legislation is also a vote to save our planet, because addiction to oil has placed us on a collision course with global warming. Every witness who came before the Ways and Means Committee, whether they were called by the Republicans or the Democrats, agreed that global warming is something we must deal with. The arguments I hear are not about whether there is global warming. The question is how should we deal with it how quickly, what's the best way. Now, you either turn back now and we will face economic calamity and planetary catastrophe, that's a choice you guys can make, or turn back now and we fail the American people in our global responsibility. The choice is very clear. The choice is really easy, and the need is urgent for our children, for our grandchildren, for the planet. I ask all the Members to support this legislation.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Yes.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr). (Mr. FARR asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the proposal Republicans have put on the table here are like the things that addicts say. They just want one more fix; let's just have one more quick fix to take care of their problems. The things that you have said here make me wonder if you understand how business operates. To give people a one-year extension of money and say, make plans, build buildings, hire people and start a new industry, but you've got a one-year guarantee, indicates you have no idea how business runs. That's why we made it 4 years, to give people an opportunity to actually do this. People listening might ask themselves, well, what's the cost to all this. Well, it costs a long-term extension for renewable energies. It costs a long-term extension for solar properties. It costs the production tax credit for cellulosic ethanol, which plays into the ethanol question. It costs a long-term extension of energy-efficient commercial building expenditures. How can you build a building in one year, from planning to building to constructing, how can you do that? But that's what you're suggesting; we will give them one year. The Republican motion to recommit makes sure that the renewable energy industry is denied the economic certainty they need to drive production of energy from renewable sources in order that the oil and gas industry can be fully sheltered. You wouldn't want any competition for Big Oil. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas to talk about how you pay for it.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman just made some arguments. He said the country is like a supertanker and we are heading for the rocks and we shouldn't change the direction. No, no, no, we should keep going right straight into the rocks. Now if you want to criticize this bill for not doing enough, I will go along with you, and I think there are many other Members on our side. But our problem is we can't seem to get any help from the other side to turn the wheel even a half inch. They say oh, if you take money away from the oil industry; they don't want to pay for anything, Mr. Speaker. They simply want to run on the rocks and the Democrats are not going to run this country onto the rocks. We are going to change the direction we are going with energy. This bill is not the answer to everything. It is not as much as it should be or could be, but we are going in the right direction. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.